A vote to fix this registration mess....

Per their own policy, they are supposed to Acknowledge and comment on any voting topic that gets over 500 votes.... we hit that number early last night.

There is one other method we can use to get their attention:

1-800-961-6851

You'll want option 3. After a short wait listening to an English accented voice ,tell you about the Linden Exchange, you get to speak to a live person.

I'm sure if we started to flood the telephone lines with phone calles, it might drive the point home a little more.

Another proven method of protest is to sit in the welcome area with picket signs.

i'ts about the only good use for the several alts i gained as off lately. more votes!!!

You've got all 10 of my free - unverified account's votes

I hope people use as little alts as possible and remove votes from other proposals. That way the true importance will be much more clear.

Honestly, I was only trying to illustrate the point and maybe add a bit of humor. Of course I won't venture to prove this as it will defeat the purpose of having an alt, but I will say that I have not voted on this or any other topics using my main account. So the votes from this alt are just as valid.

Added my final, previously used vote to my original 9, making all my votes apply to this proposal. The issue is simply too critical to ignore, for the multitude of compelling reasons already outlined by numerous citizens.

over 2000 votes now and still no acknowledgement?

I'm shocked. not.

My comment was not directed to you directly, just more a general suggestion.

Prop: 4 - Havok 2
acknowledged! in development
2439 votes/725 voters

Prop: 1503 - Bring back identity verification for new registering accounts!!!!
new proposal you voted for this
2263 votes/305 voters

I've just freed up 7 votes and put them on this, to bring it up to 2364.

MAC bans wouldn't be useless if the SL client grabbed your network adaptor's mac address and passed it on.. some might call this an invasion of privacy, but its not any less invasive than an IP address... only more secure.

Greifers may have routers and dynamic IP's, but how many of them have spare ethernet cards laying around for the purpose of annoying people?

**edit
2440 votes/327 voters/10 placedCategory: miscellaneous Sub: otherAdded: 2006-06-19Feature Detail: We have seen the results, now lets fix it. Some form of identity verification is necessary. Go back to credit cards now! It may not be the best way but it was better than this chaos.
This proposal has now officially out-voted havok 2 as the most requested fix to SL. And in the space of a day.

Though Phillip has answered at least one person in email, the Lindens have yet (as far as I've spotted) to answer the questions here in these forums regarding the registration change. But piecing what has been said together, it really, in my mind, doesn't have to be this utter chaos. It can still be fixed and for me thats what this vote means... please fix it SOMEHOW.

So this is a copy of the email I am at this moment sending to Phillip.

Dear Phillip,

In the original announcement of the new registration changes Chris Linden stated, "... we will be launching in a limited fashion Second Life’s new registration system. "

"...in a limited fashion..." Which to me means, reversable. It says to me that this was like a test. Well, I think the test failed. With the exception of those people who are thrilled about being able to create as many alts as they want and bounce easily between the teen and adult grids, most people are very troubled by this change.

At one point in conversation with someone else you described a method of allowing landowners to choose whether to allow unverified accounts access, thereby giving us some level of security. In the forums several people have expressed approval of this idea.

The problem is Phillip, that you have opened the front door BEFORE installing any security. So to fix it is really very simple. Close the door, install the security, THEN open it again.

You want easy registration, I think most people understand that. But this was not the way.

In the three months prior to 6/06/06 the Forum island my partner and I run dealt with only two griefer attacks, both mild. We dealt with on average one, occasionally two, annoying troll types a week who were easily dispatched with a ban.

In the last 14 days we have had obvious teenagers looking for sex, obvious alt accounts trying to disrupt discussions and events, people firing weapons, trying to use our land for scripting and building without permission, basic chaos. We have even had to discuss the possiblity of setting our landing point far from our facilities and blocking it off to require people to request admission.... this is an open community we've built, we DON'T want to do anything like that.

But we have discovered it is no longer possible to leave the island unattended for even a moment, an officer must now always be present. Given that all of us have lives and jobs and responisiblities, not to mention businesses to run and protect in game, this is really not feasable in the long term.

In my own store and shopping center on the other island (Sala) I have needed to put up signs warning customers to be aware of scammers and thieves. Yesterday I logged in to find someone actually photographing my boxes! After I ejected and banned I IMed this person only to be told there was nothing I could do to stop her, she was using my pictures for her own boxes and I could go to h***. She was two days old. So there is now at least one person out there selling false merchandise using my images and my store name. Lovely.

So what many people are saying is, institute this verified/unverified plan FIRST, then remove the credit card requirement again.

Monday evening at the Forum island we held a discussion about this very subject with a fairly large number in attendance. It was one of a few discussions we've had on it. My plan was to send you a transcript of this meeting and I really wish now that I could, there were some very good points raised. However, towards the end of the discussion as I stepped away to deal with an RL need, the region was restarted. I came back to find myself and everyone else had been logged out before I had a chance to save the text.

So instead, I would like to point you to a few links.

First a thread in which many people are expressing their unhappiness:
/108/72/115026/1.html

And another:
/108/78/115048/1.html

A voting feature proposal:
http://secondlife.com/vote/index.php?get_id=1503

Just see for yourself the number of votes and voters, in just one day it has reached over 2400 votes! People are shouting for your attention here.

LL is not a democracy, it is a business. Most people understand that I think. You have the right to run things as you see fit. However every business person knows how important it is to listen to the customers and keep them happy.
Please look at the numbers Phillip.... a huge proportion of your customers are very unhappy.

Thank you for your time,
(wrote real name here on email)
Account names Allana Dion and lana Birdbrain

I cant agree with this post more and with a great many customers wanting to bring back Identity verification I really think this needs a closer look.

the numbers

Prop: 1503 2486 votes/336 voters/

prop 1503

and this is in less then 24 hours of the prop being started.

Response from Robin.
http://secondlife.blogs.com/change/2006/06/the_view_from_b.html

The duplication of the posts was a result of the bug in the voting system that hangs if the proposal include the double quote character.

Yes on 1505! Support the Status Quo Now!

i like. what think you people? :3

Soooo... How long before we are given the "you need 400 actual voters for an acknowledgement" line?

As for the posted response, one thing that stood out bright and clear is that they are going to keep the registration exactly as it is and deal with ID after people are signed up.
The "better tools to deal with griefing" is another way of saying "we are not going to do anything about it beyond try and make the users feel like they have control".

Same thing as always. Linden Labs has gone from being focused on the users, to be focused on the investors. The ends justifies the means, even if "the means" translates to ***king up the whole place.

from Robins blog



I for one have lost trust with LL with the new registration process. With out any kind of Identity verification there will NEVER be any way to stop some one from making as many alts as they wish and continue greafing harassing stealing and all Other matters of wrongful behavior when they can in less then 5 minutes make a new account and be back in world greafing. A really devious greafer will never stay around to be banned they will spend a few hours doing there thing and then disappear make a new account and continue there rampage.

i imagine that the "this person has been verified" profile tag idea in her post would more than just a simple profile tag. maybe like some people have been asking, you'd be able to keep unverified people off your land.

And IF LL keeps the easy registration policy then yes that is definately needed and actually IMO a good idea. But it isn't here yet. While they're working on this idea (which really is only an idea at this point) we're dealing with the fallout from their rush decision.

I know two people who have decided that if things are still the same in one week they are selling their land and going back to basic accounts. Others are saying SL will be completely dead in the span of a year.

I personally am finding much less enjoyment in running my place now that I'm constantly suspicious of every new AV who teleports in.... and that really is SOOOO unfair to the genuinely new newbies who should be welcomed not eyed suspiciously.

If they really want to do this verified/unverified plan, thats fine but I'm hoping for two things.
1) I'm hoping they will go back to using credit cards again UNTIL they have their "idea" actually working.
2) I'm hoping verified/unverified doesn't just end up meaning the difference between basic/premium. But thats another issue.

Ick.. at the risk of thread derailment, this was a hot topic a few weeks back after the TOS change that would allow LL to print money out of thin air.

This whole verified/unverified thing (I.e., pay 9$ one time entry fee to verify your identity, gain access to more places on the grid, seeing as how most of them will block unverified accounts) would fit in a little bit too nicely with the economic situation right now...

That may be fine, but can they not still shoot you from another persons land? Might be fine if you own 1/4th of a sim where they can't even see you, but for people on First Land, you can barely take a couple steps and you are out of your 512. That sort of protection does nothing for new land owners.

And as Allana said, there is little enjoyment in a system where you have to be more suspicious of a newbie than welcoming. It would be nice if you could walk up to someone who just teleported into your store, and confidently ask them if they need help finding anything, as opposed wondering if they are there to shop or grief.
It was always a posibility yes, but much much less likely than it is now.

From the people who cannot police the event calendar (a simple list), or write decent land control tools, or, or, or? Doubtful.

Crucial had it right above as does Daniel James:As they are focused on something else (e.g. boosting 'subscriber' count) they aren't focusing on entertainment.

To see "reputation" dragged out again was pretty funny seeing how they worked so well previously.

Yep, it's like status quo all over again.

i think i'm too optimistic for this thread