About This 5 Day Trial Period

Are any restrictions placed on the player during this 5 day trial or can they come in and create all kinds of hate and griefing for 5 days then leave?? Like most people these days, if they have more than one credit card, they could do this forever!

I realize people need to see what they are paying for, but not at the expense of the current residents.

I hope the Lindens already have a fix for this and my rant is for nothing.


-TK

I think I asked about this at one of the town halls, and, if I remember correctly, all objects get deleted after the 5 days if the person doesn't pay. Also, I think its one avatar per CC, so, eventually, they will run out of credit cards.

Tracey, et al -

So I think we've arrived at a good balance which allows trial account residents to fully experience SL without giving a few bad apples too much power.

1. Trial accounts require a unique, valid credit card. With a unique, valid credit card you can trial once per every three months.

2. Trial residents cannot upload sounds or images, and cannot create or modify scripts. Once they convert to resident status, these features are unlocked.

So go hug a trial resident today - remember, the more folks in SL the bigger the world can get.

hunter

Thank you Hunter, I feel better now.

I was standing at the Welcome Area a little while ago, along with 5 others, waiting to pounce on the new people with open arms.


-TK

Just a note to the Lindens.

The general population does not love you and trust you like we do.

They will not give you their credit card number to sign up for a trial period. I would not have given my CC if that had been required for the beta sign-up at the time I joined.

Their friends will send them to secondlife.com, they will go, they will say "oh, that looks kinda neat", they will go for the trial sign-up, see that it requires a CC number and move on. They will not do the 5 day trial, they will not get addicted, and they will not give you any money.

This is true.

I 100% agree with Wednesday on this. Had I needed to enter a CC number for the beta, I wouldn't have joined. I really think you need to change the policy, Linden Lab, and allow people to do the trial without credit card numbers.

I agree with WG too.. but I don't want to see the cc requirement for trial go away, because without it there's nothing to stop BillyJoeGriefer from creating a new trial account every 5 days for the rest of our collective second lives...

#!

And let us not forget WandaJean Mule

Well, the Lindens need to find a way to have the SL client create something in the registry which knows the names of all the SL users that have logged in on that computer, so that they wont be allowed to login with a new account.

I know, they could format or delete it from registry or use a different computer, but, NOTHING is fool proof, not even the credit card thing.

I also agree with those above me. Though the credit card is a good security measure. It may also be a deterent. I know that when I registerd there was not credit requirement, but had there been It may have stopped me or made me quite nervous, because you don't want to just give out a credit card number to a company you know nothing of, or had any experience with. After playing the game for a few days, I may feel more inclined to pay for it, and have gained the knowlegde and trust needed to give out my CC number.


More of my thoughts..

What would actually get me to sign up for a trial period using my credit card is a statement like this:

"We use your credit card to prevent abuse within the game. The only time we will ever bill you is when you decide to sign up for a membership. If we bill you without your permission, you can sue us and we will settle with you out of court. So stop worrying, because we won't bill you!"

Then again, I'm extremely gullible

Edit: I would just like to add that asking for an e-mail address and using that as a unique ID works worse than a CC but will definitely get more people to try out a trial. I know a lot of places that ask for my e-mail and I only tried their services about 4 times using free e-mail addresses. After that I just got sick of faking e-mails.
I believe that if anyone likes this game enough to actually waste their time signing up on 5 e-mail addresses, they will eventually succumb and pay money to play.

Am I mistaken, but I am darn sure i entered my credit card number to join the beta of SL. I believe it had a similar statement that dave said where i wouldn't be billed.

This is the fix to that problem or somewhat, dont' auto bill them after 5 days do what they did with us and make us sign up after the "free" period, this way you can log the CC and not allow them to do the 5 days multiple times and it will relieve some of the fear of handing out your CC. Also for your info if linden labs says they will not charge your CC without express permission they ARE legally obligated to hold up to that. So its not like they could screw anyone (i know they wouldn't just saying).

I reall don't know why people are so scared of giving a CC # out, every CC company i have dealt with has been very good about dealing with fraudelant (sp?) charges. If someone uses your card # to charge something without your express authorization there is no contract and you can't be legally held responsible.

anyways thats my rant for the day, keep the CC policy LL just don't auto charge them and tell them that.

JV

When I signed up in November, CC info was not required. There wasn't even a spot for it on the form.

Would I have signed up if it *had* been required? Probably not... not due to any fear of using a CC online, because I've done that a few hundred times back when I had CCs, but because

a) I didn't know the company (reputation, etc.)
combined with
b) it was for a "service", not a tangible product that I could hold in my hands

#!

you wouldn't have done it with a notice saying you will not be charged at the end of 5 days unless you upgrade to whatever service plan?

That is a contract if you agree to it and if they charge you it is a violation of that contract. Contracts can be verbal or written and now electronic .

But i do understand that there is hassle in fighting stuff like that so i understand some people are just cautious.

I did have to put in a CC to sign up for SL and I don't regret it for one minute.

JV!