LL Rejects Players' Bill of Rights

We're all standing around beating the poor horse with big giant stupid sticks.

As well, I have finally reached a certain point in life where I cannot fathom having the patience to be rational with a completely irrational world. The collective umbra of human consciousness is losing to the average. The world is so incredibly dense with haphazard, half-baked, indolent apathy that it is becoming increasingly difficult to make a point without being obscene.

Besides, irrationality and poor logic are a point of contention with me. I try to to be succint and polite as often as I can, but patience is a virtue amongst mongrels.

There you have it. I'm just in a flippant, bitter, and contemptuous mood lately.

Perhaps Hobbes is right in this case...

We only have one right under a social contract (TOS): To obey the government (LL).

This means that we have to follow the TOS, we shouldn't get rights.

They made this game, they have total control. They don't have to give anyone anything, and some people are just being childish in wanting their "online rights" supported.

Sure, the voting page says at the top:
"please don't put bugs or policy changes into the feature voting tool."

And yes, the Instructions page says:
"Linden Lab reserves the right to refuse, remove, mark "can't do" any proposal in the system"


Still, I find it dissapointing, and a bit too convenient, that LL would so easily reject a proposal that IS doable, just because "it's not a feature."

For evidence of other "non-feature" proposals that *have* been acknowledged, just check the ACKNOWLEDGED section of the voting page. I'll list some of em here, to save time:

477: more proposal review
Linden comments: All proposals with over 500 votes will now be commented on by LL.

410: forum moderation with teeth
Linden comments: Done, read more about the Forum Policy Change from June.

OOHH! *THAT* one is damning! It has the words "Policy Change" right in the comment!

Just read the section. It goes on and on with "non-feature" proposals that are acknowledged.

To the person who suggested we ask for an SLA (service level agreement) instead of a constitution, I think you may have something there. An SLA is a *real* agreement between a business and its customers. An SLA exists in the real world. It is legally enforceable.

You can read about it here:
http://looselycoupled.com/glossary/SLA

To quote: "An SLA is a document that describes the minimum performance criteria a provider promises to meet while delivering a service. It typically also sets out the remedial action and any penalties that will take effect if performance falls below the promised standard. It is an essential component of the legal contract between a service consumer and the provider."

That sounds much more real and useful than a "virtual bill of rights." Here's a neat article about how customers are increasingly seeing SLA as *mandatory* from service providers:
http://www.xchangemag.com/articles/152back.html

Somethin to think about.

BAH to the "virtual citizen" rhetoric. We are flesh customers using a service. When a cooler service comes along, most if not all will probably migrates.

Quite right. Nothing virtual about me...

I don't think anyone as yet to mention what freedom they want that they aren't given in SL. Give us some reason why this isn't an extreamly dumb idea.

I want the freedom to go around shooting people with push-guns, being a public nuisance, and making insensitive and inflammatory remarks...

Seriously, we're barely limited at all. What right do we not have that we should?

We are both. We are virtual citizens of a virtual nation and flesh (and blood) customers using a service.

We each have a real-world name and a virtual-world name.
We each have a real-world home and a virtual-world home.
We each have a real-world currency and a virtual-world currency.
We each have real-world friends and a virtual-world friends.
We each have real-world clothes and virtual-world clothes.
We each have a real-world job and a virtual-world job.
We each have a real-world government and a virtual-world government.
And so on ...

When I speak of governments and inalienable rights for virtual citizens, I'm speaking of the virtual world (which makes sense since we are currently interacting as citizens of our virtual world within the forum).

I find it interesting that everyone buys into the virtual world analogy (that a collection of bits is in fact a house) yet they draw the line at higher-order interpersonal relationships such as governments.

~Ulrika~

We are customers. You can say that we are citizens over and over and over. It doesn't make it so. LL is a business and they make decisions based on what is good for their company. We have no right outside of the TOS, unless for some reason a court in the jurisdictional location where we bring suit, usually where we keep our flesh, rules in our favor.. or in some precident setting case. That's the way it is.

We are not even co-owners, since LL is not publicly traded and none of us own a share. If we were co-owners, shareholders, you would have a better argument, but even then we would have specific legally delimited rights.

I used to spend a great deal of time in a local coffee shop. I worked there on my own projects, met with my friends, participated in events... the coffee shop owners provided the infrastructure and I paid a fee in the numerous cups of coffee I drank. I was a member of a community even that called the place home.. but we were not citizens.. we were customers. And when eventually that shop closed, we migrated elsewhere.

I miss that place.

I understand that you WANT it to be so.

Perhaps our notions of virtual worlds have not delusioned us to the reality at play.

1. The servers hosting the software that makes this little "world" tick are hosted on computers in a shared hosting environment that probably houses thousands of websites and other network services.

2. The software is owned by a private corporation which extends us access to that software for a real-world fee. Our accessed is goverend by real-world agreements we made upon "signing up."

3. Aside from baseless intellectual properties, we own nothing. When we pay our service fees to LL, we are not creating an investment, purchasing shares, or earning interest on monies paid to LL in any way -- so essentially, nothing in SL is tangible in the RL sense.

4. My physical and social protection are not necessary in SL. I am anonymous and no one can harm, discriminate, discredit, or damage my property in any way. If they sought to harm me in RL, there are RL laws and protections that will protect me.

5. I log off.

Virtual world? Probably in the sense that it makes an attempt to establish a participatory facimile of reality.

You are displaying a disappointing combination of ignorance and annoyance.

I suggest that instead of posting mockery that masquerades as chiding, that you seek to understand that establishing legal rights for virtual citizens will never occur in a corporate environment. You will then be able to address those who are rightfully pointing out the flawed premise that ultimately insures failure instead of mocking them like a child from a position of ignorance.

...

I've concluded that Ulrika Zugzwang and Cienna Samiam are the same person, and that person is the God of the Old Testament. Having found no one in this thread who measures up, God is now having a conversation with Herself.

By the way - just to set the biblical record straight - these "government" conversations are not about whether "virtual world citizenship" exists. It doesn't. The concept has been invented, but not yet realized. They are about whether "virtual world citizenship" would give us - the clientele - and LL - the producer/licenser - certain mutual advantages. Discussions; no threat there to anyone.

The threat seems to be generated by attitudes, expressions, assumptions, values, perceived status and hierarchal differences between players, etc. - in other words, it's just...well, politics. The kinds of politics that government can cut through to achieve the fragile unity necessary to reach specific goals. And that is one of the few good reasons for government in human affairs - one human affair being (why, of course!) Second Life.

LL Rejects Players' Bill of Rights???

Wrong!

From last week's issue of the Messenger:



[left]A proposal asking for a “Bill of Rights” in Second Life was recently removed from the feature voting tool by Linden Lab.[/left]




[left]Howver, Robin Linden, Vice-President of LL, clarifed in a recent interview that the proposal was removed only because it isn't a feature that development would code. [/left]




[left]“Its removal had nothing to do with a refusal to give rights to SL residents,” she said.[/left]




[left]While LL has not yet taken steps to discuss a bill of rights, Linden said, “I actually think the request for a bill of rights is valid, and something we should discuss.”[/left]




[left]Linden added that this particular proposal had a significant number of votes (1322 from 178 voters). “It's clearly something we should address,” she said.[/left]




[left]Said Linden, “There's an interesting underlying question, which is why the community standards, which are based on a belief in tolerance and free expression, aren't sufficient for a rights guarantee.”[/left]




[left]She added that she thinks that people want to dispel the possibility of confusion over what is meant by the community standards.[/left]




[left]The bill of rights would clearly define what LL means by tolerance and free expression, said Linden. “[It would be] a statement about the values behind the community standards,” she added.[/left]




[left]She said it would be very important to gather additional resident input to use in developing a bill of rights. “And an additional challenge will be to define how a bill of rights would be enforced,” she added.[/left]




[left]“As an example, we are challenged on the forums when we delete personal attacks as censoring free speech,” she said, adding, “But as the people responsible for the tone of the forums, as well as for maintaining the business of Linden lab, we can't allow that sort of thing to continue."[/left]




[left]Establishing some rights such as freedom of press is somewhat of a moot point when LL does nothing to restrict that freedom. However, Linden said that given the response to the bill of rights proposal, it seems that the absence of a specific definition of rights is a problem with residents.[/left]

My entire issue with the whole concept of virtual world citizenship and governance is that there's no effective enforcement and accountability method. Well, that's not entirely true, the "vote with your wallet" method will always be the best way to hold a service provider accountable for its actions.

However, if we start to define what speech is free and which speech isn't, there will still be people attempting to lawyer the limits in order to be "edgy" and "push the envellope." Quite honestly, no matter how horrid something is, I can't say that someone "shouldn't" say it. I can say it's a sign of ignorance or stupidity that they say it, but honestly, once you start to cherry-pick good speech out of the entire mass of speech, you're going to leave some things behind.

Even if we have these definitions in place as part of the TOS, either by incorporation or reference, who is the final arbiter of the "grey area" cases? LL? The Residents? Some kind of SL Supreme Court? Some other model? Can I use another question mark here?

If Linden Lab wants to hire a "Player Rights Czar" to oversee all of the complaints, appeals to bannings, etc. and interpret this revolutionary (undrafted) Bill of Avatar Rights, I will gladly move to SF and do it as long as my health insurance would cover a massive xanax prescription.

We used to have someone who wanted to lead us down the path of enlightenment and democracy. Unfortunately he turned out to be just a tad power hungry.

Used to? Has Bush been fired?

Ahhh... sanity.

Now now.. you know who I'm talking about.

Sorry for the misunderstanding, Dianne. I thought you meant it was stupid to point out that SL is run by a company -- a company with self-preserving profit motives. Those are immutable facts that bear repeating whenever this discussion comes up, mainly because it seems so many people refuse to acknowledge that or want to argue with the fact.


No, "Bing and go" is just a cutesie way of saying "Bingo", or "You're on target". I.e., "I agree".


It was not intended to be either.


The community in SL may be evolving all the time, agreed, but I don't see the 'fact' of LL's ownership and control changing. Do we really expect them to abrogate control of the world to the users? That would allow us to make decisions that are contrary to LL's self interest. Surely they're smarter than that?


I knew we'd agree on something Actually, I think you and I can agree on a great deal here but we keep misunderstanding each other. I admire idealism. I am a staunch defender of individual rights and democratic freedom. I simply acknowledge that they have clear limits in an online world.


I feel like we already have creative freedom in SL. I'm at a loss to think of something we might want to do but can't, short of establishing our own laws and enforcement body -- or making a build that features baby-raping.

When you think of it, turning over Second Life to a user government is opening a Pandora's box. Do you honestly think that there would not be protests, rebellions, warfare, fracturing of the culture if we were to govern ourselves? Why would we be any different than any other nation over thousands of years of RL history? LL's governance is already amorphous and vague. Player government is liable to be all that and hopelessly bureaucratic to boot.

Make no mistake, 'government' is worthless without an enforcement body, be it your local town sheriff or the FBI. The minute the players are enforcing their own laws, this whole facade will crash down around our ears simply because there will always be those who refuse to accept the rule of people they don't feel beholden to. They are beholden to the Lindens through the TOS. What would bind them to feel the same about the United Federation of Second Life?

Oh, I really just wanted the Xanax prescription for the most part.

It'd be necessary to wade thru all the rampant silliness I think we could expect from such a system.

You might need to throw in some prescription pain killers too.

As much as we might rail against the establishment of player-run government(s) in SL, the very openness of Linden Lab to player input may well make some kind of government structure inevitable. As SL continues to evolve and change, groups are going to form that will try to influence LL to make those changes which benefit their interests. Metaverse Justice Watch was hilariously clumsy...expect future attempts at "citizen action committees" to go about their business in a much quieter and more strategic fashion.

(How many people here were aware that LL recently held an in-world, invitation-only black tie gala for private sim owners, where we were encouraged to speak with the Lindens in attendence, ask questions, and make suggestions? A perfectly sensible move on the company's part, taking care of their most lucrative customers, but also an indication of class division within our li'l utopia, where the haves potentially have more influence then the have-not-as-much's in the direction LL takes SL.)

The question just might come down to whether we want to keep these kinds of discussions with LL in the public domain, or let a system of backroom negotiations develop. Either way, there will always be citizens in our world who will band together and try to make things go their way. Do you trust LL to always do the right thing?

Was that a rhetorical question?

Do they trust me to stay in a world where I'm not happy with the way they run things?