[GameOfKnowing]

Hey— performer & small site owner here. Most of the hypothetical cases in the media (and these comments) relate to Pornhub, OF, etc— companies that definitely can afford to implement age verification even if it hurts their bottom line. This totally misses the vast majority of porn sites that are very small, operate on licensed technology that may not even be maintained, and would have their ~low-5-digit annual income nuked by the cost of compliance. In these cases, geo-blocking states one by one as they implement these laws becomes the only option. Yeah VPNs exist, but HN users faaaaar over-estimate the technical knowledge & ability of the average American used to having the net served to them on a silver platter.

[init2null]

Most of the time they'll go on Twitter or the noncompliant websites instead. That being said, published numbers have shown VPN subscriptions skyrocket. Public tech skills aren't what they were in the 2000s, but people who can't/won't verify ID are motivated. It is a powerful force after all.

[0cf8612b2e1e]

Just make sure it is not a Facebook owned VPN which is actually used to spy on its users.

https://www.techradar.com/computing/cyber-security/facebooks...

[GameOfKnowing]

I hope you’re right! There’s certainly nothing inherent stopping a widespread shift toward VPN usage and other technical work-arounds that have been part and parcel of internet usage in many countries for decades.

[WarOnPrivacy]

> Yeah VPNs exist, but HN users faaaaar over-estimate the technical knowledge & ability of the average American used to having the net served to them on a silver platter.

We can evaluate this by considering the results of DNS blocking ThePirateBay.

ref: https://kagi.com/search?q=How+effective+was+dns+blocking+the...

[raydev]

That's not a reference, it's just a list of search results.

Do you have a direct source for how many Americans accessed TPB after it was DNS blocked in all of the US?

[nickff]

The regulatory burdens on most companies have been gradually increasing, to the point that it is very difficult to run companies with <100 (some might say <1000) employees in most non-software industries. I am sorry to hear that it will negatively impact you, but you don't have the most sympathetic story, and nobody seems to care about this issue anyway, so there's little hope of reprieve, and you'll likely just have to bear it or quit.

[JohnMakin]

Why is the story not sympathetic?

[TZubiri]

As a performer and small site owner, am I to understand that you usually sell sexual material and you don't perform any check to make sure that they are not kids? How are you making sure that users are of age other than the "I am 18: ENTER" button? Maybe you take credit cards and can check their age through that? Do you take crypto or wallets that don't require 18+?

[Rebelgecko]

Do CC issuers report the owner's age?