LL must change the Linden to make it viable for SL businesses

[Dextrum Boucher]

Listed below are my thoughts on the switch to making the Lindex the sole exchange source, along with the wait time and limits on withdrawal metheds that this entails.

 

The wait time is in place to prevent people from withdrawing money gained by hacking other people's acounts or by other fraudulant means. As a person who relies on the stability of the L$, I am glad that there is vigilance to protect the currency. As a merchant however, I am dismayed at the amount of time it takes to get cash from the account at LL to paypal through a process credit. A good possible solution for the wait time could be a trust system. Under such a system, a new user would have to wait a bit of time for the source of the L$ and the  paypal account to be verified; while a regular user conducting a withdrawl of a normal amount for them, which is going to their normal paypal account, would be flagged for instant withdrawal. This sort of system is already widely used in the financial world. Banks and credit card companies use it all the time to track and catch suspcious activity, while still allowing their customer base the financial freedom they require to run a successful venture.

As for only using paypal, wake up LL, if you stifle the business community by making them go by the terms which are most convenient to you, there will be less business conducted, which at a time when the economy and user base are shrinking, is not a good thing. If you want residents to conduct more business, provide use with the tools to do so in a manner most convenient and relevant to us.

Overall, having the Lindex as the sole system of exchange is not a bad thing, but if this is the course that LL wishes to pursure, they will have to make changes or face the reality that more merchants will leave due to inconvenience, thus further eroding the value of their product.

[Dextrum Boucher]

A point to add my comments on wait time is that we live in an age of instant exchanges. The market demands instant exchanges, and user are less likely to use a service that does not provide them.

[Steph Catseye]

I opnend a similar thread 2 days ago and I full agree with you.

The fact that we are in an digital environment and have to wait 5 days for the money to arrive and another 3-5 days from Paypal to Bank turns this into a really weird scenarion. I guess once we know the path of the bunny whe can chase it and optimize the waiting period but this does not change the fact that Paypal is charging me 2.5% for currency exchange and has the worst rates on the market.

There must be better options and LL would do themselves a favor to setup a bank account in Europe as well.

 

[Trinity Yazimoto]

From the answer you got from LL here : http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Merchants/LindeX-Service-Must-Increase/m-p/2003699#M34628

its possible they are working on improving Lindex...

the 30 days period for making the TOS update effective is also a clue..

not i believe deeply in LL skills for doing things better, (they have zero skill for this) but its their business and they get money from it... i m willing to think that they are not totally stupid and will work for not loosing they income source...

[HisaDrug]

LL is a company that deals with alot of the legitimate lawful concerns. It'll be silly of them to risk their business by allowing the increasing amount of population who are aka scammers to take the money as much as they want. I know paypal is butthurt due to the high exchange rate (most of the times I feel it's unfair) but at least your identity and credit credibility are publicly verified to LL to continute the business along the way. It's beneficial for both in a long run in spite of the known problems for us. I know so many people in SL scam their money off from innocent ppl. I've been a victim when I was a newbie as well. I always wondered how come LL would allow them to go home with their wrongully earned money. 

I know for a fact, there is another popular 3D virtual game that took drastic changes to eliminiate inactive verifiers on shop. They don't allow just anybody to create products and upload them unless you're a good candidate for their own systemetic premium payments via paypal or credit card so they know your payment method is transparent. People were raging against their changes for months, the forum was exploding with anguish and betrayal but it gradually died down because it wouldn't be all bad concerning there are scammers and victims. Most likely the biggest victim will be the company if they let things happen by sitting oddly by. 

I see LL is following the footsteps of that company, and I'm pretty sure this has been in their consideration for quite some time. I saw it coming believe or not. LL will take any course of action to avoid lawsuits or violation so this kinda makes sense to me. It's still unfair but I believe it's good for them and we merchants must try understanding what and why they're doing this, for LL is still a good source of business. It's not our place to teach them how to do the job. They'll do anything to make profits in the safest way in their favour anyway. And I'm trying to compromise with the new TOS. 

It's not that LL is disinterested in doing business with you methink but feel like they'd rather see your committment in the business with them. Paypal would do and people who own paypal would less likely do suspecious transactions. It's easy for them to retract if there's any problems or reports by others. It's all about the credibility now. 

 

 

[WolfBaginski Bearsfoot]

The reports are that they told the third party businesses to shut down by Monday a lot less than thirty days.

[Trinity Yazimoto]

i know that they asked to the TPE to shut down on monday. But if you looked at the link i gave, Steph said she sent a ticket and that she got an answer from LL saying : "they said that this was already escalated and they are keen to evolve their service" 

This is not about TPE but what they will do with Lindex.

[Perrie Juran]

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WolfBaginski Bearsfoot wrote:

The reports are that they told the third party businesses to shut down by Monday a lot less than thirty days.

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Linden Lab has a contract (the TOS) with individuals.

I am not aware that any of these businesses have contracts with LL.

As an example DX Exchange is registered as an LLP and as such is considered a separate legal entity.

 

p.s.  just stating the fact.  i'd love to see us have more options.

[Pearl Vollmar]

All I know is that I've used Eldex Exchange for almost 7 years and never had a single problem with them. Money was in my bank account 2-3 days after I cashed out. I live in Germany and Eldex is in Germany, so it was perfect. Now I have no idea how to go about this. If you guys in America wait for 10 days for money to com to you.. I wonder how long it will take for us in Europe..

I know a lot of Europeans facing the same problem, and have no money to invest in SL either because they don't want to use their credit cards. 

And I feel sorry for the workers and owners of Eldex. This was their RL income. And SL just pulls the carpet under their feet.  An eye opener to all of those who rely in SL for RL income, don't do it. SL couldn't care less and you might one day just wake up to an empty grid and everything gone.

[WADE1 Jya]

Yes unfortunately Linden Lab thinks its fun to destroy, replicate & monopolize any successful resident business. Linden Lab repeatedly does inconsiderate things which render developer efforts moot.

It is a pattern Linden Lab does which creates wariness for would-be developers of their platform.

Linden Lab loves monopoly, hates to share profit with anyone else :catindifferent:

[Amethyst Jetaime]

LL had no choice. They have to obey the law. Don't believe that?  Read this article and follow the links for confirmation that this is true.  The information is from a RL virtual currency legal analyst

Why aren't you mad at TPE"s?  They had access to this information way in advance about the final regulations being published. I knew about it months ago.  They chose either not to keep up with things that effect thier business or they decided to continue trading to squeeze every last cent from people using their services, and now a lot are stuck after paying them and not getting their L's ..  Either they are inept business people or greedy.  I wouldn't trust one $L to them now.

I grant you LL didn't communicate to SL residents well in their announcement.  I also feel sorry for the individuals who have lost money, employees who lost their jobs and people who  have no way now to buy or sell L's, if they really can't as opposed to not wanting to use a CC, PayPal or the Lindex by choice.

Those SL residents that are effective should now put their energy into lobbying LL to expand payment options and improve the Lindex service. 

[Madeliefste Oh]

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Pearl Vollmar wrote:

And I feel sorry for the workers and owners of Eldex. This was their RL income. And SL just pulls the carpet under their feet.  An eye opener to all of those who rely in SL for RL income, don't do it. SL couldn't care less and you might one day just wake up to an empty grid and everything gone.

---

I too feel sorry for all people that worked at third party exchanges. Mostly because of how LL has dealed with them, which is far from elegant.

Though I think that people who trade in virtual concurrency have a responsibility themselves as well to stay informed about what it going on in their field when it comes to legal issues, I still think that LL has a responsibility towards them. Because when it seemed to be handy for LL to have these traders around they were offered to apply for LL's risk API.

And now that it seems that this is no longer sustainable under this new law, they are kicked out from one day to the other. They were confronted with a new TOS at the same time as we all and LL gave them no time at all to prepare for the new situation.

I can imagen that because of new regulations LL has to close her risk API, and when the consequence of this is that third party exchanges can no longer operate legaly, then they must close doors. But not in this way, completetly unannounced and left them without any time to prepare themselves or their customers for these changes.

[WolfBaginski Bearsfoot]

This can easily get into legal hairsplitting, but remember that the TPEs need a Resident Account with Linden Labs to transfer L$ to and from your account,

What I have found interesting is that Amazon, who act as advertising agent, collect payment, and deliver goods for third parties. are already registered as an MSB. Now the question for the lawyers is whether Linden Labs, who sound to be doing exactly the same with the Marketplace, can avoid having to register.

It looks like it will be very difficult to avoid having to comply with the FinCEN regulations.

[crydon Glanz]

Sounds to me like Linden Labs was getting butt hurt that they were getting short changed. I'm sure everyone remembers Xstreet.... I mean sure there is some fraud but damn fraud is everywhere...At least the exchanges actually called you to verify your information then gave you your money whereas Linden Labs forces you to wait 5 days Zzzzz... Idk about you but when I cash out I actually need the money now not wait almost a week then get have to pay more for the transaction fee just to get the money I need now...

[Perrie Juran]

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WolfBaginski Bearsfoot wrote:

This can easily get into legal hairsplitting, but remember that the TPEs need a Resident Account with Linden Labs to transfer L$ to and from your account,

What I have found interesting is that Amazon, who act as advertising agent, collect payment, and deliver goods for third parties. are already registered as an MSB. Now the question for the lawyers is whether Linden Labs, who sound to be doing exactly the same with the Marketplace, can avoid having to register.

It looks like it will be very difficult to avoid having to comply with the FinCEN regulations.

---

I understand the hair splitting but it is 'real.' 

I worked for a few years for a small business that was registered as an LLC.  It was wholly owned by a married couple.  When it came to Company policies and really anything to do with the Company, they were always careful to phrase things, "The Company has decided............"  We all used to laugh because we all knew who it was who decided to cut our pay while they were remodeling their house.That company had the highest employee turn over of any Company I have ever worked for.

[Flame Swenholt]

How can you all be so blind? Linden Lab DIDN'T want to perform such a change, they were FORCED to.

http://fincen.gov/statutes_regs/guidance/html/FIN-2013-G001.html

This is why there was no grace period. The rising popularity of BitCoin has caused that bill to come into play, and like as the Linden Dollar is a virtual currancy with a cash out option, it gets hit by the bill.

I agree that LindeX's times are rediculous, as seen by the performances of the third party exchanges. I have mentioned in a post on another thread that Linden Lab should seriously consider making instant cash outs at the very least a feature to premium users. Let's all face it, most business owners own at least one estate (sim) at which minimally we pay $295 (lower if you are lucky and have a grandfathered sim). To pay $72 a year, or $6 a month, on top of the larger amount we pay wouldn't be that much of a big deal if we already have enough income to support the teir costs.

I am not bashing down the 'trust' system, since I do agree that is also very good (we could also try applying that to other things like mesh uploads to really slow down game ripper activity as well without hurting the real creators), and I think we all agree that the speed of LindeX is the problem, in which I strongly hope Linden Lab comes up with some fix to this soon, or I see a grim future for Second Life.

[Fullperm Alpha]

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Dextrum Boucher wrote:

Listed below are my thoughts on the switch to making the Lindex the sole exchange source, along with the wait time and limits on withdrawal metheds that this entails.

 

The wait time is in place to prevent people from withdrawing money gained by hacking other people's acounts or by other fraudulant means. As a person who relies on the stability of the L$, I am glad that there is vigilance to protect the currency. As a merchant however, I am dismayed at the amount of time it takes to get cash from the account at LL to paypal through a process credit. A good possible solution for the wait time could be a trust system. Under such a system, a new user would have to wait a bit of time for the source of the L$ and the  paypal account to be verified; while a regular user conducting a withdrawl of a normal amount for them, which is going to their normal paypal account, would be flagged for instant withdrawal. This sort of system is already widely used in the financial world. Banks and credit card companies use it all the time to track and catch suspcious activity, while still allowing their customer base the financial freedom they require to run a successful venture.

As for only using paypal, wake up LL, if you stifle the business community by making them go by the terms which are most convenient to you, there will be less business conducted, which at a time when the economy and user base are shrinking, is not a good thing. If you want residents to conduct more business, provide use with the tools to do so in a manner most convenient and relevant to us.

 

Overall, having the Lindex as the sole system of exchange is not a bad thing, but if this is the course that LL wishes to pursure, they will have to make changes or face the reality that more merchants will leave due to inconvenience, thus further eroding the value of their product.

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There is no problem - you can use inworld Bitcoin. Even within a vendor advertising "Bitcoins accepted".

 

Have a nice day