Roleplay/Partyfinder Discrepancies & Policy Enforcement by GM's

[erroch]

As someone rather closely involved with the RP community on several datacenters, That said, I'm curious what the advertisements were that got taken down? That said, I don't have much contact with the Primal RP community to ask directly, I know on Crystal and to an extent Light, the party finder is, by large majority being used to mass advertise events of an adult nature or non-roleplay events (Clubs, etc) as the large majority of the SFW style events have migrated off to third party solutions (disclaimer, I run one of those). Having some information on what exactly has triggered things might help others to not fall into the same footsteps? We've seen the GM chants but not what was being advertised. Was it all the social PF entries that got tagged or a small collection of them?

So for those who have gotten tagged, what was the advertisement, and was it just one advertisement for your event, or did, like Crystal is having a small issue with, where every member of a group's staff putting up a party finder ad for the same event?

Also has anyone had an instance of this happening outside of Primal, which seems to be where all the characters in the screenshots were. I'd like to get a better picture of exactly what happened.

[Nakarumi]

The problem is that the conflation doesn't matter. SE is technically well within their rights to request that 18+ adverts not be posted publicly because the game is legally rated and breaches of that legal rating could get them into trouble. So, if the stance is "You cannot have 18+ adverts on PF because we cannot condone anything above our legal rating on an official level" then that is a fair stance. It doesn't matter if your 18+ content isn't sexual, you have still rated it as more mature than the game's legally intended audience and SE can, rightly, ask you to not use PF to advertise content above that age limit. Legally, in fact, they might very well have to. Recall that this is the same game that can only have minor depictions of blood and has previously had to outright manipulate cutscenes they wanted to do (like a soldier being shot with an arrow I'm fairly certain is an exact example Yoshida himself gave) because the legal rating of the game made those depictions inappropriate.

This is already protected by their statement: "Online interactions are not rated."

[Yencat]

Also, as a more clear denomination of both above-stated points and since this is something that was mentioned several times before, this game is rated T for the content that SE themselves provide and develop. However, SE also states and claims that online interactions (social activities) are NOT RATED and are only moderated on a case-by-case basis as when reported when something is in violation of the TOS. So while, yes, policy number 3.3 may not allow certain language or word-use to be appropriate in party finder, it doesn't mean that adult content is forbidden from within the game. Pornographic language isn't allowed in public forum, but ads for an adult venue is completely within reason. As expressed by another GM from another occasion:

So you're allowed to use Party Finder to advertise an ERP for Gil transaction, but not allowed to use Party Finder to RP knights and princesses or whatever because that's a violation?

[TheRedChameleon]

This is already protected by their statement: "Online interactions are not rated."

Also protected by the fact that they are not legal bodies capable of issuing fines, the only tool they can use is advocating for retailer boycotts which would be an outlandish move for them to make.

[Nakarumi]

As someone rather closely involved with the RP community on several datacenters, That said, I'm curious what the advertisements were that got taken down? That said, I don't have much contact with the Primal RP community to ask directly, I know on Crystal and to an extent Light, the party finder is, by large majority being used to mass advertise events of an adult nature or non-roleplay events (Clubs, etc) as the large majority of the SFW style events have migrated off to third party solutions (disclaimer, I run one of those). Having some information on what exactly has triggered things might help others to not fall into the same footsteps? We've seen the GM chants but not what was being advertised. Was it all the social PF entries that got tagged or a small collection of them?

So for those who have gotten tagged, what was the advertisement, and was it just one advertisement for your event, or did, like Crystal is having a small issue with, where every member of a group's staff putting up a party finder ad for the same event?

Also has anyone had an instance of this happening outside of Primal, which seems to be where all the characters in the screenshots were. I'd like to get a better picture of exactly what happened.

I, myself, am from Primal so most of the screens I was able to get hold of were from fellow Primal players. But I have heard this largely happened on Aether also. I only don't have screenies from them as I'm not close friends with most outside of my own data center. But as more and more info comes in, the more I'm seeing this was happening all over. Naturally, most screenshots were only taken after an incident occurred and the GM was clearing their PFs so no original screenshots of the PF posts themselves were captured. But reports from venue owners of all kinds were coming in from all over in several discords. SFW, NSFW, N/A... everything in-between... it didn't matter. If it was RP associated, they were being hit apparently.

[Kaurhz]

So the root of what you're referring to is just in itself: fetishes, brothels, and/or other explicit content
And not the RP community as a whole?

Do I need to repeat myself? Yes, this is the root of the problem, but again, allowing Roleplay in the general PF just enables this behavior of unwanted stuff and that Fellowship Finder is a more appropriate place in which Roleplay should be contained.

[Aslae]

Do I need to repeat myself? Yes, this is the root of the problem, but my argument is that allowing Roleplay in the general PF just enables this behavior of unwanted stuff and that Fellowship Finder is a more appropriate place in which Roleplay should be contained.

I think we all agree that that sort of thing can be safely placed somewhere where only those looking for it could find it, but Fellowship finder IS NOT the answer. It's a broken feature that performs exceedingly poorly for the type of thing you're trying to tell us to use it for.

[Borril]

From the 14 Subreddit. It was stared 3 were SFW and 4 were NSFW, so while there were ERP ones there were no distinctions made between them.

[Nakarumi]

Do I need to repeat myself? Yes, this is the root of the problem, but again, allowing Roleplay in the general PF just enables this behavior of unwanted stuff and that Fellowship Finder is a more appropriate place in which Roleplay should be contained.

No, I wasn't asking for repetition but rather a clarification. But I will repeat something I said for another user so you can see the same discussion from before:

"You're argument is half valid. Sultry adult content may be unwanted and uncalled for but you're throwing out the entire pantry for only a couple of bad apples. This does not resolve, nor address the central problem. I believe an additional category to the PF is a perfect compromise to the problem of what people do and do not want to see but until that is initiated... The problem is the overall content being used as a means to put "marks" on people's accounts when they're not doing any wrong at all. Especially when it's something that may simply be unwanted but NOT against the rules that are clearly written in the TOS. The actions that took place as described in the OP, are not justified."

In addition to that statement to one user, I also stated the following for another user as well that you may find relevant:

"I find this to be a fair assessment as well. Pushing the RP community to the side into 'alternatives or workarounds' that are unequal and can't reach the same demographic that partyfinder does (especially in the context of allowing other PFs to remain such as selling clears and marketing FCs or craft services) is considered to be completely discriminatory and prejudice against the entirety of the roleplay community as a whole. Shouts, linkshells, and Fellowships are EXTREMELY limited in their outreach and exposure and would be a means of segregation from a service that is supposedly allowable to all other aspects of the gaming community.

If a separate function or feature was implemented to allow us the same ease of access for both venues and those seeking venues, then I could find this to be an amenable resolution."

[RickmanUK]

I was meaning that all the Social Aspects of the Game that are on PF should be treated the same and reported/moved to a seperate thing so everyone is on the same page. That way the PF can remain for the pure "Do content as soon as group is ready", and adverts for FCs, Statics Selling, Crafting etc are under a seperate thing... Since then they can act on a definitive ruleset for PF and SF (Social Finder) and this type of thing shouldn't come up again.... It probably will depending on WHY it happened (Could be some bad faith actors against RP, could be a GM acting upon their own preferences etc).