XStreetSL has lost it’s soul.
Earlier this year I wrote an essay asking the question: Has XStreetSL lost it’s soul?
I now contend that it has.
In my previous essay I argued that XStreet’s soul was it’s staff. That the people who ran the website were the ones who made it great. I gave examples of the people who worked there before the acquisition and then contrasted it with an example from the new, Linden Lab® appointed, employees.
I now realize that my argument was false and that the true soul of XStreet is the vociferous community that has been built around it’s forums. Collectively the forum users provide a source of conscience, and heart, to what would be an otherwise coldly functional e-commerce site. I hadn’t seen this before because when XStreet was run by Jay and crew they were also a part of the community. They engaged us in dialog, fought and argued, and showed that they were more than just corporate stooges. After LL took over we have found ourselves to be separated, marginalized, and now completely cut off from the site. The new owners are not a part of the community. They do not care to join. I cannot blame them for it, they are busy folks, and we are, apparently, small.
Right from the start they worked to separate XStreet from it’s soul. The first announcement by Apotheus indicated that XStreet had been acquired and directed us to discuss it on the official Second Life® forums rather than XStreet’s own forums. We were directed to a place where we did not have a tight knit sense of community and of course we refused. The forums (XStreet) were abuzz with discussion and speculation about the changes.
The next day our reaction had elicited the following response from Jay (Apotheus)
The reaction to the Xstreet acquisition announcement has been passionate and thoughtful. I wanted to share some thoughts with you now that I have had a chance to read some of the feedback from the community. I can assure you from my experience in working with the Linden Lab ecommerce team, Linden Lab recognizes that Xstreet is more than a set of features. They understand that Xstreet is a community of Merchants, Shoppers and engaged community leaders. The value of the Second Life world hinges on the Residents who both create and reside there and Xstreet is a reflection and an enhancement to that world.
Note the bolded text.
At this point the soul of XStreet (the forum users) were still being listened to. However the next few lines indicate what is to come:
Xstreet is also a team of virtual commerce professionals who have built the leader in delivering online virtual goods to Second Life.
In other words a polite nod to the merchants who are not participating in the forums. The ones who view the website as a means to an end and have absolutely no care for community. Commerce professionals to whom the bottom line is money.
What is interesting, to me, is that LL was aware of this division and knew that the loudest part of the site was going to be the forum users. I think that from the start they viewed us as a nuisance, an adversary even, but that they needed to be gentle in removing us from interferring in their plans.
One of the more debated aspects of this post from Apotheus was the following passage:
Linden Lab values and learns from forum conversations and recognizes the value of the forum community. We are still looking for the best way to support Second Life forums and to encourage free speech while still keeping the forums a positive and productive exchange of ideas. Linden Lab will be evaluating how the Xstreet forum fits into the overall Linden Lab plan for forums and fostering online community.
A nice little reassurance that certainly quelled a lot of fears while also promising nothing.
Eventually we were to learn that most of this paragraph was false. Let us examine.
“encourage free speech”
It took us a while to realize the extant to which the new moderators on the forums encouraged free speech. The reason it took so long was because, unlike previous moderators, the new moderation consisted of removing entire topics from the forums, without any explanation at all. You would be happily posting and then suddenly recieve a message, “This topic does not exist”, and you would have no idea why. It could be a legitimate reason for the removal or it could not. There was no room for finding out, especially since forum policy stated that you cannot discuss a topic after it had been moderated. I saw times when a topic disappeared and I could guess why and other times when there was nothing in the topic that seemed inflammatory or illegal. Sometimes those topics talked about LL’s competitors.
Another interesting example of our free speech was when a regular forum member began to start posting topics about food. She would post a picture and name of the item and people would talk about it. Judging from the number of enthusiastic responses these topics were popular. A few months ago I was forced offline due to some RL difficulties so I was not there when this happened but apparently LL said that she could no longer post these food related topics. The extraordinary part is that apparently many forum members then began posting their own versions of the food topics in protest of this action. I do not know the outcome of all of this but it is an interesting example of “free speech” nonetheless. Hopefully someone can help enlighten me about this incident in the comments to this essay.
Today LL makes no attempt at all to pretend to free speech. Their new forum guidelines, which take affect tomorrow, clearly prevent mention of LL competitors and off-subject posting (anything other than SL).
“fostering online community”
LL still maintains that they are encouraging online community. However, by removing our ability to talk where we want (XStreet forums) and what about (new guidelines) there can be no denying that it is being discouraged. They took the forums from being something that served us to something that served them.
I realize that LL is a company and they own the servers and it is their own prerogative as to what goes on with them. What bothers me is that they say one thing, and do another, all while patting themselves on the back.
“Linden Lab values and learns from forum conversations and recognizes the value of the forum community.”
Soon after my original essay asking if XStreet had lost it’s soul we were introduced to Pink Linden. Pink reassured us that she wasn’t just the boss of the bosses but that she was also “one of us.” and could also reliably represent LL. She seemed to hint that she was the glue that would tie us all together. That she had years of forum experience and was flame proof. She certainly did prove that she knew how to act silly. While I tried to talk reasonably with her, as well as welcome her to the forums, I still felt that she was not sincere. I figured, what the heck, atleast they are talking to us now. Anyway, after several months of her syrupy enthusiasm we are treated with this lovely statement from Pink.
I wouldn’t call the number of merchants who post in this forum the majority by any stretch of the imagination. For example, not a single one of the top 10 merchants who account for a significant percentage of XStreet Revenue are here, ever. With all due respect, we manage the marketplace and the forums for the majority…that is the fairest way. We do try to respect the minority, but it’s rarely possible to accomplish this for 100% of a dynamic, active, passionately engaged customer base.
This was said by Pink in response to discussion over the removal of the XStreetSL forums.
So now we come back full circle. No longer are they giving the forum members any consideration. Rather it is the top 10 merchants who are important. Apparently money makes a majority since the top 10 people are, according to pink, the majority. We are no longer a community, we have become a minority amongst a customer base. Such is the way of corporations.
Thanks guys.
XStreetSL has lost it’s soul. It’s forum and its community of unique users. One can only hope that LL will stand by their promise to archive the forums.
As of this moment the forums consist of 606,461 posts in 121,571 topics and 12 different categories. In the time that it took me to write that sentence there were 5 more posts on the forums. Tomorrow it will all be gone.
Fortunately some of us, while cut loose, have found other places to rest. The two that I am frequenting are That Other Life, and Slapt.me.
In the immortal words of Pink, “see you there, gang“
P.s. Something that was removed, without explanation, from the forums:
Second Life and Linden Labs are trademarks of Linden Research, Inc. These words are the opinion of me, Shadowen Silvera, and are not affiliated with or sponsored by Linden Research.
I want to write
I’ve been thinking a lot, lately, about writing. Every day I look at the computer screen, place my hands on the keyboard, and say to myself, “I want to write.”
It’s not enough to want to write.
I need to have something to write about. What I write about must be something that I feel passionate about. Something that is interesting and engaging to myself and others. Otherwise I might as well go back to writing in my journal.
So how does one find a subject to write about? Self examination. What am I passionate about?
I like computers and technology. I have been programming since I was little. A rather dry subject though, only of interest to other programmers.
Cooking, now that, I am passionate about. I cook professionally. In the kitchen I talk endlessly about food and why I like it. Everyone needs it, everyone has an opinion about it. I can definitely write about food.
Ok. Now I have a subject to write about. Hands back on keyboard, raring to go! Umm, but how do I start?
Food is a big subject. I really need to be more specific than that before I can start. Hands back off the keyboard, turn up the music, close eyes, and think. While I am working on that lets get back to writing.
When I do finally decide what to write about I need to do some research. You know, to make sure that what I know matches up with reality. Sometimes I forget this part… BRB.
Oh, hey! BTW, did you know that an acronym is only an acronym if you can pronounce it as a word? For instance P.U.S.A is an acronym but F.B.I. is not, instead it is an initialism? Actually, this is debatable.
Afterwards I can start writing. When writing about something I need a middle, an end, and a beginning. Let me a take a minute to examine why it is that I mention the parts in that order. I have found that, when I am writing, I start from the middle. I make my way to a conclusion. Write a beginning as a summary of the rest and then edit, edit, edit.
Editing is the most important part. I tend to ramble a lot when I write. I also tend to have very badly formed sentences. Editing always takes me the longest time. When I am finished I have something that looks quite a bit different than what I started with. Hopefully it is also more interesting, easier to read, and better looking.
I decided that today I would write about writing rather than about food. Maybe tomorrow I’ll write about food. Maybe not.
Ciao.
Obama in Second Life
Since entering the White House in January, the Obama administration has made use of a myriad of social networking and Internet communications tools, such as blogs, the YouTube video service and Twitter, to interact with the public.
Come Saturday, you can add a virtual world appearance to the list.
When President Obama, who is visiting Ghana, speaks to a live audience tomorrow morning, his speech will be streamed on Second Life and Metaplace. These computer-simulated worlds offer 3D avatar-driven environments where participants can use voice or text chat to communicate. In this instance, however, there will be no Obama avatar.
But the Obama speech will be accompanied by a virtual event discussion, which will feature musician and activist, D.N.A.,, Ambassador Kenton Keith, and African historian Professor Tim Burke. The guest speakers will be talking about the speech and its broader implications….
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/07/10/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5151594.shtml
No Obama Avatar but I guess it’s an official stream of his speech in a Virtual world.
I wonder how long it will be before we get to see him make an Avatar?
Let’s see if the event gets griefed. I’ll keep you updated.
Here’s looking at you.
Ever wonder if you are the life of the party? Is that Avatar standing next to you checking out your latest pair of shoes? How much attention is that floozy getting across the room?
Here is how you can find out the answer to these questions and many more:
To use Show Look At, enable Advanced menu > Character > Show Look At.
Thanks to Richard Linden for this info on what the different colors mean:
* Nothing – dark gray
* Idle – light gray (look straight forward)
* AutoListen – light gray (look at avatars and objects that are talking around you)
* FreeLook – blue (follow the mouse cursor)
* Respond – black (look at someone when typing a response to them)
* Hover – green (look at the object your mouse is hovering over, when tooltips enabled)
* Conversation – dark blue (look at someone after clicking on them)
* Select – pink (look at the selected object)
* Focus – purple (look at the alt-zoom target)
* Mouselook – yellow (follow cursor in mouselook)There are various values that control how long these lookats are valid, how they prioritize relative to each other, what the percentage chance of them triggering is, etc. You can find the settings in character/attentions.xml (e.g., C:\Program Files\SecondLife\character\attentions.xml)
http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Show_Look_At
This will allow you to see where people are alt-camming or otherwise what direction in the room they are peering towards.
Images Hack
Imageshack a popular Web 2.0 image hosting application was hacked tonight by a group calling themselves Anti-Sec.
They replaced every image hosted by the site with an image that contains their manifesto:
It is ironic that the name of the website is ImageShack ie:
Image Shack
Arranged another way it is:
Images Hack
What I find more interesting, however, is that this quite elegantly shows the problems inherent in Web 2.0.
This reads like an Urban Legend but it really happened.
True Story.
When I was a teenager my brother, uncle and I would go camping every weekend. We would pull out the map and pick a random place in the state, drive out there, camp, fish, hunt, etc,. We did this for years.
One weekend we picked a place that was far out in the middle of the Oregon desert. It took us all day to drive there and once we reached the area we drove around trying to find a good place to camp for the night. It was about 3am. We hadn’t seen any traffic for hours.. it was just a long lonely highway without any sign of civilization (except for the highway itself of course). We watched the sides of the road for good places to turn off and camp when suddenly we passed a broken-down car parked on the left hand side of the road. Because we were way out in the middle of nowhere we slowed down to see if anyone was in the area and whether or not they needed help.
We went about two miles further down the highway when we passed a couple walking down the shoulder of the highway. As we came up behind them the woman turned and ran out into the road at us but the man grabbed her and violently pulled her back to him while she screamed something at us. It seemed obvious that she was in distress so we went a little ways up the highway and pulled over.
We wanted to help her but we didn’t know what kind of trouble to expect so we got our rifles out of the back of the truck and then headed back to where we came from. We hadn’t gone far ahead so we expected to see them right away, but we couldn’t find them. It was strange because we were in the high desert with no trees and only low scrub and there weren’t any good places for them to hide. We were also shining a big spotlight around as we drove. Soon after we came to where the car had been.
The car wasn’t there.
The strangest thing is that there was no way that the couple could have run back to the car before we got there. And there were no tracks or any other sign that the car had ever been there in the first place. To this day I have no idea what happened to them.
I worry about it sometimes because if they weren’t ghosts as my uncle and brother like to explain it then that woman was in trouble and we were not able to help. I know we did the best we could but I really hope she was ok.
Something I wrote a long time ago
“Want to fight about it?” I looked up from the computer at my brother who
was standing over me with his arms spread wide. I couldn’t help thinking
about how foolish he looked. He had just come home angry and I had innocently
asked him why he was upset. The ensuing argument didn’t make any
sense to me; He was angry and I was reacting to his anger. At the point when
we started calling each other names I decided to turn away and ignore him.
I couldn’t understand why he was acting like this, why he was angry all the
time. I realize that we did not have perfect lives, that violence and crime had
become a regular part of it, but why did he take his anger out on me. We’ve always
fought each other growing up, but it was different now. We hardly ever talked
to each other, except to argue.
I tried to play it off, I acted as if I was doing something important with the
computer and had a reason to ignore him. Suddenly he grabs my neck from behind
and I quickly turn in my seat. I shove him backwards and he flies over the top of
a chair and lands half on his feet, half on his back. I stand up shaking from the
adrenaline flowing through my body. The muscles in my legs and arms twitch and my
breathing gets deeper.
My brother gets to his feet and half yells, “come on, let’s fight!”
I stare at him his eyes are bulged out and his face is flushed. He
starts toward me and I sit back down. I do not like to fight.
“You know what you are? You are a chicken shit.” He shouts as he
sees me sit back down. He says it several times as he approaches me.
I answer back, “I don’t give a fuck what you think!”
He then leaves out the door to our apartment slamming it behind himself.
I get up and pace about the room. I then walk into the kitchen and briefly
think about heating up a burrito. I realize I am not hungry and thoughts of
what is happening between my brother and I pass through my head. I turn and
slam my fist into the freezer, it’s large frame rocks back and forth. My
hand hurts and I suddenly realize how glad I am that I did not fight him. If
I had hit him that hard I could have killed him. I get scared thinking how
dangerous a brotherly fight is, now that we are grown. I turn and get down
the aspirin bottle. I empty about twenty pills into my hand and begin a
process of putting them back one by one. At ten pills I consider swallowing
them all. Maybe they will kill the pain. I continue the process, running reasons
why it is not the correct amount through my head. I finally settle with four.
Almost imediately the pain receeds. “Plecebo” I think to myself. I sit back down
at the computer and notice that a friend had come online.
She sends me a message, “Hi, how are you?”
I respond, “Im fine, how was your day at work?”
We then proceed into a fairly normal, everyday sort of conversation. I
have stopped shaking and the pain in my hand has receeded to a dull ache.
Maybe the rest of the day will be normal now that my brother is gone.
Normal days are boring, I want a boring day. While having the conversation
with my online friend I also work on a story I am writing. It is about a
cat who is stranded in the middle of a big city. The cat is taken in by
a homeless man who is also a drunk. The man loves the cat but abuses it
when he gets drunk. Eventually the old man is found dead in an alley way
with the cat laying on top of him, loyal to the last. With the way things
have been going today I decide that I will write one of the abusive
scenes. I rock in the chair as I type, forgetting.
Soon after my mother walks through the door, disturbing my reverie. She
bustles about the room her breathing labored due to her asthma. I know
that something is bothering her but I do not want to know what it is.
I continue to type, trying to ignore the unidentifiable anger building in me.
She then sits down at her table and works on a puzzle. Half an hour later
I hear her mumble something to herself and get up. She then picks up the phone
and makes a phone call. I assume it is to my brother, wherever he is. I overhear
her telling my brother to come home and how she wants him to take her to see the
veterinarian. After a moment of silence she hangs up the phone and sits down
in her recliner. I can hear all of this behind me and can tell what she is doing.
A few minutes later my brother walks in the door in his usual way, fast, the door
swinging shut behind him. I follow him with my eyes. He sits in the other recliner
and stares at my mother, his eyes dangerous and cold.
“I don’t need you yelling at me like that on the phone.” My mother
says with a strange sound in her voice, choking almost.
“I was only joking.” He says in that arrogant voice he always takes
with her. I feel the anger building, I feel as if I am about to burst.
“Give me the keys, Bobby is going to take me.” She states with that
unidentifiable sound still in her voice.
“Doesn’t matter, I am getting a car tomorrow.” He says throwing the keys
at my mother, hard.
She stands up and starts half-yelling at him. I cannot make out the words
everything blurs and all I can think is that she is crying and my brother
doesn’t seem to care. I stop thinking, I am only a body trying to contain
it’s anger. Dimly I see that my mother leaves and my brother also. I hear him
stomping down the back stairs. I quickly run out onto the balcony and scream
at him to not come back. I hear him shout something and start stomping back up
the stairs. I come back inside and stand before the door, getting myself ready.
My heart pumps madly. The door flies open and he bursts into the room, his eyes
wild. He stands before me and we circle each other. I have my back to the door
and am standing only a few feet from him.
He spreads his arms wide and puffs out his chest, almost comical, “Whatcha
going to do about it?”
I don’t even realize what I am doing as I reach out and calmly grasp his
throat with one hand, pushing him backwards. He looks surprised, his face
getting red and strained. At first he doesn’t react, too surprised. When he does
react, he easily gets out of my hold on him, he has a longer reach than
I do. We have always been opposites, him tall and wiry, me short and burly.
Before I know it, he has his arm about my neck and is behind me trying to
wrestle me down to the ground. I push back with my considerable strength
maneuvering myself around so that we are side by side. I have a hold of
his neck and he has a hold of mine. It is like a strange embrace. I gather
myself and punch him in the face. He rocks back but still holds onto me.
Suddenly my mother comes rushing into the apartment and pulls us apart from
each other. We stand glaring at each other with our mother standing in between
us. Dimly I realize that she is crying again and my anger deepens because of
the frustration of the situation. We were a poor family and couldn’t afford
to fight amongst ourselves.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” I ask, after catching my breath.
“You wouldn’t understand, nobody understands!” He says and then storms out
of the apartment. My anger fades and I follow him out into the hallway and
grab him from behind.
“Wait! Tell me whats going on. Why are you angy? why are we fighting?”
He shrugs himself out of my grip and continues walking away from me. I watch
helplessly as he turns a corner and dissapears. I think to myself that I should
follow him but I decide that it would be better to let him cool off. When I get
back into the apartment I sigh to myself when I see my mom sitting at her table
and working on her puzzle. We all have our problems and my mother’s was denial.
Going back to the computer I see that my friend had sent me several messages
asking where I was. I apologized and made up an excuse for why I was away. I
guess I was in denial also.
I am several years older now and this event still resonates within my mind. I have never found out why my brother acted as he did on that day but I suspect it had to do with drugs. If I was smarter at the time I would have recognized the signs. He would often come home late at night and not talk to anyone. And sometimes after lying down for a few minutes in our shared bedroom he would suddenly run to the bathroom and get sick. I think I even knew it then but I felt so overwhelmed by everything in my life that I refused to acknowledge it. Later I found out that my brother had become addicted to methamphetamines but that is another story for another time.
Some of the above is exaggerated.
Has XStreetSL lost it’s Soul?
I can still remember when I first fell in love with XStreetSL back in 2007
It was called SLExchange back then and I had seen signs for the place at various merchant stores within Second Life®. At first I initially judged it as something not worth my interest. The name seemed silly to me. I imagined it to be another poorly made website attempting to capitalize off of Second Life. As I continued to wander around Second Life something curious started to happen. I began to notice that the signs were everywhere and that they were often displayed proudly. I thought that maybe they were paying Merchants for advertising and I asked a friend of mine about it. I was surprised to learn that the signs were displayed voluntarily and I just had to see what this was about.
When I first viewed the site I immediately felt like my judgment had been justified. It looked outdated and unprofessional. It reminded me of a time when I had started my own, poorly designed, websites with the help of PHP-NUKE. It seemed obvious to me that the owner of the site was some teenager who thought he was a genius web-master because he could follow instructions for installing a CMS. Despite these impressions I knew it was an intensely popular website and I wanted to know why.
I kept on looking around and found this from Apotheus:
Post subject: Second Life Risk API and what you can do to help
Hello all,As a number of you have found out, since yesterday’s update the SL Risk API has been telling us that a full 1/3 of ALL payments made to SL Exchange are risky. We have had ongoing issues with the API falsely telling us that payments are risky, but the problem has become worse than ever. As I’m sure you can understand, this is causing undue hardship for our support staff as well as many of you.
Our experience shows that 0.3 – 0.5% of all payments made to SL Exchange actually seem risky. That means the Risk API has 98% false positives. We have a system that automates approval of about 80% of these false positives, but that still leaves an awful lot of you having to wait for one of our staff to come by and release funds when they get held.
It’s time that Linden Lab recognizes this problem and works to correct it. If you agree with me, please let your voice be heard by voting for the bug report I created here – you will have to login using your Second Life account information to be able to vote:
I felt like I had hit a brick wall. Here was the owner of the website showing a level of honesty and integrity that completely belied my initial impressions. Not only does he admit the problem and explain it but he also does everything he can to solve something that is, essentially, completely out of his control!
I went on to read the bug report and I saw that it was well written and professional. I knew that this was a man I could trust. I was hooked. I joined the site and listed my first products for sale. I began to participate in the forums. I worked my way into an incredible community which contained a particular form of drama that was, and still is, completely unique to XStreetSL.
I grew to know the forum personalities. I watched the work of Sami with amusement and a little bit of dread, afraid that he might think that my threads had “outlived their usefulness”. I was amazed at how quickly Tigress would burn through the dozens, if not hundreds, of issues posted every day in the Technical Issues forum.
Sometimes the staff was a bit grumpy, but most of the time they seemed to maintain a positive attitude and a wry, personable, sense of humour that made you understand that they cared, worked hard, and were proud of it:
I’m sorry you encountered trouble, Mickey. I’ve credited your SL Exchange account for the missing funds. And, had you read through the sticky at the top of this forum or the other threads involving missing funds, you’d have seen that the threat of never using us again and telling your friends how horrible we are was unecessary — SL Exchange offers excellent customer service; no arm twisting needed.
-Tigress Stormwind Sun Apr 08, 2007 5:08 am
As you can see from Mickey’s response this brand of customer service worked:
hi Tigress, thanks for everything
SecondLife is full of lag sometimes.
I was worried I could loose the 2,000 $.
I will recommend your great site to the many friends I have on SL.
Congrats to the staff of SLX.
You could tell that they had been learning every day how to make this thing of theirs work:
…And you’re right, announcing the change would have been a good idea, but I honestly didn’t even think of it and would not have thought of it had I not read this. So, thank you for the input!
-Tigress Stormwind Sat Jun 18, 2005 11:19 pm
Sorry Sami, I just had to. 
Speaking of pride, check out this thread and this one.
And then everything changed. Suddenly, as if out of nowhere, XStreetSL was bought by Linden Labs®, the creators of Second Life. Some of the staff were kept, some let go. The respect disappeared altogether and we were left confused and frightened. Instead of the usual confident, and realistic, assessments we had come to expect we were suddenly hit with sniper-like changes that came without warning. We saw login changes that essentially broke the functionality of the website and were only told about it a day later. When we complained about those changes we heard that they were “temporary”. We were assured that the security changes would not break functionality and yet each new change did. I defended the website at this time but I had this illusion that it was still under competent management.
They merged the Second Life and XStreetSL accounts. They even gave us a long-winded explanation of possible concerns and a place to discuss them. Unfortunately they neglected to tell us a few details of the merger which has caused problems for some.
The worst part is the lack of respect (my comments in black):
Hey all,
(We are not your friends, we are your customers)
I’ve got a quick update for you.The Bug:
Some users who deposited Linden Dollars through our remote deposit boxes (not our ATMs) had those Linden Dollars removed from their Second Life account but not credited to their Xstreet SL account.
(ok pretty straight-forward. What are you doing to solve it?)
Make sure we’re aware of important issues, especially involving funds:
Thanks for informing us about the bug that some users had the misfortune of experiencing with our remote deposit boxes recently. (This is obviously veiled sarcasm. You don’t thank people for complaining about problems. You fix it and apologize.)Always make sure you submit a support ticket with all the necessary information, and when necessary, please create a pjira issue. We take all bugs seriously, but especially those that involve your funds. (My Interpretation: Our users are stupid. We take bugs seriously, but not seriously enough to notice them.)Unfortunately, while there are some forum threads which have been open on the subject for a couple of weeks, our engineers only learned of it within the last few days. We don’t always have time to read the forums. (You are too busy to pay attention and it is our fault?)As soon as the information propagated to us, we got right on it. (Another little jab at the users “We are confident and can fix anything but since you guys are not doing the right thing like good little sheep it took us a long time.”)We’ll work on better and faster communication of these issues internally and will better instruct our users how to get us that information as we continue to improve Xstreet SL. (Anyone else feel like they have just been spanked?)
What Caused This?:
We use the transaction history page on Secondlife.com just like everybody else. Of course, we have a lot more transactions than most usersIs It Fixed?:
We’re working on it and expect to have a fix out by the end of next week. We’ll update you when that fix has gone liveThanks and sorry for the inconvenience. We’re working hard on a solution.
(Why are you thanking us again? My Summary: “Hi,Thank you for telling me your cat is dead. I killed your cat.It wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t let him outside. Thanks. Sorry. Working hard, digging his grave.)
Define: Snarky. Adjective. Snide and Sarcastic; usually out of irritation.
/me wipes his brow, “Glad I got that out of my system!”
Now I will to leave you with a little reminder of what it used to be like:
Post subject: Terminal deposits not working
Hi all,
Deposits made at terminals, and occasionally other terminal transactions are currently timing out. I’m working on the problem now, and will post updates as they come.
…
This problem was fixed at about 7:10pm SL time. Our primary mail server was experiencing bios errors. After driving down to our colocation facility and giving it a few swift kicks, it’s running again.
Upon first glance, it looks like all the failed deposits caught up once the problem was fixed, but it is possible that some transactions have still not completed. If you had a deposit timeout and you believe your account is still in error, please contact us at support@slexchange.com. I also plan to review all those transactions tomorrow when I am more awake to ensure that all is well and to fix any remaining account discrepancies.
Second Life and Linden Labs are trademarks of Linden Research, Inc. These words are the opinion of me, Shadowen Silvera, and are not affiliated with or sponsored by Linden Research.
The Pastor’s Ass
The Pastor’s Ass
The pastor entered his donkey in a race and It won.
The pastor was so pleased with the donkey That he entered it in the Race Again, and it won again.
The local paper read:
PASTOR’S ASS OUT FRONT.
The Bishop was so upset with this kind of Publicity that he ordered the
Pastor not to enter the donkey in another race.
The next day, the local paper headline Read: BISHOP SCRATCHES PASTOR’S ASS
This was too much for the bishop, so he Ordered the pastor to get
Rid Of the donkey.
The pastor decided to give it to a nun in a Nearby convent.
The local paper, hearing of the news, posted The following headline the next day:
NUN HAS BEST ASS IN TOWN.
The bishop fainted.
He informed the nun that she would have to Get rid of the donkey, so she Sold it to a farmer for $10.
The next day the paper read:
NUN SELLS ASS FOR $10.
This was too much for the bishop, so he Ordered the nun to buy back the Donkey and lead it to the plains where it could run wild.
The next day the headlines read:
NUN ANNOUNCES HER ASS IS WILD AND FREE.
The bishop was buried the next day.
The moral of the story is ……. . Being Concerned about public opinion can bring you much grief and misery and even shorten your Life.
So be yourself and enjoy life…
Stop worrying about everyone else’s ass and
You’ll be a lot happier and live longer!
Posted by Taylor Lubezki at XstreetSL.com Forums
https://www.xstreetsl.com/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&p=512989
Men’s Liberation
I think there is a huge misunderstanding here about what Men’s Liberation is. A few people who posted understand but in general it seems you all think it is a “female vs. male” thing. Men’s liberation is simply the point of view that when men are raised they are taught to behave in a manner that causes them harm. It is a societal issue. When you are a young boy you are taught that expressing your emotions is wrong. You are taught that you must “beat or be beaten” and if you chose to not be this way you are socially isolated. You are taught that you must be strong and provide for everyone around you no matter the cost to your health or emotional well-being. You are taught that you must dominate or be dominated, etc.
It is the same as when women were taught to stay at home. To be the nurturer. To always be proper and wear dresses. They were oppressed by society and the roles they were brought into, etc.
But while society now recognizes these issues with women for men they do not.
Go to any bar and listen. Really truly listen and pay attention. If you look outside yourself and are open minded you will see it.
Original XStreetSL Thread: Men’s Liberation
