Abuse Reporting and the problems associated with it.

Yes, I know another gaming traffic thread but I'm a bit confused about a few things.

Why is it considered gaming traffic for a sim owner to put up camping chairs, pay real avatars (not bots) to increase traffic to their sim so they move a bit higher up in search, but it is not considered gaming traffic to pay LL for a classified ad to move up into search when most of the search has to do with traffic? Does this make sense to anyone?

After all, a Sim owner is paying quite a bit of real life money to own this Sim and should be able to advertise it as best as they can just like any real life business.

I would like to also know why someone can file abuse reports for gaming traffic through camping while they continue to camp in the Sim of the person they are reporting for two hours after they have filed the report, benefiting from the person they were reporting and with no disciplinary action taken at all. I mean this to me would be a clear case of false reporting. Instead, they incite a whole group to file reports, all camping btw, causing the owner of the Sim to be banned while they continue to sit there and collect his linden.

LL I'm sorry, I've never complained about much, but this is clearly ridiculous and an example of the problems with the abuse reporting feature. Are the reports actually checked out along with the reporters and what they are doing at the time of reporting?

With that, I'll leave it to someone else to figure out as I've ceased to try and figure out the thinking of anyone in SL.

It makes perfect sense.

Real life businesses don't have carte blanche to advertise. There are limits, such as zoning laws on signs and prohibitions against false advertising.


It's hypocritical, but not false. There are no rules that call for punishing the campers. It's inequitable, but this is one of those cases where I believe it's sensible and you need to live with it. It's reasonable to hold land owners to a higher standard than average avatars. It would be nice if all newbies knew all of the rules, but that simply won't happen.


It's bad enough that they don't thoroughly check out the AR before making a decision. There are cases where I wish the people filing the AR were also investigated, but I think that's an unrealistic expectation.

Actually it is false, because the one inciting the reporting admitted in open group chat that she had a main avatar dated back to 2004. She is no newb, and she continued to camp with her alt there for 2 hours after inciting the abuse reporting. I am not this Sim owner, I simply rent a shop on the Sim and I have proof all the traffic is not gamed because I have visitor sensors up on all my shop doors. It emails me with the visitors every hour. There has been very high traffic into my actual shop in the past two weeks, meaning the avatars on this Sim are not just camping but are walking around.

I thought Classifieds were their own separate category, and the existence of them, or the price paid for them, would not affect Search. Am I wrong on that?

Another thing, this Sim owner has done many different things to advertise his Sim and increase traffic. All of which has worked in tandem to get traffic up. Camping was not the only means used.

He has advertised in the forum and through classified ads in-world. He has set up a "work together program" which pays an Avatar a commission for finding renters for shops or homes. He has held events and advertised for those. He has leased shops to a few pretty well known designers which on their own bring in traffic.

So, lets compare all this to real life shall we?

Say I begin a business, I can put people outside my store on the street to hold signs saying "Grand Opening Sale" and pay them hourly for their time. People drive by, see the signs, pull into the parking lot and come inside. Oh guess what I have traffic. Unfortunately in SL people don't just drive by you shop or your Sim. So we have search. But search for a new owner doesn't get drive by traffic because well it's new. Newbs don't know to look at advertisements on the forums, they don't see a person holding a sign saying "Grand Opening." The only option, one has in SL is to get traffic up and they do this by various means. I don't agree with gaining traffic through camping only, I think that is only one form and a legit form as long as someone is actually being paid for it either in lindens or in merchandise.

I believe the whole picture needs to be looked at and fairly. I could see if all he did was have camping chairs and did nothing else to promote his Sim, but that is not the case here. He has used many means all in tandem to increase the traffic to his Sim and not just for him but for the shop owners, the helping of newbs getting started and SL economy.

Lets say I open up a parcel and properly advertise my business using classifieds, inworld promotion, quality product, and word-of-mouth. My entire traffic score would be based on genuine popularity, proper delivery of products and services, and satisfied clientele. (^_^)

Would I want to sit side-by-side with (or even below) someone in search who simply knows how to park a few avatars on a rooftop or skybox? (^_^)y

In addition to traffic manipulation being not fair to other merchants in the same field, it is also not fair to any other residents that may be affected. For example, people in the same sim (either your tenants or not) do not have access to the resources they would normally. If someone is using up the agent limit in a sim I could care less if they want to increase their traffic to their searchable plot or having the camping near it but nonsearchable (the 'dots on the map' effect). All I care is that I have lag and am prevented from having my friends TP to the sim I live in because someone is greedy.

What does any of that have to do with whether or not the report is false?


That's not proof that traffic isn't gamed. It might be proof that gaming traffic works.

"Gaming traffic" means doing things to boost your traffic scores, to improve your position in search, where those things don't represent things that typical users of search would want factored into the order of results. (That's my interpretation; I'm not sure how LL expresses it.) Just because there's lots of legitimate traffic doesn't mean that there's no gaming of traffic.

Emerald:

I appreciate that it's disappointing for you but the sim owner broke the rules. Camping on land that's set to show in search is not allowed. That's all there is. He can keep the camping as long as he cuts out a piece of land for it and doesn't set it to show in search. Or he can do what he's apparently done - have the camping and set the whole of the land not to show in search.

Your logic doesn't come into it and neither do your RL comparisons. I think you might see things a little differently if you imagine that the sim you're in doesn't have camping, or any other means of artificially inflating the traffic number but other sims, that contain direct competitors of yours, do use camping to massively increase thier traffic, causing your search ranking to plummet and you to lose a lot of sales. Consider it that way round and see what you think.

First, for someone who is so concerned about gaming traffic they file abuse reports and to incite others to do so, while they are camping at the place they are reporting is unconscionable. Not only that but for their group profiles to be full of camping groups, one of which they are the owner of. Really do I have to spell it out for you? This person has a main character who has been in SL since 2004 and are themselves involved in camping. Seems to me it was more a malicious attack on another Sim owner who probably pissed them off somewhere down the line with competition or whatever. My guess is they were turned down for virtual sex. (joking)




Actually, it is proof, because the traffic increased before the camping equipment was put out. As I said before, he has done many other things to increase his traffic which are perfectly legal. Besides, everyone has a different view as to what should be factored into the results.



This is a private Sim owned by one person, you don't have to share the resources because you don't have to be there. You can lease somewhere else. In fact, you have no reason to be there at all as it doesn't belong to you. If you have a problem with the resources used then don't move there to begin with. Your comment is understandable for mainland but not for a private Sim.



If you read my previous post you would see that they were not in skyboxes or on rooftops, they were sitting on benches along the street and they were not botted they were real avatars. I stood and watched them stand and sit, some of them walk around the streets. Also, you would have seen where I said he did numerous others things to increase traffic outside of the camping. A list again is Miss Hollywood Contest, Events, Classifieds, Work Together Program, Ads on forum (search Dubai and see), a few well known designers in shops (Babele Fashion being one and not a reseller but the creator herself who actually sent out a special and landmark to all her group members and anyone signed up with her Hippo group that is not an SL group. Just in case you wanted to check the SL group membership)

So you see he did not park avatars. He hired people to come to his Sim. It's as simple as that. Parking an avatar is botting and I totally agree that is an unfair measurement.

Hired people to enter the sim = parked avatars. They're not there for anything more than an easy buck, and as a result, his traffic is not an indicator of actual popularity, quality, or value. It's just a number that he chooses to game because he won't work his way to the top via genuine popularity. (^_^)

It has been established by Linden Lab that gaming your traffic number is a violation. The details on how gaming numbers is a violation are vague. Why? Because the methods are diverse. Why are the methods diverse? Because there's always someone looking for a loophole to game things again. (=_=)

Your sim owner friend thought he found a loop hole and turned up being wrong. Don't pick at the scabs, let the wounds heal, and run a legitimate business for once. (^_^)

I'll tell you what's not a violation... Including your SL business name in your sigline, which is what I do. This is an example of one of the hundreds of other promotional options available to people. But, such a thing requires work, sometimes. It would be a bloody crying shame if we actually hunkered down and did work, no? (^_^)y

Of course the ban on camping exists for the sole purpose protecting current large business owners. Kinda like zoning laws. Both should be scrapped.

Until LL puts me on payroll, it isn't my job to report anything to them.

I think I am starting to agree with you. From what I've read concerning the bot issue and gaming traffic, it seems having a lucky chair or mm board or any other incentive to have someone enter your Sim will soon be seen as gaming traffic. Since one can't do tv commercials in sl (well they can if they know the right people) mostly the only options one has is to do classified ads, advertise on forums, join blogsites, etc to get their name known. It may have nothing to do with the quality of their product at all. I'm so tired of hearing people say, if you have good quality then you shouldn't have any problem getting traffic to your store/Sim. That is the biggest line of bull crap I've ever heard. Which came first, the chicken or the egg? I can make a high quality product but if no one knows about it how am I going to get someone there to appreciate it.

BTW, I work very hard on my clothing designs and on getting them out there and known. I give them away to my friends and newbs I actually see, not in some box sitting in my store. I do have 2 lucky chairs and an mm board at my main location but that location was already established by another designer who is a friend and neither of these 2 items increase my traffic at all. The only reason I have them is to get my outfits out there to be seen. I still feel word of mouth is the best advertisement there is and always will be.

LOL!!!!!!

Oh, you mean you are serious?

Of course. zoning laws are immoral. But hey, who cares if we keep the poor impoverished with laws that protect the rich.

Sometimes the rules just suck but everyone has to follow them. My business is not hugely successful but it does pay it's tier and I don't use nefarious means to game traffic. (my traffic rarely even gets to 1000). I even have a friend's alt model and the land the pose stand is on is cut from the rest of the parcel and does not show in search.

I also would NEVER consider banning anyone from my land (and therefore my business) just because I had a little temper snit because they didn't agree with me...that is pretty much not good business practice.

As far as MM or Lucky Chairs etc., hey there's lots of opinions out there...opinions about prices and permissions and who buys templates on xssl and etc etc ad infinitum. I don't care about who does any of this, but yes, gaming traffic is a problem for me.

ETA: You also want to make sure the land your store is on is set to "Show in Search", and that you are running at least a $51L weekly classified. You would do well to visit the "Advice on Sales" thread /327/ac/274749/1.html because there is a lot of good advice in there for people looking for a way to make their mark

Actually I could care less if my stuff shows up in search or not, for the simple fact search is messed up even without the traffic issue. Go into the store tab and try typing in "sculpt maps" and see what comes up. You tp to a store that states in their description sculpt map but do they have any? Um, no, they have products that contain a sculpt, ie a map. Only reason they come up in search is because someone decided to put sculpt map in the description. So really the traffic issue is about the same as the description issue. I.E. search in my humble opinion is useless. I rarely ever use it. I know too many people who are creators who have found the places that sell what they want and if they don't know, xstreet is the next place I look. Find something I like there, I search the creator in SL and yay! I've found a store who sells what I want.

Search, imho, needs a complete overhaul, not just camping and gaming traffic overhaul. The use of descriptive words that are not accurate to the products offered and just as much gaming traffic as camping should be dealt with also. But that would require a few Lindens to go patrolling every store listed in search. Or to at least add a button to abuse reporting for FALSE ADVERTISING. Think I'm being ridiculous? Well that's how I feel about this camping issue.

It's up to you, I visited your store and your traffic was 4, so I checked search all and classifieds. I was just trying to help, we've all been there.

I appreciate your help.

It's your choice but that attitude is a mistake if you want to sell more stuff. Regardless of whether or not the search systems are screwed up, people use them, and they buy from places they get to from them.

It would only be a mistake if all I cared about was sales, but I actually enjoy creating things and sales aren't at the top of my agenda. In fact they aren't even on the top five things I want to accomplish in sl. I sell enough to pay my rents on my shops and to keep creating the things I love. I enjoy doing it and I get satisfaction out of the few sales I do make for the simple fact someone else liked what I made. All I really desire. This thread was started not because I wanted more sales or because I'm worried about my shop in this Sim. It was started because I find this whole abuse reporting feature and the way it is handled to be unfair to say the least. According to Jack Linden and his comments on gaming traffic with bots and camping, there was suppose to be a warning, first. There was no warning received. He was banned period.

Emerald....I might be reading this wrong....but you are saying that a person who owns their own sim, got reported to LL by campers that were camping on the neighboring sim? Then the sim owner got banned? Then the campers came over and camped on the sim owner's stuff, while he was banned? Did I read that right?

Horses for courses although why a parcel that advertises camping, provides camping and does not hide camping gets penalised is beyond me. Traffic is a cack metric but there's not much better available.

No he was reported by campers on his own sim and they continued to camp after they reported him until he came on 2 hours later and banned them from his sim and took them off his group. One started the whole thing in group chat and cited other campers in the same sim to put in reports. I have the whole chat log for that group and the whole thing was ridiculous. The one who incited the reporting was camping on his sim at the time of reporting him, and continued to sit there collecting his linden after the report as did the others she incited to report. He was banned this morning for 5 mins, then came back on, had an im conversation with a linden and was banned again. This time he has not been let back on as of this post. Not only that, but the inciter openly admits in this group chat that she has a main avatar that is dated back to 2004. I find this kind of thing atrocious. The fact she would make an alt to collect linden from someone elses camping equipment and report them at the same time. Not only that but her alt is in numerous camping groups one of which is her own. Go figure.

*BOGGLES*

Umm, how is some equally applied limit placed on how my land can affect you and your land can affect me in any way bad?