Open Spaces Announcement & Talk with M and Jack Linden

Well doesnt that paint a nice BS story of LL

HAHAHAHA and that is an acurate determinantion because.....
oh wait its not thats right pressing the power button on the pc would cause the same effect.
poor statistic to go for really it should be done overall and not because the server did not see a proper log out especially considering how flakey the grid is any way.

What infuriates me about the CNN article is that it characterizes this as a "price increase". No matter how high the increase, that does NOT sum up the reason for this outrage.

The reason for our outrage is they are giving us another service entirely, from our ability to transfer the openspaces and up. They whole pretense that they didn't mean to give us what they gave us originally is smoke screen. They knew full well what they were being used for, as I believe they knew full well in March when they set this bait that they would yank it all back in November, keeping out setup fees from their summer endeavor in their pockets.

Is this really worth it, LL? Are you trying to shift your userbase to the kind of people who'll just buy a Bay City plot for a lot of money and then shut up and leave you to your earnings? Do you think those people will really create content of the kind that will sell your world for you?

World? Sorry, your 'server resources'. After all, that's what this is. The motto should change to "Our Server Resources, Your Imagination". You have no commitment to your "land" services, you can change them or yank them back whenever you like, or you at least believe you can. You use us to bait the trap for you.

Do we know that? We know that they don't like the sleight-of-hand with separating "Owner" and "Payor", but have we heard something else that I missed?

I guess I don't understand. If LL wants to ban Estate owners from renting out Homesteads (despite introducing it as "a new product called Homesteads that is intended for light use such as low density rentals", then there's no point trying to accommodate any Estate owner interests at all: in that scenario, they're toast anyway.

I sense that there's "grandfathering" on the one hand, and on the other, "double-plus grandfathering" that takes into consideration purchases made before the $75 monthly rate. I'm not sure everybody is on the same page about which "grandfathering" they want. And actually, I'm not so sure that there would be overwhelming agreement among residents that grandfathering the exact terms of current (and/or past) arrangements is more important than opening the possibility of owning a Homestead without needing a full-primmed sim.

I dont want a second full sim. I want 3 homesteads as they are named in the current newspeak. But they will cost me 3 cents per prim instead of 2 cents per prim in a region.

(750 prims is NOT enough to make even a light forest of low prim trees)

I don't want to live on the mainland for 1.3 cent per prim ... no freedom in terraforming, much more lag than on any private region, grievers ....

The raise for a homestead is "only $ 50 per month". Not a lot of money maybe to a manager, but for me... I can try to convert my existing open spaces to one full region, but I can NOT sell my openspaces back to LL, or to anyone else for that matter, my investment of in total $750 is gone to naught

Thank you for a VERY bad marketing decision earlier this year, that now has to be paid for by me and others in the same position.. I never understood how big companies got their money but now i start to understand economics.. thanks for the (costly) lesson

Thank you very much for your response Ann. Please do not think what I'm about to say, is anything negative towards you or your post. I appreciate your help. This may be off topic, or it might just be part of the problem contributing to the severe load issues. I have never in my life had to reinstall a game daily in order to have it perform as it should especially when said game is five years into development. It should also be said I have never played a game as long as I have been in SL, which is 3 years now. I have never had to re-install a game on a weekly or monthly basis even, except SL. I suppose LL could continue to make their product so unreliable, and such an inconvenience to use, that we all leave.

The money I give to Linden Labs has "eroded" over time and continues to do so.

crashing the PC with a power down is still an ABEND (Abnormal End) otherwise known as a client crash.

I am just pointing this out as a technical correction to your observations.
I am not engaging in a debate over your opinions and feelings that you have every right to express.

Noam, you must be right... I was often enough thinking about that, seriously.

Imagine having to reinstall EverQuest II daily.. a multi hour process lol. But they send all the content to your drive up front. The entire game is cached except for npc and player data. Thus why SL installs so fast. All content is downloaded on the fly. So it doesn't hurt so bad to deal with reinstalls. For the moment anyway.

And I think that might be what lies beneath all of this. How much money did they make on those little 1024's in Bay City? You had people paying upwards of L$100 a meter for Bay City, didn't you?

Well, why sell estates at all if you have deluded yourself you can do that regularly? You pay people a pittance to build "luxurious" neighborhoods for you, then you sell them off to burb monkeys who want to be burb monkeys in SL for outrageous prices. Estates must seem pretty passe' after the kind of auctions we saw in Bay City. $1k for an sim? Pfft, they prolly made 10 times that there.

I don't believe it was an accident this happened. I believe there could be a whole lot more to this than just making a mint on a summer bait and switch. Maybe they've decided that mainland is the future of SL. If so, this is just the first attack on the private side of SL.

Sad they'd be that short sighted. Maybe a summer smash and grab was really all this was, I dunno. I do know that the stain they have created for themselves can't be washed away now even if they totally reversed and dropped this whole thing. I will never see land as land again, for me from now on I see server resources.

"Metaverse", indeed. When William Gibson was here he said something to the effect that in his image of the future SL was something that 15 year old girls would hvae made in the basements of dissused corporate servers. I think that's a little generous. I think most 15 year-olds would see the insanity in acts like this. It takes self-deluded business people with no love for their product or it's community to make decisions like this.

While I understand this is an attempt it still does not address a number of issues:

1) Those of use who, under the old rules, have 4 OS sims using 1 CPU because that was the way they were set-up before. Why are we still being asked to pay in excess of what a full sim costs when the resource utilization is the same

2) The educational discount is 50%. M's comment suggests that Linden Labs is now thinking of changing that to 30%. I'm extremely concerned about this as my cost for OS sims is still going to more than double plus now I have to worry about whether my private region costs are going to skyrocket.

3) I like the idea of the difference between the Homestead sites and the OS sim with the lower sets of limits. On the surface this I think is a good balance however M did not mention anything about whether the increase in cost is going to include an increase in performance (such as having 2 Homestead Sims per CPU for example). So is he saying that we get to pay more for the additional prims but we aren't going to get a corresponding increase in performance?

Case in point: the 4 open space sims I have which were all set-up to use a single CPU are currently doing really well in terms of performance. The 1 addition OS Sim, to put it bluntly, sucks. I am right now on that sim, I am the ONLY person on the sim, and its near impossible to move or do anything else constructive on here.

While I appreciate the attempt at trying to reconcile the situation I feel there is still a lot more that could have been done. As it sits right now I still have the same choice I had to make before which is whether to get rid of a number of the OS sims we currently own. The new rules are likely much better for those people in the commercial side of the column but as far as non-profits and educators go this still does not really address the cost and performance issues and in fact opens up new questions as to whether we need to be expecting to be nailed with another price increase over an above this one if the Educational / Non-Profit discount is about to be reduced from 50% to 30%.

*

i know that
i just find the irony of it being that the claim has been made its more stable bla bla bla on their part yet ove the past year i have seen more and more people complain about it than i did in the 2 years prior to that now maybe thats because there is a stack more residents who knows but all the new features and now this price hike is making for a lot of disgruntled people when they should be fixing the problems they themselfs created in the first place before we get all the glowing and shiny stuff and price hikes was my point behind it.
To be honest this has made me realise one thing i probably spend to much time and to much money in somthing that theoreticly does not exist.
Plain old text chat rooms did not have this much drama and going ons like this LOL
life was simple back then, Hang Man anyone?

I guess I am just speechless right now! I keep looking for the right words that might express how important my Openspace sim is to me – but I can’t. I think if someone took my RL home away from me I wouldn’t be as upset as I am about losing my sim. Obviously I have issues. But I guess the great thing about SL is that I am not alone here! But – I guess a couple of points here:

*Sniping at each other solves nothing. Are we angry – yes. We feel violated and we need to voice our opinions to those that have hurt us. The foundation SL is community – and we as that community need to stand together. Ignore the people that are just involved in the forum for the sheer joy of making people madder than they already are. As I tell my kids – ignore the bullies and they will go away -- give them the attention they seek and they just come back time and time again.

* I think Kat’s moderating is just adding insult to injury. People are hurt and they are going to say some not very nice things. And then you have some that are intentionally trying to stir the pot. Personally I want to know what my options are in SL and elsewhere. As a business preson – I always appreciated a little competition. I never insulted my competitors – even when asked. I felt it was my responsibility to PROVE why I was the better business. I built my business on trust, faith, and hard work. If I made a mistake I admitted it and worked to resolve it. And even if it wasn’t MY mistake – my customers had faith that I was on the job to get things running again. I think what Linden Labs is forgetting is that they are losing the faith and trust of all their customers – and without their customers they are nothing. How many corporations are willing to invest when there is no one around to sell to? I can almost bet that a few investors are reading these forums too and watching to see what the outcome is and how it’s being handled overall.

* Bottom line – I think it is fairly clear that people do not like this latest development. I think there have been some people who have put an INCREDIBLE amount of effort into crunching numbers and coming up with some reasonable suggestions on how to resolve this issue. The ball is in Linden Lab’s court. We know they are reading the posts. It’s up to them and I think they need to make some decisions fast or people are just going to gain momentum.

Personally – SL is my escape. It’s the one place where I forget about the demands of my job, the responsiblities of being a mother to two special needs children. I’m not looking for love or participating in some deep dark fantasy. It’s the place where I can come and have some laughs and enjoy life. I’m not losing a business. I hope to stay on SL. But if worse comes to worse – I can be a ‘land baron’ of some huge sandbox on another grid. I can live without currencey, scripts, and all the perks.

Hang in there folks – keep posting – keep viewing – keep up your inworld protests. Hopefully the CommUNITY of SL will overcome.

Bloody hell I haven't heard anyone describe it as an Abend since I stopped using Novell years ago! I didn't realise people were still using that term.

Gigs is on a previous page but Grandfathering is the option I support. Any transfer makes it non grandfathered.

The more LL sell direct the more their costs are impacted. People complain a lot about estate owners but Linden Lab's markup will be higher, the going rate for an estate manager is a lot less than Linden Lab would pay for a support person for example. Then there is the extra billing and support costs.

That's not to say Linden Lab can't or won't sell direct on Openspaces but I'd expect tier costs to go up with it and probably more than people think, say 40 or 50 dollars a month extra.......HOLD ON A MINUTE!

Yes, ones that go off on Lindens and post chat logs without permission after being warned to play nice.

They also do that to non-premium residents.

/me sends Katt a cookie.

edit: and posting here about it under an alt is probably another violation.

As a Resident, and usually a quiet one, I give you a *high five* for listening and adjusting the policy, giving Residents an option, as well as the TIME to make a decision. Time in SL is runs away too fast, as RL is always on us.

There is a wealth of knowledge and innovation among the Residents that have helped SL thrive, as well as experience. Thanks for listening to it.

Thanks for the stability too. =) It has improved!

*waves and goes to read the Knowledge Base*

Did you post this after reading the blog from M and before you read the KB article which specifies the details of the products?

Just curious.

Firelight

With all the horse crap around LL, there's bound to be a pony somewhere.

Are you going to raise the tier and/or purchase price of full prim Islands?





Is there any amount of time that you are willing to commit to not raising the tier and/or purchase price on full prim Islands?





Do you want us to go? If you want us to stay, can you please say so?





Do you feel there have been any errors at all on Linden Labs part, throughout the lifetime of Open Spaces?

If so, can you please just say so?





Being humble goes a very long way to most people. If you want us to go away, this would not make much difference.





Every page of this thread says the same thing and expresses the same concerns.





Is there some reason these few basic questions cannot be answered? I need reassurance of some kind.





No responses = assume worst case scenario for most.






I need to know these things in order to make a good business decision at present time.



Thank you.

Val

Dang Val, try posting 5 more times.. maybe they'll listen then.

Folks.. here's the rub.

LL screwed up. Of course, they will probably never out and out apologize for it, let alone admit it, but that's what it boils down to. They sold a product without enough foresight to realize that the residents capitalizing on said product would end up costing them money in the end, rather than making them money. It doesn't matter what excuse they use as a "cover", the point is that they just can't afford the product that they are selling long-term.

LL screwed up not coming forward when they first caught wind of the issue and engaging us in the dialogue concerning what to do about it. I think Mark was trying his best to say it, but Corporations are Notoriously Bad for admitting fault or guilt, because someone, somewhere will sue them and use even goodwill apologies to bankrupt the company. Courts and the laws suck at times.

Regardless, LL is now in the position of renting, maintaining, and supporting a product which, to them, is no longer profitable, but instead has become a cost center. They have to do something to rectify the situation. What would you have them do?

1. Grandfathering? Not likely. The product is COSTING THEM MONEY. Grandfathering a cost center without a complementary revenue center to offset it isn't going to happen. No business is going to do that.

2. Keep the price point and lower the product's performance? It certainly is an option. How severe do they have to lower it, though? Maybe the cost of having even an empty OS sim is still losing them money. Who knows? I don't. I wish I did, though. Would help me make a better and more informed opinion, to be sure; same with the rest of us, I imagine.

3. Keep the product's performance, and raise the price? Well, that's the initial solution put forth. Obviously it's not good enough for many reasons, but it *IS* one valid option.

4. Make multiple tiers of products for multiple tiers of usage? Well, that's what we have now.

5. Raise rates on other products and services to act as an offsetting revenue center. The "eggs in the cornflakes" maneuver. I don't think that will make the balance of us any happier.

6. The only other obvious solution is the worst of all: They simply pull the product. "Sorry, folks! We can't afford to have openspaces anymore, so upgrade to full sims, as we're shutting down the openspace product on X date". This is nothing new in the industry. Product/service offerings that fail to perform are often cut.

At the end of the day, LL is a for-profit company. They have to do everything they can to make money, and if a product is underperforming or, worse, negatively performing, then they have to do something about it. If they don't, then they will have to find the money to support it elsewhere, or they will go bust.

Should they have come to us with this months ago when they discovered the issue? You're damn right they should have. This black eye isn't going to go away for a long time. Their handling of it has been beyond abysmal, and if I had anything to say about it, some folks' jobs would be on the line, starting at the top with the most responsible person, Mark Kingdon himself.

So, yeah, it's gonna be painful. Our holdings and enjoyment here in this platform are going to contract a little, and is going to also give competition to LL the shot in the arm it needs to grow and expand, and that is a good thing. However, many of us are going to weather it the same way we've weathered all the other BS that we've had to put up with here. We'll all reach the point eventually where we will move on, as each person has their own level of tolerance before they say "screw it", but that's OK. It's ultimately a healthy thing for everyone, including LL. SL isn't the only source of entertainment, community, virtual business, etc, and will become even less exclusive in those areas as time goes on.

I'm not going to patronize anyone or begrudge anyone their choice in how to respond to this fiasco, because there is really no right or wrong way to do so, just YOUR way. The only thing I would ask is that you sit down, take a few deep breaths, TRY to look at ALL your options objectively, and make the best decision you can, for yourself, in the most pre-eminent light of reason. If you need support, ask your fellow residents. Bounce your thoughts and plans off of them and see what they say. Talk to your tenants and landlords. See if you all can work together to adapt.

In that vein, if I can help, ask. I can't promise anything, but it certainly can't hurt to try.

Who knows? LL may still amend the deal even more as they get more feedback. Maybe they will continue to adjust and amend it throughout next year.

Lastly, to LL: Learn to properly communicate and act PROACTIVELY with your customers. Involve your residents/customers in your business, because WE ARE YOUR BUSINESS! You don't get many second chances for gross incompetence like this, and even less so as your competition grows (and you are ensuring its growth every time you do this). At some point, it's going to cost you the farm, and you know what the worst part about being a faceless inhuman corporation is then? No one will cry any crocodile tears over your suffering and eventual demise. NO one.

oo you'll be back, at least once the KB article has sunk in.