The Question of Land Cutting

There are no Linden roads going through Nangrim, but the SIM does look a mess!

As opposed to a pretend bank that looks suspiciously like the freebie Frank Lloyd Wright House. If you don't sell Mainland, will that severely separated but joined 960m parcel for $L999999999 be joined by another memorial to landcutting and extortion which also won't ever sell?

The continuing theme of involvement in outlawed/soon to be outlawed businesses is quite interesting.


**The road does not go THROUGH Nangrim, it is a tiny corner. Number of businesses near the road- 1. Can't say as that business looks to really ever need prims, its a prefab thats in most every sim.

Re: Whither Nangrim



See, the only person who's making any money at this point is the original cutter. The cutter cuts, the roads-are-magically-valuable crowd buys, marks up, no one buys. And since the roadside is cut, no one wants the next layer back, which means you can't trade it, you can't flip it, you can't do anything with it.

What our free-market-righteous friends tend to overlook is that the seller is not the market. The *buyer* is the market. The *buyer* sets the price in a free market. In a free market, you go to the seller and you say, "I want your parcel but I won't give you more than L$5/m2." And then the seller figures out if it's worth it to him (and it probably is), and then chooses to sell or not to sell. But if the buyer isn't pleased, there's no transaction and no one makes any money.

And that's why these cut parcels litter Mainland: Their owners are terrible businessmen. They're either extortionists or clueless. Maybe in some near future there will be a renaissance of Second Life where all land will triple in value and customers will clamor to relieve these guys of their tier-heavy wares. However, I seriously doubt that day will ever come. And I think I'm being reasonable about it.

Chortle.

It's the argument of definition! Millions of square meters stand fallow of meaningful economic activity due to the irresponsible activity of a few, and you want to quibble over arguments of definition.

Well how about this:

If the threat exists that land extortionsts could buy a parcel next to mine, then I must buy the parcel next to mine in order to prevent this. That is the opposite of a non-coerced free market transaction, according to your definition. Furthermore, if a cutter buys a parcel next to mine, and cuts it, and then the bots descend on it like ravenous flies, and put up spinning for-sale signs and light-emitting cubes and turn it into a geological mystery site of 4m mounds next to 4m holes... Then I must buy these lands in order to protect my investment. And again: That is the OPPOSITE of a non-coerced sale.

So, by your definition, land cutters are ANTI-FREE-MARKET. So quit defending them.

Err .... any prims they bought in that sim would only be usefull on other parcels there. Of course, if it is all microparcels ......

Originally Posted by ACE BnT
You keep passing these inane, anti-market, diseconomic rules you are going to continue to drive the most productive members of SL away and within a year or two SL will be one more historical dead-end/backwater like AOL is..

Well let my dig into my memory I believe the first time I saw that SL was going to die was in late 04 then many many times after. I suppose the sky is falling works somewhere sometime but this is the oldest bad argument for a subject that exists ))

Cinco, rather than go after Ace, may I suggest you read back through my own posts? I think I have phrased the problem reasonably well.

After all the discussion I've read, I still favour a graduated price-capping system on parcels below ( & ONLY below) 512 sq.m, COUPLED WITH both limitations on land controls on very small (under 128 sq. m) parcels (e.g. banlines & terraforming) AND a more explicit policy statement re: the relationship between land use & harrassment/disturbing the peace, & more active enforcement of these policies.

Quite understandably, there has been a fair bit of discussion about how some people would be hurt by price caps on microparcels. No doubt, there will be some people (including, regrettably, some who have been acting in good faith) hurt by such price caps. I want people to consider for a moment who might be helped.

One group that I am hoping will be helped are people getting into the mainland for the first time. Such people will have access to cheap (admittedly small) parcels of land. They could get a reasonably useful (e.g. 256 sq. m plus) parcel for a few weeks of stipend, & give them a low-risk opportunity to decide if mainland is for them. It could be the new First Land, for people who no longer have access to First Land lol.

He can't, he is one, he said as much.

Angels don't ever have the urge to just get down and boogie so they don't dance on the head of pins. Also, according to Agnes Nutter it would be an infinite number since angels don't take up any space.

Oh, it's so easy to pick on the ACLU. Criticizing the ACLU as socialist is essentially admitting to being for totalitarianism since the ACLU does nothing other than to work to protect YOUR rights under the constitution so if you criticize the protection of your rights you are essentially saying that you want the government to do whatever it wants to you and you don't want any rights because it's "socialist" to want to protect your rights.

This Concept has me rather apprensive. I read through quite a bit of the thread but nowhere near all of it. I see a lot of valid points being made on both sides of the arguement.

The reason I'm apprehensive about this is that I own group land, which allots a lovely little amount of bonus tier. To fill up that bonus tier space, I have taken to buying up small 16m parcels on the same mainland sim as the rest of my land. I regularly skim through the remnants of the local adfarm area for price drops and get them when I can. Why? Because I have land tier available that would be otherwise wasted. Also, every 16m plot is another 3 prims of space added to my cap for the sim. I prefer to buy adjoining parcels, and always link them up when I manage to get them. Magically if you join a 16m2 parcel to a 16m2 parcel you go from 3 prims to 7 ^.^ .

Often, I will turn around and put these small parcels back up for sale, typically at a small markup but still less then much of the surrounding land. Why do I do this? Because While I enjoy having those extra prims, they aren't overly important and I would rather see the parcel joined to a larger one then have it remain as is. Recently this policy netted me a nice profit when a string of parcels I had bought and connected into a 256 with very odd shape, was purchased by the owner of the parcel that cut into the center of my u shaped land. The result was a 512 that now houses a beautiful little temple. I also had enough profit from the sale to purchase another decently sized plot of land in the sim and more then made up for the tempoary loss of prims.

As a rule, I join land whenever I can, But I rather *like* being able to buy 16m2 plots-but only in my home sim. I have no reason to buy 16m plots in other sims since they don't add to my prim count. I also like being able to sell 32m2+ parcels that I have made out of the 16m2's I have bought It is highly satisfying to see the 'useless' bits of land become more marketable.

A note though on my sales practice. I don't put for sale signs up, if I put any prims on a parcel it is usually a linden tree or bush. The land parcels just sit quietly, if they sell I'm happy, if they don't I'm happy since I can gradually make them bigger when oppourtunity strikes. There are legetimate uses for buying and selling tiny parcels. I do not want to be penalized along with several of my neighbors whom have similar practices for turning a small side profit occasionally on trading around these tiny parcels as they are progressivly bought aand linked into larger parcels. Since the downfall of adfarming this practice has been slowly but progressivly helping those of us living in the region to reclaim our sim and raise the surrounding land values slightly.

Another potential legitimate use is if a person is dropping from owning group land with the bonus to just owning personal land... and they have a 576m2 parcel. In order to keep from paying extra tier that person would need to sell a 64m2 piece to drop their parcel to the base 512. It would be unethical to force the person to abandon that 64m2 because it was deemed unsellable.

I do however agree that something needs to be done to stop the greifing uses of cutting land. I'm just uncertain as to what, exactly, needs to be done about it. The proposed ideas are interesting but I think more research needs to be done before action is made. Including more specific clairification on how exactly the defining lines will be drawn. The originating post for this discussion was far too general.

Granny Weatherwax will give you a different answer.

And that about wraps it up folks...... Jack?

I think it is amazing you are considering this. You are contemplating making a mockery of the idea of land "ownership".

A simple solution is to allowed cutting a parcel to smaller piece of land (child!), but only for use of the landowner. Without the ability to sell 'em. The smaller one always must follow the first one (master!) when it goes for sale.
The "Master" parcel can be limited from a LL property rule, for example not smaller than 512 sq. m.
For me, 16 sq. m. parcels are useless for normal, stand alone property.
There are sandboxes too heh?

A mockery of a mockery. It's almost Zen.

I don't like the idea of the small parcels infringing on anyone's land, however when I own land - should i have the right to use it and sell it however I want? It is afterall, MY land, right? Would you presume to tell a fashion designer that they can't sell a tshirt for for a given price?

When I bought my land, it was a bunch of disconnected 512 parcels - mostly former first land. Now, it's several larger parcels. I bought this land under the current rules, and you shouldn't change them. I.e. Land should be grandfathered. If I want to take my ~10k of land, and divide it into 512sq plots, that is simply my right.

If you wish to add a rule like this, you need a grandfather clause for people owning land since before the rule was put into effect.

First, nobody's proposing that you shouldn't be able to cut up parcels. Jack Linden put that off the table in an earlier thread. It's important that this policy (whatever it is) ONLY apply to microparcels, too.

However:

If he was spraying people's clothes with acid so they had no alternative but to buy his acid-proof tee-shirt or go topless? If tee-shirt makers were routinely doing this, I'd get out of the business of selling tee-shirts BEFORE they became illegal.

It is a real problem for me. My home parcel is plagued by spots I cannot buy because of the huge cost on 16sq parcels. I think a way to expedite a resolution is to allow for a few of such plots for each owner/group at the normal tier. Then Tier the hell out of the remaining. Such landowners will be more than happy to divest themselves of the multitudes of little plots.

This is a good point. I have this problem too. The mainland has over 4980 sims that I can't buy because they are too expensive or not for sale at all! There must be some solution that will let me buy it all for a fair and reasonable price.

I think part of the issue is that I am (and I assume others are) reluctant to buy odd shaped parcels near silly-priced 16m2s because that will encourage their owners to jack the price up even more.

I see Skye with a 16m2 in my sim but I'm not too worried about that. As far as evil landbot barons go, you guys try to be decent folks. There are others, others who have posted in this thread, that will take any sign of interest from me to mean that they should add another significant 0 to the price of their 16m2, also in that area.

Yes. If the sole reason is to sell that land via the public land sales tools. See below.


Yes. What someone does with a parcel of land of any size is their business so long as it doesn't violate the TOS.


Yes and no.

The simplest thing to do is recognize that land in SL has its parallels with land in RL and to set some simple zoning regulations.

One might be "Land smaller than 512m (minimum first land parcel) cannot be sold via the public land sales tools or be advertised for sale."

That eliminates sales signs on those 16m plots altogether, as well. The seller would have to find someone willing to buy the land directly.

Setting other similar land usage zoning rules and avoiding arbitrary pricing controls as much as possible sounds like the best course.

Another regulation could be that "Land for sale must have no prims on it without approval of local residents."

I don't think that 512m is necessarily an appropriate minimum. It may be that making the limit as small as 64 or even 16 would be adequate. I earlier suggested basing this on where the 95%th percentile of extortion plot sizes is.

This reminds me of the person who replied to my "anyone who feels that all their hopes and dreams are dashed by the existence of a 16m (or 32 or 64 or 12 on the EDGE of their property--well, for one thing, that shows a lack of creativity"

with

"Even if it's right along the edge of protected land, blocking you from that land?'

....that person knew he or she had a RIGHT to access to Protected Land, even over someone else's property...

...and also that a microparcel blocking your RIGHT to directly access protected land is Completely Different from a 512m blocking your RIGHT to directly access protected land...


!!!