Oskar Linden Fired by Linden Lab

Word on the street: Oskar Linden was fired from LL today on short notice. Apparently they sent a courier over for his company computer, so that tends to suggest that he was a telecommuter or remote worker, and wasn't in the office, where they might have appeared at his elbow with a cardboard box and and an escort to the parking lot, as they often do in Silicon Valley companies when you're fired.

I'm attempting to check this, but meanwhile here is what purports to be a message in his own hand:

On 11/2/12, at 12:49 PM, o_Oskar wrote:
> I banned a griefer from my sandboxes because he was griefing and harassing he
threatened to sue apparently the lab took his side

Now that sure sounds like a bizarre reason to fire anyone -- this is just nuts. Hmm. What's this really about? The griefer is some big spender? Lindens are really that gun-shy about lawsuits that even griefers can spook them? I have to wonder whether in fact a Linden decided that "creativity" was more important to promote than following the TOS.

On the other hand, there may be a completely different version of this story on the Linden's side.

Now let me think. Oskar was somebody who worked on those channels with the funny names like LeTigre and Blue Steele and was always testing stuff. Did they have to sacrifice him because things haven't been going so well? Who the hell knows? Was he related to mesh?

I recall Oskar was the one who got involved in testing the move to the adult grid, Zindra. He was testing whether the "age fence" was going to work to block people who weren't age-verified. And he literally built an electric fence inworld that would fry avatars if they attempted to cross it without verification. This was not a pretty sight. I felt it was in poor taste (as did others). I complained, I recall, saying it was like the GULAG, although the GULAG didn't have electric fences (later the Soviet border did) -- it was cruder with "step to the left, step to the right, considered escape/we shoot without warning" as the classic chilling phrases had it. Oskar told me he had relatives in the Soviet Union I think...

Oskar made something he called "the Sword of Maturity" to award those who age-verified. I have it for sale for $1 in my store in Ross if you want to commemorate Oskar : )  Add it to the many other lost Linden paraphrenalia -- like my Leo Linden lion's head hanging above my fireplace in Refugio at Waterfall Canyon.

If you didn't get the Oskar Linden bear -- if there was one -- too late now!

Additional versions of the story may appear...

Comments

[Pep]

Live by the sword, die by the sword.
Pep (Expects Rod to fall on his, any day now - before Christmas for sure.)

[Prokofy Neva]

Sharia Sluniverse is going into overdrive accusing me of spreading false rumours:

http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/general-sl-discussion/77915-so-oskar-linden-fired-not.html

Number one, this is not "a rumour I made up," but a story I got from a very reliable source who has absolutely no reason to make up things, never has, and is close to the dev circles.

Number two, this source supplied an email pasted ostensibly from Oskar's email with his distinctive name which even I didn't know. So I have no reason to doubt it. Of course things like that can be faked, but I don't think so.

Even so, it's an odd story, I said it was odd and that I was checking it. There's the spelling mistake that doesn't seem quite like him. But I have only Oskar's Facebook as a means to check it and I haven't heard back. There isn't a Twitter that I could find.

So as always, I put this story out precisely because in the dark tunnel that is Linden Lab, we never get any news or even announcements and increasingly, not even peppy blog posts. They haven't posted for ages, and only put up something recently about some new thing that sounds like a Star Wars character but is just a glorified panel to manage chat and voice, which a lot of people don't use anyway.

As I noted, if someone has a better story, a refutation, or whatever, they're welcome to post it here.

[cube inada]

that next "linden" you encounter inworld may actually be a rat...

http://www.core77.com/blog/technology/beaming_technology_yields_ratvatar_23770.asp

one small step for rodents.. one giant leap for sv bankers.

[Rex Cronon]

This rumor wasn't started by this blog. I heard about this yesterday at the end of Andrew's office hour from TankMaster Finesmith. I went to "Second Life Beta" group chat and asked if was true or not. I also posted in group chat the part where Oskar says he is going on vacation, and also posted the part where I found out about this rumor.
Tankmaster seems to stick to his story, and there others that also seem to support it. Until either ll or oskar say something about it there is kind of hard to know if is true or not.

[Prokofy Neva]

Gosh, Jessica Lyon sounds like a total asshole, but then, she is only meeting my expectations for the Phoenix/Firestorm team which is essentially the discredited Emerald "rising from the ashes".

http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/general-sl-discussion/77915-so-oskar-linden-fired-not.html#post1666431

All she cares about is that someone in her little dev cult has supposedly leaked information that she wanted to spin and control herself, on behalf of her little Linden friend, Oskar. So petty and stupid. Meanwhile, if this statement was made in Andrew's office hour, what kind of "secret could it be"? and if it were discussed in the "SL Beta" chat group, how secret could it be? These people think they run SL.

I'm merely reporting the news here as I get it. If Oskar is fired abruptly, it's telling of...something...because he seemed to be in charge of these versions... And if he is fired over disciplining a griefer, that's of major concern. Of course, he describes this story in such a way that it sounds like an in-fight among the beta-test love-fest gang. When he says "my" sandboxes, that means the beta test grid or something, not public sandboxes. And when he says "griefing," that may mean just stress testing something in some way he didn't like or something.

Of course, threatening to sue people over a game is always silly.

Oh, I forgot, it's not a game, it's a creative space. One of three creative spaces, actually.

Used to be, a reliable way of telling if a Linden was really axed was whether they still showed up in search. This no longer works so efficiently.

[Rex Cronon]

imo your impression about jessica is not correct. i think it is unjust to call people bad names before making sure that what u say about them is indeed true. i understand that everybody has the right to their own opinion, but does it really have to be so offensive? especially since i don't think she talked about you in this way:(

[Prokofy Neva]

Oh, hell no, Rex. Go back and see what she wrote. And the worst thing about her is that she's more worried about one of her little minions leaking something to me and showing "disloyalty" than she is about the truth. That is downright creepy. That's why she's an asshole. That she would think she "owns her people" like that. And the reality is, the guy said it in open chat during Andrew's office hour. Which is unrelated to me.

People who behave badly and run their teams like little posses that they own and get to "discipline" make for a horrid society in SL and I can and will call people who do that assholes.

It's a despicable trait, to be against openness, and for tribal loyalty and secrecy.