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Please disallow slurs as product tags on Marketplace.


Aemeth Lysette
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The world is changing and a lot of people don't want to mire themselves in places that make minorities feel unwelcome (myself included). Little by little, SL has changed for the better, but I still see racist slurs used as tags on Marketplace for various products.

This should be stated in the TOS as being disallowed, so we can report items that return when you search these tags.

Second Life should not be a place that operates on any facet of hate. Not even for the sake of "free speech". This isn't a country--it's a virtual world run by a corporation.

Thank you for reading my suggestion.

Edited by Aemeth Lysette
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This is a tricky subject.

LL actually does prevent certain words from being used as keywords, but from my knowledge only in the case of Trademark issues. 'Star Wars' for example will make your listing inactive until you remove it. So it would be easy for them to add other words, as the function is already in place.

The problem is, what words? Most slurs are contextual. I'm quite glad we are, for the most part, past the phase of using 'gay' to mean stupid. However, the would gay could be considered a slur even though it also has many other potential uses. There are numerous words like this, which although can be used as slur are not necessarily depending on how or who is using it.

However, you CAN report content that you believe promotes cruelty or hateful content. This of course is up to LL to define. There's definitely an argument for and against the Confederate flag being a symbol of hate. There will always be some gray zone.

Quote

Examples of Prohibited Content include:

  • Content involving illegality, such as piracy, criminal activity, terrorism, obscenity, child pornography, gambling, and illegal drug use.
  • Infringing or unauthorized content, such as content that you did not create or do not have permission to use.
  • Cruel or hateful content that could harm, harass, promote or condone violence against, or that is primarily intended to incite hatred of, animals, or individuals or groups based on race or ethnic origin, religion, nationality, disability, gender, age, veteran status, or sexual orientation/gender identity.
  • Intensely violent or graphic content that could be construed as primarily intended to be shocking, sensational, or disrespectful.
  • Sexually explicit content.
  • Content that promotes or could be construed as primarily intended to evade limitations on Prohibited Content.

We may remove any Content or listing, or change any Content rating that we, in our sole discretion, determine violates these Guidelines. We may restrict or delete Content, or suspend or ban your account(s), if we, in our sole discretion, determine that you or your account(s) have violated this policy.

 

https://www.lindenlab.com/legal/content-guidelines

 

What would be be helpful is an update to the Marketplace Listing Guidelines https://marketplace.secondlife.com/listing_guidelines

Quote

Banned Content Is Not Allowed For Any Residents.

Non-consensual sexual content, or any content or items that depict or suggest sexual activity that all parties involved did not consent to.

Sexual content involving minors, or any sexually explicit or suggestive content or items depicting minors.

Cruel or hateful content, or content or items that depict or suggest cruelty or hatred towards individuals or animals.

If the last line of that instead stated "towards individuals, groups, or animals" it would further make clear the limitations as stated in the Content Guidelines.

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I'm shocked Linden Lab allows some very racist words as search terms on the marketplace; so they are allowable key words.

To clarify, I don't search for these normally. I just did a search just now to see if something is banned, and it isnt.

Edited by Milk Pixelmaid
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8 hours ago, Lillith Hapmouche said:

At least tag a Linden when you start posting / return to post on the forums to get some attention. This is 99,9 % user to user...

Using the right tools might be even better: JIRA report for the general issue and flag the items to report them.

JIRA is for tracking bugs in Second Life. That's the first sentence stated on the website there. I don't believe it's supposed to be used to request policy changes.

Which mole/Linden should we tag here for this issue? I don't even know where to begin with this. @Strawberry Linden? She actually helped with a fundraiser with the Orlando nightclub shooting back in the day. Maybe she might know who can help.

All I know is that I'm black and I've been complaining about this for years. I blogged about it, New World Notes blogged about it, and nothing ever happened.

I got tired, put out by how much racism I see in Second Life, and felt sometimes that this game simply didn't want people like me around at all. Then I started playing other games too. Then I saw a statement by a Linden talking about trying to bring users back.

I'm an on-and-off player who would be happy if this game accepted her more. But can it really happen?

EDIT: Dancien created a JIRA for it. I don't know if that'll work but it's out there now! https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/BUG-228854

Edited by Aemeth Lysette
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12 minutes ago, Aemeth Lysette said:

JIRA is for tracking bugs in Second Life. That's the first sentence stated on the website there. I don't believe it's supposed to be used to request policy changes

a FYI

a while ago now Linden introduced a JIRA New Feature Request facility. To use:

click the blue Create button (top the screen) then on Create Issue page, select

Project: 1.BUG Project (BUG)
Issue Type: New Feature Request

and then fill in the boxes with explanations

i think that a change to marketplace keywords would be a new feature request

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  • Administrators

Hey folks!

I am just as surprised as you are that there are some terms that our filter is allowing to be used as keywords. Please know that we do not condone the use of racist/derogatory terms.

Myself and others are currently investigating why certain words are making it through the filter, and will work towards a resolution to disallow the use of any others that we deem as derogatory.

Thanks again for bringing this up!

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17 minutes ago, Kristin Linden said:

Hey folks!

I am just as surprised as you are that there are some terms that our filter is allowing to be used as keywords. Please know that we do not condone the use of racist/derogatory terms.

Myself and others are currently investigating why certain words are making it through the filter, and will work towards a resolution to disallow the use of any others that we deem as derogatory.

Thanks again for bringing this up!

Oh wow thank you!!

Well then I consider this thread complete, thanks to EVERYBODY for showing support, Dancien for the JIRA, and even showing love on posts. I appreciate it very much. Really, this means a lot to me!

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While I agree with the removal of contents that are without any doubt incendiary in nature from the marketplace, I disagree with the banning of keywords or words. The meaning of words depend on how they are used, even ones that are originally meant to be derogatory. Sometimes they're used for educational purposes, furthermore, these words can, and have been effectively used to counter the hateful arguments or positions by nullifying their original meanings and intentions depending on how you use it and in what context.

I can sympathize with the OP and their friends, and I'm sure their intention is good, but censorship of words is more often than not counter-productive to the cause of eliminating prejudice itself, because they impede open debates of divisive, prejudiced notions.

When someone argue with me in support of these prejudiced notions, it's more effective for me to disprove it and prove them wrong in an open, uncensored discussion and exchange of ideas where everyone can see and hear it, and know my position in earnest, which I know to be true as I've been called names just because of what I am more than once myself. Having top-down enforcement of what can and can't be said only reinforce the divisiveness, and pull more people into the extremes as the censorship can, and has been used as an excuse or "proof" that they're right.   

I'm not arguing against any decision taken or will be taken by LL regarding the marketplace situation as I'm sure they'll do what they think is best for the platform, in regard to that I just think it's important to show that there are people who might not see the situation the same way, and we don't want SL or LL to be seen as overly censorious by the people who might not agree with the censorship of words.

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19 minutes ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

While I agree with the point you're making, what benefit or "open discussion" goes on in marketplace product listings?

The use of the items - for example people might list a model of a book or piece of clothing with these words in them, but they are not always used with bad intentions. And if we start banning keywords or words from the MP instead of doing it on per-item basis, that alone can be seen as overly censorious by some people, not to mention the precedence it might set.  

For example, a certain book by Randall Kennedy (it has the bad racial slur word in the cover, but it's used to emphasize how wrong and ultimately shallow it is)

 

Edited by lucagrabacr
typo, adding stuff
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7 minutes ago, lucagrabacr said:

The use of the items - for example people might list a model of a book or piece of clothing with these words in them, but they are not always used for bad intentions. And if we start banning keywords or words from the MP instead of doing it on per-item basis, that alone can be seen as overly censorious by some people, not to mention the precedence it might set.  

For example, a certain book by Randall Kennedy (it has the n-word in the cover, but it's used to emphasize how wrong and ultimately meaningless it is)

 

I would agree with you if we were discussing The Library of Congress.  We are not.  We are discussing how Linden Lab can manage their Marketplace without it becoming expensive for them to manage.  Things that become too expensive to manage or cause a lot of support issues tend to go away in this privately owned system we call Second Life.  I would like to avoid making something useful to the general users go away, again.  We have tried, in the past, to sequester listings with certain keywords so those items are not displayed unless specifically requested but that was taken advantage of to distribute items designed to be effective tools to abuse others.  Those 'in the know' could readily find their tools on Marketplace after making a new account.  I suggested using this acquisition activity to quarantine the new accounts for review but I was informed that my input was no longer required.

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1 minute ago, Ardy Lay said:

I would agree with you if we were discussing The Library of Congress.  We are not.  We are discussing how Linden Lab can manage their Marketplace without it becoming expensive for them to manage.

It would certainly take more time and manpower to deal with reports of inappropriate items, but banning keywords or words won't eliminate all inappropriate items as people do find ways to circumvent keywords, and all it might do is removing legitimate items and possibly making SL seem more off-putting to people who don't like censorship (even Google allow these words when used in non-derogatory way)

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