That is absolutely true! Many times developers are forced by the suits and higher-ups in the company to release software that is not “ready for prime time”, and in fact in many cases I’ve seen the developers have to fight tooth and nail to get the Beta tag added just so that the company doesn’t try to make a release without *some* sort of “this isn’t finished, folks” disclaimer (which they are wont to do when not checked).

Thank you for reminding me of that grim reality. I had been commenting from an emotional position and had conveniently forgotten that the impedance mismatch between developers and the business managers is often so great that the business managers don’t listen to the developers even when the guys writing the code can clearly demonstrate that there is more work that needs to be done.

Like you said, I wouldn’t expect any improvement in this area either, unless there is a change in management, which is highly unlikely. The people making so-called “business decisions” rarely listen to developers when it comes to “issues in the large”, thinking themselves more qualified to shape the direction of the company than those silly little code grunts.

The problem is, those guys are no more prescient than the rest of us, and in this case are no more able to perfectly understand the total impact that this will have in the long term than you and I.

I don’t expect any improvement in this area however.

One interesting thing is this link: http://www.gridgrind.com/?p=228

A small excerpt:
You: So then it is NOT required to flag your land adult, you do have
the option of using some other system? I want to make that
clear. I’m not talking about verifying, I’m talking about land
flagging parcels.
…
Michael Linden: You can certainly use other systems, with or without
also using “mature” flags, sure.

…
Prokofy Neva: but what is the liability for a landlord who has not
checked off land as containing graphically sexual or violent
content, and then a tenant puts out this content and is AR’d?
Will LL go after the landlord over his ownership of the land or
the tenant for ownership of the content?
Michael Linden: Neither. It’s “strongly encouraged” and “voluntary”.

One thing is sure: if little johnny can steal her mum’s credit card to get payment info, he can get mum’s driver license and verify as an adult.
Verifying that the account holder has papers of an adult does not mean the actual person sitting in front of the screen is not a minor.

It would be a real shame from my point of view, though, since I have no intention of complying with the age verification policy, and would therefore be effectively locked out.

I’m sure that I am not alone in that, and it’s possible that if enough people feel that way then the lowered traffic could put Tokugawa or any other sim whose community is as diverse as ours at risk of not being self-supporting.

It’s a bad situation for many people, and I’m really kind of bummed that people that I like and respect will be made to make that choice for lack of better alternatives.

See, my personal opinion is that Beta means “this basically works”. When I slap a “Beta” tag on something it means “I actually think this is ‘feature-complete’ and doesn’t have any severe known bugs, and I believe this because I’ve tested it as well as I am able to at this point. I know you can’t catch every bug, but I’ve done everything I can to flush out the most obvious ’showstopper’ issues”.

Linden Lab, on the other hand, appears to believe that Beta means “we’ve got a lot of code written now, and we are now ready for thousands of people to demonstrate to us how broken it is”.

Yes, I know that I’m being pissy and that LL almost surely doesn’t *actually* think that (right?). But the evidence remains that my quality bar for “Beta” and LL’s quality bar are dramatically different.

Linden Labs *does* employ developers from other parts of the world. I’ve spoken (via Voice) with a very nice Linden on the Beta grid before that I believe had a German accent, and I know from reading on the blog that they have developers who grew up in other countries as well. Surely at least one of them would have thought to test whether international citizens could verify identity? And surely at least one of them realizes that there are EU laws against handing out personally identifying information in this manner?

Yet here it is, and it’s broken. And this is not an isolated incident. It’s a systemic problem, and it’s constant.

Very disappointing, I think.

But no worries, most of the people will just go and obediently verify with some grumbling.