Month: October 2010

Conversational consent and the CS

Posted on by Inara Pey

There has been an increasing trend within SL for people to post comments in their Profile and / or Picks along the lines of:

“TOS Disclaimer: My IM’s are logged and might be distributed if i wish…”

Or

“Since Linden Lab demands this notification you are by this informed that all my IMs as well as Local Chat are logged to harddisc and that I will use the logs in any way I feel suitable. If you are uncomfortable with this you are free to avoid interacting with me.”

So how much weight do such comments actually carry? Do they actually conform to the Community Standards (and not the ToS, as many with such comments in their Profiles wrongly refer to)?

These questions can be answered simply and in the order given:

1. None whatsoever.

2. No.

Let’s see what the Community standards actually states (Section 4, Disclosure):

Residents are entitled to a reasonable level of privacy with regard to their Second Life experience. Sharing personal information about a fellow Resident –including gender, religion, age, marital status, race, sexual preference, and real-world location beyond what is provided by the Resident in the First Life page of their Resident profile is a violation of that Resident’s privacy. Remotely monitoring conversations, posting conversation logs, or sharing conversation logs without consent are all prohibited in Second Life and on the Second Life Forums. [emphasis mine]

The very clear implication here is that informed consent is required before such conversations are distributed. Informed consent is a two-way agreement. As such, posting a unilateral declaration of intent within one’s Profile does not absolve oneself of adherence to the Community Standards.

Note also, that at no point in the section is any caveat given that allows people to bypass it. There is no “unless otherwise indicated in an individual’s Profile” or “except where the individual monitoring and distributing conversations states XYZ in their Profile”.

Rather, all these comments actually achieve in the first instance, is to demonstrate the poster’s own woefully inadequate understanding of the Community Standards for the reasons stated.

Of course, there are exceptions to Section 4: as stated elsewhere in the CS, open chat is not regarded as a private conversational area. Similarly, where outright abuse is concerned, Section 4 does not mean a person cannot use a transcript of an IM conversation when filing an Abuse Report.

But really, that’s not what these disclaimers are about; rather they lean towards the individual posting them as being at the least insecure – if not potentially malicious in their intent – by posting such comments. Certainly for me, encountering someone for the first time who has such a statement in their profile leaves me feeling they are somewhat less than trustworthy and thus I pass on communicating with them.

I have to admit as well that the sheer hubris of people putting such comments in their Profiles – particularly those who have been in SL long enough to know better – does, to use the vernacular,  get right up my nose.

I’m not alone in this feeling, as friends have pointed out. To this end, a number of us have started posting the following (sometimes amended to suit our personal style) in our picks (with thanks to Yasmin Heartsdale for the original wording). If you feel the same way, I invite you to add it to your own Picks.

To those with comments about their “right” to distribute conversations logs, etc:

Linden Lab’s Community Standards state (Section 4: Disclosure): “Remotely monitoring conversations, posting conversation logs, or sharing conversation logs WITHOUT consent are all prohibited in Second Life and on the Second Life Forums.”  (Emphasis mine)

The key here is MY *informed* verbal / written consent, *not* your own misguided attempt to waive consent on my part.

Therefore, in the correct spirit of the CS, you are hereby informed that *UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES* do I give you consent to monitor, post, or share any private conversation involving me, *regardless* of any misguided language to the contrary contained in your Profile. ARs can and may follow should you choose to deem yourself above the CS.

Consider yourself forewarned and informed.

http://secondlife.com/corporate/cs.php

SL’s got talent #2

Posted on by Inara Pey

Second Life is an amazing environment for fostering creativity, be it for business, fashion or simply pleasure. A goodly while ago now, I started a little series looking at talent in SL, but never really followed up on it.

Well, today I’m changing that, I want to follow up on both Rena and Latexia by talking about the work of another outstanding artist it has been my great good fortune to meet: Himitu Twine.

Himitu is remarkable for a number of reasons. For a start, she is one of the warmest, caring people I’ve met in SL so far. From our first meeting she was friendly, approachable, warm  – someone who can instantly establish a rapport with you.

Secondly, she has one of the most stunning avatars I have seen in SL. Her look is simply amazing – as the self-portrait to the left more than demonstrates. The look – from skin (and tone) through make-up, hair and oufit is always nothing short of exquisite.

Thirdly, she is one amazing photographer – or more correct photo-artist, seamlessly blending avatar shots with both rl and rendered backdrops, weaving both together to create evocative and sensual works of art that each tell a story, with the story itself neatly summarised in a flowing caption. Encapsulating everything from period costume through fetish to high-concept science-fiction, Himitu’s works are simply breathtaking.

It wouldn’t be fair to reproduce more than a couple of her works here – they really should be seen over on her Flickr stream, where they flow together as a collage of artistic expression I personally find inspiring – and I invite you all to go and browse her work for yourselves.

However, there is one last image I must reproduce here; just a few days after meeting Himitu for the first time – a meeting of pure chance (or possibly serendipity) while browsing a shopping mall – she asked me if I would consider posing for her; a request that was in and of itself utterly flattering. Of course, ego demanded that I did just that; I had no idea what to expect, but to be honest, anything I had imagined would have faded into nothing when compared to the picture she unveiled to me earlier today – a picture that honestly moves me in ways that I cannot express. It is called Serenity and within it, Himitu has captured not only my avatar, but also my very genuine love of the Orient. That she has done so, and so perfectly, is testament not only to her skill as an artist – but also to her insight as a person. All I can do is thank her, deeply and sincerely and encourage all of you, again, to go and look at her work – and leave comments!

All images reproduced here are Copyright Himitu Twine and used here with her permission. They may not be reproduced through any medium or in any form, digital, mechanical or photographic, without the express permission of Himitu Twine.

Images in order:

  1. Chinese Study: Just a little study in composition
  2. Tarantula on the Roof: She was a hunter in a world where life is cheap
  3. Serenity: Don’t say anything, just feel the serenity in this place…

My grateful thanks to Himitu for her time and for allowing me to reproduce these images here.

Marketplace opens

Posted on by Inara Pey

Grant Linden today blogs that the new SL Marketplace is now officially open. This replacement for XStreet has been the source of much gnashing of teeth for merchants and not a few consumers. Decisions made by LL to make the experience more “professional” meant that all merchants were faced with the need to completely re-work listings that – in many cases – had seen many hours of hard work put into them through the use of BB and HTML code to format and lay-out individual pages – with both BB and HTML being “banned” from the Marketplace. Equally as upsetting was the decision to alter the image format for posting to SLM, requiring more time spent by merchants re-cropping images to suit the new requirements.

All told, the beta of SLM caused more heartache: many popular features from XSL had been ignored in the development of SLM for reasons quite unfathomable: the “Buy Now” button for rapid-fire purchases (which, let’s be honest are probably the major type of purchase made on XSL) was absent – as was the ability to buy an item as a gift. The entire migration method was further muddied by the fact that further migrations of information from XSL initially ran the risk of overwriting work merchants had already sorted through in order to make their new stores browsable.

But it wasn’t all bad news. To be honest, even in beta, the new SLM offered a much cleaner, easier layout than XSL, and the meme of managing an online store – common to most commerce websites was logically implemented and the tool set offered a welcome improvement over XStreet – the aforementioned code restrictions and lack of a “Buy Now” button notwithstanding. So to were the new features contained within the store – the ability to cross-link products, the improved image upload, the ability to link to formatted PDF files and to include machinema videos into a product listing were all very welcome additions.

Since the launch of the beta, LL have been working to implement much-needed missing functionality – and kudos to them; “Buy Now” is back, for example, as is the option to purchase an item as a gift – even if it has been burried. And again, it has to be said that the overall look and feel is much better than XStreet and the use of stores makes it much easier to bookmark specific content creators; things that are all to the good. I really rather like it, despite the fact that as a merchant, LL made me jump through hoops on a number of occasions (including wiping my entire store at the end of September) to get to this point.

Doubtless, wailing will continue and people will grumble over some of the changes: hiding the “Buy as Gift” option away in the Shopping cart / “Purchase review” page, for example is going to leave people used to clicking on an option within the listing somewhat mystified and under the mistaken impression that one can no longer buy items for others (indeed, two people have already contacted me on this matter).

I’m also personally confused by the fact that the “Test Delivery” button merchants can use to ensure a newly listed item or an item someone has indicated they are having problems with is being delivered – has apparently vanished, and it appears that the only way a merchant can test an item is to physically purchase it from themselves  – a process that implies LL taking their commission – hardly fair if one is simply testing one’s listing. I’ve looked for a “Test Delivery” option on both the listed page for a product and the merchant’s Preview page – and I am darned if I can find one.

Doubtless more functionality will be forthcoming, whether or not it is simply page blindness that is preventing me from working out how to test deliver a product. For now, however, I hope Grant and the others involved in SLM continue to listen and engage with the community. When all is said and done, they soon more responsiveness in listening to and addressing a plethora of concerns than has been evidenced from LL during other major upheavals to people’s Second Life experience in recent history – and for that they are to be congratulated.

Of course, as I have a vested interest in SLM, here’s a shameless plug (link).

LL announce end educational / non-profit discount

Posted on by Inara Pey

Isn’t it typical?

Just when LL appear to be doing something right for once, and taking steps to address upset and concerns over the future of youngsters and educational activities in Second Life – they then go and do this…

While it is an enormous relief to the majority of us that our tiers are unlikely to increase as a result of LL hiking up the (already exorbitant) cost of sim rental, the second part of Nelson’s post must come as a real kick where it hurts to educators and non-profits alike, specifically:

2) We will adjust how education and non-profit advantages are provided, effective Jan. 1, 2011.
All  education and non-profit private regions of any type, purchased after Dec. 31, 2010, will be invoiced at standard (i.e. non-discounted) pricing.  All currently discounted renewals which occur after Dec. 31, 2010, will be  adjusted to the new price at that time. To continue to provide  entry-level, private spaces to educators just launching their programs,  we will be providing Homestead and Open Space regions to qualifying  organizations without their meeting the retail full-region criterion. Customer Support will be available to answer any questions that you may  have about these changes.

In a rough translation, this could, together with the blog post on 13-15 year olds entering SL be taken to read, OK, we’ve heard the pleas from you educators, and we’re going to provide a means for youngsters to join you on the main grid by limiting them to your private sims…but we’re going to foist a drastic price increase on you at short notice for those sims because or forcing you to take a product we’ve already severely capped in terms of usage, really guys, we don’t want you or your kids here.”

As has been pointed out in many of the (unanswered) replies to this post, this is a double hit from LL that is going to trigger a further migration away from the platform to other environs: not only does it hit educational institutions, but it takes out non-profits as well. what’s more, both types of institution generally set their budgets well ahead of time…and what amounts to a tad less than three-month warning of a massive price hike means that many are likely to be caught out by this move.

It’s a shame this move has been announced as it really smacks of nothing less that giving with the left hand and taking away with the right…

Churn, churn, churn (as the song might have said)

Posted on by Inara Pey

The last couple of days have seen rumours flying around concerning Microsoft making an offer on Linden Lab. I was pointed towards the rumours when a friend asked me if I’d seen Tateru Nino’s personal blog post on the matter;  I held off commenting, because on the one hand, the idea really did seem absurd – as some of the comments on that post point out. Ciaran Laval also did some digging, and it appeared that the matter might be all down to wicked rumour-mongering.

However, from Tateru’s blog (again) it appears the an offer may well have been made – and rejected – although not necessarily from Microsoft. As Hamlet points out, offers within the tech industry are not uncommon and don’t necessarily mean an acquisition is going to be forthcoming.

To be sure, an offer from Microsoft would both be hard to rationalise – and yet make a degree of sense. In the case of the former, it is hard to see what value MS would get out of SL as a platform in and of itself – it is barely cutting edge, it has more issues than any of us can safely shake a stick at and would be a nightmare to “turn around”, with little in the way of technology benefits that could be stripped from it. But the flip side to this is that MS has been very active elsewhere in the OpenSim environment  – so it might be argued that had they made an offer, the aim might well be to simply close SL and use the acquisition to become a dominant force in shaping the future direction of OpenSim through the use of LL’s existing “expertise”. But even given this viewpoint…it’s hard to see MS really benefiting to the degree that would warrant the investment…

If Tateru’s sources are right and it was someone other than MS, then further speculation as to who and why is pretty pointless until further information comes to light. What is important is that it appears to have been rejected by LL – which suggests that the company either a) has a robust belief in its own survivability and return to full profitability without the need for any buy-out, or b) the offer simply wasn’t big enough…

Certainly, as Hamlet rightly cautions – offers and sniffing are not uncommon in the technical industry – or even limited to it. I’ve worked in publishing for a long time, and when employed by small house publishers, a month rarely seemed to go by without one of the major Houses showing interest and sniffing around at “potential” options for purchase. That said, however, such sniffing would help put into perspective some of the more robust – if not subtly aggressive statements – Philip Rosedale (and others) have made about LL’s financial status in recent months; certainly his comments at SL7B when he “returned” to LL as CEO and his comments at SLCC 10 struck me as being more than merely attempts to calm troubled waters. Given this, I’m hoping that if an offer was made and rejected, then it is because of option (a) above.

While it is true, and others have commented, that the “killing” of LL would not slay the “vision” of SL – I personally would rather stick with the devil I know for the time being, rather than finding myself uprooted and forced to move elsewhere…