CasperTech Acquisition Discussion

[SeattleChris]

1 minute ago, Jules Catlyn said:

That is a reason as well. But i think the main reason is more personal. A person should have the ability to secure their own peaceful and happy SL. So they should have the choice to block anyone from it. In any way shape or form.

An excellent point. I guess I was overly-focused on the business/marketplace aspect.

[Sphynx Soleil]

7 hours ago, SeattleChris said:

Will Casper and his staff still be handling support via the CasperTech group, or will that be run by LL?

Some of this seems to have been touched on, but again, since I'm seeing conflicting information about both, is there a definitive answer for either? (And I'm still happy to accept "we aren't sure yet.)

Hi Chris!

As far as we (the staff) have been told, it's "as usual" for how CasperTech operates - at least for now.

Support inworld is still through the CasperTech group, and the CT ticket system is still functional - I would expect announcements of some sort will be made if/when that changes, just because of how many people that will impact if done unexpectedlly.

CT Staff are not privy to the inner Linden workings and thoughts, so unfortunately, we don't know beyond that. 

I see that Casper gave you the link to his GDPR tool, so hopefully that let you do what you were needing to do.

[Sphynx Soleil]

6 hours ago, Prokofy Neva said:

...In SL, if someone is a griefer, or annoys you, you ban them from your land or LL bans them completely from the world. But what are the reasons you'd ban someone from buying something and lose a sale?! They are never good reasons....

If someone has gone far enough in their bad behavior for me to put them on my ban list, it means they've burned their last bridge and I never want to deal with them again - even as a merchant.

There's a lot of things I'll blow off because, well, people are people (a couple of decades in customer support does that), but even I have limits.

[Prokofy Neva]

3 hours ago, Casper Warden said:

Prokofy, as you are well aware, your name was removed from the example notecard many years ago, as soon as you drew my attention to it.

As was explained at the time, I randomly (and in extremely bad judgement) used your avatar name to test name2key resolving during testing of that particular version, and I neglected to remove it before release. Again, I am very sorry for this. It was removed from the packs the very same day you informed me about it.

Casper, it's good you've stated this for the record, which you hadn't done before.

The mind boggles at the idea that you could "randomly" pick up my name and from hearsay, decide it is suitable as a "test griefer name to ban". On what basis? 

And what you're saying makes no sense. If I encountered this ban repeatedly over time, and even recently, that means that it sold with my name in it, and wasn't just a test. How could it be "just a test" when it is in random stores and venues? And I would come across it and then query the store or location and ask them what's up, and they would be mystified and usually remove it. If it were only a "test," how could I have experienced it, and over some time?  That means my name was put in products that were sold on the market, not tested.

@SeattleChris, there is a concept in civil society that the right to swing your arm ends at someone else's nose. It would be frivolous to think that today, in our play world, someone suffers because they can't buy a pre-fab or a dress for their avatar. But this is, after all, a prototype as Philip and other founders always intended. So as I said, the implications are terrible -- that on a whim, someone will be unable to buy groceries. All sales of items real and virtual could be attached to a networked Casper vendor some day in the brilliant future.

And even in our virtuality, it's corrosive to think of how this escalates. If Casper can put my name 'as a test" that in fact replicates in the market, what if he or now LL decides that all purchases are to be banned as well? That's what monopolists can achieve. 

It's absurd to think that RL stores can "ban" people in this manner. Perhaps in some small town? But in a liberal, democratic metropolis of any size, it would be impractical to try to ban a person from purchases in stores. I can't think of a case in New York City where someone is "banned from a store". Maybe at Pop's Cigar Store in Penn Yan, a child who shop-lifted candy is sternly warned away for ever more. But how is this enforced in RL? On a scale? It's not, of course.

Imagine if Amazon could ban people from purchases if they didn't like someone's criticism either on the site reviews or in the newspaper. The idea that a "bad review" on Amazon enables a merchant to block someone from buying a book or an case of soda!

And again, if someone is an actual griefer with a rap sheet, they are land-banned or banned from SL, not banned from purchases.

A world in which merchants use a monopolist system to ban people from purchases on a whim isn't a free world with a free economy.

Edited October 1, 2022 by Prokofy Neva

[Jules Catlyn]

14 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

It's absurd to think that RL stores can "ban" people in this manner. Perhaps in some small town? But in a liberal, democratic metropolis of any size, it would be impractical to try to ban a person from purchases in stores. I can't think of a case in New York City where someone is "banned from a store". Maybe at Pop's Cigar Store in Penn Yan, a child who shop-lifted candy is sternly warned away for ever more. But how is this enforced in RL? On a scale? It's not, of course.

Maybe you should browse the internet more. Plenty of cases can be found where people actually were banned from RL stores. With the police issuing a "no trespass" notice. 

Some people can be quite abrasive and they should not be surprised that their behaviour has actual repercussions. So i see the feature to ban and block people as a legitimate tool to not have to engage with people like that. This had nothing to do with monopolist tendencies and in some cases i really hope it makes people think about what they are doing. In a lot of cases the issue is not the businessperson but the person being banned.

Edited October 1, 2022 by Jules Catlyn
booboo fix

[Solar Legion]

1 minute ago, Jules Catlyn said:

Maybe you should browse the internet more. Plenty of cases can be found where people actually were banned from RL stores. With the police issuing a "no trespass" notice. 

Some people can be quite abrasive and they should not be surprised that their behaviour has actual repercussions. So i see the feature to ban and block people as a legitimate tool to not have to engage with people like that. This had nothing to do with monopolist tendencies and in some cases i really hope it makes people think about what they are doing. In a lot of cases the the issue is not the businessperson but the person being banned.

Consider whom you are responding to.

[Love Zhaoying]

Just now, Solar Legion said:

Consider whom you are responding to.

I take the stance that "once in awhile, engaging may bear fruit".   Is that one reason why people refer to me as "Silly Lion" sometimes?!?

[Prokofy Neva]

13 minutes ago, Jules Catlyn said:

Maybe you should browse the internet more. Plenty of cases can be found where people actually were banned from RL stores. With the police issuing a "no trespass" notice. 

Some people can be quite abrasive and they should not be surprised that their behaviour has actual repercussions. So i see the feature to ban and block people as a legitimate tool to not have to engage with people like that. This had nothing to do with monopolist tendencies and in some cases i really hope it makes people think about what they are doing. In a lot of cases the the issue is not the businessperson but the person being banned.

In RL, if someone is banned from a store, it's banned just from that store. It's not banned system-wide, in a monopolist system. That's the danger of bans like this. They're also banned for specific offenses like shop-lifting, not a blog post or review on a web site

It's not legitimate to bar people from purchases in a free economy. The ability for "tests" to replicate throughout the market is something I've highlighted here. Police would enforce a "no trespass" notice with *due process* in a country or state under the rule of law. That includes elements of justice such as the right to face your accusers, to be informed in writing of your offense, not to face double jeopardy, to adversarial defense and so on.

When this issue is discussed in RL, there's the limit of the bricks-and-mortar store. And even there, the debate is how it is unlikely that such a ban in a Wal-mart, for example, can be enforced over the long run. Yes, we get it about the rights of private companies to do what they want. I invite you to consider the ramifications of what happens when the private company becomes the state, in the Metaverse.

But on the Internet, and in RL, which is increasingly turning into the Internet, and in the future Metaverse that will be ubiquitous, the ability to speedily replicate bans and have them untethered from any due process and rule of law will become pernicious. 

In a setting where sharing and replication of ban lists is very easily done, you can't think of the merchant's wishes only. Long ago in SL history there was a massive ban system that began to be shared everywhere and eventually was retired due to intended and unintended consequences. I pointed out at the time that it wasn't fair to have a newbie banned from the Shelter for using a firearm also banned from my rentals where they didn't use a firearm, and from every store. Just the other day someone suggested making a mass shared ban list over some bad behaviour on private islands, using certain affordances to harass a land owner. The solution then is to change your individual land settings and practices, not replicate lists of names everywhere untethered from reality.

Also, again, I invite you to consider the consequences of *the Lindens* now being able to enforce purchase bans. How will they be appealed? And also note that the same features that make a ban pernicious rapidly are also undone with alts and friends, leading then to more aggressive forms of bans involving grabbing of IP addresses and making IP bans, which is unlawful in SL, at least currently.

It is better for the economy in the long run not to encourage this practice, especially without due process or any sense of reasonable application (i.e. banning of copybotters, as LL doesn't take ARs on them unless it is a DMCA process). There should be competition of a variety of vendor systems, which encourages innovation and better service in the long run.

 

 

Edited October 1, 2022 by Prokofy Neva

[Solar Legion]

6 minutes ago, Love Zhaoying said:

I take the stance that "once in awhile, engaging may bear fruit".   Is that one reason why people refer to me as "Silly Lion" sometimes?!?

There are some for which that fruit is simply never borne - at least, not for the one directly engaged. One might bear fruit with those who come by to read the back and forth but .... 

My stance has always been that for some, it simply is not worth the time or effort and that if anyone else wishes to converse with you ... They'll seek you out and ask their questions.

The ones that just nod in blind agreement with whomever you've responded to and subsequently washed your hands of ... Will either learn eventually or they will not.

Edited October 1, 2022 by Solar Legion

[Jules Catlyn]

8 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

In RL, if someone is banned from a store, it's banned just from that store. It's not banned system-wide, in a monopolist system. That's the danger of bans like this. They're also banned for specific offenses like shop-lifting, not a blog post or review on a web site

It's not legitimate to bar people from purchases in a free economy. The ability for "tests" to replicate throughout the market is something I've highlighted here. Police would enforce a "no trespass" notice with *due process* in a country or state under the rule of law. That includes elements of justice such as the right to face your accusers, to be informed in writing of your offense, not to face double jeopardy, to adversarial defense and so on.

When this issue is discussed in RL, there's the limit of the bricks-and-mortar store. And even there, the debate is how it is unlikely that such a ban in a Wal-mart, for example, can be enforced over the long run.

But on the Internet, and in RL, which is increasingly turning into the Internet, and in the future Metaverse that will be ubiquitous, the ability to speedily replicate bans and have them untethered from any due process and rule of law will become pernicious. 

You keep going on about a free economy but sometimes people behave in such a way that their access to this economy has to be restricted. A free economy doe not mean that a person can act in any way they see fit and expect to get away with it all the time. 

You keep focusing on the economics part and you totally ignore the personal part. If i own a major retail chain in rl and a person chooses to personally attack me, you bet i am going to ban them from ALL my stores and make sure their name gets out. You totally ignore the fact that there is such a thing as holding someone personally accountable for their actions. And if they continue to show these actions, they will have to accept that there are consequences to them. There are always consequences to someones actions, whether there is free speech or a free economy or not. 

Edited October 1, 2022 by Jules Catlyn

[Norsk Himmel]

4 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

It's not legitimate to bar people from purchases in a free economy. The ability for "tests" to replicate throughout the market is something I've highlighted here.

It is totally legitimate for merchants to ban whomever they choose, for whatever reason. 

Much like customers can choose where to shop, merchants can choose who they do not want to sell to.

Why it was also brought in on MP by LL.

 

[Sammy Huntsman]

4 minutes ago, Solar Legion said:

There are some for which that fruit is simply never borne - at least, not for the one directly engaged. One might bear fruit with those who come by to read the back and forth but .... 

My stance has always been that for some, it simply is not worth the time or effort and that if anyone else wishes to converse with you ... They'll seek you out and ask their questions.

The ones that just nod in blind agreement with whomever you've responded to and subsequently washed your hands of ... Will either learn eventually or they will not.

I just roll my eyes, when I see one of his novels of a post.  

[Sammy Huntsman]

3 minutes ago, Jules Catlyn said:

You keep going on about a free economy but sometimes people behave in such a way that their access to this economy has to be restricted. A free economy doe not mean that a person can act in any way they see fit and expect to get away with it all the time. 

You keep focusing on the economics part and you totally ignore the personal part. If i own a major retail chain in rl and a person chooses to personally attack me, you bet i am going to ban them from ALL my stores and make sure their name gets out. You totally ignore the fact that there is such a thing as holding someone personally accountable for their actions. And if they continue to show these actions, they will have to accept that there are consequences to them. There are always consequences to someones actions, whether there is free speech or a free economy or not. 

I mean it does happen in RL. I was 18 and shoplifted from one of the big box stores here in Canada and I was barred from shopping there for a year. And if I stepped foot on the property, then I would be charged with trespass. I listened. But I feel like he doesn't understand, that even in a free market in RL. You can be barred from all of a certain chain of stores for a certain amount of time. 

[Solar Legion]

Just now, Sammy Huntsman said:

I just roll my eyes, when I see one of his novels of a post.  

I use one of the forum functions to avoid reading such things and only go back if someone has quoted a block and responded. Even then this is only done if the one responding seems to be having to repeat themself or make it quite clear that some of the "response" is irrelevant to what was written.

For those ... Well, we've seen the response given.

[Prokofy Neva]

3 minutes ago, Jules Catlyn said:

You keep going on about a free economy but sometimes people behave in such a way that their access to this economy has to be restricted. A free economy doe not mean that a person can act in any way they seem fit and expect to get away with it all the time. 

You keep focusing on the economics part and you totally ignore the personal part. If i own a major retail chain in rl and a person chooses to personally attack me, you bet i am going to ban them from ALL my stores and make sure their name gets out. You totally ignore the fact that there is such a thing as holding someone personally accountable for their actions. And if they continue to show these actions, they will have to accept that there are consequences to them. There are always consequences to someones actions, whether there is free speech or a free economy or not. 

The Sacklers are not able to ban journalists from every pharmacy in the CVS chain in every state because of their critical articles on news sites about the Purdue's bad practices.

Personal accountability also applies to merchants, and there are consequences to their subjective and reactionary decisions when replicated in systems.

Time and again, we see the merchant class's interests prevail in SL, where the Lindens have always privileged content creators as a draw to their product, the major draw, really, as M Linden's notion that "the killer app is each other" failed to see the "killing of each other" that all too often prevails.

So to view this issue only from the class interests of the merchants and not the public interests and the consumer's interest is short-sighted in the long run because it creates a world of unaccountability and shoddy practices and harm. Someone can spend $3000 on a prefab unwittingly, in our situation, and can't be alerted to the fact that the creator failed to address the issues of blocked doors throughout due to convex hull and physics and the house can't be used -- a point that one used to be able to write on a comment on the MP, and can't now -- just to cite a concrete example I dealt with at first on behalf of a tenant. So people continue to spend $3000, unaware that they can't enter the hallways in their house.

 

[Sammy Huntsman]

Just now, Prokofy Neva said:

The Sacklers are not able to ban journalists from every pharmacy in the CVS chain in every state because of their critical articles on news sites about the Purdue's bad practices.

Personal accountability also applies to merchants, and there are consequences to their subjective and reactionary decisions when replicated in systems.

Time and again, we see the merchant class's interests prevail in SL, where the Lindens have always privileged content creators as a draw to their product, the major draw, really, as M Linden's notion that "the killer app is each other" failed to see the "killing of each other" that all too often prevails.

So to view this issue only from the class interests of the merchants and not the public interests and the consumer's interest is short-sighted in the long run because it creates a world of unaccountability and shoddy practices and harm. Someone can spend $3000 on a prefab unwittingly, in our situation, and can't be alerted to the fact that the creator failed to address the issues of blocked doors throughout due to convex hull and physics and the house can't be used -- a point that one used to be able to write on a comment on the MP, and can't now -- just to cite a concrete example I dealt with at first on behalf of a tenant. So people continue to spend $3000, unaware that they can't enter the hallways in their house.

 

But if the journalist is acting like an idiot and disturbing the customers, same goes for the customers. CVS can bar that person from ever stepping foot into the store. 

[Prokofy Neva]

8 minutes ago, Norsk Himmel said:

It is totally legitimate for merchants to ban whomever they choose, for whatever reason. 

Much like customers can choose where to shop, merchants can choose who they do not want to sell to.

Why it was also brought in on MP by LL.

 

So yes, LL has a vested interest in collecting the tax from a $3000 house for ever more, on the MP or inworld from a vendor, because the person who called out the bad manufacturing is silenced and PS now can't buy any products or even re-deliver it if the merchant finally decides to fix their convexed monster. 

When the Lindens take over a resident business, there are consequences, and not always beneficial ones for the public. They might make it work at scale, or work better, but then, their capacity to do wrong is also increased. The Lindens might decide that a form of punishment for any offense, or for "any reason or no reason" is to add to purchase bans.

[Prokofy Neva]

2 minutes ago, Sammy Huntsman said:

But if the journalist is acting like an idiot and disturbing the customers, same goes for the customers. CVS can bar that person from ever stepping foot into the store. 

But that's not how this issue plays out. It's not that the journalist shoplifted, or shouted at customers, or heckled the sales clerks. They wrote an article in a newspaper about a product causing harm deliberately. Hard to find an example in RL where CVS could put a blanket ban on a reporter or a whistle-blower in the FDA because the Sacklers had an automatic system in place to do so. It's good to be tethered in real life when considering the Metaverse.

[Sammy Huntsman]

Just now, Prokofy Neva said:

But that's not how this issue plays out. It's not that the journalist shoplifted, or shouted at customers, or heckled the sales clerks. They wrote an article in a newspaper about a product causing harm deliberately. Hard to find an example in RL where CVS could put a blanket ban on a reporter or a whistle-blower in the FDA because the Sacklers had an automatic system in place to do so. It's good to be tethered in real life when considering the Metaverse.

A free market and free speech does not mean you are not held accountable for your actions or words. And I don't know how to tell you this. When you step into a store, you are stepping on private property and have to abide by their rules. 

[Norsk Himmel]

5 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

So yes, LL has a vested interest in collecting the tax from a $3000 house for ever more, on the MP or inworld from a vendor, because the person who called out the bad manufacturing is silenced and PS now can't buy any products or even re-deliver it if the merchant finally decides to fix their convexed monster. 

When the Lindens take over a resident business, there are consequences, and not always beneficial ones for the public. They might make it work at scale, or work better, but then, their capacity to do wrong is also increased. The Lindens might decide that a form of punishment for any offense, or for "any reason or no reason" is to add to purchase bans.

I have zero idea what that has to do with the issue.

Merchants have, and should have, the right to ban anyone they choose.

Don't want to be banned? Don't push a merchant to that point. Because it is generally a last resort. 

[Prokofy Neva]

1 minute ago, Sammy Huntsman said:

A free market and free speech does not mean you are not held accountable for your actions or words. And I don't know how to tell you this. When you step into a store, you are stepping on private property and have to abide by their rules. 

Merchants are accountable, too, and if they ban people on a whim, they also face the consequences of word spreading and people not wishing to buy from them.

You might want to look up the Supreme Court landmark case of Marsh v. Alabama (1946) regarding the issue of malls in fact serving as public spaces. And this issue has become even more widespread now that everyone spends so much time online. You can look at Boy Scouts of America v. Dale as well to see the limitations of private groups and Estavillo v. Sony (2009) to see the abilities of private companies in Silicon Valley to make restrictive TOS -- but that's just the point.

This is a contested issue. It is not a settled issue. And I would hardly expect to settle it on this forum. Be careful what you wish for. Today, LL champions the wishes of the merchant class. Tomorrow, they may license them and make them pay additional fees for the privilege of using the vendor system to sell their wares.

[Sammy Huntsman]

12 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

This is a contested issue. It is not a settled issue. And I would hardly expect to settle it on this forum. Be careful what you wish for. Today, LL champions the wishes of the merchant class. Tomorrow, they may license them and make them pay additional fees for the privilege of using the vendor system to sell their wares.

I mean it is LLs choice if they decide to make someone pay a fee to use their vendor system. Are you gonna go and poo poo MDLabs for making customers pay a subscription fee to use their vendors? I am sorry but LL is a business and not a charity, and it is a privilege to use their vendor system. If you decide to do something wrong, they will hold you accountable and take away those privileges. That is the same for say a Merchant that you decided to crap on and tell them their product is crap, without offering any sort of constructive criticism. They can and they will ban you from shopping at their store.

Edited October 1, 2022 by Sammy Huntsman

[Prokofy Neva]

8 minutes ago, Sammy Huntsman said:

I mean it is LLs choice if they decide to make someone pay a fee to use their vendor system. Are you gonna go and poo poo MDLabs for making customers pay a subscription fee to use their vendors? I am sorry but LL is a business and a charity, and it is a privilege to use their vendor system. If you decide to do something wrong, they will hold you accountable and take away those privileges. That is the same for say a Merchant that you decided to crap on and tell them their product is crap, without offering any sort of constructive criticism. They can and they will ban you from shopping at their store.

Who is to decide what is "constructive" or "not constructive". That's entirely subjective especially in SL. And when you hand these powers to the platform provider, and not one merchant, it becomes problematic.

Of course in buying the old X shopping site, and in buying Casper, the Lindens ultimately wanted to be able to tax purchases so that they can run their business. And they can do what they want, as a private company. And they did on the MP and will on Casper, no doubt about it.  And certainly it makes sense for them to have diverse streams of revenue, and the "dependency on the land model" has already been invoked.

It's another matter whether they will get merchants and consumers to keep participating in such a system -- and they know that and that's why they are putting the taxation off to the future.

Traditionally, LL has taken from their creative class far, far less than Facebook or Roblox or Shutterstock, etc.  Likely one can expect this will be "fair" in line with the current MP tax and not 30%. But you can't know in advance and even if it will remain in the hands of the same owners in the future.

When people talk briskly of how "LL is a business," it's usually because they anticipate that "LL's being a business" won't impact them in any tangible way. They want LL to success and grow so they themselves can succeed and grow, and that is normal and natural. But it's not always in the public interest or in the interest of the medium and small business owner who may be run out of business. The consumer is not served by the inability to place reviews or comments on a merchant -- Amazon doesn't block reviews and comments but our MP now is much more curtailed and I won't be surprised if reviews and ratings disappear as well.

Sometimes people want LL to be "not a charity" and to apply ruthless tactics in the way they themselves wish to, and back them in their own ruthless tactics. Other times, they do want LL to be a charity and forever pay the tier on a beautiful sim whose owner doesn't want to pay for it any longer. Or they want endless customer service on every individual lawn in Bellisseria, which the Lindens can't possibly sustain. Everyone wants the state to be what they want it to be. Obviously it's a balance. 

Casper was likely run off his feet with CS, part of the reason indicated why he is selling the business. CS scales and sales don't in a world where concurrency has steadily reduced, see Daniel Voyager's recent blog posts. The Lindens close on nights and weekends when Casper didn't close and ran 24/7. So I guess you'll all find out what this will be like soon enough.

[Casper Warden]

1 hour ago, Prokofy Neva said:

The mind boggles at the idea that you could "randomly" pick up my name and from hearsay, decide it is suitable as a "test griefer name to ban". On what basis? 

I probably just saw your name pop up in a group chat or something, it wasn't deliberated in any way. I just needed an external avatar name to test the resolver functionality, and I forgot to remove it. 
 

1 hour ago, Prokofy Neva said:

And what you're saying makes no sense. If I encountered this ban repeatedly over time, and even recently, that means that it sold with my name in it, and wasn't just a test.

I think I was quite clear on this: "I neglected to remove it before release". Your (avatar) name was present, accidentally, in one version of the Transporter, and it was removed the instant you told me.

I did explain this to you at the time, seven years ago. We had a conversation about it, I explained why it happened and I apologised, as I have again now. I presume you are only bringing this up again as some kind of leverage?

I'd also like to point out that the transporter makes no use of the term "griefer" - that word came from you - it's just an access control list for access to the teleporter itself.

Edited October 1, 2022 by Casper Warden

[Sammy Huntsman]

7 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

Who is to decide what is "constructive" or "not constructive". That's entirely subjective especially in SL. And when you hand these powers to the platform provider, and not one merchant, it becomes problematic.

Of course in buying the old X shopping site, and in buying Casper, the Lindens ultimately wanted to be able to tax purchases so that they can run their business. And they can do what they want, as a private company. And they did on the MP and will on Casper, no doubt about it.  And certainly it makes sense for them to have diverse streams of revenue, and the "dependency on the land model" has already been invoked.

It's another matter whether they will get merchants and consumers to keep participating in such a system -- and they know that and that's why they are putting the taxation off to the future.

Traditionally, LL has taken from their creative class far, far less than Facebook or Roblox or Shutterstock, etc.  Likely one can expect this will be "fair" in line with the current MP tax and not 30%. But you can't know in advance and even if it will remain in the hands of the same owners in the future.

When people talk briskly of how "LL is a business," it's usually because they anticipate that "LL's being a business" won't impact them in any tangible way. They want LL to success and grow so they themselves can succeed and grow, and that is normal and natural. But it's not always in the public interest or in the interest of the medium and small business owner who may be run out of business. The consumer is not served by the inability to place reviews or comments on a merchant -- Amazon doesn't block reviews and comments but our MP now is much more curtailed and I won't be surprised if reviews and ratings disappear as well.

Sometimes people want LL to be "not a charity" and to apply ruthless tactics in the way they themselves wish to, and back them in their own ruthless tactics. Other times, they do want LL to be a charity and forever pay the tier on a beautiful sim whose owner doesn't want to pay for it any longer. Or they want endless customer service on every individual lawn in Bellisseria, which the Lindens can't possibly sustain. Everyone wants the state to be what they want it to be. Obviously it's a balance. 

Casper was likely run off his feet with CS, part of the reason indicated why he is selling the business. CS scales and sales don't in a world where concurrency has steadily reduced, see Daniel Voyager's recent blog posts. The Lindens close on nights and weekends when Casper didn't close and ran 24/7. So I guess you'll all find out what this will be like soon enough.

Saying your product is crap and I will never shop here. That is not constructive. Saying, I have some issues with your product but overall I enjoyed and I think you could fix x and y. That is constructive criticism. I mean its pretty cut and dry.