Demigodrick @ Demigodrick @lemmy.zip Posts 315Comments 340Joined 2 yr. ago
A vpn would work. Some people use one 24/7 these days if their router/device supports it.
Every time I see Kenshi in the wild I have to take a moment to praise what a great game it is. It has to be one of the first games I bought in "early access" in whatever format that was over a decade ago, and never regretted it.
For an indie dev it was an absolute achievement.
I'm hoping this is temporary and something changes and I can lift it in the near future. I'm hoping enough sites will shut down for someone with some power to take a second look at this
Haha I wouldn't dare get them confused 😅 how i wish I had an Irish passport
Doesn't it just!
Some of the wording in the guidance is the same phraseology that Age Verification companies use, word for word. Make of that what you will!
I think some of it is actually OK on a macro scale, and stuff like trying to stop interference might have been sensible if thought out well. But the scope is too large, the guidance too broad, and the language used by OFCOM too threatening to those trying to learn. The burden on one person to comply is insane - it takes a team of lawyers just to read and decipher the 1000+ pages of guidance.
If they'd just realised a little while ago that their scope was way off and redefined who this applies to, there might have been more of a chance of complying.
I would have no way of knowing if you found a common and easy workaround... :)
Sales of VPNs etc will go through to roof as more sites start to block the UK.
Yes - wtf indeed.
The whole thing is insane. If it was targeted just at platforms like Meta or X, I'd totally get it (and maybe even agree with parts of it).
The fact it is a blanket provision and affects even single user mastodon instances, or 93 year old Betty's gardening tips forum, in the same way as Facebook and Instagram, tells you a lot about the idiots/morons at OFCOM/UK Gov who put this together.
If 93 year old Betty's gardening forum doesn't currently have all the paperwork in place right now, btw, she's liable for that fine.
That's how stupid this all is, and why I'm nope-ing out of it.
The regulator claims this can be enforced anywhere in the world (doubtful at best). I imagine most global site admins will ignore this and carry on as normal, and if the UK ever comes knocking politely tell them where to shove their requests.
However there are personal reasons why this applies to me with the scope of the Act, even with the infrastructure in Finland, and I can't risk being on the other end of that fine. It's simpler all-round for me just to deny access to the UK.
If they removed the insane (and I suspect corrupt) age verification requirements, then I could do the work to make the site comply with the Act, but as it stands I can't guarantee it so I won't risk it.
Nope, it's called "Highly effective age assurance", which under the OSA is open banking, photo ID matching, facial age estimation, and digital identity wallets. The OSA specifically states that relying on users to self-declare their age cannot be considered an effective means of age assurance (i.e. guilty until proven innocent)
Yes, that's the beauty of federation and the stupidity of the law :)
It really is 🫤
Just a couple of quick answers to potential questions.
- Will this affect federation? No - even sites in the UK will still be able to federate with Lemmy.zip both ways. This just affects users trying to access the lemmy.zip website
- Does this affect apps? Possibly - the front ends will definitely be affected (i.e. m.lemmy.zip). Apps like voyager etc remains to be seen, as I haven't done any testing on these yet.
Jesus, the UK Gov just shitting the bed all over digital/internet stuff at the moment. It's actually embarrassing.
You can ask your site admin to add the friendica.world url to the blocked url list in the site settings. I'm like 90% sure it blocks the pms coming through when they inevitably create new accounts
Thanks for the feedback - I peeked at the lemmit bot and yeah - madness.
Toying with the X thing, will see what the general consensus is before making any decisions.
There is the public modlog if that's what you're looking for in terms of mod actions?
I've toyed with making zippy's whole action log public but it requires a lot of tweaking to make sure sensitive stuff is hidden, and I just haven't had the time!
We do have an introductory post but it probably needs a lot of work at this point. Its on the to-do list!
The problem is that people tend not to read it... If only I could force them to read and acknowledge 😅
Yeah Zippy absolutely is: https://github.com/Demigodrick/community_bot
Anyone is free to use any of the code. PRs to help expand it/make it better are always welcome too 😂
