IMPORTANT: Regarding under-13s and COPPA.

Mr. X said:

You know the saddest part about it?

That staff have decided to start enforcing this law after more then a decade since this forum's creation.

This law was on the books before this site even existed. You'd think that this would have been one of the things talked about when the site was first created, not a decade after the fact.

So all of you saying that we are a bit 'late' to the game? No. We are not late to the game. We missed the game. We never cared enough to show up for the game.

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We are enforcing it now. Isn't that good? So complaining about what has been and has now been fixed, is pretty redundant :)

It is good that the decision has, after a decade, been made yes.

That it took a decade however reflects badly.

The complaining as you say is very justified given how long it took staff to decide their stance on this law. More. Then. A. Decade. Had it been a year, then it would be useless complaints over a resolved issue. But a decade, even with this issue now resolved? You call it what you want, complaining, and I'll call it what it is - Staff incompetence.

Mr. X said:

It is good that the decision has, after a decade, been made yes.

That it took a decade however reflects badly.

The complaining as you say is very justified given how long it took staff to decide their stance on this law. More. Then. A. Decade. Had it been a year, then it would be useless complaints over a resolved issue. But a decade, even with this issue now resolved? You call it what you want, complaining, and I'll call it what it is - Staff incompetence.

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And spanked we shall be. If you want to see if that way, should not the fact that we brought the issue to light now rather be seen as a sign that the level of staff work is going in the right direction? If you have actual issues with how staff is enforcing rules (or law), you should shape those into concrete points and present them in a CQ&F thread or to a hstaff member.

This is the first time I've ever seen COPPA enforced. Yet another **** American law. Honestly, if I were Steve, I might refuse to enforce it, and see what happens if we actually get caught - yes, I know that's not advisable, and definitely not happening, just hypothetically.

I see the worst part of this as it being completely pointless, there's nothing we can do to stop members lying about there age. Is it "technically illegal" because they accepted the Terms of Service, or whatever they're called? Possibly. Do we have the physical or monetary means to do anything about it? Nope. So we've been forced to ban dozens of good members because of a (imo) far too broad law.

So, I've gotten my parental consent. Now what?

Hiroshi Sotomura said:

Have you forwarded a scan or photo of the consent to Rukario? Once he receives it, then Bob's your uncle.

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I actually haven't thought of that haha. Thanks!

just gonna ask, why did you guys enforced COPPA now? what's the difference between then, now, and later?

Lady Gunner said:

just gonna ask, why did you guys enforced COPPA now? what's the difference between then, now, and later?

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It wasn't ever discussed before. Nobody ever really thought to bring it up in its strictest form: discussing the actual law and its affect it had on the community. We decided to enforce it because it's a law. We failed to enforce it because apparently nobody reads the ToS until ten years later.

I should say...

Even though I think the law is stupid, its mostly because I think its poorly handled and defined. I understand its purpose, and appreciate it - so thank you to everyone directing whatever they have to say towards me about my dislike of the law. I literally had no idea what its purpose was and appreciate you all for informing me what the official website that had the law completely written out I spent an hour and a half analyzing and reviewing it failed to inform me of. What would I do without you guys?

I can easily tell you the difference between now and later (not so much before). As long as PC continues to not enforce COPPA, PC is at risk for some sort of litigation. All it takes is an irate parent, or some troll who doesn't give a crap about collateral damage, to file a complaint on the COPPA website for PC to at least get investigated. IF PC is found guilty, PC will have to pay a fine and then bring the site to COPPA standards, or risk getting shut down. When it comes to the law, now is always safer than later.

In the beginning, the law was meant to make it a lot harder for criminals to do their work (identity thieves, RL meetups, etc.) but it's since been expanded to include getting any sort of important information from kids (data mining, selling data to companies, privacy, all that jazz). Before you ask what sort of information PC asks for, lemme point to you the option to make public the age and birthday on your account. JUST those options forces PC to conform to COPPA. And let's not go into the gaming network identities option. That would definitely fall under COPPA.

Hey, I was just wondering if we should apply this new rule to the PC Pokemon Showdown server? I mean come on, the server is likely to be more harmful to children than the forums are (because the forums are heavily moderated). I think that this new rule should apply to the PC server especially because sometimes the discussions get a little out of hand and perhaps a little bit more than PG-13. I definitely support the idea of protecting our youngins from harmful material and I don't think it's very fair to the moderators on the PC forum to have to worry about what older members are talking about in the main chat especially considering how busy some of the moderators are irl.

As a 17 year old big brother to a new and upcoming pokemon player (who's not quite 13 yet he's turning 13 in the next few months), I think that he should not be able to come on the PC server and discuss with the members yet due to his naive and tender little mind. I just really want to protect my younger, pokemon playing siblings and everyone's younger pokemon playing siblings about the globe. Thanks.

Thunder_Chad said:

Hey, I was just wondering if we should apply this new rule to the PC Pokemon Showdown server? I mean come on, the server is likely to be more harmful to children than the forums are (because the forums are heavily moderated). I think that this new rule should apply to the PC server especially because sometimes the discussions get a little out of hand and perhaps a little bit more than PG-13. I definitely support the idea of protecting our youngins from harmful material and I don't think it's very fair to the moderators on the PC forum to have to worry about what older members are talking about in the main chat especially considering how busy some of the moderators are irl.

As a 17 year old big brother to a new and upcoming pokemon player (who's not quite 13 yet he's turning 13 in the next few months), I think that he should not be able to come on the PC server and discuss with the members yet due to his naive and tender little mind. I just really want to protect my younger, pokemon playing siblings and everyone's younger pokemon playing siblings about the globe. Thanks.

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This is a horrible idea tbh. The server is heavily moderated by a great staff team and we do not allow such discussions. PS also does not ask for personal information so yeah..I don't see the point in banning people from the server when it doesnt ask for personal information and the chat is kept under a close watch at all times.

And all they want to do on here is the same thing.... battle. I don't see the point in blocking one but not the other. You guys have every right to block younger children from entering the server at risk that they may be harmed from the discussions there. I am not saying that the moderation staff on the server is bad because it's not. The moderators there are excellent but I don't see the reason why said moderators need to worry about potential "bad" discussions harming younger members when they could just not let them on for a few months until they turn 13 and everything would be peachy keen. It's not fair to the moderators or the other members to have to put up with this massive responsibility.

Thunder_Chad said:

And all they want to do on here is the same thing.... battle. I don't see the point in blocking one but not the other. You guys have every right to block younger children from entering the server at risk that they may be harmed from the discussions there. I am not saying that the moderation staff on the server is bad because it's not. The moderators there are excellent but I don't see the reason why said moderators need to worry about potential "bad" discussions harming younger members when they could just not let them on for a few months until they turn 13 and everything would be peachy keen. It's not fair to the moderators or the other members to have to put up with this massive responsibility.

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You act as if it is a huge burden for us. Moderating the server and keeping the chats appropriate for our younger users is easy and not a burden at all. We all enjoy it and wouldn't be doing so if we didn't. You also say that it isn't fair blocking them from one and not the other, well PC=/= PS. Yes it is PC's official server, but has completely different rules when concerning COPPA.

Twilight Sky said:

Okay, I've spoken to a moderator (keeping them anonymous) and it honestly seems that, from what I've gotten, there's a misunderstanding with thinking that COPPA applies to showdown: It doesn't.

The Showdown rule regarding COPPA was removed ages ago by Zarel. I believe there's some sort of confusion regarding rule #2 as far as "follow all US laws" but i believe that is in regards to "Don't distribute pirated material, and don't slander others.", as far as my understanding comes out of it. It is also worded that PS is available to users under 18, which includes those that are under 13 as well.

I apologize if this wording is poor, I hope I clarified the best that I can.

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If you click the "rules" link on the showdown you'll actually see that it mentions that players should be 13 or over. Their privacy policy is the specific bit.

And even beyond that, PS is still within law which would completely override any local rules on age. The rules section does state that the PS will follow US laws.

/editing some links in

There's no data to be gotten off Showdown so it doesn't fall under COPPA laws (unless you're using the same name and pass for everything, don't do that). After all, all you do is register a name and then build a team. What personal data can you get off of that other than your personal battle preferences? For Showdown, it is completely up to the moderators. PC does fall under COPPA, for some of the reasons I stated earlier. If you want your brother to stay off Showdown, you'll have to block him yourself.

Magic Fox said:

If you click the "rules" link on the showdown you'll actually see that it mentions that players should be 13 or over. Their privacy policy is the specific bit.

And even beyond that, PS is still within law which would completely override any local rules on age. The rules section does state that the PS will follow US laws.

/editing some links in

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Exactly. The rule already applies on Showdown and it needs to be applied on the PC server to protect our up and coming younger members. Also, if we don't use the PC forum rules on the server and we don't use the Showdown rules on the server than what rules do we use? I'm pretty sure that a few posts ago you guys said that PC =/= Showdown so I think we need to quickly make this change and use Showdown's rules with COPPA.

Twilight Sky said:

Not to be rude, but kindly show me where it says that, because I must be missing something. That would also be contradicting the rule that PS is available to users under 18, it says nothing about users under 13. All in all, the rule wording is very fishy and I think we're only going to put ourselves in a bind if we're going to overanalyze showdown's rules and apply them to PC's server lol .-.

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I'm sorry for the slight mistake, I edited my post which makes it clear the over 13 bit is in the Privacy Policy.

Twilight Sky said:

Children under 13 should not use Showdown. It doesn't say that they cannot use Showdown. u_u

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Well, now you're digging in to technicalities.

I'll share my personal opinion: Under 13s should be allowed on anonymously (as like you said, it does not involve sharing much personal information as long as they don't discuss their details) however they should not be voiced or acting as moderators - that, to me, implies information.



Whatever actually happens though, will be up to those staff in charge of the servers/higher staff.

Twilight Sky said:

But out of curiosity, what does the voiced position or moderation status have anything to do with age? I cannot find an exact correlation between the two, whatsoever. .-.

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Their ability has nothing to do with it. COPPA does. It's really unfortunate, we've seen some great members be banned.

Pokémon Showdown does not belong to PC, so we have nothing to do with how they handle the COPPA laws. That's as far as it goes, really.