Request of Phillip Linden

Agreed - Forseti's post was excellent, and expresses my sentiments exactly.

This is true and this true and it is my emotion that connects them.

What people are having a very hard time with right now is cognitive dissonance.

Both GOM and Philip are right.. and wrong.

There is a compromise somewhere in the center and the success of any venture is discovering that center.

blaze, I agree.

And you will try to stomp two men who did more for the community than you and Chip ever have done into the ground because of a HOBBY that they started in SL that became a business. As Jamie corrected you on the historical facts of GOM, please go back and re-read LL's press releases regarding GOM and the first money exchange company that was promoted within a game. Go back and read. GOM was unique as (again) the sales of the game money didn't have to be hidden and illegal as it is in WoW and other games; and yes, their atm vendors are unique. Even here in SL, many of us feel that "scammers" SHOULD have their names posted on the forums so that we are aware of who to avoid. SWG, WoW, ADoC and others feel the same exact way.

I'm sure that other part-time business opportunists will read your threads and take several steps back before putting any further effort into the "metauniverse-ebay" that's forthcoming based on what Phillip, LL, and others have posted on the forums.

Glad SL isn't your business.

Many in SL have created businesses out of hobbies, many have grown and created a good income from it. Many have failed and many will come and continue to fail. I've watched Jamie pick up land that newbies couldn't afford, I've watched him "help" endusers who wanted a sim and needed to unload additional land prior to purchasing the sim, prior to the existing land barons being available. I've seen him and Tom put down ATM's at charitible events, collect the Linden game money, transfer it into USD, send a check -- without one commission/fee or expense. GOM helped every charitible event in SL succeed. Jamie and Tom's site allowed for "day traders" to have a part-time hobby with game money, you don't see that on WoW, IGE, or any other website. Jamie and Tom COULD have manipulated the money market within SL by purchasing very low-cost Linden's and reselling them on thier site. But they permitted the SL "day traders" to do it.

But before you bash, stomp and try to tell the world about GOM's business ethics, maybe read about the announcements and see SL's position on this company prior to commenting.

And even in the historical forums, GOM "helped" SL by pointing out huge flaws in their software that allowed security holes. They had a working friendship/partnership with LL for a very long time.

GOM was a large part of helping SL get off the ground when no other companies were around, it was a hobby of two men who took off. Now imagine your code being taken and duplicated because you trusted the people for whom you've worked with in the past.

But you're right. You and Chip and the others who bash GOM on their business ethics are completely right. We need more "professional, hard-core, business-oriented" people in SL. Fuck all to those who made a hobby successful, who helped the community grow because maybe they didn't follow your business ideals. People like that deserve to lose in the game of SL!

Like I said. Glad that I don't play your SL game. SL needs more people like you playing and encouraging other players to succeed from the get-go. When the game gets hacked again and again, and people feel losses in their designs, money, scripting... I'm sure you'll be right there patting them on the back saying... "Stupid people for trusting in a business gaming community."

History is a good component to have when trying to clarify a complex issue. Why didn't LL develop this much needed feature from the initial introduction of linden to dollar conversion ability?

Hysterical? We must not have read the same GOM post.

coco

Absolutely true. The Spice MUST flow (this is not an attack, I genuinely think you're right here)

There must be ways for anyone in SL to transparently, within the SL client, initiate an exchange between L$ and RL currencies.



Secondty-thirded !

LL cannot, IMO, simply take over all currency exchanges and run everything themselves, for ethical, professional, philosophical reasons, and for tax issues. BUT they can't either give way to a fixed number of existing exchanges to take over it either.

What we need here is LL to implement a simple API that ANYONE can build onto to create their own currency exchange. This way exchanges are still run by residents, GOM et al. can move to this API and simplify greatly their businesses (and save on Paypal fees ), and anyone can enter this market for competition.

Lynn,


You are really emotional on this topic, which you are entitled to be but, I don't share the same passion. I don't have to "stomp" GOM, they do a great job of that themselves. I pay to be here, I don't have to contribute a damn thing. This isn’t some damn hippy commune; this is a corporation I pay for service. The "community contribution" crap only works if you believe in community and probably if you aren't trying to make a profit from your contribution. Failing to make a profit isn't the same thing as being a non-profit.

You don’t get the internet Mother Theresa badge for making a great contribution to the advancement of rich people. If you want a cause, pick a worthy one that really matters and can change some lives. The internet crisis of rich people (anyone with a computer, broadband, and leisure time to play SL is rich in comparison to the rest of the world) isn't something that is going to keep me up at night.

Ahhh, Eboni, your negativity makes you miss all the great possibilities of SL.

Those poor people in the rest of the world could become very rich if they were able to immerse themselves in a society as egalitarian as SL is.

For SL not to succeed would be a crisis.

It is heartwarming to see Philip drop the pretense of lording over and protecting a mythical, single-minded community and start to develop necessary features. Those anti-griefing excuses had worn paper thin and blown away. If his fever has truly broken, we'll be seeing fully implemented XML/RPC, p2p teleportation, an API and real work toward licensed servers before the end of the year.

Give me a P...give me an H...give me an I...

Lynn, when your emotions on a subjet reach a level that you start accusing anyone who disagrees of wanting to fuck over people, well then you're probably too emotional to be looking at any of this in an objective or rational way. I have nothing but respect for GOM and everything they've done. I just happen to think they've handled this poorly and unprofessionally, and I can understand LL's reasoning for the making the choice they have. I don't see the crime here. If that makes me a heartless baby eater, so be it.

I agree -- there is no question that this will put a damper on the development of 3rd party tools which try to solve some of SL's deficiencies. If *I* was working on such a project for profit, as opposed to purely for fun, then this turn of events would give me pause. But any savvy business person would know this risk going into it -- Cris certainly has his eyes wide open when it comes to snapzilla.

As an SL-user, I would rather forgo potentially useful add-ons in the near term rather than see Linden Lab have whole avenues of software development and product enhancement shut off.

I don't really see this latest furor as having any negative impact on the traditional development of in-world content, however.

A lot of the problems we have come down to communication -- i.e. Linden Lab needs to get better at it. Probably once a month I shake my head and think "maybe they'll learn" but it's EASY to say that as a back seat driver. Harder to do the actual driving.

It's an unenviable problem -- dealing with a bunch of highly dedicated, opinionated, cranky, creative types. At least they have customers who give a damn... even if that includes telling the company off on a regular basis.


(p.s. Jesrad, the "spice MUST flow" tease cracked me up -- nice one!)

GOM is to Netscape as LL is to Microsoft.

Welcome to the next generations of the 'browser wars', folks.

May Firefox rise once again!


- Newfie

Chip, you're just saying that because you have PMS.

Condescension is so much easier than discourse. I win!

Interesting you say that. A couple of days ago I figured out the whole problem with the forums. Everybody has PMS. Permanent PMS in some case. Including half the men.

coco

I predict the thread topic will become "the problem with the forums and the people in it" in 10 seconds.

10-9 -8 -7 -...

Let's keep on topic 6-5-4-3- ...

Thank you Philip for your response!


GOM --> Continue Discussions

Geez, maybe I'll get some sleep now tonight.

I agree with Chip and Eboni (AND Philip) that GOM guys should never have taken this to public the way they did, this was highly unprofessional and emotional reaction. This again shows why we need LL based exchange system, so if guys at GOM or IGE or whatever are pissed off at LL we the residents (40,000 and counting?) are not left in cold. Thanks.

Snowcrash, remind me alot of another private business matter that went public back in early 2005.

Which is why I am surpised Merwan, that you pressed the issue further on a public forum and even had the gals to call out the CEO of LL here. I thought you would have learned that such discussions are not for the public. It fuels drama.

you know, beau, i was thinking the exact same thing.

I was initially surprised by it also - but it is in line with Merwan's broader role as a mediator. I sincerely hope that something can be worked out, and that those involved act with discretion and professionalism out of the view of any forums. This very polarizing situation is too important for the usual forum circus, and has already been whipped up into a damaging frenzy that can only get worse if it is not handled now.

I agree Cris. I just do not know enough about the issue from either side of the coin, I choose not to take a side, but I cannot help but wonder what the real motivation for this might be.

Fixing something that isn't broken? LL wants a bigger piece of pie? New investor pressure?

Too many unanswered questions.

I've a better question, why does anybody care? My theory is that it marks a fundamental shift away from protecting the community to implementing necessary features. With any momentum this'll mean the advance of XML/RPC, APIs out the wazoo, p2p teleportation, heavily revised group features and hundreds of other things that have been backburnered because they "might damage the community" whatever the hell that means or "might be used for griefing." I can easily see where this new tack would concern a few people and facilitate thousands of others.

Thank you Philip and staff for finally wisening up.