Camping, what's in it for 4 owners?

I thought they had said clubs and malls were no longer being paid by sl for the amount of people they pulled in as they once did.

With this is mine I have a question. If in fact this is true then, why the camping chairs? What's the purpose of these chairs if the club no longer gets any cash to offset the monies paid in camping?

I just saw another post besides the countless others where people are complaining of these sites overloading the sims.

Right now I know of a popular Salsa club that's in a "war" with a new club that opened up in their same sim because of the camping chairs this new club has. It overloads the sims and the Salsa club can't bring in it's usual customers.

So why the camping sites continue this, what's in it for the owners of these sites?

I say get rid of the popular places list!! And get rid of the way the traffic numbers are generated. We need a new system!!

I agree, I refuse to do business with any place that is pumping up thier popularity with a bunch of soulless avatars on camping chairs. Just turn around and leave when you see that.

Having campers also causes green dots on the map. People use the green dots on the map to find "where the action is".

Great Point

But that action doesn't help owners..... someone sees the green dot action.. flies to it, sees camping zombies, feels dooped then splits.

I use a few camp chairs, it's not a lot of money, but it does bring some people in to shop and my and my brother's store.

Personally, it's a good way to bring people into shop in a way, not hundreds of chairs, but a few are likely to be seen.

Camping chairs are also a easy way for new players to make money. Don't rail against them! I can see where too many can be a problem, but they are handy for the camper and the campee.

What's the point of having a camping avatar in your shop if they're not buying anything?

if you own a mall.. it increases your traffic score. If you're a shop owner looking for a new mall to locate in.. you'll look at traffic. It's a great way for mall owners to increase the likelyhood of their shops renting in the mall.

if you own a club.. it attracts noobs to the club scene. The noobs come for the money, but may very well stay for the club atmosphere. Clubs with a decent mix of social types, and dance pads.. can do really well. Dance pads also encourage visitors in a strip club to tip the dancers. "hey I just got this $5 for free.. I'll give it to her and she'll take her top off"

if you own a casino, it encourages your guests to stay while they play. (the entire purpose behind casino hotels in RL).. if you don't have far to go, you'll play longer. If you're in the hotel and can't sleep.. blackjack is JUST downstairs! If you have to plunk down $L1 per play at a casino, you may win.. you may lose. But if you're on a camping pad earning $L1/5m.. you'll FEEL like you're gaining something regardless.. and the theory is.. you'll risk more because of it.

camping chairs work better than money trees. They're simpler to operate, and encourage your greedy noobs to stay longer.. giving you something back (traffic score). The noob gets more in their pocket just by staying longer.. and between owner and camper.. everyone wins.

The new demon on the horizon though, is "Lucky/Prize chairs"... people travelling in groups of 26.. calling out to each other via IM which chair has which letter. TP in, sit, grab the prize.. TP out. The only difference is that lucky chairs won't let you idle.. but they're "free" to operate. (costing only product, not cash).

The combination can be enticing.. camp while you're asleep, wake up, hop some lucky chairs, camp in a casino and blow half the money you made last night camping.. do a little shopping, hop some more lucky chairs... find another camping spot and hit the bed.

the only real "problems" people seem to have with camping are:

1. it's deceptive in terms of traffic scores.
2. it uses up "valuable sim resources" (precious bodily fluids?)

Large numbers of camping chairs can "lock up" a sim. A sim (512mx512m) can only support 40 persons on the mainland, and 60 on an island. Your average camping chair is 2mx2m, and can be as small as 1 prim each. One could easily fit 40 camping chairs on a small parcel. Attract 40 people to your camping chairs, and you "lock out" everyone else in the sim. (this evil is also perpetrated by dance clubs, and other "hot venues"... any time too many people congregate in one place, and your neighbors can't use their land.)

the simple fact is that the SL server software is ridiculously limited. The limit of 40 users in a sim is a relic of a time gone by. The server software is simply unable to support the types of uses that many adept businessmen wish to use. The real issue is that Linden Labs has been unresponsive to this fact, and has not improved their server-side avatar handling to the point where you can have "more than 60 players in a game".

the server software is not scaling fast enough to keep up with the influx of new users, and corporate advertisers.. and because of this simple failing on LL's part.. a lot of misdirected hostility is levelled against those who would put the limited server resources to uses that others dislike.

if LL fails to consider this issue and the population continues to grow.. commerce in SL may eventually grind to a halt in world.. as people repeatedly hit "busy signals" trying to tp to a store or mall. Most purchases in SL (I would wager) are impulse buys... and if you can't get to the store where your friend got their hair.. you'll just go someplace else. Eventually it may become necessary to treat sims like "game servers" in FPS games like BF2.. where we get a "server full" notification in the search. Of course.. as someone already pointed out. Unlike FPS's.. fewer players in a server makes for a better gaming experience in SL.

LL's "solution" to the problem just seems to add more and more servers. To a certain perspective, that's reasonable. But it prevents any one "entertainment" interest in SL from being "really successful".

doing away with traffic would lead to "alphabetical order" in the search... and we're all surely looking forward to a return to the IRC method of traffic generation:

~~~~~~~~~~~~||||||| HOT BABES ||||||~~~~~~~~~~~~~
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! CUM ON IN !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

it even happens in phone books in RL

AAAAA Plumbing and Heating

What's the solution? there simply isn't one. LL needs to improve the server software. banning camping chairs would only lead to something else. disabling idling would only lead to more scripts running in an effort to combat it, or dedicated campers using "mouse wiggle" programs or somesuch.removing the traffic score would only end up with more and more places having useless keywords and cryptic names in a desperate attempt to attract people. taxing "resource useage" would only result in the death of malls and "scenic sims".. it would destroy "gathering places" like Furnation, and eventually destroy the social structure of SL. Switching to discriminatory pricing for corporations is not only impractical.. but impossible to enforce.

Every one of these jag-off professional complainers has their own "pet solution" that will fix the problem... but they all fail to realize that the real issue is just the server software. We all want the ability to have 100 people in a server.. and NOT suffer the lag we already suffer when 10 people are in a room. Imagine a world in which we could have SL churches.. where people could gather for bible studies.. or real movies or concerts.. where "buying a ticket" guaranteed you a seat.

That is mainly because money trees aren't meant to increase traffic. Cars work better than apples too.

i see a way to short circuit camp chairs

make identical clones of the most used ones but that doesn't give a cent. and spread em around the grid

Wouldn't spreading unscripted camping chairs be a new form of grey goo attack, I wonder?

No, but it would probably get you banned from SL.

Which 4 owners are you referring to?

I'm gonna take a crack at that one too.

I also, use a few camp chairs in my store. And people do buy things and they do tip in the open jars sometimes. I've owned a mall before as well, and my vendors reported about an average 40% increase in sales after I put them in. It keeps my vendors happy and was few enough not to break the bank.

Now that they are in my store, several have camped there overnight, then bought an outfit... it gives me traffic, and they use my money on me. Even the mere word camping can increase a store's profits, because they'll come, see my 2 camp chairs full but still buy it.

I think it must have to do with "playing the game" more than anything. It makes no sense financially (for the camper) to sit in a camping chair. It costs more money in electricity to run the computer than what you make in a camp chair. Most chairs I seen pay around 1-2L every 10 mins. Thats $6-$12L an hour. You can collect a few pop cans and turn them in and convert to $L and make a hell of a lot more money.

Then again I keep assuming people actually have a valid paypay account and are not kids....

That's what I wanted to know when I read the title ...

I have got to try this one day. Maybe try to translate how many Lindens you can get with a bag of empty cans.

Empty cans? Are you serious?

no they would be scripted , look and behave like a normal camp chair

but wouldn't give a cent

This is a good idea to frustrate campers. But the frustrated people won't come back to your store...
Personally, and I already mentioned this, when I started in SL a few months ago, I was a camper. I used the money to upload some textures and animations and create my first profitable products. Now I earn enought so I don't need the chairs anymore. I'm sure there must be a lot of more people with ambitions like mine that needs this money sources.

I see money trees that gives the prices only to pleople with less than 30 days old. Maybe some thing like that can be applied to camping chairs. There will be still a lot of campers but with a "shelf life"...

Not if your making pie.