Editing objects allows privacy breech

Ok, here's another one:

I've learned that if, for example, you create a prim, sit on it, edit it and while you're at it start moving the prim (with you on top)... you (along with the prim, of course) can go through walls!!

That's right. I really didn't know that one, untill a friend of mine demonstrated it to me. The reason she did so was to go into a room that was intentionally locked out for us. Lots of fun!!

But then I thought, isn't this a little invasive? I know some people go through some lengths to script a lock or combination key to their doors. For what reason?... who knows, but the main issue is privacy of any sort. Whether they're cybering, got some "odd" images or statues, or just want to enjoy the privacy of home or whatever. And that's just the home bit... there might be other reasons someone just doesn't want you to get across a wall.

So, I do think this should be taken care of. Maybe have it that you can't move a prim through a wall if you're on top of it... or the prim may go, but you just hit the wall (like when terminator II went through the bars - his gun got stuck behind him).

Does anyone else think this is an issue??

I really don't think it's a solvable issue simply because there's other ways of varying complexity to do the same thing. (Sit target hack, phantom av hack, and I'm sure there are others) :-/

-Meiyo

P.S. - Oh and my flight script will let you go thru walls if you set the speed high enough...

Not to mention just alt-clicking and moving the camera viewpoint around will allow you to look through any and every possible 'locked' area, assuming you can get reasonably close to it...

No.

You're right, meivo. But, they are all hacks, aren't they? Shouldn't hacks be patched/corrected/avoided? I mean after all, those aren't the intended functionalities those actions were supposed to have.

No.

LL has suggested twice now that they were going to "fix" llSitTarget, and people (myself included) screamed bloody murder. llSitTarget teleporting may not have been the INTENDED use for it, but you have to face the fact that teleporters that use the unintended feature are now not only in EXTREMELY wide use, but dozens, if not hundreds of people have paid good L$ for such systems, and to break it now would be equivilent to LL going through and randomly deleting the scripts out of one specific type of object in the world.

They don't hurt anything, except if you're trying to keep something 'private', at which point you just need a ban script of some kind.

Things like the camera being able to go through walls is A) A feature and B) Impossible to stop anyway until Havok2 gets put in.

I agree it would be great if we could have 100% reliable privacy in some way but I don't think it will happen. (I'm a pessimist.) If nothing else, there are too many teleport scripts throughout the world that rely on the flexibility of the sittarget implementation. And there are specific reasons why objects that have avs sitting on them should be allowed to interpenetrate other objects. Flight scripting through a wall might be fixed with a Havok upgrade but that's a crapshoot. And the phantom av trick is a bug that prolly will get fixed at somepoint. Your best course of action if you want to have an area that is secure from such invasions is to set up some sort of home security script that will launch unwanted users home or something if they get within the walls. Sorry... I know this prolly isn't the answer you're looking for.

-Meiyo

If you want 100% privacy... Buy an island. (Or rent one.) There is no other way.

A lot of new users seem to think that privacy exists in Second Life and request blinds in their windows and locks on their doors in my apartments. I've always told them that they do no good, but many tenants have been installing their own anyway. To keep them from wasting their prim allowance on it, I've been going through and building those features into the apartments myself.

I don't think privacy is all that neccessary in SL anyway. It's a game-like environment, not a place were we have to live. My avatar was designed to be looked at: It has an apearance, and it's connected to the internet for all to see. The same thing can be said for all my "possesions" in SL. I don't consider anything on my web page to be "private" either.

Who needs privacy? Just be shameless.

Ok! No problem.. I hear your voices. Not that I had an issue with it though. Just thinking it could be a possibility people might want privacy. And not only privacy per se... but the fact you could hack out a future RPG game by going through limits you weren't intended...

Oh well, since nobody does want it after all...

That strategy has worked quite well for me

On a more serious note...I wouldn't label it an invasion of privacy, but rather than a lack of privacy built into the system. People may expect walls and doors to maintain privacy in their FL (FirstLife), but SL doesn't yet support that concept.

While the sit/move technique may not intended to allow people through walls/etc., we should also consider that prims weren't intended to work as real walls. Once that changes (and I suspect eventually it will), then maybe it will be more feasible to try to expect privacy in SL.


- Newfie Pendragon

old news.. if you want privacy talk in im and/or get your own sim and ban everyone else and setup shop in the middle.

The "edit seated avatars through walls" problem is very difficult to fix while using the current physics engine (Havok 1.8 -- which has very expensive 'asynchronous collision detection'), so we've punted the problem until we can get a better physics engine.

Incidentally, this bug / missing feature / misfeature or whatever you want to call it prevents some games from being developed in Second Life since "cheaters" playing the games will be able to pass through locked doors without keys. Since we want to enhance the SL platform to eventually support many traditional online "games" we plan on fixing this problem someday. Perhaps it will be an option that can be toggled on a per-sim or per-parcel basis... we'll think about those issues when the technology (fast asynchronous collision detection) is available.

Bullseye

so how IS havok 2.0 coming along, andrew?

LF

Other things prevent game creation too, like the extreme lack of game support within LSL.

Forget Havok 2... Havok 3 should be going into beta very soon now. It should be a huge jump in quality, allowing collision geometry to be 10 times smaller and stop the bullet-through-paper effect once and for all.

I do hope the long delay on Havok upgrades is due to a wait for H3...

I'm wondering if I would have to change my elevator though, if avs sitting on objects would be smooshed instead of allowed through objects. o.o

YAY FOR SMOOSHED AVATAR JELLIES!