So, today I got my takedown notice from Itch.IO. I had hoped that when they did their "audit" that the game would survive despite the "family" content, but of course not.

Here's the notice I got on the Itch.IO Five of a Kind page:

Interestingly, the paragraph that starts with "We don't allow..." does not include anything that applies to this game. However, when you click on the first FAQ link, they seem to have updated their allowed content to include "Incest or pseudo-incest content."

I don't remember that provision being there before and I'm willing to bet that it was added in the last 24-hours.

I looked into Collective Shout and the people who run it and it's clear that this is a religious anti-porn advocacy group that is pro-life and anti-LGBT. In other words, this is not a woke feminist organization. Their mission appears to be making porn of any kind so burdensome to access that it's effectively banned under the guise of "protecting the children." They also lump in LGBT stuff as "adult" content and want that banned too.

I've written before about Project 2025 in previous statuses and tried to separate fact from fiction and try stay measured in my analysis so I could do my best to prognosticate what it means in practice and while there doesn't appear to be any direct evidence that this is the fulfillment of the banning porn aspect of Project 2025, The Project 2025 people seem to be well on their way to getting what they wanted without (apparently) doing the dirty work themselves...

The Internet seems to have formed a consensus around focusing on the payment processors (Visa, Mastercard, and PayPal), which is probably correct. I won't argue with it at this point. I had to read up on this to understand the relationship of the credit card companies to intermediaries like PayPal and the like. PayPal is simultaneously a client of Visa & Mastercard, but they're also a competitor because they can also link directly to banks to service transactions. For that reason, I kind of look askance when content creators only mention Visa & Mastercard but not PayPal, but that's a minor quibble. 

I think it may be only a matter of time before SubscribeStar is on the chopping block. I'm definitely preparing for that. If/when that happens, I will simply stop attempting to monetize the game, Full Stop. That doesn't mean I will stop working on the game. I will never stop working on this game, unless my country decides to eventually pass laws forbidding it. I feel like this game is the most important and meaningful thing I've ever put out into the world. It was never about the money it was about entertaining people and bringing some joy into this shitty, shitty, SHITTY world.

I'm tempted to copy & paste the Call your local congressman and Here are the phone numbers for Visa and Mastercard that you've already seen in other places, but I don't know how I feel about that just yet. I've never wanted to be both a creator and an activist, but in the words of Batman in the interrogation scene with the Joker in The Dark Knight, "I'm considering it." 

Cheers!