Linden Lab Disputes Real Name Requirement for Project Sansar, But Unanswered Questions Remain

Last Friday, Linden Lab spokesperson Peter Gray responded to my e-mail to him from last Wednesday, asking if it was true, as original reports and an interview with CEO Ebbe Altberg seemed to suggest, that Project Sansar would require users to create accounts with their real life names. Peter insists that this is not accurate, but I haven't gotten an official response from Altberg himself, despite three follow-up e-mails requesting one.

"As Ebbe said [in the interview]," Peter told me, "requiring a user to provide their real identity to Linden Lab in order to create an account wouldn't preclude one from using a pseudonymous (or anonymous) persona when interacting with other users on the platform. This is quite clear in the quotes below: 'So I could go into a role-playing, or into an experience as an anonymous user in that context. But to the platform, I am not anonymous...It’s definitely something we’re thinking a lot about. But do I want that people in Sansar should be able to walk around anonymously? Absolutely!'"

However, in another part of the very same interview, Ebbe also suggested that the company is considering an identity system which integrates Facebook's real name policies with a pseudonymous one akin to Second Life and Twitter:

Ebbe Altberg: "Second Life is on, I would say, the far spectrum of the anonymity side; and on the other side you have what we call real names, real identities, like probably the most successful real system on planet Earth is Facebook. And there’s a reason why they’ve been extremely successful with that; and there’s probably a reason why 100% anonymous networks like Twitter and Second Life run into some really interesting challenges. And there are pros and cons; and we’re trying to think of ways of potentially mixing these models, but we have not made final decisions yet. I have a preference, some other team players have slightly different preferences, so we’ll see where it ends up. But I think what would be best for Sansar would be real names, and then the ability to have personas underneath that."

Emphases mine. So on the one hand, Sansar users will be able to have anonymous personas in roleplaying contexts and to "walk around"; on the other, we have Ebbe praising Facebook's real name policy while pointing out the problems with SL/Twitter's pseudonymous policy, then saying Sansar may blend the two approaches in some way, with Ebbe's preference to put pseudonyms "underneath" a real name.

These are decidedly mixed messages, so I've asked Peter to get Ebbe Altberg to clarify by answering five questions for the record:

• Will Project Sansar only require users' real names to be registered with the company and by default, only be known by the company (in normal circumstances)?
• Under what circumstances will Linden Lab reveal Project Sansar users' real names to authorities?
• Under what circumstances will Linden Lab reveal Project Sansar users' real names to other users?
• In Project Sansar, will displaying real names in a user's publicly viewable account be opt-in, or opt-out?
• In Project Sansar, will Facebook Connect or other linking with a user's Facebook account be mandatory?

So far, despite two follow-up e-mails over the last three business days, I haven't gotten a reply. This may mean Linden Lab hasn't nailed down its user name policy enough to answer them, or that they just don't want to publicize their approach so soon before Sansar launches, or any number of other possibilities. At this point, I think the only thing we can be sure of is Sansar will require users to register their real names internally on the system, but still allow some level of anonymous and/or pseudonymous identity and activity -- but how much, and with whom, and in what contexts, are not yet clearly laid out.

At the same time, it's also clear Linden Lab's CEO has a personal preference for making real names primary -- but how that will actually be implemented is still unclear. I hope Altberg does get around to making some more definitive statements for the public record, and will post an update if and when he does.

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Comments

[Nobody]

Wow! did you deleted my comments Hamlet?

nothing was incorrect in my statements or links so good luck with your censorship of people opinions and valid facts they bring to the table.

[Clara Seller]

At this point, I'm not really sure I care about names when I can't fully grasp the context of what my name would be a part of. We've been looking at dug up little pieces of Sansar and have tried to assemble some clue as to what it is. Is it bigger than a bread box? Nope, guess again.

[Ciaran Laval]

@Nobody there was another comment in another post a about deleted post. I've experienced issues with the spam filter here before, it may just have an updated oversensitive setting.

As for the main post, Linden Lab need to stay well away from Facebook when it comes to registrations.

[Wagner J Au]

Yes, Typepad comments don't work well with certain browsers. There's also a comment moderation algorithm based on reader comment guidelines posted here:

http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2006/02/nwn_tips.html

[Amanda Dallin]

Between Ebbe's comments and the quote you have from Peter it seems pretty clear they intend to have RL names on the account but not necessarily on the avatar. It sounds basically the same as now for anyone with payment info on file in SL. This should cut down on the anonymous griefing and stalking that occurs in SL.

[Nobody]

Hamlet & Ciaran thx and will do on tips.

[Nobody]

@ Ciaran 'As for the main post, Linden Lab need to stay well away from Facebook when it comes to registrations.'

It might just be cloud party bait to get bought out.

[Wagner J Au]

BTW I totally disagree with Ebbe's implication that Facebook has less challenges because of its real name policies. RL names solves some problems but raises others. Malicious and creepy stalking on Facebook is incredibly common, especially targeting women, because the target's name is so easy to look up.

[irihapeti]

is just about numbers

how many people have created a pseudo-anonymous site account over the last 12 years, and stayed ?

how many people over the last 12 years have created a FB and stayed ?

+

can posit things like complexity of UI and site purpose. But when a RL name site has 1.3billion users and a pseudo-anonymous site like SL hasn't yet made 100million unique signups then it kinda puts into perspective what any CEO would at least contemplate seriously

[irihapeti]

ps

Sansar as a platform is something that FB might consider buying if FB can see that their view of how internets socials work has at least been considered in the design of the platform

dunno actually, but would be something I would think about if I was the boss owner of LL

[zz bottom]

It will be the end for me of the use of Sl if Facebook bought it.
As about Sansar, at this point nobody has a clue, but the lack of a continuous mainland is a no go, if sadly as it seems, it will be a reality.

[Nobody]

If anything Project Sansar is making High Fidelity more and more a viable option as HF is just building the foundation for VR Worlds not setting the rules .
Soon anyone can take the software and create a version of high fidelity under a different name for public,private or business use.

Soon you will have Sansar with your real name requirements opening up everyone to stalkers while Facebook banners run in your viewer keeping you up to date on the latest Walmart deals.

No fear about a Sansar viewer the firestorm team will still get the 'Privledge' to write a few modules to make the closed source viewer usable.

Facebook is OK for the people who use it but myself i find it really nothing more then what myspace offered... a soap box.

Facebook is mark zuckerberg dream while Ebbe must not have any vision of his own instead of creating a VR world that could surpass Facebook he created a platform to be another parasitic company feeding and relying on Facebook.

facebook something someone tomorrow could put out of business with the right idea in the right cultural shift.seems sorta risky to build your who new product around considering what did happen to the parasitic business projects that built themselves around myspace

Mark Zuckerberg - Visionary,Billionaire
Philip Rosedale - Visionary,Dreamer

Ebbe Linden - Used Care salesman. wearing vintage 70's flannel suit. ready to take everyone for a ride!

[Nobody]

@ zz bottom

Not only no mainland but no real inworld building tools from a company that was made rich by empowering its users to create creative spaces.

They did not even have to create the voxel tool sets they have been open source near ten years

Sansar says they will have voxel terrain that means they have chosen to adapt one tool kit while deliberately leading out the building kit.

They just do not want residents to be distracted when a random survey pops up in the viewer asking residents what they like about the local walmart and how it can be better.

[Hypatia]

I simply can't see what navigating and roleplaying in a VR has to do with FB, and why Sansar has to imitate FB and its "real name" policy. No one can see you on FB if you don't want them to, or your posts, or your personal information, or even your full name. In a virtual world, you encounter and talk to people in real time. You have the power not to accept "friendships" from avatars, but you still have to see what they type at you, or hear their gestures. The "feel" of the media is entirely different. There is a vulnerability. Making it available to Linden Lab is one thing; it may indeed cut down on stalking and trolling. But making it available to other users, which seems to be a condition these makers are contemplating, will keep me well away from Sansar. Treating our involvement even with the friends we make as though we're all on FaceBook together and sharing our photos and our real lives, is a huge turn off for me. That's not how I want to inhabit a Virtual Reality.

[Hypatia]

Does Ebbe et al see some kind of marketing opportunity in the "real name" condition he admires on FaceBook? Will we, as my friend suggested to me tonight, be googling different wines, for instance, while we switch between screens, come back to Sansar, turn the corner, and find a friendly barrista? Sheesh. Or be googling interstitial cystitis and run into a friendly urologist with a product?

[Adeon Writer]

As long as I have the option to use Sansar with any name floating above my head I want, and have the ability for others using Sansar to see and interact with me WITHOUT having the ability to figure out my real name;

There is no controversy, and there is no problem.

[Maddy]

LL + anti-privacy Facebook = Caprica. It won't be a good outcome.

Anyway, forget what LL's policies may be with Sansar with regard to how they formally treat your private information once they have it. Let's instead think of rogue employees in an age of doxxing where activists and other nuts with personal or political vendettas target individual users by leaking their private information out to the web.

Because no matter what your "policy" is, once your information is out there on the ether, it's out there. Knowledge is power.

[Violet]

No way FB will be involved to any extend as some have suggested makes no sense--- and no way will there be a RL name requirement-why- because FB is free- I pay $1600 plus a month for my land use fees---and those who maintain the economy in SL are not going to "buy in" to this- and as far as the 1.3 billion names on FB- Hell I have had at least 15 accounts myself- The number of accounts stated is to charge more for advertising anyway-- not actual people-- seriously get over it--"Not Gonna Happen Folks"