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Linden Labs open invitation to griefers and extortionists?

Billy Grace
Land Market Facilitator
Join date: 8 Mar 2004
Posts: 2,307
01-03-2006 09:22
Personally I say let the fool waste his money. Politically it makes absolutely no different to anyone what he thinks or that he is littering SL with his signs of which I have never even seen one. All he is doing is being a jackass and inconsiderate to his neighbors in the end.

Perhaps LL should jack the tier cost to say a factor of say 1000 for anyone owning only a 16m2 lot in an entire sim. This would eliminate this kind of thing. I can't think of even one good thing that someone can do with a single 16m2 piece.
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Gabe Lippmann
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01-03-2006 09:23
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
He had land for sale in Brown, a linden zoned sim. His price was 3000l for 16m of land. Jack Linden took the sign down - zoned sim rules. The guy lowered his price to 500L for the plot. Conclusion: his method of extortion was removed and he realized he could not sell the land without the massive sign in the sky to annoy people. So he dropped his price radically.


I hate to say this, but that doesn't prove much. I can look at it from his stated position and say that given that he could not use the land for his preferred protest method, the land is therefor useless to him and he should sell it quickly at market value and purchase a more appropriate plot to use.

Your conclusion, though most likely correct, is not the only one that can be drawn given the limited facts you presented.
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Ingrid Ingersoll
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01-03-2006 09:27
From: Gabe Lippmann
I hate to say this, but that doesn't prove much.


I'm really not trying to convince anyone. Frankly, if people see what he's doing as a wonderful display of community and freedom of inner spirit blah blah blah, that's beautiful. Hey, maybe he's just learning to build and rezzing blue cubes everywhere. The possibilities are endless.

But from what I saw, to me, it was fairly obvious what he was doing. And I think it's complete pants.
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Jake Reitveld
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01-03-2006 09:30
From: SuezanneC Baskerville
A change of text and back in business.

meaning?
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Chris Wilde
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01-03-2006 09:33
From: Jake Reitveld
meaning?

I think she means he'd just pick another topic/quest to spam the world with.
Gabe Lippmann
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01-03-2006 09:38
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
From what I saw, to me, it was fairly obvious what he was doing.


It is obvious to you, not to me. My dealings with him have led me to believe he just likes to rile people up and it is NOT extortion because he could care less if anyone bought the land or not.

The world may never know...
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Cory Edo
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01-03-2006 09:39
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
Call it whatever you want. He's putting up unnapealing stuff to sell his land.


And to be quite honest, i think this part of your definition fits in quite well:

when a person obtains money by inflicting harm to this person, reputation, or property.


Can your property really be harmed in a virtual space? Maybe not. It's all pixels. But by that logic, we shouldn't have any issues with anything in SL since it's all fake.



He's not doing anything (or threatening) to anyone else's property but his own. The segment you quoted doesn't apply to the situation.

I keep seeing the word "extortion" tossed around like so much iceberg lettuce, and along with "sociopath", it seems to be being used in an inflammatory manner in order to make the problem sound much more serious than it really is.

I could call it the end of the world and the return of Hitlerbot, but that doesn't make it true.
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Ingrid Ingersoll
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01-03-2006 09:40
From: Gabe Lippmann
It is obvious to you, not to me. My dealings with him have led me to believe he just likes to rile people up and it is NOT extortion.


Yeah but making a bit of scratch on the side must make it so much sweeter! Lovely individual.
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Jake Reitveld
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01-03-2006 09:43
From: Jacqueline Trudeau
Believe me, LL will have a change of heart regarding TOS enforcement *well* before that takes place.

When RL money is at stake in SL, you bet people will continue to equate the practices of SL with RL. Or should they not?


NO, they should not. Sl is run by a corporation and we have no due process protection except what LL gives us, and no rights whatsoever. In RL we have a governemnt and we have rights-such as freedom of speech and due process, which are constitutionally protected, and thus there isa set policy, and more or less clearly defined circustances and procedures whereby the government takes our land.

Sl as a corporation has stated now that its policy is not to remove builds on someone land. This is a good policy.

Owning a lot of ugly builds, even drving property values down is not griefing, thats a market, thats part of the risks you run living in a world with NO ZONING. Zoning is a seprate issue that might present some way of ensuring your builds stays amonog littel builds that look just like it. Zoning is also a major planning headache that LL Does not want to get invovled with. Nor really do they have the ability a resources.

Noone is pretending this is good. But don't make your case against Linden Lab for its policy try and make your case why this is really a violation of the tos? The passive notion of real-estate values being lowerd does not make this griefing, it remains to be proven that he has any intetion of extorting high prices for the land. He has said that it is not his intention. We know he has lots of little bits of land all over the grid, but it is all his land, why is he not entitled to put wehat he wants on it?
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Ingrid Ingersoll
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01-03-2006 09:44
From: Cory Edo
He's not doing anything (or threatening) to anyone else's property but his own.


Sure he is. When ugly builds crop up next to your land, it brings down the value. It also reduces your enjoyment of your land because when you're on your land, you're forced to look at it.

Semantic issues aside, I'm a bit baffled as to how people are not seeing the bigger picture. Making the divine issue into something about freedom of expression is a bit of a leap. If there wasn't money involved, I would feel differently about it. But his plots are for sale at ridiculous prices.
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Chip Midnight
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Join date: 1 May 2003
Posts: 10,231
01-03-2006 09:45
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
You're giving the guy the benefit of the doubt. I'm not. What you're calling freedom of expression, I'm calling land extortion. Here's why:

He had land for sale in Brown, a linden zoned sim. His price was 3000l for 16m of land. Jack Linden took the sign down - zoned sim rules. The guy lowered his price to 500L for the plot. Conclusion: his method of extortion was removed and he realized he could not sell the land without the massive sign in the sky to annoy people. So he dropped his price radically.

Freedom of expression is cool, if you're expressing your freedom, as opposed to expressing your freedom to extort people.


I'm with you as far as my assumption about his motivations, but my point is the inability to live and let live is exactly what he's exploiting. So it stands to reason that the best way to both tolerate him and remove his ability to manipulate is to actually live and let live.
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Cory Edo
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01-03-2006 09:52
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
Sure he is. When ugly builds crop up next to your land, it brings down the value. It also reduces your enjoyment of your land because when you're on your land, you're forced to look at it.


Anyone's interpretation of an "ugly build" could conceivably bring down the value of my land. Because a potential buyer doesn't like the mermaid castle next door to me, would that make my neighbor an extortionist? Same arguement with the reduction of enjoyment of my land. Its far too open-ended to say that he is directly affecting my land in the meaning and spirit of the definition of extortion.

He's not touching my land, he's not threatening my land, he is having zero contact with my land besides the fact that his build can be seen from my property. No extortion.

He's more like the annoying little brother that keeps putting his finger THIS close to your face and singing out "I'm not touching youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu" just to get you pissed off enough so you'll pay him off. The advice your parents always gave you is still correct here - ignore him and he'll go away.
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Ingrid Ingersoll
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01-03-2006 09:53
From: Chip Midnight
So it stands to reason that the best way to both tolerate him and remove his ability to manipulate is to actually live and let live.


Absolutely. All we can do really is not be tempted to buy his land and put him out of business.
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Ingrid Ingersoll
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01-03-2006 09:58
From: Cory Edo
Anyone's interpretation of an "ugly build" could conceivably bring down the value of my land. Because a potential buyer doesn't like the mermaid castle next door to me, would that make my neighbor an extortionist? .


No. But if he consistently put the same build all over the grid that is widely hated and then sets his land for sale at very high prices, that probably makes him an extortionist. Or at the very least what he's doing can be easily interpreted as extortion.

The set of circumstances in this particular case is very important to look at as a whole instead of in separate bits.
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Jake Reitveld
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01-03-2006 09:59
From: Cocoanut Koala
Yes, it is my opinion, just as it is Aimee's opinion that there is nothing in the TOS to cover this situation.

However there are at least three things in the TOS to cover this situation, and I have put those forth before.

Therefore it is a matter of interpretation of the TOS, which is always subjective and a matter of opinion, just as interpreting the U.S. Constitution is subjective. That doesn't mean that people are going to stop interpreting the Constitution, or stop trying to use it, or existing laws and legal precedent, to run the country.

I am not ASSUMING this user's conduct amounts to griefing. That would imply that I know nothing about the situation whatsoever. I have CONCLUDED his conduct amounts to griefing, based on many observerable facts as well as ample anecdotal evidence, chat logs, etc.

"Right now all you have is the fact that you don't like the ugly signs."

That is not a fact at ALL. That is something you have said and attributed to me. I'm not even sure I've ever used the term "ugly" in reference to his signs; I have said I don't like them. You are making me sound like somebody standing there stamping my foot and saying, "Mommy! I don't like that club's revolving sign next door! Make them take it down!"

I couldn't care less about this or that person's individual build, ugly, boring, or whatever; I usually outlast whatever is around me. I had one of these signs next to me on this property I had, and I didn't pay it the slightest attention, though I could see perfectly well the extortionary prices on the land under it.

It's when these signs multiplied, all over the grid, bringing down land values and making people miserable, taking up all the available land in a sim, while he raked in the bucks, that I recognized it as more than just an "ugly build" problem and became concerned.

This is a widespread, growing societal problem that not only griefs individual residents, but threatens SL itself. That's a far bigger "fact" than someone not caring for another person's sign or build.

That it is extortion is a total fact. I'm not sure how you are defining extortion, but let's say irl, someone next door to you kept blaring the stereo at all hours, and you demanded they stop. They said they would if you gave them $5,000. I call that extortion.

Now I know that's not a perfect analogy, but that IS what is going on here, and the guy himself has admitted as much, if other people's chat logs can be taken at face value.

coco


There is not a single fact in this entire post that says this guy did anything wrong.
He owns lots of small parcells-nothing wrong with that.
He sells his small parcels for ridiculous amountsz of money-nothing wrong with that.
Somne people have bought these parcelss-really there is nothing wrong with that, the law won't protect you from a bad bargain.
He put up ugly signs that the neighboors don't like-LL has said the signs don't cross over the land and they will not remove them, so apprently nothing wrong with that.

You then dra an anlogy that is utterly misplaced in one important particular-the person blaring the stereo taks an active step in soliciting your money. This guy has said on record to not buy his land, he has further said he is not extorting money that these signs are a legitimate form of speach. To which we say FIE ON THAT!

Okay so you think this guy is lying. How do you prove it? How to you determin whether we should belive the forum howling or his word as a resident? Are we to say every resident lies just because the forum people say he does?
In real life we have a mechanism for sorting out this problem, its call the court. You take everyone put them in front of a jury and someone is determined to be incorrect, and the fact of the extortion is legally established.

No courts in SL. LL does not want to even attempt this, and I don't blame them. I suppose they could just ban the guy and take his land because the forum people don't like him. But Coco, a buch of peole have not approved of your positions in the past, would you want LL to take your stuff away from you because ten people in the forus started swaering you were greifing? no. And LL should not do that. They see this point. You should put yourself in his position, taking everything he says at face value, and then see if his coduct is proven to be griefing.

Thus we need some actual extortive conduct to support the inferences from the circumstances around him.
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Kris Ritter
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01-03-2006 10:02
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
Sure he is. When ugly builds crop up next to your land, it brings down the value. It also reduces your enjoyment of your land because when you're on your land, you're forced to look at it.


And how DO you determine if a build is ugly? I've found that many people create utter crap I'd be embarassed to rez inworld and yet are utterly proud and in love with it, and think it's the height of good taste, while their next door neighbor swore blind it was an intentional attempt to grief.

And the answer is what, in any case? Should Linden Lab should start enforcing building standards? Based on what criteria? Who gets to decide? Public vote on the build or perhaps popular opinion of motive (easily gamed/FIC)? Linden decision (FIC/favoritism)?

Personally I just don't think this is something you can ever resolve to everyones satisfaction and I think LL are being pretty sensible by being hands off about it and not setting some precedent they're going to have to enforce all over as people twist their personal bugbears to fit and try and rid the grid of their neighbors and rivals.
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Chris Wilde
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01-03-2006 10:05
Is it true or not that his alt is a land baron? If so that shines a lot more light on possible motives.

Anyways its very tempting to try an experiment along these lines: Buy land, cut out a 16m plot, sell to alt, sell rest of land back, make the 16m plot express my "pretty" view point, wait and see if other parcels near it suddenly come up for sale, also watch if parcels previously up for sale drop in the amount they were asking.
Ingrid Ingersoll
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01-03-2006 10:08
From: Kris Ritter
And how DO you determine if a build is ugly?



As I said, if there wasn't money involved, I wouldn't feel the way I do about it. But his plots are all set for sale at ridiculously high prices. I wouldn't live next door to a blue neon sign that was 12 feet from my window for the same reasons I wouldn't want to have virtual land next to a massive, spinning, blue cube.

But happily, for those who do enjoy massive, spinning blue cubes emblazoned with crappy fonts all over them in the sky, there are many of them around to gaze at now!
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Jake Reitveld
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01-03-2006 10:09
From: Selador Cellardoor
Well, you have now seen evidence of that. But to take your point, if someone offers the Brooklyn Bridge for sale, they are still a confidence trickster, whether they find a buyer or not.


Actually no, they are not. You are free to wander the streets of new your hawking the brooklyn bridge and noone will call you an extoritinist. You can wander the streets of new your and offer choclate milk for sale at $500 a pint and you are not an extoritionist, even if someone buys it.

As long as this guy is doing things within his rights on his own land, you can't touch him. The way around it is to pass a zoning ordinance that says o signs on small parcels or some other regluation thaty is desinged to protect the community from such things. Bill borad are removed IRL through zoning, not by prosecuting the owners for extortion.
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Jake Reitveld
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01-03-2006 10:13
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
You're giving the guy the benefit of the doubt. I'm not. What you're calling freedom of expression, I'm calling land extortion. Here's why:

He had land for sale in Brown, a linden zoned sim. His price was 3000l for 16m of land. Jack Linden took the sign down - zoned sim rules. The guy lowered his price to 500L for the plot. Conclusion: his method of extortion was removed and he realized he could not sell the land without the massive sign in the sky to annoy people. So he dropped his price radically.

Freedom of expression is cool, if you're expressing your freedom, as opposed to expressing your freedom to extort people.


Yes I want to be given the benifit of the doubt before the lindens take dowm my build because the neighboors don't like it. And yes, the inference you draw from his conduct is a proper one, but it is also proper to say that since he could not put his sing there the land had no value to accomplish his purpose of expressing his political opinion, and thus he got rid of the land.

Tjhis inference is equally valid. How do you pick betewwen them?
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Ingrid Ingersoll
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01-03-2006 10:17
From: Jake Reitveld
Yes I want to be given the benifit of the doubt before the lindens take dowm my build because the neighboors don't like it. And yes, the inference you draw from his conduct is a proper one, but it is also proper to say that since he could not put his sing there the land had no value to accomplish his purpose of expressing his political opinion, and thus he got rid of the land.

Tjhis inference is equally valid. How do you pick betewwen them?


It's a judgement call. Which is why LL has been reluctant to do anything about it. He's within the TOS. Does that make what he's doing right and fair? Probably not. So, the TOS needs to be changed, or, we need to be given tools that enable us to control waht we see. There's lots of stuff i'd like to visually mute.
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Cory Edo
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01-03-2006 10:17
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
No. But if he consistently put the same build all over the grid that is widely hated and then sets his land for sale at very high prices, that probably makes him an extortionist. Or at the very least what he's doing can be easily interpreted as extortion.

The set of circumstances in this particular case is very important to look at as a whole instead of in separate bits.


If he uses the same build all over the grid, then that just makes him an unimaginative annoyance as opposed to just an annoyance.

Jake described the difference between extortion and plain asshattery pretty well. There's a specific set of conditions that has to be met for extortion, and this guy just doesn't meet them. The fact that people misinterpret it for extortion, or don't know what the definition of extortion is, is a moot point.
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Ingrid Ingersoll
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01-03-2006 10:24
From: Cory Edo
There's a specific set of conditions that has to be met for extortion, and this guy just doesn't meet them.


Well, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree in this one.
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Desmond Shang
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Join date: 14 Mar 2005
Posts: 5,250
01-03-2006 10:35
When I sit back and think about it - this is just another profit mechanism.

Consider:

1. Destroy the property values in a sim via builds with a nefarious alt.

2. Buy out upset neighbours for low $L (who thank you profusely for your help).

3. Add icing on the cake by moving them to your own island sims for protection.

4. Eventually remove the ugly builds and sell the newly acquired land for high $L.


It would work best if you were already a land baron, so nobody would notice much.
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Jake Reitveld
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01-03-2006 10:39
From: Ingrid Ingersoll
It's a judgement call. Which is why LL has been reluctant to do anything about it. He's within the TOS. Does that make what he's doing right and fair? Probably not. So, the TOS needs to be changed, or, we need to be given tools that enable us to control waht we see. There's lots of stuff i'd like to visually mute.

Onky see now we are starting a good discussion. Change the TOS. A good Idea, but how? What language do you put in the to stop this griefing? Do we band political expressions? do we ban selling lots for high prices, or do we ban building signs?

We can ban building signs that annoy the neighbors, but what criteria do we use to determine if the neighbors are annoyed? Do we take thier workd for it and turch each littel sim into a democracy of zoning, where by the guy on the plot next to you can have your house removed because it blocks his view?

are thier specific kinds of conduct we want to prevent? Like maybe limiting the number of parcells you can own? Or should we limit the number of signs every resident can put up? Or should we say that no land can be sold for more than double market price?

Now who enforces all of these additions? does every land transcation or build need pre-approval by the lindens? Should we have architectural committes and Land Owners associations? What mechanism to we use to record, enforce and publicze the various changes to the TOS?
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