Please Be Wary of Scammers

This week I have heard reports of another Second Life avatar pretending to represent my rental business. The player stole my profile picture and also used the text from my in-world profile and has been setting rent boxes on vacant sims around the grid, pretending to represent my business, Desperation Isle Estates.

Let me just make it clear that there are only two avatars authorized to accept payment on behalf of Desperation Isle Estates: Wildefire Walcott and Illana Ireton (my alt). If anyone else attempts to collect rent from you and claims to work for me, they are lying, and you should file an Abuse Report against them immediately. (And also report the user to me, as well as the sim they tried to rent to you, so I can report them as well.)

With that out of the way, if you're looking for a homestead or full-prim sim from someone who WON'T scam you, just search in-world for this phrase: for rent desperation

You can tell a sim is ours by checking the Covenant tab of About Land. My name, Wildefire Walcott, will be listed as owner, and there's even a note in the covenant listing me and my business alt as the only authorized players to collect rent.

Thanks!

How to Report an Offline Region

If a sim crashes, or if Linden Lab performs a "rolling reboot" of the grid, it usually only takes 5-10 minutes for the sim to come back online. If you discover that your sim has been offline for more than a few minutes, Linden Lab may need to be notified of the problem. They have a special support queue just for offline region notifications, and they usually handle them within an hour.

If you are an estate manager on one of our sims, you have the ability to file these support requests on your own, which should be helpful if I or one of my estate managers is offline.

How to file a support request:

1. Go to the Second Life web site and click Login.
2. Enter your username and password, and then click Login.
3. Once you're on the Dashboard page, click Help > Support.
4. On the right side of the screen, click Submit a Support Case.
   
   Note
   If you don't see the "Submit a Support Case" link, you should see a "Contact Support" link instead. Click Contact Support, and then on the next page, click Submit a Support Case. You can also try this link right here.
5. On the Submit a Case screen, select Land & Region under "What type of problem are you having?"
6. Under "Land & Region," select Report an offline Region.
7. Under "Please provide the region name," enter the complete, correct name of the sim.
8. The "If there is any additional information" box is required, for some reason. Just type anything there, so long as it's polite!
9. Scroll down and click Submit.
10. You will get an email immediately, indicating they have received your support request. You will also get an email once they have resolved the problem.

If you are unable to contact Support, please let me know!

Desperation Isle Estates Homestead and Full-prim Sims

Desperation Isle Estates offers full-prim and homestead regions for commercial or residential rental in the virtual world of Second Life. With full building and terraforming rights to your own sim, there's really no limit to what you can do with it.

Click here to see what we have available for rent right now.

Click here to learn more about our rental sims.

Click here to visit our rental office in-world.

If you are an existing tenant, have a look at the links to the right for some helpful tips about how to manage your land.

Homestead and Full-prim Sim FAQ

[Updated 2012.04.07]
DESPERATION ISLE ESTATES HOMESTEAD AND FULL-PRIM ISLAND RULES AND INFO
This covenant is the copyrighted, original work of Wildefire Walcott, for use on the Desperation and Annamaria islands only.

* IMPORTANT NOTE *

Desperation Isle Estates offers only true 3,750-prim Homestead sims and regular 15,000-prim sims for rental. As of 2009, the term "Openspace" refers to regions that support only 750 prims and 10 avatars. We do NOT have any 750-prim Openspace sims. Homestead regions are limited to a maximum of 20 avatars on the island at the same time.


* PRICE AND PRIMS *

Desperation Isle Estates offers homestead and full-prim sim rentals with no "purchase price" other than the first week's rent. Our prices are listed clearly in our search listings and in the Description field of evey parcel when you go to World > About Land.

WE WILL NEVER RAISE YOUR RENT UNLESS LINDEN LAB RAISES OUR COSTS.

The kinds of sims we offer are:
- HOMESTEAD: Full 65536m homestead sim, open ocean on all sides, 3750 prims.
- FULL-PRIM SIM: Full 65536m full-prim sim, open ocean on all sides, 15000 prims.

To see what else we have available, open up Second Life search, select Places, make sure you have at least G maturity checked, and then search for this phrase:

     for rent desperation

If nothing comes up in the search, contact Wildefire Walcott directly.


* GENERAL INFORMATION *

All of our Homestead islands are newer, "Class 5" or higher sims. Linden Lab has designed Homestead regions for "light use," meaning they're perfect for most residential purposes, but might not deliver the best performance if you're running hundreds of resource-intensive scripts (for example, many clubs have tons of rotating lights and other heavily-scripted items that might not perform very well on a Homestead sim). Renting a homestead island or full-prim sim with us will grant you the following abilities:

    * Estate Manager abilities, giving you access to most functions of the Region tools in the World menu.
    * Full control over who can access your island and individual parcels.
    * Full creative and artistic control- build whatever you want, wherever you want it.
    * Complete terraforming ability (+-100m) and the power to change your terrain textures.
    * Transfer rights enabled, so you can deed the land to your own group. (NOTE: This ability does not entitle you to sell our islands to anyone else. Please see the 'Rules' section below.)
    * To claim an island listed for rent, just go to World > About Land...

All of our homestead and full-prim islands stand alone; you have a full, unobstructed ocean view in every direction, yielding the best possible price and performance.We do not place restrictions on how you use your island, so long as you don't break the law and you follow our few simple rules:


* RULES *

    * Rent is due weekly (at a minimum), payable in L$ if you use a rent box or USD if you choose to use a PayPal subscription. Wildefire will set up a rent box for you and let you know where it is. You can pay in weekly increments, up to 8 weeks at a time.
    * If you are 3 days late on rent and do not respond to IMs, Wildefire will re-claim your island and return your belongings.
    * If you ever decide or need to move out, PLEASE INFORM WILDEFIRE WALCOTT. Second Life does not notify an island owner when a tenant chooses not to live there anymore, and if you don't notify me that you've moved out, I might not notice until 3 or more days after your rent is due, leaving me out a week's worth of rent when I could have found another tenant in that time. I will not pressure you to stay; I just don't like having empty land laying around because no one told me they didn't need it anymore.


* RENAMING REGIONS *
  
While you will always have the ability to change parcel names in World > About Land, in some cases you might wish to change the name of the island you're renting as well. Linden Lab charges a significant fee for us to do that, but it is an option if you're willing to cover the costs.
  
To rename one of our sims, you must do the following:
     1. Pay Wildefire Walcott a NON-REFUNDABLE fee of L$25000, above your normal rent cost, and IM her when you've paid her profile.
     2. Provide Wildefire the name you would like to use. Note that Linden Lab has final say on which name you choose, and they may ask that we submit an alternative name if the first one you desired isn't approved. (NOTE: If Linden Lab simply won't accept any names you provide, Wildefire will refund your name change fee.)
     3. Wildefire will submit a support ticket to have the region name changed. This can take anywhere from one hour to several days for Linden Lab to do.
  

* MOVING REGIONS *

Occasionally we get requests to move a sim adjacent to another one of our sims, or next to a sim owned by someone else. Linden Lab charges a large fee for this, and we can only provide this service if you cover the cost of both the initial move, and the move we will have to perform in the event that you move out.

To move one of our sims, you must do this:
     1. Pay Wildefire Walcott a NON-REFUNDABLE fee of L$75000, above your normal rent cost, and IM her when you've paid her profile.
     2. Provide Wildefire the exact grid coordinates where you'd like the sim moved, or at least the relative position to the other sim you'd like to be near. (NOTE: Linden Lab has final say on region moves. If Linden Lab denies the move, Wildefire will refund your name change fee.)
     3. If the sim you wish to be next to is owned by another player or estate, that player must provide permission to Linden Lab via the support ticket process.
     4. Wildefire will submit a support ticket to have the region name changed. This can take anywhere from one hour to several days for Linden Lab to do.
  

* HINTS AND TIPS *

    * Please see the Desperation Isle Estates blog for rental information and tutorials on land and object management: http://desperationisle.blogspot.com/
    * Only the island owner (Wildefire Walcott) is able to upload RAW terrain files (a technical limitation of Second Life). If you have a RAW file you would like to use, email it to me at wildefire.walcott@gmail.com and I will upload it to your island.
    * You should be able to deed parcels on your island to your own groups without my help. If you have problems, I might have forgotten to enable transfer rights. Just IM me and I'll fix it.
    * Estate Managers should have the ability to change the ground textures. You do this by going to Tools > Region/Estate and dragging textures onto the boxes in the Ground Textures tab. The textures you use should be 512x512 in size. You can find many sand, grass, and rock textures in the Library folder of your inventory. Just search for "grass," for example, and you will find plenty of usable samples.

For more information, contact Wildefire Walcott or Judah Thunders.

Remaining Sims Have Found a New Home

UPDATE: Please see a list of affected sims at the bottom of this post.

Dear recent tenants of Desperation Isle Estates,

Before making the decision to close our multi-tenant regions, I spent a full week contacting other estates and publishing in estate land transfer groups looking for someone to take over our residential sims and New Desperation Isle- but not one of the dozens of landlords I talked to was in a position to take on the whole group.

To my surprise, Thex Lecker, the owner of Rockhopper Estates, saw a thread I had started at the SLUniverse forum about our decision to close the sims and contacted me. He expressed an interest in taking over the remaining six sims- including New Desperation Isle- and preserving the homes of anyone still remaining on the estate. After checking out his estate and agreeing on several conditions of sale, I approved his proposal. The remaining sims will be changing hands, unchanged, except for the sim names and their location on the grid.

If you have not yet relocated, Thex is offering to give you a few days free rent and to take you on at the same rates you were paying me before. If you have already moved on, I apologize for both the hassle and the interruption. If you haven’t yet picked up your things, I apologize for the drama. It was always my wish to preserve peoples’ homes, and this deal allows me to do that for anyone who wishes to remain on these islands.

PLEASE NOTE: We do not know who has left already and who has not yet moved. You might get one more communication from Thex Lecker, as an offer to anyone who is still on the islands. Please forgive any intrusion. That should be the last you hear about the matter if you have already found a home.

Thanks for your time.
Wildefire Walcott

Affected sims
The following sims will NOT be shutting down. They will just be renamed and moved to a new portion of the grid sometime after December 14. If you have land on these sims and wish to stay, you don't have to do anything:

• New Desperation Isle
• Desperation North
• Desperation South
• Desperation West
• Desperation Kelly
• Desperation Juno
  

Multi-tenant Sims Going Offline

UPDATE (12/14/2010): We have found the remaining sims a home!

When we opened our first residential sim nearly four years ago, I envisioned an adult community where tolerance and mutual respect for privacy were prized more than anything else. Over time we built a small but cohesive adult village around New Desperation Isle, and eventually expanded beyond the shores of New Desperation Isle to support residents with a wide variety of interests and needs.

The estate grew and met with great success until late 2008, when Linden Lab made the first in a very long list of policy and technical changes that would threaten the stability and profitability of hundreds- perhaps thousands- of in-world businesses. We stopped growing then, but we managed to remain afloat thanks to a loyal customer base and healthy profits from our skybox business. But that all changed in 2010. New Search, Viewer 2.0, New Marketplace, fluctuating L$ value, Linden Homes, and unbeatable tier discounts granted to only a handful of the very biggest residential estates chipped into our business steadily throughout this past year to the point where we’re no longer able to compete in the current market without investing a lot more time and money than we can afford. A chapter in the story of Desperation Isle Estates is coming to a close.

WHAT IS HAPPENING

Over the next few weeks we will be shutting down our remaining multi-tenant residential sims. New Desperation Isle will also be going offline. If you are a current tenant of ours, by the time you read this we will have already refunded your rent.

We have arranged a deal for some free time and some reduced rates with another, larger estate- for those of you who wish to pursue it. They are not buying our islands; they are offering a special bonus to residents of Desperation Isle Estates. Please read on for complete details.

AFFECTED SIMS

All of the following sims will be going offline within the next few weeks:
- Desperation Juno
- Desperation Kelly
- Desperation North
- Desperation South
- Desperation West
- New Desperation Isle

Desperation Vivienne and Desperation East are no longer part of the estate.

WHEN IT IS HAPPENING

I am paying to keep the residential sims open to existing residents until Sunday, December 26th. The public island, New Desperation Isle, will be closing on or before Saturday, December 18. It will no longer be viewable from the other islands after that time.

On December 26th, I will reclaim all residential parcels and return any items left on the islands.

WHY THIS IS HAPPENING

Thanks to many decisions Linden Lab has made over the past couple of years, the work and financing required to sustain a competitive residential business in Second Life is just too much for us to bear. We tried to locate buyers for the estate, but were only able to sell two individual sims (with tenants). Most estates these days either aren’t expanding at all, or are simply not in a position to take on the monthly tier burden of eight whole sims, regardless of whether there were existing tenants. Many estates shut down completely this year, and even some of the largest estates have actually shed sims recently, due to decreased demand.

We did consider consolidation (only dropping a couple sims and moving residents to existing vacant space on the remaining islands), but that wouldn’t change the fact that we’ve been losing more tenants than we’ve gained since July.

WHERE WILL EXISTING TENANTS GO?

This is completely your decision, of course, but Solace Beach Estates is offering some special deals to our current tenants. Solace Beach’s owner, Ayesha Lytton, is a forum regular possibly familiar to those of you who frequent SLUniverse, and I trust her to take good care of you. Full details are in the enclosed notecard.

[notecard goes here]

Most of their sims are standalone, meaning they are not connected to and can’t “see” other islands like the sims around New Desperation Isle- but this results in slightly improved performance. Also, most Solace Beach Estates regions are Moderate/Mature. If you are looking for residential living space, please note that you can have adult items (sexbeds, etc.) on Moderate/Mature land so long as you don’t advertise that you’ve got adult content in the Search > Places listings. So, if you currently live on one of our Adult residential sims and you are not running an adult business or public play area, you should be just fine on a Moderate/Mature sim. We only made Desperation North/South/East/West Adult because they were physically adjacent to a public/commercial sim with Adult content. Most of the content residents have placed on our Adult sims would be just fine in most non-PG regions.

If you do have a business or public meeting place that requires the ability to advertise with the Adult classification, Solace Beach does have some Adult commercial sims which should meet your needs. Speak with their representative (mentioned in their notecard) for details.

AREN’T THERE ANY PURELY ADULT ESTATES?

A few adult-targeted residential estates did pop up after we first went into business, but every one that I ever knew about has shut down within the past couple of years (we have housed many of their former tenants). If there are any communities similar to what we formed around New Desperation Isle, I’ve never heard of them. We were unique in that regard, but luckily most content and activities kept behind closed doors (or up in skyboxes) is acceptable on Mature/Moderate sims, so I don’t expect most of you will have trouble finding a place to live.

IS THIS THE END OF DESPERATION ISLE ESTATES?

We are no longer going to be operating multi-tenant sims, and we will no longer host any public meeting places or commercial areas. We will continue to offer standalone homestead and full-prim sims to individual tenants until Linden Lab makes it so that’s no longer possible. Also, my business partner, Vivienne Schell, will continue to operate our skybox business, Desperation Isle Productions, for the known future.

Second Life has been a part of my real life for over five years now, and I will remain here for as long as the grid will have me. I’m very sorry to have to end the multi-tenant sim business and shut down my labor of love, New Desperation Isle- but the financial realities of Second Life in 2010 have made it impossible for us to sustain.

Thank you so very much for your business. I consider many of you friends, and I do wish you the best in your Second Lives.

Sincerely and sadly,
Wildefire Walcott, Desperation Isle Estates

The Return of Voice at New Desperation Isle

[NOTE: If you are viewing this post from within Second Life, click the Open in My Web Browser button to properly view the page.]

A few weeks ago I disabled Voice Chat on New Desperation Isle because I was getting frequent reports of people using Voice to harass other visitors. I have since gotten some requests from regular visitors to bring Voice back, and I am doing that, but I want to equip our guests to deal with voice griefers if we have problems with them in the future.

First off, if you simply wish to disable Voice (so you can neither speak in-world or hear others speaking), you can easily do that by going to Edit > Preferences, then picking the Voice Chat tab, and deselecting Enable voice chat. When you click OK, you will no longer hear other people using Voice.

If you simply want to block a specific individual's voice, there are detailed instructions on how to do that at the Voice FAQ of the official Second Life Wiki.

In addition to muting individual players, I ask that you report people who are obviously griefing other players. You can do this by both filing an Abuse Report against them (Help > Report Abuse), and also by reporting the avatar to me or one of my deputies:

• Wildefire Walcott (island owner)
  
• kelly Walcott (estate manager)
• Vivienne Schell (deputy)
• Lunashee Dagger (deputy)
• Lancelot Auer (deputy)
• Zaldon Barbosa (deputy)
  

It really helps if you can provide snapshots and/or chat transcripts of griefing incidents. Unfortunately, it's not possible to get transcripts of voice griefing, but all the info you can provide helps.

Here's a video produced by a Linden that may provide some additional helpful info on Voice Chat in SL.

VOICE CHAT: Improving your hearing from Torley on Vimeo.