Should LL police resident blogs? Do they?

It seems that some of the more well known blogs related to SL and run by well known SL residents are becoming more inflamatory. Naming names is common fare for these websites, vitriolic attacks are posted daily, and now some of them have fallen to posting personal RL information about residents, blatant racism, and seemingly outright lies.

As much as I don't want LL to police resident websites it eventually becomes clear that these authors of contempt are merely skirting the law of the land and perhaps maybe something should be done to insure resident safety. Abuses that would not be within TOS on one side of the virtual wall reign freely beyond it. It's as if they are going up to the line of the TOS and spitting over it.

I would like to see LL make a change and start policing some of the more insane bloggers of SL. We know who they are and so does LL. Implementing a policy that your SL account could be held responsible for certain speech violations on third party sites would be a positive move in my opinion.

If I get upset with Sally Avatar and I post her RL address on my blog then my SL account should be banned. If I make racist and inflammatory comments about Joe Avatar on my blog then my SL account should be banned.

This just seems clear to me and I'm amazed LL has not been more aggressive in protecting their residents.

What do you think?

I think they have (or should have!) better things to do with their time.

That's pretty much the whole "Freedom of Speech" thing, and there isn't a lot that can be done.

Hi Lowen! Good to see you again. You prob'ly missed my reply on the last one you started, as you mentioned you dun really care to read these forums.

Outside blogs are really outside their jurisdiction, IMO.

I really want to respond to this, but I'm just so flabbergasted that anyone would suggest it, I don't know what to say.

I mean, the 'slippery slope' potential alone...

First off, there are other ways of handling this that does not involve Linden Labs. Say if ava1 is ticked off at ava2 and posts ava2's RL info (without consent) on ava1's blog. Ava2 can and should contact the blog's hosting site and request removal and if it continues, hand it off to a RL authority.

It'd be faster than going through LL anyways.

Second, protecting the users from things happening outside of LL's sphere of influence? That would tread on the rights of other companies to handle the issues as they see fit.

Nah I read it. Nice wording. My comment in that thread was really just a reaction to the vulture like pouncing on some threads here.

I figured people would feel that it's outside their jurisdiction, I'm not so sure though. LL has shown in the past that it can police SL as it chooses.

This is true. All we need is for them to start applying in world and forum bans to things people say on their own blogs. 'course, they've said that would not do that... but saying an doing are all so often different anymore.

I can see arguments both sides, really. The freedom of speech angle is important, but equally, a resident with a popular blog shouldn't have carte blanche to break the Disclosure rules (and LL *could* police this if they wanted to: regular corporate NDAs don't limit the communication method you use, so essentially they could incorporate one into the TOS).

I think that LL would be justified in taking action against residents who post seriously bad stuff related to SL or individual residents on third party sites. Free speech is all very well, but there is also a freedom to take action and LL would be within their rights!

If people on popular blogs are going to engage in racism, especially if they're well known, then market forces should bring them down. It really isn't Linden Lab's place to be policing those blogs. If someone posts something that is completely untrue about Linden Lab, then Linden Lab have the weight to do something about that.

The any reason or no reason clause exists.

How would LL verify the identity of any poster outside of Second Life?

Please realize that many third party blogs already have things in their own ToS that cover this.



Look, I can understand the drive for this kind of thing, but there are tools already in place to handle the job. So, they aren't LL's tools, but they're probably faster.. and if the idiot made the mistake of doing it on a blog, then chances are they've already done it in world.. which leaves LL open to act. If they ever do.

Bad enough that posting to the forum can get one banned, if a Linden doesn't particularly like what you're saying.. let's not give 'em any bigger a stick, okay?

I think it's unlikely that a blog run under a false name could achieve much popularity..

Yes, but it's still a good question. What if user1 wanted to get user2 into trouble? All they'd have to do is create a blog using the avatar's name and post user3's RL info.. there is no way for LL to verify that user1 is or isn't user2.

And if I get upset with you, I can create a blog in your SL name, post incindiary, racist hate-speech and RL info about a bunch of folks, then report it to LL and get YOU banned.

See why this is a bad idea? LL's jurisdiction should be limited to LL's property - SL, the forums, it's web sites and so forth. No further. They do not have, nor should they be interested in aquiring, the resources for doing such a thing.

If someone posts your RL info on a blog, commits hate speech and so on, there are already tools and authorities to handle that. If Linden Lab won't stick it's nose into inter-resident affairs far enough to get me a refund from a dishonest inworld merchant, they certainly shouldn't be concerned about what goes on off the gird between it's users.

Some posters in this thread seem to assume these bloggers have a financial interest in SL. Some do sure, but some don't. Some of them simply do it for the..well I don't know why they do it. Some of the blogs are simply just insane.

Also there seems to be an assumption that identifying these bloggers would be difficult and that's a valid point, but some of the worst offenders are very well known to SL and LL with long histories of their abusive exploits.

Oh, I think you may be wrong. There are many SL blogs out there that receive quite high rankings.

That rather goes against the grain of 'freedom of speech'.

But.....I never read SL blogs....and have only really skimmed maybe 2 or 3. But I agree SL probably has way better things to do. People are gonna state their opinions no matter how out of control they get. The real issue would be out right slander, in which case LL would have to take legal action (or one would assume they'd want to). But really...a lot of the appeal of blogging seems to be venting. There's a LOT I could vent about....none of which has to do with LL or SL......but if I wanted to, I could give some serious literary lashings to a few entities.
So far I have restrained my urges to tell what I know to be true on a blog. But, the fact is, if I wanted to vent on a blog, I have a right to, as long as I'm not slandering.
The other point made, about personal info being revealed.....really that is up to the individual as to whether or not to pursue that. LL has no control or legal right since these blogs are NOT a part of LL and do not have to maintain any type of TOS with regards to LL.

(besides could LL possibly keep up with all those blogs~!!!? lol)

Absolutely Not.

I think that is up there with "give Mentors police powers" as one of the worst governance ideas possible.

Gaaa, who thought that one up?

Human resource departments at major companies are already reading Myspace, blogs, etc and if they don't like what you've written you quite possibly will not get that new job.

Teachers are reading the internet to better police trouble in their schools before it gets out of hand. At many schools you can be suspended or worse if your internet life is deemed offensive or violent.

Law enforcement is using the internet constantly to research people and they don't need any sort of warrant. They can use this research in cases brought before the courts.

LL already has numerous policies that could be construed as conflicting with 'freedom of speech', as they are a privately held company though, I really think they are well within their right to protect or distance SL from some of the more extreme bloggers.