Twitch is Technically Correct to Ban Second Life for Adult Content Focus & Graphically Nude Avatar Feature

Twitch's policy prohibiting Second Life streaming has caused a lot of outrage among some SLers, but that annoyance overlooks an inconvenient fact: It's technically correct. Twitch's statement says Second Life content "is sexually explicit, which is content we do not allow on our services". And in fact, the majority of Second Life's most popular sims are Adult-rated for extreme sexual and violent content -- look:

Courtesy Louis Platini's Metaverse Business, these are the top 25 most active Second Life sims this month, listed by average avatar visitor count at any given period, visitor range, and previous position -- 13 of which are Adult-rated. So that's already a problem for Twitch.

Now let's look at the full statement from Twitch:

Content in [Second Life] is unrated and often sexually explicit, which is content we do not allow on our services. We also do not permit Adults-Only rated games and games where nudity is the core focus, feature, or goal.

Second Life is not rated by the ESRB, but if it was, it'd be rated Adults-only.

But what about the idea that nudity in Second Life is "the core focus, feature, or goal?" The fact that most popular Second Life sims are Adult-rated definitely suggests nudity is a core focus/feature/goal.

But here's an even more pressing point:

In Second Life, graphic nudity is possible everywhere -- even in the "General" and "Moderate"-rated areas. Any avatar at any time can suddenly appear nude in all his, her, or its glory -- with full-fledged, working genitals and pubic hair, which are available throughout Second Life for free. In fact, Second Life is the only mainstream-intended MMO where graphic nudity is possible. In other words, graphic avatar nudity is one of Second Life's differentiating features. (Yes, a nude avatar can be banned in a General-rated area, but only after the damage, so to speak, has been done.)

Allowing the streaming of Second Life would put Twitch, a service very popular with kids, in the position of being unable to control the broadcasting of live virtual porn, anytime, anywhere, even in situations which were supposed to be G-rated -- even when the Twitch streamers did everything possible to prevent it. And you know that would happen, in the same way Second Life YouTube videos are currently cluttered with dumbass, NSFW trolling like this:

So while Twitch is losing the opportunity to stream all the truly great content in Second Life, it's a mainstream service owned by Amazon, and can hardly be blamed for enforcing its own rules. If anything, this opens up an opportunity for Twitch competitors open to SL in all its wild, often rude, genital-waving glory -- like Hitbox.

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Comments

[Ciaran Laval]

So what rating is Grand Theft Auto?

[Ziki Questi]

You're drawing a correlation between the most populated sims on the one hand, which hold 100 or so people maximum simultaneously, and Second Life users as a whole and their whereabouts on the other (with concurrency at 49k as I write this, according to Tyche's database), but I'm not sure anyone with competency in statistics would assume that popularity in these thirteen individual adult sims necessarily correlates to strong "adult" interests among in Second Life residents as a whole. One would need to examine a far deeper set of data to arrive at a conclusion.

Also, you're incorrect about "some nudity permitted" on General sims. It's not. See: https://community.secondlife.com/t5/English-Knowledge-Base/Maturity-ratings/ta-p/700119#Section_.2.2

[Kim Anubis]

Not to debate the other points, but SL can't be rated "Adults-only", because minors are allowed to use it.

[zz bottom]

Sadly, cause when i did join there was a teen grid and Sl was really only for adults.
Id any many are getting wrong is that Sl or Sl2 need to be mainstream and for kids.
Its' future as any virtual grid not dedicated to education is focusing on the "Only adults" users, period.
But well, we already know that Sl v2 will be +13 so no doubt no adult content in there will be allowed, therefore Sl v1 will keep going and even if it ends, Open sim adult grids are already a reality.

[Iggy]

I am horrified about the existance an adult-rated Fawlty Towers sim. Horrified. I blame Manuel.

[Arcadia Codesmith]

The next incarnation of Second Life might have tighter restrictions on subadult zones, but I'm certain they will have adult content. I know there's some sentiment that sex is preventing SL from being mainstream, but sex IS mainstream, and might in fact be the single largest segment of mainstream online culture.

SL has gotten as far as it has, not despite sex but in part because of it. Conversely, other virtual worlds have foundered in part because they tried to ban sex.

It's not a design decision to focus on explicit content that drives it, because LL certainly hasn't. The sexual content of Second Life is a natural and inevitable consequence of giving the users as much freedom as possible to create and play as they wish. We of course use that freedom to fulfill desires and dreams we can't always have in real life, and for many of us, that includes a certain amount of sometimes very kinky sex.

That's the nature of freedom. When you liberate people, they often use their freedom in ways of which you don't approve. That's not an excuse to intervene, unless they're using their freedom to oppress other people.

[Shockwave Yareach]

It isn't difficult to manage ratings. Simply have Mainland split into thee continents - g, m, and a. Make it so each continent is all one rating and you don't have kids in g cramming into the skin store in m next door. Simple.

And this is what they SHOULD have done when they forced everyone off their paid for property and over to Zindra. Of course, that's only one of a litany of mistakes where LL took a bad solution and worked long and hard to make it even worse.

If twitch doesn't want SL videos then that's thier choice. And it opens the door for other companies who won't care what game you show. Maybe a firm south of the border where busy body net washers are roundly ignored? A company in Mexico needs not care that a Mormon presidential hopeful doesn't like their streaming service - he's not paying the bills.