LL Fucks Up - Armanna Loves Them
General, Linden Labs, Stupidity, Support
What’s happened this week has a lot more people realizing that Linden Lab has no concern for the majority of their customers. Things like storing persistent data in the description field and using “pipe” character have been relatively commonplace, and the latest “upgrade” makes any object that depends on that unusable. The persistent data in the description field was used for more than just scripts for doors (like the Timeless Door Script that is mentioned numerous times in the comments, here), but also for product vendors, rental boxes, and many other objects that depend on communication with a central “server”. Specific (and individual) product keys are written to the description field, each time a new item is rezzed. This allows for the “server” to identify with the object and differentiate it from others that are like it. Without warning, Linden Lab screws the majority.
Picture this: You run a rental business (mall, apartments, houses, etc) and you have a rental server in your office. Outside of each unit that you rent (let’s say 100 units), you have a rental cube that people can click on for more information, or pay to begin renting. Suddenly, Linden Lab decides to upgrade to a new version, and without “any” forewarning, all of your rental boxes stop working. The identifying keys have all been truncated and they can no longer communicate with the server.
Do the rental boxes evict the current renter and return all of their items? Do they keep any record of what the renter has paid you, and how much time “was” remaining? Does the maker of the rental server and cubes have a fix for this?
What about all of the product vendors that do the same sort of thing? All of a sudden, the vendors can’t communicate with the product server to deliver the products. Let’s pretend that “Armanna” (Meg) was evicted from one of your rental units, earlier. She says “Hooooooray for Joppa!” and decides to go on with her Second Life by seeing what events are happening. She goes to the store and pays for a new dress and some new shoes and waits for the product to arrive in their inventory… and she waits… and waits… then she contacts the seller. Obviously, the shop owner is the one who put out a vendor that doesn’t work, right? Not only does the shop owner get upset at what the Lindens have done, but Armanna (Meg) also gets upset, because she really wanted a new outfit for that “Best In Formal” dance that starts in an hour. After the shop owner and Armanna work things out and bypass the vendor, though, she puts on her new dress and shoes and heads to the party, yelling “We love Linden Lab and we love Second Life! - Woot Joppa!”.
When she gets to the club, she meets up with a few friends and they decide to dance. They head over to the dance floor and click on the dance ball to start their dance animations… and they wait… and wait… When they realize that the dance ball no longer works because it’s using “pipe” characters in the description to control the various animations, they realize that they’ll just have to stand around all night. While her friends are standing around, listening to the music that they should be dancing to, Armanna (Meg) just “lays on the flooor cheeering and kicking and screaming for Joppa”. Such Fun!
Throughout this whole experience, Armanna (Meg) has crashed three times and has had to relog a couple more because of rolling restarts. Still, she thinks “LL and all the Linden’s do a great job, don’t lnock em! Keep it up Lindens!”. It sounds as though Armanna is not actually paying Linden Lab to have her fun in Second Life, but instead it sounds like Linden Lab is paying her. She’s the “only” one saying that “Negativity is not needed, feedback and suggestions should be welcomed : )“. What’s your story, Meg? … and if you “really” think that way, can I have some of those drugs you have, too? We’ll pass them out to all of the authors and people who leave comments, here at SL Sucks.
Malignant Narcissist @ February 2, 2008