Tier Pricing Increases On The Horizon?

It's true, we(the residents) don't have this kind of data. However, I don't think Blaze is stretching when he speculates that SL is not turning a profit. It's likely tier is covering machine/bandwidth costs, and programmers are being paid from the deep pockets of investors. There are only 34k of us.

However.... this is how business' work. Big ideas arn't expected to profit in year 2 or 3... they like to look more towards year 5, and some investors even have thier eye on year 10 (I think most SL business owners forget this).

Saying that, does LL look like they are in trouble? They are hiring pretty aggressively, which has all the signs of a company that is still financially healthy. I don't think LL has any financial concerns at the moment.

Even though things are looking on the up and up for LL, of course they can go out of business. Most business' fail, and LL isn't the first ones to get into the virtual world's business... However from the outside it looks like they are doing everything right. They are working towards stabilizing the grid, being very selective about hiring, slowing expanding the population (although not as slow as you might think), taking in the concerns of customers... actually it's almost like a completely new and customer friends business model. So maybe a little tweaking here and there, to get themselves prepared for year 5 isn't so unreasonable.

"1. Putting a crimp in the rental market. As things stand there is an economic push moving people towards rented, zoned sims. I think this is not really a good thing altogether. I think those that wish to live in that sort of planned community should pay a premium for doing so (assuming the community is of a quality worth paying extra for - otherwise, you've added no value...). Everyone else can buy land or group for it."

Not sure where you're going with this, and not sure I have followed the reasoning. But I think these zoned Sims are a great idea.

I figure those of us who live in them already pay a premium for doing so - the same premium anybody else wanting to live in any sort of zoned Sim can do anyplace in the world: Agree not to do or build the things not allowed in the zoned Sim.

I'm against things that make it harder for people to group together, and think the incentive for buying a large amount of land - the group discount - should stay.

Also - I am not, specifically, a renter, insofar as I have "bought" the land from Nexus Nash and can resell it to anyone I wish. I pay "tier" to him each week, too. It's a good way for a lot of people to get together and have more for less, and have the kind of community they enjoy, too.

It's like buying a whole case of Cheez-It's instead of boxes by the singles. You should get it for less!

And for those who actually do rent, I don't think that should become a thing of the past, either.

coco

Some disjointed thoughts on this:

I own a sim and pay the 195 a month. I would not happily accept a tier increase unless I got more prims.

I have 512sm that comes with my premium account. I would not want to have to start paying for that. I hope that remains as part of the monthly fee and that they keep the pay in advance discounts in place.

Honestly, if they provided more service, ie. better land tools, more prims, better customer service, I would be glad to pay more. I don't wish this thing to die due to a lack of funds and I hope LL has the foresight to plan this properly using economic modeling, etc.

With philip's comment that this is a hot topic on the forums (which I don't recall seeing), I just get the feeling that this is more like a drug dealer raising prices after you are hooked. There will be no increase in quality or quantity, just more cost. I will pay, but I am gonna have to boost way more car stereos to meet the cost...

Yea and they REALLY don't want to find themselves in the position Activeworlds put themselves in years ago when they decided to up their prices all at once instead of gradually over a 5 year period. They lost a LOT of people from that debacle!