tier donations versus tier leverage

Commune
Grid Commune

8 players - Gridded sim - Tier donations
320 $ - 8 shares of 40 $
Equity holder is the only officer
No land priviliges to other 7 members.
10% skim off the top tier worth 19.50 $
19.50$ bonus value per month

Island Commune

8 players - island sim - paypal equity holder
195 $ - 8 shares of 25 $
All players are officers of their own parcel
Land privileges for all
no skim tier, but 15 $ savings to each player.
120 $ savings per month


winner - island commune

Landlording
Tier nation
players pay LL standard tier fees to LL
players don't pay land equity
players have no control over their land
benevolent despot holds land equity
benevolent despot collects 10% skim tier for other purposes
benevolent despot chases around grid pleasing the tier nation subjects so they don't quit and move to landshe

player benefit - no equity
player loss - no land control
despot benefit - 10% skim tier (which amounts to 24% IRR*)
despot loss - chasing around the grid changing radio stations and planting trees

* 10 % skim = 19.50$ value per month (on prime land rate of 1 sim = 195 $) on 1000$ value of land = 240$/year on 1000 USD. IRR = potentially 24% (less on mature land)


Island Nation
players pay LL standard fee to landlord
player has full land control
land lord pays equity
landlord pays LL prime tier rate
landlord administers zoning and disputes

player benefit - cheap land or no equity in land, land control
player loss - not on the grid
landlord benefit - 150% IRR (low end - 78%)*
landlord loss - none that jauani can see

*
8 tenants @ 40$ each = 320 $; 320$ gross minus 195 LL fee = 125 $ net per month; 125 $/m * 12 = 1500 $ / year; 1500$ on 1000$ sim investment = 150%

4 tenants @ 75$ each = 300 $; 300$ gross minus 195 LL fee = 105 $ net per month; 105 $/m * 12 = 1500 $ / year; 1260$ on 1000$ sim investment = 126%

2 tenants @ 125$ each = 250 $; 250$ gross minus 195 LL fee = 65 $ net per month; 65 $/m * 12 = 780 $ / year; 780$ on 1000$ sim investment = 78%


winner - island nation

Jauani,

Your use of the loaded, biased, and tendentious terms "despot" and "skimming" and "benevolent dictatorship" for *the same functions* in different land groups -- namely "landlord" and "collecting rent" reveal your considerable bias in this research.

Could we get the public notecard available on public inworld notecard givers for the terms to JAUANI NATION? I think such things don't exist. But could they? And why not? Just publish your rates and your terms, Jauani, so we can see how YOU do it in JAUANI NATION with its exclusive, guided, and gated and steered high-class clientele living on half sims or quarter sims or mainland islands or whatever they do.

You've also factually misrepresented some of the features, i.e. the officers in the group on the land in Anshe's private island can't terraform or plant, they can only return prims.

I continue to be mystifed as to your motivation for continuing this slam begun over in Polysci, with such zeal and vengeance. It's a direct slam on me and my business, of course, since I'm the only one running rentals with this type of tier donation as a portion of my business. I don't fear such a slam because my business is an open book, I'm happy to answer any questions about it, and your efforts to deride me and run down my reputation only make YOU look bad.

In Tier Nation, I have as a standard feature the turning on of temporary land edit to enable tenants to terraform and plant.

Anshe can do that too but she has to do it then, not give me the edit (she used to give temp edit but now she wants to preserve a "look" and I cannot blame her). In Adam's islands, I'm not sure you get any terraform access whatsoever, we'd have to hear about that. You can clear trees, but not terraform land, I'm told. It's the same private island, and living on it with a deed, or as a tenant, gives you no terraforming privileges whatsoever -- your group with officers is not a land group owning the property like on the mainland, Jauani.

Could you go and buy some of this land and walk through the steps to get better educated on its realities? Or perhaps I'll be forced to make you an officer of my group holding a deed on Anshe's land so you can physically see it and stop making your false claims here? I'd really hate to do it. Just go talk to Anshe or Adam and you'll see.

To describe tenants as having "no" control over their land on the mainland and "total control" on the islands is silly, and false.

Tenants can have land edit, be in FIND PLACES, have a name put on their plot, get their selection of URLs, etc. on the mainland, in my rentals or other peoplel's rentals -- including your own, I imagine. I bet I have more freedom on builds than you do because I don't screen and filter my clients' lists -- anyone can click on my box because my boxes are visible in world to click on by anybody, and anybody can get my rentals latest listings either from me or my notecard takers.

They have to ask for land access customization, but they get it automatically. It is their automatic right as a tenant.

On the islands, they can't edit land. They can't be in FIND PLACES to my knowledge (at least it is not offered to them in the offering, which I have a copy of as an owner myself) and they face what could be a very arbitrary system of building codes.

People like to have alternatives, Jauani. Some are happy to live in Island Nation. Some are happy to live in Tier Nation which is what you laughingly call it. Tier Nation has a very small population compared to the rest of my cash-paying tenants who have the same rights and freedoms as they have in Jauani Nation on the mainland.

What your research indicates -- thanks for all that number crunching that show me to an advantage -- is that people can have a very good deal with me!

Unlike "Island Commune" they don't have to be hippie socialists and share everything, trust officers that could steal their land, and have some really tight-knit community and complicated governance procedures like Neualtenberg.

Unlike "Island Nation" they don't have to considerably enrich and line the pockets of land barons in the game just to have non-griefed and pretty land.

In "Tier Nation" they pay LL, not a land baron, in US dollars off their credit card. In "Tier Nation" they don't have to go to boring committee meetings or face the wrath of the real "benevolent dictators" who are the people running island sims on a whim and collecting considerable personal information to boot.

In "Tier Nation" they are free, Jauani, which is why you and other land barons don't like them. In "Tier Nation" they follow a set of open procedures visible to all and understandable to all. They come and go as they please. In the rent-to-buy they get low prices. In the buy they get low prices. In the rent they get low prices. And I do my best to give them good views and low-lag sims. I can't be as effective as an island in that regard because I'm on the mainland with more surprises, but then they get more socializing, access, LIFE, than they have on gated communities in islands which are still pretty dead (people fled to them to get away from griefing, built their houses, decorated them, and then began to wonder what to do next and ran back to the mainland to look for action).

benevlent despot was a joke - a reference to gwyn's post. get a sense of humour
skimming - it can be good - skim milk is good for you.

collecting rent and skimming bonus tier are indeed different things. the tenant gives you rent. bonus tier is like a secret level prize for somehow convincing somebody to actually use that function, particularly after they have compared donation with leverage. it's like finding the warp zone straight to level 8!

something something slam zeal vengeance - what are you talking about? i posted my numerical analysis. it doesn't even have your name in it. if you are refering to the other thread, i repeatedly said you provide a great and beneficial service to your tenants with your hobby. get a life prok. "GET A SECOND LIFE!"

your welcome for the number crunching. i got the sense after a while that math wasn't your strong suit. i don't know what your strong suit is, but from your conclusion after reading my post, it's probably not math.

maybe you are looking for a fight prok, or maybe you have some guilty concience not giving all your alts fancy pocket watches, but i have never said you are providing a bad service or that people should stop renting from you. despite the fact that you advertise scripted radios that don't work as an incentive.

why don't you make sense? i cry real tears of frustration!

Jauani, I've saved a copy of your analysis. Every once in a while these forums have truely useful information. Thanks for taking the time to summarize this in a readable form.

thanks akane.

here's a link to another analysis people might find useful. link

we tried to buy up a sim in the old sims (+/-100 meter terraform). we got most of the sim, but there were two absent landholders, one governor plot, and two people who wouldn't sell. trying to get an entire sim is hard.

we sold all our land and the resulting l$ and bought an island sim with the cash. there was some money left over. that's <1 mainland sim for 1 island sim.

the fee for half a sim is $97.50 which is much less than the $125 in 1/2 sim tier i was contributing earlier. $127.50 in savings.

we also con't get crossover lag from adjoining sim, and we don't have much lag in our sim from what we consider frivolous scripts.

I do not advertise scripted radios that don't work. That's silly. WHere did you get that garble?

Oh, you joke and call me a dictator and a despot, but Anshe and Adam, your pals, are just "landlords". And you are just a "landlord".

I will review the math. It looks suspect in several areas, but I'll get back to you after work.

I think the word portion of your text is so tendtenious that you need to check the math too.

Fortunately, many people are used to reading the forums upside down, like Soviets used to read their press, and they see when land barons and island magnates are flogging themselves at the expense of others, and they "do the math".

My alts don't have pocket watches. Do yours?

Stoneself, the frequent use of the word "we" indicates the degree of shared interest, cooperation, and closeness you need for "Island Commune".

"Tier Nation" doesn't require that of its tenants. They don't have to know or like each other or me. They just click the box.

Ah, freedom!

Stand up, Tier Nation!

island nation seems cheaper, and just as useful. look how successful anshe land is.

ok prok, why would anyone want to have a tier donation and pay more when they could have tier leverage and pay less? in both cases they would be members only, and only the despot/landlord would be the officer. so um why why why does anyone want to pay more moeny if both arrangements are structurally equal according to you???

I really like the island commune idea for owning land. I think the hard part would finding people that were commited to continue the idea. But we would all save on tier costs and get more in the long run.

Nyx and I might have to ask around a bit with some of our land holding friends and see if anyone wants to do this with us.

Island Commune requires lots of close cooperation and trust to have all the people in it sharing equally as officers over the land. Island Nation, with *it's* "benevolent dictator" of Anshe or Adam (and let's just call them "landlords", is going to have restrictions in order to keep the sim having a "nice look". They won't pass on all their savings and discounts because they'll want to make that fat profit Jauani mentioned. Whereas those in Island Commune, if they want to be all sharing the same bed, can pass on savings -- but then be in each others' laps as to issues of who terraforms, who gets prims, etc.

Island Nation has a big sim that cost $995, with $195 tier on it -- and no way to unload it unless they sell *the entire thing*. They can't cut up pieces of it. One person gets stuck! Island Commune is no better off, with the potential of 8 people fighting over who will have to sell the one sim they can't divide!

Tier Nation can unload pieces or parts or the whole thing any time, depending on how long one is willing to wait for a good price.

So why isn't Tier Nation, then better, whatever the discounts? Less risky for an investor, more flexibility given the volatile investment environment, and less work -- the Lindens do the creation of the sim and they usually make it looks its best! I defy you to explain that, Jauani.

If I buy 4096 of land, I'll pay let's say $15,000 on the auction or $30,000 in-world, I'll pay LL $25 in tier, and I'll have to fend for myself as to view unless I get lucky.

If I rent 4096 of land, I'll obviously charge no up-front purcase price, no tier as such, and just pay rent charged 1000-1500 depending on location, i.e. size of house and waterfront. (I used to keep a standard price list but decided to raise prices recently to better reflect the actual cost to me and the dips in the GOM.)

Expressed in LL terms, a tenant would have to pay Linden Labs LL 1562 if they were to rent the same land, i.e. $25/month. 4096 actually gets you 4608 if you have a premium account.

What does it *actually* cost me for 4096 if I'm at a sim-level tier? It costs me $0.0295 per square meter, if $195 gets you 66048 square meters (tier level including the 512).
So I have that 4096 for $12 in tier. I can charge $1000 LL per week, or $4000 per month (most people, living with a roomie, aren't going to spend a lot more than their $500 stipend) and make $16, that is a $4 profit over my $12 cost -- assuming the GOM stays at $4.00/1000 -- but what if it doesn't?

But what will I do with my big $4 profit, if I had a cash rent, or my big "free" 4096 that generated me 40 more square meters of tier? Given the realities of the mainland, that money often gets spent on buying other lots in the area to keep the view. It's the single most expensive factor if you make the decision not to buy whole sims, not half sims, but just waterfront or just mountain view on a variety of sims. For me, the neighbourhood is just better and more stable if it does not consist entirely of my rentals but has neighbours who own and create beautiful builds or preserve wilderness or work to add value. I could do all that myself on a sim, and have done that but it is very hard to maintain, especially due to people not willing to take over commons and not having enough prims.

I'm picking one tier level to make this point -- the fact is at lower and higher levels there isn't as much of a profit. It's why I imagine the Lindens themselves rarely seem to put up 4096 plots and they are scarce in world.

Still, even with these lesser profits and hardships, I believe Tier Nation allows for a longer-term successful business for me and better and more free and flexible neighbourhoods for tenants.

Because people only want 4096 or even only 1024, they don't want to pay $195 just to get a bulk discount LOL. They don't want to have to get into a harness with 7 other people, evidently, and share an island. But this way, they can join with 7 other strangers who have nothing in common with them but the view, pay $5, get their 1024, or pay $25, get their 4096 with no purchase price, and live the life of Reilly.

You keep harping on this tier leverage business, as if everyone is a land baron calculating everything in terms of 66,048 m2 and $195. But they aren't. They are just people with $5.

By paying me their tier donation, they don't have to buy land, pure and simple. Yet they can always save and buy land if they like -- and that's what some do. They can see what they are paying -- regular dollars in the account on a credit card. They don't have to worry about a fluctuating GOM or inworld prices and the risk of land -- land they might get stuck with, unable to hold. I cushion the risk for them by taking that on myself.

What have they lost if a brick falls on my head? Nothing, they still have their tier level for the month and they switch it to a land purchase, cancel it, or find another person to donate to. In any event, my tier bill is paid at least for long enough for them to cancel without too much of a lost after the brick fall.

If they go into an Island Commune with 7 others, they're stuck if they want to leave. Who will buy them out? For how much? And what are they buying?

If they go into an Island Nation, they also have to find a buyer or take a buyback that is less. In my themed communities, I offer equal buybacks.

I'm describing this from the point of view of the consumer. If your point is, why does the landlord do this, I'd have to say because it gives flexibility. You can adjust, tier down, revise, move, etc.

Once you buy an island, you're stuck. When you buy $195 of tier, however, you can sell the land more easily on the mainland in pieces. Let's see what happens when the market is fully glutted with islands, and some of the wannabee Island Nation Dictators now get stuck and don't want to pay that $195 tier each month and haven't sold out their island plots yet. Then what?

Frankly, we can already see some of that now with some of the ensuing hysteria.

ok so what you are saying is that i am right, that leveraging is better deal for everyone involved and that strangers should rent on islands, but if they really want to be on the grid and can find a land hobbyist willing to provide them all kinds of benefits for no gain, then the grid works too? ok yes i agree. but your original question was why people don't donate tier more, and the answer, most of which you posted yourself, was that donating tier had too many problem.

this thread is simply a discussion of the financial advantage or disadvantage of holding tier in one account vs tier donation from multiple accounts. it's not about you or your hobby. why are you spamming this thread with your ravenglass propoganda?

I think you really ought to stop insulting me by calling my business a "hobby" Jauani, it only makes you look bad by sounding so snide.

Strangers aren't going to go in together on islands as officers all cooperating buying the whole sim because none of them can take a piece of it, only one can own it (talk about despots!). I don't get why you aren't noticing that.

Does land hobby-horsing undercut land barons in some way that they need to mount a full-scale assault on this rather benign, small operation? Does the amount of land I own compared to all of SL or the holdings of barons constititute some kind of threat? Why?
The Lindens always make more of it and you can always buy more. Plenty of it around unsold, too.

Have you ever played that game where 10 people pick up a person lying down on the ground seemingly as a deadweight, and hold that person up seemingly with just their little finger?

That's what tier donation is like, Jauani. For one person, it's a little finger. For 10 people, it picks up an entire body. For one person trying to pick up one body, it's damn heavy.

To be sure, each person takes a greater distribution of the weight -- the tier -- when there are 10 of them (if we try to continue this analogy). One person dragging a body might not pick up the same entire weight (they pay tier in bulk). But 10 people picking up an entire heavy body and holding it aloft with their little fingers seemingly as if on air is a delight to behold. That's what I'd like to see more of in SL. I do see some of it already as the result of my work and the work of others in communities I have started.

Great number crunching Wu. I don't own a ton of land but this is valuable info for project possibilities that require alot of space.

Number crunching isn't everything. Because numbers are abstract. You have to run these numbers also against SL realities -- and you have to also look at the errors in your statements here.

Here are some objections:



Who says you need 8 players with $40 each? You could have one player get a significant discount by paying a larger part of the tier in US dollars then asking the others to pay him back in LL, at least a portion, i.e. in rent. In fact some communities work that way with one player paying a lot of the tier, and a few others pitching in, or more than 8 on a sim, more like 10-16 if it is rentals.

Equity holder is the only officer

I don't get what this means here. You're jumping around between two models. First you said you had 8 who shared $40 tier levels. That means they are officers in the group and hold equity at the level of tier they put in.

No land priviliges to other 7 members.

Why? All 8 officers or all 20 officers on a sim sharing tier and land can have access to land.



wait, you picture one person buys a sim's worth of tier for $195, then collect tier from others on paypal? Or in LL dollars? Or? In fact, if Grid Commune, you have to have 2 or more players actualy sharing and paying tier. So the bonus value is not going to one person, but is spread. It doesn't make it advantageous, but it gives flexibilty.

Biggest advantage you left out: flexibliy.

Office A leaves, takes out his $40 tier level. You find another officer. The rest stay. Some could tier up for a month to cover. That officer is free to go anywhere else in SL with his paid, abstract floating tier. The others could, depending on the time of the month and days available in the window, get that land sold completely so as not to cover it. They all have freedom to cut their sim up and come and go. To be sure, having a commune means finding like-minded and that can be hard. That's why I prefer Tier Nation to Grid Commune.



These people, if they are in a land group, held by the tier of one person, have a 10 percent bonus that goes nowhere -- it has nowhere to go. What a loss!

Can 8 people donate tier on the Island Commune? No. Because only one person can buy the island and pay the tier on it, corret? If she groups her land, can she accept tier donations for 7 other people to hold the tier on the estate? I need to find that out but I figure you can. It's one way of making this more flexible.

But there's nothing "winning" about island commune *the minute* the first person leaves the island paradise. They can't sell that person's ownership unless they convince them to buy a deed. They can't put the land on right-click sale if they have to, maybe sell it for prims to someone on the other half of their sim if they are on a half sim. They have to hunt much harder for someone to *replace* their original person who was in the original intact vision of the Island Commune of Eight which is now foundering on the harsh rocks of day-to-day problems like who sweeps the prims. Now, Grid Commune looks better because they can turn over the land completely to that like minded and have more of a chance -- being a controlled, themed, zoned community on the mainland -- of finding a taker because that taker can completely own and operate and resell his land.


winner - island commune


The island dictator has to turn on the land edit, too. I know because I've now walked through the steps and seen how this works. The island dictator has the power to turn it on or not, and keeps it off until you ask. Well tier nation leader is no different, he turns it on when you ask, and does it much faster than island dictator, I might add.

The "skimming of the tier" by tier nation leader is no different than the harvesting the payments of the rents/deeded properties on island dictatorship. Island dictators have to pump out those rents and tiers weekly or monthly from their subjects, who pay them less than they would pay LL, but more than what you as the dictator wuold be paying LL. So you skim as island dictator in fact, and you even skim a hell of a lot more. Your notion of Tier Nation is an idealism, since it doesn't exist in nature -- my rentals group has mainly cash payers for example with a small number of tier donors.



Incorrect, as noted. The islands' owners don't turn on land edit and trees as a default, and you must ask to get it. You must ask to get it from the tier nation leader too.

The "despot" of tier nation does as much chasing as island dictator -- if island dictator doesn't have to turn on radios, he's got other problems which are malfunctioning rentomatics, days and days of customer service delay, and building code disputes. This is big! These disputes get so bad for some they come back to the mainland. Imagine!




Player does not have full land control. I triple checked again by visiting two island nations. Neither had land edit and planting on. You have to ask for it upon purchase, and that can take days to deliver. It doesn't happen instantly. Tier nation gives it within 24 hours automatically as a default. Island nation gives it on a disretionary basis if it doesn't mess up their "look". Please re-examine this issue, Jauani, you have the facts wrong.



Player loss here is lost time in customer service delays or lack of full control over the land -- no terraforming or planting at all.

Landlord loss? You've got to be kidding. Try getting stuck with one full private island not selling, with $195 tier to pay, and absolutely no flexibility to sell off pieces of it, or rent it differently -- then come talk!
*




No, winner will be tier nation on whole sim that is not a commune -- tier nation is what gives the most flexibility, the best forms of ownership, the most access to land, the quickest access to land. You'll see.

Indeed, your fear that it *will* be the winner is what prompted this attack : )

Well, Im glad to hear it was readable to someone. Im hopelessly confused about it.

Is it a comparison? Is it an ad? Is Winner a descriptor or part of the proper noun? Without some context setting in an introduction, and maybe some conclusions drawn ... I don't know how to read this. I tried just plowing thru it from top to bottom but got lost.

Now that I know it made sense to others, I can go back and see if I can find the piece that Im missing that will help it make sense for me.

Maybe this is part of a continuing discussion and I just need to find the beginning.

Thanks

Numbers are cold hard facts hon!

Good work Prok, I didnt notice it either but he did take one of the worst ways to teir a grid commune. Just teir it to 1 person like you said and collect from others just like an island and suddenly that $320 becomes $195. Very skewed!

Is that what its about? I had a terrible time figuring out what it was about from the initial post. I got hopelessly lost trying to figure out what the numbers meant. I thought I was missing something because there didn't seem to be any kind of introduction setting a context, or any sort of conclusions.

I finally decided to keep plowing thru it hopeing something in other posts would shed some light, or maybe refer to the post where the beginning of the conversation, that this is the middle of, was located.

Thanks for the clarification

Now I can go back and reread some of this with some sort of clue about what its trying to say.

Actually, I've found that once you get into them, numbers are hardly factual. It all depends on which numbers are being discussed, which are being tucked away for future consideration, which are being applied in conjunction with what logic.

So, I generally never believe numbers, particularly if they aren't accompanied by some text that explains the assumptions going in, the sources of the data, and the bias built into the forumula.

But that is just my view

jauani is essentially 'warring' against all group land, which is somewhat understandable given as how he has a vested interest in subletting out islands made to order now.

So yeah, the numbers are quite jaded and unrealistic

thats not how *REAL* groups manage land on the mainland, and i should know, i manage the land for 3 of them

Exactly! And in this thread the assumption should have been: "Hey I picked 1 person teir model for the island sim and to make things skewed in my favor I picked an 8 person teir model for the grid sim instead of the 1 person teir model for the grid because then the costs would have been exactly the same."

Yes, Chris, you hit upon it exactly, and I'm kicking myself for not seeing that initially either, because I was fixated, too, on the model of the 8-person all-equal hippie commune that will fit the hippie group tools we have now, which distribute everything exactly equally. But if the hippies would just nominate one soul brother to buy the tier at the best possible deal level, i.e. $195, then he can resell to them at a discount for exactly what he got, i.e. $24.75 now instead of $40.

Jim, this thread starts back in the SL Polysci forum with the question: "Why don't people donate tier to manage sims?" It gets buried in polysci, but it was put there because I viewed it originally as a kind of organizational/polysci question -- why can't people just get along and pool resources to get the discount and the boons of cooperation?

Jauani then came and analyzed it in terms of economic advantage, and cooked the numbers to portray the worst-case scenario for Island Nation, and even put the worst possible spin on the polysci feature by calling "Tier Nation" (my concept) to be run by "Despot" but Island Nation (where the rules are more harsh! where the profits, i.e. extraction, is greater!) to be run by the more neutral "landlord" or "grid commune" to be run by "landlord" though we all know that communes can be run by people who make stuff like Jim Jones punch.

Now, why did he do that? Well, for one, he seems to want to go into the private island dealing business. I'm not sure he is actually IN that business. He announced he was retiring from land barony, he sold a lot of his land (I bought some of it!) and he then tried to tier down (I bought even more of it!). I think he wanted to be out of the market during the glut caused by the New Continent and Anshe's deeded private sims hitting at the same time (my, that was a bit of expert planning, but, whatever...).

That land glut made some midbie barons crash out and dump their holdings or liquidate for a song. It made others hang on for a rough ride. My own sense is that the rentals business improved somewhat merely because more people came in the game at this time (the whole reason for the New Continent thingie was because the Lindens saw lots of new numbers coming in). But by and large, the land market seems flatter for all kinds of reasons, the land glut, the performance and log-in issues, summer, etc.

Anshe's islands are the Linden's greatest competition for the New Continent, but the Lindens caving to the no-telehub crowd means lots of land sits out there unpurchased and even unlived in when bought. After the initial exoticism bubble, it crashed quite a bit and Anshe had to slash prices as did others. Jauani wasn't in the market during this period except for maybe renting and keeping some trading tier open with some prime mature waterfront which still sells even at 9.5 even on the mainland (lots competing with it out in the NC tho).

For various reasons to protect my group from attack and seizure, I asked Jauani and Gwyn and others to come in as additional officers. I trust them not to sell the land out from under me, which is what you have to do with officers. But both of them, once they saw my business, seemed to be amazed that I had more land than they thought, and began to think about my tier-donation program (not involving very many people) and I guess began to think it posed some kind of challenge to them and their programs? And both of them immediately repaired to the forums to bash me and call me a dictator, because evidently they don't like to see any independent force, even a small one, arise in the game that they'd like to rule at their end of it. So they'll campaign against alternatives that involve management of sims but not through socialism, either through the Nberg set and it's angry campaigns against "exploiters of the people" (which include the Lindens, P.S.) or through the angry campaigns against "hobbyists" and "despots" who just run sims at a bare margin -- and then undercut the "real players" like Jauani making a good profit off the land market.

Except that I think the real story is that neither Jauani or even Anshe Chung really makes much money off this land market made out of pixels because it's a utopian dream that just hasn't really become established as even a virtual reality yet.

Right at the time Ulrika began posting her ads for Nberg, the new private sim, the new low-cost subscriptions, etc. I had my ads up for one M and one PG community where you could donate tier to get the same amount of land, rent, or rent-to-buy. This last bit -- rent-to-buy is attractive because no island can offer that -- you get to own your very own land. My projects are more like homesteading (I call it that) meaning I don't build nice roads on top of the Lindens' roads or hold your hand with lots of activities pre-terraforming, you pretty much are on your own. So I don't expect my communities to sell like a house a fire with those themes but they are an experiment.

A lot of people in this game like to be left alone, though. They don't want to join a thing that is going to have committees and town meetings and government sessions all the time, and that's what is happening on the private sims. They also want customer service to happen a little faster. And I'm not the only one doing this. Obviously, Taber, Slate, Lusk, Alviso, and other communities are doing exactly the same thing, making a theme, sharing tier, picking building or game or whatever projects to do, and even opening up rentals to the public. It's my own feeling that model has more to offer than the private islands but what's good is that we now have a variety of plans to chose from.

In the usual SL fashion, however, this is about the Soviet anecdote: if my neighbour has a cow, get the state to take away his cow, and kill it. Don't have me strive to get a cow, too. Anybody can get a cow in this game, they don't have to get it by forcing the state to kill other people's cows. That's just spite -- but there's never any shortage of that here is there?