Community standards and Private Estate Standards

Can an island's local Covenant and TOS suspend or modify the general LL Community Standards? Is it enough to tell users 'By proceeding into this sim, you agree to give up the rights to complaints, whether you take the time to read this or not?'

The theme and roleplay of this island is such that Assault, Indecency, and Disturbing the Peace aren't just allowed, they are encouraged and expected. Even though the nature of the area is clearly emphasised in notecard and huge graphical parchments, it's possible that people can use abuse reporting in a harassing or vindictive manner, with or without feigned ignorance.

Also, the Moderators and I rely on the information contained in IM and chat logs to make enforcement decisions and keep each other notified of decisions and incidents with particular users -- and someone who doesn't like those decisions could potentially file Disclosure complaint. The Disclosure clause "sharing conversation logs without consent are all prohibited" does protect those who would play people against each other maliciously.

EDIT: Just had another look at the 'Harassment', and the definition appears incompatible with the intents of the sim. Sexual harassment, definitely encouraged, up to and including sexual suggestion, brazen coarseness, sexual requests, coercions and threats, whether wanted or unwanted, are all acceptible locally. Engaging in it out of context or out of character is something I will not tolerate, and this is another reason I need to validate claims with supporting logs.

Nope.



No.

To answer your first question, no the TOS cannot be supplanted by covenants or rules, however LL is extremely flexible about this when it comes down to consensual roleplaying and if your in this area it is assumed that you are consenting to this... though just to be safe most places will give you a notecard when you tp in with the rules and regulations or have a sign at the entrance point saying the same.

In reply to the first reply post, it isn't enough but again for the most part it is people going in consensually and since LL makes the rules considering that they don't get involved with more serious player issues I doubt they'd get involved with something that trivial.


P.S. As long as you don't mention people's names in particular you are allowed to mention group names though I understand if you don't want to, if you do at a later point 5L says that it's either the goreans or the BDSM junkies

That happens to be a good description of the best class of people I know;]

Not Gorean, and we have taken the policy of, instead of requiring a titler to prove that you non-consenting, requiring group application and membership to prove you are consenting. But I and others make the RP more immersive by turning off the hovering names and group titles, so unsuspecting tourists may potentially find themselves in unwanted interaction of an extreme nature. Also, non-members who give up the right to Observe roleplay and intrude on RP are typically dealt with in RP first, and that could include unwanted interaction of an extreme nature.

Even with DISCLAIMERs and the application process in place, implying consent to standards that aren't the Community Standards, is there still the possibility that someone who gets burned by an experience in context could successfully lash out with a punitive abuse complaint?

Everything about roleplay deals with consent, even if the theme of it is unconsentual behaviour.

Harassment in roleplay isn't truly harassment because both parties agreed to act out a certain scene. If that involves pushing someone into a corner or otherwise impacting movement, or involves verbal abuse, it's all done with consent and as such not truly negative behaviour.

However, as soon as one party revokes their consent and the other doesn't stop, it does become real harassment and can just be dealt in the normal fashion (abuse reporting, tp'ing away, muting, or however else someone choses to deal with it). Roleplay is no excuse for truly negative or abusive behaviour.

All it takes is a simple OOC (are you comfortable with this?) or an IM to check that no boundaries are crossed to remove any unpleasantness later on.

Actually, the policies of the sim support any RP without requiring any prior negotiation, without orchestrating the scene, however, I would consider that OOC consideration to be treading on dangerous grounds, because then you are stepping out of context and breaching the separation of RP and OOC. The answer to "Is it okay?" would be "I'm still here, aren't I?" so there is no need to ask the question. Once you're in, you're in -- you may have the protections and remedies of law, cultural traditions, alliances, and your own weapons, but everyone faces risk. Much like 1st life, only the stakes are much smaller.

If someone revokes the consent implied by taking character, that would be understandable, I would never claim that it's for everyone. In fact, the big disclaimer at the entry states this "it is your responsibility to be psychologically equipped for the possibility of attack or refrain from RP." However, that revocation is effectively permanent, if you aren't up to it you would be wise not to put yourself in such situations.

Someone may be perfectly happy to roleplay and stick to every last detail, but that doesn't mean they want to roleplay with every random person that happens to be present. Most of the roleplayers I know have rather high standards on who they'll more than casually interact with and the immersive element comes from being able to give a detailed description of what is taking place, especially in the absence of any avie body language.

I doubt there is anyone who's thrilled by the prospect of running into a newbie straight off orientation island who stopped to pick up some freebie genitals and then runs around naked across the sim "assaulting" everyone, with no recourse for the unfortunate 'victim' other than to tp away and not return because you think that "sorry, but I have no interest in you" is an unacceptable breach of RP.

I agree, which is why that is the kind of character who's application won't be approved. Granted, they can still come in and make an ass of themselves and someone will give them one last try to roleplay adequately, but if they can't handle the consequences of being forced to roleplay a complete slave or a complete outlaw, they either won't stick around to roleplay at all or they'll break some RP rule that will necessitate banning them.

These rules were elegantly engineered to protect RP. As I noted above, Observers who jumps disruptively into RP may be forced to RP on _our_ terms rather than theirs. On the other hand, someone who spontaneously brings welcome roleplay, they will be handed an application with an encouraging hint to join.

Most of the RP sims of which i have been a Part have required those Not wishing to RP to Clearly identify themselves so No Mistakes are made. Should they Choose to refuse, they are Politely, but Firmly shown the Door, and it's proper method of use when Exiting. Those Taking part in the RP have ALL been Given the rules, and standards for RP, and those who Take part in the RP, while consistantly Violating those rules and standards are politely but Firmly shown the door, Etc. Etc.
They did NOT allow people to come in, and rewrite the RP premis of the Sim to thier own advantage.
In Many of them ANY communication Out Of Character was to be contained within double Brackets ((....)) People carrying on Long conversations thus were Urged to Take it to IM. "I didn't Know" was Not an acceptable excuse for Not following the rules because everybody entering the Sim entered through the same point, and were presented with the rules and Community standards as they landed. In some Cases Only Citizens were permitted to be TPed into the Sim at a point other that the main entry by someone already in the sim.
For Citizens and Role Playing Guests it was Unlawful to attempt to Force RP on a Clearly identified Non-Role Playing Guest. Violators were punished in various means up to and Including being Politely, but Firmly shown the Door, Etc. Etc.

One sim also Included an area surrounding the entry point that was considered a "Safe Zone" where Full RP was Not in Force. That was the area where Guests were reminded by residents that the rules beyond this point would be strictly enforced, so they had better start complying Now.

No one entering the sim could say they were not fairly warned.

Angel.

This is all very interesting, and good discussion material for another thread for repeating what has already been discussed, but I really would like some answers for the original questions this thread posed. So if you have any further derailment from that, could you please find another thread to derail?

I don't believe that your local covenant or standards can, as a blanket rule, supercede the general Linden standards. I'd love to hear an actual Linden ruling on this one.

I'm a roleplayer myself, though of a different sort. I'll offer a few ideas on how to keep your RP from getting complaints from "unwilling participants".

First, restrict access to the majority of the parcel / sim to ONLY members of your roleplay group. They have to be accepted group members even to get in.

Second, I would suggest that you do as they do at Meeting Island. Set the teleport hub for the parcel/sim to an enclosed room that does not have the group restriction, and make it such that they must interact with a scripted object to acknowledge that they are consenting to the roleplay and understand what will be going on in the sim. Once they acknowledge that they want to be there and RP that way, a sit-teleport locally takes them to the RP starting area. In that room they can get info on the group and how to join it, and info on what goes on in that RP sim. To get out of the room they either must join the group, or teleport elsewhere.

Depending on how you do this, it may be necessary for the "entry room" parcel to be in another sim, as a starting point for those who are not already group members. In that case, joining the group also involves receiving a LM for group members to use to teleport into the RP area.

That arrangement shields those who simply 'go there by mistake' or who are curious. Any attempt to teleport in from outside ends up in the 'entry room'. One can still be summoned by people inside, so a friend and fellow RP member inside the area could offer another member a teleport to join them.

On your own land, the only extra rights you have are to eject whoever you choose and to make your land damage enabled if you want to. You don't have the right to demand that people obey you (eg, following your instruction to wear a titler) in order to continue to enjoy the rights they have under the regular TOS.

I believe that the TOS/CS is a lot stronger that it's commonly considered to be. For example, shooting someone with a "visual effect" weapon like the Flamebringer is technically still a TOS/CS violation. "But it's just a visual effect?" - well, what in Second Life isn't just a visual effect, really? How do you think characters die or get hurt in computer-based games or worlds? Likewise, I believe that even in a damage enabled zone, it's still in strict terms a TOS/CS violation to use anything other than weapons which deal hitpoint damage.

There are no "Do the following to invalidate the service terms:" clauses in the service terms.

So, yeah, you have to be decent no matter what. (Oh noes! grin)

If you are playing a game, make sure that everyone 'gets that it's a game' or you are going to face whatever abuse report they dish out.

But people can be removed from your land and banned from such because they do not wish to join the rp. Also a landowner right- you don't have a inborn right to be there on someone elses land.

The whole thing is a private island, detached from the possibility of wandering in, with a single telehub in a non-RP buffer zone with notecard dispenser at the beginning and a giant graphical notice at the end of each corridor. I've taken precautions to make it clear what the standards are, and yet I get ppl who claim ignorance.

As a private island, wouldn't the owners stated community standards be the ones that apply? If I've made every due effort to make visitors aware of the terms of remaining, can they still file complaint? Ignorance seems to cause as much grief as intent; at this point I'd treat them both as grief and deal with them the same.

Sounds to me like you have taken all reasonable precautions, save two.

First, what if your graphical notice hadn't rezzed yet for them?

For example, I know a club that has an upper floor reserved for vampire RP play. They have a corridor-spanning sign that says if you pass that point, you are consenting to their RP play. It even IM's you and gives you a notecard when you walk through it. That's good, but in your case I would do that, and I would also add one more prim wall a little farther down the corridor, that only becomes phantom after they touch it and select a non-default menu option agreeing to the RP.

In the club example above, it would be easy to approach the warning sign, still an un-rezzed grey square, and assume it was just an alpha-mapped curtain, like the one at the club door. If it didn't give a notecard or IM you when you walked through it, or if you ignored those (because some other distraction happened at that time), you would still have to deliberately select the "Yes, let me in" option on the second barrier.

Second, why not also restrict access to the rest of the sim to group-only? The telehub could be one parcel, and the rest could be group-only.

I would argue that conditionally, yes... it is okay.
I will cite as a precedent, the use of push based weapons.

We all know that it is clearly a TOS violation to go around SL shooting people.
Linden has held this policy and had banned people from SL for violating this policy.

However, at the same time, Linden has also upheld that using these exact same weapons in a designated combat area is perfectly legal, no TOS violation at all. Quite the opposite. People are encouraged to go to the combat sims if they want to shoot other people.

This precedent shows that TOS is not black and white. There are shades of grey.

If i enter a Gor sim and leave the visitor area, I am expected to abide by their rules. That goes without question. If someone managed to cage me there, it is no TOS violation... it's expected. I know it, the slaver knows it, and Linden knows it. If I tp into Jessie and get killed, there is no TOS violation. I know it's a combat zone, the killer knows it and Linden knows it.

If i entered your sim, having been warned in the visitor area what to expect if i leave the visitor area, again... no TOS. The precedents exist. And the fact that this is a private island just adds weight to the arguement because someone cannot just accidently wander in across the sim border. They had to tp in. The Telehub put them at the island's visitor area. They recieved the official rules. It was their choice to leave the visitor area where they were safe.

And if your visitors refuse to read the rules of your island, that is not your proplem. That is another precedent. People who claim they didn't know it was a violation of TOS (because they chose not to read them) to shoot others at Ahern will get banned by Linden, just the same. Ignorance of the law is no excuse when they clicked their agreement to abide by the rules.


Here is a suggestion:
Perhaps you can add a popup click box. They are not allowed to leave the visitor area until the click their acceptance of your island's rules. There exist objects which add people to the ban list for 24 hours. What i'm thinking of would add someone to an access list for 24 hours, and you could set your island (except the visitor parcel) to access list only.

I get people dumped in my sims all the time, simply because their teleport to a nearby island failed and they were dropped to the nearest available point by the system.

Many times it was IBM sim traffic, because they are nearby me.

So... if Irving Wladawsky-Berger (head of technical strategy and innovation at IBM) lands in Caledon due to failed teleport, and can't get a warning notecard because the asset server is choking as usual, he's open game?

This would be... well, comedy gold. Luckily Caledon doesn't have cage-gunning slavers running amok, or, if there are, they don't run amok for long!



Visitors to your sims are guests. They are to be treated as such, and behave as such.

If you don't like visitors, lock down your sim.

Desmond's point is the largest argument in favor of my sugggestion that the original poster make the RP area of his sim accessible only to group members.

If the sim itself is isolated, the ban lines won't be seen by or affect anyone other than non-members arriving in the entry area. And I don't believe a TP failure can dump you into an area you're banned from. If it tried to, you'd redirect to your home, or to some other non-banned site.

Actually I find Stephanie's points very encouraging to roleplay, while Desmond has probably missed the spirit of it. The fact is, I don't care who the visitor is or where they are from, if they act respectfully and unobtrusively as Observers have been advised to, then no one will accost them in any of the lawful areas. And if they do disrupt RP or insinuate themselves into it, then I won't find it any more or less funny who they are when the promised consequences occur to them.

But this still leaves the Disclosure clause: "sharing conversation logs without consent are all prohibited". Conversation logs and IM's are sometimes necessary information to administrate this chaos. I myself operate as transparent and aboveboard as possible, and I will validate policy decisions and evidence in documentation, so people may see for themselves how I use the authority. The RP Moderators need to be able to let users know why a user has been disciplined or removed, and sometimes they need to trade notes on individuals who would not consent to sharing logs that indicate their violations of the rules of the sim.

Could an ex-member file complaint against us for the use of logs to administrate the RP here?

This would be doable except that I've subparcelled out the land to groups that should have separate ownerships and rights. However, the security follows the same immersive design standards as the rest of the sim, and relies on players not attempting to do things that would be physically impossible, yet by design leaves valid ways to breach that security.

RP isn't a carte blanche to grief or harass others, in character or otherwise. Someone couldn't walk up to you and push and shove you around, or be your stalking shadow, or constantly pick fights with you until you've had enough and tp away and proudly proclaim that they can't be legitimately AR'ed because they happen to RP an obnoxious character.

Two characters don't necessarily have to respect each other in the roleplay, but the two people behind them do have to respect each other or one risks crossing the boundaries of what is reasonable and I don't see why such an instance should be exempt from the community standards. It's not the interaction between two RP characters in that case, but one resident "griefing" another with RP acting as the griefing tool.

Mr Shang - Desmond - notecards in Caledon would be so terribly gauche. If the superbly-named Mr Wladawsky-Berger did appear and not appreciate the setting, I am sure that the quips and raised eyebrows would inform him quickly of his faux-pas...

...which is actually an important point, in that the culture of Caledon (I am confused as to the actual meaning of this "RP" term, as if we are music-hall players or some such) is robust. We are able to take situations as they come and exhibit sufficient sang-froide so as to invalidate any supposed conflicts without compromising our own manners. (I have some experience of this pre-Caledon from discussing matters with fellow Steampunks in, say, sandboxes, often frequented by the most terrible boors). Caledon is an island which is simultaneously part of the Grid and having its own culture.

Some may wish to attempt to block outside influences completely and retain complete control over their own environment, but I do not think that that will ever be practically possible without very strict access controls; tags and notecards are all very well but whenever whatever code is being breached actually is, it will cause disruption, regardless of bannings and ToS dealings. And immersion will be compromised.

I didn't intend to use the space of this thread to promote my sim, but I guess it's only fair that you do the same...But it sounds awfully swell, and if I weren't busy spawning a pre-Victorian, pre-Industrial historical-folklore atmosphere I may find the time to tour it.

I have realistic expectations of disruptions, but the original questions regarded users and tourists using the Community Standards against me in trying to maintain immersion.

Ultimately Prodigal, it's your Land, and Your rules (Remaining within Community Standards and TOS, Role Play being Plainly stated for example) If people behave Badly, and claim Ignorance, then you simply tell them, "Now you Know Better, First, Last, and Only warning" If they persist, then there is Nothing and no one FORCING them either to Enter your land, Or remain there. Send them on your way. Under TOS you need not give any reason for removing someone from your Property, it's Your property, and your right to decide who remains, and who doesn't.
There are, of course, Certain reasonable, Limits to this, For example, you Cannot place a sign stating "NO (Insert Racial epithet here)s ALLOWED!!!" Such a restriction stated in such a manor is Plainly, and Blatantly against TOS no matter where or how it is placed.

I went to one Sim last night, Western Themed. I was prepared to Follow thier rules, But a Few of them towards the Bottom of the List i simply found both Anal, and Offensive (But i also have to allow that they Were permissible under the SL community standards), so i did what any Rational, and responsible person Would do. I Left. Yes, I wanted to See the Place, But No, i was NOT prepared to compromise my Own principles by abiding with some of thier Rules, No one was Forcing me to. Going there was a choice, So was leaving. If i went Into thier Land and behaved disruptively because i didn't wish to Follow thier rules, i would expect to be both Booted, and Banned, and i would deserve it.

Read and Learn the SL Community Standards, It isn't hard to have your sim any way you like and Still remain on the side of the Angels.

Angel.