What is this event doing here in SL?

Event: Free Nano iPod!

Description:
Want a FREE iPod Nano? Check out this event!

This is 100% FREE, 100% LEGIT, NOT A SCAM ! Thousands of people in US, Canada, and UK have received free gifts. This event is open to EVERYONE! Skeptics are ENCOURAGED! This is not a SPAM website or SCAM website! This is a 100% true way to get a free iPod Nano!
_____________

Sounds like someone is trying to get other people to sign up for "special offers" or something shady like Columbia House in order to get his or hers own Nano iPod.

Why is this allowed?

Oh that is just wonderful. I'd rather see the events full of nekkie avs playing tringo with wings and bling than scams...

Well it was only a matter of time before we saw events like this. Personally I'm amazed it didnt happen sooner. This I think is a violation of the TOS, something the lindens will have to watch out for in the future.

- Sam

I went to the event and no one was there. It was taking place on a shopping sim. The individual who was supposedly running the event has a profile in which the description is nearly identical to the description of the event itself. The profile picture has a picture of an iPod Nano.

Looks like the scam artists have found SL faster than bigger, more respectable businesses.

I love how this guy did this just in time to take advantage of no neg ratings.

By way of comparison, what was the business that profited most early on from the VHS/BETA machines?

You guessed it.


Pr0n.

The newest mediums will always attract the ... less than honorable crowd first.

I equate it to a spirit of adventure, more than anything else as an aire of risk is always in a new venture.

Actually there was something like this way back before, interestingly enough hosted in Jessie. Where a guy (not a new member but long time player) ran the event cause this website was made up in one of those infection type set-ups: that is, get one person to believe that it'll happen, and he has to convince say 20 friends to sign up too then he gets the iPod, and they need to sign up 20 friends as well to get their iPods.

It's really not a scam honestly, they actually did get iPods, it was just an easy way to get business for the company, they paid 300 dollars to get an ipod to give out, and each one of these people would get them 500 dollars in business from all the references.

That is SO awesome.

I totally think, if he has a little seminar and everything that should be totally allowed.

He should categorize it as commercial though.

Ok, if he wasn't there, that sucks.

Well SL is all about the $$$, this only the tip of the trashy iceburg.

This wouldn't happened involve that big replica of the iPod Nano I saw in the sandbox the other day?

This is the tip????

Uhh..don't we already have thriving sex and gambling industries?

Kind of like RL so far. Eventually other business will move in and it will be more balanced...like RL.

After all it IS RL in that every resident of SL is a real person and a resident of RL and have all the same RL desires and goals.

Why is it so surprising that SL is an extention of RL? Whyever would it be anything else?

Damn!! I've never played Tringo. If I knew there was an event like this one going on though, I'd sure give it a shot!

Looks like LL needs to start doing the word-scrambling verification on signup. =\

We've got the rest of the iceberg, why not the tip?

Igor? Hand me a Zemmel 323A Wedge. The thin end, please.

this wasn't a scam, I went to this event, and know MANY people who have gotten their iPod nanos from this deal.

uh, it's still in-world advertising of a real world product, with no intention of using SL as anything but a spam tool.

I don't care how many ipods you get, it's still spam.

Lf

Curious about this situation, so would love your opinion (or anyone's).

What if Neph started selling her clothing in RL? Set up a RL shop and everything. And then turned around and sold copies of her designes in SL, with the ability for people to also order the RL item.

That would be in-world advertising of a real world product. Would it still be considered spam?

What if the person doing the ipod advertising sold some gadget in SL that "looked" like an ipod (and maybe did some fun things with scripts). Would you still consider it spam?

I'm curious because to me, it seems this line of RL and SL is going to become more and more blurred as time goes on. And while I know how *I* feel about that, I'm curious about your take on this aspect of the blur?

The only time I'd see things blurr would be if you had a RL store/website that sold BOTH RL and SL items at the same time. And even then your SL advertising would have to focus on SL products not real world for it not to be spam IMO. Right now there is a clear division. In my opinion of course.

theres alot of items in sl that are based off rl items, hell some things even carry the logo. Some clothing designers don't even make their OWN stuff, they rip it off websites. Why you think we go 3 designers out here in sl that all make the SAME OUTFIT.

Yes but spam and copyright infringement are two separate issues.

Here is where it gets deeper too:
If say the items you designed and made, I see no issues transferrring to SL to sell as you own the copyrights on them. For one thing, a lot of residents link to external sites to sell their virtual products which in turn feeds an RL/SL company. You could just advertise the RL goods more subtly and push the SL stuff which in turn gets your name around which in turn gets residents interested in learning more about your products. Even have a sign "As seen in RL" above all of your products.


Sticky part that would be a no fly here:

Say you sold RL stuff like cars, that would not give you permission to be able to reproduce those cars in SL to sell here as well. While you could subtly advertise here, IMHO it would be against the spirit of SL to advertise a product which can only legally exist for sale in the RL due to copyright, trademark and IP laws.

With that said, even I don't think the iPod thing is a scam, I have looked into it too but the ones I saw had 1,000 hoops to jump through to get it. I think existing in SL for the simple purpose of advertising a RL product like that is wrong because it goes against the spirit of what SL is and it shows no real creativity on the part of the resident doing it. Not only is it not creative, I already get emails for this junk 100 times a day at home, if I really wanted one, I would have done one of the other offers already. At least if a resident were to make RL clothing and reproduce them here for the SL world then that I consider cool and most likely shop for the products both in SL and RL

This is already happening in SL. Except the situation is this: You dont sell cars IRL but you sell replicas of them in SL. SL is already "sticky" and I dont mean just the pose balls.

Many believe SL is a platform for a future internet. Not in its current state of course, but that is the direction it is heading, and seems to be agreed to by the Lindens (at least as one aspect of what SL can become). If this is true, then how would the above senario go against the "spirt" of SL? Wouldn't it be no different than business getting on the internet not to share information (create), but to sell their items (advertise)?

While technically it would be considered spam, I think the sheer novelty/accomplishment felt by the community that one of our own managed to design something in SL and have it represented in the real world would negate any repurcussions.



Unless his RL persona is Steve Jobs, it's copyright infringement, and hence wouldn't count. I have no problems with people selling stuff of their own making in SL (I used to do it myself when i was a newbie with my music), as it adds to the creative fabric of SL as a whole. Simply copying/reselling something in SL isn't adding anything, as you're simply acting as a mediocre retailer.



I think you're going to see SL being used more and more as a prototyping tool for new products, ranging everywhere between architects testing out a new design to clothing designers seeing what's regarded as fashionable ornot.. to even maybe rudimentary programming ideas once MONO is integrated.

SL is an absolutely great tool for this... I used SL to recreate the Piazza Navona in Rome as part of one of my classes... it took 13 hours, sure, but i recreated a scale model replica of an entire plaza (250 meters by 50 meters) in 3d, from scratch. How cool is that?

Also, have you seen this? http://www.objectsofvirtualdesire.com/

totally awesome concept, I certainly hope they expand their offerings.

LF

Perhaps I used the wrong wording to get out what I was trying to say

The internet is used for a variety of stuff, including advertising a product as well as providing content that appeals to the senses of web surfers. I can agree that SL perhaps will be the future internet but at it's present stage, it is presented as a development platform where the world is created by it's residents. Purely joining SL with the only intent to advertise RL products just feels out of place due to how SL is presented. If we want to surf for RL stuff, we have the current internet for that. I think that if SL were to evolve and become internet 5.0 then this type of thing would be more fitting, as SL stands now, It just doesn't feel right. If the only content you are providing is transferred from RL in the form of advertising brochures and images of products in RL, that is what I meant by spirit. The internet was orig created by the military to share info between departments, it progressed to what it is today, not only filled with cool things but it is filled with a lot of disgusting criminal things like child porn. Do we really want this world of SL to sink that low or to imagine SL becoming that world in the future? While companies advertise products on the web, many of those companies also add value to those avertisements with product help and other useful info to help make an informed decision. To just come into SL pushing RL products without the value added items is too much like spam emails and those hokey fly-by-night companies that do not exist for more than a day or so, we have enough of those already.

The Wells-Fargo project is an ideal example of what I beleive to be a cool and nice way for a RL company to join the world of SL, they are not pushing their products or services here, they are using SL to add value to their RL customers. I am more interested to know more about them because of their interest in SL as a value added service to their existing structure as opposed to just being here to advertise, to me that had more of an advertising impact than 1,000's of phone calls, tv commercials, internet ads and etc....

I define the spirit of SL as the world is presented, a development platform that is created by it's residents. Perhaps spirit was the wrong word choice. I guess I am just bitter that I have to face the gazillion web pages, billions of email messages, tons of paper adverts and the hundreds of telemarketers as is in RL, I Just don't want to login to SL and see these same adverts all over again and again and again. This is after having to install pop-up blockers, anti-spyware tools, junk mail filtering configs, taking the mail adverts to the recycling center and trying to be nice to the telemarketers as I tell them to not call my number again and take me off their list all the while I am trying to eat dinner. To add this exact same thing to SL would undermine what many of us log in for, a world created by it's residents, shaped by it's residents and owned by it's residents, not a world of the same crap that you aready get in RL, then why bother logging in...