Feedback on Ad Farm Post - Part 2

Well I'm technically buying them for self defence too, I don't want some eejit buying them but there are still a few left and I won't pay those prices but now with the shape of my land those prices are less attractive. The more I buy the only person they can try to extort is me and I won't play their game.

However the fact that I've picked up 6 in such a short space of time suggests that for some, the game is up and for the others, they're in the last chance saloon.

Now is not the time to be fuelling their ideas that they hold something of value, now is the time to step back and see what develops.

(Following in Holo's footsteps, I present -- once again -- Crumbi)

BEFORE:



AND BEFORE:



AND STILL BEFORE:



AND FINALLY, AFTER:


Thanks!

Some people seem to be misrepresenting the views of the "anti-adfarmers" or whatever pseudo-stereotypical group label they can muster, claiming that our goals keep growing. This is, of course, quite untrue. We've had the SAME goals since we started. We're not asking for more than we ever asked for; Linden Lab is not (yet) fulfilling all the things we have asked for, is all.

The problem was ALWAYS extortion. (and yes, an empty plot set at a ridiculous price IS extortion, by the very definition of the word: "A gross overcharge". In the past, it was COERCED with ADDITIONAL forms of harassment, but strategically cut and priced plots are no less harassing (and effective, for the great majority of people who deal with them) than if there was a brightly lit flashing 200m sign on them.

Microparcels are fine AS LONG AS THEY AREN'T BEING USED FOR EXTORTION OR HARASSMENT. Sure, there is self-interest. That's a priori about the whole damned thing. People started this fight to clean up the messes around and in THEIR land, AS WELL AS everyone else's land who felt similarly. Yes, I DO want the holes in my land gone, just as I support anyone else for wanting the ones in THEIR land gone, too. Yes, I DO want all the parasitic advertisers GONE from my region. FOREVER. I want the turkeys who have been threatening and harassing me repeatedly for months BANNED PERMANENTLY. Yeah, I HAVE ARed them. More times than I care to count. However, when they do it with LAND, LL doesn't seem to see it the same way as physically being there. You CAN harass someone quite a bit with a microparcel.

Strategic landcutting and predatory pricing still are a form of harassment, and is most definitely extortion. The simplistic argument seems to be "don't buy it". Sure, don't buy it. If you want to expand your land, though, pay the extortion tax. Eventually, with enough people doing this, there won't be a single sim anywhere on the mainland which won't be peppered with extortion landmines. When one sim's worth of tier can despoil up to 35.2 sims of mainland (that's 1 16sqm extortion plot for every 512sqm plot on those regions, including group land bonus), it doesn't take a whole lot of tier and extortionists together to pretty much wipe out the entire mainland. That's 142 sims' worth of strategically placed extortion plots to ruin 5000 sims of mainland. Not too shabby, considering that, with the prices at L$5000 per 16, you can make a fortune and afford to expand at the same time. Sure, it's easy to say "just don't buy it", but there are PLENTY of people out there who feel compelled to pay those prices to recover the holes and corners and whatever else is hacked out of their plots. "So don't buy ones with holes or corners cut out!" Yah, well duh, but when there is more and more land every day that is turning into this crap, it becomes harder and harder to find good land. God forbid you EVER hoping to expand in an area; you'll have to sell out and buy a NEW plot somewhere else every time you want to even THINK about expanding, because, as time goes on, the odds of you getting a plot with a hole cut out of it next to you increase, and can increase dramatically if you are in any way active on your land. Yeah, the extortionists see that, too. They watch. They know what is a good mark, and what is a bad one. It is nothing more than simple CON ARTISTRY. I can't count the number of new mainland regions that were auctioned which IMMEDIATELY were cut with anywhere from a few to DOZENS of holes.

We've been educating everyone we can FOR MONTHS, and people STILL buy multiples of these things per day. Not to mention that those trying to do everything they can (at their own EXPENSE, I might add) to HEAL the effin' mainland, it's a travesty to have to put up with the BS these people dish out day after day, and to see our hard work ruined when the jerks come back and do it to another adjacent parcel. So what do we end up doing? Buying up every parcel nearby, whether we need it or not, to make sure that it isn't sacrificed to these abhorrent fiends.

It also begs the question: if having empty 16sqm microparcels will limit extortion, then why did certain peoples' plot extortion "businesses" grow explosively since February? They never put anything on their plots, but they sure seem to have no trouble devastating the mainland with their unethical practices.

No, there is more to it than simply the adfarming parts. They were only a part of the problem, and even this latest effort won't stop the practice of extortion. There's simply no deterrent for it, and every reason to continue. I mean, really, why shouldn't I (rhetorically) go into the microparcel extortion business? People make enough money to afford multiple sims' worth of monthly tier and have plenty left over to cash out every month as well as expand! I must be in the wrong business. I guess I should sell my mall, hang up my scripter's hat and jump right in and start cutting microparcels. I am sure landbot land reseller agents will be more than happy to buy up my worthless cuts when I dump them, leaving the L$5000-L$20000 kernels behind as my "tax" on mainland land use. People will pay it, too. They always do.

Further why shouldn't ANYBODY do it? Maybe I will write a book "How to Get Rich Quick in Second Life Extorting Landowners with Tiny Tracts of Virtual Land". Send it out via spam email or something. Just think of all the gold digging opportunists showing up and jumping right in with their US$10/month investments carving away, being as antisocial as possible to get people to pay the extortion (you do realize that antisocial behavior is part of the formula, right?). So what? Be a jerk to everyone; it just makes them pay up faster! Oh, and don't worry about the Lindens; they'll never do ANYTHING substantial about it; hell, we even have residents rooting for absolute landowner and anarcho-capitalist "free market" rights to make sure we can make hay under a Forever Sun!

Of course, who says that scenario isn't already playing out in some form? Sure looks like a LOT of new names out there, hacking up 512s into checkerboards (saw one a couple weeks ago in the act; a Japanese fellow, who didn't understand a lick of English, but did understand numbers, and when we would type numbers he would change the checkerboard square under our feet to that value, unless it was too cheap, then he would raise it in spite).

It's not about "profit", it's about "fraud". Extortion is a form of fraud, perpetrated on another person through malicious intent and/or force, either directly or indirectly. It is TRIVIAL to prove that the vast majority of overpriced microparcels were specifically intended to extort. Hell, I have CHAT LOGS of the extortionists themselves admitting to it! They know PRECISELY what they are doing. They are completely and totally unabashed about it. "I can do it, so it must be right! HAHAHA! PAY UP, SUCKA!"

What is really doing a disservice to the mainland and the Lindens is mischaracterizing the effort to clean it up as a "land grab", or an attack on "landowners' rights" or some rubbish about abridging the "Free Market". It is no such thing. Just like any "right" (though within SL, everything is a PRIVILEGE, not a RIGHT), when you abuse it, you *SHOULD* lose it.

I don't have any problems with people who own and use land legitimately, even buy, sell, and trade land legitimately. I am good with the market working out most issues, except for ones that it simply can not, by the very nature of the thing being traded. Microparcels have a disproportionate amount of effect on surroundings for their size than larger parcels. They also are orders of magnitude cheaper when that effect is considered than a standard-sized plot (256-512sqm+). As such, they make the perfect vehicle for abuse, harassment, and extortion.

There have been many suggestions about how to limit this effectiveness, from making microplots cost the same tier as a 512sqm plot per region (or for each), to limiting the size of land that can be cut down to, to limiting the minimum size of plot that can be sold period. All of these suggestions are fraught with problems, and sticky issues for existing and valid owners of microplots. There is, however, a much simpler and easier solution that fixes the problem once and for all: simply ban the ones who are causing the damage and perpetrating the fraud. It's not hard to take a look at a land owner's land profile and see what he is doing. If all he owns (across all his alts) are hundreds to thousands of microparcels set for ridiculous prices, ban him. Reclaim the land. Done. Next. The policy is simple: Microparcel extortion (like any other form of fraud) will not be tolerated. Linden Lab will determine whether or not each individual is compliant, based on an analysis of their land buying/selling and cutting practices as well as abuse reports from other residents.

I would love to have a hard and fast rule, but I think that this represents it well enough to be both functional and effective. In MMOs, there aren't thousands of rules to cover every kind of cheating imaginable; there's just one rule: don't cheat; if you are caught cheating, you will lose your stuff and get banned. People know what cheating is. It's not hard to catch it and punish for it. Land extortion, just as any other kind of fraud or "cheating" is no different.

I also would ask for a Land Grievance review board of some kind be set up to mediate disputes with land between landowners. I certainly don't think that a microparcel owner should be able to control what a larger, surrounding landowner does with his land, but that's what donut holes do, regardless of how they got there. Note I *DID* say "Microparcels", not "Standard Parcels". A 256-512sqm+ plot in the middle of a much larger plot would be exempt from any consideration of coercion. The mediation would require negotiation in good faith between the parties, where all options to work out their differences are explored before LL renders a judgment on what will be done. That includes parcel swaps, price agreement, and any other consideration. However, in the end, both parties should come out no less for their troubles.

That's the way it works in RL, and it is a good model to follow. It has a lot of tried-and-true case history behind it, too. It also gives incentive for both parties to work it out between themselves, because one or the other party will probably not like what LL decides if they otherwise fail to negotiate in good faith.

Some say that we're asking for a pact with the Devil, and that we are treading into dangerous territory. However, I think we have already been down the "worst" road possible, and need to stay on the road to recovery by NOT letting go of the yoke and watching the wagon roll backwards down into the same damn pit we've worked so hard to get out of at this point.

Some others say that price controls on land is in the same vein as price controls on items. Price controls on items is an absurd notion. There's no artificial or real scarcity of items, and the market is quite capable of moderating prices for them. However, land has several levels of restriction and scarcity involved, and that is why it is critical that it be actively managed and regulated. As such, the two concepts are not analogous with one another to exemplify a reason to not do so.

Until the unbalanced extortion power of microparcels themselves is limited in some way, I don't see any other way except for LL to prohibit behavior and practice judicious and prudent use of the banhammer for those who just don't "get it". Even if that ends up being pricing controls, I can live with it, even as a Concierge customer. I have no need to gouge anyone with land, so I would never run afoul of any kind of price controls anyway.

One thing Second Life was never meant to be was a "land of anarchy and free-for-all screwing over your neighbors". It's right there in the ToS represented as a set of core guiding principles. They've practiced temperance in the past against those who seek otherwise; I don't think they should restrain themselves from practicing it for this form of fraud and abuse, either.

In the end, Freedom comes at the price of Responsibility. I wish I could get everyone to understand that, but some people just refuse. Usually because Responsibility just isn't profitable enough for them. As a result, we get the Tragedy of the Commons, repeated over and over ad infinitum.

How about an avatar habi-trail/obstacle course surrounding them? Players get a HUD that keeps track of their score, and they get points by moving through the maze and touching targets.

I understand that some feel this kid should not be able to fish for recognition, or recieve any response to his cries for help, but I would like to suggest we point out some real troubling issues this one is dealing with in order to help others avoid his inevitable fate. Furthermore I would like to make it clear that not one extortionist in the history books was ever considered successful, in fact what happens to known extortionists gives even officers in any division the willies.
Now as I piece together the words this person is trying to use in conveying his thought pattern, and yes I am aware he might even believe his idiocy is true, but something very troubling emerges. The use of the word “assume” before the given scenario of drug dealers moving in beside me (Joe). Then repeats this ”assume” as he adresses a person who does not tolerate, and is against his land cutting practices, followed with an implied threat to this persons safety in RL. Now this is where that thin red line has been crossed (great metaphor huh?).
This poor kid even goes on further to suggest that I (Joe) stop crying, and close my account, but the real issue is his request for guidence on how to survive the street, and here is where I pop in:
Dear ROBO you would be typing these words with an automated computer system that responded to the twitches in your barely functional upper lip if you tried any of this crap on people in RL. I imagine you are preparing for the street life, as you have messed with so many people, and more sadly with what they love, so please take this lesson with you (if you make it past the first day, or the door) Don’t ever try to take away something people love, because people have a tendancy to do the most unusaul and “Scary” things to people when the culprit (s) are captured.
I am not “afraid” of you ROBO, I am more “afraid” of what I might do to you when we meet, and with that to answer your question on how I survived from living on the street, very simple really, I went to school, got a job, found my calling, and most of all, (listen carefully now little buddy before it’s too late) I did not F@*K with people who werent asking to have donought holes poked in them.
Yes ROBO you are right about one thing here that we comonly share SL can be a scary place at first true, but being terrified of the real world and those that threaten our existence in it causes most if not all to stand up, and fight to the point where the reoccuring nightmares filled with violence, and bloodshed keep us awake at night begging for a place like Second Life to escape from the horror’s of warfare.
Yes I cry ROBO, and thank you for your condolances pal, but I will not shed a single tear for you, or anyone of your friends , and family when this one is over. I “hope” this helps answer your question, and points out what “not to do” should you find yourself desperate looking to make a quick buck off of once rational people. Thank-you

Sincerely,
Bushido Contepomi

I understand that some feel this kid should not be able to fish for recognition, or recieve any response to his cries for help, but I would like to suggest we point out some real troubling issues this one is dealing with in order to help others avoid his inevitable fate. Furthermore I would like to make it clear that not one extortionist in the history books was ever considered successful, in fact what happens to known extortionists gives even officers in any division the willies.
Now as I piece together the words this person is trying to use in conveying his thought pattern, and yes I am aware he might even believe his idiocy is true, but something very troubling emerges. The use of the word “assume” before the given scenario of drug dealers moving in beside me (Joe). Then repeats this ”assume” as he adresses a person who does not tolerate, and is against his land cutting practices, followed with an implied threat to this persons safety in RL. Now this is where that thin red line has been crossed (great metaphor huh?).
This poor kid even goes on further to suggest that I (Joe) stop crying, and close my account, but the real issue is his request for guidence on how to survive the street, and here is where I pop in:
Dear ROBO you would be typing these words with an automated computer system that responded to the twitches in your barely functional upper lip if you tried any of this crap on people in RL. I imagine you are preparing for the street life, as you have messed with so many people, and more sadly with what they love, so please take this lesson with you (if you make it past the first day, or the door) Don’t ever try to take away something people love, because people have a tendancy to do the most unusaul and “Scary” things to people when the culprit (s) are captured.
I am not “afraid” of you ROBO, I am more “afraid” of what I might do to you when we meet, and with that to answer your question on how I survived from living on the street, very simple really, I went to school, got a job, found my calling, and most of all, (listen carefully now little buddy before it’s too late) I did not F@*K with people who werent asking to have donought holes poked in them.
Yes ROBO you are right about one thing here that we comonly share SL can be a scary place at first true, but being terrified of the real world and those that threaten our existence in it causes most if not all to stand up, and fight to the point where the reoccuring nightmares filled with violence, and bloodshed keep us awake at night begging for a place like Second Life to escape from the horror’s of warfare.
Yes I cry ROBO, and thank you for your condolances pal, but I will not shed a single tear for you, or anyone of your friends , and family when this one is over. I “hope” this helps answer your question, and points out what “not to do” should you find yourself desperate looking to make a quick buck off of once rational people. Thank-you

Sincerely,
Bushido Contepomi

I have to say that I've all but lost faith in the new rules working. Twice I've ARed a 70m high by 32x32 ad, with the ad all the way up all 4 sides, and it's still there. It's in Seymour if anyone is interested - you can't miss it. Next to it is a 256m ex-adtower parcel that is set for sale at an exhorbitant price and with ban lines - and there's another one just like in the NE corner. I've ARed the 256s once and the ban lines are still there. The new rules are not working reliably. I'll AR the 70m high ad daily, but I'm not confident that it will be dealt with.

With Jack saying that Concierge will be dealing with it, and Qie posting a message from Concierge that they are not dealing with it, it looks like a bit of a shambles, and I'm getting the strong impression that the new rules won't be reliably applied.

Bush,

Making threats in an online forum is the sign of a true coward. Just goes to show that you are at home throwing a tantrum over a game you have no control over. Honestly maybe its time to close your account if SL brings you to make threatening comments. Its obviously to much stress to come inworld and play.

Robo

A few minutes after I posted my previous post, a contributor to this thread came to Seymour to see the huge ad that, after 2 ARs, I've been unsuccessful in having removed. He ARed it while he was there and a few minutes later it was gone, as were the ban lines on the exhorbitantly priced for sale plot adjacent to it. What I want to know is, what has he got that I haven't got? (keep any answers to yourself - I don't wanna know )


I had a chat with a Concierge help and Concierge isn't dealing with abuses of the new rules - the Governance Team is dealing with them. That confirms the reply that Qie got.

I am waiting here for your answer to why you feel my answer to your question was threatening ROBO.

Where are you?

Bushido

Alt Power! I AR'd something earlier as me and that's still there. These things are supposed to be phantom is my understanding.

The G-Team have a history of inconsistency, probably not completely their fault, many ar's require a judgement call and this thread exemplifies how people have different views of what should and shouldn't constitute abuse.

Bushido,
Never try to teach a pig to sing. It won't work and its annoying to the pig.

Ad farmers stand to lose their game. They will lie, cheat, and steal to keep themselves in it. If an ad farmer tells you something, responding to it is a waste of keystrokes. Time is on our side for this one. We need to start worrying about the next game these abusers will start to play on us. After all, that is the only thing they can do. Actually contributing to SL is out of the question when there is money to be made.

Also keep in mind that AR's get priorety based on the number of ARs by different accounts to the same avatar.

so to get your AR to be acted on faster get on your alts and do multiple ARs

Also use the RC client (if you can) for these ARs and select Harassment > Advert farms / visual spam. These tend to be acted on faster. And always include a screenshot.

Ciaran. Were you using the RC viewer?

No Phil, I just reported it as parcel abuse.

Different parts of the AR can trigger different priorities. For example, ones from a Help Island go to the front of the queue.

/me bets that they've bumped up the priority of the Ad Farm AR category, at least for now..

Maybe they have more bots...I mean alts

Souvent je rencontre des parcelles qui ont des prix hyper cher! je me dis il veux pas vraiment vendre sont terrain...ou bien il est sous effet des publicités sur les perssonnes qui sont devenu riche en creant speculations.. etc....

ma question : y a t il un prix de plafond a ne pas depasser?

Translated by google

Often I meet with plots that have super expensive price! I want to say it is not really sell land ... or it is under effect of advertising on persson who became rich by creating speculations .. etc. ....

my question: is there a price ceiling has not exceed?

There are up to 128 512sqm plots per 65536sqm region at max density.

Assuming one 16sqm hole per 512sqm, that is 128 16sqm plots to despoil a single region.

One region's worth of tier (with group bonus) allows for 4505.6 16sqm "hole" plots, and thus can spoil 4505.6 / 128 = 35.2 regions (not 140).

To despoil the entirety of the mainland (estimated at some 5000 regions now), thus would take 5000 / 35.2 = ~142 regions (not 35).

The cause was a misplaced term, inflating by a factor of 4.

I apologize for the error, however, as you can plainly see, it still doesn't take a large amount of land, spread across enough people, to do significant (and, eventually, catastrophic) damage to the mainland, especially since this is a maximum-case-scenario, where the grid is made up on only 512sqm plots. In reality, 512sqm plots may be the mode, but larger sizes are definitely prevalent over a large percentage of the grid, thus the number of extortionist plots required will decrease proportionally, since a hole can just as easily despoil a large plot as it can a small one.

Back a few weeks ago, I offered a suggestion along the following lines:

Linden Lab should seriously consider integrating a tutorial into the land-buying system to educate prospective landowners to the schemes that unscrupulous realtors use to part them from their money. This tutorial would be mandatory, and residents would be unable to purchase land until they completed the tutorial. The current approach is, literally, a disclaimer saying "caveat emptor". This is fine on a bunch of levels, but it's a little cockeyed for Linden Lab to tell its customers to be aware when buying land without telling them what to be aware of or even how to best use the tools that the company has put into a fairly arcane viewer.

Of course, this wouldn't eliminate the problem completely. However, it's minimally intrusive and certain to have an impact.

Beyond that, I would suggest that certain practices (like donut-holing and covering up the hole with prims or foliage) be treated as fraud -- which they are even by the loosest definition of the term.

I'll probably keep putting this out there from time to time until somebody listens or the suggestion is rendered irrelevant by a better suggestion.

Bien qu'il y avait une alternative a ce problem( acheter dans un sim privé) j'apprecie cet loi. Mais maintenant j'aimerais bien que on trouve une solution au source de ce problem..! Mon avis, les gens qui se trouve entre les 4 murs de ses voisins n'a plus égalité de chance et vie...!
les prix élevé me fait sourire donc j'en aurai moins maintenant.. je ne sais pas si éxiste mais je pense que meilleur solution est de préciser un prix de plafond.
je vois encore autour de moi des adfarms ....mais je ne penses pas qu'ils ont tous mauvaise foi mais simplement
ils ne sont pas courant.! j'avoue que moi je l'ai appris hier par menace d'une voisine. Son coup bien calculé et bien subtile...lol
Je souhaite, ce nouvel loi ne seras pas un instrument de vengeance, réglement de compte, ou satisfaire certains égos

No, there is not currently a price ceiling, but others have also suggested this approach before. It is controversial.

The most-heard argument against a price cap is that it's "just wrong": why should LL have the right to dictate the maximum price for which a resident can sell anything? There should be a "free market." This is basically a religious argument and easily refuted, but it contains the germ of a good argument: appealing to real life experiences of failed price controls (e.g., Nixon in 1971), and analysis comparing the factors that lead to those failures to the situation at hand, and contrasting with more successful RL controls (perhaps the Netherlands' Polder model). I haven't seen anyone try to make that argument yet, but it could be compelling.

But I think such a price ceiling has a different problem: where can it be set (by any formula) such that it allows prices to reflect variable "true" values of property yet is still effective at preventing the spread of extortive practices? This is tricky to do because a relatively small margin (well, a few hundred percent) is still enough to fuel rapacious growth; indeed, the lower the margin, the faster the turnover of parcels, and the faster the dicing must proceed in order to maintain inventory (coincidentally generating the same cash flow).

Another problem is that it narrows the difference between "sheep" and "goats": As it stand right now, blatant price differentials make it pretty easy to determine which accounts are responsible for almost all the extortion on the grid. If price caps were imposed, it would be much harder to tell who was an opportunist and who an extortionist. Granted, if the ceiling were perfect there could be no extortionists, but lacking a precise formula for setting the cap, the problem could persist. Making the true extortionists difficult to identify would close one option that's currently available: seizing the accounts of the extortionists and confiscating the land.

....

FWIW, I'm not entirely sanguine with that account-seizure approach either, but not for the usually-cited reasons. I do not think LL has any reason to worry about lawsuits, unless the complainant has very deep pockets and is suing knowing full well they'll lose--and most likely suffer damages themselves in a summary dismissal. And I don't especially care about the "rights" of those who'd lose their accounts: I think SL would get along just fine without them, and they'd get along just fine without SL; it's not like it would cut off their oxygen supply. And I certainly don't care about it setting a dangerous precedent; on the contrary, a downside risk to being an total flaming asshat seems long overdue.

Rather, my concern is that, taken by itself, this step would be just like price controls, in that it removes the current crop of blatant extortionists, setting the stage for the next crop who'll be smart enough to operate at a lower margin, just "under the radar" of whatever criteria are used to identify the accounts to be closed. That next generation will be more difficult to identify. And that turns the whole thing into an extended exercise in evolutionary game theory.

The step could be effective, though, if taken coincident with the landcutting ban that's now in the works. If LL can devise a set of rules that prevent the spread of this practice, then there'd be no way that future "low margin" extortionists could get started, and cleaning out the current den of thieves would be permanently effective. (But at that point, it would also appear less urgent. Existing Mainland still would be shredded, but new auctions would generate a premium--not a bad outcome for LL, but only temporarily, until the next time the market saturates, when they'll be stuck with seven continents full of abandoned, non-tier-paying, revenue-bleeding server space. I suspect it will be difficult to get LL to look that far ahead.)

Global warming->sea level rise + a few mountain shattering earthquakes and tsunamis should settle the problem. The new continents could emerge from the oceans as bubbling lava.