Adult
A lot has happened in Adult since the last newsletter!
In December, a discussion began regarding the issue of deeplinking in Adult. It was a long discussion that covered a lot of ground and various subtopics. The most important result is that it led to a proposal for changing the guidelines in Adult/Image_Galleries. The goal is to raise the quality of listed and future sites. We are making good progress in this thread and hope to have some improved guidelines sometime soon.
Also back in December, pvgool started a discussion entitled "descriptions that look like child porn". As can be imagined, this was a hot topic. Unfortunately, as in any branch of the ODP, more obscure categories sometimes get overlooked and questionable sites can be added and not noticed for a long time. The first result of the discussion was the removal of some problem sites in Adult/Arts/Online_Writing/Fiction/. The discussion then moved on to the Adult/Society/Sexuality/Activities_and_Practices/Pedophilia/ category. A major concern here was the listing of sites that cater to pedophiles or present pedophilia in a positive light. Many views were expressed, and there was a lot of debate on exactly what should be done. In the end, the admins created a new charter for this category and, even though everyone got a bit restless while waiting for the admin's decision, they came back with a great new charter and policy that addressed everyone's concerns. The ODP has always refused to list child pornography. The Pedophilia category now also refuses to list other types of material that appeal to the prurient interests of pedophiles, as well as members-only chats and forums.
In a more non-controversial vein, there is a cleanup taking place in Adult/Shopping. The cleanup started with a new charter for the category which was based on the category for Shopping. Our goal was to model listing policies in Adult/Shopping as much as possible on those in Shopping. Once we had the new charter in place we set to work going through the current listings to make sure they are all in line with the new listing policies. We are about half way done with this process and the Adult/Shopping categories are looking a lot better. If anyone would like to help out, especially people with experience in Shopping, please stop by the thread and sign up for a category!
