I think we all had a bad feeling this might happen due to the ridiculous influx of gold farmers who have taken it to the extremes and create a very visible, persistent and annoying presence and undoubtedly impact the economy over the past year or two...

Sadly I think it could have been resolved in other ways (account caps, DR on loot from killing the same mob over and over, reduced loot tags, single tap nodes, token caps, actually enforcing the rules against cartels and economy manipulation, etcet), but I suppose this is the easier solution for them, so this is what they went with.

I'm saddened, but not surprised. This is exactly why I've not upgraded more than 1 account to SL to date. Slim chance this will get reverted, but I don't see it happening. This is especially annoying due to how much planning for the community aspects for boxing SL have been done in the background.