FEEDING THE MEEROS

I know "feeding the meeros" sounds like a sex act. But they're actually popular pets on Second Life.
And apparently there's a lot of bad food going around. And some of them are starving!

If you have meeros, please read Hamlet Au's story below to see how to avoid starving your cute little meeros and see what Linden Labs are doing to help

Just hit Read Below

Meeroos Starving Due to SL Griefers Selling Fraudulent Food & Linden Lab Closing Their Legitimate Food Source (UPDATE: Meeroos Account Reopened, But SL Still "Flooded With Unauthorized Food")

by Hamlet Au (James Wagner Au)

Meeroos, SL's extremely popular species of virtual, breedable animals created by Malevay Studios, are currently starving. Yesterday, reports Malevay's Catherine Farspire, unidentified griefers using variations of the avatar name "Meeroos Resident" (the company's official account) were found selling unauthorized Meeroos food in the region of Twas. (The miscreants, says Ms. Farspire, "built their own [store] in the sky selling fraudulent food".) As a result, she reports, Linden Lab has closed down the region of Twas -- and also blocked "Meeroos Resident", the legitimate Malevay Studios account: "We believe the account was blocked by Linden Lab by mistake, given all the reported accounts were variations of the same name, or the account was mistakenly reported by residents meaning to abuse report the offending avatars. We simply cannot be sure. Unfortunately, this has dealt us a crippling blow at the worst time possible."

However, this does not mean your Meeroos will die. The creatures don't starve to death if their owners fail to feed them, they're simply scripted to abandon their owners, presumably in search of food. However, the company says they'll reset the Meeroos' scripting, so that doesn't happen.

In the meantime, however, Meeroos owners will have to look into their pets' wide and hungry eyes and say, "I'm sorry." At the moment, owners are taking to Twitter, begging Linden Lab CEO Rodvik Humble to save their creatures. "Don't let our Meeroos starve please," Ely Hynes Tweeted to him a few hours ago, "seems their account is on hold by Linden Lab. The poor 'roos."

It will require Linden Lab to make things right, because Malevay Studios' is currently being blocked from accessing their own content (i.e. Meeroos feeding.) "We know your your Meeroos are important to you, and unfortunately you have been provided a grave disservice," writes Catherine Farspire. "The providing of our service relies on Linden Lab providing us Service, and they have currently withdrawn that and have not been supportive in the form of a resolve." I've contacted Ms. Farspire and Linden Lab, and will update when/if there's a resolution.

Update, 12:42PM: Linden Lab spokesman Peter Gray just replied:

"This morning, we responded in detail to the support ticket that was submitted, and the problems should be sorted out." An update on the Meeroos' site confirms this, saying Meeroos operations should be back to normal very soon, but that trouble in the world of Meeroos still abounds:

We know the grid is being flooded with unauthorized food from these attackers, as now they are placing them at various meeroos marketplaces run by players. As soon as we hear anything back from Linden Lab will update you.

More updates as they arrive. Just be careful what you feed your Meeroos.