Process Credit Fees Raised. Again.

[Luna Bliss]

9 minutes ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

Friend, I spent years doing absolutely nothing but struggle alone on 750€; no plan, no school. It's miserable, which is why I'm back to school.

First you said 500 and now you say 750 Euros....why the change?

And isn't that awfully irresponsible to live on so little for so many years? I mean, if you earned more you could have put more in this savings that you tout, the savings you blame merchants for not having and so label them as being irresponsible.

Why did you live on so little for all those years?

[Rya Nitely]

15 minutes ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

All currencies fluctuate in value, whether or not LL is manipulating this one specifically is a whole separate discussion that I don't care to have.

It's not a whole separate discussion. It's a significant part of our increased costs. When any currency fluctuates there are documented reasons for it, and one reason is government manipulation - currency devaluation. But when this happens we are given the reasons why. Other reasons may be changes in interest rates etc.. There are no such reasons with the L$, hence mysterious.

This has been discussed, pages and pages of discussion.

[Wulfie Reanimator]

45 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

First you said 500 and now you say 750 Euros....why the change?

And isn't that awfully irresponsible to live on so little for so many years? I mean, if you earned more you could have put more in this savings that you tout, the savings you blame merchants for not having and so label them as being irresponsible.

Why did you live on so little for all those years?

Sorry, the different kinds of assistance I've gotten are muddled in my head right now while I'm flustered. I currently get a part of my rent paid (230€) and the 250€ student aid.

In the past I used to get the same amount of rent paid (I never get this money, I only pay the difference) and about 500€ (32.4€/day for 20 days per month).

Yes, I could have earned more to put into savings. I didn't particularly need more. When I began saving I had a different safety net and by the time that went away, I had enough of my own. I will have to find some kind of part-time job again within the next couple years while I'm in school. Not because I would hit zero but because I would lose my cushion.

The reason was because I was jobless but seeking, that's the 500€. (You must prove you're actively looking for a job to get it.) I also had a part-time job at one point which paid me 1080€ post-tax per month, that's where the largest chunk of my savings have come from because I saved roughly half of each paycheck.

This isn't to say that you should survive on 500€ ($560), it's not universally applicable because of different economies, personal circumstances (childen, pets, vehicle, poor public transit, etc.) and prices in the local area. What I am saying that when you are struggling, there are always some ways to reduce your own costs. I rarely buy games (my main source of entertainment), I don't have TV or Netflix, I don't drink/smoke/gamble, I rarely eat candy or fast food, I buy groceries by price-to-weight (I compare the prices of butter and fake-butter!), I don't have expensive hobbies, I don't buy new clothes until my current ones are falling apart, I live in the smallest and cheapest apartment I could find, and I deal with a lot of minor inconveniences. The amount of money people spend when they don't need to is pretty gross sometimes.

Edited January 5, 2020 by Wulfie Reanimator

[OptimoMaximo]

2 hours ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

If you're withdrawing "$1000", it doesn't matter what the exchange rate is. That $1000 is just equivalent to a different amount of L$ at the time of withdraw, but it's still $1000. The change in rate only matters if you've been holding onto $1000 from a long time ago, in which case the decline does mean that the lindens that were once worth $1000 are now worth less and you have in fact lost more money. Actually, I guess it does matter if you don't change your prices to adjust for inflation. I wonder if other (non-SL) stores do that?

Ok, since you're so critical, let's put this more in context, even though it was clear to all the others: to get to a $1000 to withdraw, we need 15% more L$ rather than 10%, which makes the same amount of cut as described in my comment you quoted. For the same amount of L$ that now makes $1000, i would have got $1150 without fee raise AND inflation, and without inflation that would have been $1050 which might not seem much, but that covers at least one of my bimestral bills.

[Wulfie Reanimator]

1 hour ago, OptimoMaximo said:

3 hours ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

If you're withdrawing "$1000", it doesn't matter what the exchange rate is. That $1000 is just equivalent to a different amount of L$ at the time of withdraw, but it's still $1000. The change in rate only matters if you've been holding onto $1000 from a long time ago, in which case the decline does mean that the lindens that were once worth $1000 are now worth less and you have in fact lost more money. Actually, I guess it does matter if you don't change your prices to adjust for inflation. I wonder if other (non-SL) stores do that?

Ok, since you're so critical, let's put this more in context, even though it was clear to all the others: to get to a $1000 to withdraw, we need 15% more L$ rather than 10%, which makes the same amount of cut as described in my comment you quoted. For the same amount of L$ that now makes $1000, i would have got $1150 without fee raise AND inflation, and without inflation that would have been $1050 which might not seem much, but that covers at least one of my bimestral bills.

Yes, I mentioned that at the end of the quote. I don't disagree with your observation. I guess raising your prices is just totally out of the question and all you can do is let their value depreciate with time. (I'm using the "general you," there are many in these threads who don't like it.)

What you said in the post I was responding to was yet another example of extrapolating personal experience to the wider world. "My sales are going up along with someone I know. How come the LindeX rate keeps getting worse??" Dude. That's not how it works. That's not how any of this works.

2 hours ago, Rya Nitely said:

It's not a whole separate discussion.

The fact that the value of lindens has declined is relevant and an important part of the picture. We can talk about that.

The accusation of LL directly controlling that value isn't something I care to entertain. You can do that and I'm not going to argue on that.

Edited January 5, 2020 by Wulfie Reanimator

[Rya Nitely]

8 hours ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

The fact that the value of lindens has declined is relevant and an important part of the picture. We can talk about that.

I'm sorry, it's been discussed often enough. But what you should really do is what I and others have done over the past few years - really give some hard thought as to what would cause the L$ to depreciate. Look at the historical charts, particularly daily sales volume. This is what many of us have done. We have given it a lot of thought and a lot of discussion. Not only here but also over in the old SLUniverse. So you're coming into it a bit late, and I don't want to have a long frustrating debate about it again, especially since you don't seem to want to understand but you just want to keep saying stuff like 'Dude, that's not how it works'.

But I can tell you that most people, even non merchants, ended up thinking something was fishy, because after long discussions it never made any sense. The ones who opposed the accusation of LL directly controlling that value could only say that isn't how it works and markets fluctuate, which they do but there are always reasons, and these reasons are reported, and even speculation is better that nothing.

And when I say speculation, I mean speculation that makes sense. This is one of the reasons people gave, which doesn't make sense - people have been hoarding huge amounts of L$ and then dumped it onto the market and that caused the devaluation. 

Edited January 6, 2020 by Rya Nitely

[Rya Nitely]

I still don't know how anyone can actually believe it's a real currency exchange. Those orders under 252 have to be fake, because there's practically zero chance of selling, so who would leave their L$ at that level, unless they were very clueless, and that those volumes don't suggest clueless sellers. The only people who would put L$ where it won't sell anytime soon are people who are doing it for another reason. And that would only be LL.

[Wulfie Reanimator]

3 hours ago, Rya Nitely said:

But what you should really do is what I and others have done over the past few years - really give some hard thought as to what would cause the L$ to depreciate. Look at the historical charts, particularly daily sales volume. This is what many of us have done.

Okay. I was upset and irritated last night, mainly because of Luna. Let's try it again with a different set of spoons.

Could you link me somewhere I can find a historical chart and maybe one of those SLU threads. I promise I'll read through them without making any hasty conclusions.

[ChinRey]

2 hours ago, Rya Nitely said:

I still don't know how anyone can actually believe it's a real currency exchange. Those orders under 252 have to be fake, because there's practically zero chance of selling, so who would leave their L$ at that level, unless they were very clueless, and that those volumes don't suggest clueless sellers.

It may suggest lots of clueless sellers though.

Some of the really low orders are probably years old and the sellers have forgotten about them by now, if they're in SL at all that is.

 

Edited January 6, 2020 by ChinRey

[ChinRey]

32 minutes ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

Could you link me somewhere I can find a historical chart and maybe one of those SLU threads. I promise I'll read through them without making any hasty conclusions.

The SLU threads are gone, at least for now. Cristiano closed the forum and replaced it with a new one with a new name, running on different software. He's been taking about reinstating the old discussions but so far it hasn't happened.

The historical sales volume chart according to Gridsurvey, is really weird. Apparently there hasn't been any changes worth mentioning for the last 12 years. Flucuations, yes, but the overall trend is pancake flat. During that period the SL economy has declined significantly and at one point LL blosked all the alternative exchange services, forcing everybody to trade through LindeX. Neither of these factors seem to have had any impact on the volume at all and I can't see any reason why.

[OptimoMaximo]

10 minutes ago, ChinRey said:

It may suggest lots of clueless sellers though.

Some of the really low orders are probably years old and the sellers have forgotten about them by now, if they're in SL at all that is

A lot, but never enough to justify those volumes anyway. I know for a fact that when people were seeing the previous rate volumes going down so much to prelude to the next better level to get in use, they would just "reserve" their spot placing that rate order in advance. What is suspicious though, is that when that rate never gets to be used, after some time those same people don't need that money and don't cancel the sale offer for a quicker to fill rate in order to get their cash. If the primary point is to get the cash, it's unlikely that those same people don't need it for something, whether it be an extra for covering some expenses (like bills or software subscriptions) that need to be fulfilled by own pocket in the meantime, as well if we see that cash like the little extra to afford a few dinners out "for free" as those with huge amounts that basically tell "it's my main income". Also, currency fluctuation is normal when it fluctuates, thing that is not happening: it is just going in one direction on a steady pace. Therefore I wouldn't account a big percentage of those volumes to clueless people, because along these almost 2 years, an actual fluctuation would have caused those volumes to slowly erode instead of growing, indicating that it's not even the case for clueless people that left or forgot about it. Even the most stupidly clueless individual gets that when they're not getting their money, especially when they either selling bulk of crap downloaded from whoknowswhere for the quick buck or they've worked their arse off producing legit content. 

[Wulfie Reanimator]

12 hours ago, ChinRey said:

The SLU threads are gone, at least for now. Cristiano closed the forum and replaced it with a new one with a new name, running on different software. He's been taking about reinstating the old discussions but so far it hasn't happened.

The historical sales volume chart according to Gridsurvey, is really weird. Apparently there hasn't been any changes worth mentioning for the last 12 years. Flucuations, yes, but the overall trend is pancake flat. During that period the SL economy has declined significantly and at one point LL blosked all the alternative exchange services, forcing everybody to trade through LindeX. Neither of these factors seem to have had any impact on the volume at all and I can't see any reason why.

Could someone link other relevant threads so I can catch up on the discussion, then?

The mid-2011 to mid-2016 definitely looks weird. Wasn't that period kind of the peak of SL activity though? I would speculate that it's possible that the state of the economy back then could've just stabilized at that level, but I don't know what would've caused that sudden spike during 2016 if that was the case. Were there any significant events/announcements around that time?

One thing I am noticing though, is that there was a significant uptick in individual transactions during that whole upturn from mid-2015 until the end of the chart, especially at the peak. A weirder thing is that from 13-Sept-2017 until 15-Jan-2017 the minimum quantity was L$1 and the maximum rate was around 271 for most of that. That certainly looks like market manipulation -- very obviously even -- but this could be done by anyone, not just LL. The L$ trading limits were also changed in December of 2016 and the rate inflation immediately stopped.

Edit: Seems like the major part of the chart is explained by Supply Linden filling in the demand, which kept it stable through 2011-2016.

Edited January 6, 2020 by Wulfie Reanimator

[Rya Nitely]

We are talking about L$80 million or US$300,000 just sitting there doing nothing. People just don't forget huge amounts of money like that. I would believe a small number of people, say 50 people and an average of L$2000 each, making a total of L$100,000 under 252 - that would be believable. But we know that in general, people in LL care very much about their money, no matter how small. But there would need to be about 40,000 people leaving small amounts to make up L$80 million.

In real life markets you don't pay anything until your order is executed. So people can place orders at whatever level (ridiculous is usually blocked), and lose nothing if the order is never executed, but on the LindeX we need to pay up front. So, if I wanted to sell AU$ I can put in my order today, and my money will stay in my bank account until the order goes through, then it gets taken out of my bank account on settlement, normally a couple of days later to give you time. This is the same with buying. You don't ever just leave your money doing nothing.

Edited January 6, 2020 by Rya Nitely

[Rya Nitely]

[Rya Nitely]

I'll try to find the thread for you

[Rya Nitely]

 

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[Rya Nitely]

 

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[Rya Nitely]