Solar Legion

Perhaps because it isn't a Sales Tax? Perhaps because Second Life is a computer program and Linden Lab a software company, thus making it illegal to call a Commission Fee a Tax? And that is all it is - it's a commission fee. You want intellectual honesty? Quit comparing a piece of software to a country. There's a start.

Maelstrom did not come here for advice - go back and read. There have been at least two others who did not bother to ask for advice either. The only sensible advice was given to those who asked: Report the bug, pay any overages and wait it out. If peple cannot handle this, they do not need to be using the Net. Your list leaves out wholly the fact that network spikes happen. There is no such thing as a predictable usage of data. And yes, I'm gping to tell people who whine and demand recompense to take it in stride and either wait it out or use the door they have threatened to walk through. I have been here long enough to have grown weary of their attitudes, the constant blame being placed for the simplest issues anywhere but where it belongs. There's no "finger pointing" going on here - A bug occured/is still occuring in some of the server code, it has caused enourmous data usage spikes for some users. The solutions really are as simple as paying the fees and waiting it out (including waiting to see if Linden Lab wil decide to compensate affected users or not) or to leave and cease complaining about it. Linden Lab is not required to compensate anyone for this. It's that simple. It doesn't matter what you believe the issue to be.

No correction required - all data overages incurred which are not the fault of the ISP or their systems are the responsibility of the plan owner/bill signer - no ifs, ands or buts. It does not matter if Linden Lab admits an error on their part or not - they don't pay your bills. You do - ger over it and pay the bills. I am sick to death of people looking to place blame on another corporation when it is common bloody knowledge that data can spike for any reason what so ever. If it's the fault of your ISP (their hardware or software) then you can get compensation for it. The fault of a game service, "virtual world" (still classed as a game service mind you), a web site or any other reason? You are stuck with the charges and it is up to the other company's discretion as to wheather or not you get compensated for it. Why that is so hard for some entitlement happy people to understand is beyond me: You have a data limit each and every month: You monitor it - end of discussion. Anyone else who wishes to respond with a similar "correction", undertsnd this: I am well aware of the particulars of tis bug. I simply don't care about your sob stories or your excuses. When you are on a data limited plan, you watch your data like a hawk, there is no excuse to do otherwise. Find a bug in a service that puts you over? Report the bug to the service, pay your overage fee, let others know about the bug and then wait for it to be fixed. Do not start complaining and acting as if you are owed anything whatsoever. I am normally very sympathetic to those who make mistakes. I have no synpathy for anyone who is affected by this bug that develops a martyr complex or expects Linden Lab to compensate them for the overage. If they are ging to compensate their users who were affected, they will. If not? Togh luck. Complaining and pretending that an ISP's opinion on comensation carries any weight on the matter ought to net you a little forced vacation until such a time as one can act like a reasonable adult instead of someone throwing a tantrum. Anyone who has threatened to leave over this? There's the door - you can use it and cease complaining here or you can remain and wait it out. Those are the mature and responsible choices.

You went over your data transfer limit - not Linden Lab. Thus, you're the one liable for it. End of Story. I thought you were leaving?

No, I'm dismissive of you, personally. Your attitude speaks for itself Maelstrom. Linden Lab isn't liable for your data charges - you are. That's how it works and has always worked since the inception of the Internet. It doesn't matter if a code issue causes a sudden spike in data sent, it doesn't matter if the service owner comes out and says that they made a mistake. As my roomate has just said after reading this over my shoulder and asking about this: Is Linden Lab responsible for fixing the data spike? Yes. Are they responsible for paying your overage cost? No, no they're not. Track. Your. Data. Usage. Before I moved in here? The ISP serving this house was Clear. Shortly after the largest solar flare last year (in October I think), they reported that we had gone over our cap by a rather large margin. However, our own records did not match this. One more reason to stay away from wholly "wireless" ISPs. Managed to talk them down and admit the issues was theirs. That is the sort of issue that your attitude is proper for.

That's all well and good 16 but my point was that these things happen often enough that - while yes it would have been nice for Linden Lab to send out a notice that it was happening - one should have been able to catch this and known how to act accordingly until the issue is fixed. Needing to be told what to do until it is fixed ... No, I am sorry but that should be common sense. It should be common sense to monitor one's data usage when using a service like Second Life for that matter. It doesn't matter how steady the usage is over any particular period of time ... there's always going to be spikes. These ones just so happen to be far worse than the average.

Where did I say paying users won't be missed? I said you, personally won't be missed. You're one person who has consistently gone on the attack in this thread and acted as if this sort of thing doesn't ever happen at any time on any service. You're acting as if going over your data cap is somehow the fault of everyone but yourself. Is a simulator sending more data to users an issue? Why yes - it is. Is it the end of the world? No - it isn't. Can you place the blame for this extra data pushing you over your cap? No, you can't. You didn't keep an eye out for it like a smart user. Do yourself a favor Maelstrom - if you're going to respond to me at all, anywhere ... Best to do it from a standpoint of facts. Calling me an "idiot" or a "griefer" simply because I am smart enough to keep an eye on my data usage (despite also having been smart enough to go with a capless plan I could afford) and because I have been around long enough to know that this sort of thing happens often enough elsewhere ... As another has said: You're not ging to get any sympathy whatsoever with your attitude. And here's my addition: With that attitude, you don't deserve any sympathy either.

Can you find exactly where in my response to this thread this supposed "insult" is? No, you cannot. Gee, I guess it's insulting to be told you have to take a bit of personal responsibility - or to point out how you are acting. Weren't you leaving SL? Get to it then instead of coming here to go on the attack every time someone disagrees with you.

Read the whole thread ... All I saw beyond the initial posting of what could be a serious issue (and no, I'm not talking about the fact that people with greedy ISPs are having to pay more because they ended up using more data than their tny little caps allow them) was one or two people whining about their data caps and now at least one person selling off their tier and canceling their account (won't be missed - get a better ISP) while at the same time one user constantly attacked anyone who disagreed with their end of the world, lazy and entitlement happy attitude. Data cap breaches are the user's issue - at any given moment, a service you use could have a similar issue to this one and put you over. Your only choice if you have a data cap is to be dilligent. It does not matter how steady your usage is - period. You always check the usage! The only time these breaches are not the user's issue? When the amount of data you use (and have been monitoring mind you) does not match the amount of data your ISP says you've used. Then it is someone else's issue. If you can afford both a premium account and a tier beyond the lowest levels each and every month ... you can afford a better ISP. Anyone wanting to leave SL over this - go right ahead. Just remember that this sort of thing happens far more often out there than you'd think. If this is going to be your reaction here, then you'll eventually have no reason to even use the internet at all. data spikes - no matter the cause or amount - happen.

Oh, and so you're aware: Telling people who are running machines designed before the turn of the century/millenium to upgrade their hardware is helping them. Fact of life these days: Old technology will be left in the dust. You can either keep up as best you can or be left behind.

This is a public forum and you're not a moderator or anyone in charge sweetie. You don't get to decide the criteria for posting.

Public forum sweetie. Want to control who responds? Make your own forum.

Sorry, I have to agree with Syo's orphaned response and with that of another here ... Second Life is far from "dead" and if you're incapable of running any client on the lowest settings .. ? It's time to join the rest of the 21st century. Even my ancient Dell (2005/2006) which is used as a backup PC can run SL at minimum settings.

Innula - I just report on what's been found and do the basic research to verify that it is possible. To answer the question I can answer, the same laws governing telecommunications also govern the sharing of messaging logs - in the eyes of the law, they're the same thing. To take it one step further, I'll point you to the practice of companies being required to ask for your permission to send either signed or "anonymous" useage data concerning their programs - it's much the same for one's Television company or even their ISP in general. I recall a case years ago wherein the issue of sharing a private IM with another person was found to be covered under the telecommunications laws. One party had shared a messenger log with a third party which contained some sensitive, private information. The ToS of the service in question allowed for the sharing of these logs without consent. It was some time after this case that many messenger providers turned around and went the opposite way - though for a time, a few did try and follow the laws themselves. This was and is the best way of going about it.

You've looked up the laws, correct? It's self-explanatory.

Much the same was said concerning telephone companies and businesses making recordings of conversations. Much the same was said of any company making a record of all communications on their networks - internal and external, Guess who lost in the end? Kindly don't ever try and pull this BS on me in the future - unlike you, I'm not the sort who believes the BS notion that they can do whatever they want, now and forever.

Ahem - for standard telephone calls, a simple recording stating that the call may be recorded and stating the reasons for this recording being made is more than enough to satisfy the stipulation of consent, even in the dual/multi-party systems used in some US states.

Yep - it's against the Terms of Service. Yep - some of the people who use such disclaimers do so out of a need to cause drama, just like the people who claim to avoid said types due to drama cause their own no matter what they do. For others, they have actually researched the laws concerning recording conversations via telephone systems and computer media. They've discovered that these laws extend into the chat log realm and have placed such disclaimers in their profiles for the express purpose of thumbing their nose at Linden Lab and their method of circumventing standing laws the world over. Put simply: no one is 100% correct on this topic. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying to you.

Heck, I'm still trying to figure out why certain venues silent/hard crash my client (ANY client) and why Mouselook causes a buffer failure crash after a time.

To add to a few of the comments of some of the other long standing users of Second Life: Linden Lab has also fired some of the employees who worked with and developed the code for various key features/systems. Those that remain truly only know this coding in a secondhand manner I am afraid (Sim interop technology for example, did not exist when Second Life first started). Many users have come up with a myriad number of "fixes" to make to their systems ... some good, others very bad. To use one of Penny's own points here: Script usage. This idea is both good and very bad. Why? Implementation! How much is too much? I know people who wear an excess of 140+ scripts, that's a lot of scripts - isn't it? How about 11.7Mb of script memory usage? Sounds like a lot, doesn't it? Put those two together and you get 0.270946ms of CPU time dedicated to those scripts on the server. To those who know their data, code and CPU time ... that certainly sounds like a lot, doesn't it? Here's the real trick of it all: Linden Lab's system does not differentiate between active scripts, scripts on standby and scripts that are simply reserving memory. Do a script count on an avatar you see, get their total number of scripts, memory usage and CPU times. Know what you're really looking at? A readout of all three items as if all the scripts were actively being processed by the server. Meaning, it's a count being treated as if the scripts are all set to running and constantly executing their code. Toss in a single instance of a standby command or a sleeper command and those numbers should go down. The system should be able to take that into account and compensate in the calculations being done. It doesn't. Yes, I have had this happen to me before and it annoys me to no end. I have gone to sims where they track their resource use through automated script sensors - which also eat up valuable resources I might add - wherein I was the only avatar present, utterly stripped down to bare bones (noobish avatar, nothing complex, no scripts at all) and guess what? The sim still lagged as if it was on its last knees! Other times? I'll be wearing a prim/script heavy avatar in a fairly crowded sim and there are no problems with lag whatsoever. So then ... what is the actual culprit? How should Linden Lab implement script resource limits? Personally? They shouldn't until they clean up their own scripting system.

While I'd love to see the old Mentor program back in some fashion ... Immy is right. The system was badly flawed.

For the most part ... what Ceka said. In more mature/adult RP areas where one is likely to find combat/violence/BDSM and other themes, the mall also acts as a safe zone for those visiting or intending to RP. I know the last thing i want to do is be dumped right into the middle of the RP in an "unsafe" environment.

There is a reason no one has bothered to send you a single, no permissions prim: Unless they are the original creator, it's not possible. This means nothing in terms of a product update stripping a purchase of permissions however: It's not against the ToS and it's quite ethical in specific areas of commerce. Don't like it? Don't buy products with mandatory updates. Don't like that option? Cancel your account. ETA: Hmm, while I wil leave the original text atanding, it would seem that Linden Lab has altered the permission system since 2006 - no matter, the point still stands that if it were against the ToS to create an object which has no permissions at all on it, then the permissions of an object's contents would be utterly ignored by the object as a whole for the purposes of transfer/copy/mod. Since such is not the case ... You're still SOL - deal with it.

As to tracking ... apparently, you're not very familiar with LSL. There are items out there which can track which sim you're in if you're wearing them. On toop of this, it is possible to use a third party client ot track an avatar's position inside a sim, so long as your avatar is also on the same sim. So sorry to burst your privacy bubble.

The "test" is a joke and is little more than a CYOA measure. Anyone with even half a brain knows this. There are some game makers out there (Bethesda for example) which truly don't care how you use their game and character/model data, so long as you do not turn a profit from it. Meaning: One could legally convert and upload the mesh for an Elder Scrolls race/weapon/armor/artifact/other item to Second Life for personal use. One could not legally sell it. Anyone who honestly believed that mesh would not be abused, who thought that there would be a change within Second Life which would allow mesh creation and sales to be all original, legal content ... Have I got a bridge to sell you!