Will The New TOS on Child Avatars Ensnare Short Adults?

[brodiac90]

2 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

Q: What if I am hanging out in a Moderate rated region while using a child avatar and someone shows up that is naked?

A: As long as the child presenting Resident is not engaging in adult activities and is not in an area promoting or dedicated to adult activity, then the child presenting Resident will not have action taken against them. Our investigations take context into account, and though we understand that any changes in guidelines can cause concern, please know that our team is careful and thoughtful when reviewing information. As a more direct example, if you are using a child avatar and are shopping or exploring in a Moderate region that is not promoting nudity or sexual activity, and a nude avatar shows up next to you, no action will be taken against you as long as you are not actively engaging in any behavior that sexualizes minors or your child avatar.

That's quite reassuring actually. I imagine you'd still be better off leaving anyway though. 

[Kathlen Onyx]

1 minute ago, brodiac90 said:

I mean we know people always follow the no nudity rule in G land.... 

Them being AR'ed has no impportance to me. If I stay there then I'm breaking TOS and I can also be AR'ed. 

That's really not correct. See Rowan's post above yours.

[brodiac90]

Just now, Kathlen Onyx said:

That's really not correct. See Rowan's post above yours.

Yes and it is reassuring. 

[Rowan Amore]

Moderate land is still always going to be on a region to region basis.  If it's a club that regularly hosts Naked NIght or whatever, probably best NOT to go there since nudity is often expected.  A shopping event or store where it's not necessarily expected but can occur?  I can't see LL thinking twice about it.  The child presenting avatar is shopping, someone got naked to try something on, it took forever to rez...not an issue, IMO.

Someone gave Fogbound as an example.  I've seen topless women there and a lot more.  While, I think it's kind of rude to have all your wares on display in a music club on Moderate, it happens all the time there so almost expected.  If I were a child-presenting avatar, I'd avoid places like that.

[Arielle Popstar]

16 minutes ago, Phil Deakins said:

@Arielle Popstar

Yes, it has been happening. I haven't suggested that it wouldn't happen. I'm saying that the phrase "large number", relative to SL's population, will never happen. Those who are banned don't count. We're talking about voluntary departures because of the rules.

Those who have gone to OpenSim will probably find what they want there. I abandoned a nice sea-front piece of free land there recently because there was so much ag*play, and not much normal living. At least some of the ones who have gone may well belong in that sort of environment.

Well even if it is only as much as the bot population, it would be significant. A number of the banned reported they had not been involved in any a*eplay and even more who posted  in the Reddit forum were quite emotional and weren't given the opportunity to speak. Discounting their number I don't feel is giving credence to the actual numbers. Might not have been voluntary but still counts to the reduction of people in the community that the ToS changes has affected.

Quote

Those who have gone to OpenSim will probably find what they want there. I abandoned a nice sea-front piece of free land there recently because there was so much ag*play, and not much normal living. At least some of the ones who have gone may well belong in that sort of environment.

Unlikely they will find what they want in Opensim as in general the larger grids are not that welcoming either. There are a couple of grids that cater predominantly to kids but from my own ventures there, there were very few who indulged in that behavior. The few that do, tend to stand out as they seem to be braver about being vocal. 

The advantage of the other platform of course it is much easier to have one's own private grid that is inaccessible to visitors from specific other grids should they become a problem. There is a scripter there who recently made a security orb that disallowed the unwanted from entry. 

51 minutes ago, Kathlen Onyx said:

I'd put money on that people are actually not logging in because they died or they ended up in the hospital rather than being upset with a sensible TOS.  It hasn't even been a month.

Come post this in a a year and we'll see if the number logged in changes much from today till then. I doubt it.

2 Months ago the general concurrency was around 29K at around 2am PST. This morning t was around 26K. I wouldn't suspect it is over the ToS change and I'll keep checking for the next week or so but it was an interesting drop in  concurrency for that time period.

[brodiac90]

6 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

Moderate land is still always going to be on a region to region basis.  If it's a club that regularly hosts Naked NIght or whatever, probably best NOT to go there since nudity is often expected.  A shopping event or store where it's not necessarily expected but can occur?  I can't see LL thinking twice about it.  The child presenting avatar is shopping, someone got naked to try something on, it took forever to rez...not an issue, IMO.

Someone gave Fogbound as an example.  I've seen topless women there and a lot more.  While, I think it's kind of rude to have all your wares on display in a music club on Moderate, it happens all the time there so almost expected.  If I were a child-presenting avatar, I'd avoid places like that.

All very reasonable. I suspect the real issue for us child avatars is when we go exploring new places that we've never been to. There might be these 'unwritten rules,' that things can happen but if it's not very clear in the venue rules etc then you're kind of left guessing. 

 

1 minute ago, Arielle Popstar said:

2 Months ago the general concurrency was around 29K at around 2am PST. This morning t was around 26K. I wouldn't suspect it is over the ToS change and I'll keep checking for the next week or so but it was an interesting drop in  concurrency for that time period.

You also have to factor in RL seasons. People tend to log into SL less when the weather is better. 

[Sadvhi]

At first I thought it would be great if people wanting to rp children could have their own set apart grid, but then I realized it would attract even more pervs

[Rowan Amore]

3 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

2 Months ago the general concurrency was around 29K at around 2am PST. This morning t was around 26K. I wouldn't suspect it is over the ToS change and I'll keep checking for the next week or so but it was an interesting drop in  concurrency for that time period.

That's probably a lot of those AFK places that have tons of bots that look underage.  Good riddance, I say.

[brodiac90]

2 minutes ago, Sadvhi said:

At first I thought it would be great if people wanting to rp children could have their own set apart grid, but then I realized it would attract even more pervs

Well yes, the two times I was IM'ed by adults talking suggestively to my child avatar were in very innocent kid friendly places on G and M land. 

It's also why a lot of kid venues don't allow adult avatars unless they're parents or know the child avatar. 

[Dorientje Woller]

The best way to make everybody shorties, so we can talk eye to eye:

 

Edited May 16 by Dorientje Woller

[Arielle Popstar]

3 minutes ago, brodiac90 said:

You also have to factor in RL seasons. People tend to log into SL less when the weather is better. 

I've been keeping my eye on the Firestorm reported concurrency for a few years and realize there are seasonal ups and downs which is usually +/- 1000 or so but I can't say I have ever seen it under 27 to 28K. I'll be curious to see what it is tomorrow morning.

5 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

That's probably a lot of those AFK places that have tons of bots that look underage.  Good riddance, I say.

I don't know, I don't go to those sort of places so have no idea what they are made up of. Even so, has a general alert been issued by LL regarding the policy change? From my one or two ventures inworld in the past month, showed many were not aware of the ToS changes as they hadn't paid attention to the 10+page boilerplate ToS they faced when signing in. 

[Arielle Popstar]

12 minutes ago, Sadvhi said:

At first I thought it would be great if people wanting to rp children could have their own set apart grid, but then I realized it would attract even more pervs

Not if you don't publicize the address. Can also use a security orb to block anyone over 6 feet!

[Sadvhi]

Just now, Arielle Popstar said:

Not if you don't publicize the address. Can also use a security orb to block anyone over 6 feet!

Then the pervs would just rp children to gain access

[brodiac90]

3 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

I've been keeping my eye on the Firestorm reported concurrency for a few years and realize there are seasonal ups and downs which is usually +/- 1000 or so but I can't say I have ever seen it under 27 to 28K. I'll be curious to see what it is tomorrow morning.

I don't know, I don't go to those sort of places so have no idea what they are made up of. Even so, has a general alert been issued by LL regarding the policy change? From my one or two ventures inworld in the past month, showed many were not aware of the ToS changes as they hadn't paid attention to the 10+page boilerplate ToS they faced when signing in. 

Yes, alot of people don't read the forums and I'd wager even fewer read TOS. There seems to be a lot of misinformation about. 

[brodiac90]

7 minutes ago, Sadvhi said:

Then the pervs would just rp children to gain access

I think you're reaching now. The pedofiles don't need to 'infiltrate,' genuine kid venues. There are enough sick ones like the family nude beaches for them to do their thing. It's also not how they operate. They're not spending L$1000s on child avatars when they can just use a free 1 day account. 

Edited May 16 by brodiac90

[Arielle Popstar]

2 minutes ago, Sadvhi said:

Then the pervs would just rp children to gain access

I don't know then, I've been running my own grid for myself and a few friends for years and have never had a problem with pervs. Just once over there when I was visiting a friends place and an unexpected perv messaged me. Didn't answer and jumped back to my own immediately and never seen or heard from him again.  Plenty of ways to keep the unwanted out of my way.

[Sadvhi]

The only reason I mentioned that is because there was a certain child mesh body which is no longer available that used to hold events exclusively for people using their body. They distributed risque outfits for free to all attending the events, then would later sell the same outfits on MP. I assumed that many of them were doing things against the TOS because of the type of outfits they wore, but I admit that it might just be my paranoia, thinking anyone who wears sexy clothes or who visits a nude beach as a child avatar does so because they are doing things against the TOS.

[Kathlen Onyx]

28 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

Even so, has a general alert been issued by LL regarding the policy change? From my one or two ventures inworld in the past month, showed many were not aware of the ToS changes as they hadn't paid attention to the 10+page boilerplate ToS they faced when signing in. 

Well this is their own fault. Yes, LL issued a general alert to everyone. It's called "read the new TOS and agree to it." Also there are 3 blog articles on the main dashboard. What else would you like them to do.

Also the TOS is not a boilerplate. It's VERY specific regarding the new Child Avatar portion of the TOS. 

[Arielle Popstar]

4 minutes ago, Kathlen Onyx said:

Well this is their own fault. Yes, LL issued a general alert to everyone. It's called "read the new TOS and agree to it." Also there are 3 blog articles on the main dashboard. What else would you like them to do.

Also the TOS is not a boilerplate. It's VERY specific regarding the new Child Avatar portion of the TOS. 

You're pretty new here i see. Read this maybe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_form_contract

[BilliJo Aldrin]

49 minutes ago, Sadvhi said:

Then the pervs would just rp children to gain access

well duh 😬

[BilliJo Aldrin]

This might be better for a new thread, but what if LL said tomorrow, thats it, NO underage avis allowed. SL is for adult avatars only. ANYONE presenting as under  18 will be banned.

Would that solve the problem of pedo sex in SL?

If the  answer is no, then why is LL pissing around with all these new rules that do absolutely nothing about the problem and only serve to persecute people that have done nothing wrong?

[Kathlen Onyx]

1 minute ago, BilliJo Aldrin said:

This might be better for a new thread, but what if LL said tomorrow, thats it, NO underage avis allowed. SL is for adult avatars only. ANYONE presenting as under  18 will be banned.

Would that solve the problem of pedo sex in SL?

If the  answer is no, then why is LL pissing around with all these new rules that do absolutely nothing about the problem and only serve to persecute people that have done nothing wrong?

You really are not getting it are you? When it hits you let us know.

[Persephone Emerald]

5 hours ago, BilliJo Aldrin said:

How about large numbers stop putting any more money into the platform then? No more paying tier for land, and dropping from premium to basic. 

If i really felt threatened, thats what I’d do 😬

I think people usually reduce what they spend in SL for economic reasons, not to make some kind of grand statement - at least not for long. "I'm quiting SL" and "I'm only going Basic from now on!" statements are mostly just flouncing. If a person thinks they might get caught doing something they shouldn't here, maybe they'll go to The Sims or Open Sim for awhile,  but they'll get bored and come backto SL, maybe with a new account.

[Persephone Emerald]

5 hours ago, BilliJo Aldrin said:

I find it funny because a: he blamed it on his account being hacked, and b: his “permaban” probably lasted 24 hours before he was back.

I’m not a snitch, I’m not required to report anything to LL.

Thanks for confirming that I made the right decision to block you 😂

Unpopular opinion:

If you don't own the land, group or venue, you won't get in trouble for not snitching.

[Madi Melodious]

2 hours ago, brodiac90 said:

As for those who have left. I know of at least 5 who have specifically said this is why I'm leaving. I beleive @Madi Melodious knows more and has a better idea of how many people have cancelled premiums or closed sims. It's not an insignificant amount though. 

I'm on RL lunch so I'm going to answer a lot of this at one time.  I don't have time right now to go through the thread picking specific answers out.   I really need a longer lunch break.

The problem with people saying they are going to close their accounts is all he said, she said.   I know of 3 people that said they are going to close their Prem Pro accounts, including one who said she owned almost a dozen sims.  Of the two only the one with the sims I can confirm, partially.  I've only been to a couple of her sims and as of this morning they are not available.   I know of one more Prem Pro account that might be close if come November she isn't happy with the results of the new rules.   That would be mine.   I know that the rules have also cost one Pro Plus account from being created.   That would be one for my alt. 

I'm also aware of dozens of people that are saying they are closing paid accounts on discord and in groups I'm in.  If they actually go through with it, I'm not aware of.  

As for the feeling of second-class citizens, there are a lot of people feeling that way.  I still feel that way.   The issue as I see it was the way the Lab choose to handle the roll out of the new tos.  Coming off of a scandal investigation, saying they found nothing amiss.  Then they go, "oh by the way, here are some new rules" targeting the exact issue they were investigating and found nothing.

I feel if they had simply waited a few more weeks and released the new rules it would have gone much smoother.   The better option would have been to engage the community before they rolled them out instead of after they did.  They way it looks now they are trying to cover their butts and are hanging the child avatar community out to dry. 

They rolled back some of the requirements on the modesty layers and gave the impression they are willing to work with the community by letting alphas and bom substitute for the time being.   If they keep this policy in place for six months then I feel most issues with it will be done.  There are already movement to save my body design.    

As for me, other than complying with the new tos, I'm still going to do everything I've always done.  I'll still sail the Blake, I'll still watch sunsets there.  I'm still going to shop in moderate sims.  If creators want to mix their adult stuff in with the "safe" stuff then I'll just take my business elsewhere.