Backdoor into Heaven

Recently, IntLibber Brautigan posted a system announcement on his Ancapistan Capital Exchange website proclaiming a backdoor loophole by which investment activity from his BNT Financial Bank can continue. He evoked the Middle Ages principle of Contractum Trinius, which in short allows for a three-stage method of bypassing the banking ban.

Looking at it from a purely technical sense, it would likely work. After all, Linden Lab did actually state what they were banning from a pure technical stance. They are simply not allowing monetary transactions to take place that pass through scripted objects (i.e. and ATM) that guarantee a return of investment.

When we look that this terminology, then it is rather easy to bypass. A bank doesn't have to have an ATM where depositors have to travel to. Indeed, LSL makes it possible for withdrawals initiated by a website to send funds to an avatar. Ginko Financial allowed that all the time, so I didn't need to leave my seat at the blackjack table to gather extra funds. Still though, I suspect that an object did perform the actual transaction.

Based on my knowledge of ATMs, they are needed so that website and database information on who is actually making the deposit be recorded. Otherwise we could simply send the funds to the proper avatar. This would protract the process of assigning monies to a given account, but otherwise it skirts around the use of ATMs in-world.

However, the question remains: What is the stated purpose behind the banking ban? Certainly it's not about ATMs. Fortunately, Linden Lab has provided that reasoning, which is to protect residents from those that would take advantage of us. Bypassing ATMs might slow that down in one way, but speed it up in others.

It's the spirit of the ban that is of issue. While the Contractum Trinius worked mainly because the loophole was based on sanctioned activities, Linden Lab has not in place any such guarantees. It's not papel decree that we have to worry about, but rather the law of the gods themselves.

At least BNTF has a more legitimate avenue for survival in that they are already an RL bank, which they proudly display at ACE headquarters. I do wish them luck in their SL endeavors, but if they push for the sneaky route, I fear that it may backfire. Unfortunately for us, such a backfire may very well take place in a room full of petrol.