Porky Gorky

Deej Kasshiki wrote: Very well stated. I heartily agree with the various issues you've pointed out. It's a damned shame that after a decade LL isn't even able to get the most basic things, like text chat, working reliably. One day I think some business school will use LL as the prime example of how not to run a tech company or any company for that matter. Agreed the company does have some gaping holes and flaws in it's business model. When you said that after 10 years LL still can't get the most basic things working, it reminded me of the speech that Phil made at SLB7 when he listed some of the components that make up the backbone of SL and keep it running. Philip Rosedale - 2010 - 21 - 06 "was thinking about this — what to say today and what to talk about — and I had a thought. I wanna try something. I wanna read you guys just a quick list that I made this morning, so bear with me and let me read you a list of stuff here: Our financial fraud detection systems; the systems we use to transfer assets from the Teen Grid; the central databases; our dark fiber backbone; our asset servers which have about 450 terabytes of data; the 40,000 simulator cores in the system; the group chat system; the LindeX Market placement and fulfillment systems; the physics core; the visual rendering system; the scripting engines; the ability to transfer and move land; the region conductor that manages all the sims coming online; the map servers; the inventory servers; the client UI; the content takedown tools; the monetary policy, processes and systems we use; the customer support tools; the Department of Public Works; our international payment systems; our backup systems; Linden Homes; the Welcome Islands; the Infohubs; the grid monitoring tools; the localization systems; the private regions; our land auction systems; forums; search appliances; the Support Portal; metrics dashboards; our Phoenix, Dallas, and Washington, D.C. data centers; our 3rd-party Viewer directory, open source repositories and programs, and our internal build systems. (Laughs.) So I'm just gonna pause there. That is an incomplete list of major components that make up Second Life that I was able to just sit and kind of bring up from memory this morning while I was thinking about us. Now, the reason that I read off a list like that is to kind of — looking back — to sort of beg everyone's forgiveness and explain that this is an incredibly complicated system. And we have been building all of these different systems, these core components — they're all part of the Second Life experience, they all hold it up — together." Back to me - So lets give credit where credit is due. LL has achieved allot in the last ten years. They achieve allot on a day to day basis just by keeping most of these systems functional and operational 24/7. They may fail in certain areas like customer service and support to name a few, but they are #winning in many other areas that rarely give us cause for complaint.

Here's a Link

My gripe of the day is that it's just the same old boring people around the forums day in and day out, with the same boring opinions and the same boring things to say in their boring posts about boring things. We need to mix things up around here, get some new blood in, we need to rock this forum to it's very core with some stimulating chit chat and some titillating nattering. I hereby task every one of you to go into SL and find a more interesting forum replacement for yourself. Help them get settled in, then pack your bags and off you trot Too much? :smileytongue:.

HI Emmett. Post a list of specific questions that you have in this thread and we can answer them for you. You will get a broader set of opinions that way and tap a much wider larger knowledge base. This thread can then be referenced by other people looking for the same advice. If you are specifically looking for a personal business adviser to work one on one with you then maybe move this thread to the Inworld Employment section of the forums.

Maryanne Solo wrote: : That is one smug looking moggy.

Based on the amount of sims that went offline during Q4, I speculate that there will not be any more public economic reports.

If there are potential sales to be had then I have unbanned people before now without question. I figure if they really want to cause grief or steal content they will find a way using alts. May as well give them the benefit of the doubt if there is money to be made.

Naturelle Starbrook wrote: 3. What is your current favorite song or album - one you are obsessing over? Mother Love Bone - Apple Spooky. I listened to this album for the first time in about 20 years yesterday....the exact same day you mention it on the forum. Wierdness with a capital wierd.

1. Describe yourself in two words? Mostly harmless 2. What surprised you last? The doorbell 3. What is your current favorite song or album - one you are obsessing over? Creed - Full Circle. is my fav track from the album4. What is your mood or feeling today? (Or for you NT types, if you prefer: What is most occupying your thoughts?) I felt happy this morning because I found out I got an £800 tax rebate. This inspired me to take the afternoon off and go to the pub. This resulted in me feeling wankered within a very short period as i am a light-wieght, This resulted in me feeling sleepy so I went home and had a nap. 4 hours later I awoke and went to see Phantom menace in 3D. Believe it or not Jar Jar Binks is even more annoying in 3D. Now i am home and feeling wide awake after my earlier sleep and need to get up in 5 hours for work. Somehow I don't think tomorrow is going to be as enjoyable as today. 5. What do you most hope for this year? I hope the world wont end on Dec 21st. I hope the mayor of London Boris Johnson will get to make a speech at the opening of the Olympics for the whole world to hear. I hope I don't wet my pants when I get to see the Stone Roses in June I hope England win Euro 2012.

Rene Erlanger wrote: I guess they could write a paragraph or two on Mesh....or Linden Realms.... Don't forget about the new pussycat emoticons for the forums. It's been the most successful and least problematic rollout of a new feature in SL history. :cathappy: :catindifferent: :catmad: :catsad: :catsurprised: :cattongue: :catvery-happy: :catwink: :catwink: :catfrustrated: :catlol:

Ziggy21 Slade wrote: I also have a Paypal Debit Card and it is soooo useful if like me you often need your money in a hurry. Top tip of the day there Ziggy!. I never knew such a thing existed. Thanks :matte-motes-big-grin-evil:

Bouttime Whybrow wrote: copybot is a somewhat over blown issue imo. yes things do get stolen and resold. but there is a practical limit to what a user can really do with it. i view it as just part of the cost of doing business. I agree. I don't get copy-botted anywhere near as much nowadays as I barely add any new content. During the previous 5 to 6 years though I have been targeted often by individuals and groups. I've had over 100 DMCA's successfully actioned by LL and I also have had a fair few that have failed as the thief counter-filed and I chose not to take it any further, Also some instances where LL failed to action it full stop. As you said though, after a while you accept it as a fact of doing business here, the same way you accept the fact that a LL policy change or "improvement" could seriously affect your business at any given moment. So despite my obsessive battle that I waged against content theft in the past I was still successfully ripped off. So did it hurt my bottom line? I don't think so. There are a lot of factors that go into being a successful merchant in SL. Building good quality content is only one of them. Equally important is knowing how to present and market the content as well as knowing how to get yourself to the top of inworld search and the MP to gain the required exposure. In my experience the average content thief lacks these skills. Without good exposure you're not going to sell squat in SL or deal any noticeable damage to my business. That being said, I can think of a couple of instances where content thieves have targeted top quality designers and driven them out of SL altogether. You spend thousands of hours of your life creating fantastic items and someone comes along and rips you off in a matter of minutes, then puts that content on the MP with full perms at a fraction of the price. It's heartbreaking for some people and the thought of carrying on creating content only to be ripped off again is enough to make them give up all together. That's a real shame. You need to tough skin to survive and thrive as a merchant long term in SL and some people can't manage it. They take it it personally rather than just a fact of doing business here.

I am not sure it is worth the time or money to get infringing content removed from this website. Copybot viewers and other stolen content from SL can be found on a variety of websites, some accessible to the public, some requiring membership and login which is easily obtained. I can also think of 2 IRC servers that host channels where copybot based viewers and stolen content are traded freely not to mention bit torrent and news groups. These are just sources I've found as an interested party i.e. someone learning how these thieves operate to better protect myself in SL and to understand their practices better. I dread to think how many other sources are available to the copybot community that I am not aware of. Removing stolen content from 1 website will limit the flow temporarily but it won't make much difference in the grand scheme of things. Unless you're willing to launch an assault on multiple fronts and invest a ton of time and money then this is a war that you, or any any collective of SL merchants cannot hope to win.

Sorry to hear you are having probs Lasher. I had quite a few sales on the MP yesterday and didn't have any non deliveries so the problems you are experiencing are not affecting everyone.

Ann Otoole wrote: LL is probably stacking regions more and more to a host to drop expenses. Rubber banding indicates the region host is memory swapping. I do not have any feeling or faith that SL is important to LL anymore. I fully expect LL to pile up the regions more and more until almost everyone quits which will justify shuttering SL. After all LL calls their customers names like "whackadoodle" and worse so LL does not want SL people around anyway. LL expects they will make billions on ancient decrepit text adventure games in a world that is far advanced and requires the latest gaming gear to play because of the incredible detail and increasingly massive polygon counts. Even xbox outdoes SL on every level. I mean this with all due respect Ann, but why are you still involved in SL? You severly criticise the product and the company in the majority of your posts and have been doing so for a long time now. You point out their failings constantly, normally taking quite an extreme viewpoint. This of course is your perogative and you are allowed to express your opinions and I am not critsiing you for that. You are clearly having a negative experience on a continual basis. I just wonder why you remain involved in SL when you are so dissatisfied with both the platform and the company that runs it?

I built a new top of the range rig in Dec and have an Intel Core i7 2600k processor, 16GB of DDR3 RAM, two Geforce 580 graphics cards and a 50MB broadband connection. I can play every new PC game with graphics on the highest settings without any problem, yet. during the past few days when I log into an empty sim in SL it can take 10 - 20 secs for the textures closest to me to even start gaining resolution. Am seeing Av's rubber- banding, teleports failing and I dare not even attempt crossing a region border. I've tried multiple versions of V3 and firestorm/Pheonix with the same results. So what ever the problem is, it is server side. Luckily for me I am addicted to playing Anno 2070 at the moment so it's a great excuse not to do any work in SL this weekend:matte-motes-nerdy:

As Toy said, the difference between 248 and 249 is pretty much negligible. I would rather turn my L$ into USD as quickly as possible. I've felt this way since the end of Mark Kingdon's days when I lost confidence in SL's sustainability When SL closes I see 1 of 2 things happening. 1. SL will vanish, no notice period. all L$ and content on your account will be inaccessible including any unsold L$ on Lindex. 2 LL announce that SL is closeing. They give us a notice period. Currency immedately crashes as everyone tries to sell. The minute that annoucement is made the L$ becomes worthless, Lindex will fail. Both of these scenarios result in the instant devaluing of any L$. So I would rather turn these in to USD and get them sent to pay pal asap, i'm too paranoid to leave large sums of L$ in-world or sat on Lindex.

My old business partner left SL in 2006 and he still has stuff for sale on the MP, he must still have magic boxes hosted somewhere.. Unless the items are de-listed they stay there as long as the MP does. If / when MP direct delivery comes out of beta then maybe this will change if the MB's are removed. On the other hand, some merchants have been around for a long time and just keep adding content to the MP without ever deleting the old stuff. I am guilty of that to some degree. I have a few items still listed there that are 6 or 7 years old. They were removed from my in-world store years ago but I leave them on the MP if they sell once or twice a year because there is no reason not to. Try shopping in-world in future or at the very least check that the Merchant still has a store in-world before buying from the MP. This will greatly reduce your chances of buying antiquated content.

It's normally like a snowball effect, something triggers a sudden drop in the value of the L$, rumours start flying around that the currency is crashing .Some people start panic selling in case SL suddenly goes bye bye whilst others start buying as they know or assume that things will settle down and they can make a quick profit from the panic. Lindex is incredibly stable today compared to in the past. When I started using it in 2005 it really was allot more unstable and the value used to fluctuate allot, It really paid off to leave any spare L$ that you didn't want to cash out spread out across multiple exchange rates so when the market hiccuped, as it often did you could benefit from selling at a better rate. It really paid off to play the market back then and it was fun, like a little trading mini game. Nowadays I can't even be bothered to sell at 248 as it can take 4 or 5 days sometimes. Everything goes at 249 for an almost instant sale.

I'm sure I saw you estimate somewhere that LL generate about $75000 USD per month for the MP commission sink, So assuming the average month has 31 days then this will cost the Lab/sink about 7 grand. Nice to put a ballpark value on the gesture

Perrie Juran wrote: Survey Started: http://community.secondlife.com/t5/General-Discussion-Forum/Help-with-my-survey-Should-Surveys-Be-Allowed-On-The-SL-Forums/td-p/1388125 Done :smileyvery-happy:

CommerceTeam Linden wrote: In appreciation of your patience, we will be offering free commission on all listings less than L$10,000 starting NEXT Friday for three days starting at noon PT Friday, February 24, 2012 (through noon Monday, February 27, 2012).* This is just weird, Have pigs started flying too?

I think the amount you are credited when you first log on to Aditi is based on your real L$ balance. So if you have L$100k on your main account the first time you log on to Aditi, you will be given allot more than someone with just L$2000. on their main account.

Rene Erlanger wrote: All features that reduces time spent in-world.....Profiles, Forums & Marketplace. Might as well make SL a browser base platform! :matte-motes-impatient: You can view profiles in a browser now too? LoL didn't know that. Just can't motivate myself to become interested in all these "extras" really. All my time in SL is spent either building or supporting. Forum posting is generally me killing time at work or on my commutes. I check MP once per day to look for failed deliverries but other than that I try to avoid the internet as I just get sucked in and waste hours of my life. Same used to happen with me and this forum. I find I get too involved in discussions, or start arguing with people , then get sucked in and find i've wasted half my evening when I should have been working in SL. I now ban myself from looking at any forums during SL building hours. If I am going to waste time here I should do it during the day when I am at my real job and being paid for it :matte-motes-sunglasses-1:

valerie Inshan wrote: Porky Gorky wrote: I have questions, probably due to the fact I live in my own little SL bubble. 1. What is a dashboard. Come on Porky, it's going to be 3 years within 10 days exactly that you have been in these fora. And you'd want us to believe you've never noticed your dashboard when you login to this site? Never checked the grid status or your friends online? 2. Is "My Second LIfe" a service or product? You test it, you name it. I personally take it as service. 3. How does the answer to Q2 work on the answer to Q1. The dashboard is a service, definately. 4. Do I need to care about any of it? No you don't NEED to. But you are ABLE to. That's what matters. Thanks. You are welcome. Thanks for the info. I have now found my dashboard, Yay for me! I am serious when I say I have never seen it before today. I have seperate links for each part of the site I use that are probably allot older than the dashboard. So when I want to check transactions, sell L$ and cash out I go direct to my account page, I use a direct link for the forum, which is also where I read blogs. The friends on-line panel appears on my account page so I knew about that. And I get my grid status reports the same place I always have http://status.secondlifegrid.net/.. So thats all I use the website for, I never have any reason to click on the 'home' button or enter my account via secondlife.com. So that is how I have missed the dashboard all these years. I have heard the term dashboard in the forum but never known what it meant in relation to SL. So now I know :smileyhappy: