Should bots be allowed?

well you have a very short memory then. try searching this forum for search delay threads and see for yourself how heated peoples reactions were

What an idiotic response.

Typical though, because it shows your ethics in spades.

Too bad you can't answer my question with a real answer, though.

It really does well to demonstrate the extortionist money grubbing thievery which is going on.

Thanks for that.

From the post - "She says she set the 1024m for sale for 21000L and the 44,832m went up for sale instead - I've seen similar things when there is lag."

There are similar occasions reported on the forums when the OP claims lag rather than stupidity where LL did not refund any money.

Matthew

this kind of issue will occur when a user thinks they have selected 1 piece of land, but (due to lag admittedly) another is still selected. but if they pay attention it will still show the correct pice when they confirm the sale. they are just not being observant enough. and i will say anothe rthing, just because the bots get there first doesnt mean that they wouldnt have got ripped off if it was a real person who grabbed their land

no point answering. it was a stupid question. but just for the sake of stopping you whinging......

what have i done for second life??? I pay my fees! lol

what do you want me to do for second life?? lol i dont work for linden labs, its not down to me to do anything except enjoy playing the game under the rules provided. i dont make up fantasy ethics, i dont try and force my views on others, and i dont contiualy moan at LL to change the rules just because they dont fit with my ideals

Well, my first choice would be a sale-setting dialog that is clearly up-front about the dangers of landbots or bystanders.
As I posted elsewhere, I recently tried a test sale at "bargain-basement" prices to Anybody. I saw nothing to warn me against clicking what is intuitively the final button.
According to what others have posted, it appears that if I had risked clicking that button, some sort of secondary confirmation would have appeared. I'll take their word for it. no way am I going to risk testing it.
Assuming that such a confirmation appears, it seems that people do not know that landbots exist and that they can swoop so quickly. They are not being informed of a real and present danger.


Given that people get caught out by this and lose money, it seems appropriate to deliver education at the time and place it's needed - in the initial sale-setting dialog.
Helping people to do what they intend to do is not "control by big brother".
A responsible landbot operator should welcome changes that help users to set sales in a way that matches their intent.
A system that has a history of allowing people to be effectively stung makes all landbot operators look bad. Even the ones that return land get tarred with the brush.


If the thought of people ignoring your posts gives you even the slightest annoyance, then I suggest that you stop using inflammatory words like "ignorant claims", particularly when attributing to others something that they have not proposed. That doesn't help reasoned debate and it certainly doesn't make your case any more compelling.

Neither you, nor I, nor the original poster can prove one way or the other whether the confirmation box displayed the correct information or not. It is however, known that the confirmation dialog is not 100% reliable.

Moreover there is no way that LL could prove that the OP's version that they all evidence was that they were setting the smaller parcel for sale was incorrect but they still refused to refund a sizeable amount of money. This is not the only case in the forums.

Matthew

Just did, and worked my way back through to about october last year.

I found some complaints about the Land Search feature which blocks searches if you click next a few times quickly in succession.

A number of other people suggesting a 10-15 minute delay and getting positive responses.

A large number of anti-landbot moans degenerating into capitalist/anti-capitalist name calling.

Some moans from when search was running sluggishly.

I think a poll is in order, if I can work out how...

Matthew

Absolutely right!

However, whether by bot or in person, taking advantage of someone's honest mistake is still a rip-off.
Even if it is not counter to the letter of the TOS, it is still a rip-off.

The problem is not the bots, as such. The problem is the mindset that controls some bots.

LoL ok then dont take my word for it, im sure there are plenty of others that will rememeber the outcry, and the amount of time it took to fix the problem. i cant imagine LL returning to the old delays after all that palava

You don't try to force your views?

I got news for you, that's all you do.

You add nothing to SL, just take.

Overpriced land, extorted prices and arrogant beligerence are your forte.

I don't see anyone agree with you, ever.

such is humanity. in life you need to take responsibilty for your actions. if you are playing with real money, you need to ensure you are fully aware of the rules. if i was selling a piece of land worth 2000 us dollars to a freind for 1 dollar i would make damn sure i was not taking any risks and that i had all angles covered before actioning the process.

same way if you were making any online transaction. DONT TAKE RISKS!

lol. how can you say that? i am happy for you to do watever you like in SL, same as everyone else.

and who are you to say how much a piece of land in SL is worth.

take a look in the mirror, arrogant beligerence is more suited to you im afraid.

Hey Dave! I'm agreeing with Stylee - twice in a row! OMG! sort of

Yes, don't take risks.
But in order to avoid risk, it helps to be aware of the risk.
The problem is that users that have been stung are obviously not aware of
- the particular risk
- the seriousness of the risk
- the very high likelihood of the worst happening to them.

That needs to be fixed - at the point of need.

Hardeeharhar.

All one needs to do is look in-world to see. I know the value of land. I don't need forum trolls or price extortionists ad farm land hacks telling me anything, because they have nothing to say except crap.

I have a big friends list, work for free and care about others. Three things you will never have.

blimey 2 in a row. hehe.

yeh i can appreciate that. but i think it does warn you not to put your land for sale unless your 100% sure you wish to do so. i dont think it would be a particularly politicaly correct thing to do for linden to mention landbots in the same sentence though. this would create even more confusion as most noobs dont even know what a land bot is.

for the most part this thread is tl;dr

got as far as this post and page 2 that I want to respond to

There is a crucial difference between your example and selling land in SL. That difference is that how cars operate is widely known in modern society and everyone is steeped in car culture throughout their entire lives, whereas land sales in SL is a completely novel experience for people new to SL.

Sling's point was that the land sales interface ought to be more informative to its users because people don't have a longtime intimate connection to the system. This is precisely why people complain about hard-to-understand software, because the user interface assumes you are already an expert user and fails to account for newbies. You know those popups when you were new whenever you did something for the first time? The reasons for those applies just as much to land sales. Actually, they apply even more because now money is involved.

Oh, and your point about the way such a lawsuit would go, while technically correct, ignores the fact that people can't simply leave RL. If you don't like what's happening to you in RL, well that sucks but life ain't fair. If you don't like what's happening to you in SL, you leave. I assume LL wants people to stay in SL, in which case they need to make sure people like it.

ADDITION: Okay I did read this post right above mine

That noobs don't know what a land bot is is precisely why they need to be mentioned. I agree that mentioning them would cause confusion, but in this case the confusion is desireable. The newbie would realize there is more to the land sales system than they are assuming and that they need to seek out more information.

well you should take a closer look then. prices vary dramaticaly. value is in the eye of the beholder.


big friends list? oooh arnt we popular

work for free? mug springs to mind

care about others? then you should let eveyone make there own choices.

(notice how i rise above your name calling and do not rise to the bait even though you know nothing about me)

Banning orbiting weapons & Replicating batman cubes that work in all areas is also banning creativity too

Sounds like you took it hook, line & sinker to me.

My main point in starting this thread was to find out if bots ever served any genuinely useful purpose. I see from some of the replies that they do, and I concede that point.

I didn't really mean for this to be The Great Landbot Debate Part II, but since it seems to have become it--what about the possibility of a "seller's remorse" clause? Give the seller 24 hours from the purchase to rescind the offer with a full refund of the purchase price. If, after 24 hours, the seller has done nothing, the land belongs to the buyer free and clear.

I know that might seem anathema to the instant access culture of Second Life, but considering how many hoops you have to jump through to buy land in RL, this seems like it might cut down on landbot pouncing.

Thoughts?

good idea but alas, what would happen if you have already sold it on, or spent the money. would get very confusing.

and in real life you do not get a second chance when buying stocks and shares. it is all at your own risk and judgment. thats why i love SL so much. it is so ethicaly similar to real life.

hehee. yeah i guess is did

Uhm... where did anyone give an example of a value adding bot that actually benefits the community?

There was the one who's bot doesn't negatively impact the community, but neither does it provide anything positive other than profit to its owner. That's hardly enough of a reason to claim bots are generally "useful".

The reason why he doesn't care is because he actively engages in and profits from similar situations. There's no gain in it for him to support, and even the risk that if LL hops on the landbot bandwagon it's going to endanger his ad plot cutting practices since people generally like those as much as they like bots.

If you agree on the principle that it's fine to knowingly profit at someone's direct expense, then you're certainly entitled to that opinion, but it's hardly admirable, nor very defendable from a broader viewpoint.

I know you alright. I see your overpriced ad plots everywhere. Your business is that of extorting the highest possible price for the least amount of land at your neighbors expense. No name calling necessary, I call it like I see, based on your actions in-world and on these forums.

I love the smell of hypocricy in the morning. I find it quite amusing, one of the least liked persons around is fighting tooth and nail about the virtues of land bots.

It speaks volumes.

Keep it up.