How Much Did LL Pay NBC for that Episode of Law & Order:SVU?

I just finished watching the Law & Order: SVU episode 'Avatar' where some guy kidnaps a woman who creates an underage avatar in an SL-take-off, 'Another Universe', that reminded him of a previous kidnap victim. However, the majority of the episode was a love letter to SL. Even the hint at ageplay, can work to LL's advantage, in that they can claim they eliminated it long before Law & Order did their show. Not to mention, the Philip Linden-esq character was the hero, creating programs within the SL stand-in that gives the cops the big break. I swear the whole episode was one big SL ad. Genious product placement!

So, how much did LL pay for that?

I'd say the combined sum of our stipends, which we haven't received yet. Subtracting VAT of course.

LL probably didn't pay for anything. If they did, LL got ripped off!

No where was "Linden Labs" mentioned, nor was "Second Life". The virtual world may look or sound a lot like SL, it could have been any other gaming world.

I did't watch it, but from dat description... sounds like I'm gonna hafta tread lightly all over again!

Mari

LOL

I finally got mine at 20:13:35 (still Tuesday!) and promptly went to buy one of those fun campfires.

Hmm well, I'm sure LL didn't pay anything, and it did look like some primitive open source, or maybe even college project, virtual world. Not many avatars were shown actually moving.

BUT --

Winton ... Linden ... Winton ... Linden ... say 20 times quickly

Another Universe .... Second Life

News stories about pedophilia about a month or two before this episode went into the can

Not only will this be really really close to SL in non-players minds, but it did seem to me to be almost positive press. Winton is very helpful to the cops, and I was left with a vague impression that virtual worlds could be very easily used to entrap sex criminals.

They made reference to AU being open for you to do anything you want ... gambling, underage sex, anything. I am SO sure that LL's strategic communications department will, or has already, briefed entertainment industry press on the differences between Another Universe's "wild west" (an actual quote from the show, sound familiar?), and SL's (recently) regulated world. I wonder if LL was given any visibility into the episode before broadcast? SVU's viewership is HUGE. Fortuitous timing of all of LL's clampdowns.

This is also the genius of television. You can let your veiwers get off on scenes of rape, helpless teenage girls, bdsm and still send the basically conservative message that law enforcement and businesses are the heros who get it all under control and protect our safety.

Didn't see it .. yet .. but in the view of SL being a microcosm of Real Life, is stands to reason it will play host to a crime and its detection since as we know, there is the similar wide population in SL that we contend with in RL.
I'm sure this will be most other peoples realisation, players and non-players, hence spreading people's awareness of our existence. I don't see that as bad.

Zero

Law and Order is well know for their "ripped from the headlines" themes around the episodes. SL likely had absolutely nothing to with that episode sans the research done to create the episode. I'm sure in their research, SL was likely the basis for the episode, though, I wasnt able to watch it. No problem, I'll catch the rerun on USA network eventually

There is that old saying, there is no such thing as bad publicity. This episode probably got alot of people who would never there thought of Virtual Worlds as realistic and user friendly, thinking they are, not to mention a place where you can explore your sexual fantasies. Trust me, when the news segments follow this episode, it's gonna give SL a population buzz.

it WAS sl, only with the UI off

I wanna watchit.

When drawing comparisons it will probably help to remember that The actual "new" show was probably shot over 6 months ago.

They have to prepare 22-24 shows for a season, it hardley would have been completed last week.


At which time SL was closer to the 5 million number

and Gambling and Age Play were still allowed.

Actually, Colette, L&O shoots some episodes way in advance, but the turnaround time for any "ripped from the headlines" show is about 2 months.

2-4 weeks writing
1-2 week prep
8 days shoot
2 weeks edit

This may or may not help the discussion but I have first hand experiance with this type of situation.

A couple years back I was running an underground robot combat competition in Las Vegas. Those of you that saw the CSI episode allready know where this is going.
They contacted me, they came to events, they interviewed fighters. They went to events hosted by other promoters too. They did a LOT of research. Now a few things were changed, such as the female who ran the events instead of me. That was a plot point so they could throw in the murder-for-sex angle. Some things were very specifically kept, such as the strict control of radio frequencies. They did pay me (pretty well I may add) as a consultant. They let me send invitations to my roboteers to appear in the episode with thier robots and they paid them too. In fact all the roboteers except the 3 major characters were actuall robot combatants, not actors and all the robots were real combat robots. I couldn't appear myself as I was filming an episode of Monster Garage while they were shooting it and I wasn't gonna pass up that opportunity! lol

But from my experiance, they pay well and do a lot of research to do these shows. I wouldn't be surprised if LL made a pretty penny or two off the deal and were guarenteed the "good press" aspect just like I was.

But they have to prepare an entire season - not just one show.

And they don't necssarily show them in order of shooting.

The shows are all overlapped in production, different teams handle different parts, and the way theings are done these days sometimes the final edit can be delivered the DAY of airing. EVERYTHING is pushed to the edge.

Ever wonder why a lot of shows suddenly run a repeat every 2-4 episodes in a new season? Yup, they are running behind and didn't complete that weeks ep on time and had to push everything back a week. It's a MADHOUSE of a buisness.

TV, ah yes...its that black box thingy in my livingroom that collects dust.

My thoughts exactly. Though it should be interesting to see how people percieve SL based on That Thing They Saw On Television.

How many people who saw that will even know Second Life exits to even render an opinion? I don't think it will have much of an effect either way.

I was pretty surprised at how helpful Winton was to the police. Usually companies are less than helpful in helping police in Law and Order, especially computer companies. They balk on the issues of privacy and how if it ever got out that they aided law enforcement, that would hurt their business.

BTW Winton... Linden.. it's a bit of a reach... the "Wild West" I've heard that referenced to SO many other aspects of the Internet that it should be a surprise.

As far as the LL being more visible in enforcement, it shouldn't be a surprise either since they have prospered so much being under the radar for so long... but now with their popularity they can't afford to be so loose anymore. Complaints, growth problems, pedophilia, ownership issues of virtual property, virtual cash crossing over to real cash, LL has no choice but to take a stand, before the government where they do business start knocking on their doors.

Now that is more believable. LL was probably consulted and compensated for by L&O. If you are gonna get some bad PR in the episode, you might as well get paid for it!