RC Questions

Thank you.

The not-yet-closed linden started threads (including this one) should probably be included as well.

I will start indexing this thread as well later today and I changed the fileshare service to a paid service to cover the downloads etc. as its using more than free now lol

Great idea and I have placed a page linked from the Front page.

http://www.slapt.me/wiki/index.php/A_Page_to_Vent_On

and, just in cas you haven't seen this:

http://www.massively.com/2009/05/29/second-life-users-offput-by-content-ratings-test-area/

the bad publicity is starting I hope

Yeah. Just completely separate from the wiki, and maybe it's just me, but in the course of Jack's office hour yesterday, I got increasingly uncomfortable. As messed-up as the policy is, the objections to it are becoming more distasteful, at least to me.

Ordinarily I'd just pull back and ignore the whole issue: any ill effects of the policy seem just reward for the way some attendees behaved.

Perhaps some honestly imagine that protesting the policy may have some effect, still. Maybe they're right, even.

It's my sense, however, that the most important thing to do now is to rally the community to do what's best for itself assuming that LL will proceed without regard to protests.

These are not compatible approaches: Those who protest call for refusing to comply--refusing to move or adult-verify. In contrast, I've been all about trying to do all we can to get as many folks adult-verified and as quickly as possible, and to move as many parcels as possible, to dilute the ill effects of the policy.

One of these approaches is wrong.

I LOLed at the fence setup. The fence actually "protects" a Linden only sim, NOT the adult place. It's really to keep the Lindens outside of our adult area.

what's saddening me is that the noise from these people is drowning out our attempts to extract a better deal from LL. At the moment they appear to be in money sniffing mode now - they're offering what looks like a prorata-ed cost upgrade to an island but no grandfathering of tier during the bedding in period but with all the noise it was impossible to have a discussion about this.

It's LL fault though, their poor management and communications model make this type of thing inevitable. I wish they'd have an agenda like the triage but I suspect that would make them look too professional.

btw re the piof problem.. Blondin has dropped me an IM to say he's passed it on to the jira people and expressed a hope that they will look at it.

According to the data from my shop, around 10% of my visitors are piof (including the lovely couldbe) and around 30% are npiof - how many of those 30% are actually piof but not showing is unknown. It is quite possible they'll just ignore it and hope these people will just spend some cash to update.

I have another hunt coming up from monday, if anyone has a script that can pick up all the payment types plus the aristotle verification (or whatever indicators they use) then if you want to run it so we can get some better data then give me a shout. Hunts are good in that they bring a cross section of the community in general rather than just those interested in adult pastimes (if you see what I mean )

If I were cynical, I'd think the synchronization of PIOF information is broken on purpose and this is why.

I am cynical and that was my first thought when I heard the workaround. Another revenue raiser for them.

I went to oatmeal 15 again today. This is a sick joke one wrong. First off, adults who really are adult should not be behaving so stupidly and call that a protest. Secondly, Linden Labs are completely off their trolley if they think this is a good way of running a business and looks like LL is deliberately spoiling for a nice big fight______ i hope the people who really do believe in freedom of expression and a free open world do not fall for their bait otherwise we'll all be deaded.

This is like LL's world, LL's unimaginitive business policy, goes mad.

I can get mad too.

But i won't ---- just watch

K

Blondin keeps saying you need the new RC client to show PIOF in world, showing a complete lack of understanding of the issue.
He seems to think its an adult content filter problem not a account database problem.

PIOF & NPIOF have been and some sort of flagging based on them have been around for a long time. although the earliest form was extremely dumb.

just thought I'd throw this one in again.. It makes me laugh

Thank you for all your hard work LS. We all appreciate it- that goes the same for all the rest of you who are working harder than LL to make sense of this policy and to codify is *some* sense what they plan to do so that we can have a "more predictable" time dealing with it.

Anyone else find it completely appalling that LL can't even be bothered to do the work of articulating their own policy except by way of cherry-picked Q&A session which *ask* more questions than they answer?

Blondin... If LL's policy is *really* as nebulous as your answers make it out to be, if things haven't progressed to the point where you can give the people who *depend* on a predictable and stable business environment sufficient information on which to base their business decisions...

Then *WHY* is LL so married to a particular process that they cannot (or *will* not) make a few mid-course corrections?

You have received a *ton* of very good ideas for accomplishing exactly what LL says it wants to do, all of which will work better than the plan they have articulated. In fact, they will do so with far less upheaval to your paying customers, and the only pain that will be felt at all would be on the far fringes of the customer base- they ones who won't be happy with anything other than a Totally "PG" SL, ot a Totally "anything goes" SL. (well, and whoever at LL thought that using Aristotle was a good idea, and whoever came up with "2%-4%"- Those folks might gt something of a corporate spanking)

I think that everyone understands that there need to be some limits, and that it is entirely reasonable to say "there is a time and place for everything". OUr problem with all this is that you won't *tell* us what time and place is appropriate for our content.

You say that Ursula is the place, but then say that it will have limited space, a mysterious set of criteria for getting moved there, and a continually changing set of rules as to what needs to be there and what doesn't.

You say that you want to separate Adult content from illicit minors on the grid, and from those people who do not want to see it, and yet you:

-leave some large percentage of the offensive content in place on the grounds that it isn't "advertised"
-make no attempt to protect PG landowners by giving them a firm boundary between "PG" and "mature" land which will *still contain content offensive to them.
- Refuse to publish a list of search terms that will be filtered, so that merchants can decide whether their best interests lie in staying where they are or moving to Ursula.
-Decide to rely on the AR process to tell residents whether they need to clean up their content or move to Ursula, when most of your residents want to *avoid* giving offense in the first place, and would gladly move if they knew their content was going to be a problem.
- Refuse to offer a swap to *anyone* who wishes to exchange their current land for something with a more pleasing (to them) content rating.


Honestly, Blondin, can you imagine a greater disruption to the SL paradigm than the one LL is currently contemplating? If you are already implementing a "world shaking policy, why be coy?

Why not reshuffle the entire mainland structure? Migrate all the PG sims into their own corner by simply changing content ratings at the region level. Add "adult" land if you like, but you won't be able to fix the problem unless your PG customers can't look over the sim boundary and see a hot-tub gangbang!

Announce and that you are changing the content ratings of mainland to group the PG sims together, offer *everyone* swap to a new content rating if they wish it, and suspend land sales on mainland (linden-owned) parcels during the process. People who don't mind "mature" neighbors can stay where they are, people who don't like the new content rating of their neighborhood can move for free.

Publish your list of filtered search terms, and announce changes to the list via the blogs, and simply use the MOTD to say "there have been changes to the content filters in search- see the blog entry for details"

Encourage anyone who wants to to Move the the new "adult" land, and make it as big as it needs to be to accommodate the huddled masses yearning to breathe free and all that

Let your customers make an *informed* decision as to what content rating their business needs to succeed. I guarantee you that they will adapt to the new rules quite easily if only you will TELL THEM WHAT THE RULES *ARE*.

after a suitable period, you can turn land sales back on and know that you have actually *done something* to make the SL experience "more predictable"

Of course, this only deals with the issue of managing land content ratings, and there are other issues, but if LL were to adopt a plan like this, it would cause upheaval, yes, but I think that most residents and potential customers would see it as upheaval with a *purpose* rather than mere flailing about.

The current plan doesn't really merit the name "plan" if you can't articulate it better than you *have* been, blondin.

Either LL is "re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic", or they have some other goal in mind that makes these actions make sense.

If it is the latter, then you need to *tell* us what it is, so that we can make an informed decision about out future participation.

If it is the former, then the Lindens need to get their collective heads out of their collective asses and *tell* Cyn and the gang that *THIS WILL NOT WORK*. Use diagrams, flow charts, and corporate buzzwords to get your point across, but this plan will do nothing but open the floodgates to Abuse reports filed by self-appointed "content police".

You will have turned SL into the moral equivalent of Saudi Arabia- An over class who are able to do pretty much whatever they like because of their wealth (big landowners and businesses) with *most* of the population subjected to roving bands of morality cops who have license to administer an AR beat-down on anyone they deem sufficiently "immodest".

Feel free to ignore my words, but when AR's jump but a couple hundred percent, I send an "i-told-you-so-gram"

^V^

Thank you for posting that and putting it so well!

I think the LL plan and policy is suppose to be mystifying-unless you comprehend mega mind babble that is.

Wow
Pink Linden's open honesty is awesome

K

More publicity for the wiki, LS.

Check this out.
http://foo.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2009/05/strokerz-second-life-sextoys-broken-repairs-underway.html

I feel the same way- but that is a natural consequence of what LL has chosen to do. For all intents and purposes, they have kept this a secret and allowed the more vocal opponents of this thing to define the terms of the in-world debate. People simply don't protest politely, as a general rule. "civil unrest" is by definition, offensive to the social status quo.

Or, to quote John Adams from the musical "1776", "This is a *revolution* damnit! we're going to have to offend *somebody*!"



No. this is not the case. If people are *behaving badly*, then they deserve to have their accounts suspended, or abuse reports filed on them.

*nobody* deserves what is happening at the hands of LL as regards this plan. The basic idea of separating content categories from each other geographically has merit, but they are doing it in a way that causes the most harm and the least good.


The idea of further ensuring that children don't access the grid has merit, but they are going about it in a way that does the mast harm and the least good.

providing a "more predicable" experience for "non-social network" clients has merit, but they are going about it in such a way as to cause the most harm and the least good.


As long as those facts remain, protest, complaint, and and offering alternatives are the only choice available to a reasonable person who disagrees with the way things are being done. that some choose to use it as an excuse for foolish behavior doesn't invalidate the point that is being made. if these people *agreed* with LL they would hardly be proyesting in *unacceptable* ways, now would they? If they "deserve it", then so do the rest of us for daring to speak up.



I don't think that they are mutually exclusive. I think that one can "hope for the best, prepare for the worst". That's what *I* am doing. I have a grand total of 6 alts, and 4 of them are premium- another has payment info on file, and the last is the one I am using to test the Aristotle system.

I am *prepared* for LL not to listen to a word I say. I am *hoping* that they will draw back from the brink and do something smarter, more effective, and less disruptive.

Saying "there's no point in protesting" when the vast majority of SL residents are *still* unaware of the whole thing is rather defeatist isn't it? do you imagine for a moment that the percentage of "approve/disapprove" is going to change much? Don't you think that perhaps the reason why LL hasn't announced to the grid at large that they are requesting comments for this plan is that they are afraid that they would *get* them?


It's still early days yet. the amount of economic and customer satisfaction pressure on SL at the moment is *miniscule*. they can fool themselves into thinking that those who disagree with them are a small and insignificant rabble of grumblers.

Hell, even *we* think that we're a small and insignificant rabble of grumblers!

But once the announcement goes MOTD? That breaking wave Couldbe talks about is gonna hit, and hit *hard*.

Don't give up the game in the first period- it's early days yet.

^V^

Thanks, I'm going to leave the first account alone to see if it's ever updated automatically. I think I'll try the ticket route on another account to see how that goes.

Just remember ignore the stupid email and the attempts to get you to use Aristotle or actually send hard copy docs.

Make it Clear you have "Account Verified" but it is broken,
& that you are not looking to "Age Verify".
You just want your current status fixed.

Both count as "Adult Content Verified"my own term)
Or should that be "Adult Oriented Verified"



PS.
Can't wait to see if when they finally fully announce it
if it end up reading like this:
"Up coming changes to AO.
For more info click hTTps://blogs.secondlife.com/...etc...etc"
And the common reaction:
"Doh! I need to get a new Animation Override!"

Thanks for your kind comments, but I do not see it as me doing hard work. To me its about me having the facilities available to pass this message on, not just for us Adult content providers but for everyone in SL as LL is not yet doing anything to bring it to the masses of customers. Information is important to make choices and LL does not want to pass information on, so the SLapt.me wiki is becoming a good place to collate this information from more sources than one person could collect on their own.

SLapt.me is in place for another independent venture for SL and is currently in the coding and testing phases by our team and it was only right that I used one of the servers I own for this wiki venture, as it will be an SL venture completely soon anyway. We had intentions of putting a wiki in place on SLapt.me but brought it forward when this all happened, we will be also launching an independent forum as well on SLapt.me in the next few weeks.

I enjoyed capturing all the threads and converting them to .pdf's, so that people can download the whole threads and read them at their leisure, or use them to pass onto the press etc. to raise awareness of LL's actions. Also to me it is important that they are available outside LL's control as threads in the past have disappeared from view, at least this way they are preserved and we hope not only will the SLapt.me wiki become a place to store historical data like this and maybe the next big LL fiasco, but a place that everyone can come and be themselves and build it into an really independent wiki for SL, where future and current people will come for unbiased and bullshit free commentary and facts about SL. This however can only be achieved by everyone here, I cannot make that happen, I can only give people the vehicle and they make it happen

Right now, what I am doing is trying to capture the ideas people have come up with in a compact form, since its spread over so many thousands of comments, and also trying to organize the slapt.me wiki pages a bit better. I even updated the *official* wiki pages to reflect what we know now.

What I hope is that people start to take the short summaries, and pass those around both to the community, and back to the Linden staff. There must be someone in charge of this adult project. If nobody else, I will mail it to Mark Kingdon.

Print it out and send it to him by snail mail, certified receipt, so he has to sign for it.

and cc: to every media outlet on the planet, and tell him so.

Here's my problem with that: I built and scripted an interactive exhibit that tries to explain how to get adult verified. Does it advance the cause as I intended, or undermine it? If it's approved for SL6B and I rez it there, will it be the target of protests, on the premise that it promotes LL's crappy policy?

Since this all started, I've been operating on the premise that the more people who know about this and the more people who are prepared for it, the less damaging the whole thing will end up being for everybody.

A counter-position, however, could be valid: that by trying to ease the damage, I'm making the policy more feasible--more inevitable; that the only worthy response now is to try to make the whole thing impossible by refusing to comply, en masse.

If I were 100% sure of being right, this wouldn't be a problem for me; I'd have no qualms about explaining to them how they're being shortsighted and how the hysterics among them can just suffer the consequences--I would have done all I could to save them from their own folly.

Only problem is, I'm not 100% sure of that.

To date, nothing appears to have come even remotely close to convincing Linden Lab to reconsider the plan, or even alter it significantly. I am 100% certain the plan will be carried out. Protesters who decide not to comply will simply find their accounts suspended.

The best we can do is to make Linden Lab aware of the flaws in their plan so they can be corrected, and make as many residents aware of accurate information regarding the plan as possible.