Peggy Paperdoll

Yes Momma!!!

Then what are you bitching about? Ads or the fact that I think ads are a fact of life and that the ads are a product of your Internet browsing? BTW. Contextual marketing is search based (keyed off searches on the site you received the ad). You wouldn't get a "see your mugshot" ad unless you searched for something related to jail, crime, mugshots, or, maybe Lindsey Lohan.......on Marketplace. You would see ads along those lines if you, perhaps, searched Lindsey Lohan. The ads are behavioral............not contextual. Clean up your Internet browsing and get better ads. Take a chance.......fire up Google and search behavioral marketing. Then search contextual marketing. Read a little (the wikis are good starting points). You might learn to tell what type of ad you are getting.

Shame on you for taking me for granted.....playing me for an idiot. I said IF YOU GOOD it's easy. If you are mediocre it can be hard and if you are really amateurish it will be almost impossible. So you studied hard in school.......guess what, so did I. So you cried in frustration.........so did I. The end result is that I learned what I wanted to learn and I got good at what I wanted to do.......and IT IS NOW EASY. That's the way life is You can try to impress me with your hard work.........but I know it's little more than play. If you are still, after learning your skill (whatever it is you do), working hard, then you are not very good at what you do. Get offended all you want and tell me I'm shameful...........you're still not getting the respect you seem I owe you. I respect people who are honest with me. You are not being honest. You're playing some game to make yourself feel important. You are no more important than I am (or that brand new SL resident wondering what the heck I'm talking about). You know. of course, I have some serious doubts about you being good enough to "put food on your table". Creators that good don't **bleep** about ads on a platform that they know they are not paying anything near what they are getting back from it. They're too busy creating..........and having fun. Ads on Marketplace are the least of their concerns........it's that next creation that is stirring around in their head that concerns them.

Why am I where? On the forums? That's easy.........I like the forums. I've been a forum rat for years before I ever heard of SL and an SL forum rat since sometime early 2006 (when I found them after joining SL in 2005). Asking me why I'm still in SL? That's easy too........I like SL. I got fascinated with how SL works because it was so complicated to me when I joined. I thought of SL as game and, like most people, I just could not understand why a game had to be so darned complicated. I started digging, asking questions, trying things..........learning. Once I started to grasp what SL was that made it so different from a game and unique on the Internet it started making sense......it's not rocket science but it does take a little effort to understand. That fascination still exists for me today. And, no, I do not have a shop on Marketplace......I don't even have a shop in-world. So, no, I'm not a merchant. I am a consumer though. I'm also a creator..........you know, of course, you do not have to be a merchant to be a creator. Between this account and my alt I have well over 10,000 textures that I created using GIMP (I'm guessing since that's the approximate number of textures I have over on my second hard drive and about 95% of those textures have been uploaded to SL by either me or my alt over the years). Not all those textures have been distributed to anyone else but a very good percentage have......no, I've not made a single linden by giving those to anyone. I don't see them nearly as much as just a couple years ago but I've spotted quite a number of my textures on builds and clothing. I create for the fun of creating........I never wanted that fun to get to a point of being a job so I never went that direction. I do know more than just a little bit about what it takes to create something..........and I will tell you straight up that, if you are good at it, it's no more difficult than editing your child's birthday photograph to remove that red-eye from the flash. I hear all the time about how hard creators work. Aside from worrying about some sort of income, most are merely playing.........it's not hard. On the worrying about some sort of income......well, get educated about what you can and cannot do with the platform you are attempting to make that income. That means learn how Marketplace works, how LL keeps it alive, and how you can use it to meet your income goals. Whining about the owner of the platform you chose to use for this "business" is not going to make you earn a single linden more. Demanding that owner stop doing to start doing anything for you is not going to make you a single linden more. You got ads on a website that you don't have to pay a linden for (unless you earn a linden first.....actually you have to earn 20 lindens before you have to pay a single linden). And screaming that LL is ruining your business.......come on. Get back down to earth. You're just an amateur making something to sell to other amateurs........making a few pennies (and if you are good, a few dollars, and very, very good, maybe something decent). You have practically nothing invested in the company that gives you all that. You are not what makes SL go around. I am.......the consumer. I can survive without you since I can create...you cannot survive without me. And that is why I get sometimes rather passionate about people constantly bitching about LL.......it's not constructive criticism like you always try to tell me. It's whining and crying because you don't like something or you think LL is taking something from you. You, wouldn't be here if you couldn't "make money". I would. That's my investment. I guess you can say I've lost a lot of respect for merchants (and even lost some respect for creators.........the creators who wear that title on their sleeve). You're really not special.......not special at all.

Ahh, the problems of only watching news, NASCAR races and a select few weekly programs.

So my $L5,798,992 linden balance doesn't impress you? What a pity..............LOL

Why not talk to Yami? I'm sure she would be flattered that you love her hair and might be willing to make you a custom hair. But only she can say for sure.........I know some creators don't go custom work (for various reasons but the one I've heard most is that it's hard to get paid when the cost is going to be higher for the one of a kind item and prefer to just make items for sale to all for that reason). I do know of an old skin creator who used to make "custom" skins but sold them to the general public with the name for the person she created for......sort of an honorary "award" (I'm not sure she still makes skins or even if she's still in SL..........it was a long time ago). Editing..... I wasn't meaning to reply to you Ariel, I just did my normal stunt and hit the reply under the wrong name. My post was for SenUmiko.

Keep filing the Abuse Reports. However you will only get results on the AR if the actions you are reporting are legitimate violations of the ToS or CS. Someone having some ugly build next door or some crazy animated graphics that are on their property and not encroaching on yours is not a violation of any ToS or CS rule........even if they are annoying. Such AR's will get tossed.

If that ever happens you'll learn some new terms describing Linden Lab. For heaven's sake I hear complains about the $L10 upload fees.........4 cents USD!! I guess it will be comical though. And, I do believe Second Life will survive (but it will have a very different looking creator base ).

I'm not going to stone you. I actually am not that far in disagreement with you. But I just don't question LL's motives. Nor do I begrudge them making money on their website. I may not use Marketplace but many do and unless LL makes money (or at the very least breaks even) then Marketplace it going away...for good. Ad bring in money. As long as money is brought in Marketplace can continue to exist. It's possible that if LL takes away the ads Marketplace will be close behind. The merchants are not going to foot the money required to run a website the size of Marketplace (with it's hefty bandwidth requirements.......not counting the server space which is different server space that the in-world asset servers. It's in addition to the in-world servers). The merchants want their costs as low as possible and profits as high as possible..........so does LL. The consumers like the convenience and I'm sure that's one of the main reasons LL even purchased Xstreet a couple years ago. I think the ads keep Marketplace in existence and free........so, in that sense, they are good. But I'm with most others I don't particularly care for them.

I'm sure it's a calculated risk. One LL has decided to take. At least for the time being. All ads look "tacky" on websites. Some are just plain stupid, some offensive, some are even relevant but ads are ads........someone trying to get my attention in order to take some of my money. It's life and I've learned that I can accept it and still be happy.......it's my choice to be all PO'd over it or ignore it and move on. I can go to a gardening site to look up "Morning Glories" and be faced with ads to take a Mediterranean Cruse. How relevant is that to Morning Glories? The ad is tacky when placed on a page full for pretty spring flowers. I can get upset and all up in arms about the intelligence of the owners of the gardening site (say it's Burpee Seeds) and question there motives or I can ignore the call for me to go to the cruise ship site. It's not much different.......someone decided that ads were the way to go and in the process are probably making some money from that decision. I got what I wanted and Burpee Seeds got what they wanted (even if I didn't buy any seeds from them). No harm, no foul.

"... 4. I do have to question how much money is LL getting from these.. they do not get money unless somone clicks on these ads......and if people click on these ads.... it takes them away from SL..... and SL creators.......we want people to stay on and at SL not venture off to parts unknown .......becuae if they go off to parts unknown... how are we making money? LL might be making money but what about the creators... ..." -------------------------------------------------------- And a perfectly legitimate answer to that is to get rid of Marketplace entirely. Force merchants back in-world to sell products for Second Life. Marketplace is outside SL.........how's ads shown on a site outside SL taking people from SL when they already are out of SL? Let me tell you how merchants are making money. LL provides a way for them to make money by providing the web space to sell their products for a pretty small fee (5% of the sale). The merchants don't have to rent or lease web space for their "store".......that's free. LL is paying real money to make the space available.....upfront. I don't know what contract LL has with the whoever they have the deal with but I'm sure it's not free to them. The merchants make money without having to lay out any of their own money upfront.......they only pay a small 5% fee for any money they make (after the fact). That means the merchants pocket 95% of all the money they make (their ain't many businesses in the real world or virtual world where profits are quite that good). I'm sure you (and most other merchants) would love for that deal to continue. Perhaps those hideous ads are going to make that possible (if LL doesn't make money or Marketplace costs them money then Marketplace is gone........or the merchants are going to have to start footing some of the bills upfront). Pop-ups and ads might be hideous (even to me......I've said numerous times I don't like ads, especially pop-ups) but if it means keeping my expenses down then I'm willing to endure that inconvenience or annoyance. But, again I guess I have to qualify my statements. I don't use Marketplace (I've not ever visited Marketplace in fact......on back when it was XStreet and that was a long time ago). The reason is simple. It revolves around your statement (the one I quoted).......keeping people in SL and not somewhere outside SL. Marketplace is outside SL.

Check all your speaker connections (both on the sound card end and the speakers ends). I can't imagine the problem originating with a driver issue but drivers can be quirky so try re-installing the current driver (by re-installing I suggest you first remove the old driver before installing it again or updating it). One (or more) of the audio cables could be faulty too (or loose). It's also possible that your sound card is going sour on you. It's not likely to be a viewer problem or an SL problem.......it's at your computer or the speakers. You can try headphones to see if the problem persists......if not then you need to take a good, hard look at the speakers and the associated cables and connections. If it persists you need to look at the card itself (and/or the driver). If you have onboard audio try switching to it and see if you still have the problem.

LOL We sure need a kudos button in this thread. :matte-motes-sunglasses-3:

No problem what so ever about that on my part. But, Czari, I've yet to see a post by you telling everyone that LL is stupid or the Lindens are morons. Big difference.

I put mesh in the same category as sculpties. They are here to stay. They serve a purpose. Many users absolutely love them. I'm not a fan. Call me "old school". Give me that very primitive "prim" any day.

I've had some good ideas too. I've mentioned some to Lindens (back in the days when Lindens often roamed the grid). They went no where. So, because of that, I'm supposed to be like you..........LL is nothing but a bunch of buffoons. All because they don't see things the way I see them. Your ideas may be good ones (and might even improve the SL experience for everyone)..........but, they also could be loony ideas that would destroy the experience for everyone. If you are so talented and expert on building and lag then why the heck are not out utilizing all that talent and knowledge and make the world a better place? I think I know why.

I'm about to give up here. This started as off as a thread condemning Linden Lab for using targeted ads on their websites (not in-world, just the SL related websites). In some people's furious denouncements of the recently introduced practice they levied some serious accusations against LL claiming they were purposefully placing less than desirable ads (the see your online arrest record, visit some sexy girlie sites, etc).. I don't believe that is true and I said so. Then we get the claims that the pop-ups can lead to mal-ware of some type being installed on people's computers. Again I don't believe that to be true (though, if you happen to click on the ad and it takes you to a malicious website that is certainly a possibility....but the pop-up, itself won't install mal-ware). Then we get into a discussion about being tracked on the Internet. Tracking cookies are everywhere and if you don't know that then you probably should get off the Internet all together (that's entirely my opinion......take or leave it). Installing a pop-blocker will not prevent tracking cookies from being installed on your computer (blocking those cookies will to a very large extent but not completely) Deleting cookies after the fact only gets rid of the cookie and prevents further tracking (to an large extent but not entirely). Cookies are not bad things.....your preferences for this forum site are stored as cookies (without them you would have to constantly redo your preferences. Tracking cookies have been a huge concern for years.....yet they are completely legal for websites to use (they ain't going away any time soon so it's best to understand what they are and how to protect your personal information....tracking cookies merely report back to the website that installed it to tell what site the computer with the cookie is visiting). Most people, myself included, don't particularly care for tracking cookies but they are there and I know that they are doing so I adjust my web browsing accordingly (I seldom visit sites that I might not want to get ads from.......if I do then I block cookies while I'm on the site (that is not 100% effective but it helps). Everyone here has tacking cookies on their computer........that's where your ads on Marketplace are coming from. Not from Linden Lab. And, basically, that's all I wanted to say.......you are your own worse enemy if you are receiving objectionable ads on Marketplace (or most other websites). Now the discussion has turned to Linden Lab being in poor financial shape. That may or may not be true but the indications are that it is doing fine at the moment. When you make statements about a company going broke and you have not facts to back it up then you are speculating........no matter how much "evidence" you attempt to throw out. Like LL has lost it's innovation edge. Have they? Who's overtaking them? OpenSim? What platform (besides OpenSim which is cloned off SL) provides the users mesh content created by fellow users (a platform, not VRML). As far as I have heard there is absolutely no serious competition to SL (good or bad, that's a fact). The fact that SL is the most well known virtual world that is over 95% user created with no serious competition in the wind says that LL is probably in pretty shape financially. All you have to do is think....but it's hard to think objectively when all you can do is **bleep** about a company. I've been call a pimp and whore so far in this thread (not by name but by the context of some of the comments). And that's because I happen to think LL is doing fine and is not my enemy...........I don't hate them. When I see something like targeted ads on the SL websites I don't particularly care for it.........but I can see a reason for LL doing it. And because I don't think LL has sinister motives I don't suspect them of anything malicious. I guess that makes me some LL puppet or pimp (or whore). Why do I have to put up with that? Because I'm in a "minority"? Because I piss you off by trying to make you think on your own........it's easy to "group think" (just go with the flow and no thought is necessary). Continue to throw out all your un-backed up "facts". Continue with your unhappiness with LL. I'll have my fun as I've been doing for over 7 years and occasionally joining these (mostly comical) LL **bleep** fests we so often get here on the forums. But a question that always creeps into my mind is why are you still here? LL is stupid, they rip you off, they spy on you, they go out of their way to annoy you....why in the world would you stick around for such treatment? Don't tell me that you do it because you are so concerned about SL and it's residents...........you have shown no such evidence (not in this thread or any of the other 1000 or so that I've read over the years). Children like being "victims".......are you all children?

The innovation is that mesh can be created by the users.......or, more correctly, amateurs. Yes, mesh has been around for years. But who introduced a platform where amateurs can take their shot at mesh? EA sports? Sony? Did you know "smart phones" have been around for years too? And who took the smart phone technology to a new level? RIM (Blackberry) or Apple (iPhone)? One or both of those companies are innovators........not that they created smart phones, but what they did with the technology. That is what is known as innovation. You can hate LL as much as you want. It matters not to me. But you're being dishonest when you say the company hasn't been innovative in the virtual world technology.

Introduced user created mesh.

Good work..........I'm not convinced. Mostly because of one of your first posts when you called anyone who disagreed with your view a "pimp" (maybe that tainted my confidence in your "knowledge" about what you are talking about. See how that works? You lost the argument at the instant...........you will probably never get it back (not with me anyway).

If you would search the archives you would have seen Peggy was the "only defender" back in 2007 too. SL is dead is not new...........it's not innovative either.

I'm glad you took the time to relate your positive experience in SL. I, too, as satisfied with SL. I came here a few years before you but I do remember the frustration (and, to a degree, intimidation) of SL. It was entirely foreign to me since I had never been in a virtual world (I saw SIMS Online one time on a friend's computer and was not impressed). I probably would have been gone after a few weeks but I met a fellow "first timer" on my second day.........we became friends almost immediately and explored together (got into trouble together, got embarrassed together, learned together). Between the two of us be decided one of us had to become premium.......and I thank god it was me. I've never looked back in anything but awe and pleasure (even those times when being griefed repeatedly by falling male appendanges ).

So George Lucus isn't an innovator either. I mean animation and special effects were around decades before Star Wars. Gotcha...........you are a true expert.

------------------------------------------ No problem here, I got what you were saying, I'll offer a counter disclaimer that some of what I'd said was a knee jerk reaction to those who were eluding that people that didn't like ads were just whining. Working off some bad karma for having done sort of the same thing in the past. There are times when it goes beyond just whether we like or dislike a given feature and try to get LL to stop shooting themselves in the foot. On the one hand, they're trying to get universities to come back, on the other they're presenting the kind of image via this advertising that wouldn't get a university funded. LL has never been good at laser focus when it comes to direction. I think in this case they need to decide if they want professionals back like universities, solution providers and business or whether they want to cater to the gamer/griefer/casual crowd. I think there's a happy medium, but not if they're going to downgrade their image and make the world think they're paupers.-------------------------------------------------------------- Somehow I think Czari got what I was saying (despite her disagreeing with me). But you, on the other hand, seem to have completely missed it. I guess you have consistently missed my point that I don't like advertisements (pop-ups specifically). But I also understand why are used (it revolves around money........real life money). Marketplace is provided by Linden Lab free to anyone who wants to use the site with the only charges made are to anyone selling something in the form of a "commission" ( a fee LL levees for each sale)..........there is no charge until something is sold. The seller gets that charge and the consumer does not. That's a very sweet deal.....sell nothing and you are charged nothing, sell a bunch and you are charged a percentage of that bunch (you can't loose with a deal like that.....don't you wish real life was like that?). Someone has to pay for any website on the Internet. Someone has to pay for the bandwidth that every user (consumer or merchant) consumes.........that ain't free. Someone has to maintain the site (the consumer doesn't and neither does the merchant). All that is money (real money........not Linden dollars). LL happens to be the one who foots all that expense (and more that we are probably not even aware of). I doubt a 5% (or even a 10%) commission would pay for those expenses. And you are bitching about ads (if not ads then anything else LL might put forth to help defer the expenses). How would you make ends meet........short or charging a fee for a shop or business on the Marketplace? Eat the expenses (which is what I think you believe is the solution) and end up closing Marketplace all together due to too much loss in revenue? You seem to think you know business............is that sound business? I love the red herrings like "universities". What university do you think would have a Marketplace presence? How about a corporation? Maybe Microsoft (or Apple) would be interested in selling some virtual laptop for the residents to put on there desk......complete with a virtual Windows 8 operating system (or OS 10 operating system). Maybe Ford Motor Corporation would like to sell some Crossover SUV (complete with On-Star). Think that would be of interest to a corporation? Corporations would not be concerned at all about pop-ups on Marketplace.........unless they had some themselves to get some real life sales (which I'm sure they have looked at already). This is a make believe, virtual world......corporations know that and will treat it for just what it is. That's why LL failed in the past to get any significant corporate presence in the past. A virtual world where the primary concern of the users is make believe is never going to attract a real world business beyond simple advertising. Make believe.........where you and I are in SL. Real.......where corporations are all the time. There's a vast difference. LL has found out that the corporate world and the virtual world do not mix very well. Universities are not any different........education is real and make believe learning is play. We have enough playing already in our education system......Universities know this and LL learned it a few years ago. It's okay that you don't like advertising on Marketplace (as I've said numerous times, neither do I). But it's not a case of LL "shooting themselves in the foot". It's a case of LL facing facts and attempting to fix a problem before it sinks them....all without having to resort to charging their customers. Which reminds me...when was the last time LL increased the premium fees or tier? The premium fees have not increased for more than 7 years that I can absolutely say without any doubt. The tier has increased one time.........about 6 years ago. Someone at LL is looking out for us. Maybe they are shooting themselves in the foot afterall.