Introducing T Linden. What would you do to improve Premium subscriptions?

* allow to acess private OpenSim
* change first and last name
* inventory backup

DMCA isn't really a perq for premium. DMCA serves everyone equally. Or should. I do agree that the Lab needs to eliminate habitual offenders. They do with other types of offenses so why do they allow well known content thieves to continue operating? Interesting question and since legal staff is not cheap and they have to burn time on these things it is somewhat baffling.

Here is a revision of my ideas for premium accounts.

1) Make the free land 1024 instead of 512, 512 and 117 prims is not a good incentive anymore, and I know alot of people who don't use it because it is so small.

2) Make premium members only forums, that would have added content and value as a incentive for content and issues that concern premium members, to clearify this would be a EXTRA forum.

3) Create primium only islands, parks, oceans, sandboxes and rezzing areas for boats, cars... again, I am not saying to take away any of the existing areas, I am saying to add new areas for the people who wish to pay for a premium account.

4) Offer premium members more goups, 25 is not enough for serious users that support SL.

5) Offer premium holders a debit card that they can use to credit and withdraw money from SL, they have great succsess with it at Entropia, I would love that feature in SL.

6) Offer premium only newbie skins, cloths and prefabs, Yacths, cars, content etc.

7) Priority logging and log in servers.

Extra account or a storage facility so that the avvie wont be tied down with large inventory.

9) web cam support.

10) Vacation areas where premium members get to spend 2 week in private well decorated tropical, winter, forrest sims.

* 1024sqm free land instead of 512sqm
* free uploads
* free partnership
* free parcel search
* an email adress (wich can be used to IM easily in world) and a web page for the profile @secondlife
* more group slots
* an anniversary bonus (a pony ?)
* more premium level support 24*7 including live chat (premium accounts can't be suspended without warning)
* Homesteads and Open Spaces without Full Sim
* avatars limit to 50 instead of 40 on Mainland sims
* a better server class for Mainland sims (class VI)
* lower tier fees
* less stipends

Welcome T !

Someone may have suggested this already:

There are quite a few couples in SL that might enjoy the coming enhanced benefits of premium memberships (PM). Offering a discount on the cost of such a feature when both are PM might broaden the appeal of SL and add to user longevity.

And, no, I have not the foggiest idea how this would work in practice.

I think you misread what I said, I never said it was a premium perk. I was just responding to the impression that the DMCA was not a powerful thing by itself. No premium perk could ever help with copyright violations except LL making the effort to act upon DMCAs, however I beleive that should be afforded to all personally.

Bring back free 1st land!

I joined nearly 2 years ago on the understanding I would receive this. After a month of being in SL you took it away! I was not happy.

Since then you have gradually taken away any benefits to the premium member. You make me feel not wanted.

I too have been considering canceling my membership.

Offer me something of value and I might stay!

Personally I cannot see the need for free land beyond the 512 starter pack to get you going.

Once you have been in SL for a while, if you are serious about staying, most folks get away from the mainland anyway. See all the complaints about ban lines, advertising, random building, clutter, noise, constant invasions from people you never met and dont wish to know. Best thing about the cheap 512 sqms start up plot, is that you could sell it to another avi and move on to a better safer, parcel with no ban lines, a decent build policy and a community that you find attractive.

Keep the first land where it is, in the history book. Maybe Pumpkin in the previous post, is another that demands something for nothing, so instead of contributing to SL, people like those freebie riders who want something for nothing are only for the take, take, take...

Sorry to be a nag, but its always about the price. What we get for our money. Sigmund just wants more prims for his and he happy to give you more money if you would just let him buy them. And I think lots other people would buy other different kinds of resources like script time, more avatar visits, etc if they could.

I'm delighted already to be in SL and I get more delighted everytime we get a new server and viewer because my SL gets a little bit better each time. Is unbelievable really the difference between now and what is what like when I first came here last year. So thats good =)

What I'm not delighted about is paying a premium to LL for the privilege of buying land and then renting it after purchase. The buying and renting Im happy with. Its just the paying a premium for this privilege. The stipend I get helps to offset the cost of this privilege and I'm delighted about that.

Apart from a [email]myavatar@sl.com[/email] which would benefit me while also opening up additional adclick revenue streams for LL by both in- and outworld entities like hotmail does for microsoft, I can't think of any other benefit, apart from a better mainland management plan, that would delight me anymore than I am now.

So I think about other people and maybe what can be done for them.

To start with I'm a tenant, a player, a spender. I think was Desmond S. maybe Carl M. who said there is new kind of person who is coming to SL maybe. Not creators, not business people or corporations. Just ordinary people with ordinary budgets. They already in 2D worlds like MySpace and FaceBook and Bebo and Yahoo and everywhere. Zillions of them. Thats me really. I'm just ordinary. No matter how much I may want to be a creator and make fabulous stuff. I'm just an ordinary person with an ordinary small discretionary budget, with no real talent apart from my ordinariness, which may make me unique and my Mum might love me despite myself =) but thats about it really. Ordinary, thats me, like all the other millions of ordinary people in the world I suppose.

And maybe thats what its about, our ordinariness. Maybe thats how we can retain our ordinary friends that we already got in our ordinary 2D worlds now. The friends Desmond S. was referring to. Maybe thats what its about. Just bridging the gap between the 2D and 3D worlds, so that millions of very ordinary people can cross over.

Email is such an ordinary thing and so is a page profile and chat. They so ordinary they deathly boring to quite a few of the SL pioneers. But ordinary people are not risktakers or pioneers or even settlers prepared to cross the desert in a covered wagon. We come in ocean liners and aeroplanes and taxis with all the comforts of home please =)

I want an email, I want a webpage like my Bebo and MySpace and Facebook and I want to be able to goto my friends place inworld SL and scribble a note on their comments page and drop stuff on them and send them birthdays cards and gifts and all kinds off goodies. Goodies I cant make myself. That I get from people who can. And add my fav bands and my piccies and other kool stuff to my own SL page and to my land inworld as well so that my friends can come inworld and see in 3D what I doing or if they cant then they can see me on my 2D page and me see them on theirs and I can chat all my friends at the same time in both worlds at the same time. Because this is what we do now in our 2D worlds.

Not very creative I know. But we not web designers either yet we got zillions of profile pages =) The designers and creators make them for us and make it possible for us to stick our stuff on them. Stuff we dont make ourselves hardly at all other than our piccies, home vids and stuff we like to think are poetry, meaningful stories and music we done ourselves and not very well at all really, but we like it and so do our frends because they are frends =) We just use what the creators make and we happy to give them all the money we got in return.

SL no different from any other place really in this respect. We can't give LL and the creators in SL more money than what we have. There is no more from me and others like me already in SL. Is not like I don't want to give you more, I do. Its just that I haven't got it. Only other people not yet here can give LL and all the fabulous inworld creators, more.

Is alot todo if LL did this, but Yahoo looking for somewhere to go. They got zillions of people there who got nowhere to go except out the door. Yahoo knows this and so does Microsoft. Yahoo looking for a new home. Why can't it be here.

Google tried Lively but its not working out for them so maybe LL partner with them. Gmail got zillions of ordinary people. Google already got email and YouTube as well. Even more zillions of people.

So is not like LL have to do this all by itself. LL can partner with Yahoo or Google, maybe even Microsoft because they the most ordinary people company of all. Anyone of them can help LL make the bridge. And if my SL profile page gets banner ads on it then is ok with me. Thats an ordinary thing, it happens all the time now and I'm used to it.

So what do I get for my premium? Not much really. What do I want moar from SL. Not much really either. What I really want is what Desmond S. said. I want my friends. My RL friends. But I dont want to force them into the box that is SL now, if they dont want to, just so I can spend time with them. But I do want to show them 2D what I doing 3D then maybe they will come inworld and stay like I did. And I dont want to make my own blog or webpage todo this because I dont really know how to. I just want use what Im given to do it with, like I get given now.

Is kool in SL but like Desmond S. said is quite cold and lonely for lots of new people when they first come and so they dont stay. And maybe something as boringly simple and ordinary as email and a profile page is all thats needed to make SL more welcoming and familiar.

Adding a friend inworld SL is not as easy to do as it is in the 2D world. Is so easy to spurn people here. People dont get spurned at all in 2D worlds hardly. Is not a good look if you supposed to be an important person or group and you got no friends and no comments or huggz on your page. So they addyhos most important people in 2D worlds. But is all good really cos most ordinary people just want be their fanz friend anyways so that they got at least some names on their own list, and other ordinary people soon find them and became their real friends, because they been browsing through the friends list of bands and important people they also fanz friends with. SL groups work a bit like this, well the public ones anyways, but nowhere near as well as Facebook and MySpace do.

I was at Morris WA junction yesterday. I not been there for a long time. Was amazing because was over 100 avatars there, just about all new. All just milling about looking lonely. Was a bit sad really. If I had yelled out "everyone who wants be my friend come over here and I show you how to add me to ur profile". I probably would have got at least 30-40 new friends within a few minutes, more even. And most of them would have worked out by themselves they could add all kinds stuff to their profile page themselves and would have done it and happily filled in their pages while also peeking around at the other girls and boys like they do. But I didnt because I've seen what happens when Mentors open their mouths and how hard it is for both the Mentors and the new people because there is nothing familar at all for the new people to relate to.

I'm not saying everyone has to have a full-on page profile, you can have one if you want or not, is upto you. I just saying that there zillions of people who do and they not here in SL is all, even tho lots of them come into places like Morris, 100s at a time some days, peek about a bit then shrug and leave.

And maybe thats all it will take to get lots more of them to stay. Something ordinary. Something they already know. Something they can personalise and feel comfortable with to which they can retreat back to whenever the full 3D immersion thingy starts to overwhelm them as it often does to most ordinary people in the first few times they login here. Something they can use to help them to make friends with in those first few days. Actually they probably make lots of frends because there would be whole bunches of experienced avatars at places like Morris yelling out "add me add me and I give you all kinds of kool stuff" Pimp ponies ya =D but thats actually ordinary and accepted behaviour and we used to this as well =)

Anyways I talk to much so I stop now. lol !!! i nearly wrote a whole book =)

Umm !!! I didnt mean to sound as hard as I did at the start Tom L. I just thought Sigmund had a valid point about his money and how he wanted to spend it is all. So I sorry about that. k then ciao =)

Hi River,

I don't have access to data to know if that is true for most, so I can only speak for myself.

If you don't need or want a Private Estate or can't afford the set-up fee and monthly tier for it, then Mainland is an option.

People (most anyway) already have a web page. It is called Profile and allowing search on it.

It is at http://world.secondlife.com/resident/(insert your avatar UUID key here)

You just don't get to theme it. Is it the theme thing you want?

Except that those of us with premium accounts (after almost 2 years inworld, I have 3 for various business purposes) do pump a lot of money into LL. Yes, basic accounts do spend money in world, but premium accounts are a solid, repeating income stream. And we then spend money on other things, too, as basic accounts do.

I, too, would love to see a secondlife.com email domain for those with premium accounts and/or resident websites.

Lower tier costs, of course, would be smashing

I have seen the Lindens attempts at making Mainland look and feel regulated like the private islands, but without the teeth and claws private estate owners have. I feel sad when I go to mainland, its just a mess for the most part, people dont seem to have any respect for their neighbors with some ugly builds right next to some pretty good areas.

Feel sad for the owners having to suffer the nasty neighbors on the mainland, its no way to be. Limiting the advertising must have helped, but the ban lines, the stupid high prices for plots next to 'roads' gee, its a mess. And I feel bad for those that get Linden Labs mainland as an image of all that SL is. Zoning could improve, building restrictions could improve, but then, some would say, what right have I to criticize their places on the mainland!

But then I am tastefully reminded, by being a premium member I can avoid it all and live in a nice place, a safe place without airships next door and greifers all around me with ban lines. I have to remember that some people, just prefer to live in squalor and degradation, some people, actually enjoy it.

One user agrees!

I am so sick and tired of seeing ads in my face everywhere I go and nearly everything I do anymore.

Since the viewer is open sourced it would be impossible to implement since everyone would just turn to a client with the advertising ripped out of it. Unless, of course, LL took the viewer out of the open source community again which would just be another major step backward.

Another thing I would suggest is offering a menu of possible perks for a Premium Membership. For example:

For this account, I would like:
Stipend:
A: Base Weekly Stipend of L$300
-OR-
B: Credit of L$1200 per month toward free tier on Mainland parcels
-OR-
C: $5 USD credit to USD balance each month (Usable only for paying tier on mainland OR on Homestead sim or Full Sim or Openspaces Lite sim holdings.)
-OR-
D: Decrease annual membership fee by $30 USD, and give this account none of the above perks.

Land:
A: Credit for free tier on 512 M2 of mainland per month (L$1300 value per month)
-OR-
B: Increase weekly stipend by L$330
-OR-
C: $5 USD credit to USD balance each month (Usable only for paying tier on mainland OR on Homestead sim or Full Sim or Openspaces Lite sim holdings.)
-OR-
D: Decrease annual membership fee by $30 USD, and give this account none of the above perks.

etc...

Specific options would have to be balanced against each other, so they are similar values.

I just wanted to make some compliments to people on this thread. First, thanks to T Linden for staying up on posts - that is truly unique at LL. Second, Toy and Atashi had a great constructive discussion/argument and it was good to see it handled well without whipping flame at each other. And last, I <3 Desmond and vote for him for president of the universe.

MM

If this is your definition of squallor then I'll take it. Yes it is mainland and I am perfectly happy to live there without any zoning.

Ending it.

My last post had to do with what I, as a premium member already, would like to see to give added value to a premium membership. This post is about what I think would help newish basic members BECOME premium members.

Reducing basic account privileges for existing accounts is a no no. Let me rephrase: punishing ANY current customers with service reductions or huge price increases is an absolute no no, regardless of whether they are basic or premium.

Try before you buy is essential for any virtual platform or service. A new person just signing up for SL will probably need to be in SL for several weeks or months before anything offered as "premium" has any meaning. Land? What the heck do I need land for? I'm just here to party/explore/make friends. Building tools? Groups? Access to where for what? Eh? And what do I need this "inventory" thing for? Information received in the first week or two is overwhelming and has little meaning until you've wandered around a bit and gotten some context.

Having a "signed up after this date" reduction in new basic accounts might work. Less groups, less inventory, etc. A basic account can upgrade to premium at any time through the website (and there should be a button in-world for that too). However, how about a series of three emails and notecards detailing the benefits of premium membership be sent to a new AV starting at 2 weeks since account creation and then at 3 weeks and then at 4 weeks? Not never ending constant spamming but reminders that there are benefits, and an explanation in simple terms as to what they are, in a format that you can then read at your leisure (meaning not just a link to a the website that will promptly be trashed) at a time when the newbies might actually understand how it's relevant.

Of course, the "upgrade to premium" bonus should apply regardless of how long after account creation the upgrade occurred.

I also think there should be at least 2 levels of premium account.

One a non-land owning premium benefits (like inventory, group, attachment, etc. limits removed) which is cheaper and would allow a person to fully participate in SL, run a business, rent land, etc.

One a full blown premium account which can own land, which is still not expensive but more than the 1st level premium account. There are a lot of people who would never want to buy land but would want the benefit of no restrictions otherwise and would not see ability to buy land as being a benefit.

In other words, "try before you buy" basic account with limited ability to use resources but still having the ability to participate in SL, then a step up to paying for some of the resources you use and then a further step up if you want to buy land.

Again, the cost for any premium account should not be huge and existing accounts should be grandfathered to a minimum of their current configuration and cost. However, as SL gets more and more people every day, I see nothing wrong with making SL a "try before you buy" platform with the idea that yes, you DO have to buy to fully participate just like with any other for-profit product.

Add in some or a lot of the suggestions made here for increased value for being a premium member and maybe you'll get more people back on the mainland paying you tier which can be used to constantly add even more value to your customers in improved hardware, stability, content, features, etc.

Um. Huh?

Hi everyone,

The educational sector in SL offers quite a few quality freebies for people who visit their campuses, these made a huge difference to me when I was starting in SL. It's a lot of fun to try on new clothing, gestures, rez objects, all things that have been given to you. Buying things that don't fit or look good is discouraging, but if it's free it's just a lot of fun.

I suggest a package or choice of things for premium account holders, a bonus pack of some type.

My 2 Lindens worth.....

With regard to my 'suggestion' of adverts wending their way into the grid experience - it's not a suggestion per se, but a fatalistic acceptance of what I already know will show up.

Consider the search engine Google - success meant monetising their platform, and to do that, they used advertising. So did newspapers, radio, television, the internet, and... well, I'm just not quite sure *how* the grid will not also end up that way in time.

I do land. Lots of land. I'm not blind to trends. And while it's not exactly cheap yet, I can say with certainty that over the long term, the prices will come down. Think about it. Server space and email is already cheap as dirt; and quite useful packages are already *free*. This is where the land-based product that is the Second Life grid will eventually go. Not because they want it to go there; but because of competition. Not this year or next year, but, it's coming someday. The land model revenue won't last. And yeah, I know what that means for land barons like myself.

So what else can be done... advertising. They will eventually do it. Think of this as the turning point. I can see a day in the not so distant future where an 'ad free' account would be worth its weight in gold. Does anyone remember Google before the ads? It's unthinkable to even imagine it ad-free now.

Like Gabriele says, ads can be incredibly annoying, and it is possible to strip them out - provided the account login isn't locked into a standard viewer. Yes, they can easily do that.

Maybe T here can promise us an ad-free existence with Premium going forward. Hey, worth a shot. The real premium experience has nothing to do with pixels or perks, hence the reason nobody's quite sorted out what to do with 'premium' accounts in the last few years. They will figure this out eventually.

I take back my pessimistic comments. I have been convinced that T is just what he claims to be. A sweet, newbie frog, sent to us to get our perspective on potential LL policy issues.

Most likely, this strategy is the result of the OS disaster, but that is only my opinion.

Well, a bonus for having Open Sapces as they are right now for example ?

- 3.750 prims
- 75 US$ tier / month

)

Or perhaps a fourth land type, called "premium land" , and only available for premiums subscribers, lets say

- 7.500 prims
- 125 US$ / month

I'm NOT happy with LL plans for the open spaces, nor for the homestaeds ...
The "old" openspaces were right and affordable, perhaps it would better to increase land prices again, bur LOWER the Tier pls !!! Its Recession all over the world ...

(

I agree that advertising is likely to arrive and this was discussed briefly at an office hour quite some months ago, I can't remember exactly how many months ago but it was before the new search and the suggestion was that RL ads would appear there. They may have dropped this idea as the suggestion didn't go down well but it has been in the pipeline and discussed for quite some time.



I disagree here, the land model revenue will last. What I don't think will last is being able to charge a premium for waterfront plot, land will be land tied to prims and scripts and pricing will be pretty standard but I wouldn't be surprised to see Linden Lab offering a reseller deal to people who want to pony up the upfront costs and acting as wholesalers rather than direct sellers. I'm sure there will still be room for land barons, big ones too who are behind existing web hosting solutions such as GoDaddy, there probably won't be so much room for the little guy though.