I think its time to bring back "First Land"

First Land on a Linden estate that is run more like a conventional estate is probably the best way to go. That is, no resale - you have to abandon the plot. 512L isn't going to make or break anyone, and there would be no profiteering through the sale of the land (Rental is a different matter). And the only people eligible to purchase the new plot would be another newbie for 512.

They could manage a few sims this way, and have the abandoned plots default as going back up for sale to people who never bought land before. Most newbies outgrow it fast and pick up new land, larger plots, elsewhere. Or they could keep it as a low prim homestead.

I wouldn't restrict the content beyond the PG/Mature rules, but the flipping of land for profit would come to an end and more people would be happy.

You joined after the private sim price increase though: LL couldn't keep up with the sim orders and pretty much halted releasing first land and stuck to recycling a few abandoned parcels here and there.

Before November '06 LL would indeed just carve entire mainland sims into 512m² parcels. You'd generally have 1-2 sims at any given time, along with a few recycled abandoned parcels in random sims.

As tends to be the case, LL understated its own failure and overstated the residents' failure: there was widespread abuse, but a lot of that was due to LL's failure to bring new mainland sims up (be it full sim auctions or first land sims).

Mainland prices doubled, tripled and more solely because new land became scarce even though there was still a surging demand for land due to open sign-ups which made first land all the more attractive for the less honest land dealers.

True. But I recall there was always a lot of land for sale - by resellers. It's not that there wasn't enough land for everyone, there wasn't any reasonably priced land because of the career path that a few people took. And there wasn't enough first land to go around.

FL would still be fine as it was IF LL wanted to put forth effort in keeping it from being gamed. Over the years its very obvious LL wants all automated, and there is no way to automate a system to not be gamed. So, LL's answer to all gamed things is to either ignore it or simply do away with it.

Well like I said, in the current land climate, there is no margin to game first land. You can buy 512's for like 2k now. Back before the huge demand hit, LL used to put out like 4 sims at a time, two reg and two first land sims. Currently we are down to zero. Maybe putting out a first land could work to spur growth again.

I agree that SL needs a shot in the arm. We could all use it.

Wish LL realized that. It is certainly a shame that they don't.

First land, incentives for having a premium account, stipends, etc. (not to mention taking care of godawful problems that actually concern the average resident) - LL could do all kinds of things would get people to buy into the system and become long-term, happy residents, and we can all name those things, and have.

But I don't see any point in naming them, as LL seems to be actually trying to get rid of long-term, bought-into-the-system residents, in favor of what were once termed "tourists."

I don't know why - possibly because we are too hard to take care of, and they really don't like dealing with people.

My impression is that they have a long-term goal of having mainly a lot of corporations and educational institutions, with everyone else as tourists who come in to gawk at real-world goods, or to attend a class, or employees who attend meetings. That all sounds more high-toned, too, than regular players who run around buying clothes, having relationships, role-playing, and so forth.

I get the feeling that they basically allow us to hang around for now, because we keep paying them money. (And as far as I know, they still get most of our money from us, irksome though that may be to them.) But if they could make a go of it with mainly corporations and educational institutions, things would become much worse, much faster, for the average player.

This has been the trend for probably the entire time I've been in SL, as LL tries to remove all the "game" (read: fun) out of the game. They don't want a game. They want to be important, and appeal to "real" people, like IBM and H&R Block and Harvard. Not the likes of us. Not individuals. Individuals are messy and time-consuming.

As Philip once famously said, "We had to make it fun at first, to get the people in." Well, they're in now, but I'm afraid that they're also leaving, and that SL has peaked.

Very little of what LL adds to SL seems to have anything at all to do with us. And the things that do - seem to have a wicked backbite to them, that you discover after they are implemented.

That is my jaded view, after three years here. It seems we are what they feel saddled with, but had they valued us and our needs, they would have actually seen greater long-term success.

coco

when we went premium (march 2007) firstland had been cancelled for months already, yet they continued to actively promote it as if it was still open.
in fact, they continued to do that for months _after_ we went premium as well. for like the rest of 2007 there were people asking 'wheres my firstland' regularly because ll were still actively promoting it.
i still get annoyed thinking about that bait and switch tactic ll pulled over on me.

hahahahaha

/me agrees with Coco. And Nina.