Volunteer to End Your Premium Acct. Stipends

Interesting. I'll take a look at it in more detail.

SL's consumer economy is clicking along at well over $1BB / month in spending. The introduction of a net $43MM (after sinks take $17MM out of Stipends and other sources) per month does not really matter or impact the value of the $L.

What does matter, and we have seen it the past couple of days, is the huge numbers of $L's that large retailers, and particularly land barons, must convert to USD on a daily weekly, monthly basis to cash flow their operations and meet ever increasing mind boggling obligations to LL - Payable in USD, thank you.

In order to insure that they are not caught holding $L's that they absolutely need to convert to USD to pay LL, they bid ever higher and higher sell prices.

The good news is that a few people are doing extremely well in SL, the bad news (for the average resident) is that a few people are doing extremely well in SL. That is, unless you buying $L's. Meanwhile the power players are busily raising prices - some by X2.

Sadly, it is a downward spiral that I am not sure LL knows how to fix, short of shutting down the LindeX, or further limit the amounts of $L's that can be taken out of the economy by residents to stop the 'capital flight'.

I also checked IGE today... actually got a Sell order to quote. IGE would pay me $180 USD for $100,000L. On the other hand, I could have sold the same $100,000L to another money changer for $280 USD. Hmmm....

What is going on? But, I assure you it is not the Stipends.

It is only a game. It costs me $6 a month for the premium membership and another $8 a month in tier. The only income for me is the stipend. I have a RL job that brings in in enough money and do not need a second job.

Second Life is only a game in which I pay to play!

How about limiting stipend to just one account associated with a credit card. I know lots of people have alts. I wish I knew what % had premium alt account.

If you are to think what you pay to linden lab is also to give reward to those who make things with which to play, then you are blinding self to facts.

If you see no value in any of the creations in the game then I do not see why it matters if you have a stipend or not. But if you are pay for stipend so that you may buy things you value for fun of play, then why do you begrudge the maker the small token reward?

Me, too.... I pay to be here. The day comes my RL cannot support my habit, you can find me in the the SL Rehab Unit.

Would be nice if that was way the economy works today. Ahhhh, the good ol' days.....

The number of basic accounts versus premium accounts would be useful information as well as the number of alternate accounts, as you suggest.

I'm not sure if this is true, but I think you can only have one premium account. Alts are additional basic accounts, not premium accounts. Therefore, each alt only receives L$50 each month.

A person's first basic account is free and each additional basic account (the ones that become alts) cost a US$9.95 onetime fee. The membership link does not indicate that a person can have more than one premium account. http://secondlife.com/whatis/plans.php

But, perhaps I'm wrong. Does anyone know the answer?

Add me to the list Bloop, and good thread!

I've wished there was some way to stop recieving my stipend ever since I opened my first shop. Since then, I make a point to use it as shopping money, or donate it to those I know to be in need. That doesnt change it's "money from nowhere" nature, though.

Oh, for the day when we dont have to post threads or make lists for this. It would be wonderful to just be able to click a checkbox in your preferences to opt out.
But since we cant do that, much respect to you for leading this. I hope a lot more people get on this wagon.

My husband says I need to go to the SL rehab unit NOW! He would pay Linden Labs money to get me banned!

You misunderstand me, I do not mind paying content makers money> It is just that I do not have any need for more inventory clogging content.

LOL!

Thanks for your thoughts, Elror!

Spending is not the piece of data that matters in this discussion. One single Linden can be "spent" over and over. Your figure is the aggregate spending of the SL economy in a given month. It is similar to the GNP (Gross National Product).

What we are talking about is how many total, individual Lindens are out there. We're talking about the money supply. We want to know if that number is increasing, remaining constant, or decreasing over time.

It is fine for it to do any of those three depending on several factors. If it is increasing, then the question is are there more people actively participating in the economy. If the answer is no, then there could be a problem. That is what we are currently seeing. It is not the only problem with the economy, but it is a justified concern.

Here are the numbers from LL (5/25/2006) to illustrate this point:

Total money supply (month to date): 682,853,993 L$

Total sinks (month to date): 16,986,462 L$
Total sources (month to date): 59,399,965 L$

Subtracting sources from sinks = 42,413,503 L$ increase in overall money supply

Money supply April ending = today's supply - new inputs during May = 640,440,490 L$

Therefore, the money supply has grown by:

New Linden's created in May / April ending money supply = 6.62% increase in the past 26 days.

This is ONE of the problems with the economy There are others. However, it is difficult to overlook the fact that the money supply has grown in less than one month by over 6%. That is a significant annualized rate. This is caused by stipends and only stipends.

Although the population is indeed growing faster than the money supply each month, the actual number of consumers (those that are buying Lindens) is not growing fast enough.

It takes awhile for new economies to find their level and it could be that in 6-8 months the influx of new consuming residents will finally be sufficient to eat into the expanding money supply. But, who knows it could be sooner, later, or never.

There is no economic emergency yet. Some of us are just looking into the future and seeing a problem in the current data. We're volunteering to act now while we have a good chance of avoiding the iceberg. The iceberg is in the future. If you act now, there will be no emergency. It's simply proactive thinking.

Everyone keeps trying to reduce the issue to a simplistic 'money in and money out" equation. Are we to accept that the exchange rate went from low 300's to high sell of around 350 in just a couple of days due to a paltry infusion of stipends? Or, could it have been the millions of $L's placed on the market for conversion in the past couple of days by those needing to cash flow 10's of thousands of USD's to LL at month's end?

And why the huge spread between what IGE is paying for $L's and what inworld money changers are paying today?

Just find it interesting and somewhat perplexing.

They can have my $500 for my premium, and my whopping $50 L x 2 for both my alts..so that's another $600 a week for ya.
If it might help....take em!

Yes, it is perplexing. As I stated, stipends are not THE cause of the problem but the are A cause. Money supply is always an issue. If you have too few dollars or too many in any free-market economy it can (not will) cause problems.

Your point about the rapid drop in the value of the Linden is valid. It was not caused by stipends directly. However, the imbalanced money supply helped to set up the problem. It was brewing for a while and then too many people panicked.

Since there were (and still are) too few people on the buy side of the market, sellers were competing with each other, pushing the Linden lower and lower in value. Lindens were (and still are) so abundant, that their value went down due to the sellers having a hard time off loading them so they had to keep lowering their price (i.e. accept fewer dollars per Linden).

The over abundant money supply and the lack of buy-side players allowed for the situation to deteriorate. More than likely--it is never safe to speak about all economic issues with absolute certainty--if there had been fewer Lindens in supply, there most likely would have been less sell-side competition. The panic still would have happened but probably would have slowed sooner.

Money supply is a problem, a very serious one. It is not the only one. It is, however, inextricably linked to any free-market economy.

I don't want people to lose their Stipends if they need them. That is why this is a volunteer effort. I, an no one else should, think any less of someone who chooses to keep their stipends.

Thanks, Nephilaine! Your name has been added. Welcome aboard!




Great! Thanks, Andie and welcome aboard!


Updated list of residents who are opting out of premium account stipends (L$500/wk):

1. Me (Bloop Cork)
2. Nicole David
3. kerunix Flan
4. Kazanture Aleixandre
5. Mad Wombat
6. Fade Languish
7. Jon Rolland
8. Derrick Cannoli
9. Alexander Yeats
10. Nephilaine Protagonist (welcome on board!)
11. Andie Ramona (welcome on board!)

Updated list of residents who are opting out of basic account stipends (L$50/wk):

1. Rasah Tigereye (two basic accounts)
2. Merhain Speculaas
3. Andie Ramona (also, his two basic accounts)


We're at L$5750 per week. How many more residents do we need? Uh, too MANY!

Keep going! Remember, this is a volunteer program only. If you want to keep your stipends that is perfectly fine. You do not have to state that here. If you want to offer your support but want to keep your stipends, please state it in this thread.

So, with (almost) 24 hours gone, we only have 13 people who have signed up. I know there are more of you that are concerned with the affect of too many stipends on the SL money supply. Were are you? Step up to the plate and show your conviction!

Who's next?

Evidently Jamie Bergman and Reservebank Division, two players who are strongly vocal in support of your campaign, still don't have the conviction to sign up.

Why am I still not surprised?

Lewis

Time for them to put up, or shut up.

Wow, what a great thread. I just read all 10 pages and ignored all the comments from those few people who refuse to give up their stipend but insisted on posting in a voluntary refund thread 20 or 30 times. Bloop sign me up I don't need the stipend and spend much more than L$500 per week anyway. And for the record I don't sell anything either I just like the game and have said before this game needs many more like me who just come here to spend money. I saw where someone asked how to burn money in SL and the official answer was to give it to an Official Linden. So I propose we hold an official stipend burning party every Tuesday with some Official Linden at a specified time and place.

Haha good idea, though it would look very weird in my balance sheet. How should I book that in my double-entry accounting? As a gift?

EDIT: And how can we be sure that the Lindens won't take that money to buy some widgets themselves.

They will use it to sell on the Lindex

You ever wondered how Philip paid for his Hyperflute (TM)?

Thanks, Svar! I'll add you to the list. (I'm sorry that you had to read through all 10 pages )

I love your idea of a stipend burning party every Tuesday--at what time and where? Perhaps inside Gov. Linden's home?

We will need to have two times to allow those in different places on Earth to participate. Also, if anyone can script a burning Linden, that would add to the fun.




Credit: 500 flammable Lindens
Debit: 500 Lindens that have flamed