I fucking hate the chokehold some fuckass payment processors have on what can and can't be sold anywhere and how some puritan jackasses can get them to do their bidding so easily, just the absolute worst. It should be none of their business what people spend their money on, just transfer and shut up

bad fucking move man

All the people who would have defended them, stood with them, if they stood up to the fascists. They're gone. And they won't be coming back.

Bending knee to facsism, sucking tyrannical cock. Greyscale my titties. 0% payshare rizz. Not taking a stance, sounds flaccid.

This fucking sucks.

You should try having a spine

Steam should try having a spine. Itch doesn't do enough volume to be able to say anything to Visa/MasterCard…

Steam lost it spine when Nexon and Alters broke their rule, but they did nothing

Whataboutism doesn't solve anything. Rather, it's quite regressive, y'know.

It's not whataboutism, you're missing my point. I'm merely stating that there's nothing Itch can possibly do to fight this and continue to exist… Like 99% of companies, they don't have the means to go up against Visa/MasterCard who are the ones actually requiring this…

That would be a valid point were it not for the fact that itchio is also removing SFW games.

From what I understand that's not intentional and has at least mostly been corrected now? It's not like they were given the time to do this correctly… They very likely had a deadline measured in hours, not days, that's how these things typically go…They are lucky they didn't get silently terminated…

No. They've been warned about this since April BTS. There is so much they could've done. Like, say, at least given us a heads-up at any moment before now???

April BTS?

Yes.

What does BTS mean?

and what, lose most of their potential revenue?

Steam makes Visa/MasterCard many millions of dollars a year… They aren't gonna cut Steam off because Steam got mad at them…

fuck you, cowards

If you think you can get off with dropping nsfw creators then I'm prepared to drop itch io for good. PLEASE RECONSIDER THIS ACTION & PRIORITIZE YOUR CREATORS ABOVE YOUR GREED!

This is unacceptable and I will be surprised if you get out of this without a lawsuit if not losing your entire community!

Counterpoint: fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck yo

real eloquent

They're literally stealing money from nsfw creators as well as lying about not being able to give prior notice, it's as eloquent as these cowards deserve.

Oh come now, you can be more eloquent. For example: "Counterpoint: Go fuck yourselves", and then just repeating that to anyone who responds that you're not being ~decorum~ or ~polite~ enough.

Do fucking better and stand up for the creators who use your platform and generate your revenue.

@itch.io do you know what happened to tumblr once it delisted the adult stuff that kept it a popular app. Stop bowing to theocratic nonesense or fall to the wayside.

Collective shout is a tiny voice. Revert your decision. I bet they don't even use your service.

Oh hey, didn't expect to see you in this comment section this early XD You're right, and we should be louder about it

Unfortunately, the problem is that CS contacted Visa/Mastercard, which is why we now have this situation...

yeah it's not that theyre bending to the will of this group, it's that theyre also being threatened with the loss of all revenue. still fucking sucks though, i dont think they did everything they could to stop it

it isn't NSFW, you're just pandering to the pearl-clutchers...

Hah nice

Cowards.

Spineless cowards.

Its a sad day for freedom, art and consumer rights, if a product - marked as totally fine by rating systems - is blocked by the payment processors (VISA). Don't they evade the law, by doing so? And they do that for "brand protection"? Well, guess which brand lost lots of reputation by doing so...

So you are allegedly deleting/shadowbanning sfw LGBTQIA+ content now, to nobody's surprise. Thanks for showing that you view queer people as cannon fodder even though we helped make your site as big as it is for literal years. Jfc

Also pay the fucking devs you decided to withhold money from 🥰🥰🥰

bsky.app/profile/itch...

And you believed them?

I've literally talked with leaf one on one multiple times and he's directly backed me up when I was targeted by bigots. I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt here. I think they handled things poorly and communicated poorly but I don't think they're "lying" here

Yeah, glad to see you in here this trash talk is bullshit. itch will figure it out!

You're "standing with" these cretins who couldn't even have the courteousy to give devs a heads up.

I'm on the front line of organizing against the payment processors and navigating communication with itch who is responsible for the livelihoods of devs like me. itch is now signal boosting folks in the community organizing against visa and mastercard and is looking into actions behind the scenes

we deserved a heads up.But they're communicating now and working with the affected folks on a way forward and a counter pressure to those responsible for this in the first place. itch is closer to our side than visa etc regardless of how the last couple days have played out

I figure since I was the one signal boosting the message that was received re: payments being withheld its my responsibility to signal boost their actual response

You're a good person

Maybe direct a little bit of this vitriol to the payment processors who have us all at gunpoint here

Don't worry, I am directing 1,000x more of my hatred to them; itchio is not innocent here however. (Edited for typos, sorry about that.)

You should've said something before deciding to shadowban and fuck over countless indie devs who expected transparency and honesty from you. Hope losing the trust of your user base was worth rolling over for censorship that directly targets queer people!

fucking cowards lol

This is so fucking disappointing.

But not at all surprising. Disgusting, but so unsurprisingly common. Cowards. itch.io is dead to me.

Well, I don't use your website for anything except queer media so... Why would I bother looking at it again? I don't even have to check, it's either coming or happened.

This is pathetic and you need to compensate every last creator effected by this exceptionally shitty decision. You did not just deindex games with NSFW content, but games with LGBT content and Furry content with no NSFW content. This is a flimsy excuse for allowing bigots free reign of content.

this is what this puritanian bullshit always boils down to. it's just discrimination.

tell devs they're going to get the money they're owed or fuck off bsky.app/profile/daff...

Boy i wonder why itch is having trouble paying people when they're in hot water with their PAYMENT PROCESSORS. No it's a big conspiracy actually!!

Considering the terms would’ve only just come into force that would be illegal right?

Collective shout protects Pedophiles

I don't see anything on there that connects your first screenshot with the second, what evidence do you have that Collective Shout signed anything to do with the WOMAD child rapist? Fuck Collective Shout, but I don't wanna back accusations of child rape apologism without a solid basis.

Anybody knows how many copies of That austrian artist's book she owns?

Bot behavior

They also defended Cuties, so this comes as no surprise

I'd put that under the same "art is art but you don't have to like it" label too, so super hypocritical if true.

What Wikipedia article did you look up to find that? I'd like to source this information so I can properly share around

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Womad_(...

Thank you!

I can't find a link to the petition in the screen shot, it is not on the wiki, could you add the link?

Every. Single. Time.

Wouldn't be surprised, but none of the people on the right of this are Korean, so what's the connection?

What does the section on the left, which is about an incident involving WOMAD, have to do with the people in the centre or the section on the right? I don't see what the connection you're drawing is?

I've asked this question every time I've seen these screenshots and never gotten an answer. At this point I'm assuming it's a collective shout sockpuppet campaign to delegitimize any criticism of them.

It’s signatories to the petition, it’s quite easy to follow if you read it properly

Where does it say anything about WOMAD on the centre image, or the right image? The only link I can fathom is if someone knows that little about Australia that they think Karratha, WA and Darwin, NT are anywhere near each other? CS are a terrible, awful organisation but baseless accusations of,,,

,,,pedophilia don't help anyone?

Yeah, don’t care, they’re hateful nonces

I guess agree to disagree then. I prefer to take the moral high ground, there's plenty of real stuff they've actually done.

You have the moral high ground over them already, I assume you’re not a deranged Terf/SWerf freak backed by religious fundamentalists. Stop worrying about civility, they would grind you to dust in a moment if they could. They’re fucking vampires.

I don't need to falsely accuse them of pedophilia because I'm already better than them. I also don't need to delegitimise my criticism of them by lying about things they haven't done.

Why would a petition for something in 2017-2018 be signed with July 2025, come on now. That's more likely the petition towards the payment processors

Interesting that the petition is also signed by FiLIA, a prominent anti trans UK organisation. The intersection of swerf and terf is a circle

It's well known that UK terfs are happy to work with extreme right wing misogynist US religious fundamentalists, them signing an anti adult content petition alongside Exodus Cry is par for the course

Oh yeah, fair. Still happy to call them all nonces until proven otherwise 🤷

The second image is of the open letter made to payment processors that got steam to change their tos. It doesn't link womad to this group. Make no mistake, both groups are very much alike but I haven't seen credible evidence of them being linked.

Hey @itch.io why have you favoured a mob of conservative paedophiles over your own user base?

i wonder how many of these fools are on the Epstein list?

It's more about whether VISA and MasterCard favor them, unfortunately. itch and Valve could have explained the situation to their userbases if the payment processors cut them off and really started a shitshow for them, so it's not *totally* out of their hands, but they do have very little leverage

The post you're replying to gives no actual evidence that CS (who are still universally shit) were involved at all in the Areum Lee incident. The three images appear to be completely unrelated and it's entirely possible this is intentional misinfo.

They're right wingers who want to make porn illegal, I think it's pretty safe to assume they're pro-pedophile.

Let's ban those threats www.change.org/p/calling-on...

Okay can you elaborate on the connection between these three screenshots? The dates in the first two images don't match.

Fucking cowards

Fuck you.

As a creator with solely SFW work on Itch, this is disappointing and troubling. My friends deserve their money, and we all deserve creative platforms we can trust. I understand that the payment processors and C.S. are the bad guys here, but Itch's response has put devs in a precarious position.

As it stands, I have legitimate concerns that this is the first step towards queer works like mine being deindexed under the same "adult" pretext. I would seriously like to know how Itch plans to safeguard its users going forward, and why we should trust Itch to implement such a plan.

There are already games that were labeled LGBTQ on the platform but not Adult that were deindexed.

Friendly reminder to reduce your revenue sharing with itch to 0% until this is resolved if you haven't already. :) bsky.app/profile/chao...

You are free to do as you will; having considered the available evidence, I am not going to do that

That's fair!

Itch itself is in a precarious position. I'm not happy about it, but it seems like they tried to fight it until the last possible moment. Fuck Capitalism and fuck Collective Shout.

I tried to avoid assigning undue blame. I know this probably wasn't "vicious" or "gleeful" on Itch's part as some are projecting. What I know is that we don't have all the information; Itch has said as much itself.

Bye bye then.

So you've chosen to publicly silence victims of sexual abuse since victims of sexual abuse telling us their story and the horrors they went through, would breach this. Nice to know itch.io and all its staff would have partaken in the services Jeffery Epstein offered.

Going to add I've heard that itch.io is looking into alternative payment providers that haven't been pressured into this horrible archaic censorship act. This is clearly a good move and a step in the right direction, and one I support make my above comment lose some level of its validity.

I will leave it up for transparencies sake.

are you smoking crack

No, its more the fact they included some weird parts of their update to the FAQ for creators. It's clear they've tried to sneak in things they personally don't like, and are using this current issue as a cover. So instead of giving us any real response that includes its users and

shows they're on our side and their hand has been forced they gave in (understandable action) then quietly snuck in things they don't like too (not an understandable action. They just assumed none of us noticed.

So, because they did that I'm lumping them in WITH the Visa and MasterCard because they've used this whole thing as a cover. If they openly admitted in a public post there were things they also wanted to ban from itch.io along with what was demanded I'd of said nothing.

Does this explain my way of thinking enough? Being autistic kind of impedes my communication so I want to make sure I'm being clear here.

oh trust me itch is complacent and deserves all the flack from this

Yeah. I think what made me feel this was is the use of the terms “barely legal” and how they made it so anything that's "implied" to be something banned (which people get wrong all the time) is what did it for me. Their FAQ update is clearly been done to change it so they can implement changes they

wanted to make, but with the ability for the community to not be able to blame them directly since that could lead to backlash. The only way for me to be proven wrong would be for all the payment processors to back down, and retract their demands and for itch.io to completely revert and

remove all the changes to their Terms and FAQ that this incident made happen. But a part of me knows they won't do that. So only time will tell.

Already called and complained to mastcard. Might do it again tomorrow. Pressure is all we have

Spineless

Absolute coward shit.

You're banking a lot on the possibility there will be no consequences for having been bootlicking vermin during this brief moment in history and, to that, I say good luck.

you earned me as a user not even 2 weeks ago and you've already lost me. good job, hope whatever you gain in return for all this lost faith is worth it you hacks, hope you cant afford to keep the lights on.

You do realise you've basically just stabbed yourself in the heart with a massive knife right?

Given the situation, I think we can call it seppuku.

hey itch social media person, got a sec? it's been a rough day for ya, huh. anyway, hang in there. it's real awful that itch capitulated without a fight and none of us are gonna forget that, but remember that any hate coming your way is directed there, not at you. unless you're the ceo i guess.

That's reasonable. I agree. This sucks a bunch, but you remember their social media workers are just their subordinates, still human, and and probs dont like this either. Ur wholesome.

Listen, all they have to do is hit send and walk away. They don't even have to read what we write. It's easy to imagine there's a "human" behind this but I really doubt someone is reading each comment, mortified, their mental health draining dramatically. That just ain't happening.

And you'd take that chance?

I didn't say that. I just said that being concerned about "the person behind the social media account" is not something we should be thinking about when expressing valid complaints. There's no need to white knight "the person behind the post" for this company, or any company for that matter.

nothing is stopping the social media worker from walking

A fight, in this case, would be the payment processors withdrawing services and itch.io shutting down indefinitely. You’re being ridiculous.

If you think I'm being ridiculous, just look at the other comments.

Lots of people being ridiculous doesn't change reality. Itch have no legal grounds to fight this, and a PR battle would not only fail but also mean that no other payment processor will want to work with them. Why is that a good outcome?

So, you’re embracing censorship and turning your back on the queer community? Fuck you. I used to love going to your site. I’m not buying a damn thing from Itch until y’all bring the NSFW back. Censorship is a civil-rights issue.

💔

Craven ghouls

Hey. Fuck you.

This is the act of a coward.

You are also Denying payouts to creators who "Violated the rules" rules that were suddenly put in place without notice and they aren't even your rules. You are denying payouts to people who have not violated any of your rules, you are punishing people who have violated SOMEONE ELSE'S RULES.

Okay, thats is absolutely illegal. No doubt about it.

Itch is now claiming that's not the case, for what it's worth

Apparently it is the case.

Yep, saw that earlier. I stand corrected.

I mean, I’d be more surprised if they just admitted to any amount of ratfuckery

True, but if they just kept the payments that would be unusually bad, even for this kind of situation, and might open them up to lawsuits. They might refund the payments, though, IDK

booooooooooooooooooooooooooo

bsky.app/profile/torr... everyone here in the comments please take a look at this perspective of what could be going on. there are a few short threads from this person on the matter, very informative. I feel for y'all of course, 100%, but this is something to consider.

Not buying it. They themselves said this shit been brewing since April.

It's an interesting perspective, but I have my doubts. They said they knew this was coming since APRIL. If this was the case, they should have been upfront and admitted it. How they handled this is unacceptable.

Instead of removing them, make the results say that payment processors threatened to remove your ability to get money if you don't remove it. Cite the exact companies and include their complaint numbers/emails. Put an info banner on the site linking to it too. Use your reach.

You know how I know you’ve never worked with anything involving legal compliance 😂

Okay then the PPs just stop accepting payments from itch.io entirely and tens of thousands of people lose their incomes

there's absolutely no guarantee that's how payment processors would respond. Read the writing on the wall, this will not be the last restrictions payment processors will demand, call their bluff now

What are you talking about? There are dozens of sites that host adult content that have been cut off by PPs because they “violated” their convoluted ToS

yes, but was it purely for refusing to take down content, or also for those sites explicitly stating "these are the payment processors threatening us, here are their complaint lines if you want them to stop"? 🤷‍♀️ it's the "sites making it clear who's threatening them" I'm referring to

The first line of the post I replied to literally says “instead of removing them” which is what exactly what the PPs are asking them to do. This is what will get them completely banned if they don’t comply

And there's an ACLU-backed lawsuit against MasterCard going on over exactly that.

Exactly, it’s well documented that PPs will just cut off your site if they want to, I don’t think they’re bluffing

Honestly if I was a MasterCard/Visa shareholder I would be suing because cutting off valuable income sources AND taking a huge PR hit just because some Australian pedophile-led group whined about it really loud isn't just morally abhorrent, but a dereliction of fiduciary duty towards stockholders.

The morally correct sequence of events goes something like this: all the members of CS board a spaceship which gets slingshotted directly into the sun. Problem solved

Buy them all SpaceX lifetime passes

I guarantee if the payment processors were fine cutting off a site as large as Pornhub, they will snuff out Itch without a second thought. There is no bluff to be called, this is an ant begging a giant not to step on them.

That's Mastercard's decision. Leaving material up would leave no doubt as to who's to blame for it. Instead a precedent was set that if you go to Mastercard directly, you can set policy for itch or anyone else you don't like

What do you think just happened, man?

So everyone on itch should lose their income? That’s your argument?

So it's okay for JUST queer people to lose their income? That's YOUR argument?

Itch has no other option, either they capitulate or they completely go bankrupt because they can’t process payments

So the queer people who get tossed out are, what, an acceptable loss? Protecting the non-queer creators is so important that itch is completely above criticism for throwing their queer creators in the garbage?

How do you think this would play out if they didn’t capitulate?

I consider myself a pretty creative person, but I'm not imaginative enough to think of a reality where non-queer people don't immediately sacrifice every queer person they can to fascism to protect their own money.

You don’t think itch is doing this gleefully? A site that was literally built by queer game devs that they would literally do anything else if they had the choice?

Guess we will never know, hope throwing queer people under the bus was worth it.

Do you think itch is doing this because they hate queer people?

Imagine a reality where people lose their itch.io income. What a wild thought. Couldn't be literally right now.

Hey, that last part literally just happened, Tom. That's what this policy does, lose tens of thousands of people their incomes.

So would you rather itch goes away completely?

TBH, if this is their policy going forward, I'd like them to go under so an alternative can take their place, yes. They could have done 1000s of other things besides fuck over the creators exclusively to deal with this.

Hopefully an alternative that allows people to pay without a credit card!

Y'know there's more credit cards out there than Visa and Mastercard, right? Also yeah, paypal, e-transfer, piles of things. Nevermind that in all likelihood MC and Visa would allow something like restricting their use on purchases of adult material but still working for the rest of the platform.

Unlisting NFSW gives them the time to implement those features

That sort of feature isn't hard to implement, and if they were going to do so, they'd've said as much. They also could have temporarily shut visa and mastercard transactions instead of temporarily shutting any NSFW content.

They are literally doing this, they mention it in their post, quote " For NSFW pages, this will include a new step where creators must confirm that their content is allowable under the policies of the respective payment processors linked to their account."

software was sold on the internet long before online payments.

And? I doubt the average itch.io user is going to mail a check to them to buy a game. If they wanted censor proof payments they should have never used PPs and used Zcash or something

I even doubt the average user would be willing to figure out crypto just to buy a game. So they’re unfortunately at the mercy of payment processors and batshit insane “activists” that want to ban queer content

stop fucking carrying water for this, you shortsighted asshole

What? For crypto? Or defending people that want to make money on itch?

"Defending that people want to make money on itch" is not what you're doing, actually. Don't piss on my goddamn leg and tell me it's raining, dickweed.

?

If you actually gave a fucking shit about people making money on Itch, you'd be with us yelling at Itch to fucking release payment to the thousands of creators they just fucked over royally because they wanted to bend over for exactly 1,000 TERFS in Australia.

You're being grossly disingenuous and are carrying water for the shitass TERF group harassing payment processors AND the shitass devs at Itch who won't fucking stand up for their goddamn patrons. Capitulating to fucking Nazis isn't justifiable & Itch is blocking ppl from getting their money.

leafo has mentioned on his discord why he doesnt support crypto — consumer backlash. consumers insist on using credit cards. we need to drop visa and mastercard. the only reason itch blew up is bc it was a cheap way to get visa and mastercard payments.

A tale as old as time

visa and mastercard famously did not exist at all until 2001 so unless people start using bank transfers (which tbf are becoming popular for online payments in the UK) or create a convoluted way to send cash

for the record i didnt mean crypto cause yuck i meant shareware and floppys of the 90s :)

Have you ever sold any software via a check or cash?

How is that a solution to game developers who rely on payment t processing?

Those game developers should understand that rolling over will make them more vulnerable in the long run. Don't stick up for NSFW content creators now? You won't have them to stick up for YOU when Itch tries to hit devs with another percentage cut a while from now.

Okay, but what's the solution to the issue of not having money as a result of standing up for anyone. They can't do what you're asking without entirely shutting down.

Diversify payments. Use local paying forms. Here in Brazil there's pix, other countries also have payment forms that are not the omnipresent US cards. Open, diversify, take local currencies, local cards, that may work.

That won't work, and it will only drive their business into the ground.

This too, look for Tumblr. And I frankly doubt that accepting different currencies and detaching from dollars may destroy the company.

Some of the people impacted by this are facing down that option anyway. If it's itch responsible for saving the day when it's for creators getting paid, why aren't they similarly responsible for being paid or not in these less fortunate cases?

Go after payment processors, or the scumbag company that did this, not the platform that everyone relies on.

The payment processors are who went after the platform and the platform caved. Now there's a precedent set for them and for other platforms that it's Mastercard who sets the policy and nobody will say otherwise until it's already bad news on bluesky

itch.io could have done that, yes, but they didnt they chose to cave

nevermind the fact that caving to fascists don't make them back down; standing to to them and punching them in the jaw does

Risking thousands of indie game devs income with a knee jerk reaction doesn’t sound great

You can't punch a payment processor in the jaw. It isn't a person.

They can inform those creators that they can only offer them for free, *disable payment* for those items, and post a banner.

or make all nsfw games processed for a "donation" to the dev not a specific game and

That's actually very explicitly prohibited by the payment processors' contracts.

Guess what's also against the MasterCard TOS bsky.app/profile/eva....

this is a really, really good point too

You do realize by doing that you will lose a lot of people going and check the site

First they came for the horny, and I did not speak up, because I wasn't horny....

I'm sure you "understand" (because you did it), but "truly sorry" is really stretching it.

this sucks. obviously

Is this how a storefront unalives itself?

You're allowed to say "kills" on Bluesky.

yaaaaay!

For some reason, "unalives itself" just feels more... apt in this situation. Killing would happen quickly, this is just systematically dismantling the supporting community that made itch what it is today, while making the shocked Pikachu face when no one supports them anymore.

This is a coward’s move and is going to lead to deaths as people’s livelihood is ripped out from under them, I hope everyone at your company is happy knowing that every person who dies from this is explicitly their fault.

This isn't on them. They will literally die as a business if they fight this. This is squarely on the payment providers, MasterCard and PayPal, as well as the heinous prudish group that's pressuring them.

They’re going to die as a business now anyway, who’s going to want to work with a company that for any reason without warning will hide your work and withhold money they owe you?

This is literally done by external pressure. If we eradicate that pressure, the company is fine.

They could have at least warned creators in advance, so spare me the pathetic "UWU they're smol helpless beans" routine. Even if capitulation was the ONLY avenue (which I do not acknowledge) the WAY they did it was the most scumbag of them all.

I'm seeing reports that there's a good chance that there was a warrant in place or similar, so they legally couldn't discuss it. Not confirmed, but again I don't think we should be castigating them until we know all the details.

I don't think itch is going to be fine now regardless, changing policy like this is extremely fucking illegal in multiple countries, I very much doubt they're going to survive the wave of lawsuits coming.

Like, this isnt even "maybe they broke the law but it's unclear" This is blatant, cut and dry they broke the consumer protection laws in multiple countries, largely the European Union, which they cant afford to lose (especially now) given they are a large percentage of global revenue in games.

Very fair point! But we can leave that to the courts while we focus on the targets that we can force change out of: the payment providers and that disgusting action group

We can force change from Itch, as well. Primarily into paying their creators they illegally stole money that they're owed after banning them. Not even considering the fact that, yes, payment processors are powerful but trans people have already solved this problem. We buy DIY HRT without them.

Right, sure, but even if there are major payment providers out there that can accommodate their level of traffic (and I'm not sure if that is the case) then it will still take weeks to months of negotiations and implementation, they can't spin on a dime.

It's not a payment processor. Just the possible one sane and viable use of a cryptocurrency, as trans people use it for DIY HRT. The basic flow is you turn exactly as much as you need into (usually bitcoin), pay, and then when they receive it, it goes directly back to USD. It skips VISA/MC/ect.

They're gonna die as a business as it is now.

Your action never has to be sudden or silent. You chose to stay quiet until the decision. You stayed silent and hoped the delisting wouldn't be discovered. You made a statement AFTER abandoning people and we discovered what happened. You are Deserving of every single hex you stumble upon in life.

Did itch.io delete their second post suggesting we use GenAI to write complaint letters? I think they did…

yes. lol - I guess one ratio in a day was enough.

They fucking WHAT?!?!?

Time to download my purchases from itch and close my account

weak

can you like, not

What are you doing to fight and make up for the community that put their trust into thinking you were a safe space for them.

Why are you banning SFW LGBT works then

If anyone is coming here to insult itchio, DON'T If they don't do this, they could get their site removed, they're trying to protect the devs that rely on them You can help them, though, sign the petition, make your voice heard Focus your anger on Mastercard and Visa! action.aclu.org/petition/mas...

Itch doesn't get a pass for bowing to this. Everyone not standing up to fascism is participating in it. If they aren't willing to defend the people who give them their platform then they have no business being a platform.

Again, focus you anger at Mastercard and Visa, it's better spent there

As a complex organism I have the ability to focus on multiple things simultaneously, thank you.

Pussies

I can’t really speak on behalf of other indie artists losing their business because I was only “CONSIDERING” using your platform before this mess (and I already know its not 100% your fault because you’re being “kinda forced”) but……… Really. Consider the loss you’re about to face from now on.

I love you all so much, but I can't let you get away with this. I'll set it back when you start acting right.

This is a measured response, you rock.

I know itch.io has their hands tied, but their way of communicating this with fans and developers seems very woeful. Not sure if it’ll be of use to anyone, but I came across this well put together post on Reddit outlining how people can work to change this. www.reddit.com/r/itchio/s/o...

Sad future when devs might have to convince people to either return to mail order or use crypto

I get that the payment processors are forcing this, but the fact you kept it quiet, then went beyond just NSFW to ban anything with LGBTQ tags shows you arent just being forced to comply with visa, you are using this as an excuse to purge the platform of queer content. Fuck the itch leadership.

Please read and share this. It explains that while these things are prompted by payment processors, the specifics of enforcement are almost always at the hands of the merchants who almost always preemptively and overzealously comply. This has been happening for decades. bsky.app/profile/cent...

Please note that not ALL LGBTQ content was delisted, however many of them that were SFW and carefully designed to be that way have been removed without explanation. itch responded to some with the excuse it was a false positive situation, however those games are not being restored.

Creators who have SFW games and have also released NSFW content as seperate projects are also having all their content delisted and payments held despite the fact their SFW content is permitted.

Doesn’t this implicitly mean that Skyrim should be delisted? It’s okay if the mods are fan-made instead?

Based on their behavior I doubt the people responsible would make a distinction there. The game would be on the list of bans simply for making available a place adult content is happening, not because it happens by design in the game.

i heard collective is also tryna get shit like gta and detroit become human banned

They are, it's just taking longer and more effort to do so since those games have companies with fuck you money behind them and legal teams that can fight at that weight level.

belive it or not there is a double standard in their plan however, they do support that cuties netflix show

barely even heard of the show but apaprently it has somethign to do with pedos

Yeah, that was disgusting, but of course these people aren't actually trying to stop whats wrong, just what they hate, and I guess they dont hate pedophilia as much as they say!

Yeah, compare to Steam which took a comparatively light touch and just hit the most extreme fetish content to "comply" in as limited a way as possible.

Thats where I am most disappointed in itch. They attracted this community by claiming to be a safe haven for adult game designers and the queer community, then they shit can everything with no warning, hesitation, explanation, or care to do so in a controlled and carefully managed way.

That worked incredibly well to Tumblr, didn't it?

not looking forward to itch becoming an AI-autopiloted wasteland as their profits evaporate.

This is on many way a very stupid and absurd decision . Not even considering that this communication is very incomplete and that (whether intentional or not) you have done much more than remove the "NSFW" elements.

"We are truly sorry . . . " Maybe not now, but once your user base walks out, you sure will be. Way to prove to your paying customers just how little they mean to you.

If they didn't do anything the playment processors would have stopped working with them and they would have had NO paying customers.

Stop Killing Games* *Unless they feature any theme which might offend conservatives

you are not obliged to kramer in and lick itch's boots

I am my own person with my own beleifs, please don't call me a boot-licker I think that the fault lies on the payment processors leaving itch no choice I still don't agree with what they had to do and I think censorship is bad I hope that they now have more time to make things right

first move, if you're so self-directed, is to realise when you're licking boot and not do that then

This is such a horrifically bad decision and a massive overstep in response to bigotry and fascism. You should be stepping up to protect the games and developers who rely on your site, not bending the knee.

Do explain what NOT bending the knee entails here. Because it would mean not being able to process payments. What is your suggested next step after that?

They've already admitted the pressure began back in April. The correct course of action would have been to mobilize their audience and user base, many of whom have extensive experience with direct action, to apply pressure against the payment processors. Instead, itch.io chose inaction.

And what would that look like?

A message to people back in April when the pressure initially started saying "Hey, we are facing outside pressure to remove NSFW content from our site. We believe in free expression, and do not wish to do this, but the tactics being used threaten our ability to operate. Here's how you can help."

That would be like, bare minimum.

And did you not already know all of those things?

People are booing you, but you're right. If Steam, a company with 3749837% the market share of Itch, decided in the same crisis "it's less risky to just drop these games" then what possible leverage could Itch hold to force Visa to change course?

"oh well Itch should just refuse Visa's business" great! visa will lose 0.000000001% of their revenue and Itch will blink out of existence immediately. masterful

The only ppl who think he’s right are people who seem to think visa and PayPal are the only ways to buy things lol

meanwhile here in the real world, it's fundamentally impossible to run a major digital storefront without being able to accept visa or paypal

that said, if an individual dev wants to accept ACH / cash / take on the risk themselves (say, use a personal Paypal account) but still deliver through Itch, good news - that option already exists: bsky.app/profile/bbbb... but, again, you can't run an entire storefront on this. you simply can't

do you think Visa is able to unilaterally dictate policy to vendors because everyone really likes them if you go to your real bank that all us Vincent Adultmen here have and ask them to issue an electronic transfer, they will give you a visa debit card. don't like that? wire transfers are $20 each

"kowtow to fascism as long as it means to throw others under the bus" is actually not the right thing to do

afaict the card processors and Collective Shout are the aggressors here, not the indie webpage forced into capitulation by the global financial system

You realize that this excuse was used to support things like Jews being excluded from public schools right?

all things are all exactly the same all the time

if they capitulated, then they're part of the problem. not only that, they did it silently as well. they didn't even try to resist. they had months to mobilize people, but chose to do nothing instead. defending that is the same as saying nazi soldiers was just following orders, they're not innocent

mobilize people to do what

Exactly what people have taken the initiative to do now: go after Visa and MC directly. We're calling, we're emailing, we're not letting them know peace. Itch had the opportunity to take the lead on this, to rally support. Instead, they chose to do nothing and capitulate without warning.

Why do you think they had that option? That is not how business relationships work.

Precisely. With how they've chosen to do things, their company is doomed. The niche indie scene, the only thing keeping it afloat, has collectively turned on it. Now, what's best? To fight oppression and win/at least be remembered as a hero, or bend their knee and be remembered as fools?

look it's easy to say "well if I was in charge I would have blown up the site" but that is because you are not in charge of a site that provides income and community for many thousands of marginalized people. if you WERE in that position, you'd have takes more like this: bsky.app/profile/anil...

working with itch? buddy, itch didn't even warn its users this was going on. they were never interested in organizing anything to begin with. that's the whole fucking point we're making, THEY DIDN'T EVEN TRY. they just made a post saying they'll comply and demanding everyone else does too

What do you want them to try to do right now?

Calls! Emails! Letters! Constant never ending stream of them

What do you expect them to do? If payment processors banned them it means nobody get pays shit cause you can't buy. This will also affect creators not just them. They're a small company. Even Steam which has monopoly to games caved in.

If they de-list their games, nobody gets paid because you can no longer buy the games. This will affect creators as they can no longer sell their games on the platform. They may be a small company, but they have an active customer base with experience in direct action.

Seems like you agree with me then.

If that's your takeaway, you really need to work on your reading comprehension.

if your options are shoot yourself in the head with the community, or shoot yourself in the head with the payment processors, you're going out either way

they're hating your ass but you're unfortunately right, theres sort of jack shit itch can do other than bend the knee because you can't expect 90% of your userbase to suddenly start mailing physical cheques out because you got blacklisted from major visa companies due to not complying.

blueskys internet activists are better off targeting the actual companies and organizations pushing these stupid restrictions instead of complaining to the company thats merely affected

We are. We’ve been going after visa and Mastercard since the news came out. However, Itch and companies that capitulate aren’t innocent in this. They had months to tell us what was happening, to take the lead. If they had tried and lost, that is far better than not trying at all.

You KNEW what was happening. Your inaction is not on them.

... mc and visa aren't the only payment processors, and they aren't the only way to buy things. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills here lol

Do finish that thought.

I did. They aren’t the only payment processors and they aren’t the only way to buy things. If you disagree, state why. Be direct.

So what are the others?

Cash. ACH. Writing a check lmfao. Were you born yesterday or do you not have a concept of a bank account?

Last time I saw a check was in the eighties.

Last time I saw one was today, at work, putting them into our banking records. Not sure what your point is.

None of those work for an international online marketplace.

How do I get my computer to accept a $20 Please, elaborate

if everyone followed that line of thought, we would have been living under Nazi rule since the 40's

Fight back. Duh. Like us, the people, are now. They've had since April to do so. Not only that, but they've had since April to warn us about this. Instead, they shyly comply without a single heads-up beforehand. And other banks and even payment services are available beyond Visa and Mastercard.

Fight back HOW? What leverage do you imagine them having?

action.aclu.org/petition/mas... They could have linked this if nothing else, months ago.

And if they linked it would that magically exempt them from payment processors ban? Even if they support this, it will probably take years for a law against this practice to get implemented by which point they're already out of business.

This is a disingenuous take and you know it. The options for Itch were to do something and risk failing, or do nothing and definitely fail. They chose to do nothing. At this rate, they will still go out of business as their customer base and creators abandon the platform.

Itch is a company not a charity. You're expecting too much from them.

Correct, Itch is a company which makes money when creators sell games to their customers. I expect such a company to enable said creators to sell their product to customers, rather than actively work to prevent that from happening because of a handful of bigots.

What should happen is for this Puritan groups to get mogged and a law for fair payment processing if it's legal.

They're a business in the end. They have no obligation to support anyone if it affects their business. If you want a group that actually supports people then expect nothing from them.

You seem to be expecting nothing from them.

You're right. I'm expecting nothing from them because they're a business in the end. They have no obligation to support anyone if it affects their business.

You're such a good consumer.

If the public stops using their service because they've proven they'll throw people aside as soon as it inconveniences them, then they'll also go under.

This is a little fucking bit more than “inconveniences”. This is throw them aside, or the whole company goes under.

They'll go under from people not using them.

Well, it only took 1000 phone calls to make Mastercard+Visa crumble. So pretty much anything comparatively more than that. People are on their own currently making calls and emails to Mastercard+Visa as we speak, and rightfully lessening their public image. Essentially pressuring them to revert.

if we're gonna be honest online sales, software development, all of it was a bad move we should probably be backing out of. it may not seem glamorous but we never had these problems buying a rake with a crumpled fiver

Fuck you for throwing creators who made your site to the dogs. You're never getting another fucking cent from me, you cowards.

they wouldnt even be able to get a cent from you regardless because their payment systems would be shut down And the website would cease to exist. Lol. protest the payment companies instead of itch who had their hand forced

no, itch are just homophobes bsky.app/profile/mars... you are not in fact obligated to lick their boots, you could just choose not to do that

don't really know if what i would call it "licking their boots" nor appreciate it when i'm just trying to direct anger where it may be better justified (seeing as steam had a similar thing happen) but thanks for the information, i will look into it

everyone blaming itch here needs to get some perspective bc it is very obviously the fault of payment processors and collective shout. i doubt a company that hosted a massive amount of queer/nsfw media is thrilled this is the situation they’re in

"No" Wow so hard o: o: o: Run yourself out of business if you have to. No excuse.

They choose to take this route. If companies stopped taking the cowards way out and siding with the payment companies the payment companies would lose revenue.

They are complying in advance.

itch is the company who is keeping funds for every sfw queer person selling stuff on their platform. they're the ones doing that. they decided to keep the money for everyone they banned bc they retroactively broke the new rules which is "no fags allowed"

So you're fine with them stealing money that creators have already earned? I am so sick of people like yourself whining and crying for corpos bsky.app/profile/daff...

and IM sick of people like you doing the work of corpos and attacking anyone and everyone while pretending you’re helping. ive already contacted Visa and Collective Shout. why do you assume everyone but you is doing nothing. virtue signaling jackass

Also how is having an issue with a company not paying a user the work of corpos?

because youre siding with the payment processors and the “nonprofit” by proxy. they want you to be mad at itch, its part of their stated plan. itch had their whole domain shut down a few months ago bc 1 person uploaded copyrighted material that they already removed by the the site went down. 1/2

similar situation to now with “no mercy” which was already removed. they don’t have as much power as you think, or as many employees as steam or any backing. itch is not the source of the problem & 1 of the few queer platforms left. they’re not big corpo either & its ridiculous to call them that

Its because to make the transaction, they would violate something.

Literally was on the phone with Mastercard's frustrating service. Don't be a fucking diphshit. Itchio deserves pushback as well.

When Steam bent the knee they warned people. When Itch did it they removed people's games and barred them from cashing out *before* any news was dropped. That's on Itch.

Steam has a swarm of lawyers and more money than god. They can afford to push back a LOT harder than they did. If people are mad at itch I understand just make sure you direct a hundred times that anger at the payment processors and CS

Yeah, I'm not saying Steam did good or as much as they could or anything. Just that Itch handled this considerably worse. And absolutely, the root of the problem is not with Itch. Take it higher but don't give Itch a pass for this attrocious handling either.

The owners of Stonewall knew it was going to get raided.

Thanks for admitting that you are willing to roll over and lick the boot without even fighting for marginalised people. Your site deserves to die if this is how you act. Cowards, the lot of you.

As a reminder for who itch is supposed to be from their own post

Aged like bottled sun-warmed piss.

Would be great if everyone in the comments started contacting Visa and Mastercard on masse and never stopped. Don't let the companies have a peaceful moment until they stop this shit. usa.visa.com/contact-us.h... www.mastercard.com/us/en/person....

Just gonna also share this post with more info bsky.app/profile/iant...

People are still liking this so I'm just gonna keep dropping whatever other stuff I come across yellat.money

Done and done! Thanks for providing these numbers.

the issue there is you are not hurting the company, just the low end employees. Don't buy games on Itch and it will force them to go back to their corporate lords to change the terms back

That wouldnt bother the company but the underpaid workers, which will be the ones suffering both, our anger and their bosses if everything goes bad for them / will be exchanged for ia. It would be a way more worthy to cancel any kind of connection you have with them if possible

That's literally what Collective Shout did though, they campaigned to the payment processors. The real point of leverage here is the payment processors, and the hate groups know it.

That's the deal with "if possible". Visa and MasterCard together control almost 90% of all US payment processing. capitaloneshopping.com/research/cre...

bsky.app/profile/xuel...

Oh godm, then there is no other way. I pity those workers, but there is not other way then

Are there any steps that your company plans to take to push back against Collective Shout's campaign?

Enjoy losing all your money, forever. Won't need a payment processor when everyone quits buying from you over this <3

Welp, it's not been so nice knowing you. Enjoy financial oblivion, you absolute amoebas.

Don't piss on our legs and tell us it's raining, guys. It's bad enough that y'all bent over and spread your cheeks for the credit card companies, but to treat us like idiots by telling us you had "no time" to let creators know about these changes? Yeah, fuck you too.

What would you have don in their stead? Created a completely new payment processor?

Write the blog post myself instead of chatgpt.

What's the alternative here? Stop accepting payments? How would that help the situation?

How about being straightforward and treating your audience as adults? Why do they have to play the "it's actually good for you" card?

That isn't what itch has said? The only options itch had were a) delist nsfw games while they sort this out with the payment processors or b) stop all payments to all creators and close shop. They did tell what was going on, but you people seem completely unable to read.

They posted this article AFTER they had already de-listed everything. There was an actual period of time where they could have done this like Steam did, where they gave people WARNING, so that they could SAVE their data and everything they needed to before it was gone, pull their funds before -(c)

they pulled and de-listed everything and froze people's funds. Steam gave people at least some kind of compensation for the matter. The fact is, Itch chose to cave and do it without any means of giving ANY OF THE DEVS who had their stuff removed ability to get what they needed saved off of the -(c)

platform and get what they did make out of the games before the de-listing. Which is not okay and frankly incredibly shitty of them. They had time, as shown by Steam, that they had time to warn people first. They didn't have to warn AFTER they had already done it. AFTER they had screwed a bunch -(c)

How much time did they have?

Similar timeline to Itch is implied. But they directly contacted the devs of these games they removed and issued them compensation in the form of $100 worth of app credit on the store. And did not do it afterwards like Itch did. This shows it can be done in a timely way with a warning beforehand.

Steam is a multi billion dollar company, itch is run by like 5 people. Get real and stop spreading terf FUD

Devs over who are queer or make completely legal adult content style games who have been driven off of. Every. Other. Platform.

They kept this quiet and then sprung it on everyone at the last second. They could stand up, they could fight back, but they're cowards. And now the only people who would defend them when the Fascists come back are gone. They will reap what they have sown.

How could they fight back? What actions do you want them to take? And what do you mean with "they kept this quiet"?

They could have made this a public issue. They knew this back in april. They've known for months. Instead not only do they roll over, they take it beyond what was demanded of them. They start silencing anything LGBTQ+. They've labeled themselves as Nazis as far as i'm concerned.

Whats your source for the claim that they have known this since April? And how are they silencing LGBTQ+? Do you mean the delisting of content rated as nsfw, or something else?

Yesterday, before the backlash, many of the tags such as 'Trans' or 'Transgender' were showing no results or giving errors. There's many games that were delisted unceremoniously without warning or explanation. Some for the rules that they did put in place without warning, some without any reason.

Yesterday? You said months. April was not yesterday.

If you would look at the second response I explained the April part. They didn't ban this back in April, they banned this yesterday. They've KNOWN since April but only took action publicly yesterday.

As for your question on the part from as far back as April... It's in the article they posted. "Due to a game titled No Mercy, which was temporarily available on itch.io before being banned back in April, the organization Collective Shout launched a campaign..."

This isn't the first time anti-LGBTQ+ organizations have targeted itch, and it wont be the last. Should they announce each and every one of those, when they have no idea what the effects of them will be?

That depends entirely on Itch's alignment. If they are "working with bigots to find the final solution", it can be done in silence. If they are "targeted by bigots", then being silent is counterintuitive and detrimental.

Yes!! What kind of fucking question is that?

Yes. Absolutely. Transparency is key, and fascists like those shouldn't be given a damned inch. The lack of trust happening right now is because they kept it behind closed doors and took action suddenly and without warning.

Why are you moving the goalposts?

Yes, Collective Terfs launched the campaign on April. That does not mean that Itch knew it was going to lead to anything. From what I've seen, Stripe told them to stop selling nsfw content yesterday, and I have seen no evidence of Stripe contacting them before.

This situation started in April, they didn't mention anything on it, they kept it quiet until it exploded out of control. All of the bans they were demanded may not have started back in April, but this whole thing did. And They knew the name of the Hate Group back in April.

They can take crypto stable coins

Sucks for you, sucks for us, sucks for everyone I think the group behind this was Exodus cry? Religion mixed with money I swear to god, what bunch of assholes Making the world more boring one dollar at a time

Honestly, correct me if I'm wrong cause there's too many groups going after nsfw stuff these days Those morons are gonna run out of stuff to blame and go back to blaming left handed and red head people eventually

A group called "Collective Shout", they're an extremist anti-porn astroturfing group, and yes, they're affiliated with Exodus Cry.

there's always one more I didn't know about =_= I'm so tired, I just wanna work

And they protect *actual* pedophiles. bsky.app/profile/kury...

ironic part is id bet they either have stashes of porn for themselves thats super illegal or that do the illegal stuff themselves

I remember reading something about them supporting Cuties?

An amazing amount of @'s to religious accounts and pages for an organization that has 'no affiliation to religious or political institutions' like it says on the bottom of their page.

This shit is why churches and religious organizations should be taxed into oblivion. They want to force their values on everyone they can pony up that tax 💵.

Exodus cry collective shouts all the regular niche puritanical groups composed of middle-aged housewives with nothing better to do who probably have never bought a game on this platform and call all consoles Nintendo.

Ya'll -seriously- just destroyed all the good will and faith that the largest chunks of your community had with you, damn.

People exclaiming itch should've fought back don't realize that it would just lead to the same outcome. You probably wont get paid if itch gets banned from using payment processors.

The failed here in a number of ways: - No warning to the creators. - No warning to the community. - No call to action. - No reasoning for why they went about this so haphazardly. - No attempt at finding an alternative solution.

Also, shadow banning SFW LGBT+ content as well which they didn't even fucking mention in their 'response'.

If only you read the linked article and understood what you read.

They could at least take a terminal risk and pivot to fucking zcash/btc/usdt(c) 95% chance of dying but at least they would have gone down swinging

I know emotions are running high, but please try and think about this: Itch mentioned Collective Shout by NAME. That is intentional -- most PR statements would not. Sign the ACLU petition. Do good instead of yelling at the victims. action.aclu.org/petition/mas...

It's honestly shocking how many people on here are so steadfast about blaming Itch.io for not wanting to throw the baby out with the bath water instead of doing something like calling the payment processors or even just signing petitions like this. It's like people want to be mad for the sake of it.

wow! a petition! this will surely bring about change

this started because collective shout got a 70k signatures petition and put it in front of payment processors. do you want to know why fascism is winning? it's because all the fascists are doing the beauracracy. we aren't heard because we're busy being like "wow! a petition!".

Precisely. And it's the ACLU, which is as legit as it gets. This isn't change.org

They could've still let us know before pulling this stunt fucking over everyone outta nowhere

Sign the petition and then get angry! I'm also a VN dev and having a meltdown but I signed it!!

Do all yall saying don't get mad at Itch realize humans can and do multitask? Yeah I signed the petition, I suggest everyone does, but you can still fucking call out the bullshit Itch did. They both deserve anger towards them

This, honestly. People/organizations that comply in advance screw over everyone else, and for what? They'll go under eventually anyway as the "moral guardians" demand more and more concessions from them.

What we need isn't petitions, it's recreating the end of fight club (iykyk)

Signed it ✍️

Needs US zip code, though. 😕 With a company that affects a good portion of the world.

Sorry, I should have specified that. I believe this is tied to the US because the payment processors are here, even if the Collective Shout group is Australian.

you guys are dead to us now

Every. Next. Move. Is. Important. No more half-measures. Don't just repost something someone slopped out on reddit. We don't want "AI" to attempt to save anything. Official written updates followed by actual action is the only way you can save yourself here.

But controversy could happen if fictional AI like Terminator's Skynet to make actual AI go rogue.

I mean they (itch.io) almost certainly used AI to find what to takedown, given the results. So it's not a big surprise they slammed that unacceptable shit in there like that.

To everyone complaining in the comments, one simple question for you. What do you use to pay for things online? And will you continue to use them? If you use Visa, Mastercard, Paypal, etc. Then you're directly supporting stuff like this, even if you stop using itch.

I guess to clarify since people don't understand my point. Protesting Itch doesn't stop this from happening in the future. Protesting Visa, Mastercard, Paypal and etc does. I'm not saying we shouldn't take any action. I'm saying we should take action against the ones behind this nonsense.

I can stop buying ANYTHING online if it means never using Visa, Mastercard, or Paypal anymore. Can you?

No, I will literally starve to death.

This is fair enough, but it's not really an either/or proposition. It's not hard for me to stop buying stuff online (I haven't bought anything online in ages) but much harder to avoid using cards in person Either way, I think it's understandable that folks feel betrayed and angry at itch as well.

Cards in person do often go through different processes at least. Local/national processors are much easier to start up than global ones. Like here we have Interac and such, which as far as I know, have never raised a fuss over things. But that goes through my bank itself, not via the Visa number.

But yes, you are right, though by not using those payment processors, you kinda can't use Itch in the end anyway (in most countries). I just hope that they are just trying to live today so they can fight back in the future. Instead of just accepting that this is the "new normal".

I think this comments sections would look very different if the response didn't seem so very ... compliant. If there was even a hint of "we're going to fight this" in there ... and if there had been advance communication and transparency... Well ... it's a terrible situation however we slice it.

It seems they did as much fighting as they're probably allowed. Normally a PR post like this would find a way to make it as neutral as possible. But they named the organization responsible, and also posted a link to their blog post about what that organization is doing. I still hope they do more.

We have our own electronic payment method in my country, I don't use their shit, do I deserved the rigth to complain or...? They decided to fuck my community because they are spineless. They give all the right to theses banks without a fight, should we accept that too ?

If they reject the others and only accept the one you mentioned, then they would still be alienating the userbases from other countries. If they decided to have a spine, they would simply cease existing entirely. Everyone loses except the big guys. But I am full glad that you're not using them.

Itchio is fucked either way. There is legal actions possible and this won't be forgotten. They lost the thrust of their devs, why should they continue to use that plateform ? Thrust is everything. Actions like this is what makes the big guys win. It's neutral action and they'll get devored

Legal actions are possible, but they have to still be alive in order to take those legal actions. A "Live today to fight tomorrow" sort of thing. I just hope they actually do the fighting part next.

Spoiler: they won't

This is a monopoly situation. There is no choice. When something is wrong, you stand for what is right. Not shut it down because you're locked into that system and therefore a 'hypocrite'. This mindset is nothing short of the 'We should improve society somewhat' comic.

I've responded to this one before. Buying things online and having online subscriptions is not equivalent to living in society. Abandoning society is extremely more difficult than giving up luxuries. Protest Visa/Mastercard/Paypal. Stop using their services. Call them. Email them.

Online purchases are also an accessibility thing, but I must state, you underestimate how omnipresent VISA and Mastercard are. They are Debit and Credit cards. There are places that no longer accept cash at all. There basic necessities that require cards to even pay for.

They are only handling the credit and OPOS portion of your debit card. Local transactions around here, even with a card, use things like Interac and such. It's easier to have localized payment processors. Thus competition. It's the global giants and online ordering that's an issue.

As far as accessibility goes. If someone *needs* to order things online using these payment processors, I understand that survival is more important than making a point. But for those of us that can go without it, we should.

My point isn't "We shouldn't complain because we use these services" My point is that you shouldn't let one slide while protesting the other, just because one of them is a more convenient target and something easier to give up. It's a very selfish and half-assed form of activism. Go full send.

To those who are international, and beyond the borders of the United States, If you can take such action, I am with you. But within these borders VISA and Mastercard and occasionally American Express are the only real viable options for card payments.

As far as I know, I haven't heard anyone complain about American Express. So that may be a viable avenue if a nearby bank offers their cards. If not, then yeah, best I can offer is at least minimal usage. I'm personally trying my best to refrain from using the Visa part of my card.

Well if there is something I can certainly agree on. It's avoiding using them to the best of our ability. Avoiding them completely, that's a near impossibility here for me. But I will certainly be taking action to avoid using them whenever possible.

Pix :)

While I agree with the sentiment that this really sucks, but people in comments need to understand: Fighting back against Visa and Mastercard is an extreme uphill battle. Itch will die without them. And they don't care if it does. What they gain from itch is a micropercentage. They are giants.

This might be a compelling argument if they hadn't done it without notice and weren't withholding payment to some creators, without notice. Itch might not have the power to effectively fight Visa and MasterCard, but they had the power not to blindside creators with this. They chose to do it anyway

The only way we could protest this is if we could somehow protest the payment processors themselves. But uh, hey, good luck to everyone who wants to move away from Visa and Mastercard. Move away to what exactly? The only other option is to somehow get the government to go after these companies.

this post is wrong, please make an attempt to protest these companies

But I have extreme doubt that would work. I'm willing to bet that the governments support decisions made by Visa and Mastercard. And even if they didn't, there's probably monetary reasons they wouldn't go after these companies.

Genuinely baffled that your response to this is uncritical defeatism and "sit and do nothing". Pathetic. The payment processors can change course if there's enough bad press. Particularly when this was caused by a tiny group of fascists in Australia

if you see the replies ive made after that one, you will see i have in fact rapidly switched gears into "we should 100% protest against payment processors" i just dont like deleting posts for transparency reasons.

but i do thank you for keeping me in check.

The bad press is important specially when those fascists already censored one article

There is actually a law that got introduced in the US about this very issue. Time to call your representatives if you are a USAmerican.

Good advice, and something I didn't know about. Unfortunately I'm in Canada. If anyone has any information about what I can do here, I would like to help.

I guess if there's anyway to talk to elected officials or petition the government? I dunno about how that would work in Canada but if such a law gets passed in the US a lot of countries could be affected because they don't wanna put in the work for seperate processing channels.

Yeah, I imagine it's one of those situations where as long as one of the bigger markets can get something passed for it, everyone benefits. Similar to if SKG passes in the UK, we'll all benefit from that.

If it takes collective shout a measly 100 phone calls to put Mastercard to its knees it's not the giant you think it is

They've done similar things completely unprompted before. Mastercard is run by very puritanical heads and likely agrees with things like Collective Shout. The 100 calls was probably just to bring attention to the game, they likely didn't need any convincing.

The poor guys are robbing the breeders, when it comes to wallowing in their money and keeping it, they don't see a problem. but I doubt they'll be able to survive much with the reputation of those who don't pay :)

they cant possibly pay what they owe devs either very conviently?

Itch will die regardless.

Cowards.

Absolutely fuck off and go to hell over this sickening display of cowardice. You stabbed people who trusted you in the back and didn't even have the nerve to warn them in advance. Rot in hell.

That's the bit that gets me. We've seen time and time again that payment processors have too much power but other platforms have warned users while Itch removed people's livelihood overnight without a word until it was too late.

@thelouvreof.bsky.social

Pathetic, useless cowards. Capitulating with no pushback whatsoever is what gives puritan turd burglars like this all their power, and you deserve to be left in the dumpster of history for betraying your base like this.

I grew up in a church where I was "NSFW." You assholes.

you guys are huge pussies BTW

Fucking cowards

Pathetic!!

If it's about adult content -- which shouldn't be a problem anyway -- then why are you delisting non-adult content that simply contains queer protagonists? Smells like bigotry. Thanks for showing us all who you are.

Hi there, I'm out of the loop on this part. Do we have any examples? Because I haven't bought too many games on Itch so I don't have any examples myself.

bsky.app/profile/duck...

bsky.app/profile/jazz...

Itch doesn't index games without cover images

Spectacular show of cowardace, bravo. You really showed everyone exactly who you were with how you handled this.

You fucking cowards

Absolutely vile practice to start enforcing this rule before you even made a statement, massively cowardly practice to be enabling this behavior from the payment processors as well Do better.

Fuck off

Seriously, go fuck yourselves you sell-outs.

Deep breaths now

you didn't even fucking try did you? Congrats, i'm never buying something from you again.

You know if all these companies stood up to the payment processors, they'd probably back down. Thanks for letting them infringe our rights further.

The problem is visa and mastercard have a monopoly, they wouldn't back down because the only way to boycott them is to mail checks and cash. There is no mechanism to pressure a monopoly other than the creation and enforcement of laws.

EU article 102

Can always bet on the EU having a relevant law, now we just need to enforce it.

Well one has to sue in order to enforce it. Its either a citizen, a law company on behalf of a citizen/citizens or the state. So if nobody does anything... Well... Also Mastercard already had issues with EU, so its possible

You get rid of stuff for HATEMONGERS? Kiss your customers goodbye. Only morons cater to Nazis. Way to FAIL, bloody Nazi collaborators.

Everyone point and laugh, these spineless losers love fascism! 😂🖕👉

Eat a hot bowl of dog shit and broken glass.

From my favorite platform to this, won't be giving itch a penny until you go back in this and let artists have freedom.

Yikes

Cowards.

How dare you act like their weren't other options. How dare you do this when you know it's part of a broader push used to chase queer community off the Internet completely. How dare you after years of acting creator-friendly. I hope you roll this back. Or I hope you go under

If they don't act, they lose all the payments processor and no one can buy shit anymore on itch. What do you want? No more platform for creators or only pay in cryptos for games?

how about mobilizing their enormous user base that's practiced at collective action after nearly a decade of organizing giant fundraisers? how about even a couple of days of warning? I'm aware they're the small dog in a terrifying fight but with even the tiniest bit of notice we could have helped

Also no, frankly, if all the LGBTQ creators get pushed off the platform and left without their primary source of income, I do not care about whatever is left.

and before you say "it's not all LGBTQ creators, it's just porn," please hear me when I say that I am from the U.S., where these companies are based, and the current political climate there is that ALL queer content is inherently adult. If you're trans and sell art on Itch, they're coming for you

On this one, I can't complain since I'm from Europe, so we are a bit more protected.

You are protected to an extent But if the platforms we use and the companies that support them are based in the U.S., we are *all* subject to their laws, their rules, and even their whims.

I do think a lot of online companies, such as itch, would benefit from migrating to Europe, amd we should setup our own payment processor to avoid such case of global monopoly.

Yeah. I think the current reality is that for any kind of open global economy the U.S. cannot continue to be as embedded as it is. Even that has its dangers, considering how much traction reactionaries are gaining in the EU. But the US can't be the center of this much anymore.

But you're absolutely right that hollerin' at Itch won't fix things, which is why I strongly recommend hollerin' at these assholes

A neighbor once told me about a nearby gay theater company, then couched it with "well, but it's for everyone, it's not just about being gay." I said, "Sir, I work in the arts. I wouldn't want to see a *straight* theater company." Itchio without queer creators is a straight theater company.

This is exactly it. The thing that makes Itch meaningfully different as a creator is that they have your back. The thing that makes it different is that they platform outré outsider shit With thia capitulation they kill both things separating them from Steam

Exactly. Where else am I gonna drop $4 on a six-page TTRPG about being a barista or whatever. Random artsy stuff from strange queer people is the POINT

And it's actually happening, with pointers on how to contact Visa, MC, Paypal and the other processors. The aussies puritans boasted they only needed 1000 calls to get action, it mean we can do it too, without being assholes to the ones who are forced to comply.

I linked as much in my reply to you. But I reserve the right to be angry at every step up and down the line when I see friends watch their ability to support their families dry up and disappear

Especially when they did this in the shittiest way possible. "It's happening" not because of Itch but because a lot of the people they've screwed are looking *past* that to try and help anyway

payment processor, which are banks, cannot deny the acces of corporations and/or individuals to the services they are obligated to provide by law just cause selling adult content to adults is not illegal

Does legality or morality ever stopped banks from screwing everyone over? We both know the answer: No. They can please a bunch of aussie child-fucking terf, it's better to them than thousands of vu

thousands of creators, especially if said creators are queer or SW (sorry for double post, I dropped my phone amd fat fingered the enter key.)

if corporations had taken a stance banks would absolutely bow and stop this crap on the spot for at least a decade Steam, the largest gaming platform in the planet that handles billions in cash, can 100% sue out of existence a few rightoid psychos for interfering in their lawful businesses

I know I'm preaching to the choir, but Valve has to sue. If they could keep hateful bullshit like HATRED, they can keep half-assed porn games.

I want them to do the same thing I do when a Nazi tells me to bend the knee

Do you actually think that throwing the whole userbase and every single creator under the bus for a statement is the best move?

Yes.

So you don't support sex workers and porn creators, you're just another whiny liberal. Fuck off out of here.

You make it sound like there's nothing anyone can do. Organize and retaliate. NSFW content will never leave the internet, unless we all capitulate.

bsky.app/profile/draw... Do your part.

You people are spineless fucking cowards and collaborators.

What's worse, making adult games unsearchable, or losing itchio completely? Focus your anger at Mastercard and Visa, sign the petition, share it around action.aclu.org/petition/mas...

I already have signed that stupid fucking petition, it's going to go nowhere because petitions do nothing if you're not a right winger.

What about harassing the Visa , Mastercard , PayPal or Stripe through email and phone?

Do you really want to know the answer to that question? I know you suppose it's rhetorical but the answer may surprise you

this would make sense as a response if not for the outright removals theyre Also doing. if they really were a brave ally or victim in all this just biding their time until they can find a way to make it work, they wouldnt be deleting some games while just shadowbanning others.

what have they been deleting? im only familiar with the search restrictions

so far i only have one example on hand itch.io/takedowns/23... but in itch's official statement they say theyre doing this explicitly

Things YOU can do to Counteract Payment Processors Harming @itch.io (and @steampowered.com so they're not got like Gumroad) www.reddit.com/r/itchio/s/Q...

They could just delist games. Yet they removed paid games from people accounts. So screw them

I'm really interested to see if they get a class action for that.

it's already lost.

All collaborators are bastards.

imagine being a big enough fucking moron to think anyone gives a fuck about petitions

They aren't worth keeping around if they aren't going to defend their creators.

Itchio was lost the moment they caved in. Now the content is dictated by payment providers - and NSFW and LGBT is just the first step.

both are bad, mate. people and companies have to stand up to these payment processors too. but yes, mastercard and visa should be destroyed tbh

itch isn't going to fuck you dude

There isn't much of a difference tbh.

Thank you for realizing! Lets stop this censorship once and for all!

Shame on you

Hey, I suggest you google the words "tumblr" in conjunction with "what ever happened to". Congratulations on your decision to become entirely fucking irrelevant as even devs who don't make NSFW content leave because they either don't support censorship or wonder if they'll be next.

Disappointed in you. After spending an entire year singing your praises, you pull a move like this. Guess I was wrong about you.

Never trust Capitalists.

There are countless crime and horror novels that would get pulled from Itch under these guidelines. Stephen King would never be able to publish there.

what the actual fuck

If my games are free-to-play, then why should payment processing matter? Deindexing all adult NSFW content is disproportionate.

I'm interested in this as well, as my game is barely NSFW and I have the payment options (even optional) disabled.

I made a thread last month explaining precisely how any platforms hosting adult content (incl. game) are “policed” by card schemes - you will probably be interested

What about doing adult games, but giving it for free, just having like "support the artist"... They are not banning art altogether are they?

Just trying to think of workarounds, how to "fuck" the system sort a way.

There are may ways some platform can do that and a few work at small scale for individuals (with associated risks…). Larger scale like a platform like hitch hiding this would not really work

Grow a fucking backbone

Fucking cowards. Worthless website, standing with fascists

They are Fascists now. When 9 people sit at table with a fascist, there are 10 fascists.

Devs, JUST USE BTC OR THE BRAZILIAN PIX... both work better and arent linked to payment processors. Just dump itch and steam for greener pastures that terfs cant reach.

Pix is technically a short term for online money transfer.

Como assim usar o PIX? Eu n entendo mt dessas coisas, como ficaria a situação dos cartões de crédito e tals?

O pix n é indexado a processamento de pagamento e tem função credito, alguns paises fora do br aceitam por ex, portugal... e a lei brasileira protege desses abusos. Cartao de credito ficaria só por bandeiras n afetadas, quem ta causando isso é mastercard e visa

O pix é direto com o BC no Brasil.

Ia ser um puta baque pra comunidade, mas seria mt melhor aceito doq essa vergonha oq eles tão fazendo

Ss, pelo menos garantiria o futuro dos jogos afetados, e blindaria contra esses grupos terf. Pq no br, negar pagamento assim é crime, se fosse sediado aqui o site, estaria blindado contra esse tipo de pressao. Outra opcao é o euro digital, que esta sendo implementado, e o proprio BTC

Cripto é foda, mt gente ainda tem preconceito e mais gente ainda n entende

Mas garante segurança financeira pra minorias. Acho justificado a mudança mais forçada

Spineless collaborators. I pray for your downfall

fuuuuuuuuuuck youuuuuuuuuuu lol this ia so fucking bullshit.

Wow. You guys really suck.

Like nobody is ever going to trust you again after you ambushed people with this and these people you've now forever associated yourselves with gradually broaden the definition of NSFW and Adult as their stated mission is a complete destruction of all adult media and you gave in to them,so good job.

Not even just adult media, any media they disapprove of. Oh your game has two men who hold hands? Banned. Trans people like me are extra fucked by this.

110% they operate on one term but secretly use a different definition that includes anyone who isn't straight and/or cisgendered.

Reading through the comments and this is fucked up. You were happy to charge my pink money and now this? 🤬

Fucking BOOO

Eat a dick.

Strongly recommend EVERYONE reduce their Itch support to 0% until they reverse course.

Im closing my account, f them

Itch is not your friend, and they will gleefully throw you to the wolves. They are a business first and foremost, so it's time to treat them like one.

The pushback must be a collective effort. We, the people are small. So all we can do is just not support the sites that bend the knee and dont do smt. If they feel it, they will do smt

The Mastercard and Visa and all will crumble like a card castle at the slightest push I think. They are an oligopoly, so they cant really do this

EU Article 102 targets the abuse of a dominant position, which can be held individually or collectively.

And then what? You are boycotting Itch when they are not the problem.

That's not what "boycott" means. Just another anonymous account shouting from the safety of their armchair instead of offering solutions.

Boycott Mastercard and Visa. Throw your cards away, take your money out of the banks, and use local payment processors. Criticize and form petitions around collective shout.

Not actually a solution in a digital age, but nice try.

It's not something we can feasibly do, BUT we are the ones who gave Visa and MasterCard that power in the first place

I did not. The system was long in place before I ever received my first pay check.

As ever, the boomers

You can switch to Discover/AMEX, but there's no such thing as a local payment processor…

actually bullying a company is cool and good and should be done more often

So why not Mastercard, Visa or better yet, collective shout? Yeah, the former 2 is kinda impossible. Pretty easy to do with the third.

well, two things can be done at the same time

Yeah this. These anonymous naysayer accounts are weirdly attached to everything being either-or.

I just dont see what use it is to bully itch when they were forced to do this, unless I misunderstand something. If you want them to change their rules back, either they do, payment processors shut them down and they die. Boycotting itch of all the companies involved is the most useless use of time

Also, you can't bully a company. I know the US Supreme Court thinks otherwise, but a business entity is not a person.

I dunno how else to call a company putting massive money into game development/movie making and ad campaign of a bad game/movie, intentionally not buying it, and said game or movie dying, for example. Hope it happens to Marathon lol.

Alternatively, they could have found other payment processors like Odysee did. They also made other choices that they didn't need to make. bsky.app/profile/elis...