Notice of banned avis ?

Is there a way to find out what happened to somebody who has suddenly disappeared from SL ? A friend has just poofed and since I only recently met her, I don't have any RL contact to ask her what happened. Her avi still shows in search but she's gone from groups and friend lists (not just mine) and her shop is gone too. Is there anywhere to look to see if someone has been banned by LL ? What exactly happens to someone's stuff and their linden balance when they get banned ? BTW, I am assuming she didn't just suddenly leave SL -- I'm quite sure that didn't happen. Thx !

It's very possible that she went away from SL for a time and let her paid account lapse. When that happens, the account is not downgraded; it's deleted. If you let a paid account lapse, then you risk losing everything: avatar, inventory, land etc. I'm not saying that's what happened, but it's a possibility.

If she was banned her name would not appear in Search. Also if she was banned it's unlikely that she'd have had time to go back in and clear out her stuff. People don't get notice that they're going to be banned or suspended, they just get forcibly logged off and can't log back on again. It seems much more likely that she has left voluntarily.

To add... Linden Lab would reclaim the L$ balance on a banned account. Any land owned would eventually go to auction once tier is not paid. Inventory would simply be deleted, I expect.

If she is banned by SL, for wathever reason, or cancelled her account all her Linden$ go to LL and her stuff is wipped off.

Now I'm just guessing - if she still appears in search, it can be that she cancelled the accout. LL maintain the account half-live for a while in case she wants to revert (for a fee, of course)

To answer the question, No. There is no place to see if accounts have been banned. LL barely tells the people getting banned anything, let alone the general public.

If you want to know what happened to her, you could always try sending an IM. Assuming that she has checked the settings to have offline IMs forwarded to e-mail, she will get the e-mail (assuming it's not a banned account or somesuch). And then she could just reply to the e-mail and you would get the IM in-world.

If you don't have a valid and still in use external contact method, you'll never know. LL will not help you to find out, and you can't find out on your own.

I knew someone once who apparently just walked away from 6 whole sims that she was renting. A full sim and 5 OpenSpaces. Left everything behind, and just vanished. Was still in Search for several months, then vanished there, too, most likely when her Premium membership lapsed. For all anyone in SL will ever know, she got run over by a bus and died, or got killed in an avalance or some other disaster in RL. Or possibly, though not as likely, she just got sick of SL, and walked away, never intending to return. I have to think if it was intentional, she would have sold off her sellable stuf and settled her debts. She had always been prompt to pay for things when she was here.

If someone gets banned, they vanish from search, but their in-world stuff remains until someone reclaims the land and returns their prims. I've even seen merchant vendors continue to operate for months after a banning, taking money and delivering merchandise, with the money going into a black hole.

Is there an official FAQ about this?

I was thinking about going premium, but if I risk losing my stuff by doing so... forget that.

If there's a way to lapse without losing your avatar, then fine, I can take losing my land and such - but not my avatar.

Arcady, this is a real threat on premium accounts. There is a JIRA on the matter: http://jira.secondlife.com/browse/MISC-1961 (vote for it)

In my case, when I realised the danger, I've made an alt account that is Premium, and owns nothing. The 512 m² allowed land was donated to my group, and it transfer the weekly L$ 300. If something happened and this account is deleted, I will lose the allowed land and an unused alt account, no more.

That's a good plan. Make an alt account (pay the $9.95 to get a second?) and put it on premium?

I also found this:

https://support.secondlife.com/ics/support/default.asp?deptID=4417&task=knowledge&questionID=4211
- downgrading a premium to a basic.

They ought to just do that automatically and save your data, even as they sell a terra-formed version of your plot to the next person. So that if you ever re-appear, you can pay to get your data back and then put it down on a new plot once you buy such...

One real issue I have with buying land in SL is no such thing exists. All you're really doing is renting it.

thanks for the replies. i guess she didnt get banned because she's still searchable. it just seems so unlikely that she left because of things she said. anyway, i guess i'll find out if she comes back ... or won't !