Should the Lindens be able to take down your builds due to whims of your neighbors?

ya rly

I say "other" because there have been some really offensive builds that should not be protected in any life - but only for that reason... for now

Why don't you clarify that you're talking about the Bush signs?

This is very different from an ugly build.... we're talking about griefing.

Lewis

What's the difference?

My neighbor's ugly build is griefing -- there must be justice!

Now, what if "my neighbor" equals you? What if your aesthetic tastes are wildly different from mine, such that our views on "good looks" are completely opposite?

What if I got enough people riled up on the forums to not only visit your site, but to start bothering Lindens to have it taken down, regardless of your original intention of the build?

After all, it's griefing, because 20 people on the forum says so. Justice must be done.

LL should not be able to take down my builds at the whims of my neighbors, but they should take down my neighbors' builds at my whim. I know that sounds ridiculous, but I, of course, am a better arbiter of good taste than my neighbors and have otherwordly knowledge regarding what is legitimate protest versus what is griefing.

If your neighbour surrounded your property on all sides with copies of his ugly build then yes its griefing.

Having an ugly build on one side is not.

Lewis

Ah. So having a 16 square meter plot with an Impeach Bush sign is surrounding your land? Do you have, like, .25 square meters in the middle?

whim? You call all this noise a whim?

Exactly. Like when you own a nice 32 sq. m. plot and a bunch of jerks surround it with giant ugly walls.

They are able to do whatever they want at any time for any reason on no reason. Did you mean ought they? As we were discussing elsewhere I think they should allow themselves to make qualitative judgements and act upon them. They certainly do so in the forums and have prohibited discussion of the correctness of those judgements. This wouldn't be so peculiar if LL was primarily in the forum moderation business instead of the virtual world business.

There is a reason that every human society has needed judgement and authority: because the breadth of human endeavor and conflict is far to broad and nuanced to ever be codified as a formal system. Judgement is not Turing complete although with SL it is in the hands of mostly engineers who are far more comfortable with formal systems. Was it not the philosopher Geddy Lee who said "If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice"? If this is so, then every abdication that LL makes is essentially an affirmative act. And they do make plenty of them.

I've seen some people express concern that should Linden Lab take an affirmative stance on this issue then it will be a black stain on their PR. Within the last year there was a near total reversal of their 1.2 Intellectual Property Policy, to which that tiny fragment of the world who even knew of it largely yawned. I should think that unmanaged chaos and indifferent stewardship is ultimately a much bigger black eye because it affects almost all the "residents" and all the potential customers.

It takes courage to say "this particular conjugation of action, stated intent, and inferred intent is bad" without having to codify it into some broader ex post facto law. Having spent considerable time in the SF Bay, I can't help but think that the prevailing social norms are informing this failure to be affirmatively judgemental. This is not an indictment of the area's culture, merely a recognition that norms vary from place to place and that San Franciso norms differ significantly from many other places. Tolerance is good, but everything is better in moderation.

Standing ovation for Introvert!

Introvert, reading you cheers me considerably.

coco

Uhh, there was? I didnt see any changes to the TOS which removed your rights to your creations.

The TOS parts which give LL a license to use your work within SL itself for specified reasons were added at the same time as the rest of it. Note, this is just a license for use (which is fair enough.) - not giving them any control over the copyright itself.

Infact, it's been strengthened somewhat since SL now has a SLA in the TOS; which means LL at least somewhat recognises real world value for downtime (although it's not quite what I'd want just yet, but thats to be expected.).

There were specific additions to the ToS (e.g. section 5.3) which added, in part:You are correct that they still assert that you retain copyright or patent rights outside the "service", but the above addition significantly expands their rights and grants them license that they did not previously have.

AR your neighbours if you want, sure. I don't think we'll ever stop ignorant self righteous assholes from thinking they have some claim over the view.

Then let the Lindens decide for themselves whether the content is a violation. Then when they have decided, adhere to their ruling.

Since we already know that you are not supposed to come here appealing against Linden 'injustices' etc etc I think they should now start handing out suspensions and bans to people who repeatedly come fucking whine here about Bush signs, which the Lindens have already said is perfectly fine however unpopular.

I'm pretty sure that's a clarification - the original terms also contained similar language (albeit with more brevity). LL has always had a license to use any works created in SL

An interesting, but typical, view of those who disagree with you.

Kinda like your saying that I must have lead a sheltered life if I don't believe Lazarus is committing extortion, then?

Mine is far more logical though; it is a fact you do not have a claim to the view unless you buy all the land you can see. Whereas you have absolutely no proof whatsoever that Lazarus is committing extortion because you have no proof of his motives - just a bunch of assumptions.

Do we? I thought it was simply forum moderation that ought not be protested here and my re-reading of the Guidelines seems to support that.

But thanks for adding some much needed invective - every little bit helps.

Sorry, no. Your ability to enjoy second life is not severely hampered by a spinning blue sign. You are not forced to buy his land at outrageous prices.

It is not extortion.

I may be wrong, but wasn't it you, Selador, calling those who disagreed with you on this issue "apologists for griefers?"

It is undisputed that the lindens can and do have the authority to take down a build for any reason. They would be foolish not to build that authority into the TOS. But Should they? Obviously not. The intent of the TOS is to give LL wide powers to control the enviroment they run, as such it represents an outside limit to power. It is up to linden lab to use the power with discretion.

If they go about pulling down every build that is unsightly, or every build the neighboors complain about, then they will quickly find SL losing customers. It is in LL's best interest to foster a community with a broad latitude of expression, because ultimately SL is means of expression. They know that a certain element of customers will be unhappy with things, and will turn over. However they also understand that part of discretion is about not using your authority. In principal, it is a good thing to assert the right of residents to build what they want on their land. It means that businesses, like coke, might want to come in and invest money in the platform without having to worry that a hue and cry put on by pepsi will have the coke build removed. (This assumes SL is a platform and not a game).

As a practical matter, opening up the door of lindens adjudicating the removel of every build means the have to investigate and evaluate every complained of build. They don't, can't and won't have the resources availble to get inot the buisness of land use administration.

Perhaps another side effect is that people will form land groups to buy sims that they can administer on thier own, with their own zoning. This will in effect form many communities across the grid as people who want to build similar builds will move together to accomplish the task.

If its greifing yes.. if its an ugly build. no.. one persons trash is anothers art.

I've seen various forms of this argument that all imagine that if LL were to act on this singular issue, that it would imperil the fictive "rights" of every player, establish a precedent that they would have to adhere to, and exert a chilling influence on "freedom of expression".

Whereas I wholly agree that all of these imagined consequences would be bad if true, there are many reasons that these consequences would not obtain:

1. No action LL ever takes establishes any precedent whatsoever and a plethora of inconsistent application of enforcement could be put here to demonstrate this.
   
2. This is not a single case of a few people disliking the content in one area, it is arguably the biggest issue on these forums for at least two months running and has affected large portions of the grid. Even some of LL's largest customers have noted the depressive effects upon their in-game businesses.
   
3. other stuff
   

Nah, I give up, it has already been decided. I can't bring myself exert any more concern on the matter.

Do I think the Lindens should Remove Build? In general no.

BUT...

I do think the should be able to move them. An example being an offending tree that is on the property line or someones build that is 2/3 on your property but the main prim on theirs.

I think they should be able to return obviously stray objects trapped in sim boundaries or vehicles stuck in security systems thats RETURN not DELETE.

What bothers me more than anything are the instances I have personally witnessed of someone going Linden shopping and I do not mean for $. Keep trying different Lindens until you find one that will delete whatever you want deleted. Thats DELETE not return or move.

Unless the build violates TOS I really do believe it should be hands off in the part of the Lindens. If it does violate TOS have at it but consider RETURNING not deleting and follow with whatever other disciplinary action is necessary.

But most of all be consistent in your actions Lindens PLEASE.