In 2004, I mentioned that Bravenet singled out the works of John Norman in its terms of service:
Funny, Frank Herbert, J.R.R. Tolkien, and R.A. Salvatore don’t suffer from the literary persecution John Norman does. Here’s section 8d of BraveNet’s terms of service:
(d) Associate Bravenet and any Products and Services with any adult material of any sort. This includes, but is not limited to, such things as nudity, any site, page, image or service requiring any adult verification service, anything that users to be 18 or older to view or join or access, and any text, image or likeness suggesting sexual and/or inappropriate and/or illegal acts of any sort. Without limiting the foregoing, you may not use the Products and Services to store, use, contain or display pornography, adult novelties, adult toys, XXX material, escort services, Gorean, bondage, BDSM, bigotry, racism, hatred, profanity, or any material which may be insulting to another person(s) or entity;
No Counter-Earth fan pages for you, children.
Well, I see today that Lileks added Bravenet forums to The Bleat, so I went a-looking to see if Gor is still prohibited.
Yes.
Although it’s now in section 9, so someone has updated the terms in the last seventeen years, although nobody removed the Gorean prohibition. Probably they didn’t know what Gorean meant. Which, to be honest, is probably why few people post Gorean content using Bravenet widgets or services. Not because anyone but me reads these terms and conditions closely.
You can probably find all kinds of Fifty Shades of Grey knock-offs across sites using Bravenet components, though. Because that’s modern stuff and not really dirty like your grandpa might have liked.
