Socially|Mundane

An old saying we used to throw around in my Army days is "they can kill you, but they can't eat you." I know, I know... "Huh? Wha...?"

It's just another way of saying they can beat you up, hate you, make you miserable - but in the end, they can't take away your principals. And so, I now hereby open myself up to whatever flaming, trolling, vitriolic hatred might come my way when I make my genuine opinion here known to the world.

Not a secret, but never before openly and loudly shouted out to the Second Life enthusiast world. So, please allow me a moment to get my helmet and flame-retardant armor on and buckle my seatbelt, 'cause here we go...



First, I'll repeat a comment to an article I wrote and my reply. The article, in-short, can be summarized as 'worrying about copybot and its derivatives is a waste of time'. It is simply a sample of a discussion that was posted at Shopping Cart Disco (source).

In the source and my post was this statement:

Informant: And it’s completely safe, you can trust me on that, but yes they were all originally derived from the same people in the same place, most creators were underaged boys and made hacked viewers to sell to normal Second Life users, or so they could steal content for themselves.

To which, someone named "hiyas' commented to my post about it with:

If i understand, Kids aren't allowed on Second Life. I've Ar'd people after i've found out that they're kids

This is true. This is how it always has been - especially since back when I first entered second Life back in 2006. And from then (and before) all the way through now, this 'argument' has been made over and over and over again.

News flash: The dead horse has been beaten to death.

I responded to "Hiyas" with this:

Unfortunately, Linden Lab allows the teen grid to wither away and rot. And along with free "basic" accounts and virtually no checks and balances whatsoever, Linden Lab has allowed a serious proliferation of underagers to enter the grid. The Second Life grid is infected with the, ([sic]: them)

Even though the population has been shouting to Linden lab [sic] to fix the problem, they never raised so much as a finger.

Now they are trying to fix the problem. The only way possible is the move the city walls inward - into the middle of the city in order to keep the unwanted out of the inner sanctum - rather than the city itself.

So now - you should be able to say ZINDRA is for adults. The rest is more or less hush-hush, wink-wink wide open.

I forgot that my comments and replies to them via Disqus (which I love, by the way and wish every blogger would use it) is set-up to also post a notice to my Twitter feed (along with notices when I update this and my other blog.)

I was surprised to see a tweet from someone (I assume) at Linden Lab in the feed called "TeenGridNews". The tweet said:

That’s teens for you. <_<

I must humorously agree. I am not sure if the reply was in response to the reply I made on my own blog or to the comment first quoted above. But that's neither here nor there. I rarely use Twitter directly. I use it as a notification system for those who prefer to follow me there rather than directly at my Tumblr blog - so my tweets are automated.

However, I manually sent this tweet to TeenGridNews on Twitter... (allow me to tighten my seatbelt right now)"

@teengridnews - I open myself to serious flaming here when I say *I SUPPORT* Opening the grid to teens - I hope ZINDRA allows it eventually.

There it is. I am now officially standing on the south-side of that great dividing intellectual fence, accompanied by very few against the vast majority of Second Life users. (Allow me to lower the face visor on my helmet before you start flinging the icky, nasty, stinky organic waste at me, please.)

Linden Lab is asked often about the whole Zindra plan. They are asked and it is often assumed, presumed and accused that Linden Lab's primary plan for moving all "adult" content into that 'inner sanctum' behind tall walls called Zindra (Zindra is the Linden word for "Kremlin", folks — okay, okay, just kidding!)

Linden Lab's response is and always has been (I paraphrase, but it always comes out to) "We have no plans at this time to merge the Teen Grid with the Main Grid."

I believe them. I also believe Linden Lab when they say the Zindra 'segregation' project (my words) is not designed or planned to the end of merging these grids. I believe it is simply to better organize the genre of content on the grid.

Any reasonable person with minimal common sense would agree even adults can be offended, even shocked (and often just plain tired of) the premise of much of the "adult" content and activities that go on across the grid. These are genuinely sensible people. It just gets 'wearing-down' seeing it all over the place after a while - and it is often in vendor displays, where those vendors are in the markets you almost always land in practically everywhere you go - the same markets that are necessary to help the parcel owners cover their tier fees..

Want to visit a role play sim? Teleport, land, rez, stare a large vendor screen with a picture of some giant sex toy staring you in the face. Sure, we just shrug it off and go looking for the entrance into the sim proper. But don't you get tired of seeing all that stuff all the time when you aren't even looking for it?

Let's face it, teens are here already. Let them be for crying out loud. The only reason "underagers" are 'forbidden' from the 'main grid' is so you and I and everyone else can be allowed to play by our own nastiest, most deviant, shocking dirty little fantasies.

Linden Lab allows this. It is not a right, but a privilege. This of course brings legal ramifications into the mix with regard to access to that naughty content by legal minors. Linden Lab wants Second Life to be open - open access to all, regardless of race, religion, skin color, creed, sexual orientation and... if they can find a way ...age.

I say go for it.

Not quite yet, of course. But once the content segregation is properly completed and the grid is 'cleaned-up' — go for it. Allow the teens into the main and kill the teen grid, which languishes like some lost, forgotten gulag.

I figure since the grid is being 'cleaned-up' (I mean this in a good way: the segregation of content genres) in order to make it easier to run into "adult" content only when you explicitly choose and intend to find it, then why not allow the teens in? There really is no reason not to.

So to be clear: I am not advocating opening the main grid to teens...yet. I agree, adults need to know they are surrounded by other adults. And they will, when on Zindra. As for the rest of the grid, why would it matter?

I believe the is the end to which Linden Lab is working and I support it. Uncle Philip has already stated that changes are coming and they will be uncomfortable changes, perhaps even 'painful' changes. But change happens. I believe allowing teens into the main eventually will be one of those "changes".

"We have no plans at this time to merge the teen grid with the main grid". No plans at this time. True - the plan is for a later time - after the grid has been cleaned-up. Merge the teen grid with the main grid. True - allow teens in and kill the teen grid.

The point being is that it is not a question of if, but when this will happen. And I stand on the side of the teens with regard to this scenario - provided the time is right and the grid made appropriate for it.

/me now pulls the splash cover over my entire body in preparation for the onslaught of whatever may be thrown in his direction.

art: GaBbu & Oleh; Ben SanJose; Jack and Laurie (DBCoop77)