In these troubled times...

I suggest the Lindens lower tier for everyone!

Return stipends to basic accounts and raise them for paid accounts!

Put some money into the hands of the players, and let's get this SL economy moving again!

All things are relative. As server space goes, land in SL is extremely expensive. I pay $72/year ($6/month) for a premium membership. My land cost me about $8.00. That averages out to $6.66/month for 512 m2/117 prims. This is like renting space for a web page that is measured by the word.

I pay $99/year for 1/2 a gig of server space for my web sites. That's like renting three or four whole islands in SL terms.

It would be great if the price of land dropped. There are whole undeveloped sims in Eastern Gaeta so there is no shortage of land. Giving nonpremium members free land (a 512) would be a wonderful idea.

First Land used to be available to first time land buyers. They could get 512m for 512L.

The only problem was that the land barons created infinite new accounts to buy up all the First Land and immediately set them for sale at 5K.

Yes, and I suggest Homesteads for everyone !
Not only for full sim holders.

= residents will be happy, LL will be happy, IBM will be happy, real people will be happy.

OK, this post is shallow..but smart people make out its intention

Of course as a tier payer, I agree.... But, I have to disagree with basic account holders.. (if you mean free) 300L is nothing, i get it a day before the 1000 classified renewal and the 60L group liability.... which... why am I paying liability???



Yeah good for LL, bad for us poor working.. (or not) hobbists who just wanted some virtual land to build their dream homes..... "sigh"
Glad LL pockets are fat..

Free ice cream!

rotisserie chickens delivered to japan .. still hot.

Flickr acceded to demands from the Flickr group "We Demand Donuts!" and gave them donuts; see http://mashable.com/2008/04/12/flickr-donut-trip/ and http://www.flickr.com/groups/wedemanddonuts/discuss/72157604480415555/ .

So free ice cream from LL is not an impossible dream.

so basically youre letting me down gently and saying that i am SOL on the rotisserie chickens thing?

Yes THAT would be the business model, lowering your income as a company...

Indeed land IS expensive, but it does not show much thought to compare it with web page space. Why not compare it to blank printer paper?

We are part of an environment with pretty high costs. Forget about the server space, but think of the bandwidth used, for example. Of the Development team for a very innovative platform. Support team. Maintenance team. Costs that probably are much higher then the server costs.

Oh yes, give everyone in SL what the aussie govt did for us..."stimulation packages" for all...yaay

I'm not against freebies, I have a load of my own freebies available. But as time goes by, the number and quality of free items on offer increases. My theory is that freebies are increasingly the real competion that goods for sale faces.

Did we ever get that pony we were promised waaaay back when?

If not, then add that to the list of demands. Also put pie on that list, please and thank you!

Yay, stipends for infinite unverified anoymous accounts what a great idea, are you paying for it?

Anyone who pays tier or buys L$ will be, that's for sure.

No, I don't think that LL should raise L$ stipend or lower their fees. What I really feel they ought to do is make changes to the tier lvl system, so there are more choices for tier. Me, I'd like to add an additional 512 or even 1024 to my existing 4000.. err something number. (No coffee until MIL is taken care of for the day.) Instead, I'd have to go up to the $40 USD bracket, which is waaayyy more land than I need or want to pay for.

Adding more tier levels might allow those of us who can't afford the next tier lvl but can afford a bit more to do so.

Hold on... you just made me realize that with such an action, I can get rich quickly.

Sign up for 20 bots, thus getting my Places Search ranking up, AND earn 300 linden per account. that is 6k per week. Cool! Signup page here I come

And a chicken in every pot!
Why work for anything?
Gimme gimme gimme -

Mr. Gustav, you are absolutely right - run for Prez of SL - it worked for this guy

errmmmm.......

Well, unless I appear to be living on a different planet to LL.

I thought the cost of Hardware (Hard drive space, Memory etc etc) was falling all the time.

So, why should prims per parcel and the price of land not keep falling as the costs for creating, storing and running this data continues to fall?

There should obviously be a year on year price drop, or prim increase.

Or in a 100 years time, when you get a 50 terrabyte memory stick free gift in your box of cereals and you have more CPU power than you know what to do with. Are we still going to struggle on a 512 parcel with 117 prims?

Quoted for Truth.

why in a pot.. what does everyone have against rotisserie chickens???
just because you can get them...
dun forget about us poor underprivileged heathens...

The stipend for basic accounts was only 50L, and, if the Lindens would enforce their limits on the number of basic accounts you can have, it wouldn't be a problem. Every player could use a little pocket money, and I don't think anyone will get rich off 50L a week.

As far as asking a company to lower its income, did you ever think that allowing players to keep more of what they earn might spur economic growth in the community? Giving players a better incentive to invest in new sites and new products because they know they are going to make more of a profit will bring in more revenue for the Lindens in the long run.

Just today, one of my renters told me they would not be investing any more of their own money into their business until the SL economy shows signs of improving. They are not alone.

The SL economy is mirroring the RL economy. I'm not proposing some fake "stimulus" package, but rather a cut in "taxes" that will give people incentive for investment and provide long term economic growth.

That being said...

I personally am not in SL to make money. This is a game and I play it for fun. However, I can only keep my site going as long as it doesn't cost me a ton of RL money each month. I don't mind spending a little, but I can't afford to drain my bank account $300 each month so other people can have virtual sex.

I do want to see SL's economy grow, and I do want to see business thrive and people making money, because I enjoy SL and I believe that a good economy is needed to keep it going.

How about giving newbies and basic account holders free land with a few stipulations.

- 512m of land, for each newb or basic account holder
- This land is non-transferrable, which would deter land barons from snatching up land.
- You would have to apply to LL for the land, which would prevent bots from snatching parcels.
- And to sweeten the deal for LL and keep the land giveaway from going out of control, there would be a 1-time set up fee from users applying for the land of $10.00 USD. In the scheme of land prices, $10.00 land with no additional fees is still, for the most part, free.

This land would be directly tied to the account holder for the life of the account and permissions could not be tranferred, land could not be sold or deeded to a group, etc., etc. You get what you're given by LL (no choosing your land), take it or leave it, period. This land would obviously have limited permissions, but would allow the owner of the land to develop, rez, terraform, do everything they wanted aside from any transferring or selling of the land. Only the owner of the land would be able to rez prims, "allowing others to rez" permission would be locked out.

This would allow everyone to some development space, a shop, etc. Just a thought, has prolly been proposed before, I jus never read it.

~Chipleh

Giving a small stipend to basic account holders would not break LL. LL, basicly owns the printing press for Lindens. Storage is cheap. What the stipend would do is prevent newbies from arriving absolutely broke.

It would also allow them to make their own clothes (It's 10L/texture uploaded and GIMP is freeware.)

If you are concerned about bots, you can make the stipend a texture voucher. I doubt bots are much interested in making clothes.

Making a first custom t-shirt or first set of pretty underwear/bathing suit is a great feeling and it also helps bind newbies to Second Life.

As for first land, I think it would make land owners out of people who would never otherwise own land. I think that participation in Second Life follows a hockey stick or raised cat's tail model also called a J-curve. There's a small percentage of users who become severely hooked and who are willing to spend as much per month as a gym membership for their fun and who of course think nothing of the hours online. I guess as any one who has a premium membership I am in that group.

Then there is everybody else. Giving them some sort of 512 first home (I'd make them wait thirty days for it so they can get acclimated. Those thirty days were very good for me) might help change the participation curve shape.

It might also keep users from being tempted to camp or participate in other time wasting schemes for exploitation wages.

Second broke users are vulnerable to scams. Users with some L in their pockets are I think less vulnerable.

Now with this first land is going to have to come some education. I got some of this in my first thirty days, but I'm probably in that upraised cat's tail of the J-curve though I don't want to admit it to myself. Most of the builds on SL are for larger land holdings than 512 so a kind of bait and switch can happen.

Encouraging innovative ultra low prim houses, discussing uses for a 512, and generally educating newbies to what will be possible with a small build (Lots of small build neighbors helps with this) should help prevent the bait and switch blues.

What I wonder, is why LL should provide anything for users that are allowed to use the environment for free. Because in the end, who do you think is going to pay for it?

Don't get me wrong this is not a rant against basic accounts. Many of them spend more in SL then I do (wrong example, as I run a business). But why on earth should you:
1- get a free client AND
2- get free access to SL AND
3 - get free linden dollars AND
4- get free land

Honestly, you can get into SL, and create a great avatar, for zero lindens. Learn building in public sandboxes. What more do you want as free member? At some moment, you will have to throw in some lindens.

Slightly off-topic: to get more people to stay, they could try to improve the learning curve. Many people quit even before they find out what they can do.