Those are NOT Bots! They are Campers!

I reserved judgment for a long time, once I found out what bots were. But after talking to some very creative people, who work very hard, here.....and watching new creators who are very talented, battle with traffic counts constantly....my judgment is made.

So now, I no longer shop at stores with bots. To be fair, I do go find the bots first, and verify Today, I was unable to verify, because the store landing was inside the store, and there were no doors, and I could not get out to fly to the bot platform. I could also not tp out of the store, using the map, to another landing spot (very clever).

I wrote to the store owner, and he responds, saying that those are not bots, those are campers, and he is paying a good wage to them to support SL, and help newbies, and contribute to the SL economy.....and we have a rather one-sided conversation on business ethics.

So I ask for a landmark to the camping spot. Tad bit of a delay, there. The landmark sends me inside the store again. I asked half a dozen times how to get to the camping area, and how does one become a camper. Much discussion, no answer.

He finally says that the windows are phantom, and implies that I am clueless, because I can't find the camping area. I couldn't find any signs on how to become a camper there, and no signs to point me toward the camping area. He says it is simple enough to find. I say, (for the umpteenth time)....then tell me how to get there. I am supposed to fly through the windows, and it is underwater. So I do. Sure took me a long time to get there.

The camping mats I saw offer ONE linden per 30 minutes. He argues that some offer 3 to 6 lindens per 30 minutes.

Laughing Hysterically

you'll find that even if those are actuall campers, they'll most likely be camping bots. a bot is a bot

ooops.... I was wrong on the numbers, just read back over my discussion, and it was not 3 to 6 lindens per 30 minutes....it was 2 to 3 lindens per 30 minutes.

*waves at Mickey*

Where ya been??

As a shop owner who employs ONE "bot" for the purposes of modelling my avatar(s) so people can see the details, and for purposes of maintaining my store's update-mailing-list/group invites.. I would caution you not to make sweeping generalizations about whether a store is "good" or "bad" based simply on the presence or not of a bot.

llPushObject can still get your avatar through most walls... That's how I do it. (^_^)y

Build enabled? If so, rez a cube, sit on it, and edit the z-coord.

Some people are disguising bots as campers, but you can only be sure about the ones who aren't very good at it.

I haven't worked at it in a while, but I have a project underway to determine how many people are actually at their keyboard.

http://greendots.typepad.com/

Interesting blog, Anya. Thanks for the link, I'll be following that. There's a store in my home sim with two boxes of traffic bots, plus an alt of the store's owner regularly sitting in exactly the same places. Occasionally she'll move the boxes around, so it looks as though the 'people' are moving, but they're all bots. I've flown over there several times, and sometimes I've seen the odd avatar wandering around the store, but mostly it's just the bots.

I won't touch the debate about store bots, but when it comes to bots in clubs and other social places then yes, that is downright deceptive. People go to places like those for chat and social interaction, and they're not going to get it from a bunch of bots spamming random scripted chat lines from pre-loaded notecards.

I build prefabs and generally have a few "bots" or "alts" or whatever label you want to give them logged in. The bots are different sizes, one tall, one short so I can make sure my builds are in proportion and accessable to varrying sized Av's as I build them. These bots also hold some inventory to keep my main inventory below 30k items. so one of my bots holds my many thousand of premade sculpties, one of them holds about 20K textures that are not regulally used but occasionally needed. I also use the bots in lots of other minor ways that dont invlove increasing traffic. Bots have a bad rep but they are useful tools for me.

We run 6 bots on our 2 Sims. 2 handle the 2 separate group invites and also ban spammers etc from the land and 4 model outfits in the store. The reason being they can only handle 10 changes of outfit each. The Modeling Bots are clearly marked as such and the 2 group bots we have under our Telehub with 3 big notices on the wall explaining what they are.

I don't give a pig ears about traffic number count and i wish they would do away with the numbers as they are misleading. All of our group members know about them so to the OP i to add, please don't make sweeping generalizations about the use of them and i would also say get used to them as they are here to stay for the foreseeable future and serve a good purpose when used correctly.

I might also add that our 2 Sims are there for the members to enjoy the free facilities we offer, we don't make a profit in fact we spend a lot more on tier, event prize money, money ball the 2 money tress than we take in, but there again we have our Sims backed by our 2 RL websites and registered businesses so cashing out is something we don't do or need to do.

Instead of trying to start yet another witch hunt maybe your time would be better spent lobbying LL to get the dam traffic figures removed because you have our vote and on the mainland where people over use them i totally agree you should only be allowed to use the amount for the amount of land you own, ie: own half a mainland Sim u can use up to 20 Bots. If people want to use lots of them they should buy their own Sims.

Just my 2 cents

Just registering another vote for doing away with Traffic as a search-ranking metric altogether. There are lots of reasons, stated many times for this, but specific to this thread: bots can be extraordinarily useful (mostly due to the way LL has lobotomized the scripting language), so it would be a big win if folks didn't have to suspect that all bots exist to inflate Traffic.

(It is of course possible to carve out tiny parcels on which non-traffic bots operate, so as to avoid inflating the Traffic figures. It creates complications, though, especially if the store layout ever changes, or if parcel teleport routing is used.)

I just think some like to moan about the BOTs and think everyone uses them for bad deeds, we are upfront about the ones we use, but then we certainly don't rely on SL for an income and we have a good and growing member base in SL both from our RL website and from within SL, but it will be good when traffic goes away as numbers.

If I encounter 2-3 bots somewhere I don't care. I usually assume they serve a purpose, like the ones I met on Sine Wave after being led astray by an old LM. They handled group invites and whatnot.

It is when I encounter a large group of noob-looking avatars, or avatars dressed up in demo-wear, sitting at a platform I get annoyed. Especially when this cluster of bots are on a otherwise busy and laggy sim.

I'm not making a "sweeping generalization".....like I said, I Verify. I'm not talking about 4 or 5 bots that people use for modeling or inventory back up. I use alts for inventory back up and to set poses, and they may be on the store property on a platform above the store, because that's where I keep the workshop. I'm not talking about that.

I'm talking about 20 to 40 bots/campers/alts/avs/boxes/whatever located on a platform high above or below the store, or way off in a far corner of a sim, that generates a 20,000 to 60,000 traffic count per day, when there is not one single soul in the store shopping, for extended periods of time. And I've got no problem writing to a store owner, and telling them I will no longer spend money there, because of it. They are welcome to come up with an argument, but I have yet to hear one that makes sense.

I think that "planting a seed" that one of their paying customers will no longer shop there, because of it, is a small step. Evidently, no one has called them out on it, before. And that makes it "acceptable." The store owner I mentioned above, told me that when SL posts a comment on their web site about it being frowned upon, then he will remove them. (evidently he does not visit the forums).

Pointing that out, is not a witch hunt. I've pointed it out to business owners that were scratching their heads over why some stores were getting a 50k count, while they're working their buns off, and getting darn good real traffic counts, that won't even approach 50k, and they should technically be at the top of the search....because their store is just below the 20k and above traffic count stores, which are bot driven. No amount of extra work, extra products, extra promotion, is going to get them high enough to hit that top, because the ones above them are false readings. And they should have the glory and benefit of being at the top.

I don't see spending time on a crusade to fight with LL over it, as effective time management. Those counts contribute to the picture that is painted of increasing population, and that would be a tough battle. I didn't get excited when I saw last week's online population count hit 70k.....I just assumed the mall and store owners were stocking up on alts/avs/bots.

I would rather spend time sending shoppers to stores with great items and great service, and let the money spending determine what is effective, and that's what I'll do....coordinate with other businesses on special deals for group members, have special events together, and blog about products from stores that have great items. You could do the same. Just make sure the money gets to the stores that are the REAL Best Stores. They will reciprocate, it's all about Karma baby.....and it would benefit those who are selling without depending on tweaked traffic counts, so that they don't have to look at the search tools, and scratch their heads.

When I told that store owner that I would no longer spend my money there.....(and I was there to spend money, until I saw the bot cluster)....he said he will just rely on the other 14 million SL residents for his sales. Huh ??? That attitude alone, bots or not bots, determined my final opinion. Because when he was a little guy, starting out with a small store, and no bots, I spent money there.

I won't name stores with bots to my own shoppers....to me, that is using one bad business practice to cancel out another.....but I will highly promote those who do not use them, to my group members and friends. If everyone that was concerned about the issue did that, it would make a dent. Just direct the money spending to the places who are using business practices that you approve of, and do it actively and ethically.

Anya - I just visited your blog. Very interesting indeed. Awesome Work! Keep it up. I like that you included Real Traffic, too - that's handy info for someone who is getting ready to rent in a mall, or make a decision on a land purchase, or decide what business they want to coordinate with, in promotions or events. Very Handy Info.

QFT

Hi Mickey i agree with what you are saying here and personally I think that people that are talking about BOTS and the way they are used to game the traffic figures should write to LL, I'm not talking about a full scale lobbying just everyone that wants traffic numbers stopped then tell LL and for the record we have

BOTs are a great tool when used correctly and very helpful as many agree but there will always be those that abuse the situation imo and while the stupid figures exist as a metric then BOTs and the attitudes of the person you mention will continue to flourish.

We also shop as you suggest and try wherever possible to use people that don't use inflated figures as you rightly say there are a lot of good designers struggling to sell their wares while this situation continues. It will be a great day when the playing field is leveled for all to compete in once they remove the gamed systems in place now

Have a great weekend