Payment processer overreach is an existential threat to creative expression on the internet. Already, platforms like Steam, Patreon and ItchIO are being forced to censor content.
But it doesn't need to be this way, and we have the solution: WhyCloud
Free and open-source, with WhyCloud anyone will be able to host their own site and process payments - whether it be through standard, high-risk, ACH, or Crypto - no technical knowledge necessary.
As adult game developers, we've been forced to self-host practically all of our websites, and we want to use this knowledge to help other creators.
Without the problem of payment processer censorship being solved, there is a real chance that we could reach a point where it becomes impossible for adult games to be funded, or for adult digital artists to support themselves.
That is why we are launching an Indiegogo campaign to help us fund the development of this tool.
With your support, we can help bring about a world where everyone can Create Fearlessly!
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Saw this a bit ago and somehow didn't connect it with StudioWhy. Neat to see you guys attempt a project like this. That said, you've asked for comments/feedback, so I'll give mine. Understand I don't mean to be overly cruel here, I'm just cynical/realist by nature.
I don't see this as being especially helpful.
There are four main problems adult creators face now: Legal persecution, hosting, discoverability, and payment processing. Of these four, WhyCloud only really helps with hosting, which is by far the least of the problems. Hosting is complicated and a bit of a hassle, but doable, if you have some basic tech knowledge. The other three are far larger problems, to the extent that hosting isn't really worth bothering with until they're dealt with.
1. Legal persecution: Over half of US states now have "porn ID" laws, with more on the way, which effectively outlaw explicit content, including drawn content, on a practical level, as only the largest sites will be able to afford to implement verification systems, and most people will be unwilling to give their ID to random shady 3rd party services that totally aren't storing them up for blackmail or laziness until they get hacked and leaked.
If you run a website with explicit content and someone in these states manages to access it, enjoy paying $10k per day in fines. This has already been found to be acceptable by the Supreme Court (Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton) and lawsuits are already being filed.
2. Discoverability: With the exception of a few titles that got nuked from orbit on Itch during the recent funtimes, all the games that were here previously are still here. Hosting is still, for the moment, available. But no new customers are discovering paid titles anymore, because they're all indefinitely (probably permanently) removed from search and recommendations. Setting up your own site is great and all, until you realize you're screaming into the void. No one will find you. No one will be buying something similar and see you in the sidebar and check you out. This is why we moved on from the 90s model of a bunch of isolated websites: discoverability was HORRIBLE. Technically it's not that hard to buy some hosting and slap some mp4s up somewhere, but everyone uses Youtube instead because if they don't NO ONE WILL EVER FIND THEM.
You've made some vague mentions of "federation" and teased some screenshots of a storefront-like page with search, but this seems like an "eventually maybe" feature rather than a core component, and historically federated systems have seen very poor adoption rates because most people, frankly, can't handle the complexity. People go one website, people click, do search, find games. People no understand wtf federation is or how it works. We got to see this play out in realtime as everyone fled Twitter not long ago, tried to understand Mastodon, and all their heads exploded with the effort. Discoverability is ESSENTIAL. Self-hosting, alone, is not a solution, and Federation is not a solution.
3. Payment processing: None of this matters if people can't get paid. And online, everything is MC and Visa. Paypal is MC and Visa. Square is MC and Visa. Stripe is MC and Visa. Patreon is MC and Visa. You get the idea. There are no alternatives in the US, and it's unlikely there ever will be. No one's going to use crypto, it's been regulated and bad-pr'd to death. "Adult" processors are useless: they're just for chargebacks from clueless boomers, they still have all the same censorship restrictions, and even THEY are now getting sued (Segpay just got pulled into the suit against Nutaku).
3 is essentially unsolvable, and may end up being the death knell for all of this. But if you want to attack the rest in the meantime, there's a much simpler solution than what you're proposing: e621, but for porn games.
Start with a booru engine and mod it. Every entry is a game, instead of a pic. Mod it so you can have multiple screen shots for each entry. Description text is the info for the game, source is links to it, wherever it's hosted. The booru is one site, run by one group of people, with entries and tags crowdsourced, everything easily searchable in one place. Easily usable by a caveman. No "federation", nothing to understand, it's just a site. Whole thing can adapt to "damage" in realtime, source links can be updated as needed, and point to any and all hosting and services that exist.
If you have people that understand the systems and programming involved, this should be doable in a few weeks, a month at most, with very minimal expense. I briefly considered doing it myself, but I don't have even the limited resources needed to attack a project like this, and am unwilling to expose myself to the legal risk of hosting ANY explicit content in the current environment, even just thumbnails and screenshots. But if you are, you're welcome to it.
Just an idea though. I just don't see the proposed framework for WhyCloud as really solving a problem that needs to be solved for most people. Having recently experimented with what's out there, it's not THAT hard to sign up with a cheap host, get a domain name and slap up some html. If people are capable of making complex games in the first place, they're probably capable of that. The problem is that if creators do that, they'll be tiny, isolated points of light in a vast abyss, with zero searchability, tags, recommendations etc. As much as I hate centralized platforms, we left the 90s Internet for a reason: Unless you got your website featured on a big blog or PRINTED IN A MAGAZINE (remember those?) no one would ever find you.
Again though, not meant as an attack on you, I'm glad you're trying to do something. I just don't see this, as described, as having a lot of utility currently. And paradoxically, if people are tech-illiterate enough that they can't handle hosting and basic wordpress config on their own, they probably won't be able to handle your "simple" system either.
Thank you for the detailed feedback!
We agree that those three areas are "larger" problems but, in our opinion, a sustainable solution to them all necessitates that people stop relying on centralized hubs. Here's how WhyCloud aims to tackle each of those outlined problems:
1. Ethical and Sustainable Age Verification
We are against the idea of age verification but, since it is legally mandated in many places, any implemented AV solution should be free, open-source, and most-importantly client-based so that the information never leaves the user's machine. Thankfully, such a solution already exists with: go.cam
This is valid in both the UK and the EU. The US laws largely depend on individual lawsuits, so if it works in practice most creators should be decently protected.
WhyCloud can help configure a creator's site to implement this form of privacy-friendly AV and, in cases where creators are told that this is still not enough, we can configure their site to block those regions if the creator so desires.
With centralized solutions, they may pay the cost but that is simply more incentive to prohibit adult content entirely. The creator also has no choice over what form of age-verification they want to implement.
2. The Discovery Hub
We agree that discovery is the reason that creators stick to centralized solutions. Unfortunately, due the fact that they accept payments, these solutions are inherently susceptible to pressure from payment processers/card networks. Either the marketplace doesn't let people get paid or it gets censored. Even if Steam tried to route payments to adult games through crypto-only, payment processers are known to not care. High-risk content needs to be on a completely separate site, like with SubscribeStar.
With our Discovery Hub, there will be a primary instance that we run and moderate (to keep out malware, etc.). Any site with the appropriate plugin (which WhyCloud can install and configure automatically) can register itself with any Discovery Hub instances, such as ours.
When Users visit the Discovery Hub, they will be able to search and browse tagged content, create lists of favorites, see recommended content, and purchase content just like any other storefront. However, the purchases are in actuality routed through the individual creator's site behind the scenes. This way it is impossible for payment processers to pressure us to remove content, but at the same time it necessitates that people are hosting and processing payments themselves.
As a result, our Discovery Hub solves both the issue of discovery as well as being able to let users buy things, the federation is just the cherry on top.
The federation allows anyone to host their own hub, and users will see aggregated search results based on whatever hubs they subscribe to. It's much more similar to Bluesky in this regard, where most people will use the main hub but the option to use your own Personal Data Server is there.
3. Choice in Processing
We agree that this is the hardest problem to tackle but also believe that the actual problem comes down to fact that creators do not have any choice in the matter.
Do they want to:
1. Use PayPal/Stripe and barely conform to their policies or try to "slide under the radar" for as long as possible?
2. Sign up with a high-risk processer and have less content restrictions but need to pay large fees to Visa/Mastercard?
3. Accept payments through regional bank-to-bank methods such as Automated Clearing House, but accept that these are regional?
4. Accept payments through crypto, which is the most censorship resistant but also has a horrible stigma attached to it.
Currently, creators are forced into Option 1 most of the time. Option 2 is sometimes available, such as with SubscribeStar, but as you likely know even they are facing pressure.
Still, integrating sites with SubscribeStar will be a good option for a lot of creators. For others at least the last two options are still available to them if they host their own site.
Also, you mentioned it being easy to pay for a basic site that allows adult content, which is true, but it also locks non-technical creators into using that web-host (and also likely overpaying). WhyCloud makes it easy for creators to switch hosts if they so choose.
You seem like you know a lot about the issue and also care strongly about finding solutions. You should join our Discord if you want to talk more about potential solutions.
Thank you for taking the time to give a thorough reply. Some thoughts:
Go.cam is an interesting idea, although I'm still skeptical:
1. That it performs as described
2. That people will be willing to provide said information, regardless of what the code actually does and
3. That it will satisfy the patchwork of state requirements in the US.
Still, it does sound like the least bad way of doing this I've seen so far, so fair enough. I'll keep an eye on it. The fact that it is a lightweight and cost-free solution is also extremely useful if it turns out to be acceptable.
I'm glad the Discovery Hub has been given a considerable amount of thought, as evidenced by the amount of detail you're able to give. That said, my core criticism remains: having multiple federated instances can't help but fragment the community, just like Mastodon. There are Mastodon instances that do alright for themselves, largely because they're run as extensions of other, larger services, in the way web pages used to have oldschool forums back in the day. But those are each little isolated worlds unto themselves. In general having multiple instances creates distracting competition and dilutes an already fairly small audience across multiple sites. If it's like bluesky, hey, great, but the weird little fiefdom design of bluesky a. did nothing to prevent centralized control in the end and b. did a lot to confuse and frustrate users. Kind of the worst of both worlds.
Using the Hub as an obfuscation layer for payment processing doesn't really do much either. Fundamentally, it's still on the users to figure out payment processing. Now, if payment isn't in your scope and you primarily just want to create a somewhat centralized discovery and hosting platform, fair enough. But there doesn't seem to be a good reason to do some kind of payment passthrough on your end, as far as I can tell. You aren't going to bamboozle Payment Processors.
As for Discord, I'll have to politely decline. Discord servers are not, to my knowledge, searchable, certainly not from google (and attempts to make them so have been fiercely shut down). Your server could get hacked tomorrow, and then all the discussion there will be lost forever, and rendered useless for purposes of future reference. In contrast, unless Itch shutters or bans you, this discussion will remain easily linkable, searchable and reference-able. The modern internet is far too ephemeral, even for an electronic communication network. There are forums from two decades ago, long put into archive mode, that are still yielding useful information to people today. I don't want to contribute to linkrot.
All that said, I hope you're successful in providing a useful service in the end, at least to some people. I'm just not sure I see it fitting in to what I need, or most creators that I know need. But at the very least, now more than ever, we need to be sharing information on the inner workings of this stuff as we work to stay alive and functioning. I'll definitely keep an eye on Go.cam for example.
Best of luck, and I'll keep an eye out for the project as things progress.
Awesome with this idea and Censorship needs to be Outlawed for good.
agreed