L$ for sale on ebay???

ok ..... LL is taking the easy way out ... as they COULD claw back lindens from the inworld sellers as its more than likely that they arnt one time hits.

what is certain that if you can buy Lindens on Ebay for 30 or lindens from the Lindex for 36 then LL is loosing out therefor its now ilegal you cant do it .. if you do .. the four horsemen of the appocolipse will come raining down there virtual death apon your lindens account. Dont get me wrong im certain there proberly is a bit of fraud going on but no more than IRL or fleabay.

Bottom line is that Lindens are licenced under LL and as such they can say where you can and cant buy them from

BS

LL has every right to report this to the RL authorities. The example above is a case of goods purchased with stolen goods and LL can seek RL compensation from the theif in a court of law. Including all court costs to prosecute the theif.

LL is simply taking the easy way out and saying the victim is the oen that needs to contact the authorities, which is stupid since LL has all the logs and will need to be supenoaed for them anyway.

It'd be far easier, and more finacially sound, for LL to simply find and convict the true thieves through proper legal channels. It would even be a good *gasps* Customer Service and *gasps again* Public Relations move.

~Jessy

How? From what I understand, most thieves use disposable email addresses and, given the way SL is set up, can just create a new account if LL catches them using one fraudulently. I suppose LL could track IP addresses, but there ARE ways around that if someone is determined enough.

In RL too, if you're found to have purchased stolen goods, they will be confiscated from you and returned to the proper owner. I don't know about the possible 50% fine...I imagine if you were determined to be in complicit in a similar RL situation (ie, you had some reason to suspect the goods might be stolen), there would be consequences as well. Perhaps LL feels that, since they've warned us to only use sites that are part of the Risk API program, we should assume there may be issues purchasing from any others. The problem with that is they're not a) making the warning obvious enough to new Residents or b) being upfront about which sites are safe(r) to use.

LL is just handling it like in RL.. if you receive a fraudulent US bill and deposit it to a bank. The bank will just take the bill away from you. No one will refund you any money. Actually you might be charged if you knowingly using it.

The bank, however, won't take up to 50% extra from you, which is what LL has said they may do (and, in fact, have done).

There was a Forum thread not long ago by Someone who had their lindens confiscated by LL. They had Purchased through a third party, and it turned out, through an audit done by LL that the lindens in Question had been somehow Illegally Obtained (No exact details were given, but an exploit was indicated). The Purchaser Lost his RL money, to the vendors of the Stolen Lindens, and his Linden balance to Confiscation by LL. I don't recall offhand but i believe there was also question of a suspension of the players account, but i don't remember whether the OP had said he was suspended, Or if one of the respondants suggested it could have been a Possibility.

On the whole, i don't think Buying from sources like E-bay are too reliable. You have no consumer protections. Best that could happen is getting the vendors account on E-bay frozen for dealing in Stolen Goods, or services, But your money would still be Gone.

Angel.

Like I said before, if the authorities believe you're complicit in a RL act of fraud or thievery, even through neglect, there's likely to be some sort of penalty levied. The Lindens are the 'law' in this case and, if they decide you didn't exercise due care, they can and will fine you...hell, they could eject you, in which case you'd lose everything you had tucked away in inventory, as well as all your money. I think 50% is high, but the idea of a fine doesn't strike me as unreasonable. *shrug*

I personally know someone who bought Lindens on Ebay, and their account was terminated. They had to create a new one and start over from scratch. So I wouldn't touch L from ebay with a 100 meter pole.

yeah - not worth the rist to save 6$ US ..

Of course where do you get a 100 meter pole - you cant link a pole longer than 40 meters can you?

Buying from ebay is not a good idea. I have a friend that did that. The Lindens watched the site and once the bidding was over and the tranfer of funds occured in game. His account was wiped out. He was informed at that time it is against game rules to obtain funds that way. To get the money from ebay he spent out 200.00 rl. He lost that plus was told if he did not purchase money on game they would close his account. So if you like to play I woud not test trying ebay

I dunno why they would say that you have to buy them on game

there are plenty of places that sell lindens outside of SL or lindex and ppl do not get their accounts closed

if he got lindens that were gotten by ill means then yes they will take them back

the watching the auction, how does he know this? if they knew the lindens were illegal ones they would not wait till the auction ended, they would report to ebay and have it shut down

I have sold lindens on ebay, as mentioned before I stopped because I got ripped off. I was not selling them illegally but, the buyer made a claim to paypal that it was an unauthorized cc transaction.

too easy for the buyer to rip off the seller of legit lindens and nothing SL will do about that.

and when I sold them on ebay there were zero problems from SL
heck I even created a website which now is useless to me, called lindensforsale.com

nice name but... I am too afraid to sell them anymore

Your "friend"?

Why would LL watch an eBay auction if they knew some fraudulently obtained L$ were up for sale? All they would have to do is seize the L$. No need to watch any auctions to do that.

Further, it is not against "the game rules" to buy or sell L$ on eBay.

Finally, nobody is required to purchase L$ in-game.

http://www.slhistory.org/index.php/Building_Records

- Biggest Linked Object: Hank Ramos (2800 meters (roughly 10.5 sims long)) (with Kyrah Abattoir coming close with a ~150 meter link set)

Except that LL doesn't have legitimate authority to levy a fine. They *aren't* the law in any meaningful sense other than that they do these things to their customers, and nobody challenges them. That doesn't make them the law, it makes them a bully.

They own the world, we just live in it. *shrug* I imagine the fine is to a) discourage people from helping fraudsters, albeit unknowingly, and b) to offset any fines LL may be liable for as a result of said fraud taking place via their platform.

Then there's the TOS, which we've all agreed to in order to play. In part, under 1.4 & 1.5:



And, my fave, 5.3:



Basically, we all signed a contract agreeing that LL can, in fact, do whatever the hell they want with our accounts and data...THAT gives LL the authority to impose the fine.

Except that the TOS is so grossly one-sided that portions of it have been judged unconscionable and unenforceable in court. i.e. part of the TOS has been judged to be illegal and not binding on LL's customers. I suspect the only reason the currency management portions of the TOS haven't been kicked is that they haven't been challenged.