Is Paying for Links in Profile Picks Cheating?

Nonsense. Do not make statements you an back up. Optimizing for search is not the same as cheating. Bots are irrelevant for search all, and the picks I pay are getting less (others pay more I have heard), still I stay on #2. By far most are not payed ones, and I do not advertise it anymore because I see its not needed.
Because I made it my quest to know how to get there by using the right descriptions and so on, I got where I wanted. And Phil pays no one for picks.


Now there is a lot I want to accept in peoples writings, but this one is way too far. Slander, it is called. So I give you a choice: withdraw this statement, or face an AR. No one calls my products inferior to win an argument, this is very low behavior from you.

Marcel:

Kitty is known for being low, although I haven't known her lie before. That's probably because I just haven't noticed. I suggest ignoring her. I don't mean put her in your ignore list - just ignore her as a troublemaker. She isn't worth the effort.

The idea that Phil; the most prolific personal attacker on this board; is qualified to comment on what posters should be ignored .. is pretty laughable.

Before this further degenerates into flame wars, can we try and stay some where near topic? I am finding loads of info and even appreciate conflicting views but please, can we stay civil?

QFT and quite f*cking true.

A question: I may have missed it in this thread, so pardon me beforehand. Instead of paying others to put you in their picks, why couldn't you simply set up an army of alts with your store as their pick? It's free. It should only take a little time and organization to do, I would think. Or does actual logging in or being a premium customer make a difference?

In short, the answer is no.

Re: inferior products - that is completely subjective and an unfair accusation. No one forces anyone to buy from the first entries in search. If it was crap, the sales would not be there to back it up.

Relevancy is supposed to be an objective metric. By factoring in picks and traffic, LL obviously tried to make the general public's behavior become a large part of the data pool for determining relevancy by measuring where they choose to spend their time and what strikes their fancy enough to want to recommend it to other people. Now we can argue about the wisdom or usefulness of setting it up that way, but the intent is very clear. Traffic bots and paid picks folks attempt to wrest control of determining relevancy away from the general public by subverting the objectivity of those metrics in order to arbitrarily decide for themselves how relevant their place is for any given search. That's driven by greed, not by any desire to make search more accurate or useful. It's contrary to the most basic purpose of a search engine which isn't to be an advertising medium but to simply provide objective information. Traffic and picks have never really been objective to begin with and the result of using those metrics was completely predictable, but that's not a valid justification for abusing the system and exponentially magnifying its flaws. The more LL allows people to manipulate search ranking, the less useful and more arbitrary it becomes. The way it is now makes about as much sense as ordering listings in a phone book by how many stripes people have on their bedspreads (hey, I know, I'll just go get more stripes!).

An avatar has to do certain things before their picks count. This is a double edged sword because it means some picks don't count. However it is desgined to stop people setting up an army of alts.

It does depend on your definition of cheating.

If you see manipulating the search results by using money to influence a metric that was intended to be based on personal choice as cheating ..

Then its cheating

Not quite, it is still personal choice, however it's a personal choice that you object to.

Edited to add:

It's the factors involved in that personal choice you object to.

The money is influencing the personal choice .. its still possible for people to believe that is cheating.

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Much as money given to people to change their opinions would potentially make those opinions invalid.

If I paid you a million lindens to change your opinion on this issue - I would be cheating in this argument as well.

Even though it would be your choice whether or not to take the money.

I believe all inbound links have to be from "Payment Info on File" residents to count. That's a big PITA for a bunch of alts.

Of course it's possible for people to believe it's cheating, but that's not the same as saying it's not about personal choice. You don't like the variables included in that decision making process.

What do you think of referal programs that give rewards if you get a friend to signup? Do you see that as cheating? That's a common business practice, indeed it's one Linden Lab engage in.
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That also happens a lot in business too. Customer is unhappy, they get a pay off of some kind. I was at a cinema once and the movie was badly delayed, although we saw it eventually they gave us free tickets for another movie, is that cheating? Would it have been more honest of them to leave their customers angry at the delay?

I am not opposed at all to paid promotions.

I am opposed to paid promotions influencing a metric that wasn't intended as such.

I think LL should get out of the measuring popularity business entirely - there is no way to stop it from being gamed .. and their inaction makes it look like they endorse such gaming.

You've fallen into the problem pattern of thinking that Linden Lab uses.

The fact that there is vigorous debate on the forums shows that there is no consensus that something like Traffic or Picks would be completely useless in a Search.

You, in fact, have no data or solid information to conclude universally, for most searches and most searchers, that Picks or Traffic are completely useless.

Thus, let the searcher decide for oneself. Some will decide that Traffic is useless and never use it. Some, however, may still find Traffic to be helpful and continue to use it. Some might find Traffic helpful for some searches and not others.

It's a basic tenant of healthy capitalism. Let the market decide whether something has value or not.

If, after providing the option of including or excluding Traffic or Picks, it turns out that searchers only use them very rarely, then those options can be phased out.

But why continue to tell people like me that something like Traffic or Picks shouldn't matter to me? Why not let me make that decision? Is someone else so smart that they can decide what is important to me? Read my mind? Or am I just too stupid to use a Search engine, and I need experts to dumb it down for me?

That's part of the problem. "Popularity" is quite a subjective concept. It can't be measured objectively. Statisticians and pollsters have tried for decades to do it without a lot of success.

It could be that there are some sectors within SL that are not gamed in search.
For those, whatever they might be, Traffic and Picks might still be an indication of people voting with their feet and profiles.

However, if the inclusion of those factors was optional in Search, which should be the default? I should have thought that 'exclude' should be.

I wonder how the options would be documented? They use of the options would have to be explained.
How would LL explain that those factors are excluded by default as they have been largely rendered useless by gaming?
Would they mention it?

How would a Torley vid tut describe them?

You might want to read the paragraph above that and put the quote in the context it was in.

Or as an analogy: 'random supermarket's house cola is inferior to Coca Cola', which is quite different from "random supermarket's house cola is just plain awful". Just because something is inferior doesn't mean it's worthless junk, it's just "not as good as something else".

I can think of a dozen furniture stores that offer far better furniture and which are somewhere below the gamed rankings and that's the point I was making with the website analogy (and the adjusted version of your example a few pages back) in that post: great quality stores are pushed down just because of the questionable games that are played with search.

If it's just that paragraph you have an issue with, I'll just edit it out. If you're simply offended because I don't think it's top quality there's little I can do about that, because I honestly just don't.

Thanks for changing that, of course I do not mind your opinion about my stuff, but the way you wrote it was plain and simple: I was selling inferior stuff. And that I objected to, and was quite ready to AR (something I hate to do). The fact you do not like my stuff I can hardly object to, you probably are not alone in that. I do not claim to make stuff everyone likes, I claim to make low prim stuff for fair prices.

Of course there are people making better furniture. And there always will be. There are not many people making better furniture this low in prims though But that is not the issue here.

As I said before, the Search All is hardly gamed by me or Phil, even without the handful of paid picks I would be on #2. For arguments sake let me drop to #3 if I drop picks payments, I could handle that Simply because both me and Phil investigated how to optimize our parcels for search all, put us on 1 and 2. Phil buys no picks, I buy a handful.

Now if there are low prim furniture makers that deserve to be on the first page of Search All, they should put more effort in getting there. Many quality designers put effort in their creations but forget to put effort in their marketing. And optimizing for search is one of the most important marketing instruments (imho). Not by cheating, but by using the knowledge available to all of us, you can get pretty good results. The fact that they do not do that, cannot be blamed on me.

If so many people are hell bent over gaming traffic why don't they also get upset at people throwing money events?
Many clubs and places offer money events as incentive to hang out at their place. 2 and 3 hour events. Why? To boost traffic and awareness of said club or place.
I don't care how many campers/dancers/picks you hire. if the place is crap then it will remain crap even after no more events campers or pick camping.

I seen one place. Buy a sim. Threw 15 bots in the sky in a cage and expected to make something of their place. They then resorted to paying campers and also the bots . Having 50+ avatars in the region putting them high on the traffic list and not 1 person hanging out at their ballroom enjoying the place. heh And they did this for 2 months. Now said ballroom sits empty and no visitors. People hang them selves if you give them enough rope

So let me ask everyone here who is against paying for picks.
Do you think it is also wrong to Have a monthly reward contest for members who have them in their picks? I personally dont see anything wrong with it. It is no different than having money or prize events to boost traffic and awareness of your place.
The metric is there and is equal oportunity metric. Use it for what it is worth.
I dont see people getting bent over money chairs to generate traffic. Payed traffic still
I dont see anyone getting bent over money trees. Again a payed incentive to visit the region and bring awareness of said place.

I think if a lot of people spent less time pissing and moaing and more time promoting their business the more fair it would be to them. I feel The only reason some see it as not fair is because they are too cheep and greedy to pump their place up with a little cash.Just my oppinion lol. It takes money to make money and when LL has search borked and classified borked why should anyone spend the rest of their SL sitting on the bottom waiting for nothing to happen . Good business people make it happen and they do what it takes to make it happen within their reach.

Me personally. It doesnt matter what money they offer for any event or any picks. If I dont like the place, then im not supporting it.. For any amount of money. And if a place is so heavily gamed when I arive and I see it is gamed . I laugh and leave. thats how it goes. New people figure it all out eventually. Sure the camping and picks paying can get out of hand. But like I said above. It doesnt matter what a place or product does to boost the awareness of their place\product. If it is crap, then it will remain crap.

Heh there are places being put in Showcase that have 40+ campers in there. Do you think LL thinks it is cheating?

Just my 2 cents
Peace.

Frankly, Kitty, you are talking out of your proverbial. For one thing, you can't think of any furniture stores that offer better low prim furniture, no matter where they are in the rankings. But the biggest error you make is that we gamed our way to the top of the All search.

Marcel has paid for Picks, and some people consider that to be gaming, but if he dropped those picks right now, it wouldn't make any difference to him being in the #2 position.

Personally, I haven't done any gaming of the All search to get to the #1 position. You were wrong about that in the nasty little paragraph that you removed. The html that I told you about was done *after* I'd reached #1 - not before - and no gaming of any kind was ever involved in me reaching #1. If you want to say that *anything* that is done to improve rankings is gaming, such as optimising the parcel and object names and descriptions, then you are deluded, and you'd be a solitary voice in the wilderness. Well... maybe not solitary, because there are a few die-hard self-styled super-ethicals who might agree with you, but you'd be a tiny little group in the wilderness.

At long last....I've been waiting for someone to finally to bring this point up! I think some people (and most likely participants on this thread) have this notion that all you need to do is simply "create" a product, place them for sale......"and then they will come" (quote from the "Field of Dreams" film)

For some strange reason some people believe that LL should do their marketing for them, whilst sitting back waiting for sales to happen!

To be successful in SL imo, you need create quality products to begin with...and the other 50% of the time you should spend marketing your company and its products. Now that can take many forms from.... search optimatisation, classifieds optimisation, notices into large consumer groups, forum postings of new product, listing businesses on 3rd party websites, holding events, having sales on discontinued items, placing ads in SL newspapers, placing adverts on radio streams, having DJ's advertise your company inside clubs, create a blog site, create large customer group base, get your products blogged....etc etc.......and yes, i have done most of these at some point.

If you just sit there on your bottom and do nothing........or do nothing except point the blame for your failed business or lower than expected sales....because of Picks, bots and keyword spamming or whatever the favourite fad is at the time....you're seriously dillusional.!

As they say "cream always rises to the top"...and you can remove picks,bots or whatever.....and the majority of successful and BEST RUN companies...will still remain the best run companies. They work hard in maintaining that success...be it more or improved products or better effective marketing. These are types of businesses that can adapt to any changing business enviroment. It's exactly that.... a business....not a hobby. Not many hobbyists make significant income!

Take bots & picks out.....and i bet you'll find that both Phil & Marcel will still make decent monthly sales.....they'll simply research alternatives, because they'll do their homework!

This all would make more sense if you weren't expecting honest sellers to compete with those using questionable business practices.

Quel surpreeeze!

I should of known better..... the same grouping from the Bots thread, find themselves here- rofl

There are many forms of marketing & advertising and it's a definite skill in itself.
Why do you thing its such a large worldwide industry and why billions of dollars are spent on it!

I have seen a several talented SL creators who absolutely clueless at marketing or selling their products. They make virtually zero sales.
I should know more than most.....i have a mega talented SL partner and SL son who both create many different types of SL products..........yet when it comes to selling their products..............forget it!