Xstreet SL and OnRez to Join Linden Lab!

I'm sorry but I can't imagine how "the reach of these services would be greatly improved if they were integrated directly into the Second Life experience". That smells like PR bull to me. LL did it for the revenue streams, plain and simple. Let's call it what it is.

Onrez offered 3 things that made it wonderful:

1. Most importantly, unlike SLX, there is no charge to use onrez unless the seller wanted "premium advertizing services".

2. The onrez merchandise setup for the merchant was very well designed and thought out, far superior to SLX's clunky system.

3. Images loaded to onrez had their own URL so you could link to them in these forums.

I had a lot of my merchandise duplicated in both systems, but didn't use their in-world vendors. So I guess I'll just let my onrez stuff go; but this situation looks like an illegal anti-competitive monopoly to me. So, I'll be in the market for a competing web-based sales system. I've heard a couple names so I'll check them out.

While I do use XStreetSL to sell, my "primary" use of the site, was as an alternative to the Lindex.

I have never trusted the Lindex. Not that there's anything bad about it, per say, nor is there anything shady or wrong with it.. but it's a matter of "what if"...

See, if something goes wrong, with a cash-out or transaction.. I didn't want to have to rely on Linden Lab's customer service department to get the issue resolved.

Linden Lab is not exactly known for their customer service. And since the dissolution of "live chat" inworld help, they are not known for speed, skill, or happy endings (as it were).

When something went wrong at SLX.. I wasn't just a "basic membership", you're just a number, file a ticket... wait for someone working for less than US minimum wage in a call center in India to get back to me.. I was a person.. a customer.. and the people who helped me were people too, and very often the help came straight from the top.

While I'm still in Second Life as a customer, and due to the needs of my inworld business, I own a premium account.. Linden Lab is not my first choice for companies to deal with. (much akin to being a gmail user who gets online via AOL.. which already comes with email).

I know that Linden Lab has tried, in the last year, to earn my (and everyone else's) trust back.. but you've still got a long way to go before I will feel comfortable with LL having a practical monopoly on "cashing out".

Seriously though, TOS. Is Linden labs going to control Customer Service and does the LL TOS apply to SLX now.

We all just need to know some tiny little things like... do we file a lawsuit in Pennsylvania or California?

Correct me if I'm mistaken, but I thought the ultimate goal of SL was to become the 3D web. I still believe in that idea. While Xstreet and Onrez were nice (preferred XStreet myself), they are nothing more than intermediate steps to the ultimate vision. I don't want to have to go outside of SL for HTTP services and to do so only means that LL isn't quite there with their overall vision. This is a step in the right direction.

The search option is SL is TERRIBLE. I hate having to use it for shopping. I will either buy a product via Xstreet or hope that the merchant bothered to post an in-world location. I always tell people to use Xstreet to find what they're looking for. But, it makes no sense to have to go outside of SL in order to shop for something inside of SL.

So, I shall remain positive. We still need independent shopping web sites for other grids and all the conspiracy nuts who think LL is trying to take over the world. However, if the Xstreet integration works well, here's hoping I won't have to go outside of SL whenever I want to do some shopping!

So does this mean every ban on SLX will be lifted as it now falls under LL TOS?

Filing a lawsuit? Why? Silly rabbit! Tricks are for kids!

110% AGREE. That is the person I feel took it down. Street was starting to hurt when it was SLX. Sales and gone way down and it just so happen to take place when they started getting ban happy in the forums and such. And in most cases it was her finger on the button every time. Once I got sick of all the anti U.S. posts in there and started to stick up for my country a bit she was quick to hand out some BS ban on me from the forums for supposedly cursing in a post however after many e-mails to her, the owner and other staff to this day none of them have been able to point me to that special post in their heart or even tell me what it was I supposedly said. So I let it go. Just figured they wanted to make Street no longer a business but rather some sort of "click" which is exactly what the staff there did which is why all the sales went into the toilet which is also why I am sure he sold the company to Linden Labs. He could see the writing on the wall. He can say it was to make it a better place and bla bla bla but when it comes down to it I know they were losing money big time and this was a bailout for them. When it comes down to it... If you people want to blame somebody for this buy out, blame the staff and owner of Street. They made their bed now it is time to lay in it. You can not expect to trash people left and right and have selective policies that you only enforce on some and expect business to continue and normal. Life does not work that way. Guess you got to find out the hard way.

The only question I have now is how will this effect the exchange on there.
Will you still be able to transfer money to your PayPal within seconds or will it be days...

Even if it goes back to days... At least I will no longer have to deal with the communist SS party that was running the show.

Thank you again Linden Labs for this HUGE BAIL OUT! GREAT MOVE!

Striving towards monopolization have only one purpose: to gain control and profit, leading to an inferior product at a higher price!

Those are the realities, so don't be surprised...

If a semantic analysis was made of many of the statements and responses coming from LindenLab, I can assure you, that most of the content would cancel out and leave us with just so much hot air!
One thing they are quite good at - one must allow them that - are creating streams of platitudes and unctuous positivism without actually saying very much...
There probably is a failed political campaign-leader hanging around creating this muck.

Winston Churchill once said: You can fool some of the people some of the time; but you can not fool all the people all the time!

Once I was a starry-eyed noob in SL too, happily lapping up what came from LL - alas, those times are gone, as the aims and methods of LL has become clearer over time.
Don't get me wrong, I love SecondLife, it's the management style I disagree with...

I understand completely why Lindens do this, it makes sense.

However, this add another conflict of interest to a growing number. Now that Lindens have a huge stake in steering people toward XStreet...what is to stop them from policies which make it even harder for competitors? We are already fighting for network neutrality on the web, there is no legal reqquirement at all for this within SL.

Am I saying the Lindens do this now? Not at all. I do think they enjoy a considerable advantage.

I do think they pulled this trick though with openspace sims. They allowed open space to become very popular, then raised tier on us (NOT THEM, although they do hold considerable open space). Alhtough their given reasons were not these, it has the effect of giving Lindens considerable advantage when it comes to land sales etc. Is it an accident that almost simultaneously they start rolling out themed sims? I don't know...but to me if smell as fish, i think sushi.

p.s. I am not a Linden Hater...but some recent decisions have made me start to get nervous of my investment of time. Already, many people in information technologies are switching to open source virtual worlds....

I am willing to bet it will all start fresh and then it will all fall from that point under the LL TOS which it should. As for the forum.... Close it! Slam that door shut. The staff there destroyed that and its way to tainted to leave open. Besides LL has their own forum so why run 2.

As a user of both services and being a creator inworld for over 2 years now i must say that I am not too happy about this either. But instead of being negative we need to let them know what we think would work good AND bad.. hopefully they will listen and see how we feel about it.

There are good points and bad points to each service.
If you are going to intregrate these two services here is what I suggest.

Onrez-

Keep the easy usability of their uploading system for listing products (this is much simpler than using XStreet). XStreet is laggy, you have to refresh the page many times and sometimes it doesn't hold so you have to redo the entire listing all over again, PLUS it gives you the option to upload more than one item at a time. This makes it very simple for us users.

Keep the picture upload amount the same. They allow you to upload more than one picture and at times this is needed to really show off the detail of some products.

Keep the option to allow the registered avatar to send the $L to any avatar they wish.

Keep the wallet option & vendor options.

Keep the system they have to allow us to tag our products.

Also, their transfer to inworld avatars is spontaneous. XStreet sometimes when sending from their website your avatar cannot be in "Away" mode or off the screen otherwise you won't recieve your Lindens, and even then, if you are there sometimes it just doesn't go through and you end up emailing support and waiting 24 hours before anything gets done about it... to which they blame SL for "having problems" when in reality it's on their end and they just do not want to admit it.

XStreet-

Keep the instant transfers to paypal the same. This is done momentarily usually for $1.00USD no matter what the amount.

Get rid of their uploading system.. honestly, its alot harder on people and the refresh rate on uploading sucks.

I LOVE being able to use this as a stock market account.. allowing me to sell my Lindens for a better rate depending on who is buying them at the time. Please keep this option. This has really helped me in time of great need.


Those are my two cents... i really hope this transition goes as smooth as possible so we can all get over this and move on.

Corrin Maitland

This seems to me like a great oppurtunity for someone to start up their own version of Onrez.

Thanks for this Tigerlily. . . . I didn't even know about this.

I wonder how many more places have options like this so I can avoid this whole Xstreet-OnRez debacle all-together.

It's much easier to shop via web because we all know that teleporting inworld is a PITA, and when you do finally teleport somewhere, goddess forbid if I am able to find what I'm looking for anyways.
I didn't know about Onrez and I use XStreet quite often despite all the garbage I have to wade thru to find what I'm looking for and never really had any problems with it besides that so maybe it won't be such a bad thing.

If LL manages to run Xstreet like it does the rest of the grid, there is a HUGE opportunity for someone else to build a server and put out whiteboxes just like Xstreet has. If LL louses it up (and you know they will) then a couple of people with the knack can create a new shopping system outside of LL's control.

I for one do NOT like this move by LL. It is unnecessary, monopolistic, and insulting to all the creators who put their merchandise there because SL Search is useless. Xstreet solved a problem in SL, and now the problem is swallowing Xstreet up whole.

M had better not sob about the company needing the money when the next price increase rolls around...

So now I suppose the SLX rates are going to be brought down alongside the rates the Lindex charges and any hopes of actually turning a buck are now gone.
**laughs**

Why do we do this again?

With the grid as unstable as it is, the database issues, failed teleports, your absolute 'stick your head in the sand and ignore' DMCA issues, rooking the landowners three times over now with regard to the value of our property/sims, why would you take this on? Management was supposed to get better, yes? This has to be the most trivial thing I have seen you do. You are going to screw with two systems that actually function for the most part without problems - well I guess that wont be happening anymore.

I give up. Three years and gets worse everyday. What was the name of that other grid, mars something?

Isn't this kind of like the US Government buying out Walmart?

My concern is where do we go now outside LL for products and services? I'm not 100% against LL. They've done a lot of good for SL. But, that was also a long time ago. Updates used to come regularly. You used to see Linden's out and about in world interacting with the users. You used to be able to get to Linden land. You used to be able to get help right away if you were having technical trouble or problems with a griefer.

Those days went away with Phill. No longer is LL interested in keeping Second Life users happy. No longer are they interested in stability of their product. (Otherwise they'd do what EVERY COMPUTER TECH I've talked with said they should do and UPGRADE THEIR HARDWARE BEFORE THEY CONTINUE ANY FURTHER ON ANY SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT!)

For the past 3 days we've had a total of approximately 20 HOURS of Database problems that caused most of us as vendors to lose money. XStreet shut off it's services due to SL problems, and users were instructed not to purchase anything in world.

My question is. With a record of unreliability from LL in the past year, and poor decision making (bottle-necking transactions instead of upgrading hardware), what confidence does this give me that XStreet will remain a reliable source for transactions?

I do almost all (considerable) of my SL shopping through online marketplace.
I find that even though X street SL has a much better selection of items to buy I end up shopping at the ONRez site for the simple reason that I can put money into my account without having to go to a terminal. Their system of simply paying their online banker (commerce leader) makes shopping much faster and easier. I don't have to TP to the terminal, fight the lag, and put money in. So much nicer to do it instantly and privately.
I think that an online banking system for X street would facilitate alot more business. It certainly would get me back to shopping there.
Thanks

First off, another "surprise" from LL. Granted, this one did not necessarily warrant the discussion of the residents, but lo' and behold a lot of us are unhappy! Great job, team!

So, since you're going to give the creators more work by restructuring our vendors and advertising, here's what I want at least in return:

*XstreetSL*
- Category/Search Format
This was the best feature, beyond being easily recognizable and having a larger audience than OnRez.

*OnRez*
- No fees
OnRez doesn't take a portion of the sale and only provided service.
- In-World Vendors
These are a great free tool that are easy to work with.
- Wallet feature
Don't have to wander all over to find a terminal, although terminals are also nice to run into at people's stores.

There are probably more advanced creators that can provide more forward and critical points, but those are mine. You asked, I delivered, no do your job and stop acting like Comicbook Guy form the Simpsons just because you're intelligent and have ideas doesn't make you all-knowing.

What a bad way to moderate a forum.....this makes it look like Foxy was the one advertising when she only pointed out that another person did it.

Monopoly Monopoly Monopoly

I'd go on a long rant like many here, but its a tried, tested and true fact that nothing is ever said of any substance by LL when these things go down. Threads are shut down when they either run out of answers, or down right refuse to answer based on their continued lack of planning. Its pointless. As much as this angers me, there will be new "exchanges". Its the way of the world. End game.

However I will say it will be interesting on how they try and implement this all into the in-world search. I can see the corrupt foaming at the mouth in anticipation for the newest exploits to cheat the system. Lets be realistic, there's always a way.

Lastly, I just truly hope a web interface with a REAL keyword search will still exist. To me, the entire point was not having to go through all the bulls#it keyword scams on the in-world search. I could see items without having to tp in. Oh how I love sky platforms of bots lagging the place down and things not rezzing.

Just wanted to note that XStreetSL.com DOES have a pay box that you can keep on your land that you can buy from XStreet for free. It's a Remote Deposit. Here's the link: http://www.xstreetsl.com/modules.php?name=Marketplace&file=item&ItemID=207296

Just though you might want to know.