Meins Moving

Mainland sim for sale. (Meins is looking to move)

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Sim To Sell: Meins
Type: Mainland
Class: 4 (newest hardware)
Status: Taking serious offers
Transfer Date: Latest April 28th 2005.
Conditions:
Payment

You can see this ad in Land Sales and Rentals in the classifieds.

Only today, people were touting the Meins experience, and rightly they should, because Meins looks good, was organized well, offered a great deal for people, had a lot of effort put into it...but....now it has to move.

And because Meins is touted as a successful residential zoned community and will go on being touted as a successful residential zoned community long after it ceases to exist, let's look closer.

The reason isn't my "ego" and my "desire to flaunt my projects" which were never as cool as Meins, but simply the desire to *know why things happen the way they do*.

I heard that GIGAS was "pulling out" from Meins because it "wasn't making money".

Is this true? Why am I not surprised? Because...you can't make money from renting sims unless you are willing to do some things people won't like (allow more freedom at the expense of "looking good" or....eat the expenses and losses or be willing to break even.

Why would Meins have to move? Because the new sims you can just buy like Anshe did are so much better? You can deed parcels. etc.

Was there griefing or viewblockers around Meins' edges?This problem always fascinates me...how to solve???

Anyway, comments appreciated.

It most likely has nothing to do with the 100m x 90m billboard I put up facing Meins that said "Welcome Neighbors!"

No never....

- Sam

Just kidding - Truly I'm sad to see Gigas leave, they truly were good neighbors - Great luck with the new sim(s) Nexus )

It's more likely not an issue with Meins itself, but that island sim owners can now deed plots to group. That makes renting on islands much more feasable, because the sim owner can give almost full control off to the tenant (barring the Estate tools) and the island becomes nearly as autonomous as the mainland.

Not sure how well that can be scripted, but I'm sure Nexus is working on it...

Right. You have to take in account that Meins residents were consulted about this move. It's not like this is a panic decision to 'save' the idea. I guess it's just a "better course of action" for the future success of the SIM. I know I'll welcome the tools, as a resident, if/when it's moved to an island. I think it'd just be way more convenient for everyone.

No, I'm not suggesting GIGAS and Meins' owners are doing anything in a panicked fashion at all.

I'm sure they're making a shrewd and calculated move to go to the private islands/estates like Anshe.

But I did hear that they might not have made the sales they had hoped within 30 days, so I think that merits study.

Now that they can essentially do everything that Linden can (except give full freedom of sell-back and really full-fledged ownership for freedom in builds and activities) -- they are attractive, I suppose. But it seems to me that there are still issues.

1. Are residential sims really as popular as everyone thinks? We need to see whether they really sell. I think they do, but only with an investment of time and labour. I think they are never get-rich-quick schemes precisely because communities take time to make work.

2. Are people happy with islands off the grid? Do they get the socialization and fly-bys for sales and other features that can make them happy? I just don't know.

3. Are they really safe from griefing? I'm willing to be that new island sim communities are going to find that griefers find ever-new ways, and stealthier ways, to grief.

Dunno about this one. My preference is quiet/private, pure and simple.



I am, see my answer to first question. I don't *want* socialization and such sometimes, I'll goto the mainland for that.



Hmm. Make totally private (invis to grid). Allow only the land group(s) created. Griefer will have very hard time even seeing it then. Yes it takes a gated community to having a locked gate then, or the griefer to be a 'paying' customer. This, obviously, is an extreme, but I'd be curious if others would want that level of privacy.

Hey guys, I just noticed this post I'll try and answer all the questions

First things first, we are not pulling out, simply moving. Moving why, for the residents. The better tools for land ownership and less lack of control that we would otherwise have at our borders. (We never had that issue)


This is false, we are moving. Meins was a pilot project for Gigas, to see if it could be done. It worked, however, to make it more succesfull, we think that private islands is the way to go at the present time. And it wasn't making money, I (the financial guy ) never expected Meins to make money, primarily, it didn't have enough usable land.



I'm just gonna take Prok's quote on this, it wasn't panicked. An opertunity came up, and it was either grow, or stay steady. We looked at the project and decided to move it up a notch.



hehe, this is pretty much bang on. As for scripting wise, a new rental system is coming up, I decided to scrap the old one and start on a new one. It will be much better.



I think this is true in a part, we wanted it fill up but I was expecting the borders to stay vacant and the big hill was a pain to work with. We had too many big plots to cover the hill and not enough small ones. Again, i'll point you to above, I never really expected it fill. As for tfillign the way it did, that was totally predictible, the middle to out. Now with a private island, I hope that people will be happy to move next to the borders. A) nothign to render, b nice and quiet



Yup I asked every single resident. I got a thumbs up from everyone

I hope this answers most of it. If you guys have another questions feel free to ask Plus if you want a plot on the new sim, give me a shout

I don't expect to make money in the rentals business, either. If you combine rentals and sales, maybe have some concentrated rentals of vendors in your system, maybe have some trading now and then, perhaps you might break even or get a bit ahead but there are always huge costs.

So the rentals business -- even "deeding a plot on the private island" doesn't strike me as a business anyone can make money in.

That is both good and bad. It's good if it means people get into it, like myself, not to gouge the public and extract Lindens from them, but to try to at least cover costs and try to keep sims looking good, as good as they can when you give people freedom.

And it's bad becuse it means it is not a viable, replicable, thing to be doing. Currently certain features and factors get in the way of doing this, and some might change, and some might not, but these are very important issues to be looking at when we look at the issue of residential zoned communities.

Quite a few people are interested in this topic now. They're interested because all of a sudden they see some interest in other residents in finding ways to secure views, enhance experience and get rid of griefers. And they are interested because they see the game devs interested and they want to jockey to influence the game devs LOL. It's funny to watch.

What's important about the Meins experience is that Nexus hit several walls. I'm really familiar with these walls. These walls include things like having "too much" land in one sense, that you can't sell, and having "not enough" in another, because everybody wants that nice parcel down by the waterfront, and less people want that precarious sheer cliff face that might be in your parcel way up at the top LOL.

There's the issue of how much land is put in the commons, how prims are divided -- all the wonders and joys of communal living LOL. And I think it is really a good thing to have public discussions about this, and people who raise these issues shouldn't be slammed as evil.

Nexus is another Leaving Las Vegas story. Anshe left Las Vegas and made Ansheland. Now Nexus will make GIGASLAND or whatever he calls it, and more power to him. These lands are off the main grid, and have perhaps less accessibility but then...who wants maximum accessibility when it is just used by fucktards and griefers. These lands have a bit less freedom to build WTF you want...but then...who wants everybody to build WTF they want, because chances are then they will build a stupid pink box shedding pink light for miles? And so on.

What's left on the Badlands Grid? Still, a struggle to see if you can combine human freedom and human dignity.

Nice post Prok, very constructive and insightfull.

I have a couple solutions to the problems you posed.

First with the too much land, I have potiential solutions that worked out in Meins (this is why it was a pilot) i'm not worried about filling to 100% but something about 80% would be nice.

As for making money, meh, it's more of a hobby over here, every penny made is thrown back in the project. So if it does take off and people support it by owning land in the new sim, then it will grow. I think that Meins offered much more then any other community, and that was just the start, i'm working on some new disigns and stuff for the new one. It will be WAY more organized and efficient, without being crowded.

Third... the "whatever you'll call it", that's a great question, I need some help with that. I loved the name "infinit islands" but it's taken, I was thinking of a couple today... perhaps corney, but along the same lines, "Frontier Islands" something like that. Something along those lines. Havn't found a good one yet. But i'm open to suggestions

Well off to bed for the night, I will check back in the morning.