Mahz's Dev Journal

[HeySeuss]

Is it possible an adult RP section will damage ad revenue?

@LegendBegins

Not if if the ads aren't put on the adult section itself.

[Syben]

@HeySeuss Are we talking about this adult section as an 18+/Mature, or more of an /avert your eyes you pervert.

[HeySeuss]

@HeySeuss Are we talking about this adult section as an 18+/Mature, or more of an /avert your eyes you pervert.

@Aeonumbra

18+/Mature RP's will basically be put behind the opt-in curtain, but I expect that until we institute some sort of privacy function for 1x1's, we'll see them sticking to PM's. I think, personally, that a system allowing the original poster of a 1x1 or RP to make their threads private and allow only specific individuals in will be necessary to actually get that stuff out of PM's, because most people try to be very circumspect about their adult content to begin with. (And we're grateful for that, because Google Adsense.)

The reality is that this stuff is going to be done on the community somehow anyway, so we'd like to simply accommodate people that want to do that sort of RP, as they are members of our community, as well as set it up to be comfortable for everyone involved. The same thing with allowing alts and so forth -- the idea is to afford everyone a degree of privacy and minimize the nannying on the part of the Guild to simply what we are obligated to nanny, and that's largely preventing stuff that endangers the guild. (I'm sure you've all heard us say that before. :) )

The opt-in means that people who don't want to see that stuff won't and there will be less confusion over the interest checks, which is something we've been keen on since the NewGuild was brought online -- making adult RP allowable means that people can specify what they're looking for rather than mug each other or communicate indirectly about what they want and allow people to find what they're looking for (and avoid what they aren't) more easily.

This is just a continuation of that.

[NuttsnBolts]

DeviantART do a similar thing with their content where in order to view mature 18+ material (gore, sexual, drug, etc) you have to be a member and then allow that content to be viewed. From what I can tell from when I used the site years ago it never really affected their advertising and I never, and still haven't, seen ads that push the realm of acceptable.

So as what HeySeuss said, if you block it up in the right way its going to keep the community happy with their privacy as well as protect some of our younger members.

[Ellri]

How would such opt-in be implemented? as a separate section or as a special tag? A section might be easier for the permissions, but the tag would make it more convenient for the various types of players and roleplays that might feature such themes.

If going with tag, it might be more appropriate to have several degrees of it, though that could also be covered by GMs. Some might want to just have "a little bit extra", while others might want detailed orgies. Neither of those should be visible to the youngsters (though it is a topic for disagreement where the top age of "youngsters" is, depending on country of origin. Some nations have 18, others 16. Some probably have other numbers again too.

[Lillian Thorne]

Since this site is hosted in the US, US rules would apply.

[Syben]

@HeySeuss Now this tag, what does it entail? If the luscious smutty details are to be kept in 1x1 until a privacy function is available, are the juicier bits to be left out? Is it simply to state that mature, offensive, racist, and heresy style themes will be present? What would be the guidelines for such themes? How far are you allowed to "imply" or even describe things.

Take a very vague topic. When vikings pillage a village they weren't too picky on the age of their "victim" if you catch the drift?
Does this tag allows players to reach into the darkest depths, or should everything be kept vague on certain things?

I guess what I am asking for are specifics on what the tag actually means.

[HeySeuss]

@HeySeuss Now this tag, what does it entail? If the luscious smutty details are to be kept in 1x1 until a privacy function is available, are the juicier bits to be left out? Is it simply to state that mature, offensive, racist, and heresy style themes will be present? What would be the guidelines for such themes? How far are you allowed to "imply" or even describe things.

Take a very vague topic. When vikings pillage a village they weren't too picky on the age of their "victim" if you catch the drift?
Does this tag allows players to reach into the darkest depths, or should everything be kept vague on certain things?

I guess what I am asking for are specifics on what the tag actually means.

@Aeonumbra

Racism in RP isn't a problem. Our racism rules tend to be aimed at OOC statements to begin with -- to date, we've only had to ban one guy for that, and he was posting outright pro-genocidal Nazi (shit you not) propaganda.

Offensive is a values judgment. Not sure what that's supposed to mean.

Primarily, we're concerned with explicit sexual themes and drug use maybe (but Google doesn't seem to ping to fictional descriptions of drug use, but rather penalizes the sort of website that describes how to cook your own meth in detail so that some dude can proceed to blow up his trailer -- not really a problem for us) but primarily explicit sexual themes. No one really seems to care about violence; you can't really come up with a degree of violence that would even really get anyone in trouble with Google Adsense.

Pedophilia will still be verboten, because that is, quite frankly, offensive and disgusting even if it weren't illegal and a likely candidate for getting the site itself shut down. The current 1x1 standards will apply in the sense that this sort of shit will never be right with us on the Guild; there are communities for that hosted out of countries that don't give a damn, and that's a good place to go if someone wants that sort of federally-illegal taboo.

So the darkest depths won't be happening and in most cases, the darkest depths isn't really a thing for most people that would be engaging in adult RP anyway. We already ban it in PM, we're certainly keeping that in place when we create an adult area opt-in.

Source.

We'll relax standards on what can be advertised behind the filter, however. In the opt in, we'll let people list more specifically what they want in public. But the darkest depths thing...well, hell no.

[Ellri]

Indeed. As it should be. But if you are doing an RP centered around some type of raids and you want to highlight the fact that the raiders don't care overmuch about the age of their "playmates", then simply say so, just don't describe it. Use it as a vague tool to inspire the raiders' opponents to go do what they need to do to stop the raiders.

On the racism note, its fairly easy to avoid that. Speciesism is far more fun. Instead of the black fighting the white, they team up against the green.

EDIT:
Huh. We were curious, so we looked it up:

Each U.S. state (and the District of Columbia) has its own age of consent. Currently state laws set the age of consent at 16, 17, or 18. The most common age is 16.

age of consent 16 (31):

Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Georgia, Hawaii, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Vermont, Washington, West Virginia

age of consent 17 (8):

Colorado, Illinois, Louisiana, Missouri, New Mexico, New York, Texas, Wyoming

age of consent 18 (12):

Arizona, California, Delaware, Florida, Idaho, North Dakota, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin

Wikipedia

[LegendBegins]

Since this site is hosted in the US, US rules would apply.

@Lillian Thorne

According to US Law, the only possible violation that could be charged would be "sexting." Even text based depictions of child pornography isn't illegal in the US, as they are considered a "victimless crime." So the only fear would arise in actually RPing in an 18+ Roleplay with an underaged person, and that could most likely be argued away in court. All this is in addition to the fact that US Cyber Law isn't enforced in the slightest.

[Ellri]

From what we could see from digging further, the US is the only nation in the world with a age of consent that isn't a single number. as such, it can be impractical to use. Correction, Australia has one region with 17 while the rest is 16.

US appears to be primarily 16 (30 states + DC), with some states at 17 (8 states) and 18 (12 states).
Taking that into account, we'd suggest going with the number that appears to be most common throughout the world (and throughout the US): 16.

But its not really as if we can truly verify the physical age of people in any case, so its a bit hard to do with 100% certainty.

[Lillian Thorne]

Just out of curiosity, are you arguing to allow 16 year-olds into the adult section or just arguing for the sake of arguing?

[Ellri]

a bit of both really. And a bit to educate people that age of majority != age of consent. Doesn't matter if they're 12, 14, 16 or 18, we'll personally still consider them children.

[Captain Jordan]

Indeed. As it should be. But if you are doing an RP centered around some type of raids and you want to highlight the fact that the raiders don't care overmuch about the age of their "playmates", then simply say so, just don't describe it. Use it as a vague tool to inspire the raiders' opponents to go do what they need to do to stop the raiders.

On the racism note, its fairly easy to avoid that. Speciesism is far more fun. Instead of the black fighting the white, they team up against the green.

EDIT:
Huh. We were curious, so we looked it up:

<Snipped quote by Wikipedia>

@Ellri

Be mindful that while the age of consent is sometimes 16, many of the states have additional requirements that the partner be of the same age, or still under 18. So a 16+16 is fine, 16+17 is fine, but 15(or under)+16 and 16+18(and over) is not. There's some fudging and some lack of enforcement depending on the graces of the DA, and sometimes the upper age limit is 19 for a 17 year old, but basically the age of consent under 18 generally only applies when the partner is also under 18.

But @LegendBegins is correct about the actual text description of acts. That doesn't meant this site has to allow carte blanche under US law, it can devise its own rules. Rulebreaking, like HeySeuss noted, is likely to occur in private 1x1s and PMs regardless of what rules are in place.

[Ellri]

true, Jordan.

We personally feel that sexual age of consent shouldn't be a static number, but based on age discrepancy. Something like this:
50+: ±15
30-49: ±10
20-29: ±5
12-19: ±3

so long as there's a clear set of rules here, we don't really care overmuch what the relevant number(s) is(are).

[Captain Jordan]

true, Jordan.

We personally feel that sexual age of consent shouldn't be a static number, but based on age discrepancy. Something like this:
50+: ±15
30-49: ±10
20-29: ±5
12-19: ±3

so long as there's a clear set of rules here, we don't really care overmuch what the relevant number(s) is(are).

@Ellri

Are you talking about RP or real life?

[HeySeuss]

US federal law applies here, because this is interstate commerce and that's a hard and fast 18 for majority and consent. That trumps over state laws regarding age of consent and so forth because almost all communications here are between people in different states, which means that the transmission from state to state becomes a matter of federal law.

I realize there's a lot of wiggle room in other countries, but this site is, for better or worse, hosted in the US.

Yes, I've had cause to find this out because, get this, it's kind of mahz's ass and our asses that get boiled if there is a problem. So that 18 line is a fact of life.

[Ellri]

sorry to argue, @HeySeuss, but there actually isn't a US federal law concerning age of consent with a single number. The US age of Majority is primarily 18, though. (exceptions: Alabama (19), Nebraska (19 or upon marriage), Puerto Rico (21) and Mississippi (21))

Federal law makes it criminal to engage in a sexual act with another person who is between the age of 12 and 16 if they are at least four years younger than you. Each state takes a different approach as the age of consent has ranged from 10 to 18.Jul 22, 2014

[HeySeuss]

Pertinent sections;

- 18 U.S. Code § 2422 - Coercion and enticement

Thank you for not putting us on any sex offender's lists in advance.

[Captain Jordan]

@Ellri age of consent doesn't matter for online depictions of the act, your arguing is futile. What matters is age of majority and laws surrounding erotica.

Pertinent sections;

- 18 U.S. Code § 2422 - Coercion and enticement

Thank you for not putting us on any sex offender's lists in advance.

@HeySeuss

Reading erotica isn't sexual activity, HeySeuss. You should look into obscenity laws instead.