Kickstarter clutches its pearls.
www.theverge.com
Back in 2019 we covered the censorship that was hurting the sex toy industry. One of the offenders was Kickstarter, which later changed its ways and became more welcoming. But it seems like the company has regressed. “Sexual pleasure” is now a banned concept for rewards, though Kickstarter says pleasure might be fine as long as the product is not designed for “insertion or penetration.” I want to know what’s going on over at Kickstarter HQ but I fear nobody is having fun. [Link: Kickstarter’s new rules | https://www.kickstarter.com/rules | Kickstarter]
  • M137@lemmy.todayEnglish
    9 hours

    I hope some NSFW only kickstarter clone comes from this, it’d be both really fun to browse and I think it’d make some cool, fun, weird etc. products real.

  • Brewchin@lemmy.worldEnglish
    13 hours

    This dystopia is sofa king boring.

    For those who haven’t read it: it’s Stripe, their payment processor, behind this. Kickstarter isn’t doing a Tumblr; they’re just handling it like amateurs, rather than just yeeting those puritanical morons.

  • texture@lemmy.worldEnglish
    14 hours

    the puritanical mania we’ve arrived at in 2026 was not in my bingo cards. sigh.

    • mangobanana@discuss.onlineEnglish
      32 minutes

      Well with the completion of the project 2025 I can completely see how we got here I mean history does relay itself

  • HuntressHimbo@lemmy.zipEnglish
    19 hours

    Its such a good thing to see a pretty normal part of the human experience get ripped out of every place humans gather because it makes the money holders uncomfortable.

    • Hideakikarate@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      18 hours

      Is not even money holders. It’s those small but loud “Christian” groups, like that one from Australia that kicked up a shit storm with Steam not long ago.

    • ferricoxide@blahaj.zone
      17 hours

      @[email protected] @[email protected]

      This seems like it could be a move like Verizon trying to force adult content off of Tumblr. It feels like there’s a non-trivial percentage of content-creators that work thorugh Kickstarter that could be forced to find new platforms. Especially given how nebulous the “safe” term is.

      Feels like, in about five years, the internet will only be usable by 5yos.

    • plyth@feddit.orgEnglish
      18 hours

      People should ask why it makes them uncomfortable.

      • renrenPDX@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
        9 hours

        I saw an interview with the founders not too long ago. It’s golf ball sized, soft/firm thing and it’s designed to be pushed in. I’ll leave the details out, but it is engineered to dissolve after a few hours. It’s meant as a way to bypass douching prior to the act.

        Found the YT link. It’s 30 minutes of education and entertainment.

      • deafboy@lemmy.worldEnglish
        13 hours

        A ball? 2 things internet has thought me…

        1. Never put a finger on the trigger if you’re not going to kill someone
        2. Never put anything without a solid base in your rectum.
    • frongt@lemmy.zipEnglish
      19 hours

      Probably a bit of both. Usually it’s the payment processors being lobbied by vocal “Christian” groups.

      • terabyterex@lemmy.worldEnglish
        9 hours

        i thought payment processors dont like porn because it has a high charge back rate.

    • DraconicSun@piefed.socialEnglish
      18 hours

      It’s Stripe. The CEO has ties with Palantir and Elon Musk and wants all porn to be banned.

    • zewm@lemmy.worldEnglish
      19 hours

      If you never know the motivation for something a company does, just know that the answer is always money.

    • KoboldCoterie@pawb.socialEnglish
      19 hours

      It sounds like it’s just insertable toys, so it might be a liability thing if they’re afraid people are selling unsafe toys? Who knows. That’s a really weird distinction and definitely one that payment processors don’t make.

        • KoboldCoterie@pawb.socialEnglish
          11 hours

          Another article confirmed it was payment processors again. This is why we can’t have nice things.

      • tal@lemmy.todayEnglish
        19 hours

        Does Kickstarter have liability in general for Kickstarted projects? I’d kind of assume that that’s on the specific project. I can’t imagine that Kickstarter is in any kind of position to really do a domain-specific evaluation of whether a given project is in line with local regulations.

        • JayGray91🐉🍕@piefed.socialEnglish
          17 hours

          IIRC, no, they don’t. They put the onus of proving the project is legit on the project maker and on the backers to be vigilant not falling for too good to be true projects.

          Over the years kickstarter has become just another big marketing platform for big brands (for their niche) and pushing out smaller projects.

          As a former serial backer, over the years I “only” have backed 40 or so (I don’t remember the exact number and don’t want to check now) and only 2 that failed to deliver. One, in hindsight, is blatantly a scam and kickstarter didn’t do anything about it. The other one that didn’t deliver is just mismanagement. At least it looked like it. Could still be a scam.

        • KoboldCoterie@pawb.socialEnglish
          19 hours

          I really have no idea, and this would probably be jurisdiction dependent anyway.

          They do allow things like food, which it seems would come with more liability anyway, if they can be held liable for kickstarted things.

      • zewm@lemmy.worldEnglish
        19 hours

        Why would Kickstarter be liable for someone else project.

        That’s like trying to sue UberEats for delivering food that gave you food poisoning.

        • dariusj18@lemmy.worldEnglish
          19 hours

          You can’t really legalese yourself out of being liable if it can be shown you knew of an issue and did nothing to prevent it.

  • binux@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    19 hours

    They probably think the US prohibition didn’t work because they just didn’t try hard enough

    • bluGill@fedia.io
      18 hours

      Prohibition worked. It had the annoying unintended consequence is some people ignored it and became criminals, but alcohol consumption clearly dropped when it was in effect.

      • binux@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        18 hours

        And yet the illegal alcohol market boomed and it gave massive rise to organized crime and government corruption to allow it. It doesn’t “work” in any practical sense, it just concentrates the problem and makes it even harder to control.

        • bluGill@fedia.io
          18 hours

          It only didn’t work if you demand absolute perfection, which is unreasonable. I’m going to stand by it worked.

          I already addressed the unintended consequences.

  • tacosanonymous@mander.xyzEnglish
    19 hours

    This is so fucking stupid. Has anyone ever thought work should be a whole lot cooler about things?

    • TheLeadenSea@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      17 hours

      Yeah but how tf do you buy things with monero? 😭

      I spent an afternoon trying to work it out once, and it’s not exactly intuitive, and it seems like the people who convert from normal money into crypto still hold all the strings :/

      • shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zipEnglish
        13 hours

        Buying a product is actually rather easy. You’re just presented with an address and an amount and you can copy and paste that address and amount into your wallet and click send. You are also presented with a QR code where you can scan it and a lot of websites even present a open with wallet button that you click and it will auto fill in the address and amount necessary.

        • SparroHawc@piefed.worldEnglish
          11 hours

          You’re ignoring the fact that you have to:

          • get a wallet
          • make sure your wallet is secure
          • fund the wallet from a trusted source
          • back up your wallet

          Crypto is many things, but it isn’t exactly as friendly as a credit card provided by your bank. Or PayPal, for that matter.

          • shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zipEnglish
            37 minutes

            It may not be quite as friendly, but PayPal or your bank can also freeze your account at any time and nobody can freeze your Monero address at any time for any reason.

            So you can pick sovereignty or convenience. With Monero you have full sovereignty, but with the banking system you have a lot more convenience.

          • Fiery@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            2 hours

            Been a sec I used XMR, but getting a secure wallet was simply built into the desktop gui wallet (which is the default recommended option on getmonero.org). While getting that wallet it also tells you to backup the seed phase (preferably by printing it iirc). It has a simple mode especially for non-tech users.

            So installing the GUI wallet takes care of 3/4 points, then to fund it you just find any reputable crypto exchange that supports sending Monero in your region (I used kraken before in the eu). By design in Monero the platform (which does have to do KYC probably) doesn’t know anything about where they sent the money. Transactions are not traceable in Monero.

        • Noxy@pawb.socialEnglish
          10 hours

          your wallet

          what if I don’t have a “wallet”? the fuck is a wallet in this context anyways?

          • shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zipEnglish
            38 minutes

            A wallet is nothing more than a piece of software that understands the Monero network and the way it works and allows you to store Monero. Look at getmonero.org for a list of recommended wallets.

  • Swuden@lemmy.worldEnglish
    17 hours

    I was thinking about this the other day. Are the powers that be worried about innovation in adult content getting so good that people will stop seeking out real companionship? In their minds it could lead to a drop in births, leading to a drop in consumers and producers.

    • Canaconda@lemmy.caEnglish
      16 hours

      The only people that would consider porn/etc as a replacement for real sexual intimacy are people who’ve never experienced it.

    • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.worldEnglish
      16 hours

      That is generally the impetus behind religious institutions disdain for it. Their best chance to increase their numbers is through indoctrination of the children of their current members. Conversions rarely occur, despite how much they are talked up when they do.

      They are, of course, wrong to think that. Toys, in practice, generally increase intimacy and likelihood of a couple having children. But not as much as being raised your entire life being told that it is the entire purpose of life and if you don’t have as many kids as you theoretically could, you have done yourself a disservice. So as long as they conflate the results, they will keep assuming they are correct in doing both.

      • Canaconda@lemmy.caEnglish
        16 hours

        IMO it’s more about control. I went to Christian private school. Students dating was forbidden.

        They keep children sheltered before pushing them into a marriage/parenthood that is sustained by their participation in the church community. Tho this doesn’t seem to work as well these days as I know of several marriages that ended within 1 year.

        From there it’s a simple matter of peer pressure to keep people in line. I’ve seen parents disown their children to protect their reputation at church.

        It’s a fucking cult.