Request of Phillip Linden

GAMING OPEN MARKET IS NOT A HOME GROWN SECOND LIFE PRODUCT.


The Linden dollar was one of the last currencies they added the website, and it happened to be the only one that lasted because LL agrred to work with them when other companies didn't They did not develop the software for SL, they developed it for selling all online gaming currencies.



I don't get why GOM is supposed to be this great protect SL resource. They are only here in SL, beacuse no one else would deal with them.

Yes, lets be innovative! I think the EUR and CAD is not big market though. I rather think the future of third party exchanges might be topless currency delivery. If you are exotic dancer looking for job, maybe should send us your job application

i would pay a 3 percent premium for that!

Eboni you do know the facts - it was not a defacto thing...


Jamie Hale was asked personally by Phillip Linden to set up a currency exchange for SL - he brought Jamie in.


_/ _/

They were selling currency before SL, they are not some SL residents that saw a need and filled it. They were an outside company that came into SL for profit. This is not the same thing as them replicating Snapzilla, SL Boutique, Second Server Etc. I realize the line may be thin to some but to others it is crystal clear. If everything that they have said it true, they are just a company that was brought in for a service and are now being given the boot. Although if you read what Phillip said and take it at face value and don't toss in every conspiracy theory and emotional thought into it, they are not being put out of business. If anything they are showing their lack of professionalism yet again by whining in forums, yet again.

1. Exactly. Even I thought of that, and I'm no economic genius.

2. It also wasn't lost on me that this was favoritism in the first place, in that they approached GOM only, and not the other people in the same business.

3. I always thought it was OUTRAGEOUS that SL co-opted Snapzilla without as much as a nod to Cristiano before they did it. (Even though, as I understand it, they can take anything and everything they want from SL for any reason or no reason, and they do snag the photos before they are OUT of SL.)

4. I figure that there is money in this for SL somewhere or they wouldn't be risking all this good will by doing it. They will make a profit off it somehow, someday, of that I'm pretty sure. They can in no way be simply another competitive provider of this service - heck, they OWN the interface.

5. Despite my extreme disappointment over all this, and the fact that it seems horrible on so many levels to me (the favoritism in the first place; the screwing over of GOM; the appropriation of their work and advice gleaned from long effort and experience; the fact that it goes against this whole "Your World"/platform business), I would add that . . .

. . . everybody cautioning to not jump to conclusions till more info is forthcoming is right. We just haven't heard enough about this from the Lindens (unless I've missed yet another Philip post by more than 24 hours). It's amazing how much different something can seem when you get both sides fully. Not necessarily in this case, but it COULD be amazing.

Which means they should talk more about it, once they get over the panic in their own offices all this has engendered.

Or, they might have said all they intend to, and it is simply a done deal, and we'll know how it works when they roll it out. They can do that, too - it is their game and their business.

coco

I appreciate you being outraged, but I do one to clear up one important point. It is true that I did not know about the change on the web site until after it launched, or any of the technical details of how they were implementing it. However, I was aware of plans to add live pictures to the site in some way. I had discussed it vaguely with Reuben, but it was more conceptual and very brief. What I was upset about at the time was not that they put those pictures on the front page, but instead the limited information. I was upset about the fact that they did this, said nothing to me at all about how it worked (my initial panic was over bandwidth), and there was no credit of any kind on the site.

Additionally, Prokofy and Blaze locked onto the whole front page thing like a heat seaking missle (Blaze on the spamming front with his macro program, and Prokofy on the important metaverse pictures being ruthlessly controlled by one site) and I was having to answer for things I had a) no part in implementing b) had no control over c) had no information from LL on. I do not feel my work was co-opted, I just felt in the dark and left hung out to dry to answer for their decisions and having to explain them while LL was silent. After venting to Robin about it and getting some things cleared up, all was fine.

I have a question.


How would you feel is a company you once partnered with or considered partnering with (whatever) reveled to the public a development plan/product you had before you were ready to release that information? If they made GOM sign a NDA, they might be in for a lawsuit.

Were you even in SL then to realize there really was no one else doing this? Conspiracy theories are really getting old from you.

Unless you are referiing to IGE, a company I wouldnt want to approach either. I mean they even have rumors of Chinesse Sweat Shop opperations


Funny, I've heard you bringing this up time and time again but never once heard the site owner complaining



Great start another baseless conspiracy rumor Cocoanuts



Wow I think you stated something I agree with

In this model, the third party site is the one selling to the people buying through the SL front end - that is transparent to them. They are not buying from you, or from me - they are buying from GOM, Anshe, etc. This is a bit speculatory, since it is not final, but based upon Philip's comments, it would appear that if you (Pendari) went to buy currency through SL, you would say that you want 10,000L. The order to buy would be filled by the site with the lowest available price for the amount you want. LL would bill your credit card and deliver the funds to you. Sellers would continue to sell to third party markets - LL would not be buying - they are not even selling. Additionally, I imagine users would also continue to use third party sites. Even though There sold T$, there were third party sites selling them as well - they offered better rates, in exchange for convenience and privacy.

It's a reversal of an foolish policy that the investors are implementing for two reasons. It'll increase LL's cash flow, on paper, because they'll be clearing and redistributing the US dollars. It'll also add a feature to SL that should've been added a long time ago to boost it's chance of being successful when competition rears its head in a few years, oh no months now.

They, of course, have no problem making Philip act as the scapegoat as long as they leave him in place as the company figurehead. When he's no longer useful in that role, they can finish buying him out and chuck him out the door.

If y'all want to negotiate, find out who's in charge and deal directly with them.

I'm too new to know if there was previous mention (and how far back)
of LL implementing a way for people to get more $L with a single
click from the GUI or not, but this feature seems like it should have
been pretty obvious from the beginning... Especially since Philip
has been talking so highly about promoting the economy and marketing
SL as a way to "make real money".

Even if it was not spoken in public much earlier, I'm not sure it's
fair to say they've "stoeln" anything.. unless you have proof.
Not to mention the fact that it sounds like they were already working
on it (or starting to) when they talked to GOM, and GOM did not
give them any code, so they still had make it themselves.

Yes. I agree the post on GOM forum sounds very bleak,
but it DOES sound like LL has already tried (twice even)
to get them included. Now after LL has put in all the hard
work to create it, you think GOM should be paid for.....
oh yeah.... LL doesn't need anything from them now, they've
already put in all the man-hours for coding... (of course
I do know there may be several things LL could still work
with GOM on)


On another note.... Everyone may as well jump on the
bandwagon NOW because SLexchange and SLBoutique
are next on the "hit-list" !

Oh... didn't you catch that? LL has said for a while now
they want an easy way to search for items being sold via
the GUI. I think that's great too, as it will make my life
easier.

We ALL take risks in biz... that some other biz won't come
up and eat our lunch on PURPOSE... but I don't feel LL is
making these GUI improvements to specifically target GOM,
SLexchange, etc. They are doing it to make the GUI more
powerful.. and user-friendly. They wont be designing clothes
because that isn't making our interface easier to work with.

So, SLexchange... make lotsa money while you can!
It's been a good run. Hopefully you can change your
biz model to continue to make a profit after that.
The writing is on the wall... hopefully the lesson is learned HERE.




The $L will always only have as much value as the residents
are willing to pay. If the supply is up and the demand is down,
then cheap... but if the supply is down, and demand is up, then
the $L will have great value.

Gabrielle

Khamon,
I have worked for a few companies that got angle investments, they do not have the same power over a company that publically traded companies have. Infact, the owners of both my experience had enough power to still run the companies into the ground and go broke.

I am not saying LL is doing this by any means, my point is thatt Phillip is probably still the main decision maker. If this has anything to do with investors, as was previously stated, it is just to show a more positive cash flow to help get further investments.

I feel I should not "cash flow" and "profit" are two different things in the world of business.

You keep missing the point.
LL is not doing this to make money!
They are making an improvement to the GUI which will
help residents bring $L more easily in to the world.
(exchanging $US for $L).... and even using GOM, IGE, etc
to do so !

Lynn, with all due respect you are really twisting this. Yes they found a security flaw in something they were the first one to try. Also to bring up a client hack that LL fixed in less than 24 hours is not fair at all.

DOH, I was replying to your statement.

THE CODE is a home-grown product, the creation of the in-world vendors, and the one of the FIRST creations of an open-market buying and selling system FOR SL. It was hyped by Linden Labs to the hilt when it was created. What about that don't you understand? Their software code was specifically designed to work within SL.

....but what they can take from you.

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"At various points over the past year or so, we have brought up the idea of an open, community-standard banking API, going so far as to discuss design and implementation with senior management at LL. You have now informed us over at GOM that you are in the process of attempting to re-create what we have built in order to set up a competing currency exchange with an unacceptably inadequate API, rather than implementing the far superior, secure open banking API we have described in detail to you."

So, in the business world of SL, "it's your world, your imagination" -- BUT dammit, if it's a GOOD idea that works, WE'LL STEAL IT!

They have not done anything special. ATMs that take money from one avatar, give it to another and send an email to a webserver is not rocket science, its not special, and I think I will pause on the distrubtion of the Bozo Buttons for it.

This decision is a super smart move by Lindens, and I congratulate and fully support Philip for his courage to make this happen. Why having LL based exchange market critical for future of SL? Because this will ensure that there will always be secure, protected money exchange available to SL citizens. What if GOM decided to close their doors tomorrow, for whatever reason, then what? What can LL do about that?? Pretty much nothing and you are left with a big hole.

Furthermore, while for now this does not make too much business sense, in near future it will. Philip cites 300K US$ exchanged per month and at 3% this is 9K for them, yes peanuts now. But what if in few years that was 30 million dollars a month? Suddenly you have a million dollar revenue.

Also, with this implementation and other changes LLs have been doing recently, they are now moving from the development phase to become credible for big companies to utilize SL. This can not happen with uncertain web site run by two guys, sorry. Sony did the same thing with exchange and it was a smart move on their part.

On a last note, LL based linden$ exchange can also set the framework for more serious future money markets, banking and stock options. Go for it Philip! This is good for SL.

In other words, we were getting our egos stroked and thought that we'd have sway in controlling which direction this went (and a resultant advantage in the exchange market) but LL decided to do something else rather than what we told them to do, and now we're going to have a hissy fit and cry theft. *scratches head* Let's get this straight... GOM wanted this done with their API that they outlined to LL in detail. LL isn't doing that and is going with a different method that GOM doesn't like, which is partly what GOM is pissed about. How is NOT using their suggestions theft exactly? Sorry, I'm with Eboni on this. GOM is acting very unproffesionally at the moment and might be demonstrating why LL decided not to go with a partnership arrangement. Trying to negotiate a business arrangement and then libeling your potential partner when things don't go your way isn't exactly a shining example of professionalism.

3% is not profit, it goes to the banks, not into the pockets of the Company processing the credit card payents.


There is a reason why a lot of small companies have not accepted credit cards, they take a hit on profits.

Actually if you read Philip's respond he implied there may be a 3% on top of credit card charge (second sentence):

I didn't read that as 3% on top of 3%, equaling 6%, but maybe that is what he means. Considering they will need a person to handle this full time, they will have to deal with charge backs (the consumer is only liable for $50 and the company that get the chargeback has to eat the rest). If they make 3% "profit" and I use the term profit loosely because it still seems like they will lose money or just break even on it in the end, doesn't seem like much. If they are making 9K a month, that should just cover payroll, payroll taxes, and maybe some health benefits.


In There people impulse purchased ThereBucks all the time. Many of them housewives or whatever, who were also cheating on their spouses etc in There, when the husbands saw the bills, they refused the charges. Accounts were suspended and closed on this all the time. Right now LL probbaly has minimal chargebacks, as more people impulse shop for Lindens with a couple of clicks(and all the kiddies pretending to be adults using their parents credit cards on the MG), it will probably increase their chargeback numbers and open them up to more administrative headaches and overhead.


They have been smart to leave this to outside companies because it just seems like a pain in the ass not worth bothering with. I do think it is a necesary measure to stablize the economy a little. Since so many people in SL are living off SL funds, paying rent, buying food, supporting entire villages in China, the stability of the Linden is important. I don't think it should be trusted to 2 guys who run a business after hours when they get home from work.

Thank you for pointing this out - it is one of the concerns I have always had. There has always been a risk that IGE will tire of SL and pull out, or of GOM going under for a variety of reasons (it is 2 people working part time barely making any money from it). The loss of GOM or IGE without something under the care and control of SL would be devastating to our economy, and all of the people relying on this economy for income. GOM has offered a great service, as has IGE, but our entire economy should not be beholden to third party sites that could easily cease to exist.