Objects which earn residents karma or dollars?

Hi All

Does anyone know of any objects in SL which generate either some form of karma, or income for the owner based on actual use?

I'm thinking of something like bike rental costing X dollars per hour (not ownership) for example.

Hope you can help, thanks, EA.

You could sell an item that deletes itself after time expires. Maybe put it in a spawner box that you have to 'buy' from to get your bike. Like a permanent bike box (with auto-delete so they don't get littered everywhere) that you click on, 'Buy' a bike, and then the bike itself disappears after an hour or whenever you detach from it.

- Jolan

Hi Jolan

Many thanks for your great answer. Your answer would solve the time expiry, but not the income for the owner over time idea.

I'm thinking about something like a power generator, that makes money or karma for the user over time. Any thoughts?

Best wishes, EA.

Make it so the object can be 'payed', then on the money event in the script set a certain amount of minutes/usages based on the amount payed. (Make sure to only permit the person payed access by temporarily storing the key of that person too).

It's not much different from most rental boxes, i believe there are free rental scripts available. You can maybe use those as a basis.

Timed automatic payments are possible in SL, but require users the permission to allow money to be taken from them. As this permission can be used to completely deplete a persons account, there is not many people who will allow this permission to be granted though.

Are you trying to print Lindens? .

What I was trying at was that you would have say, a backpack that stored the rental in it but in order to get it, you have to pay. Like a mini, portable store that only sells one thing.
You've got me guessing it's either a resource in a game, or a camping chair that pays out over time. I'd go with... IF timer = 0 and sitter = Same-as-before, Pay 1$. But I don't make those .

- Jolan

Well, sticking with the bike idea you could have the bike created when someone pays a bike rack (or simply have all the bikes sitting out). When the bike is created/paid, it becomes a vehicle the user can control and ride around on, the more money they paid, the longer the ride will last. When time expires the bike will cease being a vehicle and thus stop in place until the rider pays it more money.
Therefore if you want a two hours bike-ride and the charge was L$20 per hour, then you could pay L$40 to start with for the two hours. If you don't know how long you'll be you pay the L$20 for the first hour then pay more when time runs out.
The bike would delete itself, or reset itself (move back to where it came from) after a while if no further payments are received, or the user gets off and tells it they're finished or something.

This may be more of a scripting problem though?

I'm curious as to what the advantages or purpose for having a rented object are? I've been thinking about scripting solutions, i.e. how to make it work, and keep coming up with potential pitfalls, that have led me to question why not just sell the object in the first place?

In a literal 'rental' situation the ownership of the object would stay with the owner and they'd have to pay the object (or a box or something) to enable the customer access to use the object. So you'd need the object scripted in such a way that it could know the name or key of the avatar it was rented to, and the duration of the rent. They'd have no actual permissions on the object since they would not own it. So if a vehicle for instance, it would have to be scripted to not work unless it was currently rented, etc. Then when the rental period is ended it would have to either delete itself or return itself to the store. A downside here is if it's a vehicle, say a plane or car, and the renter drives it into a ban-line, it will poof and appear in the owner's inventory, not the renter. So the renter will loose the object and loose any time remaining on it. A potential source of complaints and bad customer relations / bad pr.

You can simulate renting by selling them a copy of the object, with the object being scripted so that it again has a time-limit set after which it deletes itself. There are problems with this, in that selling them a copy automaticaly transfers ownership of the copy to them but you still don't want them having any permisisons. I.e. no mod, no copy, no transfer. You don't want them having mod because then they could just edit the scripts or delete / replace the scripts and change the rental period / remove the automatic deletion etc. You don't want them having copy because then they could just rez as many copies as they want - when the first rental expires they re-rez it and the timer is reset to 0 again. And you wouldn't want transfer because (potentially) they could try and sell it as a scam i.e. rent it for L$20 then sell it to some unsuspecting avatar for L$200 without mentioning it's going to delete itself after 60 minutes of run-time. However, it is against LL's policy to have no-copy no-trans objects. It can be done at the moment through a bug or hack but no guarantee it will work in the future. So simulated renting by selling a time-exipring copy isn't a good solution, imho.

Finally, there are a number of methods already in place for selling items, including the most basic - just set the object for sale, sell copy, and set the permissions for the next owner accordingly: either no-mod no-copy, or no-mod no-trans, depending on how you want to protect your IP. (Personally I prefer no-mod no-trans since if the customer gets bored with it, but their friends like it and want it, they have to come and buy a new one from you, so you get paid for your creation.)

Of the two rental options, I think the first would be more feasable, aside from the possibility of the customer losing their unused minutes because the object was lost somewhere / somehow. But of all three solutions, I think selling the object outright is still the simplest to manage.

-Atashi

edited to add: The more I think about it, the 2nd rental solution seems less and less viable. If the scripts are reset when the object is rezzed or if they can reset the scripts through tools, that could enable them to reset the timer and get perpetual use out of it. You could have the rentals managed by an off-site server that the object contacts through email but objects get a new key when they are re-rezzed, so it would be difficult if not impossible to track which object was which. Consequently I don't think it's possible to make an effective, foolproof way to simulate renting by selling a copy of the object. Of course I could be wrong...

Hmmm Karma and money.....

Have you seen eg the Paradise Blankets? Very expensive items that you can make open access for a fee and they are on a 30 min time limit. After that they derezz and have to be paid again. I have mine set up in the garden and am paid very regularly for its use.

The Funfair items are also a short lived thrill that people will reuse if they are good enough.

Sorry to knock the bicycle idea but I think most people tend to tp.