By Prokofy Neva Virtualtor
I'm going to just park this incident here now (the other one was here; there is yet ANOTHER one) while I've been sent it -- I haven't had a chance to read through all the chats and notecards and sheer assfuckery of a bunch of heedless morons in our rentals -- I will, and will comment in due course.
I'll just say that this incident here is the second terrain-related assholery today for Henry -- see above. And it follows four other tickets involving terrains on another sim -- so that's six terrain tickets which is really six too many, in my view. So I'm going to do a separate blog post on the phenomenon of terrains, and the sheer nonsense and idiocy -- and again, can I say assholery that goes on with them. Sure, some of it is newbie bungling and roads to hell paved with good intentions and all that. I get all that, truly I do. But the self-preoccupation and inability to cam out and SEE HOW YOU LOOK is fucking incredible.
Did your mother never teach you the poem?
O, wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as others see us!
It wad frae monie a blunder free us,
An' foolish notion.”
―
Here's chatGPT's translation into modern American English if you have trouble with Scottish:
"Oh, if we had the gift to see
Ourselves the way that others do,
It would free us from many a mistake
And foolish notions too."
Henry came on the teen grid at my suggestion, with three of his RL buddies, when he turned 13 in 2008. They had a ball, learned a lot, got some real skills in technnology, marketing, group living, etc. until Blue Linden broke their little hearts by allowing the rich kids whose parents bought them entire sims to use traffic enhancers and Linden-giving chairs to create false traffic -- which contrasted unfavourably with their organic traffic on their venue, which included stores, hangouts, and a game called "Sewer Safari" which they had a decent following for (a precursor to the similar event held now by Second Syndicate).
They drifted off to WoW when SL became so unfair and became expensive and never came back in the same way.
Then in 2015 I believe it was, after Henry's RL motorcycle accident and recuperation and schooling, I had him help me occasionally with builds and tasks -- but soon he was off again doing other things of greater interest, acting, photography, etc. In 2016, when I had my accident and spent a year getting my leg to heal with constant hospital treatments, I delegated tasks to him so that if I couldn't get online the rentals would be covered. But he had no interest in this whatsoever really.
At the beginning of the pandemic -- he had COVID, I was housebound until the vaccine was developed -- he helped but in a very succinct matter -- moving people to the resident status from tenant so they could access powers. This is the one piece of the self-service rentals we can't automate -- there isn't a way to do this I think except possibly by maintaining a bot on the land which takes up an avatar slot, always scarce on Mainland, and adds to the script load and management burden. So we don't do that. We don't use bots.
That is, bots could issue invitations after payment events that already contain resident powers, that's a thing. But we have another concept -- no waiting for a bot or landlord, join on your own, rez immediately, set home immediately so you can find your rental again, and then a manager adds your powers to ban, put in media, change parcel etc later after your payment is confirmed (and a cursory check is made that you are not a griefer or stalker or putting up some ridiculous build).
At some point I believe Henry made a couple of little areas to see if he could make a go of them - he couldn't because Mainland rentals are not a viable business. Only people with huge amounts of sims and staff and working capital could make it such; only scamming slumlords and scumlords engaged in ad farms and land cutting can really make a buck; a few individuals have fancier boutique operations, but basically the Lindens' Bellisseria has killed this off.
If you have 100 sims and think you're a Very Big Deal, I have not a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you, but a YouTube to show you. More on that later.
I wasn't going to publish this one because it contains no threats of violence or threats to organize boycotts -- that's my standard for publishing nasty tenant communications as a form of deterrent because we have no independent courts or independent media in SL and there is no recourse -- LL does not adjudicate personal disputes.
But I decided that since it led to Henry telling me he won't come back until after Labor Day, and because it so well illustrated that deep fuck-you hedonism in which too many virtual world denizens indulge, I'll publish it without the name. After this next incident, Henry came back to the sim, found yet another terrain customer had not paid their rent well past the grace period, and did not answer IMs, so he returned the prims and abandoned the land. OK, I wouldn't have done that? Because a kindly land baron gave that to me (or one nearby) because she rescued it from an ad farmer and held it for me. I value that much.
But....I get it. Because we're all tired of managing terrain land. There's other terrain land I abandoned last night. We're done. We don't wish to tier the view for you any more. Buy your own steep mountain and put your house on it and leave us out of it. And no, you vultures, Campanula has a long-term tenant on it so fuck off.
So...
What is fuck-you hedonism? It's not my phrase -- I believe the infamous Cristiano Midnight dreamed up 20 years ago on the forums to describe the people whose attitude was "fuck you, I get to do what the fuck I want on my land" -- hedonism, self-indulgence, concern only with one's own convenience and comfort and pleasure -- and heedlessness of how you look, how other people see you, whether you are making their life miserable. Total self-preoccupied, self-referential self-indulgence. Common to millenials -- but not only millenials.
I'm afraid I don't have a picture but this build overlooking Hector Lake was HUGE. Apparently Henry has some pictures but they'll have to wait. Go to Hector and see the set-up between the elevated Linden road and the slope down to the lake about 3-4 stories below at that area. Why someone would want to build an eyesore like that and then perch on it is beyond me --the build a ramp to it -- but it's because few people cam out and see how they look in the world.
I could note for added context that our neighbour in Laothoe, who owns half the lake, who once pledged to give us a heads up if she needed to sell her land, and who long ago forget that pledge, put all her land up for sale on the Laothoe side of the lake, and put it to sale for $2/m. I have looked away. More on that later.
[2024/07/17 07:05] Henry Hutchence: Hi, I'm sorry, but it was never our intent for the land you are renting in Hector to have a giant terrain on it, a ramp from a roadside rental to it, and thereby forcing other tenants to leave because now they are staring at a giant wall. So all of this has to come down. Our lease notes that no builds can be more than two stories from the ground -- that's for a reason. If you can't be content having your house at ground level only without a giant wall of terrain, then you can refund because we cannot accommodate a build like this that destroys the view in two many directions. Thanks for your understanding!
[2024/07/17 07:05] Big Mountain Girl: User not online - message will be stored and delivered later.
[2024/07/17 13:32] Henry Hutchence: I'm returning the terrain since I haven't heard from you and I have to address other tenants' complaints. You have 12 days remaining on your rental box which I am refunding. Should you be able to put your build normally on the ground and get rid of the ramps, etc. you can pay again. But if you require all this huge build, you'll need to find another place that will accept it or buy your own land.
The terrain was returned, not the house and furniture as a courtesy so the person could pick them up.
[2024/07/17 13:32] Big Mountain Girl: User not online - message will be stored and delivered later.
[23:04] Big Mountain Girl: (Saved Thu Jul 18 02:04:27 2024)Apologies,it was not my intent to make people leave. I was trying to create resonance with the rest of the land. They didn't have to just up and leave just because of that, they could have spoken to me directly if it affected them but no one did nor had I any complaints until yours. i had my house at ground level initially and only raised it due to my friend wanting me to feel closer. I have no problems to put it back the way it was. Also sending me a message in one day and expecting an answer in one day seems quite unreasonable. For future communications allow at least 24 hours for people to respond. Not everyone lives in virtual world 24/7. My build is certainly not huge,as my prim limit which you presumably know is at 206, quite a tiny allotment for any kind of housing structure in Second Life. (i've owned entire sims before so saying my build is huge is laughable) The only thing which appeared huge is the cliff which I put up to make it blend with the remaining land. Are you the land manager or the
[23:04] Big Mountain Girl: (Saved Thu Jul 18 02:04:27 2024) owner in an alt? Because it was the group owner whom I spoke with earlier and when I mentioned the lack of a land manager he said he was the only one.
[02:10] Henry Hutchence: Big Mountain Girl, there is nothing about a giant stone cliff that creates resonance with the land except the other stone cliffs *roadside* that are managed not to protrude into the view down below. I hope you can grasp that. Your job is not to complain about how they did or did not speak to you -- people are reluctant to start dramas and just leave. Some of the people who have been here for years and years just hope it will be fixed. You were given the courtesy of a message and option to remove it yourself so that you would not have all your things returned in a clump. As it dragged on as a real eyesore and the potential for more and more complaints, I could have just returned it and have been done with it. But I waited for you and the other tenant to respond. It's good you did, because 2 days into this, you'd get your prims in a clump. Nothing is unreasonable here; what's unreasonable is your notion that you can build a giant cliff in a small, compact, community like this with mulitiple people, with a beautiful lakeview, and not expect some static.
You're only looking at this from your own perspective perched up on your giant cliff without any consideration of the people down below -- frankly, I marvel at that. When you rattle on about prim counts, you are missing the point completely: you built a huge cliff that dominated the view on every side and blocked the view for several people on one side that they had enjoyed for years. It was supremely inconsiderate. That's why I refunded you immediately. Because you still aren't grasping the problem and usually in these situations people leave in a self-righteous huff. So please do that, if you need to -- or stay on the ground with your house within its limits, with two stories, and don't crowd your neighbours' view. Your house is really too large for this lot and now the lot next to you won't rent out except possibly as a skybox.
But you know what? I honestly don't care. Your house fits within your [sic: our] rules, if you need to stay because you want to be next to your friend up above on the road, that's your call. Please don't be in any illusion that we make money off these rentals here. Do the math on how much tier we pay -- US 0,0030 per meter -- see what your value is in US dollars, and have a clue. Finally, what on earth does it matter whether I am owner, manager or alt? I'm an officer in this company who has instructed you to follow our rules and stop blocking the view. Your friend up above instantly understood that. It doesn't matter whether I am the owner or the manager, truly. I have no idea what you are talking about with some reference of "the lack of a land manager". This is a self-service operation owned by Prokofy Neva, owner & manager. I'm Prokofy's RL son who occasionally helps out especially when Prokofy is tied up in RL with care of a sick relative. We are not giant land barons like Anshe Chung such as to afford to have some huge crew of people to wait on people when -- did I mention this already? this is a self-service operation.
[02:10] Second Life: User not online - message will be stored and delivered later.
[02:10] Second Life: User not online - message will be stored and delivered later.
[02:10] Second Life: User not online - message will be stored and delivered later.
[02:12] Henry Hutchence: Any time you are unhappy with the service which you have served yourself, you may click refund. I sent you a refund manually to speed up that process. You violated our rules, which you didn't bother to read in the info card in the box and the FAQs, and you decided you could just inflict anything you like on to a nice lake view. You were given the courtesy of a warning about this so as not to get your house back in a clump. The expectation then is that you apology and either leave or you put out your house as indicated and stop justifying your actions. That you feel the need to keep doing this lets me know:
[02:12] Henry Hutchence: I quit.
Big Mountain Girl then moves her rather large house that doesn't fit on these smaller lots down to water level; it spills on to two other parcels, one a hangout, the other a rental where the person left. Now it becomes unrentable. So something has to be done, and her terrain -- not her house and things -- is returned.
[02:18] Henry Hutchence: Your terrain is returned once again because it overlaps on to other lots that either we need to rent out again, or which serve as a community hangout. You really need to learn how to live in group land rentals with other real people or else move to Bellisseria where everything is done for you and spaced out -- but that will cost more. Turn on view/property lines or on Firestorm, World/Show More/Property Lines while wearing the group tag to see the aqua lines that are your boundaries. A big terrain like that in fact really isn't needed. The land will not terraform like a flat pancake -- this is mainland. But it can be adjusted a bit around your house. Your house -- we have the same one on another sim -- has a *deck*. it does not need a terrain under neath it for you to place your furniture. A deck suits a lakeside; a giant terrain does not. If you don't like the Linden's terrain texture here -- it cannot be changed -- then *this is not the rental for you*. Look for rentals where you can have more space, change the textures, etc. But they will cost more. Good luck.
And do note: I don't live in a virtual world, something you clearly intend as an insult. But you do.
Next, there are a whole bunch of conversations which I can't get now because Henry is out. And the Lindens have made all our lives 100x harder by cracking down on the sharing of accounts. That these are clearly businesses where people with a shared business, even a shared address in RL (until recently), but with different credit cards on the accounts and obviously a different IP at times to log on, should be abundantly clear to the unaided eye when dealing with something like DRD, which first began complaining against the Lindens short-sighted crackown.
We're a fraction of the size of DRD and can't fight this. We have each others' perms, but certain objects -- teleporters come to mind -- can only be handled by one avatar. The rent boxes even can be transferred without disrupting their paid status, that's how they are scripted. The rent revenue coming in can go to pay the tier, great. It's not vital to log in every day for such a helper. But it goes to paying SOME tier, not ALL, and at some point this becomes a NUISANCE. I am trying to work on solving this now, but meanwhile, I've only got a summary for the rest of this story.
Apparently another tenant, related to this new tenant, intervened and seemed to be more understanding, perhaps because he'd been there awhile. But then he started pulling what Henry thought was "DEI" which frankly, I would not have deployed, given everything, and that conversation seems to have gone downhill and uphill with Henry finally saying, in response to the customer's apparently somewhat precious invocation of how he came on to SL to work "during certain time windows":
"Well, Time Window this: my dad sat in the GULAG for 9 years."
The premise that Big Mountain Girl has -- that every landlord renting land for cheap and not always meeting expenses -- and tiering the view for you and managing it with rules -- is supposed to do X, Y, Z. And if he doesn't, why, he is rude, inconsiderate, failing to give 24 hours notice, blah blah. That if he has some little rental box he's come in to service from a very busy life of wife and kid, caregiving an elderly babushka to give her regular caregivers a break, shopping, repairing, cleaning etc. that he "must be living in a virtual world" -- well, that's whack. None of us can live in a virtual world 24/7; we don't have UBI, we have to work for a living or care for others or pursue other pursuits.
Henry will be back soon enough -- I've got some favour-banking chits in here and he'll have to step up.
Meanwhile, adjust your attitude, all of yez, you're disgraceful. The kinds of crazy-ass tickets I've seen this week go beyond what I have seen in 21 years of SL.
