Linden Lab: Sales Tax on U.S. Purchases

Today Linden Lab released a notice concerning Sales Tax for U.S. Purchases:

Ever since Second Life’s inception two decades ago we have seen many local, state and federal governments impose new ways to collect tax revenue from internet-based businesses. The Wayfair Sales Tax case decision by the Supreme Court was when prior rules about sales tax really changed. Since then, we have done our best to shield our residents from these taxes as long as possible, but we are no longer able to absorb them.

As of March 31, 2022 we will begin charging sales tax in the U.S. For the time being we will charge taxes only on recurring billings, such as premium subscriptions and land fees. The amount of tax charged will be communicated clearly in the receipt or invoice.

We will continue to absorb the taxes at point-of-sale purchases such as one-time L$ buys, first-time premium subscriptions, and name changes. At some point in the future we will need to begin passing those taxes on to you. We will make another announcement when those charges are phased in.

Your individual charges will be determined by your local jurisdictions. There are more than 13,000 sales and use tax jurisdictions in the United States, with great variation in their rules and tax rates. Tax amounts are also affected by other factors such as the type of goods or services being purchased. To determine the charges, we will be relying on an automated third-party system which closely tracks local tax laws, so the tax amounts are always up to date.

This is news we don’t enjoy sharing, but for the health of the business and of Second Life, we can no longer continue absorbing these tax burdens.

Thank you for your understanding and your continued support of Second Life.

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    This is hard news for many people who are already at their financial limit for SL fees and charge increases. I am not sure of the legality of charging State taxes on virtual land fees, though. In any case, there is not enough information in this notification, just hints at things to come. Less than a month notice on this abrupt change too. There is no time for people to change their land usage without abandoning the land - which means a total loss of value on the very thing that is being billed for and now taxed for. There is not enough time for most people to sell the land to recoup their "investment" in it.

    We will have to wait and see how this pans out, but I know that it is the landowners and premium users who keep SL alive. We do the creating, the designing, the landscaping, the events, and the promotion - and apparently, all of the paying too. 😕

    It is another brick in the wall, and another straw on the camel's back; That extra $5, $10, $20, and more every month will mean that many people will be cutting back their land usage. They will also be cutting back on the number of private estates and homesteads they own. And people who run rental properties will be increasing rents to cover the additional tax costs. Those who host income games for players, they will be cutting back on how much they fund those games that give so many SL players free $L. It is a domino effect that affects more than most people realize.

    But that is how it is going to be from now on. There is no fighting it. There was no way to stop Netflix and Hulu from charging State taxes on our monthly plans, and there is no way to stop this from happening in Second Life. I just hope that Linden Lab rethinks their plans to add additional levels of Premium Membership; That will be, I really believe, the last straw, and the last brick, for Second Life.

Best regards to all,

Markham Weatherwax

Firestorm Viewer - Chat Logs

     I am one of those people who saves all of my chat logs when I am logged into SL with the Firestorm Viewer. A few times a week I delete them from the folder, and also save some of them to a different directory/folder. There are many reasons I save my chat logs, one of them being for customer service issues, or rental property requests, or similar. 

I also save them so that when someone says they said this, I can prove that they said that. 👅

One of my pet peeves about Firestorm is the default location where it saves the chat logs: It is a directory/folder where other non-chatlog files are created and updated too. It can be very difficult to delete only your chat log text files because some other files are TXT files too. You do not want accidently to delete those and other data files when you are deleting the chat log text files.

On my Windows 10 system Firestorm stores the chat logs in:
C:\Users\MyPC\AppData\Roaming\Firestorm_x64/Markham_Weatherwax/ 

Well, you can change the location of the chat logs folder by first creating a new folder on your computer, then changing the location inside of:

Firestorm Preferences> Network & Files> Directories: Conversation logs and transcripts location.

Make sure to save your settings after making that change. 

Now, me, I created a ChatLogs folder in the /AppData/Roaming/Firestorm_x64 folder: C:\Users\MyPC\AppData\Roaming\Firestorm_x64/ChatLogs/

    You do not have to put your folder there; you can make the folder in your system [My Documents] folder if you want to. I created mine to be efficient and also so that I do not need to bother putting a system exclusion for my Firewall or Antivirus program so those won't scan that folder: I already have exclusions for Windows Defender and my Firewall for the appdata folder and subfolders. 

Inside of the new Chat Log folder, you create another folder with your SL login name (First underbar Lastname or Name_Resident). You need to do this yourself because Firestorm will not automatically create that username folder if you change the default of where the chatlogs are stored. 

Mine is: 

C:\Users\MyPC\AppData\Roaming\Firestorm_x64/ChatLogs/Markham_Weatherwax/

If you use Firestorm to login to different SL accounts, Firestorm automatically creates a different folder for every username you login with under the default folder for logs and transcripts. So, if you create a new folder to store chat log files in, you will also need to create that username folder for each account you use to login with.

If you have chat logs already saved in the default folder, simply move them over to your new chat log folder(s) or delete them but leave the data files and the existing username folders alone. Don't delete them. Firestorm will still use that folder for work files and data files.

I recommend if you make your new folder under the appdata/firestorm_x64 folder, inside of that folder create a new shortcut, and then drag that shortcut onto your desktop. That way you can also easily access your Log files. 😁

NOTE:

Windows 10 hides tons of files and folders, and one of those it hides is the appdata folder (and roaming). You have to edit the Windows preferences to show hidden files and folders if you want to do or see things inside of those hidden folders. 

I hope this is helpful to those of you who save your chat log files, and for those of you who have tried in the past to change that location path before but ran into difficulties. It is not documented in the Firestorm Wiki that you need to make username folders if you change the default location for logs & transcripts. 

Best of luck, everyone! Happy SLing!

Markham Weatherwax