GOM "theft" - an egotistical try for a last word

The problem is Ellie, some business plans are long term ones, and there are no rewards in the short term. Lack of reassurance hampers such models and turns them into all risk no reward.

I imagine your answer would be, well don't take the risk then? OK thats fine, but I think that kind of attitude is going to hamper the evolution of SL. We need long term business plans, not just make a quick buck businesses. Lets be clear, we are not talking about the risk you see in th ereal world, that of future competition, we are talking about complete rule changes.

You know what I do in SL Ellie, its a plan that will only profit over the long term. If LL were to go to a flat tier model, it would completely destroy the rental market. Can you make any reasonable comparisons in real life? The only way I would have been able to cover my arse is by selling the deeds, as you know, something I do not agree with and LL does not support. So where does that leave us all?

Agreed.

But I don't think the answer is to lobby for a "compensation culture".The answer is to lobby for a flat tier not to be introduced. Not because some people will suffer. Not even because future innovaters will be deterred by a perceived increase in risk. But because your activity is beneficial to everybody else as well as yourself.

I may be wrong, but I don't personally think LL will actually emasculate telehubs, or go to a flat tier. I will join in lobbying against both, because I think both benefit us all.

If we once create a "compensation culture" we have opened a huge can of worms. Bitter infighting over who gets what for what, and what people did or didn't lose, and to what extent they chose not to ameliorate their loss, and people gaming it by entering markets specifically to get handouts from the rest of us when they go down.

The ramifications, and resentments, and division caused would be horrific.

And where do you draw the line? Look at the loss everybody is taking on their land, due to the double whammy of the dual price slide. Should all the non-landowners share the loss, by forking out huge and widespread compensation continuously? A sort of free world-wide land price insurance scheme that pays out under a formula each time you sell ? With a huge (even if invisible) tax to pay for it ?

And say I sell a few thousand L$ of teleporters a year. Do I put in a claim if p2p comes in? You want to pay for the bureauocracy to handle it, along with a few thousand others ? To audit and quantify the losses I claim ? Shouldn't I just be pleased I made that money in the first place, in such a rapidly changing world? Move on to the next thing ?

If one thinks it through - there is only one answer - NO.

If this puts some people off innovating and taking risk - its just our loss. The alternative I think is worse.

And to encourage people to take risk by waving reassuring compensation promises would itself distort their motivation, and maybe cause whole business plans to be gamed around it, particularly if the prize included Linden shares (which in my ignorance I personally know of no other way to obtain - though I understand something is going on in the background ).

It certainly might make an "under threat" business area more attractive than another, other things being equal. What sort of universally-valuable bias is that ?

That really the golden nugget. People need to look at these types of issues in terms of the precedents they set and whether or not they could be applied evenly and fairly going forward. There's absolutely no way for LL to offer compensation to residents every time they change a policy or add a feature that impacts resident businesses. It would cripple the development of SL. That LL entered in to talks with GOM and even offered them compensation speaks volumes about their willingness to go the extra mile, but it's silly of people to have any expectations about such things.

This issue kind of reminds me of another one in RL. Some cities are now prepared to provide free wireless internet, but the big telecom companies are trying to interfere.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1843722,00.asp

Interesting parallel. I for one, applaud this step LL is taking. It would be so much easier to just buy from another player without the added steps in between. Don't get me wrong, I like GOM, but I can never figure out the right amount to get from Paypal and it's an extra step. While I understand everyone who is in support of GOM, I can also understand Philip's reasoning. If LL has to take into account everyone's current product before doing any kind of upgrade, SL would never grow. Take this new attachment moving thing in 1.7. Just because it now allows hair to move, which will give competition to the new particle hair Kharmon Fate has been developing, should LL not implement this feature?

For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel's sake. The great affair is to move.
Robert Louis Stevenson

Making attachments movable in 1.7 is a developement of having attachments in the first place. We have been asking for moving attachments since I first joined SL. Making improvements to the vehicle system will not put current vehicle builders out of buisness, it will allow them to build even better vehicles.

LindenLab have consistently told us that they would never sell L$ themselves, either directly or indirectly, and specifficaly encouraged GOM to do it for them. Further, they were offered an alternative that would still allow buying direct from the SL interface, but without taking GOM (or any other exchange) out of the loop.

Aka throw it in ginkos and leave it alone.

I've caculated by time I'm ready to retire, EVEN AT 3.50 exhange rate, I'll have eough $$in L to retire and live however I want at about 40. If I NEVER pull any out agian (whch I'mno,I lost a ton by doing that last time on a business venture. That guys paying me back slowly, which I apprecaite, but I lost millions of USD on that over 20 years.)

esstailly SL is a great and SAFE investment house, and its all tax free until you pull it out..... all I have to do is bulk sell to LL in 20 years or so, and I'm rich after I pay the feds off. IF LL crashes and burns, I've lost NOTHING but my basic account fee, which I think I got my $10 out of SL.

win win, since I don't buy L..........

I knew they had always stated they would never trade in them on their own account. It is interesting if you are right, and they have changed their mind having previously stated they would not even provide active links or act as intermediaries.

Though of course, like everybody, they always can change their minds. With a new VP finance arriving, and an economics consultant getting involved for the first time, I guess they will quite probably do a bit more mind-changing on financial/economic matters quite soon. They are learning and trying strategies continuously I think. This is pioneering after all. No-one has created anything quite like this before.

I don't suppose you have a link to their previous assurances, do you ? Be interesting to see.

It's not emotional nonsense, thank you very much for your opinated response. Telehub land is a very different issue than GOM and it's reselling software; think about it. It's not the same.

Wasn't it you a few months ago that was screaming on the forums to have your money reimbursed for land that you purchased that devalued in price? Nice turn-around on the subjects at hand -- if it's not me, then f*ck 'em the hard way.

Without outside developers like GOM, Snapzilla, SL Exchange and SL Boutique -- do you honestly thing that SL would be where it's at today? Oh that's right, you're still screaming about your lost monies on land purchases and devaluation.

You voiced your opinion, I voiced mine. Anyone thinking about helping this metauniverse along with original code and business opportunity should think twice.

Please stop flip-flopping on the issues at hand.

You're right. I'm sorry, Lynn. "Emotional nonsense" was going too far.

With regard to the "screaming" and "reimbursed" bit, its a wonderful example of the problems of forum posting. Someone misunderstood what I said, rephrased it for me, and kept repeating it until it seems you, at least, think I said it. My point then, and now, is that we need stable land prices. In principle I dont care what those prices are, so long as they stop sliding about too much - up or down.

I cited the recent drop as bad, because it made people more reluctant to hold land, including me. But a rise would be equally bad, for other reasons. I just want it stabilised somewhere, and if you're the wrong side of the barrier when it comes down, tough. At least you never need be again.

So you see, if you look at what people themselves say, not the misinterpretations and simplifications projected onto them by those who disagree, maybe they are not so inconsistent after all.

If I say "I dont want the price falling or rising, I just want it steady somewhere", and you cleverly report just -"he doesn't want the price falling - and by the way he has some land so work out HIS motivation" - is that fair representation ?

My advocacy for stable land prices and exchange rate has been firm, unchanging and continuous. Not higher, not lower, no particular value. Though in the short term one might be better than another for the majority, and for the sellers who might have to change all their carefully chosen prices.

Just stable. I won't drone on again about why.

I ask again - if we start compensating people where will it end ? Where will the line be drawn ? And who will pay for the bureacracy, the claims auditing, and the award appeals, as well as the payouts themselves ?