Itch.io has released an addendum to their previous announcement, answering questions about their hasty response to pressure from payment processors to censor their platform.
As previously reported, Itch deindexed nearly all of their “adult” games. This happened shortly after Steam was pressured to add a rule deferring to payment processors to determine what’s considered appropriate content.
The situation is evolving as we await final determinations from our current payment processors, Stripe and PayPal. There are still unknowns that prevent us from providing a fixed timeline.
In the meantime, we are actively reaching out to other payment processors that are more willing to work with this kind of content. We have suspended the ability to pay with Stripe for 18+ content for the foreseeable future.
Firstly, Itch has clarified that they’re not removing games from individuals account. This is despite some users claiming that after Itch deindexed adult games, they lost access to games they already paid for. However Niche Gamer has been unable to verify these claims.
Secondly, Itch has clarified that it’s never their intent to withhold funds from NSFW content creators. They go on to clarify that they have existing rules which are used to counter scammers and shovelware, but not to punish good faith content creators.
Some have noted a rule in our adult content policy about not processing payouts for infringing accounts. This rule has been in place for a long time to address bad-actor situations where a user joins the site and blatantly violates our terms to make sales before being banned.
Lastly, Itch goes on to name Stripe and Paypal as the offenders causing them grief. While Visa and Mastercard have been the target of protests by gamers and free speech advocates, it’s clear that Paypal and Stripe are no better.
Online censorship has quickly become a hot button topic, with payment processor censorship entering public discourse just as the UK has introduced their draconian Online Safety Act, requiring users in the UK to verify their identities and ages for services ranging from Discord to Spotify. Despite being labeled as a law to “protect children”, critics have quickly pointed out that it appears to be a weak excuse for increased government surveillance.
