INFOHUB UPDATE: auctioning off the land!

I would like the opportunity to consolidate my multiple telehub land locations into fewer, larger lots before the auctioning of any telehub land. I would not be getting more land, I would just get the choice to consolidate my existing land into fewer sims. I would end up less but larger lots. Who knows, maybe other telehub land owners might like to do it too?

I would smile
Sinatra Cartier

I agree with those who wish to keep them Linden land and removing the 'Blue I'.

The community is *far* better served if the Governor would send his minions about to clean up and auction off the other 300 odd servers worth of land he is holding onto.

^ who else agrees? Speak soundly please!

This continues; I am wanting for many more voices to chime in here. Each Resident of Second Life counts with your own opinion--together you are the community.

Already, I've directly contacted several of you who've expressed contra-auction opinions for your initiatives. Eager am I to find out what you feel is better, and what you want to do. I would like to assist in those Infohub developments, and will get my hands dirty when you do too. This dialogue is important.

It was good to see you inworld, Karsten, about this--again, it sounds like a very fruitful collaboration will take place with broader usages! Let's hope it has a big stamp of KICKASS on it.

Sinatra, could you please explain more about how that would be done?

And... out of curiosity, why is it the worst is so often assumed when a "blank slate" of land is up for bid? Anyone, funds willing, could purchase land and shape it to their whim. For example, what if a lofty visionary wanted to make a new snow park in Anzere? Or is it because of bad previous history that's soured? The fear that it'd be cut up into little parcels and made even exponentially more horrid?

To take the temperature, and by no means scientific, but to get the pulse de semaine, I'm going to append a poll to this thread. Please vote, and of course, post further commentary in the thread itself.

The poll's been added. It is quick 'n' dirty, and it will be closed in a week. This, in addition to the feedback in this thread, will be taken into compassionate account.

Vote confidently, vote well!

Good to hear! I hadn't realized that you had done so much legwork in preparation for this thread. Half the battle is getting the word out that something is afoot. The other half is finding the folks willing to put their best foot forward.

This reinds me of when we started work on the hub area in Nova Albion. I contacted every land owner in Grignano, Sistiana, Barcola and some (not all) in Miramare. (Many of the Miramarites were already aware of the hub possibility and contacting each land owner was A LOT of work.) Not many responded. Enough did that we got a beginning group of folks involved, but it is a small percentage of the overall city population. I suspect many don't have the time or necessarily want to get as involved in the city affairs. Thats cool. We all have differrent priorities and maybe a lot of it has to do with timing. The hub area will be there if they find time to help out or want to contribute something to it. I look at it as a long term thing that different folks will contribute to over time and not the responsibility of any one person.

Some may be worried that they can't build and don't feel that they can contribute to helping out with a hub. Building is just one part. There is scripting, texturing, contacting folks (like the Lindens) to help find solutions and also just being at the hub to answer questions when a new resident wanders by. You and your neighbors can pool your talents to make your hub areas into someplace special.

Have a hub in a remote area? Find out what the unique aspects of your area are and build on those. Put a SLurl for your hub area in your signature or on your blog or web page to direct people there. Send a notice about it to the follks at the InfoNet, Metaverse Messenger or other publications. Get the word out. Make some noise. Be the squeeky wheel!

You may be surprised at what happens.

*snickers*



It would upset a lot of landowners around existing infohubs who did pay over the odds in the past for that plot of land, and you can guarantee it'll be the biggest player in the area that will buy the land, and make it even more worthless for those around. It's almost a certainty that there will be either a laggy mall or club spring up on it, or an expansion from the lagfy mall or club next to it.

There are so few 'public gathering spaces' in game - my camp fire circle being one of the few - and I think it would be so helpful to make more of them, as is my intention.

Incidentally, it would also be helpful if people who don't own land - or don't have appropriate land - could 'rent' the infohubs to hold events. Say I own a huge mall, but would like to hold a discussion with like-minded individuals on advanced playing techniques for the Peruvian Nose Flute; rather than rebuild half my mall to make somewhere to hold the meeting, I could just rent an infohub for an hour - which would appear on the events calendar - and hold the meeting. I think this would encourage a lot of people to diversify within their gameplay, when the majority of their in-game resources are tied up in a particular style.

Lewis

There has been a lot of upheaval regarding land around telehubs/infohubs and the back and forth nature of teleporting from point-to-point to fixed telehub and back hasn't helped. I can understand why landowners around hub land would be upset. Uncertainty is a factor in our first lives and now second ones too. Fortunately here is an opportunity to do something about it. For those that live near hub land, especially those seemingly on the auction block, get out those tool belts and hard hats and make something happen.

"Almost a certainty." And there's the wiggle room -- the possibility that it won't happen. Right now it's possible that the hub land Torley listed as going up for auction might not -- if the locals want to do something about it.

I haven't had the same experience as you with regards to finding public gathering spaces. I find them all over the place. Maybe folks just don't know about them or have some sort of notion about what they need to be that doesn't fit in with what's out there? What is your definition of a "public gathering space?"

Unless I have misinterpreted the Events web page, anyone can hold an event at any Linden Hub Land that is listed as a "Gathering Place" already. I don't think they have to be a land owner. I checked the list and it lists quite a few places. That may also be a feature that is not widely known. Perhaps they have to be a premium member, I can't check what the list might show for a Basic Member.

Torley, have Basic Members been able to hold Events at Linden Hub Land Gathering Places all along?

Pleasantly, YES.

And others which are not "Infohubs" per se but land owned by Governor Linden and designated as Gathering Places. As I alluded to earlier, places like the chalet in Wengen and De Haro's campgrounds are underrated. They could stand to be publicized more. This'll all develop...

SQUEAKY WHEEL!

(Going to bed shortly, please awake me with the sounds of many wheels a-squeakin'!)

I hadn't picked up that you could use infohubs as event hosting places - so I stand corrected on that one. It seems that the info isn't well known - and it's something I plan to correct in the one I have been given to redevelop.

My definition of a 'public gathering space' is land that isn't something else. For example, a courtyard in the middle of a mall is still a mall, with all the lag and problems it generates. Clementia Park, whilst it may be a nice non commercial place, doesn't necessarily lend itself as a gathering space as there is nowhere to gather.

I suppose everyone has their different ideas on these things - but I do plan to make the one I am working on 'gathering friendly', by being pleasantly landscaped but with a stage area so that a host or musician has somewhere they can work from.

I think part of the problem is that the standard infohub layout is more of a placeholder than anything else, there's really no reason to go there and the design isn't anything special either. Hopefully this will change all of that, and people will find the desire to hold non-commercial events that they may not have. Presumably the end of the dwell/DI gaming will mean that people stop doing events for profit and traffic, and do them because they benefit others instead.

Lewis

There is land that used to have a telehub on it.
For this example let's call it "telehub land".
And there is land whose property line shares a border or borders with telehub land.
For this example let's call it "adjoining land"

Before you auction off "telehub land" allow the owners of "adjoining land" to use a portion of the telehub land for consolidation of the adjoining land they own in several sims.

The size of this portion would be determined by what percentage of telehub land perimeter the adjoining land shares.

If my property surrounds 15% of the perimiter of a sims telehub land then I could use 15% percent of the telehub land adjacent to me to consolidate my adjoining land from two, three, four or more sims into fewer sims.

What I end up with is larger lots in less sims. Linden Lab benefits because as I empty out of some sims (consolidating into another) the size of the lots LL can auction could be larger.

I benefit because I can create more thematically on my fewer but larger lots.

I am not getting more land, I am only trading location of some of my "adjoining land" for some of LL's "telehub land" So that I may have larger, less fractured, lots.

I would feel good about that

More like splashes, as the baby is thrown out, with the bathwater.

Sorry...I just had to say it.

I'm sure if you ask in the Scripting forum someone would be able to write that animation for you

Lewis

i finished my freebie delivery system prototype, based on my multi pannel vendor, it is fast and effective ^^ i just need now to come up with a proper design and it will be good

Gonna still advertise them as 'info hub land' and make the same mistake twice?

I didn't go to info hubs - because - well - there was bugger all info there really.

Dunno bout 'diluting and spreading out' seems thats the exact OPPOSITE of what information should be - company info should be saturated - easy to get hold of.

Not a case of too many infohubs.

Case of not enough info.

That's a good point. All the hubs were exactly the same, so there's no real benefit to going to one over and above any other. Or, to be honest, any, once you no longer classed yourself as a newbie?

Part of my redevelopment plan for infohubs would be for them all to have a different look and different purposes - some as merely gathering places, some set up for meetings, playgrounds, cinemas, etc etc - so that depending on what you wanted in an "Infohub", you'd go to an appropriate one.

But you're right, "Infohubs" is the wrong term to use. They will - hopefully - have a variety of different purposes, and a rename might make them more utilised. Perhaps "Public Space" will do the job, anyone else got suggestions?

So what does this mean for Linden Radio? Torley mentioned it was going to be broadcast around the infohubs? Is that project scrapped too? LL seems to change their mind as often as they change their underwear lately.

I only skimmed this thread, but I don't think they're auctioning off all of the hubs, or are they?

The question at this point is "are they going to auction any of them?"

I like that idea... a whole variety of public spaces with different purposes. That'd be useful for everybody, not just newbies. Plus it'd look more interesting than having near-identical setups everywhere you go; might encourage people to explore a little more.

I'm working on it but I can only do one at a time.....

Lewis

I don't have big suggestions for redesigning all the infohubs, but I was at one the other day and thought how quiet and lonely it was. Made me wish for Max Headroom (remember that show?) on a television screen, making jokes, fading in and out, giving useful information, telling the Second Life News, etc.

The whole concept of that show was interesting (though my memory may not be recalling all of it this many years after the show was cancelled). If I were designing a world of the future, I'd have television screens everywhere with updated news, something futuristic but familiar at the same time. (I love post-apocalyptic entertainment, heh).

Just the addition of television screens with streaming, daily-updated content here and there around SL would be most excellent , and if it were Max Headroom I'd spend a lot more time visiting telehubs myself. (yeah it can't be Max, I know )

I can only ask: Why???
It is not like available land is running short in SL? There is like 5000 lots of land for sale to put clutter on; and LL ads more crappy sims out for auction daily.

My suggestion would be, wipe them, make them protected land. Ppl living by them has counted on them staying Linden owned, and do not want a 50m high pink penis on them some day.

What is next? Selling protected land that by which ppl have paid good money for land, because they do not want clutter in their view.

Seems LL monthly comes up with something to screw the players with. I am afraid of the future in SL and all the idiocy that those deciding comes up with.

These words send chills down my back. "This is an experiment..." As best as I can recall, these are the same words used by Karen (?) regarding the last minute announcement of the Telehubs conversion to Infohubs. The loss of public land and how it has affected, not just Weedy, but all of us (per Weedy's explanation), really has nothing to do with the auctioning of Infohub land, nor does the issue of the Telehubs/Infohubs conversion and how it affected many land owners, with one exception...it demonstrates how LL seems to sometimes do things without thinking them through properly.

For instance, has it been considered how LL is going to compensate current land owners who's parcels abut the Infohub lands slated to be auctioned off? Has it even been considered that there will be compensation for these land owners? I can assure you that the loss of an Infohub and the fabulous protection it provides to the parcel directly adjacent to the Infohub will greatly devalue that parcel.

I won't go into my own story except to say that the lack of forsight on LL's part regarding the Telehub/Infohub conversion was deplorable. On the other hand, I applaud LL for eventually and fairly compensating land owners near Telehubs for their losses, however I was one of the few/many who still got screwed over for the simple reason that LL hadn't initially forseen that compensation would be necessary (I'll explain in detail if you wish).

If the issue of compensation hasn't yet been decided upon by LL for the loss of the Infohubs listed, then I am of the opinion that the only residents who should be polled regarding this issue are the persons who currently hold land abutting these Infohubs. I do, however, get the impression by what you've said here Torley, that regardless of how this poll/thread concludes, the Infohubs listed will be auctioned off anyway. If I am wrong about this, I apologize in advance.

As far as what I feel should be done with the Infohubs, my opinion is nothing should be done with them, or...and I can't believe I'm agreeing with anything that Lewis says, but:



I agree with Lewis here. I, personally, think the Infohubs should remain as public parks (protected land), however, Lewis shows forsight in that, perhaps, in the future, the network of Infohub lands could have other public oriented uses. If maintaining the hubs is too much for LL to handle, then simply remove the Infohub, but leave the land as public parkland and gathering areas, i.e. put in more seating, add chess and majong games similar to the welcome area in Ahern.

Ilianexsi, I've got a sentimental attachment to that Zermatt hub myself. Want to get together and come up with a proposal for preserving it or developing it as an appropriately wintery community asset?

why does that sound dirty to me ?