Two questions on stipends

Forgetting about personal feelings here, I still see far more common ground on both sides of the debate that somehow seems to get lost in the rhetoric.

So to hopefully flesh out some details on both sides, I ask the following.

1) For the pro stipends group, if $500 per week is good, why is more money not better? Wouldn't $5,000 per week be 10 times as good? $1,000,000 per week?. For those of you who are pro stipend, do you see any downsides to introducing new money simply by existing.

2) For those who are anti-stipend, how do you propose that new players obtain some cash to spend and enjoy that aspect of SL? Keep in mind that "working" in SL has to be fun, otherwise it defeats the whole purpose of the game.

I'm still new to SL, but not new to gaming by any means. Some of the true classics have endured for decades because of player discussion and feedback and even suggestions. And just because LL may not respond to any particular suggestion or thread, you can bet your SL donuts they are read.

Good questioning Cannae hehe. No I'm not for adding More i think more in that retrospect is bad. I think 500L a week is a good amount for people to recieve. I dont see a downside to adding new money but rather in the process in which people are selling it. They have no real incentive to sell it higher and want to sell it fast. And for the 2nd part of what you stated while im not anti stipend I feel that it needs to be there not just for new players but for those that enjoy SL as something other then just some kind of platform for making a business. Work in SL is work scripting/building 3d enviroments, animation and texturing.

I think its alot of failure on the part of a small group in SL that are interested in making a profit and want to create a way to make alot in a short time. What will they do when it goes in the reverse and people are really fickle with their money and they make even less then they do now? Will they quit SL or will they whine to somehow reintroduce the stipends. The simple thing is there isnt a simple solution and alot of people need to realize that. There isnt some magic fix for an economy in any context.

We will never yield to the Pro-Stipend Group. They are Socialist
who believe the State should fund them while they lay around
doing nothing. Unproductive citizens who wait for their welfare check.
They don't create, they mooch.

Reserve seriouslly you expect everyone to create. Come on. Thats not fair to ask them to do. Alot of people come here to get away from The work grind and dont feel like working in SL and should not be expect to. Its not welfare they pay 5 dollars a month to recieve a stipend. Premium account is not 5 usd but rather 10. Now still wanna go on with this its not welfare even though there is an oversite a bit in value of L with the stipend it is far from welfare. Your not one to talk as if you have ever bought anything in SL and I'll assume you have you are as guilty as every single person. If you have ever had a product bought from you you are guilty as well.

The money came from Someone's stipend and as of late even more from it. All your precious little views are actually mooted by just being in world. You guys that arnt pro stipend are a greedy pack of people that dont care about anyone else other then yourselves. You can bring up real world economics all you want but real world economics has the same factors as SL does and gives away free money for those that need it. Stop trying to line your own pockets by making everyone forced to buy L. You people are the cause of the problems in SL not the stipend.

Giving the n00bs a few dollars to start off is fine. Its a 1-time cost.
But continuing the payment for 52/wks a year for 200,000+ accounts
becomes inflationary for those who actually "invest" to create widgets
or services, only to see their profits evaporate.

Why buy up land to rent it our for profit, when 6/months down the
road the value of the dollars you are collecting in rent have lost their
value? Then you are in the red, making the case for doing business in
SL no worth the effort.

The L$ needs to be stabilzed with sound economic policy. And the corner
stone of that policy is fighting inflation by ending Stipends....

And reserve you just proved my point of you people being the problem in SL. These profits you claim make you guilty of using a stipend. Your just here to turn a profit and if you dont your going to make it so people enjoy SL left so you can turn a little profit for a short period? Your the type of person that is a perfefct example of things that are wrong with LindEx. And you prove it throughout your statements constantly. I think you have some serious issues if you came to SL just looking for a profit and mabye you shouldnt be here if thats how your going to treat it.

SL is not just here for a business model for you to make a profit it has a social structure and things other then just an economy. There is a community of which you seem to be lacking being a part of that are actually here to escape work. They wont be forced to work just to line your pockets.

Reserve,

Lets assume for arguments sake I agree with you about stipends.

If they are removed, what do you see as the best way for new players to earn income, keeping in mind that SL has to be enjoyable. And to be clear, I'm talking about player to player jobs, not some Linden government sponsered one.

Lets assume that LL can add any reasonable game features to allow players to create fun jobs for other players, over and above what is already there.

If this can't be done, then the cure could be worse than the disease.

Lindex, it's not just for breakfast anymore.

This is something I disagree with, and it comes down to design. One old game I played simulated the D-Day, there were hundreds of units running about, as each division had 12 units attached to it. In the design notes, it stated that rather than come up with arbtrary rules requiring players to keep these 12 units together, the game design itself should encourage it, that good game play meant handling the division like its real life counter-part. (1)

For Second Life, it needs a working economy. Not just because some people want to make a profit, but because for it to simulate a true second life, the economy has to make some sense, while still permitting SL to be SL, including that items can be created out of thin air.

I can be a bit of a rules pusher, and I'm already seeing how the current economy can be twisted for personal gain at the expense of the overall SL community. And if I can see these stupid tricks, I'm sure others can as well, and a lot of them depend on stipends. But part of being a rules pusher is to close the gaps that allows the rules to be pushed in the first place.

_______________________
(1) RIP AH

I come to SL to play, not work. If I have to have a second life job, it needs to pay 10 USD an hour AT LEAST.

They buy it on LindeX. It's not difficult.

Well I'm assuming you mean new premium accounts, since basics already get nothing, so not much to debate there.

So if you want to make sure they have money, when they upgrade to "premium", just make them pay $5 extra for a $5 market buy order on Lindex.

Once stipends cause the Linden to devalue below 489, there will be no reason to ever go premium if you don't want to tier up. You can buy $6 of lindens on lindex each month, and get 500L per week with a nice 750L per month left over to rent 512 of land with.

If you need to own land for whatever reason, you'll be getting ripped off. Your 500L stipend and 512 of tier will cost more than market value. You'll beg LL to not make you pay more than market value for lindens just for the right to own land.

Sadly it is part of the problem wether you disagree with it or not R&D is perfect proof of it being the problem. A few choice people in SL are the ones outcrying that the sky is falling. There isnt a simple fix for the economy and most people would have you believe you can do one or the other. People rely on the stipneds and your aware of other games. However games with an economy differ. And if things get out of hand it will end up going the other way sadly.

Its human nature *sigh* and its sad to see the corruption of man here on a daily basis. Simply put if they dont like SL they can leave rathen then complain thats all i ever hear is the sky is falling. LindEx is operated by people not by LL and these people cause alot of the problem. A few people sell say 50,000,000L at 5 points below value whats that have to do with the stipend? Nothing at all. Someone then has to sell a point lower to sell faster then them and it becomes a viscious cycle of their own creation. These same people then come and whine when the economy fails due to their own greed of selling fast enough to cover their teir payments and as i stated b4 teir is someone you should be able to afford with or without the L > USD.

The tough part here is taking a stand against the big names and most people are pretty much just lap dogs and say uh huh uh huh yeah that works good to go along with the big name people its rather sad really. I think your question is quite legitimate but there will also be less paying jobs in SL if the stipend is gotten rid of if its Player To Player run because these people will have to pay people directly out of pocket. What these Anti-Stipend people fail to realize its that the stipends are their income from SL. The stipends are the profit. They want to turn out some fast cash real quick and will whine when the opposite happens. Without control over lindex there is no solving this problem it'll go one way or the other not stabalize.

When the "need money NOW" becomes as valuabe as what you can get for waiting for the money, then $L will stop dropping. Basically when the wait of an extra day or two is worth it to be able to make te money yu need selling $L, then people will stop undercutting. Until then, loosing $10US or more is stll worth being able t sell in time to pay tier.
And for your information, ever day, the ENTIRE day, only about $10,000,000L to $15,000,000L gets sold. I.E. only $10mil to $15mil of it is wanted by the players. But A LOT MORE players who have $L want to trade it for $US. Undercutting is done because there are a lot of people trying to sell, and only a few are offering to buy. As a result people are falling over each other trying to sell first. No difference from, say, me wanting to go to the market where a bunch of peple are selling oranges, and saying, "I need just $10 oranges," and then watching people stumble over each other, trying to get to me first an give me the cheapest price, just so I'll buy at last SOME oranges from some people. Simply waiting will not fix the problem. If I was selling $L, and decided to simply wait, as soon as $1,000,000 in front of me would sell, $2,000,000 would be put on top of it. The line would just keep getting infinitely long. there are two reasons for this.
1. Too few people want to by $L. Feel free to suggest how to fix that. So far all I've ard is "create better content," which is kinda moot, since te best we have is THE BEST WE HAVE. The other thing I've heard is "I will NEVER buy from Lindex." That doesn't exactly help matters either.
2. Too many people have $L to sell. Feel free to suggest how to fix this problem, too. Only two options I've hears are to reduce the souce of that $L, making less $L to go around to sell, ant make it worth t o keep $L in game by setting up in-game investment avenues (savings anks and such) which will make people preffer to keep their $L in the game. In order for that to help, this investment vehicle would have to generate as much interest (profit) as is lost every day due to the devauaton of $L

There is only a problem with the economy if you rely on it in some form to support your gameplay.

For the majority of us, who are here to have fun, build stuff, and couldn't care either way about Lindex, there is no issue.

Although certain individuals yell stipends as being the problem, they aren't willing to give theirs up when challenged to do so.

And as for the 250,000 people collecting stipends.... only basics who log in get their stipend, so you can knock that down to about 10% - if that, completely destroying the figures that are often thrown into the argument.

Lewis

I am basic. I recieve stipend. I do create content and have created content for some months now. What I get in stipend and sales pretty much gets put back into my business for more uploads and new content creation.

I very much resent the implication that I am a leach on the system.

More is better - Sure, why not?

I'm all for it! Let there be more money! Give me 5,000,000L a week!!!!

The only problem with this is the size of the 32-bit unsigned integer field would become a problem.

Who cares what the L$ is worth???? Content will scale with the price of the L$. It has to.
$1L machines would become $1,000L machines at the casino....and it wouldn't affect me at all!!

If you don't scale up the price of your content, and are undercut, what's the difference between that and being undercut by all the current freebies!?!?!

I spend all my stipend in world now, and I love it.

So, I'm pro premium-stipend, and I think that the Lindex will track with what my Linden Dollars are worth to me. I'm not worried about in world or out of world inflation. Those who can hack it will raise their prices, I will decide whether premium is still a good deal for me, and I will make choices....and so will everyone else...

Including the thousands of Korean users we can expect in the fall

What are you talking about? I'm ready to give mine up as soon as SL wises up and cuts them. I only pay quarterly so I would be one of the first to lose it.

I don't hear anyone saying "cut everyone else's stipend other than mine".

What a provoking bit of nonsense.

I'm certainly not a Socialist.

I certainly don't lie around doing nothing in SL.

I'm not unproductive. I spend probably 95% of my time in SL creating.

I don't "mooch." I paid for my stipend.

I want to keep it.

I like the system by which I get a stipend. I don't like a system in which we would have only the choice of buying money from Lindex or some 3rd party site. I feel it would be deleterious to businesses, to customers, and to LL.

I invite those who want to keep their stipends to join our group,

"S.O.S. - Save Our Stipends!"

It's under Groups on the Find menu, is free to join, and is intended to provide a voice to those opposed to eliminating and, for some, reducing stipends.

coco

and once again you indulge in the same rhetoric Jamie..I mean Cheyene..I measn RBD.

OK, I'm pro-stipend and along side that pro-bigger sinks. Pro a land sales tax in L$ as the new significant sink at some moderate level, that I'm too sleepy to go and recalculate once more. One thing that a land tax gives us is the ability to easily adjust the levels up and down. Land can only be sold in multiples of 16sqm, so you've got taxation in lots of interger steps overall, even if the tax is assessed as (say) 3/16th of a dollar per sqm. Other things like "vanity" choices (change names etc.) being used as L$ sinks would also work for me, but I'm not sure how big an impact they'd have.

Even with that, there's a balancing act. I'm no longer a newbie, in fact I've recently been called an oldbie for the first time, and my income is not primarily based around my stipend, nor my dwell. Now my stipend mainly forms pocket money - I'll go and spend it happily on things that catch my eye, shuffling the L$ around, boosting the GDP numbers, helping some other content maker earn a L$ or two, and I'm not really bothered whether they cash it out or not.

When I was, by anyone's standards, a newbie I used to save up for stipend day, and back then my stipend plus ratings bonuses gradually accrued to be worth L$600-1000 a week. It would often get blown within a couple of hours of getting it as that skin, hair, dress, toy, etc. I'd been longing for all week was mine to play with/wear etc.

If we end all stipends, how many people will actually stay in world and buy their L$ on LindeX, or be so successful in business that they will earn from one of the current fat cats and spread their L$ around? Yes, sure, the rate on the LindeX might temporarily rise, but that will simply make it less likely that new people buy L$ (the Lewis' and Jonah's of this world's argument). All those who clamour for it will try to cash out this month, then next month look at their sales and wonder what they do to scrape their tier together.

Over the last 14 days the LindeX has been, on average, roughly stable, ranging between $330 and $340. There are silly outliers, but there are just about every day if you check all the data. That's a variation of <4%, if we can keep that as the new level in the longer term prices will gradually adapt if they must. Even if the devaluation continues to some other level where it stablises, do we want a Second Life where the books balance perfectly - because it totally stagnates and no one does anything (except leave)?

Frankly, the 500L a week is part of the advertised package. Any move by LL to break this promise opens the door to false advertisement investigations and charges by both state and federal authorities. This is why they changed the basic package after a certain joining date. Advertise something in the US and you must deliver.

As for raising stipends, here's my thoughts.

Instead of depending on an influx of alts, children, and griefers to pay the bills, I would reward those who have given me USD and will stay and give me more. After all the bills are paid in USD, not L$ And I could print the L$.

The stipend will remain at 500L for premium accounts. With 10L bonuses for each solid 30 minutes logged in. Each tier level that the account carries, I would increase the stipend. Buy an island, and the stipend would be enormous.

I would bring back dwell, but I would limit it per resident to discourage hour upon hour of camping. This would encourage residents to move around and see the world.

As for basic accounts, 250L and 50L a week for 24 weeks. With 5L bonuses for each solid 30 minutes logged in for the first 24 weeks, and then 5L for each solid 180 minutes after that.

I would do my best to keep alts to a minimum and give them nothing. No starting money, no stipend, no bonuses. I would keep basic memberships to no more than two per household. But no limits on premium memberships.

For everybody screaming their heads off about L$ "value", I would pay interest on money kept in world over 1000L. 2% for basics, 5% for premiums a week. Rounded to the lowest 100L and I would use the lowest amount held. And if you buy from the Lindex, I will increase the interest to 5% for basics and 10% from premiums for that week. This will encourage people to hold off on selling their L$ and encourage them to buy more L$ or buy them more often.

The more people, not accounts, people who sign up, log in, and stay, the more that will buy stuff and buy L$. The people who spend the most USD and log in time should get the biggest rewards.

Am I paying people for existing? No, because the L$ has no value. I'm giving people incentive to stay, play, and pay. If people stay, play, and pay, the content makers will reap even bigger profits.

Nah, because the L$ has no value other than what people are willing to spend USD for. Since I'm not selling my L$, I don't care what the "value" is.

You weren't one of the two individuals I was referring to who cry out for stipend removal but refuse to give theirs up because they can sell it on and make money out of it.

Cutting stipends would not be "wising up", it would be a backwards step and detrimental to everyone, whichever side of the argument you are on.

Think of SL as an Ebay auction.

I want that item. It's currently $10. Bargain. I'll bid up to $15, that's what I'm prepared to spend, if it goes to $20 then it's probably not worth it.

Now replace that with SL fees. I'm currently spending $25 a month on land tier and a quarterly premium, whatever that works out as. With my L$2000 a month stipend, it's what I'm prepared to pay for my SL experience. If that disappears and I'm suddenly expected to shell out another $5 a month just to maintain my gameplay by having something to spend, it becomes less attractive an experience. A lot of people won't - or can't - pay out more; so to maintain their levels they will tier down, or spend less - hurting either LL or other players by doing so. Multiply that by thousands of people, and we could have a serious problem.

I spend my time in-world enjoying myself, and sometimes building stuff. If 90% of my in-world time ends up being spent working on making things so that I can sell them in the hope of recovering my lost stipend, SL suddenly becomes a non-fun experience for me, and don't forget that whilst everyone else is slaving away trying to make stuff, they aren't spending.

My mind boggles as to how people can be so completely oblivious to the damage that removal of such a simple thing WILL do, making SL less of an attractive experience to both existing and new players.

Lewis

I strongly believe that the recent 'fall' in L$ value and the glut of L$ available on the market was caused by one individual land baron who HAD to sell many millions of L$, regardless of the value, in order to make another monthly payment - which I calculate to approximately 2 months profit based on the figures that are known. That's quite a serious chunk of cash, and I can't help but wonder how much longer this particular 'business model' might remain feasible with the inevitable increase in rental prices to maintain profit.

Expect to see another huge drop in the L$ value in around 3 weeks time.

Lewis

Now you are getting it. When the linden hits a certain level (489), it's no longer worth it to be a premium account, since it will be absolutely cheaper to buy Lindens on Lindex.

LL must act before this point or the premium account userbase that doesn't own more than 512 of land will all drop to basic. The ones that do own land will be pretty miffed that they have to buy overpriced lindens.

If you raise stipends as a reaction to this, you just cause even more inflation, which is just going to send the Linden spiralling to worthless. I think that's your goal anyway, destroying the value of the Linden. That doesn't seem to be what Linden Lab wants though.