Openspace Announcement Discussion with Jack Linden

As much as I admire the people who buy and build in SL, I don't think I will ever be one of them.

In this particular event, if you disregard what is said and simply look at what's happening -- an astounding increase in price -- the idea of owning land simply loses its appeal.

It's not the cost, necessarily; it's the uncertainty.

When prices can change so drastically, no planning is possible. A budget is meaningless. It may work now, but it may not work tomorrow. It's not business; it's a gamble.

In an environment like this, renting makes sense, but buying does not.

What benefit does raising the tier create? This seems more a scheme to increas LL profit than to decrease issues with lag. Why not just bear down on the sim owners who create the lag. Create a form of guideline as to what will cause the excessive lag.... ie max script, max load..... etc. I lease a open space and currently run with .03ms script, no lag....it is very easy to have an attractive sim without loading the system. Increasing the tier is annoying at best... will raise my cost from 90 to 137 a month..... not sure how i will recoup that...... sigh I went into the open space aware of the issues with lag and have taken every possible step to avoid loading the system... i feel successfully. My question is.. what is the purpose of the tier increase? Is it to ensure LL makes the same amount of cash even when open spaces disappear now in record amounts due to increased cost? If so this is inappropriate, and greedy..... but then that is your perogative as a company owner.

well said , alot of people dont realise is that the estate owner has to pay 250usd upfront for these sims!

this smacks more of "charge what the market will bear", than "we have to raise prices to give you good service". I have read in the media numerous accounts of the ex-CEO bragging that Linden Lab was making plenty of money. I am not convinced of the necessity of a 67% price increase.

I think enforcing limits on open space sims would be far more effective, than rationing the usage by exorbitant fee increases. LL, you really need to educate your marketing vice president that customers don't like 67% price increases. It's not good business.

Anyone who uses the content in Openspace sims has an interest in the discussion.

When I get group notices about sims I frequent facing closure because of this, I certainly will read and post in this thread!

I don't own any OpenSpace sims, but I live in sims that are next to them, and more importantly I enjoy them.

I can fly around them, sail across them and go exploring. They provide a fantastic view from my own plot which would otherwise be crowded with small property plots.

They're owned quite often by people who have educational purposes, artists and communities for pleasure, creativity and enjoyment.

They're also owned by individuals, to give them a low cost chance at having space around them to create their own world.

They're also owned by people who rent them out. Imagine living, just 3 or 4 of you, in a large space of open fields, lakes or forests, with scattered farmsteads, or a tiny hamlet. Perhaps a few animals wandering down to the river next to the old mill with it's slowly turning waterwheel.

Yes, I painted a nice picture. Now it's gone.

There are multiple reasons for wanting an openspace sim. The main one is more space for low cost. Yes there are a few that will abuse the usage, but that can be tackled in different ways.

For my part, I feel that the dramatic changes in the land system to encourage people to buy openspace sims, with increased prims, much lower costs, the ability to buy one at a time, and *importantly* to be able to place them so as not to adjoin the full sim(s) you own led to the belief by the majority of those who purchased them that they could be used as a "light sim" even for residential or other purposes, and that the server structure was in place to cope with it.

This notice from Linden Research seems only to attempt to refute that intention (one wonders about the relation to breach of contract, based on intention, since the courts would look far more at intention of contracting parties than exclusion clauses such as the TOS).

I think that such a large price hike (67% so I read) will have an adverse affect on the many creative, paying customers here in SL, in that a line will have been crossed. In an economic downturn the luxuries go first, and this is a price rise that may just take the cost past the amount many people can afford.

I am saddened that what was supposed to be a creative company, looking to let people enjoy being creative in their own fashion, has turned little by little into a facsimile of many of the faceless corporations that have only profit in mind. I wonder whether the entire charade is serving only to push profits to a high this quarter and next, to prove that the new CEO is doing a good job.

Just a few days back the new CEO was gleefully shouting that "There's no credit crunch in Second Life". Perhaps he may have to eat his words.

Then why allow 3750prims on a * light useage sim* why would people pay rent to sit there and watch the water?? hello?? cmon people LL knew they would be used for homes and other uses. Alot our renters use them lightly with just a home a few trees and alot of land or water around there island. I think the most attractive thing about a open space is Total Privacy and Full estate controls. We have never had any problems with lag on OS's so why are the innocent people who use them as intented pay for others who dont?

They need to come to some solution to track down the heavy abusers or just allow certain amount of scripting per island?

Wilst I understand the need to crack down on performance I don't understand why an Openspace cannot just have a script and avatar limitation.

Its a typical lazy fix. Example. I paint cars. I have a problem with Blue paint. Rather then get better paint I just don't paint blue cars!

So I cannot believe that with all the workers hacking code at Linden Labs that you cannot design a specific Openspace Server Code. OSC for short.

Hear me out. It appears to me that Linden Labs is not thinking to far ahead. Because Estate owners that did use them properly to give oceans and open space to their build will now have their whole business model trashed.

So I see that with the sucess of Linden Themed sims such as Nautilus and Bay City that you have already and unfairly gone into competition with the very people that seeded your original growth. This is a very unprofessional approach to patch a poor decision to create openspaces cheap to begin with.

There are many people that purchased Estate Regions with openspaces and you will also see those estates close down. So I may be wrong but you stand to loose Estate Region revenue as well.

I will be giving my openspace back to LL in December. I use it for sailing and building projects. sometimes my prim usage is up to 3000 but the normal usage is under 2000 of the 3750 and my trafic is 280. My regular sim has the extra prims that I can move my building back there.

I feel I was tricked into spending the $250 usd to set up the openspace only to have them change the game by another $600 usd per year.

Sorry LL... this is not how good business people do business.

I for one could do with less prims to solve the problem they say they are having... but this is another of their decisions which are inspiring my decision to look elsewhere than SL for my entertainment. With the $ I spend here for the two sims, I have lots of options.

Um, I don't think it will work that way. Abandoned regions will be taken back by Linden. Now, they have free hardware to put their own regions on. OS are on the same hardware as full prim. They get back 16 abandoned OS, and viola! A free server for them to put 4 full regions on.

I don't normally engage in Linden-bashing. Having run an online service for 10 years myself, I frequently understand the situation they are often put in. In this instance, though, I believe they have shot from the hip, rather than considered alternative ways to address this issue. Did they plan this 8 months ago when they increased prim counts and lowered pricing? I typically try to see the good in people, and, I suspect they didn't fully consider the consequences of it.

(Ok. So, in a choice of considering Linden evil or stupid, I tend to lean more towards stupid. I could be wrong, though.)

Exactly. I would totally understand a 10% price increase once a year, but this... first the sudden price increase from $195 to $295 for full sims (51%), and now a 66% increase for OS sims. I wonder what will happen next year? A 75% tier increase? Or simply double tier? I bet they'll sell that to us as punishment for supposed abusers / measures taken against lag too.

*nods* i was expecting a decrease in tier fees..if anything!
performance has been less than special..on all sims!!
...onya LL..more money to you!

HI Jack,

I was very impressed by Second Life that I planned and invested more than 600Us$ in 2 months i joined here. Openspace sims are a perfect option for poor people like us to be owners on Second Life. While you are right on the misuse, why not give a checklist of Do's and Dont's instead of calling it light use.

I think residential is perfectly okay for Openspace, it wont lag at all. Yes clubs and other scripts intensive can go. You can close SIMS but not punish everyone who has OS with them.

What you are doing here is to make people abandon lands, and i think you have a new product and you are just using this excuse to create more computing space for yourself.

With IBM doing your new servers why are you putting the expenses on us? 125$ for an Openspace SIM is a killer. If you really care for your people, DONT DO IT. You will lose half your database of users and yes they will cancel accounts and maybe go to Google and ask for a second Second Life and compete with you.

SO think before you leap Jack

Jensen Kranfel

JACK LINDEN'S REPLY - POST #598 - BUMP

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BUMP

so instead of juping up the prices kick off the people that are over loading the sims and leave the ones like me alone that just wanted a private island hell i don't know where the benifit is for me to be paying almost the same amount for a full perm and prim sim does not make any sence something has to be done about this that is more reasonable

I did not say it was easy, or that I could do anything , I said a BIG COMPANY needs to take the technology and open in competition to SL.
If this happens they will have a ready made customer base and SL will be empty

this is done by the lindens, not by estate owners. and that's a big difference.

After some hours thinking about it...

For OS Sim owners like me... which are running a buisness on a OS sim... its kinda unterstandable...

But for private lands... its a rly bad step.... ima own a private OS sim too... and ive got like almost 0 Traffic and scripts on it... and i have to pay more?? lol

I think u could find a other solution for it... like the OS sim owner which are running a buisness on it - could pay the 67% more... but not the lil private ones, which just wanted a lil own hide place...

Just my 2 cents for it... even they wont read em...

Here's my sad story. Bought three full sims at the old price 1600 dollars.

Saw the price lowered to 1000. SO lost 600 apiece in value.

Then took advantage of the new op sim policy to help my residents enjoy more space.

My open sims average approximately 8 to 10 avitars across 10 open sims at any time, less that 1 av per open sim,

Now i will have to tranisiton back to full sims at best or release them. Very sad for me and for my residents.

How about just limiting the avitars in an open sim to 10 max at a time. with current ricing. If they want more give them that with the higher pricing.

There is a real compromise instead of an arbitrary demand on all open sapace users. solves the problem for those who want open water as well.

Well by God should this not have been done BEFORE you took THOUSANDS of peoples money in good faith, only to now wipe out their investment?? Wheres your comment on that, Jack? Wheres your comment on the livelihoods effectively destroyed by your actions?

Just to add my two cents.

When I bought OpenSpaces I was careful to read and understand their intent. They do not have any type of support and I am fine with that. And it is intended for light use. It clearly did not say that they could not be used as rental lands. They have a prim limit which is what directly controls how laggy they are.

So I bought some and set them up with 3 residential lots each and make it clear to renters that they are for light use (I set the agent limit to 22) and residential only.

I then reserve prims in the public land so that none ever hit the limit.

I charge very little over the actual fees (making about $11 per month if 100% occupied).

Using principles of the free market, I make a nice looking place, make sure I keep it performing well and I will get customers. If I overcrowd it, then the performance goes down and I lose business. I realize that I share with others that may abuse this, thus I have to be even more conservative. If, after a while, I just get to the point that OpenSpaces won't work, the free market will cause me to abandon them or return them to non-revenue generating use.

I already have one as a $0 generating sim as a place that serves as a park and tier centre, but jumping from $75 to $125 a month will have me try to offset some of that increase.

I understand you can do anything you like, I just feel badly for those people that have found a nice way to enjoy SL and appreciate light space places to call home.

The title summarises my feelings on this announcement. My partner and I have spent a year building a great community sharing one full sim and four openspace sims. We have carefully managed the use of the openspace sims to avoid causing lag. There is no way that we can personally absorb the massive increase in monthly charges on the openspace sims and I feel certain that this will be too much for our residents. We left the mainland because of the crowding and its uncontrolled nature. We built a peaceful and desirable place to live that is as good as any in the Lindens showcase. Now we will have to dismantle it and try to recompense our residents, as we are moral and ethical people and would not expect them to lose out as we have because of Linden Labs shortsighted decisions.

Exactly!

[sarcasm mode on]
LL is making a casino of SL.. (one huge casino..)
And the fun part, they don't allow gambling in SL, when real money transactions are part of it. They had an active sweep over sl, removing all gambling locations.. and guess what:
THEY ARE THEMSELVES CASINO OWNERS...
sooo, that's their plan...
being the kingpin of the gambling world in sl!
(the monopolistic type)
rrrrriiight... way to go LL!
[sarcasm mode off]

But in a sense it's true... they make it a gamble operation if you look closely. No one, even full sim owners, parcel owners on mainland, etc.. actually can even predict what the future will bring for them, as LL matters.
We've seen it over and over again, the last 1,5 years..:

1) sudden tos changes
2) rules on land usage (mainland, e.g. advertising part)
3) drop in prices for mainland, but not for other lands
4) policies for usage on OS
5) price changes for both full sim islands and OS islands
(multiple last 1,5 years)
6) the false promise of opening their own SIM code, to the public to decentralize the grid. Making it possible for people to host their OWN SL region(s). (out of a sudden they work with OPENSIM, a third party project in early development stages, and not THEIR own code, as they use themselves.)
7) support blockades for basic users as for ticket concerns. (early 2007)
promise to make sl more stable, while they are infact more focussing on new features.. (voice, windlight to name two)
9) Changing of board members, thus changing business models.

and i can go on...
People simply can't keep up, that quickly.. and are left with FUD.

It's becoming to monopolized model, this whole SL thing.
Nothing seems to decentralize, as LL wants. (not in the near future anyway, since they change too much to plan on it.)

Their current model is: BIG COMPANY attraction to the grid.
Seeing their pricing models introduces, like today, is for big corps cat money, an no biggy to pay.
While the avarage joe/janes in this world, which are the majority in SL, who build it, who drive it, etc.. are left behind, with invoices that cannot be payed anymore. Or with restrictions that cannot be met anymore. (especially on a short term)

I think eventually they will whipe out all the non mainland sims for good. (proof of this theory is the fact that LL seems to put more and more estates inworld for cheap prices and completely themed (like the recent nautilus thing).

So even full sim owners cannot predict, plan on how their sim(s) will be able to continue. And that's a BAD thing.. not to be able to trust your provider of services/goods/products.

and this has a negative effect on transactions (through lindex) eventually. residents will stall their expenses, because of the FUD.
You see it happening already, the last half year. Slighty lowering, and even if it's slightly, this is still a serious thing. It means people hold their money.. and works against, what LL want.

Plus the fact, of the economical ressession.. being in place.
(real world)
People are even more uncertain on the will to spend real money into this world LL created.

All in all, it's a BAD move, and LL will see the severe consequences shortly.
Mark my words....

Let's read that again.................75 to 125!
In the present economic climate...put a 60% increase on your customers!
This shows a disregard for many of your CUSTOMERS, not colleagues or workers...who will find it extra tough to manage this huge increase.
Very unhappy and unimpressed with your operating style and practices.

We were using an open space sim within the restrictions that were introduced in March. We have done a major airport/seaport build on our sim, but we still have significantly fewer than the allowed number of prims, minimal scripts, and low traffic. I am not sure what we would gain from paying a lot more for the same thing, so we will most likely be moving out. We can't afford to keep shelling out more money, particularly because we are NOT using our sim as a commercial enterprise. It makes me sad because I spent six months developing my land and now I will not be able to afford to keep it. And I will now have a lot of inventory that I bought for this purpose that I can't use for anything else.

People helpfully forwarded the verbiage that indicates we're using this sim for other than its intended "light use" purposes. However, I don't see how rezzing the prims within your allotment is considered abuse. A prim does not know if it is a tree, a house or the wing of an aeroplane.

Even if you are using the sims as prescribed, the new price is prohibitive and I have already heard from numerous people that own them that they are facing the prospect of letting them go, because the market is going to be flooded with open space sims for sale once LL severely reduces their value. $125 is a lot to pay for something you are barely allowed to use.

The community where I live is probably going to change dramatically as a result of open sims going away. Much of the progress we have made in establishing ties will be nullified or seriously diminished. I feel like we are being punished and I'm not sure what we did to deserve it.

If individual owners/renters are taxing the system, why not bring it to their attention and deal with it instead of punishing everybody?