An Open Letter To Linden Lab

LL is a corporation not a damn government. Hello, McFly?!?!?! Hello?!?!!? Reality is calling. I am all for role playing but SL is a corporation, these are servers, not real land, and all of this is fake as hell, and a good magnet can wipe it all clean.

Best business plan ever.

We get the people to pay us gross amounts of money.
The people build all the stuff.
We use all the stuff the people build to attract more people.
We charge more money.
We randomly remove things and break things and ohh, also lose things.
We are responsible for nothing. PWNAGE
We charge more money.
We hold contest, pay almost nothing, then use it for marketing.
We get the customers who pay us, to work for us for free! HA! Even the mob wasn't this crooked.
We like the things our customers create, so we adapt them for more PWNAGE, and more $$$$$!
Rinse and repeat.


People are in business to make a profit. This is not a freaking government.

I beleive you would call that "spin off". Yes?

Spin off is the result of economic stimulation. To be healthy within the economy, money needs to change hands, alot.

So yes, GOM was run by 2 people, but the number of users who benefited was huge. Likewise, the spin off from my business reached alot of people too. This is why I will continue to insist that the governor stay out of the land business.

Hiro is just mad Linden's don't post on his threads when he begs for attention.


Fanboys require lots of attention, it is in the manual.

I am sorry, I do feel that using land scanners to swoop in and grab the land and then make profit off land you did nothing to get is dubious . Obviously, opinions vary - it's nothing personal against you. Additionally, there is so much opportunity in the normal land business, between standard sales and arbitrage that I can't believe that someone as shrewd as yourself can't find a way to make even more money that you were relying on the randomness of public land release.

There are three sides to every story. Right, wrong and reality.

Eboni tends to reflect the latter.

Umm, Gov Linden has always been in the land business.


Weedy, buy some private islands, develop them, split them up, rent the shit out. The mainland is dead, let it go.

You have not addressed a single one of my comments from my earlier posts. Just because I happen to dislike "scan and swoop" doesn't mean that my points are invalid.

If you want to believe that this thread is accomplishing any good discussion, perhaps you should address comments that aren't in agreement with your own. Discussion requires an opposite viewpoint.

Fine. I can dig that point of view.

But then change the slogan to, "Our World, Your Labor." Then I will stop expecting anything better.

coco

Again, I am going infer, that the only way you can make your opinion come across as fact, is to vilify me and my business.

Don't you worry, I will adapt. I guarantee it. It's not the only trick I have up my sleeve.

Look at all your fellow consumers working for free. It is implied. Read between the lines. You told us all your creditials before, if you were in a honors program you should know how. Why would they change a good slogan? It is working!

Your points are not invalid.

I have addressed numerous comments. The reason I chose not to respond to yours, because you are anti-scanner - Period. That does not mean I operated unethically or am a nefarious or clandestine person. I simply wanted to express my viewpoints, based on my experience.

I absolutely will not be vilified for what I have done in the past.

If my points are not invalid, then why don't you respond to them?


Then you should have considered your actions at the time. My problem is less with your previous choice of business, and more with your need to villify Linden Lab for making a business decision that your personal pity-post has nothing to do with.


Then go get a blog. This is a forum for discussion.

And you wonder why I don't respond? These are assertions, not comments.

1. What is the difference between an assertion and a comment?
2. I backed up my original statements.
3. The main point of my original posts was less to provide more info, but to question your initial postings. I thought I brought reasonable questions and challenges up, and then that would mean it is up to you to re-bolster your initial arguments to explain why my challenges are invalid.

Weedy:

- Did you really think that land scanning was a safe business to get into?
- Do you think your disabilities entitle you to special treatment in business?
- Does other blunders Linden Lab makes have any effect on the topic of hand on land scanning?
- Can you really stand behind your claim to be ignorant of LL's reasoning behind this when you yourself detailed several events that show that there was public backlash for scanning and it was Linden Lab's intention all along to look for a solution?

An assertion is where you make a point based exclusively on your opinion and leaves no room for further comment.



I will answer these, because they are valid questions.

Q- Did you really think that land scanning was a safe business to get into?

I understood that LL may change position on land scanning. Up to this point, LL upheld the right to scan for land. I also beleived, the reason they didnt change the policy in the years I have been here, is because they were content with residents doing the work, so they didn't have to. To answer you question more clearly, I was 50/50 as to the safety of it.

Q- Do you think your disabilities entitle you to special treatment in business?

Not in slightest. Having been this way my entire life, I am quite used to it. My point in saying it, was to have people understand why I chose to make it my occupation. My age and my condition preclude many opportunities. Land scanning was an open door for me and I followed through with it.

Q- Does other blunders Linden Lab makes have any effect on the topic of hand on land scanning?

As a coder yourself Hiro, I think you understand, that fixing a problem, can often give rise to new problems. It is my intent at this point, to bring into the discussion, what some of the potential problems might be.

Q- Can you really stand behind your claim to be ignorant of LL's reasoning behind this when you yourself detailed several events that show that there was public backlash for scanning and it was Linden Lab's intention all along to look for a solution?

Yes, I can. Up until Andrew made his post, I was unclear to the reasoning behind the changes. While I had my suspicions, I had no proof until a Linden weighed in on the situation. I have heard some proposals for solutions, and in the interest of good decision making, I offered some criticisms and comments based on my experience in that field.

That was a rhetorical question. There's no difference between an assertion and a comment. Both can be supported or unsupported.



Thank you.


So you were comfortable investing a good deal of money on a business where it could fail simply on a 50% chance that it might be made technically obsolete, let alone all the other risks such as competition?


Okay, I see what you mean here - SL when you started your land scanning business had less RL money making opportunities. While I feel that is changing now, I can see some validity in this statement. I hope you, in looking at other ventures in SL, find more opportunity nowadays.


It just appears that you were running from your initial post. Thank you for clarifying where you were going with that.


I find this hard to believe. Just because you don't have proof doesn't mean you don't see it coming, ask into it, etc. Also, as this is what you depended on for your business, don't you feel you should have become an expert on exactly what Linden Lab's intentions were with this?

Anyway, thank you for addressing my questions. Perhaps you would be a good person to start getting developers together to petition Linden Lab be more open with their features.

gom
gom
gom

because now they have to buy it from ll...

please note: gom'ng has nothing to do with availability of the resources... it has to do with who people have to go to get the resource.

They had to go to LL to get the resource before. Who the hell do you think they were paying the 1L$/m to? Linden Lab. This is about the discovery of said resource, who they have to buy it from - that hasn't changed - they just can't use a scanner now to find out its availability.

fish is a good source of vitamin b12.


prior to change -
abandoned land was turned over to LL.
LL immediately placed it on sale.
land scanning scripts alerted land scanners to log in and BUY THE LAND FROM LL immediately at 1 L$/m2
which they immediately resold the land for 4L$/m2, turning a 300% profit.

land scanners did not act as middle man. they did not provide a service. they picked up land off of the in world land market and basically repriced it. without them in the picture, the end use would get a lower priced parcel.

post change.
abandoned land is turned over to LL
LL holds the land for one week before putting it on sale.
land scanning scripts no longer detect the land because it no longer has the null tag.
all players have equal access to BUY THE LAND FROM LL using the finding tool.

how this differs from land barons is that in the inworld market, land barons buy land from other players so they don't have to abandon it. to stay in business they must offer a competitive buy price to gain access to the oppurtunity of earning a margin on resale.

land barons offer players an oppurtunity to realize some return on their land value in a speedy liquidation. land barons support a fluid land market. land scanners exploit a game mechanism. they sell land cheaply to increase turnover rates. land scanners devalue land.

there is a lot of money to be made from speculating in sl land: buying large parcels and parcelling them to fit market demand, selling land groupings based on interests groups, joining land locked land to waterfront to raise the value of the whole, developing and beautifying land before reselling and playing realtor. that is adding value. flipping public land with a land scanner is like collecting aluminum cans from dumpsters with a metal detector. you just cannot get indignant when the municipality starts a door to door recycling program.

Like I said in my previous answers, although I had my suspicions, does not make it so.

It's no secret, that some former land scanners were less than ethical in their dealings. I'm sure you remember some, if not all of them.

One scanner was hideous, not only that, once he quit SL, he left them up and marked his plots for sale at a high price. There was not much "chance" that this guy would take the time to return errors or mediate in land disputes, whereas motivated by profiteering. His karma ran over his dogma, you might say.

Then there are two other scanning incidents, where we worked together on, Hiro. I'm sure you remember these. The first being the notorious lb_v2 scandal. The outrage to this was not necessarily about scanning per se, although it was a factor to some. This was a global system which was not submitted for prior approval. It exploited many of the shortcomings of the SL client, such as 0 autoreturn, temp on rez, air space, email to anonymous recipients and surrepticious data collection. The operator of this system, owned no land from which sim data was collected and Philip stated that global projects should not be employed without paying for it. Eventually the owner gave up on the project, for reasons I should not discuss, due to privacy issues.

Then there was the Building Block scandal, for which you and I had occasion to investigate, Hiro. For the sake of those unknowing, I will touch on it. A person, who many of us know for his outspoken behavior in the forums as an alt, was using another alt to place scanners on land in alot of sims, where he did not own land. Once a plot was detected, he would hack a 16m plot, drop a scanner and sell the remaining 496 at a profit. He was clearly exploiting the 0 autoreturn feature to avoid paying someone for land to initiate his project within the sim. Legal, perhaps...ethical.....I don't think so. Anyway, once the practice was made known publicly, and having the audience of a Linden Liason, this practice was soon reversed, within 24 hours.

Most recently, a land baron fished for information from me, as to how I was aquiring land. He assured me, he was not interested in competing, insomuch as he was curious. Like anyone else who asked, I told him. The next thing I knew, he went against his word and aggressively began scanning from 16m plots. I had viewed his script and it was remarkably similar to Chance Small's scanner which is public domain in the scripting forums. I advised him at that time a couple of things. A- use a better script, and reduce the interval. and B- Don't make a spectacle of yourself. Well, initially he did neither. First of all, he eliminated the interval to get "jump" on the competition. 15 seconds can make or break a claim. Secondly, he hid the scanner inside of 3 prims, in a feeble attempt to hide the numerous scripts, 15 to be exact. Furthermore, implied threatening behavior by naming them "Weed Whacker" etc. Numerous complaints were filed about his scanner and I am aware that he was advised to "tone down" , the number of scripts and the use of sim resources, by Linden staff.

In a nutshell, the indiscriminant use of land scanners within sims is not good for the overall health of SL and I will be first to admit this. This is why, I made every effort to operate in an ethical and considerate manner.

I made no bones about my involvement in land scanning. That said, I made every effort to use the cleanest scanner possible, making every possible effort to minimize sim resources. The land was owned by a group, for which I was clearly an officer and my allocation of land tier was also clearly displayed. I never scanned from land where no permission was given, and bought and paid for every single micro-plot. The scripted object was not surrepticiously concealed, but was set at llGround() where anyone could view. The script creator was me, the owner of the prim was me and the data transmitted from the object was sent to me. I never attempted to use anonymity to conceal my involvement, nor did I use alternate avatars as data recipients.

In a nutshell, it was my hope, that if I was to conduct my business in a forthright and respectable manner, that perhaps LL would respect my right do so, by upholding my rights.

They don't have to though, and are well within their rights to make any changes, as they see fit. It is my belief, that prior actions of other residents, the potential for further abuses and the pressure from some residents, led to the changes brought forward in 1.9.

I have little choice, but to live with that.

no substantial amount of money is invested in this business. small investments are made on a regular basis with very quick returns.

land that is bought at 1 L$/m2 is resold within days for 3-5 L$/m2.

when weedy says he has bought 2000 USD worth of land, he likely means that is the total in purchases over one year he tabulated in his spread sheet. it means that if he has bought 2000 USD worth of land, he has already resold it for 8000 USD.

nobody could lose a penny scanning public land as a business. it was the best exploit in town.

$2000 USD is not chump change....it went into the pockets of other SL residents. It is the cost of purchasing the microplots I scan from. Have you invested that much in cash to other residents?

Your assumption is 100% wrong.

Oh, for heaven's sake, Hiro, expressing one's viewpoints based on experience IS discussion.

coco

No, discussion requires more than one speaker. Else it's a lecture, a rant, a speech, or something similar.