Openspace Announcement Discussion with Jack Linden

I cant believe I am actually going to post in here - but come on people - if you READ and do a bit of research - you will find this isn't the huge problem everyone is making it out to be - so you rent out open source sims - here is your solution:
If you're converting four Openspaces into one normal region, submit a ticket of the Region Issues type with the following information:

* The name of the four existing Openspaces to be converted
* The name of the new region
* The estate it should belong to
* Any region-placement details that you wish to pass on.

The four Openspace regions are converted into one standard region. You are charged a conversion fee of $100.

I think a better solution would be to implement a "Moderate Use" sim class, with the same prim but run on 2 cores instead of 1 to handle the load better handle the load of light residential and commercial use. Charge the same increased setup charges to $500 for them and the $125, leaving the "Open Spaces" where they are.

Now with that LL should clearly define the uses of these spaces and that they can and will upgrade your sim at regular charges if you choose to continually over load the space. So for example a resident that sets up a light residental sim on an "Open Space" clearly marked for open space terrain builds, LL can force upgrade to a "Moderate Use" sim, the abusing owner footing the bill. The same would go for "Moderate Use" to "Full Sim", the use of a "Moderate Use" sim would be clearly designated and the understand that abuse will force an upgrade to a Full Sim. And well if a resident is abusing a full sim LL would have every right to pull the plug in the best interests of the whole grid.

I to really do not see why those who choose to have there own private ocean to yacht in, or there own private forest to hike in should have to foot the bill for those that will abuse sim types.

I believe this is illegal against the TOS, unless that friend owned a full sim already.

Jack, if you acknowledge that a light use product may be possible in the future when appropriate software has been developed, then I strongly encourage you to maintain the openspace pricing as it is now, accept a short term loss on that product in return for the long term good faith of your customers, and then offer the new product line as it becomes available. The comments in this thread have been shocking and cry out for compromise.

FIRST: I’M NOT A NATIVE SPEAKER, SO PLEASE DON’T CARE FOR MY TYPING

I have the bad feeling, that anything we say does not count.

The OS have been a Win from the beginning. Beside they crashed the Land Market for those who liked to sell their old Parcels on Full Sims.

I also have the feeling that the „abuse of OS“ is just an argument hiding the real issue.
My buisness is very small but I run it for about a yeare now. Changed from rented Land to own land to an own full sim…
Ppl don’t buy that much anymore. Too many Fereebs – and some of them are preaty good – too much sales of companies quitting the game and more and more web companys offering Linden$ uploades for a fair fee.
So I already started to reduce my Land to actualy „what I realy need…“

I could truly imagine that LL has a loss with all of this.
!!! I DO NOT SAY THAT THIS IS THE COUSE!!!
… I just say that this would be a better explaining of the situation.
AND I would understand a honest word saying
„We don’t earn enough money to pay our own bills, therefore we have to higher all Land Tiers Privates as well as Mainland“
But that is a speaking of wish…
!! LL NEVER SAID THAT!!
I don’t have a clue what is the real issue forcing them to higher the fees about 65,86%
But I know, that even if the support is not what we would wish and so on and so on, LL has running costs and ppl to pay.
And the RL worlds situation is gone mad atm.

OK

A full sim with 15k prims to use (and the alowance to use them all) is 1 serverplace
4 OS with 3750 prims to use (but please not to do that (?)) is 1 serverplace
That is what I can understand with my easy knowledge of a RL buisness woman.

If „4x 3750“ prims is the same as a „15k“… And I vever ever read something about „light use“… nowere.

In my case: I do not use any Temp reez boxes or megaprims, because they make graphic noice and iggy LAG. Shure, I use scripts if they alowe me to make this SL look more realistic. Butt he best scripts cause LAG. And my computer system is very sensitive.
So as it was said here another 1000 times earlyer: I get mad about being set in a bad posicion because „SOME“ do brake rules wich have never been told or have been written someweare.

BTW… about these temp reez boxes. So let me say that they are not only used at OS!!
I have seen Mainland SIMs loadet with those because 512m“ plots are free but have just a couple of prims. Remove those!!!
But!: Same like there have been roumours about „LL will decline all megaprims“ about a jeare ago? Nothing happened.

Being a „renter“ or „tennant“ on an estate means „you have to live with rules“
Owning a Mainland means the same… „follow the convenant!“

My understanding of „your world, your imagination“ means acting free and giving my ideas and fantasy space to be created. Otherwise I could stay RL making socks form y sisters children.

Owning an OS means being free and without convenatns.

The most worse thing is that, and without naming anyone, there are ppl going to the RL maximum to effort the SL HOME they love.

My SL is the opposite to my RL to gez some rest, to meet ppl…
And here comes the most worse thing!
It seems that LL knows that here are ppl wich are not willing to give of the friends and the beloved ones we found here!!!

They do advertisements wich such and sich many registered users, but how many of them are alt’s?? And yes, they did something about the problems we had a few weeks ago with 60k ppl online, just to have it with 70k ppl again.

For us Sellers in SL this is a desaster! X-mas marked is done before it started and the numbers of sales will sink again because of the ones finaly got bored of LL and their taking away more and more.

Well, they could say „look at what we gave you like the cheate OS and the land marked delivering them within an hour…“

SL will shrink. Shrink to the ones wich are realy addicted, and the ones who care for other ppl here.
I am frustrated and I’m starting to get bored…
OVER 60 sites of things we said.
But he desicion is already made as you can read the the very first page.

It's clear LL has planned this change, for months. Proof is there, and execution of it too.
They tricked many people with vague rules, policies, pricing.
And now, they are collecting. (big time us dollars)

The reason Phillip left the position of CEO, is clear too, it's all planned.
So he will stay out of it, "it's not my fault anymore... "
He got cold feet, and left the position, knowing a stampede of angry customers would soon follow.
M is not better, it's the same character, if you look at what has gone wrong since his introduction.
(wouldn't suprise me, if this M linden is an ALT afterall, used by two or more people, like governor linden is)

We've been played upon, using us a labrats...

They are missleading and lying.. simple fact.

BUYERS BE AWARE... LL CANNOT BE TRUSTED.
(it is in the open now, the last test of their evil plan, failed, and their plans are clear now: money more money, even more money.. and not caring about residents, users at all!!!)

LindenLab? hmmm better change it into LyingLab

No, it is not illegal nor against the ToS to change the owner name to someone else whilst I remain as the payer. It is quite common, actually. If it were against the ToS, LL would not do it, now would they?

I initially quoted the wrong part of Jack's post. I have corrected that now.

Ok, I may be late to the game, but DUH? This is EXACTLY what needed to be done, not just simply make us pay more. Put in tools to limit resources to exactly 1/4 a regular sim, and then put in some sort of notification in the location bar that states it is an OS. Done. Charge the same, but people suffer when they are on one because the resources are truly limited.

Charging more does not fix the problem, it just gives you more money and pisses everyone off. And to add injury to insult or whatever that saying is, you're giving us 2 months, so all of us who bought OS and may want/need to sell are screwed.

Anywho, thanks for nothing, Lindens.

MM

While I have enjoyed the benefits of OS rental, and will probably continue to do so even at a higher price, I also see an opportunity here.

There are so many people being impacted, and so much cash being spent... what if 10% of us actually started to support the OpenSim project? I personally won't use OpenSim until I can TP with my assets from one place to another... or TP in a friend with assets intact. But that day is coming. It will come faster and work better if some of US would support the geeks out on the front lines. The day will come when your SL AV will be able to pop home to your own hosted server, off the SL grid.

Think of the opportunities.

They have needed that option ever since they raised the tier for private islands to $295. The growth of OSRs and their obvious popular usage for things more than scenery should be proof enough to LL that there is a demand for it.

As a recent purchaser of an openspace sim in SL, I am APPALLED at this recent move to ruin us and our enjoyment and creativity in SL. LLs once again threw the hook out to its fish, who pay through the nose anyways, in order to escape the harsh realities of RL. Land prices dropped, enough to where people like myself could afford it. LLs- you suk!! You are in the extortion business, trying to pad the pockets of your poor shareholders who were stupid enough to ride the waves of Sally Mae, and other doomed invertments.
OHHhhhhhh-and also, about the "quad-core" servers an such- there are major discounts available to LLs and other online gaming companies. Suuuure- Like you go out to Best Buy, or Comp USA, and buy them consumer base. give me a friggin break!!!
As a regular on SL, and at many newbie places, i might add, the recent influx in more people to SL has generated more interest, but LLs will kill this, if suddenly, the land is empty again, and the businesses have a hard enough time in this economy.Even in the virtual world of SL, they WILL go under. and again, LLs, whos personnel are mostly voting for the left this election, is doing the spreading around of the money. Haha- what a joke!!!-Listen, all it will amount to is the rich get richer, and the fair, kind landowners will suffer to the mega-rich land barons. It will happen just like when California jacked the land and housing prices in the mid-70s, and the rest of the country followed suit. NOW- look where we are....

I am totally sad at this, as I was saying finally that LLs had begun to really give a sh*t about its residents, and that they were making it more user friendly and REALLY wanting to add people to SL. Oh, and as a note, LLS!!!!!!- YOU ARE NOT giving an improved product!!!- charging 67!!!% more????-for what????- I dont give a rats behind about yur greedy shareholders, if they dont care about us!!! Y'know- for a doubling of prims, i mAY consider keeping the sim. Disgusting!!!

Did you miss the boat? Many of us JUST yesterday paid that to convert them the opposite way as that is what people want, they do not want Bekka Jones having her yard sale out their bay window!. We maintain them, we enforce them for light use and they have no lag.. there is no abuse here... your missing the whole point. People invested in them as tennants can not pay a 67% increase, they have no choice but to abandon them in turn the estate owners have no choice but to fork out another $100 USD to LL now to change them back or pay another $200 a month... lets see that makes LL $200 to the plus and estate owners -$200 to the minus...... can you see the math? now try that times 20.

I tend to agree with someone earlier.... non owners of any open space sims as estate owners or residents have no business on this thread, you get comments like that

Ok let me see if I have this right. If an "abuser" owns an open space sim, they could have 50 shops rented out to vendors for 800L (aprox 3US) per month for 50 prims each making that owner about 40000L per month or approx (depending on exchg rates) 150US
giving that owner a profit of about 75US (note this still only uses 2500 of the 3750 prim leaving 1250prim for the shop builds and other owner uses)

With the 50US increase per month the owner could pass on the cost and each shop owner would only have to pay 1US more per month which most shop owners would probably suck up and stay. Therefore the abusers wont really lose anything. They will still continue to have their high use OSS sims under the new LL OSS pricing......

The real owners that will suffer will be the OSS owners who use them as true open spaces with very light use....water sims, parks and single resident occupancy ....These are the sim owners who will be forced to leave. (not to mention the education groups *shame *shame) The Anshe's of SL wont even bat an eye over this. (btw I havent see Anshe complaining about this ...hmmmm)

the likes of Anshe have already recouped their intial costs tenfold by now and have glutted the market with outrageously low prices forcing full sim owners out of business or forcing them to compete in the Anshe huge OSS market. It is hard enough now to rent the full sim lots just to breakeven (thanks to the lower full sim purchase prices and flight to OSS) Many of the full sim owners never would have even bought the OSS if they could have broken even on the full sims....I bought my only OSS just to help cover my full sim tiers.

Now I along with the small OSS owners will lose that and not be able to even keep the full sims

So, if it is LL intention to reduce the total number of sims this action will certainly do that but since most of them are owned by the so called abusers who will just adj to it by passing on the cost on large shop sims it wont really reduce it as much as they may think and it will probably only increase the load on them as the abusers try to increase the use of them to make money.

If it is LL intent to really have the OSS used for the original intended use then the current proposed action will not help....What person really wants to pay 125USD a month to occassionally float a boat and look at water? It is my guess that those types of OSS uses will disappear completely only leaving the "abuser" OS sims. It would seem to me if this is really the intent LL would offer each sim owner 1-4 OS sims for the original 250US buy plus 75US per month tiers and charge the new fees to owners who own more than 4 OS sims....Now that would really reduce the abuses but since I dont really think this is LL true intent that would probably not happen as the really big "land baron" types would pitch holy H***
So it leads me to believe that either
1) the big land barons are all for this with LL to force out all small OS owners
2) this is just a move to create a cash infusion for LL
3) this is a ploy to increase the shrinkin mainland sim market
4) all of the above

I only own the one OSS and in my opinion it is "light" use ...1 resident who doesnt even use all the prims. So I will just have to give it up if this proposed price increase goes through.

As far as my full sim, if I lose the one OSS I wont be able to cover LL tier costs. So, I guess I will have to give that up too.
which means I will be spending less time on SL, cancel my premium account thereby using the free account, and buying less items in SL (wonder how the business will like it when there sales go down) So LL will lose 4560US per year from me in addition to the approx 1000US per year I spend buying other peoples goods here. If there are many like me then the result will be a further depression of the the already sinking SL economy and less money in the LL pockets long term. Of course LL is probably only looking 3 months ahead to the next quarterly report and bonuses to be made by execs at LL. I guess they are like the other greedy RL businesses....hire a high priced CEO let them run the company in the dumper then pay the CEO a fat fee to get out of their contract with them leaving company and the customers left to suffer from the greed of the high priced execs.

Anyone at LL heard of PR, Marketing, Long Range stategic planning?

Of course I dont know what percentage of LL income comes from small sim owners and premium account owners that dont even own land but seems to me if only the land barons are left and no one buys anything from them they too would disappear over time.

Oh well just my opinions.

Hope LL will rethink this and offer the current sim owners 1-4 OS sims at the current price and charge any sim owner who has more than the 1-4 OS sims the new proposed price structure. (they can monitor the 1-4 sims to ensure they fall under the LL light use definition)

---Keeping my fingers crossed but not holding my breath

67%, actually.

I know, I know, that's a correction in the wrong direction.

As I understand it, the only difference between a private region and an open space is that a private region gets a dedicated CPU whilst four open spaces share a CPU. That means that a single open space is the equivalent of 25% of a private sim, for quantity of prims. Slightly less for performance, because there will be additional load in sharing CPU time and rendering 4x the amount of terrain. The whole argument that open space should be used only for water and landscaping never did wash. Water and landscaping alone are not going to take up 25% resources compared to a full sim of activity.

The challenge with open space regions is that, whilst you can restrict the number of prims, you can't restrict how scripting is used to create effects, or the use of streaming media and other resource-intensive activities. An open space could potentially use as much resource as a full sim. That would be a major problem for the other 3 open spaces sharing the same CPU, with no support provided by Linden.

As someone who is/was about to set up a region, I would not buy only one open space because any of the other 3 sharing the same CPU could cause problems and there would be nothing I could do about it. Instead, the plan was to buy full sims and add open spaces in blocks of 4. But under the new prices, four open spaces is $205 per month more expensive than a single full sim. That's ridiculous. We'll build upwards instead of out.

I do not understand how raising prices solves anything. It would make sense to require open spaces to be purchased and rented in blocks of 4 and ensure they are always hosted together on the same CPU. That way, if someone tries to overload an open space, they cannot affect any sims but their own. I would even say it would be OK for open spaces to be more expensive, because of the additional land you get to terrain and the extra overhead in managing CPU resource, but not 60% more expensive. (1 x full sim = $295, 4 x open space = $500 compared to $300 currently)

This decision does not seem logical. There is no benefit performance-wise (and, unless I missed it, there is still no support) and the cost increases significantly. Given Linden is long overdue a rival, annoying your customers and raising prices is an interesting strategy in the current economic climate.

[some time later]
...well, the announcement has had it's benefits. Reading through the comments, I've discovered OpenSim. Now researching that as an alternative to purchasing within SL. I'm lucky. I am not yet land owner.

Of course. Everyone can live with constant small price increases. But when was the last time you saw any price in real life go up by 66 (!!!) percent? And that 1 month / 2 weeks after I bought my 2 sims?

Suppose you rent an apartment. Of course you know that the rent will go up eventually, perhaps in a year or so, to keep up with the inflation rates. By a small, reasonable amount, let's say 10% max.
So you sign the contract, you buy and lay carpeting, paint the walls, pay a moving company, buy some new furniture and so on, lot's of costs and efforts that you wouldn't have taken if you knew what was coming. And then the shock: One month after you moved in, the landlord announces a rent increase of 66%, starting 3 months from now. Would you call that normal, sh*t happens, suck it up and don't "whine" about it?



And that's exactly how I many people use their openspace regions. So how is it their fault that others... wait. How is it their fault that LL is greedy? Because that's all there really is behind this.

Because it's also not the fault of those who made a business renting OS sims. LL never said that OS sims CAN'T be used that way. They merely suggested light use, mostly to cover their butts regarding the poor performance I suppose, i.e. to warn buyers that it might be a laggy experience. LL never made any restrictions except for the low prim count.



Light sims is EXACTLY what they were advertised as. Sims for light use. Light sims. For scenery, for boating etc., that's what LL told us. And they even increased the prim count, thereby suggesting that OS sims can take more prims, more "abuse".

Scenery with some bird sounds scripted into the prim trees causes the exact same load as a single house with some scripted furniture. LL even suggests boating. 5 residents in scripted sailboats surely cause more lag than 2 people in a sex bed, which frankly is what most people use OS sims for. It's what I use my own and I have no real performance issues whatsoever. I never complained about the little lag now and then, I and every other OS sim owner I know knew what we were buying, a light and therefore less performant sim.

Besides, don't you realize how that sounds? "People took it upon themselves to decide"... what their sims should look like and be used for. OF COURSE they did. They bought and rented those sims. What do you expect them to do? Everyone building a little scenery and happily sitting among Linden trees, alone, without ever inviting visitors? Sorry, if that was a rule and not a suggestion, LL should have made it into law.



They weren't? Then why increase the prim count, allow to buy one at a time and place them anywhere on the grid? They always were light sims or sims for light use as LL puts it. Size of a private island, reduced prim count, lower costs. 1/4 prim count and 1/4 price to be exact, totally fair. LL could easily enforce a visitor limit and thereby also 1/4 of the traffic, which would really only affect those who create lag by building malls or clubs in OS sims. But no - they realized that their product was attractive and decided to squeeze more money out of it. 66% more money, my smoothly shaven ***. They have a monopoly, so they think they can do that. Hopefully not much longer.



A shady business plan like a huge price increase, after buyers did sink too much money into the product to pull out of the contract? Anyway, let's assume for a moment that landlords really have only themselves to blame. Then what about the many people who use OS sims as intended? Who should they blame? Other residents who supposedly brought it onto them by doing something that was never forbidden? That's exactly what LL wants, us blaming other residents while sucking up the highwayman-style business methods of an unethical company who grossly abuse their monopoly while they still can. I won't blame anyone but LL. Nor should you blame any resident, especially if LL's waylaying doesn't affect you.

I can't help but keep wondering if this isn't a case of "Let's give the residents the worst possible news we can, so they'll accept X instead, gratefully."

And of course, in that statement, the "X" is what other nasty they can shove down our throats and that we'll gratefully accept because it isn't the worst case scenario.

In my experience the LL employee at the end of the line doesn't always know what they are doing, and it's your responsibility to make sure you don't break the TOS. OK, maybe I misunderstand the situation, it's just that I'd make sure your legally clean before taking action against LL. Also it's a mute argument now, because since today it is most definitely not allowed.

Well, then, if you could care less about someone else, there is no reason for us to care about you.

Such a typical responce by LL to an abuse problem. Penalize the folks who use the openspace sims per the original intent and rules and let the abuse continue but charge everyone for it. "Oh look, if we make the abuse of opensims the norm, we can make some more money!"

Better solution, monitor the openspace sims resource use and take back the ones being abused. If people are using them to make rentals or other things outside the original intent of the openspace sims, take them back.

The real solution is to - Change the POLICY so that conforming users are allowed to continue using the openspace sims per the original intent, leave the pricing as it was, and go after the abusers.

But then, that would require real monitoring of SL, some actual labor and actually supporting the people that pay the bills, vs just changing the pricing and gouging them.

General mainland pricing is in the toilet, LL now directly competes with private sim owners on themed lands, and the new viewer is borked beyond usability by builders as it can take over a minute for the texture, color, or second inventory window to open.....

I keep wondering when LL is going to point the gun at their head instead of their feet, and the bullet is going to fatally damage SL.

DR Dahlgren

I don't own any sims. The below is a theoretical example. ( I was thinking about buying a full regular one, but that's on hold now, after all who knows what may happen to those tiers now that 4 openspace sims will cost more to run than a regular one.)

SMALL EXAMPLE
I think you may find that say I owned 20 full sims and interspersed between these were 40 openspace sims used for a variety of purposes. They were all nicely terraformed into a nice looking continent.

I don't think that the people who were renting on them would enjoy being told to go back to a small tiny plot, nor do I think that the nice looking continent would look all that good with massive gaps everywhere.

Not everyone can just consolidate back to regular sims. Else they wouldn't have gone for the openspace option in the first place.

END EXAMPLE

In response to other users, I agree that perhaps a solution is to bring back void sims and have 3 options with a low use (void), mid use (openspace) and a full version to choose from.

In response to transferring assets to Opensim, I believe it is possible for full perms objects using easily bought solutions such as Second Inventory which saves them to your Hard Drive, and works with Opensim and thus you can import your assets easily from Hard Drive to your Opensim account.

In response to builders: I too make a good portion of my living in building, terraforming and designing entire sims. The loss of affordable openspaces will certainly hit me hard, especially with RL becoming more expensive, and income harder to come by for contract workers in the current climate.

Less people will want to buy openspaces, and the demand for sim design and builds will fall. That also has a follow on effect, since those renters who no longer will be renting , will no longer need to buy any houses I build and sell either. And of course less houses means less furniture needed, and less avatars needing less products. So in a word, the whole virtual economy will slow down.

No Credit Crunch in SL, Mark? Are you joking? You just made one!

Poor concierge. Judging by the scared Linden(who will go nameless) I calmly talked to last night...Hostile feedback is the norm.

And Jack is right. This thread is a sham, just like the other ones. It's here to allow users to 'imagine' they are talking to LL or jack, but that's all it is. LL have a history of seeking user opinion and then doing what they were going to do anyway, in spite of user opinion. They sometimes claim to have listened, as Jack did in the blog, but that's often a lie and it's sometimes that they've seen the odd user opinion or two to match what they intend doing (just like in this thread and blog comments). In this case, they didn't seek anyone's opinion, so there's no chance of changing their minds.

I really wonder if Linden Lab has an active policy of killing the private owned Estates?
I would prefer honesty above tricks if this is to be true. If we, as large Estate owners, are not fitting in the policy anymore, please be frank about it and we can move on. To OpenSim for example.

Large private estates are still struggling to recover from the last blows by Linden
(lots of smaller estates simply died):
1. The change from 1875 to 3750 prims which made normal sims less valuable.
2. An enormous increase of new mainland sims and dieing small estates overfludded the grid and did put the simprices down to way below newprice.

But as the two above can be seen as "just consequences", this new one feels like a direct attack on private estates as it only influences private estates.

The use of opensims did not change at all. It only got more popular to live in openspace sims. Living in openspace sims was around already long before the last changes. Infact only LL herself used openspaces for pure water. Saying that openspace sims are meant for water, traveling and trees only, is also total bull after increasing the primlimit to 3750. The 1/4 burden is already mentioned in many comments. No need to add to that.

Really the only reason I can think of is that LL really wants the Private estates out and as manager of a 153 sim large estate which is one of the oldest around, I can tell you that LL might succeed this time

It is not only the price increase. It is the changes without any regards of the effects, that make it simply way too risky to have a RL company invest in this grid. Whats next?

Or should we see SL not as a platform, but as a game after all?

Price increase in a time where OpenSim gets better by the day?
I calculated and tested serverburden and datatraffic using a testsetup of OpenSim regions at servers in a high quality hosting location. LL prices seem not based on any reality.
Price increase seem like a way to outprice LL from the new grid market, but why?
I just don't get it?
Maybe I am the stupid one here?

We're not all "lame brained" just because we don't own an open space sim. Non owners visit these sims and enjoy them. We would hate to see these places vanish and I for one am willing to donate L$ to help them survive. These things affect everyone in Second Life.

Last time I looked, this forum was open to all Second Life residents.