Catch this bomb!

Regarding what kind of economy we have here, "global" is hard to envision in a community of 20k-30k individuals, and "frontier" might have applied a year ago, but probably not now.

"Amish country" I think is more apt: a town-sized population owns land, offers goods, maintains relationships, and generally interacts day-to-day in the community, while a much larger "tourist" population (the 80% Basic Accounts) comes and goes, inflating the economy without otherwise influencing it much.

That said, I think we get along fine with the informal guild-style economics we have going now, with LL intervening should money sinks/supply get unbalanced. At most we might benefit from a Chamber of Commerce--talking about an IMF or WTO in a community of this size is aburd.

/me puts on his gray suit and whittles a rocker.

OKay, I got ya. I really wasn't trying to be snarky, so I apologize for putting you on the defensive. I think it was the medeival guild bit that made me scratch my head. I'm having a strong aversion to prokofyisms these days, so my fault, not yours.

I just had to respond to this comment by Ulrika. In fact, all rule is mob rule, the only question is the size of the mob. Autocracy - very small and exclusive mob related by blood ties; oligarchy - somewhat larger mob related by (usually) economic ties; or democracy - biggest mob of all - everybody - with consequent dilution of abuse of power.

Anarchy is an unstable political form (like a radioactive isotope) that quickly decays into one of the others.

As to the main point of the thread, most politically driven economic mechanisms are to mediate interaction with other political bodies. Hence features such as central banks to manage exchange rates and interest rates (another form of the same thing), customs agreements for exchange of goods, etc. There being only one true overarching political entity, these don't seem relevant.

Secondarily, political control over economic factors such as wages and prices, monopoly businesses, etc. don't seem to be relevant to the kind of economy in this game. If the game had banks, then there might be some need for a federal reserve type of control. This would require that banks in the game had the same ability as banks in RL to "create" money, by lending a multiple of their holdings. LL does not seem inclined to provide this.

As there is no meaningful infrastructure in the game, there hasn't been a need to have "municipal" type government, or private associations that would provide the same services. We don't really need roads, electric or communication lines, or sewers. It would be a much different game if we did!

Ferren, when you rail against "mob rule" and knock out all the historical forms of governance, then what are you *for*? Some enlightened council of tekkies who are more intelligent than the rest who will know what's best for them as they wryly put out "Nobody" for president and then handily make sure that "Nobody" is the name of their own alt? No thanks. That's Bolshevism. Let's not prettify it. Explain what you are for if you're going to attack a very workable system like representative democracy, and so denigrate it due to its shortcomings, that you don't seem to supply an alternative...except a pack of very bright and cunny wolves, connecting and reconnecting across the grid and taking advantage of people where they can, and dressing in sheep's clothing where they can. Again, no thanks.



You see what it's like, Seth? I've left you alone to twist in this thread because the same mob will come after you ever time, even if they agree with you more than not, just because they didn't like your tone or your name or your icon.

What I resent about your bomb-throw is your elitist implication that you are a tone-setting, that you can throw out red meat and watch people salivate and attack it, etc. Indeed, I gave you the standard hippie anarchist anti-World Bank response as a little cliche, mentioning dams in China, just so you could congratulate yourself that somebody sprung the trap you laid..but now I'm circulating back and saying, Seth, you manipulator you. Throw out all the red meat you like and watch the hounds bay. Or, have a legitimate discussion without all this silly posturing and name-dropping of RL institutions and old dead white guys LOL.

Seriously, Seth, what do you want your Federal Economic Council to *do*. I totally agree with others that point out that while we thought we had stamped out the fire of player government by having Philip saying he "opposes it," you're just sneaking it in the back door under the guise of "discussion about the economy" or "a little economic council that won't do much except maybe discuss when new land should be rolled out".

In our patch economy -- we lurge from patch to patch with economic expectations rising and spending increasing in anticipation of new features....getting new features...getting bitterly disappointed with them not working...tiering down...not being able to log in...etc.
well... the main thing to game is the patch. When is the patch? And what is the patch? Not much economics here! More about game development lol!

The single biggest factor for destabilizing prices, land sales, new subscriptions, tier-ups -- is patches and their performance. They have a tremendously vicious backlash sometimes. The next biggest factor is policies -- like the anti-Tringo events listing bork, like the anti-landowner islands-deed issue. These policies, rooted in a kind of socialist/social democracy/utopianist viewpoint *already* shape the government and governance of our world. They hobble liberal capitalism as it might take root; they even foster social democracy in ways it doesn't merit being sponsored.

If player democracy through the website could vote not just on the features in the patch (that's all it can do now) but on polices and on the all-crucial issue of land roll-out, we might get somewhere.

But before we can take on the function of affecting landout, we need those all-important numbers Philip always keeps close to his chest.We need him to tell how many players there are, how many new ones, how many players pay how much tier, and how many new players opt to tier up past the free 512. When we can see the economic strata and demographics of this world, we can understand better what kind of government would be worth making for it -- if indeed, any at all.

Vudu, that's about the most accurate description I've ever heard of SL. And it's no accident, comrade, that the Amish are a people with a very hierarchical society, whatever the equality of the brethren, when it comes to how women and children are handled within the society. I'm glad you've highlighted the guild economies -- one rarified and talented and specialized guild selling to another, with the masses looking on, coming once a week to the Amish fair to buy their clever rockers and home-baked goods. Very apt analogy indeed.

There's just one thing I want in Amish country. I want a Better Business Bureau. Because as simple and plain as these Amish folk seem to be, I think some of them are up to no good, precisely because no one can peer into their closed society and see if they are copying others products, switching boxes, slandering people's reputation falsely, etc.

Paranoia strikes deep.
Into your life it will creep.
It starts out when you're always afraid.
Step out of line, the Man will come and take you away.

Prokofy, you're ascribing all kinds of motives to me that people have long recognized in you. Posturing, manipulation, name-dropping, etc. I think the word is "projection". Sorry, I'm not in the picture with you. Wishful thinking on your part, maybe.

Yeah, I have an ulterior motive: a good, civil, on-topic discussion. Someone said: "Ain't gonna get it here, Seth." I said: "Watch me."

Did I manage to do it? Probably not. But it felt OK trying. Good enough for me.

As far as the "debate," I thought perhaps breaking out economic issues from political issues might engender a better discussion. I'm aware as the next person that there really is no distinction between politics and economic issues, but I'm also more aware than you of the distinctions between an organization like the UN and one like the WTO. They were RL examples, for anyone who was familiar with them, or cared to follow up.

You know, Prokofy, you're a bright guy, woman, whatever. Think you could make the ultimate sacrifice, just for once? Drop the shit-faced attitude and let your arguments stand on their own merit? I've been dangling that invitation in front of you for the last two months.

LOL, I have been dangling that invitation, haven't I? I guess that does make me a manipulative, posturing, dishonest bastard!

Already answered all of your concerns, Prokofy. See my post above. Have a nice day!

I really don't think you've answered any of these concerns, Seth, because you haven't really indicated what you want this council to do, and what your avenue is for getting it to the Lindens, given the highly-flawed "direct voting" system.

In that sense, I totally agree with what Chip says. There are groups of economic interests. Each will defend themselves. As we've seen in the Tringo/events bork and the Land Sales/ads bork, these interest groups fight each other to the death, each vying to get the ear of the Lindens. An outside force is needed to adjudicate and weigh them, but we don't want a player government and the Lindens don't either.

So you essentially advocate a Wise Man's Council where "we the intelligent people and the only intelligent people and we are surrounded by idiots" get to be the kings and get to have a rare citizen's seat on the august council of game devs and their hired economic guru. Bah to that. How will they pick you? And whom will you represent? And what will be the process for sifting you ought of the matrix?

Thanks for clarifying Seth. I have to say that I think this would be an extremely bad idea for a couple of reasons... we don't have access to the data that LL has so we can't see the big picture and would be unable as individuals to make truly informed choices. Also, since we are all participants in the economy, none of us can be objective about it. We would all vote for things in terms of self-interest rather than common good. I think LL has the right idea in hiring a full time economist (ala Greenspan) to watch over the economy and make adjustments such as rate of land release and adjusting money sinks. When major changes are made it should be opened up for public discussion or at least we should be given advance notice so that people can plan accordingly, but beyond that I think these kinds of decisions should be kept away from direct community influence.

I'd like to hear more about the job description of this fellow, but since the LIndens need to rule the economy, they'll do what they want. The question is whether they are making a model then for all the companies of the world that will henceforth be replicated and reiterate some of the bad things here -- keeping land owners eternally off balance by pouring excess land in the mix.

Should the community be kept away? Would that be undemocratic? But the community doesn't pay for the servers, hire the technicians, pay the technicians. It's just that simple.

In common parlance, "mob rule" refers to a majority opinion having sway over the whole without any respect for laws or protections for the minorities.

You're right about anarchy being unstable. But the worst part about anarchy is it tends to decay into an even worse form of government. A totalitarian dictatorship or something along those lines. This depends on how far society is allowed to decay. For all a lot of high-minded pseudo 'thinkers' in the college age crowd hold up "anarchy" as their ideal form of government, those who live in an anarchistic society rarely do it of their own choosing. Anarchy is not condusive to a functioning, stable, productive society. Anarchy, as well, is thankfully usualy fairly brief... It mostly exists in periods of revolution or upheval. It's not so much a decaying form of government, as it is an intermediarey form of government.

Government would have to get pretty bad before I would embrace anarchy as a viable alternative, and even then it would be with the desperate hope that it would be brief and a better government would arise from the ashes.

I couldn't agree more! See, I'm sure we can find whole areas of agreement despite the evident disagreement on how snarky to be to the landowning class LOL.

Anarchy is often deliberately incited and allowed to run its course by inciters with hidden agendas who want to install an authoritarian or totalitarian system.

You've also summed up perfectly a problem we find in SL -- to bring it back to SL -- a lot of "high-minded pseduo thinkers in the college age crowd" who embrace what they think is a kewl fad, get the "A" on their t-shirts, put a couple of Chomsky pamphlets in their backpacks (Chomsky is actually horridly conservative and not at all an anarchist in the way they imagine, only when it suits him), and maybe add a nose ring, and then they are in business LOL.

The fact of the matter is, they aren't just college-age. A good many people who enter the adult world keep these half-baked ideologies and nurture them in secret and in resentment as they work in their huge IT companies with bosses from hell repressing them. They harbour utopianist and pastoralist visions of freedom and equality--with Internet hookup and all the latest conveniences of course--and they actually think that anarchy is maybe something a bit unstable but which isn't going to lead to anything worse and therefore might best be preserved in some fashion.

They're going to try to portray game anarchy of the benign kind where nothing really can hurt you THAT bad -- it's only pixels, etc. -- as being a Good Thing.

But what will happen is that the griefing and ugly factors are going to so catch up with the Lindens when they get to trying to please larger investors, including some who will want to come into this game and live or work, that they will begin to either enforce their own TOS in ways that make them more like a federal government, or allow more player-based solutions.

I'm thinking that the anarchy that threatens the Linden's control -- whatever its effect on the player base -- will eventually tip the scales on this and force them to take added measures. Maybe it will be some faceless "any reason or no reason" kind of expulsions no one ever hears about, or maybe higher-profile actions, I'm not sure.

Wow, we actually found something to agree on Prok I'd think the job of whatever economic adviser they hire would be simply to adjust the money sinks and the mint and the rate at which new land is added to try and keep the exchange rate and the price of land somewhat stable... so that there are less suprises and a more predictable experience for everyone, including LL. The only community involvement should be feedback. As we see over and over again even a small and seemingly insignificant change can have large unintended consequences for different kinds of endeavors and businesses, so getting feedback on proposed changes helps avoid those kinds of surprises that LL didn't predict. I don't think I'd see the point of making things any more complicated than that unless in world businesses grow to the point of being profitable real world businesses.

Try try, Prokofy. As I've stated several times on this thread, I was trying to ask questions, rather than pontificating about solutions.



Yes, I understand your point. See how that works?



And again, nice try. Do I need to say that I was asking questions again?



Is that not a question that deserves discussion?



The community does, however, provide the income that pays for the servers, hires the technicians, and pays for them. And the key concept in these statements is "community", which indicates something very different from "client" or "customer." So, another question that deserves discussion.

In real life I understand the reasons governments must exist. I vote, pay my taxes, participate in civil society, etc. I do not advocate anarchy as a viable form of government in today's REAL world. In a nutshell, there's too many RL 'griefers' for it to be a viable option. I also see no reason to extend the grief RESULTING from politics into a virtual space beyond the barest required minimum. As a system for 'running' things, I advocate online Anarchy as far as it keeps the bullshit associated with RL politics out of the VR world.



People bring alot of half-baked ideas into SL. We see them all the time in these forums. Some people can write reams and reams and REAMS of text about their own half-baked ideas (after all that writing, maybe some of these graduate to 2/3rds-baked ideas) and can spend just as much time, if not more, tearing down the ideas of others.

To me, the least half-baked idea is that we should be left alone to do as we wish within the confines of the TOS.

Some of us are here to build, code, design, and have fun. Some of us are here to club around, hang out with friends, and have fun. Some of us are here to play at running malls and casinos and rental properties to make a 'profit', and have fun. The key factor we all have in common bringing us to this virtual world is to have fun. If you're not having fun, its time to find something else to do.

-Ghoti

I'd rather have a player-run government that was restricted from touching the global economic levers, than no "government" per se and player control over those levers. The economy is the main reason why less government is better than more.

In RL, the only legitimate reason for government is to act as a monopoly on the use of force. As has been pointed out, anarchy can degenerate into a primitive crime society, at least according to Hobbesian social theory. Government acts in theory as a wall between violence and the people.
Of course, the Government always degenerates into an organized crime gang itself. The criminals eventually gain various degrees of control over the force that mediates them. One problem is that they now, as a "legitimate", super-organized mafia, have access to certain economic controls that they never would as a collection of disorganized gangs. They eventually learn to work together to "farm" the population for their labor.

In SL, where the "laws of reality" have been shaped in such a way that totalitarian or predatory violence is mostly impossible (and probably could be made completely impossible by LL eventually), there is no legitimate reason for Government at all.

Coming back to the economy, this is the one area of human existence (and we are still human behind the avs) where it has been most clearly and definitively demonstrated, both in theory and experience, that intervention and meddling pretty much only do harm.

The only part of the economy that even LL should touch at all, is the monetary system, and that only because it is inevitable - given the way land works, and because of new people entering the system.

If players were to get control over these economic forces, either this control would end up in the hands of "White Collar Criminals" (which are few, if any, under our current system) or, if it were a full-on direct democracy, everyone would inflate themselves to death, as the people would be tempted to raise subsidies and avoid deflation. There would be a brief "boom" and then, a hyper-inflationary crisis.

Originally posted by Reitsuki Kojima:



Absolutely correct! My standard counter-argument was to ask for a reference to even one anarchy based society that had lasted more than two or three years. Back in APA days (Amateur Press Association - pre-Internet discussion groups using Gestetner or Mimeo paper reproduction too tedious to explain) one fellow claimed there was an example in Peru, but he was never able to give details.

I never could stand the anarchy types. When I was in university, I painted the last paragraph from 'Atlas Shrugged' on my dorm room door.

Originally posted by Agatha Palmerstone:



LL has a lot more influence than just the monetary system (by which I presume you mean the money supply). They decide how much additional land is added to the game, and that has a major impact on the economy. If land were added a lot faster than it could be absorbed by new players, market forces would drive down the price of land. They also have to manage the money supply not just through the stipend, but also through sinks such as purchase of auction land in L$ rather than US$. The out-of-game currency exchanges provide a lot of signals as to how quickly to expand the money supply.

That's one reason why I think it would be interesting to introduce player-owned banking, in the true sense where banks can lend more than their assets thereby expanding the money supply. It would provide another, more market driven, method of expanding the money supply. That might require LL to set up an FDIC type insurance fund!

*Shudders*.

Ugh. I knew we had a *real problem here*. We could debate about Ayn Rand.

What I'd like to hear is how this applies to Second Life. I think I have an idea how. It's not pretty.

I kinda figured Rand would be right up your alley. Admittedly, that was based only on your shared enjoyment of verbosity. Unfortunately, Objectivism appears to be anathema to your own personal philosophy. Whereas Rand propounds the importance of self-fulfillment and enjoyment, a Fuck You Hedonism if you will, you prefer a philosophy of Prokofy-centrism wherein we all strive to fulfill your own goals. Why should we derive enjoyment from our personal freedom to build and script as we see fit, when we could be indentured servants of the Prokofy Neva Cult of Dispersonality?

Well Put Ghoti,

Shadow

How does secession work in virtual reality?

Anarchy does not exist in SL. It never has and it never will. In SL you are governed by a corporatist oligarchy (rule by a few in a corporate structure) known as the Lindens. They change rules without player consent, enforce rules inconsistently with no chance for appeal, and set all monetary and real estate policy with little hope of reform.

~Ulrika~

As far as player-on-player governance, I currently reside in a state of anarchy. Those who choose to do so reside in whatever form of player-run governance they choose to join.

Yes, all this takes place within the confines of the Linden like-a-government. Think of it more like the natural laws (Linden Law, i.e. the TOS) versus the rules of humans (player-run governance).

No player holds rules over me. In SL, I live in a state of anarchy.

-Ghoti

(edited for spelling)

Um sorry Ulrika in the context that Ghoti offers it up..Ghoti got cha...as I tend to belive somewhat the same thing.

LL=Natural Law...AKA like RL Mother Nature.

RL We dont fuck with Lightning as we know it will Kill us.

IN SL we dont fuck with a linden as well same...hehe..dont shoot me Phillip please.

PRG(player run government)= Man Made Law

I follow no PRG thus I live in a state of Anarchy as Ghoti mentioned.

Shadow

This is anarchy. This is a credible definition of anarchy as it applies to an online virtual world.

Within the confines of a collective, contractual agreement, administered by an overarching organization without agendas beyond maximizing community profit (LL), we are free to do what we want, with the intent of pursuing happiness, fulfillment, "fun". That organization (LL) has no real authority or sovereignty over you or me (we can always quit), but exists as a tool to maximize our living styles and standards. (The real issue is whether the interests of the overarching "tool" - LL - matches those of the "community" - you and me. But that's a judgement subject to constant review and debate.)

Could be an issue of definition here. Anarchy is not "no order," or "no government". Anarchy is not analogous to Hobbes' or Rousseau's "primitive states of being." (Crime in the wilderness, or whatever.) Anarchy is that form of political order that allows you to do the most for yourself within the limits of what is needed to allow everyone else the same right.

Which means that most of us are anarchists, here in Second Life, myself included. Personally, when I speak of "economic directions", I'm talking about ways of maximizing profit and pleasure without allowing an organization to have real authority or sovereignty over me. Most people here seem to think it's not necessary.

I can live with that consensus, while wondering whether it represents a missed opportunity.

I've never heard living under an oligarchy described as anarchy before. Sounds like a nasty case of cognitive dissonance to me.

From Wikipedia's Anarchy page:

I'm not sure what you have but it's not anarchy.

~Ulrika~

~Ulrika~