the SL Economy

There are third party exchanges that give them value.

I'm not so sure about the Lindex, but this isn't a good reason why.

You must remember the community that existed before the Lindex, which followed the exchange rate on the various third party exchanges, giving a certain uniformity to people's price expectations. I often checked it before I bought L, just to be sure I was getting a rate reasonably close to what the market was setting.

Without the Lindex, one might think it would be third party exchanges and not LL feeling the heat from the U.S. laws. However, I am not so sure about that either. The faction in Congress that opposes internet gambling, and every other form of what they think is online anarchy, could still find ways to make that gambling illegal.

From what I can see, LL waited as long as it could, before banning gambling. It's not as if it hasn't been illegal online for a while now.

Yes and they have to operate so as to protect themselves from liability if they want to operate as a business. That isn't the issue here and how they operate will not affect whether the grid remains open.

The whole point is that the third parties don't OWN the Lindens, they just trade in them, much like we do ourselves.

LL owns them, so they cannot operate an exchange in which they themselves give them USD value. Otherwise, they have in effect created a currency themselves.

It's not gambling in SL, without the involvement of USD. Online gambling is not illegal, only the funding of it with USD is illegal. There is no federal law anywhere that makes internet gambling illegal. That's why only the online processors have been taken down.

Online sports betting is a whole different issue.

The LindeX is the only thing that legally gives USD value to $L.

Yes chips or tokens are traded for USD in RL casinos. Their TOS however does not state the chips or tokens have no USD value and you can cash them in at the counter for USD.

With LindeX, it's basically the same as cashing in your $L at the counter for USD, not because they buy them, but because they offer an exchange in which they facilitate your cashing them in for USD.

Had you been following the thread and or issues, you would see this was a heartfelt post by Chilly. He is quite possibly the kindest and most generous person in SL. Your callous disregard for this forum is evidenced by your failure to respond either to the issues or the content.

If you don't have anything to contribute, why are ya here? Both SL and RL can't be that boring for ya.

Peaking in again after inadvertently dropping a small minefield of naivete about age-verification and uniting the Teen and Adult Grids--thanks for the informative responses! Got me thinking about how tricky it will be to effect any restriction of *visual* access to mature-content parcels: how the heck does that work now, between neighboring PG and Mature regions?

But, wading through more recent posts... it's not making a lot of sense. Did I miss the post putting forward the premise that the best thing for the SL economy would be if the L$ could never be exchanged for anything of RL worth by anybody, ever?

If that's not it, then I don't understand what all the fuss is about. It's not like it matters whether Linden Labs sells the filthy lucre; what matters is that somebody is willing to exchange the d*mned stuff for other stuff with RL value, and SL's owners want to let folks use US credit cards to pay for access to SL. As long as those two facts are true, regardless of where LL is headquartered or where SL servers are based, then SL can't be used for gambling. For that matter, even if some completely different virtual currency were used for all gambling, traded exclusively by celibate white-bearded Alpine gnomes only during alternate lunar eclipses, as long as it could be exchanged for stuff with RL value, access to SL couldn't be paid for by US credit cards. So, surely that can't still be a topic of interest, can it?

Yes ya missed it hon. Click my name and read my posts. I know, they are hellish long, but they do contain the facts and the evidence to back them up.

It's not about removing value from $L. It's just about removing the liabilities for ALL of us by getting LL to ditch the LindeX. There are some valid reasons why.

When I read the notation on one of our 'bank notes' it says 'I promise to pay the bearer' the essence of currency, is for the nature of exchange of goods for services and vice versa. The first coinage was introduced as being endorsed by the rulling body on the land, but because not wanting to make it 'monolopy' value, it was actually made from precious metals that were reconised as being of a certain value throughout the civilised world. Some countries would perhaps consider the precious metal of greater value and therefore the birth of the exchange rate values were born.

To say that L$ carry no worth and therefore cannot be considered currency is nieve. Anything that can be exchanged for items, not on a like for like basis, is considered a trading token (currency).. what the basis of the arguments here are, seem to focus on whether L$ are a currency.. they are... and as they are now exchangeable into RL money, makes that argument even more valid.

Indeed, in England and Wales the only legal tender is issued by the Bank of England but stores will happily accept Scottish and Northern Irish notes. A store could accept payment in peanuts if they chose, but they wouldn't evade tax responsibilities by doing so.

Bingo

LindenX makes the L$ real

Instead of simply saying "read the law" over an over, please recognize that laws are open to interpretation. That is the whole point of judges and attorneys, because laws are not some boolean operation inside of a computer, despite what people seem to think and want.

Anyway back to your point that running Lindex makes lindens a currency, I don't think that is sufficient either. Continuing my computers analogy, note that ebay runs a trading platform. This still doesn't make computers currency. Clearly, being openly traded in an efficient marketplace doesn't make something currency. Again, perhaps that is a necessary feature, but it is not sufficient.

Ultimately, this gets back to my earlier point that while I don't know what the complete definition of "currency" is, it's clear to me that the arguments thus far fall short of the definition of currency.

ADDITION: People seem to be fudging up the issue with talk of taxation or value or whatever. The issue that is at stake here is whether or not LL is breaching laws against creating your own currency, not whether or not lindens have value or sellers in SL have taxable income.

LL even calls Linden dollars DOLLARS. They sell them and they buy them back and you can say "as an agent" all you want but the money you get when you sell them comes FROM LL, and when you buy them your USD goes TO LL. Look on the check or the back tranfer or the PayPal transfer, that tells you who gave you USD for your linden dollars and or who you paid to buy some. It's pretty simple.

It is an ilegal currency.

They should have left it alone and honered "your world your imagination".

What discusts me the most here is LL screwed it all up and thier way of fixing things is to take no responsibility what so ever and to screw it's customers, leaving them holding the bag.

They have a motto and it is *BE EVIL*

Gisela is driving home the point of what they are doing legaly wrong, and she is right. They are the ones breaking the law here.

I am driving home the point how they will screw their customers at any opportunity and are blind to what they started out to achieve. They have lost thier vision and they are losing any faith the community has in them because of the way they are treating the community. They will bury your ass to save their own because now it's thier world and thier imagination. Don't be fooled.

There are two things at play here, what is legal and what is fair and LL is screwing up on both fronts.

Open your eyes.

I sincerely doubt the Lindens have the motto "Be Evil"

Furthermore THEIR lawyers have been involved with the LindenX from the begining. And unless theres some sort of (evil probably) wool over their eyes, I imagine they have researched their standing on this.

I didnt like when they unfairly ran GOM out of Business either .. But I just somehow doubt now that Gamblings been banned they will be coming after Second Life for illegally printing virtual currency.

I understand you completely Colette. This doesn't affect you. I really wonder why you are even posting?

Why don't you post something when you feel it has affected you?

Probably not but governments the world over are looking into virtual worlds, they want their tax. They'll come in the guise of money laundering to make us all feel safe and secure though

In the mean time others will continue to fight for your liberties in SL and hopefully they will do a good enough job that you never will be affected.

In fact this struggle will be a success if in the future people will look back and say "look at those stupid posts Gisela and Chilly made way back when, nothing as silly as banning sex or checking to see what you were holding with your virtual hand ever happened at all! God they were so silly everything is fine!"

When that happens, when these posts are looked at in humor and poked fun at then they served thier purpose.

If this banter back and forth serves in any way to maintain what is left in the ways of freedoms and liberties in this virtual second life then they are well worth the effort.

There is no glory in this. We will fight for you even if you choose not to fight for yourself.

Or we can roll over and wait till you have been wronged and just say welcome to the club.

Who's next?

=c)

Forums are fun! There's nothing like thinking posting on a forum is fighting for liberty and freedom!

Have we had enough of the "Everything's going to be banned!" threads yet? They make little or no sense and are repeatedly being refuted by people employing even the most basic logic and reason but someone out there just has to come back and start it all over again.

I think "the man" will come to ban furry children with guns and no pants before they'll come for our L$.

What LL needs to do is decide if L$ is going to be considered to have value or not. The gambling ban vs. everything else they have on their internet give conflicting ideas on this.

By the time this thing turns into "the Internet in 3-D" we'll all just be using real money like we do on the regular internet anyway.

STOP LOOKING FOR IMAGINARY ISSUES IN SL. There are enough legitimate ones to hash out already!

Why are you wasting your time here SqueezeOne. Go contribute to one of those real problems then, you're wasting your energy and you obviously don't care about how LL treats it's customers unless that customer is you.

Not to veer totally of course here but...

In terms of a civilization, society, and government, Second Life is still in its infancy. Things are going to morph all over the place.

So, let us know that no matter how much we complain, change will continue to occur. Sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse.

I could say, "There's no use fighting change, it's inevitable." But this is only one side of the coin--the other side is the fact that we WILL fight change if we deem it unfair or irrational--it's natures way (as long as people don't continually disappear if they do). This does not mean we will get the changes to take effect...I'm not sure SL is a democracy. Although LL has listened to the citizens in the past, the truth is, they don't NEED to.

My entire point being--the economy and laws of SL will continue to evolve. Second Life CAN exist in a void. So let us consider the L$ to be a valid form of currency. Who cares what the L$ is to someone not in SL...

Soley from my work in SL, I put more than just food on my table.

The income tax law is only one of which the trading of $L for USD subjects us to. The particular one that addresses this issue is US Securities laws. I have posted the link for that many times.

The law simply does not allow someone to make a token currency and give it USD value by facilitating the trading of it for USD in their own company. You and I can trade it for USD and then we are each responsible for claiming it as income and paying any taxes that might be due. LL on the other cannot do that because they own the $L, they give it USD value, and they continue to issue it.

On one hand LL states in their TOS that $L has no USD. If they did not do this, they would be in violation of US Federal laws that do not permit you to make your own currency. On the other hand, they facilitate the trading of $L for USD in an exchange called the LindeX. This is in direct opposition to the TOS.




The only annoyance is clearly demonstrated by yourself and others who refuse to listen to the facts. Perhaps your vision is clouded because you detest the gaming industry so much. It matters not how it began, but only that it has and not just for the gaming industry, but for the benefit of all industries and all people and all business interests in SL. It should only matter to you whether the issues have any merit or not. In that regard, I point to the research that clearly backs up what I have to say.

I detest the depraved niches of the sex industry here in SL and deplore the devastating effect of it on our humanity, but would not deny anyone to stand up and protest the banning of that industry as has happened with gaming. I would listen to what they had to say particularly if they thoroughly researched and backed it up with evidence to support whatever it was. We all are guilty of personal bigotries and prejudice. It's just easier to allow them to affect your judgement and thought process because patience and understanding require considerable effort. Character and principle speak volumes for the efforts one makes toward that end. It's a personal choice, not a requirement.

So we can agree to disagree and leave it at that. I do expect a little more from ya than just noticing coincidences though. Would it have been better for you had we begun it after they banned whatever it is you do in SL. I would certainly have accommodated you, if that's the case. Don't be surprised if LL arranges that very scenario.

I am not arguing with you here, but I take it from your posts that you have some legal background. I am not yet buying your argument that Lindens represent unregulated securities. Securities law, however, is not one in which I have extensive experience. As someone with a legal background, you are no doubt aware of the importance of citations. Please provide them. I have to assume you have read the laws so should have no trouble providing them. I would like to review these laws and the annotations myself. All I need is citations. I have access to Westlaw and a full legal library, so finding them should not be a problem once you provide the cites.

I have always seen Lindens as being the same thing as casino chips. They can be exchanged for cash, but inside the casino, they can be used as an alternate currency. You can gamble with them, tip staff, buy stuff, etc. I've never tried to pay for a hotel room with chips, but I bet they would take them (no pun intended). If you make more chips with them by gambling, then you get to keep the profits, but you have to pay taxes on them, regardless of whether they are cashed out. They do not have any value to speak of outside the casino, although I know a few people who collect them as a hobby, so I guess there might be some nominal value there. They are not securities, and the casinos have no obligation to register them with the SEC. There are also no laws being violated by the casinos regarding the issuance of alternate currencies. I fail to see the difference between chips and Lindens other than that one is virtual and the other is not, however, I will be very upfront that this is only my own belief and I have no law to back it up. That's why I would like to see the citations backing up your legal argument.

You're NOT taking them out of circulation. You're selling them to other Residents, just like in Colette's Chucky Cheese tokens example (which I loved, BTW). Those L$ don't just disappear off the planet; they get bought and sold over and over again. If you were to take USD out of circulation, you'd have to burn them, bury them where no one would ever find them, or feed them to your dog. Same with L$. The only difference is that L$ are valid nowhere except in SL.

Sure they can be exchanged with other residents for USD, but that doesn't make them valid currency outside of SL. Just like in Chucky Cheese, the tokens can be used ONLY inside the restaurant, but can be freely traded and bought/sold within the store. I remember buying tokens from my friends for cash (and selling them too, for that matter; in that case, would I be a TokenEx or whatever?) but obviously we all knew that the tokens themselves had no value outside of Chucky Cheese. I could then use the USD that I earned by trading my tokens out in the US economy. It's EXACTLY the SAME in Second Life.