Rich Grainger – Coating the World in a Warm Blanket of Software
by Alphaville Herald on 06/01/09 at 7:22 pm
RGF Estates Corporation owns 450 sims – and growing
by Alessandra Narayan
In this interview, Rich Grainger, CEO of RGF Estates Corporation, says he runs a growing company in the virtual land business, and claims his company is growing at the rate of one new sim per day. An entrepreneur with hopes of becoming a mega-land baron, Mr. Grainger is willing to reach the top and fight head to head with the big sharks in SL’s estates, but doesn’t plan on issuing an IPO because «RGF doesn’t need one».
Ultimately, Rich Grainger confesses his dream: «Coat the world in a warm blanket of software.» Also, RGF’s CEO explains how his differences with the RGF's prior CEO, Frank Essel, led to a change in command of the corporation.
Alessandra Narayan (AN) – Is it true you said “I’ll make money out of any soul I meet in SL”?
Rich Grainger (RG) – I said I’d sell the souls of all I’ve ever meet to make money, RL or SL.
AN – What's that suppose to mean? That no one can trust you?
RG – I have many who do, more than most. I believe 99% of people like me on my sims. Ask around…
AN – Still, shouldn't there be higher principles or goals rather than money?
RG – Yes, of course, my purpose in life is to coat the world in a warm blanket of software, improve communication, thus increase yield. Example: in Vietnam 1 acre produces 3 bushels of products and in Japan 21. Difference equal to info, crop reports, the more communication, the faster we feed the people, shoe the children.
AN – How many sims do you own now?
RG – 450 approximately.
AN – And you intend to rise that number? And when will it stop?
RG – One per day and I’ll stop when demand stops.
AN – When will you launch an IPO?
RG – No need. Cash positive at the moment. Besides, I have no idea why someone would give away part of a business if capital not needed. So, I don’t intend to launch an IPO and if I did, it would be for something big. Also, I don’t want to be the only large real estate in SL. I think competition will grow all of SL faster and I think SL needs a human anatomy.
AN – Are you thinking of buying smaller corporations?
RG – Yes, but not hostile. Must be unanimous. All agree or no deal.
AN – And did you receive any investment proposal to join you in RGF?
RG – A few from RL and I didn’t reject them, I just don’t have a prospectus or capital need.
Professor C
Jan 13th, 2009
@ Witness X
I know who you were referring to earlier but last I checked, IntLibber posts in here as his real name. I assure you that I am not him. But you can believe what you wish.
When there is an article on IntLibber you will see some of the things I know about him that he does not want the public to be aware of. In the meantime. Do not try and guess. Your expectations will fall short.
What I will say is that I am very successful in what I do in Second Life. This here is a hobby. As for you personally Witness X I have seen things that are posted under that name. And the entire lot of you do not know your ass from your elbow.
About IntLibber however. I do get amused at how much trouble he causes and how much of a flaming prick he can be. At times I think he is worse than any other of the PN’s and I know he is in league with them. I have sat in on conversations with him and others. He sticks his nose in others business to cause rifts in friendships. I have watched him and sat in on his schemes. He does not know who I am but I am gathering enough information and evidence to take him out of everyone’s hair forever.
But that is all vague I am aware. As I said. Details will follow when someone posts an article about him. See you then. The truth always comes out.
Professor C
Jan 13th, 2009
Rich Grainger
Why not?
Rich Grainger
Jan 13th, 2009
Professor C
I did not feel comfortable giving a region to a member of a charity. I prefer he be an officer and use the sim for the charity.
IntLibber Brautigan
Jan 14th, 2009
I have been kicked out of SL cause I can’t pay my tier. But that’s ok as long as I don’t get kick out of the buffet line.
Rich Grainger
Jan 14th, 2009
Hi IntLibber
If any of your residents lost land in the shuffle, please send them to me. I will give them free land. (and in some cases credit lost tier) This goes for anyone who has paid tier and been ejected by the estate owner or by LL as a result of the estate owner not paying LL.
From what I remember you carpeted the grid a few times with a flying texture. While I am no fan of grief, part of me was glad you found the exploit, debug, while SL was 1/10th it’s current size. I beg the rest of the SL 3L1t3 please report bugs rather than exploit. After all this grid is used by us. The faster we fix SL, the sooner I can build a holodeck and tryout my wii unitard.
All of the LL I spoke with appear dedicated, smart, patient, people. Even those I have had bad experience with often surprise me in the next encounter leaving me to wonder if the problem was actually me. If you or others are about to default on regions, please IM me before. I always buy regions with residents and leave everything the same. We do not have a covenant or any rules. Just follow the tos and whatever goes.
Jackie Sweetwater
Feb 19th, 2009
you know i have worked with RGF since the begining and all of this is a bunch of crock buried in a barrel I seel land and work for Rich Grainger and for myself and find nothing wrong with his polices now a few previuos employees gavea bad wrap and sold land to clients under false pretences of what they were getting and most of them are gone now and all of the current customers are happy and get the customer service that they desevre Me and a few other Employees work around the clock at RGF to provide the best customer service avaiable in world and if you pay your bills on time we give service to ever it may be to the person that owns a 1024 sqm lot to a full sim and if you can compete with that your more than welcome because you wont find any better i have several properties through out Secondlife from Rich Grainger to Stoltz Sinatra to Azure Estates and By far the best customer service is RGF estates and you can take that to the bank in Real Life
Frank Essel
Feb 19th, 2009
>>>>Ultimately, Rich Grainger confesses his dream: «Coat the world in a warm blanket of software.» Also, RGF’s CEO explains how his differences with the RGF’s prior CEO, Frank Essel, led to a change in command of the corporation< <<<<
Frank Essel, retired in RL, retired from the company he created due to a difference of opinion with the Financial Backer(aka Rich Grainger), Rich was an ass and was a total douche promised were made that were not kept. I settled out of the business for 2 million lindens to walk away quietly from RGF and I left quietly been almost two monsths since i left RGF Estates, but I wont ever see a dime of that money, Rich’s word is worthless. He is in it to win it and only looks out for himself. He once told me in confidence that he weould sell everyones Soul in Sl to make a profit. “The soul of everyone i have ever met, to make a dollar” those were his exact words. Since I left RGF Estates i obought a few of my own sims fror a few of the customers that followed me, since then i have sold them all for a profit and pretty much left SL altogether because of RICH GRAINGERS actions. Like I said he is an ass and a complete douche, Rich Graingers name isnt worth the 2 cents it takes to keep his character alive on Second Life. Also consider the actions of his other Characters, Sofiamarie Anthony, Ur Lu, and Castor Twin, yes thats a complete list of his characters and I hope some griefer puts those names to good use.
Rich Griangers daily nut(tiers owed to LL is aorund 3k per day in USD and when he crashes and burns due to the market changing i will sit back and laugh, alot of poeple will be hurt because of this, he pays tier on around 450+ sims in Second Life, and when it happens there will be a lot of unhappy poeple. So long folks, I have defaulted to just playing on my half a sim and building homes that look and feel of realism, you can find my homes on SLex(now owned by SL) under Fuji Homes. Laterz
Sophia Yates
Mar 14th, 2009
@Rich!
Nice bait & Switch there buddy I want my 32,000 linden back you bum!
You set me up and you know it. They did the same thing to me as they did to that other guy who is due his 40K.
SWINE!
Sophia Yates
Sophia Yates
Mar 15th, 2009
Alright people this is what went down after I was conned by this jerk.
I came back in as my alt and went to their office. I asked for land 1/2 a sim and guess where I was taken?
Back to the sim i had bought this morning for 20KL and on top paid 12kL for tier at their office.
After that transaction took place Mr Rich Grainger comes along and tells me oh you build fast but you have to move please come with me to this other sim and you can stay there. It was trash it was not what i wanted and it meant i had to take up once again 2 weeks of hard work and move it.
so guess where the salesperson took me? Back to the sim i had already purchased! YUP! as I asked questions a couple came by and said they owned the sim now and that they had bought it 5 hours ago. Hmm its now 2:02 am where i am and the ytold me this about no more than an hour ago. I bought the sim they said they bought before noon this morning!
After I tried to warn these nice people they ejected me and the saleswoman was iming me saying she had a 1/2 sim for 10KL now 30KL a month. WOW 10KL now off the price.
I have tonight read so many other stories like mine of people who got conned by this man. but the funny thing is i filmed this transaction ok. I am also going to do something that may change things. I wont say yet but this is going to stop. No more of this crap. Its over! No more games!
Sophia Yates
Rich Grainger
Mar 19th, 2009
Jackie, ty for kind words and hard work.
Frank, glad your back, what does “doushe” mean. I looked it up in my DnD monster guide and it say “a giant water spout”???
Sophia,
1 Didn’t you like the half sim on “Mixi” where you STILL own land?
2 Why not mention the free weeks of tier I threw in the deal? Or that the person you paid tier on the original land was your friend, not me or RGF and they did not refund your $ or pay the tiers on the island?
3 Didn’t you understand I could not allow you to keep the island where your objects were rezzed if you only offer to pay half the tiers?
4 If you did read the above post you would know I always settle disagreements by offering free land and free tier. When you are ready, come to the office for your land.
Sophia
Mar 27th, 2009
Ohhhhhhh really Rich. Well when I went to pay my tier for the first week on the sim Mixi it was not set up for me and you had not informed Stefan Demina of your transfering me and my rent had increased but Stefan straightened that out after I told him you had sent me there. that you had moved me to another sim after I had bought the land on the sim currency.
It did not matter after the fact I got taken by the woman for taking my rent. I came on that very morning and bought the land and paid the tier for the currency sim. At that point she had no deal in my buying the sim.
I did that to secure myself on that sim. Which i had thought i had. But 36 seconds after I purchased that 1/2 sim on currency you came in and said you made an error and I had to move.
One has to wonder how many times this goes on. How many other times have you sold land to and then gone back and shuffled them around to move to another location? I hear its often. And that the rent goes up often after renting or purchasing.
Later that evening I went in and saw you had sold the whole sim after I had already bought 1/2 of it and it wasn’t till hours later you did that.
I settled on the Mixi sim so I could get on with business but had to rebuild. There were people o n the mixi sim and now they are all gone. Today! Why? what is going on with you guys?
It’s terrible. I did not receive any free weeks rent. I’ve been paying all along. Stefan Demina told me you did not speak with him that he had no idea.
Your friend Frank sent out a message he also taking over for you while you went on vacation right after our ordeal. I can’t say I do not have a clue what is going on because I get it.
I have no more straws left in my hat.
I know you like to be known like a little devil but your dealing with real people in Second life. Not robots. People are dishing out real cash to you not fake money to rent virtual land. Sounds crazy to me but its a fact. If you want your business to thrive treat them fair sir treat them fair or you’ll end up with it all in your lap.
I had some really sad people leave the sim today. Half the sim now is empty. How can you profit anything doing business like that? People are walking away from it all now. And that’s not what i want to see. If your going to sell land or rent it. don’t shuffle people around. People put a lot of work & time into land they get and for people to say after a few weeks times up you have to move here or there.
People are going to just plain give up. You may think there is an endless pool of suckers but not the way things are today and it doenst look like its going to get any better any time soon. So if i were someone with that many sims and the burden of having to pay that much tier each month god I would treat the people i had renting from me like a good friend.
Sophia~
Z
Apr 6th, 2009
Well I have only one thing to add to this. Ive had to console a friend who was lied to by this buisnessman and it ruined her. She sank money into her place and was repeatedly ignored by the staff, and shen she finally got up the courage to say something to someone with power they sim banned her and insulted her verbally.
this is a great company? If I were someone with power with LL I would ban the entire collection of these scumbags from SL and auction off everything they own to pay reperation to the growing number of those hurt by these people.
thats my 2 cents.
Z
Paranormal
Dec 24th, 2009
This guy is a DIRTY business man in SL. I bought a piece of his land, did not pay tiers before talking to a Sr estate mgr. 5 mins later one of his Sr estate managers reclaimed the land due to a misunderstanding I had. And Rich would NOT return the purchase price of $2288L for the land. He kept playing ignorant when I asked for the linden to be returned to me. I REPEATEDLY told him I would like the money returned, and he continuously asked “how many prims would you like?”. This was after I thoroughly explained what happened. At first I serioulsy thought maybe he was foreign and just sincerely couldn’t understand my english. He made no effort to correct this presumption, he just played it out.
After literally hours of this, I filed a fraud report as it was clear he was, with absolute deliberation and full knowledge, scamming me out of the lindens. I too own a business in SL and would NEVER keep linden from anyone that had clearly made a purchase and did not receive an item. EVEN if the purchase was made in error, this is not how I do business, in RL or SL.
It’s not even about the linden, it’s the principle of it all. I cost him $0L and he refuses to return the linden, that’s just outright dirty and disgusting. Sad this is 1 of his methods of earning money.
Extremely Poor business ethics with an obvious insatiable appetite of greed.
SL User
Mar 17th, 2010
- I am renting land from Ben Schumann and the estate owner is Rich Grainger. Will this happen to me ?? I put so much effort into my sim and i wont leave it without a fight and some justice. But, am i at rist since he is the estate owner ? Ben told me Rich is his business partner and now since i have read all the post im felling iffy !
Scorned employee
Mar 30th, 2010
I have not bought land from RGF but i was indeed ripped off by this man. I used to work for him but he has employees who are continuously rid to the lower level employees and he does nothing about it. So one day at an RGF meeting I said what i thought of the upper management and low and behold i was fired for having an opinion. Worse is they refuse to pay me my money I worked for. In real you do this shit you get sued how should secondlife be any different. Watch your back all rich is a con man and will do anything to make his lindens. DO NOT BUY LAND WITH RICH GRAINGER AND RGF
Chance Found
Jun 30th, 2010
I’m glad I read this. I had my suspicions, although he wasn’t lucky enough to get anything from me. I almost got sucked into this scam. Thank you everyone, for publicizing this type of bussiness. Thank you very much indeed.
Hearld Yuvonna
Jul 6th, 2010
Rich is getting popular
Ahmad Melodie
Aug 21st, 2010
Yeah this Rich Grainger guy is a total azz hole, him and his partner Ben Schumann!
Me and my SL partner purchased a full homestead from him that was supposed to have come with estate rights. It was a sandy island very nice and and had been fixed up . The land sign said the land come complete with everything the house and everything. all we had to do was pay the weekly tier payments. So we purchased it and went to shop for some thing. When we came back, everything was gone!
and the land was no longer the beautiful sandy island any more but grey rock! So we contacted RGF. And a lady asked to be tp to the island so we did. We asked her what happen to everything, and why the land was rock and not sand any more. She said the other owners may was using raw files to transform the land back to it’s original state. So my Partner told her the sign said everything was included in the purchase thatswas there. So we requested the estate rights in which was promised if you buy a full sim or full homestead. No one answered us or helped us. Mind you that the tier box on the land was in Ben Schumanns name Rich being the owner . It was even gone to. After we couldn’t get help from Ben or the rest of them at AGF. We contacted Rich. He came to the land acting like he was about to give us the estate rights and stood there for about 20 minuets and left without giving us any thing. My Partner got a bad feeling about this guy and his business. And we didn’t pay no more tiers and left. After reading what I just read. I’m wondering if they did some else like Sophia.
Ahmad Melodie
Aug 21st, 2010
TO Rich and all of those you run scam with in SL.
The love of money is the root of all evil. You will reap that which you are sowing. And there will come a time when you will fall, nothing is forever but the word of God. What goes up must come down. And you on your way dude! You can’t mistreat people like you do and think you will succeed in becoming great. It’s the little people that make you big, and if you mistreat them. Than you will be nothing!
and Yeah he did tried to act like he didn’t know english when he spoke to my SL Partner. GREEDY BASTARD !!!
Ahmad Melodie
Aug 21st, 2010
YOU CAN TELL HIS ASS GREEDY FOR MONEY. HE WALKING AROUND SL WITH A FREEBIE SKIN WHILE SCAMMING OTHERS OUT OF THERE MONEY. I SHAKE MY HEAD AT THESE FOOLS.