Selling Lindens Via PayPal...A Nightmare

Ah, OK. You didn't mention that before, so I just wondered.

Also, LL makes the money, so if they decide they don't want you doing something with your L$ and you do it anyway, that qualifies as 'wrong.' I'm not so sure they care if you sell your L$ on eBay though, it's just been known to be a hotbed of fraudulent activity - lots of Residents wind up getting their eBay-purchased Lindens, plus a 50% additional fee, removed from their accounts by LL. It's possible you might get caught up in that, which makes it at least unsafe.

Third party exchanges must be covered under the "Risk API" to be permitted by Linden Lab.

http://secondlifegrid.net/programs/api/risk

"If Linden Lab, in its sole discretion, determines that a Second Life user has purchased Linden Dollars for real currency through any means other than LindeX, and that the seller of such Linden Dollars acquired such Linden Dollars through fraudulent means, or any other means in violation of the Terms of Service, then Linden Lab will consider the buying user a complicit party in the fraud or violation. As a penalty for participation in such fraud or violation, Linden Lab will reduce the Linden Dollar balance of the buying Second Life account (and/or any Second Life accounts owned or operated by, or affiliated with, the owner of the buying account), by any amount up to 150% of the amount of Linden Dollars involved in the transaction. In addition, repeated participation in such fraud or violation will result in suspension or cancellation of the buying party's accounts. (The selling account will of course be suspended or cancelled on a single fraud or violation at Linden Lab's discretion.) "

Ebay is not covered under the Risk API, therefore you are not allowed to buy/sell L$ through it.

Linden Lab says it's wrong, so that's the only explanation you need. Their software, their rules, which you agreed to follow when you signed up to play - it isn't their fault if you didn't read all the reams of small print.

I'm with Broccoli here



Well, I've read dozens of sad stories here and on other forums of people who got their accounts suspended, lost all of their stuff and had to pay up to 150% of the 'illegal' transfer back to LL.

Like you, most of them didn't realize they were doing something that isn't allowed, and didn't have anything bad in mind. The problem is that Ebay transfers can't be verified. There's lots of cheaters and conmen out there that try to use SL as a tool to launder money. LL has no choice but to step up and take action against this, otherwise the FED might really shut them down. This is why there are just a few trusted parties, which all use the LL risk API - that are allowed to trade Lindens. SLX is one of them, I believe there are a few more. It is strongly suggested to only use these parties to trade your Lindens if you don't want to get into trouble.

They mustn't care or eBay would prevent it. That's what amazes me. People are quick to exclaim that something such as that is illegal.

Selling a copy of Windows XP without a keycode is illegal. If you post such it will be kicked off eBay almost immediately. eBay runs standard bots that look for and highlight certain things and then they are killfiltered as necessary.

If selling Lindens was illegal it would be simple - LL would tell eBay to killfilter any auction advertising Lindens for sale. End of argument.

Since they don't then it proves selling Lindens on eBay is legal. End of story.

Big part of that quote "and that the seller of such Linden Dollars acquired such Linden Dollars through fraudulent means" - if they were not acquired fraudulently then through the LL admission, selling them on eBay is legal.

I was wondering how someone so new could have made so much money so quickly, on the assumption it isn't an alt of an older player.

Then I looked at the profile.

One group... "Jackers", founder member.

"Second Life Jackers is an informal group for anyone who enjoys using the "Jackers!" adult video viewing booths in Second Life."

This practice confuses me, since you can just simply sell the L$ on SLEx and get a really fast turn around along with great customer service. Also you cut out the middle man and their fees...

This is in direct opposition to their claim you cannot sell them on eBay if they were obtained fraudulently.

Again, if LL doesn't want them sold on eBay it is very simple to have eBay kill all auctions advertising Lindens for sale.

Sounds to me like it's just another option that is provided for those who choose not to release their CC information to LL or the SLX and prefer having PayPal handle the transaction by only providing your email address to the person buying the Lindens from you.

Whether selling on Ebay is allowed or not, I still think selling on SLX totally kicks ass. The LindeX is too slow to be useful, really, unless it's just for paying tier.

But with SLX, I get my money within minutes in most cases, I can "sell now" at market rate or set a desired price and wait until it's hit, etc. I can't see why anyone would choose EBay over SLX.

You haven't inflamed me one bit, it's pretty clear your plan is not to cheat on people. Just be careful man, because you CAN and WILL get banned if you happen to run into a fraudulent buyer. Yes, they exist too. I would strongly suggest to at least check out the alternative, slexchange.com, mentioned by some of us. Anyway, it's up to you. You have a nice day too

On SLX, your email address is not sent to 'the person buying Lindens from you", there's more levels of indirection than that. Essentially, SLX hooks up the deal anonymously as far as you and the other party are concerned, and in fact it may be that if you sell enough Lindens, you are in fact fullfilling more than one buy order.

Not that anonymity is the big issue for me in using SLX, speed and features are the big draw, but I wanted to point that out anyways.

Um, I don't think they ever said that. As a matter of fact, I'm fairly certain there was a semi-recent blog post which basically said you could buy or sell wherever you wanted, but if you didn't use the Lindex, you were putting yourself at risk. I'd go look for it, but the Internet filter at work will not allow me on the blog page.

I do appreciate that and I have an account with both SLX and OnRez and will most definitely investigate that.

I think what got me most interested in selling on eBay was last fall, around October. I had a guy buy L$50,000 from me for $225USD. I saw his name and address and about flipped. He's a very famous celebrity who is also open about his interest in SL.

I was surprised he would buy L$ through eBay, paying more in the long run, than buying them over the course of a few days via the regular channels. He said "hey, I like the convenience of buying in bulk all at once." And that got me hooked. By seeing someone like him, with all the money in the world, buying several hundred bucks worth of Lindens at one time, knowingly paying out the butt for it, it became obvious to me why so many others continue to sell on eBay.

If the person who bought them was using a stolen credit card/hacked account, for example, then you'd be caught up in the chain of investigation.

Sure, you weren't to know that they were being bought illegally but I seem to recall that "not knowing it was a 30mph area" isn't an excuse for doing 60mph there either.

You do realize it's all the internet right? And not everybody always is who they say they are?

Just checking

I mentioned before on this thread that I have multiple accounts. I've been in SL since August of 2006.

Jackers is a very lucrative venture of mine and started with this newest avatar. This one is my forth avatar/premium account. I have a different premium account for each of my businesses in SL.

Just to say that I have used the SLex and PayPal several times and never had a problem.

Timing for me is not a major issue - SL is a fun thing and taking money out is not somehting I need to happen instantaneously.

I think the OP's experience may be the exception and I hope that the billing support people can help.

Of course SLX cares whether the transactions are legit or not. They would get hit with the same 150% penalty that any other avatar would being involved in helping to launder ill-gained Lindens. This is why they use LL's risk API, and they adhere to it strictly. In using the risk API they only allow transactions that LL would allow.

You should read the forums more - because many have had their accounts suspended for this, both buying and selling on EBAY. They have also had their Linden$ Balances wiped.

Used to be a fairly common thread topic, until SL exchange was more popular.

And yeah its well known that they suspended Anshe's account before, you are tiny infinitesimal potatoes compared to her monthly payment wise.

To those who commented on my post, I did say in it that I hadn't thought it through, and that it was off the top of my head - and I stand corrected.


A couple of questions:

Does SLX send cheques, or do they only pay into PayPal?

Whats the exchange rate like there as compared with the LindeX? I pay 28500L per US$100 and sometimes a few more cents. Is it better on SLX?

hmmm someting seems fishy

i have never had more then a 5 minute wait to get through and not always happy wiht there answers i have never had them hang up on me or not answer the phone


just my experiance

You can do a Limit Sell of your lindens on the Lindex at 265L/$, and they'll sell in a day or two. At 266L/$ they'll sell right away. The 3.5% only takes the rate up to 275 or 276. You're doing something wrong if it's taking you 28500L to get US$100.

Whoever you sold your Lindens to was either lying to you to cover their identity fraud, or they were completely guessing about the Lindex. The exchange rate they got from you was 196L/$. They could do a Limit Buy at 275, get their lindens faster than an ebay auction, and get 61792L for US$225. Even at a Market Buy, they'd get a rate of 265L/$ or better and immediately get at least 59545L for US$225. Either your buyer was completely ignorant of the process, or they we're using a stolen credit card.

thats not true. stop spreading lies vegetable