Kirby's Rainbow Resort

Thanks to Disk, the forums have been patched to comply with the United States COPPA laws when members under age 13 join. This means everyone who is currently under age 13 is now unbanned, and everyone is now welcome to join regardless of age.

If you have been previously banned for being underage and haven't yet been unbanned, please fire off an email to me (amyclare at redmongoose dot net) or one of our other staffers and we'll be glad to take care of it for you.

Please remain honest about your ages when you sign up; certain features are limited to the younger accounts for liability issues, and we must insist that if you are under age 13 you do not reveal any personal information about yourself.

Have fun!

_________________

So happy meals are now being served at the Kirby Cafe?

Anyway, can you link to these new laws? Or explain them? Are they laws where you can choose the age limit now or something? I'm a little confused.

And don't we have a reputation for being a little bit wild sometimes?

I would supect that we won't get a 5 year old joining anytime soon, though.

_________________

stranger things have happened.

basically, coppa's not a new law. it's been around for a while and it's the reason that until now we've not allowed people under thirteen from joining. It basically says that kids under thirteen are not allowed to share personal information on the net without their parent sending the website permission. That's why sites like facebook, etc, have age restrictions for joining; they don't want to have to tangle with coppa, and they don't want to take chances that a kid may be forging it because the site's still accountable in that case. iirc, this patch has made it so kids under a certain age will be part of a special usergroup until they turn thirteen that prevents them from changing profile information, among other things, so it lets kids join but gets around coppa by taking the initiative to prevent them from sharing personal information.

that make sense?

_________________
DUN DUN DUN DADAH



DUN DUN DAAAAH

I will add at this time that the patch is not quite doing what I want for this rule, and I'm looking into ways around the issue. (People under 13 can edit profile information at this time but not avatar/signatures until age >= 13. They should be restricted there as well, but this isn't possible due to how the forum is coded.) I reserve the right to wipe profile data for such people on valid parental request (the spirit of the law).

So it allows them to join, post and all but restricts them form editing their profiles untill >13? If so, that makes very much sense, thank you.

_________________

I'd just like to point out that we've had a great deal of successful posters under age 13 in the past (hello Frosty), and most of us who've been here longer than a couple years were incredibly uncomfortable outright banning everyone who falls under that category. Granted, that "old guard" is in their 20s now, but the point remains. Obviously, though, you err on the side of caution with COPPA, and if someone is really that unfit for posting due to their age, they'll undoubtedly find themselves banned for something.

_________________

To who it may concern,

I would like the ability to have an avatar and signature. Not every kid is immature. I take most things seriously, so at least let the underagers have a signature. just to be fair to everyone, please.

From,

Domino Knight.

PS: All you underaged people out there, if you agree, post a response to my post. If you don't care, post anyway. And if this wazzes you off, email me at I-Don't-Care@I-Seriously-Don't-Care.com. And you can hold your breath until I respond. (no offense to anyone, just trying to get the point out)

Sorry about my last post. I'm just wazzed off because my school gives homework on the weekends

You know, posts like this don't make your point any more relevant. In particular, that bit towards the end is completely unnecessary and goes against your whole stance on maturity.

And, no offense, but it looks like you did not read why this was done in the first place.
I suggest you read the bits that I bolded. It's not a matter of fairness or maturity or whatever you think it is. It's because it's the law. No ifs, ands, or buts. If they did not comply, they'd face some serious legal troubles, I'm sure. And no body wants that.

Not trying to be a jerk or anything. I'm trying to give you a better understanding as to why this was done in the first place.

_________________
AKA CMK
My AniDB page.
Recent stuff:

Watching: A Certain Scientific Railgun (ep.14, stalled), Carnival Phantasm (ep. 8), Hoshi no Kirby (ep. 71, stalled), Ben-Tou (ep. 9, ulgh...), Shinryaku!? Ika Musume (ep. 5)
Reading: nothing

WHATEVER!

Yeah, whatever man. Who cares about some stupid law anyway? They should totally just make it so anyone, even those who don't know better, can reveal personal information about themselves on such a private place as the Internet. Who cares about the consequences this could have?[/sarcasm]

Seriously, is having a signature and avatar really that important to you? Would you rather have it so that people under the age of 13 cannot post at all? That would've been the sure way out of it, but then you wouldn't be able to participate in the community at all. That's neither fun nor fair. When you're over 13, then you can have and change your avatar and signature to your heart's content. Why is this such an issue for you? I really don't see what the big deal with this is.

_________________
AKA CMK
My AniDB page.
Recent stuff:

Watching: A Certain Scientific Railgun (ep.14, stalled), Carnival Phantasm (ep. 8), Hoshi no Kirby (ep. 71, stalled), Ben-Tou (ep. 9, ulgh...), Shinryaku!? Ika Musume (ep. 5)
Reading: nothing

I have to wait (insert number that I won't tell you) YEARS!

Also I won't respond to anything else in this topic forevermore

You did a very poor job at proving your point.

_________________

dood, i've gotta say that, like everyone else has pointed out, you are really not helping your case about age related maturity. The entire reason for the rule about the avatars and signatures is to keep you safe. Is it fair, i will agree it isn't. But as the saying goes "better safe than sorry." And if you honestly can't be patient enough to wait a few years to do something that really doesn't really matter in the long run, then please don't start taking it out on the people who are just following the rules dood.

_________________
"Fu-Rin-Ka-Zan!"
.......Avatar by Deguass

I don't think it's fair either. But yeah, it's the law that was made for your safety. Whether you like it or not, it's not really up for debate. And honestly, as I've already said, the higher-ups here could've just had it just be so that people under the age of 13 couldn't participate. It's what a lot of other websites do to avoid the issue. I'd rather have something over nothing myself.

_________________
AKA CMK
My AniDB page.
Recent stuff:

Watching: A Certain Scientific Railgun (ep.14, stalled), Carnival Phantasm (ep. 8), Hoshi no Kirby (ep. 71, stalled), Ben-Tou (ep. 9, ulgh...), Shinryaku!? Ika Musume (ep. 5)
Reading: nothing

_________________

The funny thing is that if you're under 13 and you lie about your age there is no way of us even knowing, unless you make it really obvious. I'm sure a lot of people posting are under 13. I can think of several people, even staff members, who started here under 13. I'm not saying "Yes kids lie about your age", I'm just saying that if you had and were sneaky enough about it no one would have ever known. I'm pretty sure being dishonest about your age also relieves us of any legal trouble but I'm not entirely certain.

Annd the mod hat is on.

Okay guys, chillax.

Like Kapus has said, you're made an excellent job of disproving your own point. Frankly, if you're worked up over as little as a signature and avatar, then I don't think you have room to claim maturity.

The whole point is to minimise the room for us to run afoul of the law. I'm sorry if this is impacting you negatively. If it's any consolation, it's a flat rule that's being levied against everyone under 13, so you're not alone in this at least.

If you don't like the rule.. I'm sorry. I don't think any of us do, really, it's just to be careful.

_________________

JEEZ GUYS I SAID I WAS ON IT gosh.

_________________