GMC Rentals Service

For those who rent lands for Gorean homes or stores, you can now have your rentals listed with the GMC. Please review the information carefull on the Rental Enrollment Form before submitting it so you are aware of what GMC rights this service has.

Please note …
There is a common phrasing in Second Life where you “buy” or “purchase” the land from a landlord and then you move in. This does NOT mean you actually OWN the land, you are simply paying the landlord an extra premium (most only charge $1L so you can take ownership of the plot) and then you have to also pay a rental fee or charges above that. You are RENTING, not owning. We will NOT USE the terms “selling”, “owning”, “buying”, “purchasing” in GMC listings and confuse prospective renters by the veil of offering something which is not true. If you, as a landlord, have an issue with us not using those words in your enrollment listing then your choice is to not use this GMC service but it’s not open for negotiation and any use of those words ’slipping’ into the enrollment form will be edited out.

If you have any questions about this service, or if you would like to apply to be the focal for this new service, please contact email Dartavia Vesperia

New GMC Service: Translation

With the many cultures which make up Second Life and a large number of different languages used in the Gorean Market places, we have decided to add a new service to the GMC for translation services.

We will be asking volunteers to join the GMC as an official translator and be able to help those who need it when speaking a language they have a fluent or very-high vocabulary of. If you would like to volunteer, please fill out this form and detail what languages you will be able to translate.

Translation staff will be listed on the blog so they are easily found along with the language they provide service of and will have a tag in the GMC so they are easily found in the members group when searching by tags.

Please be aware that if you volunteer to be a translator you will be required to provide this assistance any time someone asks for it (through group) or if you see someone struggling with an English translation please offer your services if you can help.

We don’t expect you to give up all your Second Life time, don’t panick! This service is only provided in direct relation to merchant needs by way of renting in markets. Store business will have to be handled through the store owner who might have translation services offered to their clientelle.

For more information about this new service, please contact AcidladyHot Westland in world.

Change Requests not processed …

… because someone OTHER than the listed market/sim owner has made the request. Please remember when there is a change in the market’s information which requires an update with the GMC listing, we will not process requests coming in from market managers unless they are also the sim owner/admin. This is to protect from instances where a market manager tires and ‘takes over’ the market and only in place for the markets protection. This information is listed on the form but often overlooked. Please ensure your managers are aware and submit any requests for changes yourselves to avoid any delay in processing the request which can have an impact on market business. Can you imagine what would happen to your market if some “Joe Blow” submitted a change form listing him as the new market manager and it was processed? This is why we have this policy in place and will be strictly followed. Please cascade this to your Market Managers.

New GMC service: Rental/Housing Listings

Another new service the GMC is offering the Gorean community is to have their rental plots/housing listed on the blog and have a single notice posting allotment per week to advertise what they have available. There is a very specific set of criteria for this service, which is outlined on the Rental Enrollment Form.

The Enrollment Rules are posted on the form so you can easily find them and reference them before filling out and submitting the form. Once the form has been submitted it will be understood you have read and understood the rules provided.

If you have any questions, please contact Dartavia. We are currently seeking a person to be the focal contact for the Rental Roster. If you would like to take on this task, please fill out the Staff application form

Fraud in Marketplaces

There are many forms of fraud which you can experience in a market place. Never under-estimate the fraud artist who will stoop to any level in the attempt to make the biggest buck the quickest way with little to no effort.

This post will be an on-going edit of the many tactics used in the Gorean Markets to fraudulently gain funds from people in Second Life.

It is in your best interests at your store, or your market place, to post signs significant enough which will be noticed easily outlining the names of representatives, or if there are none, and what steps should be taken if someone fraudulently represents themselves as an official staff member.

If you become aware of someone who is pulling these scams, submit an Abuse Report and advise anyone who was ‘taken’ by the scam to do the same. Simply banning the person from your store/market won’t stop him or her from doing it elsewhere. Preventing this person from doing it again through the abuse reporting system will give Linden Labs all the information they need to investigate and take the furthest action possible they deem is necessary to stop this person from doing it again – such as banning the IP of the individual so they aren’t able to create alts and start their scheming process over again.

If you are aware of any other valid fraudulent tactics, please email them to Dartavia so they can be added to this list.

Technical Assistance
There is a known case of someone posing as a person offering technical assistance (in some form or another) to merchants advising them that a vendor is not working and to pay them directly for the product with the promise of it being sent to them.

Important Change in Process

Because there seems to be a large change-over of market managers which leads to a lot of sign switching and confusion, there is going to be an enforcement of a processing proceedure for the forms.

1) Only the market/sim owner can submit forms. They will also be the only one getting the signs. This will cut down on the amount of managerial sign swaps that’s needed.

2) Sign renewals will be sent to the sim/market owner listed on the blog page. Ensure your blog page is accurate by checking it.

As per this post, there will be a removal of market managers from the hippogroup unless they are also the administrator for the sim. This is to ensure that only authorized people will be given signs through the market manager update group if there is need for an update to be sent out.

A bit more of an explanation (taken from the GMC In-world chat)

As we all know markets can go through a lot of changes in market managers. When managers change, so does signs. Some times old signs are left out and new ones aren’t put out there is the confusion when the old sign deletes itself and the new manager/market owner thinks they were removed from the GMC. Which can lead for days of explanations from Cela and I.

So, to avoid that confusion signs are now only going to the sim/village administrators and they will put them out and that will also save those same people having to renew numerous times and straighten out sign issues when the market manager has moved on (for whatever reason) and the market is left without signs.

This DOES NOT impact the inworld group – all MM’s keep their notice postings. This is just for the HippoGROUP, which isn’t used much as all can attest to, but if there is a major update to signs it will be done there so i don’t have to drag signs to 100 profiles which takes hours

Merchant Gathering

We will not be having a merchant gathering this week. RL intrudes once again but stay tuned, next week we are back!

GMC Merchant Gathering 08

Group Announcement | Agenda | Transcript 11am | Transcript 5pm

http://slurl.com/secondlife/The%20Central%20Fire/114/203/23

Join us this Saturday Sept 5th 11am-1pm and 5pm-6:30pm at the Central Fire Market for this weeks Merchant Gathering.

Topics will include:

a- Adult Verification / Search Revisited

Well, now that adult verification and search is in full swing let’s revisit this, share our stories, learn the latest and see what’s been happening on the adult front. Also, some confusion over Adult and “age verified only” on some sims, so let’s sort that out!

b- The adult / bot nazis

Seems that recently some have taken it upon themselves to seek out those they feel are violating the adult or bot policies. How do we deal with these accusations?

C- Open discussion for anything that’s on your mind!

Join us!! http://slurl.com/secondlife/The%20Central%20Fire/114/203/23

GMC Gathering 07

What ways are working well to promote markets and merchants?

MM boards and treasure hunts are all the rage, but do they really produce traffic and sales?
Are classifieds really worth their price these days?
Is XStreetSL and it’s new face lift and integration with secondlife.com and SL inworld a good place to market?
Are groups even worth bothering with?

Come and join us for a round table discussion on what is working and what isn’t these days.

Saturday August 29th, BlackWraith Market

Group Announcement | Agenda | Transcript 11am | Transcript 5pm

Merchant Gathering Market of Laura Aug 8th 2009

The next Merchant Gathering is this Saturday at the Market of Laura.

Topic: Linden Labs Content Management Roadmap https://blogs.secondlife.com/community/community/blog/2009/08/04/our-content-management-roadmap

**Please review the blog post PRIOR to the meeting!!

During the discussion we shall review these new upcoming LL policy changes and tools and develop some coordinated feedback we can send back to the Lindens.

Agenda | Transcript 11am | Transcript 5pm