Is LL Subsidizing Our Exploitation?

First of all I must say I am not very happy that once again my name has been mixed into what should be general discussion about the system. I am only one of maybe 200 people who are in full sim tier scheme. It is also simply wrong that I ever received anything only remotely close to 3000$ in dwell. The real figure is one tiny fraction of that. I might receive something like 3% of my tier cost as dwell.

As to tier fee progression you should keep in mind what people really buy with that money. Much of the costs by Linden Lab is customer support and bandwidth. I am one person who spends 70 hours per week in world, mostly working to create content and service. I might average two or three customer support tickets per week. 80% of my land is empty and not create any prim load on servers. The remaining 20% provide high quality retail space to people. For this I pay 3000 US$ per month tier payment.

Now lets assume small land holder pay 15 US$ per month. For same tier money Linden Lab has to provide customer support to 200 land owners, who use 200 times bandwidth and you can rest assured they don't use 20% of prims but rather 80% of prims on their land.

Another thing is that tiers progress in 100$ intervalls and that everybody who is trading land is paying for much unused tier because when you always buy and sell you have huge fluctuation in amount of land that you actually hold. Often times people might have 40000 sqm of land but pay full sim tier.

So do small land owner subsidize huge land owner? No! It is just the opposite. The more land you own the more you subsidize Second Life and help it grow. Linden Lab is not stupid. I hope this answers question of fairness.

Now lets see what would happen if Linden Lab would introduce linear tier progression. Mmmm, well, the first thing you would see would be large scale projects and huge estates disappear. I think I can safely say that 90% of private islands would not be here if tier fee would increase linear. Clubs would not be on their own island, but on small parcels of land in YOUR sim. Le Cadre would still be sitting in small building in Pandora, Club Elite would still be lagging people in Federal and all those nice landscape islands like Hawaii or Fairchang Island would not exist. You would not find mall in LaLa or MeXiCan nor would you find 90000sqm of big shopping space with thousands of prims high quality nice to look at buildings in Centre Ville. We would never have bought Montmartre island. Retailers would have to pay at least double fee per prim that they pay now. Yes, you would still have to go shopping in some small narrow box malls littering all of SL landscape and lagging every 2nd sim. You would not find telehub sims like Mahulu, Nuba, Isabel, Ross/Samoa, Grizedale or Hanson where you have clean environment and consistent development by huge land owners. Instead you could enjoy SL telehubs littered and blocked by huge skyscraper and box malls with rotating signs on small piece of land in all directions. And so much nice content you would be missing or forced to enjoy it compressed on much smaller land. How about Sim Quest? How about some sims that feature huge parks and landscapes paid for by the huge land owners? Would you have ever seen Svan Village? How many newbies would not be able to have nice cheap appartments they can enjoy now, living on those huge estates. The socialists now want to TAX those estate to DEATH and make poor little newbie homeless ????

But I am sure you push loud enough for it you will get what you ask for. Just don't be surprised if result might be disappointing. In Chinese history people also beat up big land owners one day. Then the following years millions died of starvation.

Well said.

*wanders into the thread*

*glances at sheer volume of words*

*wanders back out of thread and exploits Hiro on the way for good measure*

*realises I'm trolling*

*doesnt care*

*is very bored*

*but not bored enough to read this thread*

*waits for indignant replies*

sausages

*runs off*

*rubs his pinched backside*
I sure have been!

Ulrika has done some monkey math attempting to "prove" a non-existant point. The existance of bulk discounts nobody has ever denied (Or, if they did, they are a genuine moron), and her conclusions, which are the heart of her supposed arguements, are completely unrelated to her actual figures, as her flawed sociolist approach to economics is always going to break down when she attempts to use it to understand any service-based industry, which SL ultimatly is.



What does this have to do with Ulrika's supposed 'point'? If anything, it goes exactly against it... Ulrika's point is that a single avatar (Well, and 2 alts, but anyone can have two alts) is getting a better deal on land than 100 avatars buying the same amount of land. But again, nobody ever denied that.

We simply reject her conclusions she attempts to draw from this.



I hope you do some serious thinking over every single purchase you ever make, because I promise you in each and every case, someone who is buying alot of it can find a better deal than you.


*edit*

Monkey Math - A form of math where the figures are all technicly correct but are presented in an overly elaborate way to attempt to add either confusion or false authority to what is fundamentaly either an unargueable point or else a very simple one.

1 - Tier is not a commodity, it's a service charge.
2 - Large land owners create less workload for LL per land sim than small land owners.
3 - Companies tend to provide discounts to large customers.



* Ulrika, you should note that neualtenberg was only possible because of the current tier structure. If players were paying 5$/512 m m2, it would ahve been impossible to obtain the tier donations necessary.

The average Joe might not like "land barons" (a misnomer in my mind, since barony implies such wealth and power as to be able to dictate prices... that ain't happening, since all these land resellers are competing with each other), but you can bet your bottom L$ that the Lindens like them.

LL wants to maximize the land that is owned and generating recurring tier fees. That is only natural, since that is the core of their business model.

These land resellers facilitate the maximation of this revenue for LL in two ways. Firstly, they help get land from auction and into the hands of the ultimate owner because, face it, there does exist a rather large class of people who just can't be bothered with the auctions. Secondly, by the very fact that the land resellers have to carry a large tier to support their business, LL is generating monthly revenue on land that is otherwise just sitting there idle, waiting for a buyer.

I think you're waving your arms, looking for a solution to a problem that doesn't really exist.

- Ace

Or just TTZ (Tier to Zero extra land fees, that is).

Its improved my experience quite a bit. I don't have to care about what the neighbors do, or who is building what. Certain practices still irritate me from time to time, but that is on principle, not that I'm personally getting 'ripped off' or affected directly.

I guess my message is - if you aren't satisfied, then drop your land to the minimum your account will support, such as 1,024 sqm for a premium account. Cut the land tether, and wander freely. You may be suprised that SL isn't that much different for you, and in fact, may even improve as a result.

Just my perspective.

If I told you --I'd have to kill you.

pro·gres·sive : increasing in rate as the base increases <a progressive tier>

As the base (amount of L$ paid for a tier) increases, the rate (total m^2 of land) increases.

It's by definition progressive.


Ohhh wait....but wasn't it regressive by definition, or is it progressive by definition? That's the thing about definitions, it all comes down to how one words their definition.

But enough of the semantics, and on to my own $0.02L....


As much as I dont really like the concept of land barony, the problem here isn't the tier levels. The economic model of land in SL is a capitalistic one, which means those who want to make money need to have money. That means either pooling resources as a cooperative group, invest your own money, or find an investor willing to invest money in your enterprise. This is no more a matter of exploitation, it's a matter of if one is willing to make the investment/risks to get themselves to that level.

The concept of a group cooperative has been used frequently in SL, and in many cases is working quite successfully. I'm in one myself with two others, and we use our collective buying power to pay for an entire sim; we get the progressive benefits of the higher tier by pooling our resources. We didn't have to be land barons or even deal with one to do it - we did it from the ground-up, putting in the L$ and effort to realize this goal.


Seems to me the 'exploitation' here doesn't exist, unless one is fundamentally against capitalism in its entirety. After all, if a small percentage of the population is at the high end of the end curve, it doesn't take a lot of 'logical' statements to try to imply the mid-curve folks must be getting exploited. It all comes down to how one displays the numbers, and what message they want people to see.


"Logic is the art of going wrong with confidence" - Joseph Wood Krutch

Interesting points; the alts have to do with group land the more land put into the group the more land is aquired. +10% can you show me where her math is off please. Also I dont her politics have much to do with her well written report.

Cat

On a side note why you all pulling Anshe into the mix? She was out done by Blue long ago.

Cat

I guess you haven't heard about The Neualtenburg Projekt. hehe


I don't really agree with Ulrika's solutions. I realize there is an issue though. I tend to do like Siggy stated and just avoid buying land from those who I feel are doing unfair land buying and selling. And I agree with Cristiano that there are many out there with Large amounts of land that are not selling it. Why should they be penilized because of the dislike some have of the practice of someone buying land, upping the price, then reselling it?

Nope. We don't want to "punish" the wrong people. Right now I haven't seen one solid solution alone that would work, though bits and pieces of various solutions seem to make sense. Not an easy issue to find a good solution too though it seems.

hmmm. I guess I should add that while I may not agree with Ulrika's ideas as an SL wide solution, I of course have no objections to voluntary experimentation with groups of people.

Based on the community there isnt a singular solution however again as pen and others have stated punishing a large land holder just because they have the land is wrong.

If you want to hit em where it hurts I have some solutions but Id prefere not to discuss on the forums. None of which are illigal and in all honesty compliment what LL's orginal goal was in the first place.

But again I digress and shall not go in depth other than to say for those of you that discredit Ulrikas numbers...yes they are off somewhat as a few variables are missing but for the most part her theory on reward is correct. but at the same time she is shooting the solution in the foot by wanting to flat rate it and penalise the large groups by limiting the 10% bonus.

The way LL has it set up is for a reason climb out of your boxes and look back and you will see a sea of boxes in the vastness of the grand scheme.

Its lunch time I will ponder on this some more after lunch......


TTFN.

Shadow

This is false. The "total m^2 of land" is not a rate. A rate is something divided by something like meters per second or dollars per area.

In the case of land-tier pricing we have a base which is the amount of land and a rate (a ratio) which is cost per amount of land. As the base increases, the rate drops, making it regressive.


If you're talking about the inverse function that mirrors a function around the "x = y" line, then it would be progressive but it would still mean the same thing. In this case the base would be the amount paid and the rate would be the amount of land per dollar. As the base increases the rate grows, making it progressive. This means those that pay more get progressively more land. However, one would never use the inverse function as it implies that land is the dependent variable, which it's not.

Sorry, I don't mean to be contrary. I'm a stickler for mathematical accuracy.

~Ulrika~

So I see a lot of people saying a) there is no problem so we don't need a solution and b) there is a problem but I don't agree with her solutions. As far as I can tell the only person who has offered solutions is Hiro!

Given that removing or limiting group bonuses is unpopular and that removing the land-tier subsidies is unpopular, what are your ideas?

My other idea is a progressive tax on the selling of large amounts of contiguous or noncontiguous land by groups or individuals in a short period of time. It would have no effect on large land holders or groups. The goal would be to remove the group and land subsidy for people who sell land. They can still sell, they just can't sell using loopholes in the land and group system.

I see the work done by a land baron is trivial. Buy, divide, and put up a sign. Let's reduce the profit to something more commensurate with the level of work done by closing the land subsidy and group loopholes.

~Ulrika~

I think you are arguing semantics.. not mathematical accuracy.

I also think this argument is a prime example of the sort of "mental masturbation" that my 8th grade math teacher used to encourage us to engage in. In doing so, and by playing with algebraic formulas, we often wound up "proving" that 1=2 if you are allowed to divide by zero.

If you redefine the color red as blue, then the current color wheel we use only "works" if you rename all the current color combinations. However, don't accept that premise - that red is now blue - and any subsequent argument based on that premise is moot.

I don't accept the premise in your argument Ulrika.

Monkey math. Can't think of a better term. Designed to sound brainy and cool, and may be technically correct, but covers up with a hailfire of lies the essential issue: do you or do you not subscribe to a Marxist ideology, and do you or do you not believe that value is finite and can only be restributed equitably, or that value can be generated from initiative?

Coming clean on your belief system, your political grandfathers, etc. would help us evaluate your monkey math, which to date we don't believe to be sincere.

You've not answered any of my points.

I don't see how making land more expensive for large land holders would help me, unless they made it less expensive for small land holders.

See, what I would like is to be a large land holder, so I wish they would make it cheaper for everyone. I can't think of a reasonable way to do that, so I'll hush now.

Right on the mark.

And to that I ask once again... Ulrika, if the welfare of the "little guys" paying so much money for 512 sqm plots is so important to you, why don't you and your followers create a 'Social Democrat' fund, buy several sims at the highly discounted rates you speak of, resell to the "little guys" and collect the tier from them at your cost?

I think that would definitely gain the admiration of all residents of SL and prove that actions indeed speak louder than words....

- T -

I'll go you one better:

Ulrika, where do you currently pay your tier, and to whom?

Was your community relieved of tier, because you submitted a proposal for a grant (or social welfare) to the company for Neualtenberg? I'm not disputing the merits of that -- it's a separate discussion -- but I think if you're going to call all of us who maintain separate accounts and pay little dribs and drabs of tier as chumps exploited by barons, or call those of us who go out on a limb and pay real-life money and time to develop sims as "exploiters," we need to understand *which class you yourself are in* so, we can understand *which class interests you represent* in your Marxian world.

Are you a little guy paying tier? Or did you get welfare from the company? If you tier is waived -- lucky you! -- how much did you have to pay for the land? Why did you pay for it if you think it is an exploitative system?

Finally, even if you have tier waived, as an account holder, you have 512 or 1024 available in tier to put out somewhere. Are you using it?

You don't have to answer these questions -- nobody has to give private information just to justify their ideological platform -- but if you do answer them, we can access better whether you are sincere, and have come to your socialist beliefs through rational thought and real experimentation, and accumulation of experience, or whether you have come to them through falling victim to a Marxist mind-meme, which is like catching the flu.

Like monkey-math, a Marxist mind-meme is a thought or concept that is an ardently held belief, akin to a religious belief like the Immaculate Conception, which masquerades as scientific thought, and which spreads virulently among the intelligentsia, especially the non-working intelligentsia who live on grants/welfare/trust funds, and don't work for a living or try capitalist ventures with their own risk and nerve. Progressive taxation is such a mind-meme.

Does the company's social welfare for certain groups exploit us all? Does it harm business entrepreneurs who put their own value, money, labour into projects?

Hey, I arrived at a great counter argument. Every project that gets a hand-out from the Lindens is an exploiting class! WOOT! They suck away initiative from us all, they discourage us from initiative, the harm the little 512ers, they soak up the value of tier which we pay out in earnest, and do a thousand other destructive things.

Why should the company be paying for a talk-shop?

We didn't think there was a problem because nobody really decided they were exploited, except, possibly by anything other than groups living off free grants from the Lindens.



Why did we have to have ideas to solve an artificial problem, that you created by inciting hatred of land barons?
.

Not only land barons, but most reasonable people who either aspire to become land barons or who are just running big projects will fight this tooth and nail. It isn't fair, because it solves an artificial Marxist problem invented by you. It isn't fair, because it means their capital, risk, venture, intitiative, is vitiated and eroded in value. It isn't fair, because the policing of it would require such great administrative resources and bureaucratic red tape that no body would be able to fight their way out of city hall in order to take advantage of good deals. If everyone trying to do a deal had to stop at window 3 and get a signature from Ulrika that that they had paid Tax A and then wait in line at window 5B in order to get a statement that they had paid the taxes and also paid a one-time licensing fee, and then had to wait at window 7Q for an excise stamp while the clerk is on break -- no real estate or group planning will happen, and it will turn into Uzbekistan.

To exploit your silly system, all I'd have to do is take a tiny square out of two parcels I bought to make them non-contiguous. Sheesh.



Bulk discounts aren't loopholes, they are bulk discounts. They're legal. They're legit. And no one can understand why they have been "victimized" by a fake problem that you yourself have invented just to be able to find more guinea pigs for yet another socialist nightmare experiment on this planet.



Bleh. You obviously never tried to work with land, work with potential buyers, work with advertising, etc. etc. You just have no idea what you are talking about.

Go buy a big piece of land and get your 140 people to buy it off you in your social democracy experiment, and come back and talk to me when it's over.

Omg! I didn't even think of the fact Ulrika gets her sim for free. And here she is and demands higher tier fees and profit taxes for those who actually pay for their projects. Sorry, I think I am in wrong movie. I have to stop here or my keyboard explode...

Personally, I don't feel the need to offer up one. You, and a handful of others, are trying to sell the idea that there is this huge problem and have offered up solutions that would wreak havoc on what you would classify as non-exploiting land users.



I really wish you'd quit referring to it as a subsidy, since you have yet to factor in *all* of the costs, and focus instead on the discount given when you hold land in bulk. You also neglect to mention that there is a substantial amount of risk when you deed land to a group, that is non existant if you are the sole land-owner. Until you've factored in *all* of these.. please refrain from calling it a subsidy.




That's your personal opinion, yet you expect the entire community to change because it goes against your personal beliefs?