Employment Opportunities

We pay for it as part of premium..so its not a welfare class issue.

I think that the problems that we see in this forum are mostly related to social confusion. Those who come to a form related to "land and the economy" to scream about how much they hate land AND the economy () also regularly make reference to SL being a game, and this not being fair, and that not being fair, and omg, I paid for my stipend.

You surely must realize by now that your position is directly at odds with LL? Philip has stated, at every opportunity that he gets, that he's not building a game, but a world. Second Life is a platform. If all you "gamers" around the economy forum cannot realize that after all this time and moaning, perhaps this just isn't the right game for you.

OR, perhaps you should grab up a few islands, and within them, build your ideal game! I'm confident that many would play! Just some random thoughts and observations from a platform subscriber.

It -is- a game to me. Theres no rule that says a game can't have an active economy.

Second life is a game..though some may see it differently. Its your call really, and feel free to disagree with me, just don't bother shouting for me to change my view. It won't happen.

As an RL DJ... wow that's a bad deal. I guess here in lies the big problem with 'jobs' in SL. I'd make that in my first minute behind the decks.

How about putting ads for these jobs across the border from a camping hole? There's people there "working" for less than that.

A couple of hours an evening, a couple of times a week, and you've upgraded your income from Basic Stipend to Premium Stipend level.

amirite

Welcome to the Forums, Vasudha.

First, some advice regarding this war zone fondly known as the Forums: Stay low, don't make yourself a target, and follow orders, and you just might get back to the states alive.

So, after 18 months in SL, I now need to find something productive, and definitely marketable, to do in Second Life to earn my Second Living. While I never seen an economist actually head up a Jobs Creation program in RL, the SL organization is somewhat different in both structure and function. The program could have come from the Community Development and Marketing folks, but at least it is now out in the open. I admire your courage.

The basic question: Is the SL community now mature enough both culturally and economically to be 'self sustaining' ? The vision of SL becoming a true business based economic model is now dependent on whether or not senior management can implement the strategy and achieve the stated goals, including those of the now seldom mentioned venture capitalists and associated executed agreements. That's where you come in.

It is interesting to read the posts based on the "age" of those residents making the posts. Many of of the oldies have provided some excellent perspectives, comments, and suggestions that only long term experience in SL can produce. Schwanson Schlegal, Enabran Templar, Francis Chung, Merwan Marker, Shaun Altman (he is a real futurist thinker), Iron Perth (brings an excellent RL historical perspective) and many, many others. Read them carefully.

The youngsters, the newbs, also provide great feedback, much of it is gut reaction and based in either RL experience or from other virtual worlds they may have inhabited. Read those, also. For that group represent your biggest risk in terms of future membership gross numbers declines.

We oldies are here for many reasons, but we survive and stick it out regardless of, or inspite of, management's actions. Plus, we have no real psychological or cultural barriers left. Many of us, I sincerely believe, love the abuse. We are the second tier of risk - and the greatest risk. We are your core book of business. Just don't do anything that results in major declines in business activity or materially effects the power player's SL incomes, and we will be here for the long haul.

Me? Who IS this guy you ask yourself. I guess you would classify me somewhere between what you have called a "tourist" and a borderline SL creator and business person. I have created and sold content, but not for my Second Living. I do it for the fun, the challenge and the experience. Any Linden dollars I earn are well received, including my weekly Stipend (sorry, nasty word), and always reinvested into the SL economy. A few land deals here and there, and some contract service projects with my long time pal and best friend in SL. It has all been good. I am your perfect member / resident. I am long term, I contribute, and I don't mind investing some U.S. Dollars now and then. I know you must love me now..... Hey, this guy is alright you are telling yourself.

BTW, you guys should really pay interest on the USD's that I periodically 'lend' Linden Lab. I eventually get it back, but time is money. Jeez, sorry, I am writing to an economist. *extracts foot from mouth.

Take care, remember my advice, go forth and do great things....and you might just get back to the states alive.

E.

It's not that I disagree with you, it's that I agree with Linden Lab. If you're unwilling to see the platform from their perspective and get onboard then you're only clouding your mind with dillusions. It's pointless to come to a forum about land and the economy, and complain about land and the economy, and attack the views of platform subscribers because they don't fit well with the game you want to play.

This is a world and a platform. Linden Lab says so. If it's a game that you want, you're expected to build it, or play the games that others build.

you expect this to happen when?

And Apple claims to be a hardware company. That doesn't mean that many people are buying Macs because of the hardware... they're buying them because of Apple's software.

Similarly, most of the people on Second Life are playing a game. It's those people who are paying, in the end, for almost every dollar going into LindeX.

There's three net sources of money for LindeX:

1. seed money from businesses that haven't yet turned a profit.
2. money from people wanting to use SL for training, research, and design.
3. money from people playing a game.

Money from the first group is chasing money from the third group.

The second group is tiny, and doesn't buy much content. It might pay for Nova Albion if it was all bundled together.

The third group is what's making the economy work. Knocking the "it's a game" people is pissing into the wind.

The game itself is the interaction. You are disillusioning yourself if you choose to see a game from such a narrow perspective.

There arent always final goals. There aren't always strict rules. There ar emany forms of roleplay games. SL is juts one of them.

As far as phillip, he also said havok 2 was coming soemtime last year, so since when do his statements really mean anything?

And I don't attack those who come to the land and economy. The only -ideas- I attack are those that would ruin the game for everyone by having it shut down...such as cutting the stipends.

Your views are futile in the long term. You're dillusional if you think that this situation will remain static. Right now SL is growing it's subscriber base and maturing it's platform. Eventually, the world/platform will mature to a point where you will have to either do the majority of your gaming in user/corporate constructed pay-to-play gaming areas, or accept a much less rich virtual world experience, probably on par with the current experience on the mainland.

I'm sorry, but this is just where the platform seems to be headed. Not that it's a problem for the gaming crowd, there will just need to be a philisophical shift for those who stay on more than another year or two. I don't see why people come to this forum to scream and yell in hopes that LL will change direction and make them a game, when long-term, other residents will be more than happy to make them one.

For a little reference/perspective, I see SL mostly as entertainment right now too. Sure, it happens to be entertainment that puts a few bucks in my pocket, but I try to keep it fun because it's not that many bucks. Long-term, I'm here to work on building a world, and to provide a richer and more accessable experience to the millions of gamers AND fellow world builders who will eventually be here to utilize my products, services and environments. I'm definately onboard, and I see no reason why LL should do a 180 on SL's direction to please people who don't... seem to like it.

This is a fairly rich and robust platform already, and those people should use it to make a game within the world which would bring them more enjoyment than the raw platform seems to.

I don't know where any of this came from, so I can't really respond to it. Perhaps you could elaborate on which lines you've read this between so I can comment, or re-read my post.



I have complete faith in Philip to get SL to a robust and mature state. Would I like it to be faster? Sure. Do I get frustrated and rant sometimes? Absolutely!

Then again, at the end of the day, I fully understand that nothing worth doing is ever fast or easy. One quick look around SL reveals a mind boggling amount of work to be done to get it up to current standards. It's no doubt very hard to do this while breaking so much utterly new ground in other areas. I'm confident that the end results will be worth the wait though.

I would like to see them cut back a bit on socieopoliticoeconomic engineering to please basic accounts and gamers so much, and take a more back to basics approach for a while, but that's just me. The island changes 1.9 were a fine example of getting back to basics. There's some real core features there without a lot of fluff and nonsense, just plain critical platform tools. I think they should focus in this same core way, on things like the rendering engine, the physics engine, the development APIs, overall application performance, same-region concurrency and bug fixes, not nesicarially in that order. Personally I feel like the fluff can wait a while, let's get current first!

I don't see any need for a philosophical shift myself. To those of us who take the game as the social aspect, playing a 'resident,' a person in a virtual world. In world, Jona sis not me. He's alot like me, but hes not me.


LL doesn't need to make a game, SL already is one. It all depends on your perception and definition of 'game.'

edit: The basics SHOULD be first. Fluff second.. after all the basics help people whether they consider it a game, a platform, or a world. Once those are set..then we can do 'luxuries'

Ya shure iz. Don't be holding your breath, though.

Nuts and bolts how would increasing job opportunities increase un/under-employed spending in SL(read buying lindens with USD)?

And Apple might turn into a music company and quit selling software-hardware bundles. In the long term we're all dead.

Right Now Second Life Is A Game.
Or you'll so it in a successor product that's licensed to AOL and MTV and paramount, or you'll do it in a competitor to SL. In the long term there's so many different things that could happen that it's futile to make plans or demands today on Second Life being a "game" or "platform" or "web" or "online service" or "wakalix".
I'm sorry, I don't understand this comment at all. Where have I asked LL to "change direction and make me a game"? Most of my requests have been for richer development tools and a richer economic model, and for them to take advantage of the way people react to economic conditions rather than trying to fight them.

I'm not saying "SL should be a game". I'm saying "SL is a game". I'm not saying "SL is only a game", I'm saying "Whatever else it is, SL is a game". I'm not saying "SL will always have these characteristic" or that "SL should always have these characteristics", I'm saying "SL has these characteristics".

There's nothing wrong with SL being a game, and there's nothing in it being a game that keeps it from being used for other things. But Phillip's declaration of how he wants people to perceive SL isn't actually a description of what SL, right now, really is.
World development is one of the games I'm playing, myself.
I see a lot of people in this forum (Land and the Economy) demanding that LL make changes, but they don't seem to be the ones who are arguing that SL is a game.

Wow. Way to be condescending dude.

I make my plans based on where Linden Lab says that we're going, nothing else.



Please note that I said "people", not "Argent Stonecutter". It sounds to me like you're on the right track here. Congratulations, Argent Stonecutter, for being on the right track.



It absolutely is not a game. Ask Philip Linden, and he'll no doubt explain that to you. It is a maturing virtual world platform. An activity being enjoyable doesn't make it a game. I take a lot of enjoyment out of what I do IRL too, but that doesn't make what I do a game.



There's nothing wrong with it being a game at all, except for the fact that it isn't a game. It's a virtual world platform, which is totally cutting edge in many respects. Who exactly are you to tell LL's CEO that he's got an incorrect perception of SL?

I am glad to see someone who is going to look at SL that has the background as you do.
However, looking at the Second Life Forums is not really the correct place to look. If there were a way of seeing just what the percentage of SL residents actually look at the forums I am pretty sure you will find out that the percentage is extremely low. Therefore, you are not going to get a real picture of how the majority of the residents feel.

My suggestion would be to get your employers (LL) to hire a few residents who spend a lot of time in-world to conduct a survey of the actual residents who spend time in-world.
Naturally I am volunteering to do a job like this. It takes time to gather this information and I would expect to be compensated for it.

I spend a lot of time in-world and meet a lot of people being I am an SL Mentor. I explore all over SL and I am sure I see on a day to day basic the majority of residents.

I would be very glad to discuss this with you. Please see my profile as George Flan.
I can be contacted by email at: [email]georgeflan@gmail.com[/email] if your interested in my services. After initial contact by email I would be willing to discuss this over the telphone.

I am experienced in all of the Microsoft products so could take the results of any survey and put them in a database or spreadsheet for review. Again, we could discuss this as well as the content of the survey.

Poor George. Don't you know the WebBots are going to snag
your email address and you will spammed from now until kingdom
come with 2% Visa offers and crap like that? Enjoy.... LOL

I would tell him this, yes. Because it cannot be defined as a 'platfrom' to me because it is indeed a game to me. In its very core.

Who exactly are you to say that my percetions are wrong?

Phillip isn't always right, hes been wrong many times. And I, for one, put more faith in experience and history than one man's statements.

Havok2-I-mean-3-(maybe-4)? SpeedTree? Telehubs?

I make my plans based on what looks fun. That's why I implemented my long distance security teleporter even though llTeleportAgent() was about to show up... and I'm glad I did, since it didn't.
I don't see any reason to take what Phillip Linden says about his future plans as a description of current reality. Any more than I take what Jeff Hawkins (Palm/Handspring), Steve Jobs (Apple), or Bill Gates (Microsoft) says as gospel.
Why does it matter who I am? Besides, I haven't said anything about Phillip's perception of SL. I'm just saying that his description of SL doesn't describe SL as it currently exists. Not only is it used as a game, not only does the economy only work because it's a game, but it's got came elements buried in its guts that don't even need to be there in a game!

Seriously...

SL has all kinds of artificial limitations and functions that are purely game-oriented. Every last bit of "PvP" code could be implemented by residents, and it's all game functions. The limitations on travel (which are thankfully going away, one by one) and the whole "energy" concept are all "game balance" features that have to be painstakingly worked around if you're trying to do other kinds of simulations... even if your simulation is a game. Then there's other things that make no sense outside a game context like the limitations on names (why can't you have your real name floating over your head?) and the lack of privacy and decent land and group management tools.

I really don't see any point to continuing this discussion. You can tailor your development efforts entirely to today, and that's fine. I can aim mine 30% at today, 30% at 6 months from now, and 40% at a year down the road, and that's ok too. I'm always willing to think on my feet if things don't go exactly according to LL's stated plans, but at any rate, none of this has anything to do with the fact that SL isn't a game.

Yes, you could certainly implement PvP code and make a game. It has in fact been done. This only farther demonstrates that SL is a platform on which games can be developed. The fact that the API (energy) works a certain way has nothing to do with whether or not that is in fact a part of a platform. I can't seem to get my mind on the same page that yours seems to be on, where a platform needing to mature negates it as a platform and instead turns it into a game.

Directing my development efforts to what actually exists doesn't mean I'm limiting them to today. Taking Linden's roadmap with a grain of salt is just the result of more than a quarter century's experience of companies that say one thing and do another, and Linden Labs' track record there is par for the course.

And in any case, for a system as large as Second Life... 6 months is short term. A year isn't all that long term. Five years? If it still exists, I expect that a significant amount of my code will continue to work without modification (though it could probably benefit from it).

I recently found some code on the net that I'd written 20 years ago, and last seen 15 years ago, and it compiled and ran the first time... and after a slight change it worked better than it had originally.
What it means is that the PvP functions and the "game balance" limitations in SL aren't necessary for a general purpose platform that allows games, they're there because Linden Labs was designing a gaming platform.
Where did I say that it being a game means it's not a platform? "game" and "platform" are not opposed concepts. Even something as old and deceptively simple as chess or checkers serve both purposes.

Second Life is a game, in six months it will still be a game, in a year it will still be a game.

In five years? There will be lots of environments like Second Life, and some may be descended from it, but if you're doing any development now that depends on anything Phillip Linden says about the real long term you're acting prematurely.

But over the next year? It's more likely for Apple to release Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) as a generic package for any Wintel box, and for Windows Vista to ship with a Linux kernel, than for SL to change that much between now and March 2007.