Bring back event support for events other then education

Feature Voting Request:
Name: Bring back event support for events other then education
Category: miscellaneous
Subcategory: other
Author: Jenna Fairplay
Prop Date: 2005-04-13

Feature Detail
This is a duh one but hey I know I want it Have support perhaps scaled paying more to education but still paying something for other events as well. No min of having to be 30 days or older to host as well.

Feel free to discuss further here...

As long as the debate on this was in the forums, I'm surprised to see none here. So, I'll use this space to thank Jesse for bringing this and other features which have garnered significant numbers of votes as proposals up for discussion. I've been wondering what the voting system process was on the LL end as only 3 proposals have been moved to the approved section and the Linden comment sections are conspicuously empty. If Havoc 2 and the introduction of http access as well as others are already decided upon, it would serve the process well to free up these votes for proposals lower on the list.

Thanks again, Jesse

1,000's of SL members do not log in here and i'd guess a significant number of those of us who do - do not vote.

LL I hope has informed the board of directors about this 1 Forum User/Alt account/ = 10 votes - I'd love to be a fly on the board room wall.

PLZ!

I don't care how its regulated at the moment as long as its possible! It would still be good to favour educational events IMO though.. As they bring something to the community.

Also, I know I'll get yelled at for associating SL with money, but.. Its basically $2 for an hours work, with no garentee you'll get paid if fewer than 5 people turn up. Which is ok if you can choose what event you hold and get prize money on top, but for teaching its quite a small amount..

Just my two.. uhhh.. somethings..

The yelling may commence!

What is the rationale behind this? Specifically the removal of a minimum user age of 30 days? It sounds like you're asking Linden Lab to let you exploit a system that isn't even allowed. I'm not entirely opposed to the idea, but i'd like to hear a good reason why this should happen.

There's certainly no reason why individual players can't sponsor events, rather than asking Linden Labs to do it. It really doesn't make sense for LL to do the sponsorship except for mentor/educational type events. I think if they did it would just lead to unnecessary inflation of the economy.

I feel that just because your new does not mean your not skilled. Many players come into this game know how to script, use psp or photoshop, poser, and lets not forget social skills that shouldnt be ingored based on their SL age. I was hosting events my first week into this game and look at where I am now. I was teaching others how to host, post, and such just 3 weeks into the game.

As for support it was once paid for by Linden but cut to help the Linden dollar become strong. If you look at it the new player has no real form of income other then to work for estalbishments that are already established thus rich get richer new players stay poor. All they have really are their weekly stipens and so Linden encourages that if they truely want more Linden to go and buy it more fire to my rich get richer reference.

Lets face it social, sports, gathering and gaming events are the backbone of the entertainment of Second Life. They are what drive *most not all so all u I dont attend those events hush!* players to socialize and form a connection with the game and continue playing. This venues who provide these events should not be ingored for their events and should not be forced to pay for this huge and needed service out of pocket.

If this is the case any new estblishment wont stand much of a chance unless there was a huge rl bankrole. Thus keeping the average new player down and the rich player growing.

Why arnt there more SL players posting here? Because most dont play SL to go and post on a forum. So collection of information via forms will not reflect that of the genreral population. They are out shopping, building a home, or enjoying a "social" event.

Jenna
*edited by pluto my human spell checker*

Which is fine, you're not limited to hosting events your first 30 days, just sponsorship. Otherwise someone could create 2000 free accounts, each do an event, transfer all moneys to your account, then leave. It's a huge abuse hole, and not unreasonable


I don't understand this argument. Every player in SL has a fairly open field of opportunity to come up with methods of income. Who pays for what is up to the players, LL doesn't control it. For income, you have to find a way to do something that other players will pay you for. You don't need Linden Labs to give you more money. If the event hosting is worth the money you get for doing it, players should be willing to pay you that as well, otherwise LL is giving you the money for no reason, because the value isn't there.


They aren't ignored, and if it is a needed service, why should they not have to pay it out of pocket? They make the dwell from the event, plus sales or whatever else they have going on. Again, it's economy, if the value is there, the players will pay it. If the players won't pay it, the value isn't there.


Please explain this further. Why can't new establishments hold an event without spending any money at all? The only requirement is the cost of the subscription for land. This is the same cost everyone pays.


Not to be horribly offensive, but you should invest in a grammar checker as well. I'm by far not qualified to be an English professor, but I found your post rather difficult to read.

In a nutshell: there ought to either be support for ALL events or no event support at all. That's the only real fair way of doing it.

Whether to have event support or not is a more difficult question. It depends on motivation. If Linden Lab intends to run SL like a game and ensure a steady stream of events (though with no guarantees to quality), then having event support would be a good thing. If LL would rather run SL like a small country on the free market system, then they should be laizez faire with events as well. (And there's almost certianly other factors).

post removed

Yes bring back support for events! Jenna fairplay has a vote going now! Vote 65.......

Myself, I don't feel event support is a requirement, or an entitlement. We can get along just fine without it.

The question is - is the world a better place with event support? IMHO - I think it would be for the following reason:

Variety

However - I don't think we can carry the load of all this variety until the Event Filters are put in place that we've been talking about. Once folks are able to filter out & search for events - LL should be pushing and encouraging all types of events - so there's always an array of things to do.

Ideally I'd like to see LL reintroduce a form of event support in tandem with the major event calendar overhaul.

Instead of event support, I'd rather see LL make dwell work a lot better, be more points/money, and be easier to understand/an easier formula.

If we had real dollars on our feet, and if our traveling to various lots, events, activities could really elave dollars in the pot of our hosts, we'd be our own events grants system not requiring any administration.

Everybody worries about "gaming" a system like that. But if it caught on, and worked like it did in TSO, where there were so many people NOT gaming it that it had value despite the gamers, it could work.

What a joy it would be to work your ass off all week, and then see $500 LL come into your box at the end of the week because you got X number of people to come to your events. No fuss, no muss, not grant application. Just people voting with their feet. Of course, some people will perch their alts, or pay newbs to come and park. But that's fine. There won't be so much of it to totally discredit the system, and meanwhile, we get a tremendous way to really have a democratic and rewarding vote on what we find interesting in the game.

Say I log on with $25 LL worth of dwell to dish out. Maybe I even see the meter going down as I travel. Maybe I am prompted to stay at someone's event until the end if I see they get the full $25/day (or however it works).

The dwell system now is to hard to understand especially for new people. Junk it in favor of a more robust points system that really cashes out in a better way every few days.

The greatest thing about feet-dwell-dollars is that you have the potential of relatively small groups of people doing something creative and turning around their chances to move up the list. Now, dwell begets more dwell and it is hard to break through. With more feet power/fly power, we could make it better than the grants system and really tell us about what people find makes them stick in SL.

Some individuals rarely sponsor events. Events bolster LL's economy. In rl, arts and culture do get grants. There is no other way for events hosts to be paid at all in medium sized venues unless the venue owner subsidizes the entertainment of LLs customers. Currently dwell and modest fees at the door cannot pay vor events. All of these are reasons why this proposition is a good idea. Sponsor host money for up to 1 event per day at each venue. That lets at least one host be paid. Let us come up with prizes ourselves through sponsorships (prize sponsorships are always easier to come by than cash donations to pay for the time of the host). This will ensure that no inflation results in the economy. Events are good for monetary circulation. SL Economy will benefit from increased availability of and variety of events.

Travis, do you actually break even on your events or do you subsidize them out of pocket? Overall, are you breaking even on your venue? Because without the Events Host subsidies, I am paying out of pocket. I get decent dwell (low low down on the 2%) but still it isn't enough to pay a measely $150/event to staff and break even at the end of the month on props, djs, and staff costs. I subsidize my spa with every cent of my furniture sales and other miscellaneous income that might be used to buy me cute shoes instead. lol. So I guess, what makes you think we can get along just fine without events host monies? Or, like Prokofy suggested, higher dwell money? I think this is only true if you are in the very top part of that 2% of traffic. Otherwise, we need the host money to break even. I don't think it is asking too much to break even to entertain LLs customer base.

If a venue has, say, more than half a sim of land and a mall and 3 events going on a day because the owner is buying lindens and spewing them out on the people who come by, on hosts who run events, and gambling that he or she will get into the top part of the 2% traffic awards (because that is what it takes to make money) then maybe. That is an empire. not an events venue.

What the writer you were questioning might likely have meant is that new establishments (one who haven't gotten to empire status) simply cannot break even on events without event host monies. If one gets dwell of 30 maximum (with half those leaving due to lag from having that many people in a sim) one might see as much as $200 from that day (that has been our highest dwell award EVER and we've sometimes run 3 successful events per day). Now imagine the person doing the work wants to be paid. I know. it's a stretch perhaps. But so the joe or jill who is TPing People, keeping track of the $5 door charge, trying to get people to pay while simultaneously running an event, entertaining folks and keeping an eye out for griefers... this person I figure is worth far more than what I can afford at $100L/hour (that's what, 30 cents?). This job used to be worth $250 with Linden support. So, as the land owner, If I pay for events hosts for two events per day for two hours per day that is $400. I make $200 on dwell. If I'm lucky, I've recouped another $100 on door (but that's only gonna take down my original $200 on dwell coz less people come when a cover is charged)

Average event day (Not Including Tier Costs!)

Money Going Out
Staff Costs: $400 (make that around $2000 when we have a DJ)
Properties/furniture upgrades $100

Money Coming In
Donations $100
Dwell $160

Total = -240
And this isn't in a black box venue. This is in a venue where people have said they are impressed by the build, by the variety of events content and things for people to do on property. They voted (as Prokofy said) with their feet and put us up into the top 2% in March. Still, we didn't break even.

Then with a Dwellnor Award, I might cover half the Tier costs of running the venue. If we could even get one host fee paid every day per venue, that would be awesome. Not automatic either: still have to file the report as before and a minimum 1 hour event for $250 for the host. That's what I'd like to see just so events programming can break even. I will make or beg or borrow for prizes, but I really want to see my great staff get paid what they deserve. Materials content makers are advantaged by not having to pay to recreate their work and take advantage, endlessly, of time invested earlier on through volume sales. Events can only possibly cater to as many people as technical limitations allow for. Events are good for LL and good for business however, and LL should continue its support of events.

I've never made money - even before when we had event support. I typically burn through about 5k-10k per month of my own cash - and that hasn't seemed to have changed even with the new support rules. I did have to make some changes to the way I do things in order to keep it this way, however.

When event support was cut, I went through some serious belt tightening - and got creative with my funding sources.

What I did to survive - was:

1. Cut out all contests other than Payment Podium, except when we have a surplus week.
2. Agressively seek sponsors
3. Began using Metaadverse
4. Focused my energies more on community service.
5. Tightened the belt on the money machine.

I am agreeing that event support should come back - I just think its for different reasons. In the end, it will provide more variety for events, and encourage more folks to host. With all the concern over the cluttered event calendar lately, however - I can't see LL taking us seriously on event support until there's a way for residents to filter events to their liking

Ever since I came back with my new character I've noticed something depressing about the events.

A lot of the 'community' based events have practically disappeared! By this I mean the events that really do nothing but bring people together under the pretext of some sort of contest.

Yes, I know there are a few scattered one remaining, here and there, but in the olden days of yore, the event calander was filled with;

Show and Tells - made something cool, show it off and win a prize
game show events - Pituca still has Jeopardy, and there's a few half-hearted trivia's, but that's it.
Structured best of "fill-in-the-blank" . Now it's just a dance floor and every once in awhile people are asked to vote of whatever.
Newbie question hours. There always used to be Mentor shows for newbs about one thing or another.
Mentor shows. Aside from the newb shows, Mentor events were everywhere, about everything.


The list goes on. Now it seems like 90% of everything is a club dance with something tacked on as an afterthought. Nothing but a dwell device. Now there's nothing intrinsically wrong with that, they can be fun too, but we lost something that's a little hard to put my finger on.

Wait, maybe I can pinpoint it. Now, events are mostly just for dwell. They used to be just for fun. Sure, you get paid for doing it, but the prize money was also given to you which meant you could have an event just for pure fun without worrying about dwell.

I'd like to see that again.

Sorry for the Shameless Plug - but some of the stuff you mentioned lacking we have going on at a regular basis at the Shelter At least in my case - not all of the events out there are for the purpose of dwell.

Every Sunday/Tuesday/Thursday at 7pm is our Game Show - Payment Podium (Similar to Who Wants To Be A Millionaire) This is our only 'Lag-Fest' event - due to popularity. Since everyone is typically seated - any lag experienced seems to become less an issue.

Every day at 4pm we have a Newbie Welcome Party (Not always calendar posted)

Every day at 5pm we have a Freebie Exchange Gathering (Not always calendar posted)


If you get a chance, stop by and say hello! Mostly, our mission is helping newbies - and I've received comments before that we seem to be much less a 'club' and more a 'lounge'

Edit - Just noticed the title of your post was "Bring back events would be a BOOD thing"

Is this a typo for a 'Bad' thing or a 'Good' thing?

Unfortunately, this sad state is much like economics in the real world which are bad.

A failing business endeavour should not be bolstered by the government when it can not turn a profit on services it is providing.

The simple truth of the world is that if you are losing money from providing a service, you're managing it wrong -- businesses which are managed wrong go out of business. That's the way it is.

The problem with the arts/culture comparison in grants is that grants come from tax money which is allocated for that purpose.

Linden event sponsoring instead comes directly from the "mint", which is why it affects inflation more directly.

If you would like to pay money into a grant fund to sponsor events with, it would be a more comparable analogy.

The problem with the business analogy is that what I am noticing is not just "unsuccessful" clubs failing. The point is that no events venue is turning a profit (not a single one that I know of, and I've talked to a number of people). In other words, if we were business people we could say that difinitively events cannot be a business given the limitations of the vehicle.

The limitations of the vehicle are this:
1. That avatars cause too much lag for a door charge to be effective.
2. That there is no way for the doer of the job (the host) to immediately recoup for his or her efforts from a door charge mechanism, even if one could have enough avatars in a sim to make it profitable.
3. We are living in a climate in which the paradigm has long been for events attendees to be paid by events and not the other way around.
4. Dwell is too small to compensate our events hosts for their time.

The limitations of the business analogy as compared to SL are as follows:
1. Doesn't take into account that manufacturers of materials content are effectively subsidized by not having to pay for any of the materials they sell other than uploaded textures (prims are cost free and therefore manufacturer's costs are 0).
2. SL isn't a government, but does sometimes behave like one. It is a business and has an interest in having happy customers with something to actually do while here.
3. Many businesses work for the government to supply goods for the citizenry. For this, the government pays money to those doing the work (building sewers, making the infrastructure so to speak (and it could easily be argued that for a company selling an entertainment product, events are the infrastructure of that entertainment)).

I would somehow take the issue as my own failure if it were only one endeavour that were failing. If however, an essential business (and events for Lindens should be an essential business) Fails as a Class then governments certainly have been known to come and bolster that business. If we need airlines and NO airlines make money, then the government will find a way to subsidize airlines. Because I have yet to speak to a single events venue owner who has made money or even broken even on their events (all I've talked to and even top clubs indicate that they lose money regularly) then we can fairly say that events as a whole are something that private individuals are being asked to pay for out of pocket to entertain LLs customers. This is clearly unsustainable.

I have a number of things going for me, which made me think that if anyone could succeed in this game I could. I have formal training in business and arts management. I have free land (no tier for 4096 of my venue as a result of a contest win) and I have an excellent community of people working for me (never even once had to post for regular spa staff or events hosts...not yet). Nonetheless, I am not breaking even. That is because it is not doable. It is impossible to pay hosts and break even. Should all events content be made by volunteers? Also not sustainable.

You need to scratch dwell off the list too, that's still equivalent to a government subsidary.

I find it almost unbelievable to think that you can't break even hosting an event. It doesn't take any amount of genius to come up with a way to break even. You have effectively 'workers' and you have revenue generated.

If you are not generating any revenue, your problem has already been addressed. You're effectively just wanting to be paid to "party". Nobody will pay you to do that in the real world, so it's not surprising if people won't pay it in SL.

However, there are products which can be sold still. I would suspect a club owner could sell cheap dance attachments, drink objects, glow sticks, yada yada, other little party favors, access to special stuff, what have you. This is the job of a business owner and entrepreneur. You are to find a product to sell, and sell it.

What people are doing presently, is handing out money, selling nothing, expecting to sell nothing, trying to sell nothing, and wondering why it's not a successful business model.

Now, with that said, I understand your goal. Events are an "important" part of present SL culture. The solution? Don't spend more than you bring in for the event. If you can't find a host to work for free or for a percentage of the revenue, don't hire them. An even more novel idea, do it yourself until you have enough traffic and revenue that you can afford to hire someone to do it for you.

I'm not a business management scholar by any means, and even I can see the supremely obvious flaws in the goals here. There is no something from nothing, and it's that simple. Start selling a product, or stop giving out money -- either one will work.

Why is this thread even open?

There are tonnes of events (some say, too many) and good events should be able to get sponsorship from private sources.

Maybe come up with some tools so sponsoring events is a proftable thing to do, but handing out stipends for this sort of things is very very silly.

Imagine you are entertaining customers for an entertainment company. You shouldn't be paid for entertaining their customers?

Many people complain that there isn't enough variety in events. This is because the only way events can now recoup money is by dwell. Since events venues do not collectively decide that charging at the door should be done, any event that DOES charge positions itself unfavourably with events that DON'T charge. Also, dwell only accounts for a fraction of the costs of paying events hosts at the going rate (which is far less than the actual work is worth in my opinion)

As for Si Money's rather snide comment that people want to be paid to party, allow me to illustrate what I do for my events. Anyone who has actually BEEN to one of my events can tell you that it takes a bit of effort and this generally shows. For Example: a scener's event takes a discussion with our team to see when it should be posted and what the themes of the competition should be, the event's calendar posting, making invitations to people who scene and sending them out to ensure we get good actors, another hour or two shopping for or making props (mostly making to save money), another hour or two making or begging for prizes, and then another hour or two to set the props up and build the settings. That's just the pre-event work. Next, half an hour before the event, I send out a reminder IM to people, TP people into the event, Ask people in IM who is willing to perform, Create groups for scenes based on my RL experience in theatre and people's scening capabilities, make everyone feel good about their contributions, Ask for audience votes for best sceners, reward best sceners, reward all sceners (taking time to send them stuff while still keeping the event going by simultaneously adding to chat) and celebrating our successes and thanking the audience for attending. This is hardly expecting to be paid to party.

In making these events I am doing something valuable. The problem is that with the limitations of the environment, I can't currently fit more than 20 or 30 people without the whole thing lagging all to heck. ALSO it seems fair that I should get a little money for doing all this work that ADDS TO CONTENT in SL. You're telling me that people will and should only ever pay for 3D content? What are people to actually DO in world then? Events as they are, as they were called earlier in the thread, unsustainable if people do it as a volunteer activity. It is in LLs interests to see a flourishing events calendar.

If there were no dwell, there would be no events and the game would certainly die. Dwell is the slim little thread supporting events. Cut that and that is the end of the whole affair. No more clubs, no more events, nothing to do but fly around and build chairs.

IF SL is interested in growth (and as we have seen growth certainly means RL money for makers of 3D content) then it must also necessarily be interested in giving people other than experienced 3D designers something to do in game. AND if you are a merchant or even a money trader, this is of importance to you. IF events go, your customers go with them. People buy lovely items to wear OUT. IF i'm staying in, the tshirt and skirt I made with sliders will work just fine for apparrel coz who is gonna see em? If I have a club and want to make it a fun place for people I buy things like furniture, poseballs, club gear, games, etc. BUT if i have 0 incentive to run a club (no way to make money from it or even break even) why would I need to buy all that stuff? Why would I pay land teir?

The only way for most events to break even (and trust me, we have sought out and received sponsorships at the spa, but one has to decide, ultimately, if one is going to beg or do events because there are limited hours in the day) the only way for them to break even is to rely on unpaid work of events hosts OR for events host funding to return.

This isn't the bush administration. This is a vehicle for entertainment. People play it to be an active part of that entertainment. Events are key for this. SL's rationale behind cutting events host funding was that the events calendar was thriving, but I can say for certain that many of the fun events I liked have almost disappeared. I keep making them, volunteering my time to do so, but it is frustrating to be basically told by people on the forums that what you do isn't worth anything. or you would be making money doing this if you weren't so damn stupid. We are neither at the spa. We make great events and we spend as little money as possible to do that. We have consistent sponsors. We pay staff modestly to let them know they mean something to us and their work is important. Yet we lose money because there is no way to recoup money effectively from the people who attend events. Events Directly Benefit SL. SL should pay for events to continue through paying events hosts. It makes not only sense, but dollars and cents for everyone.

If you are doing something valuable, then charge those 20-30 people a cover fee for the event. You will quickly find out if it is, or is not valuable. It's basic supply and demand, if there is demand, and you are the supply, people will pay you for it.

Since you know you are limited in capacity, perhaps even sell tickets in advance. None of these concepts are alien. This are all basic business concepts. I don't understand the confusion.

The concept of providing these services in a 3D world vs a real world isn't really all that different -- you pay the owner of the venue a fee for using it, and you charge your audience a fee for the performance. The goal here is to get the venue fee lower than the revenue from the event itself.

Honestly I have no idea what type of event you are talking about -- but hell, I may even show up myself if the result is as good as indicated here.

I agree that dwell needs to be explained better and much better formula. I have yet to figure out how dwell is actually calculated. Yesterday, my dwell was at 1500, today its at 2200, yet my dwell bonus went up only L$7. Which is L$1 more than when my dwell was at 3300. What gives?