Age Verification - A Few Questions.

i have a few questions that have been bugging me which i would really like cleared up.

Firstly, i am a little concerned that because i'm an Australian and not an American citizen i may have trouble verifying my age, it may all run smoothly but being the sceptic that i am it worrys me.

Secondly, you say premium members pay $10 US or something and basic members pay a larger fee, well, what is this fee? i'd like to know how much i'll need to pay in advance, even if it's just an estimate.

Lastly, is this a one time fee? once i pay it is my account flagged as being verified and i can just go inot any mature content sim?


i would really appreciate it if a Linden could give me some clear answers to these questions.

Thankyou,


sky

I'd like to add a few questions of my own. #17 in the FAQs listed in the blog says "...explicitly sexual or excessively violent...".

I think those need to be clarified.

Is a Collar explicitly sexual or excessively violent? a tie down? a leashing point?

What about a gun manufacturer?

In all these cases provided the store displays are not showing whippings or shootings or nudity I really dont see how they fall under either.

We need clearer guidelines as businesspeople to adapt our businesses BEFORE the SL world gets turned upside down on us.

And please LL stop dropping these bombshell announcements late on Friday nights hoping to avoid the fallout by not being accessible to residents unteil Monday. Its getting to be rather an annoying pattern.

I'm reminded of a quote from one of my favorite movies.

"We find it's always better to fire people on a Friday. Studies have statistically shown that there's less chance of an incident if you do it at the end of the week." - Bob Slydell

Premium members will pay less than 10 linden dollars, not US dollars. While that doesn't answer your question, it does put it in perspective. Even if basic members would have to pay ten times as much, it would still not be an amount to get worked up about.

I for one have absolutely no problem with paying my (minutely small) share in the costs of age verification.

Ahhhhhhhh... yeaaaahh.. We're putting new cover sheets on all of our TPS reports now before they go out.. Did you get the memo on that? I'll make sure you get a copy of the memo. Mmkay? Thanks.

I do not have a problem with the cost. I am highly suspicious however of the method. I am not at all reassured that my information wont go on file at this company and sold to whoever is willing to buy it.

For me personaly, I am taking a wait and see attitude. There are many things that need to be clarified/researched before I am willing to hand over personal data. If that means I am restricted from some areas so be it.

But I do have family members with content that doesn't clearly fall under the definition above that might get caught in this. That does concern me.

Well a question got answered today. In Germany there is on the news SL and a case about child pedophilia. Seems that they got there man and he is in Germany. They are also saying that Lindens are at fault for not doing more. Open access.

With the largest user base being German now it would be a death blow if Germany blocked SL. So lindens in their way jump and do something with out research or asking about. Piss poor PR and not talking to their customer base.

I am all for verification but not by a company like aristotle. Verify yes but with an authority who is trustworthy and who honestly seems and cares about protecting kids.

There have been a lot of reports that teh aristotle system will accept any data, even stuff that is obviously bogus. if it will happily verify someone with bogus data, then I have no further objections to it in terms of privacy.

Except of course it won't do the job it is being implemented for. But then, given the ease at which a child can obtain their parents' details, it wouldn't even if it were actually checking against a real db.

The Largest Userbase is American -Its just the majority are not American. This statistic seems to confuse people.

In Germany are virutal age play images considered child porn? Or was their actual child porn images involved?

In the US and thus SL these are not considered the same thing though Ageplay has been pushed underground.

Additionally how can Linden Labs police what people upload and give others? They can only attempt to regulate whats displayed / accesable on users land.

Or does this case somehow actually involve a minor in SL in some way?

Yes. Fictional characters, in written or graphic form, with no actual children, is considered child porn in Germany.

That's of no issue to me, because I won't come within miles of that kind of ilk. But it does worry me if SL is blocked to Germany because of this case.

oh, it is Lindens lol, well that's a bit better. i'm applying for a passport in a few days so then that will be out of the way, i guess my only concern now is that all will go well and i'll get verified without any problems.

especially because the only place i go to is a mature rp sim and my home, also in a mature sim.

well, stores obviously too =^.~=



sky

Is there and English Translation of this story?

And were there any actual minors involved. I dont see how they can say Linden Labs should have done more reguarding Age Verification if a Actual Minor wasnt involved.

Removing Ageplay vertual images doesnt have anything to do with Age Verification.

And Child Pornography is illegal for Adults also - so it doesnt have anything to do with Age Verification either.

As I understand the postings on german blogs and in the news they mix up the cases. Actually there are some investigations against a german who should have offered child porn images through SL and they blame the ability for ageplay too. One senior public investigator is cited about, that he thinks that SL is a "offer for child porn" to others.

Maybe some other german with more english skills would translate the interesting parts here?

Sources are:

http://www.swr.de/nachrichten/-/id=396/nid=396/did=2146866/t7csx0/

and:

http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/89378/from/rss09

and

http://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/web/0,1518,481467,00.html

Cu
S.

hmmm interesting

But the ability to transfer images is pretty common for any Internet chat program.

Yahoo Instant Messenger actually is much better at transfering files than Second Life. And you can sign up for that annonomously as well.

I guess its not just people in the US who lack common sense on the subject of virtual worlds , the internet and what all can and does happen.

LL has said that neither company will keep the data unless you request them to. Are you saying that that's not enough? If, for some reason, you had to do an age-verification thing, what would you be okay with?


The A-B stuff? I thought it was pretty clear that A-B was using a different scheme than LL was going to be using. Or were there some other reports?

I am worried that this is the beginning of the end for Second Life.

Between the United States' idiotic Internet gambling laws, the questionable logic in Germany's anti-pedophilia laws (which seem to ban works such as Lolita and Candy), and who knows what other arcane and ill-thought-out laws that exist throughout the world, how many more things will become banned on SL?

Moreover, have any of the Lindens ever realized that some legal adults do not have drivers licenses, passports or other official forms of ID? (I am glad to see that a Social Security card is acceptable as otherwise I would have to quit SL if this goes through). Also some people are very concerned about their privacy and many will leave SL rather than divulge such information.

While I would like to see minors kept off the main grid, and realize the importance of making SL a predator-unfriendly place, I think this action will do more harm than good by the number of good people it drives away.

"He Thinks". So he hasn't seen for himself? So many bureaucrats and politicians get self righteous and spout off on subjects they no so little about, save for what they have been fed by their minions.

Either they have data on you in one of their internal databases already, which would demonstrably prove that LL claim to be a falsehood, or they are interrogating government databases around the world in real-time, which would be an astounding security breach by EU rules. or they aren't actually checking against any such db at all.

I would not be against sending in a scanned image of my passport, with all data except name (match with the registered rl user name) and date of birth blacked out. I see no legitimate reason they should want or need any other information in there.

I doubt LL would consider this, as it would require human intervention in the age verification process, and they want to make it all machine-automated.

According to Wikipedia, the USA has a law banning computer-generated child pornography as well, and the UK is partway through introducing one banning all fictional child pornography that is not artistically justified.

The motive - and it seems reasonable - is that society should send an unequivocal message that sexual desire for children shall not be satisfied by any means.

But what does that have to do with LL being responsible becuase they let underage people onto the grid?

The poster who brought this story up,
said that the Story claimed LL wasnt doing enough to keep underage people out.

The poster didn't accuse LL of not doing enough to keep underage out, they were only attempting to translate.

We don't know the full story unless we can read German, but I would assume that if someone was actually arrested, then there was more evidence of paedophile behaviour then just using SL.

SL is getting a reputation as being some sleazy underworld where people can practice activities not socially acceptable in RL, it doesn't surprise me that LL are trying to put that side down a bit. Most people have been fed up with the top searches etc consisting of just sex.

I have a HUGE problem w/ paying an additional fee. I own land. Entering an adult zone for the first time, I have to verify I am an adult first, regardless of the fact that I own the land I'm trying to go to. I shouldn't have to pay a one-time fee to visit land I already own. This is just wrong.

right ill edit my wording - thats what I meant to say and looking at it ..

Well, um, what do you think most people use virtual worlds for?

What do people do most of the time on WoW? Murder.

You can't do that on SL, so they move to the next choice..

The fee for premium account holders is L$10, I would assume anyone who is running a sex business makes a little more than that