Toysoldier Thor

So Porky and Gavin, forget about the debate if there should be mandatory Developer programs, PIOF, restrictions of who can sell on the current SL Marketplace. I posted a proposal for you both and you did not answer. If you both feel so strongly about SL having a more mature, exclusive, restrictive, elite marketplace which would be rid of old outdate content and content that is free and content that is not copybotted, why have you both not jumped on and fully endorsed the concept of creating a new (additional) ELITE MARKETPLACE? Strange how you both did not respond to this idea. It was so perfect in that developer / merchants like you would get the restrictions and controls you wanted in this new ELITE marketplace, and you would leave the main SL Marketplace for all the rest of the merchants that have no problem with the level of access and low barriers to entry. Not a word about your support for this proposal. WHY?

you're starting it. I was talking about your mention that LL is planning to introduce "special developer access only" tools and how this is not surprising with the moves coming from LL on stratifying builders to the basic builders and the elite special registered builders with access to tools that the general community doesnt have. As for your lack of interest in building with prims.... for every one like you does doesnt like or cant figure out how to create amazing creations from simple prims... I can point out 20 builders that absolutely love SL's prim building. Luckily for me I have experienced and liked both sides. I really like prim building and figuring out the technical and creative challenge to make such simple prims become amazing builds. I also love the analog natural shape forming abilities of sclpties and now mesh. In fact I like, have tried and can fully appreciate the value of so many facets of the build environment - prims, sculpties, scripts, texturing, mesh. Ironically, the only part I have never had any real passion or interests in has been animations and poses - never built one and dont feel like I missed anything for not having built one. Maybe that is why I am not as quick to keep calling out the demise of all other building components of SL and "everything I build from now on will only be MESH". But... LL's move to a create a more restrictive class of builder with plans to block development / build tools from the general community... not good news. I would agree with you there.

I do think there are influences around the LL product development teams that would like to see this establishment of more elite classes of developers, builders, etc. and they are using the "with mesh we can start to change the SL world". So it doesnt surprise me that we are seeing more and more restrictions and hurdles and guidelines and shifts with the MESH then all the existing building tools. Maybe Rod and Sr. Mgmt see that the days of the "anyone can be a builder" are coming to an end.

I took my mesh "kneeling woman" sculpture that rezzes at a LI=2 and kept adding script after script until I had 9 scripts in the mesh sculpture. The LI satayed at 2. One of the scripts is large - over 500 lines of code. So the complexity of the script didnt change it nor did adding up to 9 scripts.

isnt it funny how you conveniently left out in the $ revenue figures the Revenuw made from all the manufacturers of the Android platform. Samsung, HTC, etc. Funny how you also forgot how long the proprietary Apple iphone platform was on the market before Google's adroid OS and all the devices of that platform entered the market. Funny how you call all of Android's apps free and that its the same FREE model that LL has and is collapsing when countless Android Apps charge for their apps (the benefits being that developers dont have to jump through Applies costs and hoops to put out a new app). And after all this.... as popular as Apple is... they are following the same model they went through in the 70s 80s when they kept things proprietary and with high barriers to entry and heavy partnering controls for the Apple II III etc. Remember in the mid 80s when the PC entered the market and all the industry experts initially thought "ROFL PCs have no hope in penetrating Apples desktop microcomputer market". Fast Forward 10 years later and Apple's microcoputer marketshare eroded to 10% of the market. So you keep throwing today's numbers around and we will see 10 years from now - specially when Androids have already taken 1st place in monthly device shipments over iphones in only 2 years. Last thought...... if you so strongly feel the LL SL Marketplace model is so flawed and headed for ultimate collapse... then why are you so stupid as to be spending any time and effort in this marketplace. GET OUT NOW!! invest your time and effort in a virtual world and platform that has high barriers to entry and restricts most of your competitors from competing with you and there is a lot of control where you can jack up your product pricing. Your actions do not match your beliefs Gavin.

Gavin Hird wrote: This is not a discussion about Apple vs Andriod. It is a discussion about Linden lab's market place, and where I have made suggestions on how a developer program can be fashioned along the same simple lines for enrollment and benefits. It is NOT a suggestion to adopt Apple's business model. ohhh but it is and you started the comparison to how the SL Marketplace could be modeled after the Apple model. Let me quote you... A sound developer program can be run modelled on Apple's developer program where barriers to entry and participation are low, it gives you rights to trade in the App stores, and it gives you great access to documentation, beta products and forward looking product plans. Fashioned in this manner, the barrier for the hobby builder who finds he wants to go "pro" is very low. You said that LL could develop a program just like the Apple Model. My thoughts on my response are that the Android model is what SL's Marketplace is already like and it has proven to be amazingly popular and successful even with its flaws. Resembling Android's model proving now that its an amazingly more attractive model for most than Apple's since even with Apple's huge marketshare position establishment prior to Android entering the market - in 2 short years the Android platform and its apps have already taken month unit sales marketshare leadership away from Apple. How can this be possible if as you suggest Apple's model is superior and LL should model a Marketplace acces program after it? With all the current revenue generated for Apple Iphone developers, why are so many consumers trading in their iphones for Androids and developers are writing free or near free apps for the Android??? I know why. I am sure you know why. LOWER COST OF ENTRY.... LOWER BARRIERS TO ENTRY.... LOWER CONTROLS... So I am glad you brought up the comparison of LL Marketplace Paid Developer access to that of Apple's model. You could not have proved my point any more clearly. PS.... you suggest that for SL Merchants that paid and signed up to trade on Marketplace they would be given access to documentation, beta products, etc.... Do you remember we are talking about LL Commerce here? Exactly one documentation do you think LL would create and share with us that we could not get in the public space? Beta products?? You want to join LL Commerce's Closed Beta teams? LOL More power to you. You can do that now for free - as long as you like a sock rammed in your mouth for ever. This has been a fun discussion and one that I know is purely acedemic since LL Commerce never listens to us (good or bad). The reason your ideas are not causing a flamestorm of protest against you is because most Merchants that are against your idea fully know that LL would never take the idea seriously. So thanks for the enjoyable debate.

in addition to the cost. for the code and access.. your code you develop is not reviewed by Apple and does not have to meet all of Apple's countless controls (including the "we just dont want that in our store for no technical reason" control)? Again.... if you wanted to explain low barriers to development - GOOGLE ANDROID. that is why Android is the fastest growing platform on phones and apps and why it is outselling Apple's platform. Ohhhh do you think this amazing android phenominum is happening because Google's barrier to entry is far lower than Apples? Isnt that amazing how the reason SL's creator merchant community has grown so fast is the same reason Android's popularity has exploded in the last 2 years to be the fastest selling platform on the market?? Just real cool to see the same model working on two different marketspaces.

PS - have you ever researched how many hurdles a developer must go through to be an APPLE APP developer??? If you wanted to explain low barriers and benefits.... you should have referenced Google's Andoid development. Apple's is far far from low barriers and easy. I know. My Brother has struggled to get through it. If Apple's App Dev program is your idea of "low barriers to entry"... we are on a totally different wavelength. LL putting in Apple's model would destroy SL's future merchant community growth or merchants and content.

Gavin Hird wrote: You are putting a lot of words in my mouth I never uttered or wished for. My statements are purely for the Marketplace. The oportunity for everyone shall still remain as is in-world. The problem with the marketplace is one of crowding the way it is laid out – crowding of freebies, crowding of demos, crowding of ripped and stolen goods, crowding of old stuff that hang around in servers people have long time forgotten about. It does, in addition, remove attention from in-world activities and discourage land use for commercial purposes. Which bites LL's hand much more than mine. A sound developer program can be run modelled on Apple's developer program where barriers to entry and participation are low, it gives you rights to trade in the App stores, and it gives you great access to documentation, beta products and forward looking product plans. Fashioned in this manner, the barrier for the hobby builder who finds he wants to go "pro" is very low. it does not eliminate the issue of ripped and stolen goods, but it minimizes the attractiveness of it. Gavin, I am not really putting words in your mouth. Moreso I am paraphrasing the world you would like to see. And in your last post you state that your wishes of these new DEVELOPER CLASSED Merchant would only be for the world of SL's Marketplace. LOL Arnt you Generous! So, you only want to rise barriers to entry for IP creating Merchants on the largest and fastest growing and easiest to setup market on SL? You suggest that all those creator / merchants that cant or do not want to break through your DEVELOPER hurdles - they can still sell all their lame weak non-blessed content within the inworld community. The same inworld community where we all already have been witnessing the fast erosion of inworld selling marketplace. So for the rest of us - we can still set up a store inworld where fewer and fewer SL residents actually shop anymore and where there is near zero product search and where the additional barriers ot selling are put up for new creator / merchants (having to rent land / stores etc. with no promise of any sales). Arent you so nice to push us non-developer classed merchants into the dying inworld lands. I have a much much better idea Gavin. This is an idea that would make all creator / merchants happy. How about you work with other fellow Commercial Classed Developer / Merchants of SL (that top 10% of merchants) and create a new Marketplace. Create it and if you can convince LL Commerce to setup a 2nd marketplace for the ELITE MERCHANTS.... then you can set up rules and barriers and guidelines and annual membership fees and applications where each member must register his/her RL information. You can make this ELITE SL MARKETPLACE as exclusive as you want. Then, you and all these other Elite Developer-Stamped Merchants can migrate all your content to this new ELITE MP and close out all your listing from the current main ugly dirty cluttered content-theft ridden Marketplace. Then, SL Customers can decide if they want to shop and buy from the Main Marketplace or your ELITE Marketplace. If you and Porky and Medhue and others that want these standards are correct with your theory - all the SL Customers should quickly abandon the main marketplace and migrate to this ELITE Markeplace. Why? because SL customers dont want to shop for and buy free / cheap content. They dont like search results that are all cluttered. They will want to buy from all your trusted mature and formally Developer endorsed merchants. RIGHT? In the meantime, your demands for the Elite Marketplace does not impact the 90% of Creator / Merchants that want easy access to the powerful and growing Main Marketplace... even with all its evils... We are all happy. What do you think of that idea?

Josh.... YOU ARE 100% CORRECT.... And this is one of the fundamental flaws to the SOPA PIPA ACTA.... Those that promote and support these acts - they simply want the tax payer and ALL OTHER coorporations and individuals to take on their responsibility of enforcing they copyrights but do not want anyone to share the profits that come from these rights. Saying it again.... GREEDY & LAZY and even SOCIALLY IRRESPONSIBLE. Although they failed to get these laws passed this time - you can rest assure that the power, $, and influence of the media / rights holders lobbyists will attempt again to pay off and bamboozle politicians to pass a similar law.

Ciaran Laval wrote: Porky Gorky wrote: I completely agree with Gavin here. In fact I would take it one step further and change it so that only premium account holders could list and sell content on the marketplace and in-world. The anonymity currently afforded to merchants in SL has also helped drive up the amount of copyright infringement we see in SL today. There needs to be more regulation and better accountability in this multi-million dollar market. Considering questionable Mesh content has already been on the marketplace and that ripping started before people were able to access Second Life without providing these details, I'm not convinced it would make a big difference other than narrowing the amount of people who engage with Second Life. 1000% agree with your comment Ciaran. These wishes are just coming from a portion of the Creator / Merchant community that would like to see the 90% of the SL creator / merchant community be culled from the SL marketplace. This does very little to stop theft, copybotting, poor customer service, and all the other benefits mentioned that they suggest would come out of creating all these formal barriers.

Gavin Hird wrote: Toysoldier Thor wrote: (PS to make you feel better - I was forced to PIOF but only because I wanted to convert all my profits to RL $) Good! As I have stated elsewhere, a developer program is overdue. You should only be able to trade on the market place if member of the developer program. The program should have a yearly fee to be a member. You would have to disclose your real identity to the program manager (LL.) As a member you should be able to trade all your content on equal standing regardless of prim, sculpt, mesh, script ... Membership fees should be used to develop the marketplace, such as having multiple brands for one developer, seasonal products, varieties, much better reporting, campaing management, bundling management, etc, etc. I don't think a direct connection between premium and developer is a good idea as I can see many cases of people wanting to be member of one or the other. Im sorry Gavin but I have to completely disagree with your "wishes" on how you would like to see the Merchant / Content Developer community should be in SL. I do understand where your vision comes from - the worlds of formalized, well trained, commercialized development communities where there are classes of "creators" and classes of the pure "consumers". A world where product creation disciplines are in place, standards, guidelines, oaths, formal obligations, fees for the rights to to be one with the community of developers and commercialisation of the created content. BUT.... in your vision of what you feel you want SL to evolve to, you have completely forgotten / dismissed the fundamental critical success of the SL Creator / Merchant community and why it has evolved so quickly in SL to be a large and vibrant and amazingly successful as it is now. Why do you think SL has over 70,000 Creator / Merchants within its community? Compare the population of SL's creator/merchant community to any other world like sims, IMVU, blue mars, etc. I will be blunt.... SL's creator / merchant community (even with all its current flaws primarily due to its enormous success) is so large and successful for one major reason - THE BARRIERS TO ENTRY ARE EXTREMELY LOW ! Maybe you are special and came into SL for one primary reason - "to become a commercial developer of SL product for the objective of establishing a commercial business operation". But, I am very very comfortable in stating that the vast majority of all 70,000+ creator/merchants (I will estimate over 90%) evolved to becoming creator / merchants because they learned the easy to understand basics of building content inworld. The barriers were/are very low to build some amazing content. The knowledgebase is very large to become an expert builder in SL . Then, many of these Builders discovered that the barrier to actually SELL what they built to others was even lower. They then got the bug and discovered they could more formally sell many of their products in an inworld store or on a low cost risk MARKETPLACE website. In other words they all quickly learned that the barriers to formally selling their content in SL were extremely low. It was a bit confusing but most untrained averge-joe builders in SL could easily evolve to becoming Merchants. Once they evolved to becoming a Merchant - many of them stopped their evolution there and just sold what they made with little formal disciplines of development, marketing, customer service, etc. A FEW remaining percent evolved to becoming very mature Creator / Merchants or even large scale commercial merchants. Why am I reminding you about how SL's creator / merchant community works for 90% + of the merchant community? Because your proposed ideas of introducing formal communities, fees, guidelines, structures, exposing your RL identity, formal obgligations, etc..... they put up HUGE BARRIERS TO ENTRY for the next generations of creators that want to become Merchants. Your great idea flies completely in the face of the fundamental reason that SL's Creator Merchant community is the most successful of any other in its marketspace. Your concepts are a great idea for you and any of the top 10% of creator merchants that have far passed all these hurdles and are not willing to look back and what made the economy of SL the success it is that YOUR BUSINESS LEVERAGES. So.... I respectfully and strongly disagree with your ideas. If you want to run a business in a developer / merchant community that has pre-established rigors and fees and disciplined rules and hurdles that wipes out the ameteur / hobbyist creator / merchant.... then I suggest you close your SL business - and move to a virtual world that better fits your model of how a creator / merchant community should run. May I suggest you move to Blue Mars. You CANT bite the hand that feeds you Gavin.

Gavin Hird wrote: This is not a question about your customers and the realtion to them. This is a question about you - as a merchant and developer - and your relation to Linden Lab and your fellow merchants. By having to disclose your real identity to Linden Lab to be able to trade on the marketplace, it makes you much more responsible in terms of what goods you offer and how it was obtained. It makes it possible to legally go after you if you infringe on other peoples IP. Nobody has said that your RL indentity must be revealed to the rest of the SecondLife community unless you decide to do so. I don't care if I only know you as Toysoildier, but the minute I found you infringed on my IP, I would be very interested to know who you are. Having that disclosed to Linden Lab gives me a certain assurance. That was Medhue's belief on how PIOF was somehow going to improve sales as they will know me better and feel more comfortable buying from a merchant that exposes himself. But go back to your initial statement. Honestly, LL does not personally care if Evil Doing Merchant #1 is stealing IP from Good Open Honest Reveal All RL info to LL Merchant #2. This is not an issue between this evil merchant and LL - its an issue between Merchants. So maybe you are lulled into a false sense of comfort that if MP was made up of only PIOF / Premium Account holders, but if were an evil doing Merchant and your content is something I would love to steal and make $ on, I would just buy a copy or steal a copy as one of your customers and then sell it inworld. I would take it to Inworldz and other open sims where your small sphere of control does not exist and make cash on your IP there. So your hopes that adding more controls on MP will scare away all the evil doers and solve your IP woes is wishful thinking. What it will do is move a lot of the problem elsewhere and at the same time discourage a lot of creative legit content from new or existing merchants that do not wish to do business within these MP controls. But really.... you and porky and medhue and any others that would like mandatory controls that would only allow "professional" commercial merchants to use MP would actually hope that these controls do scare away evil and legit merchants.... lesss competition for you to deal with I guess. Thankfully - LL Commerce does not listen to their customers - so this means they will never listen to the ideas in this thread about mandatory merchant controls like Premium Account holders only. (PS to make you feel better - I was forced to PIOF but only because I wanted to convert all my profits to RL $)

Medhue Simoni wrote: I wouldn't say the theory is out the window.... Actually Medhue, lets get back to what theory Gavin suggestion... Gavin said to me: "Why would you expect LL to take you serious as a merchant and remain anonymous?" He did not ask why would my customers expect to take me seriou as a Merchant. And again, my response was that "I DO NOT CARE IF LL DOES OR DOES NOT TAKE ME SERIOUSLY". It has already been established for a very long time by most of the merchant community that LL Commerce does not take the entire Merchant community serious - regardless if some of the members have PIOF or not. And honestly, when a vendor / supplier of my (like LL is) treats their customers with such complete disrespect - it is not a major factor if they want to take me serious or not. They already do not take me nor you nor Gavin seriously - regardlesss if our identity is known or not. I only care if my customers trust me enough that they will want to buy from me. And in that manner, you and Gavin and Porky can have your theories but they are simply acedemic - the VAST MAJORITY of SL customers (at least most of mine) dont take even 1 second to check if I have a PIOF... nor do they care Medhue if you are a nice guy in RL or have a family in Iceland or you are a sheep herder in Scotland. You all are kidding yourselves if this is a major factor in your products being sold. I love to get to know my customers - if they reach out and ask me a question or are in my store and I will engage in an intro "HI - is there any way I can help you". But, 99% of my customers go onto MP, find my product (either by search or word of mouth) and simply buy my product because my listing convinced them that they needed it and it would work. As such, since I do not care to have LL's respect (since they dont respect their customers in general), and since having their respect would improve my sales any, and since my customers buy from me even if they do or dont know who I am, then.... me maintaining my RL privacy and anonymity is of greater importance. Ohhh and for Gavin Porky and you that all are hoping that LL will force Merchants to reveal their RL identity in order to participate in SL activities - your hopes go against the CIO of LL that has a very strong understanding and holds a very high importance in the ability for SL Customers to remain anonymous. He has made several presentations on the reasons why. Your RL identity being discovered may not be of high importance to you... but for countless others it has very high importance and so the principle and practice to maintain this anonymity is critical for them. So dont question or judge others that have a high importance to keeping their RL / SL relation private just because it is of low value to you. As for Porky's belief that all Merchants must be a Premium account to be a Merchant.... sorry - I dont see any value in this and in fact all it does is not only reduce the Merchant population of possible "evil doers" it will also reduce the Merchant community size of legit merchants that do not want to be premium account holders. There is very little value in being a premium account holder - this would simply be a tax grab for LL. Copybotters and all other evils will simply sell more of their stuff inworld where an annual Merchant Fee is not required. You all need to stop with the "life would be so much better if there were more Merchant fees and controls and and and" theories. Put yourself in the shoes of most of your customers. They dont care about your theories of what makes them buy products..... PIOF and Premium accounts etc. doesnt do any of this.

Gavin Hird wrote: Toysoldier Thor wrote: As was mentioned.... its a matter of policy / principle when operating online with online gaming / social networks to have a strong level of adherence to maintaining high anonymity. I really didnt want even LL to know my RL personal identification - in any way. Why would you expect LL to take you serious as a merchant and remain anonymous? A very good and sound business principle is that the parties are known to each other. IMO you should not be able to list on the marketplace without LL having your real identity on record. ROFL... first of all.... LL doesnt have to take me serious. I dont make any money from them so I dont care one plug nickel if they dont take me serious. As long as they do their job and treat your customers LIKE ME as any vendor should treat a customer. The people that I want to take me serious already do.... MY CUSTOMERS... fellow SL residents. And its great that a lot of merchants seem to as well. I was just asked to be in ( and will be in a few weeks ) a book being written about how to start and operate a successful business in sl. and isnt it so funny Gavin.... the 1000+ customer I have that have paid me $1000's of US cash for my few products I offer the market.... none of them seemed to be too concerned that they didnt know my real identity. rofl Soooooo Gavin.... I am guessing your theory is pretty much out the window since I made a ton of cash being in business in SL ... using a VENDOR like LL as a platform to make my cash. LL doesnt or shouldnt care who the real person behind the merchant is that is generating their revenue for them and generating all their content on their grid.... as long as they have a way to pay me my cash when I earn too much linden in my account.

TatianaDokuchic Varriale wrote: "Technical, all other types of rezzed prims and group of prims each have a fixed LI=1 or a multiple of 1 x the number of these units." Well actually that's not the case. As I've said, I now have linksets that contain only simple prims with a LI lower than the Prim Count. See Ciaran Laval's blog Using Convex Hull to Lower Land Impact if you would like more information about that. This means that LI is now relevant to ALL objects being sold not just those that contain Mesh which is why it's time it was included in the Marketplace. As a consumer I would now rather know the LI (including disclaimers) than the Prim Count. This also means that I now have prefab homes and furniture that are half the LI than what they originally were and I would like to highlight that fact. I'm certainly not talking about tricking customers but rather informing them. LI is here to stay so we should be finding ways to educate our clientele and provide them with information that is relevant today. To me the Convex Hull is moreso a prim that falls into the true MESH category then the basic prim category. I joked at Medhue in another thread when I said that he should be creating MESHED cubes and spheres and sell on marketplace the more efficient LI of a meshed prim. This used to a joke to sell a cube prim on marketplace and to see customers buy these prims.... but hey... maybe there is a business in making more efficient basic prims The new Pet Rocks of MP

Madeliefste Oh wrote: Toysoldier Thor wrote: This might not work for all mesh markets but for example, IF in the future its feasible to sell mesh landscape terrains (it isnt right now), then why wouldnt a mesh maker make the initial model 1m x 1m x 1m in size on rez? When the model scales in size - the LI will skyrocket but since the listing only reports LI on initial rez - the listing will look good and competitive. Another sleezy trick is for the builder to provide scripts to the build as seperate items and optional add-ons to the listing being sold. Normally these scripts would have freely and with no thought added to the object, but since scripts in a mesh model impacts LI, why not take them out of the object and include the scripts in the item sold for the buyer to decide if they want to place it into the object? So now you see another issue in LI that would have to be figured out on Marketplace.... setting an agreed standard of what a mesh LI is measured at when posted on a listing. Without these rules / standards, I see LI being gamed by smart creators that could increase sales by how they build their items to manipulate LI on Rez. The LI field should be linked to a size field. It should not be possible to put in a LI number, without also filling in the size field. There could also be a field that can be checked for scripts, like 'no scripts', 'scripts included in object', 'scripts available but not included in object. Now you are talking Made The other posters here are just saying "LI's are here to stay so just start using it and educate the customers on what LI really means" BUT that is easier said than done. AND we are all naive here if we think that all merchants will play fair and no merchant will GAME the LI number. If it makes better sales by a Merchant selling a Couch that is .5 x .5 x .5 in order to keep his couch at a lower LI then his competitor or to let the customer add into the couch the scripts they want within the pack so that the LI count on the couch is lower without the scripts.... THEY WILL DO IT. Made... you are doing what I wanted to hear.... you are addressing the hurdles that the Mesh developers that created this crazy complex LI model didnt care to deal with.... How to set listing standards for a field value that has no relevence because of its inherent variability. And LI value would have to be tied directly (with mandatory inputs) with SIZE of MESH, # of Scripts included in the listing so that the customer knows exactly what makes up the LI value. If this info is not provided by the Merchant as a mandatory for mesh listings then the LI can and will be GAMED.

WADE1 Jya wrote: Interesting viewpoint Medhue, although we are in agreement on these points.... I take kind of the complete opposite stance on my overall conclusions in the end... I am very aware of how corrupt & corporate-serving all world governments are.... lobbbyists & plutocracy controls all... it is really bad... but corporations want zero regulation when it limits their business. I want solid strict regulation of most things, not just internet. If not regulated, corporations tend to do very very nasty things. They are often driven by profit and that is the only motivation, it is really that simple... and it leads to them being quite evil if left unsupervised. Regulation is all that guards against our food being poison, helps keep our medicines real, safe vehicles, provides us truth in advertising & more. Poorly regulated industries like Big Oil and Big Pharma show the problems with a deregulated system lacking effective enforcement, and they are always lobbying for more lax regulations to save themselves money or increase profit at all costs. They do not care if their business literally kills people, as long as money keeps growing. Sometimes laws are actually good and there to protect people. When people speak up in unison intelligently we can bend laws to favor the people, not to serve corporations. I still think google & facebook pulled the wool over everyones eyes with this one to protect their own business models. These big web corporations could take some responsibility. How hard would it be for Google to include a "Report Copyright Infringement" in google search.... the same way there is a "Report Spam" option in gmail. Instead they insist to do nothing to help honest people. Often piracy sites are so blatently obvious it just takes one human to look at it and it could just be blocked so simple because it is purely an infested rats nest of open theivery, not a matter of fixing a few links. I would provide a link to a real big obvious one based in Russia here that I have been fighting with as example of why in my opinion some sort of revised improved SOPA/PIPA/ACTA is needed, but for obvious reasons I won't link to this offensive material Google will never block these type of bad sites unless forced to, and Google themselves must also protected 100% against liabilities or they would never take action to block pirated materials. Assuming Google wished to help us (I think they do not want to help the creative person), they too need a nice set of robust governement regulations to begin to take action against pirates.... regulations thus far lacking & nonexistent. Well that's my opinion anyways.... what do you think? WADE, I know you understand the corporate corruption as do most of us... as you agree that the corporate corruption and/or pure effort to generate every penny of profits by any means (legal, immoral, unethical, illegal) to help their bottom line. SOPA was this industries attempt to get the government to force others to become directly responsible to protect and enforce the "rights holder" copyright material. They have the laws on the books now to do their jobs while the Internet still remains free and un-censored. In their extreme goal to enforce their copyrights and squeeze every drop from content that others created for them AND to do it at as low a cost and effort as possible, they figured they would bamboozle / payoff politicians and brainwash the weak minded that SOPA was needed to protect creators. In actual fact, it was an ANY COST to enyone else. Sony, Disney, etc. dont care if the Internet is censored in the process or that other corporations or individuals would have to take on these cost burdens or lose their profitability to enforce their interests by deploying SOPA. So.... lets respond to your "WHY DOESNT GOOGLE..." idea. I know because of the side you have taken on SOPA that some of the details to your idea have not been thought through but let me do that thinking for you... So.... you want Google and all other Search Engine service providers on the Internet to be forced by regulation to spend development time and effort to come up with a technology and process and added infrastructure to drive a "copyright infringement reporting / blocking" system? Do I have to go on with this thought? I will. So WADE, are you willing to put YOUR MONEY into a fund that will pay all these search providers to build and run this system that only benefits YOU? Since it is 100% your responsibility to protect your copyright, it is your responsibility to pay all costs associated for this protection. Since Google and the dozens of other search providers gains NO BENEFIT in deploying this solution that only benefits you, why should they deploy it with no compensation to them. In fact - at a huge cost to them. Secondly, since Search Engine providers like Google make actual money (its Google's largest stream of income) in selling ads on websites all over the world, not only will filter and reduceing traffic to these suspect illegal sites be a pain to filter but your are asking them to take a major hit on their main revenue streams. So lets ask you the next question WADE... since its established that YOU are responsible for protecting your copyrights and those costs are diectly your responsibility, will you be willing to pay a portion of all of Google's and every other search engine's lost profits by protecting you ?? Be ready to be paying more in protecting your copyright then its worth if you say YES. Now lets talk about the technical feasibility of monitoring, reporting, filtering/blocking copyright violating content. Biggest question... WHOS CONTENT? What list does Google use to know that ANY website around the world contains content that is violating someone's copyright? If its fair, it should ANYONE's for ANY VIOLATION. So that would mean that if this was even possible, Google and all other search providers would have blocked the website of the actual website of the US congressman that introduced SOPA as a bill (since he used copyright violating image on his site). In actuality WADE, you just want google to block websites that those with the money to take a site to court want blocked. So you want Google to block all sites and content that HOLLYWOOD deems blockable. How do I get my photoart protected against all those that illegally copied my photoart? Specially when the violators can and likely doe simply change the name of the content? Let me finish this point by saying, the technical feasibility to FAIRLY monitor, report, block sites using or publishing copyright violating content is so far from impossible that it makes me laugh to think how it would be done. But you already know that what you want Google to enforce is the select list of sites that HOLLYWOOD would demand blocked - very simple and complely not a fair system. Finally, forget about economics and costs, what you are suggesting in your simplistic view of the solution that Censorship and filtering of content being search is OK. This is where I fundamentally am so much against SOPA and where you are clearly OK with this - as long as it benefits your personal interests. So if SOPA would have forced Google and all other search providers to arbitrarily block copyright violating content. Based on who's determination? Unless you have connections with the big industry hollywood mega corps, your content will not be on any list. But worse yet, slippery slope of Censorship. If Hollywood would have had SOPA to force all the Internet providers to block sites that THEY thought were illegal, then what? Lets ask Google to block sites that the Government (US or other countries) are not in the best interest of their policies. Why? Well its in the best interests of the citizens that these sites be censored. And if the supposedly the most free country in the world (cough cough - most outside USA dont believe it but lets run with this) is allowed to enforce a law that censors Internet content for something so vain as copyright violating search results, why not something far more important like protecting the soverign interests of a country like China, Arab states, etc. where searching for content that might open the population's mind to new ideas and cause lost control on their power?? So WADE... there is your simple solution fully discussed and analyzed. Still think its a good idea to impose your copyright protection responsibilities onto other parties like Google? If you say YES... then you now fully know what I labeled you as GREEDY. Your profits at ALL COSTS.

First of all the LI and its variability based on its use / deployment is still and likely for a very long time only going to pertain to any item you buy that has a MESH model included in the build. Technical, all other types of rezzed prims and group of prims each have a fixed LI=1 or a multiple of 1 x the number of these units. So LL Commerce (if they had the time to focus on anything other than DD with their staff) wanted to provide more information to Marketplace Buyers, they could change the listings in a couple ways. They could leave the PRIM COUNT field alone and it can be used for any listing where NO MESH models are part of the item being sold. So a prim count of 12 is a fix count. Then they could then add a new field called LAND IMPACT for any item that uses a mesh model in its build. This field should warn buyers that the LI will change if the purchased item is adjected or amended after rezzing. So the LI field is LI ON INITIAL REZ. They could remove PRIM COUNT and just replace it with LI. So an item with 12 non-mesh prims in it would report an LI=12. If it has mesh then it would be reported as the prim count on initial rez. For either option the biggest issue with the LI field when it comes to selling and which the creators of the LI concept didnt think about or care (they were only focused on the pure acedemic aspects of figuring out the perfect formula to determine every possible factor that would cause a mesh to cause lag on a sim) was that since LI is a potentially powerful selling feature in determining a sale, smart MESH MAKERS will start making Mesh model very small in scale which would positively impact one factor in the calculation of a LI of a mesh. This might not work for all mesh markets but for example, IF in the future its feasible to sell mesh landscape terrains (it isnt right now), then why wouldnt a mesh maker make the initial model 1m x 1m x 1m in size on rez? When the model scales in size - the LI will skyrocket but since the listing only reports LI on initial rez - the listing will look good and competitive. Another sleezy trick is for the builder to provide scripts to the build as seperate items and optional add-ons to the listing being sold. Normally these scripts would have freely and with no thought added to the object, but since scripts in a mesh model impacts LI, why not take them out of the object and include the scripts in the item sold for the buyer to decide if they want to place it into the object? So now you see another issue in LI that would have to be figured out on Marketplace.... setting an agreed standard of what a mesh LI is measured at when posted on a listing. Without these rules / standards, I see LI being gamed by smart creators that could increase sales by how they build their items to manipulate LI on Rez. There are a lots of hurdles and complexities in the selling of items that are based on LI's variability if a mesh model is included. The flaw that LL Mesh Developers didnt care about is that in their pursuit of creating the perfect LI formula, they didnt put any thought into how it will be listed / sold. They could have kept the LI formula much more simple and based on much courses thresholds that would not only have made MESH models more attractive to build (lower penalties for uploading and rezzing on the land) but also easier to list and sell. Ohh well... So the question is.... which approach does LL consider deploying and how does LL deploy a listing change that fairly represents the Mesh model's true efficiency vs it being gamed?

On another note from listening to Stallman, he said something that never poked in my mind until he said it.... So a question to the group here... I am a Canadian (Stallman's presentation was at the University of Calgary) and Stallman said that the DMCA was a law create by American and has no power outside the US. So... that being said, if inside SL some goofball were to wrongly file a DMCA against some of my works, what would LL's position be? The filing would be against a person that is not American and therefore not enforcable. Would LL execute a takedown of my content when a US filed DMCA is not enforcable against me? Even if MY content that was being attacked with a DMCA resides on a LL serve located in the US, the dispute is about the content - not its location. How would a scenario like this play out?

Medhue.... The Stallman video was awesome. I watched the whole video. Amazing how many thoughts and statements he made that I was trying to explain to WADE1 in another thread. WADE should watch this Stallman video but since WADE has admitted to be on the side of the Publisher / non-creator "rights holder", WADE will publically dismiss and disagree with Stallman. But many thoughts Stallman was saying are pretty much my beliefs and see what is happening in the US Government being used as a willing puppet to the NON-CREATING mega-corp rightsholders of that was created. The SOPA and PIPA and ACTA are all perfect examples of the propaganda and scandal that these companies constantly will try to gain control. Too bad that the TRUE ARTISTS and those that are creating these wonderful works like Puus N Boots & Titanic, or to the 99% of musicians that are not getting their fair share of the sales generated from THEIR music which the record companies hold, or the 2D and 3D artists of paintings and shapes etc. or books..... dont get their fair share for what they created. Too bad there are so many - specially in Government that have been brainwashed to believe that these proposed laws are to protect the rights of the actual creators.

Jennifer Boyle wrote: Toysoldier Thor wrote: The decision is personal and I understand the reasons why he wouldnt - I surely didnt want to. I ask this, not confrontationally, but just seeking understanding; why? I could understand that having to have PIOF would be a problem if you couldn't do it, but if you could, why would yoi mind? I especially wonder, since you can register a throwaway CC number (or prepaid debit card number) and have PIOF, and if you use it just once, you can have PIU, after which you can cancel it and have nothing on file without affecting your PIU status. As was mentioned.... its a matter of policy / principle when operating online with online gaming / social networks to have a strong level of adherence to maintaining high anonymity. I really didnt want even LL to know my RL personal identification - in any way. LL has proven countless times since I started how weak and immature both their development and business policies are. To give a company like this my RL credentials (even yoru "throw away" CC means they now know your RL name and likely credit check you through that card to find out more about you) is something I was and still am uncomfortable about when I generally do not prefer giving out my RL ID that ties it to my SL/online personna. I dont want my anyone generally to relate my SL and RL. So... myself and many others like me have a policy that we generally do not like breaking of not release RL identity from our online alias. thats why.

Great news! I am sure you gave him great added insight and validation to what his book is trying to educate ppl on. Cheers!

Hollee Dion wrote: I almost laughed when I read the subject of the post. Sure, you could file a Jira but I agree with the above, it's a complete and utter waste of time. You might as well put your suggestions in a bottle and throw it out to sea for the good it would do. Look how old some of these feature requests and bug reports are. https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/WEB-2399 (opt out of email spam - year and half) https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/WEB-2324 (Multiple store fronts - year and half) https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/WEB-3406 (simple character count bug - one year) LOL Hollee.... I think most SL residents that actually try to work with LL and follow LL's stated formal process to get them to solve discovered bugs and work in features that LL's customers are asking for already know all too well that LL does not actully respect their own processes nor the JIRA system. For the most part LL uses the JIRA system just so it keeps us busy for a bit and makes us believe that now that its in their system - they will actually put bug fixes and enhancements into a priority queue to get resolved. But companies like LL can only play the trick for so long. Most know its a joke now. You think your JIRA's are are good examples of how badly LL neglects Jira when you listed a 2 year old unresolved JIRA? Try this one that I have tried to get LL to resolve for a long time and that affects my Landscape sculpty customers and many on yhr grid.... https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/VWR-4018 (Just past 4th year without a resolution - LL recently put this Jira into the status of "UNRESOLVED" but iit still in the worst stauts of JIRA "PRODUCT BACKLOG". I swear they do this status switching every few months just to make their customers think there is movement on the Jira. A year from now I will show you this bug will still be open) So YES.... Filing a JIRA is an utter waste of time.

Medhue Simoni wrote: Check this out. Lamar Smith, the senator that wrote the act, had a copyright violation on his own website. http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/11747/sopa-author-lamar-smith-rtx-breaks-copyright-law-on-his-own-website What a moron! Yes I couldnt agree with you more. It completely proves my arguments to WADE1.... This politician like so many others have absolutely no clue about the bill they brought forward to make a law. They were not even involved in writing up the bill - it was likely written up completely by the Movie Music TV heavyweights and this congressman was given some briefing notes on "How do I sound like I know what I am talking about". Combine that with some unseen lobbyist glad handing under the table.... and you get yourself a new LAW! Then they violate the very laws they are trying to pass. OHHH OHHH but hold on Medhue... this Congressman only wanted a law to stop "foriegners from pirating American content".... since this Comgressman is an American - all is OK. Plus... all this Congressman did was violate a copyright of a lame little IMAGE.... surely that is not covered by SOPA.... the intent of SOPA was to protect the big budget movies, music, and TV shows that the lobbyists wanted protection for. There was no intent or care about protecting copyrighted content from liitle guys like us photographers and artists. They are too small to worry about. LOL - SOPA... a complete joke exposed for what it really was. But be ready everyone - this industry will try to bamboozle another US politician to sneak this scam into law.