News Room Contributor Posts: 8087 Joined: 12 Nov 2002 | CNN Reports on Sporn
CNN has a story about a new plague slowly spreading across the Earth, a digital scourge known as Sporn.
Sporn - short for "Spore porn" - is the inevitable result of releasing to the general public content-generation tools that allow for the creation of simulated biological creatures. While we here at The Escapist had discussed the "time to cock" phenomenon as far back as mid-June, the issue has come to a head and attracted the attention of major mainstream news outlet CNN. In its report, CNN described the proliferation of anatomically-hilarious creatures as "the downside of tapping into the booming user-generated content arena."
"Whether it's modeling clay, dolls or crayons, a small number of people can be counted on to use it for something vulgar," said Spore Executive Producer Lucy Bradshaw. She said that once EA discovered the existence of Sporn, it joined with YouTube to pull the user-created videos as they came up, issuing warnings, suspensions and ultimately bans to repeat offenders.
The response left some people unhappy, however, including a 37-year-old Creature Creator user who calls himself the Spornmaster. "It was a totally ridiculous overreaction," he said. "I admit it is silly and juvenile, but I don't think there's anything perverted, vile or awful about it. If people find it offensive, they can simply not search for it online. No one is forcing anyone to see this content."
In fact, EA is implementing a filtering system to ensure people get only the Sporn they want. Spore will include three options for accepting user-generated content over the course of the game: To ignore it completely, to take content only from people on a buddy list, or to receive all external content. Miles Moffit, a student at the University of Georgia who has created numerous "clean" Spore creatures of his own, is a fan of the filtering system. "My initial reaction to discovering [Sporn] in my final game would be to ban it so it wouldn't show up again and then blow it to pieces for the sheer satisfaction of it," he said. "Go ahead, create a walking phallus. See how long it lasts in the databases and galaxies of Spore."
EA does, in fact, have content moderation for Spore creatures, as evidenced by the mid-June banning of Boobalicious, a creature built by PC Gamer Editor-in-Chief Kristen Salvatore in response to the flood of giant penis monsters generated in the early days of the Creature Creator release. And while the company has presumably tweaked its moderation policies since then (and likely continues to do so), isn't it interesting that two of the earliest high-profile examples of Sporn - including a call for the first Spore giant penis monster ever created - came from videogame magazine editors? The full CNN report on the evils of Sporn can be read here.
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Gone Gonzo Posts: 3902 Joined: 4 May 2008 | Malygris:
...the issue has come to a head...
I hope that was pun intended. I hope with all my heart that it was.
Plus, that image is possible the finest phallusaurus I have seen made. |
Muckraker Posts: 255 Joined: 4 Jun 2008 | This game still doesn't seem appealing to me in any way shape or form. The second they introduce the playable FPS version of it where you're a counter-terrorist and you go around and blow the piss out of all of peoples spore creations...THEN I might consider it... MIGHT.
Whats so good about it anyway? CNN's gone and brought about the over-hype apocalypse on a video game once again. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 3902 Joined: 4 May 2008 | I actually think that they held back quite well with that article. They could have gone on to start preaching how the game was ungodly and was undermining the Church, as many other news stations have done, but instead they took a lighthearted views. Albeit, one that was looking at walking todgers. |
Escapist Co-Founder Posts: 829 Joined: 21 Nov 2004 | Johnn Johnston:
Malygris:
...the issue has come to a head...
I hope that was pun intended. I hope with all my heart that it was.
Plus, that image is possible the finest phallusaurus I have seen made.
Mebbe. :P |
Paperboy Posts: 45 Joined: 29 Jul 2008 | The spore creators new that this would happen and if they wanted to prevent it they could've just kept it out of the game in the first place, though that would go against the user creativity freedom that the game promises. |
Pulitzer Laureate Posts: 780 Joined: 7 Jun 2008 | OOPS The issue has attracted the attention of the mainstream media who, in keeping with their already ridiculous "remember the good ol' days where we suppressed all shocking truths?" agenda run a negative story about how deprived the internet is and now EA has to go "Oh, guys... no funny. Where did all these penises come from?" to what was once a humorous joke of a trend.
What kills me is that CNN plays non-stop in my college cafeteria, but since it's the summer, no one'll see it. I'm curious if they actually displayed a penis monster. |
Copy Clerk Posts: 88 Joined: 8 May 2008 | Hahahahaha I find this whole topic very amusing, I just cant take it seriously the people who do it and the people who complain, it's all just a laugh to me. :) |
Beat Writer Posts: 136 Joined: 2 Apr 2008 | TunaCanner:
The spore creators new that this would happen and if they wanted to prevent it they could've just kept it out of the game in the first place, though that would go against the user creativity freedom that the game promises.
Yeah. They just forgot to add the "PenisMonsters = Off" line to the source code. Right. |
Anonymous Source Posts: 1 Joined: 16 Jul 2008 | The thing I find ridiculous about this flap is the term "sporn." Do people really think anything made in the Spore Creature Creator is pornographic? Like, that someone is going to lust after cartoony dongs with legs? I've even seen articles blur out Boobalicious' "nipples"--as if some hypothetical children would be corrupted by something they could make themselves out of Play-Doh. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 3664 Joined: 21 Jan 2008 | dunadhaigh:
I've even seen articles blur out Boobalicious' "nipples"--as if some hypothetical children would be corrupted by something they could make themselves out of Play-Doh.
Funny enough, the copy of the Spore Creature Creator (the one I got with The Daily Telegraph; like I'd download it and waste my precious bandwidth) is G, so they technically should. I know it's asinine, but still.
Anyways, I think this is funny. I've yet to try out the creator, but it sounds like fun. |
Anonymous Source Posts: 7 Joined: 3 Feb 2008 | It's cute how CNN pretended this was unexpected. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 3664 Joined: 21 Jan 2008 | I think my Stompy has something to say to CNN... isn't that right Stompy? /cutesy voice |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 2666 Joined: 20 Jul 2008 | I doubt this will come to a halt anytime soon too. EA can't control every video streaming site, though EA will most likely attempt to. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 4297 Joined: 20 Dec 2007 | snuffler:
This game still doesn't seem appealing to me in any way shape or form. The second they introduce the playable FPS version of it where you're a counter-terrorist and you go around and blow the piss out of all of peoples spore creations...THEN I might consider it... MIGHT.
Whats so good about it anyway? CNN's gone and brought about the over-hype apocalypse on a video game once again.
Haha, sounds like a good mod for it. |
Press Junketeer Posts: 426 Joined: 23 Apr 2008 | Thats cool, the game hasn't even come out yet and it's already pissing people off! Who would have thought that Spore would be in the same league as the GTA series. |
Gone Gonzo Posts: 3902 Joined: 4 May 2008 | huntedannoyed:
Thats cool, the game hasn't even come out yet and it's already pissing people off! Who would have thought that Spore would be in the same league as the GTA series.
Grand Theft Spore: Todger City. |
CNN Reports on Sporn
CNN has a story about a new plague slowly spreading across the Earth, a digital scourge known as Sporn.
Sporn - short for "Spore porn" - is the inevitable result of releasing to the general public content-generation tools that allow for the creation of simulated biological creatures. While we here at The Escapist had discussed the "time to cock" phenomenon as far back as mid-June, the issue has come to a head and attracted the attention of major mainstream news outlet CNN. In its report, CNN described the proliferation of anatomically-hilarious creatures as "the downside of tapping into the booming user-generated content arena."
"Whether it's modeling clay, dolls or crayons, a small number of people can be counted on to use it for something vulgar," said Spore Executive Producer Lucy Bradshaw. She said that once EA discovered the existence of Sporn, it joined with YouTube to pull the user-created videos as they came up, issuing warnings, suspensions and ultimately bans to repeat offenders.
The response left some people unhappy, however, including a 37-year-old Creature Creator user who calls himself the Spornmaster. "It was a totally ridiculous overreaction," he said. "I admit it is silly and juvenile, but I don't think there's anything perverted, vile or awful about it. If people find it offensive, they can simply not search for it online. No one is forcing anyone to see this content."
In fact, EA is implementing a filtering system to ensure people get only the Sporn they want. Spore will include three options for accepting user-generated content over the course of the game: To ignore it completely, to take content only from people on a buddy list, or to receive all external content. Miles Moffit, a student at the University of Georgia who has created numerous "clean" Spore creatures of his own, is a fan of the filtering system. "My initial reaction to discovering [Sporn] in my final game would be to ban it so it wouldn't show up again and then blow it to pieces for the sheer satisfaction of it," he said. "Go ahead, create a walking phallus. See how long it lasts in the databases and galaxies of Spore."
EA does, in fact, have content moderation for Spore creatures, as evidenced by the mid-June banning of Boobalicious, a creature built by PC Gamer Editor-in-Chief Kristen Salvatore in response to the flood of giant penis monsters generated in the early days of the Creature Creator release. And while the company has presumably tweaked its moderation policies since then (and likely continues to do so), isn't it interesting that two of the earliest high-profile examples of Sporn - including a call for the first Spore giant penis monster ever created - came from videogame magazine editors? The full CNN report on the evils of Sporn can be read here.
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