Well, GOM closing adds a new twist to the "do we use L$" argument...

... considering now we're pretty much left to the tender mercies of IGE or Anshe, at least until the Linden system comes up.

Thoughts on how this will effect us?

Eep! When are they closing? I hadn't heard that.

Also, what impact does that have on SL's argument that one can earn real money in SL? If one cannot easily extract it, then what's the point?

~Ulrika~

Ugh. Folks are predicting a run on L$ up until the closing date.

We might want to ride out this blip in the market, as opposed to converting the city's savings right now.

~Ulrika~

It's lemming-like panic, and that's an insult to lemmings. People will still wish to buy and sell L$, and all things considered, having the Lindens handle it does at least prevent this kind of situation.

That said, I'm holding tight to my own L$ since I suspect the drop the last few days was a few large money-holders liquidating in a hurry. It'll bounce back, we just need a stable market. Still, do we have enough USD to cover our expenses until then? Sudane?

The rumor mill is going full force. The latest news from the grapevine is that LL will have a full exchange system in place before GOM closes. I am still trying to verify that LL will convert L$ to US$. If they do, this market blip could be an excellent opportunity to purchase L$.

Thus, I could always purchase L$ from citizens and pass on US$ to Sudane via my PayPal account in a pinch.

~Ulrika~

OK. It looks like LL is duplicating the features of GOM, so we'll be fine. If they're not up in time for our next monthly payment, we'll work something out (like having those with PayPal accounts purchase L$).

~Ulrika~

Ulrika, it's all pretty old news actually. You missed out on a lot of it.

Basically, LL approached GOM about helping to integrate GOM and other L$ exchanges into SL (since the process of buying and selling L$ is actually kind of arcane right now for the average newbie). GOM worked with them for awhile, but didn't care for the final offer. LL announces they're making their own service; the GOM's rate has been poor ever since.

GOM's closing is not a total surprise, although they claimed they would continue for as long as they could make a profit. There, the price of L$ traded seems as if it would be largely irrelevant so long as the overall number of trades was the same, but... *shrug*

I'm worried, but people will still want to buy and sell - it's just a matter of whom. Nobody wanted to step up to fill the GOM's shoes.

I'll volunteer my own Paypal account if need be, though I won't be able to buy a lot I could cover about what I pay myself in monthly fees if needs be.

Hopefully it won't come to that, but...

Gracious. Leave SL to give birth and the whole virtual world falls apart.

I'm disappointed that GOM (a company which I greatly admire) couldn't reach an agreement with LL.

~Ulrika~

This is exactly my feeling as well. The only event which is negative for Neualtenburg is a downward trend of the L$ against the US$. *Stability*, and, obviously, upward trend, are both positive for us. And I strongly feel that long term continual downward trend is not going to happen.

There is now about US$180 in the Paypal account (which is why the LL billing glitch on Monday failed; "insufficient funds" ), plus about US$20 in GOM, which I will remove. This is easily sufficient for the October 21 LL billing, since those folks who pay in US$ will also increase our Paypal account.

So, we're fine for 2 months. Hopefully LL will have their system in place by then. I am very glad to hear what Ulrika has heard, that they will include conversions of L$ to US$. In fact, this really *had* to be the case, or their whole exchange system would have flopped. But they have so studiously avoided mentioning it; i was certainly worried.

I have used IGE personally in the past; I have found them fine, and their L$ > US$ rates very good. But they have frequently suspended L$ > US$ trades, which makes them unrelible for Neualtenburg needs.

And Anshe, doesn't her conversion system function through GOM? She has certainly pegged her rates to GOM... this has led me to suspect that she uses GOM itself for actual trade process. But I could easily be wrong.


Sudane

I haven't read the most recent rumors yet, but in saying that LL will be duplicating GOMs feature set, do you mean they will have open market trading? My initial understanding was that they would sell $L based on the current price at outside markets, i.e. GOM, and with them gone I wonder how it will work? IGE has also been liquidating, so they may not be an option either.

It will be interesting to see how it all works out.

Tai, neither GOM or LL are selling L$, they just work as a broker between people that want to buy L$ and people that want to sell L$.

And yes, they want to support this better in SL allowing credit cards instead of / besides (?) PayPal account.

Anyway, I really think that they should focus more on technical aspects and let people like GOM manage life inside SL.

Mel

I understand the brokerage aspect, but I didn't think LL would be hosting a trading board. Maybe they will. I can see how an in-game auction house could work.

This just posted by Philip:
/130/e6/63293/3.html#post662741

I think the phrasing should be... I'm disappointed that LL (a company which I greatly admire) couldn't reach an agreement with GOM

Come on, they prop them up as the poster child of resident business... Use GOM to market "make real money"... Take them to conferences to speak on the same panels... Use GOM as good ole market research... and then use Investment Capital to tell them thier service isn't worth anything and re-write the whole thing from scratch.

I understand the business reasons behind it, and I can't blame them. But here's the fallout from biting the hand that feeds you. In short, I think it's important to ignore LL's marketing, because they look the the friendly shop on the corner, but are just as cut throat as anyone with VC's.

I think that anything LL can do to improve the *platform* of SL they should. And I think this is one of the cases where that was needed. Now if LL started setting up clothing shops in world, I would be upset. As to me that is content and should be resident driven only. And while our economy should also be resident driven, to leave the tools to work that economy in the hands of only a resident business is a scary thought. And there can still be resident businesses that compete with the Linden Platform Exchange tools. This upgrade to the platform improves the tools of SL for us residents. And that to me is what LL *should* be doing.

I agree. I'm not disappointed in GOM rather I'm disappointed that an agreement couldn't be reached. Darn shame it is.

~Ulrika~

What a shame, what a loss — but what an opportunity

You all know that I'm not a professional programmer, but just a very enthusiastic amateur. However, I'm always baffled about the "wonder" around all these magnificient toys people put up, and how "difficult" they seem to implement. Linden Lab took some three months to implement their integration with PayPal; but what their system does can be accomplished in about three hours by an amateur (Ulrika can tell you how much time she needed to place the PayPal button on Neualtenburg's web site!). I don't know how much "development time" was put on the e-Commerce sites; people claim "weeks" or "months" of development, but I put a very crude one up in a weekend a year ago (I had way more free time back then, but no experience) and am currently working on the second one It's easy, most of the stuff is open source anyway, and available for free, and just needs a bit of tweaking here and there. A money exchange? 6 weeks of development by LL, I have heard. Well, integrating it into SL's without breaking anything may be tricky, but a website...? That's about two weekends of work for an amateur. In my experience, professional programmers do things at least about 10 times faster than I do, so they'd probably finish that in two hours (ok, if they just work on it 5 minutes per day, perhaps that would explain the 6-week delay...) And the GOM approach even has an added advantage — you don't need to "back" the system up with money, either in L$ or in US$, since it's just an exchange.

I wonder if Neualtenburg wouldn't rise to the occasion and launch our own money exchange I mean, just take a look at the amazing work Ulrika has done on the accounting of the Neualtenburg "vendor system". It's infinitely more complex than anything I have seen in (or around) SL! I'm quite sure that many groups/communities/malls/large shop owners would simply love to have access to that amazing technology

The only "problem" I really see is not technical — but one of marketing. Has anyone ever heard about Troy Westerburg? No? Hardly surprising, but his web sales site http://www.westerburg.biz/ has been up well before the "three biggies" have ever considered going into business. Ok, now he uses his site to redirect sales to the "three biggies", but this used to be a fully-working e-Commerce site for SL, also done over 2 weekends, although it certainly didn't was as "catchy" as the others. The main reason for its lack of success was the difficulty in marketing this idea properly.

My reason for posting here is that we could see GOM's end as an opportunity, not a nightmare. Sure, many would shun "our" money exchange. But when the choices are IGE (who, as mentioned by Sudane, not always have enough money to buy/sell) or Anshe, I think that even the anti-Neualtenburg groups (less numerous these days ) would consider an alternative to LL.

Well, this is just a brainstorming idea. As I see it, "taking over GOM" by a new group would mostly be a marketing strategy: technologically, they don't have much to show, but their brand is quite powerful, they have a really large user base, someone entering the "money exchange market" would hardly need any advertising to start their operation, and that is what is quite valuable these days...

Ah, these 12-hour-working days make me sadly lose all the interesting opportunities

This isn't the silliest opinion I ever heard; granted, Switzerland's a bit away from Bavaria, isn't it?

But it involves (a) something that wouldn't change Neualtenburg itself, unlike Eugene's one radical proposal, (b) something I believe we already have much of the equipment for, and (c) well within the abilities of the current Guild.

Also, (d), we could possibly make money from the whole deal. Or at least ensure we always have a place to sell L$ paid for land.

On the other hand, it would still be a pretty big step. I think it's something that could stand to be discussed at next appropriate meeting.

Very interesting idea Gwyneth!! I know Ulrika and Sudane would have a better head than I on knowing if/how this could work. But from what you state, it does at least sound like something worth discussing!

I agree there is room for someone to step up. I have friends that fear LL is gonna make them give a SSN number and cut physical checks (some peeps don't like that). However, I think we should stay far away. It would be A LOT of work to manage this and there is a huge potential for fraud. GOM was kinda perfect for this because the owners worked on IT Finance systems in the real world.

Hm. Good point. I still think it could be done - and let my support up above not be seen as "we SHOULD do this", more of a "could we, would it be worthwhile, to do this?"

As it is, LL seems to be moving double-time with the exchange so th epoint may be moot.

Personally, I'm quite concerned about fraud as well. I remember those couple of times that GOM was ripped off and LL stepped in to help. If LL has its own exchange, will it still step in to support 3rd party exchanges?

~Ulrika~

I've been following this quite closely and have never seen that claim. Quote please?

Agreed. Handling people's real money would mean potential liability issues, lots of audit requirements, and certain support headaches.