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Ravie Bunny

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Everything posted by Ravie Bunny

  1. I am going to try to answer this question for you. I am very knowledgeable on this subject, as I run a fairly decent sized business in SL, and deal with taxes, etc. However, keep in mind I am not a CPA nor a tax attorney, so this isn't any kind of tax or financial advice. Additionally, please keep in mind I'm speaking in the context of federal taxes, as I live in a state with no state income tax. With that said, what Linden Lab is doing here is perfectly reasonable and expected except actually sending you the 1099-K this year (See final paragraph for details). For income tax purposes, the IRS does not care about L$. What they care about is the USD you get from L$. It is this way, because the L$ exchange is the centralized exchange, and not a decentralized one (eg: bitcoin). When you sell L$ through the lindex and get USD in your credit balance, that is the point the money belongs to you. You have gained income from the sale of the L$. Afterall, you're getting that L$ from somewhere, right? This is the moment you have received income from second life for tax purposes and are then liable for taxes on that income. Even if you ran a region and accepted donations and then sold the L$ to make tier, this is still income for tax purposes. There are ways you can structure this to avoid it, but you'd need to talk to a CPA for that. And those reading this that feel that it's not really income, I hope the IRS doesn't come after you. However, take my situation for a moment. I run a business here in Second Life. As such, I pay tier for several regions of mine that simply count as business expenses and in the end net zero tax liability. If I sell $3000 a month of L$ for 10 regions and all these regions I have gained $3000 of income, but if all these regions are used for my business then I have a $3000 business expense and this gets claimed as such resulting in no taxes due. The final part confuses me that you're receiving a 1099-K. It is my understanding, per the IRS rules, that you don't need to receive a 1099-K unless you have over $20,000 of income AND over 200 transactions. However, this changes in 2022 taxes thanks to Biden signing the "American Rescue" thing or something in March 2021. This year, however, you shouldn't be getting a 1099-K unless you hit the 20k income and over 200 transactions. Next year, though, you're really going to get *****ed, because you're going to get one from BOTH Linden Lab, as well as Paypal. Have fun explaining that one if you don't have some kind of tax representation. Then in 2023, you'll do your first filing with it. That's probably what Patch Linden is "looking into", because you most likely shouldn't have gotten one of those this year.
  2. I have a need for a full sim builder to build sims, or update existing ones. I'm easy to work with and will pay well, but I am very exacting in what I want. Job Requirements English Speaking. Ability to organize things and have good skills when laying out lots of objects. Sketch out an idea of how the build will be before hand. You must be able to build to a general theme (eg: Fantasy, or Retrowave). You must be able to enter skill gaming regions. No exceptions. (If you cannot, please read here for information: http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Second_Life_Skill_Gaming_FAQ#Why_can.E2.80.99t_I_access_a_Skill_Gaming_Region.3F ) You must build all components used in the build, or otherwise have full permissions of any objects used, with rights to transfer them to me in a build. You must be willing to build this exclusively for me, and give me the rights for me to use the build anywhere in SL as I like. You will be properly credited for the build, of course. You must be able to build across several connected regions, accounting for SL bugs, such as falling through geometry when walking across a sim crossing, etc. Please contact me in world (vexacion resident) for additional details or to ask me any questions. I will not be keeping up with the forum as well as I would in world.
  3. http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Value_Added_Tax_(VAT)_Frequently_Asked_Questions#Linden_Lab_is_based_in_the_United_States._Why_are_you_charging_VAT_for_European_Residents.3F
  4. re: the USA -- Depending on how you set up your tax situation in the USA (S Corp, etc) the taxes are generally quite minimal. If you're doing it all personal, then it's all just ordinary income for federal (For the average person this is gonna run in the 15-20% range), and state is whatever rules the state has. I'm in an income tax free state, and am setup as an S Corp for all my SL things, so the overall tax burden is less than what you pay in just VAT and all the tools I use to create content (Software purchases, computer cost, etc) are all expenses and thus not income that is taxed. You can get around the VAT problem with your region if you'd rent it from someone else. You'll pay more in rent than the region cost, but you'll pay less when you factor in VAT. I rent out several regions to people for this very purpose (but I'm not a land baron, I only rent to friends!). I am very sympathetic to you in general here since I'm a content creator myself have paid well into 5 figures of "fees" to the lab and feel the lab isn't really thinking this change through, but just being blunt here, your personal tax burden (35% income rate, and also the VAT rate) really isn't the fault of the lab. I mean, all us creators pay taxes (Assuming everyone is doing the right thing and reporting/declaring your income), some are going to pay more than others. For VAT, they have to follow the rules of your country, so the path to changing it starts with the people who legislate where you live. Anything that impedes further content in Second Life from being created is a stupid move on the part of the lab.
  5. I have acquired a sim. Thanks to all who responded.
  6. I am still looking for a sim, preferably from someone who isn't going to sell me one for $300 with tier due the next day.
  7. Looking to buy a full sim, please message me in world.
  8. I've emailed you and messaged you in world a bit ago.
  9. You can have a lot of fun in Gaming Island, which is a Linden Lab run location to enjoy skill games in a free to play setting for everyone. http://secondlife.com/destination/gaming-island If skill games are not your thing, there are many other styles of games available. I see a lot of games from KR Engineering in a lot of places and I know Greed is popular, as is the board game parcheesi. Also, thanks for fixing the wiki, Tommy!
  10. Just ask owners to ban you from the skill gaming regions. Unlike the previous post mentioned, nearly every owner today will, so long as they are able to (eg: regions we own). The owners today are much more professional than when it was wild wild west days. I've gone ahead and proactively banned you from my two skill gaming regions.
  11. As I've created several popular Skill Gaming Addons, I figured I'd respond right quick. I wanted to point out that the add on policy is fine -- but this [slgaming-unapproved] does sends a bad message to player, as if we're running something we should not be or otherwise is against policy, even though the operators (ideally through their attorneys) have determined that it is infact, per policy and allowed. I have opened a case with the lab on this, requesting that this be changed to [slgaming-addon] or something similar. "unapproved" is ridiculous, and how no one thought this was a bad idea defies logic.
  12. 1 on 1 mentoring is indeed hard, but if you need help feel free to message me in world i'm always happy to help fellow scripters (for free)
  13. Yes, she does have an agenda, Freya - you are perfectly correct. And as usual those with that agenda exist to tell others what they can and cannot do. Many women, myself included, love a lot of those fantasies the OP is railing against. So yes, Carlotta, Freya is correct: We're not interested in your silly senses of morality and out-dated shaming behavior, especially when you do it against other women. You don't get to choose how we enjoy SL. Go take your fight elsewhere, you'll find few on your side here.
  14. In my mind, I think these are some of the causes: 1. The exchanges selling off their excess L$ inventory. This would cause a massive influx of L$ into the market, easily eating up all the 257 buy orders wiping them out. I suspect this still isn't done and there is still a lot of L$ to sell. 2. The way Linden Lab has been treating the skill gaming program is absolutely atrocious and many operators whom in the past would keep large L$ balances on hand are now cutting their balances and holdings, putting many more sell orders in than in the past. 3. A lot of people, in general, have been losing confidence in the Lab (myself included, sadly) and simply do not invest anymore here. Between the false DMCA garbage a lot of creators deal with, to their treatment of the Skill Gaming program, to the lack of common decency many large land owners get.. people are quite frankly just tired of Linden Lab -- and Sansar just adds to that. Also, the lindex exchange as been borked for awhile, actually -- ever since they announced the end of the 3rd party exchanges. I watch the lindex a lot, and the 257 buy orders had been teetering between 5 million and 25million for months and the sell orders have been over a hundred million for awhile. It just finally gave way and looks like it's here to stay.
  15. I have found what I needed, thanks to all that responded to me for this
  16. Please contact me in world (vexacion resident), I have a lot of work for you! I can give you much more detail there. (If I don't reply to you immediately I will - sometimes RL creeps up)
  17. Paradise Bay, Second Life's newest skill gaming venue is now open, as of today 2/12! Paradise Bay offers all your favorites in a nice, relaxing comforting tropical atmosphere. We offer over 13% rewards for players for a prolonged promotional period, including a free L$100 free play credit every day you port in. No obligation at all, just join the free group, walk over the landing point, and ta-da, get your L$100 freeplay! 30 minute, 12 hour, and weekly Money Givers, 300 Game contests, 30 minute, Weekly, Daily, Monthly gameplay contests. Come check us out today, there's no reason not to! http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Paradise/128/128/31
  18. I know how all this went down. On 8/27 someone asked LL the question specifically about playing games "across sim borders", and they said in response on 8/28 "No, it's against the policy to do that". Except, there was no policy that said that. The next day, it mysteriously shows up in the FAQ as a "Note:" section, and SGR regions that were connected to non-SGR were suddenly converted back or forced to be moved. The facts point to one thing, that Linden Lab so haphazardly thought through the Skill Game Policy in general, that this is yet another instance where the were oblivious to one of the most obvious things concerning land ownership. They aren't "just now getting around to setting that rule". They had no idea to begin with until another resident asked the question. I'm quite sure had this person not asked the question, this would be no "policy", and would probably be an exploit that would have been used for awhile. It's good they did, it saves the headaches later, but it doesn't hide the facts. It's no different than the ridiculous part of the FAQ that discusses sharing ownership of a skill game with a group. Everyone who has ever created anything concerning debit permissions in SL knows that you cannot request debit permissions on a group owned object. The FAQ entry is completely extraneous to the skill gaming policy as a whole as the only objects it applies to are ones that don't pay out - and is another example that really just shows us that Linden Lab, with all due respect, are not completely clear how their own platform functions.
  19. What I would do is if you want the hud to dynamically change the object its controlling based on your distance, then you're really best using llSensorRepeat in your HUD, narrow it down as best you can for your objects (sadly, sensors are a little bit limited...), and track the closest one, and issue llRegionSayTo commands to that UUID. The critical part is narrowing down your Sensors to your specific objects. Say you repeated the sensor every 3 seconds, then as you walk around your objects, every 3 seconds if a different one is closer, just have a variable change in your script to the closest objects UUID.
  20. You should approach this in a slightly different manner. The main terminal should start with a blank list of fuses. Let all the fuses to the work. The main terminal doesn't really need to do anything but rez a fuse. It doesn't need to check in. Let the fuses do that. When a fuse is rezzed, have it blast out its prim uuid with a command (i.e. FUSE_REZZED|llGetKey()) which the main terminal can put in a list. When a fuse runs out, have it blast out its prim uuid with a command (i.e. FUSE_DIED|llGetKey()) which the main terminal can then remove from the list. You could, if you want, add a FUSE_STATUS command, that the main terminal can blast out, and the fuses that are active can response with their llGetKey(). You could put that in a timer, every few minutes or so, to make sure that lag doesn't muck anything up. Also, you dont have to include the key in the message, but I personally like to do it that way, you could just use the id from the listen when your fuse talks back. Also I'd recommend if you are the creator of the items, you add your extra security measures if needed (i.e. checking fuse creator, etc).
  21. I agree it is confusing to a lot of people. But when I say that it is generally understood, I was referring to people who have several months into SL. I don't think anything is understood to a true newbie here. When I create things, I try to offer as much full disclosure as well - my scripts are never mod, but the items themselves are. The point of this post was to see what people felt when an item is mod is actually no mod. I didn't mean to get into the nuances of things like "If you can change teh texture it's mod". I'm well aware of that and yes the option is there. But the fact that the scripts within the object revert any mods you make, at what point does the item cease to really be mod? That was the point of the post. I also fully agree with like gaming tables and stuff - even on a mod table, a script that reverts the playfield to its original texture is not a problem - afterall, it is a critical part of the item itself that can't be messed up. But if I wanted to change the color of the table from brown to black, that isn't critical to the core function of the item, and should be able to be changed. If you don't want it to be, then don't make it mod. What creators in this original case seem to have done was merely to circumvent the fact you can't make a no copy, no transfer, no modify item, so they make it no copy no transfer, but then actively look for any modifications and merely revert them to default. My original example stands -- if you purchased some hair for your avatar, and that hair was mod, but every time you changed the size or color of that hair the scripts inside of it reverted your changes, would you still consider this hair mod? Sure, you can find all the scripts in it, pull them out, or find some kind of workaround, but that's besides the point -- should that hair still be allowed to be sold and advertised as mod?
  22. I agree with you Nova. I think this is blatant circumvision of the permissions system and I've since ARed the *vendor* that sells this item since it does not specify that you can't actually modify anything but is being sold as mod. However, I've since gotten around this issue. Since the creator sends linked messages that tell the other prims what to do, I wrote my own script to capture those linked message and then send my own so the prim doesn't actually change. Fight fire with fire, I guess. While he "deletes" foreign scripts including mine, the way SL appears to work is that it still compiles my script, and the bytecode still executes, even though the script was removed. As long as I don't re-rez the item, it will continue to run my script. So this works around the issue. I still think this is very unfair to end customers. I am a scripter/builder/creator myself - I am very very familiar with the permissions system. However, I still believe that by selling an item as "mod", and advertising it as such it is generally understood that you won't be able to mod any scripts in it, but the physical item itself (i.e. a chair for example) you should be able to do basic appearance things -- changing texture, adjusting glow, resizing, etc, and of course, you do all these things at your own risk especially with an item that is no copy. I'm pretty sure most people would be quite upseet to buy some hair, for example, taht was sold as mod for your avi, only to have it revert back to default colors every time you colored it.
  23. Yeah I know how all the permissions work and such, but unfortuantely unliking it would permanently break the item I'm sure. His scripts themselves in the item will automatically revert the prims (i.e. llSetPrimitiveParamsFast on all the items back to original textures/forms/glow/transparency/etc). My frustration isn't that he's doing that in particular. It's that they sold this item with Mod permissions, and while you can mod the item, it just reverts back to its original form after a few seconds.
  24. Yeah, unfortunately, there is no mention anywhere of that, other than that its mod! Except it isn't. They don't actually tell you what is mod, or that there are measures in place to make sure nothing can actually be changed. They just merely say that it is mod, no copy, no trans. This is akin to selling an item as COPY, but licensing it as a single-license. But thanks for the help. Thanks.
  25. Unfortunately, this was a unique item (in respects to something no one else makes), so its not exactly something I can buy elsewhere. But that is so deceiving and deceptive, I'm quite surprised its allowed, especially since it was over L$35,000 to purchase. And they advertise, right there on the vendor, that its Mod. Ugh.
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