Friday, July 18, 2008

Whimsurance



Whimsurance

Whimsical Virtual Insurers and Guarantors

“It’s not just INsurance; it’s WHIMsurance!”

I. Your Policy

This is your new Whimsical Virtual Insurers and Guarantors Life Insurance policy. Your payment of 10L provides you with a copy of this policy. That is ALL it does. Any attempt to procure benefits because of loss of virtual life or limb will be met with derision and maybe even hysterical laughter.

II. Terms and Conditions

This policy supercedes and replaces all pervious Whimsurance policies. For your convenience some changes in this version may substantially reduce or eliminate your coverage. Other changes may not appear to do so, but court interpretations suggest they actually do so. Not that there was actually any coverage to begin with!

III. What It Is

This policy insures you against loss of virtual life and limb. If, for example, a giant half-molten lava rock is tossed into the air by the volcano goddess Pele and, in its careening path down the side of the volcano, bulldozes your avatar, squashing it flat and ending your virtual life, YOU ARE COVERED! If you should encounter piranha in Whimsy’s waters and they shred the flesh from your virtual bones, YOU ARE COVERED! If Cheyenne’s elephant ride tears off your right leg or you should meet your demise at the hands of Inky the Squid, YOU ARE COVERED! If your free parachute should fail to open or your free SCUBA gear fail, YOU ARE COVERED! If you slip into the lava or tumble 750 meters from our Flights of Fancy store to the ground or are injured in one of Whimsy Transportation Authority’s frequent train disasters or are ripped asunder by a berserk bodybuilding android at the Museum of Robots, YOU ARE COVERED! If YOU are attacked by a rabid virtual pet belonging to a Whimsy resident or are orbited because one of Whimsy’s estate managers is in a snit, YOU ARE COVERED! But see Section I, above.

IV. Fiduciary

This policy is transferred to you in exchange for your payment of 10 Lindens to a sign. WVIG is not responsible if you fail to receive your policy due to erratic performance of a Second Life server. Nor is WVIG responsible if you misplace this policy in your cluttered inventory of 30,000 virtual objects. In fact, WVIG is not responsible for anything. YOU are responsible for paying us 10L. So get to it!

V. Definition of Loss of Limb

Loss of limb shall refer to the misplacement of your Xcite! genital or the loss of one or both eyes, arms, or legs. We are not responsible for that avatar you bought which seems to be missing its right leg, nor are we responsible for your irresponsible use of the sliders in Appearance.

WVIG may require you to submit to a virtual medical exam to verify your loss of body part. Our doctors are highly qualified rejects of Gorean society who will of course be anxious not to humiliate, abuse, capture and enslave, or torture you.

VI. Definition of Loss of Life

Loss of life is defined to occur when your viewer crashes or you have to go to work and must hit the big red X at the upper corner of your screen (well, blue-and-white X if you’re using Dazzle). You’re not in world after that, after you? No. That means you’re dead until you log back on. You are therefore insured until you log back on. When you log back on, you will not be dead anymore. This policy will be canceled and we will set our army of lawyers on you for whimsurance fraud.

VII. Losses Not Insured

Objects of all types. This is a Life Insurance policy, you big dummy! We don’t offer insurance against loss of property. Considering the past performance of Second Life’s servers, that would be insane! We will, however, because we’re nice people, give you a free plywood prim should you incur inventory loss. What you do with it is up to you.

Scripts, Sounds, Gestures, and Animations. Most of them are annoying, anyway.

Property Reclamation. We TOLD you to pay your tier!

Loss of ability to connect to the internet. Get a better computer! And a better ISP! SL is not for sissy computers!

VIII. Specific Exclusions

This policy specifically Does not include acts of LINDEN [war, nuclear hazard, computer disease, natural disasters (which are quite likely on an island with an active volcano), or suspension of your account by Linden Lab because of your repetitive defiance of the ban on gambling].

 IX. Vehicles

Vehicular accidents are covered by an optional rider to this policy, available for only $10,000 Lindens.

X. Health Benefits

WVIG is a big supporter of socialized medicine. For this reason, we don’t offer a health benefit policy. But if we did, you can bet it would be expensive with a huge deductible and would cover almost nothing.

XI. Duration of Policy

This policy is in effect when you receive it and expires when you read Section XI.


Thank you for your trust in Whimsical Virtual Insurers and Guarantors. We work tirelessly (as does the rest of the industry) to reduce the quality of your coverage and eliminate your benefits. Be assured that should the worst come to pass, we will ignore your frantic IMs and insult you and call you a liar if you do manage to get through to us with your claim. Go forth now in confidence, knowing you have the best virtual coverage available. And please, forget our phone number.


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