About

Plaintext publishes long, detailed explainers about online subcultures and platforms. It is written for three readers at once.

• Someone new, who needs to understand the subject from nothing. Every article opens in plain terms, and Start here assumes no prior knowledge.
• A professional, who needs to act on it. Every article has a section for practitioners, and the briefing collects indicators, evidence handling and reporting routes.
• A future investigator, who needs to know what was known, when, and on what basis, possibly after the original pages have gone. That is what the source register, the chronology and the archived copies are for.

How claims are graded

Each article contains a table marking its main claims as one of three things.

• Documented Established by official figures, a court outcome, the subject's own statements, or reporting by a named publisher.
• Alleged Claimed by one side, in a lawsuit or by a party with an interest, and denied or untested. A settlement is not an admission.
• Observed Community behaviour described from public games, servers and videos, with no published source behind it. One writer's observation.

Each source is graded separately, as primary, reporting or reference, and marked with whether it was read in full or known only through a search summary. The register explains these and gives the counts. The counts are not flattering, and they are published for that reason.

How articles are written

• Claims have sources. Numbers, dates, quotes and legal claims link to a numbered source at the foot of the article, and from there to the register.
• Unknowns are stated. Each article ends with a list of what is still not known.
• No instructions for harm. Articles explain how scams and abuse work well enough to recognise them. They do not include working methods, links to illicit marketplaces or anything that would help someone do it.
• No names of minors or private individuals. Public figures, companies and court cases are named. Children, ordinary users and community groups are not.
• Dated. Every article carries the date it was last checked.

How the site is preserved

• Archived sources. Every cited page is looked up in the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, and the archived copy is linked beside the original. Where no copy exists, the link opens a search instead.
• A record of what each source said. The register states what each source is used to support, so the claim survives even if both the original and the archive are lost.
• No dependencies. The site is plain files with no outside fonts, scripts or services. A saved copy works for as long as web browsers do.
• Downloadable. One zip file contains every page and the data. Unzip it and open index.html.
• Citable. Each article ends with a ready-made citation including the access date.

If you rely on this site, keep your own copy. Anyone is welcome to submit its pages to a web archive.

Machine-readable data

• sources.json: the full register, with archive addresses and where each source is cited.
• chronology.json: every dated event, with its type and sources.
• glossary.json: every defined term.

What this site does not do

There are no adverts, no affiliate links, no analytics scripts, no cookies, no newsletter pop-up and no comment section. The only thing stored in your browser is your light or dark theme choice, and only if you press the button.

Limits

This is the work of a non-specialist using public sources. It is not legal advice or official guidance. Most sources were checked through summaries rather than read in full, the primary court documents have not been read, and large parts describe behaviour that nobody has studied. Use it as a map to the subject and to the real evidence, not as the evidence itself.

Corrections

If something is wrong, it gets fixed and the change is noted at the foot of the article with the date. Nothing is silently edited.

Independence

Plaintext is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Roblox Corporation or any other company mentioned on the site. Product names are used only to identify what is being discussed.