Open Spaces Announcement & Talk with M and Jack Linden

Linden is just another web hosting company offering 3D Social Platform.

A web hosting company will never change it's monthly hosting fee for the server that the customer sign up and will never force you to upgrade to a higher class server due to performance issue.

Every detail including Processor, Monthly bandwidth, Hard Disk Drive, RAM, Operating System, Port 10/100/1000 Mbps are clearly listed out and configurable.

On share hosting, If someone overused the CPU resources, that particular account will be shut down or suspended as some of you might have seen it before. No question about it. They do not punish everyone by raising the monthly hosting fee.

Resident buying islands from Linden to sublet are their resellers. Linden should treat resellers as their best friends. They put in time and effort to beautified your island and get you more users.

If a product is not tested, do not market it. You need beta testers to test your beta product just like any software. Do not release it till you fixed the bugs.

Remember, your customer is always right. They are the one that pays your monthly salary.

Honestly, I am beginning to think they don't care. They have a lot of turnover in SL. How many people do you see with birth dates earlier than 2007 these days? I think maybe they think that with turnover like that, offending a lot of oldsters is a decent risk, given they will probably just wander off eventually anyway.

Especially oldsters of the class, who would rather put up the money for their own sims than pay L$100 per meter for Bay City foolishness. I have seen this happen in other venues. They bring in people whose interest is business, not THE business, and therefore have no love or care for it. Bad stewards, bean counters.

And, I am in much better shape financially then many, many people who find SL a door to the world community and to freedoms unattainable in RL. These people are on fixed incomes, disabled, chronically in pain - mentally/physically, and probably would enjoy a latte or a night out.

I just found out that

The tier for 16384sqm of mainland (3750 prims) is US$75 per month.

Coincidentally, Openspace tier is also at US75 per month, total prims is also at 3750 prims, but the land is 4 times bigger than mainland!

It's clearly underpriced from the start when Linden market this product.

No wonder Mainland crashed.

I just found out that

The tier for 16384sqm of mainland (3750 prims) is US$75 per month.

Coincidentally, Openspace tier is also at US75 per month, total prims is also at 3750 prims, but the land is 4 times bigger than mainland!

It's clearly underpriced from the start when Linden market this product.

No wonder Mainland crashed.

Every day, we read more about the growth, opportunities, and risks of social media. Without fail, three of the largest social networks make headlines: MySpace.com, Facebook, and, more recently, YouTube. For a while, MySpace was front and center. Then, YouTube was the story of the week. Now, it's Facebook's turn in the spotlight.

Facebook is a social networking community for college students and alumni. Many things distinguish it from MySpace. It has 9 million members, compared to MySpace's over 80 million. Although Facebook is smaller, it's more exclusive. The admission ticket into Facebook is a valid .edu e-mail address. In addition, individual member pages are less customizable than MySpace pages. The last two characteristics make Facebook a more comfortable place to advertise for many brands.

Last week, Facebook made a very public misstep. On Tuesday, it added a live news feed that displays changes and activity on your friends' pages. If a friend in your network adds a photo or a friend or changes her relationship status, you know instantly. On the surface, it doesn't sound like a major change and might even be a useful, time-saving new feature. But many in the Facebook community were instantly up in arms. To them, the new functionality felt as if every move they made was captured and on display for all their friends to see. Tens of thousands of users joined protest groups, declaring the Facebook news feed an invasion of privacy and "big brotherish."

Two days after the announcement, Facebook chatter in the blogosphere more than doubled. It became the number two search term, according to Technorati.

The community, vocal by nature, began an online campaign that included online petitions and thoughtful discussions on personal blogs. Here's a sample of each:

We all know who has dumped who, who is doing what, and who doesn't like something anymore. This is invasive, and while it is displayed for others to see, it is not meant to bombard their homepage. The Facebook has become a perfect tool for stalkers to gain access to their prey, easily.

Despite the fact that this does not "violate the privacy policies already in place," we feel that it is invasive and directs us to information that we are not normally interested in. --Robert Venezuela

The problem is that facebook assumed that the privacy settings as they are would be sufficient to deal with any concerns that would arise from the new interface. However, this interface REQUIRES much more granularity in the privacy settings than is currently provided. For instance, just because I want people to be able to find my relationship status profile doesn't mean I want to everyone to be notified if I break up with Linda. What I want to make available is not necessarily the same as what I want to notify others about. Also, what if I want people to be notified about changes to my notes but not my wall? There's no way to pick and choose what classes of data are to be fed. What if I only want to get wall feeds? What if I only want total feeds from five people? The default is basically all or none, and in the face of that people are scrambling towards none. --Dima's Blog

By Thursday, Facebook made it clear it would put this new feature under individuals' control so they could determine what changes others would see. The members prevailed. How? And why? Members used this powerful medium to connect, assemble, and make their voice heard. Fortunately, Facebook listened and responded.

The takeaways for marketers:

* Listen carefully. If you target connected customers, have a mechanism in place to collect feedback before taking major actions (product changes, new product launches, etc.). Don't act in a vacuum. Use social media to engage customers and solicit their feedback. Then, make their input an important part of your strategy.

* Be ready to act. Social networks and many Web 2.0 tools make it very easy for people to assemble around a cause. Major brands should have a rapid action plan in place to identify and address these situations before they get out of hand. In the old world, this was called public relations or crisis communications. In a new, networked world, it's good community relations.

* Respect the community. What I wrote in an earlier column about five best practices for marketers who venture into social networking still applies: "Respect the Community. It's a club and you don't really belong. Most social networks aren't about advertising or commerce per se... As an advertiser you're a guest in the club. Understand the environment and respect the unwritten rules: don't intrude on conversations or connections in a way that irritates members; don't divert users from the network to other sites; and don't disguise yourself in a dishonest way."

If this advice doesn't resonate with you, close your eyes and imagine this scenario:

You've just spent six months developing a new campaign for a major new product launch that's a line extension in a very popular, somewhat dated product line. You and your management team have high hopes for this product. You need to invigorate the product line and generate a big bump in sales. You've carefully researched the product and launch strategy. The focus group results indicate you'd add new customers without alienating your core franchise. You launch.

Within a week of launch, 126 groups have formed, all calling for a boycott because you spoiled the product with this line extension. The revolt started in the U.S. and is now moving to Europe. Angry customers are filling your inbox with hate mail. Your boss calls and asks what the heck's going on, how significant the damage could be, and what you're doing to respond. You tell him you're going to change the campaign messaging and heavy up on PR. Then, you realize that strategy won't fly. These people want answers and action -- now. You have hours. Not weeks.

Unfortunatly the deed is done. Most here do not understand they were actually getting a steal, and naturally do not want to lose that sweet deal. The openspaces were grossly underpriced and you are right, it led to mainland becoming virtually worthless. But this is the fault of LL not the people buying the openspaces.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did



http://www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page=3623393

An Article by Mark Kingdon Sept 12, 2006

Um ...

It's not actually going to make much difference to the server at least not enough difference to justify the lies in the MARKETING of OS.

Again and again, it's the way that these were sold to the people who bought them (I am not someone who bought any of them) that has made many people angry.

Well, I think OS is a Mainland killer. Mainland owner are also angry when Linden launched OS underpriced.

Let's take a look at how a reseller sell his OS.

Cut OS into 4 equal parts, 16ksqm each. Sell only 4096 sqm, 937 prims, in the middle of this 16ksqm plot.

The cost would be only US$75/4 = $18.75 per month.

For $18.75 per month, you get a 4096 sqm, 937 prims island surrounded by water.

As for mainland, you pay US$25 per month of 4096 sqm, 937 prims, surrounded by advertisement.

Let's take a look at how a reseller sell his homestead.

Cut Homestead into 4 equal parts, 16ksqm each. Sell 4096 sqm, 937 prims, in the middle of this 16ksqm plot.

The cost would now be US$125/4 = $31.25 per month.

Will there be market for Homestead? Yes, It's slightly more than US$25 per month for mainland.

Get the picture? OS is underpriced at US$75 per month and Linden suddenly realised it.

Oh my goodness. That is incredibly funny. Ironically funny.

I'm absolutely floored.

Firelight

Um... Wow! What happened between 06 and 08 to M? He no longer believes what he wrote about in that article to be true? Maybe our M is an imposter?

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.

-167 islands in 6 days. Golly. Now, will those people go buy mainland, or are they buying anything at all, I wonder. That's LL's big gamble at this point.

Oh my goodness. That is incredibly funny. Ironically funny.

I'm absolutely floored.

Firelight

The takeaways for marketers:

Listen carefully. If you target connected customers, have a mechanism in place to collect feedback before taking major actions (product changes, new product launches, etc.). Don't act in a vacuum. Use social media to engage customers and solicit their feedback. Then, make their input an important part of your strategy.


Be ready to act. Social networks and many Web 2.0 tools make it very easy for people to assemble around a cause. Major brands should have a rapid action plan in place to identify and address these situations before they get out of hand. In the old world, this was called public relations or crisis communications. In a new, networked world, it's good community relations.


Respect the community. What I wrote in an earlier column about five best practices for marketers who venture into social networking still applies: "Respect the Community. It's a club and you don't really belong. Most social networks aren't about advertising or commerce per se... As an advertiser you're a guest in the club. Understand the environment and respect the unwritten rules: don't intrude on conversations or connections in a way that irritates members; don't divert users from the network to other sites; and don't disguise yourself in a dishonest way."
If this advice doesn't resonate with you, close your eyes and imagine this scenario:

You've just spent six months developing a new campaign for a major new product launch that's a line extension in a very popular, somewhat dated product line. You and your management team have high hopes for this product. You need to invigorate the product line and generate a big bump in sales. You've carefully researched the product and launch strategy. The focus group results indicate you'd add new customers without alienating your core franchise. You launch.

Within a week of launch, 126 groups have formed, all calling for a boycott because you spoiled the product with this line extension. The revolt started in the U.S. and is now moving to Europe. Angry customers are filling your inbox with hate mail. Your boss calls and asks what the heck's going on, how significant the damage could be, and what you're doing to respond. You tell him you're going to change the campaign messaging and heavy up on PR. Then, you realize that strategy won't fly. These people want answers and action -- now. You have hours. Not weeks.

"Well, some of it's going to be converting 4 os sims to 1 full sim. People started doing that last week."

God... I really can't imagine anyone continuing business with them after this. It would never cross my mind.