Warning - Land Swooping on the Rise

No need to thank me, thank the forum rules for outting yourself to everyone as to your business ethics.

Oh, oh, I know! How about we not allow anyone to sell land without a signed, notarized letter from their mother? And then a delay of 30 days before said land is listed while LL flies the seller to California to interview them personally to make sure they want to sell the land. And then, after a certificate of mental stability and a signed notarized statement of intent, the land can be put on the local neighborhood list for sale for 90 days. Any buyers would have to go through the same process, including written permission from their mothers, to buy the land.

Or maybe, just maybe, people could read the information in the sell window and click the right buttons themselves. I mean, really, if you can't do that, what the heck are you doing on the internet all by yourself in the first place?

Uhm? This thread is about me? I swore this was a discussion of a purchasing land for deal prices.

In other words, it's ok to take people's land when they made mistakes? ..... mmkay.

The problem is that people don't realize just how vulnerable they are. New residents, residents who don't read the forums religiously, and possibly residents for whom English isn't a first language.. aren't aware that it's possible for their land to be bought from a distance within seconds. I mean, they know the land is available for purchase... they click "Ok" in order to allow the land to be purchased by a person standing in front of them, or maybe even by an alt account. But, they just don't realize there is a network capable of detecting the land sale so quickly, and they don't realize the speed at which swoopers operate. So, the seller doesn't understand the importance of setting a "Sell to" avatar, and the seller almost always gets burned the first time around.

Things could be different. For instance, instead of several "are you sure" dialogs... why not have a single pop-up that covers all the bases. When the checkbox is clicked to set the land for sale, the a dialog could pop-up with the regular warning but also with a dropdown menu. The dropdown would include a list of everyone on your friends list, or the ability to manually enter an avatar's name, or an 'anybody' selection. The dropdown would also default to 'nobody', which in effect would cancel the land sale checkbox. That would be an option to force the seller to actively input "Sell to" information.

I also like my idea listed early in this thread... charge a 5% transaction fee to have the land sale listed globally, and a checkbox to enable that feature.

i got land swooped and had to sell my kidneys!

Michael,

I am all for personal responsibility. At the same time, there are steps that LL could take to help ensure that this problem does not occur nearly as frequently as it is, and that is a good thing. Leeway does need to be given for new users who make mistakes. Put a friend of yours in the place of a faceless, nameless person and have this happen to them, and then tell them "Too bad, it's you're fault" and have no sympathy. Even older users can sometimes not realize the full implications. By simply redesigning the UI a bit and making the steps clear and make the default response be not so destructive, it would help to alleviate this problem. Is that so terrible? Yes people need to read. However, people do make mistakes and should not be penalized by ruthless, bottomfeeding losers who try to profit off of that. It is a win-win situation for everyone involved (except the land swoopers).

hmmm pot meet kettle....

Yeah riiiight.

This is just a rant, because I like to hear myself talk?

I should just shut up and let scoundrels exploit others ?

Feature suggestions are to be shunned, perhaps?

Educating others to the proper use of land tools, is bad?

i think you are proving the point of the other post that you slammed because you didnt think it was important to you. I dont think your concerns are important, at least they arent to me because I dont bother with land, but I would not say what you did or would I go after you with hate because i dont care about your concerns. Face it, people have different concerns and the next time that you want to slam someone for raising a point you dont value just remember that others have to tolerate your rants to.

Point taken, however, why post now since your last post was Dec/05?

What is so compelling, that you needed to speak up against me after such a long hiatus?

I didn't read through all the posts but I'll say this:

It seems as if one problem is that people want to give their land to a friend. They don't understand that it's very important to set the "Sell to:" field properly. They think it's no big deal, they'll set it for sale for a buck, the friend will buy it and that will be that. But, a land swooper comes in and ruins the plan.

One suggestion is to put a bunch of warnings and confirmations on the dialogs that popup when you want to sell. That's fine but only goes so far. In the example cited, people are just going to click through thinking their friend will be able to buy the land right away.

Another suggestion is put a confirmation back to seller when someone goes to buy the land. If someone goes to buy the land and the seller is online, the seller gets a dialog asking to confirm the sale. If the seller is offline, they get an e-mail and then see the dialog when they next login.

The seller can turn off this "buyer confirmation" option if they want to not be bugged by it. It should be on by default though.

This would also help the seller to not sell land to someone they don't want to sell land to because there is no "Don't sell to:" option.

Why does a person's last post date matter? Either their point is or is not valid.

Smell alt in here? Otherwise right, it really doesnt matter.

Taking someone's land at a cut rate when they tell you it was a mistake isn't defensible in my opinion. It's a completely shitty thing to do. Any decent person would return the land in exchange for their money back. End of story.

no.

are you saying we need to make the land sale process so complicated that no land is ever bought or sold to protect half a dozen illiterates from half a dozen assholes?

I'm so against this it's not even funny.

I'm paying LL around $100/month in tier already, and my land on the ground is park land, open to pretty much anyone who wants to come and wander around. (So long as they don't bother my house at 385m or my friends and I when we're busy.) I'm not doing this to support a business or a club. I don't sell anything, I'm not in it for the money, I do this because it's my hobby and I enjoy it. *All* of the money I spend comes dirrectly out of my own pocket.

In the last month I've swapped a fair amount of land in my sim, buying and selling land itrying to get all of the land in one continous piece, and to help my neighbors do the same.

With a 5% tax on each of those transactions, I'd probably have let my neighbors go hang rather than helping them out. For the land that I left for open sale, I certainly would have jacked up the price to cover that 5% loss, or just left it as an empty, disconnected lot of prim land, instead of giving some new person a chance to buy a nice piece of land next to my park. Or left them surounded by me on 3 sides.

I already pay my way in SL. Why don't you come up with something else, maybe pick on the people who come right now and don't pay LL a dime. Have them cover some of the costs for a change. I already pay quite enough, thank you.

I got land swooped and *they* sold my kidneys!

The proposals suggested are hardly that complicated. Particularly the one about asking someone if they want to ad the land to the public land listings before it happens.

Personally, I'd love to be able to put land up for sale and have it so that only people who landed there, or saw the sign would be able to tell that it's for sale. That would give me a way of making sure that people in the neighborhood would have the first shot at the land, something I'd much prefer.

As to land swoopers, personally I'd like to see a list somewhere that I could add to my ban list and my security system, just in case. If they want to be complete scum, well, there's nothing in the TOS to stop them...but that doesn't mean that people shouldn't be able to give them a free ride home if they happen to come onto the land of the people who object to their practices.

Thanks to this thread, I've already added at least one name.

Lotsa alts in this thread.. *lol*

It is rather sad to hear that land swooping is becoming a larger problem. There used to be a time where the big land sellers would ask sellers if they had made a mistake and refund the land after the mistake. You can't expect people to always be ethical when no rules are being broken. There is a limit to what rules can do. No matter what the system, there will always be people who make mistakes. The only true solution is to have people with a conscience. Unfortunately, there is no way to force that on the masses.

As for the OP. I think she has proven to be one of the people who has a long history of working ethically. I say this as a former competitor of hers from last year. You don't have to take my word for it. Just wait until you make a mistake, and you will count yourself lucky if she is the one to purchase your land. You will quickly get it back. I've made mistakes as a land seller myself after sims upon sims of sales. Mistakes are inevitable for old residents as well as new.

One idea I haven't seen done yet, is a well known private site run by non-land sellers listing unethical sellers. You can't do it in the forums, but if residents are getting pissed off, they can pool together some money and run a website.

i agree the land scam is bad news

weedy claims another victim.

i agree that people shooting each other in the streets is bad news

Yeah there is one particular guy who is REALLY annoying about doing this. THANKFULLY< I was QUICK to buy. But LITERALLY, as soon as I hit the buy button he was there OUT of nowhere.

But LL doesn't care about our piddly little land disputes after all, most of us aren't buying and selling islands and sims like some of the others, who shall ALSO remain nameless. I bet if this started happening to the big land dealers, LL would be all over it