Which technological advances have made a difference to your building and shopping?

I remember an SL with no sculpted or flex prims, and really primitive lighting. Then Havok 4 and Mono came around and broke a few scripts. Now there's talk of a new lighting system.

I know, women will never go back to non flex hair and skirts. But other than that, have any of the advances made in SL over the past, say two or three years changed your business or shopping habits in a major way? Ruined a product line? Made you unable to compete? Given you handhold that let you break in? Would you turn back the clock or put something back into the box if you could?

As strictly a shopper I have to say no. I really don't put any thoght into the how's and why's of the products I buy. I look, I like, I buy. If it doesn't suit me for any reason, it gets trshed, end of story. In general most things have improved quality and function wise, but I really don't dwell on it much.

Turning back some economical aspects.

Unlike RL, in SL the competition raises prices to abnormal levels.
E.g. a simple object, with a simple script is now easily put for sale for like 300 L$, while in 2007 it was like 75L$ for the same kind of item.
Also the landmarket, should be more realistic, because of the increasing land prices and thus tiers, merchants/builders extra raise their prices ontop of the competition levels already in places.
E.g. many land is offered for like 1prim/7L$ value or even more.
(don't believe those 1 linden buy/claim adverts for land, cause the tiers are going to be in the same pricing as mentioned above, when bought.)
this is absurd.. and not in the interrest of anyone on the big scale.
If this doesn't stop, both elements, i forsee a major decrease in sales all together (and a real economical crisis with the linden dollar balances/power in relation to products, just like in RL: this would hurt LL deeply, and might need to close their doors, or part of it, and that would affect all residents on the long term, reason: because people simply cannot afford it anymore to buy or it's not worth the price asked for it.

Thumb rule in sales: better have many low prices sales than a few sales for high prices. e.g. 5000 (for 50 linden a piece) small ones make better marketing and more income in the end, then 1000 (for 100 linden a piece) big sales. cos reality shows, the lower the price the easier it will be sold. That's called advertising and competitive sales. (price your items lower then the compatitor.. if the goodie is the same type/feature rich, just like in RL)
so, 1000 big sales is realistic in SL, and it will be hard too to keep that amount for that money, if people find the same goody elsewhere for 50l$

especially now, people are more comparing products from different providers, mainly on price/features.. since their RL wallet is holding them back to just easily spend for virtual goodies.


thirdly, quality.. many people start businesses, without knowing what they do.. infact most malls/shops etc.. don't sell geniune items anymore, but resell it. (either stolen goodies, or through reseller vendors given out by the real builder/shop)
This way, you see a decrease in quality and originality of objects on the grid, sold.

Infact, i hardly see any new inventions or items anymore, most are all the same, with just a different texture, on them. (look at clothing/shoes etc.. most are the same in shape, or features.. and are put for sale everywhere, with only a different item name labeled. and thus different prices..)

2007 e.g. there where many new inventions, and original items brought into the grid for sale or freebie..

so, currently it's mainly roulation of the same stuff.... no (or hardly) real new products are brought into roulation.

it's time to invent a new type of wheel, instead of keep on rolling the same wheel over and over..

E.g. in ancient times, there was only the stone wheel.. unpractical, etc..
then cam the wooden wheel (with metal ring to stop the wood from harm) this was more practical.. but it could do better..

so, in the early 20th century (1900 - 2000) it became made out of rubber kind of material.. a completely new invention, that steered up the mass, and the use.

I think the biggest change for my shopping is the sculptie prim. I have just completed (well, it will never be totally complete) a very large garden and had to use 1 prim sculptie plants. These look every bit as good as the older 3 to 6 prim kind. While going shopping for plants I had to completely disregard the older kind, and those vendors were left in the dust I'm afraid.

I also like the way some clothes and avatar parts can be made one size fits all by using a sculptie along with a transparent prim to hide the body parts that may stick out. (I'm not exactly sure how this works, but that's what it seems to be.)

Also I think Windlight had an effect on the market. I certainly might not have considered buying a horse, and several aricraft, and a boat if I still had the same predictable skies to look at. Much as we griped about Windlight at first - those gripes I think were only about the garish presets. You can make it look very natural.

This is just the sort of thing I'm asking about. You switched from 3 to 6 prim plants to single sculpties, leaving the old style in the dust. I'm wondering how the plant makers who haven't recognized the need to change feel about that.

You also mentioned Windlight--which I DID consider, but I didn't think it would affect peoples buying decisions much, yet it was key in affecting your decision to buy quite a bit of new content.

Say Moo's comments, (while I agree with much of it) were a bit beyond my the scope of my question. Tho, I disagree with the part about a simple script increasing the price of a simple item. As an example, the first video screens that were capable of displaying YouTube videos were astronomical. Then the newer ones were reasonable, and now you can get them for free.

I've also noticed there are some established content creators who DON'T seem to pay much attention to the latest trends. Yet, they seem to do just fine.

Things I'm seeing that are scooping up my shopping Lindens are open shoes with realistic-looking toes, greater availability of well-matched pant cuff prims instead of that too-short 70's style pant flare, clothing offered in multiple layers, more easily adjusted prims. And a greater attention to textures.

While these aren't technological advancements, they show an ever-improving skill on the part of the designers.
I wish more of them would spend more time and talent on creating well-detailed textures than slapping on prims that always just end up looking like slapped-on prims, especially in windlight.

You mentioned "Made you unable to compete? Given you handhold that let you break in?"
Like Say Moo said, quality has a lot to do with it. We like to blame SL's avatar mesh, lighting issues, etc but there are several creators out there perfectly capable of producing wonderful product within those restrictions.

We spent several hours yesterday just wandering through malls that we have not seen before in hopes of finding something new and wonderful. We didn't. We found the same old same old displayed in intricately, elegantly designed shops that conveyed to us that the owner must think their goods are a gift from the Gods. The stores were empty. The designers do not compete and they aren't going to get a handhold if they don't start to produce quality that people will actually spend their Lindens on.

Designers: If you don't know what is meant by quality, stop slapping your Photoshop doodles on shirt templates and start studying what the popular creators are doing.
I spend a lot of Lindens on clothes. But I want value for it.
Hint: if your stuff isn't selling, don't blame your marketing. Word of mouth is powerful in SL. Instead take a look to see if you are actually selling what people are looking for.

Wow, this turned into a rant. I guess I'm tired of the mindboggling mass of shops out there selling utter nonsense.
I know people have to start somewhere and that practice is important, but don't expect to practice your craft at my expense.

</rant>

computers and corp banks working together...
i think that's been the biggest impact on my shopping experience

Most of my products were the result of either technological advances or discoveries I made about how the technology worked. Certainly, I made new products based on HUDs and Camera Control, and llGetParcelDetails significantly enhanced another.

I'm not sure where the idea that competition is driving prices _up_ comes from. In a world with savvy consumers competition should always drive prices down. The only counter possibility is that new consumers are getting so lost in the sea of businesses that they are just buying from places they find early on - which has always been observable to some extent.

(Although some very old products might have increased in price as a result of changes, due to the loss of the universal stipend. Back in th'old days, a product for L$50 or less was effectively free because the buyer would have recieved an L$50 stipend that week, so pricing items that low was a fair strategy for making money by "salami slicing".)

A very few technological changes have hurt products - certainly, for example, the availablility of llDetectedTouchUV rendered pointless a fair amount of work I had done on one product.

If any changes have hurt my SL, they have been social changes, and there have been far more of those than technical changes over the past few years.

this is a test reply.. I'll delete it momentarily

The thing with "trends" is that not everyone has the same wants/needs and there is always a trade-off if you are going to adhere to trends.

Fashion is a great example. If you are really into fashion, then you follow the latest trends. You know that the drop waist is "in" this year and lavender is "out." So, you as a connoisseur, follow the trend. However, your sister who could not care less about trends and loves lavender and empire waist dresses will likely wear what she likes without thought to what is trendy right now. No matter that lavender is "out," there are plenty of people who love the color and will buy/wear it.

Content creation in SL follows similar rules. Sculpted shoes may be very, very trendy and everyone who is anyone is making sculpted shoes. However, not every buyer wants shoes that look like blobs when they first rez and thus they don't like sculpted shoes - they are still buying prim based shoes and keeping those creators in business. So, what happens in the marketplace is that trend concious creators will grab the business of trend concious buyers. Plenty of buyers coudn't care less about "what is hot right now" and they buy things that meet their needs/wants.

There are drawbacks to following trends as well, the main one being older content that needs to be refreshed. Everyone may be using sculpted pillows on their furniture now, but there are hundreds of thousands of pieces made before sculpties and not every content creator is going to go back and rebuild their old stuff.

The other drawback is supporting new features, especially scripted ones. There is a constant flow of NEW! IMPROVED! products for builders -- usually scripted. Anything you put into a product for sale is something that you have to provide support for as well. Some builders will throw every bell and whistle on the market into their stuff just to help close the sale. Others subscribe to the KISS philosopy (keep it simple, stupid) and stick to what they are willing to support. Customers can always add their own bells and whistles aftermarket - as many do.