Teen Grid land sales prove that the FIC exists

WHOA! public land in the city sims?? What is the teen grid like? an exact mirror of ours? Do their city sims have double prim allotment as well?

Yeah, they do. I advise anyone with kids to have them buy that land pronto. Double prim sims are rare as hell.

Plus it's a nice place to live.

Much smaller grid.. roughly 27 sims. 4 city sims DO have double prim allotments. They even have a functioning trolley that runs through the city sims using two TG-resident-designed trolleys that travels under cables using a script/route supplied by the Lindens.

Land in the vehicle sims has been sold to residents as a means to "maximize" income at minimal cost to LL - that is, LL traded resident experience in terms of FPS for income (when compared to the vehicle sims on the main grid which are merely rentable and usually do not have significant numbers of people, prims or scripts affecting their FPS over any period of time).

The TG does mirror the MG in other significant ways. Luna Mall and Oak Grove have scaled down equivalents - combined in the Oasis sim. The WA on the TG began as a mirror of the MG Ahern-Morris-Dore-Bonifacio WA but has changed to an extent in that a Linden run Tringo setup up is in that area also as is a Linden maze similar to that now seen in the Rizal Sports sim. There are directly equivalent sims to Rausch and Jessie. The MG's Sandbox Island and Goguen-Newcomb-Cordova sims are paralleled by a 2-sim Sandox Island sim area on the TG.

Linden Village/Ambleside is not directly represented on the TG, however at least two of the Liasons have personal plots/builds as the only things other than trees in one sim (I could be wrong on this one....I'm going from memories of an over the shoulder tour given by my kid).

There is no equivalent of the Ivory Tower there - apparently LL has chosen not to or been unable to secure permission to copy it or to buy a copy for installation on the TG. However, Robin Sojourner apparently donated a copy of her Texture Tutorial build which is installed next to the WA.

There's no equivalent to Abbotts Aerodrome and no private islands - yet. However, apparently at least one Linden seems to think this is where the TG is going.

As I said, this and whay I have posted above in this thread is what I remember from my kid's over-the-shoulder tour and what I have gleaned from discussions with her of what was happening in their forums. I don't have a lot of other details.

Instead of asking questions, I could just see all this for myself. My Katie is 15.

coco

Tell her to snap up all the city land! She'll enjoy that... double prims. Good spot to set up a little store too.

I'd love to see Boardman on the TG. Wonder what it's like.

I don't know which SL you're playing, but the one I'm in is solely owned by a company, Linden Labs, and they can pretty much do as they damned well please unless they break the (RL) law. That includes pulling the plug tomorrow.

Their customers can object to a business practice, but considering that you signed a TOS agreeing that they can pretty much do as they damned well please, your only real recourse is to (1) state to them why you think a particular business practice is a bad idea in terms of public relations (customer retention), or (2) vote with your feet.

This isn't necessarily true, I know of several cases myself where an account on the main grid signed up for SLBoutique/SLEx/SecondServer and when they got moved to the teen grid their accounts still worked. They could buy stuff online from those sites for themselves, or in most cases, other teens too. It's not a hard stretch, some enterprising teens may be making a pretty penny on it. Charge someone 550L and buy them a 500L item from SLEx. Everyone goes home happy.

If people are interested i'll calculate the number of teen grid accounts.

This makes no sense at all to me.

First, I would say that any sane person is outraged at the way in which people are allowed to take their inventory when they get banned to the teen grid. They should be wiped. The avatar and all files should clearly be destroyed before anyone is transferred to TG, period.

Since this horrible error has already been made many times over the only soloution is wiping the TG completely though and since that aint going to happen so we are stuck with things as they are.

However, your description of taking snapshots and pshopping them to make new textures simply doesn't work for skins and clothing. It's easy enough to rip off any texture on a flat wall if you are carefull enough, but the only way you could do what you assert here with skins and clothes is to have the original textures in your inventory in mod/copy form, i.e to be the creator or a close compadre of the creator of the product in question.

Either you are mixed up, or the person who told you that was bragging (a disease rampant on the TG), or your just stirring it up yourself.

That just isn't possible to do AFAIK.

Well Dianne...

when I bought my (very expensive) skin, it came not only with the skin files, but also with the texture files (no transfer). It's a nice feature of the skin package, for when I want to add my own tattoos. I imagine some teen could slap the skin texture files on a cube and do a screen cap.

Well thats new to me. Thanks for the update.

Most skins makers protect the textures like gold (textures are the gold of SL), and certainly all the good ones are impossible to gt hold of usually. NIce to hear that at least some skin makers are doing that.

My point was that without the texture file taking snaps of a skin or a dress on an avatar is not going to get you anywhere, which I think you probly agree with.

Then you obviously haven't tried it to realize just how easy it is. I did it starting from a demo skin once - intending only to use it myself... (I had wasted nearly two weeks trying to do my own skin, but I am no artist). After I finished, however, I decided I didn't like the integrity clash it caused my psyche. So, I deleted it from my inventory and my hard drive and bought the real skin from the original creator here on the MG.

My hi-res snapshot-to-direct copy of the skin method took me all of 30 minutes from the time I got nekkid and first wore the demo skin - including the minutes it took me to decide I would try duplicating it while removing all the "copy protection 'demo'" elements. Cut-paste-place-erase-smudge...30 minutes, honest. That's all it took. And I am no photoshop expert, that's for sure. When I was finished, I would bet even the original creator would have had a hard time telling the difference between what I wound up with and the creator's original non-demo skin.

Same thing with practically any nice clothing pieces. I've generally found clothes to be easier to copy than skins when I decided to study how the clothing textures were created. No mod/No copy/No transfer clothes can only be snapshot-copied if you want to reconstruct the textures. Still, the most time one has taken me to reconstruct, when I have done it, is about 20 minutes including posing and taking numeous snaps from various angles --- or including snapping pics of an uncooperative/unsuspecting person who wore a clothing item from which I wanted to try to recreate the clothing textures. (At first it was educational curiosity... when I do it now, it's a question of whether or not I think the process might be a challenge.... fewer and fewer are to be honest.) ((Again, I have never sold such pieces and rarely wear or wore them. But it did teach me how to create a few of my own that I am satisfied with.))

Then again, you DID say "AFAIK". I know different quite obviously.

Simply put, the very essence of the process of receating a skin or clothing item via snapshotting is merely taking pics from the proper angles and timing when you click the snap. The rest is merely assembly using basic photoshop skills.

Edited to add comment: Kolya's "proposed method" is obviously easier than mine - but requires access to the original texture.

What did you think I had in mind doing?

coco

No clue. Your post isn't to the Lindens, and it doesn't
You're telling us that Your statement isn't true. They CAN do it. It is neither illegal under the laws of the US, CA, or San Fran.. nor is it against the TOS.

I assume you meant that you don't like it if they are doing that and think that they shouldn't (if they are in fact doing that, which we don't really know anyway).

Or maybe you're leaving (voting with your feet) - dunno

In the meantime, how about a fact-based dialog.

Yes, of course they CAN do it. How about you agree that our conversations here will be in the vernacular. I'm not writing court briefs or drafting legislation.

coco

First you say they can't do it. Now you say they can do it. Your first statement was simply wrong -- and as such, drowned out your meaning.

This isn't about formal vs. common language. This is about saying what you mean if you expect to be understood. And, if you make a inaccurate statement, expect to be called on it.

There is no reason that every-day writing can't be clear and accurate.

LOL.. sorry to sound pedantic in my previous post, but I work as a writer and spend many hours trying to get people to communicate in brief, straight-forward, accurate statements. Then, I come to the forums... which I'm starting to think Dante missed in his tour of Hell. Would the forums be the 1.5 circle?

*beats her head on the keyboard*

Are we seriously still bitching about a vaguely not-nice thing that Linden Lab did with regard to angsty teens who hopefully have lives outside of Second Life?

Come on now.

And really, cut the crap. It's not about rules or what's nice or what's decent. Life is about who you know. Folks can plug their ears and shriek until they pass out, but this fact will never change.

I don't lament opportunities missed because I didn't happen to know people. It's my own fault if I'm not networking. (and I'm not even all that good at networking, but it's amazing how clear things become when you assume personal responsibility for your whole life)

There are a couple people in this thread that are way to concerned about the politics of the teen grid. WHY???? What do you care what goes on there really. If I were LL I would do an investigation on one particular person in this thread because my super natural abilities are telling my intuition that this person is in fact on the teen grid him or her self.

My son is on the teen grid and really I never cared enough to get all worked up over their stupid politics. I hate having to deal with our own politics. If anything those kids just got a valuable lesson in life, sometimes it just isnt fair.

You're just never gonna get it, Enabran. It's not about what is "vaguely not-nice." It's not about "crap" or "rules" or even "what's decent."

It's about really fundamental principles, which you, capitalist pig though you claim to be, somehow fail to grasp. If you are going to be a proper capitalist pig, you're going to have to address the basic rules of fair play that drive proper business (or are expected to drive it) in this country, and that's to say nothing about government involvement. if we go by your line of thinking, we might as well let each president just appoint his successor, etc.

As for both you and the previous poster, I am assuming that both of you, and indeed, everyone reading this message board, understands that we are talking about the game SL here. And that is why I wrote earlier:

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"Human, yes. Private business, yes, but even there, only to an extent.

SL is more like the government itself, presiding over us, with huge powers over all of us. As such, they can't just pick and choose arbitrarily who they are going to give land to, or tax breaks to, or big contracts to, etc.

coco"
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By that - for the literal minded - I meant they "can't" just do that if they expect to keep players. Of course they CAN, but because it is so counter to everything most everyone believes about fair play, online games, countries, online countries - you name it - they would be cutting off their own nose to spite their face (lord, I think I've used that cliche three times in the past two days) to persist in doing things that way. Particularly when people are objecting to it. I used the word "can't" as in the vernacular, "You just can't do that!" Or, as further and time-wastingly explained in this paragraph.

And Enabran, you are wrong that all the shrieking in the world won't keep it from being the system you apparently prefer. The Lindens aren't as close-minded as you apparently are, probably because their incomes are at stake, and they aren't deaf when it comes to concerns like equal opportunity for all.

coco

Well it's not me, Beau, and it certainly isn't the O.P.

Why? Because I want SL to succeed and to grow by leaps and bounds, that's why. And that includes the teen grid.

coco

Ohh, and your the business expert that will lead them to that path. Silly me.

In addition to the business advantages of doing things on a fair basis, there's also this, Beau:

It was wrong here, and it's wrong there.

coco

The crappy thing about the mute feature is that you're still able to see people's blathering when they are being quoted. Like a broken record player without an off switch.

Coco, sometimes, something that you might see as unfair might be fair to others. For instance, lets say for just a second there is someone on the teen grid trying to take over the land market and make it very expensive for others to get any land. This might be leaving a sour taste in many of those parents mouth and they will be telling their children "sorry but I am not giving that game any more money".

These are kids, money should not be a major aspect of the game. Making it a major aspect of the game will cost the parents money. Many parents will not dump big bucks into virtual property for little Johny to play with prims. If a Linden helped some people get land so they would remain a member and not have to pay a Jr. Land extortionist 5x as much, I would see it as the decent thing to do.

I bet you are also the same type of person who likes to see corporate advertising in childrens schools. Just last week my daughter came home with some stupid DVD and the school said if they didnt bring it back by Monday they can keep it for $20. I got very annoyed. Many parents also complained that the children misplaces or damaged these DVD's and now they had to pay $20. I see the land market on the teen grid the same way.

So just maybe it was a very smart business decision that some parent saw as a decent thing to do.