Friday, July 27, 2007

General FAQ

This covers more general things asked that don't relate so much to the actual operation of the things we sell, they are in order of frequency they are asked, if you have a problem with an item we make click here


General info:

Store locations:

Main Store - The Island(largest store - PG and mature sets)
PG Store(PG anims, plus newer copiable types)
Daphnis (Mature)


Bits and Bobs animations officers are:

Craig Altman
Jenny Dinova
Yoshimi Muromachi
Yawneeb Grommet

NO other person is authorised to offer discounts or offers etc and please report anyone doing so to any of the 4 people listed above.

Items in the shops are sold by their creators, we do not sell animations that are downloaded from poser content sites or made by any other person, ALL animations are made entirely by their respective creators(see above) in Motionbuilder and Poser 6 and 7

Please note that the following people have been allowed to place certain items in the shop, all enquiries about these items should be presented to these people:

Steve Patel - the Multi Animation Tool
Mash Mandala - Shower head and faucets
ZenMondo Wormser - Poseball security scripts vendor

F.A.Q's (Presented in order of Frequency)

Hi/Hey/Hello?

Hello

Sorry but I don't answer these ones if I wasn't online at the time they are sent, because invariably when I do the conversation goes along these lines:

Caller:(Saved) HELLO?
Me: Hi can I help?
Caller: ??????
Me: You left a message saying "hello"
Caller: who r u???
Caller: do u script?
Me: Nope
Caller: what do u do??
Me: I make animations
Me: I presume you IMed me for a reason?
Caller: im trying to figure out that reason
Caller: hmmmmmm
Caller: i must have found your name on somthing u built
Me: possibly
Me: if you dont know why you IMed it cant be that important can it
Caller: bare with me
Caller: did u build a clock?
Me: um no
Caller: its ok
Caller: nvm

Obviously this is a short one I found for the purposes of example, they can often be a lot longer, if leaving an offline IM, please put a question or tell me the problem.


R U online??

Assuming SL is not having one of its "presence" issues, if my profile doesn't say I'm online then I'm not, I don't ever use "hide online presence", I am British so my time is 8 hours ahead of the time in SL, I'm generally online between about 2am and 2pm in SL time, if I'm not in game then its likely I'm near the computer and I do get IMs to email so if you state the question, Ill get back to you pretty quick.


Where is your shop/can I have a LM to your shop?

To get to my shop:

1. Open my profile(which you probably already have if are here or going to IM me)

2. Press the "Classified" tab at the top of my profile

3. towards the bottom of this page is a button saying "teleport"(next to another saying "map).

4. Press the button saying "teleport"

Alternatively you can click on this link , I think you must not be in SL at the time though

You can now if you wish go to the "world" menu at the top of your screen and press "Create landmark here" if you like.


Where is Lovescene?

OK If you are not already at the main store, follow the directions in the above Q&A, then go into the shop, go up the stairs, at the top of those stairs take the door on your right, Lovescene is directly on your right as you go into that room, incidently ALL longer anim sets are also in this room Lovescene 2 is on the stand directly opposite the stand with lovescene on it.


Where is Slowdance v6?

This is at the main store (go up the stairs and on the stand facing you at the top of the stairs) and the PG Store (go up the stairs and take the door on the right)


Do you make custom animations?

Not really these days I'm afraid, the issue is time, I'm normally asked this 3 times a day at least and it generally takes at least a week to make a single person anim, it got to the point where I could not keep up so had to stop, having said this I always appreciate ideas for animations and if the idea is good I will often make the animation and put it for sale in the shop mentioning the person whose idea it was and also send that person a copy of it for free.


Who does then???

I don't really know, and I'm not going to give a name unless they have either given me permission to do so or they are a person who has advertised they do custom anims, in the past I have given people names of animators who i thought might and the person has then IMed that animator saying:

"Craig Altman said you will make this anim for me".

As you can imagine I log in next day to a not very happy IM from the animator in question..


Do you sell couple animations in red/full perms versions?

Couple animations I do not sell in mod/copy/trans I'm afraid, I rely on these ones, they are what allow me to sell the ones I currently do in mod/copy/trans.

Please don't press me on this, its an across the board thing and its not about amounts of money or whether or not I trust the person, in the past I think I have heard all possible arguments including:

"Make a verified builder group" - verified people have alts, you will never know who the alt really is or who they got them from, its been tried before, infact the last 2 people to do this to me were alts of a person who informed to me about someone else doing it!!!, and the only reason I found that out was how bad the people in question were at hiding group links/use of language and common use of the same group land.

"Charge more for them to deter people" - Yes I thought 1000L$ was a lot to most people and would stop them, it didn't, the price is immaterial, the more they cost the more you could make from knock-off ones.

Now I still firmly believe the vast majority in SL are good people, the problem is that with full perms items it only takes one person, it doesn't matter even if I know who the person was, by then the damage is done and before long everything I ever made is in an identical "business in a box" being sold by 14 different people, yes I can and do use the DMCA to get these items removed but its like cutting a 2 acre lawn with a pair of nail scissors, would spend my whole time doing that and even when done it will have grown back.


How about copy/no trans then?

I will sell the following items in copy/no trans:

Animations intended for animation overriders (NOT POSEBALLS)

I charge no more for copy/no trans versions of these, to exchange a no copy/trans one for this type just IM me and send it to me and Ill send you the copy/no trans version.

More recently I have begun making newer couple animations in copy/no trans only, this I had to do as an exploit now exists in second life allowing infinate copying of "no copy" items, for the last year I have been asking Linden when and if they will fix this exploit, and I have nothing back from them so the only defense I have against this is to make newer ones in no-trans.

Is your stuff transferable?

Unless clearly marked on the items(as with the newer copy/no trans sets), all are transferable yes.

I have a mall, would you like to place a stall?

Sorry but I only really place on land that we own, where we have more control over any problems, in the case of the Main Store I have also done the best I can to limit lag by making sure that entire sim stays below 3000 prims.


I saw/bought a DJ Booth/Pool/Furniture set etc that was made by you and.......

In SL, linked items take on the name and creator name of the last linked prim, and although I ask people who use my copiable animation balls to link a prim they made last in the linked set, they don't always do this, thus items I have never even seen around SL report me as being their creator, there are a few ways to find out the actual creator:

1: Right click the item, press "more" in the pie menu until you see the option "inspect", this will give you an entire list of the prims in the object and their creator, the poseballs will have me as creator but the majority will show the name of the actual creator of the item.

2: Go to the "World" menu and "Account history", if you select the "to" and "from" dates to cover the time you bought it and press "view(up to 500)", you should find that item in the list and the name of the person you bought it from, now even if the person you bought it from is not the actual creator, if they are a responsible seller they should be able to help you or provide you with the name of the creator.

3: If you remember the store at which you bought the item, go there and IM the store owner, I would hope the owner can either answer the question or provide you with the name of the person to contact about it.

Please understand that I know no more about the item than you do, continually asking about the problem and getting angry will not change that, I know what I do and don't make, continually telling me "you are the creator" will not make it so, I cannot help the fact SL works this way on linked items and I have done all I can to get creators to make sure a part they made is linked last, its even in their best interests to do this as it means someone else is getting credit for a thing they worked hard to make.