May I invite people I don't know to join my group?

Hello, I publish a daily SL Humor blog through my group, called Friends of Marcophoto Upshaw. Currently membership is almost 900. It has taken off like a rocket. I use various means to ask people to join, including standard billboard advertising.

My question is, is there anything in the tos that specifically prohibits me from issuing Group Invites to people I do not know? I have done this, with very favorable results. Yet, today I received two angry messages from people saying that I was violating the tos, and that they were going to file an abuse report against me. I have spent 3-4 hours thoroughly studying the tos, and searching allllll through the Second Life materials for ANY mention of using Group Invites, yet I cannot find one single mention anywhere, neither in the tos, or the Community Standards. Am I just dense? (be nice). I sincerely want to know. I don't want to log on someday and find my account has been closed by the Lindens. Yet, I sincerely cannot find ANYTHING banning this practice. Please note, I am NOT uploading any kind of email scam. It is just a standard Group Invitation. If there is some area that discusses Advertising via Group Invitations, could somebody please tell me where to find this? The Abuse & Griefing does not have it, the Legal section does not have it. If it exists, where is it?

It's a good way to get a lot of people to mute you.

I get at least 3 blind group invites a week.

It's f'ing irritating. At best.

It's also a way to get AR's for spam.

I know it's been commented many times in these forums that people do. Whether any action is taken I don't know but it's damned sure a good way to make enemies.

It's probably more the case that people would consider it unsolicited spam. I'm not sure what impenetrable sub-section of the TOS covers this, if at all... but personally, I would find it annoying to be invited to a group I'd never heard of / bought from / visited.

It is similar to rezzing in a sim and getting a friends request from someone you can't even see, let alone have talked to (or want to).

Better to have a location with a sign that allows people to join your group if they want to.

I have seen disciplinary actions in the police blotter/incident report for "spamming via group invites" - so I would stay away from that.

No, you may not spam me with unsolicited group invites.

What if every person YOU walked by sent YOU a group invite? It wouldn't be nice would it? So, TOS violations aside, ... what makes YOU so special to feel privilaged enough to inflict this spam on others?

Now this question made me wonder something.

When people buy from either my Hippo vendors, or though SLX, they get an automated group invite, so they can receive necessary support, free items just for the group, and of course new product anouncements. In general people either join, or ignore it, where some reply to the alt involved in the process. Those replies are mostly like: Sorry no more slots. Never a negative remark. So do you guys think that type if invitations is a good think to do or do you also consider it spam?

As for the OP: If I do get an invitation out of the blue for a group I never heard of, I would not think of joining it, because it would irritate the hell out of me. Even the 3 blue boxed when entering some shops get on my nerves: Notecard/TP/Freebie. That is why I only implemented a whispered greeting in my shop. So you might not go against the TOS directly, but the method could be considered spam, in which case you do violate the TOS. On the other hand I do wish I had 900 group members

Greetings, Marcel

no

I am unsure of the ToS status, but what I know as a certainty is that they is no faster way to get me to click the 'Decline' button.

The technique is on the increase, I having received some three in only this week. Needless to say, all were declined without even reading the text.

I find it astonishing that with a limit of 25 groups, which is inadequate for the groups the I *want* to join, that some groups believe that people would join a group that they likely have not heard of, and may or may not be interested in, merely because they have been sent an unsolicited junk mail communication.

So, from the POV of the health and stability and meaningfulness of your group, I would suggest that the ToS is only one potential problem you may encounter using this technique.

Send me blind invites, landmarks and notecards and I always send a few folders full back to you
If I enter your store of buy one of you products, I don't mind a group invite, but random blind invites piss me off

Random group invites are like thos annoying little peices of ads people put on your windshield in a parking lot. Dosen't matter if I was interested in your product or not before - after, no way will I use/frequent the advertisee.

...beyond annoying!

For me, I'd rather receive an unsolicited IM than see a billboard. I can't mute the billboard.

There should be some kind of payoff for receiving advertising in a place where most of us come to get away from that bombardment on our thoughts in real life. I wonder why people haven't devised a way of providing really good freebies that you only get after listening to a message, reading a short series of notecards, or some such.

That could be very effective and painless except there's already a lot of fairly good freebies available now. Still, I wonder if there would be L$ in it for designers to offer full perms of something exclusively to advertisers for this purpose.

On second thought, someone might find a way to make a new kind of ad farm or something equally irritating with that method.

Whatever you're selling, I'm going there right away!

To the OP - when you say people you don't know, are you sending group invites at random to strangers who have no connection to your activities? If so, TOS violation or not, I can see why people find this extremely annoying. I know I would not join such a group (though I wouldn't bother ARing or sending an irritated IM to the inviter either, at least not for receiving a single invitation).

I send a lot of invitations to my cafe group and I find them very effective. But, I only send them under certain limited circumstances that minimize the random and annoying factor:

* Send an IM and a group invite to everyone who shows up in my visitor logs twice or more. This is a person who has shown enough interest to return to my place, and so someone who might actually want to be in the group. The IM says, basically, thanks for visiting my cafe, I'm sending along a group invitation if you'd like to join. By the way I keep records of whom I have invited this way so that I do not irritate them with repeat invitations if they decline.

* During events, ask once "Is everyone in the group who would like to be?" Anyone who speaks up gets an invite on the spot.

* When someone is in the cafe at a time other than an event, and I am chatting with that person, before they leave I ask if they want an invitation to the group. I did that yesterday, as an example, and the person actually said "Yes, and thanks so much for asking first."

Asking first goes a long, long way.

Yes, yes it does!

I don't mind being invited to a group if I've purchased something from the place - I figure actual customers are probably fair game for group invitations, since if you've bought something, you may actually be interested in the store updates and support (esp. for scripted items). I get annoyed though if I've only visited the place once and get a group invite. I also get annoyed when I get a group invite as soon as I teleport in. That's a good way to ensure I don't come back.

When people do this to me, they get ARed and muted.

--Hugsy

Same with me.

Yes indeed. I got one yesterday out of the blue. Don't know this person. Needless to say I clicked decline.

Let's hope we don't have to invent something in SL ala National No-Call List. I go to SL to get AWAY from annoyances. *sigh*

Just do it.

There was a thread on here recently which supported someone's right to stand in a public place and scream racial slurs, simply because those that objected should have used the mute facility rather than take offense.

Seems that in SL, "spam" is more reprehensible than racism and xenophobia.. what an interesting world we've created for ourselves.

My advice .. do it. If people mute you .. then fine, you'll be hated but successful..

Unsolicited group invites are one of my biggest pet hates in SL. Currently I only mute senders of such invites, but I've toyed with the idea of starting to AR each and every one.

For some reason, I get more of these invites sent to my alts than my main. I really think there is a good case for being able to toggle off/on the ability to be invited to groups.

I think I'll start muting those who encourage others to spam, too.

Absolutely ludicrous reasoning Stephen. And you know you're being disingenuous.

Exactly. If you can't be bothered to speak to me first, asking for MY time is just plain rude.

Not sure where the OP is sending these invites, though. He IS asking if it goes against ToS. The only reason there is so much spam is because it works. If he isn't doing anything wrong (ToS), then he will continue....

Hi Max,

Well my question would have to be why is the reasoning ludicrous?

If Liberty is the SL watchward and freedom of speech is every citizen's right, regardless who it offends, then I'm not sure where the distinction is drawn.

Perhaps I'm being dim, but if I arrive as a new citizen in Ahern and racist diatribe appears in open chat and at the same time I receive an unsolicited group invite, what is the difference?

Oh, and if you think the above example is spurious, you've not been to ahern much these days.

Either both are unacceptable and deserve to be AR'd or neither. The mute is adequate response for both or neither.

..Ok.. I'l admit a bit of devil's advocacy going on here... But I'd like to know.. what exactly are the values we want to defend in SL..?