1. I don't think it's a very good idea. Regardless of whether or not there are teenagers who get along better with adults than they do with teens, there will still always be those annoying little pissants whose main purpose in life is to make your game play miserable.

Plus, the servers are apparently overloaded as it is (what with the removal of the rating system and all). Why add to that problem by allowing the teens to move over as well? Doesn't that kind of defeat the purpose of trying to lessen the database load?

Then there's the problem of the casinos and strip clubs and escort services, etc. Not to mention the virtual drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, etc in game. There's no surefire guarantee as it is that everyone below the age of 18 are staying off the adult grid. There won't be one if the grids are joined either. At least right now, we can say we did our part trying to keeping the kids out of the strip clubs, hooker's pants, and hash bars (i.e. LL has the designated teen/adult grids, some places won't accept employees without payment info on file, etc).

And I don't even want to get INTO the ageplay situation that would arise, inevitably. *shudders*

I could say more about this, and why I feel like it's a bad idea, but I'm sure to just start rambling. Regardless, I sincerely hope it doesn't happen.

Posted at 12:11PM on Apr 15th 2007 by Ryker

2. To me it doesn't make any sense to have seperate grids as you should see Second Life as the internet of tomorrow. Needless to say mature content only belongs in mature areas AND Teens shouldn't be able to visit these areas.

Posted at 12:21PM on Apr 15th 2007 by Yo Brewster

3. after I read the article here at SLI about the two friends that got separated by one of them turning 18 I thought of somthing

there could be trasition parcels or sims, where people with an age difference of less than 7 years or something woudl be able to see each other and their creations, perhaps making some sort of visual representation of age difference, people that are older gets more transparent (ghost like) as their age difference gets bigger, and people that are younger will look smaller ont he screen of the older person till they are just a single pixel on the screen if they are exactly 7 years younger

the seven years thing was an arbitrary age difference I thought of to try to have friends not get separated, but a smaller age difference limit could be choose if so recommended by psicologists or somthing

but after thinking a while about that idea I realised that it wouldn't work if people (or the law) still sees as wrong the interaction between someone that is 17 years and 11 months old and someone that just turned 18 a couple of minutes ago :/


ps: I just thought of a few more things now while I was writing the comment, instead of transparency it they could be fogged out from distance and only visible and hearable from up close

Posted at 1:26PM on Apr 15th 2007 by TigroSpottystripes Katsu

4. It's about time. I don't know if anybody has ever been on a forum. But those certainly don't maintain this artificial boundary. You can see people from 13 to 43 just communicating normal with each other.

The current maintained rule is one out of fear. We should not rule upon the base of fear. We are creating a very virtual world with these principles.

Posted at 2:56PM on Apr 15th 2007 by Sebas

5. You cant protect childred from adult content, they will find it no matter what you do

Posted at 5:29PM on Apr 15th 2007 by eshop600

6. A friend of mine directed me to this page; Here's the original proposal:

Unification Proposal - Unite Teens with Adults

I, Alex Harbinger, propose that Teens be allowed to venture to the Main Grid’s PG simulators, yet the Teens will still retain the Teen Grid for themselves.

Connecting the two Grids (Teen Grid and Main Grid) would allow for a more diverse community, which in turn would prove the underlying essence of ‘Second Life’ as it really is - A Second Life, adults with Teenagers. There should be no age discrimination, no segregation.

Teens should be allowed to venture to the Main Grid’s PG sims. This may raise some problems however, such as: Legal and financial issues of exposing Teens to potential mature situations, the time and effort needed in allowing Teens onto MG-PG sims, adults disliking communications with Teens, and a magnitude of problems and issues that would arise.

By retaining the original Teen Grid, Linden Lab would evade any possible legal problems, and still keep their theme of a place ‘only for Teens’. This would also allow for teens that wish to stay separate from adults, separate.

It may be needed that Teens on MG would have a tag in their profile alerting others that they are, indeed, teenagers. In order to counter-balance the problems that may come with this, teenager abuse reports against adults should take top priority, or teens should have their own ‘support team’ (Ex – The current ‘Teen Grid Support’ team becomes ‘Teen Support’, working with all Teen reports, regardless of Grid.

Adults would benefit from having Teens on the MG-PG sims in a magnitude of ways, including a more diverse community, being able to communicate not only across continents, but also across age groups. Adults would also be able to teach Teens how to mature, and in turn, Teens would be able to show off their creativity. Adults would still keep the Mature sims to themselves, so that any adults who don’t want to see teens all the time can stay within the majority mature sims.

Linden Lab would benefit from this not only by being able to call their platform ‘Second Life’ and actually meaning it, but also by possibly allowing only Teens with payment info on file to be allowed on MG-PG sims, increasing both Teen-security, and allowing Linden Lab to retain more information on their customers, and increasing the chance of overall profits. This could potentially also increase the amount of customers Linden Lab has as more Teens would want to play, and adults that believe in a more diverse environment.

Furthermore, many Teens bring up the subject of ‘economic meltdown’ if Teens ever became able to buy MG items. Many residents on the Teen Grid have complained, “we aren’t good enough!” or “there’s no way we can stand up to adults! They spend 30 hours a day on SL!”. Adults may spend more hours in a day per day on SL, but that does not mean they are all better then Teens, nor that Teen-created items will become obsolete. Many residents of the Main Grid encourage Teens to create, and are interested in Teen creativity.

A recent study showed that Teen-created objects sold better on the Main Grid then on the Teen Grid, not only in volume, but also in profits while the items were at an elevated price. The amount of L$ gained far succeeded that on the MG than on the TG with an EXTREME minimal amount of participation on the [seller]’s part (No advertising on MG; Lots of advertising on TG). If Teens sold their items on the MG, there would be no lack of L$-flow.

Teens are strong enough, by far. We are not useless!

I say Linden Lab, let my people go. Unite parents with their children, teens with adults. Give us a chance. Make Second Life what it was meant to be!

[For more information, visit [http://www.alexharbinger.com] - Updates will be posted as they come]

[Vote for the cause! - [http://secondlife.com/vote/] - Prop 3128]

Posted at 10:59PM on Apr 15th 2007 by Alex Harbinger

7.
Life unfolds, despite the rules (whatever they are). But the current organization encourages cheating for legitimate reasons (like kids or parent wanting to stay in contact with those on the other grid) and those with less than legitimate reasons (whatever that may mean) will cheat anyway.

And kids meet adults day in and day out and if they have access to the internet, they have access to adult content. So the separation is not so much to protect the kids, but to keep the concerned adults comfy.

But, and I think this is a social issue, with the way the media/press works, it's probably smart of the Lindens to keep it as it is to cover their asses.

Posted at 7:09AM on Apr 16th 2007 by Markus

8. to be safe they should probably hire a bunch of specialized lawyers and psychologists/psychiatrist to help them make the best decision on this matter...

Posted at 8:51AM on Apr 16th 2007 by TigroSpottystripes Katsu

9. the answer is no. sl is not yet ready for a unification grid, there is still a lot of issues to be resolved.

Unification may work in say 3-5yrs from now but not for today's sl. there may be good intensions but the bad out weigh the good unfortunately, the grid is unstable, sl might be the internet of the future but its far from that today. When SL is ready unification could happen but for today 18 is still the perfect age for the adult grid. sl is already overloaded as it is.

Posted at 9:33AM on Apr 16th 2007 by N.O

10. Moo, Thanks for putting attention on this movement. But for point of clarification, Global Kids has not taken any position for or against the Unification proposal or any of its elements. Rather, we are simply putting attention on the movement, supporting the grassroots political efforts of teen residents, and helping in our very small way to have their voice heard by adults.
Barry Joseph, Global Kids, HolyMeatballs.org

Posted at 10:49AM on Apr 16th 2007 by Barry Joseph

11. I Think That It Should Be Ok For Teens To Use SL After All In RL There Are Teens Who Can Accsess Mature Things Off SL So Why Is It Any Different In SL?

Posted at 3:58PM on Apr 16th 2007 by Tomski

12. I missed those good old days when I was young and I was restricted from everything. Not.

Damn the world governments with their bleeding nanny state protection policies. I say the kids are alright!

Posted at 5:48PM on Apr 16th 2007 by Wai-Tung Leung

13. In RL Adults and Teens Mix like water, to protect us teens we should move all the teens to a medium sized island and all the adults to a giant island and then kill nay teens that bring mature content to the Teen island. Well that solves that problem no more teens will interact with adults anymore. See how rediculus(Sorry for spelling) that sounds?

Posted at 11:19PM on Apr 16th 2007 by TheCoolLeader Boyer(Teen)

14. I wonder in how many entries related to this I've posted comments, but well...

I can't say I support the teen proposal fully (especially when many things about it have been done before and seem to be ignored today) - instead I think that a cool thing to do would be to hold a debate between people from both grids with Lindens reading. These things are generally debated between adults or teens separately, and that'll lead to nothing, honestly - especially when the interests behind both positions are mostly commercial...

Posted at 1:48AM on Apr 17th 2007 by Mariel -teen-

15. Basically, by separating the teens from the adults, LL acknowledges that to a large number of users, SL is primarily for sex, gambling, drug use, and other "adult only" activity. So, if LL is admitting it, why can't everyone else?
The difference between RL and SL is that in RL people have to work, go to school, pay bills, do laundry, pee, poo, mow the lawn, cook food, etc. That's why teens and adults can interact without any problems; not to mention the legal problems one faces when it's taken to a level beyond simple interaction.
However, we all know that SL's job is to get rid of the annoying crap that everyone hates doing and focusing on the things that people love doing.. otherwise, sex wouldn't be SL's main deal. I don't think SL would be that popular if all you did in it was go to work, pee, eat lunch, get annoyed by co-workers, go to meetings, come home, have the wife nag at you for not doing the laundry, do the laundry, cook, eat food, and then HOPEFULLY get some action later on that night.
So, that's why teens can't be on the main grid. If RL was a world just like SL, full of vice with none of the everyday annoying stuff that we all have to do, then maybe it'd be a different story.

Posted at 7:26PM on Apr 17th 2007 by rp

16. No. Absolutely not.

Once you turn 18 and get a credit card, come back.

We don't need anyone who's mommy might sue if their baby sees a fake penis to go all sue-happy.

Come back when you're an adult.

Posted at 1:02AM on Apr 18th 2007 by Kahni Poitier

17. Q. How do we protect kids from adult content?

A. Within the Teen Grid's borders alone there are both Main-Grid created, and Teen-Grid created mature content. It is virtually impossible to protect Teens from viewing mature content. Linden Lab would of course restrict Teens from venturing to the Mature sims.


Q. Given the curious mix of PG and mature sims butting up it's impossible

A. It is possible for Linden Lab to not send the Mature-simulator info to clients logged in with Teen-tagged accounts, thus eliminating the possibility of Teens getting into Mature sims.


Q. This proposal would make it possible for families to share SL together, which they currently can't (there are people who see this as good, those who see it as bad).

A. Is this not Second Life? Life is all about family - Without family, life would not be life at all. It’s the fundamental basis of human society. It would only be ethically and morally right to unite families and stop the segregation.


Q. In RL we mix teens and adults in many situations and circumstances - families, shopping etc. Teens can, and do, find adult content if they look at all hard. Why does SL maintain this artificial division?

A. Covered in the first question - One can only do so much to try to protect Teens from Mature content. If one is determined, one can do almost anything.

Posted at 2:45AM on Apr 18th 2007 by Alex Harbinger

18. Well Alex a few things you are not realizing. First, the PG sims make up about 10% of the total mainland. Second, the teen population of Second Life is roughly 1% of all active users. Third, the teen grid is much more stable and less lag intensive due to its smaller nature. Third, this action would pit you, as a young land baron against Anshe, Azure Islands, etc. Fourth, this is sadly probably where Linden Labs is going with verification, meaning that I as a person who could care less about "adult" with the kiddies.

Posted at 12:50AM on May 23rd 2007 by Economic Mip