Woodbury University Island Destroyed
by Pixeleen Mistral on 01/07/07 at 2:28 pm
LL’s extreme smackdown – Woodbury University’s island deleted for TOS violations!
“a fascist company-controlled cookie-cutter world” – Tizzers Foxchase
by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk
not even a smoking crater was left…
Sometime Saturday, Woodbury University’s Second Life island dropped off the map of the virtual world. Second Life players have grown accustomed to intermittent outages from their metaverse service provider, sometimes spinning fanciful stories about tsunami and seismic activity as part of in-world roleplay. A virtual catastrophe does not appear to have been the cause of Woodbury’s demise, however.
It appears the complete disappearance of an entire virtual university was a disciplinary move on the part of Linden Lab – for Terms of Service (TOS) violations. Tizzers Foxchase, an administrator of the virtual land group for Woodbury University, provided the Herald with a copy of the virtual eviction notice:
Tizzers Foxchase: (Saved Sun Jul 1 12:19:36 2007) Linden Lab has continued to find inappropriate uses of the Second Life region “Woodbury University” under your control. On the 16th of April, you were informed of problems with the activities taking place in the region. Many members of the Woodbury University group (which controls the region) have been detected before and after that date causing severe problems in Second Life, in violation of the terms of service. These problems include incidents of grid attacks, racism and intolerance, persistent harassment of other residents, and crashing the Woodbury University region itself while testing their abusive scripts. Due to the ongoing problems, Linden Lab has no option but to immediately close the Woodbury University region. If you believe that this notice has been sent in error, or that the details of this incident have not been adequately examined, please address your concerns in an e-mail to abuse-manager@lindenlab.com Sincerely yours, Customer Support Linden Lab 945 Battery Street San Francisco, CA
Earlier this afternoon, I contacted Ms. Foxchase to learn if the Lindens have refunded Woodbury’s money, what the plans the displaced residents have, and how the Linden ban on Wodbury’s sim might affect educational uses of the metaverse.
Pixeleen Mistral: so in other words, Linden Lab pwned Woodbury
Tizzers Foxchase: Right, which was totally the wrong thing for them to do.
Pixeleen Mistral: how so?
Tizzers Foxchase: It’s as if LL took Friedman offline because we decided to hang out in the WTC basement or something, Intlibber can’t be held responsible for the actions of every person that comes to his sim, and especially things they do outside of it. That’s what they expected of me.
Pixeleen Mistral: what does this do for Woodbury University’s commitment to Second Life as an educational platform?
Tizzers Foxchase: Pixeleen, education and educational institutions are dangerous, people they are a place where people can think freely. They start asking questions and doubting authority. If WU is going to exist in SL, we’re not just going to be a static virtual mock-up of a RL campus, we’re going to be an active, living, breathing entity. Linden labs is like the catholic church, and we at WU are the modern Luthers.
Pixeleen Mistral: I wonder who the modern martin luther is in that analogy?
Tizzers Foxchase: We are. In fact WU is going to be writing a book about it. Second Life is not the peachy euphoria that it’s advertised to be, it’s a facist company-controlled cookie-cutter world where all the citizens are expected to comply and conform to the model of life that the Lindens have outlined.
Pixeleen Mistral: btw – who was paying for the Woodbury University sim? Did they get a refund?
Tizzers Foxchase: The University was, it was coming out of the communications advertising budget. I’m not sure if they did, but there’s hell to pay if they don’t. We have people working on the inside to get it back. And by on the inside, I mean people who have developed a personal friendship with Philip Rosedale.
Pixeleen Mistral: I ask because a lot of the institutional “purchases” are pre-paid for a year or 6 months
Tizzers Foxchase: I’m not sure of the financial details, all I know is, there was quite a large financial investment made.
Pixeleen Mistral: this all happened over the weekend – so I don’t imagine that the office staff know anything yet
Tizzers Foxchase: But do you see where I’m coming from? 99% of the RL schools in SL are nothing but boring models of a RL university. WU dared to be different.
Pixeleen Mistral: WU was certainly different
Tizzers Foxchase: The WU sim was purchased as a place to study virtual culture. /b/ and 4chan personify virtual culture. What better guinea pig or test subject, than to bring culture to us.
Pixeleen Mistral: I wonder if I should run this story now – or wait and talk to some RL people at Woodbury tomorrow?
Tizzers Foxchase: I can give you the direct phone number to MC Fizgig (Dr. Edward Clift). He is the chair of the school and is really the driving force behind the campus. I’m sure he’d be happy to answer any questions.
Pixeleen Mistral: so what is the next step – besides trying to get the sim back? if the Lindens won’t give it back, then what?
Tizzers Foxchase: We are going to begin writing a book. And waging a barrage of media, exposing the truth about the metaverse.
Pixeleen Mistral: so you would not recommend SL for education? or its only good for some sorts of things?
Tizzers Foxchase: It depends on your goal. If you essentially want a virtual museum, by all means SL is a great place. But active involvement comes with a bit of risk, the risk that Linden Labs may disagree with your viewpoints and the way you operate.
Pixeleen Mistral: any other messages for the Herald readers?
Tizzers Foxchase: Second Life has not seen the last of Woodbury. You may be able to kill the physical establishment but you can never kill a mindset. Ideas are bulletproof.
Pixeleen Mistral: so you will still be around
Tizzers Foxchase: Indeed we will.
Pixeleen Mistral: I suspected as much
As the displaced residents of Woodbury University consider their options, I was struck by the irony of a group that helped displace the Alliance Navy from half their Emit Time sim base being displaced by a higher power – the Linden game gods.
Certainly Woodbury University has attracted a rough crowd at times, but with the Bragg lawsuit hanging over the Linden Lab, the question of “ownership” of virtual land is brought into stark focus here. Will Woodbury write off its investment in virtual real estate? Will the Lindens refund all or part of their payments? Is it possible that the Lab may rehabilitate Woodbury and turn it into an example of compassion in action? This seems unlikely to those who remember the destruction of Satyr sim. While we wait for others from Woodbury to respond to Herald inquiries, perhaps the only clear lesson is that rolling with griefers may start with lulz but end in tears.
Economic Mip
Jul 1st, 2007
I did report them, once. This was largely due to my misunderstanding of English, and repeated IMs with MC Fizgig, which suggested (at least originally) that the griefers were just that. Perhaps I misunderstood those as well. (I was also briefly on the island when the Lindens previously shut it down, and was apparently TPed home by a second party.) I have Seen VR rooms in Second Life, and they are an impressive use of the technology available. I also have nothing against any member of the group, as once I heard the griefers were allowed I left them alone to self destruct (which is of course what happened). Tizzers admits that she built a lot of the “furry death camp” crap, so it is not unlikely that some of those items may have been created on Woodbury. I also strongly believe that if you cannot babysit a sim 24/7, then at least turn off scripts. Outside of the VR room, I am unaware of anything on the island which required them which was not griefer related.
Jessica Holyoke
Jul 1st, 2007
Prok,
If the sim owner was marxist, callous or indifferent, or a combination, that justified the ending of his lease and the loss of his investment?
In relation to landlord/tenant, you mis-stated what I said. You had asked Robin Linden if the owner of a sim is responsible for what happens on their sim without their knowledge. You said the expected answer is “yes” and then based it on real life law. I stated that a landlord is not responsible for the unrevealed illegal acts of their tenants. You then stated that I had no idea on how to apply the law because a tenant is responsible for anything that happens in their apartment or on their land. Which isn’t what I stated. Now it seems that the expectation is that instead of ‘owning land’, which is the promise made by the Lindens, you are actually ‘leasing land’. But you are still subletting a portion of that land to someone else. In which case, you are again in a landlord/tenant relationship.
Put another way, if a renter is running a drug operation out of their home without the landlord’s consent and knowledge, the home is not seized from the landlord because of the renter’s use. And why should the end result be different through a sublease?
And we aren’t talking about homes in Woodbury’s case. We are talking about a sim open to the public, which in SL means constantly being open. Anything less would not be able to reach a world-wide audience. So a sim owner, who is being encouraged to have open spaces for people, is responsible for when the public misuses the space? That would be saying that every sim and every build needs 24 hour security, which, as Prok stated, requires trust and sharing on everyone’s part. In a world of unknowns, such trust is not likely to happen.
I’m beginning to see that Woodbury is not a very popular group, even if I haven’t seen them in action. But is that any reason why a forfeiture of an island based on the actions of others is a good thing? As someone else mentioned, it doesn’t stop the griefers.
I’ve never been to Woodbury so I can only base a judgment on ‘educational’ based on what I’ve read here. But the one thing I haven’t read is that the owner of the sim was part of the activities complained of. I’ve seen uncaring and indifferent, but not actively involved in the complained activities. Only that people associated with the land were part of anti-community acts and that was the reason for the seizure.
All around, this is bad policy on the part of the Lindens. They are in other threads stating that ‘virtual land’ is only a lease right, but in other steps they are taking state that the leasees are strictly liable for all activity on the land. I think this will more lead to people closing off sims and not creating a better community.
Csven Concord
Jul 1st, 2007
“Csven’s distorting the facts again.”
I’m just trying to determine what *your* facts are, dearie.
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“Perhaps if someone were to line up all these people and check all their RL data, gosh, it might turn out that they are all white European Americans. So what?”
Wait a second. A few comments ago you were making a point of saying they’re young Asian males who are racist, and *now* you’re saying they might all be “white European Americans”? and it apparently doesn’t really matter.
If you’re unsure, and it doesn’t matter, why say it in the first place?
That’s okay. You don’t need to answer this as I think I understand.
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“Yes, Woodbury University has indeed been openly tolerating a group of young males — and apparently females — some of them Asian, some European Americans, it’s not so important, and yes, because of their upbringing — or rebellion against their upbringing — or due to their LACK of upbringing, they are racist, act out racist activities, avatars, props, and sayings in SL. This is AMPLY documented.”
So some *are* males. Some *may be* females. Some *are* Asian. Some *are* European Americans. Except they *might* ALL be European Americans (see above). And they’re completely anonymous. So for all you know they could actually be Brazilian!
Man, the *facts* sure are fluid in your world.
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“Yes, I’m the journalist, and you’re the 40-something former long-time Navy guy and evidently non-recovering Catholic who is “between jobs right now,” and lashing out at people for sport.”
That’s pretty funny. Now I can see how you fuck up the *facts* so badly.
- Somehow the *minimum* tour of duty (4 years) translates to “long-time Navy”
- Somehow, even though my family is not now nor ever has been Catholic, you’ve dreamed up that I’m a “non-recovering Catholic”
- Somehow being self-employed, self-sufficient, and able to go for months between clients translates to “between jobs right now”
- Somehow, asking *you* reasonable questions translates into “lashing out at people for sport”
Oh-kay.
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“From now on, I think just one remark might make sense in response to any of your postings, you loser: “Did you get a job? And have you been to Confession?” I think that should about sum up the whole thing.”
One ludicrous comment deserves another, I guess, so let me ask you: “Do you have kids and if so, do you spend more time in Second Life play-acting being a *famous* journalist than you do raising them?” That should about sum up the whole thing.
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“It will have to remain one of those mysteries of the Internet, but it is easy to determine, and unmistakeable even if anonymous.”
I assume this is one of those funny anti-logic arguments of yours where your assumptions become “fact”.
Enjoying your responses. Thanks.
General Cronon
Jul 2nd, 2007
Honestly, Let’s look at what most of you guys seem to be missing. I know that place may be facist, but I don’t think thats why they were banned. I belive Linden Lab didn’t get their cut of the under the table cash so they deleted the island. Seems really weird how they delete it at the end of the month(after pay day). If they are so facist, why didn’t front national get deleted before the end of french election.
Coincidental Avatar
Jul 2nd, 2007
I think Lindens did the right thing the wrong way.
WU demonstrated that the SL guidelines provided by LL are brain dead and unsustainable, and LL can’t follow them itself. According to the guidelines, the SIM owner can do practically anything in his/her SIM (including griefing or maintaining a criminal or griefing group) and LL/other SIM owners are responsible on policing the in-world outside the evil SIM.
Additionally, according to the contemporary guidelines, LL didn’t have any right to complain to WU griefing SIM owner about the actions of WU griefers outside WU SIM.
Thus, if WU charges LL based on the promises and contracts, WU might win the case in court, only because of the stupidity of LL.
Then why does LL use moron lawyers who give bad advice? They are greedy for money in LL and wanted to have a policy which licks the ass of SIM owner, their primary source of self-earned money.
LL is a risk taking average company in good business with average business morons who just wait to be wiped out by better businessmen.
Alyx Stoklitsky
Jul 2nd, 2007
I can see certain people here just sticking their fingers in there ears and just bawling an endless chant of “GRIEFER GRIEFER GRIEFER!”
Economic Mip: Aren’t you the idiot that added me to slbanlink with the reason “PN WEAPON MAKER” after teleporting into woodbury, saw me stood there building a gun out of prims, and then zapped out immediately?
Everything but the lucid exhibit was ‘griefer related’? Wow. I never knew internet culture was considered ‘greifer related’. Awesome.
Also, you were TP’ed home by Nicole Linden, just like everyone else that wasn’t a JLU member was.
Prokofy: Did you read my last response to you atall? Or are you just conveniently ignoring it?
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
>I’m just trying to determine what *your* facts are, dearie.
No, trolling my statements to try to find something to “trip me up” and then feel a sense of gleeful maliciousness — which is what passes for the only sensation experienced in the dark soul of Csven Concord.
“Perhaps if someone were to line up all these people and check all their RL data, gosh, it might turn out that they are all white European Americans. So what?”
*THESE PEOPLE* here on the thread? Or in general? Or all the griefing groups? It’s all a question to be asked! Perhaps the ones I’ve confirmed *aren’t on this thread*. Or are they? Or perhaps they aren’t even in the Woodbury Group, but are lurking! But they are definitely in b/tards/PNs! That is confirmed. They are Asian, young, male, and racist.
>Wait a second. A few comments ago you were making a point of saying they’re young Asian males who are racist, and *now* you’re saying they might all be “white European Americans”? and it apparently doesn’t really matter.
Maybe. And that’s what inquiring minds want to know! How did they get racist? By being Southern Baptist White types? Or Asian? or? Inquiring minds constantly ask, sift through the data, confirm this, reject that, and KEEP AN OPEN MIND. They never close like a steel trap on one factoid for ever, because then they are cut off from the truth.
There are young Asian racist males in this mix! The question is — how many? where? And…who are the rest of them? And…why?
>If you’re unsure, and it doesn’t matter, why say it in the first place?
Because they’re confirmed. And it doesn’t matter if in some cases, their racism is rooted in being, say, young males in immigrant families who have developed an animosity to blacks (this is demonstrable in RL), and in others, it doesn’t matter if they are whites of European extraction with very conversative southern values, say, that have made them racist — but racist they are! So it’s interesting to keep inquiring WHY!
>That’s okay. You don’t need to answer this as I think I understand.
No, Csven has a closed, horribly constrained mind, closed in on itself, and looping endlessly in a routine that is borderline psychotic.
>”Yes, Woodbury University has indeed been openly tolerating a group of young males — and apparently females — some of them Asian, some European Americans, it’s not so important, and yes, because of their upbringing — or rebellion against their upbringing — or due to their LACK of upbringing, they are racist, act out racist activities, avatars, props, and sayings in SL. This is AMPLY documented.”
Yes, amply documented.
>So some *are* males. Some *may be* females. Some *are* Asian. Some *are* European Americans. Except they *might* ALL be European Americans (see above). And they’re completely anonymous. So for all you know they could actually be Brazilian!
No, they don’t appear to be Brazilian. But some ARE males. Some ARE Asians. Some apparently (from the testimony of Alyx, not confirmed) are European males. Some are female (from the testimony of Intlibbery, unconfirmed). They are anonymous, yet some of their traits are definitely confirmed (by me). It’s a riddle to puzzle out! They don’t appear to be Brazilian, no. But, they’re racist!
>Man, the *facts* sure are fluid in your world.
No, they are established bit by bit, and one retains an open mind, until every aspect is proved. That’s what an open society and an open mind are all about. You float a hypothesis — confirm it. Move on to the next hypothesis — confirm of disprove it. You keep thinking, moving, taking in fresh information. You don’t say nothing, and make no characterizations merely because you can’t pull the lid of SL and see who sits behind every avatar when you have confirmed *some* and that’s *ENOUGH*.
>”Yes, I’m the journalist, and you’re the 40-something former long-time Navy guy and evidently non-recovering Catholic who is “between jobs right now,” and lashing out at people for sport.”
That’s pretty funny. Now I can see how you fuck up the *facts* so badly.
No, they’re the sort of facts Csven “decodes” when presented with facts of his perception. Like, the way he’ll decide that if the difference is pointed out between the fraud Linden suffers and its options, and the fraud from another resident a resident suffers, and his options, that it must mean that “OMGODZORZ Prok claims fraud is worse than RL child pornography!”. That this statement isn’t said, and is untenable, is of course a mere irrelevance to the loopy looping mind of Csven.
>Somehow the *minimum* tour of duty (4 years) translates to “long-time Navy”
Gosh, some people sure know how to fluff up their resume!
>Somehow, even though my family is not now nor ever has been Catholic, you’ve dreamed up that I’m a “non-recovering Catholic”
Gosh, the percentage of people who ARE Catholic at that university is so great that it’s a good bet! The kind of safe assumption one can make in saying that if Prok points out the different abilities to act between Linden Lab and residents, that must mean that “fraud is worse”. Right!
Say, there’s always conversion!
>Somehow being self-employed, self-sufficient, and able to go for months between clients translates to “between jobs right now”
There, as I said, “between jobs”. Glad we cleared that up, and got to the ROOT of the problem.
>Somehow, asking *you* reasonable questions translates into “lashing out at people for sport”
Yes! That’s all demonstrably seen. But I know what to reduce my responses to:
“Csven, have you gotten a job yet, and have you started your CCD classes yet?”
>One ludicrous comment deserves another, I guess, so let me ask you: “Do you have kids and if so, do you spend more time in Second Life play-acting being a *famous* journalist than you do raising them?” That should about sum up the whole thing.
Yes, I have two kids, and I raise them very well, thanks, and I spend more time with them when they’re out of school than at anything else I do, except my various jobs, and that’s why I work at home for the most part.
>”It will have to remain one of those mysteries of the Internet, but it is easy to determine, and unmistakeable even if anonymous.”
>I assume this is one of those funny anti-logic arguments of yours where your assumptions become “fact”.
Unassailable facts, and a puzzle still unsolved!
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
>If the sim owner was marxist, callous or indifferent, or a combination, that justified the ending of his lease and the loss of his investment?
Yes, dearie, because all of those things contributed to the necessary nihilism and negligence that led to give griefing a pass and not take any warnings seriously, as property, responsibility — these are all bourgeous values he has no use for, evidently. By itself, Marxism — or anarcho-capitalism or Buddhism — isn’t a reason to take property away, except the Lindens might come to that. But griefing and giving a pass to griefing does, and that has an ideological substrate.
>You then stated that I had no idea on how to apply the law because a tenant is responsible for anything that happens in their apartment or on their land. Which isn’t what I stated. Now it seems that the expectation is that instead of ‘owning land’, which is the promise made by the Lindens, you are actually ‘leasing land’. But you are still subletting a portion of that land to someone else. In which case, you are again in a landlord/tenant relationship.
You are still failing to grasp how law is applied in RL. You are INDEED responsible, and lack of knowledge of the behavior of those persons in your premises is no excuse. You need to go down to housing court and watch some real cases involving holdover actions.
>And we aren’t talking about homes in Woodbury’s case. We are talking about a sim open to the public, which in SL means constantly being open. Anything less would not be able to reach a world-wide audience. So a sim owner, who is being encouraged to have open spaces for people, is responsible for when the public misuses the space?
Yep. Because the landowner has the tools to ban miscreants, and when WARNED by LL, he could be expelling and banning these miscreants. Instead, what Tizzers did was turn them into her security force (bursts out laughing).
>That would be saying that every sim and every build needs 24 hour security, which, as Prok stated, requires trust and sharing on everyone’s part. In a world of unknowns, such trust is not likely to happen.
It doesn’t matter if you have no 24/7 security. You are responsible for content and behaviour on your land. That’s the facts — in RL as in SL. Your notion that we are NOT responsible has no leg to stand on, and it’s curious that you’re so persistent with it. Read some real cases.
>I’m beginning to see that Woodbury is not a very popular group, even if I haven’t seen them in action. But is that any reason why a forfeiture of an island based on the actions of others is a good thing? As someone else mentioned, it doesn’t stop the griefers.
Oh, stop it with the revolutionary claptrap and tugging and pulling law to fit some radical agenda. Baloney. Their popularity or lack of popularity has nothing to do with the price of fish in China. They griefed people, crashed sims, and are now at the end of the line. It indeed DOES stop them if they have no land to play on. It should have been done 3 months ago. They’re getting better at this.
>I’ve never been to Woodbury so I can only base a judgment on ‘educational’ based on what I’ve read here. But the one thing I haven’t read is that the owner of the sim was part of the activities complained of. I’ve seen uncaring and indifferent, but not actively involved in the complained activities. Only that people associated with the land were part of anti-community acts and that was the reason for the seizure.
You still fail to grasp that in a group-owned sim, the group owns it. That’s really how land works. And the group contains people who griefed. They are owners. SO their ownership is revoked. Hardly due process or the perfection of law in a democratic society, but that’s can’t subtract from the fact that these people are griefers and violated the TOS that led to their demise.
Even in RL, the landlord can evict you if you break property, disturb others, violate the lease. You REALLY need to even just read a newspaper!
>All around, this is bad policy on the part of the Lindens. They are in other threads stating that ‘virtual land’ is only a lease right, but in other steps they are taking state that the leasees are strictly liable for all activity on the land. I think this will more lead to people closing off sims and not creating a better community.
No, it will lead to people being less fucktardy and taking responsibility for their actions.
Furriesonyolawn
Jul 2nd, 2007
Hear that?
It’s the sound of furries LAUGHING all across the grid.
LOL PWND!
Crunchfest McGee
Jul 2nd, 2007
To everyone who keeps spouting “proof” of griefer attacks that were staged from WU, most of those were conducted by either non-WU members or a few morons who were (read, WERE, until we banned them from the group and the sim) in the WU group albeit briefly. When we could, we would take care of any griefing activities or boot them out as we didnt want any part in it. Those were the ones that we did catch.
To say we aided and abetted it is like saying sandboxes aid and abet griefers. So do sims that allow object creation and script creation for anyone, especially barren sims.
Also, like someone said, 7chan’s /i/ board called up a meeting a woodbury. I never recalled this, but it may be before my time on SL. In any case I have doubts it was officially supported.
I think that Woodbury was a scapegoat for the lindens after griefers ruined the 4th birthday bash.
With the whole Emit Time drama (which was all legal, and hilarious because it was, and the only offense was something that contradicted the TOS anyway) made it all the easier to justify. “ZOMG LOOK! THEY’RE “GRIEFING”* AT EMIT TIME! AND GRIEFING OCCURRED AT THE BIRTHDAY BASH! THIS IS ALL WOODBURY’S FAULT.”
*(yeah, doesnt griefing usually mean the shit comes to people instead of the people coming to the shit? the only people offended were anyone intentionally visiting and allowing themselves to be offended. if the lindens dont want to be offended, they need to get out of this business. dealing with people, in any business, you have to learn to grow some balls and learn to laugh it off. I know, I’m majoring in business, and I also work sales, where I’ve been called all sorts of colorful names and seen all sorts of stuff that might offend me. But I worked with it. Emit Time was a private sim and it should have been up to the sim owner, not the lindens. The only furries offended were ones who were told about it and they went there and made themselves offended.)
The PN already stated that the bday bash was their doing, and woodbury had no involvement in a similar article at sltimes. So this is all looking like a chance to scapegoat woodbury.
Hey, what about baku and their griefing past? how come they haven’t been shut down? by the same logic, they should have been taken down years ago.
Also, Prokofy, if some group started hanging out above your sim/parcel and planning attacks and the like when you arent around, and your sim got banned and no matter what you said or did the lindens didnt budge, how would you feel? Just think about that. I know you’ll just shrug it off and scream about capitalist conspiracies again. but seriously, think about it. Think how fair that would be to you, even despite your best efforts, they just keep coming until you get the full responsibility. I bet you’d be screaming your head off in anger.
Crunchfest McGee
Jul 2nd, 2007
I also must note one more thing:
You know why people love griefing this game? I’m not a griefer and I see it.. You wanna know?
Because every other person in these comments have shown why. Paranoid, overly sensitive people. Prime trolling material. According to half the commentators, anything 4chan is griefer material, anyone in woodbury who made ANYTHING was making griefer weapons, saying memes is grieferspeak, stating any opinion against the Secondlife “norm” = griefer. I guess the only way to be a “normal” citizen is to conform, say what everyone else says, and take your servings of bullshit by the bucket load.
Here’s a tip. grow some balls, stop being offended because you can and accept that people are going to be different from you. Same social rules that apply in reality apply in second life, as much as you like to deny it. Where you have people, the rules are still the same.
Natasha
Jul 2nd, 2007
“I think the real problem is that there HAPPEN to be several griefer groups that are connected to the 4chan “random” board (/b/), and therefore, since Woodbury was also connected to /b/, then the griefers were attracted to it.”
No, the /b/tards don’t HAPPEN to have some girefers as members, it IS a griefer group.
And on this sim being taken away from those supporting and associating with /b/…
Guilty by association. Just like everyone with a furry AV is concidered a furry by your buddies. Difference of course being that the people from this ‘university sim’ associate with griefers by their own choice.
Justice, I like to call it.
And no, this will not stop the griefing, but it at least gives of a clear signal: Asssociate with griefers, you’re gonna get burned.
Also, /b/ =/= PN =/= V-5 =/= W-hat =/= 4chan =/= 7chan but they all share one thing: They’re griefers. And of course you can deny that all you want, but I know better. I lurked long enough.
Alyx Stoklitsky
Jul 2nd, 2007
>Furriesonyolawn
“Hear that?
It’s the sound of furries LAUGHING all across the grid.
LOL PWND!”
You really haven’t read anything, have you? Screw civility: I will go so far as to say you’re a fucking ignorant dumbass. The PN are crashing your sims. The PN are messing your Yiffing. Woodbury is not the PN.
Conclusion?
ITS THE SOUND OF NOTHING HAPPENING, AND THE PN ARE STILL GOING TO BE CRASHING SHIT JUST AS HARD AS EVER.
Csven Concord
Jul 2nd, 2007
>Somehow the *minimum* tour of duty (4 years) translates to “long-time Navy”
Gosh, some people sure know how to fluff up their resume!”
Everything I’ve claimed is a matter of government record. A *real* journalist should have no problem confirming what I’ve claimed.
More interesting is that you’ve once again done what you claim to abhor: brought RL information into a discussion as a sad and pathetic means to attempt to belittle someone.
Guess that’s what you do when you can’t do anything else.
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“Gosh, the percentage of people who ARE Catholic at that university is so great that it’s a good bet!”
A “good bet” is not a fact, Catherine. It’s just an assumption. But we all realize you don’t understand that or discern between facts and guesses. In Prokofy’s fantasy world, guesswork takes on scientific certainty.
-
“There, as I said, “between jobs”.”
Not really. Between jobs suggests I do not currently *have* a job. I do and I deal with it on a daily basis (e.g. today I have to deal with a delinquent payment from a client among other things).
More accurate to say I’m between client projects… though not between projects, because I have my own.
-
>Somehow, asking *you* reasonable questions translates into “lashing out at people for sport”
“Yes! That’s all demonstrably seen.”
Glad you agree that you twist reasonable questions into something else.
Thank you for admitting this.
-
So, perhaps now we can get back to why you hate Asians.
Csven Concord
Jul 2nd, 2007
@Crunchfest
“Also, Prokofy, if some group started hanging out above your sim/parcel and planning attacks and the like when you arent around, and your sim got banned and no matter what you said or did the lindens didnt budge, how would you feel?”
Good point. And more importantly, how long until this happens?
IntLibber Brautigan
Jul 2nd, 2007
As anybody knows, I’ve been opposed to the PN’s sim crashing and grossly offensive hate crimes since they first raided my sims in January. We’ve been actively fighting them on a regular basis since that time. We’ve infiltrated them quite deeply with spies, tracked them by planting trackers in their weapons, profiled them as they entered our sims, and even sabotaged their grid destroyer before it could be distributed. We have also met with LL to provide them with suggestions to improve SL security (back in late February).
To date, with the sole exception of possibly a script filtering equivalent of an anti-virus program, none of our suggestions have been implemented in features. We had been promised we’d get the ability to limit particle emission at the parcel level by non-group members, since turning off scripts doesn’t affect the particle emission settings of worn prims. However this feature has failed to appear, as have many others that would go a long way to improving security in SL, such as a subset of lsl for managing estate functions, an ability to IP ban from an estate, and an expanded estate ban list function. There are many other proposals we’ve made to the G-Team to no avail.
It is thus rather clear that LL is disinclined to keep griefers out of the network. Thus, we are in a situation akin to a a Border Patrol that hands out milk and cookies to illegals and drug smugglers crossing the border. Engaging in a ‘war on terrorism’ strategy is thus not possible to succeed on any permanent basis alone. We can beat the PN on a regular basis, but its expensive, its a drag on the SL economy to put resources toward security that could be going toward buying land, creating businesses, new products, and spending on enjoying one’s second life.
For this reason, there has to be undertaken a sort of in depth mentoring program for those likely to be recruited to grief. Sort of a Special Education program. There DO need to be paths to legitimization of the opinions of these person, and they do need to have equal access to economic opportunities to participate in the SL economy.
The taking down of Woodbury University sim is an affront to the most cherished notions of free speech and expression that have caused western civilization to flourish. WU was the most visited university sim in all of SL. It was preparing to teach classes in building, scripting, as well as in SL business to the attending students, beyond just providing a haven for their free expression of their artistic talents.
I find it broadly offensive what has been done to WU. I distinguish between the 5-10 sim crashing PN, and the general /b/tard population in SL, and I recognise that a University can only discipline those who it finds grief, just as a RL university is expected by local communities to punish students who commit hijinks in violation of local laws, or otherwise bring the student body into disrepute. However the taking down of WU is nothing but fascist and repressive, the sort of thing one would expect of Nazis or Soviets, Maoists, or Khmer Rouge. The intolerance of opinion and free speech by the LL G-Team smacks not of the libertarian ethics many have told me that LL has, but of the worst sort of PC persecution one can expect from tyrants.
At the very least, after the first time LL raided WU, the campus should have be placed in the Local Governance program, so that Tizzers, or possibly Professor Clift, could be more well informed about the actions of those who belonged to the university group, receiving CCs of abuse reports filed. That is what principles of accountability require: if someone is to be held responsible for something someone else did, they should be well informed about it, and there should be due process.
The concept of collective responsibility is one that one normally sees only in the Leninists and other radical leftists that Prokofy claims to despise. Leaders of groups can only be held responsible if it can be proven they were in fact responsible for directing people to commit illegal acts.
I know that Prokofy lies. When she was screaming at me in IMs once that Tizzers was raiding her sims, Tizzers was in fact having a chat with me in Friedman, where she was investing on the stock market in BNT and other companies.
The only reason she is in the Brautigan & Tuck Holdings (AVIX: BNT) group is because she is a stockholder. She has no power in the group other than to be able to receive notices like other investors. I do not discriminate, unlike others, in which stockholders can be in the company group. I have a fiduciary responsibility to communicate with them all. Unlike some in SL, I take my responsibilities as CEO and Chairman of BNT Holdings seriously as if it were a RL company, and as it will be in the near future.
We at BNT plan on opening an independent grid in the future, here in New Hampshire, the Free State, where free speech and free enterprise are both held as sacrosanct. We won’t allow sim crashers or other criminals in our grid, but we also won’t persecute people for peacefully expressing their belives.
I find it rather odd, that a company that tolerates the celebration of slavery (Gor), Naziism (Furzis), pedophilia (sexual age players), and beastiality, all of which are felonious or even capital crimes to commit in most of the world, would so agressively persecute people for merely speaking their opinions.
When I first started calling for the PN to abandon sim crashing and other offensive acts, I told them if they did so, and were still B& for merely speaking their minds, I would stand for their rights to speak and express. I do so now. Taking down WU was plainly and simply wrong. Shame on the G-Team, and shame on LL.
If LL has evidence of serious griefing activities (i.e. crashing sims, not telling Prokofy she’s an idiot) going on in WU, they need to publicize them for the SL community to judge for itself. LL pays lip service to local governmance, but fails to deliver the information and ability for us to judge and regulate our fellow residents. I call on LL to step up, or restore WU.
Nina A
Jul 2nd, 2007
I swear if Prokofy said murdering babies was wrong, some of you would show up to argue that Prokofy is wrong and that baby murdering is our free democratic right that only facists would try and prevent.
NobodyImportant
Jul 2nd, 2007
Prokofy, how does removing a sim stop people like the PN?
These are people who have basic field-improvised Doomsday knowledge, accessible by all members.
Any Tom, Dick, or Harry could join the forums; find the guide; then go on the grid and modify a POPGUN – one of the most basic items, and a Library item to boot – into a Doomsday. They can then go to a sim they decide they want to crash, and crash it.
How does baleeting (deleting, destroying, etc) a sim stop that?
Mako Mabellon
Jul 2nd, 2007
Note to Prokofy Neva and anyone else who referred to /b/tards as racist: YHBT. YHL. HAND.
(Seriously, as far as I can tell, they aren’t actually racist – they just have a cruel and socially unacceptable sense of humour and a LOT of odd memes.)
anon
Jul 2nd, 2007
While it may be the case that these folks needed to do a better job at keeping to the terms of service, the larger picture seems to me, to not be such a good business decision on the part of Linden Labs. Why? Because they have for quite some time stated that they have no control over what sim owners do on “private” islands. I have such emails.
Linden cannot have it both ways. They cannot allow the fraud and protect the perpetrators of such to collect the tier money of land baron scammers while at the same time running off those that do not have a large enough investment in sims to make the alternate decision. Linden is hand picking and running off single/few islands sim owners. If Linden wants to play by the rules and the law, they need to crackdown on those paying the big monthly bucks to them.
How can it be that Linden takes the stance that they have no part in private island law, then when they feel the need, take action as they do.
As mentioned, and while it just may be that the above named sim was not doing a great job monitoring the issues, I still believe the larger issue is the way Linden goes about doing business. Fraud is against the terms of service as well, we don’t see anything being done about that.
If Linden is going to police sims, then they are doing the opposite of what they claim when someone turns in fraud cases.
You cannot say that the sim owner has control and ownership of virtual space and remove them as they are doing in the name of TOS. Where are the virtual rights of the individual in this case as an owner? Should there not be formal certified letters sent by Linden describing the issues and asking for resolve? In the US, you cannot just oust people from their property. There are formal ways and laws that protect even those that may or may not have done a misdeed.
Bobby Troughton
Jul 2nd, 2007
I always wonder why Lindens never delete griefer groups entirely, and “perma” ban those that attempt recreate them. I mean there’s a whole group called Concerned Griefers of America listed, and all the other known and blatant ones. Shouldn’t be too hard. But they rather take down “griefer sim bases” as if griefers even need to use a base.
Griefers aren’t like the kids who play army, needing something to pretend to defend a base and lose morale when they can’t. But taking down griefer Groups themselves ( and banning their convenient memberlist ) would greater disrupt griefers from organizing anything. Not to mention they’d only be losing less then a dollar, while sims lose much more money.
Another thing, does anyone know if there is proof that this Woodbury “University”, was officialy connected to the real life college? Or was it all just a cover for this griefer sandbox? Seems to easy to stick up a false description for the place.
3pointD.com
Jul 2nd, 2007
Policing Second Life: Guilt by Association
What do you do when a group of troublemakers is disrupting the operation of your virtual world? If youre Linden Lab, which runs Second Life, you ignore the griefers themselves and simply go after the owners of the land they happen to be operatin…
IntLibber Brautigan
Jul 2nd, 2007
Now, some of you may want to know why I would defend WU. Its because I know they are innocent, at least irt any of their actions inworld. Tizzers Foxchase made me a member the Woodbury Secret Service almost two months ago. I was able to monitor the Woodbury group chat, and those individuals who attempted to promote or recruit or brag about raiding or sim crashing, I promtly got banned. It was a month and a half before any but Tizzers were really aware of my presence in the group.
What I believe really happened is thus: The Alliance Navy, which was previously pwned in Emit Time by students from WU, along with Ethan Schuman and others, has undertaken a campaign of filing false Abuse Reports against anybody and everybody involved in that series of events. They are doing so against myself, as they have in the past filed false ARs upon my staff, as well as others. They have sicced every gullible anti-hate-crime group in SL to Emit Time, and upon me, making outlandish accusations of me, my politics, etc. claiming I’m anti-furry (despite the fact that I own a furry sim, Fur Liberty, and a furry av) or are a nazi (despite the fact my RL family is part jewish). The AN has influence in LL due to their long history. They are abusing this influence now out of spite for being beaten badly and made fools of for their previous misdeeds and abuses.
shockwave yareach
Jul 2nd, 2007
Isn’t it funny all the defenses being made about the WU. “It was random people who just happened to be in the sim.” “It was only a handful of us, not the whole group.” “Not everyone in the group is a griefer.”
Funny how these troublemakers all congregated at WU for some magical, mystical reason. And funny how the sim owners declined to do anything about it. Sorry Tizzercakes, but if you run a crackhouse, the govt. can take it and not give you squat back. If you own a sim then the sim’s govt. (LL in this case) can do the same. You don’t like it? Then go away and don’t come back. Take your gridcrashing punk friends and go hang out at Sony’s THERE instead. We will miss you not.
You weren’t shut down for being too creative or for your freedoms. You were shut down because your sim was run by hackers who were hellbent on crashing computers, destroying everyone elses freedoms and threatening the existance of the very system that housed you. You got back only a fraction of the trouble you gave out. I hope you don’t see a nickle for your sim, as you broke not only LL TOS and rules for common courtesy, but also federal computer tampering laws.
I don’t know if the furries all over are laughing at you or not. But I sure am. But hey, don’t take it all so seriously — it’s only the internet, after all. And besides, we are getting LULZ out of it, so lighten up and learn to laugh at yourself.
Jessica Holyoke
Jul 2nd, 2007
Prokofy, once again, you can’t handle what people are saying, or are misinterpreting them. I did not say that a tenant is not responsible to their landlord. You did. I also did not say that a tenant is not responsible for their actions. I also fail to see why a holdover action, which is someone overstaying their lease, is relevant to what is being discussed here. The Lindens took the island because of violations of the ToS both on and off the island. They took it from a group that contained, but not exclusively contained, griefers. The group was not started by griefers and the island was not bought by or sold to griefers. So because there were griefers in the group, the land was forfeit. How is this not guilt by asociation or collective punishment? This is not being made responsible for your own actions, this is being responsible for someone else’s actions. And I noticed that you did not disagree with me when I said that a landlord is not responsible for their tenants actions, the actual statement that I used. You decided to put words in my mouth and declare that I’m wrong based on the words you used.
If things were truly like you were suggesting, that a sim owner was responsible for everything that was put on their land, why would I allow other people onto my land? The best response would be to ban everyone and allow only a few trusted people. Why would I create a build on land I purchased if the acts of others, griefers or otherwise, could cause it to be forfeit? And dont’ tell me about taking off build and scripts, because there are ways around that in order to still have harassment and griefing by others, that apparently are a land owner’s responsibility.
Prokofy, I want you to stop talking like you are knowledgable on the law. Because you are not. Time and again, I see you make an argument either using the wrong standard or the wrong facts. I’ve stated that landlords are not responsible for the illegal activities of their tenants. In rebuttal, you told me to check out holdover actions. The two things are not related. I won’t go into details Prok, but this isn’t the first time this has happened, where you really want to prove point A, but your support has nothing to do with Point A.
furriesonyolawn
Jul 2nd, 2007
“You really haven’t read anything, have you? Screw civility: I will go so far as to say you’re a fucking ignorant dumbass. The PN are crashing your sims. The PN are messing your Yiffing. Woodbury is not the PN.”
I never mentioned PN. I know PN are not /B/. But they are related. and they’re both griefer groups. Woodbury was run by someone who got banned before… and I BET it wasn’t for uploading caturday pics.
“Conclusion?
ITS THE SOUND OF NOTHING HAPPENING, AND THE PN ARE STILL GOING TO BE CRASHING SHIT JUST AS HARD AS EVER.”
yeah yeah whatever.
same pathetic shit as always. Excuse me while I go back to my yiffing, and pardon me if I don’t care about how big your “afro” is or how often you have to prove it to your loser anonymous buddies.
(PS, I’m still laughing)
Anonymous
Jul 2nd, 2007
“I find it rather odd, that a company that tolerates the celebration of slavery (Gor), Naziism (Furzis), pedophilia (sexual age players), and beastiality, all of which are felonious or even capital crimes to commit in most of the world, would so agressively persecute people for merely speaking their opinions.”
ehm, since WHEN did freedom of speech include griefing?
Khamon
Jul 2nd, 2007
As time goes by, I understand more and better what Candie meant when she claimed three years ago that “Lindens are griefers and Philip is the worst of them.”
Raz Welles
Jul 2nd, 2007
I found WU about half a day into my first serious foray into SL. I had an old account I decided to pick up, as I now had a computer that could handle the graphics. After wandering around for a bit, and really being a lost player, WU became the first group I could come back to and recognize a few names- and those names would recognize me. I will admit, I tagged along to watch the AN thing happen, but honestly I had no idea what was going on throughout the whole event- and it was only until the news hit this site that I began to understand what cards were falling where. I didn’t know what a griefer was, I had no idea about the specific details of how the TOS played out ingame, but as I “LURKED MOAR” so to speak, I began to piece things together, and the general structure of the society began to unfold before me.
Once I was able to distinguish the different types of people that would come to WU, and realized that it was not one group, but an amalgam of smaller dissociated groups, I was better able to make decisions on who to follow where, as quickly learned (by incident) that the mere act of being around and bearing the WU name would make me guilty by association. I like this avatar name (Raz Welles), and I do not wish to lose it.
I also like Woodbury, and so this puts me in a difficult spot.. well not so much anymore as the server is gone =\ ..
As a member of WU, and really, one for visiting the intricate displays (memetic in nature) they had up and the funny gestures (I can’t tell you how many laughs I get out of the ridiculous “tiptoe through the tulips” one), I am sad to see this (losing the server) happen, and do hope that it comes back.
Yes its true, there are some rough characters who visit WU, and some of the memes may be inappropriate. More often than not, the content is a lot safer than what is on 4chan itself, and I’ve never seen an undoubtedly TOS violating build stay. I recognize that this does not dismiss the occasional horrendous nature of some of the builds, those flukes tend to disappear faster than any of the authorities have notice of. Perhaps it is merely that bruised egos heal more slowly than the fleeting existence of the object in question.
Also, while I don’t think there is harm in members crashing their own sim, if it effects other sims, then I’ll accept that such an act is wrong as well.
I won’t argue whether you should pinpoint the owners or the individual, it seems that topic of argument is well covered. I thought it might be a good idea to tell a brief summary of my first 2-3 days on SL. Lump me in with the rest if you will, but against what I was taught in my first year of college- the grouping, name calling, and tendency towards black and white is rampant in the comments, and all parties are guilty of it. The “woodbury gang”, “the Lindens”, “JLU” (it seems in a recent posting a JLU member admits that it was wrong to lump all /b/tards together), etc. Yes, it’s easier to keep track of a select few groups and represent them as unified entities against each other, but I would think the better option would be to investigate the matter in its full gradient.
Unfortunately, this also means time, money, and due to the semi-realistic nature of SL’s social structure, brings into ponderings the age-old problems of managing society that have never been solved. So yes.. it’s simpler to consider this in great unified chunks, and create larger single targets, fairness be damned.
I would like to bring into light, however, some other points for discussion which I think need to be considered.
It was already mentioned that Linden is a company. Their sole reason for existing is to capitalize on their own creation, protect its well-being, and look for more ways to create profit. I may guess (yes.. only a guess) that their only reason for even trying to be fair is to make sure their customer base remains and grows- otherwise, and it states this in the TOS, they have no reason to consider what is fair. They do mention they have no obligation to be unfair, but the point still stands, they don’t need to be fair if they don’t wish to be.
Let’s detail that last one.
We seem to have been forgetting that Linden dollars do not actually have a value.
(Section 1.4)
You agree that Linden Lab has the absolute right to manage, regulate, control, modify and/or eliminate such Currency as it sees fit in its sole discretion, in any general or specific case, and that Linden Lab will have no liability to you based on its exercise of such right.
(Also consider section 5.3, the large print is the TOS, not me)
THESE DATA, AND ANY OTHER DATA, ACCOUNT HISTORY AND ACCOUNT NAMES RESIDING ON LINDEN LAB’S SERVERS, MAY BE DELETED, ALTERED, MOVED OR TRANSFERRED AT ANY TIME FOR ANY REASON IN LINDEN LAB’S SOLE DISCRETION.
That wonderful piece in 5.3 means that although we own the idea, we do not own whatever is on the server- at all. By placing it on the server, we give Linden a non-exclusive right to use and distribute our creations, but if I remember what I read last night correctly, however, we may ask Linden to halt all use of our creations if we so desired.
The point I’m trying to stress here, is that as money has been exchanged and land has been bought and sold- the close proximity to how it feels to make money and gain land in reality is enough that we’ve been forgetting (or maybe not forgetting, but just not keeping in the forefront of our minds) that it all still does NOT follow real laws or regulations.
WE DO NOT HAVE RIGHTS TO ANYTHING BUT ABSTRACT IP IN SECOND LIFE.
Your land, your “play” money, your very persona is up to the whim of whether Linden Labs deems you may continue to have the privilege of using their service.
Whether the TOS itself is legal, is another matter, IANAL, so do correct me as you see fit. These realizations on my own part, have halted me from making any serious investment in SL as of yet, especially since I like to hang around WU and “guilty by association” seems to be in play at the moment..
So land owners, business owners, any type of SL entrepreneur, don’t think for a moment you really “own” anything. You have no assets, you have a privilege that may be revoked without explanation or reimbursement. This is only my interpretation- draw your own from the TOS, go through it again paragraph by paragraph. If you find something that says otherwise, let me know, I’m not trying to muckrake, I’m trying to reestablish reality.
Before I move onto the other side of the coin, I’d like to tie what may have seemed like a digression into the main topic of discussion. Tizzers has a right to be angry- and what may seem like a direct attack on Linden Labs in writing a book about the dark side of the metaverse, may also be considered a reality check. Key word, reality. It really is that easy to forget we don’t have rights to what we think we own in this game, and it is upsetting to think that your “virtual life” can be wiped away without any ramifications or ability to fight for it. Woodbury being wiped away is less to me about griefer control, and more about the reality of the game hitting home.
Now the other side of the coin.
We seem to be talking about Linden Labs as a unified entity as well. Clear me up on this side as well if you know otherwise, please. This whole response is not meant to be an attack, or a defense, I want it to bring in some important concepts and issues into realization.
I’m not sure if Linden Labs expected to be dealing with the flood of issues that are now happening. Maybe they were prepared, maybe they weren’t. Earlier I mentioned that it is likely in their best interest to make users feel like they have assets to play with and use real money on. Anything in this game that may deter the illusion that we are playing with actual assets and value and make users, land owners, business owners, feel insecure about their holdings, would, I think, not be in Linden Labs’ best interest at all.
In removing WU, perhaps they thought they were eliminating a source of griefers who cause problems for their big money rollers, performing such an act in what they thought was in the best interest of their “ingame economy” and their own profits overall.
At the same time, they are trying to balance the freedom of the individual, so that we may feel more secure about our place in this metaverse and be encouraged to spend real money in the fantasy world. After all, a game is to let us do things we can’t normally do in real life. Cutting our personal freedoms in the game destroys the illusion. Land owners may not be the biggest potential asset in the game as it still all comes from the dollars of each individual. Land cannot make money without the individual living on it or using it. Limiting griefer tactics may limit those freedoms we enjoy. This may be a reason for their hesitance on this issue.
Also, notice that each Linden ingame may have their own code of morals and beliefs in what is right and wrong. It could also be that while we feel one group is getting favored, it might be more that that one group is more prone to squeak and get the oil than another. It could also feed the machine that as that group seems to get favored, other groups develop a stereotype mindset against the group percieved to be favored. This is only one of thousands of possibilities.
————————————————
Whereas there seems to be a lot of answers and clawings for what should be done about these current issues of griefing. I can only beg recognization of a few select concepts that complicate the matter and make the answers much less clear cut.
We can’t have a perfect society because we ourselves are imperfect- we can only come close if we share the same ideals. As the greater common denominator finds its way into SL, these shared ideals will likely fade or manifest itself into what may seem like vicious policing and unfair policies. The best way to keep the ideals alive is educate the newly unwashed masses, and provide personalized venues for them to find acceptance and in turn accept the game. They- no, we all need a reason to put on our best face and enter society with grace and stature. Sometimes the smile is on, sometimes our bad habits best us. Overall, we can only hope for the best. We are our own best asset for getting what we want in this game.. sadly, we are prone to our nature for fighting amongst ourselves.
I can only wonder what Linden Labs may have in store to solve this problem- or if they can solve the problem at all.
I wonder sometimes- and I had this conversation with a furry- if griefers were gone, would they be replaced with something far more sinister? As long as we keep a foot in reality, the griefers may be a good reminder that we are still trading real money for non-real assets. I fear that if security increases and freedoms decrease- worse things lurk on the horizon, and so much prefer this current balance. I don’t condone griefing, but I sure wouldn’t like to see what it may escalate to.
Remember, balance is the name of the game.
If Linden Labs fails to manage their idea conducively, I suspect the OpenSim project (http://opensecondlife.org/wiki/OpenSim) will mature soon enough, and bring with it its own solutions and problems. I should wonder, however, if we would prefer to govern ourselves, or to have Linden do it for us. What rights will we be trading for what rights- and what implications might there be for such changes?
So to WU, I dearly miss it and hope it comes back. I think Tizzers has given us an important reality check. To Linden Labs, I do hope they start considering things in a new light, perhaps they are, who am I to say? A sociologist and economist or two might help. To the readers, please consider what I have said and sort out the reality of what you do in SL and what it really represents. Try and make the distinction between the realities and illusions of what you are really doing and truly own in that game before you start betting chips- because at this point in time, it really looks like betting to me. To the herald, I thank for helping me get a better idea of what kind of world I’ve gotten myself into (lol).
Second Life has given us such a wonderful concept, and like Tizzers said, ideas are bulletproof. Regardless of how this whole thing plays out locally, I think the good ideas will carry on, as I believe this is an evolution of MMO that will move on and progress regardless of the companies that hold it.
Good luck, everyone, and be sure to eat your breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and get at least 8 hours of sleep per night.
Kami Harbinger
Jul 2nd, 2007
Prokofy, your religious ravings are incredibly offensive and bigoted. Your delusional belief in a “God” and your constant use of it as a rhetorical attack against anyone who disagrees with you is un-American. If I thought for half a nanosecond that you weren’t just a troll, I’d demand that you apologize.
However, in the last few months it has increasingly become clear that you are just a troll. You are the exact same thing as the /b/tards, as the PN, as any other griefer group. You exist and stay in SL only because it annoys people, only because you want to cause misery. You whine and claim that you have the high moral ground because it allows you to make your attacks and yet run away. You even brazenly invoke “Eddie Haskell”, when that’s exactly what you do every day of your miserable, venemous life in order to keep from being banned.
Linden Lab was right to ban you from the forums, SLCC was right to ban you and shouldn’t have backed down, Terra Nova was right to ban you, and I sincerely hope LL bans you from SL and Uri quits letting you shit on the Herald very soon.
Rot in the Hell only you believe in, you cretinous bitch.
Jim Schack
Jul 2nd, 2007
THANK YOU INT!
Though my time at Woodbury was extremely limited, mostly hanging out with Tizzers, I am not a griefer. In fact, I’m an anti-griefer who works for Int in his estate as VP of BnT and head of Ng Security. I can say that all the time I spent in Woodbury it was filled with /b/ pacifists who were not engaging in greifing.
But to Prokofy, that doesn’t matter. Because they made fun of her, therefore they must hang and all of their property taken away. The police and FBI should be called on them and all should be arrested for speaking ill of her or her cat fetish. And Int was right, that’s so Mao-like.
There is not enough Sudefed in the world that would make me sleep in a blanket of cats like you do every night but god bless you for doing it. What I wouldn’t do is call the humane society and bitch that you got too many cats unless they were coming in my house and peeing on my carpet. And i would call the cops on you if a stray cat did it. It was a cat, and you have lots of cats, it’s one and the same right?
Utter fucking nonsense Prok, it really is. Shame on you. You bitch and wine about their totalitarian antics and then praise the VERY SAME SHIT you are so tenaciously oppose.
That name calling i stated earlier wasn’t an attempt to troll, rather a passionate plea of reason and civility from a lunatic who wants the same and cannot provide it herself.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
Hi, Kami, you’re an outrageously evil cunt, thanks for sharing!
I don’t write on religion or God, or use these subjects to beat anyone with. I believe in God, but I don’t force it on others.
You’re absolutely raving and lunatic if you think I do. Does asking if someone believes in God, or affirming a belief in God in a mere line in a post now constitute “bigotry”? Hardly.
You’re unhinged, and part of this hugely zealous movement lately among atheists who are aggressively trying to stamp out religious belief in others — it’s really scary. Freedom of conscience and belief — or non-belief — is vital to an open society. Leave it alone.
The idea that bannings are something you celebrate, and hope to be applied “for life,” lets us all know what a totalitarian asshole you and the other TN people are. It gives us a glimpse into the kind of world that would exist if you were in charge, and helps outspoken people like me keep fighting!
If I’ve noted that the PN don’t believe in God, it’s merely an
explanation for part of the problem of morality and lack of compassion that permeates these nihilist griefers.
I’d be happy if secular humanism would impart the values of belief in something higher at least than one’s own flawed will, and compassion for other human beings. Then it could succeed at its mission.
Clearly it hasn’t done that for you!
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
Gistya, you are a classic case of a Popular Front type group operation designed to create the shell of something that can hide a Communist Party type infilatration with credibility. Very same mechanisms.
Secondly, everyone here that is accusing Tizzers of being a “griefer” has not said anything specifically that she has done. The only accusations have been that she associates with groups that “grief,” but as to specific examples of things that have been done — nothing.
But she does personally grief. She constantly joined my groups to try to harass — she had an entire island, didn’t need a rental, yet joined the open group to be a nuisance, paid rent, and tried to move into an area just to be nettlesome. Everybody can see what’s up with that! She scoped out one area, even after being ejected from the group, refunded, and banned from that parcel, and found other parcels to fly in, then whistled and brought her griefing pals to the area who shot at furries, harassed them verbally and destroyed property. Tizzers orchestrates things like this thinking she has plausible deniability but she’s then seen and detected in the area and everyone figures out what she’s up to.
You and the other apologists always act as if there is this perfectly fine upstanding art group that appreciates Asian culture that has just been accidently infilatrated by just a couple bad eggs. But that’s all arrant bullshit, and we all know it. The purpose of these exercises by Tizzers and you and others is to try to whitewash griefing groups and enable them to keep griefing and harming people while constantly looking like the cat who didn’t eat the canary. It’s so infantile and stupid — and we all see through it.
If you wordsalad and Haskel after these lame exercises are done over and over again, you only look MORE lame and MORE retarded.
Tizzers knew EXACTLY what she was doing taking hands-on griefing banned fucktards like Hazim and putting him in “Woodbury Security”. *Rolls eyes*.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
Csven, did you find a client yet? Also, did you start those CCD classes?
Jessica Holyoke
Jul 2nd, 2007
While I was driving, I realized that I may owe Prok an apology. Much of what we were debating about revolved around who is the tenant and who is the landlord. I realize now that Prok sees himself as a tenant in relation to his holdings and not a landlord. So sorry about extending that out.
I also remembered that even if someone is part of a group, that doesn’t mean that each member has the same amount of rights to the land. Members can be limited as to what they can do with the land, as in banning, access, media, selling or abandoning it. Or if a griefer in Woodbury did not have any interest or control over the land, then he didn’t lose anything, other people did.
Homewood
Jul 2nd, 2007
I remember a while back I contacted http://www.woodbury.edu/ about the problems with the sim in SL, I got amessage back saying that the university had no ties with second Life. They said they would be looking in Linden Labs and seeing if they could get the sim removed as it was destroying the Woodbury University reputation.
Nina A
Jul 2nd, 2007
Wow!! Now we know where the WU people have gone to…. here!! There’s me thinking it was LL that threw their asses out the door but it seems it’s Prok that’s to blame.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
Intlibber isn’t really opposed to griefing; he even gets a kind of thrill out of it because it helps him test security systems and play spy, infiltrating groups and spying on them. The TOS bars the use of spying equipment on other residents — how do the Lindens stand idly by while Intlibber mounts his intel ops to play spy? Intlibber and Angel Fluffy are part of this awful Security State that the Lindens are allowing to be put in place because they are weak and disinterested in real security.
And real security should have more to do with banning groups that keep perpetrating crimes as a conspiracy, and nipping them earlier in the bud when they re-appear, and following through on this “hash mark” stuff they claim bans entire computers, even coming in on a switched IP address.
I fail to see why the Lindens have to drop everything to provide the maximum security state that Intlibber, Angel Fluffy and others wish to install to harass, bully, and ban people they don’t like, even on ideological grounds. It’s really. With these ideologies of anarcho-capitalism that Intlibber represents, and BDSM fascism that Angel Fluffy represents, we really have to worry about how SL is turning.
All Intlibber does is run a real estate and banking business. He can make a ban list and empower his tenants to eject people like everybody else. It doesn’t have to be the maximum security compound with furious intel ops that he imagines. In fact, the PNs grief him more because he’s turned it into a game with them, he infiltrates them, they can see it, but they play along with it.
The idea that people will have their IP grabbed within the society of SL and used to withold goods and services and freedom of movement is really wrong. For one, as we are always told by haranguing tekkies, some IP addresses are dynamic. Actually, the DSL ones tend to be pretty stable, but there are enough that aren’t to make this a hopeless exercise at one level, and an intrusive invasion at another. It’s not just about efficacy, it’s about the invasiveness of forcing the Internet and its practices, some of them dubious, on to the integral virtual world.
I don’t see why Lindens’ failure to make LSL commands available to enhance the ability of large landlords to make even more sequestered country-club estates is at issue. These commands will exist when people can host their own sims. In the meantime, the world should be kept as open as possible to grow it, test it, and make it something different than real life, which is filled with armed compounds guarding boring surburban lives of the idle rich. I don’t see why so much attention should accrue to Intlibber just because he wants a real estate business or Angel Fluffy just because he wants organized rape games to succeed and create his little SL empire. LL’s failure to enhance the agendas of these two SL right-wingers is hardly a point for criticism; it’s part of balancing the right and left in SL which we wish they’d do more of.
What’s pathetic about this entire trajectory is that having failed in his “war on terrorism” strategy, like Bush, Intlibber is going out and befriending thugs like Vladimir Putin, whose regime is responsible for poisoning or murdering journalists and political activists, and saying we have to help them with “education”.
I’m sure the nihilist fucktards at PN were laughing up their sleeves at this rich dude thinking he could teach them spacebux lessons.
“The taking down of Woodbury University sim is an affront to the most cherished notions of free speech and expression that have caused western civilization to flourish.”
I don’t think the most cherished notions of Western civilization include:
o harassment and griefing of others
o racism
o obscenity
o destruction and devaluation of private property
During this vaunted “educational” sojourn in SL, I never saw one class, manual, tutorial, event, help card — anything from this educational sim. It’s not educational; that’s a sham. And it’s important to call the Haskels on this.
>It was preparing to teach classes in building, scripting, as well as in SL business to the attending students, beyond just providing a haven for their free expression of their artistic talents.
Uh…and what was stopping them from doing that for the last 6 or 9 months or whatever? Nothing at all. Why is it always “going to be good” and “working toward something positive in the future” as “soon as we get rid of a few bad eggs”? This is all arrant bullshit. They are goof-offs and griefers, all of them, and that was easily ascertained. It’s a scam.
>I find it broadly offensive what has been done to WU. I distinguish between the 5-10 sim crashing PN, and the general /b/tard population in SL, and I recognise that a University can only discipline those who it finds grief, just as a RL university is expected by local communities to punish students who commit hijinks in violation of local laws, or otherwise bring the student body into disrepute. However the taking down of WU is nothing but fascist and repressive, the sort of thing one would expect of Nazis or Soviets, Maoists, or Khmer Rouge.
No, the real Nazis/Maoists/Soviets/Khmer Rouge here are the b/tards, PN, Woodbury apologists and Intlibber for enabling them all as a fellow traveler. They affirm nihilism, deceit, the Big Lie, cunning conspiracy, distraction, propaganda, etc. — all the techniques common to all the totalitarian movements of the 20th century. Nothing new here.
>The intolerance of opinion and free speech by the LL G-Team smacks not of the libertarian ethics many have told me that LL has, but of the worst sort of PC persecution one can expect from tyrants.
No, thank God our hippie dope-smokers can see through this kind of bullshit rhetoric which covers up the fact that crypto-fascist totalitarian movements are getting started in SL and trying to use the liberal and libertarian lexicon to infiltrate with sinister agendas. Thank God it’s exposed.
>At the very least, after the first time LL raided WU, the campus should have be placed in the Local Governance program, so that Tizzers, or possibly Professor Clift, could be more well informed about the actions of those who belonged to the university group, receiving CCs of abuse reports filed. That is what principles of accountability require: if someone is to be held responsible for something someone else did, they should be well informed about it, and there should be due process.
Doesn’t this make everybody’s hair stand on end? The local governance program, which will make things like this impossible to abuse report! Since all the abuse reports will go to…the sim owner.
While we are all for due process and the Lindens have precious little of it, the cheerleaders here have picked a really bad example to start with. Tizzers is injured, but not innocent, and injurious to others.
>The concept of collective responsibility is one that one normally sees only in the Leninists and other radical leftists that Prokofy claims to despise. Leaders of groups can only be held responsible if it can be proven they were in fact responsible for directing people to commit illegal acts.
The b/tards and other variant strains that Tizzers befriended, aided and abetted are the first to engage in collective hate and responsibility, with their anti-furry sentiments, Nazi regalia, anti-black avatars and props, and their disrespect for other people’s property and privacy. Their notion that everyone has to treat SL as a game and a sandbox just like they do is the most fascist thing about them.
>I know that Prokofy lies. When she was screaming at me in IMs once that Tizzers was raiding her sims, Tizzers was in fact having a chat with me in Friedman, where she was investing on the stock market in BNT and other companies.
That’s silly. Tizzers does recon missions, scopes out areas, then sends in her goons, and goes and has a cigar with Intlibber while they do the dirty work. Geez, that should be obvious!
Intlibber is a fool for allowing a known and detected and documented griefer and orchestrater of griefing to get into all his structures. I guess it’s because communism and fascism always find company and common cause, sooner or later.
>Unlike some in SL, I take my responsibilities as CEO and Chairman of BNT Holdings seriously as if it were a RL company, and as it will be in the near future.
I guess we’ll see an end to this practice common on the WSE then, where the owners overvalue their property and transactions and run off with the proceeds, and create dummy stock corps that fold, leaving the purchasers of the stock holding the bag?
>We at BNT plan on opening an independent grid in the future, here in New Hampshire, the Free State, where free speech and free enterprise are both held as sacrosanct. We won’t allow sim crashers or other criminals in our grid, but we also won’t persecute people for peacefully expressing their belives.
Um, I have great faith in Intlibber’s ability to detect the difference *cough*.
>I find it rather odd, that a company that tolerates the celebration of slavery (Gor), Naziism (Furzis), pedophilia (sexual age players), and beastiality, all of which are felonious or even capital crimes to commit in most of the world, would so agressively persecute people for merely speaking their opinions.
Maybe because they crashed sims with weapons while they were um…free-speaking? lol.
>When I first started calling for the PN to abandon sim crashing and other offensive acts, I told them if they did so, and were still B& for merely speaking their minds, I would stand for their rights to speak and express. I do so now. Taking down WU was plainly and simply wrong. Shame on the G-Team, and shame on LL.
*Rolls eyes*. These folks were griefing right up to the last minute. They don’t reform. They didn’t reform when Verbena started a projet to engage them in “creativity” in the aptly-named “Satyr” — they didn’t reform in a “university”. It’s all fake. Containment, not engagement, is the only answer.
>If LL has evidence of serious griefing activities (i.e. crashing sims, not telling Prokofy she’s an idiot) going on in WU, they need to publicize them for the SL community to judge for itself. LL pays lip service to local governmance, but fails to deliver the information and ability for us to judge and regulate our fellow residents. I call on LL to step up, or restore WU.
LL already stepped up. They sent a letter saying “Your sim is removed because you keep grid-crashing and testing weapons scripts to crash sims”. Even Tizzers can’t deny that went on. They also are documented as harassing other residents — without me filing a single abuse report. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to go read the chat logs and see the Big Lie.
Why Bother
Jul 2nd, 2007
You know something, many of you who come to Woodbury’s defense only know the tip of the iceberg concerning what went on there. Those who have befriended Tizzers and take her side have been taken for a ride since she’s playing you all to achieve her own goals and you’ve fallen head over heels for it. I also find it funny that many of “Tizzykips” postings on the PN “secret” forums don’t stay out in the open for too long. Here’s a tip PN, Tizzers played you little twips too. All for her own profit.
In no way do I care about Linden Lab and their piece of shit game that I left, the reason why everyone gets upset is because they think that Second Life is all about having freedom. It is not. Just as Tizzers played everyone to her whim, Linden Labs and that dirty hippie Phillip have done the very same to all of you. They made you believe you have absolute freedom, you do not. They made you think you can say all you want, freedom of speech, you do not have that either. Until someone is daring enough to make a COMPLETELY open source equivalent to SL much akin to a Linux distro, you’re all living in a sick sad dream world. All SL is about is business, period. It’s about money, period. Intlib up there wants to build his own grid for the very same thing. Commercialism is what’s brining down this virtual society, and real life society, down.
To those who defend the Chans, be it 420cha, 4chan, 7chan…whatever. The Chans are a rotten pool of shit. The defense I keep hearing about the this /b/ crap is that “We just lulz at it. We’re not really rasist or [insert other highly offensive thing here]” That doesn’t fly when people are constantly creating new and offensive material. That doesn’t fly when many of Channers start taking those views into the real world and executing acts of vengeance on a /b/tard level like this here:
http://www.itsoverninethousand.com/i-did-it-b-i-did-it/#more-323
and everyone on /b/ finds things like that humorous. You can’t tag a racial slur on someones house, then get caught and charged with a hate crime, and tell the judge “I thought it was funny” and be let go. The judge will think YOU ARE FUNNY and throw the book at you. /b/ thinks they can get away with it because they are “Anonymous”
Before I get attacked, because I know I will, I’m no saint and I claim not to be one. I’ve done many bad things in my life myself. The difference is that I felt guilt for it and that’s what separates me from the Anonymous/PN/Channer/b/tards, Intlibber the virtual pseudo business man, Prok who bashes everyone and everything, Tizzykips and Mootykips, or Linden Labs and their asinine doctrines, and other examples.
My tip to all of you is to think for yourselves. Everything stated in this comment and the above comments by everyone else is just OPINION. Everyone keeps taking that OPINION as FACT when it is not.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
>I did not say that a tenant is not responsible to their landlord. You did. I also did not say that a tenant is not responsible for their actions.
But you did, scroll back and read what you write, it’s terribly misinformed. You said that a landlord can’t be informed of all the goings on in their sims, and therefore as they have no knowledge of offense, can’t be guilty of an offense. But they are in fact responsible.
>I also fail to see why a holdover action, which is someone overstaying their lease, is relevant to what is being discussed here.
This is what I mean by the need for more practical knowledge of how law is wielded. Landlords play this game all the time. They announce that a tenant is violating some term of the lease that is usually specious; they start eviction proceedings and also begin holdover proceedings as a form of harassment. They often lose these cases, but their hope is to wear out the tenants. A “holdover” box is sometimes checked on a housing court card just to see if it will “stick” even though a tenant has a valid list and can prove he hasn’t violated it and its unlawfully terminated.
In this case, however, the Lindens don’t have anything like a lease or lawyers or holdovers or housing court. They have a service agreement about server space which is being misused so they terminated the service contract under their TOS — unconscionable or not, see you in court, end of story.
>The group was not started by griefers and the island was not bought by or sold to griefers.
I disagree totally. Tizzers *is* a griefer and MC Fizgig is either a fellow traveller or a remote-control griefer, not clear. But they did fully plan to engage the 4/chan anime stuff in their digital arts program and did this in the full knowledge of what b/tards were and in fact ENCOURAGED them to come.
It’s funny to recall Intlibber’s first hysterical commentary on this — he thought it was a government experiment where the USG was trying to test people’s reactions to griefing.
>So because there were griefers in the group, the land was forfeit. How is this not guilt by asociation or collective punishment? This is not being made responsible for your own actions, this is being responsible for someone else’s actions. And I noticed that you did not disagree with me when I said that a landlord is not responsible for their tenants actions, the actual statement that I used. You decided to put words in my mouth and declare that I’m wrong based on the words you used.
Because the group is a conspiracy, Jessica. It’s a group created, designed, staffed, and activated for the purpose of griefing, and nothing else. This refers not only to the b/tards or PNs, but “Woodbury Security” which has nothing to do with either education or security.
And once again, you are either idiotically misreading my words because you’re dense or obdurate from too much legalist literalism, or deliberately misreading them out of malice. LANDLORDS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR TENANTS; TENANTS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR SUB-LETTERS AND ANYONE ON THEIR PROPERTY. THEY ARE INDEED RESPONSIBLE.
Your problem here is that you are failing to understand the paradigm. Linden Lab is our landlord — regardless of whether we are mainland or private island. We are all tenants here. And we are all sub-letters. And yes, we are all responsible for our sub-letters.
>If things were truly like you were suggesting, that a sim owner was responsible for everything that was put on their land, why would I allow other people onto my land? The best response would be to ban everyone and allow only a few trusted people.
Well, because most people aren’t literalist harassing nits like you’re being, trying to play lawyer? Most people have a give and take and a simple, but workable concept of “do unto others” that makes it possible to live in a world, not restrained at every turn by contracts and laws to prevent tortious actions and the need for lawyers *cough*.
Of course landlords are responsible for what is on their land, and in the SL setting, it’s even more clear — they are tenants with subletters, even, not strictly “landlords”.
>Why would I create a build on land I purchased if the acts of others, griefers or otherwise, could cause it to be forfeit? And dont’ tell me about taking off build and scripts, because there are ways around that in order to still have harassment and griefing by others, that apparently are a land owner’s responsibility.
Because most people behave well? Because 98 percent of the population obeys the rules? Because it works good enough without having heavy legal binding and restraints or vicious anti-griefing tools? If it were up to you, there’d be more laws, and if it were up to Intlibber, there’d be more lsl to control everyone’s movements to his satisfaction. Fortunately, we won’t have either any time soon!
YES, LANDOWNERS ARE RESPONSIBLE!
>Prokofy, I want you to stop talking like you are knowledgable on the law. Because you are not. Time and again, I see you make an argument either using the wrong standard or the wrong facts.
Jessica, I want you to stop talking like you are knowledgeable on the law. You are a law student who did not pass the bar, didn’t get a job yet, and has no reputation yet that we can judge. Why aren’t you clerking this summer, for example? What’s up with that? I’m using common sense, and citing common usages of the law, and standard principles — accessible to anybody, not only lawyers. That’s the wonders of law — it is not like religion, available only to priests in some sects.
>I’ve stated that landlords are not responsible for the illegal activities of their tenants. In rebuttal, you told me to check out holdover actions.
That’s because you didn’t understand two things: 1) the ability of landlords in New York City to use holdover actions abusively and incorrectly; substitute the term “frivolous eviction notifications” if that will make you feel “better” and 2) the fact that in SL, we are not landlords, but we are all tenants.
But in RL, landlords are responsible, too: if a landlord enables a crack house to keep functioning, he’ll be called to account, too.
No, of course they are related, you just didn’t understand my references, to RL or SL, because *you have no practical knowledge of either*. Get a job!
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
>Because they made fun of her, therefore they must hang and all of their property taken away. The police and FBI should be called on them and all should be arrested for speaking ill of her or her cat fetish. And Int was right, that’s so Mao-like.
Given that I haven’t abuse reported these retards because I’ve ceased abuse-reporting for weeks, you can’t pin this one on me. That’s the beauty part! Other people did though outside of our communities, I guess, even with Intlibber loving them up — apparently they bothered enough other people out there that the record was compiled.
And their actions deserving of abuse reports aren’t about making fun, or teasing, but of harassment of the sort involving prim litter, shooting, event disruption, etc. not just things like sending a notecard.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
Say what you will about our Philip, he *is* kind of a hippie, but he is not dirty. He has the most amazing hair, cool clothes that are way cooler than even Uri's, and he smells good, too.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 2nd, 2007
>I realize now that Prok sees himself as a tenant in relation to his holdings and not a landlord. So sorry about extending that out.
I’m glad you finally came to see that, but the landlord is responsible in classic terms, too. That’s why the Lindens cooperated with the German police on the “ageplay case”. And that’s why any landlord who didn’t cooperate with RL police on something like a crack house would be held responsible, too.
stfu
Jul 2nd, 2007
Seriously… What a load of horseshit, on both sides.
Jessica Holyoke
Jul 2nd, 2007
Prokofy, making an attack on me based on incorrect personal information just shows that you are not someone to be taken seriously anymore. Instead of debating me on the points that I am making, you feel the need to “win” by using an attack that is not relevant to what is going on.
Additionally, no one would be clerking when they are studying for the bar, as I am doing. Something I have stated in these forums before.
I am tired of being attacked personally by you everytime when I have defended you to others and given you a great deal of respect.
Kryss Wanweird
Jul 2nd, 2007
“No, the real Nazis/Maoists/Soviets/Khmer Rouge here are the b/tards, PN, Woodbury apologists and Intlibber for enabling them all as a fellow traveler.”
I invoke Godwin’s Law.
Prok, you lose.
Thread over.
Jessica Holyoke
Jul 2nd, 2007
And Prok, if the Lindens didn’t cooperate with the german authorities do you think they would have been arrested for possessing child pornography? If the landlord of a crack den didn’t cooperate with the police, do you think that he would be guilty of distributing crack? That’s what I mean by being held responsible for the actions of one’s tenants.
IntLibber Brautigan
Jul 2nd, 2007
Prok sez: “You still fail to grasp that in a group-owned sim, the group owns it. That’s really how land works. And the group contains people who griefed. They are owners. SO their ownership is revoked.”
Sims are owned by individuals, its impossible for a sim to be owned by a group, just look at the estate function… In the case of WU, its owned by MC Fizgig, who is Professor Clift of Woodbury University in real life, in Burbank, CA. I find it disturbing that LL emailed Tizzers, a student and estate manager, and not Prof. Clift himself. Looks like one more screwup. So Prok, when do we see you and your cats trucking out to do the LA Law thing against Fizgig? You and your collective responsibility needs to place the blame where blame is obviously due, on the big man hisself. Why isn’t Fizgig B&? Wheres the Nuremburg trial of collective responsibility for him? He’s obviously the only adult in this bunch of “Eddy Haskelling” word-salading neer doo wells. He must therefore be responsible.
BTW: where is the collective responsibility for those who refuse to take any measures to keep their sims safe? People who refuse to use banlink or abuse reports, like Prok, and most of Furnation, are encouraging griefing by failing to take personal responsibility for their own self defense, as assuredly as those citified idiots who think criminals obey gun control laws.
Tharik Oyen
Jul 2nd, 2007
WOW. Just WOW.
I thought I was bad. Did any of you guys get any work done in the office today at all?
DaveOner
Jul 2nd, 2007
I just think it’s amazing that the Woodbury folks have been such victims of drama and circumstance by all the alleged griefers hanging out there. I’ve been in SL (and RL for that matter) long enough to see that most people tend to be in relationships they actually want to have.
I’ve somehow managed to NOT keep the company of career griefers and still keep a fairly active in-world social life which includes participation and coordination in some large, active groups. Most of my friends are builders or hold other similar interests of mine and are in general good people. Why do these admins of WU have such problems keeping out of trouble or out of the company of trouble?
I bet the answer is some professor thought it would be a good idea to let the students run this project and too many involved had the “when the cat’s away the mice will play” attitude and it got out of hand.
I don’t have any more info to go off of than the one-sided SLH stories. However, they have (most likely unintentionally) shown both sides of the overall story with the AN Furry Concentration Camp story. There are definitely guilty parties associated with WU and LL’s accusations.
I do think LL may be treating WU differently than say a private sim owning individual, though. However, they shouldn’t be treated the same as an individual. They’re supposed to be a learning institution and keep some semblance of legitimacy, respectibility and dignity. Apparently they couldn’t pull it off.
I also think they would have done the same to IBM if a bunch of their employees were up to the same sort of antics. They aren’t making THAT much money off of these institutions!