A long time ago…

in a metaverse far far away….

The new alliance of builders, scripters, texturers and clothiers have stollen the blueprints to Darth Philip’s new secret weapon….

OK, maybe that’s silly… but anyway, what did happen was that a group of various content creators got together

one afternoon to discuss the problems of freebie-reselling, texture-theft and related issues. They needed a name, and got one, and they called themselves R.A.T.E. in an act of rebellion against Rate-Whoring, another popular scam in SL at the time.

It was mildly successful at the time, and wasn’t even the only group. But dissent set in, and apathy… and eventually the group failed, collapsing under it’s own weight.

This, it’s charter:

————————————– RATE—————————————-

This merchant is a certified RATE (Retail Association of Trade and Enterprise)retailer and abides by the RATE charter:

1) This merchant will sell items only with the knowledge and consent of their original creators.

2) This merchant will not sell items that were intended by their creators to be free.

3) This merchant offers refunds and exchanges when requested (no-transfer items are at the merchant’s discretion).

By agreeing to the RATE charter, this merchant pledges to conduct business in a fair and ethical manner, and to provide timely customer service to its patrons.

————————————————————————————

If you believe that this merchant is in violation of the RATE charter, please contact the creator of the items in question, or notify a RATE officer (search for RATE with the find tool under groups).

————————————————————————————

Would you like to support this initiative and display the RATE seal in your business?

Contact a RATE officer to ask to have one placed. You do not need to join the RATE group in order to participate. You’ll need to have an area at your location that does not auto-return objects in order to display the RATE seal.

————————————————————————————-
————————————- ABOUT RATE————————————-

RATE is a voluntary initiative to help protect the rights of creators, consumers, and merchants through the practice and promotion of fair and ethical business practices. RATE meetings and events are open to everyone, and all merchants are invited to participate. If you have questions or comments feel free to contact a group officer or post in the RATE group forum at secondlife.com

It’s been tried since, and the latest is being discussed now in Second Citizen. I wish it more luck than we’ve had in the past, but somehow, I don’t see it happening.

Technorati Tags: SecondLife

Only one day on…

… and I’m sitting in Eve Online working on skills. So, what has changed? Well, I don’t really think anything has except… well, as I mentioned yesterday, I needed to log in to change skill training last night. Well, it turned out to be about 6am this morning in fact, so I left it and woke up early to do so.

Well, the skill training was complete, as expected. I checked my ratings, hopped into my nearest convenient ship and programmed the autopilot for a trip to Caille University in the Bourynes system. I launched, and was on my way… reading the Second Citizen forums to pass the journey time. And, to be honest, couldn’t raise much interest. I just didn’t feel like responding to anything, which is most unlike me. I didn’t feel like logging into Second Life either, so I stayed in Eve for now. Anyway, I arrived at Bourynes, warped to the University and docked. I picked up two new books, (Sentry Drone Operation and Repair Drone Operation) and set my autopilot to take me home. I went to make coffee.

So I got home, started the skill training and looked for something to do. Well, as it turns out, a known pirate gang had set up in a nearby system and were running an illegal prison facility there. I was asked to go check it out and if possible, put a stop to it. My agent offered me about 400,000 credits to do this. Pretty small money, but since I’ve not been around for a bit, that’s understandable. I fitted my ships defences and off I went. Not a lot of point in being stealthy here – a battlecruiser tends to be a bit obvious, a command cruiser, even more so – so I warped straight into the middle of them, picking out sentries as preferred targets. I knew their cruisers would take time to get into attack range, and my combat drones could hold off their frigates indefinately. It didn’t last long.

So now, I’m home and heading to my base to dock. We’ll see what comes next.

Anyways, I’ve been offered a mission called Massive Attack next. It’s a good one and the reward is well over a million. It takes a while though – the time bonus is set at 6 hours – so I’ll leave it til later, after the daily downtime.

Technorati Tags: Eve Online