Proposal / Discussion: Banning of Avatars based on Account Age

An RFC, if you will. If this subject has been discussed previously, please clue me in to its location.

Given the recurring problems of griefers and their alts ad infinitum - often discussed in these forums - has there been consideration for giving landowners the option of banning avatars based on a minimum account age?

For example, ban all avatars less than 90 days old, unless they were given specific permission by the landowner.

While not a perfect solution, it seems as though this would help limit the creation and use of "harassment" alts.

Yes, I understand that some few would stock up on alts to be used "down the road" - and perhaps there's a more comprehensive approach - but I invite comments on this subject before proposing it as a feature. (Unless, of course, this has already been done.)

=Sinclair

I'd just ban everyone younger than 32 months.

Briana Dawson

While I understand and appreciate the intent, I think this would cause more harm than good. If so many people ban avatars based on account age you will have a bunch of noobs who get frustrated and leave very quickly.

A true noob won't know shiat from shinola for places to go. I know when I first started I would look stuff up in find and then go exploring around the place I had TP'd to. If a noob is flying around trying to figure out what is what and is continually get bounced from an area why would they want to stay in SL? I think the whole experience would turn them off to SL in a very short amount of time.

So while such a solution could prevent annoying alts and griefers from bugging people, the ones who would be "punished" (for lack of a better word) would be the noobs.

Ejection/Banning of avatars based on the avatars age is fairly simple to achieve via script. You just scan for agents, check their date of birth and then add them to the ban list if they're born after a certain date.

I have to agree with Astrid though, I dont think discrimination against residents just because they joined after a certain date is a viable solution to griefing.

After all, what if some really awesome new designers turned up, created some amazing builds and then decided to ban all avatars over a certain age from their land just because some 'oldbies' can be pompous & arrogant?

Ageist.

P2

Strongly oppose this.

Instead use existing tools and lsl to do whatever you want with your land.

AND. Solution to this problem can only come from LL. They have to revert the registration system to the old one with checks.

Sounds like an interesting option.

Then you would be banning nice people like me. *hides blowtorch*

Last week I wouldn't have liked the idea.

This week I'm seriously undecided.

What a difference a subscriptions service can make eh?

Right now I'm boardering on 'nice idea - a lot of people could probably use it'

That's just age discrimination, and griefers would soon enough figure out that they have to create an account then wait 90 days to use it.

Against, but how about this: detach anything from a > 90 day old av, and delete anything they rez when they enter your area (Actually, return it to inventory right away)

Newbies can still explore, and griefers would have a harder time griefing.

I think we are loosing site of the fact that some of the worst griefers are members of the Sl mafia sub-culture and a great many of them walk around withscreens filled with orbiter huds, harbinger, meteor et al, and a damn large number of them are way over a year old, some over 2 years old.

Point is greifing- its not just for noobs anymore

I don't like seeing proposals like this. Not all griefers are newbies, and not all newbies are griefers. You're stereotyping subscribers based on an unreliable metric.

This is exactly the kind of arrogant old-timers mentality that gave birth to the FIC conspiracy theory and almost a full year of dissent, tension and hard feelings among the SL community.

How about banning people for bad behavior instead of assuming that new=bad?

Very well put. I voted no.

Wendel

No for me too. Regardless of what happens, it would be a sad day if it came to this.

Two things:

-This is already possible today with some minor LSL kung-fu.

-I don't think this is a good idea. The vast majority of new residents are great people. Its only a small minority that causes a lions share of the problems. I think the same could be said about many sub-groups of residents.

I voted yes, on the stipulation that we'd have it be able to ban in all directions... so for example, maybe Grandpa doesn't want any damn newbies on his lawn... he could ban the youngins... but also, lets say Number One doesn't want any old 'grown ups' in the Kids Next Door treehouse, he could ban AVs older than a certain age.

-Ghoti

Yeah. Just for curiosity's sake, I knocked up a script just now that I think would work:
http://ordinalmalaprop.com/scripts/autoban_with_age_limit.lsl
but I'd not use it myself.

(Uh-oh, my TC reading is showing...)

So far I've gleaned the following:

1. This feature might be effectively implemented using existing LSL scripting
   
2. That turnabout is fair play - such a proposal could (should?) cut both ways
   
3. The behavior of some long-timers ( with established alts ) might make this feature sufficiently moot
   
4. That I might be in danger of losing my SL Good Citizenship merit badge
   

Well, in spite of appearances, I'm not anti-newbie; quite the opposite.
Heck, I still feel like one myself, three years down the line.
( - It often shows in my lack of LSL knowledge - )

Nor am I having any particular problems with griefers and/or alts, newbie or otherwise.
( - Well, until now at least... - )

It's just that, based on forum discussions, there seems to be a constant current of problems which stem from the ready availability of disposable identities. I'm hopeful that some way can be found to fix this for the folks who are having to face these problems. I'd hate to become so defensive - or so arrogant - that I'd need to resort to this.

It could be said that a system which allows the creation of disposable identities - which ultimately suffer no consequence for their bad behavior, other than a laughable "banning" - is already in a sad state.

I'm open to considering any proposals that help to curb misbehavior. Hence the discussion. In my healthily uninformed opinion, it seems that in general, a new account would be far more likely to be a source of griefing than an established account.

I'd absolutely want some way to allow new accounts conditionally - I'm not advocating any sort of a blanket ban.

It's clearly not a perfect solution, but perhaps a welcome option for those beset by harassment alts and joyriders.

Thanks to all who've chimed in on this discussion - and for keeping it civilized so far.
And - a pleasant welcome, to all of you who are truly newcomers. Hope to see you inworld.

=Sinclair
</soapbox>

(emphasis mine)

There's your problem, basing views on what's posted to the forum. There are, maybe, 2 dozen or so regular and semi-regular posters to these forums. There are way over 100,000 members who can (or could) log into the game.

Also, how often do you see people talking about the good they see, compared to the bad? I mean, you're a lot more likely to hear from a restaurant customer "they suck" than "they rock". That doesn't necessarily mean that there's more "suck" than "rock" opinions, just that it's human nature to complain about the bad more than praise the good.

I vote no. This feature would seem unfair to other residents. Although if used on a private estate it might be ok to do.

I am not often one to speak up on matters such as these, but despite my now nearly one-year presence on SL, I still acutely feel "noobish". This despite having built, sold, textured, and traveled. From this standpoint, I can openly and honestly say that such a feature, used indiscriminately (and despite many wanting such a thing to be used responsibly, history, both RL and in SL, have proven that when something exists it WILL be used), would do nothing but utterly discourage any new players from wanting to be here. Pardon me relating a tale...
I distinctly remember about three months ago when, due to an error, I was bounced violently across two sims' worth of security banned enclosures, ending up on a dead-end road where I was flung to and fro. When I finally managed to get my av under control (something not easy with a hideously low frame rate), I was almost angry enough to give up, and on the verge of tears. Only the knowledge this was not directed at me but at the general public on a whole kept me there.
In short, if you as a landholder can imagine this kind of frustration, then increase it, with the lack of knowledge that comes from being new, then you may get an inkling of how bad this would be.
Sadly, griefing via alts, new or otherwise, is here to stay. I feel that banning new players from an area due to age would be the worst possible solution, not the best. It is ill-concieved, and will lead to nought but hurt feelings, and maybe, just MAYBE an increased amount of security, but that latter is not likely.

Please pardon this old Kitsune's ramblings on this matter.

Yours respectfully,
Mika Kyubi (Muromachi)
Kitsune-at-Large
(Who wants her last name of Kyubi in SL!!!)

Thankfully I haven't been exposed to a lot of unruly behavior - but I have noted some of course, and based on what I have witnessed, I would still consider that newer accounts make up the bulk of "troublemakers" that I have seen. I'll admit that I don't keep records - why bother, for the most part - but the few avs that I have needed to ban from my own land were all less than 2 weeks old at the time of banning, if I recall correctly.

I'd quibble with your assessment of the numbers of forum posters, but I accede that you have a point if I were to base my opinion solely upon forum drahma. I'll work on trying not to do that. However, in the absence of organized in-world mass communication, the available bandwidth of opinions and observations (pro and con) is much much greater on the forums than in-world.


Personally, I find the forum community praises as well as it damns, but you make another valid point and one true to a large extent... When there are no problems there is no need to complain.
I think this helps justify the need for this kind of option, though, if there are sufficient users complaining now about the "bad" element of this type... (Does this sound like a Six Sigma project to anyone else?)


Good point made here.
I clarify my position in that this should apply only to private land, not Linden / public land.


Muromachi-san, thank you for expressing your opinion so directly - and politely, I might add.
No need for apology - we're just having a civilized discussion and poll here...

...which by the way at the moment has the "against" votes with quite a substantial lead (50:20 ratio).
I think the writing is on the wall - or maybe the ballots are stuffed with alt votes! .

Thanks again to all.
=SV