Photos gone missing from Illustrated stories.

[rogerfun]

Hi, for a few weeks now, I am experiencing many instances of photos not loading from the Illustrated stories section. This happens across different devices, browsers, and networks. Tried clearing out browser caches to no avail...

 

[Britva415]

Were any of them sexually explicit?

 

[rogerfun]

Thanks, that explains it. But it doesn't help me with my disappointment...

 

[polku24]

Yep, pics wont load anymore. This sucks. Thats the point of illustrated stories! To see the pictures with a story!

 

[LeslieRMcPherson]

Not only were my R-rated pics removed from three of my previously published illustrated stories that received >1 million views, three-rated PG pictures that showed fully clothed models were also deleted from those stories by Literotica's leadership. The bottom line, that's it for illustrated stories. I submitted an illustrated story before this new policy was announced. Now I understand why it sat in limbo for 10 weeks. Literotica was trying to decide what to do with its illustrated stories, both previously published and newly submitted.

 

[Small_Island]

I get the idea of enforcing the nude photo rule for public facing areas of the site so they don't show up unexpectedly while you're browsing stories in public. But inside of stories? If you open an illustrated story on your device in a public place, that's on you.

 

[LeslieRMcPherson]

I get the idea of enforcing the nude photo rule for public facing areas of the site so they don't show up unexpectedly while you're browsing stories in public. But inside of stories? If you open an illustrated story on your device in a public place, that's on you.

Literotica's stated reason for removing all nudity from its illustrated stories (even R-rated pictures) makes no sense because its members are aware of the category of every story at the site before it is opened. In my illustrated stories, three PG-rated pictures of a fully clothed model were also removed. If a reader was worried about someone looking over his/her shoulder, just don't open up an illustrated story in a public place.

Finally, the statement that most Literotica's members want this is ludicrous. In that regard, I've published 10 erotica stories at Literotica (under two pen names), three of which are illustrated. These 10 stories currently have a total of 1.2 million views. While I’m happy with that number, it’s misleading because 1 million of these views were from just the three illustrated stories.

Literotica claims it gets 7,500 stories a month. Of those monthly stories, my three illustrated stories were the most viewed ones in their respective 30-day windows after they were published. There are many authors at Literotica who are more talented than me. The reason why my three illustrated stories were appreciated by so many is mainly because of the photographic images that complement each story's text.

We may never know the true reason why Literotica's leadership decided to remove nearly all of the images in its illustrated stories.

 

[theMasterBaiter]

Let's not kid ourselves. The USA has shifted to a level of judgement not seen in decades. Survival, staying online, not being taken down for BS reasons requires threading a line between joy and fear. Don't blame or pretend Lit leadership doesn't have a good reason. Just hope for another sexual revolution and happier days ahead. And no matter your political leanings, stop voting for prudes.

 

[HawkerPenn]

Let's not kid ourselves. The USA has shifted to a level of judgement not seen in decades. Survival, staying online, not being taken down for BS reasons requires threading a line between joy and fear. Don't blame or pretend Lit leadership doesn't have a good reason. Just hope for another sexual revolution and happier days ahead. And no matter your political leanings, stop voting for prudes.

It's a myth that a person, group or institution can survive tyranny by complying in advance. Like dealing with gangsters, if one complies, more is demanded until all is gone. Only group resistance and pushing back can lead to survival. Resist!

 

[desperado1089]

The last time we assumed that they would be satisfied, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Poland fell before the rest of the world caught on. And then France and Belgium fell right afterward.

Oh, and any pleas for leniency towards Lit leadership will fall on deaf ears if directed at me. They claim to be such staunch proponents of free speech, yet the moment it's threatened they kowtow instead of standing up, which they would be in a better position to do than the site's disparate members. But they apparently lost their spine someplace along the line and lied through their teeth to conceal that fact so they're not getting any sympathy from me.

 

[rogerfun]

Sounds like an opportunity for another site to host all these great illustrated stories. Any idea where some of these authors may have gone?

 

[theMasterBaiter]

It's a myth that a person, group or institution can survive tyranny by complying in advance. Like dealing with gangsters, if one complies, more is demanded until all is gone. Only group resistance and pushing back can lead to survival. Resist!

As individuals? Yes, I strongly agree. As organizations providing a service? I don't believe that is possible.

 

[HawkerPenn]

As individuals? Yes, I strongly agree. As organizations providing a service? I don't believe that is possible.

Some law firms, for example, resisted, some did not. The ones that did triumphed; the others have been subject to further ruinous demands and loss of reputation and clients. I suggest that Literotica join with other organizations to fight for their First Amendment rights, else they must cease to exist.

What does Project 2025 say to Literotica?
"...Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned. Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders. And telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its spread should be shuttered."

 

[desperado1089]

As an organization, Literotica can resist more effectively than any small, disparate group of us. But it is choosing not to.

 

[lilshymynx]

Some law firms, for example, resisted, some did not. The ones that did triumphed; the others have been subject to further ruinous demands and loss of reputation and clients. I suggest that Literotica join with other organizations to fight for their First Amendment rights, else they must cease to exist.

What does Project 2025 say to Literotica?
"...Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned. Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders. And telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its spread should be shuttered."

One of the challenges with this is that its not always up to them and there is often someone that can cut their legs out from under them no matter how hard they fight, and its not the Government. Literotica's biggest vulnerability is domain hosting. Someone puts pressure on them and *poof* no more Lit. Part of what caused ASSTR to go away is issues with hosting, and I believe there was another erotic site that recently got chased off their host and had to find another.

You saw the same thing happen with "incest" content on pornHub and the like. It's all changed...turned into "step" content or just gone, and it wasn't the government that did that...it was their payment processors.

 

[desperado1089]

Well the payment processors don't exactly have any real motivation to do any of that absent of anything more powerful than the loss of the almighty dollar--of which there is no such thing. So who puts the pressure or makes it seem like they might put the pressure on the payment processors to move a certain direction?

Hint: it's not Santa Claus.

 

[LargoKitt]

So it looks like illustrated story pix and illustrations on Literotica are just gone. All mine are. Blah blah nudity policy. Makes me wonder if I wrote a story called "VOD Girls" and included screen shots of the advertising pix that always hem my stories; would the story pass muster? Of course I couldn't say I owned the content.... How about my own illustrations that look just like the VOD advertising at the top and bottom of the page...?

 

[LargoKitt]

Literotica's stated reason for removing all nudity from its illustrated stories (even R-rated pictures) makes no sense because its members are aware of the category of every story at the site before it is opened. In my illustrated stories, three PG-rated pictures of a fully clothed model were also removed. If a reader was worried about someone looking over his/her shoulder, just don't open up an illustrated story in a public place.

Finally, the statement that most Literotica's members want this is ludicrous. In that regard, I've published 10 erotica stories at Literotica (under two pen names), three of which are illustrated. These 10 stories currently have a total of 1.2 million views. While I’m happy with that number, it’s misleading because 1 million of these views were from just the three illustrated stories.

Literotica claims it gets 7,500 stories a month. Of those monthly stories, my three illustrated stories were the most viewed ones in their respective 30-day windows after they were published. There are many authors at Literotica who are more talented than me. The reason why my three illustrated stories were appreciated by so many is mainly because of the photographic images that complement each story's text.

We may never know the true reason why Literotica's leadership decided to remove nearly all of the images in its illustrated stories.

My non-illustrated, even non-erotic stories are bracketed by a row of photos of semi-nude women advertising VOD videos. Personally, I find this offensive. I want to set a tone in some stories that definitely not set in a brothel. I don't write male gay stories but are they hemmed by male pics?

 

[LeslieRMcPherson]

Some have posted on this thread that the decision to delete nudity in its illustrated stories might have been forced on Literotica by the US government and advocates of Project 2025. That might be true, but there is another explanation, namely it was a pro-active decision by Literotica’s leadership to obtain a greater presence in certain populated global markets. In that regard, Literotica and Similarweb (I’m not allowed to give the web link) recently released a number of interesting web traffic statistics. Specifically, Literotica is currently the leading website in the world for the publication of free erotica with 41 million visits every month. Nevertheless, Literotica currently ranks only #771 in web traffic throughout the world.

Most of Literotica’s members reside in the United States. China has a population of 1.4 billion. That’s >4 times the population of the United States. As best as I can tell, virtually no one currently living in communist China is a member of Literotica. The likely reason for this statistic is China’s strict censorship laws on the use of the web by its citizens. As of March 2023, Literotica had 2.4 million registered members. While that’s an impressive number based on the size of the United States, the number of members probably would increase at least 4-fold if China allowed its citizens access to Literotica. It, therefore, is possible that Literotica’s leadership is desperately trying to find ways to get China and certain other restrictive countries to lift their censorship of Literotica by deleting R-rated photographic images in its illustrated stories.

 

[desperado1089]

With all due respect...that is patently absurd. The CCP would find something else wrong with some other aspect of the site. Trying to make a non-Chinese website permissible in China is like playing poker while blindfolded and with noise canceling headphones and the dealer changes the rules every hand and makes up rules every so often as well.

 

[LargoKitt]

I had a flash go off when I saw the NSFW initials on something. Thousands of people must be reading Literotica at work and school! Or if working from home they are using company equipment or servers. Of course the 'Calvinist' logic (not the kid with the tiger, but nevermind) is that one shouldn't be viewing any recreational material at work or school, much less smut. But obviously people do or else the NSFW would be an unnecessary label. And a person can be scrolling a story or a forum comment on their work screen and it doesn't shout across the room that you are looking at raunchy stuff; but T&A&P on your monitor is pretty obvious. So Manu and Laurel are preserving their clients ability to scope out serious BDSM or gay porn stories while knoshing their bangers and mash, vegemite, or pb&j at their desks or in the caf without being called on the carpet. And the professor or manager looking over your shoulder at your laptop or phone might think you are scanning the recommended reading rather than a steamy story about blowing the dean under his desk or rogering the head of HR.

 

[desperado1089]

I guarantee you that the stated reason for the policy change is a big pile of steaming horse shit. What's even worse is that it's easily debunked, going by how many people have come out and straight up said "I never asked for this." And if such a survey was in fact conducted, why has no one heard about it? Why has no one come out and said they are one of this so-called majority that told Lit leadership that they didn't want to have nudes on their screens at work?

Because it's all bullshit, that's why.

 

[TheWritingGroup]

I guarantee you that the stated reason for the policy change is a big pile of steaming horse shit. What's even worse is that it's easily debunked, going by how many people have come out and straight up said "I never asked for this." And if such a survey was in fact conducted, why has no one heard about it? Why has no one come out and said they are one of this so-called majority that told Lit leadership that they didn't want to have nudes on their screens at work?

You do realize that forum participants are a tiny fraction of Literotica readers, right?

--Rocco

 

[desperado1089]

You do realize that forum participants are a tiny fraction of Literotica readers, right?

--Rocco

That still doesn't really change the fact that this survey or poll or however they (allegedly) came to the conclusion that opening images in public was a good reason to ban directly hosted nudity of any kind, was a complete surprise to anyone who spoke out after the policy change was announced.

Or, put another way, if feedback was in fact sought, surely someone would have said something by now?

 

[NobleKorhedron]

One of the challenges with this is that its not always up to them and there is often someone that can cut their legs out from under them no matter how hard they fight, and its not the Government. Literotica's biggest vulnerability is domain hosting. Someone puts pressure on them and *poof* no more Lit. Part of what caused ASSTR to go away is issues with hosting, and I believe there was another erotic site that recently got chased off their host and had to find another.

You saw the same thing happen with "incest" content on pornHub and the like. It's all changed...turned into "step" content or just gone, and it wasn't the government that did that...it was their payment processors.

ASSTR...?