Phillip Rosedale leaving SL

Phillip Rosedale announced he is stepping down from the leadership of SL:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20427347.200-philip-rosedale-the-web-needs-to-be-more-lifelike.html[URL]What does this mean for SL?

In the above article, he outlined his vision for the future of virtual worlds. The article got several negative responses about SL. Why are some people so hostile to SL?

Is there another virtual world out there that doesn't involve fighting, living in a luxury apartment, or on a farm, where you can create your own art and sell to others, promote your RL business or cause, and then go to Burning Life later and take part in a fire procession?

i didn't see where it said people were hostile to SL but hostile to virtual worlds in general..
A lot of people don't even like computers let alone virtual worlds..

I thought he had announced this some time ago.

He was still working with the company, but will be going into another venture now.

That was announced at least a couple of weeks ago.

Wow, guess I'm a bit late. But the question remains, what now for SL?

We've heard this from LL before, that they wanted residents to sorta govern themselves. 2-3 years ago.

/me looks around for tools that LL provided to enable this. Hm..

Smile. Pretend stuff is abfab. Focus on big-business customers.

Hmmm, indeed. Given the way that SL is currently set up, with all real power invested in the hands of those who own land, any "self-government" we see here is likely to be rather interestingly feudal in nature. There are simply NO mechanisms for a truly collective self-governance. SL was NOT build for democracy.

/me starts casting around for a benevolent dictator or philosopher king. Any wealthy patrons of learning and the arts, a la Lorenzo de' Medici, out there who want to support a modest bookshop?

/me smiles brightly.

One cannot dispense justice without the tools to

1. Identify the guilty
2. Determine guilt beyond a reasonable doubt
3. Protect the innocent
4. Punish the criminal
5. Deter crime

The current situation in SL does not provide its residents with the tools to do this, except in extremely limited circumstances (i.e., you saw it happen with your own eyes on your own land). Even in that situation, the guilty can come back again with an alt and repeat the offense.

Nice point Lindal. Without these mechanisms, "justice" (so-called) becomes nothing more than an arbitrary exercise of power, the irony being that that "power" is all the while limited to booting someone (temporarily, because of the existence of alts) off your land.

So, both unjust AND ineffective. Sort of the worst of both worlds.

now WE take over!

Ok, maybe we DO need to revisit the idea of a sort of "enlightened despotism" after all . . .

You got that backwards, Jumpy.

In the time of Our Lord Philip, this used to be A World Imagined and Created By It's Resident's. That was the time when Resident's ruled.

Now we have a Virtual World Platform that can provide a Predictable Experience for Licensed Corporate Commerce and Educational Opportunities.

Elvis has left the building, folks. No more sequined codpieces for you.

Philip "Columbus" Rosedale jumped overboard in the middle of the ocean. Still no land in sight, but he gave up the misson and left the expedition. Seems he is not that type of man who would be able or willing to bring things to an successful end. This seems also to be a pattern through his biography. "New challenge" is just an euphemism for: no strength and leaving the scenery at the wrong time. Some sailors who are sticking to the real challenge (we) saw him paddling in his small red rubber boat in direction horizon with amounts of our good money and then he disappeared as a little small point at the sundown. He also took the compass and the sea charts.

Ship is now under command of some obscure grey people which entered the bridge one night, silent and secretly.

The crew has the impression that the new captains have no clue where to sail. We have cliffs in front and massive leakage at the hull plus fire at the stern.

This is the situation.

It is not longer our project.

It is time to buy some swimmies/water-wings on Xstreet or inworld.

I would think that the less Philip we have, the better for SL.

http://ondrejka.net/metaverse%20memory/2009/11/16/whats-in-a-name.html
Which pretty much explains a whole lot of what LL does. Fixing bugs is boring, meeting deadlines is stessful, listening to residents is depressing, etc so if there's noone around to crack the whip when they needs to then people generally just neglect those things because they can find things that - to them - are better uses for their time.

well i meant ME heheehehehehe. NOW I TAKE OVER~not WE!

Jumpman Linden for President!

maybe its a good thing he's leaving?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bettinatizzy/4113109358/