"reduced stipends for premium accounts created after July 21, 2006"

How does that follow?

- LL will sell (at this point) $10,000 worth of L$ per month. That's $10,000 that otherwise would have gone directly to content creators.
- LL will sell up to the total amount of sinks in any given month, effectively eliminating *all* sinks from the economy.
- LL has not introduced any way to stop the L$ from declining again

So, when the L$ reached 350 again, you *will* have to sell at that level. Only now, you've got the guys who print the money, run the exchange, and have the power to kick you out also selling at that level. Yeah. Win-win.

-i'm not totally sure how this would have otherwise gone to content creators. either way it's going to people one way or another, who will use it to buy things from content creators.

-exactly. balance

-that's what this thread was about in the first place. they'll continue to add sinks, reduce stipends as needed to let them sell the amount they need to turn a proffit. i wouldn't be surprised if they cut premium stipends to 300 in a couple more months, and eventually even removed them entirely for new accounts, making premium just for land ownership, and the lindex for people needing money. the internet doesn't give free money, and neither can sl if they hope to become something simmilar.

and i really don't think many people are steering clear from buying lindens due to this, aside from possibly the day traders, and they aren't buying my stuff with that money anyway.

Over the course of each month LL will place $10,000 worth of L$ onto the market alongside users' orders. Previously, for a certain level of activity, all the cash used to purchase L$ would have gone to content creators. Now, $10,000 of the money used to purchase L$ will be going to LL instead. Ergo, this move will directly cost content creators $10,000 each month. And that assumes LL sticks to *only* selling $10,000. There's nothing to suggest that will be the case.


I'm hoping that was a joke. Just in case it isn't, this is the epitome of unbalancing the economy. Previously, some amount of L$ evaporated from the economy. This caused a scarcity of L$ that acted as a stabilizing factor. Now, instead of letting the L$ spent on sinks evaporate, LL is pumping them back into the economy. This will driv the exchange rate down further.


But, they have said that any L$ sent to sinks they add will just be put into the account of their L$-selling account for resale. They can add sinks until doomsday, but if they proceed to resell the L$ that are "lost" to sinks, it won't matter one bit.

i don't honestly believe they're planning on putting every cent they take out in sinks back in through selling. i take their word that they'll sell as much as needed to mantain a balance against the otherwise rising price of lindens caused by the sinks and stipend cuts they'll make and continue to make over the coming months /years.

and i still don't get the content creators thing. it's still all going to get sold. i'm still going to get my chunk moved within a few days as long as i sell at a reasonable price, whether there's some on there for sale from ll itself or not. if it's not all getting sold, then i expect ll would pull some of theirs from the market to stabalize things.

No, I think you are understanding it correctly.

It won't help the economic cause at all. It was never intended as anything that altruistic.

I don't think it ever had much to do with "stabilizing" the economy - it had primarily to do with LL making money selling Lindens. Otherwise, how could one account for the notion that for some reason *now* is the time to start selling Lindens? After all, the Linden isn't all that robust, though it has gained health and held steady for the past few weeks, and certainly not at the level most people think of as strong ($4.00). In any case, we are hardly in an emergency state where Lindens are too expensive and LL needs to start selling Lindens to balance the economy, are we.

LL's larger goal, as I see it, is to get to where residents buy money only from LL on the Lindex; not player's money. Those wishing to sell their money to other players will ultimately have to do it some way other than Lindex, though for those who stay (if allowed), LL will still at least get the handling fee.

When the current situation - LL selling their own Lindens now on Lindex - causes the Linden value to slide, then the next portion will be introduced. This will be where only LL sells Lindens on Lindex, or LL's Lindens always go first, before anyone else's. This will be seen as a "necessary" thing to do to stop the slide of the Linden value, and will be lauded as wise and necessary by those believing that LL's moves are in the best interest of the economy and all of us.

(Of course they are in the best interest of all of us, if you consider that unless LL is sufficiently profitable, there will be no all of us.)

People will still be able to trade on third-party sites - they won't outlaw it - but the majority of the buyers will be going to Lindex.

The content creators will have trouble making money for their work, but then, their work is no longer needed. The smart ones will be doing work for outside businesses whose pocketbooks are deep and who want an advertising presence within SL.

Similarly, getting rid of the stipends has less to do with "maintaining a stable economy" than it does with having residents buy Lindens from LL directly. LL will end up with more money this way.

Premium members will still pay the same amounts (or more) for owning land; they just won't get a stipend along with it.

(Somebody wrote above that you can own land while a basic member - that is certainly news to me! You mean I can go basic and still own my land and pay tier?)

The number of premiums will probably dwindle, but then I don't think LL cares about retaining individual paying premium members. The total resident count doesn't rely on that, and LL probably prefers a system where large land barons control most of the land anyway.

They know the slack from loss of premium individual land-owners will be taken up by land barons, and that is easier and more cost-efficient for LL to handle (and can be more easily controlled) than individual landowners. The land barons, of course, will make sure they make a profit, and being a small individual land-owner will gradually become more expensive than renting from a baron anyway. It will become a luxury.

We will all live on baron-owned land, and agree to and abide by the "governments" these owners install. And that is the "government" we are going to get.

So what we are looking at is the eventual eradication of all moneys ever coming to residents from LL, except those bought through Lindex. This means all stipends will be eliminated, along with anything else that remains (what does remain? I forget), with the possible exception of stipends for giving classes, but that isn't something available to everyone anyway, but given to hand-picked residents.

After all this will come ways to get a cut of other things - shopping, for instance. Those things which were once left up to us to do will become something LL does, and we can do it, too, if we do it somewhere else, and if we find any takers, considering that LL has a monopoly on the game's interface/screen/buttons.

As for the Lindens limiting the amounts they sell to the total amounts of the sinks . . . well, I wasn't born yesterday.

coco

Right now I am just hanging out until september when NWN 2 is released.

Has the sky fallen yet?

L$500 a week is about U$1.50, a small coffee at Starbucks is more than double that... really if you can't afford that... how are you paying for that internet connection?

And $10,000 a month is over $330 each day. That's the amount of money LL is taking directly out of the pockets of *their* content creators.

I don't think so.

Looking at some numbers very fast at the end of a long day, for the month of June the Stipends totaled 50 Mil. Sinks were 23 Mil.

To see the long term effects of the new change, fast forwrd 12 months where it's assumed that all but the lifetime accounts have renewed for the new stipend amount and no other changes were made.

Thats a reduction of 10 mil per month and up to 23M to be sold.

The end result is if LL sells the full amount equal to the lindens removed from the the sinks, then LL is pretty much getting the worst of both worlds; all the negative effects of stipends (reduction of the value of the linden) with non of the benefits (purchasing power to players).

However, I think its reasonble to assume that the LL collective is not stupid and have probably figured this out too.

Therefore, I think that either they may not sell the full amount of the current sinks, or they will increase sinks, or continue to reduce the stipend over time, or some combination of the three.

All of which are good for the overall economy, PROVIDED an alternate means to providing income to player who do not desire to work in game yet pay for a premium account is found. Once a solution to this is found, you'll see a much better economy long term, and a lot of happy players too.

The Lindens took out $10K a month they paid to content creators, to provide entertainment, to get ppl in and keep them coming back, and now..as much as this feels like a huge slap in the face, they will be selling this $10k back to us...to ummm what are they calling it "stabizing" the economy ? From what they were touting all along was to remove created "L" out of the system to keep the Linden from falling further in worth...sooo maybe im seeing this wrong, but if they haul in 10K and set it out for sale, isnt this a severe form of inflation ?? They are creating more L are they not ??

And as far as Philips blog goes, theres way too much hocus pocus and flim flam in it for my taste, does anyone know whats really going on?? do they really want us to ?

I know my account is fine, but if they are going to start reducing stipends it's only a matter of time before it effects us all. I propose they just combine basic with premium. make it free, and give us all the same stipend. XD that way you only have to pay for land.
*rolls eyes*

You've been glossing over a few points I feel. Firstly, they're reducing the amount of money introduced to the supply from new premiums. Won't that reduce the money supply per capita over time? That and the removal of basic stipends is the means LL has introduced to help stop the L$ from declining in value again.

Also, from Philip's statement:

"3) Sales will have restrictions applicable to currency tier traders. Supply Linden will start trading under the limitations of Currency Trader Tier 2. This tier is limited to US$10,000 selling per rolling 30 days, and also limited to US$5,000 per day."

It say limited to... an upper cap. It doesn't say, they will sell that amount. It doesn't say we will sell US$10, 000 per 30 days. It's says no more than. It sounds like a constraint, that's all.

"5) Sales will be volume-restricted based on Linden Dollar sinks. In any 30-day period, we will not sell more than Linden Dollar sinks in the past rolling 30 days."

It doesn't say, we will sell as much as sinks. It says we will sell no more. Same deal. It doesn't, on face value, mean the effective elimination of sinks at all. Just a check.

Basic stipends for new users are gone, premium stipends for new users are being reduced, the world is growing.There will need to be a way to introduce more money into the economy as needed, this sounds like a mechanism they can use to do it in a controlled fashion.

My alts are free basics, who only have the money that I have given them (less than L$1000 each) for buying stuff or testing things I am selling in my store. So, no, this change won't affect me - but I wasn't aware we should only protest against things that directly affect us, instead of making our feelings known for the good of the game overall and its future?

Lewis

You've been glossing over a few points I feel. Firstly, they're reducing the amount of money introduced to the supply from new premiums. Won't that reduce the money supply per capita over time? That and the removal of basic stipends is the means LL has introduced to help stop the L$ from declining in value again, in theory.

Also, from Philip's statement:

"3) Sales will have restrictions applicable to currency tier traders. Supply Linden will start trading under the limitations of Currency Trader Tier 2. This tier is limited to US$10,000 selling per rolling 30 days, and also limited to US$5,000 per day."

It say limited to... an upper cap. It doesn't say, they will sell that amount. It doesn't say we will sell US$10, 000 per 30 days. It's says no more than. It sounds like a constraint.

"5) Sales will be volume-restricted based on Linden Dollar sinks. In any 30-day period, we will not sell more than Linden Dollar sinks in the past rolling 30 days."

It doesn't say, we will sell as much as sinks. It says we will sell no more. Same deal. It doesn't, on face value, necessarily mean the effective elimination of sinks at all.

It remains to be seen how much they actually put on the market.

Basic stipends for new users are gone, premium stipends for new users are being reduced, the world is growing.There will need to be a way to introduce more money into the economy as needed, surely? This sounds like a mechanism they can use to do it in a controlled fashion, possibly. Yes, they're introducing more Lindens into the market, but less will be coming in via stipends, and over time, the amount of basics who don't recieve a stipend and premiums on a reduced stipend will increase as a proportion of the population.

Never needed the stipen. Never desired the stipen. Own land. Still not understanding the fires people keep on lighting. Aparently people cannot enjoy SL becuase their too bussy bitching about the grass on the other side of the fence.

If you can afford a computer and an internet connection capable of supporting SL (which is a feat in it self ) then I fail to see the problem here. Lest we forget entertainment costs money...

/end 10,000 ft observation

Premium contract included stipend. Paid for stipend. Expect what I paid for.

/logic

I don't understand this logic. You're mad so you're going to take your marbles and go home, eh? You'll show those jerks, alright, instead of paying them for the right to own land every month you'll instead be paying...them...for the right...to own land...every month....hmmm...

ok a couple of things in the preceding pages of posts stick out to me.

First 10,000 USD going into LLs account from sell L$. Some are claiming it is being taken from content creators. I think there are a couple of flaws in this argument. First not everyone that sells L$ is a content creator there are land barons and traders as well. Who is to say it is not a Trader (or Land Baron) that buys that 10k effectively short circuiting any loss to the content creators. No way to say it is content creators getting ripped here. Also it may well be that on a monthly basis the increase in buyers of L$ is far exceeding the 10k amount ie the people saying this seem to be assuming the amount of L$ bought is constant. It isn't. This month I may need 100k for land next month nothing. We can't say how much of that 10k is being taken (if any) from content creators in any given month.

The second thing that struck me is that 10kUSD is a paltry sum compared to total sinks. Yes it does negate some of the sinks but it does not even come close to couterballancing ALL the sinks. 10k USD is roughly 3 million L$. Total Sinks is MUCH higher than this.

Third, the way I read it is the 10k is the absolute limit. So if the amount they would sell relative to sinks would be higher they will stop at 10k.

just my 2L for what its worth

hmmm, I was always under the impression that you had to go premium to own land.

hmmm, I was always under the impression that you had to go premium to own land.[/QUOTE]

There are older programs and offers. One such example is the lifetime account. Another, I believe, was letting basics pay teir, and own land.

There are older programs and offers. One such example is the lifetime account. Another, I believe, was letting basics pay teir, and own land.[/QUOTE]


oops, not my quote!

It doesn't work that way...

It's up to US$10,000 of L$ entering the system each month at fair market value instead of at the subsidized Premium rate. We'll be competing less with other L$ sellers this way, as it stands today sellers on LindeX are directly competing against Premium stipends. That's not a healthy long-term scenario for the market.

It's not necessarily a whole US$10,000 in L$ per month that we'll be selling. If the market is weak it's likely we'll sell much less than our limits, if it's strong we'll get closer to those limits.

As the sources and sinks continue to be adjusted we'll have a better ability to introduce more or less L$s into the economy as required to help stabilize the market.

Figuratively speaking, US$10,000/month isn't even much of a rounding error relative to our income from land sales and maintenance. We aren't doing this for the US$, it's not a justifiable expenditure of resources to do it for that reason. We are doing this for market stability.

There is no L$ sales target, it's ALL about the market stability.

Cheers,
Lawrence