We've Removed NSFW

I'll give a quick summary of what happened and why this is happening, with more details at the bottom for those who want them.

We've been using our source of NSFW for almost four years. We recently discovered a lot of the content was scraped from external sites. This means it's both unlicensed AND, more importantly, has a very strong potential to have non-consensual images. We are not okay with this morally in any way, and we can't support this. Since all of the NSFW was from that API, we are removing all NSFW support. This includes the entire NSFW category as well as the NSFW auto-posting.

Longer Explanation

As I said, we have been using that API for almost four years now. At the time, Dank Memer wasn't a business. It was a hobby at best. I was adding anything and everything to the bot that people requested, and people wanted NSFW content. (this was before currency even)

I found this API and got access for free since I was somewhat friendly with the owner, and added it to the bot. Non-business Mel's mind didn't even think about the source, I just assumed it was all above board. We've not really put thought into it since then, as the API never changed or really had issues.

It was not very long ago, just around two months ago, that someone asked us where we got the content from. I told them the usual, that we got it from this API. But they wanted to know WHERE the content was from, not just how we got it served. This led me to ask the API owner, who gave a very forward answer.

Most of it came from Tumblr, they told me. My first thought was "Well that means it's probably unlicensed, but we're probably not liable and the API owner is the one who would be". While concerning and something I'd want to address, it wasn't pressing or urgent.

Fast forward not too much longer and someone on my team brought up something I hadn't thought of; "If it was scraped from social media, there is a really high likelihood that some of it was non-consensual nudes posted." It could be stolen, it could be revenge porn, etc. This absolutely sickened us at the thought, and we immediately began making plans to remove it sooner than later.

So here we are. Just a day or so ago we put a poll on Patreon to see how much revenue we'd lose with removing these. Not to decide if it was GOING to be removed or not, because we were removing it either way. We wanted to see how much of our budget would be affected.

After that poll, it looks like it's in the realm of ~35%. It could be higher, it could be lower, we won't know for sure until a few months later to see what happens. But this is a massive chunk and puts a large dent in our long-term plans.

That being said, we absolutely don't regret removing it. It was the right thing to do, and I will stand by that.

Now, this brings us to where some users are probably asking "Why don't you just get another source?". That's a fair question and something we've definitely considered. The issue is, with avoiding possible moral and legal issues that would be the same thing that API was plagued by, we'd have to directly license things ourselves more than likely. This is... a bit out of our budget. Even without that lost revenue, it would likely be unaffordable for us no matter who we reached out to.

So that's that. While we don't have any issues with porn/NSFW, we take issue greatly against adult content that was made or shared below the board. So while it sucks that this category is being removed, it is the only option we are willing to do.