Op/Ed: Repression, Tyranny and Corruption = Economic Stagnation
by Alphaville Herald on 21/08/08 at 11:59 am
by IntLibber Brautigan
KREMER, SL – The recent LL blog announcement by Jack Linden that LL is holding off any new mainland land sales indefinitely, due to flat land prices, indicates that there is little new interest in land buying by the general public. This means literally zero economic growth in SL for the past two months. The game gods have succeeded in killing an economy that previously had grown at rates of over 400% annually.
While many could explain it as a reflection of RL economic circumstances impacting individuals disposable income, there are other factors at work here. It is a proven fact that tyranny begets reduced economic activity. Former users of SL have either left SL, or reduced their usage to the status of free accounts with no land not just due to real life circumstances, as many are well paid professionals in RL who have plenty of disposable income. The reason they are ceasing contributing to the SL economy is they are sick and tired of the creeping fascism in SL.
Lets face it, the casinos, the ad farming, the banking, was all a sign of a healthy, growing, vibrant economy. People joined SL because they liked the idea of earning at least a part of their living in SL, and they were willing to invest their savings and free time here to make that possible. Linden Lab even promoted SL for this very purpose. Unfortunately, people from economically repressive states and countries also joined SL, brought their ranting demagogery with them, and have succeeded in destroying the economy and driving away capital, much as is the case in their real life nations.
In the real world, cultures that ban economic activity such as these wind up in the economic dustbin. The muslim world, many argue, is underdeveloped specifically because the islamic prohibitions on charging and paying interest on loans or deposits makes obtaining capital difficult, even in supposedly oil rich countries. If islam dropped the prohibition on interest, those nations would flower economically, their middle classes would grow with industry, and the supply of disenchanted underemployed individuals to islamist jihadist organizations would dry up because they would be too busy working.
terror is bad for business
Governments which engage in campaigns of terror against dissident groups wind up driving out economic players. Argentina, for instance, is a good example. The junta ruling that country in the 80′s ‘dissapeared’ thousands of persons, but the terror of being dissapeared drove out tens of thousands of the most creative, productive, and prosperous individuals, who fled to more free countries with their ideas, creativity, and wealth. Where Argentina was once the industrial powerhouse of South America, it lost so much ground economically that by the 1990′s it suffered a monetary meltdown and required a bailout by the world bank, and now lives under austerity measures and goes begging for debt restructuring.
Mexico, as well, has suffered economically because of its political corruption and record of repression of opposition political groups. It is decades behind the US specifically for these reasons. Recent reforms mean it is now catching up, and its membership in NAFTA is helping.
Second Life is suffering a similar fate as other nations suffering under tyranny. What exacerbates things here is that nobody is trapped in SL, and this is indicated by the vast reduction in new premium accounts, and the steadily decreasing number of new accounts, while the number of existing accounts going dormant is rising significantly. For this reason Linden Lab should be far more circumspect about how harshly they treat people. One story of bad publicity about how LL treats residents drives away tens if not hundreds of formerly loyal users.
The ban of gambling is now recognised as the cause of the collapse of Ginko Bank, and its collapse set off a wave of bank panics and capital flight that easily destroyed between a half billion to a billion L$ of net worth over a few months. The repercussions of this was an inworld recession which we have not yet exited from, a year later, and those remaining in SL are left to cause drama and infighting. LL tried to gloss over it all by blaming the banks themselves, refusing to recognise that ANY economy so drastically changed, in the real world, by government fiat, will set off a similar banking collapse.
Creative and outspoken residents are regularly branded ‘griefers’ by the mundane uncreative mediocrities of SL, and false abuse reports for age, harassment, assault are levelled and too often enforced by a governance team which is now demonstrably corrupted by furry and JLU influences. The furry communities intolerance of opinions which regard their behaviors as extremist fetishists and sexual deviants is well known. The g-team regularly permbans residents who do not implicitly accept furriness as mainstream and ‘normal’. They engage in vendettas against idiosyncratic and iconoclastic individuals who regard the “Big Six” as little more than softcore fascism and who publicly confront others who promote fascism through ranting demagogery.
Today I witnessed possibly one of the most overt acts of corruption by the g-team I’ve ever seen.
Now, you all know that a few days ago, I created the Tizzers BnT account using my custom last name which I paid LL a lot of money for and for the ability to register any account I wanted on it. It was shortly age-banned even though LL knows I am ID verified and have been for a year now, and knows all my BnT accounts belong to me. The account had NEVER been logged into the grid, so there was absolutely no chance that anybody could have filed an abuse report on it with any evidence to support an AR.
Since then over a dozen accounts with the first name Tizzers, created by various other residents, have likewise been banned, and in some cases their primary accounts have also been banned, without any valid incidents or evidence to support the bans.
Linden governance team corruption
Those of us at todays Governance Team office hours witnessed this corruption first hand. I got up and asked what the policy was regarding accounts named Tizzers, why they seemed to get banned without any justification. The g-team members repeatedly attempted to evade my questions, trying to insinuate I was asking about a specific case and not explicitly about a general policy, as my questions clearly stated.
Finally, Socrates Linden stated there was no policy wrt accounts named Tizzers…. read on…
[10:15] Public Microphone: Next up to speak is intlibber BnT
[10:15] You: Please explain the unpublished policy that prohibits anybody from having the first name “Tizzers” on an account and why you age-ban anybody doing so, even when you know the primary of the account owner is already ID verified, and before the account even logs into SL for the first time? There have been over a dozen accounts treated in this manner in the past couple days created by many different residents.
[10:15] Zara Linden: even so, we can’t operate off of notecards or IMs (info is in video)- please file a support ticket if you have any concerns that were not addressed after filing ARs
[10:16] Socrates Linden: Age closures are not done via first name.
[10:16] Aargle Zymurgy: I understand, Zara. the notecard wasn’t abuse related.
[10:16] You: well if an account has not even logged into SL once, you obviously are not operating off of abuse reports
[10:16] Kaylee Linden: And again intlibber we cant deal with specifics at this meeting
[10:16] You: this isn’t specifics
[10:16] You: this is about policy
[10:16] Public Microphone: adding Dakota Schwade to the question queue.
[10:16] You: you are obviously exercising a policy against a number of residents
[10:16] You: please explain the policy
[10:17] Harry Linden: Your question relates to an account created by you, unfortunately we can’t dicuss that here.
[10:17] You: wrong
[10:17] You: it applies to over a dozen accounts created by other residents int he past day
[10:17] You: not just me
[10:17] You: so obviously you have a policy you are not admitting to
[10:18] Socrates Linden: The policy is, no one under 18 is allowed on the main grid.
[10:18] You: that has nothing to do with it
[10:18] You: how do you know someone is under 18?
[10:18] You: if they’ve nver logged into SL on that account?
[10:18] You: so you have no chatlogs
[10:18] You: and the accounts are created by known, legitimate residents
[10:19] You: so again, please explain the policy you are not admitting to
[10:19] Socrates Linden: And specific accounts are “specifics”.
[10:19] Kaylee Linden: intlibber – you have already stated some of those are created by you, we have stated we do not deal with speicifics especially when they are not relevant to you, this is not the purpose of this meeting
[10:19] You: I created one of them
[10:19] Harry Linden: Unforutately we can’t dicuss this topic here, if you have an issue with an account please file a support ticket at the support portal.
[10:19] You: which you have not released yet
[10:19] You: I am asking about your policy wrt accounts named tizzers
[10:19] Socrates Linden: If you feel that someone has been incorrectly banned, please file an appeal.
[10:20] You: that would keep me busy for months
[10:20] You: so what is your policy wrt accounts named tizzers?
[10:20] You: it shouldn’t be hard to answer this question
[10:20] Kaylee Linden: intlibber we’ve discussed this lets move on to dakota
[10:20] Socrates Linden: We have no such policy against the name Tizzers.
[10:20] You: either you have one or you dont
[10:20] You: ok thank you
[10:21] Kaylee Linden: dakota you’re next 
[10:21] Dakota Schwade: Well he’s not “done”
[10:21] Kaylee Linden: please say done intlibber
[10:21] You: done
Now you can clearly see Socrates statement. Which, taken by itself would give everybody a big sigh of relief that whatever vendetta one Linden may have held, it has been dealt with. However this was tested a minute later:
[2008/08/20 10:25] Pierce Kronos notices an unbanned Tizzers show up
[2008/08/20 10:25] Zara Linden: you came to the right place jacen
[2008/08/20 10:26] You: newly created
[2008/08/20 10:26] Tizzers Muggins: This unbanned Tizzers is 30 seconds old.
[2008/08/20 10:26] Jacen Merryman: I am staff for a private estate w/4 islands.
[2008/08/20 10:26] Tizzers Muggins: We’ll see how long that lasts.
Indeed, shortly after the office hours finished, both Tizzers Muggins and Bridget Waffle were logged off by administrators for no reason:
[2008/08/20 11:31] Alyx Stoklitsky: Intlibber: No. Geona: I may google it.
[2008/08/20 11:32] Tizzers Muggins: rofl, Bridget was just logged out.
[2008/08/20 11:32] Alyx Stoklitsky: POOF
[2008/08/20 11:32] Alyx Stoklitsky: AND THE LIGHTING LEVEL IS BACK TO NORMAL
[2008/08/20 11:32] Geona Graves: I best run, lest I get removed
[2008/08/20 11:32] Alyx Stoklitsky: THANK YOU, LINDEN GODS
[2008/08/20 11:32] Tizzers Muggins: “Please check your email regarding identity verification”
[2008/08/20 11:32] Alyx Stoklitsky: Shit is SO cash
[2008/08/20 11:32] Tizzers Muggins: Countdown to ban….
[2008/08/20 11:33] Tizzers Muggins shouts: DO IT HARRY. DO IT.
[2008/08/20 11:34] Alyx Stoklitsky: THAT IS SO CASH
[2008/08/20 11:35] You: both banned eh?
[2008/08/20 11:35] Alyx Stoklitsky: aye
So, despite Socrates clear declaration that there was no policy against accounts named Tizzers, this one and her primary account were both logged out of SL and age-banned within minutes of the conclusion of the governance team office hours meeting where Socrates said it. The logouts occured in the sam sim, Kremer, as the meeting.
Now, I know the identity of Tizzers Muggins and Bridget Waffle. Neither is a minor. The entirety of Tizzers existence on the grid was in the sim of Kremer, and I witnessed the entirety of her short life in SL. Not once did she say or do anything that would lead one to think they were underage.
selective enforcement
However, the G-team is not even in its enforcement of age-bans. I have repeatedly reported one individual, as have others, who is 14 years old, who stole tier money from people he worked for and bought his own sim on the adult grid with the stolen money. He lives less than an hour from me in real life, and I know he used his mother’s ID and help to fraud the age-verification system. Despite proof being supplied about this, the G-team allows him to remain on the grid because he is also a furry. Yes, a child who engages in furry sexually deviant activities with adults on the grid, and Harry Linden refuses to act.
It is now clear that death squads now roam SL filing false abuse reports against people they don’t like, and getting corrupt members of the g-team (if they are not the death squads themselves) to ban those residents for false reasons. It is also well known that SL mafia groups have Lindens in their pockets who will permban a resident for money. Yes you heard it. The Nicholas Mafia is well known to offer this service to people, and to exercise it themselves against competitors in the mafia business.
Historically, mafia activity, no matter which ethnic group is involved, tends to be a sign of economic and political repression of ethnic minorities. Sicillians formed La Cosa Nostra due to economic and politcal repression first by the Moors in the middle ages, and later by northern Italians, French and Spanish occupiers. In the US, Italian-Americans repressed by the WASP establishment, formed mafias to gain economic opportunities and political power through racketeering and corrupt practices. In Russia, Georgians and Moldovans have historically done the same. The Triads of China, and Yakuza of Japan arose the same way.
Terrorism and guerilla activity is also a sign of political and economic repression. While such can be exacerbated by proxy-state brinksmanship between superpowers, the seeds of any such group are based in local repression. It creates fertile soil with which leftist revolutionary theory can be taught by activists to individuals with nothing to lose.
While the PN griefing group arose out of the /b/tard community on 4chan.org, they are only a small percentage of the overal /b/ community. Yet the governance team targets /b/tards in general, as do narrow minded fools like Corsi Mousehold, Angel Fluffy, and Kalel Venkman.
Likewise, many members of the PN leadership: N3X15, Mootykips, JWAN, Yaranaika, NigraLynch, Orly Lawl, have all been outed or come out as furrys. Shouldn’t LL likewise ban all furry’s from SL by the same logic?
They won’t because furry’s are so embedded within Linden Lab. Harry Linden, head of the g-team, is one, as are others.
Governance Team out of control
The Governance Team has clearly and unequivocably gone overboard in their remit. They are now clearly suppressing legitimate residents who pay good money to Linden Lab, and cooperate with groups that target legitimate, money-paying members those groups do not like. This is not new. Cyn Linden, VP of Customer Service (Harry’s boss) was the person responsible for stealing Mark Bragg’s land in 2006. When LL caved in on the case and settled rather than have a precedent set against them, Cyn was not punished for causing the whole mess, she was promoted higher where should could do more damage. She drove Michael Linden out of the G-Team manager spot, and put her protege Harry in his place. She is also responsible for driving Chadrick Linden out of LL, as he was slated for the VP’s spot until she started plotting against him.
It has become quite clear to those of us in the SL public what has previously been spoken of by sources inside the Lab to myself: Cyn “Linden” Skyberg is destroying SL, and most people, in and out of the lab, are too scared to do anything about it. Philip and Mitch are oblivious to her responsibility for the state of things, and M Linden has not been here long enough to figure out she is snowballing him.
The corruption and repression the g-team is exhibiting against certain members of SL, while letting others who are members of approved fetishes get by, is destroying SL. The decisions by Cyn Linden in dumping land on the market, in banning advertising inworld, in banning bank interest, gambling, etc. have driven all the interesting people, the fun, and the capital out of SL.
SL was such a killer app. It really took a lot of work for Linden Lab to fail, but it seems endemic. When I was at an LL recruiting party in June 2007, I was asked what I wanted to do for LL. I said “Strategic Planning”.
They asked, “What do we need to plan for?”
I said, “among other things, you need to plan on how to not become AOL.”
One of them retorted, “But AOL is a GREAT COMPANY!”
It should be no surprise that to cap off this summer of fail, Linden Lab has hired as the CTO replacement for Cory Linden, an executive from AOL. Now all they need to do is hire an exec from EA who used to run TSO and things will be complete.
If Linden Lab wants to revive the battered SL economy, they need to do a lot more than freeze mainland land sales. They seem to have taken the first step by implicitly permitting the return of certain types of gambling. This is a good thing, because the FBI told me specifically that they never told anybody the L$ was akin to a poker chip.
Secondly, LL needs to recognise that Federal Law prohibits real world banks from dealing in L$, so no RL bank will start banking here without a change in regulations. LL should seek such a change from the Feds, or take on the responsibility of lightly regulating the banking business with a few simple rules, and a basic equation that will use known economic data to set official prime rates in SL for independent banks to follow. This isn’t hard, its called Mankiw’s Law and is known by many finance professionals. They should use their gamegod powers to ensure that bankers maintain adequate reserves and limit their ability to take money out of world through process credit or transfer significant percents of bank assets to other avatars.
Thirdly, they need to make separate PG and M continents. This pastiche of PG and Mature sims and parcels is a huge source of drama and strife. Once you make a PG continent, merge the Teen Grid into the main grid, and make teen avatars tags and profiles a distinctly different color from normal accounts, so nobody can claim they dont know they are minors. Then require all teens on the grid to have a parent registered to supervise them. Only allow teens to be on the PG continent, and permit registered parents/guardians of teens to review the chatlogs and other interaction logs of their teens.
With separate PG and M continents, there will be no problems with advertising content being inappropriate, advertising installations on the mainland should be permitted, and owners should be able to sell the land they advertise on at rates reflecting the economic value of the advertising installation. Unless you own a private sim, you have NO RIGHT TO A VIEW. You on the mainland pay 33% less tier than those of us with private sims. The discount you get is because you get less abilities and rights. If you want land that zones out advertising, etc then you should be prepared to pay higher tier for it. Zoned mainland tier rates should be commensurate with private sim tier rates. Likewise, ‘adfarmers’ should also pay higher tier for the economic opportunity they are exercising.
If the governance team wants to get tough policing certain chronic troublemakers who refuse to repent, so be it, but they should do so and can save LL a lot of money, by filing complaints with the local authorities where those individuals live. However it should likewise be open to hearing the heartfelt pleas by those who have forsaken troublemaking, who have grown up, and wish to become positive, contributing members of SL society. We know they have done this in the past for Plastic Duck, and Sha Laxness, both of whom exist on the grid today, unharassed by the g-team on alt accounts.
The person behind Tizzers Foxchase would like the same opportunity and has made a heartfelt apology and plea for mercy, repeatedly, via email, IM, and in person, to no avail. I know Tizzers is personally responsible for much damage done to my own sims in the past. Tizzers made a heartfelt apology to me several months ago in confessing all of her offenses. I have accepted that apology and she has remained true to her word since then. I request that Linden Lab give her a second chance. I am positive that you wont regret it.
stop yiffing and get down to business
It is time for everyone to recognise what is happening, to drop the drama, drop the demagogery, drop the vindictiveness and vendettas, try to just get along, and get back to building the economy of SL.
Corporate customers are not leaving SL due to griefing. They are leaving due to public queasiness about furry and ageplay fetishes going on which the g-team protects, and they are leaving because Linden Lab seems to be more occupied with protecting sexual fetishists rather than developing and producing the tools needed to make real business possible in SL, namely:
a) Groups 2.0: a fully fleshed out group management system for people to run their businesses through.
b) SL VOIP: Businesses need to voice conference with anybody on the planet, not just other SL users. You need calling plans for users to be able to call people outside SL.
c) HTML on a prim: no, not just a picture like the media setting show, but a dynamic link library to make prims into dynamic objects in a linkset application to do email, web browsing, embedded media, ecommerce, with SLL and shttp and https connectability.
Stop messing around in yiff-pads and get to work on making SL the business platform you’ve been hyping it to be. Stop harassing and messing with residents who pay, or want to pay, good money to be involved in this economy, and stop listening to chronic demagogs like Prok and tin-pot-rent-a-cops like the JLU.
Archie Lukas
Aug 21st, 2008
The fun, excitement and vibrancy of Second Life has pretty much gone down the drain.
It’s a pity cos I had a year and a half of good clean fun.
I spent 2 hours the other night cleaning up the inventory Landmarks and met no-one who could type speak -it seems we are overun by a race of mutes.
Yawn…………………
Reality
Aug 21st, 2008
Libber – dearie?
Get. A. Grip.
gambling banned by ‘government fiat’? Linden Lab is the owner of Second Life – not a ‘government’. The ban was made due to the presence of a section of law within the Safe Harbor Act that congress decided to sneak in at the last minute. ALL internet gambling for real money is now illegal within the United States and all US residents are prohibited from getting money from an overseas gambling site.
as to the rest of your ‘article’?
Here’s a thought for you dearie – second Life is whatever the Lindens want it to be. If they wish to allow fetishes into Second Life then they will.
Do you know what the real cause of these problems you have blamed on fetishes is?
The twits like you that cannot put a line between reality and fantasy.
respond when you’ve discovered that line.
Eye Korobase
Aug 21st, 2008
I totally agree with you, IntLibber
The Lindens problem is that they do not give a shit about you or me, unless you pay them for either protection or to get a account banned. The whole system they use is FUBAR. A known grifer/copybotter that I know told me that, his account got banned, so within 30 mintures he was back online. Yet My account gets stolen and I got to wait 3 days, a few hours, and 10 mintures before LL can get it back. The friend I know, has had his account banned a few times for different things. I have never done one thing that is against TOS, yet it takes them 3 days to fix something that only took my friend 30 mintures to do. The Ticket system is FUBAR as well. The lindens never really want to help you, all they want is your money and they alway tell you if you have a problem, to put in a support ticket that can take anywhere from 30 mintures to a few days or even weeks to get through.
I also agree with your statement about the furry business. Lindens are biased in favor for furries, because some of their own are furries. So they see any action against a furry as a TOS break. This happened with Dark Sleeper AKA you all know, had asked just one question to a member of the 39th as a joke. She, being a furry, reports him for harassment and he gets banned for 3 days for just asking ONE question. All because she was a furry, she got speical treatment.
Mootykips
Aug 21st, 2008
Where to begin, where to begin?
We’ve seen a dramatic increase in the number of Tizers bawwwing articles, and IntLibber bawwing articles in the past week. This is a sign that things are Not Going Well for the fake Woodbury University we’ve all come to know and love. We all know you’re not just “waiting for paperwork from the real life Woodbury” before Linden Lab will allow a sim to be renamed. The other, more important and certainly overriding reason is that for the second time in four weeks, your main account has been suspended because you can’t pay your bills, and Linden Lab won’t do anything till they’ve been paid.
Seeing the PN jump around like frogs who suddenly realize they’re being boiled alive is fun too – this whole thing is collapsing of its own weight, as I knew it eventually would. The ratio of posts from PN who think they’re being abused has now far exceeded those posted by furries, and everyone is now scrambling to get away from Tizzers, IntLibber, the furries AND the PN because they can see the whole thing is coming down at once and nobody wants to be caught inside the building when the roof finally caves.
The only thing holding the roof up is IntLibber’s rapidly evaporating money supply. I’m sure I’ll be entertained for months watching what happens to him, and all of you, after that. You’re all so wrapped up in this, clearly, because your Second Life is your First Life.
I was able to put it down and walk away. But I’m betting you just don’t have it in you. Any of you.
Charles Xavier
Aug 21st, 2008
Orly Lawl was Angel Fluffy.
ohohoho
Aug 21st, 2008
I was able to put it down and walk away. But I’m betting you just don’t have it in you. Any of you.
Posted by: Mootykips | August 21, 2008 at 02:51 PM
You yiff Farsuka Botha in the Machina sim and cling to SLH, you didn’t let anything go.
Crunk Munster
Aug 21st, 2008
OMGZ! SL IS FALLING APART!
Darien Caldwell
Aug 21st, 2008
The timing of all of this is interesting, as it coincides with the shutdown of LL to resident communications as I have outlined in my own blog. The LL blog has been effectively closed, with all discussion being routed into the forums. An outline of what and why is available on my blog (click my name).
I wonder if the impending SLCC has anything to do with it, perhaps some announcement which will cause widespread outrage?
mootykips
Aug 21st, 2008
ps griefing saves lives
Charles Xavier
Aug 21st, 2008
Orly Lawl was IntLibber Brautigan.
mootykips
Aug 21st, 2008
blargh my last post got eaten and i’m too tired to type it out again soooooo
tl;dr: intlib you are a moron for comparing internet games to juntas, i don’t spell my name with a capital M but that guy was p. much right, and ohohoho BAWWWWWW
ohohoho
Aug 21st, 2008
@mootykips
protip:
BAWWWWW has 5 W’s, not 6.
Charles Xavier
Aug 21st, 2008
Lidiya Martynov is Alyx Stoklitsky – I had to give him a fake name so he could continue to ban people on BanLink even though he’s ruined his reputation by outing himself as a PN on the Herald.
Nikola Shirakawa
Aug 21st, 2008
I could almost guarantee you that Kalel Venkman and the JLU are not behind this one, at least not officially. Could be one or two rogue members, I know they have a couple, but by large, they lack the time and the patience for that. Believe me, with all the alts he knows I have, if they were banning people like that, I’d have been booted a long time ago.While they may have a ridiculous vendetta against channers, they aren’t liars, and they won’t file false or unprovable abuse reports.
But your statement that at least the BnT account could not have been banned by AR is just false. The moment an account is created it appears in the record, and if someone with an axe to grind against your or her, like say Prokofy Neva, Kalel Venkman, Angel Fluffy, or Harry Linden, they could start filing just based on the name. And it would only take one person. Personally, my money would be on Prokofy, as she has the itchy trigger finger and would go for the age charge. The others would shoot for a disclosure charge, particularly because Kalel knows for a fact Tizzers is not underage.
Corsi Reality
Aug 21st, 2008
Reality, I mean, Corsi…
The end of that article there, he meant you too, you hyperreactionary diaperfurry fool.
General Drama
Aug 21st, 2008
Nikola,
Pay attention. Its widely known Int owns the BnT last name and he only uses it for company accounts that he controls. Since he is already verified, the Lindens know he would not really be Tizzers Foxchase. Even Prok, as obtuse as she is, knows this. So do all members of the Governance Team. So theres more to this than someone with an itchy trigger finger. Harry, Plexus, etc are all corrupt (oh and Plexus publicly went furry this week, while Socrates is a bouncer for an ageplaying sim on his private alt). Int’s been talking about this for a long time with few people believing him until now. Now he’s got a rock solid case.
Just Me
Aug 21st, 2008
And, in the meantime, the rest of us .. the non-griefers, the non-complainers, the non-gripers, continue with our normal SLives …. none of this affects 99 percent of the SLers who are busily interacting, socializing, building, and generally having fun.
Just another perspective on the matter.
mootykips
Aug 21st, 2008
yes ohohoho i’m sure you would know
The Juggernaut, Bitch
Aug 21st, 2008
GET OUT OF MY HEAD CHARLES.
Socrates Linden
Aug 21st, 2008
I’LL PERSONALLY BAN EVERYONE WHO COMMENTS ON THIS “STORY”. YOU’LL WALK MY LINE OR GET BANNED FOREVER!
IntLibber Brautigan
Aug 21st, 2008
I am happy to report that Tizzers BnT has been unbanned today, after a week of being agebanned without ever having logged into SL. However I do not see any other Tizzers accounts back. I encourage everyone who supported us in this to file tickets regarding this. Mine did work, lets see how other peoples tickets work out….
Anonymous
Aug 21st, 2008
Fun thing about intlibber is, he’ll have some valid points, but kills them when he goes on a tirade including unrelated things that reek of conspiracy theory shit.
Real reason shit is going south:
Linden Labs is a company run by adults with child-like minds. They’re irresponsible, immature, and are run by the same driving force behind the dot com bubble.
There is no real value it “Virtual Real Estate” when you’re the only company making the land and printing the money. LL claims to act like an ISP, but do the exact opposite, they make the infrastructure, then control every aspect of it. They keep it closed in and milk it, and then more than half of their immature staff, a good portion who are furries (and not really just furry hating here, but honestly, furries are the worst case when it comes to immaturity and acting like children, they dress the way they do and act the way they do because they have a serious peter pan complex) who hold personal vendettas and try to control everyone’s thoughts. Being anti-furry is one of the unspoken rules of SL, and if a furry AR’s you, you will either lose your stuff or get permanently banned without warning for “Intolerance”. That’s another issue in itself, thought not completely off the subject as the other thing that is making LL lose customers is that they practice favoritism. They favor “special” groups. Over the years I’ve noticed that people tend to defend what gets them off more than anything else. Which LL seems to be doing, they will defend sexual fetishes (until the law comes breathing down their next, then they panic) to the very end. This is why there’s a joke that SL is just furcadia 3.0, LL will defend furries until the very end, because more than half their staff are furry, etc, etc.
Linden Labs has also constantly kept things under lock and key and uses a lot of smoke and mirrors to generate hype, and constantly lie and give no reasoning behind their actions. This is another reason why they’re losing customers. Businesses dont want to go near them for the reason that they cater to sexual fetishes (come on, any outsider looking in even says this, denying it means you’re completely deluded, I mean, I knew before playing SL, that SL was pretty much a modern day Sodom and Gomorra) and the fact that SL is not straight forward in any of their business. They dont inform companies of any issues, just “give us money and you get a sim, however you dont actually own it and we can just pull it from you whenever” They give no assurances to the security of your investment. Then there’s the fact they practically print their currency and do nothing to keep everything economically balanced. They push for business and growth, then turn around and say their money has no real value and it isnt their fault if they fuck shit up and make it collapse. No one wants to deal with that bullshit. Seriously, linden labs could completely make the Linden useless to cash out tomorrow, and there would be NOTHING anyone could do or say. No one could even sue them.
Then the last thing, “Linden labs claims zero liability or responsibility because we’re an ISP, we’re not responsible for our own actions either” which is basically “we can fuck you over for our own immature entertainment, take your money and not give anything in return, or just munch your accounts. Though they are in the right according to the TOS, as your money that you put into the grid already belongs to them. You just have refund credit with no value.
To sum a TL:DR post up:
Linden labs doesnt care about anything but themselves and their personal interests, they want companies to go in and play, yet offer no assurances, and they slap around residents and generally have a cloak and dagger approach to dealing with people. and surprise surprise, no one wants to stick around, especially with the hype bubble gone.
If LL’s smart, they’ll start licensing out server software for people to run their own sims for the last grab at some money. They can at least license the proprietary parts, the rest of the opensourced code they use they should haven released years ago, the client doesn’t count, either.
But I forgot, they aren’t smart. They fired all of their intelligence. Now you just have immature children and opportunist assholes at the top who will milk a company to its death for short term gains.
Angel
Aug 21st, 2008
“and ageplay fetishes going on which the g-team protects”
This I certainly agree with, just look at ageplay sims like “Commune” run by the group “HIM & I & US” a place where young boys roam about naked, have a nude dance club and “private” sex areas.
A place ARed many times, complete with photos of boys fucking, but which has been completely protected.
Rawst Berry
Aug 21st, 2008
Poor people complaining about ad farms ruined the SL economy. Lol.
And LL loves furries so much that they took furries out of their new starter avatars, and encourages people to watch their avatar rendering cost, possibly leading to furries not being allowed in many areas because they use a lot of prims and will usually have a higher rendering cost than humans.
What the furries and economy shit had to do with Tizzers, idk. What the hell is this article about? I’m sympathetic about the Tizzers issue but this is just a bunch of raving.
Gaius Goodliffe
Aug 21st, 2008
Just Me: Just So. Well said.
SL is surely collapsing. Not a month has gone by since I started using SL in 2005 that someone hasn’t posted a tirade about how obviously true this is, and how the latest outrage from LL was responsible for it, and that SL was now doomed because of it.
Meanwhile, the other 99% of us go on having fun regardless. How foolish of us…
LL’s behavior with regards to autobanning anyone named Tizzers is abhorrent, and they should be publicly, resoundingly roasted for it, but somehow linking this to land sales and the economy is patently ridiculous.
No doubt Philip Linden is responsible for the problems at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, too… lol
General Drama
Aug 21st, 2008
Rawst,
You can be forgiven for being a noob. Everything here IMHO is valid criticism. You may not understand it all, thats ok, but lurk moar to find out before judging it.
meatwad
Aug 21st, 2008
Trying to get an answer out of Zara Linden is one of the biggest wastes of time EVER.
The ONLY Linden that doesn’t suck at this point is Torley.
I’ve been here 2 years now, and I’ve watched the “soul” of die off. The only reason I don’t leave is because of all of the investments that I do have already, and the fact that my business is finally doing something.
But the actual “soul”? Totally mismanaged away.
The only people left right now are die-hards and new accounts made for griefing.
Sinking the values of the properties bought by existing residents, to lower prices for new residents was a bad idea. You can’t attract/keep new members by making the old ones mad. The halt on new land sales is a good start, but still doesn’t help everyone that got screwed over with the restructing of private islands and manipulations of mainland supplies to keep prices LOWLOWLOW!
Their absolute refusal to do anything about bots (both land and camping) destroyed a lot of the “trust” that many residents had in anything financial. ONLY 20 accounts per e-mail account? No verification needed? That’s a problem asking to be exploited. And it has been. Viciously.
Mis-management is killing SL. And sad to admit it, I’ll ride it down until it crashes. Which from the looks of things, won’t be too long now.
The neopotistic management team needs to be thrown out. I’d actually LOVE to see accountability in the management positions, but you know it will never happen.
But you can file a CS ticket about it if you’d like……
And I agree with one of the posters above. It was a good point, IntLibber, but your wandering off on the conspiracy theory paths detract from your point quite a bit. But the hyperbole DOES fit, so I can overlook it. But to be honest, you have to lay off the Alex Jones and Jeff Rense websites. It’s affecting your thinking.
(oh, and your write-in for Ron Paul is a joke. Bob Barr won’t win either. Your post REEKS of your political views, I just had to laugh)
Proteus Hand
Aug 21st, 2008
Too bad the NWG is buggy as shit. I’m betting money that if LL doesn’t sagebomb itself into lucid maturity, it’s going to be as fucked as Enron, except this time it’s a different kind of oil on the furry little animals, and in different places.
mootykips
Aug 21st, 2008
meatwad: i wasn’t aware “fuck you i got mine” was a real political view
Proteus Hand
Aug 21st, 2008
Besides, LL needs a fresh blood bath. They killed the community.
Eye Korobase
Aug 21st, 2008
To bring up another topic on the furry/linden love issue is that as long as someone copybots a furry avatar, LL will never ban them for that. After looking into it and hearding this from a few people, this is the story. A Girlfriend of one of the lindens, not sure of the name, but she is a fur, Copybotted a Blue Avientiy fox avatar and the linden knew about it. The issues was taken up to the linden in question and did not act on it one bit. To this day, that chick still has that copybotted fur. Again as we can see, nothing is off limits to lindens as long as your a good friend of them or paying them. I do feel bad for the land owners who have to put up with LL’s BS, but their are bigger issues within SL to deal with.
mooty = prok?
Aug 21st, 2008
Gee Mooty, since when are you copping your political slogans from Prokofy?
Ya'man
Aug 21st, 2008
Int,
I tried to read this $hit, I really did, but I couldnt.
Now Frizz’s entry was most enlightening I will admit and pours massive TRUTH & WIN.
But having said that…
I got about 1/4 the way thru your piece IntLibber and thought to myself, this guy is either punished with an infirmity and therefore has the only real excuse for being a total self absorbed SL puke trap OR this guy is just a real, totally self absorbed SL puke trap. I often wonder if some of these Herald writers are aspiring journalists, or english majors in college. But I’ve come to this conclusion – no f’n way – they are just loser types with no basis for real-world interaction, motivation and intercourse for that matter. Go grab some summer y’all while it’s still making an appearance. SL is destined to go the way of the dot.cum bubble soon enough. “Anal”ysis of anything in that regard shows TRUE basement dwelling tendencies.
Go out and “get some” reals before it’s all gone… Seriously
meatwad
Aug 22nd, 2008
Haven’t been paying attention the last 8 years, huh?
TheTruth
Aug 22nd, 2008
pssst….
There’s furries in the white house too, man!
there’s people who say the US government did 9/11. There’s /b/tards that say furries did 9/11. Coincidence?!?!
NASA sent chimps into space in the past, Russia did the same with a dog… Think of it. animal astronauts… they’re taking over, man!
Down with furries! cause it’s EEEEVIIILLLL to want to fake-fuck on a glorified chatroom! EVIL I say!!!
IntLibber Brautigan
Aug 22nd, 2008
I love it when petty fascists like Prok try to make out like *I* am the extremist, not them. SL was founded on my libertarian beliefs, as was the US. I am not the extremist here. Nor am I alone:
“The more laws and restrictions there are, the poorer people become.”
- Lao-tsu, TAO TE CHING
“The effectiveness of a competitive market is in no way dependent upon the goodwill or honesty of its transactors.”
- Thomas Sowell, THE ECONOMICS OF POLITICS AND RACE: AN INTERNAL PERSPECTIVE
“…Amnesty International’s listing of human rights abuses shows a definite pattern where those nations with the least respect for human rights are also the poorest. By contrast, those with the greatest respect for human rights tend to be the richest.”
- Walter Williams, ALL IT TAKES IS GUTS
“…we are living in a sick Society filled with people who would not directly steal from their neighbor but who are willing to demand that the government do it for them.”
- William L. Comer, AVOIDING THE HIGH COST OF DYING
“…while men usually recognize criminal acts when they are committed by an individual in the name of his own interest, they often fail to recognize the very same acts for what they are when they are committed by some large gang in the name of “social justice” or the “common good.”"
- Jarrett Wollstein, SOCIETY WITHOUT COERCION
“How does something immoral, when done privately, become moral when it is done collectively? Furthermore, does legality establish morality? Slavery was legal; apartheid is legal; Stalinist, Nazi, and Maoist purges were legal. Clearly, the fact of legality does not justify these crimes. Legality, alone, cannot be the talisman of moral people.”
- Walter Williams, ALL IT TAKES IS GUTS
“…most of the evidence suggests that licensing has, at best, a neutral effect on quality and may even cause harm to the consumers.”
- S. David Young, RULE OF EXPERTS
“…mainly the research refutes the claim that licensing protects the public.”
- Stanley Gross, Professor of Psychology, Indiana State University
“…state licensing boards, particularly for medicine, but also for other professions, have instead become first and foremost devices for protecting the monopolistic position of the professionals.”
- Marie Haus, REGULATING THE PROFESSIONS
“Bureaucratic Rule of Two: Removal of an activity from the private to the public sector will double its unit cost of production.”
- Thomas Borcherding, BUDGETS AND BUREAUCRATS: THE SOURCES OF GOVERNMENT GROWTH
“It has been in periods of untidy, tumultuous competition that products have been democratized and have gone through their most rapid rate of growth and innovation.”
- Peter Samuel, UNNATURAL MONOPOLIES
” If we can prevent the Government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of caring for them, they will be happy.”
- Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence
“What is common to many is least taken care of, for all men have greater regard for what is their own that what they possess in common with others”
- Aristotle
“Depressions and mass unemployment are not cause by the free market but by government interference in the economy.”
- Ludwig von Mises, THE THEORY OF MONEY AND CREDIT
“…public schooling often ends up to be little more than majoritarian domination of minority viewpoints.”
- Robert B. Everhart, Professor of Education, University of California, Santa Barbara
“A general State education is a mere contrivance for molding people to be exactly alike one another; and as the mold in which it casts them is that which pleases the predominant power in the government, whether this be a monarch, a priesthood, an aristocracy, or a majority of the existing generation; in proportion as it is efficient and successful, it establishes a despotism over the mind, leading by a natural tendency to one over the body.”
- John Stuart Mill, English philosopher and economist
“Economic control is not merely control of a sector of human life that can be separated from the rest; it is the control of the means for all our ends.”
- Ludwig von Mises, HUMAN ACTION
“No matter how worthy the cause, it is robbery, theft, and injustice to confiscate the property of one person and give it to another to whom it does not belong.”
- Walter Williams, Professor of Economics, George Mason University
“The more that is given, the less the people will work for themselves and the less they work, the more their poverty will increase.”
- Leo Tolstoy, author of WAR AND PEACE
“Cities with rent controls had, on average, two and a half times as many homeless people as cities without them.”
- William Tucker, THE EXCLUDED AMERICANS: HOMELESSNESS AND HOUSING POLICIES
“When taxes are too high, people go hungry.”
- Lao-tsu, TAO TE CHING
“Government is not reason; it is not eloquence. It is force. And force like fire is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.”
- George Washington, First President of the United States.
“I let go of all desire for the common good, and the good becomes as common as the grass.”
- Leo-tsu, TAO TE CHING
“Your America is doing many things in the economic field which we found out caused us so much trouble. You are trying to control people’s lives. And no country can do that part way. I tried it and failed. Nor can any country do it all the way either. I tried that, too, and it failed.”
- Herman Goering, 1946, Nazi minister
“The state spends much time and effort persuading the public that it is not really what it is and that the consequences of its actions are positive rather than negative.”
- Hans-Hermann Hoppe, A THEORY OF SOCIALISM AND CAPITALISM
“The more prohibitions you have, the less virtuous people will be… Try to make people moral, and you lay the groundwork for vice.”
- Lao-tsu, TAO TE CHING
“Center your country in the Tao and evil will have no power. Not that it isn’t there, but you’ll be able to step out of its way.”
- Lao-tsu, TAO TE CHING
“Let the Tao be present in your country and your country will be an example to all countries in the world.”
- Lao-tsu, TAO TE CHING
“…according to the U.S. Department of Labor’s own statistics, “protectionism” destroys eight jobs in the general economy for every one saved in a protected economy.”
- Vincent Miller and James Elwood, “Free Trade vs. Protectionism”
“It is no coincidence that some of America’s most lethargic industries-steel, footwear, rubber, textiles-are also among the most heavily protected.”
- Thomas DiLorenzo, WHY FREE TRADE WORKS
” It is wrong to demand that the individual subordinate himself to the collectivity or merge in it, because it is by its most advanced individuals that the collectivity progresses and they can really advance only if they are free…. The individual is indeed the key of the evolutionary movement.”
- Sri Aurobindo, THE FUTURE EVOLUTION OF MAN
“Soviet citizens have a worse diet than did Russians under Czar Nicholas II in 1913.”
- Mortimer B. Zuckerman, editor-in-chief, U.S. News & World Report, 1989
“Measured by the health of its people, the Soviet Union is no longer a developed nation.”
- Nick Eberstadt, THE POVERTY OF COMMUNISM
“The use of force to achieve equality will destroy freedom, and the force, introduced for good purposes, will end up in the hands of people who use it to promote their own interests.”
- Milton Friedman, Nobel Prize winner, Economics
“When man interferes with the Tao, the sky becomes filthy, the earth becomes depleted, the balance crumbles, creatures become extinct.”
- Lao-tsu, TAO TE CHING
“Socialism of any type leads to a total destruction of the human spirit….”
- Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Soviet dissident and defector
“Moderation in temper is always a virtue; but moderation in principle is always a vice.”
- Thomas Paine, COMMON SENSE
“The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism, but under then name of Liberalism, they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program until one day America will be a Socialist nation without knowing how it happened.”
- Norman Thomas, Socialist Party Presidential candidate
“It is a known fact that the policies of the government today, whether Republican or Democratic are closer to the 1932 platform of the Communist Party than they are to either of their own party platforms in that critical year.”
- Walter Trohan, Chicago Tribune, October 5, 1970
“If you want to be a great leader, you must learn to follow the Tao. Stop trying to control. Let go of fixed plans and concepts and the world will govern itself.”
- Lao-tsu, TAO TE CHING
Lord George A. Zimmer IV, High Inquisitor for his Majesty God Emperor Frizzle of Fry CI
Aug 22nd, 2008
Jesus Christ, IntLibber, WALL OF TEXT.
Anyway “TheTruth”, your sarcasm aside, the reason that furries are hated is because they won’t recognize that their fetish is indeed that, a fetish, and won’t leave the rest of us alone. No, they have to make people accept them as a rainbow colored twelve penised fox with shitting dick nipples, because “that’s who they really are on the inside.”
This shit’s going to cut out.
I’ve been fighting the furcunts for a long time, (before most of you even knew they existed) and every time I see them show up on a website, it’s always the same. One brings in fifty, and they take over and ban anyone who doesn’t tolerate their faggotry. They aren’t satisfied with having their own websites, no, they have to show up on ours and try to force us to accept them.
Simply put, since you won’t go away of your own volition, we’re going to force you to leave. GET OFF MY INTERNETS.
Charles Xavier
Aug 22nd, 2008
If IntLibber actually believed anything he just posted, he wouldn’t be on the road to hell right now.
Oh, and Orly Lawl was Plexus Linden.
Charles Xavier
Aug 22nd, 2008
Also IntLibber’s quoting lots of people who succeeded at whatever they were doing, but he also quoted a lot of failed communists, unable to tell the difference LOL.
And FrizzleFry, go back to dogfucking. You’ll find it much more enjoyable than humiliating yourself in public. The least you could do is go humiliate yourself in private.
Corona Anatine
Aug 22nd, 2008
Muham Maid, lord God Frizzle, WALL OF INTOLERANT BIGOTRY.
mootykips
Aug 22nd, 2008
lol @ intlibber trying to justify his utterly failed laissez fair ideology with a bunch of random quotes from Red Scare politicians, ancient Chinese philosophy, and allusions to an online game. a descent into madness.
“WOOOOOOOOOO DONGS”
- The Internet, The Internet
Lord George A. Zimmer IV, High Inquisitor for his Majesty God Emperor Frizzle of Fry CI
Aug 22nd, 2008
Protip: All the Charles Xaviers after the first one are Angel Fluffy who is butthurt about being called out.
Anyway, Corona, you speak of intolerant bigotry, but furry is a fetish not a race and just like I think people with a foot fetish are repulsive, I find furries repulsive as well.
You crying babies use Racist/Sexist/Bigot/Homophobe to describe people when they make you angry because they disagree with your world views.
Entire team is babies.
dick burns
Aug 22nd, 2008
also furries ruined star-fox for me
Lord George A. Zimmer IV, High Inquisitor for his Majesty God Emperor Frizzle of Fry
Aug 22nd, 2008
Protip: All the FrizzleFry posts are him trying to draw attention away from the fact that he yiffs with Tizzers every day in IntLibber’s Skype chat, and is “leading” the PN by pretending to attack Angel Fluffy, when in fact neither he nor IntLibber has any idea who Orly Lawl really was (IntLibber believes anything he’s told, whether it makes sense or not – FrizzleFry does whatever IntLibber says and makes PN Int’s Personal Army, therefore FrizzleFry believes Orly was Angel).
Protip: Orly Lawl was Pat Harlow.
Lord George A. Zimmer IV, High Inquisitor for his Majesty God Emperor Frizzle of Fry
Aug 22nd, 2008
The PN can suck my dick – I’m taking down the server.
anon
Aug 22nd, 2008
Frizzle, you stupid fuck. We NEEDED that server!
corona Anatine
Aug 22nd, 2008
you speak of intolerant bigotry, but furry is a fetish not a race and just like I think people with a foot fetish are repulsive, I find furries repulsive as well.
QED
an outgroup does not have to be a ‘race’ (there are no ‘races’ anyway – only variations of polythetic traits)
it can be any group of people who are different – it is still blind bigotry
if they were trying to make you a furry it would be a different matter – but attcking them just because they are merely on the same sim as you
grow up
ps it is not anger that fuels me but sadness for the state of your small and narrow mind
corona anatine
Aug 22nd, 2008
‘Entire team is babies.’
‘The PN can suck my dick – I’m taking down the server.’
hark at the kettle calling the pot black
Lord George A. Zimmer IV, High Inquisitor for his Majesty God Emperor Frizzle of Fry CI
Aug 22nd, 2008
@Fail Imposterfag
Cry more. Your tears sustain me.
Lord George A. Zimmer IV, High Inquisitor for his Majesty God Emperor Frizzle of Fry CI
Aug 22nd, 2008
also, Angel Fluffy’s trying to distract from the fact that he’s Orly by dumping irrelevant bullshit on the SLH.