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legal committee

A Question....

Has there been any consideration about age restrictions at the suggested archive?

As a long-time, multi-fandom participant and talking with another one this week over the issue at LJ and with fanlib, two things came up:

1. As long as we're paying someone else to host our things, they can decide not to host specific things. Also, people will attempt to make a profit off of us in any way possible. The best solution is to host our own site with a dedicated server than can house us all.

2. We were talking and we both agreed that if there was a multi-fandom fanfiction hub, we wouldn't want it to be along the lines of ff.net. Everyone I know cringes when a news source goes to ff.net to talk about the "fandom phenomenon". That said, admitting fic.'s based on quality is tricky and subjective. If we create something, for ourselves, then I hope that we would both cover ourselves legally and present ourselves professionally. There is a legal issue involving minors and NC-17 material than can only really be remedied by not allowing minors. The easiest solution seems to be creating a panfandom archive for underage readers either in association with or as part of the larger archive, requiring a age statement to sign up and logged-in-only access to adult material. Also, if there are no underage readers allowed, then there is less likelihood of creating another ff.net.

I know that this will probably not be a popular opinion. I know that many people in fandom, particularly on LJ are underage and "passing" or "socking" in order to read adult material. I'm not saying that some underage readers cannot handle adult material or aren't already participating in adult activities; however, from a legal standpoint, it seems more responsible to take precautions.

Additionally, in light of the recent LJ events, it's obvious that much of what gets archives, websites, journals and fic.'s shut down is a perceived danger to the "childrenz". If this is a site by adults, for adults it's less likely to come under that sort of negative fire. After all, we're going to have to deal with the legal ramifications of intellectual property and copyright laws already.

I'm truly not trying to rock the boat or ignore the many and important contributions of underage fans to fandom. I'm just trying to ascertain how the issues of liability will be dealt with.

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IIRC this was discussed in the original post in astolat's journal and thought was leaning towards having a theoretical but not actual system of age-restricted material

I must have missed that; I'll go look for it, thank you. The proposed 'theoretical' system would work and is essentially one of the option I foresaw.

My thoughts on this are also mixed. I didn't really get into fandom much before I was 18 and in my first fandom, I wasn't really interested in adult material so it was non-issue. However, my friend, who's been in fandom for almost 15 years was definitely underage when she got involved. I don't know what the answer is. The library isn't going to restrict books to children based on their perceived appropriateness for the age; they expect the parents to do that.

Unfortunately, for some reason, parents seem to think that they aren't responsible for what their children see online, the website is. It's an unfair double standard, but it's one we have to deal with.

And I wonder what the response is to under-18s writing the porn...!
I considered this, but I have no idea as to the answer. You can't stop underage people writing things based on age-appropriateness, but if you let them post them and don't let them read it seems hypocritical; I know. Search me on how to deal with it.

Yeah, but on an indirect harm principle - that something about the content will lead to children being harmed - as opposed to a direct harm principle where children are actually harmed by the existence of porn/the reading of porn.

I agree in relation to this latest issue, but I do think that a group of "concerned parentz" could hit an archive based on the "providing pornography to minors" principle. Which could and almost certainly would shut down an archive. That's why I wanted to know what was being considered.

he only thing I do feel strongly is that under-18s should not be ghetto-ized away. I agree as well. No one wants to be someone's ugly step-child and I wouldn't want to make underage fen feel that way. I don't know what the answer is, but I hope it's one that is respectful and safe for everyone.

I'm really not truly to be a big bad bully, I'm just trying to see what the consensus is and what we're considering.

Unfortunately, for some reason, parents seem to think that they aren't responsible for what their children see online, the website is.

Which is kind of tragic considering that, barring requiring a credit card number to join an archive/site/whatever, websites are actually completely unable to truly restrict content. Anyone can lie in a profile, administrators don't know. Parents are the ones who have to check. (Of course you need smart parents... my father checked my history one time. I started clearing the cache after that.) I mean, smart parents just should not rely on that.

I do think that a group of "concerned parentz" could hit an archive based on the "providing pornography to minors" principle.

Yeah. That's a concern. I mean, IANAL so I don't know much about the technical defintions of pornography - I know that academically the difference between pornography and erotic fiction is generally about to what extent the work is demeaning. Unfortunately that's a degree of sensitivity I don't think anyone really applies in these situations. So.

I'm really not truly to be a big bad bully, I'm just trying to see what the consensus is and what we're considering.

Yeah, I got that from your post :) don't worry. It's a valid concern.

Which is kind of tragic considering that, barring requiring a credit card number to join an archive/site/whatever, websites are actually completely unable to truly restrict content.

I agree. It seems to me that responsible web parenting is very different from responsible RL parenting and some people that are good at the latter are not good at the former. I don't know the solution for them is, but the common response seems to be to shift the blame onto the site itself. (And sadly IP's seem to react by shutting down the site--which none of us want.)

I mean, IANAL so I don't know much about the technical defintions of pornography - I know that academically the difference between pornography and erotic fiction is generally about to what extent the work is demeaning. Unfortunately that's a degree of sensitivity I don't think anyone really applies in these situations.

I agree with you here for the most part. I don't know what standards would/could be used, but I think it would be best not to have to find out. :/

Yeah, I got that from your post :) don't worry. It's a valid concern.
Thanks.

And sadly IP's seem to react by shutting down the site--which none of us want.

Yeah. I mean there's an extent to which, no matter personal feelings on the matter, protection from being shut down by Higher Powers is kind of vital.

Much more important is the ability to easily back up the whole archive so it may be moved and/or restored. Every ISP screws up sometimes and any site can be the target of accusations, justified or otherwise.

Backups should be a given, anyway, no matter what sort of technology you're talking about. You never know when someone is going to accidentally hit the wrong button.

Mmmm. Not only should we be able to make backups, I reckon we should make the database dumps publicly available so that anyone can bring up a new site if they want/need to. Wikipedia does this, for example, allowing people to copy the entire Wikipedia to their own hard drives or make another copy of it in another country if they want. I wrote a bit of an article touching on how that could be done, which is linked from http://damned-colonial.livejournal.com/414885.html if you're interested.

That sounds like a smart idea. The more accessible, maintainable it is, the better IMHO.

Thanks :)

barring requiring a credit card number to join an archive/site/whatever

Very bad idea, since in most of the world (except the US) the majority of people don't even use credit cards! That is, here in Europe they don't - only businessmen usually have them.

That's one of those things that keeps annoying me - I can hardly buy anything online because everything's based on the credit card system, which is normal for Americans, but weird and uncomfortable for us here.

Oh, I know! I'm from NZ and I am really anti the idea of getting a credit card, I have enough debt to deal with already - so I can't have a paid LJ or any of that fun stuff (ironically, there are solutions if you're in the US - things like paypal, I think, can be run through eftpos cards and so forth - just not outside it!) I used the exampke deliberately to point out how ridiculous an idea it would be. :P

*blush* You can send your money through RL mail. You can't send checks from outside the US and money orders cost as much as the money you're trying to send, most of the time (meaning you'll have to pay €10,0-or something while you're only trying to send €20,-), which basically means your only option is to put the (changed, dollar) money and the printout of your order in an envelop and hope it reaches them well.

I'm kind of worried about how I'm going to support the Archive, because I doubt they'll let me send the money cash.

Perhaps we could have a write-in method for those without credit cards, where individuals desiring access send a pdf copy of their passport/birth certificate, etc. (or a paper copy). As far as I know, that hasn't been done anywhere, but there is no reason it shouldn't work.

I'm in the U.S., but I don't have a credit card. Even if I wanted to give out my real name like that, I still would not feel comfortable sharing a copy of my passport/birth certificate. That seems like it would open up a lot of identity theft possibilities.

As far as I know, that hasn't been done anywhere

Probably because identify theft is rampant and people are hesitant to share important personal documents--even copies--that casually.

I agree. Most people I know only have debit cards, and two common ones in the UK are often not supported in this context.

Also, you don't have to be 18 in the US to have a credit card. In my state of origin, I had a credit card at 16 or 17 (to build up credit; I didn't really use it much), but the age of consent was 18 and I wasn't legally supposed to buy porn or sex toys until 21 (O US laws, logic escapes thee).

But frankly, I think it's offputting to require credit cards for verification; it's primarily done by sleazy porn sites, which is probably not a good association to have. And I, for one, wouldn't use any site that wanted my credit card # for "verification," and I suspect I'm not alone.

Using debit/check cards would be worse.

I'm not sure how things are done in the US, but here debit cards are the safest thing on earth. You can give the number to anyone - the only thing they can do is give you money. They'd need your card and your PIN code to be able to do anything to it - and there are a number of free numbers you can call to block your card if it gets stolen. You'll have a new card in the mail within days. If someone finds out what your PIN code is, it only takes another call and a few days later you can go to the post office or the bank to pick up a sealed envelope, read and memorise your PIN code and tear/burn the paper. Easier than pie. A lot easier than pi.

You can use a debit card online without a PIN code here (I'm not sure what you use instead; I've never done it) as well as run like credit with a signature in a physical store. The thing is, while in terms of getting your money back if someone steals your card (number) credit vs. debit is a wash, but if someone DOES steal your card, it can take a while to reverse the debit card charges, while with credit cards it at least doesn't hit your account until the next billing.

Also, you don't have to be 18 in the US to have a credit card
Exactly what I was going to say.

But frankly, I think it's offputting to require credit cards for verification; it's primarily done by sleazy porn sites, which is probably not a good association to have. And I, for one, wouldn't use any site that wanted my credit card # for "verification," and I suspect I'm not alone
Ditto there too.

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