Subsidies.

That'd be cool. Then we could charge per mp3 per listener for streaming music and DJing, per viewer for streaming video.. Or better yet, just get rid of the streaming music and video altogether and go back to having to upload songs in .wav format like they used to.

Taking up for something isn't being divisive, insisting on comparing them to some other group which really has nothing to do with it, is. Could you perhaps enlighten me as to why you think it's self-serving and ridiculous?

Well Stone, are people really tying the price they charge to the value of the linden? I mean say the linden goes down to $3.50/1000, are people going to start charging $200 linden instead of $100 lindend for a shirt? And what about the increase in spending power putting more money back into the market. I mean i am auuming that if more lindens are given, more lindens are spent. Do you think that if the value of the linden dropped to $3.50 or $3.25 people would stop paying and stop creating? I guess I don't know enough about the economic statisitics, since I never sell anything. I appreciate the insight though.

And I think a one shot gift of $2500 lindedn would have a huge short term impact on the market, but I think a scaled increase based on tier would have a much less dramatic impact. I mean the scale could be set so that someone paying $195 or more gets a $1200 linden a week, whereas someone paying $9.95 gets like $750. Noone is going to get rich off these sort of numbers, and the whole notion may just be seen as away to get more money in the hads of the rich, but frankly if you own a whole sim, its doubtful that $1200/week is meaningful. Of cours I don't own a whole sim.

You're wrong Jake. I pay the $195 tier and it's completely covered by converting L$ from sales to USD. If the value of the L$ drops too far I would either have to tier down (resulting in LL receiving less money) or charge more for my goods and services.

People would definately have to charge more $L if the value of the $L were to drop significantly. Most malls pay their tier by converting $L, if the value dropped they would have to charge more rent, the retailers would have to charge more to cover the increased rent.

Your first sentence begs the whole question. You are saying that I can TALK about the different strata of the game, I just can't compare any of them to each other. Which, by the way, I did in my own head shortly after I got here and decided on what I would do in the game.

"You're discussing divisions in the game! You're being divisive!"

Economy (and that is just one feature of all this) is interconnected. To say one can talk about one strata of the whole picture but not compare it to the others is ridiculous.

The reason I said I suspected it was self-serving is it strikes me as a weak accusation one makes when one has run out of other things to say.

coco

Exaclty. My point is we all benefit from the way LL has set up the environment, and to say they have given you nothing, when they have incorporated the very tools we use into the game, well that is giving you something that allows you to make clothes (which you do very well by the way) and allows me to make my buildings. I think the point you and stone made about event listings is good, and not something I had thought about. As is this point of about streaming music, which arguably is a subsidy to clubs.

So maby the question should not be wheter SL is a game or a market, but maybe whether the Lindens interest (and by extension the community interest-yes! the C-word!) in having a social community justifies payment of Dwell, Stipend and Bonus as a reward for participation in the SL experience, and enhacing the particpation of others?

I suppose one corrallry to this is that if we suddenly start charging for entertainment, how does the new user, or the causual user pay for that when all thier money is spent of rent and getting something to wear?

They buy L$ at an exchange, as it was intended.

I think the portion you quoted deals with a slightly diferent issue. My comment about the $1200'week linden was a compairion to your weekley gross from your store. I have to imagine that your clothing like grosses you more than $1200 linden a day. I don't know, and your perspective and input is valuable in this area (and others of course!).

Also, at what level would you fail to meet your tier? I mean what kid of drop in value scares you? And do we have the economic data to even predict exactly what level of stipend increase would have a dramtic effect on the market?

And finally I gues I wonder what is it that makes your interest in voering your tier witn income derived from your business mre important that a casual players interest in having money to buy a really nice skin without havign to get a job? this is the point I don't get.
Yes you would lose real money, and I understand that. But hey I pay fifty bucks out of pocket every month with nothing to recoup the cost, as the man says, if you want play you gotta pay.

Now I don't really mean to belittle the personal money loss aspect, I can absolutely understand why you would be very protectionist with the value of the linden. "I stand to lose a lot of monye if it drops is a very good point.

But drawing this back to the philosophical point is the right to make money the most important right in the game?

yes. people use their sl sales to pay for sl recurring fees.

mind you i think using l$ for the economy is stupid, and that sl should solve the mircopayment problem. of course if they did that, subsidies are almost sure to disappear.

Well people forced to pay for entertainment will probably have a littl e less money for items and Land.

The places getting those entertainment dollars would possibly offset that, as their sucessful employees would purchase more items and land.

Right now SL would be primarily a "producer economy" since the majority of all value is coming from the content creators.

The hope is it would evolve a "service" portion of the economy where service providers (ie entertainment) would add comprable value into the economy.

What I do is work, Jake. Sure I enjoy it but it's still work that takes me many hours every week when I could just be playing. I do it because I'm compensated for it by being able to profit.



Any increase in stipend would effect the market. The more people are given for free the less need they have to buy L$. The less demand for L$, the lower the exchange rate goes. It's pretty simple economics.



I can't afford $195 a month to play SL, so I work here to earn it. If you can afford your $50, that's great. I couldn't afford that either.



It's not philosphical Jake. It's cold hard reality. I'm a professional artist. I do this for a living (not just in SL). I don't do it purely for enjoyment or as a charity service. SL relies on user created content and to attract casual gamers that content needs to be of a quality roughly equivelant to what can be found in other games. To expect people to devote the time and tools necessary to create it purely out of the goodness of their hearts is simply naive.

So the reason you feel Dwell and Bonuses should stay is place is because you believe some other group gets bonuses? Is your support for entertainment subsidy really based on what you feel other content creators are getting? It's only by splitting the two up and comparing one to another that you can tell what your opinion is on it, or that you feel they should get the bonuses? If not, you're being divisive. Call it ridiculous and self-serving to point it out if that makes you feel better though.

I've made all my positions perfectly clear already in this thread.

coco

While I'm not the only one to be able to claim this accomplishment, I will say that I was among the very first 25 people to receive the Developers bonus. And while yes I had a tiny shop, honestly, the most I did was hang out, "entertain", people that were on my property. And honestly, had it not been for the other issues surrounding me at the time, I don't doubt I would have been on that list a few more times.

Of course, the list became a game for RL money. And I was not able to compete with that. But I never came here for that reason. So it was not important to me. I do the events I do, I help the people I help, I create the things I want to create, because I enjoy doing so. And I have been successful despite that approach.

I've received harsh IMs and emails because I have won contests. Because for very long people thought I must be rich in Linden money due to my age and popularity. Pfft. There are people that have been here only a few months that have more Lindens than I have now, or will ever have. hehe.. My closest friends are often amazed at how little money I have in SL. Yet I continue to donate to events. Tip hosts. Give where I can. I continue to maintain a postion of less money given to us by the Lindens themselves. And you know what.. I have YET to want for anything in SL that I was not able to obtain.

This world is not a game where we have GMs hovering above us guiding us, creating for us, and allowing us to experience only what they are willing or able to give us. This world is a world created by the human beings that reside here. It is up to us to create the content, events, and "life" that makes others want to come back to this world day after day. This world can see so many more possiblities if not left solely to the hands and ideas of the creators. Why would anyone want them to do anything more than they have, when *we* will always have the capablility of doing so much more?

Yes, this was also my point. To support an argument for Dwell and Bonuses (which I also support) by claiming that other content creators get so much more is false, and yes, it's divisive. There are tools built directly into the game for content creators, and also for event creators and hosts. There is no reason to try and build one up by dragging another down, or even splitting them up and comparing the two. If it can't stand on it's own merit, then maybe that tells us something.

If we all benefit from the way LL has set up the environment, why is the division neccessary to support Dwell and Bonuses?

I guess Jonquille the divisiveness I see is along a different line. This falls a bit outside the intent of the thread but maybe it illustrates my perspective.
I have been told, and seen it posted, that if you want to get monye in SL you need to make soemthing or create an opportunity. I know that the content creators work for hours making content which they sell. So in essence I am told that if you want to play SL you have to learn to script or create or you are not contribuiting to the comunity. Well to a lot of us who don't do this things, this attitude comes off as a slap in the face. Yet it is espoused asa gospel on these forums, and to a lesser extent in world. (read the "motivational speech" thread).

I( think that for many people working to make money is axiomatic, and they tend to project an attitude that people who want free content, or like money trees club contests, tringo and slingo and the like are second class citizens. The whole thread was born because someone said oh do away with dwell and such because usualy that goes to fund money trees and contests we don't need to coddle the players. then when someone has raised this point in the forums, then gey shouted down. This is the source of much divisiveness.

For myself, I work mostly 12 hour days IRL, and usually 6 hours on Saturday. I have a very limited time in which I can play and enjoy SL, and it competes with other interests. Now granted I am a builder in SL, but I have no real interest in putting in the kind of work it takes to learn to script or to devote myself full time to running a business. So I fall inot the causal player. Now as it happens, dropping a couple hundred bucks on the GOM for linden doesn't really break me, but I can see how it would be a problem for others. But people tell me how important thier SL incomes are, and by exention how much more improtant thier incomes are than my entertainment. To me this is again, a slap in the face.

Imagine if I were to tell someone oh you can't afford fifity bucks a month for SL because you are a teacher-well why don;t you just go get a better paying job. I mean anyone can go to law school, pass the bar and make a decent living, if they want to work hard enough.

You see its riduclous, a lawyer isnlt any more valuable than a teacher, but when I hear people saying oh If you want to play you have to work as a scritpter of creator, and if you can't do these things, learn. Well what I hear is "anyone can go to law school." this is the basis underlying the perception of the so-called tekki-wikki scripterati. Whether or not this is intended, ther perception is there.

The point of this thread was not to foster divisiveness or deteriorate inot a question of who is responsbile for destryoing SL. It was to let all sides be heard. I don't think there is any accusatory intent we are just exploring a disagreement. I think LL has a very good Idea of how they want the world to develop but I am trying to develop an understand of the world. So far somequeistions have been answerd for me and I have developed new ones, for me this is one of the things the forum is about.

I will tell you why there is a lack of entertainment (apart from Tringo, clubs, casinos and the like) in SL.

Because not many people do it. The question isn't why they can't make money - which, by the way is purely speculation. The question is why they don't want to do the hard work involved in building a successful entertainment business. Have you (figurative you) tried it? Has Coco tried it? If not, how do you know?

All I hear is people defeating it before they even try, claiming they are going for the higher paying job, and then pointing at other "strata" within SL and crying "no fair".

What's not fair is having folks who don't want to do the work involved with launching such a business, try to justify extra subsidies for their desired niche. A successful clothier gets no event money simply by virtue of existing. Nor do many successfuls clubs, casinos, and game event holders. Somehow they make it while entertaining. I won't be buffaloed into believing that the pittance educational event holders makes them wildly successful and/or Lindenaires. I can make more sitting at a club for a few hours collecting free money.

Right now, a clothing creator, or what have you, has the SAME exact subsidies given to them as does an entertainer. Dwell, stipend, and a chance for a developer incentive.

Anyone ever heard of Moonshine Herbst's Casino?

It's almost all entertainment, and a highly successful venture at that. I can't remember the last time I was there, when there was less than 15 people present.

I can be done, and stating that it can't be, is just self-defeating speculation.

Expecting to be able to make money on the level of successful, well established content creators, just because you want to entertain, does not compute. You have to do a lot of hard work, period, whatever avenue you choose. LL did not subsidize Pixel Dolls, CMFF, ANOmations, etc.

I think it's important to note that entertainment IS content. Make good enough content, and they will come.

I ran the numbers, Nolan.

coco

So you didn't try it, I see. What "numbers"?

You really need to try and fail, then provide numbers to get me to buy it.

BTW, on your "everyone knows it's a game" sentiment:

From the town hall with David Linden, just a few moments ago:

Mulch Ennui: The site that introduced me to SL has user comments, and there was alot of critisizm that this is not a game as much as a glorified chatroom. ..
How would u turn that percieved lemon into lemonaid considering how important community is to SL and its content?
David Linden: Actually, I believe that SL is not a game at all.
David Linden: Games can be part of the SL experience and we need to be much better at communicating what SL is.
David Linden: If we position SL as a game, those that are new may not get it.

Edited to add more from David:

Pendari Lorentz: Does LL want to market SL as a world created by LL with a hands on approach - or as a *user created* world, with LL taking a more hands off approach?
David Linden: Great question. Our position is that SL is a user created world at all levels.....
David Linden: LL is creating a platform and maintaining it for users to let their imaginations dictate what the world will be.
David Linden: That is our strength and we will continue to position SL in that manner."

I know what the corporate mantra is, Nolan.

coco

Well, you claim they sell it as a game.

At any rate, you should then know who to be mad at, and who to address.

It's cool though, if you want to finger point, and brew up a pot of "us vs. them", I am sure it helps you to be taken more seriously.

I would still like to see your numbers, and a brief synopsis of how you arrived at them.

Would you quit with the "us versus them" thing.

What is divisive is keeping telling people they are being divisive when they aren't. Now THAT'S divisive.

coco