[opensource-dev] Unjust Banning of residents?

malachi at tamzap.com malachi at tamzap.com
Tue Aug 16 10:23:21 PDT 2011


Violation: Third Party Viewer Usage
You are connecting to the grid with a viewer that is not in the third 
party viewer directory.


However...

A viewer does not need to be on the Third Party Viewer Directory in
order for development or usage of it to be compliant with the Third 
Party Viewer Policy (see Policy on Third-Party Viewers | Second Life) 
and the Terms of Service. While I am sure you are well aware of this, it 
can also be deduced through common sense that the open source program 
(Snowstorm, Snowglobe, etc) would not be able to exist in an environment 
where every personal compile had to be listed on the TPVD before it 
could even begin to undergo any form of live quality assurance 
processes.

Long story short, unless there have been recent changes to the Terms of 
Service that I am unaware of, or if there are relevant sections that I 
have missed that indicate that a viewer that complies with the Third 
Party Viewer Policy still must be in the Directory to be legitimately 
used, I would request that you provide me with them.

What this means is every single BETA tester for every client on the 
TPVD is at risk of losing their accounts because that compiled version 
of that client is not listed on the TPVD. Each and every Developer who 
has worked so hard to help Linden Lab build their Client into what it is 
is at risk of losing their accounts because each time they recompile the 
source it isn't listed in the TPVD and is now considered a Violation of 
some hidden TOS clause.


I am posting this to this forum because I wanted to get feed back from 
the community. As I myself and a developer who has contributed patches 
to various TPVD Clients and am now finding myself cautious to even use 
these clients source codes to help them. I would like clarification from 
Linden Lab as well as other Developers on this new banning policy that 
is requiring every compiled client that connects to second life to be 
listed in the TPVD.


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