Ugly Retracted?

(I've been experiencing limited spotty Internet access for the last week. Sorry I haven't posted sooner.)

I'm sure everyone who follows or creates captions on Blogger knows by now that Blogger changed their mind on prohibiting "explicit images". I received the following email yesterday:

Dear Blogger User,

This week, you received an email telling you about some changes we were making to the Blogger Content Policy. In that email, we announced a change to Blogger's porn policy stating that blogs that distributed sexually explicit images or graphic nudity would be made private.

We've received lots of feedback about making a policy change that impacts longstanding blogs and the negative impact on individuals who post sexually explicit content to express their identities.

We appreciate the feedback. Instead of making this change, we will be maintaining our existing policies (http://www.blogger.com/content.g).

What this means for your blog:

• Commercial porn will continue to be prohibited.
• If you have pornographic or sexually explicit content on your blog, you must turn on the adult content setting (https://support.google.com/blogger/answer/86944?hl=en) so a warning will show.
• If you don't have sexually explicit content on your blog and you're following the rest of the Blogger Content Policy (http://www.blogger.com/content.g), you don't need to make any changes to your blog.

Thank you for your continued feedback,
The Blogger Team

(c) 2015 Google Inc. 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043

So, I guess we can all breath a little easier for now, but I wouldn't entirely write off Blogger/Google trying it again in the future.

More Ugly (Blogger Migration, Part Deux)

As a follow-up to the last post, discussion among most of the TG caps community (at least the ones I follow) on Blogger/Blogspot seems determined to migrate elsewhere. It's looking like Tumblr is the leading contender, but Wordpress has been recommended by several people. Unfortunately, Wordpress' User Guidelines specifically disallow explicit content:

"We know that there may be different definitions of this, but generally, we define pornography as visual depictions of sexually explicit acts. Nudity, in and of itself, is fine."

Many cappers may find at least some of their content crosses this line. WP's UG also doesn't seem to clearly delineate between media types, meaning that even if the images used don't cross that line, the accompanying text or themes still might.

Edit: Dang it, how did I overlook "visual depictions" in their UG?! It must have marked up with the obscure <fnord> tag. :/

The Good, the Meh, and the Ugly

The (Very, Very!) Good: Suddenly, both Hailey Pixley and Loki have reappeared! Loki is back up and running at the same digs as before, and you can find Ms. Pixley herself at her new blog.

Edit: I had archived all of Hailey's old caps, and you can download them here: part 1, part 2, and part 3.

The (Unsurprising) Meh: Despite plenty of ideas, I still haven't finished any new caps.

The Ugly: Today, I received the following email from Blogger:

Dear Blogger User,
We're writing to tell you about an upcoming change to the Blogger Content Policy that may affect your account.
In the coming weeks, we'll no longer allow blogs that contain sexually explicit or graphic nude images or video. We'll still allow nudity presented in artistic, educational, documentary, or scientific contexts, or where there are other substantial benefits to the public from not taking action on the content.
The new policy will go into effect on the 23rd of March 2015. After this policy goes into effect, Google will restrict access to any blog identified as being in violation of our revised policy. No content will be deleted, but only blog authors and those with whom they have expressly shared the blog will be able to see the content we've made private.
Our records indicate that your account may be affected by this policy change. Please refrain from creating new content that would violate this policy. Also, we ask that you make any necessary changes to your existing blog to comply as soon as possible, so that you won't experience any interruptions in service. You may also choose to create an archive of your content via Google Takeout (https://www.google.com/settings/takeout/custom/blogger).
For more information, please read here (https://support.google.com/blogger?p=policy_update).
Sincerely,

The Blogger Team
(c) 2015 Google Inc. 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View, CA 94043

Damnit! This is likely going to kill Blogger as an effective platform for the TG captions community. I don't have much content (or many viewers), but there are many cappers who have years of posts and thousands of caps who will likely be needing new homes. Tumblr is still an option, but what stops them from following Google's/Blogger's lead? DeviantArt is another way to go, but their admins seem trigger happy on suspending accounts when any too-sensitive/too-prudish viewer starts flagging.

Does anyone have any better ideas?

Update: Disqus integrates well with Tumblr, so that might provide an improved replacement commenting system. It also allows the site admin to import comments from sites like Blogger (as well as backing them up and/or exporting them from Disqus).

A Possible Threat?

In early June, the brilliant One-Cap-a-Day site went down without explanation, although the capper had briefly mentioned in a previous post the expense of hosting the site and traffic.

Then, in early July, we lost marathon capper Rebecca Molay's Rebecca's World, including dozens of intricate PDF illustrated stories. It was discovered that some asshole(s) had threatened to expose her, so she quit and deleted everything.

We lost Loki's Captions in early August. Loki was using a paid hosting site and paid stock photos, so maybe the expense's just got to him/her. Still, the site disappeared overnight.

...and in the last day or so, we just lost Hailey Pixley's wonderful Tight Spot. Her email and social media account are also deleted, and I had sent emails to her and gotten replies only a couple weeks ago. If she just needed a break or was burnt out, she seemed like the type to at least say goodbye first.

Maybe I'm just being paranoid, but the TG capping community may be dealing with someone(s) specifically targeting/doxing us. If you're reading this, please take reasonable precautions to protect your identity (and maybe leave a comment or two on some of your various favorite cappers' recent efforts.)

And if you're reading this Hailey, I hope you are OK. You will be missed dearly, babe.

A new cap for me, a fan email, and maybe future caps

Wow! It looks like the voter's choice for Miss Pixley's latest contest... went to me!? I'm still a bit stunned. The gracious hostess then made me a custom cap, which you can see by clicking on the pic below to visit her site.

Sept. 24th Update: With Hailey's Tight Spot deleted, I've uploaded the cap she made for me here:

Also, I recently received a fan email! Woo-hoo! Thanks for taking the time to write and I'm thrilled you enjoyed  "Teaching an Old Tom Some New Tricks," "Being the Big Sister," and "Love Stoned." I've got a new shared universe idea for a bunch of short 1- or 2-pager caps, but I've got to backburner any captioning plans for the immediate future. I've still got a non-pervy writing project to finish and a non-pervy editing project that should show up in my hands fairly soon. Hopefully, I can finish the second one up soon and then make significant progress on the first one (which hopefully will make a little money).