Will there be any leadership on signage griefing?

Huh?

The two things in the first paragraph;
1. "Fair market value is whatever price the market will bear." and
2. "Someone decides what they believe the price should be and others decide if they wish to purchase the land at that price."

ARE EXACTLY THE SAME THING.

And, btw, price fixing is NOT fair market value.

And the last statement is not "extortion". Extortion is the "exaction of an exorbitant price."
Exaction is forcing payment or demanding payment. You are neither forced nor can you be demanded to pay ANYTHING for land since land is not a requirement to be in SL and function in SL.

If people don't like land prices then simply lease a sim from LL, subdivide it and lease out the smaller plots at the prices YOU think are fair. You can then set your own CC&Rs and terminate the lease on anyone that YOU feel violates them. That is what LL would most likely prefer; YOU as a resident set your own rules on your own sim.

Maybe so. I live in the one where linden lab has spelled out their decision. If there is evidence of extortion, put it forward to them. I have now seen five of these signs and at no time was the property the sign sits on for sale.

So far the facts presented tell me one of two things: either LL investigated this and found it was not a violation of the TOS or LL simply has not conducted any investigation and will not enforce the TOS.

If it is the former then we are all subject to the doctrine of tough shit-we live with the signs. If it is the latter then the thing to complain about is the lack of enforcement, not LL's decision to establish a policy against interfering with the private use of land. Frankly I have problems with LL's consistent enforcement of the TOS-there are a lot of issues i think deserve more attention in the enforcement department than these signs.

Be that as it may, LL has an abuse report system, if you feel the signs are extortion, use it.

My best wishes in everthing you do. Farewell and best of luck in your future.

Remember it could go both ways. Maybe the intent is to drive down the value of the property of land near the small plot. Piss off the neighbors, they put their land up for sale cheap just to get out of it because no one will buy the land with the signs near it, then land baron alt comes in and buys it up cheap, removes the ugly signs from the small plots and then resells the plots he just bought back at a higher rate in a nice neighborhood. Rinse and repeat. Im not saying its whats happening, but its what I would do if I was evil.

Well, Jake, I have seen it! You may not have, but back when this was first starting, it popped up next to a piece of land I had at the time, I forget the sim now, and it was like $500 a square inch or something, lol.

And last I looked at his property in Rosieri, which is considerable, yes, every damn bit of it was up for sale at ridiculous prices. I haven't looked at in it the past four days or so, because someone else finally put up some property in the sim that I bought to fill out my tier.

I think it would be safe to assume - though I can't prove this - that yes, people have been AR'ing this guy, and bringing Linden attention to the land prices, his behavior, and everything else relevant.

coco

That is absolutely right. I think the 2 circumstances, the towers build and the bush signs are incomparable. Ridiculing the twin towers catastrophe approaches a cultural taboo because of the injury to humanity and loss of civilian life at peacetime. The impeach Bush signs, while may be prompted by the same basic concerns, represent a political viewpoint about loss of life at wartime.

If LL wanted to remove the signs because even one member thought them ugly or offensive they would be gone. We have seen this in past LL actions. I am attaching a picture of a build, a noob tower, built in Aqua more than one year ago, which caused the member who built this to be suspended for 3 days on his very first day of membership. The tower was deleted by Colin Linden. Why...because the main land owners in Aqua at the time thought the build was ugly, and they used their insider influence to call every LInden to the scene and demanded the removal of the build. They got what the wanted and within 24 hours the build was deleted and the new member suspended for 3 days.

Take a look at this picture I have attached. Was LL concerned about "free speech," or "customer satisfaction,"...no. LL was only concerned about the compaints of a handful of Aqua landowners that this was an ugly build. So yes, if LL wanted the signs gone they would be gone, now. If LL wanted the impeach Bush member gone he would be as well.

Take a look at the picture. Sorry its so dark, but it was night time in Aqua and my monitor is crap. It was a noob build of rotating prims built by a new member who was learnign to build. I know because I was there and witnessed the entire incident, and in fact, one member who is now defending the presence of the Bush signs on the grounds that we are free to build on our land as we wish even if the build is ugly was one who reported this noob build and demaneded its removal.

So to all those citing the TOS...accept the fact that if LL wanted the impeach signs gone they would be gone regardless of the TOS. Subjective interpretation of harassment and offensive allows them that margin.

Wait, you are saying the Lindens removed that build and suspended a new user 3 days for building it because it was ugly? The build WAS on his OWN land, right? Not somebody elses?

Well if this is true and Colin Linden deleted the build on this new user's own land and suspended them 3 days ... well then you're right. It was wrong of Colin to do that.

But I have to be honest, this story is a stretch. It's reminiscent of those "I was banned for just saying HI" type stories ... where more incriminating details inevitably wash ashore. "I was banned for just saying HI, while naked, wearing a giant penis that shot swastikas at people."

Anybody else remember this build in Aqua and the details of the Linden action involved?

Did you happen to keep the locations of those signs? If so, I would be grateful to know them. Thanks.

No one has to be robbed by a confidence trickster. They hand over their money willingly. But confidence trickery is still illegal. Even attempted confidence trickery.

ITs all true. If you IM me in world I can give you the names and dates and further proof. IT was his land, his build and yes Colin deleted it...reason provided was overlapping textures could cause lag. It was this incident that triggered my evenhanded treatment/favoritism advocacy. It was really uncalled for and I was as shocked by this incident as anyone. Please IM me for details, I welcome it.

The overlapping textures is an important detail. Texture fighing does indeed cause lag, and THAT *IS* detailed in the community standards. However it's still shocking that Colin would:

A. Delete the build without giving the user the opportunity to fix the problem.
B. BAN the user for this build.

So I suspect there are more details I'm missing here. Perhaps this user was on his final warning after a history of using these types of builds to cause lag?

Again if this is all true, I still think Colin was in the wrong for banning this user. But I suspect there are still more details that haven't been revealed here as the Linden reaction is uncharacteristically harsh for what you said was done.

Again the problem is.. Its drastically decreasing the value of peoples investments and desire to invest in the infested areas, harming SL as a whole.

Katy,

How did a player, on their first day in SL, have land in Aqua?

How do you prove it? IRL we can do this, its called a court. How do you do this in SL?
LL has made an announcement regading their intentions with respect to this. You call him a confidence trickster, but how do you know?

my comfort level demands a lot more evidence than the braying of the neighboors to justify LL coming on my land and taking down my build. Yes they have done so in the past, as Katy points out. But I see that an a problem of selective enforcement at the whim of a few. I see this policy decision as a good one. Even so, if anyone could prove that this was extortion and not opinion stating then, I am sure LL would listen.

I am not discounting the possibility, I am just stating the obvious. Somone has obviously AR's this, and the lindens stated thier position. New evidence might change everyones opinions. But so far, as I said earlier, this is a lot of grips about some very ugly builds.

That would be me she's referring to. The build was reported and removed because it was killing the sim, not because it was ugly. That was also almost two years ago. Points of view can and do change over time.

And just like the telehub situation-its market economy, and you aren't entitled to land value protection. Wait the guy out, or sell you land and move. My land value likely went up since i have no signs near me. So it balances out in terms of Sl as a whole.

It could be argued that those making a big deal out of the signs are doing the same thing. I have had the signs near my land - my "investment" didn't suddenly plummet. Yeah they are ugly and obnoxious, but they are not ruining anyone's SL by being there. You can't extort the willing - if people did not buy the land, and just ignored the signs instead of crying foul about them all over the place, they would starve Lazarus of the obvious attention and notoriety he or she craves and the signs would go away. Instead, it is a cat and mouse game where the victims are victimizing themselves by just making it worse. How does a giant impeach bush sign outside of your house on another piece of land impede your ability to use your land, just curious? Does it physically block the land? Or does it just annoy you? That is the real issue - what "damage" is actually being done by the signs, and what damage is being done by those reacting to them?

I stand corrected.

Colin did the right thing removing your griefer-ass!



But wait, were you actually suspended too??

I have to agree with Christiano. The signs don't even seem to be the issue anymore, it is the bickering that it is causing between residents.

FYI, I have asked for the official LL stance on this matter here...

/invalid_link.html

...just so people will stop beating a dead issue into the ground.

I think he means Katy was referring to him as the swift hand of doom that came down upon the newbie to get the blight in his beloved Aqua banished.

PS - as a side note, the best use of a sign ever in SL was when Lordfly put a CHAIRMAN MAO SAYS NO TO CLUBS sign on my land in front of Club Elite. The expletive-filled chaos that ensued was a classic moment in SL history.

OOOPS. Sorry, my bad.

hehe, it wasn't my build. I don't recall whether or not I was the one who reported it. All of the prims were scripted with animations, had animated textures, were lights or physics enabled or both. It pretty much brought the sim to its knees. I also don't believe the land it was built on belonged to the builder which would be a likely reason for its removal.

See, swift hand of doom! And that hand was covered in an eerily realistic photoskin while everyone else still looked like they were made out of play-doh

Thanks Chip. I suspected this story was more complex than initially presented.