Morons!

In what can only be described as an extra helping of stupid on top of the serious case of dumb we’ve already had this week from the “employees” of Linden Lab. Not only do we get to now give LL our hard earned Lindens for hosting our items on the hot piece of steaming mess known as XStreet, and not only are we getting force fed their “protection” via a new plan they somehow thought was a good idea (Hey kids, I’ve been to San Francisco…good times…good drugs….but seriously put down the fucking pipe), they now believe it is gaming the traffic system if you have employees.

This link right here: Ta-Da! It’s correspondence between Linden Lab and a store owner who has done rather well for themselves and is  fortunate enough to be able to provide Second Life residents with jobs as customer service representatives. Apparently, that is not allowed however. In fact, she recently got everybody’s favorite email:

Dear Store Owner,

This email is notification of action regarding your Second Life account,
+++++++++, for violation of the Second Life Terms of Service or
Community Standards. The violation in question occurred on November 10,
2009 in the region of Richfield.

Violation: Community Standards : Gaming Traffic Violation

As of the 1st May 2009, the use of bots or camping to game
Traffic values will be considered a violation.

Whether a landowner uses Bots or Camping Chairs, or Camping
Chairs with Bots in them, the effect is the same – the
traffic value for that parcel is inflated unfairly (and
therefore Search rankings).

Attempting to gain an unfair Search advantage, by the use
of Bots or Camping to inflate the Traffic for a parcel, will
be considered a violation. This policy applies to both
Mainland and Private Estates as both are represented in
Search.

If you continue to violate this policy, your account may be
suspended and the parcels relating to the violation maybe
removed from Search listings altogether.

For further information, see the following blog posts
http://tr.im/sl_camping and http://tr.im/sl_bots

If you are using bots/scripted agents on your land, please
look to self identify these accounts, for further
information please see this blog post
http://tr.im/sl_agentstatus

If you are going to have avatars as models they must be registered as
scripted agents.

Action:
No additional action is being taken at this time.

Appeal Process:
The decision to suspend your Second Life access was reached after
investigation of your use of the Second Life software and service. If you
would like to appeal your suspension, you may contact Second Life Support,
in writing, at the address below:

Second Life Support
Linden Lab
945 Battery Street
San Francisco, CA 94111

You may also appeal electronically by filing a support ticket at
http://www.secondlife.com/support For more information on this process,
please see this KnowledgeBase article http://bit.ly/hBIjz

Please provide relevant information that you believe would explain the
above violation.  Linden Lab reserves sole discretion in considering
whether to take any action on an appeal.

Please note that for electronically submitted appeals, due to the nature
of the ticket, it may take upto 72 hours to receive an initial decision on
your abuse appeal.

Sincerely,
Linden Lab

Seriously? Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? So, we can’t actually have employees. But we can register bots and that’s okay? You’re anti-bot policy is now: Real People Bad Fake People Good?

So the store owner  replies and asks some rather important questions.

Did you check the Knowledge Base?:  Yes, and I have further questions
Preferred Language:  English
Details:  As far as I was aware paid models doing a job were allowed onto a sim? I just received an account suspension warning for campers/bots…. I have NO campers or bots. The items returned to me are model stands, that the models have to be assiged to a group via invite only, they are asked to fill out job application forms, they have tip jars, they are modeling my clothes that I made at my store and are there to help my customers. They have rules stating they are not allowed to be away from the keyboard for any period of time. So we are not allowed staff now??? Can someone please clear up for me what the differance is between paying staff for doing a job and camping? I know of plenty of other stores with paid models and campers and bots and I really start to feel like you target me.
Can you please tell me why I am not allowed paid staff??
I need my staff there to help and guide customers, so why am I not allowed them or not allowed to pay them?
Thank you.

Makes sense. Staff make the shopping experience more enjoyable for the average consumer. They are there to answer questions and they keep people from constantly bugging content creators. It makes sense, less stressed creators equals more products, happier customers equal more money spent. Kind of win/win isn’t it? I mean I’m sure the money grubbing monkeys at the lab will even get their piece of the action due to it.Apparently……not.

Hello, Store Owner:

Thanks for contacting customer support.  Model bots are allowed however each bot is required to be identified as a scripted agent: http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Scripted_Agent_Status. This is so traffic results will not be affected by these bots.  You run a risk of further disciplinary action against your account because can not view someone else’s scripted agent status however any model bots on your land must have this setting enabled.  What you may do instead is subdivide small parcels for the model bots to be on that have About Land > Show Place in Search disabled.

Regards,

Frontier Linden

I enjoy watching the Lindens respond to emails. It gives you that warm fuzzy feeling inside your chest like when you finally realize that no, the person is not actually reading what he is responding to, and did indeed copy paste that shit straight out of the manual he lives and dies by.

So the store owner, obviously frustrated decides to check to see if good ol Frontier has bothered to read the original email. (My guess is no.)

Reopened  +++++++ Can you please re-read my email to you, they are NOT bots!!
The models were real live people there to help customers, earning a base rate of pay, they have to fill in application forms, have knowledge of my store and products, not go afk, be in the correct group.
Why am I not allowed paid staff????

Please do not tell me about bots, I have NO interest in bots, I don’t use bots and I never will. I need real staff on my land which you are saying I can not have? Not one single bot could have been on my pose stands, I know this as everyone has to fill in forms and tests with basic questions before being invited into the group.
So please tell me why am I not allowed staff?

Seems fairly reasonable. Upon talking with the store owner, the models/CSR’s have very specific rules. They are encouraged to interact with customers and are paid through pose stands spread throughout the area. These are not bots. These are RL people who earn money to buy stuff in Second Life by doing this.

Frontier replies. As you can guess it’s mostly the same old song and patterned response tap dance.

These residents may not be bots however traffic calculations are still being artificially inflated.  In order to avoid further disciplinary action in the future, these options are available:

- They should have their scripted agent status set to true.  Please keep in mind you will not be able to confirm that they have done this.

- Create a separate parcel of land and disable About Land > Show Place in Search.

This will allow you to have paid staff without inflating traffic results by mistake.

So, the anti-botting policy now covers actual people. And the solutions make me giggle.

Solution 1: Create a separate parcel to house said real people and have it not show up in traffic. Great idea! (no not really)

Solution 2: Have the real people set themselves to appear as bots. So…about that logic. Or maybe the lack of it. I can’t really decide on this one. Of course, you can’t actually check to see if your employees do this.

The traffic is not being artificially inflated. In that logic lies idiocy. Those are real people doing what they are paid to do. Artificially inflated traffic? Try actually busting down on those pathetic BIAB owners who bot the hell up and then create a new account when suspended. Until then, Linden Lab? Seriously? Shut the fuck up.

The store owner responds over and over again, asking for clarification and gets stonewalled by a case of dumb the likes of which I have not seen since the “boycott”.

This idiot policy calls into question the ability to have employees for anything. What about ye olde local SL strip club? No hosts? No DJ’s, No dancers? Those are all paid employees. Do they not increase traffic? How long am I the store/club/whatever owner allowed to stay there. Am I not increasing my traffic?

Why not actually take the time to come up with a bot policy that is actually understandable and works. Or better yet, blanket policy. No more registering bots for second life. Instead let us just remove all of them. No bots at all. Want to have models and what not? Actually help the economy in Second Life by hiring people like this author did.

These policies stacking up are going to lead to several things. The big stores will fail thanks to Linden help while the small stores will continue to do so-so. Less people will cash out (which is what LL is hoping for). And somehow the Lindens will post happy things about it. Followed of course by their resident cheerleader Torley. (Seriously? After you fucked us on XStreet and everything else you’re going to send Torley out to talk to us like we’re 5?). For some though, they’ll get it. And instead of writing in chalk outside Linden Lab at the next SLCC, there may be more people doing this.