2025 color ban

(OP) fp: owot lost its Technicolor™ license
...............

(OP) fp: colors are off because it's a really good pressure to get me to deploy the hide-images feature within a day or two rather than MONTHS

On December 19th, 2025, FP temporarily disabled color on the Mainpage after a video script was used to broadcast NSFW footage^[1] at Spawn. This decision was a part of a long running effort to combat image pasters in OWOT, with FP saying during the ban that he was working on a menu option that would allow users to hide all images on the canvas.

The color ban sparked backlash from large portions of the userbase, though a few users found the monochrome canvas to be more aesthetically pleasing. A variety of methods were used to work around a lack of text colors, such as using emojis and URL/coordinate links to render colored images. On the other hand, several scripters simply opted for black and white image pasters.

In many ways, OWOT's Mainpage was made visually similar to that of Your World of Text, a text canvas which has never supported more than one text color on any given page. Though there were still some differences stemming from OWOT-exclusive features like Symbols for Legacy Computing and text decorations. Colored landmarks on the Mainpage also retained their color after the ban, and when damaged FP would continue to restore them in their original states.

The ban was lifted on ??????.

Lead up to the color ban

i've said this several times before but octant pastes are genuinely beautiful with colors disabled
for an event, fp should disable all colors at spawn for a week or so

— Rscr on December 14th, 2025

The week leading up to the ban was marked by several NSFW pastes from a single user. After the ban, Sylveon came up with a successful way to brick that specific image paster.

atp with how much porn that gets pasted on the front page, fp can't just say he can't do anything about it. it's got to count as willingly exposing minors to porn, especially how he gives them wiper perms to get them to do his job for him.
I guarantee he knows all this by now, and by not shutting down the canvas entirely or removing colors it definitely falls under being intentional

— Catha'vi on December 18th, 2025

The color ban started on December 19th at 2:13 P.M. EST, after FP was alerted of a NSFW video that was broadcasted to Spawn the night before.

not cp, it's actually a youtube video on cyclops sydrome (from a medical channel)
but I still disabled colors globally out of precaution until the image safety feature is implemented and rolled out

— FP on December 19th, 2025

User reactions

OWOT IS GOING YWOT!!
unfortunately that means that confessing something in black text is no longer fun
because everyone's in black text

— Katiserie on December 19th, 2025

💗GoldShip🤍: owot without colors is just glorified ywot
💗GoldShip🤍: like
💗GoldShip🤍: literally the same shit but with worse people
💗GoldShip🤍: 0/10 won't try again
🖥️Fun.com💚: meh
🖥️Fun.com💚: OWOT has much more new features than colours
💗GoldShip🤍: man god FORBID someone uses the site for what it was intended for
💗GoldShip🤍: (programming)

💗GoldShip🤍: like ngga you made this shit you should know what it'd cause

ℓ≻ marie: when do we get the colors and image pasters back front page
💗GoldShip🤍: when fp stops being a pussy
ℓ≻ marie: i wanna paste uma yuri again front page
rscr: i want the color ban to go on for a while
💗GoldShip🤍: YES
📱(Ꙥ) JanTechPL: i
rscr: it's interesting to see how people work around a lack of colors
💗GoldShip🤍: lil ngga thinks he's white diamond removing them colours
📱 (Ꙥ) JanTechPL: wanna know
💗GoldShip🤍: and individuality
[8185]: imagine an owop color ban
💗GoldShip🤍: and being hot
≺ℓ≻ marie: The color ban is dumb asf💔
rscr: like using emojis and links for color
💗GoldShip🤍: oh i have one
💗GoldShip🤍: grayscale hentai
📱 (Ꙥ) JanTechPL: when the sock of publicity will have a public space

[8185]: and then they make all emojis grayscale and max contrast

By Dupy(December 20th, 2025)
Alternate text

i remember someone saying a few days back that sites like owot looks prettier with no colour and i can see why,
this looks awesome

— Blancrenarde on December 20th, 2025, commenting on an extravagant script display that used emojis instead of colored text

Schjessu's protest alt(December 20th, 2025)
Spam that replaces text with #BRINGCOLORSBACKFP

man fuck sylveon and fp for causing this problem, no more colors, no more image pasters, no more SLC, just boring ass stuff with pasting image of dots

Color replacements

Using emojis

Emoji pasters have always existed in OWOT, but are rarely seen due to their inability to accurately represent images.

December 19th, 2025
December 19th, 2025

Using links

During the ban, two text colors were still available using links: blue(url links) and green(coordinate links).

By Dupy(December 20th, 2025)
YWOT link art from 2010^[2]

By Banksy
Slime effect by Rscr

Text density

Can't produce actual color, but can be effective for shading.

See a tutorial below.

To Shade:

III;;;;;:::::.'.'.'`.`.`.```
IIIIII;;;;;;:::::.'.'.'`.`.`.````
HHHHIIII;;;;;::::::.'.'.'.`.`.`.````
IIIIII;;;;;;:::::.'.'.'`.`.`.`````
III;;;;;:::::.'.'.'`.`.`.```

Darkest: W V H 8 @ #

Second Darkest: I 6 9

Third Darkest: ;;;;;

Second Lightest: :::::: .'.'.

Lightest: .`.`.`. ````` .....

*You can also space out characters to make them lighter.
*Any character can be used for shading, not just the ones
listed above.

Workarounds for identification

Since color is usually the primary means for users to identify themselves on the canvas, the color ban posed yet another issue from which multiple solutions emerged.

Dupy/Fun.com created a script that applied alternating link types and text decorations to their messages, giving them a unique look in a canvas where only three text colors are available.

Schjessu, on the other hand, opted for the simpler option of writing her messages with the bold and italic text decorations.

The ban also gave Katiserie an opportunity to bring out her message tagging script, which attaches note links to her messages so that a popup saying "Written by katiserie" will appear whenever you hover over them.