FA Banning Cub Porn Again?

[ProvincialTwit]

which demands people leave comments on it in such quantities so as to make the FA servers crash.

IN ORDER TO SAVE THE PORN, WE HAD TO DESTROY THE PORN

[Vikar]

IN ORDER TO SAVE THE PORN, WE HAD TO DESTROY THE PORN

He who controls the porn, controls the universe!

[Jim Demintia]

I just read that journal screencap Vikar posted in his second edit to his post.

Now, I produce cub stories and they're my main source of income

Holy shit.

[Mondegreen]

FA's Acceptable Upload Policy has been changed - as of today,

FA does not permit images of minors involved in sexual situations. This applies to humans (Loli, Shota) or otherwise human-like characters (i.e. Cub) who are, without question, under the general legal age (18). Images where the character is of questionable or indeterminable age will be up to the discretion of the administration.

The reasoning:

AlertPay dropped us. We have been having issues accepting payment processors for some time to fund the website, as any reputable company we've contacted has given us the thumbs down when it comes to our content. Specifically, they have only ever had issue with one particular kind of content: cub art. Everything else has been fine, but companies want to distance themselves from that grey area because it makes people uncomfortable.

AlertPay canceled, and specifically cited cub art as the reason. We were given no options to appeal. With that cancellation, a fairly sizable amount of money in our balance from ads and donations have been lost, which has effectively crippled the website from having ways to fund itself long term. We will not be able to maintain and improve without a reliable payment processor at our backend, and that can not happen while they continually have a disagreement regarding certain specifics with what we host.

Right now we have to make a choice. Do we continue on with cub artwork and protect the artwork in the name of freedom of speech? Or do we remove the one Achilles heel that has proven itself to be a liability and a frustration?

If we want to keep Fur Affinity alive we have no choice but to remove cub art.

[Jim Demintia]

Ah, so without any way for Dragoneer to get his welfare payments from the fandom, something had to be done.

But I'm glad they have air-tight language in that AUP change. Because surely no one is going to reason that their 10 year old naked anatomically-correct cub is really 24 but just looks 10. Most real sites will refer to the character's apparent age, or make reference to something like "prepubescent [or underdeveloped] appearance". Yet this genius is speaking as if these drawings have an actual, real human age, and as if some number is the crux of the issue at hand.

[m_estrugo]

They've got to clean the zillions of 'cub' art they've got there already. How are they gonna do that?

[Jim Demintia]

How are they gonna do that?

More likely, what would happen is that random users would be randomly banned for random reasons. Basically, no significant logistical change would be necessary! The AUP is already a meaningless collection of words; changing what those words are won't change that fact.

[Conan]

So much for those donor badges.

EDIT: They must have lost a lot of money. Does Dragoneer understand how a bank works?

[Jim Demintia]

EDIT: They must have lost a lot of money. Does Dragoneer understand how a bank works?

That's actually the real story here if you ask me. The banning of cub art is just a symptom of this.

[AshleyAshes]

But I'm glad they have air-tight language in that AUP change. Because surely no one is going to reason that their 10 year old naked anatomically-correct cub is really 24 but just looks 10. Most real sites will refer to the character's apparent age, or make reference to something like "prepubescent [or underdeveloped] appearance". Yet this genius is speaking as if these drawings have an actual, real human age, and as if some number is the crux of the issue at hand.

It's strange cause a lot of people have suggested this loophole and the admins have flat out, shot it down.  This leaves you to wonder why they never specified that in the AUP in the first place.

[Jim Demintia]

They clearly don't understand the framework under which such things usually operate. If it's that explicit, WRITE IT DOWN.

[rodox_video]

I can't believe it. He pulled the trigger.

Pretty brilliant, really. FA's administration gets to ban cub porn and take the blame entirely out of their hands. They get to have their cake and eat it too; dropping all the responsibility at AlertPay's feet was a wonderful way to avoid backlash.

People are rejoicing in the streets. They actually think furry just got a little bit safer and a little bit less creepy.  Such a shame that they're mistaken.

[pikachang]

Some choice gems from the thread:
(about the amount of money lost)

We can only confirm it's in the four numbers.

Before you can accept AlertPay for money reasons they have to do a manual review of your site and approve/disapprove the content. So we let them do that, and they greenlit FA. Then somebody reported us, a ticket was opened and the account put on hold... six days later the account was shut down.

AlertPay, and several other groups, basically told us that whether they felt it was legal or not... the amount of money we'd generate for them in a year wouldn't amount to the legal fees that they'd incur a day if it ever went to court, and because of that, we weren't worth the risk of protecting.

You can still have your dog genitals.
Why are you whining?

[ProvincialTwit]

Ahahaha oh wow.  That didn't take long.  I'm already seeing hits in our referrer logs from desperate pedofurs searching for "cub porn furaffinity alternatives"

[Jim Demintia]

Then somebody reported us

Well, champ, if you're violating the rules...

AlertPay, and several other groups, basically told us that whether they felt it was legal or not

Red meat for the pedo masses, or butthurt? You decide.

[pikachang]

Yeah... basically, pedos are incredibly lucky that their shit wasn't banned for so long:

- At first, it WAS banned, but not enforced.
- Then there was the whole pedofur art vote debacle.
- Dragoneer was considering banning it, relative to various european/canadian/australian law developments that would have made drawn pedo art illegal:

We were actually considering banning cub porn, and had a policy drafted earlier this year (around May, I think?). We were watching policies being proposed in the EU, Australia and other countries, and were in a "holding pattern". If the policies passed, blocking it in the EU or other places, we'd have enacted to protect the 20% of our users who came from those areas.

Be we opted to hold back in the name of free speech.

That didn't work out in the end.

Basically it WAS going to happen, just a question of when. Now the question is more like, are they going to half ass the whole thing and leave up all the "supposedly toon/chibi styled art but actually looks like a 5 year old" stuff, or even leave it in the AUP but not spend any effort to actually delete any of it? Or, most probably, do the huge cleanup, get approved by the pay processor, then get lazier...

Incidentally, I think the whole thing might deserve a front page article... no?

Bonus quote:
(in reply to some pedo stating that he's sad and he's moving to Inkbunny)

Think you should know: AlertPay cut off InkBunny this morning for the same reason and they'll probably have to ban Cubshit too. =D HAVE A GREAT THANKSGIVING!

[Jim Demintia]

I love how he can barely contain his venom towards rival porn sites.

And lol @ the idea that Dragoneer follows international politics, or anything at all that isn't featured on some dumbshit video gaming blog.

[AshleyAshes]

Think you should know: AlertPay cut off InkBunny this morning for the same reason and they'll probably have to ban Cubshit too. =D HAVE A GREAT THANKSGIVING!

Link?  That's a huuuuuuge thread and I can't dig it up myself.

[Conan]

Does anybody remember last year when FA had to find a new colocation facility? Remember when Dragoneer announced he had found a Canadian company that was willing to host them, but then went with their current one because it was better in the same town as him?

Anyone think it would have been funnier if they decided to send the servers to Canada? This whole thing probably would have ended with FA's servers being seized by the Government.

Think you should know: AlertPay cut off InkBunny this morning for the same reason and they'll probably have to ban Cubshit too. =D HAVE A GREAT THANKSGIVING!

Link?  That's a huuuuuuge thread and I can't dig it up myself.

Trying to buy something gives you this message (halfway through the process too, after you enter your address)

Sales System Offline

The sales system is temporarily unavailable. It is not possble to pay for your chosen items at this time. We are sorry for the inconvenience.

Please try again later. You can still continue adding items to your basket and they will be saved for when you return.

[pikachang]

Think you should know: AlertPay cut off InkBunny this morning for the same reason and they'll probably have to ban Cubshit too. =D HAVE A GREAT THANKSGIVING!

Link?  That's a huuuuuuge thread and I can't dig it up myself.

http://forums.furaffinity.net/threads/87380-The-New-Policy-on-Cub?p=2265172&viewfull=1#post2265172

Bonus: Apparently the only important content on FA is cub porn.
http://forums.furaffinity.net/threads/87380-The-New-Policy-on-Cub?p=2265827&viewfull=1#post2265827

Also, seems that Sofurry was also using Alertpay and also got hit.