The Pond are promoting a rental land auction in conjunction with advertising on tradingpost.com.au.

The reserve amounts are quite reasonable and it’ll be interesting to see what the level of interest will be. What will be even more interesting will be what businesses or residences will end up there. There’s a key sentence in the information provided: “BigPond reserves the right to make its own judgment about the suitability of any potential tenant of The Pond”. You can assume Optus won’t be allowed to set up shop on The Pond….

The full notecard available in-world reads as follows:

“The Pond – Residential Land Sale Process

On the 26th July 2007 we will publish some web “For Sale” pages on TradingPost.com.au, which will allow you to offer a MONTHLY TIER amount for your preferred Lot in LINDEN DOLLARS .

A link to the relevant URL can be made by touching the in-world Info Map at the central information site. You can also search the Trading Post in the Entertainment & Electronics > Video & Computer Games categories.

An offer will imply acceptance of a minimum rental period of three months at the rate offered. After three months you, the tenant, will continue to pay the same monthly Tier in LINDEN DOLLARS.

These Trading Post web pages will have a reserve price associated with each Lot, which is the minimum Tier offer we will accept for the Lot.

RESERVE PRICES (Monthly Linden Tier)
Some lots are slightly different sizes, yet have the same reserve price.

L$ Tier Meter2

$10,800 8,192
$6,750 4,096
$4,050 2,048
$2,160 1,024
$1,350 512

If you want to make an offer, you will need to register with the Trading Post. To register as a buyer you need to have an acceptable email address.

No credit card details are required for registration, unless you cannot provide an acceptable email address. BigPond will not have access to your email address or personal information at any stage in the process.

We suggest that you using your Avatar name as your user-name on the trading post (eg. Very_Mulberry or ThreeD_Raymaker), but this is not a requirement. If your Avatar name is not the user-name used for bidding, then it is up to you to make your Avatar name clear by including it in conditions attached to your offer.

We will keep the offering process open for 7 Days. During this offering period, we will periodically review, reject and respond to any low offers, allowing you to place a new competitive offer if you desire. BigPond cannot guarantee that any offer that is not explicitly rejected will be accepted.

At the end of 7 Days, Thursday 2nd August at 18:00 AEST, offers will be closed. At this time BigPond may accept an open offer for each property, which will most likely be the highest offer. BigPond reserves the right to make its own judgment about the suitability of any potential tenant of The Pond.

BigPond will use the Avatar Name details provided with the winning offer to contact the Avatar in world via IM, at which time the Property Statement, Residential Agreement, and General Terms notecards will be given to the Avatar.

Payment of the monthly Tier at the Land Vendor by the Avatar will constitute acceptance of the terms contained within documents.

Upon payment, BigPond will transfer ownership of the Lot to the Avatar, for their enjoyment for the duration of the tenancy.

Tier payments are required monthly in advance, and can be made at the Land Vendor in-world.

Full Terms and Conditions incorporated in the Residential Agreement and General Terms will be available for viewing at the Information Stand in-world, as soon as possible.”