Xstreet SL and OnRez to Join Linden Lab!

I have heard of the Xstreet acquisition. Nice.
I have some questions about Xstreet staff, "disabling" peoples accounts, including my own for reasons that are not against the LL Terms of Service(TOS) nor against the Xstreet Terms of service.

On 12-29-08 my Xstreet account was disabled after I transfered 24,000L from my account zFire Xue, to my roommate's MLchael Swashbuckler.

I contacted Xstreet then Tigsman Talon said I was "money laundering" and no longer welcome at Xstreet.

I explained that I had 2 items ranked as high as #8, and that they can clearly see my Linden Dollars are from a successful business of selling high ranking products on Xstreet, NOT fraud, nothing illegal as they are fully capable of verifying.

Tigress Stormwind said:
"Linden Lab does not allow our service to be used to transfer L$ from one
account to another when those accounts have logged in from the same
computer. Unfortunately, when we find this has happened, we have no
choice but to disable all accounts associated or involved with these
transactions."

I pointed out that Tigress Stormwind was indeed wrong. Xstreet TOS did not notify users this action was forbidden & that LL TOS does not forbid this action as she claims. I also pointed out that Apez.biz (an Xstreet Competetor) allows this.

Tigress Stormwinds said:
"If Apez wishes to risk being shut down by Linden Lab, should LL find out
this is happening, that's their choice. We however, have too much at
stake to risk losing our business by going against Linden Lab's wishes."

Knowing she was wrong, I spoke with Michael Linden (with Permission to quote)
[17:02] Michael Linden: What's up?
[17:02] zFire Xue: Hey!
[17:03] zFire Xue: I was wondering if there was a TOS rule against transfering Lindens from one person to another thru one of these selling sites like xstreet or onrez.com or apez.biz
[17:03] zFire Xue: apez.bez alows it.. and Xstreet says it is money laundering
[17:04] Michael Linden: Well, we don't enforce any deals. As far as we're concerned, if you use the telephone, or the internet, or a company, to agree on a Linden dollar exchange, that's between you and the other person.
[17:04] zFire Xue: Xstreet said apez.biz is wrong, but both have the SL linden exchange api, so there big time
[17:04] zFire Xue: Hmmm
[17:04] Michael Linden: We don't actually do the transfer, of course.
[17:04] zFire Xue: True
[17:05] Michael Linden: We give and take money from apez and Xstreet to Residents same as anyone else.
[17:05] zFire Xue: Xstreet said that if I pay into an account with them,, that money goes to another avatars account with them, then back inworld.. thats a banable offence with SL and xstreet
[17:06] Michael Linden: Uh ... I'd have to see their TOS about that. But not a bannable offense for SL, anyway, as you've described it.
[17:06] Michael Linden: It's just moving L$ around.
[17:06] zFire Xue: Yep.
[17:06] zFire Xue: Its not in the Xstreet TOS either
[17:07] Michael Linden: Now, if I was them, I wouldn't do it, because it CAN be and aoften IS used for money laundering.
[17:07] Michael Linden: When people steal L$ they want to hide the L$.
[17:08] Michael Linden: If they can put it into Xstreet or whatever, and then have it come back to a differetn SL account, they've hidden it from us until we check with Xstreet.
[17:08] zFire Xue: I see and understand Xstreets point for anti fraud, but both partys said it was not fraud,, all the linden was mine, from sales on Xstreet, and they are mad that I transfered it out, and banned me
[17:08] zFire Xue: I understand that point.
[17:08] Michael Linden: Well, they do business as they see fit, with whom they want.
[17:08] zFire Xue: True
[17:09] zFire Xue: Ok, I just wanted to know if they are incorrect about the Linden rule they claimed.
[17:09] zFire Xue: So then its up to them to be reasonable or not.
[17:09] zFire Xue: Ok, thanks Michael
[17:09] zFire Xue: Thats everything I expected.
[17:10] zFire Xue: Mind if I quote ya, as far as how I asked, and how it was worded, so I dont take it out of context?
[17:10] Second Life: User not online - message will be stored and delivered later.
[17:42] Michael Linden: Sure, go ahead. Again, I can't say what their own terms of service are.
[17:58] zFire Xue: ok thanks. And yes I know. They know their own TOS ofcourse


I pointed respectfully corrected Tigress Stormwind, and she muted me and blocked my email communications with Xstreet support. I emailed from another account, and was blocked again. I wrote the Better Business Bureau, Apotheus Silverman (Jay Geeseman) called him, left a message, gave him a notecard that he accepted, offered to meet them in-world WITH MLchael Swashbuckler, on voice let everyone meet everyone, explain that there was no fraud and they could verify this.

I believe that they became bitter because of my pursuit into the matter, and careless with customer support because of the pending sale of Xstreet to LL.

I had amazing feedback and comments on Xstreet for my products that I continued to support for my buyers with upgrades. My sales are verifiable, and every Linden I made.
They misquoted the rules and I only want the opportunity to sell my items.

Now that LL owns Xstreet, I hope that this and other more serious fraud related issues with Xstreet can be cleared up.

Thank you for your time,
This was the "short version"

zFire Xue

PS: I have also created a script to monitor the incoming signal that tells an Xstreet Magic Box to deliver its item to a buyer after finding that on some days I have my average traffic on Xstreet, but ZERO sales. I became suspicious that Xstreet may have been keeping $L by not logging sales on my system. Error or Fraud, it DOES happen as anyone can see if you monitor your own Xstreet Magic box! I have had my items delivered an NO SALE logged with my account! I am also aware of others who's accounts have been closed with $25,000 USD (not $L) and not given a refund. (So they tell me.) Will this be cleaned up if LL takes over? The number of users on Xstreet and its ease of use are a god send to my business with SL, I only want the chance to reach out to SL users again. (But I will not trust my money to an Xstreet account.)

I think most people just whine about nothing... Why do so many people sta yin SL while they think Linden Lab is the Beelzebub??? RUN FOREST RUN

Stop whining about nothing. This is not going to destroy economics nor will it destroy SLX. Maybe it improves the whole sale stuff and if they add a vendor system to SLX I would appreciate this...

So I'd say the glass is half full lets see how it works out but all the whining and bitchin about everything Lindens do gets lame at one point...

First, let me note that I am really concerned about this. Competition is good... centralizing sales into a single entity makes very little sense to me. However...

XStreetSL already does this. You pay for a thicker line around your posting, and you pay more to move it to the top of the page, and still more to move it to the beginning of the section. Oh, and you probably get more sales for posting a higher price because it by default sorts from high prices to lower ones...

My curiosity is what you intend on doing about banned accounts by the old SLX staff that were made from the forums that inevitably lead to entire accounts being banned. Frankly the staff at SLX were at times abbrasive to say the least and established a tone that lead to many people mirroring the amount of respect that was used in a forum> Not only speaking from personal experience but from reviewing page upon page of the interactions between the old admin of SLX and its "members".

On many occassion you can see in the SLX forums that the SLX staff.... (unless those posts have suddenly disapeared) conduct themselves questionably, allow certain behaviors, condone certain actions, bans others, but more over sometime even set the atmosphere for the forums. In other words when their staff was left to conduct themselves in inappropriate ways in the forums and members conducted themselves the same they were banned.

At times people were banned for just cause based on the TOS of the forums. At other times they seem personal. I say personal because I've seen the admin staff of SLX do similar things in general conversations that were either equally as rude or with the same tone.

My concern is when a staff that conducts them selves in such a way bans someone from a forum, is it even fair to ban them from the other part of the site as well? I suppose you can say yes they can do what they want its their web site. But I think the responsibility shifts now.

In the interest of fairness I have the hopes that LL will rectify some of the mistakes and wounds that SLX have created thoughtout some of the SL community by its actions against its "members". I might also add members who were also merchants who made a decent amount of lindens and trade on the site and also had the commission taken out of their sales. It just doesn't sit well in the eyes of any consumer to see the operators of a site or business tromp through its members discussions and insult, or make inappropriate comments that aren't professional.

For myself I was banned from the forums for what I considered personal reasons from a private conversation I had in email, and in secondlife. I was told through email even that the situation that lead to my banning in a forum was handled inappropriately and shouldn't have taken place. Yet I was still banned based on the notion that the staffs decisions would always be supported. I was told my private conversations inside sl were reviewed by the staff. (a violation of the tos in SL) and a decision was made. Thats how things work in the real world and I can understand that. But my conversations or questions made to staff inside SL and comments made back and forth on a personal level between that staff member should never play into account whether or not I'm banned as a merchant on a website. My entire account was canceled due to personal issues between me and a couple of the staff who handled the forums on SLX. My partners account was also removed with no answer to why. She wasn't even involved in the least. She has actually had no contact with any of the staff at all except when she contacted them to ask why she couldn't log into SLX. It really made us both question if LL was even watching how SLX treated its merchants, members and customers. I was kind of happy at that time that LL had nothing to do with them as it reflected extremely bad on SL based on the fact that SLX associated themselves with SL constantly.

I think now that this transition is taking place that my account and others should be reinstated. Not because I say so. But because its the fair thing to do in an open market. You will never have a fair and balanced market with the ability to compete with the other merchants if you don't start by treating people fairly. I for one was treated unfairly. My account griefed by someone repeatedly which I had to report, my personal questions and conversation inside SL shared amongst staff, I can provide information about any incident in detail to any concerned party as well. I offered to do that when I was told by a junior staff that I was banned as well. Parts of this may be my opinion but I don't see why I shouldn't be able to continue to do business on a site just because I was banned from a forum.

I heard someone say today that it smells of antitrust issues, and fair trade, and bouts of favortism or something or other. I honestly don't have any clue what any of that means really. All I know is that there were many situations that were handled very unprofesssionaly in my view and hope that it changes in the future.

The people of SL can hope that with LL in control of the site now that it will be handled professionally and fairly.

Thanks..

Loki Ball

What do you anticipate that this will do to the community and interaction between residents that may meet each other while shopping? Where is the social networking?

@Zep and other vendor creators
Our goal is to create a great marketplace to enable Resident businesses. We succeed when you succeed. So it's not our intent to compete with you at all.

Can you please integrate the OnRez item listing and editing interface into the XSL site? It's sooo much quicker and friendlier to use than the one on XSL, which means less time and frustration for merchants listing products.

What about our OnRez vendors? They work great.

Well what can I say, you are mixing my favorite shops hehe. I am a customer of both, as what one not has I can find on the other one.
But one thing is I like in the onrez shop very much. The Wallet. That let me shop at my homeplace and when I have not enough money then I can use it and add more. For XL I have to jump to a terminal and add my money there. It is ok but the version of onrez is the one I prefer, so maybe there is a way to add that when both are together.

This is a huge opportunity, but also a huge chance to mess up. I personally am sorry that there is no viable competition anymore, and as a merchant I have to put all my eggs in one basket.

For my businesses, SLX and OnRez performed almost equally. OnRez had the better advertising rate and - with one exception - the much more advanced user interface (as a merchant). I usually listed items FIRST on OnRez, and then started the tedious task of converting them to SLX. SLX on the other hand had the larger marketshare.

My wish would be that LL puts some work into the SLX backend, and incorporates a lot of the advanced OnRez features into it. Also a "makeover" in the OnRez style would be nice.

Pro's for OnRez:
- better backend (with the exception of exchaning items)
- better bulk editing features
- better advertising rates
- nicer look and feel

Pro's for SLX:
- faster
- larger marketshare

Let's embrace the opportunities.