Op/Ed: SL- What Went Wrong & How Do We Fix It?
by Alphaville Herald on 23/02/08 at 9:10 pm
2007 was a difficult year for Second Life. 2008’s not looking much better.
by Deltango Vale
The establishment of anonymous accounts in June 2006 opened the doors to underage players. This resulted in international legal scrutiny, increased exposure to legal liability and damaging media coverage. Linden Lab responded by intruding into residents’ sexual relationships and expelling two consenting adults for underage roleplay – even though no underage players were involved. Refusal to close the anonymous accounts and dogged insistence on an ineffective and unsound ID-based age verification system cost Linden Lab considerable political capital with no benefit. ID-based age verification is no better at screening underage players than credit-card verification, nor is it more ‘fair’. It rarely works for residents outside their home jurisdictions and, in many countries, it may not even be legal.
While anonymous accounts may have launched Second Life’s dramatic growth phase (October 2006 to June 2007), failure to formulate a land management strategy resulted in a speculative bubble as Linden Lab first starved and then flooded the mainland market. Islands ceased to be an attractive alternative when LL raised tier charges from $195 to $295 early in the cycle. Worst affected were the very residents who comprised the growth phase. The unexpected policy reversal on gambling in July further undermined Linden Lab’s credibility. Growth stopped. Premium accounts and total hours remained flat throughout the second half of 2007.
The overnight imposition of VAT (15-25% sales tax) on European residents (40% of SL’s population) in September not only trashed European landowners, but it caused considerable friction between European and North American residents as Linden Lab, a supposedly global company, began charging based on regional factor prices. It also led to the crazy situation whereby European landowners (some owning dozens of islands) who shifted their tier to North American business partners lost access to Live Chat support.
Longstanding problems of asset management, grid instability and poor customer service have undermined residents’ confidence in Second Life’s entire technological and managerial infrastructure. While organic development was the correct approach to building Second Life, expectations of success amplified perceptions of failure. The year ended with the resignation of CTO Cory Ondrejka due to “irreconcilable differences” with CEO Philip Rosedale.
Just days into 2008, without consultation or discrimination, Linden Lab banned all banks, regardless of their history, reputation, structure or business practices. In a matter of minutes, SL’s evolving financial system was demolished as sound and responsible banks closed their doors in the ensuing panic. More residents lost money because of LL’s clumsy intervention than from all bank frauds combined. Good businesses were crippled and good people hurt – not so much by scammers as by Linden Lab itself!
So, what went wrong?
Philip Rosedale and the Board of Directors are highly skilled engineers with little or no knowledge of economics, economic history, strategic planning or customer relations. As Second Life grows from a technological startup to a mature business, they are out of their depth. They are making serious mistakes. They are destroying the wealth and confidence of the entrepreneurial class who risked enormous time and money to build Second Life in the first place. More importantly, they have lost sight of their original vision.
Second Life was about user-generated content, remember? It was about “your world, your imagination”. That was the business plan and founding principle: to create a world that was VIRTUAL, VOLUNTARY and ADULT – framed by the philosophy of individual liberty and responsibility. Second Life was NOT intended to be a pale imitation of real life. It was NOT meant to be a playground for Republicans and Democrats to ‘govern’. It was NOT about majority rule through public opinion. Yet this is what has leaked into Second Life since 2007, drip, drip, drip. The sad irony is that now, out of ignorance and a naive desire to ‘do good’, Linden Lab is poisoning the very world they created and seek to protect.
How do we fix it?
Linden Lab is a private company, so they can do with Second Life what they wish. We ‘residents’ have the choice of being here or not. At the moment, there is no viable alternative to SL as a comprehensive virtual world. Therefore, Linden Lab still has time to prevent Second Life from becoming the ‘Lotus 123′ or ‘WordPerfect’ of the virtual universe.
1.) Regain integrity of the system. Announce the closure of all anonymous accounts on 1 March 2008. ‘Anonymous’ accounts may now be described as accounts without payment information on file or have not been age verified through the ID scheme. Keep the ID scheme during the transition process, but consider phasing it out by the end of the year and returning to credit card verification.
2.) Stabilize the financial system. Lift the ban on banks. Present the following message on the login screen: “Rate of return (interest or profit) on any investment is proportional to the amount invested, the length of time invested and the RISK OF NONPAYMENT.” Give residents information, not regulation, and the system will evolve in a healthy and productive way. Reputable businesses providing good customer service will always prevail against fly-by-night operations.
3) Reassert the founding principles of individual liberty and individual responsibility. Resist the temptation to sanitize Second Life. The road to hell is paved with good intentions; the desire to protect residents from themselves will only lead to a downward spiral of regulations to offset the harmful effects of other regulations. Also, Second Life is NOT real life. It is NOT a nation-state. Second Life is virtual, voluntary and adult. We are here by choice precisely to escape the restrictions of real life – and there is no Berlin Wall to prevent us from leaving.
As for those who want SL to become more like Disneyland, well, Disneyland already exists. We don’t need another one.
Prokofy Neva
Feb 23rd, 2008
This article already appeared in the comments at Reuters on January 25:
http://secondlife.reuters.com/stories/2008/01/25/opensim-worlds-lure-second-lifes-outcasts/
It contains predictable points that have been hammered over and over here and elsewhere, but with little persuasiveness, it is merely a means of bonding certain groups of disgruntled customers.
Age verification isn’t about screening out kids. That is, sure, it screens some out, almost as a byproduct, but certainly not effectively.
No, age verification is about verifying *adults*, making them put a name and address and other identifying information on their subscription to make them liable under the law for any activity that may be deemed criminal in their jurisdiction. That’s all there is to it. For that purpose, it works fine.
This writer is having the same problem understanding that “ageplay” is unlawful even with consulting adults if it is merely a depiction of child pornography, because mere pictoral depictions violate the EU laws. That’s how it is, and the Lindens are irrelevant except as a company that complies with law-enforcers from a country that they’d like not to ban their service.
VAT is not about “different prices”. That’s one of the most silly and entitlement-happy notions out there. It’s about different *taxes*. The EU has higher taxes to fit its socialist systems. Don’t like them? Protest to your government, not Linden Lab.
All of these principles for a new world sound like something that should be tried on open sims, as long as the parties can get away with it, but they ought not to drag down the rest of the subscribers who don’t wished to brought down with them.
Greefin Oh
Feb 23rd, 2008
I for one welcome the new Disneyland. I’m tired of having to kick naked non-english speaking noobs off my property. Especially the underage ones who speak on voice, with their volume sky high.
What should be done is, if you want e-sex in SL, there should be a price for that account. Make it subscription based. Just like you would when pay for a premium cable channel, or the playboy channel. Do that, and you will eliminate most of the underagers out there (the ones who can’t get a hold of mommy and daddy’s credit card).
Yea it might piss off a lot of people. But I can’t see any other option.
KMeist Hax
Feb 23rd, 2008
I’m sorry, but your proposal is stupid. First of all your definition of an “Anonymous” account is very flawed. There are many residents who have no credit card information to give to SL, and have to buy their currency from third-party exchanges. They buy their currency, and then rent out land from mainland renters or private islands. Closing down all anonymous accounts irregardless of land ownership, social status, or the internal linden “naughty meter” is simply a blanket ban much like the banking and gambling bans which you decry in your very own op/ed.
As for the banking ban, you can’t just slap on a giant “NOT FDIC INSURED MAY LOSE VALUE” banner and disclaim liability for the illegal acts being done on your system. In most countries banking is heavily regulated. Second Life isn’t some magical place far away from everything. It’s a bunch of servers on US soil and subject to US law. The regulations SL puts into place may be short-sighted, but are required if Linden Labs ever wants to grow the grid to web-scale and not be sued all the way back to the stone age. You don’t like a _legal_ world? I hear EVE Online still allows Ginko-level scams.
As for “sanitizing” SL, like I said the sanitization of SL is a nessesary evil if Linden Labs wishes to continue it’s existence. The “restrictions of real life” which you cite are there for a reason. The government doesn’t regulate banking just to make sure you can’t start an inworld business.
I do agree, however, that LL seems to have been fumbling around in the dark a bit with their policy changes. However, we can’t have a large virtual world and no anonymity at the same time. The internet is, by nature and by design, mostly anonymous anyway. SL would never become popular if people were required to give their credit card data before they could explore the world. I don’t just give out my credit card data out for something I don’t know about. I wouldn’t have even played SL had it not been for anonymous accounts in the first place. Anonymous accounts function sort of like an extended trial – there’s no time limit, you can build stuff, etc. But you can’t own land or buy things without money, so it provides an impetus to upgrade to premium or buy L$ or rent from a private island with real money. Some people don’t need land, so they stay anonymous.
And I guess the point I’ve been dancing around here is that everyone’s been expecting Linden Labs to be mods for everyone and ban griefers. But on the rest of the net the idea of being “banned from the internet” is stupid. If I’ve interpreted LL’s direction properly, they want SL to eclipse the regular world-wide-web – which means stuff like a distributed grid, the AWG stuff. If it does get that big, having a single company that can ban people from the grid would be very, very stupid. Like being “banned from the internet”. You’ll have to hire security/mods just like every real website on the rest of the Internet. LL will probably still manage their little corner of the grid (“Come see the Historic Linden Mainland!”) and moderate that, but the rest of the grid will be other competing companies with their own secuirity/moderation/etc. Or even entire companies with their own sections of the grid and their own security, just like the real web.
Or I could just be talking out of my ass. It’s hard to tell when you try to out-think LL without getting caught in their propaganda.
nimrod Yaffle
Feb 23rd, 2008
The gambling ban was required for (Current, and future) legal reasons.
d3adlyc0d3c
Feb 24th, 2008
’1.) Regain integrity of the system. Announce the closure of all anonymous accounts on 1 March 2008. ‘Anonymous’ accounts may now be described as accounts without payment information on file or have not been age verified through the ID scheme. Keep the ID scheme during the transition process, but consider phasing it out by the end of the year and returning to credit card verification.’
I have an ‘anonymous’ account and yet I am one of a few with a positive cashflow of over twenty thousand lindens from my business since feb 2nd. I say thats impressive and I have little doubt that there aren’t other business owners such as myself without payment info on file. What you are talking about is insane, it would do even more damage to LL because people like me actually help the economy thrive. I am a content creator and I’m creating new content every day. If LL banned anonymous accounts and required me to prove my identity then my business would cease to exist in a split second – most LL employees have no desire to see me back in second life and would ban me in a heartbeat if they knew who I was, despite the fact that I am no longer griefing. Closing free basic accounts would be another blow to the economy and implementing any kind of serious identity verification procedures would be a final blow.
’2.) Stabilize the financial system. Lift the ban on banks. Present the following message on the login screen: “Rate of return (interest or profit) on any investment is proportional to the amount invested, the length of time invested and the RISK OF NONPAYMENT.” Give residents information, not regulation, and the system will evolve in a healthy and productive way. Reputable businesses providing good customer service will always prevail against fly-by-night operations.’
The ban on banks had little effect on the economy. Banks are actually still legal as long as they don’t generate interest. Look at first meta, for example. They are still within TOS. Banks did nothing for the economy at all, all they did was trick poor sods into investing money into land businesses because the individuals running said businesses didn’t have enough skill to build their own business up from scratch.
J
Feb 24th, 2008
Banks *aren’t* banned. If they have a license they can operate, correct?
Seriously, why do people complain about the banking ban… yes I’m sure it’s a pain in the ass and many people have lost money, but unregulated banking has caused disasters in the past. Can’t we learn from mistakes?
humanoid
Feb 24th, 2008
The age issue only impacted them because they rolled over like a lame dog and let it impact them. Instead of saying “No, screw you, it’s your damn job to keep your brats off the internet!” like they should’ve, they and other internet based companies (Myspace, etc) have dug themselves into a legal hole where they can be liable for almost any insane imaginary crime society dreams up. To be fair, it didn’t start with Linden Labs, but they’re only encouraging the trend by becoming a part of it.
This sort of thing was never an issue back in the days when I ran a BBS because we (system operators) never pretended it was our business to know what our users did among themselves. Nor did we think it was any of our business to know the age of our users.
vikingbezerker bobak
Feb 24th, 2008
well…stupidity seems to be the name of the game here…. i personally have no credit and no credit cards and have been on sl for a year.
i enjoy it and i don’t think i should be discriminated against because i don’t have plastic.
as it stands i am disabled in the real world and it’s one of my few outlets into normal life, i know others in sl in the same situation as i am.
if you think this is a legitimate idea, then i suggest you bend over and stick your head up your own ass.,….. oh sorry it’s already there!
Peter Stindberg
Feb 24th, 2008
In my country (which accounts for the second-largest group of active residents in SL), only a minority is in the posession of a credit card. In our banking system wire transfer and debit cards are the predominant means of payment. Credit cards came rather late (during my teenager days) to my country, and never really caught on especially due to the premiums and yearly fees cusomters and especially shops had (and have) to pay.
dandellion Kimban
Feb 24th, 2008
How to fix it? Simple
Offer and encou8rage limited access to non-credit-card residents. There is an option for restricting access to the parcel for residents without CC. That should cover adult material. Make parcel permissions (rezzing, running scripts…) also dependable on CC and you solved griefing.
Nobody Fugazi
Feb 24th, 2008
Where Linden Lab went wrong is where all the virtual world ‘experts’ went wrong – and continue to go wrong. They treat it all as if it were not related to international commerce, etc – but it all is, just as international law plays a vital role (especially with copyright law).
Even the prophets scribbling on the subway walls know better than many of the lauded experts.
Just Me
Feb 24th, 2008
@ d3adlyc0d3c
I too have a basic/anonymous account and am a content creator.
Just because I don’t pay for my account doesn’t mean I’m not participating in the SL economy. I rent shops, and at this time, I’m making about 50,000L a month fom them by selling my ‘stuff’. Some of my earnings are plowed back into the SL economy when I make clothing purchases, tip DJs and venues as a “thank you” for making my stay in SL more enjoyable.
BTW, as another poster mentioned, I too am disabled and rely on SL for a social outlet.
The Choir Invisible
Feb 24th, 2008
‘I have a basic accoune, and My shop makes monies’
‘I am a ‘basic’ account, and I contribute yaddayaddayadda’
Know what? Good for you. Good for you for being productive. Doesn’t excuse the sea of fuckwits hiding behind their faceless infinate accounrts. For every one of you who makes good, there’s 2 dozen waste of space idiots, begging and such, and a number of active griefers.
It’s not ‘fair’ to shunt out the no info accounts, I hear that time and again. AND I kinda agree. It isn’t fair. BUT as long as They can make infinate freebie accounts, the trouble won’t go away. Now I disagree utterly with the people who say existing accounts should be taken away. THAT is just monsterous.
Marc Woebegone
Feb 24th, 2008
And I required a change in the TOS…..
d3adlyc0d3c
Feb 24th, 2008
‘It’s not ‘fair’ to shunt out the no info accounts, I hear that time and again. AND I kinda agree. It isn’t fair. BUT as long as They can make infinate freebie accounts, the trouble won’t go away. Now I disagree utterly with the people who say existing accounts should be taken away. THAT is just monsterous.’
Ok I can agree with that. Plus we all know that a bunch of griefers have legitimate alts. If they were unable to register new accounts when they are banned that might be incentive to not grief.
Maybe it’s just me but I have heard that most of the griefers have been inactive for awhile now. Now maybe I’m being fed propaganda because my friends who know who I am are fearful that I would go back to griefing for some odd reason if I heard anything about it happening but somehow I doubt this is the case. Since I came back to SL the only griefing I have witnessed is a bunch of idiots caging and orbiting folks in sandboxes.
Hiro Pendragon
Feb 24th, 2008
@Deltango
You went wrong in the first sentence, when you called SLrs “players”. Done.
Open access to information is necessary because SL is a part of the Internet. However, doing this before tools were available to verify age was, I still believe, premature. But what’s done is done, so let’s look at your fixes:
1. Is an enormous P.R. mistake. It’s also dishonest. Instead, let’s put in place better tools to let users restrict their own content. Linden Lab shouldn’t be the police (as this is not a game), they should be the architects, and design us better tools to manage the system ourselves.
2. You call “lifting the ban on banks” a thing to “stabilize” the SL economy. Hold on, while I contain my laughter. (5 minutes pass) Okay, so, seriously, there is no SL economic recession. As I pointed out in the Herald article comments previously, gambling out of SL has reduced the artificially inflated numbers. Almost 2 years ago The Herald did a study and found 80% of transactions were gambling related. Well, if I sit at a slot machine for an hour, wind up net 100L down, but pull the lever every 15 seconds for something even as small as 10L each, that’s 2400L in transactions, with only 100L real net. Gambling inflated the numbers, and the overwhelming majority of in-world sellers I’ve spoken to report continued increased sales. So, you’re wrong.
3. (3) is in total contraction with (1)! First you say to ban all these accounts, and then you say to emphasize responsibility. Isn’t banning literally millions of accounts… um, “sanitizing”? Oh, I see. You’re being selective. You’re complaining about the banking, gambling, etc bans. Well, welcome to planet earth. There are laws Linden Lab has to follow. Linden Lab didn’t ban banks; they banned illegal, unregulated banks.
But your overarching principle of putting forth individual responsibility is right on. Let’s figure out what tools best help users exert that, and push Linden Lab to do them. What do you say?
Spankubux
Feb 24th, 2008
”
And I required a change in the TOS…..
Posted by: Marc Woebegone | February 24, 2008 at 04:06 PM”
Steal any cars RL lately, thief?
Razrcut Brooks
Feb 24th, 2008
Could someone please hand “The Choir Invisible” (above comment) a dictionary? Please tell me his keyboard is malfunctioning. Actually Choir, I am just messing with you as I understand exactly what you mean. For every productive anonymous account there are 100 who cause chaos and lag.
HOWEVER:
Deleting anonymous accounts is absolutely wrong. Many of these “fuckwits” -as you so elegantly labelled them- become productive later. And by productive, I do not just mean financially. I consider myself productive to SL in various ways. I place my own money into SL these days and have no regrets.In the beginning, I was a…what did you call them? oh yeah: “fuckwit”, but I have settled and am at peace w/ SL. Deadlycodec has also proved that residents evolve.
********(By the way, someone needs to start a campaign to motivate LL to let him back in without alts. Someone use their Photoshop skills to create a “FREE D3ADLYCOD3C!!” tshirt…send to me in-world and I will pay them 500L. **************** Make it a cool tshirt..not NOOB-looking!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Free Tizzers
Feb 25th, 2008
Razrcut,
Deadlycodec is already on the grid, hiding. Hes here, and he never existed on the grid as D3adlycod3c. Conversely, Tizzers Foxchase, who did not crash sims, did not develop some of the most effective griefing weapons to date, remains perbanned simply because of some ignorant bullshit that prok fed to Robin and Cyn.
Ari
Feb 25th, 2008
What an *F*ing joke.
Ummm… first of all – the freebie accounts weren’t available until SEPTEMBER 2006, not June (hence the population explosion beginning in OCTOBER) – wow, 2+2 really CAN equal four. LOL
Banks are NOT banned from SL. Offering interest or dividends is BANNED. Banks are NOT. And an in-world ‘bank’ CAN offer interest or dividends by showing the right paperwork to Linden Lab. Pfft.
As for the “age verification” thing… it’s NOT “age verification” – officially, it’s “Identification Verification” A.K.A. ID Verification. Not “Age verification”. People like you by misusing the English language are the ones bastardizing it. But I do digress. How NIGGARDLY of me! (Oh, is that a bad word? Look it up and find out for yourself. Gain command of the language you speak for crying out loud.)
However, I will say this, unlike most whiners, at lease you provide solutions. Even if those solutions are STUPID solutions, it is more than most whiney-assed crybabies. So therefore, I won’t tag you with “whiney-ass”. I’ll just say “crybaby”.
SqueezeOne Pow
Feb 25th, 2008
Unfortunately for everyone who wants their anonymity and eat it, too, some form of ID verification is unavoidable if SL is to become anything more than it is. The current age verification setup is a joke, but something like it IS going to happen sometime.
Face it, even the “CC on file” folks have anonymity to a certain extent in SL in part due to LL’s ineptitude when it comes to their AR system but mostly due to the fact that your info is protected from other users. On the real internet, if you plan on having any sort of business or monetary transaction you have to make your true identity known. Only in the bowels of blogs and message boards (such as this, all the b-tard chan whatever and Prok’s blog) is there anonymity to the same degree that’s in SL.
That’ll have to change for businesses to feel like doing anything more than making SL a 3d advertisement space. At that point people will start looking at ways to integrate SL’s services and goods with RL services and goods (being able to buy RL shit via SL). Once that happens then the pretend L$ will go away and people will start trading in real money so the “economics” of the platform will be completely out of the hands of LL or whoever ends up being the service provider for this thing down the line.
Until that all happens you’re all playing wack-a-mole with griefers whether you like it or not and spending game tokens on Donkey Kong barrels.
shockwave yareach
Feb 25th, 2008
What is done is done, and cannot be undone. What has to be arranged is a way to control the damage that’s occurred without destroying what good has been built because of it.
I propose four levels of user: Paid, Verified, Unverified, and Guest. The accounts already here form the top three levels – existing free accounts without age verification become Unverifieds while those with Premium accounts become Paid. All NEW accounts are Guests, and limited in what areas they may travel to, more accurately about 36 sims or so around the newcomer islands. Guests then have to ID Verify and become a Verified for a free account, or pay LL 20$ to enter the world at large as an Unverified. And of course, there is always paid level too. This lets people sample the game for free, and can enter the main grid by either providing ID or paying a fee – the user’s choice.
This puts a cork in the current holes without getting rid of any current residents, many of whom are our builders and content providers. We grandfather in the accounts already here and limit the abilities of new accounts until they choose how they wish to pay for access – ID or Cash.
Why Bother
Feb 25th, 2008
In my opinion here’s how you fix Second Life.
Wait for a good alternative and competitor to come along. Hopefully that will light a fire under Linden Lab’s ass to get their act together. If not, well, their population will leave in droves to something better (whenever something better comes along).
The reason why SL is such badly coded, badly implemented, turd is because Linden Lab has no serious competition. Linden Lab obviously doesn’t care one bit because they have no worries at all, they can shovel all sorts of bugs, lag, and bad customer service on people and they know that while everyone bitches and moans they THEY STILL STICK AROUND.
We either need for people to start taking a stand and hit LL where it hurts, their bottom line, OR we await for the arrival of a damn better alt to SL and leave Second Life in the digital compost heap.
Corona
Feb 26th, 2008
Why bother
easy – because something better will come along
whether that is owned by LL or another compnay is down to LL getting their act together
but if they really want to expand to become the new internet
then gambling will be part of SL
because it is part of the current internet
Seraph Nephilim
Feb 26th, 2008
Ari,
The article is correct. On June 6, 2006, SL was opened to unverified registrations, aka “freebie accounts”. I have no idea where you are getting the idea it was in September of 2006.
For reference:
“The validation-free version of Second Life registration started on June 6.” (Abuse Levees Holding LL blog post: http://blog.secondlife.com/2006/06/15/abuse-levees-holding/ )
Unfortunately, there’s no official announcement in the blog as I don’t believe that was the primary form of communication at the time. And I *do not* feel up to searching the forums right now….
—-
Why Bother,
Unfortunately, I agree. I believe LL has burned up a lot (all?) of their good will and the only reason many people are hanging around is that there is currently no viable alternative, especially on multiple platforms. OpenSL is improving, however, as well as other alternatives and once they are viable, I fear the bleeding will begin. I know I stay around because of the people, not because of the platform. When they go, I go. And some have already left, tired of all the BS.
Johnathan
Feb 27th, 2008
I started in Secondlife as a freebie account and went hunting for 1 thing in world. Star trek. I have beomce a highly respected memeber within the group I am in. if they booted all free accounts then they would screw the pooch on a group with over 500 members. just a reminder what you think is a smart idea is not always the best idea and remember we dont own this we either pay for we have the free accounts. also lets do something about this gay data corruption problem tired of having to roll a sim back 6 times in 4hrs because stuff that only I can return vanishes when I am out of world.
Penance Sautereau
Feb 27th, 2008
I guess RazrCut didn’t like the “Free Cod3c” tee I made. Oh well.
*goes back to cannibalizing Stage 6 before it closes*
Archie Lukas
Feb 28th, 2008
Its about CASH
More people now, than 2006 = CASH
Child roleplay =legal action = reduced CASH
EU sues Lindens for VAT = reduced CASH
in-world banks=fraud=legal action = reduced CASH
age verification = less legal action = less CASH
so as a private company – lindens desire raw CASH, lots of it and constantly expanding CASH deposits – thats the nature of capitalism and the American Way.
Sooooooooooo …… What the hell did you (really) expect them to do?
Archie
(Brit)
youve been framed
Mar 6th, 2008
Haha. That’s so funny. Not only did Miss Vale post this story on Reuters in the comments, it came out a whole month earlier as an analysis (albeit edited) in The AvaStar, Issue 58 – go check… http://www.the-avastar.com/epaper/archive/2008/TheAvaStar_Issue58.pdf
Miss Vale sold you guys right up the stream…
pixeleen mistral
Mar 6th, 2008
@youve been framed (a.k.a. ‘tardstar sockpuppet) – you missed that miss vale also posted the piece in the comments on the secondlife.com blog. zomg!
i thought the opinions expressed deserved wider distribution, contacted miss vale and after receiving her permission published her work here.
shocking, isn’t it?
Deltango Vale
Apr 3rd, 2008
I do NOT oppose free accounts. I oppose anonymous accounts.
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