My personal opinion on currency discussion at this point is that there is so much more that needs to be addressed currency should even be a topic of discussion, right OpenSim is barely 40% complete and there is a monumental amount of work that needs to be done before implementing any kind of currency, we could possibly be talking about a year or more before things like this will be addressed, while its good to plan ahead i think this discussion is quite a bit premature and so many things are going to change by the time we can think about currency that at this point it really just detracts from the core programming that needs to be completed.
<br><br>Nebadon<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Nov 14, 2007 10:47 AM, Aldon Hynes <<a href="mailto:Aldon.Hynes@orient-lodge.com">Aldon.Hynes@orient-lodge.com</a>> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">I
think the concern that Michael brings up is a little bit of a red herring.
Let me explain why. To me, it sounds like he is saying that because some
implementations of OpenSim grids would not be able to guarantee the validity of
the currency in their implementation, then we should not create software that
will make it possible in any implementation. That sounds like a mistake to
me.</font></span></div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">To me,
the handling of ingrid currency is one of the more compelling aspects of the
Second Life and related experience. It is worth noting that many MMORPGs
have different ways of supporting currencies, and from an MMORPG perspective, it
seems essential. Likewise, from a business perspective in seems
essential. I could easily foresee myself running a very open grid where
anyone could connect their regions and the currency in that grid would be
meaningless, while at the same time, running a much more tightly controlled grid
where I could verify the region operators and feel confident that the money in
that grid has real meaning. It seems to me as if currency should be grid
dependent and not region dependent. My understand is that this is how the
current SL viewers and SL servers behave, and my hope is that OpenSim will end
up being essentially an alternative choice to the SL servers that behave
essentially the same way and can interact with the existing SL viewers without
the need for special mods to the viewers.</font></span></div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">So, I
do hope that people rethink their view about currency and its role in the
OpenSim project. I believe that not addressing it and making it an
important part of the project will make the project much less
compelling.</font></span></div><font color="#888888">
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">Aldon</font></span></div></font><div><div></div><div class="Wj3C7c">
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<blockquote>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Tahoma" size="2">-----Original Message-----<br><b>From:</b>
<a href="mailto:opensim-dev-bounces@lists.berlios.de" target="_blank">opensim-dev-bounces@lists.berlios.de</a>
[mailto:<a href="mailto:opensim-dev-bounces@lists.berlios.de" target="_blank">opensim-dev-bounces@lists.berlios.de</a>]<b>On Behalf Of </b>Michael
Wright<br><b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, November 14, 2007 11:59 AM<br><b>To:</b>
<a href="mailto:opensim-dev@lists.berlios.de" target="_blank">opensim-dev@lists.berlios.de</a><br><b>Subject:</b> Re: [Opensim-dev]
Micropayment<br><br></font></div>One of the main problems with money in
opensim, is the whole thing of having the Region servers involved, in any way,
in transactions. Which is how the current system is set up. <br><br>That is
okay, if you always know that you can trust a region server; ie you have a
closed grid where every region server on that grid is trusted. This is how LL
can use the current system. As they control the servers, they "know" how
each region server will behave. But with a open grid where other people can
connect their region servers, then we can no longer trust a region, like the
current system expects. Anyone, could have changed some code on their server
to do fake transactions or various other things. <br><br>So the general
opinion is that money should be something like a direct client to transaction
server approach, with messages saying the transaction has been completed sent
to the region server if required. And that will need changes to the
client.<br><br>So at least at this point, currency is not part of the opensim
project. I generally, don't think it will ever really be part of the core, as
different uses could have their own requirements. And some uses, just won't
require any in-world currency. So its likely that such systems will be
add-ons/modules. But even for those its really to early. <br><br><b><i>Aldon
Hynes <<a href="mailto:Aldon.Hynes@Orient-Lodge.com" target="_blank">Aldon.Hynes@Orient-Lodge.com</a>></i></b> wrote:
<blockquote style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(16, 16, 255); padding-left: 5px; margin-left: 5px;">
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">Ezekiel, Sean,</font></span></div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"> I do hope I'm not being dismissed as a 'marketing
guy'. I've been trying to keep the discussion of how finances are
handled in OpenSim on a technical level. I initially brought it up in
terms of how we handle authentication as a response to a suggestion of
dealing with anonymous users. As we looked more closely at it, I tried
to focus particularly on how money is handle in scripts since that seems to
be the real key do commerce in Second Life and hence is likely to be key in
OpenSim as well.</font></span></div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"> When I connect to my OpenSim grid, I see that I have
1000 dollars. I've looked at the database schema, and I don't see
where that is stored. It would seem as if it ought to be in the users
table. However, I don't know enough about the entity relationships to
know if it would be better off in one of the other folders. In
addition, I'm not well enough acquainted with the code, or the data
abstraction layer at this point, to have a good view of how to approach
modifying the schema.</font></span></div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"> I also scanned through the code, but I couldn't find the
section of code where the number of dollars that a user has is
communicated back and forth between the server to the
client.</font></span></div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"> All of that said, I think Ezekiel is right. I've
worked on too many projects in the past were an important part of
functionality is not considered early on and it becomes a mess trying to
shoehorn that functionality in later. In my mind, the currency
component is one of those pieces of functionality I would hate to see
shoehorned in at the last minute.</font></span></div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"> So, I do hope that we maintain a good threat about the
currency and not simply dismiss it because of potential non-technical
issues. </font></span></div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"></font></span> </div>
<div><span><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">Aldon</font></span></div>
<blockquote dir="ltr" style="margin-right: 0px;">
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Tahoma" size="2">-----Original Message-----<br><b>From:</b>
<a href="mailto:opensim-dev-bounces@lists.berlios.de" target="_blank">opensim-dev-bounces@lists.berlios.de</a>
[mailto:<a href="mailto:opensim-dev-bounces@lists.berlios.de" target="_blank">opensim-dev-bounces@lists.berlios.de</a>]<b>On Behalf Of
</b><a href="mailto:ezekiel@daelindor.com" target="_blank">ezekiel@daelindor.com</a><br><b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, November 14, 2007
5:03 AM<br><b>To:</b> <a href="mailto:opensim-dev@lists.berlios.de" target="_blank">opensim-dev@lists.berlios.de</a><br><b>Subject:</b> Re:
[Opensim-dev] Micropayment<br><br></font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Sean,</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">you are absolutely right. The technical
discussion should not be drowned by </font><font face="Arial" size="2">enhancement requests from the 'marketing guys'.</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">However, while you dev guys are working hard
to get the core up to speed, someone must </font><font face="Arial" size="2">plan ahead to add the features that make this whole venture a
success.</font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">If we discuss the money and usability stuff
in a separate thread, how do we make sure </font><font face="Arial" size="2">that we get heard and you don't end up with an excellent
implementation of an SL clone - minus the hipe ?</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">Ezekiel</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">>I think that in world Money is one of
those places where the OpenSim<br>>grid runners are going to need to
provide code appropriate to their<br>>situation. Running a sim
with no money is easy. Money opens up all<br>>sorts of other non
technical issues: privacy laws, taxes, refunds, etc.</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">>It would be nice to avoid drowning out
the technical conversation on<br>>list with lots of money
pontificating.</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">>That being said, patches are always
welcomed. :)<br> </font></div>
<div><font face="Arial" size="2">>Sean
Dague</font></div></blockquote>_______________________________________________<br>Opensim-dev
mailing
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</a><br></blockquote><br>
<p>
</p><hr size="1">
For ideas on reducing your carbon footprint visit <a href="http://uk.promotions.yahoo.com/forgood/environment.html" target="_blank">Yahoo! For
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