Age Verification: What the lindens are missing.

- The aspect of age verification, in theory, is a great way to keep the population of minors down while in the same step giving a flawless demographic of the actual population of secondlife. The problem that arises with age verification is the fact that IF under-aged players had the motive to create an account on the main grid what stops them from stealing parents' ids and information. This is merely promoting identity theft, not by the lindens, but instead by already established players which have a friend base they are used to seeing. At the mere mention of age verification a number of players (whom shall remain anonymous) had instant solutions to the impending age sweep.
- In a scenario where the age verification could be done successfully with flawless results the idea of age verification is still a shot in the foot to lindens. Players whom have basic accounts and are appalled by the eerie reenactment of George Orwell's 1984 as well as the existing underage players will create a deficit in cash flow towards the lindens. The notion that players whom are underage and cannot purchase linden is not a singularly layered black-and-white demographic; instead, established players who provide for underage players will also cut short the amount of linden dollars purchased, for example: Player 1 has billing information loaded to their account, Player 2 is underage but has a friendly relationship with Player 1, Player 1 is likely to provide for Player 2 at some point in their game play.
- Of 3 players I know personally whom are underage, collectively, they have been the motivation behind the purchase of 10,000L in the past 2 weeks by established card-holding individuals. The loss of reactive revenue does not justify the "noble motivation" that is sheltering young minds from the mature content ever-present in secondlife.
- It is a shame that in today's world young people are exposed to illicit, degenerate, and racy content, but the presence of the internet in the home is the responsibility of the parents. If a 16 year old is determined, and has the resources needed to do what they want, stopping them from getting what they want is near impossible, and can only result in an inconvenience to all other parties.
- The charge to all players, while it may momentarily fatten the lindens' wallet, will ultimately result in a sheer drop in profits. Tighter security on a game that is falling far behind in bug fixes and updates will only be the deciding factor to leave for half of the game's population. Teleport systems, inventory, and friends lists haven't worked flawlessly for two consecutive days in months.
- The implementation of tighter security, also, will inevitably increase grief attacks. Distraught players who once had access to the entirety of secondlife and are confined to PG areas will most assuredly try and rebuild their past, uncensored, gaming lives in areas where such acts are restricted. The absolutely overwhelming influx of abuse reports will strain the linden staff to the point where, unless every single staff member works 24/7 to correct abuse reports, the network of PG sims will become the old mature sims thus forcing adult content on players who may have otherwise been spared. If half the concentration of the linden staff that would be required to work on the problems generated from forcing on those who wish to keep their private information anonymous the game would be flawless.
- Age verification marks the decline of a great society that has limitless potential. When we hear the name Enron what do we think? Will we sit here and watch the digital apocalypse unfold before our eyes and shudder at the term linden as we do Enron? Or will this end and be seen as the quick fix that sounds good on paper which creates a world of problems that it really is? This can of worms is deep and its seal tight, will you be the one to open it?


John Patch, age 20
aka Kytec Switchblade

- The base for reporting illicit activities in pg sims after the verification is by the same residents currently responsible for reporting underage players. Just promote the old system, if they lie whats to stop them from using another person's id to lie in another form. Don't condemn the populous over something that will yield so little results with such a tremendous counterproductive reaction.

oh, because underage people make other buy them money.. its somehow good? give me a break... LL should block your account right now and ask for verification just because you claim to know underage accounts you haven't reported.. means you are probably underage too... You've given the most nonsense reasons I've read yet.

underage people can come off as people who are of age but did not want to give the personal information required for a credit card association to an account. I'm not saying its a good thing, I'm saying its a chunk of the linden's revenue that they are fore fitting. And those whom I know that are underage are only most likely underage and have not been factually confirmed by me, I reserve the right to leave those players to their respective privacies and not dig into their personal lives to get them expelled.

Underage players who pass for mature in SL by
doing mature things
saying mature things
reacting in mature ways

are ,guess what, for all intents and purposes mature.

People who behave like assholes - no matter what there age - are no fun to be around.
Switchblade makes some good points. There is no sense in going all ad hominem on him


-and hon, I most assuredly am not underage (oh to have my youth back)

I would have to agree with you on this, i for one know a certain 7 year old who would gladly steal his fathers ID just to piss him off. People will always find a way, and there is no way to stop them. It is the job of parents and other people in positions of authority to monitor what their children are doing, not of those who are here to provide entertainment for others.

Think about it, people who once went to mature areas and bought items there, can't do so anymore if they refuse to get AVed. This results in a loss of profit by the shop owners, and thus they have less to use towards paying their rent, and the land owners have less rent money to pay their land with. This will directly or indirectly affect the amount of land purchased, and as such the amount of money made from that. Not to mention the numerous other ways that they will lose money on this. Myself this is the first i had heard of it, a friend showed me the post about AV. The very first thought i had when i read it was several ways to get around it, and i don't even need to because i just turned 23 about an hour and a half ago. And what of the people who don't have a passport because like me have never had a need for one? I've never left my country, hell i've barely left my province. Not only that, but doesn;t everyone know they are not to give out their SIN to strangers, and i think the creators/operators of SL would class as strangers since i for one have never met them.

We only have their word that our information will not be kept, and i think everyone knows how little someones word means these days. I believe identity theft is high enough without sticking up a sign that says "Sucker". I am not saying that SL staff would steal our identities, but after hearing about a few banks recently that had their account files stolen, among other cyber crimes, i would be a little leary of handing out my info to anyone. I mean a hacker is less likely to target a single persons computer unless they know that person is loaded. But a big company would be fair game, especially when it has been released that they are going to be having peoples info. I mean you may as well slice your wrist and go swimming with sharks. If Sl is having so many problems with bugs and stuff, wouldn't it stand to reason that they might also have security issues as well?

And i am sure alot of people want to know whether this is a monthly fee or a one time thing. Cause i know that i have no intentions of paying monthly for it, thats why i chose a basic account. Well anyway i think thats enough for now, have to wait until they finally get around to telling how much basic users will have to pay before deciding if i will take the risk or not. See you all.

Alright. Lets try some more.

- How about legitimate users, 20+ who do not want to give up sensitive information to a third party, or for those of us outside the US, who do not have a passport. Should they be cut off from 99% of the world because they do not want to go to the expense to get one?

- How about being forced to pay more or less just to play. SL will then become a Demo IMO and will at least for me bring LL into the realm of misrepresenting the free aspect of Basic Membership.

- Consider also where most activites are located, Shops, Clubs, Hangout places, not all of them sexually related. Almost all are located on Mature land that will get cut off from non-varified accounts. So we HAVE to pay the fees and provide sensitive information just to use the world! Its no longer a fee membership then is it? Its a free trial.

- Speaking of which all if not most of the ways for new members who can not or will not pay USD for L$ are also on Mature sim. In essence all new members will have to pay to verify themselves in order to get started, or stand around looking like carbon copies of each other.

Nobody is forcing anybody to do anything. If you don't want to give up the info, don't.

How about actually reading before posting? Being unverified does not mean you can't enter mature sims, it means you can't enter parcels with the new "adult content" classification for sexually explicit and extreme violence. Which means only those places will will be cut off. That is not 99%.

people need to stop bashing Lindens about "its for the children" stuff... LL is only doing this for legal reasons... its the sue happy Lawyers that will "do it for the children" and sue everyone to hell and back to get rich. ..... age verification is LLs way of covering their own butts, and the butts of the 'adult' content providers.

Well, this is still completely in-effective on the mainland since the current camera controls would still alow the member to view the content by zooming through walls, unless the parcel is extremely large. Next I suppose LL will have to requre people with adult flagged parcels to increase their land holdings so that there is a buffer zone between the edge of their parcel and the "adult content" so that camera controls can't be used to get past the block.

This is complete BS, because if it was truly a concern they would have never dropped the CC requirement for signing up. They created this problem when they opened the flood gates, they should have thought of this first but reaching a million users was more important at the time. Now WE are supposed to give up sensitive information to continue what we have been since we signed up? I don't think so, LL caused this and they need to find a way to fix it that does not require the providing of such sensitive information.

okay now i hate to say it but people are just being obtuse about the whole thing. If i kid is gonna steal a credit card or whatever he is doing it now big deal he needs a spanking and maybe for his parents to leave him a the local police station for a couple days

but honestly these reasons and whatnot its kinda well yes you can think of a way around anything but its better then leaving it as it is now and having people scream at me if i decide to have an xxx lot that I'm not screening at all.


The solution is simple dont verify if you dont want to and dont go to "those" places. YOu can still sell your wares no problem unless you selling sex toys of course then your going to have to swallow your arguments and verify because you shouldn't be selling sex toys anyhow like you are now so.. bah

Next were gonna start hearing the excuses about the kids who convinced some adult they know to do action x for them like when they try to buy a bottle of booze or a pack of smokes when they are underage. (get the guy at the corner to buy it or the big brother to buy it)

I'm wondering how many people have been out in the real world lately because all this age verifying stuff exists in bars and clubs all over the place now why do you not want to verify online?

you go to a bar you look underage what do they ask for? age of majority a birth certificate or a drivers license take your pick EVER BEEN TO A BAR AND LOOKED TO YOUNG TO GET IN I HAVE they stopped asking me finally when i turned 35!

Then why is credit card info enough to get onto any porn site on the internet?

Ok, but they just look at your ID quickly to check the birth date, they do not save the ID# or pass it along to any other company to verify that it is a real ID. Bad analogy.

not a bad analogy at all, no one is saving your information, the 3rd party is simple looking at the info, then telling LL a yes or a no, then throwing away all of the information... no different than Bars that only allow 21+ year olds to even enter, and the guy at the door is speaking for the club looking at your ID with a yes or a no if you get in or not... if you do you get in and never get checked again... if you dont, get lost.

yes they are gonna look at the info you give them and they are gonna say "yes this person is indeed over 18 years old" and they are gonna check in the box and that will be the end of it

that is their purpose

they will verify that you are in fact over 18 years old like the guy at the front door of the bar does for the bar owner and let the owner know (linden labs) and let us in the door. Then they are gonna move to the next guy and repeat said process till everyone lined up is in

problem here is?

I will answer that for you

*hysteria and paranoia*

someone has already pretty much stated in another thread that our identity has already pretty much been put out their for people to steel and that we dont actually have to supply any information because its all our there already. Well then great you know since somene is already able to steal my identity because the info already exists me giving the info over again isn't gonna do much is it

bottom line people are at present going overboard when in 99% of cases all they are gonna ask for is a drivers license or some other form of PHOTO id look at it verify you and move on.

Please elaborate, I had no idea this kind of merchandise is somehow against the TOS?

I don't agree, we have not recieved an agreement from this 3rd party co. that says they won't save the info. We have no guarantee of this. Anything typed into a computer can be unwillingly saved by another company. Key-logger programs do this and it can be accessed from the internet by some of them, meaning that if you type your ss# into your computer, you could possibly be saving it on some company's database without your knowledge. Typing something into a computer and someone glancing at your ID are VERY different things, unless the bouncer at the door has photographic memory of course.

And yes Wilhelm, there is a bit of paranoia, very valid parinoia. LL had their database compromised last fall, many people's cc#'s were compromised, what promise do we have that this 3rd party co. won't be compromised. Considering the technology and programs that can be downloaded onto your own computer without your knowledge, I think it is prudent to be paranoid when it comes to placing sensitive info on the internet that if it was stolen could be used to steal your identity, drain your bank account...etc. That is why the account that I use for online purchases has a VERY low daily balance.

where did i say its against tos now your trying to start something that doesn't exist

did i say its against tos? NO its related to adult porn and x rated content lettting it hang out in the wind with no AVS in place should not be happening they are just fixing that like all the rest of the porn they are putting an AVS in place to keep it all nice and legal

actually there are many lawsuits in court over this right now. And no, CC info will not get you into any porn site, though it will get you in almost all the ones that are not based in the USA. Linden labs must follow USA laws when based in the USA... they have to cover their butt. You must not look at US based porn sites much if you think they all just take CC info. The times are changing, Linden Labs is avoiding lawsuits by helping lead the way.

If you think that using a CC number is valid, then why do the CC companies tell you they do NOT allow you to use it for age verification? Why is it so easy for underage people to buy a $25 visa gift card at wal-mart and sign up for a month at a porn site.

go to agecheck.com its an adult verification site go verify see how hard it is how much info you give and tell me that this is such a horrible thing

go to cyberage.com another avs system for the same type of content

why do i know this stuff? because once upon a time I had to build these systems they aren't that evil!

You said it's something people "shouldn't be doing". And the only thing people shouldn't be doing is what's listed as prohibited in the TOS.

So either it is in the TOS, or it's your personal vigilantism and attempt to push personal views on whole population. Or in simpler words, you have zero say what people "should" and "shouldn't" do in environment that isn't your personal property. So please don't.

Well, agecheck.com doesn't work and the other one requires only a credit card to apply...what's your point?

Aristotle.com did not, when I searched, have any clear notice saying they will not save any data you send them for resale or profile collation purposes. That lack of notice to claim good intent in itself is good enough reason not to give them that data, doubly so considering their main business is selling such collated data.