VAT Nonsense = Non Renewing European

No Cherry, your sim is definitely second world. Might even strentch to first world with a few more strategically placed balls


Who are you?

Who am I? Who am I? WHO ARE YOU??!!!

And let's leave balls out of this

/me points her to the Cherry (Pie) thrower at the hangout and runs away laughing.....

I have an almost surreal image of the UN delegate from Belgium asking for UN sanctions to be made against the USA for non payment of VAT.

The cartoons in the newspapers about such an event would be worth seeing - lol!

If you'd been paying any attention you'd notice that the chief complaint about LL has been that they didn't give people notice. That they introduced this in the current billing period, therefore someone who has budgeted for the bill LL said they'd face now have an increased bill. Had they been given notice, they could have sold off or even abandoned land to reduce tier to levels they were happy with next billing period.

There is no excuse whatsoever for LL not to have forewarned people over this issue. None, zilch, nada.

If you'd been paying attention you'd have also notice people advertising petitions, advising people to write to MP's and complain about the actual law that has led to this situation.

True.

Yes, but those get buried under all the new people that don't bother to read the entirety of the morass of threads and then come out with a fresh version of the same complaints - many of them being against VAT's applicability.

Funny, 6 months ago or so when the whole Casino thing started and the ageplay fiasco was lurkin on the horizon all the Honorable posters here from the EU were nearly unanimously calling for SL to open offices in the EU to better comply with/support the laws of thier lands, money and issues. Self righteously proclaiming that they should not have to comply with the Laws of the united States and California State law as they were snobbishly holed up in thier old world dichtomies and proud to proclaim it to the world. Well, it seems to me that you folks got you're wish, and a nice little bill on top of it. Enjoy the fruits of you're labors. You asked for it, you demanded it. Well, never let it be said that Linden labs are not supportive of or willing to listen to you're collective old world bleats.

How insulting at the end.

The office in the UK makes no difference to this EU VAT ruling so don't see what that has to do with it all.

So you are in effect claiming to be a mirror image of the very people you're criticising? Plenty of people pointed out that gambling as it existed in SL would be illegal in Europe too.

Claiming to be..I could be. But, just the thought of having to answer to a poster that in the same space of that 6 months has racked up well over one thousand six hundred posts..Well. As much as I would love to help you to "Improve" you're post count. I don't know if entering into a debate with someone who so loves to see thier own bleatings in electronic immortality so much would be good for my delicate Inner child. Flame on talking head.

...... and so it begins...

/me goes down the pub for a pint.

Inc

You don't have to answer to anyone, it's a choice. Ooh look another post count for me!

Actually Amy has a point.

The majority of the chorus of Europeans WAS against LL imposing US laws upon them with reguards to gambling.

Similarly during the Age Play thread them allowing Sexual Age Play was considered wrong even though it the SL versions were aperently allowed by our freedom of speech.

Similar voices have said we don't really even have freedom of speech in the US.

Prior to this VAT subject there has definitely been a TREND of posts that give the idea that Second Life should follow European laws as opposed to US laws becuase the Europeans are a big part of Second Life.

Now that the VAT has arrived and LL is making an effort to comply, clumsily it seems, theres a chorus saying that either they shouldn't enforce this becuase they are from the US or that they should swallow the loss so that Europeans can stay competitive.

I understand why - people will make whatever arguments they can so that something they perceive as affecting them is decided their way.

But the number of people making attempts to be unbiased on these threads are definitely in the minority.

Have one for me, too. Please.

Of course they are, they're looking for a get out clause to save themselves from being hit in the pocket.

Ageplayers were looking for a get out clause when it hit their pastime, so were those involved with gambling.

People react when they're affected. I wasn't a fan of the overnight gambling ban and said so. Although I would never consider LL to be a platform that was trustworthy enough to have gambled in anyway. I didn't like the implications of the sudden announcement and then we had all the "Well it's the law isn't it" yadda yadda yadda.

Now with VAT, which affects me, I'm still in the position of not liking sudden announcements that hit people in this fashion. If Americans suddenly found themselves having to pay more because LL had overlooked something, I'd take no pleasure in the neener neener approach.

Well Tax Laws in the US are as follows, as long as you keep your Lindens in the game its not taxable, but the minute you convert the Lindens into US Dollars, you must report it to the IRS.

My question is tho, according to the TOS, which has been an ongoing issue with a different event is SL, TOS says Lindens are "fictional monies" so how can there be tax out on something that is supose to be fictional and if the VAT is in effect is Lindens saying that there is a value to their Lindens ???

What Amy has pointed out and I agree is that theres a definite inconsistancy in the way people have reacted. Some are even the same people.

You are right the reason for the inconsistancy is people who are viewing their self interests.

for Age Play - many people wanted it banned, so they used European Law as an Argument.

for Gambling - many people wanted it to remain, so they attacked US law as an Argument. Claiming European law allows them to gamble.

for VAT - many people don't want to have to pay it, so they want LL to pay it or else use its US status to not pay it at all. What they don't understand is they are attacking European law in the process and thus being disingenuous.

-------------------


The argument over poor notification and bad wording is secondary. Although its enough to upset people, its only a 1 month thing - since people agree if they had given 1 months notice they would have been okay. The way prices are advertized is semantics. Something they could clear up, sure. But they don't change the substance of what needs to be paid.

Don't forget all the anti-ageplay folks calling for stricter regulations (ostensibly to protect the children) who are also against ID Verification!

Amy was just rude and insulting to Europeans about a subject that neither effects her nor would have much understanding of.

As for inconsistancy, there may be one or two posters, but for the majority I doubt you could back that up. Personally I wouldn't be jumping on threads insulting Americans if something came in that effected them making the grid an unequal trading ground, I would either keep out of something that didn't effect me and I didn't understand fully, or be looking for way to lend support.

Which I agreed with but Amy was rubbing people's noses in it, which is inconsistent.



I know of no European law that bans age play. Depictions of children in sexually explicit situations is different to age play. Americans also argued that this was against their laws. With quote and counter quote.

The claims on European laws allowing gambling as it stood in SL were incorrect. This has been pointed out.



I don't pay VAT on my livejournal account. Of course people don't want to pay VAT but many have acknowledged that they don't have a get out on the basis of not wanting to pay it.



As far as the complaints against LL are concerned, the poor notification and bad wording are primary. I'm sorry but the point remains people were quoted x and told they have to pay y. That's piss poor communication, it's misleading, it's dubious business practice and LL are rightly being criticised for it.

If people had been given notice they could have tiered down or cancelled memberships and had time to agree to a pricing structure they agreed with. This complaint is all to do with LL and how LL handled it so with regards to pointing the finger at LL, it's the primary complaint. Pointing the finger at LL because VAT has to be collected is churlish and doesn't really appear to hold water.

Yes it's a legal issue but apportioning blame for how this has been handled, LL mismanaged it. You can only blame LL for so long however, after a certain period people need to realise it's the law and not LL that raises this issue. However LL should have given people that period to take this onboard and then people would be aiming their fire in one direction with a united front and sympathy for LL's position.

I think that for the most part it's a case of people making opportunistic arguments -- that is, when I want X, I will make argument Y about the law, and when I want Y, I will make argument X. Of course this creates inconsistencies, but in my experience people are more than willing to make inconsistent arguments if they can get their way in substance in the end.

Lurking behind this is a broader issue of broader norms. Do the EU's laws and norms apply outside the EU? Doe the US's norms apply outside the US? Internet services are kind of a "tweener" in that everything is certainly subject to US law because the servers are in the US and LL is in the US, but many countries take the view that it is also subject to the laws where the keyboard is. When it comes to Europe and the US, this kind of approach leads to endless, endless conflicts because our legal, tax, regulatory systems are *very* different. So it leads to contradictions. Both Americans and Europeans are "dug in" to some degree about the legitimacy of their own approach, and to be honest it's well known now that Washington and Brussels are engaged in a broader "competition" globally about which standards will apply more generally around the world. So it's not surprising at all to see some of these tensions and conflicts popping up in the forums when the contradictions inherent in trying to comply with very different cultural, legal and regulatory systems begin to have an effect on the ground, at the level of the users.

You are rearrainging the past - the Arguments that were made were that Sexual Ageplay needed to be banned becuase Virtual Sexual depictions of Child Avs were against some European laws.

Yes some Americans also felt it was illegal under US law - how does that change anything?



No its secondary - becuase the amount of money involved in LL having to pay the VAT while holding prices for the EU residents to the same level as non EU residents is far more substantial.

As would the penalties for LL not paying the VAT with an office in Brighton.

You are confusing what is Primary to you and others affected by the lack of notification with the primary problem with the VAT being enforced.

LL should have given notice as soon as they started having to pay VAT. And they should change how they structure the price page to clear up confusion.

But a 1 month issue - compared to a future of SL issue is secondary.

Thats exactly it. Whether Amy rubbed anyone's noses in it or not .. it doesn't change the fact that it happened.

And to be quite honest you are right. I was rubbing peoples noses in it. I had worded it as a generalization so as to not specifically attack any one person or group of people who may or may not have been the people who's noses I was trying to rub in said "It". To the others, the innocents. I apologise if my comments were miss-construed(sp) to mean all of the europeon Union and it's entire population.. This is not the place for such a disscussion at any rate and I also apologise to the other said poster to which I responded to said persons comment in perhaps an inconsiderate manner. Just because I don't live to see my thoughts emblazoned across the Intra-Netz does not give me the right to be so judgemental towards them. Flame on talking heads.

It wasn't a Europe vs America "My Dad is bigger than your Dad" spat.




No, sorry, what I meant was that the primary complaint to LL, the primary justifiable complaint is that they didn't give sufficient notice.

The main issue is the law, but that's not something we can complain to LL about.