Governance Features for Version 1.1

Philip Linden mentioned in another thread that the Lindens are considering a number of options for adding self-governance features when version 1.1 is released.

I feel this is a sufficient;y important subject that I want to get my two cent's in here, and I hope others will do the same.

I'll start off by repeating several suggestions I made elsewhere, which I think are sufficiently important to repost under the correct forum:

As far as gamer government goes, I feel that the recent experiment by the Lindens in allowing settlement groups to have the first crack at new sims was a great success.

Currently, the formal group structure is a great model for 'opt-in' government. The survival of a themed sim depends on the continued enthusiasm of the group members, and if a group fails to maintain that, perhaps it is best for it to fade away.

I would recommend a few options be added to the game to fortify this group system:

1. Set an option on land for "Allow owner build only" and "Allow group member build only" Thus providing more control to the owner over what occurs there.

2. Allow the officers of a group to "uninvite" group members if they prove troublesome.

3. Provide the owner of the land the option to send other's items back to that other's inventory rather than simply deleting them. This way the owner can get rid of objects left behind by friends without upsetting them.

4. When opening up a new sim for settlement, perhaps the threshold for early settlement and land claiming could be set a little lower - allow each member to claim up to 1/8 or 1/4 of the land. 1/16 is too small to allow sim standards to be set by a core of active group members, and the rest of the land still sits unclaimed.

5. Provide access to a database on groups!
Allow each member to see a list of all the group members, including whether they are currently active, the date they were last online, and whether they have left the group.

This has become a problem with my group, Kazenojin, as it grew beyond the point where everyone knew each other. We have something like 35 members listed, but no way to get a reliable up to date census.

6. Improve group communications: Set the group IM's feature so it will save these messages, just as it does for individual IM's

I think that making groups more robust is the best solution to 'self-government'.

Here's another:

Allow limited 'governor' powers to any person capable of buying and holding more than 1/2 a sim.

Specifically, this would allow the person to set the 'type' of sim, such as PG, Mature, sandbox, etc.

Other governor powers may be suggested, I'm sure. But no one should be allowed to be a governor unless they are sufficiently rich or popular enough to hold onto this much land, and I mean under current tax rules.

Let's hear what you think, guys!

Here are a few things I would like as part of the self government options:

1) More levels of membership.
2) Ability of Officers or the Leader to remove group members and / or demote them. (you said this but it bears repeating because it is *very* needed)
3) Robust rent system:
- Set weekly rent.
- Ability to cancel from either side of agreement
- Grace period for canceling from either side - don't get land pulled out from you and don't suddenly lose income.
4) A group treasury with an easy way to donate to it or with draw from it (leader and / or officers only). Even if this is only possible through a script it would be great.
5) Option to have a weekly charge to be in the group in addition to or replacing the join fee. Used to cover land tax etc. Different costs for each level of membership.
6) Join fees and recurring fees to go to the treasury.

i'd really like to see the ability for more than one person to own something...objects or land (especially land) or whatever. let them set the percent of the taxes that each automatically pays each week. probly have to make it require both people to agree to any changes.

and i'd really really love it if things that have group permissions set could know i'm a member of that group even when it's not set as my active group. i hate having to try and guess which group someone set something under then change to that group and mess with it then change back. over and over and over....

Ama, I second the rent system! A voluntary weekly pay-out would make things much smoother for group-built activities.

I noticed a strange message when I logged on yesterday:
"-- has granted you edit permissions"

Is this an available feature now? The ability to grant edit permissions on my creations to specific, trusted individuals would be a great asset, especially on group projects.

I think that feature has been in for a while. I haven't had much need for it, but a few of us in Welsh can edit each others things (I think). Or maybe it only works with groups.

In general I think most of your ideas about future enhancements are good by the way.

On the other hand...SL is now in an important phase of any programs development.

Namely, the thing basically works and does everything that they set out to do for the official release. Every new feature they add now will cause the program to get bigger, slower, buggier to some extent. Even though the programmers are talented enough (as we have seen) to rapidly add new features I hope that it does not become too much of a patchwork of overlapping capabilities and grandfathered functions calls etc. I'd much rather see a proposed list of new features published for us to discuss and then maybe have a round or two of modifications on that list before any implementation began.

One thing in particular that needs to be addressed... as you have noticed, there are already features that are so buried in the interface that many people don't know they exist. Each new enhancement will probably make that issue worse. How do you decide which features should be on the dropdown menu vs on the pie selector vs some other special window?

Very well said .....we need this stuff real bad , would help with the long term future of the themed sims

Right click on a users note card and click "Grant Permissions" That person then has full modify rights to all your objects. This has been in for a long time (at least since the begining of April). Things you can't do with this: mess with land or trees.