Reply to comment

OK, I've been pretty calm so far but I'm livid right now. Someone IM'd me and complained about WSE giving them WIC for selling their GPB. If that makes no sense to you, you will understand why I had to check. They told me that if I sold some shares, I would probably see.

What the hell? I don't have anything better to do with those worthless bonds, now was as good a time as any. I dropped all 183K of those silly 'perpetual bonds' to the market. Tossed to the wind. Sure, I got violated in a very fiscal sense, but I expected that.

What I did not expect was to see a Linden balance of 560 Linden dollars for my shares? What the? Then I saw this 'WIC balance' that didn't tell me what I could do with it. I didn't ask for these dumb WIC whatevers, I was just selling GPB so that I could cash out the Linden dollars. Why couldn't I just get Linden dollars? So I tried the World Internet Currency ATM link, and it was asking me for my WIC account name. I try 'Nobody Fugazi'. Not happening. I try it lower case. Not happening.

What are these sticky WIC things I don't want, and how do I get rid of them? Then something clicked.

It is just another way to screw people.

Then something else clicked.

Duh, of course it is another way to screw people.

Railroaded into these WICs, there was no obvious way to deal with them. Unlike some who become upset, I don't lose my reason - I get an intense focus. I teleported to WSE, just to see if there was someone who might have a clue about these things. No surprise. No one was there who could help. No WSE staff. Just some other folks trying to figure out the ATM and some idiot spamming me with notecards so I would take a loan at his bank - on WSE property.

Bad timing. If I wanted a loan, I'd probably fly where you live and beat it out of you. Since that is not legal and prison is not on my dayplanner, I don't want a loan. OK?

Calm. Breathe. 'You expected the WSE presence in SecondLife to be useless for this. You did your due diligence. Move on'.

Back to the website. A link to an Education Centre at the top. Sure, Big Bird and Cookie Monster might know something. I was wrong - Super Grover points from there to a link to What is the World Internet Currency? and, seeing my mood, lowers his helmet and flies off. Buried under the fertilizer about fictional currency, a stab at intelligence without wisdom by WSE, I make my way through enough marketing phrases to choke a petite marketing representative.

WICS to Linden Dollars

You can buy Linden Dollars using your WICS by visiting the WIC Exchange ATM located at Hope Capital Island in Second Life. For a direct teleport please visit the ATM Locations page in the Education Centre.

USING THE FICTIONAL WORLD INTERNET CURRENCY IS SUBJECT TO THE TERMS OF SERVICE BY WIC EXCHANGE PTY. LTD LOCATED AT WWW.WICEXCHANGE.COM

Well, first of all boyo, I didn't agree to the Terms of Service when Ginko funds were transferred to GPB. I spit on those Terms of Service. If I had drank more coffee, I would urinate on them. I am not here voluntarily, as so many others are not here voluntarily. The fact is that no one who had their Ginko Financial account tranferred to these silly bonds wants to be here and no one voluntarily accepted those terms of service. Given the options of 'lose all money' or 'use the site', well - gee thanks for the shotgun at my head.

So I looked around, and to the right of the main WSE ATM is a diminutive ATM which doesn't stand out that much. I touched it, and it sends me to register on another site - on to wicexchange.com - which after filling out my personal information regarding PayPal (which I really did not want to give to these people), I got logged in to find... oops. No balance.

Of course, it makes no sense for me to have to transfer from one site to another... such idiocy... but I did because, hey, I have 130.37 of these stupid WICs and I want my money. So I go back to the World Internet Currency ATM link and transfer my funds to the OTHER site - but guess what? I can't transfer the 0.37 WIC. Why not? No good reason, they're just trying to get a stellar review from me. Are they doing good so far?

Then I try to use the ATM inworld to get Linden dollars - you know, the things which I've been trying to get for half an hour or so - and it gives me a pop up dialog of Linden dollar amounts to buy. It's really simple to me. I want 130 WICs cashed out to Lindens.

This should NOT be difficult. So I try typing a few numbers I come up with after researching what a WIC might be worth. That doesn't work, no surprise that the ATM doesn't work as expected. What are my other options?

Sell to PayPal directly. FINE. I do that. So, let's recap:

I sold to market and got WICs with Lindens. I didn't want the WICs. I have a very vivid idea of what WSE should do with those WICs. There was no option that I saw which said 'limit sales to people who have Linden dollar buy orders'. It's a trap among many traps that people who got stuck with GPBs have fallen into, and the best way to describe it is rather visual and may give people nightmares.

Then to get rid of the WICs, you cannot transfer percentages. So they sit there.

Lukeconnell Vandeverre, you owe me 0.37 WICs converted to Linden dollars.

The whole thing is a minefield of what can only be described as a purposeful way of irritating people and fleecing them at every opportunity - from the percentage on the sell order itself, to getting stuck with Luke's made-up-barter-currency to giving them my personal information (changing my PayPal information because I don't TRUST these people)...

What should have taken me about 2 minutes to do took me about 45 minutes to do. Why? Is this something which is supposed to garner good faith? If so, it is as misdirected as just about anything else I can find.

As far as I'm concerned, any fees I paid WSE or wicexchange.com were stolen. The sign over WSE should say, "Here There Be Muggers, Pickpockets and All Manner of Thieves". I was mugged, and other people have been and will continue to be mugged either by incompetence or a complete lack of ethics. Right now, I think it could be both.