MN310

Major Nelson: So Stepto should we start with you and start off the show by talking about what is going on in his world.

E: I suspect there are a lot of people who would like us to so lets

Major Nelson: So I have him on once every 2 months to let us know what's going on in Policy land.

Stepto: right

Major Nelson: So there have been some interesting policy issues (Major is stretching this out to put the heat on Stepto)

Stepto: You guys are enjoying this way too much LOL

Major Nelson: issues you been dragged into and we want to talk about that. So why don't you tell us what happened and what's going on and more importantly how it effects the live community.

Stepto: So its not so much a new thing, its something that happened before. We have as you know several different policies regarding content in the GT and the Profiles. This week we received a report on the consumerist involving a gamer I believe they said her name is Theresa who experienced some harassment from Xbox live users but then found herself suspended for having the expression of here sexual orientation in her profile. I don't know what was in there by the way or here Gamertag the consumerists information was very vague. So we don't know who talked to her she said she talked to MS she didn't talk to my team I can tell you that much.

Major Nelson: cause if anybody I am probably the most visible people on the Xbox team so when anything comes thru on policy its like in your inbox within seconds.

Stepto: Which isn't to say none of it happened it could of certainly happened. I just want to Stress if your listening to this Theresa I would love to talk to you.

So lets talk about the policy ( Major says so you haven't talked to her) No I haven't I put it on my blog. I would love to talk to her my email address is Stepto@microsoft.com but taking a step back the policy that currently exists its not a elegant policy. It is a objective Policy that doesn't mean that everyone going to experience it the same way. The Policy right now is that for text based fields like GT and Profile that they expression of relationship preference sexual orientation what have you is not allowed.

Major Nelson: So Justice here is blind

Stepto: Its whether its straight or otherwise its just not what we feel is the right place you can talk about it. Vocally you can thru in game vocal chat and the part of the reason is you can provide some context about what you are saying. Because what we found when we ran across some of our user displeasure with this policy previously last summer. We had people say that really isn't a good policy to have. We took a step back and said what can we do to make it better.

Major Nelson: I think they where a little more eloquent than that. I think they said this sucks

Stepto: The amount of Mail I get that calls me all sorts of variations of Homophobe but once I explain. People go oh yeah this isn't a easy problem to solve.

Major Nelson: You are going at this with a Methodical measured response that will not only work in the US but around the world.

Stepto: Yeah right that is the other thing that people don't quite catch all the time is that the rules have to apply and be portable to places like the UK and to other places where Live is and then it also has to apply where English is not the primary language. My team does that world wide.

E: also I think people need to understand it just cant work for them because if you are playing Halo3 you might be playing my 11 year old son so when he pulls up your profile it needs to be appropriate.

Stepto: Right and here is where we run into the policy and what we are doing about it I want to note that this is something that people are not universally happy with and there are very vocal group who want this to be different and I am fine with that I am always fine with revising policy. Policy should always be a living breathing thing ( I just wanted to say we are very lucky customers to have this kind of Team that is willing to listen to any argument they might not agree but what other company has that kind of Face to Face) it should be able to adapt. So when we came across this last summer we looked at what we could do about it. So one of the proposals was well why don't you just stop banning those words. Why don't you just let gay be expressed. So we thought yeah that's a reasonable request. So lets go take a look at the Data.

And we found that somewhere between 95 and 98 percent of the time depending on what month the use of the word was as a insult. ( ok Creative license time I am not going to name all the insult words) Something against the Terms of Use. So that made us step back and say that is not really going to help solve the overall issues. So what we are doing is taking look at a way we can allow people to express themselves but that can be misused and that is something our customers want. The question is how do I prevent that small fraction from using it the wrong way ( Creative License). So its not a easy problem to solve its something the community wants no announcements at this time.

But what we did last summer was we actively engaged the gay and lesbian community and they are working with us. We also talked to GLAAD and got their input and they are coming out next month to talk us about it. So we want a informed policy.

Major Nelson: This is a very hard problem to solve whether its Xbox live or what every social network you are involved or member of.

Stepto: Its certainly not us trying to enact some kind of formalized bigotry. Because we allow it in the vocal chat and the harassment is absolutely out of line. It doesn't matter if she had violated the terms of use. Just because somebody does that does not give another player the right to harass that person chase them down follow them into games that just absolutely abhorrent to me. So we take action on the harassers.( ok so Stepto here just point out to use the Mute and avoidance and also file complaint feature) We have people across the world gaming looking for bad behavior so where you see it report it and that is where my team can step in on.

Major Nelson: And your Team almost 24 hrs 7/365

Stepto: yeah holidays and everything

Major Nelson: I like to refer to you and your team as like the Police Dept

Stepto: I like us to be known as Air marshals ( creative license)

E: before we rap this up its not about the sexual orientation expressed its that it wasn't appropriate regardless of what the orientation.

Stepto: Yeah so that is the Current Policy and that is because the text is freeform and people just aren't using it for that. People are using it to cast insults ( yeah I know I am missing a word but you get the idea). It has nothing to do with the orientation somebody said I bet they wouldn't heterosexuals or I bet they wouldn't ban straight. And we saw a dramatic up tick in people putting straight and Heterosexual in their profiles. I am here to report that we suspended those individuals ( LOL sorry I just had to laugh at that one by the way Major Nelson and E are laughing too). We didn't even have to look for it just came up in a up tick.

E: so people tested the boundaries I am shocked (lol)

Major Nelson: ( I just want to clarify I skipped the colorful name lists for obvious reasons) So before I let you go you guys are working on this issue and you haven't got hold of Theresa.

Stepto: No I would love to mainly because one of the main things that concerned me in the consumerist is she had written that someone at MS had told her they sided with these harassing players. My team has no idea about the context we only receive the content of the complaint and then we look at it under the terms of use and if it violates current policy then we have to take action. It had nothing to do with siding on anything or passing any judgment's want her to understand it wasn't a taking sides matter. Had I known the identities of the person harassing her they would of gotten stiffer punishments then just the profile punishments harassment on line typically has a longer suspension. ( Stepto once again explains that he works with GLAAD and others and he has a open door policy to anything policy related)

Major Nelson: I appreciate you stopping by and straightening out the issue that popped up this week ( they talk little bit more basically going over the fact that MS isn't out to discriminate and that they are working to find a revision to the current policy).