pay for event listings?

yay or nay

think of it as public service announcement time. in a newspaper they have free space for community events and gatherings, but also have cheap ad space available (and expensive ad space). I'd say make it possible for people to advertise if they want to but keep PSA space, particularly for community events that cannot possibly make money (depression support groups, poetry circles, etc.)

Charging even a small amount would likely discourage free event hosters from advertising. I would probably support this idea if free and non-profit events were not charged.

so
Nay if the charge is indiscriminate,
Yay if it's related to the event being advertised.

Something does need to be done about the organisation of the events list though. I gave up trying to wade through it months ago.

( I think there should be a fine for misuse of the event list )

Make it an auction just like Classifieds, but retain an ability to post free too. Higher Linden payment gets an event listed first for a given time slot. Add a check box which filters on free ads only. Maybe that would help get rid of the yard sale/best in nekkid/slingo "events" for people who don't want to read them.

Nay.

The only way to fix the event calender is to have someone properly patrol it, and punish those who abuse it.

This will only make things worse.

The ones who are using events for advertisment and to gain something, will see it as just another classified section to list on.

Those who do it for fun, or to help, or in the true sence of "an event" will most likely stop posting all together.

Classifieds is for advertising for L$. The event calender is for listing events.

Speaking for myself (and as one non-profit)..

**Assuming active patroling of the event calendar is not an option***:

I wouldn't be upset in the least if there was a L$50 charge to post a 1-hour event to the event calendar.

However, I think the charge would be most effective if it were tied to the duration of the event. If events can be posted in 30-minute increments, then L$25 per 30-minute increment, with a minimum charge of $50. This means that a 3-hour post would cost L$150.

I think it would be a disincentive to spam, especially for the "5-posts-per day, 3-hours each" of the same event. It'd get rather expensive after a while to keep that up.

I'm suggesting L$50, because it would place the cost in line with the cost of a classified ad - since classifieds run for 2-weeks, they might become more attractive for the postings that really belong there.

For any commercial endeavours -- Yay: yard sales, grand openings, sales, events in which the host keeps ANY money donated to pots, etc... A big fat YAY.

For everything else -- Nay.

Personally I would say no, because it would put a lot of people off advertising genuine events, and remember that not everyone here does things simply to make a profit, but many out of an actual desire to entertain and provide something for other people.

I run semi-regular tours round the game, which take up about an hour of my time when I do them. I don't charge for them, occasionally I get tips from people, sometimes if people hang around long enough afterwards I get a L$ or two dwell if I'm lucky.

But I don't run them for the money, or the dwell, just as part of my desire to make SL a more interesting place for people to visit. So far, they appear to be fairly successful, and although a group of 10 may not seem particularly big, I don't think it's too shabby.

If I had to pay a set fee, say L$500, to advertise an event, then I quite honestly couldn't afford to run them any longer, compared to the other costs that I have with things like uploading textures and sounds, as part of my continual rebuild and improvement of my property. There is no sense in making myself out of pocket that much to do something I don't have to do.

The big places that multi-post in the event calender already have a big enough cashflow going through that it wouldn't make any difference to them if they spend L$10,000 a week to make themselves more popular - and the little guys who do these things occasionally for fun end up getting shafted again.

I still feel strongly that the only way to tidy up the events calendar is to restrict the amount of events you can post a day per person further - perhaps to just two - and add to that you can only post a certain amount of events - two again works well for me - per parcel of land. This would stop all repeat events, and people who, through alts, are deliberately getting round this restriction would have action taken against them for violating the rules. Maybe the punishment after several warnings should be restricted to losing posting privileges for that property for a month - but I think that a few high profile places (who are often the most guilty) getting a slap on the wrist might make some of the lesser offenders think twice about violating the rules.

So what of places like Teazers who legitimately post multiple events each day from all the different classes they run? Simple... a 'license' that you can apply for to raise these limitations under certain conditions, such as a recognised educational establishment, reviewed say every 3 months, and if you abuse this license by posting inappropriate events, then you lose the license for the rest of that 3 months, then you have to apply again.

Are these changes too tough? Perhaps. Is it necessary? Of course. Don't blame LL for this, blame those who abuse the calendar, and it's plain to see day after day exactly who is multiple posting spamming events back to back.

Stratics has a 'moderated' calendar, where events do not show up unless a moderator approves them. Their rules are different - but the same principle of a moderated calendar would, I believe, work well as long as everyone follows the same rules - which should be clearly defined before beginning. Think of it as a 'calendar ResMod' idea.

It's not necessarily the 'type' of event that is the problem here - after all hosted yard sales are, in my belief, legitimate one-off events for the calendar - it's the multiple posting by multiple users to spam the calendar. That's why I believe nerfing yard sales "just because they are" is not the way forward.

That's what I'd do.

Lewis

Patrolling the calendar has proven not particularly effective or scalable. A Linden (or resident) police force to dish out punishments for abuse is a time sink when our time is probably better spent elsewhere developing Second Life. As Second Life continues to grow quickly, the calendar abuse will continue to grow requiring more policing etc.

As it stands now, most people who are holding events for fun and not profit are bypassing the calendar entirely and sending group IM's. I suppose the logic here might be if people are going to fill up the calendar with pseudo-events and ads anyways, we might as well create a new money sink. I like Travis' suggestion of charging by the half-hour or simply porting over the classifieds model which has proved successful.

I'd be for the mixed option some have suggested.

Paid and Unpaid.

Normal event listing would list paid events first, followed by unpaid events. Then have a checkbox to filter out all events that were paid for.

Alternatively I wouldn't mind if all events had a nominal fee (L$10 to L$50) then having a mechanism for re-occuring non-commercial events to request fee waivers. For example if you do a Sports or Sailing event every twice a week in set time slots, and there is no charge to participate (and it's not a commercial event pushing some product) then you could get a fee waiver. All Educational events would also get waivers.

Things that would not qualify for waivers would include Casinos, Clubs, store Sales or Yard Sales. For re-occuring events, people list the event and someone reviews it before it goes live. For one time events, you register (pay for it) then request the refund.

But of course the second option requires linden lab staff or volunteers to moderate the event postings. Perhaps Linden Labs could setup a job farm where when an event is submitted everyone that has signed up to moderate an event gets a dialog broadcast message (perhaps they have to wear a moderator bracelet.) Everyone that gets the broadcast gets to vote if they think it's Commercial or Non-Commercial. An event must get a minimum number of votes before it's approved. If more then 60% think it's commercial, the event poster does not get a refund. If more then 60% think it's non-commercial, they get a refund. If it's in the middle, it gets flagged for a Linden staff member to review. Then everyone wearing a moderator bracelet gets L$1 for every 10 or 100 events moderated (could even just limit it to events moderated where they modereated in the majority.)

The biggest problem I have with charging is the legitimate situation of not doing something for a profit, just doing it to have fun/enhance SL. The folks who are already abusing the system will not really take a hit, they will just pony up - the good part of that is, it's another sink but the events calendar will stay broken this way - it may even worsen since the price for entry will be a burden on those least able to afford it - and no impediment at all to those who've broken the system in the first place.

What needs to happen is what Travis has been campaigning for for lo these many moons, which is a calendar that can be properly searched based on exclusion. I'd add to that the inadequacy of current categories. Make a yardsale category, and then only show them there, my main beef is, whenever I do a concert, I'm torn between posting it as Arts/Culture or Nightlife - it's BOTH - as the system is I can choose one, or post in both (which of course is duplicative) It might be nice to be able to post a single event and choose both, or better yet, just have a "concert" or "Live Music/DJ" category.

I guess I'd say before you start charging for events listings, try and make the current client work right - for the user.

I have seen many many people volenteer themselves to be a Event List ResMod when brought up as an idea in several threads. As for the population growing, therefore the more people needed to help out grows, isn't that the same as livehelp? They add more people to the pool of LiveHelpers as needed.



Group IMs I HATE and have caused me to leave MANY groups.. I've seen events advertised on the volenteer channels, I don't want to see this carried on.

If the event calender is broken, fix or remove it. Its like trying to put a band aid over a broken bone. I appreciate you're trying to stabalise the exchange rate, but I don't see this being the answer.

And..

If its going to be introduced, which by the looks of things seems to be already decided. This is the way I'd like it to be implemented..

I stopped holding events reguarily (Show&Tells, Contests, Trivia) when you got rid of event support, as I couldn't give away prizes without the cost being on myself.

If this happens as a grid wide charge, it'll be a heck of a long time before I post events again.

I'd say a universal fee would be good... as long as it's quite small. I do several non-profit and semi-non profit events, and wouldn't mind paying, say, 10-30L, especially if such a fee might reduce the overall number of event postings even by, say, 20%.

I say a conditional yay. But it must be done in concert with a wide acceptance of paid events a well thought up and considered replacement to the DI and a better way to police and enforce a no camping chair rule. Otherwise its LL making more money off of event producerswho cant possably ever recoup.

I still use the calendar. I'm not going to create a group just for spamming, and I eventually leave all groups that spam me -- sorry, but it IS annyoing as hell
I might like a place, or a group, but when I'm having a conversation with someone or at (another) event, group IM spam just bugs me.



No. I don't have L$ 20 000 to put my event on the 'visible' list.
I currently have my event first one at the specific time slot. How? I do it regularly, and always at the same time, and schedule it weeks ahead. I also spend/give the prize money from my pocket (well, now with FFRC support, too).

I don't get why the events listing cannot be moderated by either ResMods or Lindens. It could also go like 'you must announce your event a day ahead', so only approved events go on the in-world calendar.

The only thing I would find acceptable is a 'deposit' system: to post an event, a deposit (let's say L$ 500) would be locked from your SL account. If you broke the rules, the deposit will be lost.

I also wonder what does this mean exactly?
There are about 300-400 events listed per day. If to look after them is an hour of work, or two for someone (a person with not too big qualifications), that might mean a cost of 25-60 USD per day. But probably this could be outsourced from Linden Labs, so this figure might be lower. It's about 500-1300 USD per month, which is money, but it's probably not much compared to what the abuse report handling/support team costs.

Or, a group of volunteer moderators would cost nothing except a little time training, and some vague oversight if the rules are clear to keep.

It may take half an hour a day - if that - for each of the 'calendar resmods' (for the want of a better term) to prune through the crap, and keep a log of all the event calendar abuse, to be passed on to a Linden -presumably Jesse - to hand out some slappings when, despite repeat warnings, persistent offenders (individuals or places), the abuse continues.

That's what I'd do.

Lewis

I am unequivocally against fees affecting visibility within the event calendar listings. Any sort of system similar to advertisements, where higher fees grant higher visibility, will quickly destroy the community service aspect of the event calendar as it is overrun by deep-pocketed commercial interests. Not only would they gladly pay more for increased visibility to their current listings, they would experience a profound financial incentive to abuse the calendar even further against its intended purpose.




That said, my initial reaction to charging a token flat fee for listing any event is benign. Legitimate events could readily afford something on the order of $L50 per event, really that's not notably more than upload fees, but casual calendar spammers would be discouraged against the ongoing expense of 24/7 advertising.

It's been noted that deep-pocketed commercial abusers would be unaffected by any trivial fees, and that's true. Such calendar abusers would require a different course of action to mediate. To discourage the other casual calendar spammers is still a nice start, however; an end no less laudable in light of deep-pocketed commercial abuse.

It's also been noted that calendar abusers might feel 'entitled' to their actions if they have paid a nominal fee to take them. This is probably correct, and it emphasises that event listing fees can only serve to supplement other means of curbing calendar abuse, not replace them. It's imperative that Linden Lab maintain a policy of delisting inappropriate 'events' without refund, tough cookies to the abusers. To do otherwise would only serve to encourage further abuse.




I'm rather fond of Lewis' suggestion of limiting any one avatar to hosting two events per day, maintianing the current 2-3 hour duration cap for the listing. To tie such limitations to specific parcels would prove an ineffectual solution, easily sidestepped by carving out a handful 16-square-meter microparcels from a venue.

I'm in a situation, as event manager for a burgeoning residential community, where I could readily run up against a two-event-per-day wall. Presently we're a trilingual community and there are many occasions where I'll want to post one listing each in English, German, and French - not all that different from the situation for events which straddle mulitple categories.

I believe that for legitimate events this is easily enough worked around through assisting hosts. For example, I could host the English-language listing while assisting residents fluent in German and French could host listings in their own respective languages. Legitimate category-straddling events could easily adopt a similar approach. Repeated events, such as performances scheduled twice within a day to cater to both North Amercian and European time zones, could also function under such a system.

Casual event calendar abusers would be stopped dead in their tracks, however. Deep-pocketed commercial interests would be mostly unaffected again, able to afford a pool of host-alts, but just like the token nominal fee, curbing casual abuse is a great start to cleaning up the calendar, regardless of whether large-scale commerical abuse will require further action.




So in summary:

1)Token fees on the order of L$50 per event or per hour are good.
2)A two-event-per-day host limit is good.
3)Neither approach is a substitute for calendar abuse enforcment. They are merely tools to for keeping the problem at a more manageable scale.

I also think the suggestion of applying event listing fees toward financing something similar to the forums' res-mod program is an intriguing notion worthy of further development. It could neatly work around the manpower issues presently crippling efforts at active calendar abuse enforcement.

1.The best solution would be to add tools so people can exclude certain words.

The events calendar is one of the best things SL has going for it. I've said so since I joined, and I absolutely cannot fathom why anyone would want to restrict it so much. People want to be able to find lots of things to do, and at all hours. The more, the better.

2. The worst solution is to have residents policing the thing.

We've already seen that many residents want to define what is an event for everyone else, and I mean, they really, really, REALLY want to define it for everyone else.

Just because some residents have the idea that yard sales, Slingo, best T&A contests and the like aren't really events doesn't mean there aren't BUNCHES of people out there who want them and want to be able to find them.

Including me. Yard sales are one of the few fun, wholesome things there are for me to do in SL, and I think it is absolutely perverted that there is a movement afoot to get rid of them. I resent it. If somebody doesn't like yard sales, then just the heck don't GO to them - stop trying to make it hard for me to find them!

4. As for paying for events, I don't think it is a good idea to nickle and dime people to death, plus we already have classifieds. But at this point, I don't really have an opinion on it one way or the other.

Except I do think that making it where you have to pay more to be at the top of the list is a bad idea.

And I think charging people who are holding yard sales or grand openings more - or making them be the only ones who have to pay - would be unconscionably worse.

To sum up:

We already have categories.

I really don't think someone's pain and suffering from actually having to skim the words "yard sale" should trump my rights to find them, go to them, and have fun at them.

Make the search tools better. But don't expect that to stop the complaining, because making categories didn't.

I think the language already in place - that the event have a start and end point, and a host present - is the perfect definition of an event.

Within that, all events should be treated exactly the same.

God knows, I don't want some residents deciding what I should see as events and what I shouldn't. Please do not give them that power.

And I don't think that should be any of Linden business, either, as long as the guidelines already in place are followed. Don't try to social engineer me away from my yard sales, or some other person away from his T&A contests, or somebody else away from their Tringo.

coco

Just to add, I love Zonax's show and tells, and put them on notify whenever I'm in world. One of the few "real" events held on a regular basis

Doesn't necessarily work. Let's say I absolutely hate tringo, and want to filter out anything *ingo. An event which is "Show and tell, come show us your fantastic creations, no camping chairs or tringo here" gets filtered out. But that's an event I would want to go to, as I have several times in the past.



It works fine on stratics....



I think that the rules that are there are fine at the moment - the problem is not the events posted, but the multiple posting spammers.



True... but there are other great events that are actually "one offs" that are being overshadowed by the perpetual 24 hour *ingo, yard sales, product launches and everything else that are not what the calendar is there for.



Back to the rule enforcement issue... if LL don't have the resources to do it, and you don't like the resident based idea, what do you suggest?

That's what I'd do.

Lewis

Those other events are not being overshadowed by yard sales and Tringo.

You can look at the whole calendar for the whole day all at once and then wring your hands over what all is on it, and how you might have to look carefully to find something you'd like. But I think people do only that to decry the whole calendar. I don't think they are really looking for something to do. They just want to talk about how horrible the calendar is. If they were really looking for something they would like to do, they could find it within moments.

The way I do it is in two ways: I look at the whole calendar, starting with the time I get on the game. I see what is going on that hour and the next hour or two.

And/or I sort by category. Usually I check "Discussions" and "Arts and Culture." If you do that, you end up with only like five or six things for the whole day. Not hard to read.

And I always check games. It's easy for me to see if there is a game going on I would like. Sometimes I put "Blood 21" in to see when the Blood 21 one might be, even if it is hours off.

And the problem you mention with the filters, well, that's just the nature of the beast, so too bad. It works the other way, too, you know - half the time when I put in "Blood 21" things come up that aren't really having Blood 21; it's just that there is something in their description of their place, saying that they sometimes have it.

The reason I suggest more filters is to satisfy those who are offended at merely having to look the listings of sex contests, -ingo games, and yard sales. (I myself would filter out "boobs" and a few other choice words, lol.)

I don't think your Stratics thing is really analogous for a number of reasons. Fewer events, for one thing. And - more importantly - there was no voluable cohort on Stratics determined to impose their idea of "correct" events on everyone else, as there is here.

coco

Why have rules if you expect us not to follow them? Or not even bothered when we break them? Basically what you are saying is that you give up. Let them scam the events. Turn it into a money sink. So instead of punishing those who break the rules, you further punish those that do have actual events?

If the events were only allowed to be posted in advance, say the day before by a certain time, it would take what an hour to go through it? It may not show all the bogus events without hosts but it'd be a start.

Group IMs only work if a person already knows that someone holds a certain event, finds the group, and has enough space to belong to it. What about new people? That's of less help to them then to the complete joke that the events list has become.

Worst case scenerio? The end of classes and non-profit events people have and more work for the volunteers. ta.

Will someone please explain to me the proof of sucess from the current classifieds model vrs sorting by date?

Your opinion maybe. Obviously you are of the minority that believes that.



Rubbish. Nice going on calling anyone who can't find interesting things to do listed in the events lazy or stupid. The amount of interesting things to do posted in events has highly diminished since I got here. When I do find those little gems, which is actually quite rare, few people are actually there. Assumptions on peoples motives is generally incorrect.