retroengeneering and idea stealing

Bwahahhaaa! Prove it.

(Start by wondering who they're making money from. And please don't try the "other creators it's a zero sum game" theory).

Um, no. If there was, say, 1 person in SL interested in a given thing, then anyone else's chance of meeting them is so low that effectively SL doesn't support that thing.



Sorry. You said "hang out as a vampire". Well, do you mean just standing in a club, doing the same thing as everyone else, but wearing a vampire outfit? You can do that IRL, it's called a fancy dress party, but even the existance of those isn't enough to make the statement "you can be a vampire" true about RL.

They're making it from the continuous turnover of new users who spend some money before they quit.

Statistics bear that out: L$ buys remain constant even while user numbers rise, but are generally in proportion with the growth rate.

I bet some of those five hours include them trying very hard to teach you to build, but you won't have any of it. That's not what you want out of such a conversation.

Most of the people I know who I've been hanging out with for the past three years aren't creators, and some of them are spending an awful lot of money, and they're having a blast.
Oy. Go build something. Quit spending hours arguing about it.

Returning to the actual point: it is possible to be simply ignored and empty, or at least to be ignored in all ways that aren't generic.

The long term people i know are not creators...many of them do not own land and dont do one thing but wander the SL earth and enjoy it.

Marketing in SL is far from a failure..come hang out with me sometime and ill introduce you to lots of happy nice people. Ill also show you lots of successful people or people who are just here in SL being what they want to be without a care in the world, no frustration and no drama or upset....seems to me like you may be hanging around the wrong people. LOL

Nope, it's usually them arguing that I don't need to build to enjoy myself, or that maybe it's a talent I don't have, and me having to respond to those simply to preven tthose being a sign-off. None of them have even suggested that I go to the IToP. (I have in fact already been there, but they don't know that.)

You can't be a vampire in RL because the human digestive system can't handle feeding on blood.

And why would you expect someone to just tell you to start building if you ask about it? Most people want details, and that's what you'll usually get. Only the smart-alecs will say "Open the Edit window and start building."

I just don't believe you. You ask things like, "why can't I build? It shouldn't take any skill or have a learning curve". I'm paraphrasing what you ask that in a thread. Don't expect anybody to jump in to helping you build with that opening line. Rather, go to any of the various in-world classes on building. Find a good instructor, and try to engage them in some private tutoring. For the right price, I'm sure you'd find someone. Just don't start on about how SL shouldn't be like this, OK?

No, marketing in general needing to exist is a failure because it means that a key principle of capitalism - that the consumers make the best judgment about which products should be produced - is no longer true, as things have become too complicated for them to make complete judgments. At that point marketing is an arms race - no advertising method could possibly work for every company since that would just be back to there being too much information.

Believe it or not, there are real people in this world who dress and act like vampires and walk around etc. They do drink blood and they do all sorts of wacky things....and YES this is in RL. It may not really make them a vampire but they sure can act it out and do.

I have to put it that way because otherwise the response will be "it's a skill you don't have, tough".

Another argument by absurdity. I'm going to patent that and sue you the next time you do it.
Apart from the "hanging out in a club" bit, don't you think that most of the time that's what a vampire does the same things that anyone else does. Read books, watch TV, buy groceries (they're different kinds of groceries, admittedly), fix up the house, shop for furniture, work in the garden, post to forums.
In RL, your typical vampire can only "be a vampire" at a fancy dress party (or, I suppose, in the privacy of their crypt), but when you're shopping for coffins or gauzy drapes and guttering candles or stuffed armadillos... you got to pass as a human. In SL, you don't.

I never buy generic ignorance. I know it's cheaper, but name-brand ignorance just tastes better.

Then go ask somebody who isn't an ass!

Either you are DEFINITELY hanging around with the wrong people, or else you're not asking them to help you build.

I'm starting to think you might not be taking this very seriously...

It's not absurd at all. In fact, very many builds a born from there being just 1 person interested in something - and die from others either not being, or not knowing that it exists.



Aha! That's a vital, fundamental point which transcends the whole SL system - that the majority of roles are the same 90% of the time, and so in order to have an experience which defines a role, it has to focus on the "magic moments" - the other 10%. (Otherwise, you get the argument of "you can be a vampire IRL, since you can go to a bar looking like a regular person, and a vampire *would* do that, right?" Now. How can SL do that?

Well, one time it happened at the Forum Cartel

Please define what you believe RP should be like in SL.

I mean, "it's possible for all things you do that differentiate your role from everyone else on SL, to be ignored".

*Those* people?

Yes it is. So what? This reminds me of your plan to allow everyone to be a rock star. You decided that it's vital to have an audience, so you came up with a way to try to ensure one.

Yumi..that is totally not true about marketing. If i make something, i need to let people know that ive made it...whether or not they purchase it gives me feedback so in that way the consumer IS making the judgement about what gets produced by voting with their dollars. Just like in RL, you cant make a better mousetrap and keep it at home and expect people to come to your door and ask you for it...you have to let them KNOW about your better mousetrap. How you choose to do that and if it is effective is the marketing part. This is true in RL and its true in SL. The real world is too large for me to know that the perfect item for me is in greece if someone in greece doesnt somehow make me aware of it...that is exactly how it works in SL also. If i dont know about the item amoung the thousands of items and thousands of people and thousands of sims, i cant purchase it in SL either.

You are happy in your frustration it seems, and i am happy being positive. Being positive and constantly growing in SL works much better for me. My business thrives, my relationships thrive, etc. I do see that no argument will counter your inherent frustration but that is because you have already decided it wont. And you speak from your experience and I speak from mine. Im just sorry your SL experience is such a miserable one as you describe it.