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Question: In your opinion, what have been the greatest controversies in the 15-year history of Second Life?


Vanity Fair
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I'm curious, and I thought this forum would be a natural place to ask the question:

In your opinion, what have been the biggest controversies in the 15-year history of Second Life?

I have found a website with an interactive timeline of SL controversies, but it only goes up to 2012. What do you think have been the major controversies since then?

Thank you in advance for your comments! I've also posted over on That Other Forum Which Shall Not Be Named ? and I am hoping to trigger some lively discussion and (perhaps) I may write up a blogpost for my blog on the topic.

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I haven't read the timeline, yet. But I would think the biggest hoopla was when "Copybot" first appeared on the grid and everyone learned of it. Second to that, I would think was the time when the whole "*****" fiasco exploded. Third would be the news reports that Anshe Chung made U.S. $ 1 Million from "playing the game" (which I still don't believe, other than "creative financial reporting".

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1 hour ago, Callum Meriman said:

ibtl

Vanity, the Lab have made some real weird descisions in their days, but rubbing their nose in it, on two forums.... wise?

Hey, I'm not laying all the blame at Linden Lab's feet. And this is not any sort of attack on Linden Lab; I think overall they do a pretty good job as a company (even if they do make the occasional blunder now and then; every company does).There have been many controversies that have happened on the grid WITHOUT their involvement, too (disputes and lawsuits between competing vendors, for example).

And if Linden Lab decides to shut this thread down for—God forbid!—talking about the history of SL, warts and all, well then I'll just continue the discussion over on The Forum That Shall Not Be Named. It's probably going to be more entertaining over there anyways.

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One that sticks in the memory was when LL added the adult continent Zindra or Ursula as it was initially known due to all the sims being named Ursula. used to see material all over the grid protesting against relegating adult content to adult sims and mainland and having to age verify (in some cases manually) or submit payment info to access the new adult rated lands and any land that requires it

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Yes, I do remember that. Age verification was definitely a controversy at the time. I remember that LL hired some company called Aristotle? Or something like that to do their age verification for them, and all the complaining that people did. And then, after a while, LL removed the age verification system they had in place. 

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I remember a lot of what everyone has mentioned! The age verification, copybotting, the exodus to Zindra which I think coincided with the teen grid closing. I never noticed but the opening of SL to free accounts was a big upheaval apparently. I also recall a few smaller things like Last Call closing, or Gala getting knocked out and even the Sexgen beds becoming free. 

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I think this was probably before 2012 but that website is only good if you're browsing, but no good if you're looking for something specific, which is what I tried to do. So I'll mention it anyway.

Even though it didn't involve me, the biggest controversy from my point of view was when LL started selling a sim type with reduced capacity. I forget what the sim type was called, but it was more than an OpenSpace sim. People asked LL if it was ok to do certain things on the sims, and LL said yes it is. People were even told, "that's what they are for".

Then, after selling a load of them, LL realised that they had made a mistake and claimed that people were using them for things that they weren't intended to be used for - things like clubs and such, which are the very things that people were told it's ok to do on them, and "that's what they are for". And LL changed it all. I don't remember if they stopped selling them, or made rules as to what could no longer be done on them. It was like...

LL: "Buy these cheaper sims. You can do 'this and that' with them."

USER: "Oh goody. I'll take some."

LL: "Thank you for your money, but you're not allowed to do 'this and that' with the sims."

USER: "WHAT???!!!!"

I think that LL reimbursed, but it was a huge controversy at the time.

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5 hours ago, Phil Deakins said:

Even though it didn't involve me, the biggest controversy from my point of view was when LL started selling a sim type with reduced capacity. I forget what the sim type was called, but it was more than an OpenSpace sim. People asked LL if it was ok to do certain things on the sims, and LL said yes it is. People were even told, "that's what they are for".

Homestead?

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