Object Permissions Need A Gift Option

Here I am in my new AfterHours Collection - Batgirl by Lourdes Laysan (SLurl) costume. It is well made and at just L$200 I think it is also a great deal. Yes, I am Batgirl! But I wanted to buy it as a gift. The texture on the vendor prim did not show any permissions information and peeking at its contents was equally fruitless. It turns out that some items were No Transfer which, in this case, means No Gift. Sure, I would have bought one for me anyway, but if I want to give it to someone like I would Real Life clothes, I can't do it.

Sure, I could contact the maker and ask to have it sent as a gift, but her profile indicates that she is on a sabbatical. Her Xstreet store front does not have this item, so while that might is an option -- albeit less attractive than being able to hand my friend a gift box -- for some items from that store, it is not for this one. Besides, many merchants mark up items on XStreet to cover the commission fees.

What we really need is an overhaul of the permissions system. Everything should be transferable just like in Real Life. Since that would raise havoc with the other system permission Copy, a creative form of Transfer needs to be found. I propose a Gift Upon Purchase option. It would have been great to be able to right click on the vendor prim, choose Buy as Gift rather than just Buy, and then be prompted for a name for delivery. Some vendor systems allow this, but for many reasons merchants prefer to use non-scripted prims so having the gift option built into the fabric of the Second Life viewer/servers would be best.

Children in SL

Honestly, I think most so-called drama in Second Life^® is brought on by children who have snuck into the adults-only side of the service. Not just children in the chronological sense, but also children in the I-behave-like-I'm-4-years-old sense.

Here is the scenario: Some 100 meters from where I was standing, minding my own business, a resident was being a nuisance and was ejected from the region. Said individual then began to harass the ejector and thus was banned. So here is where I come in ...

Out of the blue, I received an IM asking why this other person was banned (don't ask how I knew, but I was aware that the IMer was an alt of the offender), making me wonder why they contacted me. I was not wearing my security group tag, though if someone was really diligent they might have found out that I have the Security Chief title despite someone else really having that job. So, maybe it was a fair cop (pun intended) to contact me.

Mind you, at this point I knew of the incident peripherally at best, but despite that, the offender's alt began to harass me because I would not clear the ban. They did not ask to discuss the issue or to plead their side. And they were in contact with my boss, the real head of security with much the same conversation going on at the same time. From what I found out later, the initial ejection and ban were valid based on the region's rules, but the resident's subsequent actions would have earned a ban anyway and eventually earned official Abuse Reports from several individuals.

What kind of abuse? Apparently the resident makes vendor systems (though thier profiles were very vague as to which ones so I can't imagine they have much business) and promised to program into all the vendor server software the avatar keys of all the region's staffers so that no in-world vendor would sell things to them nor would the vendors work on any region owned or operated by the owner of the region from which the offender was ejected. They also made vague threats about some sort of action on XStreet, but I guess all the contempt was lost in the rabid froth so I didn't understand most of it. Lastly, the resident threatened another region with similar actions, not aware that I have never even visited that region. ::shock:: Could this person be banned there, too?!?

Do you see the childishness? I mean, aside from trying to hurt people not involved in the situation, such as other staffers not even present and the merchants who would lose business from the loss of sales. A more mature person would probably have thought through their actions and realize that their vendor clients will be contact them about why transactions are failing.