Hoist the Mainsail and head for the high seas

They are doing it in conjunction with a private estate. Mainland owners cannot buy openspaces, some of them have asked to have this feature. It's perfectly fair for other users to raise concerns over this venture, there are commercial features of the USS sims, they charge for rentals of stores and berths of ships.

Hi Jack,

Can you add to our 41 remaining OS sims also a lot of free water sims and announce it in the blog and Sl website.

Our residents will love it !!
(read: it will be good for my business)

PS: you don't have to connect them to the mainland but if you do it i won't complain

I was the 3rd person to join the complex now known as the USS and I bought all 19 sims. The first 5 full sims, 4 of which were split into 16 open sims were purchased at a price of $1675 per full sim so I have lost much more than any Johnny come lately who paid $1000 for a full sim. There are at least 2 other owners in the USS who also enjoy private estates with lots of open water on open space sims available to the public. It is these open water sims where much of the sailboat racing occurs and that wouldn't be possible without the generosity of the private estate owners in the USS. Granted there some real estate developments in the USS too but that is not what the USS is about. The USS is about a sailing community that enjoys the company of other sailors. A vast majority of the sailors who use the USS have no financial involvement at all in the maintenance of the USS.

I have been approached many times by people who want to rent land in my estate but I don't rent my land and refer them to the developments who do. Some people want waterfront property with access to open water and that is what the real estate developments provide. The demand for all that property was there before the expansion that currently exists occured.

So it's the right thing to do, to waive the relocation fees for a compilcated move of a big group of several estates. But when I asked if they would waive the fee so I could move one lousy region to fill in the hole left by consolidating some OS regions, they said no -- because it was 'my decision' to consolidate and 'noone forced me to make that choice'. Not like their 67% price hike was exorbinant or anything like that.

I paid $1675 for my regions too, our last expansion was just before the price cut. I remember what LL had to say then too: "too bad."

Open water for sailing, and open skies for flying, have always been cornerstones of my estate. Where's my blog entry, Jack, Katt? That Linden seal of approval might help in these tough times.

-Atashi

So, consider this an approach from the Mainland estate: Next, could we please have a water passage linking all the Mainland continents, including at least a 1-sim-wide passage between the west (Heterocera/Sansara/Jeogeot) and east (Gaeta/Corsica/Nauilus/etc)?

Then after those passages are complete, next, please, full protected-water circumnavigation of each of the continents.

Those spin school classes are doing you no favours



Moving the land for free is a favour and it is a discount. If you want to do things like this Jack, and I have no objection to you turning to private estate owners to assist the development and management of your platform, then be transparent about it. Let's face some facts here, USS were hurting over your Opesnpace policy change, they have now been handed something in return to help them overcome this difficult period.

It's great to see this! Only thing I hate about sailing is crossing sim lines and getting the message expired region hand off! lol

This is a welcome change and I hope that more collaborations will bloom that will be similar to this. I really hope that this succeed.

But attached to their estate so in effect they are getting free use of openspaces/homesteads which they otherwise would have had to purchase and pay tier for - at a time when many (smaller) privately owned openspace regions themed for sailing are being closed due to the LL's imposed price increases.

Matthew

Unfortunately I see this as another great disappointment in the making. More than likely it will go the way of the other big LL-Resident transportation collaboration the SL Railroad... The Lindens solicited residents to provide designs for train stations all along the rail line, winners were chosen, stations rezzed.... Then it was decided the whole thing was too much to maintain and it was promptly abandoned.

The tracks now sit silent save for a few people who take it upon themselves to ride them with their own engines.. Oh and of course the new residents who rez their freebie's along the track (some are set to 0 autoreturn) so the piles of garbage are ever expanding.

The content planned for these new oceans will probably be abandoned as well, their scripts breaking down one by one as the sims crash...

And that's exactly what people who are on the mainland around the new sims and the USS are getting as well ... that's why it's called a partnership....

You know that's kinda why a lot of people on the mainland live by the oceans..

People on mainland pay a premium for those areas in purchase price. If Linden Lab had auctioned this space people would have paid a premium for that too.

I paid a premium for my space in Nautilus when I bought it ( the original continent not the new fangled one), then they opened up the channel down to the old continent, then they added the new Nautilus, now they have added the USS sims ... it's kinda called luck of the draw don't you think?

And how do those living on the other mainland sims by the ocean get free LL ocean openspaces attached to their sims?

And how do other estate owners get free LL ocean openspaces around their islands (particularly if they've just had to abandon private openspaces doing the same thing due to the price increase)?

Matthew

OK, so LL can't give everything to everyone, so why don't they just do nothing ... some people will moan either way?

For you yes, for USS? It's not luck of the draw, it's a massive free boost. Mainland owners were asking to be able to buy and use openspaces whilst estate owners were buying them, they were told no dice. People have wanted to be able to use openspaces to connect to mainland for quite a while.

Why has a special case been made for USS? This is favouritism, Jack's denial is plain silly.

yes mainlaind people paid over 2000 USD for a sim, nautilus people even more. how much did USS pay for a sim again? and now they value will go up to the mainland standard while other estates see a drop to 1 L$ per sm.

they also get the over 40 homesteads for free and can use them and place their objects on it. so i ask myself why homesteads, why not the new OS sims with 750 prims which are meant to be for landscaping. does that mean linden admits the new product is useless and can even not be used as plain ocean?

USS gets free land for approx 6.000 USD per month, not included the buy price which would be more than 18.000 USD free land.

So why should other estates not feel there is favouritism, and why didnt linden announce it in a blog and give all estate the change to apply for it?

i dont say something againt the USS, they been lucky not their fault linden is again acting very unprofessional. i hope other estate owners will stand up against it and ask for the same treatement as that is for sure a preference for one estate and would stand any legal action against it.

They will never admit it, but yes it is a sure sign that the new openspace prodcuct really isn't fit for purpose.

Had LL created a new continent which was primarily openspace oceans designed for sailing - perhaps calling for volunteers to help create it (ala DPW) and perhaps calling for groups such as USS to help sponsor it etc - then no one would have complained.

But LL has effectively give an estate owner free use of set of openspaces which will be attached to their estate at no charge, at the same time as substantially increasing the cost of openspaces for other estate owners.

A otherwise good idea, executed so badly as to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory...

Matthew

I post here the content of our support ticket #4051-5623557

We are willing to be moved BACK to the mainland and attached via a "Linden sea"

We have 70 sims and had 84 at the time of your announcement for the tier hike.

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We would like to request a "Linden Sea" as posted here http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/12/19/hoist-the-mainsail-and-head-for-the-high-seas/

We feel we qualify as back in 2005 we were asked to move from our prime location just under the mainland sandboxes to be able to expand and told that joining to (even remaining near) the mainland was not an option if we wanted to add even 1 more sim.

We have had water based sims since 2006 for our residents and anyone in SL to sail on and are forced to reduced them now because of the horrendous price hike Linden Lab has forced upon us in 2009. We feel our residents and everyone in SL are losing out because of this.

It is wonderful to see that you have seen the light and now offer this to estates

Please attach east of FairChang Riachuelo, FairChang Miracima, FairChang Palmetto, FairChang Playas and FairChang Cabos.

Please consult with Jack Linden before you answer this so that you are in FULL possession of the facts behind our claim.

Many thanks
Garth & Pituca FairChang

PS. I am posting this support ticket on the forum for other estate owners to see as I am sure the "Linden Sea" sims were not intended for Just select few

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This comes as a shock to me, since this new Linden sea is basically my front yard. Now I don't feel like such a sucker for paying Anshe Chung 2006 land prices for Devolin Mal.

Fun stuff, Lindens. Thank you!

Whereas the people behind USS say:

"Is this favoritism? Yes, I won't lie about that, but it was the best option for our communities"

Jack please stop speaking like a politician. People appreciate honesty, even when it hurts them.

Jack, if I may make a suggestion for the future. One way to at least make people feel like it's fair even though it's a flagrant PR tactic is to have put out a general announcement announcing that you are doing this type of program that says either how to apply or saying something vague about a temporary selection method until we have a more permanent system in place. That would at least give the illusion that you had this planned before you chose the sailing sims. Again it's a stupidly blatant PR method and ,not an entirely honest one at that, of doing things but my guess is that it would have quieted a lot of the noise at least initially.

Absolutely Gordon. I really don't mind what they're doing here, I just want them to be upfront about it and I don't think that's asking for too much. I'm all for enhancing the mainland experience and the experience for SL users overall.

I have to say I don't agree, the USS is a long running community, that is pretty much the epicentre of sailing in SL.

Wouldn't you offer to have a partnership with the best in class?

You want them to offer something like this to a group that knows bugger all about sailing?