Would you rather see greater sink fees or smaller stipends?

I'd rather see greater sink fees for uploading.

New users have it hard enough... time to tax the older residents a bit more.

I personnally have no problem with stopping basic account stipend after 3 months.

I'd rather see more sinks, it's a 'nicer' way to achieve the same thing, and an easier sell. Personally, a decrease in stipends wouldn't bother me, and I wouldn't consider a combination of the two unreasonable either.
I also agree with Jesrad though. I think LL should take the 'drug-pusher' approach to basics. Give them a higher stipend for a defined amount of time, something they can have fun with, once they're hooked, sorry bud, now ya gotta pay if you want a stipend.

Well since the question is directed toward anyone replying, I would like to see fewer stipends than greater sink fees. I'm paying 3500L to 4000L in sink fees already and really would not want to pay more. I'll leave it up to LL to decide whats best to balance the economy so the currency exchange has some balance to it also. I also think targeting just one thing like bigger sink fees for uploading targets only certain groups of people that upload tons of texures daily.

My two Lindens

how about 'abolition of the L$'?

And with that two cents there goes the survival of business in SL since they depend on the newer folks buying thier goods.

I dont think thats true at all.

I've had several business ventures and I tell you for a fact it wasnt noobies supporting me with stipend. And many of the people I know who run businesses now would say the same.

Question Fade.

Would this include those basic accounts that were paid for before LL made basics free? Somehow I think you're going to say yes but I'm hoping (against hope lol) that you won't. All this talk about doing away with basic stipends has made me realize just how much I have had to depend on it at times just to upload a couple of snapshots of my work for sale. After 6 months of busting my butt and not making any Ls to speak of I have to conclude that others are doing something I'm not. But for the life of me I can't figure it out.

Why do you refer to them as 'sink' fees?

sinks, increasing sinks reduces the amount of money that makes it back to lindex after people buy lindens

I'm not sure what the deal was when you joined, so I don't know. Probably not, depending on the agreement. Can I just say, I'm not particularly for the removal of anyone's stipend. I really would rather see more sinks. I've mostly taken a prove-it's-the-stipends and prove-by-how-much stance, and what else would we do other than remove stipends line.
My suggestion above was really a 'what I'd do if I was LL (which I'm not), and I was really thinking more about future users. As to whether they did it, I don't really care.
I'm not exactly worked up about the stipends. I do think SL has a steep learning curve, so there does need to be a way to facilitate new residents to learn what it's all about at an enjoyable pace. When I made my above statement, I certainly didn't envisage any less than three months (and note I said give them more).
SL's economist has no doubt been fairly quiet so far, because they've probable been swamped just completing an initial analysis. It would be a big task, I bet they're thinking "I should have asked for more". It seems it's starting to bear fruit however. Without that analysis, I wouldn't recommend any drastic measures. I think we may see some more information flow our way soon.
I'm generally for flexibility in the free structure, so people have as many choices as possible for how they access SL.
As to the last part, have you tried talking to people outside your immediate circle for feedback? Maybe approach people you see successfully doing a similar thing? I know some may be disinterested, but generally I find people willing to talk.
Maybe look at your whole operation. How efficiently can you use land, or rented space? Are you making the most of the classifieds, using lots of keywords for Find? How's your stuff presented? Is SL Exchange or SL Boutique a good way to get extra revenue and reach out to new customers? Maybe look around, put your work up against a harsh light... compare it to the best of it's kind. What can you learn from that?
I'm not suggesting you are deficient in any of these areas, I'm genuinely trying to be helpful.

Thank you very much Fade. I really appreciate your input. I think we do see pretty much eye to eye on most things. And just FYI I did have to pay for this basic account when I got it. This was before LL started giving them away for free.

I will definately look into your suggestions!

Well I'd say a deal's a deal and should be honoured and yw

Didn't we just decrease the money in SL by getting rid of DI? Which will, in turn, largely get rid of camping chairs?

I say wait 2 months and the $L will rise. That is UNLESS there is a glut of land on the market.

Well that's fine if everything else is free! I'm sure you say this just to rile the capitalists

Even as a staunch anti-capitalist I can see the benefits of monopoly money in a system like this. It's ok to keep on saying get rid of L$ if you have the spare money in RL to throw at SL but what would you replace it with ?

We'd end up with a system consisting of an RL rich playground where the rest of us paupers would end up being nothing more than envious onlookers. That's almost what we have already, but at least content creators can currently make enough to pay tier, that's what I want from SL. Being a control freak I want to own my own domain as far as I can, I wouldn't be satisfied with a basic a/c used only for chat and looking at other peoples stuff.

Bring on OS and user owned servers and I'll agree with you, but I think we'd be talking something that isn't SL

Pesonally I think LL's mad rush to outgrow WoW is crazy they need to slow down.

I would have no problem with doubled sinks either.

Nor would I. It would be good if we could discuss where common ground may exist, as you are doing Jesrad.

I'd like to see staggered upload fees for images - say, for example, 5L$ for 128x128 or smaller, 10L$ for 256x256, 20L$ for 512x512, etc. It would be a good incentive for responsible use of high-resolution textures, and a smaller upload fee for low-rez textures would help those that like to upload multiple versions of a texture to preview it in-world. The idea has been suggested previously in the forums, I hope we might get an official Linden position on that one day

< likes Jackal's suggestion.

I'm all for limiting the length of time basic accounts get stipends. Or even, maybe give them some starter money so they can buy some goodies and get set up, then point them at the LindeX.

I DO NOT want to see increased, tiered, etc fees for uploads. I have to pay enough RL $ to first have a premium account, and secondly to purchase L$. Keep your damn paws off the upload fees unless you're reducing them.

-Ghoti

How about a fixed fee for bug reporting? That way, all the users that have the most problems and are burdening LL with having to fix these issues instead of implementing new features are helping to offset the cost involved in dealing with them, if they continue to insist on reporting their problems to LL and expecting solutions!

There's so much room for new sinks I feel. I posted a couple in another thread, 'vanity' taxes like choosing your own surname (this would be popular with partners who wished to have a shared surname), a new improved business vehicle that costs more than a group...
Another good one that FlipperPA suggested once was a kind of 'profile plus', the ability to pay to put more information than is currently possible on profiles, like picks etc. This would be really useful to people with businesses. How about allowing people to have more than 15 groups, but you gotta pay a fee?

... nearly no one would be reporting bugs anymore ! Suddendly there would be no more bugs at all in SL, genius !

Well, it'll either provide a money sink for hacked off players with crash issues, or at worst it won't fix the economy but platform stability looks bloody great on paper! Either way it's a winner!

I would be willing to pay LOTS of $L to finally get my last name changed to one of my own creation.

-Ghoti