Was looking into the reblogs and thought Iâd my 2 cents. I work in the technology industry and enforcement of theseâwhat some might callââdelicateâ policy matters do impact teams behind the scene. Often weâre the ones cleaning up.
Note Iâve never had to deal with this situation myself, but I know what these terms mean in practice/enforcement.
When the policy refers to âartistic purposesâ they do not mean erotica. Written pornography is considered what it says on the tinâpornography.
While the original story may be suspect, Google has been very clear on their policies over the years: What is only accessible by your account is largely your own business.
If you open up that share link or email shares to anyone?
Yeah, thatâs now Googleâs business.
Thatâs considered distribution.
Now, Google canât reliably monitor everything anyone is doing. They rely a lot on AI to flag certain things for human review, but mostly itâs a report by a human reviewed by a human where the trouble starts.
Erotica writers have been warning since Google Drive opened: Do not rely on it. A single report by a single person could nuke all your work.
So why the sudden scare for some people if this policy has been in place for years? Probably changed or tuned the AI to catch more suspect terms and some people got caught up in the crossfire. Theyâll retune it if they feel thereâs backlash. Or this is a really juicy drama story about someone invading erotica zones just to report their google docs. Itâs most likely the first thing.
Normally, I will say, moderators donât really care about this content anyway. It tends to be a low-priority review. âOh no, Clarence is talking about pegging again!â Doesnât get the teams worried⌠buuuut.
To put it bluntly⌠But some moderators are assholes.
Hope that helps fill any knowledge gaps. Iâve made a couple posts on this myself and am dismayed by people rejecting what has been wisdom for years. Investors think sex and sex work is icky. They will look for any way to justify their moralization with money.
You put yourself at risk when you rely on the goodwill of the people with money.
FYI I just came across a thread on twitter which says that an author shared on google docs an explicit story with a friend for beta reading and google removed the file due to violation of TOS (apparently it has been updated where you are not allowed to share anything with sexual content). Not sure if itâs just this instance or if itâs going to become a widespread thing but if you guys write in google docs MAKE BACK UPS!!
(Instagram link to the screenshots)
Edit: also wanted to add that it seems that Microsoft word has the same language in their TOS so onedrive is not a safe alternative!
I guess the original post was fake and got deleted? Yeah, but this isnât a fake scenario.
It happens all the time and a quick search will tell you as much. Erotica writers have been warning for years not to trust cloud services for the reasons I detailed above.
And yes, I have proof. Hereâs a Google Gold Product Expert discussing this. To quote from the June 26th, 2023 answer:
New Google Sites is under Google Drive policies. You need to interpret: Do not distribute content that contains sexually explicit material, such as nudity, graphic sex acts, and pornographic material. This includes driving traffic to commercial pornography sites. We allow nudity for educational, documentary, scientific, or artistic purposes.
No, âartistic purposesâ does not include written erotica. That falls under âpornographyâ.
If youâre wondering where that came from, literally word for word the Google Docs policies under âsexually explicit contentâ found here: https://support.google.com/docs/answer/148505?sjid=13036319188792965749-NC
While the original story may be fake, it carries some truth: Do not trust Google with your erotica. It is not a safe place to share sex or sexuality.
But please note I said âshareâ. If your content is private to you and not accessed by anyone else (who isnât using your account) then youâre golden. Google Drive doesnât care if you use it for storage. It does care if you use it to share/distribute.
FYI I just came across a thread on twitter which says that an author shared on google docs an explicit story with a friend for beta reading and google removed the file due to violation of TOS (apparently it has been updated where you are not allowed to share anything with sexual content). Not sure if itâs just this instance or if itâs going to become a widespread thing but if you guys write in google docs MAKE BACK UPS!!
(Instagram link to the screenshots)
Edit: also wanted to add that it seems that Microsoft word has the same language in their TOS so onedrive is not a safe alternative!
Note this has been happening for years now on Google Drive.
This is the continuation of credit card companies and big banks beholden to investors who think sex and sex work is icky. Until that changes, you have to increasingly make yourself less reliant on companies (period).
Yeah, babe, weâre on our way back to the good olâ early days of the internet where people spread hubs by word of mouth.
So, hereâs my tech-y response for non-tech-y people: Learn how to create a self-hosted cloud for your backups. If you really donât need to pass around files that much, then probably resort to emailing docs back and forth for editing. Backup your documents locally through a USB drive. You can get terabytes of storage for really not that much money.
Self-hosting takes some money and some time, but I promise it is well within the reach of most denizens of the internet.
Iâll maybe work on a tutorial for this since most tutorials out there expect you to understand a lot of random devops maintenance things. In the meantime, google (hah) around a bit and youâll find what you need.
Additionally, keep in mind that cloud services through data center booms are destabilizing the United Statesâ electrical grid. We donât have enough power for all the reams of data the internet wants to keep online and accessible 24/7. And we donât have enough clean energy for that not to be contributing to the destruction of our planet.
Thereâs not a perfect option. But when you control your own means to own and share your story, you put a lot of power to decide what to do with that information in your hands.
Use your power wisely.
FYI I just came across a thread on twitter which says that an author shared on google docs an explicit story with a friend for beta reading and google removed the file due to violation of TOS (apparently it has been updated where you are not allowed to share anything with sexual content). Not sure if itâs just this instance or if itâs going to become a widespread thing but if you guys write in google docs MAKE BACK UPS!!
(Instagram link to the screenshots)
Edit: also wanted to add that it seems that Microsoft word has the same language in their TOS so onedrive is not a safe alternative!
I'm just going to leave this here, because this woman said what I've been trying to articulate for ages much more effectively and succinctly than I've been able to
Wanted to shout out this open source project called âFountain Pen Companionâ.
Iâve been contributing to it over there with inks I have and enriching the entries wherever possible. I know some people have recently followed me for a future fountain pen project. I wanted to let people know it exists and is doing awesome things.
The pen part of the site is still under some development, but the ink part is relatively solid. I look forward to when they allow things like gradient selections for complicated ink colors or glitter color selections. It will help make the colors clearer.
Link will be in a reblog due to tumblr suppressing outside links.
Wanted to shout out this open source project called âFountain Pen Companionâ.
Iâve been contributing to it over there with inks I have and enriching the entries wherever possible. I know some people have recently followed me for a future fountain pen project. I wanted to let people know it exists and is doing awesome things.
The pen part of the site is still under some development, but the ink part is relatively solid. I look forward to when they allow things like gradient selections for complicated ink colors or glitter color selections. It will help make the colors clearer.
Link will be in a reblog due to tumblr suppressing outside links.
Unironically one of my favorite shows. I have no idea what will happen except that I will have fun.
My pet theory is heâs reverse Cassandra. Everything he says is true and everyone believes him except himself.
Have any bad anime reccomendations?
Eminence in Shadow is an anime about a highschool edgelord vigalante (the first episode is him beating the shit out of sexual predators with crowbars in the real world) who gets isekai'd into a fantasy world where he decides to live out his fantasy dream: he doesn't wanna be the hero or the villain, he wants to be the leader of the secret society that knows seemingly everything and operates in the shadows.
and he THINKS he's just playing pretend with his childhood friends from that world, but in reality everything he bullshits on the spot about a cult trying to resurrect a demon and stuff turns out to be entirely true. the entire show is him doing incredibly embarrassing chuunibyou roleplay, but the show takes it 100% seriously, so everyone around him thinks he's badass, but because we as the audience get to actually follow him around, we can see how much of a dork he is.
but also he actually IS extremely powerful.
here's a clip of him (as his mild mannered alter ego) hearing someone who's ACTUALLY cool and mysterious say something cool and mysterious, and then all of the subsequent clips from the next 2 episodes of him saying verbatim the exact same thing to different people because he thinks it sounds cool.
and sometimes he stumbles or says it where it doesnt make sense, and it sounds kinda stilted to the viewers because we know what he's doing, but the show NEVER makes him look silly with the music or anything, it 100% conforms to make him look exactly as cool as he wants to.
so the house of representatives just passed a bill that will now move to the senate to BAN tik tok completely in the united states and they are expected to argue that ânational security risksâ outweigh the freedom of speech and first amendment rights. biden has already said that if it gets to him, he will sign it. whether or not you use the appâŚâŚ.this is something to be worried about
this is a ceasar safe zone mostly because if i reblog something ides of march related and fuck up the date itâll be really embarrassing and a little because the dude named his daughter julia caesaris which is really funny
Iâm working on an art project which requires me to swatch a lot of inks by obtaining a lot of samples.
You will all be getting my unsolicited opinions about bottled inks. Hereâs a sampler:
Sailor inks are for the rich. Noodlerâs did some shit and you shouldnât support them. I wrote three words in Organics Studio 5 months ago and itâs still smearing on my hands and over everything oh god oh god to this day. Ferris Wheel Press is my nemesis in this life and the previous.
You know I used to think "tumblr's absolute refusal to actually engage with the Trolley Problem in favor of insisting that there must be a third, morally pure option that doesn't require them to make a hard decision and anyone who asks them to make a binary choice is just a short-sighted idiot is really fucking annoying, but I guess it's not actually doing any harm".
Anyway that was before we asked tumblr at large to decide between "guy aiding a genocide but making progress elsewhere" and "guy who would actively and enthusiastically participate in a genocide and would also make everything else much, much worse for everyone elsewhere" and the response was that there must be a third, morally pure option that doesn't require them to make a hard decision and that anyone who asks them to make a binary choice is a short-sighted idiot.