LL advertising private businesses in their blog?

[Love Zhaoying]

1 minute ago, Jules Catlyn said:

I don't think it will lead to a massive influx of sales for Blueberry. We will see how things play out in the future.

Agreed, only limited users read the blogs, even if on viewer home screen prior to login.

[Phil Deakins]

Whether or not LL is favouring Blueberry with free premium accounts or simply by accepting payment for them from Blueberry instead of the new premiums, the reason I started the thread isn't changed - Xiola Linden promoting 2 specifc SL businesses in LL's blog. I find huge fault with that.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Phil Deakins

[Love Zhaoying]

Ethics training maybe lacking?

[Callum Meriman]

3 minutes ago, Phil Deakins said:

Xiola Linden promoting 2 specifc SL businesses in LL's blog. I find huge fault with that.

You are not the only one Phil, it's shady considering there are a lot of places that would happily pay the bribe of a premium to get coverage.

[Jules Catlyn]

2 minutes ago, Phil Deakins said:

Whether or not LL is favouring Blueberry with free premium accounts or simply by accepting payment for them from Blueberry instead of the new premiums, the reason I started the thread isn't changed - Xiola Linden promoting 2 specifc SL businesses in LL's blog. I find huge fault with that.

Question: Would you have been equally offended if she had picked 2 unknown brands? Is it that she can't mention any brand names or the fact that it is 2 well known ones?

[Love Zhaoying]

If the clothing is Mesh, then perhaps it will drive purchase of more Mesh avatars, which definitely drive the economy due to high price.

[Callum Meriman]

1 minute ago, Jules Catlyn said:

Question: Would you have been equally offended if she had picked 2 unknown brands? Is it that she can't mention any brand names or the fact that it is 2 well known ones?

I would rather the Lab doesn't show favouritism to ANY business. They need to be hands off here unless they formally accept advertising and Xiola-time from anyone willing to pay.

[Phil Deakins]

2 minutes ago, Jules Catlyn said:

Question: Would you have been equally offended if she had picked 2 unknown brands? Is it that she can't mention any brand names or the fact that it is 2 well known ones?

Any SL businesses. The 2 she promoted were totally unknown to me. I'd never heard of them,, and I found great fault with it immediately.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Phil Deakins

[Akasha Sternberg]

she added a style card ... that´s what all fashion bloggers do no matter what their last name is....

Sponsoring isn´t unusual either... and in this case it could have been back and forth but that´s between Xiola and Berry really...

Berry does a lot of collaborations and giveaways plus she´s one of the huge designers now... 

Maybe she gave the outfit to Xiola - maybe Xiola bought it...

I do actually like the increasing activity of Lindens  - Dakota posts on the forums, I ran into River in a photo groupchat inworld, Xiola blogs - it makes them more real and not some abstract bot employee... We all do have private lifes and professional lifes (even if your profession is being a home-manager).... Yeah of course they could create alts for that but they shouldn´t have to...

heck I do stylecards on my blog no matter if I got it from the designer, if it was a groupgift or if I spent my cashed in RL money to get it... it´s just common curtesy and tells the viewer where the item is from  so they can go and get it should they want to

 

[Jules Catlyn]

I don't they have featured products before that were of a different variety and clearly recognizable as being from a certain brand. If this is the beginning of more of this i think it is a fun thing. As long as it isn't being monetized (they don't do it for a fee) and maybe more Lindens do it.  

[Callum Meriman]

When our politicans accept bribes and use their power to show favortism to a commercial venture the people and press rightly get a bit antsy.

[Phil Deakins]

@Akasha Sternberg

Style cards, as you call them, are fine, and, imo, there's nothing wrong with Xiola putting them in her blog. But that's not what she did. She put them in the Linden Lab official blog, so that it appears that Linden Lab is recommending those stores. Whether intentional or not, that's tantamount to advertising certain businesses to the detriment of the rest, and that's what's wrong imo.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Phil Deakins

[Love Zhaoying]

I bet “SL Look of the Day” will be with a lot of brands. Hoping for some male models!

[Jules Catlyn]

2 minutes ago, Callum Meriman said:

When our politicans accept bribes and use their power to show favortism to a commercial venture the people and press rightly get a bit antsy.

You assume Linden Lab was paid for it then. Which i don't see any proof off. I also don't look at the Lindens as politicians but as people. And as Akasha said: I do like the increased activity of the Lindens. Good for them to show their involvement in Second Life. I don't think shooting them from the sky at the first effort they make is very constructive.

[Callum Meriman]

Just now, Jules Catlyn said:

You assume Linden Lab was paid for it then. Which i don't see any proof off.

It's even worse if they were not paid for them. What criteria does the lab have on who to choose to advertise on their official blog?

[Phil Deakins]

5 minutes ago, Jules Catlyn said:

You assume Linden Lab was paid for it then.

I don't think that Callum assumed that at all. But it would be better if all businesses could pay for such advertising, like they can for ads on the login screen, and other places. That would be an even playing field, and there could be no complaints.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Phil Deakins

[Jules Catlyn]

1 minute ago, Callum Meriman said:

It's even worse if they were not paid for them. What criteria does the lab have on who to choose to advertise on their official blog?

I just finally found the post. Akasha is right. She just posted a stylecard which features several brands not just the ones you highlight. This even shows more that there is no preference for any brand in her post. To come back to your criteria: The only criteria that seem to be at play here is that she visited an event, bought items from SEVERAL creators and blogged about it. I am happy that these creators get exposure. Like i said before: I want to see how this plays out in future and not shoot things down at the first attempt a Linden makes.

 

[Love Zhaoying]

Three words: Test Marketing Campaign.

[Jules Catlyn]

2 minutes ago, Phil Deakins said:

I don't think that Callum assumed that at all. But it would be better if all businesses could pay for such advertising, like they can for ads on the login screen, and other places. That would be an even playing field, and there could be no complaints.

It doesn't show an uneven playing field. There are several brands featured in her blogpost not just 2. I am strongly against paid advertising because that would make the playing field uneven because brands that don't have the funds would be at a disadvantage even more then. With these blogposts EVERY brand has the chance to be featured.

[Phil Deakins]

The thing about Xiola's blog entry is why. Why post it at all? Is she starting another thing like Pic Of The Day? She hasn't said that that's what it's about. To all intents and purposes, it's just Xiola using the official LL blog to say 'look at me', and 'here is where you can buy the clothes if you like what I'm wearing'.

[lucagrabacr]

I read the blog post and it doesn't seem too shady to me. It feels more like Xiola is trying to make a minor official blog post that shows that LL / LL employees know or acknowledge the ongoing fashion blogging trend in SL of giving out info about where they got their clothes in a notecard.

I think it's rash to call it favoritism from a single blog post, it might just be Xiola happen to have and like those items she's wearing from those stores and decided to make the blog post.

[Akasha Sternberg]

what criteria do you have to wear what you wear that day... what criteria do I have to wear what I wear... like, wear, photos, blog - posting a LOTD post is quite popular and she seems to have wanted to participate in that trend, showing the Lindens are no dusty relicts of the past running around like it´s the first day of SL ... there doesn´t have to be more to it really... Digging for any corruption and uhhh weird deals.... is just unnecessary

it doesn´t even have to be any campaign or test either.... oh my....why are we treating the Lindens like they´re some glasshouse celebrity that never go to use the bathroom for a bigger meeting if you know what I mean. (And yeah Celebreties have bowel movements too...and they stink just like yours and mine)

We could choose to not be the mob with burning forks and actually aknowledge their interaction and them doing what so many of us do for once.... XD

[Phil Deakins]

6 minutes ago, Jules Catlyn said:

I just finally found the post. Akasha is right. She just posted a stylecard which features several brands not just the ones you highlight. This even shows more that there is no preference for any brand in her post. To come back to your criteria: The only criteria that seem to be at play here is that she visited an event, bought items from SEVERAL creators and blogged about it. I am happy that these creators get exposure. Like i said before: I want to see how this plays out in future and not shoot things down at the first attempt a Linden makes.

 

You are mistaken. There are only 2 stores mentioned - the two I posted. There are no more in the blog.

The only other thing mentioned is the sim where the pic was taken.

[Theresa Tennyson]

1 minute ago, Phil Deakins said:

You are mistaken. There are only 2 stores mentioned - the two I posted. There are no more in the blog.

The only other thing mentioned is the sim where the pic was taken.

Uber isn't a store, it's a shopping event with multiple designers.

[Callum Meriman]

And the co-existing blog about 10 free premium memberships from Blueberry

All seems a little too tight to me.

Edited September 1, 2018 by Callum Meriman
Added the gyazo