Scams & Cons Forum & the Beauty of No Verification

Well, in the past week, the General and Bulletin Board forums have pretty much become the "Warning! Another scam!" forums. It looks like removing the credit card / Paypal requirement is working out really well, ugh.

Is it time to have a separate forum for "Scams & Cons"? Should we allow the naming of names there? Now that there's no verification whatsoever required to gain an account, SL is already being reduced to the level of email with the 3-D phishing & other crap that's going on.

Its really sad. At least by having a financial tie in the past, there was some level of potential punishment; now there's jack shit. I continue to think this is a bad move on the part of LL. Its really sad now that every store owner needs to put a sign saying, "THE ONLY MANAGER OF MY STORE IS <fill in the blank>." Just take a look at the now-scarred beauty of the PixelDolls build for proof.

Regards,

-Flip

Nice posting

/agree

Oh, and by the way, when you're going to name names about a scammer, take the 15 seconds to create an alt account to do it from first.

The short term population numbers are increasing: great for marketing.

The quality of life in SL is decreasing: not so great for long term population numbers.

It's a unfortunate situation precisely because of naming names. I suggested putting the names on SLUniverse, because we really do need to know who to watch out for.

On the other hand, someone innocent could end up getting ruined. Though chances are that won't happen, it is still a nerve-wracking possibility.

It would be better if LL went back to the way registrations were.

coco

LOL....i thought about replying to this in the affirmative, using all of me and Neil's shiny new alts, but I am far too upset...and lazy.

Excellent post, Flipper.

LL:
We work hard on our stores and take a lot of pride in them. We dont want our customers misled or mistreated, and we dont want our beloved places of business defaced by self-placed protective "Fraud Abounds" signs. Or to have to spam everyone who enters our store with a notecard, for thier own protection.

Your new policy is causing problems, and that fact is *not denyable*.
Plans? Comments?
Lots of folks are curious about this one.

And here's to hoping the response to all of this doesnt involve a link to anyone's blog. I think my poor head would explode.

Laundry lists of hundreds of names that only existed in SL for a day or two, scammed/griefed, then were deleted won't do a whole lot

Okay, for the record, people who agree that the lack of age verification on the new registration system sucks:

FlipperPA Peregrine and Lewis Nerd
Cristiano Midnight and Cocoanut Koala
Nephilaine Protagonist and Prokofy Neva

Just think about that for a minute. I don't think the six of us have ever agreed on anything until now, period. If the point was to unite those who've traditionally have diametrically opposed viewpoints in the past, Linden Lab, you're doing a BANG UP job.

I find Daniel's blog post interesting from an LL internal standpoint, but disgusting in that is says, "Oh, we at LL are doing okay with it, therefore, all is okay." No, not all is okay; its sucking for us. PLEASE reconsider.

Regards,

-Flip

i know, isnt it hilarious!!!
I was thinking that earlier, looking at that poll thread. 85% hate it: amazing.
this is the forums. we dont DO agreement here, generally.

such unusual allignments of opinion, you would think, might cause some interest. let's hope...

maybe its all a machievellian plan to unite us in spite of our differences?

Me and Magnum.

Now you KNOW there is trouble.

Someone check hell, I hear icicles are forming!

While I completely abhor the lack of registration checks which allow for a modicum of identification of the people joining the game...I'd also like to point out that its completely impossible to scam a store where the owner/operator or trusted staff of the owner operator are on hand at more or less all times.

My shop can't be scammed or gamed...cause I'm there. And if I'm not there, I have paid staff on hand and close business associates that do business at my store that spend their time there as well.

Scammers and exploiters are a horrible thing, don't get me wrong...but the biggest contributing factor to these kinds of scams being effective is the "set it and forget it" mentality of most of the inworld businesses in SL.

Very few businesses hire trusted staff. Very few businesses have the owner on the premises to assist customers. And because people prefer to run their SL businesses in a hands off fashion which allows them privacy (though I personally don't ever seem so overwhelmed with IMs and requests that I can't have a little me time), they leave themselves open to these kinds of scammers.

Hire some security, or pay a few people to represent you at your store if you're too busy to be there yourself. Have some people on the grounds at all times to ensure that the people in your business are legitimate and not using your business as a way to screw you and your customers out of money. Theres a ton of non-premium accounts out there that would LOVE to make 100L an hour doing something TANGIBLE and REAL in the world for a few hours a night.

By taking a more active role in your businesses, you protect yourselves against this kind of thing. And through hiring staff, you stimulate the economy....both are positive benefits to you and to Second Life.

Not slamming anyone..but it just amazes me that people seem to be ignoring the major contributive factor to these kinds of scams being viable. SL may be E-Business, but that doesn't mean you can run hugely popular businesses as a one to two person enterprise and never spend any time on the site and expect not to get ripped off in some fashion.

And thats why these scams work. Cause by and large a business where you can talk to the person whos name is on the items that are sold there, personally and face to face, is a rare thing indeed in SL...hell a business where you can talk face to face with even an EMPLOYEE of the developer of the items your interested in is a rare thing.

Employees, security, developers on site. Yeah..its going to cost you some time and money..but lets be honest, the people being defrauded are making more than enough to put a little back into insuring the safety of their businesses from fraud.

As a "patron of the prim arts" it is sad to see these types of abuses being allowed to run unchecked, as it really takes away from what Second Life is supposed to be about.
Seems to me it is about time for a Second Life Vendors Association Group that you can all use to warn other business owners in game about the latest culprits, trends, etc... Keep the group to just legit vendors maybe. That is if you can all come to an agreement on a *gasp* second issue.
Obviously this doesn't fix the bigger issue, but might help curb the abuse and save some of the customers lost Linden. And let's hope Linden Labs will start to focus on fixing these types of trangressions.
My $6L...

Luna Cartier

Suzanna, great points in your post. While I realize that every crisis brings about change, and that sometimes that change is positive, I want to add a few points of my own:


* Most merchants in SL make enough to cover tier and not much else, unless they're either large volume or on a cutting edge with an idea. If it costs $75 or $100 US per month to own a sizable store, add in the uploads, the offline software plus time investment and there's only so much left over to pay for hired help.

* Then you have to find people you trust. Someone else called the flood of newbies "transients", and that's what it feels like these days. I know people who can make a couple thousand $L a week playing Tringo or dancing in contests or gambling - none of which are reliable incomes, of course, but it beats $100-500L per week for standing in a store wearing a badge.

Your post did a good job of addressing better customer service (but didn't tell me how I, who hold a fulltime RL job, is supposed to cover my store when I'm just starting out). It did not address the multitude of other issues which the new process has incurred -- specifically, underage members in adult areas and a noticeable rise in the number of griefers randomly shooting people and filling other people's land with trash prims.

The policy is so bad on so many levels I don't see any way the users can fix it all by ourselves. We need more and better land and group tools, we need a more visible Linden enforcement policy and we need a return to credit card validation as part of the registration process. Give us those and the fear and concern on this board will go back to normal levels.

Not only that, but I have packed away my LL cheerleader uniform until further notice, and until something is done about this ridiculous policy.



No more LL cheerleading til age verification is reinstated.

WE NEED AN AGE VERIFICATION CHECK!

P2

Just feel it needs to be said, but the person who's name has been everywhere on the forums today about the fake employee scam joined SL in April.

So, age verification certainly didn't stop him *shrug*

zOMG!

I just figured it out!

The scammers are all alts of the LINDENS! This is their idea for removing L$ from the economy to stabilize it!!


(Kidding, of course.)

It's not really age verification, it's identity verification. If people can create an unlimited number of alts they can't be banned. This sort of con could happen under the old system, but it would burn out quite quickly as the ARs started coming in and word got around.

Mind you, it may be that ARs aren't doing anything and there are enough people in this con group to avoid bans.

Smatter fack, that isn't a bad side effect. I mentioned it the other day on Second Citizen.

Still, ruination of SL is an awful high price to pay just for us to discover that each other isn't so awful after all.

coco

I think the answer is PR. If the media were to get a few good stories about minors on an adult site the government would probably step in and force LL to do something about it. Plus bad PR about greifing and scams can do wonders at correcting bad busness practices.

In the meantime, how do I set my laser printer to stun?

Don't hold it quite so high above the victim's head prior to dropping it?

Excellent post Flip I could not agree more

As i wright this i have Photo shop open with a sign in the works that reads exactly as you said

THE ONLY MANAGER OF THIS STORE IS CRUCIAL ARMITAGE

You know..... the cynical side of me says that everyone having to make these signs, and uploading a texture, is a nice little money sink.

Lewis

The cynical side of me says If I were a scammer I'd have my OWN signs to fit over the 'real' ones...

well good thing i have auto return set to one minute