Feedback on Ad Farm post

Yay! strides!

I don't think they will either. We've tried hard to use advertising to support NCI in a responsible and community friendly manner. But--if they've got to go, they've got to go. In the long run, everyone will be better off under the new policy.

Wow, it is finally here!! Thank you very much for taking this huge step to clean up one of the mainlands worst issues. It will be interesting to watch it all unfold. Guess I just might have to start bidding on auctions again when they roll around. Bye bye all you lowly adcutters

Congratulations on taking this very wellcome step towards controlling the despoilers of the mainland. We can now look forward in good heart to the further actions needed to complete the elimination of extortion.

I agree pretty much with Ordinal's prescriptions for permitted advertisng, but would be a little more severe....

1. Maximum height 10m.
2. Full bright only allowed if it is scripted to turn off at night.
3. As well as physical movemet, the speed/rates of texture animations should be limited to non-harassing levels (and to avoid the induction of epileptic fits).
4. Excessisve resource consumption by temp rezzing should be disallowed.
5. No light emission at all. The limited number of available light sources means that a few light emitting prims can easily be used to harass by extinguishing other lights.
6. Affected residents should have the right to screen themselves from the sight of advertisements that they find personally offensive without the threat of disciplinary action. The advertisers should be responsible for the visibilty of their manifestations by having suitable location and control (by nwnership or agreement) of sufficient surrounding land to ensure the required vsibility, and, of course, by avoiding offensive content.
7. Nothing floating (unless it's a gas ballonn tethered to the ground).
8. Blimps and skywriting only above 500m.

Some consideration given to the nature of RL comodities that are acceptable for LL-approved advertisement might be worthwhile in helping to maintain a positive public image.

Hahahahah. Now that would be maybe 20 well known adfarmers, each with, say, 20 alts = 400 adplots per sim. Are you sure that's enough for you?

That sounds about right ..

My impression Carl is that as the primary use of your parcels isn't for advertising, that they will be ok. This is the grey area that I'm sure some will try to exploit, but NCI won't fall into that category.

reading your post, Jack, made me believe a little more in LL. There is so many time we were trying to make you move. Finally it seems you are moving, slowlly, but moving.

Today i can say we won a battle, but... I will only believe you gave the end solution of adfarming, as you told Talarus you will, in your last Office Hour (and i was there, i heard you saying it) the day i will see the end of adfarming problem.

Well Jack, are you a man of one only word? I hope you are...

If there is to be land set aside in each region for Linden-sanctioned advertising, it should be only allowed by vote of the landowners in the region. IE, if the majority of land owners (their votes scaled by size of parcel owned in the region) say "NO", then they should be removed. If, on the other hand, a majority say "YES", then they should be allowed.

Otherwise, nothing really has changed, except that now, LL is sanctioning ad networks in my backyard.

I've gradually acquired most of a mainland sim, with the goal of improving the "value" of the land by eliminating blight. I've lived in constant fear that all of our work (and investment) could be undone by an adfarm. So I have a vested interest in this topic.

I applaud that something is being done about AD Farms. Its long over due. However, unless the opportunity to secure a license is open to every qualified applicant, LL will be in the position of granting a monopoly to those early and lucky enough to secure the coveted license. That doesn't seem fair and will build resentment against LL over time.

I'm concerned about that.

On the other hand, it seems that if the economics changed, the problem would be reduced. To that end, I recommend that LL consider the following:

Parcel Sizes smaller than 512m may not be bought or sold.
Parcel Sizes smaller than 512m do not support the generic "allow only" option, however would support a true "ban" of named avatars.
Parcel Sizes smaller than 512m are subject to a prim penalty, e.g. dramatically reduce allowed prims for very small parcels.
Block (disallow) Email and other forms of communication unless the parcel owner or group owns an AGGREGATE of at least 512m in the sim.
Abandoned Parcels less than 512m may NOT be auctioned. In lieu thereof, they will be offered to adjacent landowners or maintained as virgin land owned by Governer Linden until a adjacent landowner claims the small parcel.

Requiring a minimum parcel size for land sales would discourage a number of irritations without affecting shop keepers to split parcels for vendor stalls.

Disallowing the "allow only" option on smaller parcels eliminates the ban lines issue while still protecting the right of land owners to ban specific griefers.

Applying a prim penalty to smaller parcels has a two fold benefit. It would marginally reduce server load by increasing unused prims, and reduce the "value" of a 16m square plot.

Restricting prim communications based upon aggregate landownership within a region pretty much eliminates networked adfarms of 16m parcels, while allowing networked vendors to continue to operate at malls or other locations where a larger parcel is split for administrative purposes.

Taking abandoned smaller parcels "out" of the auction system further reduces the opportunity for mischief.

In short, making the cost of advertising more expensive changes the economics, and should have the effect of improving the esthetics of a region (over time). And more importantly, it reduces the need to use (or abuse) abuse reports and reduces the need for LL to become involved in land issues.

I suggest no temp rezzing, no glow and no particles. And there needs to be a limit for how many adds there can be in a sim. A low limit. Like 5 max. Im not sure about the idea to have ads by roadsides since people have to live by roadsides also. But if this is the way to go, make sure they are actually roads, and not just a strip of Linden owned land between parcels.

Isn't it nice to be appreciated for a change?

Thank you LL

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I really hope this works out well and sorry for doubting you all.

This is fantastic and I am finally happy to hear that Linden Lab is taking action against abusive and illegal use of advertising on the Mainland. I can't help but wonder if you have read the story on the SLNN about the problems that we encountered during one build and how we resolved it. http://www.slnn.com/article/big-paw-paw/

Even though this refreshing move has come too late for us, we are still pleased and hope to soon see a renaissance of the Mainland. Bravo!

However, I am concerned about the quiet, silent, little demons in hiding, who are stealing our data and info without our authorizations. These people have data collectors all over the mainland on small 16 sq meter plots. They are an invasion of privacy. Most of us hate them.

Will people still be able to own 16 and 32 sq meter plots and also divide and subdivide, and sell so small? There is also another type of extortion there, even though not always an adfarm.

Thanks again Linden Lab!

I hope this doesn't fall into the "good idea with bad execution" category that plagues may Linden Lab policies.

It concerns me that the deadline for disallowing ad farms has been set, quite soon, before Linden Lab has actually formulated the policy defining what an ad farm is. It sounds like a recipe that will lead to some costly chaos for otherwise innocent residents.

Unless, of course, the policy has already been decided internally by Linden Lab, and the call for comments is just for show.

Getting rid of the ad farms is a good idea. But rather than approaching it haphazardly, why not develop the policy first, and then set the timetable for implementing it?

If someone did that to me I would simply put an invisiprim up between me and the "grid". I have an adfarm across a sim border from me, and I simply don't see it. Parcel muting would make that much more effective... even if he was stanfing there you wouldn't see him nor hear him... nor would anyone else on your property.

In addition to many of the suggestions above, I think on future advertising plots the use of temporary prims should be prohibited. I have the unfortunate 'pleasure' of being on a sim littered with a number of 16m plots that have fifty+ prims on them continually re-rezzing, emitting sound and particles, all attempting to extort money out of people for some Native American charity, whilst displaying adverts for porn sites, medical sites and other such spam-like places.

I agree with the calls that all out-of-world advertising should be curtailed. I think if these companies are so eager to advertise in world, they should make the effort to establish a credible inworld presence and be prepared to play by the 'laws' operating within Second Life.

As other people have said, these kinds of schemes break too much legitimate activity, and don't stop extortion.

As I said in http://forums.secondlife.com/showpost.php?p=2135042&postcount=56 ...

I don't think any kind of scheme involving limiting ownership or trading in small parcels will solve the extortion problem. What WILL solve it is *per-parcel* parcel-level muting.

If all the landowners around an extortion plot mute it, so nobody can see the objectionable content, there's no more leverage for the extortionists.

Wish I could say YEAH to this, but I'm very skeptical about this plan. It all sounded good until I read that you were going to have licenses to advertise. So this appears on the surface to be about making the mainland a "nicer place" to live in. But behind that is possibly another revenue stream for Linden Labs. Will these advertising licenses be free or will you have to pay for licenses to advertise? I'm guessing you will be charging for advertising licenses.

So we have 2 competing agendas here. One to eliminate offensive Ad Farming and related crap for the good of the Second Life community and residents. This I say YEAH to!!! The second agenda will be for Linden Labs to sell licenses to people so that can "legally" advertise. This concerns me. Who will win: the public good, or Linden Labs making more money?

It can be a very slippery slope. You sell a big advert license to someone and they abuse it. So you tell them "stop that". And they don't stop. So you decide to shut them down -- then someone at Linden Labs says "we can't shut them down, they are paying us $$$$$$$$ every month." And we are back to where we are now -- with one difference -- Linden Labs is making money on the offensive advertising.

There is one statement in your post that is critical: "The idea here, is that where we do allow a small amount of network advertising to take place, it is highly controlled, low impact and managed responsibly." If you can do that, I will say YEAH!!!

This is going to be a monster, hard job. Do you have a big staff dedicated to this? Enough to wander all over SL and deal with each advertising violation? Each situation will require a human being to go to location and make a personal judgement of the violation. After all this is a "visual" and aesthetic problem we are dealing with. Can you deal with the hundreds of "advert abuse reports" you will receive each day? Will you deal with EVERY advert abuse report, or just the ones YOU think need attention? Big job -- hope you guys are ready for it.

Can the "public good" win over you guys making more $$$$$. In Real Life, $$$$ almost always wins over the public good. A few years ago I would have said "Second Life is different from Real Life in this way." Now I'm just not so sure.

I love the idea of eliminating offensive advertising practices in SL. We will have to wait and see if you can actually do it.

Tim

Many sims are completely spoilt and worthless because of Ad Farmers (and others) using hillsides and mountain slopes (even over 200 meter up) and adorning these with ugly and "out of character" ad monoliths and billboards

All advertising restricted and at "ground level"?
Lets make that restricted and at "sea level!

Fantastic... cant wait to get my view back and the 50 and 80 meter high ads removed from next to my property.

Absolutely! The last thing a legit advertiser wants to do is get lumped in with the ad farmers and alienate themselfs from their potential clients.

These are just a few of the extortion prices around me:

300 L for a 16m (18L/m)

or for the truly delusional:
1495L FOR 16m (93L/m)
9999L for 16m (624L/m)

which this one makes the above look like a bargain:
14999 for 64m (234L/m)

Extortion is a crime which needs to be addressed. The track record of all those applying for licenses should be taken into account. the 9999L belongs to one who should be looked at closely. The price was 5000L yesterday.

As long as extortion will get addressed as well, this is a wonderful and commendable move by LL. I look forward to not seeing the floating body parts from my home anymore.

Thank you for this, Jack. Much appreciated.

As to this -

- no thanks. I can picture it now: 40 bots sitting and doing nothing, while 40 large, fullbright adprims hover in the air above their heads...

A step in the right direction. /applauds LL

However, it still does not address the "banlines", "prim land" or "roadside" extortion., because huge parcels are being hacked into 16 sqm plots as we speak. Lately, I have been seeing tracts a large as 4096 being cut into 16's, in some regions.

"Checkerboarding" used to be subjected to disciplinary action and I highly recommend LL revisit this rule.

Fragmented land, often becomes unsaleable because it cannot be joined to adjacent plots, or is a total eyesore and is highly labor intensive for LL staff to manage. Not only that, land held by Governor Linden does not generate revenue for Linden Lab.

Travis Lambert said it best. "Governor Linden managing small parcels is not scaleable" whereas, resident programs are.

I implore you Jack, to go all the way, addressing all of these issues collectively, then and only then will the issue of extortion be dealt with fully.

P.S. Licensing need not only apply to advertising. Scanning, bots and data mining should also be considered under this rule.

Carl, AdNode is focused to be seen only by people attending NCI, inside of NCI venues.

Banning NCI's AdNode advertising would be the equivalent of banning networked JEVN vendors in shops. Every networked vendor system is plastered in ads (of the products sold).

AdNode is not aimed outward for passersby, it's aimed by people intentionally going to NCI, just like a shop. I've never heard of Networked Vendor Farming ever mentioned as a problem. Just about every major shop has networked vendors.

To settle any doubt, one option might be to put a roof over NCI locations so that AdNode graphics could not be seen from the outside, period.

Invisiprims don't stop harassment, and in the last few weeks, the Lindens have been going around and removing such prims that we have used to block adfarmers/extortionists, because the parasites have been ARing us, the victims of these scams, claiming that we're "blocking access", even when the prims are invisible from their side and phantom.

No, what they need to do is take the list of the worst offenders that we've already given them and just BAN them permanently, and if anyone ever comes back and cuts land for the purposes of extortion, they get banned immediately, all L$ reclaimed from their accounts, and their land seized and returned to the available land pool.

Now, THAT is REAL deterrence!

ROBO Marx, it will be so good to see your ad gone from in front of our bowling alley in paw paw.. have a nice SL life.. and absolutely "not" to one ad per avi.. that is an abuse for sure...grr

This might explain the disappearance of an ad building near one of my parcels a few days ago. It wasn't real ugly or intrusive but I doubt anyone is crying over it being gone either lol. Now if only they weren't trying to sell the empty 256m plot for 46,000.