Automated Burglary

You are making a huge assumption here, and once again, I ask you to back this up with what you know to be factual about the bot, and how it actually operates. Cory's statement suggests quite the opposite of what you're asserting here.

_Scan Object
__Check For Sale flag
____For Sale
______Index item
____Not For Sale
______Do Not Index Item

Cory said nothing more than what I've outlined above. What you are saying doesn't even amount to conjecture, given you know absolutely nothing about how the bot is written, or how any of the back-end is written. From a pure efficiency standpoint, it makes much more sense that the discard takes place at scan time. Why would they want to bloat a database of items for sale with items that are not for sale? The data is useless for the purpose of the search engine. Why go to the trouble of collecting it, only to discard it later? It has no value whatsoever, just sitting there in a database row, beyond giving weight to your conspiracy theory.

How did they make it public? I never saw a notice in world. If it were not for fact i visit the forums here, I would not know they exist, like most on the grid do not know either.

Just asking

Right your idea makes more sense since it would work like this -

- Scan Object
- Check to see if owner is Opt in or Opt out
- IF they are opt in record data
- If they are opt out dont record
- If neither check for "For Sale"
- If for Sale then record

Though you could be right I suppose the Bot FOR EACH SCAN looks up the owners Opt In/Opt Out status for Each object.

Becuase thats more efficent than sorting through the database where you can simply write a Macro to delete data based on status.

I stand complety corrected it probably works according to your idea.



It would make more sense if the Opt IN status didnt exist - since then you could just store based on sale status without looking up Opt IN participants name for Each item. I could see it being as you suggested at that point

Theyd still have to delete the data of the opt outs though.

If it actually does for each object check the list of opt ins and opt outs before deciding what to do, its wasting a lot of time.

I should have been more specific when I spoke with Cory. Considering in the same thread we discussed what you could do with a list of all the Prim data on the grid.

They made it public by posting it clearly on their website. Public doesn't mean an obligation to notify every single user of SL, even the Lindens can't manage that. Every single person who comes within viewer range of your land or objects is downloading them without notifying you, your consent is considered given by the fact that the object is rezzed in-world.

/me laughs so hard at the absurdity of that statement that the Ovaltine she was sipping shoots out her nose.I do believe they can. They do it in-world whenever they need to shut the joint down. They also have everyone's email addresses and can blast a message with the push of a button./me re-reads the sentence and falls out of chair with more laughter./me gasps for breath and shouts "Ah, Douglas Adams you were sooo right."

Why anyone would set something for sale for L$0 and think that nobody is going to buy it, is crazy. Trying to lay blame on someone else when she only did what YOU told her to do, is even worse.

Burglary... pffft.

I'm sure SOMENE at ESC know SOMEONE at LL. Someone#1 could have very easily mentioned this "Experiment" to SOMEONE#2, who then could just as easily have arranged for an announcement of some sort to be made here on the forum and on the Blog, The "Official" announcement site. It may have not reached everyone, but it would reach a lot more than being on the site of an entity many of us never even heard of before. Google and Yahoo are mentioned as similar in concept to this. I take great precautions to protect my identity on the Internets. I'd like that option here as well. Is it too much to ask? A bit of a stretch,but even if it is beneficial, I wouldn't want to be an unknowing Guinea Pig in a Medical Experiment. The same theroy should apply. Just from my personal viewpoint.

Its STEALING..pure and simple. STEALING. Its a shame that LL is turning a blind eye to this which speaks VOLUMES about their corporate ethics. No, its not an oxymoron. LL has decided, by doing NOTHING about this, that STEALING is ok with them. shame shame shame. The arguments for this vile and disgusting sheep bot thing are pathetic. If I go to Macy's or Nordstrom, buy electronic gear and furniture or whatnot, take them home and leave...only to return home and find someone has broken into my home and STOLEN these items it is STEALING [burglary more specifically]. For the thief or his friends to start moaning that I didn't "opt out" of having my things stolen and "gee whiz" the price tags are still on the stuff" doesn't make it not STEALING.

Shame shame shame on the operators of this sheep bot thing and shame on LL for letting this go on.

I find it amazing that anyone can actually defend this practice.

It's possible that LL could have made an announcement on behalf of ESC, sure. It opens a can of worms I'm sure they'd rather never be opened though. People would most assuredly be bashing LL from hell to breakfast because they were doing special favors for ESC.

It is ironic though, that in this day and age, there isn't really any way to reach the global SL community unless you're a Linden. Then again, if there were such a channel/channels, imagine the massive freightliners full of spam that would pour through them.

This is a truly scary thought.

GAH.

Every time someone else repeats this nonsensical objection it is appropriate to remind them that we are talking about people who did NOT set the object for sale at L$0 or any other price, but merely were unaware that such a thing had been done by default, possibly through a game bug or "for any reason or no reason." Your presumption that such prices have been consciously set by these owners is flat wrong, and everything in these threads makes it clear that is the case. Either you have not read the threads and should correct your ignorance, or you are dissembling and attempting to sow confusion. I trust it is the former case.

The persons who do set such a price - temporarily - are people who need an efficient way to swap assets back and forth during a complex build and use this device to get around a deficiency in the design of SL. They too have no intention of selling the objects to any other party. Many take precautions (like making sure the sim is empty before proceeding), and this is a longstanding practice in SL that has been trustworthy in the past. Now, this searchbot tool has blindsided them by making these temporary price tags intended only for private use public knowledge and the object instantly available to anyone who knows how to tp and click on "Buy."

Please read the threads before posting, because by now, when people see something as oblivious to plain facts as this, they begin to suspect you are posting in bad faith.

I can't find much to diagree with there. Just that since this did affect the entire communityon a global scale, whether positively or negatively, *In my opinion*, LL could have taken an extra bit of interest in this.

This thread was started by and is about EXACTLY someone who deliberately set things for sale at $0. In your imaginary world we may be talking about all manner of things, but this thread is by and about a person who made an unfortunate mistake, period, end of story.

By dragging these other issues into the discussion ("game bug", ha) you are the one being disingenuous, and arrogant and rude to boot. So you would do well to stop accusing others.

Piece-mealing along here . . . In the above, I think you are somewhat overlooking the part about the deliberate decision to involve people in a system - a beta system, at that - without their knowledge or consent, and publishing the results, often to their detriment.

The idea that system that is bad now is actually okay because it will ULTIMATELY be a good thing is a poor idea.

The idea that though it hurt people now, though it may use people as it wishes now, and though it will take people and put them in it without their knowledge and consent now, that's all okay because EVENTUALLY it will be something positive . . . just doesn't cut it, really.

Especially considering it didn't have to be that way, and certainly doesn't have to be that way now. It's only that way because a few individuals want it that way, because it is the shortest route to their own profits and self-aggrandizement.

And that - isn't good.

coco

This isn't a good analogy. The problem with the searchbot is the collection of an dissemination of other people's information without their permission.

The problem with copybot was that people might copy things and sell them as their own. The copybot people weren't ABOUT to make a public list of everything they copybotted.

The (ostensible) purpose of the searchbot is precisely to make a public list. The list itself is the (ostensible) purpose.

If someone is running around collecting for their own personal use exactly what prims I have where, that really isn't going to affect me much.

But if someone is running around collecting exactly what prims I have where, and publishing information about them and their locations, and inviting every reader to a convenient TP directly to the prim, well, then, Houston, we have a problem.

coco

Hahahahahahahahaha!

This remains a ludicrous notion. As I mentioned before, if ESC is supposedly in the business of setting up corporation businesses and publicizing them, I should hope they would be capable of doing more than simply mentioning the business on their ESC website and calling it a day.

In the first place, the ESC website doesn't exist for the residents. Naturally they want their corporate clients to know about their new capability.

There are many venues which do exist for residents, though, and ESC saw no need to so much as put a notice in any of them. Doubtless because they anticipated an outcry, and their plan for dealing with that was to put it off as long as possible, then to stonewall it until people hopefully give up talking about it.

ESC continues, in fact, to see no need to discuss this here with us at all, except for Cory's early contributions.

coco

P.S. Reading on - no, it would not be good to allow ESC to use the Linden methods of communication to announce their new toy, any more than it would be good to allow ESC or some similar company to use the message of the day to announce the new Coke sim.

There ARE other methods - those of us who sell things in SL work those methods, and work them well. You would think that ESC would be good at it, too, considering they can supposedly launch corporation debuts and all that.

No, it's not that they can't do it. It's just that they didn't want to do it. We, folks, are chopped liver.

There was no mistake here.

This is a story about a person who thought they knew the rules of SL and operated under them, when in fact, the rules had been changed and that person was not informed.

Old Rule: If you privately IM a friend and tell them you are going to transfer an item to them (let's say it's a big house that is set on its plot, just so) by selling it to them for $0, and you check your map and notice no one else within three sims of you and friend, you can quickly make the transaction.

Even if a third person was within a few meters of the transactors, they would not necessarily guess what was transpiring, unless they can read private IMs or they have the habit of right clicking every prim they see, hoping for a freebie.

New Rule LL Has Not Written Anywhere: You privately IM a friend and tell them you are going to transfer an item to them by selling it to them for $0. You check your map and notice no one else within three sims of you and friend, so you set the price. BUT THEN your friend gets an RL call and you stand guard for any AVs until the friend returns. Suddenly someone TPs in from whoknowswhere and right clicks it away in a zip. You're screwed. Tough luck. Bahbye.

ANTI!!!! *waves*

Actually, there was (is?) a game bug where the 'for sale' flag on some items didn't get switched off at purchase...I believe Har was referring to the people affected by that, not the OP in particular.

Robbed by your own stupidity, rofl.

Folks how can this be theft? As far as I know the meaning of the words "for sale" are pretty clear. It is like putting a for sale $0 sign on your car and being surprised when it is gone and accusing the person of taking it of theft. Blaming ESC is like blaming someone that drives around looking for sales for telling people about the free car they saw.

Theft probably isn't the right word to use, but wouldn't you agree that if a $L0 sale was unintentional (the reason to set an item for sale was to complete an island build, not to sell to joe shmoe) and the buyer refused to return the item he bought for $L0 unless he received a profit, it'd be a pretty shitty thing to do?

Once again I'd like to point out the real bad guys in this case. The buyers who didn't make nice after the OP explained to them the problem. Any reasonably kind-hearted person would understand, and return the item immediately. Only a complete jerk would demand money for it.

I don't see it as "theft". When you set an object for public sale at a price, it is for sale. Period. If you are using that as a workaround for an inefficiency in SL, you are taking the risk as the "bad" along with the "good". You should also be well-prepared to minimize that risk as much as possible to mitigate any potential loss.

In this specific situation, I have to ask, why wasn't the sim set to private? IE, no access to anyone except the owner and his/her workers? Just thinking that because the sim is new and not showing up on the map is not a very good attempt at risk mitigation.

There is no theft here, and no victims, except maybe of their own ignorance. You can blame ESC all you want, but what was stopping someone from flying into the sim, noting the furniture was for sale, and buying it, without ever bothering to check the ESC search engine?

Yeah I've been around and I know the routine; it's always struck me as a gamble (fwiw a stranger needn't even click, they can just mouseover), kind of gaming the system to save time - I'm setting it for sale but it's not *really* for sale, wink wink. So in my mind it is a mistake to do it with items of considerable value, but maybe that's me. Nothing has changed, there were no Rules in the first place.

I just thought Har's response was very insulting and condescending and (*insert other negative adjectives here*) toward a person who offered a not-uncommon differing view.
ANN!!!!

OK, but that doesn't give Har a license to ignore everything else and start tossing out words like "nonsensical" and "ignorance" and going off on a pompous, arrogant rant while conveniently ignoring the OP and the main thrust of the thread. Grrr, sometimes I think Hannibal Lecter had the right idea about rude people. I better get some more coffee :/

Uhm... Anyone with half a brain, irregardless of 'old rules' or 'new rules' wouldn't 'stand guard' untill the friend returns. You know why? because people have always had the ability to TP in and have always had the ability to right click and buy any object for sale without the owner being able to stop them. 'Standing guard' has always been useless in these circumstances. If your friend gets a RL call, you'll just have to flag the items 'not for sale' again until he stops by.

It's not like you set something for sale and even before the intended buyer is able to, somebody else TP's in and buys it. Firstly because TP'ing in, waiting for the world to rez, and buying the object takes way longer than it takes to just buy it when you are the intended buyer who is already there. Secondly because the sheep bot is not omnipresent. It is not just lurking invisibly on your land to scoop up items the nanosecond you set them for sale. It has other things to do, like scanning the rest of SL. It can take up to (and from what I have seen even longer than) 24 hours for an item to actually get included in the online database after it gets flagged 'for sale'.

Let's look at the time line for getting something bought out 'from under you':

1 you set item for sale
2 the bot happens to come by sooner or later
3 your items get scanned
4 the data the bot collects gets filtered
5 the data gets published
6 someone has to happen to search for a keyword associated with your item
7 that someone notices you object in the list of objects for sale
8 that someone clicks the link and tp's in
9 that someone waits for the world to rez
10 that someone looks around and locates the object
11 that someone right clicks and buys the object

Now let's look at the time line for selling an object to an intended owner:

0 you make sure you and the intended owner are both present and nobody else is around
1 you set the object for sale
2 The buyer right clicks and buys the object

Even if the bot happens to be on your land when you set an object for sale (which would mean you neglected to make sure nobody else were around, a bot is just another avatar), you can't make me believe steps 2 through 11 of so-called 'stealing' can happen faster than step 2 of selling to an intended buyer who is right there. Your things getting bought out from under you because someone uses the sheep search can only happen if you leave your stuff out for sale for a prolonged period of time - which is exactly what the OP did. Leaving stuff for sale without intending to sell to anyone is not very smart. Whether there is a sheep bot or not. And while I may sympathise with someone making an honest mistake, I am not about to blame a bot just for noticing you apparently set something for sale. If you do leave items out for sale regularly, bot or no bot, some day someone will show up and take what you offer: buy your items for exactly the price you specifically ask for.

To be fair the process isnt this fast; the bot process is about 24 hours I believe-

Before when you thought that the fact your stuff wasnt known to anyone but you and your freind was enough to keep it fairly safe.

In the Original Poster's case it was on an Unlisted Private Island.

Those who teleport using the search tool probably did not even know they were teleporting to unlisted land. The probably didnt know whether it was listed or not.

This listing of "for sale" items by Electric Sheep was Reckless, since it makes no distinction between business and personal land.