Removing the Monopolies in ECRP

[Buggs]

Problem:

Currently places like DCC and Weazel are able to operate completely free of competition. For any individual to try to enter into competition with them by creating their own business through the property request system, they would still require script help to function. This means that these businesses can operate, treat, and blacklist customers how they would like without fear of repercussions because scriptly no other business like theirs can exist.

Solution:
How it could work...

For DCC competition: create a ride sharing application similar to a freelance job, where people can get on the job and will get notifications if someone needs a ride.

Much like roadworker, tollbooth, etc. you pick up the job 
Another person would /gooberlift need a ride here please. got one person plus myself.
The driver would type /af or /acceptfare then the ID of the fare. For example: /af 102

 

For Weazel: allow people to post their own ads, however they wouldn't be able to make bulks and would have to be online to do it. That would be the difference between something like LangleysList over Weazel.

How it could work....
/placeadvertisement Selling maxed paragon for $420,069. SMS for details 420-6969.
How it would look in game...
[LangleysList] Selling maxed paragon for $420,069. SMS for details 420-6969.

Pro's
-Allows for competition
-Allows for those who have been blacklisted to still use the server scripts
-Server rules would be created for what ads can and can't be created, so it does matter who you are. If you ad is within server rules, it will be run.

Con's
-LangleysList wouldn't allow for bulks
-Possible increase in forum reports due to ads/admin time taken up by regulating ads.
-No way to pick/set your own fare for GooberLift
-No "boss" to talk to about employee complaints at GooberLift or LangleysList

Edited November 10, 2022 by Olivia Can
Formatting Fixes

[Requiem]

+1 to the idea of competition in the market, -1 to players making their own ads.

Competition is good and creates a healthy economy, but there are limitations to how this can be achieved in this server sadly. If someone wanted to, they could  make their own rideshare business without script support currently (although it may be somewhat difficult in some aspects). 

As for the ads, this would be terrible honestly. You would never be able to read the chat box because it would constantly be spammed with ads everywhere and people would troll and grief with it, writing troll things in ads just to "announce it" to the server. And if it was all moderated by server staff, it would simply take up too much time for them and couldn't realistically be done. 

Edited November 9, 2022 by Bill Breacher

[MrDisciple]

-1 If you want to do one of these faction activities. Join the faction. Or drive a friend around XD

Factions like Weazel and DCC create alot more RP than a freelance job will ever be able to do.

[alexalex303]

Weazel News started as a player run faction that was given official status and script support after showing great roleplay and dedication.

There is nothing stopping you from starting a competing business.

[BlueFlame]

-1

Edited November 11, 2022 by Shadyar8023

[Buggs]

1 hour ago, alexalex303 said:

Weazel News started as a player run faction that was given official status and script support after showing great roleplay and dedication.

There is nothing stopping you from starting a competing business.

Do you not see the difference?
If someone started a competing business now. There would be no newspaper for them. No place to post their articles. No ads they could run except for in their own publications, which wouldn't be able to be posted anywhere.

 

2 hours ago, MrDisciple said:

-1 If you want to do one of these faction activities. Join the faction. Or drive a friend around XD

Factions like Weazel and DCC create alot more RP than a freelance job will ever be able to do.

You're missing the point of the post. It's not to get apart of the factions. It's to create competition in the city for monopolies that exist.

[alexalex303]

3 hours ago, Olivia Can said:

Do you not see the difference?
If someone started a competing business now. There would be no newspaper for them. No place to post their articles. No ads they could run except for in their own publications, which wouldn't be able to be posted anywhere.

 

You're missing the point of the post. It's not to get apart of the factions. It's to create competition in the city for monopolies that exist.

There was a time when there was no newspaper for weazel, no place to post their articles, no ads they could run, etc.

End of the day it's roleplay, if you stick to it and people are interested in it, they will seek your stuff out.

Plenty of people had RP-based jobs that paid way better than any scripted jobs.

[Icarus]

MPT is a fantastic real example of this. It started off as literally just RP fixing up cars and the like and eventually, was given the ability to actually repair vehicles. 

Personally, I think the monopolies lie in script businesses like general stores and gun stores which are basically used as passive forms of income for the owners. I know a lot of people that would love to actually do some RP in their general store and/or gun store but the barrier to entry is to high for them to even be able to. 

[MrDisciple]

42 minutes ago, Icarus said:

I know a lot of people that would love to actually do some RP in their general store and/or gun store but the barrier to entry is to high for them to even be able to.

They are bringing out leases soon so people don't own a gas station for the rest of eternity.

[IAmTurtle]

44 minutes ago, Icarus said:

Personally, I think the monopolies lie in script businesses like general stores and gun stores which are basically used as passive forms of income for the owners. I know a lot of people that would love to actually do some RP in their general store and/or gun store but the barrier to entry is to high for them to even be able to. 

I would love to be able to hire people to work at my store. And give people that role play. Instead i have to "hand over" ownership of my dealership over so they can rp as my manger.

[Buggs]

2 hours ago, alexalex303 said:

There was a time when there was no newspaper for weazel, no place to post their articles, no ads they could run, etc.

Right, but it's not that way anymore. So anyone who wants to do that same thing... would be already at a big disadvantage. All I'm asking is that you see the flip side of things.

Yes, you can make these things, as it is possible without a script. However... most will just go to Weazel. As we've seen with MPT, people did come to MPT (such as myself because I really love the RP) but the AVERAGE player just sticks to Bayview or LSC. Once they had the ability to actually repair cars, you would see more and more people show up, but even then I still would hear from MPT's business owner about how it's failing.

The average player on this server is not a heavy RPer. The average player is a medium to low RPer.

[Requiem]

9 hours ago, Olivia Can said:

Right, but it's not that way anymore. So anyone who wants to do that same thing... would be already at a big disadvantage. All I'm asking is that you see the flip side of things.

Yes, you can make these things, as it is possible without a script. However... most will just go to Weazel. As we've seen with MPT, people did come to MPT (such as myself because I really love the RP) but the AVERAGE player just sticks to Bayview or LSC. Once they had the ability to actually repair cars, you would see more and more people show up, but even then I still would hear from MPT's business owner about how it's failing.

The average player on this server is not a heavy RPer. The average player is a medium to low RPer.

Yes, but this is the same case in real life. In any free market economy, there will be a company with the monopoly or majority market share, and if you start up a competing business, of course almost everyone will continue to go the big players in the market. This is the fundamentals of business and marketing. I don't think the lack of script support is everything here. If someone has a good enough idea or execution on their business and strategy, people will naturally start migrating to it. But yes, it will be a struggle to begin with and it will require hard work...but again, this is no different than real life marketing. 

[Buggs]

35 minutes ago, Bill Breacher said:

Yes, but this is the same case in real life. In any free market economy, there will be a company with the monopoly or majority market share, and if you start up a competing business, of course almost everyone will continue to go the big players in the market.

There are laws in the United States, which is where Los Santos is supposed to be located, that prevent these types of things.

"The antitrust laws prohibit conduct by a single firm that unreasonably restrains competition by creating or maintaining monopoly power. Most Section 2 claims involve the conduct of a firm with a leading market position, although Section 2 of the Sherman Act also bans attempts to monopolize and conspiracies to monopolize. As a first step, courts ask if the firm has "monopoly power" in any market. This requires in-depth study of the products sold by the leading firm, and any alternative products consumers may turn to if the firm attempted to raise prices. Then courts ask if that leading position was gained or maintained through improper conduct—that is, something other than merely having a better product, superior management or historic accident. Here courts evaluate the anticompetitive effects of the conduct and its procompetitive justifications."

"a "monopolist" is a firm with significant and durable market power"

I would consider Weazel and DCC to be a monopoly as there is no current alternative that offers the same thing.
If Weazel raises prices where do you place ads?
If Weazel blacklists you where do you place ads or blips?
If DCC blacklists you, how do you get a ride when no friends are online?

Edited November 10, 2022 by Olivia Can

[alexalex303]

MPT speaks against your point, because they just started RPing, and in my opinion, succeeded for a long time before receiving official recognition. 

If you want change, be part of the change.

[Buggs]

Like I stated multiple times. The owner of MPT would only talk about how his business was failing every time my character spoke to him in game. It is very easy to sit on the sidelines and say "be the change you want to see". It is another story to actually have to do it. Did you ever talk to him to see how hard it was for him to do everything he did? Do you understand how hard and how much money someone has to dump into a business like that before they could even see an inkling of gain? And even then, they'll probably still lose money on ads, blips, salaries for employees, and other business costs.

[Requiem]

4 hours ago, Olivia Can said:

"a "monopolist" is a firm with significant and durable market power"

I would consider Weazel and DCC to be a monopoly as there is no current alternative that offers the same thing.
If Weazel raises prices where do you place ads?
If Weazel blacklists you where do you place ads or blips?
If DCC blacklists you, how do you get a ride when no friends are online?

They are not a monopoly by choice. There is no competitors. That is not their fault. 

You are stating there is an issue, but what myself and alex are saying is the solution can be implemented without the extra support you are asking for. No one said it was gonna be easy. It WILL be difficult for sure, but difficult doesn't mean impossible. 

[Buggs]

Did I say it was their fault?

I said this is a Government allowed monopoly, which it is. It is also a scriptly allowed monopoly. As anything else that tried to compete WOULD NOT OFFER THE SAME SERVICES, making Weazel, still a monopoly. I can create a new Weazel all I want, but I cannot post ads the way they can, I cannot offer the same services Weazel can by way of blips or putting their story in the newspaper that anyone can buy at a general store.

So literally it is impossible to create competition as you cannot offer the same services. Does this not make sense?

[Antonio_Colombo]

Brilliant suggestion. Monopoly situation puts progress of development to absolute stall, where only couple of lucky individuals gains it all. I'm not against IC monopoly, however, but the situation is above IC because scriptly it isn't possible, so even if someone does good rp for make their own business, it will quickly deplete due to lack of script depth. 

Also big + for weazel, I personally hate that every ad is like a cancer infested diarrhea, you simply can't make workers to listen to your wants and needs - "every add should have at least x amount of colors and y amount of emojis" which is just absurd. OK I might be biased against them because some of my past experience, but in a nutshell I agree to that part. 

Also, I had made some stupid suggestion, that barely resambles Yours, to stimulate competition, you can check it here: 

 

Edited November 11, 2022 by Antonio_Colombo

[Pazz]

On 11/10/2022 at 3:55 AM, alexalex303 said:

There was a time when there was no newspaper for weazel, no place to post their articles, no ads they could run, etc.

End of the day it's roleplay, if you stick to it and people are interested in it, they will seek your stuff out.

Plenty of people had RP-based jobs that paid way better than any scripted jobs.

This is not necessarily true. I can do with or without the "monopolies" in the server, but some points might need clarification here.

Yes, Weazel News did start out as a group of players that came together and decided to make it a reality, and it was turned into a recognized legal faction of Eclipse in some point of 2017, but I think it is important to remember that the server environment was inherently different, as well as the focus of development and faction management (or the lack thereof that existed at the time). 

Is it difficult to do what was done in a matter of.. two months, at best, in 2017? Yeah, and it is most certainly not achievable in a time-frame that is anywhere close to the time in which Weazel News appeared as an organization and then became a recognized faction. Is it impossible? No, not really, but the server doesn't really allow for it in most cases. Yes, the argument can be made that at the end of the day it is roleplay, which it is, but that's a very easy cop-out when you consider the changes that have been made to the server and the environment since the establishment of the faction and the evolvement thereof in terms of how the server favors it. 

The vast difference for i.e. Weazel News is that the arguments made do not hold up in 2022 as they did in 2017, and I don't think it should really be used for argument's sake;

• Weazel News did not have an in-game newspaper, correct. That said, they had the classifieds forum section that allowed for them to post their newspaper. It was done through i.e. pasting screenshots of an enormous word document together. I should know, I ran Weazel News for several months back in the summer of 2017. However, this has only just recently become available again to the playerbase, as for whatever the reason or poor justification may have been, someone along the way decided to forcefully move all IC means of advertising or posting on the forums to the LifeInvader platform which died out immediately, meaning that there was no proper platform for a competitor to arise until a couple of months back, at best. Weazel News had the upperhand in that regard in 2017, and continued to hold the upperhand in 2022, although not through means of healthy competition, but by indirectly being favored by the server.
• This circles back to the IC boards on the main forums; Weazel News did have a place to post their articles, and they did. They made use of the IC boards that, again, were removed by server management in favor of a poorer and significantly slower platform used by a fraction of the active players on the server, if that, which effectively eliminated any proper opportunity for any individual(s) to establish themselves as a competitor to a news agency that has the ability to sell newspapers in-game and post them in a dedicated forum section.
• Weazel News did have ads to run, because when they started, VIP players and Donators had access to /vnn and /dnn respectively. The players behind Weazel News (who were Donators, may I add), instead of utilizing these ads (which for the record to those who do not know, were unlimited, cost-free, and unregulated for the most part, bar criminal advertisements) for themselves, advertised on behalf of other players, either those that did not have access to such features (as they were behind a paywall) or those that wanted their advertisements to continue in timezones they didn't cover. Currently, the only type of advertisement that a competitor could do would be advertising on someone else's behalf on the forums through the classifieds, but that is by no means any competition to the server-enforced "monopoly" of in-game advertisements which is entirely in the hand of the already established faction.

Competition is healthy, and the possibility to establish a competitor or a legal business/company that may become an officially recognized faction (with a salary, if we want to compare it to the mentioned businesses in the OP) is very much present. That said, while people have paved the way for others to go down this path too, I do not think it is fair to not recognize the significant changes that have been made over the last half decade and how they affect the potential of a competitor.

In that sense, competition to DCC is much more likely than competition to Weazel News, but even then a player will have to compete with an in-game app that comes on every single phone and a company that pays their drivers at an hourly rate with funding from the State Government, which one player cannot sustain a network of, unless they're one of the three richest players on the server.

Basically, it's entirely possible to pave the way for a new roleplay- or character-based job that earns you loads more than any other paying job would, whether that be something you can put your artistic skills to use for, i.e. Kellie's drawings, or something else. It is also possible to establish yourself as competition, but a very small possibility at that, and whether that'll be fruitful in the end, who's to say.

[Puzzling]

Hi just to speak as the owner of MPT here, we only went through IC ways of getting everything we got. After 6 months of just RPing with ourselves in terms of what support we could actually do. We partnered with Bayview in order to be able to repair vehicles, we have been doing this for about another 6 months. Unforunetly, once we got official and eventually asked for full script support it was denied.

 

Outside of the IC things we could do, we have no unique script support. It was a long 6 months of attempting to get repairs alone and it has been fun, but frustrating that's for sure. It is challenging and everyone who works at MPT does it for the RP, there is no money making involved, because we can't make money while competing with either of the mechanic factions, but again, we do it for the RP. 

 

tl;dr we didn't get script support from anything, just IC methods of working around the script to use it for our advantage.

 

edit: just checked our ledger, we are -$1.4m on the business, thankfully people like our RP so they donate xD

 

edit2: would be pretty sick if we could get full script support after a year of pretty solid RP within the game that multiple factions have interacted with, ty FM

[TheCactus]

There have been players that ran and advertised their own "uber" company but their idea died because people used to call them just to rob them and chop their car.
Big no for ads placed by players. I personally use weazel news services very rarely and I am still able to sell houses and cars. Maybe a little bit harder when it comes to running a business but there are many alternative ways.

[Requiem]

11 hours ago, Puzzling said:

Hi just to speak as the owner of MPT here, we only went through IC ways of getting everything we got. After 6 months of just RPing with ourselves in terms of what support we could actually do. We partnered with Bayview in order to be able to repair vehicles, we have been doing this for about another 6 months. Unforunetly, once we got official and eventually asked for full script support it was denied.

edit2: would be pretty sick if we could get full script support after a year of pretty solid RP within the game that multiple factions have interacted with, ty FM

Did they at least give a good reason why script support was denied? Kind of unfair to put that much effort in to prove yourself as a group and put in 6 months of effort to show that just to get told no, when the script support already exists for other factions. 

[Astrx]

-1. 

 

For Weazel competition there is room to be able to compete, it's just everyone think that you can only do it with scripts. This is not the case, there is now /fdo that can help so much with it and will be able to assist you with this business.

Weazel started off as a player ran business, no scripts only roleplay. They worked tirelessly to where they were granted official status and were worked with to be able to be where they are now. If they could do it you can to. And they excuse of "we have no newspaper or scripts", that doesn't matter because its all roleplay, use /fdo and word of mouth to your advantage.

[Bala]

To be honest, as much as I like people taking it upon themselves to create factions like Mirror Park Tuning, you have to ask yourself does our server currently need a third mechanic faction?

Would our server need a second news faction? A second taxi faction? 

The answer in the cold light of day is no. If anything, it’d probably make more sense to only have one mechanic faction but that’s an argument for another thread.

The success of an extra faction in the area would take away from something already established and with the player base we have, it’s not like we really need more of these types of factions. 

We need the ones have used more if anything. 

[Puzzling]

2 hours ago, Bill Breacher said:

Did they at least give a good reason why script support was denied? Kind of unfair to put that much effort in to prove yourself as a group and put in 6 months of effort to show that just to get told no, when the script support already exists for other factions. 

"not up to us, that is up to the devs" (but then isn't that your job to ask and see if it can be?) 

 

56 minutes ago, Bala said:

To be honest, as much as I like people taking it upon themselves to create factions like Mirror Park Tuning, you have to ask yourself does our server currently need a third mechanic faction?

Would our server need a second news faction? A second taxi faction? 

The answer in the cold light of day is no. If anything, it’d probably make more sense to only have one mechanic faction but that’s an argument for another thread.

The success of an extra faction in the area would take away from something already established and with the player base we have, it’s not like we really need more of these types of factions. 

We need the ones have used more if anything. 

This just isn't a good take, imagine saying "We are putting a limit on the amount of criminal factions that can be made to 3 because we peak 150 players and we don't want people too spread out"

There is a reason there are only 2 official business factions outside of MPT on the server, and both of them run because they own several scripted businesses that require minimal intervention to make money