Grid Crashed Again — Ho Hum
by Alphaville Herald on 30/04/06 at 6:53 pm
We’re so bored at the Herald by griefers crashing the Grid that we didn’t even bother to report on yesterday’s Grid-crashing attack on Second Life. But with another Grid crash coming hot on its heels today, we just have to protest. Can’t the griefers of SL come up with anything more creative? Let’s just hope they don’t have Internet access in jail, since Robin Linden is throwing them to the lions again. But so far, the lions have proved toothless. And Linden Lab’s Love Machine doesn’t seem to be very interested in a technological solution, at least so far. With big corporations now contemplating projects in Second Life, and the Grid getting unprecedented attention in the media, LL will have to whip something up, and fast. If they don’t, it’s anyone’s guess where things will go. Could this be the beginning of the end?
TrannyPet Barmy
Apr 30th, 2006
Just a quick thought here, don’t you think you’re making quite a quick/broad assumption that the cause of the SL grid crashing is down to some “griefer” ?
It couldn’t possibly be because the population growth, and land expansion of SL has by far dwarfed it’s physical equipment expansion ? What i mean is, possible LindenLab’s grid is at breaking point and now needs upgrading, and the fact that their grid is crashing more often is a possible indication that their grid is now incapable of coping with the data volumes that are being thrown at it by an ever publicised exponentially increasing world population ?
Agreed, it may well be down to a ‘griefer’, however, i think it’s a bit rash to instantly assume some one acting maliciously every time the grid falls over. My personal belief is the above, and personally, i think it’s high time that LindenLab stop trying to pass the buck onto the ‘griefers’, get over it, FIX THE BUGGY SOFTWARE, FIX THE BUGGY GRID, UPGRADE THE HARDWARE WHERE NESSECARY !! What do they really think they can expand infinitely with out ever having to upgrade their infrastructure ??
Finally, any one im’ing me in yahoo/msn asking me if i had anything to do with this, please stop and read SecondCentral.com first, I haven’t been interested in SL in some time now, not to mention, contrary to popular beleifs, i’ve never actually intentionally crashed a sim or the grid yet !
TrannyPet Barmy
The Real One
Walker Spaight
Apr 30th, 2006
You make some good points, Tranny, but I’m just going by what Robin said in the forums, that they’re working with authorities to pursue the person responsible. So they may be assuming it’s a griefer when in fact it’s their overloaded hardware/software, I don’t know. But in fact, I doubt the problem in this case is on LL’s end.
Phillip Gateaux
Apr 30th, 2006
All I know is that I’m minding my own business sitting in my living room watching music videos and I get herpes. HERPES!!! Evil little balls, probably a dozen. Took forever to get the off of me. Shortly after that the grid went down. I doubt it was due to the number of residents online. The griefer is more likely responsible. And will most likely be back, under another name.
TrannyPet Barmy
Apr 30th, 2006
Thanks Walker, I dont have access to the forums(being permbanned kind of prevents it) so unfortunately I wouldn’t know exactly what was said and what wasn’t, but, remember not only is Robin making a statement that is going to be in favour of LindenLab …. ie; she’s not likely to say “well actually all our servers fell over today, as a result not being bothered or wanting to spend out cash on upgrades”, but, i dare say on top of this, she’s hardly likely to have had any word with the techs there, being as it’s the weekend, they’re more likely to get on with the repair job, and submit reports tomorrow to the boss.
The thing to remember here on the main part is, LindenLab are never going to say “actually the fault was ours, it was our buggy software, running on our overloaded network, that actually fell over”, they will ALWAYS pass the buck onto supposed malicious users, it’s not good business practice to be highlighting your own faults !!
The facts are clear from my experiences of SL and the talk i hear now, SL is/was buggy as hell and isn’t getting any better, if anything worse, as population increases. If LindenLab are serious about taking on large scale customers, then dont they think it’s about time they listen to the words i posted here some time ago ? CODE OUT THE ABILITY FOR MALICIOUS USERS TO KILL YOUR SYSTEM !!! Forget all the morals and do gooder rubbish, they count for jack all in the business world, you think the likes of Microsoft, or Dell, or any other large corporation wants to hear “well our system is as secure as can be, so long as we keep the griefers out, and any one who likes to experiment with our ENTIRELY OPEN scripting language” …….. personally i think any major organisation would think “hmmmm haha, they’re joking right ?” right before finding out the grim reality and walking away.
I dont think this is by any means the end of SL, it’s simple a restriction on LindenLab’s ability to expand their world’s mainstream use beyond that of the home user, and small in world business men/women. Currently, due to the evident lack of effort or investment in security and stability, SecondLife is stuck stagnating in realm of the home user, and until that effort and investment is made, thats where it will remain. I guess LindenLab really need something very similar to come along soon, and give them a little incentive/motivation to get on with it, or get left in the side lines
TrannyPet Barmy
The Real One
Prokofy Neva
Apr 30th, 2006
There goes TrannyPet again, rooting for W-HAT.
Of course, it’s griefers, because there are dozens of reports documented of grief balls replicating and the owners/creators names are being published.
Of course, it’s W-HAT (or as we’re supposed to say in politically correct fashion “a rogue faction of W-HAT that isn’t really the true W-HAT”). It’s the same M.O. They always have. It always works this way, and they always do the same thing right after the attack (even during it) — they come on the forums and gloat, essentially, in a clever way, by bedeviling and harrying and mocking people who come on angry, who are mad that they lost game entertainment time or business losses.
It’s the same list of suspects we always see every time the grid crashes, the same apologists piping up on the forums after a long hiatus, and stirring shit: Louis Neutra (finally Moopf Murray remembered that he’s the W-Hat 9/11 “I’m falling for you guy”; a newbie named Irvin Maltz who has come specifically to event-grief me, which is something no one else but W-HAT ever bothers to do; Huns Valens, who *always* carries water for W-HAT — go and see the threads and you’ll see what I mean — cheering, egging on, and slamming all the ordinary citizens who complain about down time. Here these fucktards who support grid-crashers are mocking people and telling them they have no life and should go outside — when the real people with no lives are the ones who can’t get any excitement and meaning in their impoverished lives except by crashing grids and harming other people.
It’s really a sickening sight to behold, how this happens each time, and how the victory dancing by people like Louis Neutra is simply tolerated by the Lindens and many others. No one challenges them.
TrannyPet Barmy
May 1st, 2006
Porky, sorry i’m not going to get into some big flaming session with you, you’re a waste of time in that respect as in many other, but let me just point out your usual tactics of twisting what i actually said into something you *wish* i’d said. Where exactly is it that you feel i’m “rooting” for the W-HAT ? I said nothing more than i thought it was a bit hasty to be jumping to conclusions over the cause of any current grid crash/attach issues.
I agree, there have been a number of documented incidents where “grief balls” have been involved and the “griefers” names publicised, however, i think it’s a little brash to just sit there as you are, ranting “of course it’s griefers …….. of course it’s griefers …..” it’s people like you that enforce and ever strengthen the “griefer is only cause of grid crash effect” with in SL’s population. It’s time to wake up a little bit and realise that systems do crash for many other reasons than just malicious 3rd party intervention. It’s this mentality that’s partly holding SL back, by covering up the reality of 50% of the incidents. If people were to realise that LindenLab’s set up is failing, rather than blindly following people who haven’t the foggiest such as yourself, then perhaps the majority may push LindenLab into updating/correcting their system, instead of allowing them to palm off all the incidents onto the ‘griefers’.
Strangely, again you’re sat here making accussations, “of course it’s griefers ….”, basing this solely on past incidents that have been documented. I’ve followed SL Herald for some time now, and watched it report the grid has fallen over again a number of times, and yet, not all of those were reported or documented to be ‘griefer’ related.
So any way Porky, this incident, that “of course” must be the “griefers”, since this incident is well documented according to you, please do tell, where i can see screen shots of the said grief balls and ‘griefer’ names pertaining to this incident ? Dont waste my time with a tangical flaming session avoiding this question, just show me where exactly i can see this documentation.
The fact of the matter is though, if LindenLab really want to be taken seriously by the larger business then now is the time to increase their security, code out the exploitables(as i said months ago) and upgrade their infrastructure. Morals have no place in business ! MDs dont care about your user’s morality, mentality etc …. all they want to know is that that system is up and running, and they are not losing money. Damn, it’s like me turning out a network application at work, saying, “oh the login screen is a bit weak, basically, any one could log in as admin, and any one can alter the prices on the items, but, we’ll rely on the majority not doing so, and any one that does that we catch up with, we’ll try and make a court case out of it”, i could just imagine the look on my boss’s face !!! Even if LindenLab did successfully do anything authority wise, what do they think that would acheive ? There’s a 1000 more already to go the same way, just to get their name up in ‘L337 Lights’. Time for LindenLab to stop screwing around with FlexiPrims, and get down to the nitty gritty of sorting out the buggy, unstable, insecure pile of ‘code’ they have now.
TrannyPet Barmy
The Real One
Huns Valens
May 1st, 2006
What exactly do you mean that I’m carrying water?
TrannyPet Barmy
May 1st, 2006
Phillip, i hardly think your evil herpes ridden balls are enough to cause a grid crash, i suspect thats some one trying to tell you something. See thats the problem, thanks to The Gospel of Porky, every one is so trained in on grid crashes always having to be caused by ‘griefers’, that they dont stop to think that many other things could have such an effect to.
TrannyPet Barmy
The Real One
Ex SL Resident, Permbanned & Glad
Plastic Duck
May 1st, 2006
Tranny, you’re right about certain grid crashes being accidents. The Nov 2005 grid crash by Ol was infact an accident. Those griefspheres died when anyone typed “d” for a reason, and that reason was to keep them under control. Griefspheres themselves were made to swarm and attack people (the herpes incident reminded me a lot of the original griefspheres infact, coincidence?), not spread and destroy the grid. The reason the griefspheres escaped our plot in Gallii at the time was because a bunch of people getting attacked by the self replicating ones started to shoot them with pushguns which launched them into other sims where Ol’s shouts of “d” did not reach them and they continued to replicate. Soon after the space server died and these things were warping into private islands.
Todays grid crash however, was likely not an accident. Michi reported on the forums that lusk was getting hundreds of objects per second even after he returned them.
wut?
May 1st, 2006
Huns is to be forgiven. You people treated him like SL’s biggest nerd and when someone once upon a time ridiculed him he found the attention he craved and he crawled to it. Huns is a W-Hat SA who has no idea what SA is. He sure likes the attention though. He will stand up for these “friends” because he has none.
The majority of SA that stay in SL more than a few weeks become regular rule abiding residents. This is truth. The clowns of W-Hat are cliche of joke driven losers who bask in their own circle jerk sustained superiority.
Does your house have STAIRS?
TrannyPet Barmy
May 1st, 2006
Plastic, that highlights yet another flaw with the “grid crashed, must be griefer” doctrine that the likes of Porky throws around, fact is scripts can have undesired effects, scripts can go wrong. Surely as well as ensuring that intentional malicious scripts fail to execute with the desired effect, LindenLab’s owe it to their community to ensure those learning LSL cant inadvertantly do the place any damage through some script they’re ‘playing’ with ? I’m not saying the herpes spheres you talk of were a learning excercise btw, just pointing out there can be more reasons than just “griefing” for a script to have a detrimental effect on the grid, and it’s down to LindenLab to prevent this happening, rather than crying and whining about “authorities”.
DBomber was an example of this, the notecard spammer that i wrote some time ago, i had no idea it would have the effect it apparently did on the grid. This was actually the reason i got permbanned last year, because DBomber was supposedly a grid attack. Strange thing is though, i wrote it as a one-on-one note card spammer, i had no idea at all that it would effect the grid in the way it did, that was an unknown side effect, there was no intention on part what so ever in that respect. Point being though, i got permbanned because some one else ran my script, and it had the effect it did on the grid ….. so with out any intention on my part, nor action as it happens since some one else was running it, i got permbanned for “Grid Crashing”, that basically equates to banning any newb in SL, for unwittingly writing a potentially damaging script !! Not very encouraging for experimentation and learning on LindenLab’s part now is it ?
Maybe if they actually invested in making good what they have now, before adding more features, they could overcome their paranoias of users trying to harm their precious, but very fragile, grid.
TrannyPet Barmy
The REAL One
Ex SL Resident, Permbanned & Happy about it
Plastic Duck
May 1st, 2006
You’re absolutely right TrannyPet, the way LL handle bannings and exploits now is just plain retarded.
Someone fucks some shit up in your game, accidentally or not, you permaban them but don’t fix the problem. You’ve just killed the reputation and hard work of a content creator who knows atleast a little bit about what they’re doing. Chances are that said person is going to get a little annoyed at this and they will come back to the game with an account full of nothing. Scripted gadgets are a lot easier to replace/recreate than some carefully put together prims. After going through a few accounts personally, I just started dumping my own scripts onto a wiki so that I can have access to the fun things I make on future accounts.
Now that was just an example. Knowing Ol outside of SL, I can tell you he never came back to crash the grid and that one accident was the only time for him. But I know other people who have been responsible for multiple self replicating object attacks after having their main accounts banned for doing absolutely NOTHING.
Yes, it happens. Some of the closer knit communities in SL (I’m thinking of some of the Lusk folks, specifically) are known for ARing goons simply for group association. These goons will show up at Lusk to innocently buy an avatar or talk to friends. However some of the Lusk admins who seem to have a thing for clicking profiles and checking up on groups will urge OTHERS to AR the innocent people who have done thing. Since my accounts rarely last too long, I’ve made it a point to “harass” the Lusk folks by doing just this, joining the w-hat fan club or similar groups, and showing up in their treehouse in a silly costume of some sort and doing nothing. You wouldn’t believe the number of times I’ve had good ol’ Michi reacquaint me with my favorite Lindens.
Now what they’re doing is pretty shitheaded, but ultimately the blame should go to LL for not giving people enough parcel tools to be able to isolate themselves from certain others and any objects/scripts they may be trying to throw onto your land. It really wouldn’t be hard to implement this kind of stuff, just like it wouldn’t be hard to implement a lot of other stuff. In the end it’s LL’s fault that people are resorting to flinging shit and bitching to Lindens because they don’t have the proper tools to ban whole groups from their land if they want to.
Someone crashes the grid? Thank them for finding the bug/exploit and fix it. If you’re dealing with the type that thrives on breaking stuff then you’ve found them and can keep a close eye on them. LL do keep closer tabs on officers of groups like w-hat than others, why wouldn’t they want to keep a close tab on someone even more notorious? What happens when you ban them and take away all the content they’ve made? They get angry and come back under a new alias that you don’t know about and you’ll never know what they’re going to do to screw you next.
Adohan Zephyr
May 2nd, 2006
Hello everyone.
For those of you that saw the global announcement from Kenny Linden you already know who I am, For those who missed it the “herpes” balls belonged to me.
Now before we all go crazy and get out pitchforks let me tell you what happened.
I was in satyr dumping a sit anim into a chair I had just bought.(who sells them without them anyway?)
I was bumped by a cube called object. As it had full permisions set. I picked it up to stop it disturbing me.
A short time after I was in spinich I got a IM asking me to come get one of these balls. then another and another. then I got a few HUNDRED system messages telling me that my object had gone off-world and has been returned to me.
At this point I PM’d Kenny Linden asking for help as I didn’t know what was happening. I contacted the Lindens.
All this time reciving PMs from over 50 people demanding I remove the balls. I replied to as many of them as possible that I was talking with a linden and working to get it fixed.
Kenny said I would be logged out and put on hold while they fixed it. So I was logged out.
Kenny then sent a global message pop-up to everyone on-line at the time that these objects where mine (mentioning me by name, a first for this kind of announcement?)
Yesterday I got a email telling me I was perma-banned.
Marsellus Wallace
May 5th, 2006
For once I gotta agree (to a point of course) with Tranny and Plastic. I do think there could be better processes for how things are dealt with in the game when rules are violated purposely or accidently. If a Linden was working on something and accidently took the grid down, would they fire and ban him? No, they would give him the option to explain what happened. Some cases are obvious griefing was the cause, but others there can be a genuine reasonable doubt.
Adohan, so not only he mentioned you by avatar name, this object had your name all over it? I’m confused. How can you simply picking up an object cause all the other objects to select your name as owner (unless some how the take option was changed to allow this change and the first sucker who does that takes the wrap)? I don’t know LSL all that well yet (And no Tranny, I never claimed I did, but let’s not start that rant as we are on the same page for once) so am curious if something like this is even possible.
I think LL seriously needs to impliment a appeal process for when you are permabanned in order to tell your side of the story. Shit happens and so do accidents. Not saying some of those permabanned don’t deserve it and just about every single person who is permabanned will cry foul. How many people locked up in jail right now in rl claim they are innocent? Sure a number of them are, probably a lot of them are, but there are a few that cry innocence that are not just to further their cause. (Uri for example when he was banned from TSO)
My point is, how can you have a virtual world that mimics real life, when you have a justice system where 1 small set of individuals are jury, judge and executioner all rolled into one? I understand if you are busy and can’t look at every case throughly, but in the cases of permabans, that needs to be done. I also know that they leave decisions like this for repeat offenders up to a random jury of players. Have you ever read the responses by some of those jurors? Might as well just hang yourself right then and there. If you are going to have that type of system in place, make sure you have it setup to be fair and just. A full court system, not a half of a one sided one. In real life, people have the right to confront their accuser.
Whatever happened to the Metaverse Court?
Marsellus Wallace
Boss, The Sim Mafia
http://www.thesimmafia.com
TrannyPet Barmy
May 7th, 2006
Adohan, sounds like exactly the same situation with me and DBomber. It was a one on one weapon, that i had no idea would have any huge impact on the grid, and after Adam Linden contacted me asking me about it, and explaining there was a problem, i did all i could to assist in finding the DBomber object and resolving the issue, i even gave Adam Linden the script because he said it would help. After all his promises of making sure i wasn’t permbanned for it, since i’d been as helpful as i could, as soon as he had what he wanted from me, he turned nasty, and quite obviously did next to litte in helping me keep my account, as 2 days later, just like you Adohan, permbanned. By all accounts, all the land i owned was split up amongst the Lindens, i had friends check out ownership on those lands, and yeah, lindens names every where !!! I’m sure the same happened with all the funds i had to. Obviously it’s in their interests to permban people !!
Marsellus, i’ve been saying that for the last 6 months, that you cant run an effective judicial system with judge jury and executioner all rolled into one, it’s a little bit on the FIC side of things, too much control, that can be very easily turned into manipulation and self gain all thrown into the hands of a certain select few.
On the point of things that go against the ToS and warrant abuse reports though, why not just add in a set of rules flags to the sim code ? So that for example, push can be turned off in a sim, or another example, profanity can be filtered out …………. 1/2 the abuse reports wouldnt even get filed then, since the offences would not be committable. Perhaps even give the sim owner the option to prevent self replication, and as i’ve been saying for months now, why not even ensure that no sim allows self replicating objects to cross sim boundaries, then grid crashes of this form would be a thing of the past, thats not to say though, that there aren’t another 100 ways to crash the grid for sure.
TrannyPet Barmy
The REAL ONE.