Toysoldier Thor

But its not even SHINY.... these reports are the exact same reports that were released with the original deploy of MP. Yesterday's release upgrade did ZERO to these reports. Not sure why some are thinking there is ANY changes to these report.

lol i was going to say the same thing. Those lame limited non-resetting counters have been there since the new MP replaced xstreet. In fact LL Commerce gutted the xstreet reports and gave us these two crappy reports. The counts on all your items have been counting from zero since the summer of 2010 so even if you compare views to sales (which I did in the fall of 2010 to see the view/sale ratio), the counts are of such a huge period that the averaged stats are pretty much meaningless to look at. If your top selling item has a count of 400 (about what mine has) and it has 250,000 views (about what mine has), what does the ratio really mean? the view count could have had a huge december 2010 spike that disappeared because of an advertising campaign or you changed pricing or new competition etc. Since the count that LL gives you is from inception of MP, the counts are equivelent to a US National Debt Counter - Neat trivia but pretty much useless for any business decisions. I still shake my head that in LL Commerce's attempt to provide us a better marketplace to replace xstreet, they offer us these utterly useless reports to replace the xstreet reports that at least had SOME value (not much). Old useless reports Made.....

good thoughts but for a population to shift toward not buying sculpties and wait for mesh ... this would not be a shift that happens iwithin 1 week. I had a major collapse on Aug 1. Secondly, anyone that knows mesh knows that meshed landscapes are still not a viable competitor ro Sculpties. but i am sure some customer / builders might think it is. I am not saying Brooke single handedly was to blame but as the new manager of the commerce group, her leadership on the team's direction and execution of plans is under her guidance. The whole LL commerce and development team has flaws. For me, thes sales from about late aug seems to be my new norm that i have to just accept.

Darrius Gothly wrote: I don't believe Toy is talking about actual errors in the displayed value, I believe he is referring to the downturn in expected revenues after each update. While it's not possible to calculate the difference exactly, anyone with some historical data and a bit of chart making expertise can point to clear dips in actual income versus what would have been statistically predicted. So Darrius, as per your request and without taking days to create, here is a chart of my profit taking from SecondLife from as far back as Oct 2010 (that is as far back as my PayPal payout to $US transaction go on the SL history logs). Since I generally liquidate my SL account to $0L when my balance reaches about $100US, the best way to represent my running tab of profits over time was to convert each event to a AVG $ PROFITS / DAY PER EVENT. Each bar you see on the chart is an actual Paypal withdraw event and its Avg$/Day on that event. So a few things to note on the chart. - The trend prior to this chart's 1st event was about the same. It was quite stable since late fall 2009. What you are seeing is how my long stable trend begins to end shortly after Brooke's arrival at LL Commerce. - Notice the frequency of withdraws to Paypal and how they radically shift from almost a weekly event to event not happening for 2 to 3 weeks at a time. - Notice the major decline that began almost on AUG 1 when LL executed some not fully known changes which caused a lot of grief to merchants - including me - andof which my sales never recovered from. - Notice the Sep 13th disaster changes to SLM that Commerce deployed and how it even further collapsed my sales. It has now flattened out to this new low level. - I am sure the LL CheerLeaders will come up with countless non-LL related excuses / reasons why my sales have noticably declined since summer of this year when Brooke's team began executing some of their changes to SLM. But in my opinion these changes are primarily related to the current LL commerce team's handling of the SLM.

Arwen, your questions on the Manage Inventory date is completely legit. I have not added an item into my SLM magicbox in months.... yet I have dates all over the place including dates of TODAY and a few days ago. The dates are not based on last edited, not by last sold, not by when created as a listing, not as when made active, not anything relevent. I have no clue what the date is for. Either the date is completely broken or means something obscure that even LL doesnt know what its for.

So if Commerce Team is actually going to start fixing the smaller items of SLM, maybe they can add these fixes, functions, features into their secret list of priorities... "Top Selling Products" "Top Searched Products" at least have a count reset. Even this request is far from great but being the LL wants to totally ignore any Merchant Reporting functions, something as simply as Zeroing out the count is a baby step. My top Searched Product is a whopping 384206 since SLM started counted back in summer of 2010 - WOW what an utterly useless stat. Optionally for request #1, to convert these two simple reports to at least a last 3 month daily count histograph of these counts - like Xstreet had. Optionally on Reporting (yeah I know I am wishing for a lottery win here but...) if LL could integrate Google Analytics to listing pages. LL... if you give us merchants this.... we will never bug you ever ever ever again on SLM reporting. why? You will not be able to compete with Google Analytics for website traffic reporting - so outsource the function by letting us Merchants link our GA code to our product pages. PLEASEEEE! This is a REALLLL simple one but one that still has never been fixed by LL.... Fix the SLM website header so that if a merchant or customer wants to leave marketplace and go to the main www.secondlife.com website, they could do it by simply clicking the HOME icon. Wow how radical is that... a HOME button that takes you to SL's main home page. Right now there is no click from the maretplace to the main page. On the MANAGE INVENTORY, add some basic sorts for each column. i.e. sort by the name column, date (whatever date is for), price. On Transaction History, the Filtering Search is not reliable. I can type one full name in and it will find it and then type in another full name and it can find any transactions. MORE IMPORTANTLY... the customer filter search should allow wildcards. Filtered search should also allow filtering of Date Range. Clicking on a customer name on the orders/transaction history should also provide profile information. It would also be nice to be able to send an IM to this user without having to be logged into SL inworld. The ne USER LICENSE permission would be of some value if the customer actually had a EULA or Usage Agreement note to read prior to agreeing to a User License. Wouldnt that make sense? How bout a listing fields HELP system that explained all the fields like this new User License. When a sold item was actually delivered to the customer, the email notification that comes to the Merchant should include critical information that the Sales Confirmation reports in the email.... missing information that should be included are: Date/Time product was actually delivered, the name of the customer it was delivered to, the Order # and Item # being delivered. Not sure why LL did not thing this information was important for the delivery email. without this information, its hard to match the Sales and delivery email notifications together. Would be nice if when a customer that is on one of my listings wants to contact me while being on my page. i.e. SEND MERCHANT AN EMAIL. just some ideas

So Darrius.... If this USER LICENSE is exactly what you say it is.... then where on the listing do I offer the actual USER AGREEMENT note that is currently in my boxed item? How can a user agree to a USER LICENSE that they cannot read ahead of time? Maybe this is why the USER LICENSE permission joy buzzer makes no sense. As a customer I can click "I AGREE" and since there was nothing to agree to... I am legally safe from any agreed to terms. This joy buzzer does nothing but add another click to my customers.

The issue for me after reading this description is that my SLM Magicbox status shows pretty much all my items I loaded into the magicbox in 2011 are considered unassociated. What is confusing is that even though the SLM magicbox status says all these items are unassociated to a listing, they are in fact associated to a listing and active listings. And I am 99% sure they have successfully sold. I will have to test a purchase tonight to be 100%. So why is the magicbox status saying all these items are NOT associated? I am too afraid to synch my magicbox because it might actually break what I believe is working.

That is why a lot of Merchants need to test LL's code. I didnt have any orphaned listings in SLM so my store seems to not be affected by this bug that LL still has not fixed. I am worried that all the content I added into Magic box this year show up on the magicbox Status as "Items that appear to not be associated with any Marketplace listing" when in fact they are. As such, I dare not press the SYNCH WITH MAGICBOX button for fear of what that will do with a dozen of my listings.

Without being able to test a purchase, the Merchant screen for inventory management looks good and so far stable. I tried the functions they mentioned and it worked. My magicbox status is totally reporting far outdated information (saying that the new inventory I added since MP started are still unassociated when I know they are not. But so far so good... I just cant test actual transactions.

First explain to us what the USER LICENSE is and exactly what active function it plays? I looked around the Merchant inventory management page for a HELP button and nothing on it. I clicked on it and enabled it for one of my items... nothing seemed change. So... since the site has no help to describe what the button is for and what it actively does, please enlighten us.

Sassy Romano wrote: Dartagan Shepherd wrote: But I do see feedback from the forums, answers and other sources heard too. Nothing wrong with listening to many people from many sources. Agreed, then what you do is form a plan and communicate it with the major stakeholders. I'm just not sure who that happens to be considered to be? You'd think the Marketplace stakeholders would be the customers and crucially the merchants but it seems not. I can't think that anyone at LL is *really* a major stakeholder. Nope, i've just checked my Project Management references and the CEO isn't the major stakeholder here. It really wouldn't hurt to say "Thank you for all the feedback you provide on a regular basis, your thoughts are wide and varied and clearly quite passionate. We've consolidated your thoughts and it would appear that the issues of major concern are the following <list> and we plan to do <insert actions> in order to address these. There are some features that are outside the present scope and resources, these being <list of exceptions>. Does this seem sensible to you?" I just don't understand why this all happens in such a cloaked way then up pops some solutions as a "here you are!" when clearly some of the things asked for have been requested as priorities for over a year and not a peep about them. Where's the filter for the new shiny thing called MESH on MP? I can list an object as being Mesh but I can't search for products that are only mesh? Yet I can do that for other permissions. Go figure. Trivial UI change, equally trivial SQL query to implement it. Ho hum. I knew there was a reason i loved you Sassy. Toy's 1000% approval and support on this way of any company / IS operation - including LL Commerce - of collecting and communicating their plans and roadmap. and yes... an I.S. group IS NOT a stakeholder. A customer or a company's representative for the customer would be the stakeholder. Not that Brooke truly understands the life of a merchant but I suspect Brooke believes she can be the Merchant's Spokesperson and speak on behalf of all of us.... even though that would involve the Spokesperson fully understanding the business and collecting the feedback from those he/she is representing. Brooke does not do this so clearly she is not a stakeholder.

OK.... seems we have come out of the update... November 30, 2011 Latest Release Date: 11/30/2011 This release fixes some outstanding issues from the September release of Marketplace, as well as adding some new functionality. The merchant admin inventory management counts, filters, and search functionality have all been fixed. In addition, inventory items not associated with a listing have been separated out into an inventory only section--and we have added User Licensed as a permissions option. The final feature that has been added is a minimum account age for becoming a merchant. An account must be at least 5 days old to create a store (become a Merchant) on the Marketplace. For more details, see the Marketplace Release Notes are now posted on the wiki. SO Merchants... do your testing....

You still didnt clearly explain this new USER LICENSE feature they are adding now. What is it. So we will now see on all prims a MOD COPY TRANS USERLICENSE permission option. If I click on this USER LICENSE permission what restriction will this apply to the prim or object vs MOD COPY TRANS? You seem to be deep into Mesh and as you are suggestion - this new feature is coming from Mesh. I would think this is a more fundamental change than what is needed in Marketplace. As for Beta testing (open beta testing), where in my posts here am i complaining that the DD Beta Grid Testing was an issue? Its great that the open beta grid is going to happen and that merchants can go in and find all of LL's DD bugs. What I was complaining about is exactly what I mentioned to Darrius.... F'ed Up LL COMMUNICATIONS! Their announcement of today's changes strongly implied (because of the titles of the BETA WIKI vs the MAIN WIKI) that the changes will be applied to the Beta grid of MP but that there was going to be changes applied to the Main MP but not clearly explained what the changes were. Thankfully Darrius - our resident LL Communications Interpreter helped convert LL Speak into what most humans can follow. As for a priority list of what LL Commerce is working on... this fits perfectly in place with my previous post's complaints.... if there are fixes, features, new functions on LL Commerce's priority list, show me a consolidated clear communication of this list. Features and fixes to SLM are dropping into LL Commerce's TODO Priority list but they are coming from countless sources. You say "ohhh if you only would have been part of this group or this initiative or followed this JIRA or read this blog or read this forum thead from 2009 or or or or or.... then of course we all were asking for this". Come on Dart.... other than possible you and Darrius and a couple other rare Merchants of SL that seem to partake in EVERYTHING that LL development teams are involved in, 99% of Merchants dont. What SLM Merchants could follow is a single list of LL Commerce fixes, features, functions, initiatives on LL Commerce's radar and a possible ETA or priority of each. If you are going to say that this is too complex to create.... then WTF list is Brooke following? Clearly she knows the list and is following it.... PUBLISH IT ! Damn rights I am on a roll.

In anticipation that there will be disucssions on the results of SLM's functionality and stability after LL Commerce bring SLM back into production after these changes, here is the thread to dump it. As fellow Merchants blow the dust off their SLM store and start testing if LL actually properly tested their changes this time and that SLM survived a LL Change with no major glitches, bugs, etc.... or if the JIRAs will start sprouting like mushrooms, you can throw them up in this thread.

So Reading Darrius's list of changes that hits us in 10 minutes.... User Licensed is now an option for permissions Resident accounts must have a minimum age of 5 days to create a store (become a Merchant) What exactly is "user licensed" in my permissions? When did we ask for this in our backlog of things from LL Commerce Team to fix and focus on? There is a new permission to MOD COPY TRANS? Someone explain this high demand new feature?? What is the purpose for waiting 5 days to become a Merchant? Is this some lame deterrent to stop ... uhmmm... what? Help me out on this Sassy. You are normally aware of what LL Commerce might be thinking. And how did these two features bubble up to be a priority to deploy yet reporting is still a "never to deploy backburner feature"? EDITED Post: Another question to ask to the void since LL never answers questions in public.... Clearly someone in LL and some of the Merchant population are working together to 1) come up with their list of SLM fixes and new features, 2) set a priority that suits their specific needs. Who might be influencing LL to put development effort and resources towards these obscure features which I have never seen anyone in the general merchant community even ask for - much less scream to LL to deploy? Come on Brooke, who is influencing you on the weird priorities you set for your team to work on?

Darrius Gothly wrote: The section I clipped states specifically: "This release is scheduled for deployment on November 30, 2011 between 8am and 10 am SLT." These are the pre-release notes for the planned release today. Not only does the Grid Status post state that quite plainly ("For release notes and details on where to check out this new release, please see the Marketplace Beta Release Notes.") but the anticipated release time stated in the wiki page matches precisely with today's release downtime. Two points for, one against (and as we all know from reading far too many contracts, the section titles have absolutely no bearing on the meaning, intent or message of the explanatory text) ... therefore I believe they are following the advice given after the last major update by posting pre-release "what we intend" notes and, after the update, fix up the regular release notes and attend to any boo-boo's at that time. PS: By "boo-boo" I mean where they intended to release a specific feature, but because of whatever issues arise after release, that specific feature has been rolled back and not included in the "final" release. Sooooo..... what you are trying to say is.... If you can think like a Linden Commerce Team member who likes to communicate a thought in the same way that a pinball bounces around in a pinball machine and if you are smart enough to translate LL's incorrect misleading Blog / Wiki Titles and if you are a person that is good with legal contracts.... THEN YOU TOO CAN CLEARLY UNDERSTAND THE MESSAGES THAT LL IS TRYING TO TELL YOU. Come on Darrius. Are you going to stand here and tell me that Brooke's release notes on what is happening on today's changes was simple to find, follow, and understand? LL has more buckets of WIKI's than a beach has grains of sand and cross connects their website, blogs, JIRAs, and these countless WIKIs together like a bowl of spagetti. I think you should approach Brooke and ask to become their new communication VP. Your posts make sense. You can speak human. So fellow Merchants.... hold on to your Butt Cheeks.... here we go again. Another LL Commerce Marketplace Change Ride. Hopefully see you on the other side.

Actually Darrius, I was referring to protecting anything within your control prior to LL Commerce making changes to the marketplace (which we often know they love to slide in changes to anything possibly related - including any financial systems). So as a precaution (and I dont care if LL has or has not impacted my account balance), there are only two things we merchants can do to reduce the risk / impact of LL's often screwed up changes.... Backup your MagicBoxes Liquidate your SL Account's $L Account balance to the lowest level possible which still allows you to operate. There is no danger in liquidating your account anyway - so why not take the precaution. As for my sales eroding since the changes Brooke's team has made to MP, I can show you via the number of time I liqidate my $L to $US over the past 1.5 years how Brooke's reign and recent set of changes (starting this early Aug) has aligned with my declining SL income. Dont have the numbers here now... but I will work on that just for you.

I read that WIKI Darrius but you clipped that set of fixed from the wrong WIKI. Here is the link that you provided to the status and that we all read... Scheduled Marketplace Update [postED] 2:10PM PST 29, November 2011] There will be Marketplace downtime on Wednesday, November 30, 2011 from 8am -10am PST for a deploy. For release notes and details on where to check out this new release, please see the Marketplace Beta Release Notes. (Once the deploy is completed, the Production Release Notes will be updated.) Notice there are TWO release notes. You grabbed the list of fixed for the BETA GRID upgrade fixes that LL will be doing. I dont give a care about what changes LL will be making to the BETA grid. My business does not run on the Beta. Click on the link for the PRODUCTION RELEASE NOTES.... and tell me where the list of fixes are for the grid that matters most to us.... the PRODUCTION Marketplace.

So Darrius, I read the same status and I went to the wiki that relates to the status.... What am I missing that you are seeing? Where is the list of things that this update tomorrow morning will fix? Please clip it out and paste it here in this thread what the change tomorro will be trying to fix? I dont see it. As far as I see, Brooke has done what she did on Sep 13th.... posted an announcement that there will be a change the next day to marketplace and look at the wiki for what "we" changed after we applied the change. So we merchants will have to scramble right after the change window to hunt down and figure out what part of the system LL changed to test if its still working. Just like we had to last time. instead of just telling us in the wiki BEFORE the change what they intend to fix. If we at least knew what LL was going to focus the changes on we could immediately check what they failed to fix and what new potential bugs they introduced. We know from history that the LL team cant test even the most basic of fixes or features they introduce (aka Sep 13th). So they need us to do their testing and find their bugs but we also have to do it in the dark. LL commerce seems to think this is some kind of perverse hid and seek game.

Brooke is playing her same tricks again like Sep's marketplace update... Tomorrow at 8am SLT LL commerce is bringing down the SLM for 2 hours and Brooke and team refuses to release any information as to exactly what is being updated tomorrow. SO.... here we go again Merchants!! Hang onto your magicboxes and prepare for the worst. I liquidated my $L account to near 0 today and I backed up my magicbox. Other then that there is nothing else I can do but hope that the bugs this update creates wont impact me too much. Again, my prediction is that 2 JIRAs will be directly generated from this update tomorrow.

we were just talkin about this in the inworld Group Chat. I predict that LL Commerce will generate TWO JIRA's that will need immediate L attention.

Paladin Pinion wrote: Toysoldier Thor wrote: On the note of DD, the Open Beta has been running.... and yet not one word from any of those that were playing with it? WOW... is it really that clean and smooth running?? Or is there some kind of gag order in the open beta grid for DD as well? No, it doesn't start until December, and the exact date isn't known yet. No one has had a chance to see it yet. As clipped right from the SLM Merchant homepage "technical Announcements" November 04, 2011 BETA TESTING NOW AVAILABLE ON ADITI! Beta Now on Aditi: 11/3/2011 Beta Release Notes are posted on the wiki. But of course, how could I have been confused. Guess I need to read the fine print since LL's big lettered title says its NOW

Knowing LL Commerce's strong history of developing code and testing code quietly within production, what you are seeing with DD Folders magically appearing in your PRODUCTION account/inventory without you being notified first or not even a general notice from Brooke or her team that they will be experimenting on some of us.... THIS IS NORMAL LL DEPLOYMENT PRACTICE. LL Commerce has not yet developed the solution of DD that actually would deal with the migration / transitioning of Magicbox MP content to DD. Their team has been queitly scrambling to come up with a solution. So likely what you are seeing is their team testing it out on some of you. For LL their philosophy is "ITS EASIER TO ASK FOR FORGIVENESS THAN PERMISSION" On the note of DD, the Open Beta has been running.... and yet not one word from any of those that were playing with it? WOW... is it really that clean and smooth running?? Or is there some kind of gag order in the open beta grid for DD as well?

you didnt understand my point on the global change.