Malicious, unfounded threats to AR people.

I was at Orientation Island yesterday helping answer questions from newbies.

The chat was being hogged by a newbie arrival who was slagging of SL, LL and all of us in foul and abusive terms. Presumably this was an alt of a banned resident.

Anyway other people were telling this person to go away but they kept making accusations against anyone who argued and threatened to abuse report people for racism, harrassmant etc.

I was ready to send an AR but then the troublemaker left.

I am just wondering how aware LL are of our vulnerability to malicious abuse reports.

Or more importantly, do they care?

The care.

The reason most ARs take so long to come to conclusion (and why a lot seem to do nothing at all), is that LL DOES investigate them. Tehy pull logs and investigate accounts (on both sides) and only when the evidence is clear cut (one way or another) do they do anything.

A false AR is a fast track to a perm ban.

Best thing to do in the situation above is to not even talk to the person, jsut quietly AR him, getting a good shot of the chat history in the AR snapshot (the chat logging option still doesn't work for ARs). Then just IM the newbies and explain how to mute someone and that sitting on a box prevents any type of pushing around. Or offer chairs *grins*

"griefers" (that good old generic term for a$$holes) get their jollies from attention. Don't give it to them. Ignore them. Some people like to Freeze and tell them off. You hurt them more by just Eject/Ban/Mute and go on about your buisness.

~Jessy

I don't know this for a fact, but many people have told me that LL has chat/IM logs they can check to verify any accusations. This makes sense, otherwise any AR based on what someone said would be completely useless, as the person could easily deny it.

Assuming they do have the chat/IM logs, they can see that it was the other person causing trouble and threatening to falsely accuse people.

To help LL when submitting an AR, keep it brief and factual, without judgement or emotion. Simply state what has occurred. In a case where it is about something said (like these threats and harassment), open your chat history (or IM if it was there) and copy the relevant portions into your report.

In fact, you might take the opportunity to instruct the new people there how to submit an Abuse Report. It's never too early to learn to stand up for one's rights, and the multiple reports will (a) clearly demonstrate who is causing the problem and (b) probably trigger a faster response from LL.

ETA: Just saw Jess gave almost identical advice while I was still typing!

I happen to know 100% that they *do* have chat and IM records that are saved and can be checked at any time. Makes ya wonder if the Lindens read em on breaks eh?

I would be willing to bet, that the number of frivolous AR’s overwhelm the few legitimate abuse reports.

Kind of like sorting through a millon junk emails to find one thats legit........

On a side note, does anyone know if you can request a lsit of AR's that have been filed against you?

Obviously, they can't tell you who did, but since I'm security, I get the "I'm going to AR you!!!!" all the time. Usually after Eject/Ban using the Land Tools *snorts*

As I've never even had a warning from LL, I no longer fear these "false ARs", but would be curious to know how many were filed against me and for what. *chuckles*

~Jessy

One person filing a large number of ARs against anyone and everyone is more likely to find themselves banned than anyone they happen to AR.

However is a large number of people AR this one individual and include a good description of what they are doing that individual will likely get banned.

Don't Tell them "be quiet, or we'll AR you" Just AR them and be Done with it. there is no law anywhere that says you have to Warn them first.

Angel.

Generally the first AR someone gets *IS* a warning. Let LL do the work.

They probably get bored of reading "bad lag here", "WOOT", "HOWLS", X slaps Y's ass", "where is the big city"etc!!!!

Anyway, thanks for the replies

I've been spending a lot of time lately at OI Public and Help Island Public, and I bless the moderators and helpers there for their patience and restraint.

There is an awful lot of griefing going on. Primarily verbal, because scripts and build are disabled, but it is still, as you note, highly annoying.

I find the Mute function works best in most cases. It shuts the loudmouth right up. Submitting an AR is only warranted in the most egregious situations. If you do AR, collect lots of evidence...photos, chat logs, avatar names, time of occurrence.

It's a good lesson to teach the newbies, too...how to sit on something to avoid a push, and how to Mute someone to avoid verbal abuse.

...it doesn't matter what the AR says. It's what LL determines after reading the AR. It's not like a citizen's arrest or anything.

LL's very aware of the potential of abuse of the ARs. Otherwise you wouldn't ever hear "LL never responds to my AR's". Crying wolf gets ignored after a while!