Alts

If Sasi's E-Mails were as abusive as her positings her and on the Hotline, I can't say I blame Philip for not responding immediately. Also, there are probably better people to address this than the president of the company. This is not the earth-shattering tragedy it has been made out to be.

Don't talk about the media or the courts. The media isn't going to care that someone didn't bother to educate herself on the rather simple business of selling land. The courts are not going to care, as the Second Life terms of service explicitly disclaim any and all warranty for their products and services.

Personal accountability is a big deal. I encourage others to learn it, to love it, to live it. To quote the sign atop the desk of New York mayor Rudy Giuliani,

"I'm responsible."

I totally agree with that, Im hoping that making the land sale section fall in standard with the layout with the rest of the software and also making it the same as windows standard, will help greatly in this case, having a tick box on the left with entry box on right usually means tick to enter info, which is very wrong here. and then a confimation box on actually setting the sale.

We're also hoping in the proposition to get th release land dialogue reworded to explain it better for newbies so they dont think they are releasing it for sale etc.

But from the im's and people chatting who'd experience the same, with loosing land, sometimes nice people buy it and return, sometime the lindens have reversed the sale and in this case nothing, they've known about this alonnnnng time. and things like this really need fixing first before some shiny new feature.

Why would they be abusive, philip had a nice chat with her and she just put down the facts of the case to him and robin, nothing more nothing less. I dont see why you need to presume anymore.

As for the rest you should read back, after failing to get regonition from customer service and being told by the head of liasons to stop bothering them she had got her answer, even though the software had a bug listed for this they call the sale fair and legal.

Perhaps you should read the terms more closely, section 4.2d, here it is

(d) you hereby release Linden (and Linden's shareholders, partners, affiliates, directors, officers, subsidiaries, employees, agents, suppliers, licensees, distributors) from claims, demands and damages (actual and consequential) of every kind and nature, known and unknown, suspected and unsuspected, disclosed and undisclosed, arising out of or in any way connected with Linden's resolution of disputes relating to the Service.

Linden have not entered into resolution of this dispute relating to the service, therefore they are not released from such action.

As far as media goes, well not sure about usa, but i have 2 news agencies here i can call on, i choose not to though, because i actually love this place believe it or not.

Hahahahaha.

Whats the laughing for? The fact i love the place can be seen that i volunteered to be a mentor, i volunteer to be a preview tester and bug hunter, If your talking about the media then my current employment is with british sky broadcasting in the uk, with attachment to the bbc interactive unit. Previous employment has been with london weekend television, itv news and mtv networks europe.

Linden labs has my cv (non rejected liason application) if you want a copy two i dont mind showing it here.

I believe what he was laughing about was the prospect of alerting the media. Good god, this has gone way too far, over Sasi's own stupid mistake. Read carefully. IT IS HER OWN FAULT. She was careless enough to do this. You can only protect people so much from their own stupidity - granted we try, it is why there are warning labels not to drink shampoo or put an iron on your face. It doesn't mean that someone who is careless can blame everyone else for their problems. Alert the media, I am sure you would get the exact same reaction as Enabran's post.

I have underlined this problem before. Hopefully Sasi and Nathan lack the financial resources to drag LL into a silly court case, based on their paranoia and unfounded sense of grievance.

But SL is such fun that there is no reason bored RL millionaires or even billionaires should not be playing it. Who could fund huge court cases on a whim.

To reduce this danger we need to try to develop a clear culture here. A culture in which everyone takes responsibility for their own actions, and recognises the overall value of LL's minimum-intervention policy, despite the inevitable uncorrected wrong comitted by one player on another. A wrong, as in this case, which violates no rule, except perhaps a moral and philosophical one. Even RL law cannot legislate for morality, and SL certainly can't.

Lets get this clear
Anyone who sues LL or stirs up media criticism is potentially attacking and damaging every other player, and endangering the value of everyone's assets.

It should never even be considered unless you get virtually unanimous support from every player who has listened to the tale. In forum for instance. I'm sure Nathan and Sasi can see that the balance of forum opinion is against them. Hopefully this will cause them to step back and wonder why. We can't all be malign individuals with hidden agendas.

Yea i can see that now, im sure if your car had a know defect or bug, of which they had acknowledged as needed fixing as it was confusing the driver into making mistakes as is the case here, and then you had an accident. Would you a) do nothing b) see if they offer compensation c) sue the company

Well i certainly wouldnt do nothing, i would hope they would talk to me and offer compensation as in this companies tos state they will eneter dispute resoltuion ( still waiting there) of course if that doesnt happen they dont close the legal door so onto c.

And im sure many media companies are interested just how much real money you can loose just like the ny times just wrote about how many you can make it. Customer service is very important here, we even have a government department for the protection of customers, so the news is very geared upto that.

I believe the night this sale took place it was resolved and the further comments about it didnt have to be replied to but they were and didnt have to be.
Simpy because one party didnt agree with the resolution doesnt mean they didnt resolve it.

What happened to her was not a bug. SHE DID NOT TYPE THE PRICE CORRECTLY. That is user error, not a bug. Not a known bug, not an issue. Them agreeing to add a confirmation message is a warm and fuzzy UI thing to add a layer of protection from someone doing the same thing. However, adding bumpers on your car to further protect your body doesn't mean that it's the car maker's fault that you crash.

Keep up your fantasy that media companies would care about this. You are also oddly fascinated with the royal family there too. At the end of the day, this was a player dispute - and if the Lindens decide not to intervene, that in itself is a resolution - they have decided their course of action. It is so easy to point the finger and whine and blame, but you know what, this is completely Sasi's mistake.

I have no intention of taking LL to court i have stated that, please read the post again ellie, i dont know why i have to keep telling you to do that. As i've said i've not lost a single dollar here, i will not be in any way no matter what happens be gaining a single dollar, all i want is for LL to be open and fair, treat all customers the same, and when they say they are doing something then do it, so robin says in the hotline she is talking outisde the hotline then perhaps she should actually talk to sasi.

As you know from the previous thread such a case could be bought for 10$, i believe not a us citizen so i dont know, small claims court i believe someone said. i dunno. But from what your saying ellie is if a company breaks their own tos they should not be held liable.

And now in your clear bold font you're trying to gang up against everybody like me and sasi who try and get fair treatment using any means necessary, im sorry ellie, but you've threatended me fromt he start with name calling and alike, but now this gang like activitity is beyond belief, you were accused of working for LL well sure as hell looks like it now. Im sure as hell reporting your post for threatening behaviour, and encitement to others. This kind of behaviour truley sickens me

Ugh, fanboyz on parade. Really unsightly. I guess the game is "Let's all see how smarmy we can get about the Lindens, and how indignant and abusive we can all get about somebody challenging anything about them and their practices." I'm hoping that these kinds of suck-ups and smack-downs really expose themselvse so I don't have to waste another 2000 word essay on this topic.

I can see where Sasi would be very upset losing that much money (oh, it's down from $2000 US to a more realistic $600 -- I hadn't realized at first these stories were connected). I find people lately suffering huge losses in the game -- a friend whose $16k Tringo disappeared completely out of inventory after the game patch; a tenant's employee who lost $3,000 of animated balls after a return from her lot -- this kind of stuff gets hugely annoying and people understandably get really angry and any lack of recourse.

What makes people angry about this story is the knowledge that it is actually within the Linden's power to freeze this land, to reverse the sales entirely, to have a dispute resolution process -- or even to act instantly to cancel a mistaken sale and tell the player who opportunistically bought it for a song that they don't get to be that greedy and nasty in this game, when someone makes a mistake THAT big.

But...they don't chose to use that power in this fashion evidently because they don't want to open up a slew of opportunistic cases that come on the heels of them rendering a judgement like that -- I can imagine dozens of impulse buyers of Anshe's land coming here every week and suddenly screaming "I wuz robbed" because they claim they didn't see an extra 0 on a price or they sold to Anshe to liquidate then regretted their hasty sale. Obviously Linden can't get involved in all those player disputes and has to be resolute in staying out of them. When a $600 mistake is made, however, you do wish they'd review it for a possibly solution. And their failure to do that for 2 weeks (like other reviews they promise that seemingly go nowhere) is probably a function of them failing to have the staff, the time, and the will to have an ombudsman-like process. Indeed, you wish that this system, being that it is so like a Russia or a China in not having a legitimate and independent judicial system, would at least have an ombudsman, originally from the Swedish model, which would take on problems like this that had exhausted other remedies. Indeed, for this semi-feudal system we do have in place, an ombudsman might be a good solution (player nominated, Linden approved).

I don't care if Lindens have alts. When I suggested them having a policy to NOT have them it was, as Jake said, to prevent abuses inherent in them using insider information and old players networks to get an advantage in a game where land and business has RL dollar amounts. I actually think they don't do that sort of cravenly opportunistic stuff because they seem like decent sorts in a decent company. What I imagine is a worst problem though is the entire corrupt and corruptive AR system and reptuation-enhancement system where they do become biased and adopt a seemingly intransigent "received wisdom" about "what is good for the community" and "what is bad for the community". But, at the end of the day, you have to throw aside any consideration of fairness, justice, the American way, and you have to say "It's their servers. They can do what they want."

The MMORPG game culture is riddled with corruption, injustices, and idiocies, IMHO, especially when that game culture tries to transpose itself on to RL situations with RL dollar values and more RL activity like business or non-profit work. The MMORPG game system is set up with two insidious features: a) informants (automatic AR system) and b) loyalist old players who become wizards/mentors/Lindens. These are systems without checks and balances of any sort, easily manipulated, easily gamed out and leveled up, and crying out for reform. If this were really not a MMORPG but really a RL thingie, you can imagine how people would begin to complain once they bring RL business or serious non-profit/government expectations to this culture.

If LL is the "federal government" then some RL entities would want them to behave like a "federal government" with anti-corruption mechanisms, and codes of conduct to prevent abuse, including third-party outside inspections and audits, etc. But, they really aren't that, they're just a game company, so...well, ok, they all have alts and play the game themselves.

I think it's hardly likely than a Linden alt tried to steal this land for a song. Still, the climate is ripe for that type of accusation given that we're dealing with silly MMORPG game culture and not RL institutions with checks and balances and separation of powers.

THIS JUST IN:

IT IS POSSIBLE TO DROP YOUR WALLET. IF YOUR WALLET IS FULL OF CASH, SOMEONE MAY PICK UP YOUR WALLET AND REMOVE THE CASH FROM IT!

San Francisco, Calif. (AP) - Linden Wallet Company, a recent player on the wallet scene, has been served with a court injunction. The Linden Wallet has been enjoined from further sale of its wallet which, plaintiffs claim, can be dropped. Once dropped, the contents of these wallets can be pilfered by any individual walking by.

"I think it's terrible. I put all my money in my wallet, and then I left it on a table in a park. Someone took all the money out," laments Susi Baloozy, a plaintiff named in the lawsuit against Linden Wallet.

The suit, filed last week in federal court, alleges that Linden Wallet Company included in its design a method for removing the contents of the wallet. The suit further claims that this design issue, coupled with Linden Wallet's failure to coat the wallet in adhesive, leaves the user of the wallet susceptible to fraud.

"You know what the worst part is," continued Baloozi. "The man who took the money out of the wallet I left on the table in the park? He worked for Linden Wallet. I can't prove it, but the fact that Linden Wallet wouldn't give me my money back tells the whole story. They're selling wallets specifically so that people will lose the money inside them, and then Linden Wallet comes and keeps the money."

A spokesman for Linden Wallet could not be reached at press time.

Yea please feel free to stereotype, i dont care at all about the royals, im not going to lower myself to having a go at your stereotypes.

So not a bug then, lindens say it is? lindens say its confusing.

You've used that allow window and the ban window and how they are used, tick box on the left, and extry boxes on the right, when you close the box the thing becomes active. So you move to the land sale window, you tick the box saying i want to use this as you would do in most windows apps etc, but thats not what happens it puts land up for sale straight away, you start editing land if you put a 1 in its a dollar then a 2 for 12 its 12 dollars and so on.

There is no point in you disputing this the lindens have already admitted this

its confusing, it needs fixing and there is a bug entered for this are all answers robin have given in the hotline, please read it. and before you ask it wasnt just me or sasi asking it was people who dont even know us.

And for the people who badmouthed sasi and me in the first thread, she was not in this for the money, people offered donation all of which she refused, all she ever wanted was for lindens to talk to her, which im sure if you were in trouble and had lost 600$ then thats all you would want, and not to be ignored.

Ugh. This is really nasty stuff.

First of all, I'll make it clear that I think that "suing Linden Lab" over this land incident would be silly. I can't think of a court in the land which would take it. People often get litiginous when they are angry, they write letters saying "the next letter will be from counsel," they get a lawyer friend to write some nasty letter on a law firm's stationary, etc. -- and they try to throw their weight around. But it's because of a grievious sense of loss, and that's what we should be recognizing here.

The loss is real. The person lost $600. Whether they lost it due to stupidity in typing something wrong or because of greed by another player absolutely unchecked in this game of fuck-you hedonism, well, they're out the $600 or however it will be measured. Now why can't we think of ways to address that instead of trying to diminish this person and call them stupid and call the Lindens wonderful? The Lindens aren't so wonderful if they have a game where these kinds of really gross mistakes happen, and where greedy asswipes can swipe a person's land like that. Therefore the confirmation popup that mitigates greedy asswipes and clueless (or sleep-deprived) screw-ups are not "warm fuzzy UIs" but actual good things.

If after all of this someone feels they still need to sue Linden Labs, well let them. I'm sure Linden Labs has scores of lawyers or access to counsel that can handily fend off a nuisance suit like this. They're grown-ups, and they're in the MMORPG culture and they know people get emotional and angry in games and take them to RL. They've all read about the guy in Korea that killed somebody over his stolen game sword or sued a company of their lost game sword or whatever. So they can handle it, trust me. We don't need to artificially be genuflecting to them, and overprotecting them from the overly litiginous in our midst. It's likely to come to naught, so it's ridiculous to mount a paradigm where anyone who has the lack of judgement to mount a suit on a game company automatically gets tarred with the crime of "being against the whole community" gasp.

More serious is this idea that anyone who subjects LL to media criticism is "harming the community" or worse -- in a really insane and dangerous twist -- actually devaluing or harming their assets, such as to them be targeted in some even more elaborate lawsuit for devaluing or destroying property. That's insane.

Media criticism is a healthy thing. LL has had its share of picks and pans in the game media and RL media and it seems fine. Again, it's a big boy, with a media department that can handle these types of issues without scores of livid fanboyz rushing to its rescue.

I'd resolutely oppose any player who claimed that criticism of LL in the media by anyone, inside or outside the "community" was so "dangerous" as to be "harming assets". It's not only ridiculous on the face of it, it's truly authoritarian if not fascistic to claim that everyone who signs up for the Second Life project has to so toe the company line that they can never criticize anything and have to forfeit their right to mount a torts suit -- something that even the US government would attempt to do to them. It's just plain wrong.

Try to get a grip here, people. If you're going to take the route of "it's just a game" -- stick with that, and see that the customer service department ought to be handling this customer's entertainment shortfall. If you're going to say "it's RL money and a RL thingie" then try to cede this person at least as many rights as they have in America, anyway, which is the right to sue for damages and the right to speak in the media.

Nathan, I understand what you're saying but the fact is that none of us really knows what the internal policies are for Lindens which govern their Code of Conduct. None of us -- including Prokovy who said:


I was objecting mainly to his assertion-without-evidence, and when I called him on it he fell back to the tritest, most inane mass-labelling imaginable (Version 208.8b of "ill-informed chip-on-shoulder game board stereotyping":


This isn't about challenging a damned thing. This is about making assertions without evidence, engaging in wanton paranoia and conspiracy theories based on VERY subjective experiences. Surely Prokovy can be more original than 90% of the other MMOG board flamers out there on the net. You have the brains, after all. On that assertion, I do have evidence

Cindy

This doesn't appear to have been mentioned yet:

I'm sure one of the factors here is the Lindens not wanting to set too stong a precedent about undoing land sales. Can you imagine? The number of people who'd start demanding a reversal of thier sale because they realised they could have asked more for thier parcel. The Lindens, having set the precedent for X amout of difference defines an entry error would have to draw ever finer lines defining what is and isn't an error.

Considering that you can set up a land sale enitrely before checking the box to sell land, I can in no way consider anyone but the seller to be at fault for underselling thier land. Yes, people make mistakes, we all know this, which is why the responsibility ultimately lies with the individual using the software, and none with the designers of the software.

The Lindens did at one time have a grevious error in the design of that dialog box, exposing your land for a 0L$ sale for the time it took to type in your intended price. They have since fixed that issue, and fixed it well. So, yes, if there was fault with the Lindens, I would place it there. In this case, I see none.

Again, you can set up the entire sale before checking off the sale box - there simply is no excuse for not double checking your work.

Wait. Who is claiming this? Link?

From what I saw here, nobody ever said that criticism of LL is harmful to the community. Instead they were all saying that THIS criticism was just unfounded (and it's a fair opinion.)

This thread has spiraled into a series of personal attacks and inflammatory language and as such is being closed.

If you have customer support concerns, you should address them to the LL Customer Support team via email at [email]support@secondlife.com[/email] or phone at 1-800-860-6900.