Age verification

but still..noone is addressing the issue that led to these people being caught for having that material.Will someone PLEASE somewhere tell me where I can find the measuring stick to determine what a "child" avatar is??.
If i choose to wear a child Avatar (which are sold for perfectly innocent reasons in second life). Will my privacy be threatened?..will some "watchdog" group begin chasing me thru the virtual streets of second life blowing a whistle?...heck if i wear pigtails and suck a lolipop with boobs and am 3 feet tall..will someone misconstrue that as a child avatar looking for sex? ..and if all that can happen?...am I protected?..no.

~Lana Tomba

This verification is against the law in many countrys including mine the information LL wants us to give, such as photo copy of my passport, and my ID number that is big no no. At this rate LL is going to have more then just the German and American government on them. If they are in turn forcing others such as my self to break our countrys laws.

LL this whole system you have came up with, will do nothing but destroy you and SL.

No Atum, you are wrong. For several years, I have been using electoral roll data from multiple commercial organisations (ancestry.com, 192.com, b4usearch.com) besides my local library for family history research.

Nope. Thanks to the Representation of the People Act 2000, from 2001 (not 2002) commercial entities were only able to request an edited version of the register. The only difference between edited and full version of the electoral roll is that the edited version doesn't include people who have opted out, and it only contains name and address details. Obviously, DOB is irrelevant. If you're on the electoral roll, you're 18 years old.

All the above information is corroborated here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_registernot if Integrity are open to other forms of ID (electoral roll would be the easiest option). i've pointed this out above by the way, so i'm surprised you're bringing this up again.

They aren't forcing you to do anything. It is voluntary. In which country do you live, Sofia?

They are not "forcing" divulgence, yes it is voluntary, but it is linked to the free and reasonable use of the Second Life grid, in the same sense that you can "choose" not to pay $3.50 per gallon for gasoline and not drive, or not pay $1.99 for a loaf of bread and choose not to eat. No, they are not on the same level, but the principle is the same...simply put, it is extortion of information...either you choose to divulge information you would not freely share with most of your best friends or you simply walk away from Second Life, because without identity verification, Second Life will become largely devoid of any of the character that makes it currently worth a damn to anyone! And I don't mean that ALL that second life has to offer is in Mature sims, it isn't, but the only way to get to the PG sims will be to "parlay your identity" for the right to teleport across the Adult/rubby rubby lots in order to get to the rarely-seen PG sims... which will be the only thing you will be able to get into at this rate of Linden progress, if we remain lucky

We have no Free and Resaonable use of SL. LL owns it. They can set whatever requirements they want. We don't have to meet them, but we can be denied the use of the service.

Errrm...so you agree with me ? Electoral roll data is not avaiable to Integrity for everyone over 18 ? People who opted out will be omitted ?

I see nothing else which they can use which would be even vaguely acceptable to those of us concerned about the security of our personal information.

Are you telling us that the DVLA will let a commercial company query the driver database ? Or the Passport Office ? For such a purpose ?

Surely not. That would be shocking, and surely a breach of the data protection act.

As for sending them photocopies of these actual documents - firstly you would be nuts - secondly i suspect it would be no offence to send them nonsense mockups.

All that leaves is the credit refernce agencies, who themselves are heavily reliant on the electoral roll, and know nothing of those who don't need to borrow.

I suspect that really quite substantial numbers of people, in many countries but varying from country to country, will be simply uncheckable.

We must of course always remember that the check is pretty pointless anyway, as any kid can easily get a parent or friend checked instead of them. It's all spin really, isn't it.

The significant difference is between a useless check which can be presented to the naive as a good try, and a useless check which cannot. Both are useless, but one is superficially more defensible.

What happens with people who never registered to vote?

Duh..erm, no?

You said:..which is absolutely untrue and I called you out on it.
Correct. But you didn't say that originally. You suggested commercial entities had no access to the Electoral Roll whatsoever which is not true. I have also pointed out in two entries that despite this, it could still easily be used as primary way of cross-checking the name, address and over-18 status of particular individuals. It has already been indicated that secondary methods of verification are available and Linden Lab will assist users struggling to get verified, but as it is, 9 out of 10 people (read: the vast majority) have not opted out of the public electoral roll (go check the wikipedia link I provided), and Integrity could easily use it as a primary source. Just like Equifax and Experian do when they perform credit checks.
Who is us? And no, I have said no such thing. I have merely pointed out that secondary options (such as passport and driving licence) have been mentioned, but we have yet to hear how that form of verification will work.You suspect wrong. It's not an offence to display a driving licence or passport, or mail photocopies of either, to whomsoever you like (whether it's a bad idea or not).Again, you "suspect" wrong. Identity fraud (with official documents in a real or fictitious person's name) is a serious crime, so good luck with that.Credit references are not heavily reliant on the electoral roll. They get most of their data from financial institutions. You only need a current account with an overdraft facility (most come with one by default in the UK) for Equifax and Experian to confirm your address.there's that word again. Look, all the points you are raising have been argued to death over the past eight days all over these forums. I agree and disagree with many, I have my own concerns about getting verified and I'm not sure whether I'll submit to the process myself; but I was only dealing with the Electoral Roll misinformation here after being wrongly called out on it. I don't really see the point in further speculation about what's going to happen, there, how pointless it is, why it won't keep the kiddies out, etc. Been there, done that, own the t-shirt.

They can't vote. (lol, sorry). The opt-out system isn't the same thing though. If you tick the opt-out box on the registration form, you're still entered on the private electoral roll (and may vote in elections), but your details will not be provided on the 'edited electoral roll' which is available to commercial entities (for things like marketing).

Not registering at all is a crime that carries a £1,000 fine. People fail to register for all kinds of reasons. Avoiding jury service and debt collectors, fraudulently manipulating their council tax bills (if the council believes a residency is occupied by a single person, they get a 25% discount), etc..

It's amazing how quickly Second Life is turning back into First Life. It kind of makes one wonder how it all came about. SL used to be a good idea -- open access for anyone without (many) constraints where (nearly) anything goes; free market, free society, free imagination, free thought and action. Unfortunately, political correctness will let neither good ideas nor good deeds go unpunished.

It sure would be nice is someone somewhere, somehow, would create a similar type interactive program that wasn't dependant on private or public commerical entities which could be effected by govenments or arbitrary societies. Imagine such a metaverse where such freedom of thought, imagination and expression could occur.

It will never happen of course because it would be chaos -- there might even be violent underage alien spacemonkey group sex and viewing such pixels is bad.

Parents don't want their children viewing violent underage alien spacemonkey group sex but they cannot be held responsible for actually properly parenting their children so it cannot be allowed to exist at all.

Society does not want it's members viewing (much less particiapting in) violent underage alien spacemonkey group sex cause it (see Parents) does not approve of such behaviors and what would happen to society if it became the norm -- then everyone would have to have violent underage alien spacemonkey group sex.

Governments do not want its citizens viewing, participating or even contemplating VUASMGS because they have no laws in place regarding it, cannot control it, and those who allow governments to exist (see Society) don't want it.

So there will never be freedom of thought, imagination nor expression for we adults -- only kids can (and do) get away with that sort of thing.

LL, would you be willing to accept a notarized statement from us, certifying that we are over 18? That would be a legal document, absolve you from legal problems, and protect our personal data. Sure, you'd have to have some people opening the paper mail, but then at least you would be doing the right thing by your customers. I'd be happy to pay 10 USD for that, but I will not pay 10L to that other company.

I'd really like to hear an answer to this question. I mean it when I say I'd gladly pay you 10USD for this. Give me an address and I'll pop it in the snail mail as soon as you are ready.

can i get an LM of the sim that sponsors that "VUASMGS" hehehe c'mon..thats CAN'T be made up

There would be a lot of people in jail here, if that was ever the law....

How about letting me verify by sending in a receipt for some rum I bought using my credit card? Surely that verifies my credit card is being used by an over 18 year-old

Aw, come on, Haravikk, we all know you nicked it out of the trash bin behind the package store.

Seriously, I really would like some hard answers. First to my question above.

And I'd also like to know how LL plans to address those of us who refuse to go through this third party or to hand over our personal data to anyone, who own land that may well have a parcel on the region that may become flagged Adult. After rereading the blog, this hit me:



This is saying to me that if one parcel in a region is flagged Adult, the whole region is closed to un-verifieds. Eeep. I own a home in mature land. I refuse to be verified in the manner proposed. Thus, even if one parcel owner flags their land Adult, I will no longer be allowed to access my own land....

And at this rate, I'm quite sure I'm not going to get a kiss after this screwing.

We are not talking about what they can do, or what they should do, what we are talking about here is customer dis/satisfaction...jeez, please dont let it be lost that without customer satisfaction, there IS NO FUTURE FOR SECOND LIFE!

This topic discussion is not just empty moralizing for over 300 posts to the thread, just to figure out whether the policy is right or wrong, it is a MESSAGE to SL that, yes, you can implement any policy you want, but IF YOU WANT YOUR GRID TO SURVIVE, you will listen to your customers...so please, either express specific reasons you support their policy, or specific reasons you don't, we do not contribute anything by continuously and non-committally regurgitating the corporate mush-speak...we can read the TOS and the Linden blog if we want that! Pick a side, and state reasons for your views that don't include what we already know, that it is their company to screw up.

I have posted both of these questions in other threads, and no reply I can see yet from a Linden! Thank the FSM and his Noodly Appendage! I am not the only one that sees that the inverse reasoning they have used to formulate this policy (which BTW MUST also hold true and fair for the original policy to be effective!) is fatally and incredibly flawed!

The kicker is, there might just be enough people who blindly trust LL and any third party and will go ahead and send in their personal data without thinking. From what I can see, there are an awful lot of new people who are content to just shop and spend money and not contribute in any constructive way to SL.

Now that there are corporations building in SL and paying people to do things for them, there is 'product' for these folks to buy, and that seems to be all they really want. They are like mindless shopping bots. And that may well be good enough for LL.

What will bite LL on the arse, is if those folks find out that Aristotle/Identity used their data for other purposes, or their data gets stolen. And the fact that a lot of folks come to SL, get addicted for a while, and then wander away. Without it's base, those people who care and contribute, when the shopper bots move on to the next new hot internet fad, LL will then be left without residents. Because this may well run off the solid folks who helped make the place the hot fad that it is right now.

I think it is clear that this policy cannot be rationally defended - it will allow into SL just as many minors as before.

The actual motivation, I think, is simply to allow LL to protect themselves from the costs of litigation by accessing the "insurance policy" offered by Integrity.

Maybe that is not itself illogical. They must have estimated how many of us they will lose, and calculate it to be worthwhile.

Now my question is - where is OUR insurance ?

Will LL negotiate that Integrity will compensate us fully if any data about us leaks into the outside world via their system ?

Full guarantees for LL - ok. Now where are the corresponding guarantees for us ?

OK, It's a contract. I get that. We don't HAVE to play. We CAN go somewhere else. So, in that sense, a voluntary meeting of the minds must exist and blah blah blah.... BUT, my "home" is in mature territory, my friends are in mature territory, my online business is in mature territory.... now i have to pay and cough up personal information to stay there? What happens when I log in and can't get "home"? Do i lose the building i constructed? the rent i've already paid? All my possessions (which i paid good lindens for) because I'm not there to pick them up? Does Linden have a CLUE how many mature site there are and do they know what that means? It maybe a "voluntary" contract, but it feels like extortion. It goes something like this... Now you've been here awhile, you like what you have, a home, a significant other (partner, master, slave, sub, dom, whatever), a business, a place to play, clubs, galleries, and so forth, now that you have a taste for it, we're holding it back until you PAY to give us info you don't want to give us. Personally, the age verification thing is nothing more than a way to make money. Period. As IF any adult playing in SL can't tell a teenager from anyone else at 20 M. I mean, come on! They're the ones walking around with their pants down going: Wanna get laid? Fact is, lots of SL players "live" in SL more than they do in RL, and to withhold it from them because they spend their days in "mature" sims and not white bread sims is silly. More than that, it's like withholding cocaine from an addict... we'll all be in withdrawal. I'm already mad the US Gov't wants us all to have federal ID papers. Can't they just talk to the IRS? And as for SS numbers, how many times has the government and any prosecutor worth his salt said to you: Don't give out your SS number! NONONO. This is really bad. So bad, SL may commit financial suicide over it!

I think you misunderstand what is proposed. I think an LL post used words loosely, and gave the false impression that flagging any plot in a mature sim as "adult" would recategorize the whole sim as adult.

I am pretty sure this is not the case, so your fears are entirely groundless.

I'm not surprised we are confused, however. The entire proposal is ridiculous unless some entirely new restriction is implemented to prevent us looking from a normal plot into a hardcore plot, and from moving our camera into it.

The whole "Mature sim" concept always suffered from this same flaw, but I suppose stuff well back from the boundary wouldn't be seen by accident.

With plot-sized flagging, this defect becomes so glaring that, uncorrected, it renders the entire proposal little better than a cosmetic sham.

I really think the only sane solution is to flag CONTENT as hardcore, not plots of land. Make hardcore content invisible and phantom to the unverifieds.

It's not easy to overcome the obvious snags, but I do give some details of a method I think could work, in another post.

Search for "invisiblizing" in the unlikely event you want to read it.

Welcome to the wonderful world of land ownership in Second Life.

Its not ownership at all..I have a friend who explained it to me this way. Someone sells you a dog..the dog does all kinds of tricks..they not only charge you for the dog..but they charge you monthly to keep the dog..they even tell you that you that you need to be in a club (membership fee) in order to own the dog...what they don't tell you is that one of the tricks they taught the dog was to run away from you and back to them..where they again.... sell the dog to the next sucker.


This is where i learned that virtual land..(no matter what you do to it)..or what you build on it..can't be resold to anyone else for more than what the lindens will buy it for back from you..(it can be rented )..but not resold. I also learned that regardless of what you do..what you pay..the TOS provides for the lindens to do basically whatever they want.Its their land..it's their game. It's their virtual world. AND.. it's a sad realization that regardless of how many people refuse to voluntarily "do" anything' there will be enough people who DO voluntarily provide the information asked for that Linden Labs won't miss a beat.Why?...(here comes another sucker looking for a dog...that does tricks. )
~Lana Tomba

Not registering to vote isnt a crime in the United States.

If a kid has managed to put in an adult's credit card details and get away with it, surely they would have no problem faxing that same adult's passport or driving licence. This seems like an expensive waste of everyone's time.