Traffic Bots Against the TOS of LL?

There is a difference.
It is one thing to have friends and acquaintances put Picks in their profiles.
It an absolutely different thing to manufacture large numbers of picks from people whose sole reason for the pick is the hope of gaining reward.
Why would LL use Picks as a ranking factor? As a measure of popularity.
Is a paid pick a measure of popularity? No
Do paid picks subvert the intention of LL? Yes.
Is this in any way good for SL? No.

Unless one has hundreds or thousands of friends willing to do that then the effect of friendly will be insignificant in Ranking. The larger effect could be in visits triggered by people reading profiles.
I see more places as a result of browsing Picks than I do from Search.
If it becomes common for people to have paid picks in their profiles, then there is a whole world of trust, respect and integrity that will be impacted. People become walking billboards but without identifying themselves as paid billboards. It's insidious - chipping away at integrity - turning us all into numbers.
Like spam, it's doesn't scale

Just because people currently choose to accept reward for their picks does not make this in any way good or praiseworthy. The practice cuts directly against the intention of the feature. "It's not against the TOS" is not a justification.



Read more carefully See Post #22 in this thread for example:





Rank by relevancy of the About Land content only. Expand the text space available.
Make keyword spamming a TOS violation. Code the indexing to automatically ignore identified keyword spamming. Act on ARs.


If potentially useful features are going to be pulled because of determined gaming then stop introducing new features that are open to gaming.
Stay with something that is simple for everyone to understand and where gaming attempts are obvious and actively slapped down when reported.

Keep it simple.

On one of our RL websites we run a very effective Affiliate program where people get commissions for sales made through their affiliate link. Serving 2 purposes for us as a business website, one we get a better positioning in google and other search engines through the links and 2 people maybe will get a reward if sales are made through their link. To me that is no different than here when our members put us in their picks in the hope that their name gets picked in the weekly draw and it is counted in search as links to our site here as this is all it is a 3D website with cute avatars

AT&T is one of the biggest companies now for telecoms because it used affiliate style marketing, LL uses bonuses for introducing friends et. etc.

We don't fully know LLs intentions for this platform/game/whatever you want to call it so how do paid picks subvert LLs intentions? I would imagine LL still wants this to be the next 3D internet, in which case there will even more changes that the general populace doesn't like, just as there was in the early nineties when gasp the people started using usenet to promote businesses, but hey the world didnt end and the internet is a better place for the development in those early years, IMHO.

Its back to how different people perceive SL. I see it as a platform to meet friends and family a 3D MSN/facebook/myspace and also a fantastic platform to promote our RL businesses and when i rent space from LL its no different to me than when i ask my hosting company to put a new dedicated server up for me for our businesses except with SL i have 3D instead of 2D space.

For others SL is an escape from reality and others see this place as theres and will fight any change that LL announces while forgeting we are all in virtual space on rented servers that LL owns at the end of the day and what they say we have to obey or leave.

Just my personal observations

Anyone know about the use of bots in other virtual worlds such as Active Worlds, Cybertown, Kaneva, etc.?,

I'm not thinking of MMOGs where the motivation for botting is clear, to win a battle or get some loot or some such, but virtual worlds more along the lines of SL.

So if a location only has a couple of people using paid picks that's ok then? If you object to the practice of people using their picks for a location that isn't actually their favourite location then you object to it, excusing one use of it doesn't hold water but the bottom line is you're dictating to people how they should use their picks and that simply doesn't wash. People choose to put somewhere in their picks, they're not forced.

People use their picks for all sorts of reasons, I've seen FAQ's, returns policies, shout outs to friends, none of them are measures of popularity. This is what people choose to do. That's quite an important principle.

Yes people are walking billboards, but that's by choice. The feature has been being misused for as long as I can remember, so a feature that was already being misused was chosen as a method for ranking, the result is hardly surprising, people said this would happen.




How do you sort the order if two parcels have exactly the same description? There has to be order in a search system. There will always be gaming of a search system, you have to be realistic in your expectations of what can be done. So fine, ban traffic bots or make them useless but there has to be a sensible sorting system and there has to be an order results are returned in and someone will always come up with a method of utilising a search system better than someone else.

Hi Suez,

A friend saw this thread and asked that I answer it.

Activeworlds and it's licensees eg Outerworlds do allow bots.

They are external progams (to AW/OW etc) written in C or other supported langauge and using the AW API. They have their own name, but login using your User ID with a separate priviledge password that you specify.

They are used for all sorts of things, eg hosting games, as build tools etc.

Some are dedicated to a single purpose, but there are multipupose, user configurable bots, such as Magine's available here

http://www.turtleflight.com/magine/mb.html

Legitimate uses of bots is one thing, but use of bots to cheat, scam or siphon money by deception....how would active worlds feel about that?

Bots in activeworlds are part of the program you dont waste resources like secondlife.
and they only allow 3 bots per account. you login with an external program but AW knows its a bot. and they are actually useful you can make backups
of many cells of builds (cells are way better then sims) secondlife can learn a lot by looking at activeworlds. as well if activeworlds tried to be a little more like secondlife i would go back very quickly.
but "you cant have the best of both worlds"

LL are running a business.
Their decisions will be based on whats best for them " as a business "
So Classifieds and tags in picks is a business decision.
Theres no crime in that.

It makes me laugh people who bang on like LL should be looking after them ( usually in the blog announcments ) like their " mom and dad" and we're their children.

They run a business. Its not a crime. But your damb straight they will make decisions based on finances first and formost.

A LOT of money goes into Classifieds...skin co's paying 500K a week! I can only assume they have to spend that to profit at all because of the competition.
I hear ppl saying " omg they MUST be making 500K plus a week then" Not really.

All businesses have overheads, most RL businesses have to pay X amount in over heads rent staff etc before they can make any profit. So they "Invested" 500K L$ once and keep that as a floater...

Sorry Ive gone off track.. lol

I hate traffic bots..I think if your going to fix traffic dont try insult ppls inteligence by having 15 bots in the sky. Only a noob would fall for that trick.

Its just a cheap way to ensure your seen...even paying cammpers has more dignity as much as I hate campers too but at least THAT way your putting L$ back into the economy so other stores will benefit..so everone benefits that way.

But bots are one of 2 things
Mass farming were someone will own hundereds of them making L$2 every 2 mins x 1000 bots..its a LOT of money..that sucks..
Or its some - one that wants to fake traffic and not have to pay for it..either one sucks IMO.

Uh, you do know that's gambling and a TOS violation, right? Lotteries/raffles are covered by the gambling ban.

Not if they're free to enter It's an and gate not an or gate.

Doesn't cost them a dime to enter. Money is given freewill of owner for contest. In which they do not have to pay into a pot for.. Far from Gambling

LMAO they dont pay to enter they contribute nothing except adding us to their picks and i pay one of them when i pick a winner from the list. i used the word draw for the want of a better word so as they dont pay to enter there is NO breaking of the TOS unless LL rules otherwise Have a great Sunday

Dunno guess you will have to ask AW or OW but there again they are different to here as in gameplay etc. He was just answering Suez's question

They are paying to enter by having to put the parcel in their picks so it isn't actually free, even though they aren't paying L$ to qualify. I'm not sure how LL would rule on that one but I think it's pretty questionable and wouldn't surprise me if it was verboten.

I'd be extremely surprised if LL would give a flying fig, it's simply not gambling.

From the gambling FAQ:



Having to enter the parcel in picks is "consideration."

They do not pay to put us in their picks we just give them the option to do so most don't but a few do by adding us to their picks NO L$ changes hands except when i pay them if their name is drawn. Bit like our money ball that pays out every 10 mins 5L$ to a random person if they are on our land NO money changes hands so therefore no gambling.

I am certain that LL don't see either of these things as gambling.

Did you get out of bed the wrong side today

PS: Please feel free to drop by and AR either of the items in question Im sure LL G Team would be happy to get 2 such a waste of time AR's

Did you? By my understanding that kind of drawing is of questionable legality and you might be wise to ask for some clarification from LL to make sure it's okay. Or not. Suit yourself.

Gambling has a specific economic definition, referring to wagering money or something of material value on an event with an uncertain outcome with the primary intent of winning additional money and/or material goods

Adding someones parcel to their picks does not fall under the category of Material value or monetary value

I suggested that you drop by and AR it as I am not going to waste LL G teams time on something like this. If they rule that its illegal i will remove it and im sure many other sim owners will do the same if its ruled illegal.

But i'm not in the habit of wasting other peoples time on such a trivial matter, I will comply with any LL rulings tho on any issue as i have always done but at the moment these picks machines have not been ruled illegal yet, when they are i will happily remove it and rethink the picks issue

Consideration in gambling terms means something of value. Hence you couldn't use your plot of land as a wager.

I'm not out to AR anyone. The ban covers any kind of drawing where participants have to give "something of value." I think a reasonable argument can be made that profile picks are now things of value so I wouldn't be too quick to assume that it doesn't violate the policy. If it were me I'd want to make sure it was legal before putting my business at risk considering how vague the policy is.

Chip with respect, as has been mentioned the picks more than likely DO NOT constitute gambling, I can see the reasoning behind what you are saying but I am deducing that LL do not, certainly atm see this as gambling.

I know that you are not out to AR anyone, but it was a challenge that was all. If LL does rule that its illegal I will be the first to remove it from the land as i did with the gambling equipment when that ruling was made. I do not put my business at risk unless a rule is passed and i then ignore it but then that is just plain stupid

Until then im not going to waste, as i see it the G Teams time when they have more important issues to deal with here and if LL rules that this method i am using is classed as gambling i will donate L$10000 to an in world cause of your choice

Affiliate programs are above board. It is quite obvious what the relationship is.
Paid picks are not above board. There is no way to look at a persons picks and determine which are paid for and which are not.




It's simple really.
Dwell and traffic were attempts to introduce a metric for popularity. They were abused.
Picks existed as part of a persons "This is me" / Facebook / whatever. When they were used as rankings in search, the abuse started at once.
It's clear that dwell, then traffic and picks as serach rankings were intended to be measures of true popularity.
Unless of course Brilliant Linden came out with " Hey guys! How about this? We include Picks as a ranking in the new search. That way people can get paid to put places in their picks and make L$!" And Lotsa Linden said "Wow! That's brilliant Brilliant!! But now, if we can only think of some way to rank search by actual popularity, that would be cool."