Merchant Elitism at its finest

https://blogs.secondlife.com/thread/2558?start=0&tstart=0

That is all

Some would like it that way. Think of all the money to be made by a few if there were only a few merchants on SL.

Isn't this a 'feature' of Blue Mars?

I like the part with the suggestion that LL charge a fee for everyone to list their stuff, just to keep the riffraff out.
I wonder what he thinks their commission is for?

Well wasn't that very idea the hot topic in this forum yesterday?

Edit for out of context assumptions...

-me

Here:

/327/f4/341072/1.html

Very similar kinds of desires from this community.

Na its the same group of people that worked so hard on killing off active worlds...

I bet though LL in all its stupidty WILL do it.. all they see is short term dollar signs.

I agree that there's some overlap, but many of the people advocating some sort of limitations being placed on the ability to make throw-away alts, steal content, and sell it, are people who are NOT major merchants wanting to cut competition. Some of them, in fact, are more concerned about griefing than about the retail business.

The set of those at the top of the sales figures will always include some who'd like to see competition limited; that's human nature.

The question is: how will LL deal with the conflicting interests of all those yelling for changes of various types? Will they put into place restrictions on anonymity? Will they change the permissions set-up (perhaps restricting non-zero transactions in some way?) Will they institute licensing of sellers?

Will they do nothing?

You could be right (though I hope not). I do recall reading quite a few statements from those high-up in the LL administration (including Philip) to the effect that the foundation of SL's success is that anyone can create---and sell their creations, too.

I hope they don't forget that.

Can someone give me a Readers Digest Condensed Version of the thread, I can't make head nor tail of it?

I'm trying but it may be a while. It's nearly 200 replies and the thread-organization functionality is, as we know, basically nonexistant. I'd particularly like to follow this Wal-Mart idea, but it isn't easy.

(LL is doing their level best to keep us from communicating and being informed, and you have to hand it to them---their best is pretty darned good!)

Hehe, indeed, but how can you sell in marketplace thats convoluted with crap? The same analogy is applied to, how can you create in a full sandbox? The prims are full, so you can't create. So you get your own place, does this mean we have to make our own competitive xstreet marketplaces?

Edit: I actually like that idea, always did, to start my own marketplace, but I haven't got the time or money to spend on such a thing, I got more profound work to do.

You're right--it would be a huge job, eating time and resources.

For that reason LL won't have a LOT of competitors for XStreet. But there are some. Try to keep people from mentioning them, though LL may.

Or it's just a side-effect of their own inability to communicate.

But.. I did read a bit of the "thread" in question. I see no reason to limit anyone from posting items to XStreet. And I dare someone to come up with a definition of "serious merchant" that we can all agree upon.

I agree. If any changes at all are made, they must be made on the basis of some characteristics that can be measured, not on value-laden terms such as "serious".

I don't know. I can see that it's a problem that it's very hard to compare or even find particular items on XStreet because of the volume of items, but I don't the solution is to limit the number of people who can list items there. I think the solution is to actually invest some resources into improving Search.

(I'd advise anyone against holding their breath waiting for that to happen, though.)

At SLCC, we got some interesting information about what attracts people to SL based on what videos people clicked on to learn more about it. "Play" was the number one selection, followed by things like Shop, Dance, Explore and Love.

Guess what was DEAD LAST?

Create.

Most new residents are not at all interested in creating. They just want to enjoy what others have created.

Creating is play. Play is creating.

Its a profound business starting and running our own market place I promise you

There ya go.

That information (shared at SLCC) is very interesting, but I think it would be a mistake to assume that it accurately measures the interests of those who've been in SL for, say, a month.

I know that I had no idea, when I registered, that creating/building would become so compelling for me.

(It simply wasn't predictable by anyone--for instance, my job history contains nothing in the arts--and I'm guessing this is true for a large proportion of those who spend most of their SL time building.)

What'll they do? Slap Me?

Talent killed that dream in the first five minutes. Anything to do with that is illusory.

I'd say its still pretty true that anyone can create and sell their own creations. Talent or lack thereof notwithstanding - I've seen the full range for sale, and I've seen that the full range tends to get purchased.

I've also seen that quality has almost no correlation with price. Nor does popularity.

There are no animals in the room, the huge elephant notwithstanding.

Well at the moment a lot of people, myself included are pushing out ideas for discussion. What I'm seeing is a lot of opposition to most ideas with a "rather do nothing because everything is fine" attitude. people would rather not make any inconvenience to theives unless it has zero effect on their convenience.

I suspect a lot of people won't think it's a problem till they see their stuff being resold. Or they aren't merchants so stolen stuff means cheap prices for them by driving real creators priices down to compete withthe theives and there's no risk to the customer at all, the original creator is obviously a millionare so it won't effect him.

I am not seeing a great number of other ideas to address the problems caused by infinate disposable anoymous alts being used for griefing and re-selling stolen content. The theives just continue to multiply as many stick their heads in the sand or fight to preserve their right to remain anoymous and have zero risk.

Creating competing 3rd party market places is a great idea, then there could be those that allow L$0 stuff from unverified people and those that don't and let the customers chose their own preferences.