I've written before about the benefits of adult site labeling. While I am most certainly not suggesting that you ditch the classic Warning page, I am suggesting that you increase your efforts to keep the underage and easily offended off of your porn site.
|
"We're not advising that you get rid of your Warning page. We're not suggesting that you dump your ICRA (Internet Content Ratings System) labels for an RTA Label. We want you to use all three." |
An adult that wants to view porn on the web should be able to find it without the fear of Federal agents busting in the door. As well, a person that wants to make money selling porn on the web should be able to do so without being deemed a criminal. There are a heck of a lot of uptight legislators and pearl-clutching groups that want to criminalize Internet porn. They want to drive us underground and they don't care how many civil liberties they have to quash to achieve their goal. From the US. Department of Justice's never-ending attempt to enforce COPA, to their tortuous overhaul of 2257 record-keeping requirements to the efforts by private and legislative interests to encamp us in a .xxx TLD red light district, the powers that be refuse to accept that adult webmasters are law-abiding citizens, just trying to make an honest living. They will continue to beat the drums of shame and outrage unless we as an industry stand together prove to them that we don't want underage surfers on our adult sites. Our collective stand is self-regulation and that is where site labeling enters the picture.
Say what you will about movie ratings but after almost a hundred years of doing business, the American film industry has managed to avoid government censorship. How did they do it? Self-regulation.
Untitled Page
In 1922, there was much lot legislative outcry for someone, anyone to control the supposedly torrid and evil influences of Hollywood. Before the government got the chance to makes laws against boobies and curse words in film, the studios set up the Motion Pictures Producers and Distributors Association. Headed by former postmaster William Hays, the MPPDA adopted a code of standards in 1930 referred to as the Hays Code. The Hays code stood until the 1950s but was often ignored by both filmmakers and studios. In the 1966, the MPPDA (now known as the MPAA) chucked the production code altogether and adopted a movie ratings system. At first, that ratings were simple. G for general audiences. M for mature audiences. R for boobies and curse words. X for super-nasty bad stuff. The ratings got more complicated for the next decade or so. The X rating was dumped because the MPAA didn't own the copyright on it and because an X-rated film - "Midnight Cowboy" - won the Academy Award for best picture of 1969 and was totally not a porn movie. Today, the ratings are G, PG, PG-13, R and NC-17. Porn films took custody of X ratings and cloned them with XX and XXX. Movie ratings seem sort of quaint and arbitrary in this day and age but they mean a lot when it comes to marketing. Trailers for R-rated films cannot be shown in a theater presenting a G or PG movie. NC-17 rated films have a heck of a time getting any promotional support from studios. While there is much to criticize about the MPAA ratings system, the self-regulation keeps the government out of the movie censorship business.
Today, the adult Internet faces the same dilemma that the film industry faced in 1922. It is also the same dilemma the music industry faced in the 1980's from the PMRC. Self-regulate or allow the government to censor us. Fortunately, our industry has taken the problem by the reigns.
RTA Label is a website labeling system started by the folks at ASACP. When you apply for and label your site with an RTA Label, users with filtering software can block your page from their browsers. The label is self explanatory. RTA stands for Restricted To Adults. When you apply, your page gets added to the RTA Label database. Simple paste the code and graphic on your site and, viola, you have done the right thing, the smart thing. You have joined the ranks of adult webmasters who proudly announce: "No, we do not want children on our sites."
As written in the opening, we're not advising that you get rid of your Warning page. We're not suggesting that you dump your ICRA (Internet Content Ratings System) labels for an RTA Label. We want you to use all three. We are writing bout RTA Label in this article because it is adult industry-based, made by adult webmasters, for adult webmasters.
Read the FAQ. Study and agree to the Terms and Conditions. Apply for the label and paste the code. Stand with your fellow adult webmasters and self-regulate!