The Question of Land Cutting

This policy proposal has come about due to the creation of small parcels for the purpose of extortion. Don't make it more complicated than that. It has never been about say a 4096 being divided into 1024 s or 512 s. The market does a fine job controlling the prices of these larger parcels and they should (and certainly will) be left alone. Cutting land and the consequent setting of small, strategically placed parcels at ridiculously high prices is a criminal act and should be treated as such - this practice is what the policy is about. And in fact, the cutting of land into small parcels that then get bought and set for sale by extortionists IS still going on at a high rate. Look at the land sales pages if you want proof. The reason we need this policy is that the ad rules did not eliminate small (256 m and smaller) plot extortion.

Many have no idea how to manipulate whatever this referances while there on the land page is a media slot that you just put your stream in. And it has only to do with land management not extortion and I suspect inside your boundries no one cares so it is the easiest way to implement seperate streams. Just don't sell the little dots.

I am amazed by people's poor understanding of markets and the alacrity with which they seek to employ the power of the state to boss others around.

All transactions require a buyer and a seller. Without an agreement on both sides, there is no transaction.

There is a 96m2 lot on Boardman for sale at L300k, interested? Why not? Probably because you don't want it - even at L10. What is its 'value'? To you, maybe zero, to me, maybe L10k, to someone else, maybe L100k. Judging from its time on the market, no one wants it for L300k. That means the owner will have to lower his price to sell it. Welcome to Economics 101.

Harassment and ad-based extortion are already against the TOS. The number of people who use/buy/sell small lots for legitimate reasons dwarfs those who build eyesores for the purpose of extortion (repeat, already a violation of the TOS).

Therefore, what many people are REALLY saying is that LL should force owners of small lots to sell at the buyer's preferred price. How wonderful! Shall I now march over to my neighbor with a troop of LL police and lawyers and announce that he shall forthwith sell his 128m2 lot to me for L1k?

Why stop there? Isn't that 4096 down the way 'overpriced'? Let's call in the LL cops to make him lower his price. Yahoo! Free beer all round.

On several occasions, I have paid L10k for 16m2 squares imbedded in neighboring land then given those squares to the grateful neighbors. Why? Because it was worth it - because L10k was a small price to pay for the resulting benefit. Shall we ban this practice?

Bottom line: value is subjective. The market (community) is composed of a range of people with a range of preferences for a range of goods and services. 'Price' is the communication system between these people. 'Price' is the method of allocating goods and services across the economy. It may not be perfect, but a network of decentralized micro-decisions is vastly superior to the mood swings of a centralized bureaucracy.

That's it! It is not "market". It was an extortionist that maintained the micro plot only to sell it overpriced to the only people who could be interested in it: you. And you paid him, and he is now laghing at you.

Yes! This parctice must be banned!

• Do you agree in principle that land cutting needs to be a violation?
– yes ... and no ... read on ...

• Are there any legitimate reasons for land cutting (excluding profit) that we should consider when setting policy?
– yes! and the reasons are many; 'land cutting' itself should not be disallowed or considered a violation but trying to sell those "micro parcels" should be. (the server should disallow the sale of a parcel below a certain size.)

• With land that is already cut up, but still mostly owned by the resident that cut it, should we ask that the land be joined back together?
— no; but disallow their sale

Yes ...
Clamp the price for parcels smaller than 64m.
And disallow the sale of 16m parcels.

I agree 100% that is a violation.
There is no legitimate reason to sub-divide the parcel other than gain a profit from that.
I own a lot in Batak. After I've bought it I discovered a 16 sq. m area that belongs to someone. This mini-lot destroys the whole look of my land. There few more small 16 sq. m parcels located on the boundary of my land and I am afraid that some day the owner of them will put something ugly there blocking my view.

The type of land cutting that you are describing above to squeeze more profit or extort higher prices is a great step towards cleaning up the mainland. I see no need for ad farms. We have a search function for that. I have several small 16m parcels in my sim. These are not for sale or intended to cause any problem. These 16m parcels within my sim are used for advertisement in search or as a TP point within the sim.
Now some of the other uses that I have heard about I.E., selling a parcel with a hidden 16m in the center unknown to the buyer until they find a spinning for sale sign in their living room with a price tag worth many times more than the amount of the lot that surrounds it. Yes that is wrong and should be dealt with. I am happy to see that something is being done about this. “Rome wasn’t built over night.” So I can se how the grid is being cleaned up one step at a time. Great work everyone! Next get the juveniles out of SL and keep this an adult grid.

I have 4K mainland land that is surrrounded by 16 meter pieces. Most of the people no longer play or refuse to answer my notecards. Many pieces are selling 1K to 15K each. One `16 meter piece is right in the middle of my land. I have bought up all the pieces that were 333L to 777K lindens and pieced it all back together.

I bought some land that was in pieces and the parcels that really belonged in someone else's yard, I gave to them. I think we all need to work together to fix this mess cause by stinking greed.

I think all 16 m pieces should be confiscated and given to the land that surrounds it or offered for purchase to the land that it is attached to.

People who own these pieces and have not been active for awhile should absolutely lose them. Then the pieces given to the appropriate land that it should be a part of.

Firstly, I am glad you are addressing this topic, I am a mainland resident and am unhappy with the '16 sqm parcels for sale' cluttering the land. Of course there are legitimate reasons for a 16 sqm parcel, but I can not think of a legitimate reason for selling one!

I do not have the time to read all the posts that this topic will generate but here is an idea I had (sorry if it has already been posted):

After a specified date, parcels smaller than 64 sqm may only be owned by a Resident/Group with an adjoining parcel or more than 512 sqm in the same region. This allows most of the legitimate uses that I saw (streams, rental space, rental offices etc.).
If the ownership conditions are not met, the land is automatically abandoned and made available to the parcel neighbours, prioritized in order of number of shared boundaries, for L$5 per sqm.

Yes to all 3 of the questions in the blog.

No. The problem is not land cutting per se but the incentives that drive the price of the cut parcels above market value. Use of cut land to annoy your neighbors should be a violation. The act of cutting should not be.



Media streams have been mentioned several times. I use cut parcels as part of "home sandbox" system. Small parcels with different permissions for shoppers to rez merchandise boxes also come to mind, or as teleport landing zones.



Only if the resident is using the land in a disruptive manner.



Interfering with the market like this is seldom successful – look at the home mortgage situation in RL. If this is implemented, people will sell 80 square meter plots. Address the crime, not the method of committing the crime.

I'm with those who recommend exercising immanent domain over those who hold small plots and use that ownership to disrupt their neighbors. Auction the seized parcel to the owners of neighboring plots, with no reserve price; this will recombine the land. Allowing for this special sale will require some coding effort as well, but is more likely, IMO, to succeed in the long run than attempts at price controls.

Finally, I'm pleased to see Linden Lab actually soliciting ideas from the community before embarking on policy decisions. Thousands of residents do have a pretty good chance of finding a solution that works. Thanks for giving us some credit, Jack.

Cutting into small parcels to allow renting of small areas with their own media and also to allow different media to be played in the same building, to limit access to certain areas etc.
This is not something you want to prevent surely ??

Selling for profit is one thing, but dividing parcels is an essential tool !!!

Instead of introducing a rule that will badly affect legitimate users freedom, would it not be better to just make it clear what is considered to be abuse, and then start banning people who do abuse it.

I agree with Astryl Arai. The same thing happened in Marybank to all of us. Cleaning up the mainland is very much appreciated.

I fully support the policy of prohibition of commercial land-cutting. I have been irritated by this, and I know I have avoided buying property that has such land adjacent to it, or even in the neighborhood.
There are, however, some legitimate uses for land-cutting on one's own property. I have a store area where I have cut out a 16m square for customers to rez their items. This square has different properties than the rest of the area. I'm sure those who rent stores or homes and apartments to others, also like the ability to section off an area to provide different property abilities.
I think one way to prevent this from becoming a problem would be to limit the minimum size of land that could be sold. If 256 or 512 was the minimum lot size one could sell, I believe it would eliminate the problem. You could further include no subdivision within the boundaries of a property. For instance, if I want to sell that property that I have my store on, I would have to recombine the lots, eliminating that 16m cutout. So perhaps a specification would be not to have any dis contiguous property within the borders of a lot for sale.
And thank you for this work of cleaning up the mainland. It is appreciated.

I own a total of 2 1/2 sims in SL. Do I cut land..sometimes I cut a 16m plot to set a landing point or run a classified or event or to name a section of my store and run a classified. I even cut a 16m plot to set an atm to SLExchange so I could name it and ppl port to it (before SL bought it and took the atm *sigh*) So yes being able to cut small plots is very useful sometimes. I don't sell it or put big advertisements on it and see no harm in me doing it. I own the land and should be able to do this if I want/need to if I am not creating eye sores for the mainland or trying to rob ppl. Why punish us when you should go after the bad guys?

The issue of cutting is indeed a very interesting one and I could not agree more with having policies against parcel fragmentation. But what I would like to do here is to relay the frustration of some friends who could buy 512 square meters on mainland without paying monthly tiers but who cannot find other parcels than 32 x 16. This rectangular size can be a drag if you want to rezz scenes on a holodeck because, usually, they are squared, like 25 x 20. Any possibility of a change? Thank you.

Cap prices on land 64 m and smaller. I have read some posts here by micro plot network owners that state they have paid high prices to begin with. Well, too bad! Your loss will be entirely due to your adoption of a business plan that has had an adverse effect on the rest of the grid. If you do not want to recoup some money by selling your land at a loss, then abandon it and leave SL. Good riddance! Oh yeah, good luck with those lawsuits. ROFL

Who exactly is going to be dealing with the Abuse Reports such "violations" would undoubtedly generate? The Governance Team are going to need to take on a whole load more staff to deal with this new "crime", when it seems they are hardly able to keep on top of the more pressing - and potentially life threatening to Second Life - issues as it is.

I think the ultimate solution needs to be to remove the economic incentive. Make it impossible for lots smaller than a certain size to be sold for a price above market value. Yeah, that will take some manhours of development to implement, but then it will take probably the same number of manhours to run around the grid looking for violators of a new policy.

64sqm is too small though. Make it 256 or 512. Whatever you make as the new threshold will become the new minimum size the cutters will go for, policy change or not. So make it big enough to actually be useful.

I do not pay L10k for ALL 16m2 lots. I pay L1k or L2k or L5k or L10k for PARTICULAR lots depending on their individual value to me.

Some people pay $500 to go to a performance at the opera; other people pay $500 to watch a football game. Some people pay $100 for a hairstyle; other people pay $100 to play video games. Some people pay $50 for a sirloin steak; other people pay $50 for a bottle of whiskey. It's up to each individual to choose for himself how to spend his money. That's what freedom of choice is all about.

I've seen this one on Berkman. They have an area for viewing their videos with a bunch of little kiosks; you walk up to the one you want to watch and start your video and then you see it on the big screen nearby. The screen doesn't have to be on the same plot so long as it has the correct texture; somebody standing next to you on one of the other plots will actually see a DIFFERENT video on the same screen.

The rule wouldn't affect them anyway because Berkman is a private island, but somebody might want to use the same technique on a mainland plot.

I have lived next to an ad farm and tried to buy most of the 16m2 parcels surrounding it and put up a screen and tall trees around it. Yes I paid a small fortune, but instead of seeing huge, ugly ads, I saw my screens and trees. The tiny parcels are usuelss and have one reason only; extortion. Now that ad farms have gone away, well sorta, the little parcels remain at very high prices. Cap the prices on anything smaller than 512m2 to avg price. And, as someone suggested, put a time limit on those who do need a reason to split their land for whatever reason.

Thank-you very much Linden Lab, and especially Jack Linden, for taking these positive steps towards restoring the mainland to its original beauty, and intended purpose.
I have put myself on the front line, invested thousands of USD in order to restore the land that has given me so much hope, joy, and purpose. Today, I feel that it was worth every, hardship, penny, and would invest it again should ignorance, greed and intolerance run amuck in this exciting new virtual world we share.
Questions: Do you agree in principle that land cutting needs to be a violation? Are there any legitimate reasons for land cutting (excluding profit) that we should consider when setting policy? And with land that is already cut up, but still mostly owned by the resident that cut it, should we ask that the land be joined back together?
Answer: There is absolutely no need for a 16-64 sq. m. Parcel any longer in SL, and I highly doubt that chopping up a 512 sq. m. into 3 sections benefit’s vendor’s (renter’s) currently allowed to own their own 512 for free at first level tier membership rates, and if the odd shaped roadside/ riverside/ lake...whatever, is larger than that; then perhaps bring your membership up to the next tier level, and buy it, but do not complain that you can’t chop it after the fact.
My 5 vendor’s (including 2 unpaid AV’s) were successful on the shared land provided, it was much larger than 512 sq. m. sold their creations, and left me a tip (rather than paying rent) in order to cover the $L30 land search tool; including my tier fee’s. My non-premium account apartment renters were happy paying the rental box outside, as was I when I had my first apartment in SL (actually it was in the apartment, but moving on...). Claiming that it is necessary to split audio/video streams in that small of a section (512 sq. m.) baffles me.
Advertisers were never a welcome sight, and left a destructive mess that is going to take many hours to clean up. Joining the land back together will raise the price of mainland, and boost the economy by benefiting all that are here for the enjoyment of SL rather than the obvious exploitation that has taken place.
When I decided to get into this battle over Virtual Mainland micro extortion parcels; my intention was to make sure that new Mainland owner’s understood the Micro Parcel Extortion Issue, and had hoped that LL would inform the public about what was really going on (before purchasing Mainland).
I do not see why the minimum parcel holdings of one tier paying Avatar in one SIM should be any less than a combined 512, and I look forward to flying (or hiking) across a more visually stunning Mainland.
Things change in business, adapting, and overcoming obstacles is a huge part of it. Griefing about all the money we have invested in our enjoyment of Second Life is redundant. Someone pointed out in a previous post that those micro parcels, were originally created as a griefing tool, and yes; I too wish it was dealt with many thousand dollars earlier, but am grateful to be a part of the solution, and not perpetuating the problem.
Remember that we have, and will benefit greatly from this experience; paving the way for unlimited new customers of our product, and services, but most of all; our friends and family that will revel in the beauty of Second Life.
Even though a majority of noob’s still have no idea about this issue, and may not have to experience what we have been through to get to this point; I am optimistic about the future of Second Life, and look forward to seeing how LL handles future scam attempt’s on our community.
Thanks Again Jack!
Sincerely,
Bushido Contepomi

Yes you have the freedom to continue the problem by paying the extortionist's prices. That doesn't make it any less dumb.

I'm afraid I cannot read all the 230 forums posts before mine, so just consider this my "vote", for what's worth, and not an attempt to reply/engage in communication with previous forum posts

First, thanks, Jack, for addressing this I think that's the major issue here — thanking you for being willing to look into it and figure out a solution.

Now, for your questions:

1. Do you agree in principle that land cutting needs to be a violation?

Yes, in two cases: if land cutting (into tiny plots) is used for extorsion purposes (ie. unreasonable pricing) or for other ToS violations (ad farming, surrounding other plots with banned lines, etc.).

But no if there are legitimate purposes...

2. Are there any legitimate reasons for land cutting (excluding profit) that we should consider when setting policy?

At least three legitimate reasons come to mind:

- setting audio/video/HTML streams per parcel. Several types of vendors and art displays require those
- when reparcelling plots, sometimes tiny plots require "temporary" existence for a while (so preventing the land tools to size plots under a certain limit is not a good idea). I suggest that the land tools allow microplots to exist, but not to be set for sale. It'll be hard to define what should be the minimum size of a plot to be set for sale. Suggestions have been 64m/128m, but I'm pretty sure that even those slightly larger plots will at some point be abused as 16m-plots are today. It's a tough question to answer
- slicing off a bit of a parcel to keep within tier limits should be absolutely legitimate


3. With land that is already cut up, but still mostly owned by the resident that cut it, should we ask that the land be joined back together?

Yes, unless it's been used for legitimate purposes. Perhaps the best answer is: yes, if all those plots are set for sale.

So here goes my suggestion. The first thing is that "legitimate purpose" will be hard to set in *code*. A first principle should be easy: plots under, say, 512m (to be discussed) should not be set for sale to _everybody_ (ie. not listed at all on the sales) but just _for an individual_. The reasoning? Premium accounts are still required to own land on the mainland, and you pay the same tier for 512m or 16m. So the land listings should *start* with listing *only* plots of 512 m or larger.

There is the issue, of course, of people wishing smaller parcels, e.g. have two parcels of 256m, one in snow, another by the beach (for example) and not willing to go up on tier for that. So what to do? For legitimate business, this is not hard: all the landowner needs to advertise is that they have several plots for sale and are willing to slice bits off it. But this means that they'll have to legitimately engage the willing buyer on one-to-one chat, slice a bit off a 512m plot, and set it for sale for the willing buyer _only_. Granted, there will always be ways to grief the system, but definitely much less than today.

So what this means is that if someone wishes to buy a tiny slice to be within their tier limits (specially when buying group land), they ought to be able to do that — but, manually, with face-to-face communication between the parties.

I can imagine that the number of *legitimate* transactions of small plots is actually not widespread. People wishing very very small plots are more often interested in rentals; the only reason for a Premium account *not* to want a full 512m is to be in two or more locations at the same time (e.g. to have tiny shops spread across the grid). These will be exceptions, and the above described system of _personal_ sales will certainly deal with that nicely.

Speaking of legitimate sales, it would also be nice to prevent listings of plots for L$1 on private islands that have a covenant telling that visitors will be banned if they buy the plot for L$1. This old trick of getting unsuspecting visitors — most of them new to the land business, unaware of the Covenant page, or simply be non-English speakers — and getting them kicked out of whole communities, just for the purposes of "gaming" the listings, is a vile and unethical form of advertising. There is a simple mechanism to deal with it: average land prices are calculated somehow, and something could be coded that a plot being offered for sale 20-50% below market price (to be discussed) would not be allowed. This would cancel out those L$1 listings once and for all. If someone seriously wishes to *legitimately* dump a parcel into the market (because they are going through financial problems or so) they could simply set it at the lowest minimum that the system allows and tag the parcel with: "willing to sell for less than the price — contact me!" and if someone is willing, they would — once more — *personally* contact the seller and agree on a price, which could then be freely set just for one avatar *without* being listed. This, of course, would apply to both private islands (where covenants are so often used to ban unsuspecting buyers) and the mainland.

Coding for "ethical business" is next to impossible, all systems can be gamed. Enforcing that these "extreme" cases, which rarely (if ever) are ethical, require to rely upon personal face-to-face communication instead of automatic mechanisms, are a way to deal with things. There will still be crooks of course, but the harder it is for them to engage in unethical business and taking undue advantage of flaws in the system, the better.