Removal of "Gift To" On Large Ticket or No Copy Items

[OxfordLennox]

4 hours ago, Klytyna said:

YOU say you 'lost' 25,000 ls worth of valuable mechandise, but what you actually lost was, a dollars worth of gacha. LL won't spend $20-$40 recovering your 1$.

Sorry but those are the harsh economics of gacha resale .

 

Because that means when someone says 25000L worth of value gacha lost, 25000L are taken from the balance. I may pull 100s of gacha items from a machine and can't have a single rare or just a common from the machine. That happened and will be happened again. I spent 12k for one set, I should sell that set for 5-6k and I could get only 2 of those 3 rares in the machine. I spent 8500L to a machine and I just got 1 of the rares of 3 and spent 2k to have other 2 rares and had to set the set to 8k. If YOU haven't experienced this before, you must be very lucky. This is not up to anyone else to tell what the fair price is to someone "played" that machine. Some gacha items are retiring, some are so hard to find, some never comes from those machines. And when they steal my set from my MP, sorry but those are just not fair, harsh for thoughts, keeps me thinking of what's stolen today. Thanks.

Edit: It doesn't matter if I paid to machine or a reseller. I have the item and it's being lost. This must be solved.

Edited May 5, 2017 by OxfordLennox

[Klytyna]

I'm not anti-gacha reseller... Just telling you WHY things are as they are. 

This kind of problem can affect any business, SL or RL that involves selling 2nd hand items for significant markups on the original purchase price.

Harsh reality time... Doesn't matter how many pulls it takes to win that ultra rare, the cost price to you of that ultra rare is the same as the most undesirable common, the cost of a 'pull', if you have to play a machine 1000 times to get that ultra rare, that item did not cost you 50,000 ls, it cost you 50 ls, and you have 999 other 50 ls items that wont resell for as much.

The fine art business RL has similar problems, paintings bought with stolen money that can't be recovered because nobody knows where they went, but the money paid has to go back to its real owner, forgeries that look just like the real thing, etc.

In the art world, selling a painting for $10,000,000 then finding out it was a forgery, or that the negotiable bearer bonds used to pay for it were stolen and you have to give them back, well, THAT is serious money, hence why people are really careful in that business and always have business insurance.

Maybe what you and the other gacha sellers should be asking for isn't ineffectual market place controls based on snobbery like 'tick box to only sell to premium' etc., what you should be asking for is for LL to set up some kind of MP Vendor's Insurance Scheme, to compensate people for loss due to criminal activity, pay a modest premium, and when your 'valuable whatever' vanishes, make a claim on the insurance.
 

[OxfordLennox]

First of all they can purchase "all items " in my MP store in ONE DAY with stolen avatars. Second, I can't have some stolen content back since they are retired. Third, I can't write a DMCA report since creator is not me, but LL can close the alt account immediately when that happens, but they wait doing this. Fourth, it's MY item, it doesn't matter if I am willing to sell or keep, it's simply MINE, not the business, item. Fifth, if we won't make some profits and not willing to keep the gacha items, why do we play? Isn't it harsh for the creators of us not to play or sell them for dumb prices on MP. There are many things I can say. We simply don't want fraudulent lindens, we want a rescue/recovery for our items. They deny. That's why we try to find other solutions. That's all.

[Sunny Hui]

14 hours ago, Lucia Nightfire said:

The overall problem is that LL only follows the money and goes no further where that ends. Governance needs to update their protocols to also follow purchases and distributions of no copy objects as well if they find that that stolen funds were used in the original purchase and return the no copy object(s) back to the original seller.

While it is true that a no gift option on marketplace could still be abused with an alt making the purchase, logging in and transfering the object to another alt possibly generating a transaction trail, it would still slow them down and make it even easier to track their actions.

This feature aims to decrease the chances of fraud, as it is impossible to deter fraud 100% of the time.

A seller can have peace of mind not allowing gifting of high dollar items and/or no copy items if they choose.

With all that said, I'm curious how you all would feel about additional listing options such as:

- Accounts must have Premium status to buy this item.

- Accounts must have Premium status to search/see this listing.

- Accounts must have payment info used to buy this item.

- Accounts must have payment info used to search/see this listing.

- Accounts must have payment info on file to buy this item.

- Accounts must have payment info on file to search/see this listing.

Such listing options would also further reduce the chance of fraud.

Adult listings already require adult status afaik so it shouldn't be hard to check for the logged-in account to possess any of these flags. Granted, it may hurt sales chances, but it should still be up to the seller who they fell comfortable marketing and/or selling to.

The basic no gifting thing would be really good, as it, to my mind, cuts merchant out of the crime loop.  

The loss should go on the account buying the item, not the seller who bought it to resell legitimately.  I know they are often victims of phishing, but a merchant can't be asked to be responsible for them.   

A regular repeat of a log in notice on main viewers to warning on blindly clicking the phishing links people spray out in groups would be helpful.   The threat of a scam will get peoples attention enough to take notice. 

Already the competition is steep, copy botters putting rares and entire collections up often at near cost price is impossible to compete with when a merchant often spends 50 to 200 real dollars to buy up enough to get the equivalent in stock and is left a massive amount of stuff that won't sell for years.

To my mind, the big merchants putting the gacha's out at festivals and so on seem to be making enough profit not to file dcma on their copybottted gacha's or they would do more often.  

 

[Sunny Hui]

31 minutes ago, Klytyna said:

I'm not anti-gacha reseller... Just telling you WHY things are as they are. 

This kind of problem can affect any business, SL or RL that involves selling 2nd hand items for significant markups on the original purchase price.

Harsh reality time... Doesn't matter how many pulls it takes to win that ultra rare, the cost price to you of that ultra rare is the same as the most undesirable common, the cost of a 'pull', if you have to play a machine 1000 times to get that ultra rare, that item did not cost you 50,000 ls, it cost you 50 ls, and you have 999 other 50 ls items that wont resell for as much.

The fine art business RL has similar problems, paintings bought with stolen money that can't be recovered because nobody knows where they went, but the money paid has to go back to its real owner, forgeries that look just like the real thing, etc.

In the art world, selling a painting for $10,000,000 then finding out it was a forgery, or that the negotiable bearer bonds used to pay for it were stolen and you have to give them back, well, THAT is serious money, hence why people are really careful in that business and always have business insurance.

Maybe what you and the other gacha sellers should be asking for isn't ineffectual market place controls based on snobbery like 'tick box to only sell to premium' etc., what you should be asking for is for LL to set up some kind of MP Vendor's Insurance Scheme, to compensate people for loss due to criminal activity, pay a modest premium, and when your 'valuable whatever' vanishes, make a claim on the insurance.
 

I've thought of a group fund not for insurance but for a lawyer. 

[Klytyna]

Ok, a 'simple' option... when you put an item on the MP, there's a tick box, where you can decide if instead of the standard 5% cut for LL, you want to agree to a larger cut, in exchange for which if the item getsd bought with stolen funds, you don't lose financially...

[x] Yes I wish to pay a 7.5% LL sales tax on this item in exchange for fraud protection insurance.
 

[Sunny Hui]

13 minutes ago, Klytyna said:

Ok, a 'simple' option... when you put an item on the MP, there's a tick box, where you can decide if instead of the standard 5% cut for LL, you want to agree to a larger cut, in exchange for which if the item getsd bought with stolen funds, you don't lose financially...

[x] Yes I wish to pay a 7.5% LL sales tax on this item in exchange for fraud protection insurance.
 

I don't want to start that game, it just gives thieves permission to steal more and then premiums start rising.  

Basic no gifting and phishing scam warnings on log in seem still the best option, easy to implement, to me. 

My ultimate is to work out how to best identify and ban phishers and copybotters and actually do it, but they too generate a lot of income for LL.  As you keep trying to stress, the machine is the machine.  But still, it could work a lot better.  

Edited May 5, 2017 by Sunny Hui
typo

[Klytyna]

 

 

Edited May 5, 2017 by Klytyna
responding to a now corrected typo...

[OxfordLennox]

23 minutes ago, Klytyna said:

Ok, a 'simple' option... when you put an item on the MP, there's a tick box, where you can decide if instead of the standard 5% cut for LL, you want to agree to a larger cut, in exchange for which if the item getsd bought with stolen funds, you don't lose financially...

[x] Yes I wish to pay a 7.5% LL sales tax on this item in exchange for fraud protection insurance.
 

I'd accept that if that did.

[Sunny Hui]

That's a typo, I meant basic no gifting, not no basic accounts. I edited it out about 10 minutes before you posted.  

2 minutes ago, Klytyna said:

Still with the damn assumption that people who don't pay premium and live on the damn mainland are somehow pointless criminals and not worth bothering with. How many legitimate sales will you lose if you only sell to Madlanders? How much will it cost you? A damn sight more than business insurance. It's almost as if you WANT to go out of business due to bad practice.
 

 

 

[Stone Avedon]

On May 5, 2017 at 4:03 AM, OxfordLennox said:

That would be nice if the purchasers were alts, only the people who get the items are alts. Buyers are stolen accounts.

Folks, why are you feeding the troll... it clearly states in her title, 

• Professional Cynic

She's sending you scenarios and going off topic and coming up with rigmarole, it's not the gacha business model that is being brought up here, it's ANY business model in SL - regardless of "pulls" or whatever. If I paid a licensing fee to use a texture or likeness on a tshirt. That came out of my pocket. If someone bought that with stolen funds LL is not protecting me, the seller, from fraud.

The right to refuse service. The right to point out the loophole and asking to tighten it.

Plain.

Simple.

Enough coming up with grandiose plans or "Exposing schemes" or "raising taxes for protection" scenarios.

Stop feeding the troll.

 

[Klytyna]

1 hour ago, Stone Avedon said:

Folks, why are you feeding the troll... it clearly states in her title,

• Professional Cynic

She's sending you scenarios and going off topic and coming up with rigmarole, it's not the gacha business model that is being brought up here, it's ANY business model in SL - regardless of "pulls" or whatever. If I paid a licensing fee to use a texture or likeness on a tshirt. That came out of my pocket. If someone bought that with stolen funds LL is not protecting me, the seller, from fraud.

The right to refuse service. The right to point out the loophole and asking to tighten it.

Plain.

Simple.

Enough coming up with grandiose plans or "Exposing schemes" or "raising taxes for protection" scenarios.

Stop feeding the troll.

 

First of all... a Cynic is not the same as a troll... Buy a dictionary.

It has become increasingly obvious over the last 15 years on multiple platforms that most MMO amateur hobbyist small business operators, have no clue how a business operates. 

Removing the gift option from gacha sales WILL NOT STOP phishers using stolen accounts from ripping you off. They will just BUY the items, and 2 mins later manually send them to a selection of other accounts, 1 of which will be their alt.

Refusing service in this case is pointless, useless, and clueless.

Refusing service to people who are not payment registered, is also pointless, useless, and clueless, accounts with no money don't buy expensive gacha.

Refusing service to non-premiums is pointless, useless, and clueless, all you do is destroy your customer base, kill your own sales and put your business into financial trouble.

The closest analogy I can think of in FirstLife to the gacha reselling trade is the 2nd hand book business.

I collect books, I have nearly 4000, This a trade I've seen close up. 

Book dealers buy up old books in places such as house clearance sales, usually in bulk, and sometimes by weight. A book dealer might agree to pay a $1 a book for an entire private library of several thousand volumes. This is similar to you 'pulling' a gacha machine hundreds of times.

Amongst those thousands of books, delivered in crates, there may be 'sets', a complete multi volume novel series, or an encylopedia. Sets sell for more money, so our book dealer spends time going through the pile sorting them by titles and publishers and category etc., just as you sort your gacha.

When a book dealer drops $1000 for 1000 2nd hand books, if they happen to find a RARE 1st edition in good condition in the pile, they DO NOT claim that THAT ONE BOOK cost them $1000, because it did not, they bought 1000 books for a $1 each and got lucky on one, just like you did with your gacha.

Selling the other 999 books... Well some might have a resale value of more than a $1 especially if they can be grouped into sets, but there will be some that, frankly are worth less than a $1. A Professional book dealer KNOWS this and factors it into their calculations, it's a risk you take when buying books in bulk without examining each one first.

Now for your sales strategy.

If an item doesn't sell for years, that is Nature's way of telling you that you are charging too damn much.

If you are STUPID enough to think that rare item cost you $1000 (with 999 not rare items thrown in free, whose resale value you myopically refuse to remember when costing) and claim $1000 as your 'costs' on that rare item alone, do not be surprised when somebody SMARTER undercuts your sale price on the same item. Being undercut is Nature's way of telling you that you are charging too damn much.

Do not assume your time playing as "business toddler" is worth whatever hourly rate you get in your day job in FirstLife, do you deserve compensation, sure, can you realistically expect ME or any other customer to pay you your FL hourly pay scale for sorting a pile of gacha? NO.

A professional 2nd hand book dealer sets the resale price on that lucky $1 find of a rare 1st edition, to cover the slight loss on the worthless pulp items that also cost a $1, but also realises that many of the other 999 books also have value, and factors their markups accordingly, especially as those low to mid range priced books will sell faster, thus returning the book dealers invested capital that much faster.

Most of you gacha dealers seem to work it backwards, you try to reclaim ALL your operating costs on ONE super expensive item, and leave the rest to rot in your stores for years.

Professional 2nd hand book dealers run businesses, which in most countries generally means having business insurance, both to cover losses from theft, fraud, fire, bookwork, red rot etc., but also to cover 3rd party liability.

You gacha dealers seem to want to be business people without understanding how businesses operate and without ANY of the obligations of a real business. You have unrealistic expectations.

You do occasionally run across a 2nd hand bookshop that operates like a gacha dealer, weird little places in quiet country towns, with windows so dirty you can's see in, that open maybe 2 hours a day 1 day a week, run by elderly eccentrics who desperately try to prevent people from buying the books, at least until they go bankrupt or die, and a normal book dealer comes in and buys their stock for a $1 a case...

But I'm tired of this, your problems are not mine, I did try to point out how the system actually works, I even suggested a possible partial fix for your problem, based on the solutions used in FirstLife, but ultimately, you've made a rod for your own backs, and you will continue to bleed for it because you refuse to wake up and listen.

 

[OxfordLennox]

It looks like we don't know anything but others know everything. Just saying, in Second Life, gacha things doesn't work like a book dealer. Because book publishers have limited books, not unlimited copies like SL creators have. This is not the same way of economics.

EDIT: Oh well, I refuse/ give up answering someone spends the words like others are stupid, do not listen, do not understand, do not have any idea and only the mentor of EVERYTHING about economics, life, oh well ANYTHING she knows.

I read that back after Stone's post. I don't want to call anyone as troll, but your last post claims you are only the mentor of being a troll. From the first post of yours, I tried to understand your point by YOUR side, but it's being a bull***** against thread. Please stop that, you are not helping. As you say, it's our problem, not yours. You don't need to tire your fingers to explain economics to stupid people. This will be my last answer, then I am ignoring your messages. If there is nothing offering a SOLUTION, then there is nothing to read and spend my time. Thanks.

Edited May 6, 2017 by OxfordLennox

[Stone Avedon]

10 hours ago, Klytyna said:

First of all... a Cynic is not the same as a troll... Buy a dictionary.

It has become increasingly obvious over the last 15 years on multiple platforms that most MMO amateur hobbyist small business operators, have no clue how a business operates. 

Removing the gift option from gacha sales WILL NOT STOP phishers using stolen accounts from ripping you off. They will just BUY the items, and 2 mins later manually send them to a selection of other accounts, 1 of which will be their alt.

Refusing service in this case is pointless, useless, and clueless.

Refusing service to people who are not payment registered, is also pointless, useless, and clueless, accounts with no money don't buy expensive gacha.

Refusing service to non-premiums is pointless, useless, and clueless, all you do is destroy your customer base, kill your own sales and put your business into financial trouble.

The closest analogy I can think of in FirstLife to the gacha reselling trade is the 2nd hand book business.

I collect books, I have nearly 4000, This a trade I've seen close up. 

Book dealers buy up old books in places such as house clearance sales, usually in bulk, and sometimes by weight. A book dealer might agree to pay a $1 a book for an entire private library of several thousand volumes. This is similar to you 'pulling' a gacha machine hundreds of times.

Amongst those thousands of books, delivered in crates, there may be 'sets', a complete multi volume novel series, or an encylopedia. Sets sell for more money, so our book dealer spends time going through the pile sorting them by titles and publishers and category etc., just as you sort your gacha.

When a book dealer drops $1000 for 1000 2nd hand books, if they happen to find a RARE 1st edition in good condition in the pile, they DO NOT claim that THAT ONE BOOK cost them $1000, because it did not, they bought 1000 books for a $1 each and got lucky on one, just like you did with your gacha.

Selling the other 999 books... Well some might have a resale value of more than a $1 especially if they can be grouped into sets, but there will be some that, frankly are worth less than a $1. A Professional book dealer KNOWS this and factors it into their calculations, it's a risk you take when buying books in bulk without examining each one first.

Now for your sales strategy.

If an item doesn't sell for years, that is Nature's way of telling you that you are charging too damn much.

If you are STUPID enough to think that rare item cost you $1000 (with 999 not rare items thrown in free, whose resale value you myopically refuse to remember when costing) and claim $1000 as your 'costs' on that rare item alone, do not be surprised when somebody SMARTER undercuts your sale price on the same item. Being undercut is Nature's way of telling you that you are charging too damn much.

Do not assume your time playing as "business toddler" is worth whatever hourly rate you get in your day job in FirstLife, do you deserve compensation, sure, can you realistically expect ME or any other customer to pay you your FL hourly pay scale for sorting a pile of gacha? NO.

A professional 2nd hand book dealer sets the resale price on that lucky $1 find of a rare 1st edition, to cover the slight loss on the worthless pulp items that also cost a $1, but also realises that many of the other 999 books also have value, and factors their markups accordingly, especially as those low to mid range priced books will sell faster, thus returning the book dealers invested capital that much faster.

Most of you gacha dealers seem to work it backwards, you try to reclaim ALL your operating costs on ONE super expensive item, and leave the rest to rot in your stores for years.

Professional 2nd hand book dealers run businesses, which in most countries generally means having business insurance, both to cover losses from theft, fraud, fire, bookwork, red rot etc., but also to cover 3rd party liability.

You gacha dealers seem to want to be business people without understanding how businesses operate and without ANY of the obligations of a real business. You have unrealistic expectations.

You do occasionally run across a 2nd hand bookshop that operates like a gacha dealer, weird little places in quiet country towns, with windows so dirty you can's see in, that open maybe 2 hours a day 1 day a week, run by elderly eccentrics who desperately try to prevent people from buying the books, at least until they go bankrupt or die, and a normal book dealer comes in and buys their stock for a $1 a case...

But I'm tired of this, your problems are not mine, I did try to point out how the system actually works, I even suggested a possible partial fix for your problem, based on the solutions used in FirstLife, but ultimately, you've made a rod for your own backs, and you will continue to bleed for it because you refuse to wake up and listen.

 

http://careynieuwhof.com/take-back-the-internet-how-good-people-can-beat-the-cynics-and-the-trolls/

[Klytyna]

10 hours ago, Stone Avedon said:

http://careynieuwhof.com/take-back-the-internet-how-good-people-can-beat-the-cynics-and-the-trolls/

As a 'Professional Cynic' I feel obligated to point out that your link points to a commercial website run by a self proclaimed "lifestyle guru", who hopes you will buy his books and sign up for his "online leadership courses", backed by the testimonials of  two little league pastors and a woman with a phd in "practical theology", which should give a clear idea of the kind of material that's involved in "taking back your life" and learning to "live with hope".

Speaking personally, as a cynic, I'd rather examine the problem, determine the fact, and formulate a workable real world solution, than shell out dollars to some self hyped liberal arts conman, in exchange for being told that "faith that sticks" and "living in hope" are the answer.

Do what real businesses do, learn how to correctly calculate your operating costs, invest in business insurance, stop demanding that the rest of the world should financially compensate you just for being online.

/thread
 

[Stone Avedon]

4 hours ago, Klytyna said:

As a 'Professional Cynic' I feel obligated to point out that your link points to a commercial website run by a self proclaimed "lifestyle guru", who hopes you will buy his books and sign up for his "online leadership courses", backed by the testimonials of  two little league pastors and a woman with a phd in "practical theology", which should give a clear idea of the kind of material that's involved in "taking back your life" and learning to "live with hope".

Speaking personally, as a cynic, I'd rather examine the problem, determine the fact, and formulate a workable real world solution, than shell out dollars to some self hyped liberal arts conman, in exchange for being told that "faith that sticks" and "living in hope" are the answer.

Do what real businesses do, learn how to correctly calculate your operating costs, invest in business insurance, stop demanding that the rest of the world should financially compensate you just for being online.

/thread
 

/thread.

 

Praise the Gods.