The tier system blows, Vote in Prop 443

ROTFLMAO!

Thank you for your penetrating insight Elex, I think you've got to the heart of the matter here

You really like the current system Elex, you must be in the tier rental business.
Or perhaps your just a bored, drunk driving, litterbug tossing hypethetical booze bottles on my fake lawn with utter contempt and total disregard for the fact Im the one paying hypethetical tier to keep that lawn. ( no shrubs tho, not enough prims available, maybe I should get rid of my sofa and loveseat so I can do some landscaping).
Apparently, according to you, we should be satisfied with the way things are, and never submit any proposals for change. Be a good sheep and follow the straight line down that metal chute over there. The 'elitest powers that be' know whats good for you? Of course they dont care what you think, as long as their pricing model is making them money. Thats their option as the business owner. But if enough people complain that their 'champagne only being sold in expensive magnum sized bottles' is cost prohibitive, and that by perhaps changing their business model they could sell more champagne, maybe they will sell some half pint sized bottles to us 'hobo's' out here who dont want to buy a 6 gallon drum when all we need is one more glass. Special treatment my ass, Im looking for change for the good of the customers, and perhaps even to the Lindens. Many people do 'go without' because they dont want to double that tier bill. People who would indeed buy more land and pay more tier if they were able to up their tier in smaller quantities.

If you feel that your sofa and loveseat are not getting enough use then by all means remove them and place shrubs on your parcel. You would then be managing your prim allowance as you see fit.



My fundamental belief is that people should cultivate or not cultivate their parcels as they wish. How one wishes to cultivate or not cultivate their parcel has nothing to do with the marketplace. The more land one owns, the greater one's tier fees, however, there is a decreasing scale of discounts. In other words, the more prims one has the lower the cost per prim in tier fees. Increasing volume typically results in a decrease in the cost of the product or service. Shaking my fist, even collectively, will not result in the "elitist powers that be" to break the tier fee schedule into smaller chunks based solely on my perceived _hypothetical_ needs nor cause them to accept giant, stone Yapp Islander money as a means of exchange especially when there is a variety of _non-hypothetical_ options that already exist (rent the needed land, own the needed land, own the needed land and rent the remainder).

As the vast bulk of the population presently owns _no_ land it's highly unlikely that LL will change the tier fee structure on the off chance that a fractionally small percentage of existing landowners (already a very small percentage of the total resident population) will incrementally increase their total parcel sizes. Plus, the amount of time to implement such a system would be outweighed by the accounting costs involved, the explanation of the new system, altering existing documentation, etc. You're demanding that the marketplace give you a change in the tier fee structure, collectively, when to do so would be unprofitable, especially as collective methods of overcoming this barrier already exist.

I understand Elex. This was indeed an exercise in futility. Nothing will change. Next time I will not support any idea's that I may agree with because there is no point in doing so. There are ways to work around any problem which arises, so change is not necessary. I will now simply comform to the wishes of the status quo. Or...maybe not
THE TIER SYSTEM BLOWS! SUPPORT PROP 443!
http://secondlife.com/vote/vote.php?get_id=443

Or maybe... you could possibly re-craft and re-present your argument. Not based on hypotheticals. Not using an increase in the scale of the hypothetical. No one is under any obligation to support your current rationale for supporting the proposition (sadly, 29-prim outhouses and 1,000-prim signs are no longer the pure comedy gold they once were).

Based on the current account and tier structure...

* a single-prim costs US$1.02 to own over the course of a year for a Premium account with a 512-sq.m parcel, not including the cost of land acquisition.

* a single-prim costs US$0.25 to own over the course of a year for a Premium account with a private island, _including_ the cost of the island acquisition.

This is a discount of 75-percent at the high end of land ownership. It's a large price break. In between these two tier fee levels is an additional seven-layers (there's also additional tier fee discounts beyond an entire sim).

You're asking for an increase in the complexity of the tier fee structure. It would add additional levels and not make things simpler. As Lewis Nerd previously pointed out the adoption of a flat rate per sq.meter tier fee structure would most likely increase tier fees, not reduce them. Most tier fee paying residents would not wish to pay more in tier fees based solely on your desire for increased convenience.

As pointed out before... one can rent additional prims (thus avoiding the increase in tier fees by using another resident's discount exchanged for rent), purchase the additional land (cultivating a portion of their existing land to offset the added expense), or purchase the additional land and rent the remainder (selling your discount in exchange for rent to cover the tier fees of the acquisition). Simply ignoring these options nor shaking one's head and claiming an "exercise in futility" does not make these options go away. Residents exercising these options within the marketplace does not make them part of the "status quo."

If you wish to make tier fees more expensive for tier fee paying residents by means of a proposition, then by all means do so, but at least take a moment to consider the costs involved and the increase in complexity.

I decline to vote on behalf of Proposition 443 as it would most likely cause an increase in tier fees and their complexity solely for the convenience of a fractionally small portion of residents who are unwilling to use existing options within the marketplace.

I don't see why you would assume it would make things more complicated. All you would do is this:

Take the tier you are currently on,
Divide the tier cost by the number of sqm,
That's the cost of an extra sqm, until you reach the next tier.

Yes that does produce some paradoxical results when you are only a few sqm under the next tier, but I don't think that would be a problem.

No-one is asking for a reduction in tier fees. What they're asking for is a continuous rather than discrete system. It's silly that, if I own 16384sqm, I can't buy an extra 512 anywhere without being charged as if I owned 32768sqm. What 443 is asking is that instead, LL should go "you have 16384 sqm, that's the $75 tier, that's about 0.004c per sqm, so an extra 512 sqm will cost you an extra $2.34."

And of course there's a business benefit, namely, LL gets that extra $2.34.



Renting imposes extra limits, especially on the mainland. Also, there has to be someone renting the land you want. If the land next to yours, that you want to expand into, has been put up on regular sale, renting it isn't an option. You can hope that a renter buys it, but if you do that someone who isn't a renter might buy it instead and then you're stuck.

Also renting is worse for LL - most big renters are buying at the maximum tier discount. LL needs to encourage small landowners to buy more land from them because they make more money that way.



And winding up paying tier for land potential they do not want.



If they want to go into the rental market, however that isn't easy - it requires marketing, price setting, landscaping, and similar. Also, unless you own 65536sqm already it's very difficult because you will be competing with people who do and who can set their rental rates based on that level of tier discount.



Prop. 443 would not increase anyone's tier costs. It's only asking for a continuous rather than a discrete system, not changing the numbers involved.

And if LL holds out then they stand to make an additional US$50 (a greater benefit). It's up to the landowner to determine whether or not their expansion requires such an additional expense, and if not, manage their prim allowance accordingly.

Tier fee-paying residents are "bread and butter" accounts (they pay above and beyond the normal costs for a Premium membership) for LL and residents are able to purchase the "butter" in 512, 1,024, 2,048, 4,096, 8,192, 16,384, 32,768, and 65,536 sq.meter tubs... it's highly unlikely that LL wishes to get into the business of collecting tier fees for individual pats of "butter." Residents, on the other hand, have few barriers if they wish to rent tiny parcels of "butter."

Claiming that because the remainder of the tier is not being used one should be given a discount is asking for special treatment, especially as it is up to the individual landowner to make or not make use of their entire tier.

Elex, the way things work for most people is this:

They figure out (1) how much they can spend on Second Life. They figure out (2) how much they can make to offset their costs. They add 1 and 2. If 1 and 2 are more than the next tier, they don't tier up. This costs Linden Labs money.

If the jumps between tiers were not so big, 1 and 2 would add up to an acceptable number more often. People would then tier up and buy more land. The discounts could stay the same, the price per meter could stay the same, and so on, and all this would not be hard to track because we have SOFTWARE.

Bottom line:
Linden Labs would make more money because more people would own more land. I do not see the downside to this. Unless you just want more renters and fewer owners, which costs Linden Labs money.

I think winter fails to take into account the power of alts and group land . If you need 1,000 more prims Get an alt. Make a group for you and the alt and mabye a freebie alt so you have 3 members and get the tier you would need on the alt instead of doubling the tier you get about the amount you need. Either way your looking at 25-35 dollar increase and really if you dont need the land dont buy it. The costs could be less sure but then the service could be worse then it is to and im sure we dont want that happening. Even with the sims laying dormant they are using massive amounts of bandwidth to stay loaded up. Its not like they sit there offline till someone tp's into them. All the land details and objects and textures are always loaded and then loaded more per user.

I'd rather they just kept the current system. While you may not like it there are ways to control prim usage a bit better. And if you just wanted 128sq meters more you would just get an alt and tier up to first tier costing you only 15 more per month. You have the power to make alts and get bonus land utilize those abilities. They could ultimately cut it into 512 sq meter incriments but i somehow doubt that will increase the popularity of owning more land. As said most people average at about 2560. I own with my partner about 40240 sq meters total thats 39713 sq meters in 1 sim 16 in another sim (this was used as server land) and 512 in another sim used as server land and a public park of sorts.

With the bonus we get from having it groups we get a few thousand square meters extra which is quite a nice thing. If you take that into accordance with tier pricing its not really all that bad. Like i said it could be split up but its really not a neccessary move.

Actually not really because the people renting would be unlikely to rent the land then and would likely dump it costing LL money as well. And if these people wouldnt tier up because the next step up in tier didnt add up its not all that bad. People shouldnt take both 1 and 2 into account because 2 actually isnt all that stable. They may or may not make that projected idea that they have and if they dont well they relied on a gamble as an income to try to cover that extra tier.

Now if they dont make that extra projected value they may not be able to pay their tier in which case LL loses even more money. Alot of people rely on an extra income inside SL to make tier payments. While the tier can be split into smaller areas really its not all that neccessary because if they do split it into 512 they are getting 5 bucks per 512 sq meters then. 30,672 square meters would then be 60 times 5 resulting in a tier cost of 300 bucks for less land. Pardon me but the math really doesnt add up there. You end up paying more for less really. Unless they start lowering the price per 512 square meter. Your actually paying less the more tier you buy.

Look at it this way. LL give a discount for larger parcels because its not based on a sq meter basis. If they did that it'd cost us more and your saying they should drop 512 sq meters down to 2.34 charging that way. They already discount it pretty highly. As stated people can manage their prims better, make alts for the little bit, or group own the land. You can do it yourself to group own land if you really wanted to. There are ways to get bonus land without costs like group owning. If they started charging by square meter those of us with bonus land would be forced to pay more or we wouldnt get that bonus land. Hence you take a draw out of land ownership away to.

People renting doesnt cost LL any money in fact. Because people that would otherwise not both having land rent. Then the landlord has to go and sell the L which actually nets LL some extra money.

Hmmm...

A resident purchases an annual Premium membership which allows them to own up to 512-sq.m without incurring tier. This is a one-time charge, paid annually.

The aforementioned annual Premium resident then purchases an additional 16-sq.m (a 4x4m parcel) which pushes them into the next tier bracket, normally an additional 512-sq.m for US$5 under the current system, but under a pay-per-meter system this is a cost of US$0.15625 (about 16-cents) per month.

US$5 / 512 * 16 = US$0.15625

The costs associated with monthly billing and charging for such tiny parcels would prohibitive for LL. ("Would you like to put this single pat of butter on your Mastercard or Visa?"

Please also note, that even if such a tiny charge could be billed, it would have to be rounded up to 16-cents, incrementally increasing the cost of the tier.

If the person eventually decides to buy 32768sqm of land, then LL will make that additional US$50 - but they will get that under proportional pricing too. I would seriously doubt that there are any accounts who are tiering 32768 in order to have 16896!



Except that they don't get to choose which parcels are available for rent.

Also, it's not like buying butter in tubs. If you want 16896 of butter, you can buy a 16384 tub, and then a 512 tub. That doesn't apply on SL: having bought the 16384 tub all you can do if you want more is take it back, get the 32768 tub and then throw away all the unused butter.

This is an extraordinary case, I think. It would be easy to insist that residents must be at least at the first tier step (ie, 512 above First Land) before proportional charging is available. Since that means there is a US$5 bill on their card every month, all the billing costs are being paid anyway, billing US$5.16 instead won't be any more expensive.

Allow me to repeat the example...

A resident purchases an annual Premium membership and is billed once.

This Premium resident can own up to 512-sq.m of land without paying tier fees.

They acquire 512-sq.m of land.

As it is within their 512-sq.m limit they are not required to pay monthly tier fees.

They then acquire an additional 16-sq.m of additional land.

Under the present tier fee system, they would be charged US$5 per month for this land.

Under Proposition 443, the charge for this additional land would be approximately 16-cents
(US$5 / 512 * 16 = US$0.15625).

It is highly unlikely that LL would be able to bill 16-cents monthly for an individual account and come out ahead on the transaction. ("We lose money on each transaction but we make it up in volume?"

As this case can exist within the examples of how Proposition 443 would work it should not be considered extraordinary (the language of Proposition 443 does not include an exclusion of the lowest tier amount).

HOWEVER... If we suddenly "insist" on such an exclusion (err... how _undemocratic_ that we're suddenly excluding and penalizing the smallest tier fee-paying parcel holders and sliding in an additional level of complexity to the _simplicity_ of Proposition 443) the actual cost of moving into the second portion of the tier fee schedule after the acquisition of an additional 16-sq.m would be US$5.10
US$5 + (US$3 / 512 * 16) = US$5.09375]
(btw, in your previous example, you just overbilled the account by 6-cents)

Even if we maintain the pretense of insisting on such an exclusion it is unlikely that LL would step over dollars (US$3 for the additional second step tier fee revenue) by modifying the existing tier fee schedule to get the nickels (10-cents) especially when there are multiple options (grouping land for the 10-percent bonus, renting the needed land, acquiring the land through increased cultivation of existing parcel(s), acquiring the needed land and renting out the remainder) to address this problem.

Hey guys. I hate to sound like a cynic, because I am no one - honestly - but have you checked lately, what is the most important part of LLs revenue stream?

And do you realize that as a consequence of the current tier system many premium accounts are paying for at least slightly more sqms than they own?

And that a change from the current "stepped" tier system to a more smooth one would cost LL revenue?

Let me phrase it like that: I assume that the chance for acceptance of a proposition which significantly reduces LLs revenue stream is significantly lower than for one without such ugly consequences.

Presumably there would be some minimum chunk at which additional tier could be purchased. Probably $5 for 512sqm a month. If you want half a sim, plus another 512 (in addition to your 512 for being premium) it'd be: $125 + $5 a month in tier on top of whatever membership plan you have.

If you get to the point where you're at 150% of your largest tier, it'll be almost as cheap at the low end, (and definitely cheaper at the higher tiers) to just round up to the next tier level.

I concur Jopsy. I like the idea of a mix and match. For example, a half a sim bulk package plus the ability to add an additional 512 or 1028 ect ect package. As opposed to having to buy a whole sim as your next option. I dont think the literal definition of Prop 443 would be the way to go realistically, but a change in the tier system to enable such block combinations would surely sell more tier.
http://secondlife.com/vote/vote.php?get_id=443

But Proposal 443 "Re-design tiers to a per-sq-meter system" specifically states:

"Tiers inhibit land purchases by making you do a big jump to the next tier maximum price, if you want to add a little land to your maxxed-out tier. Tiers should be on a per-sq-meter basis ... so if i want to go over the tier limit, the next land I get will be at the next tier's per-sq-meter fee, rather than charging a flat rate that assumes I'm buying land all the way to that tier's maximum."

It makes no allowance for mixing and matching and you no longer agree with its "literal definition" (it says what it says) yet you continue to promote the proposal.

Now would be the time to generate a new proposal specifically outlining, in detail, how such a mix-and-match tier fee system would work, the costs, minimums, etc.

My post 10 in this thread provides a detailed solution.

Lewis

Your detailed solution breaks down when...

Attempting to bill an annual Premium member 16-cents on a monthly basis for a 4x4m parcel above and beyond the 512-sq.m of tier included within their Premium membership.
0.97-cents * 16 = 15.52-cents

Attempting to bill an annual Premium member a half-cent for a 4x4m parcel held for only one-day above and beyond the 512-sq.m of tier included within their Premium membership.
0.97-cents * 16 / 30-days = 0.5173-cents

As either of these problems can occur within your solution they should not be considered extraordinary. Plus, the costs to process and bill such a transaction would exceed the transaction's net value, if any.

In that case, make the minimum of 0-512 sq m above 512 remain as $5, and retain the structure I suggest for the rest of it.

This is the point of discussion of ideas - to figure out possible oversights and flaws, and to come to a better solution.

Lewis

Ahhh... but Proposition 443's original language does not exclude the lowest step of the tier fee schedule. It makes no mention of "once we get above and beyond the first US$5 tier fee for 512-sq.m".

And ultimately, a better solution already exists within the marketplace: grouping land to gain the 10-percent bonus, renting the needed land, cultivating existing land to offset the expense of acquiring additional tier, acquiring the additional tier and renting the remainder.

Just because a tiny fraction of tier-fee paying residents decline to use the existing methods of "granularity" within the marketplace doesn't mean the marketplace now needs to create one.

I described n a previous post why these aren't sufficient.

But how many people would buy more land if they didn't have that huge leap of tier; and the larger the gap, the larger the problem.

Right now I am 440 sq m away from my next tier; I would love to buy a 512 sq m plot near me but it'll mean for the sake of 72 sq m I go from $40 to $75 a month - which isn't even worth getting an alt for because of the $10 per month cost on top of it.

So, I lose out on land I could use, someone else may end up sitting on a plot of land they can't sell, and really nobody wins, due to the current rigid structure.

We just need smaller tier intervals, period, even if it's only broken down in 256 sq m intervals between current rates, giving a more progressive rate scale.

Lewis

This?



One also might not be able to buy land in the same sim. If renting land is bad for LL as it reduces the revenues from tier, then why is a per-sq.meter flat rate good as it _also_ reduces the revenues for LL from tier?

Was it this response to cultivating one's existing land to earn a return thus offsetting the increase in tier fees?



And possibly making a profit, thus coming out ahead. Or simply breaking even and retaining the land.

Was it this response to acquiring the additional land and renting the remainder?



If they want the land they're going to have to figure out a way to pay for it. No one said renting land was easy, just that it can be done within the existing marketplace. And plenty of residents have less than an entire sim and are renting land.

I find it hard to believe that a person would be unwilling to manage their prim allowance OR group their land for the 10-percent bonus OR rent land for the needed prims OR cultivate their parcel to generate income to expand their land holdings OR rent the remainder of their land SOLELY because this would require effort on their part.