Clyde Lindman

I vote with Josh for more conspicuous comments. All the negative reviews I've received but one are from people who can't be bothered to read instructions before they buy even though they are either in the product description or available as a PDF on the same page.

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/LP-TEXTURE-CHANGER-III-OWNER/319730 https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/LP-TEXTURE-CHANGER-IV-OWNER/1672074 These don't use menus but will do the job. Also come as Copy/Transfer for more L$

hmmmm I haven't heard back from either complainant so I'll assume they received their merchandise one way or another. Scratch the notecard then.

This would be THE prime time for some enterprising individual or group to start another SL Exchange (remember that?) To succeed it needs only do 2 things: (1) To Work and (2) Provide actual customer service. All my stuff on the marketplace is in DD now, but I found nothing wrong with the magic boxes, which BTW are still used successfully on other grids. I would quickly jump to list on a new marketplace. The last time there was some competition to the then XStreet, brought about by the anouncement of listing fees, my sales on one of the other markets actually exceeded XStreet for a month. SO where are the new entrepeneurs who are ready to seize the moment? I would if I had the skills .....and time. After shining that ray of hope, I would feel it necessary to point out that if a new market based on magic boxes turned out to be successful, LL more likely than not would break the magic box scripts as they did a certain feature of TPVs so nobody knows what viewer anyone is using, or more to the point, not using..

To the OP: I moved 20 products yesterday. 18 Did fine, 2 exhibited the problem(s) you experienced. After poking around, it looks like the enire listings were lost so that I'll have to relist those items. Luckily neither was a very popular item. After moving the items I did a test delivery and also a test purchase with my alt of the some of the more popular items. All seemed fine. I've also received non-delivery compalints from 2 customers who, it turns out were still using V1 TPVs, so I've prepared a notecard to be sent out to all non-delivery complaints ot explain how and on what viewers DD works.

You can link a new object to an existing link set as long as you do it in the right order. Pick the new prim(s) first and then the linkset last and the root should remain the same. Not mentioned above and depending if your build is static or not are the "huge" build rezzers like builder's buddy (freebie) which will rez prims within a given radius linked or not.

It is very telling that LL first of all did not invite comment on their original post and have not sent any Linden to clarify 2k on this thread. I run my alt on V3 and it is usable. As far as innovation goes need anyone be reminded of V2 or the fact that it has taken LL till now to supply a usable viewer since it announced the demise of V1?( a viewer incorporating 'innovations' which have been present in TPVs for some time, probably, I would expect, using code from those TPV.) 2k is nebulous enough so that it can be read in 2 ways: 1. You can't put anything in your viewer that we don't have in ours or 2. You can't put anything in your viewer that we (LL) do not want in SL or without giving us lead time to include the cool stuff in ours too. While I would love to think #2 is the case but 5 yrs of SSL experience tells me it's #1. Now being forced to use V3 is not a deal-killer for me (I also do not limit myself to SL for my virtual world experience), but LL needs to be aware that the 2 most popular TPVs are also being groomed for other grids. Some of those grids have the rudiments of an economy beginning AND have what SL doesn't and probably will never have: the ability to move between grids (primitive now but improving day by day), so worst case scenario is that LL will be killing innovation on SL while the rest of the virtual community moves ahead.

I don't think the concurrancy issue can be resolved without fundamental restructuring of grid archetecture........... Totally agree with everything you said. The biggest possibility I have encountered so far is the OS Grid where your SIM resides on your server and the central servers just handle inventory and routing. OS is still pretty primitive but is advancing and has diverged from SL in quite a few areas, particularly in scripting. I don't believe that it's necessary for newbies to have $L I partially agree. If a newbie is savy he/she will find all the high quality freebies available, but that's just part of the picture. That special skin and clothes and hair will eventually cost and while new folks no longeer have to contend at the beginning with an Avi that looks like an animated department store maniquin there is a limit what can be done for free and most people I have met reach that limit quite quickly. Then maybe land which always costs. I'm not quite sure how camping used to work but if it means hanging out somewhere inworld just to earn $L, I can't think of anything more boring. During the camping days almost everyone had an alt or 2 that did nothing but camp so your main avi was free to do whatever and maybe camp overnight. The one problem with this was some people camped armies of bots which were never used for anything else, except maybe the sport of bot tossing where active campers used orbit weapons to see who could put a bot in the strangest place. There was a lot of socialization that happened among campers early on too. At the beginning I met most of my friends camping. Alas all but 2 have left from those days. if I hadn't discovered Firestorm I would've dumped SL within my first couple weeks. Yes Kudos to the Phoenix team, their product an example of what can be produced when developers listen to users. All I did to gain access to A rated sims was state my age. Really? Back when it started they wanted either your drivers license or passport number. If you have payment information used or on file it will be very quick to trace it back to the real you. I like Marketplace because I can browse it without being logged into SL. I order freebie stuff from it so if something doesn't arrive it's no big deal since i spent nothing on it. I'd rather see inworld shops disappear than I would Marketplace. I would rather see 3 or 4 marketplaces thriving. The SL Marketplace was originally privately owned until LL bought it and it's chief rival. Still after that there were at least 3 others running until they went belly up for the reasons I stated above. Inworld stores are important especially to builders and scripters so potential customers can experience their work before they buy. I've seen the term technocopian before......love it!

I actually took the time to read this whole thread and with all the links being thrown around this one from April never surfaced: http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2011/04/linden-lab-financial-analysis.html Now where the discussion began on how rosey the future is (or not) and gradually deteriorated into what Second Life is or isn't, fact of the matter is, especially acording to the above article, SL is in trouble. So more likely the question is probably not what SL will become but if it will survive. Now this is not to ask if LL will survive since that is a different question since LL has its fingers in more than just the SL pie. I tried to find the link I read about a year ago concerning LL's involvement in the OS Grid for instance. Unfortunately I couldn't.. I would love to see SL continue and thrive. I have a business plan involving the RL entertainment industry (with an interested RL clientel I might add) waiting for SL (or some other grid) to solve some BIG problems that will make the difference if virtual worlds (not games like WOW, but true virtual worlds) will remain the private playground of a few tens of thousands worldwide or make it into the mainstream. I'll enumerate the hurdles in what I see is the order of importance and you will see I agree and also disagree with a lot that has been said. 1. Concurrency. This I see as the biggest problem since if you don't have a lot of bodies online how successful can you be? Right now the wheels start to come off SL when the online population reaches <> 70K with it becoming a waste of time somewhere <> 80K because of general lag, teleport, and delivery problems etc. etc. etc. This I see as a three fold problem, the first of which is to solve the network and server problems. The system needs to be able to handle a higher number of Avis in order to begin to attract them. Also attached to this is the maximum number of avitars that a SIM can handle. The second problem is getting L$ into the pockets of new Avis FAST and continually until they either decide they want to invest real money in the grid or have developed a marketable skil to earn L$l. IMO LL made a huge mistake when they killed camping without providing some sort of substitute. To all those who would dispute this I would say L$ are L$ whether bought directly from LL or given to a camper for 'gaming' traffic by a store owner. LL still gets money in their pockets. Third problem is that people have problems with the UI. I have to confess I never did, no matter what viewer I used, but LL's answer was V2 which IMO was the clumsiest thing I ever used. V3 is getting closer but strongly resembles the better of the third party viewers which IMO is still better and easier to use. Why not set specs for a viewer and let the populace produce their own and devote resources to the network and servers????? The TPVs almost always do it better and at a lower cost to LL (that is nothing). 2. Visibility Solving this will help with #1. I have never seen a company that lacks an a public image like LL. Moving through mainstream cyberspace how often does one stumble upon adverts for Second Life? as compared to the social media sites or WOW???? Secondly when SL has made the news lately it is usually some 'expose' on the seedier sides of the Grid. Last year, I believe there was a CBC, special on how SL destroyed RL relationships. The subjects they used were pathetic people to begin with AND if the reporter was really savy we all know she could have found even darker secrets buried, plus she used graphics that were obviously not mainstream SL. However LL left it up to users to 'defend the faith' and many of the replies proved as pathetic as the subjects of the expose. I never see anything covered in the news about the immense amount of creativity that happens constantly on SL, the educational triumphs, the community, etc. LL could make an effort to tell others besides users what is happening. LL, don't you have friends or even know anyone on A&E or Bravo??? 3. TOS This again ties in with #1. When I found SL in 2006 (Clyde is my second avi) TOS was simple and easy to understand. Since then there have been so many thou shalts and thou shalt nots added that I almost need the service of a lawyer before I venture anything new. The latest is the 'audition' one has to take before being aproved for mesh, like that is really going to stop copyright infringement if a person wants. SL is now a world built by the residents but controlled with an iron fist by LL when on a whim they decide to change whatever. Back off LL. Rather than trying to cover your arse from every legal threat that may evolve in TOS just make the owners of the avis divulge their real names at signup and be responsible for their actions. You already have that info from anyone who is either age verified or has payment info used so let the users know you have it and you will divulge it to any legal or criminal investigation. 4. Marketplace While this seems only to affect merchants it also effects anyone who shops in that the fact that LL owns the marketplace stifles competition. Inside the marketplace merchants are constantly complaining about the glut of cheap items yet any competing marketplace that is willing to take it up (cheap stuff) has soon found itself belly up not from the items which sell well on the Marketplace but from lack of visibility because LL bombards you with Marketplace as soon as you load the viewer. This gives LL a virtual monopoly on the distribution of goods, the only other source being directly from inworld stores which are not all that easy to find with the new search and since trafficing has been 'fixed'. I closed my inworld store when I could no longer find it in the 'improved' search engine and wasn't about to participate in the keyword and prim manipulations it takes to move up the ladder. Think what would happen to RL economy if you could only shop at Macey's which was government run. Secondly this comes at an immense cost to LL maintaining a 'commerce' team that again like the UI team is woefully behind what the residents want and what they experience elsewhere on the web. Acquiring the Marketplace was another huge and costly mistake for LL. So IMO the Future of Second Life in particular and virtual worlds in general will be decided by how and how soon the above items are handled.

I had problems like yours and with inventory and textures way back when I started using different viewers to access SL. My solution (If I can remeber right it came from the Emerald team) was to create a cache folder on my desktop for each viewer I use. Every upgrade I manually clear that viewers cache (ie delete everything in the folder) before installing the new upgrade. I've had no problem since except when the SL servers hiccup.

Sorry only 1/2 of one here too, for while I agree with you that the LL V2-3 is a pain I also agree with Cin. LL isn't going divert from their chosen direction. Luckily Kirsten's Viewer presents a more workable version and Firestorm, when finished will be as popular as Phoenix since they are polling people as to what features are wanted (how's that for revolutionary. Listening to customers??), so go with the TPVs.

To the OP: I went the route you are considering a year ago when I could no longer find my store in the new search whereas it appeared at or near the top of the old search in what I considered key fields.. I however was able to sell my land, at a huge loss of course, but I still got something for it. I took it one step further and cancelled my premium membership since I use mainly TPVs and LL refuses to give you any support if you use one, so why pay premium??. So LL is out my tier and premium membership. I sell 100% on the Marketplace and while gross revenues are down a bit, expenses are 0 so the net profit is way up. I've found a nice quiet sandbox to work in and so it goes. In closing the store, though, I could no longer offer the useful freebies I acquired over the years from other scripters and was able to offer at my store with their (the creators') blessing. Even though I do spend a lot of time on OS Grid, I have no intention of leaving SL. I'm just in a holding pattern right now waiting for LL to get it's act together so that it would again be an atrractive platform in which to invest time and money.

The only downside of not owning land is that you don't have a private home base. That is important to a lot of people so they either rent or buy. I owned mainland for 3 years and had an inworld store for 2 of those years.It might be for you if you want to privately explore your kinky side and don't want other Avis taking snapshots Owning land was fun: terraforming, building a home & store, landscaping and just making my individual creative statement. However as time went by I found myself spending more time on the land and less exploring AND it's expensive, beginning with premium membership and ending in tiers. You can skip the premium membership and rent or 'own' estate land but too many of my friends have suddenly found themselves suddenly landless and homeless when the estate owner either didn't pay their tier to LL or sold the land and the next owner decided he didn't want tenants. Also as in RL, unless you want to buy a whole sim, you cannot choose your neighbors. I had great neighbors but also could write a book on the antics of a certain developer who tried to drive me an my neighbors off our land. All that being said, I still have land, just not in SL. Someone gave me 1/2 a sim on the OS Grid

Of the 1.XX viewers I think Phoenix has by far outdistanced the competition. For the 2.XX viewers as of this moment I like Kirsten's the best. It has a very polished feel and look. However I do believe when Firestorm is finished it will be my favorite as it will almost inevitably incorporate temporary downloads and other power features from Phoenix that make my Second Life so much easier.

During the time of the listing fee debacle I had my items listed on four of the alternate marketplaces. There was in fact one month that my sales on one of those sites exceeded those on what was then XStreet. If it was true for me it was probably true for others so very quickly LL noticed and backed down. One by one the third party marketplaces died. So while the SL marketplace is far from ideal, LL is being very careful not to give its merchants any real reason to leave in any great numbers and thus anyone trying to start up will have a long uphill battle to win over customers. I believe in another thread you railed against the glut of freebies on the Marketplace (historically, BTW there was the same complaint on the SLX and the SL Exchange and probably all other incarnations before I arrived). Well IMO if LL were to either charge listing fees or in some way make the listing of freebies unattractive to merchants, this would be enough of a trigger to start up competing marketplaces. This would ultimately be good for the SL economy, eliminating the monopoly held by the present marketplace and thus opening things up a bit. However, as with the delisting of or listing fees on freebies, LL ain't going to let that happen.