Where do you stand?

This is far from perfect, to the point that anyone making a "2.0" of this will likely do a far better job.

Scoring:

First five questions are the X axis: "grid left" and "grid right" and do not necessarily reflect one's real world politics whatsoever. A score of 5 is left on this scale and a score of zero is to the right.

Second five questions are the Y axis: "libertarian" versus "authoritarian." A score of 5 is libertarian and a score of zero is authoritarian.

All peaceful commentary is welcome and encouraged. There are no 'wrong answers.'

Des, I would take this poll were the results not tagged to individuals. Since this is a Public Access area, I do not wish to identify my avatar a with specific set of answers that may or may not be featured on other places on the net without my consent. Call me chicken but too many recent SL blog/forum/media folks are harvesting material from this forum to light fires and promote their own agenda.

my 2l

Ya know what, that's a really, really good point.

Let me see if I can undo it...



Edit: Hmm. Not even a delete option. I'm terrible with these things. Rather than cut and paste this monster, and write 'use the other one' all over it, I'm tempted to just let it sink faster to the bottom of the forums than try to fix it. If anyone else wants to, be my guest. Consider it an "open source" poll with no copyright rights reserved.


Second edit a couple hours later: looking at this again, I have just realised what an epic fail this poll likely is. Consider the case of a rightist authoritarian (according to the premise given) ~ for which it is possible that there is absolutely nothing to mark on the stupid poll. It should have been 20 yes/no anonymous questions, not ten 'yes only' questions. I was hoping there was some improvement possible, but realise now that it is possibly hopeless. Ah well.

[X] I feel that the property model for digital content creation/distribution is outmoded.

I do think it is outdated but I do not know how to replace or update it.

I think it's an impressive effort, Desmond. It sounds as though you have improvements in mind already, but this is a great start.

One point: the third statement ("I feel that the property model for digital content/creation is outmoded" confused me. Is this intended to appeal to those who believe there should be no restrictive permissions on objects created in SL?

"Outmoded" could mean that the person's opinion is that the current SL permissions system isn't retrictive enough, or is too restrictive.

Then again, maybe you weren't talking about object permissions at all...?

I'm not sure how to record my response. I'm against all of the statements.

There were a couple that tempted me: The one about abuse by banlines and builds, and the outdated property model for digital IP. (Exactly as they're stated, I agree with both, but I don't know a mechanism by which either could change for the better.)

So I score (0,0), which might say something about me, but if somebody is trying to make sense of the aggregate responses, a (0,0) is "off the charts"--literally.

Actually Ponsonby I'm wondering if this wasn't the most ill considered idea I've had yet.

But I suppose a clarification is in order. I tried to make each question "neutral" as best I could, where a reasonable, rational person of principle might hold (or disagree with) each position, depending upon their personal values.

With regard to "property model for digital content" ~ this didn't have to do with specific permissions per se, but more an overall rejection of the "buy once, use as intended by the seller" model of property. Either by technical fiat or enforced licence.

For instance, the "like a real book" model. If you were to give a digital book to a friend that had "like a real book" licencing, the idea would be that you delete your digital copy of it, once having given the digital book away.

Roughly, much on the grid can be said to operate with a property model; one "owns" things that one can put in inventory, or one does not. A non property model might lend a great deal of credence to the technical difficulty of preventing copying. And thus place a lot higher value on asset creation but a far, far, far lower value on asset distribution and control, once released.

It's a 'big picture' issue that would certainly affect commerce. I'm not terribly good describing it because I personally don't lean that way, but let me make as good a case as I can for the 'other side.'

One rather narrow example might be: consider that no one "owns" their digital music collection, but rather pays X dollars per month for access to absolutely anything and everything they want. As long as they pay, they can listen to anything, and there might be some mechanism to reward content creators who make popular content somehow. Again, realise that I am terrible at describing this worldview; others might do so far more eloquently than I.

I had to go with 'If I had to choose, a 100% open sourced world is better than a 100% closed source world.' The rest ned to be proceeded with 'In a perfect world...'
You left out the human condition as a factor.

Ah, thanks.

Beliefs about "property" and "ownership" are certainly highly relevant to SL..though of course it's the beliefs held by Lindens, not by residents, that are MOST relevant.

And of course there's the point of view that ascribes a large part of the success of this platform to the fact that Ownership was made an essential part of the rules and of the experience.

Several questions would probably be needed in order to get a full picture of any one person's beliefs.

(For example, I'm fully, and gratefully, aware of the debt I owe to those who've created full permissions objects and textures and sounds and scripts--things I've built on and/or learned from, in order to make my own creations. So any question that forced me to say something like 'ownership should always be strictly held by the creator--the system should have built-in requirements of large fees to be paid for each and every use of anything someone else has created, no matter what that creator's own wishes' wouldn't quite cover my philosophy. But on the other hand, something like 'ownership is an outmoded concept--all that we create should be freely available to all' wouldn't be close to my philosphy, either. And I'm sure this is true of many of us.)

Very interesting, Des. I think quite well thought out.

As I suspected, I remain a fence sitter (LOL) with 3 left, 2 right and 2 libertarian, 3 authoritarian. Mind, most were answered with a "depends on..." clause.

Thank you for putting in the effort, for what it's worth.

Nice poll Desmond

Ho-kay, der jaegermeister is only talkink about in-world politix. Now back to ze lab for hyu.

I got nothing to hide and would sign it with my RL name and send it to the current mess of fools in Washington - then photocopy it and send it to the next batch coming up after these-

Good poll Desmond - i find I am not all that radical, I do believe some controls are necessary - whether imposed by our LL Gods or the politicos we elect to office - just sadly, power tends to make some reach for more -

Not a strict allegory with LL since they are still a company and gotta look out for number one in the myriad of ways that can take shape. But, other than to prevent mass hysteria dogs and cats sleeping together (well, it is SL- as long as they are consenting lifeforms, no one's biz) then like the reg gov, they should stay the hell out my way.

Yes, I ran into this problem immediately.

... What?

Hi Desmond,

I think that both threads you've started recently are interesting and pose important questions, I do think however that the options and alternatives you present restrict the debate to a paradigm that even stuffy old economists are starting to question.

I'm not crass enough to suggest I have an answer at all, but what I do recognise is that a new paradigm for social, economic, political interaction is emerging and we need a new language to discuss it.

Is it necessary or even helpful to suggest that the only alternatives are those that can be expressed in anachronistic terms like "left", "right", "conservative", "socialist".. ?

Again, if stuffy and unengaged politicians retreat in embarassment from such labels and language, why do we insist on confining ourselves within that world view when we pride ourselves on being at the forefront of a brave new society.

My opinion, for what it's worth, is that we do need a paradigm shift in how we think about the world as it develops in the 21st century;

And while I recognise that it's definitely not sexy, my view is that this paradigm will best be framed (albeit loosely) by a new economics.

I know.. BORING.. but economics has recognised for a while now that a lot of what drives us in a knowledge economy/society is intrinsic motivation not the usual old extrinsic stuff like pay rises and bonuses or who owns what.

Autonomy - Mastery - Purpose

Three intrinsic motivators that I think we all recognise as important to us in SL, and begin to explain why projects like wikipedia don't just fizzle and die.

The question then really isn't where we place ourselves on the conservative/socialist continuum, or how we appropriate the most profit from our latest great piece of work.

I'm not even sure what the question is, but it seems to me that it will largely depend on how we can create sufficient "external" concensus between our "internal" motivators in order to act together to actually create solutions to some of our problems.

What is the cause, above common self interest, that will give us autonomy to follow our own paths, allow us to master techniques and arts which interest us; and above all let us feel that we're contributing to something bigger than ourselves?

Obviously it would be good if we could also work out how to feed ourselves and put a roof over our heads while we work on all this high falootin stuff!

That's it.. obviously I'm just some guy talking, and one with nasty hippy tendencies at that!

it's no secret that I'm strongly against micro management (it stifles progress in general) and I like to keep an open mind (just not so open it falls out)....

so with that in mind, I think the WHY of the answers is more important than the answer itself.

I should be able to make a new, 100% anonymous character any time I want.
~ no, there always needs to be some level of accountability for actions, 100% anonymity only has benefits when potential damage is limited

I think there is already as much intellectual property protection as is reasonable to expect.
~ no, at least not as applies to SL. I'm not advocating new protections, just better ways to access the already available protections.

I feel that the property model for digital content creation/distribution is outmoded.
~ yes, the current system/model is broken and leaves only two choices... micro manage every end user, monitor and police them as if they were all criminals, or give everything away... neither is acceptable.

If I had to choose, a 100% open sourced world is better than a 100% closed source world.
~ yes, with a very narrow margin. unfortunately neither is very workable, but in a better society, the former leads to greater progress.

Those with land regularly and casually abusing others with banlines and builds, should be stopped.
~ no, but there should be better ways to limit bleed. if a resource is being supported by you then do as you see fit with it.

Residents trying to add even more rules to this world concern me greatly.
~ yes, good fences make good neighbors, but my neighbor doesn't need to police my side of the fence, or vice versa

I should not have to be verified in any way to access the digital content of my choice.
~ yes, this plays to the above, and really cannot be accomplished at the digital end. the sooner the HMIC realize this, the better (that's head morons in charge)

I feel regulations on gambling, inworld banking, &c go farther than they ideally should.
~ no, not as applies to SL anyways, it's a simple matter of risk reduction for the companies involved, as it puts LL in the position of either assisting malfeasance, or being the victim of it, with no recourse.

The less our service provider involves itself in our inworld activities, the better.
~ yes, to a large degree, it's better to provide individuals the tools to control their own experience, rather than try to police everyone (more effective too)

What I do online is none of your business, unless it is on your land.
~ yes, abso-fucking-lutely, (added caveat: unless it directly affects you; such as making you a party to a crime)

Whoa... I log in this morning and... stare at all this participation in disbelief... don't you guys all have jobs or something that are being neglected, your first day back after a long holiday?

laughs... just kidding, that was horribly snarky of me wasn't it... no evil intended!

I'm dumbfounded with the response to this. I had imagined maybe 3 or 4 deeply critical critiques explaining how this poll is all wrong and should be improved or tossed, and two more asking for the Pie option before it free~fell to the depths of the forums. Landing somewhere between SL 2nd Birthday planning and the class 3 to class 4 upgrade discussion.

Seriously folks, in retrospect this is probably one of the most ill conceived polls ever, especially in light of Argus' very noteworthy point. Even worse, it only identifies those who agree with statements, also.

A side effect is that the poll naturally tallies up votes, sort of showing 'popularity' ~ which likely has more to do with me not making the questions neutral enough, than anything else. Perhaps I should have made it such that in the ideal, each question got 'yes' or 'no' 50% of the time? Not that it would be possible. But then, how smart are the people who write the IQ tests? And why didn't such introspection stop them? I wonder about stuff like that.

Anyway... I'm going to sit back and mull all this over some... but probably leave the inworld politics aside for a veeeeeery long time. The whole thing was just to stimulate some thought, and perhaps get us all thinking about what the future of virtual worlds might be like in a community sense, as opposed to a technical sense.

About 1 inch above the surface mostly. Sometimes it is as low as 6 inches under the surface.

100% anonymous to everyone except for Linden Lab, perhaps, and it should be possible to ban "all alts of..." someone under those circumstances, so long as that doesn't automatically reveal who you are.

That doesn't mean that the current balance is uniformly "too strong", but I do believe that the rules defined in-game are already more restrictive than they should be, and I certainly don't condone using out-of-band workarounds to clone and redistribute content.

I don't know, I haven't seen anyone come up with a better one that's credible, so on the whole I'd say "no". Not saying the rules all make sense, byt the underlying mental model does seem to be the most practical one.


Of course I choose a mixed world... but one with no open source at all would be a totalitarian nightmare.

Stopped, no, but better educated and given better options, yes.

Zindra.

If someone doesn't want me in their stuff if they don't know who I am, I'm not going to bite them. If someone doesn't want me to be able to see OTHER PEOPLE'S STUFF if they don't know who I am (eg, you can't get library books anonymously), that's a different jar of ferrets.

This is the one I would expect certain self-identified "right wingers" to say "yes" to.

Mixed feelings here. What does "involvement" mean? For example, I think all the Lindens should spend at least 20% of their work time in-world as non-Linden alts so they can get an idea of what's really going on in there.

Another one I can see people identifying with the "right" getting behind.

Controlling your access to "other people's stuff" was the jar of ferrets I was referring to, but yeah, it wasn't clear.

Right wingers/libertarian questions... this poll is quite imperfect. Depending upon interpretations there are possible overlaps, certainly. And even standard definitions of real world "left wing" (admittedly, extreme left) include both communists and anarchists, which certainly aren't the same thing at all.

"Involvement" was supposed to mean the opposite of "hands off, not interfering" ~ for instance a totally hands off policy would mean there would be no rules against adfarming, for instance.

Of course, once questions like these are released into the wild, my clarified intent counts for a whole lot less than everyone else's interpretations. I could say I meant "green eggs and ham" for question three... which would only make a big mess of things and take away from the discussion.

I don't get this statistically. But then again, I barely got through college stats courses, so please pardon my confusion.

At the time I'm posting my reply, I see that 453 people have viewed this thread, and yet less than 50 have voted for any one topic. Either the other 400+ disagree with every statement or have no opinion. That makes the "votes for" in the minority, big time. Seems like capturing the "I don't cares" and "NOs" would be more valuable.

And what do the percentages mean? Percentage of people who viewed voted for this item? I did some quick math, and it didn't match: "number who voted yes" divided by "total viewed" did not equal the percentage posted.

In my case, I disagree with all but one.

I think the statements are too nebulous, or fail to fully represent a single stance which can be polarized. Some of them are like asking "Have you stopped beating your mate?". Agree/disagree both have "unresolved issues".

I should be able to make a new, 100% anonymous character any time I want.

The only time we should be automatically allowed anonymity is versus the RL government itself. When it comes to private organizations/individuals, such entitlements, just like Freedom of Speech, do not and should not apply.

I think there is already as much intellectual property protection as is reasonable to expect.

I don't think there is ever "enough IP protection". Protection, like security, is a regression on an infinite scale. However, there are far too many attempts at "more protections" which have significant negative consequences, and MUST be avoided at all cost. That doesn't mean there are no more "good protections" available to us, just that they have yet to be discovered/developed.

I feel that the property model for digital content creation/distribution is outmoded.

I think I would say: I feel that the current implementation of the property model for digital content creation/distribution is outmoded. I don't know if I would consider that the property model itself is outmoded. I WILL say I don't care much for it, but it is what we have to work with in today's world, if we want to give people an incentive to create, or at least not give them a disincentive, deterring them from creation. The concept of "intellectual property" is really an oxymoron. Thoughts and ideas are intangibles. Even expressions of ideas are hard to relate in terms of property. I agree that it is against the natural order of information to try and lock it up in a property model. However, unless and until we get into a Star Trek Utopian world, where everyone can pursue their dreams without having to worry about the little mundane necessities of life (like, you know, eating, clothes, shelter, etc), the unnatural property model for information will have to suffice.

If I had to choose, a 100% open sourced world is better than a 100% closed source world.

It would depend on the criteria of the choice. For security, stability, and rapid development/evolution, 100% open source is the way to go. For creating a profitable business surrounding the sale/use of said software, I think 100% closed source would be the way to go. Of course, this statement doesn't make any sense in light of SL, since it is neither 100% open nor 100% closed, nor do I think either would be best for it.

Those with land regularly and casually abusing others with banlines and builds, should be stopped.

Well, anyone knowing my involvement with adfarming and land extortion will easily predict my response to such a question. It doesn't matter what tools/tactics of the trade are employed, no resident should be allowed to harass or scam another. Those who attempt to make a habit of it should suffer the same fate, up to and including being permabanned from the service. The problem is in determining where the line is, and whether it was crossed.

Residents trying to add even more rules to this world concern me greatly.

Rules are a natural consequence of society and civilization. If one is alone in the world, anarchy works just fine, even though most people would still set some rules for themselves, because no one can ignore that laws of physics, or the environment. Residents attempting to add more rules only concerns me if the rules are frivolous, useless, poorly constructed, or ill-considered. I am all in favor of good and useful rules.

I should not have to be verified in any way to access the digital content of my choice.

To the extent that such verification is accurate, and performs a necessary function in preventing illegal access to said digital content, I disagree. However, if verification can not be made accurate, it is meaningless and a waste of time. Within the current online climate, one CAN NOT "verify" another. The onus must be on the user to censor content for himself, and anyone else whom he has local access control authority over. Putting the burden of that impossible task on the service provider, who has NO WAY of accurately verifying who is sitting at the keyboard, is a waste of time and resources.

I feel regulations on gambling, inworld banking, &c go farther than they ideally should.

Similar to the banlines and builds assertion above, people who scam others should be taken to task for it, and regulations put in place to curb the potential for such scamming, I don't have a problem with. That said, I don't particularly have an issue with gambling or banking, AS LONG AS its legitimacy is NEVER in doubt by anyone utilizing such services. In other words, establishments must not misrepresent their activities/services in such a way that deceives people into thinking that they are "secure" or "fair" in participating in the activity, or in using the service. For gambling establishments, that means no cheating or misrepresenting the odds. For banking, that means no misrepresenting the nature of the business, or what is being done with the money. This is a lot harder with banks, because just calling oneself a "bank" automatically leads most people into believing the legitimacy/security of the business, since that is the default expectation for most people. That expectation is fueled "behind the scenes" in RL by an extensive body of regulation and oversight, none of which is present in SL.

The less our service provider involves itself in our inworld activities, the better.

To the extent of CONTROLLING the expression of ourselves in our in-world activities, with the exception of when those in-world activities cause harm to other residents, I agree. However, I think it should be MANDATORY for Lindens to "eat their own dogfood", or involve themselves in every part of the world. Living in an Ivory Tower doesn't help them understand the problems with their service, nor their customers' expression of said problems. I would LOVE to see Lindens all over the grid dancing, shopping, playing, communicating, learning; just experiencing this world they steward. I think it would give them more incentive to service the residents effectively and efficiently.

What I do online is none of your business, unless it is on your land.

I agree, with the specification "..as long as it doesn't harm me unnecessarily." Things don't have to be on my land to harm me unnecessarily.

There's probably little point in critiquing the poll at this point, as the OP himself is evidently well aware of its flaws.

That said, it has residual usefulness in that it identifies quite well some of the central "political" issues that confront us (or at least, those of us who care) in SL.

I think I'll take Desmond's challenge of working up a revised version. Give me a few hours to work on it.

*loves categorizing things*

As much as this puzzles you, it puzzles even more the psychometricians who craft such tests. Still, constructing instruments of psychological measurement is not so much introspection as experimentation, not so much inspiration as perspiration.

I wasn't kidding when I posted somewhere about the gazillion questions asked of a gazillion residents. Right now we're hypothesizing factors that may or may not exist, asking questions that may or may not measure those hypothetical factors, and--not surprisingly--wondering what to do with the results.

Those gazillion scattershot questions would assume that the whole of virtual world philosophy is up for grabs. If we're pretty sure the axes are those with which we label RL politics, we can proceed with measuring the effectiveness of questions that try to probe those axes. Or, given that those labels aren't all that predictive even in RL, we might dream up some other philosophy of what people believe about virtual worlds and then build a tool to measure those beliefs.

Ultimately, however, unless we have some theory of how those beliefs influence behaviors of interest, we risk building a tool that perfectly measures something perfectly meaningless. In any case, validating the instrument itself doesn't validate the theory.

So... either we need a sizeable research grant (can we recruit those damned student surveyors? ) or I think we're back to Gedankenexperiment.