Linden Dollar Economy Update #1

Call me a conspiracy nut (thank you. Tune into Coasttocoastam.com and you can be one too ), but the first thought that ran through my mind when I read the Economy Update was feeling that it was all part of the "big plan";

LL creates this platform, offers monetary incentives to creators to develop it, and when they do fill it with content, to take the freely done content-filled platform back over to take all the profits for themselves (ie; players now buying $L from the company instead of the creators, cutting out the middleman (the content creators) so to say, allowing them to have their cake and eat it too.

I rank this right up there with grassy knoll theory myself...

I hope more people stick to their guns either for leaving or for staying. Either way it sends LL a message that players can't be taken for granted. We have our own plans and can only be pushed so far.

I myself am staying. If they screw up trading it doesn't hurt me much since I mostly do it for fun (I cash out all of 60 bucks every 3 months to pay my fees for another game). I am here for time with my family which is scattered internationally and to build things. People can buy or not it doesn't matter to me. I just love building it.

But those that are dependent on trading for cash to pay for the game Oui this is a most serious situation.

Hi Lawrence,

This is a well thought response of me opinion about the recently announced policy change by LL on selling L$ on the LindeX. LL is acting like the US Federal Reserve System to control the L$ supply in SL. LL has much greater power in SL economy than the Fed does in the US economy. Be very careful how you exercise that power.

The value of the L$ is in reality zero, it has no value. The reason people give it value in actuality is because of confidence in their ability to convert it into USD. The LindeX is the vehicle where that is possible. When I joined SL in mid April the value of the L$ was about L$300/1 versus the USD. It stayed at that rate for a few weeks until LL announced on 5/7/2006:

"Tomorrow we'll be pushing an updated version of the terms of service. They've been rewritten to separate out the billing terms, and also to be easier to read overall.

We have also made a change (see paragraph 1.4) to enable the L$ sale by Linden Lab. We are considering the sale of L$, but only within the context of smart economic policy. In other words, we will only sell L$ if we think the economy can absorb a new infusion of L$ because either other sources have been reduced or sinks have increased."

This destabilized the LindeX currency market and the value of the L$ fell to an average exchange rate of L$337.48/1 on 5/31/2006. That fall in value was because of a lack of confidence in the value of the L$. Your stated policy of using up to the 30 day rolling average of sinks as the maximum amount of new L$ LL would sell in order to reduce a fall in the exchange rate has the potential for an economic disaster. Looking at July and August you are talking about increasing the monthly change in money supply by 69% and 79% respectively. Are you crazy? You don’t know what the effect of changing the increase in monthly supply for 10% will be much less 70%.

If you want to increase the money supply by selling up to the value of the sinks per 30 day rolling average fine but do it in baby steps and don’t couple it directly the exchange rate on the LindeX. Let the free market work and control the exchange rate indirectly by announcing your policy of how much more money LL will sell every month to increase the money supply.

Selling massive amounts of L$ to stem a perceived too rapid drop in the exchange rate could very easily overshoot the ability of the economy to absorb the new money and cause an oversupply of L$. If the exchange rate starts rising too fast you have no mechanism in place to stop it and that can lead to run away undervaluation of the L$ especially if you piss off too many very creative content providers that may cash out and find a more user friendly environment.

The frustration level of old established very talented content creators is already high with very little protection being provided by LL for the rights of their intellectual property. Remember LL provides the platform those content creators provide the toys that make SL so much fun.

The short message is be very careful how you implement this new policy and don’t compete directly with the talented content creators for their profits.

PS I’m not a content creator I just want to be able to continue buying the toys they create.

I've posted this on the blog as well:

I think LL will and should keep selling L$.
LL will have to be issuer of more and more L$ if LL whants to keep the exchange rate more or less stabilized and the economy of Second Life reasonably working.

And the reason for this, to me, is obvious.
Every day more and more people enter in the system and buys L$. The RL economy is much bigger than the SL one. So, if LL doesn’t inject new money constantly while this movement keeps happening there is realy NO LIMIT for L$ to appreciate.

I saw many people saying to me: “perhaps you are new in SL and you didn’t saw in the past that L$ valued 250 per 1 dollar”, but, how was the size of SL by that time? Because I think that this exchange rate has the potential to drop a lot further…

In my oppinion if LL doesn’t keep creating new L$ the economy of SL will eventualy halt.

Give it a year or two... and the U.S. and California IRS will have their fingers in the pie, and soon L$ and fantasy currency transactions in other MMO's will be yet another form of regulated trade.

LL has always injected L$ into the economy. The main reason people are pissed is because LL cut out adds which gave back to their players, such as dwell, which paid you for having a place people went to and stipends. Then after cutting all of that, they turn around and sell L$ on the exchange jumping their own players on the LindeX. So now we are getting screwed from several different directions.

The big argument before was, "cut dwell and stipends to stop the L$ value drop!" and now that that has been done, they are not giving us back our losses in the form of adds, but instead they are selling the Linden on the LindeX. The same market which they created and completely control. Just seems very odd and unethical.

While I agree this situation is unethical, the reason why so many wanted dwell to end was because it didn't actually work as intended. Same with DI. LL wanted to give rewards to people who made something other people liked, not for residents to pay others to sit there afk.

I don't even care about dwell myself. It was the stipend cuts that upset me. I was willing to take the loss for the good of SL, but now that the currency value has been fixed and the population has started to grow so fast after the registration changes, maybe give us our stipends back rather than keep it and sell on the LindeX against the content creators and other SL residents.

Please look at the stats on the bottom of this page. https://secondlife.com/currency/economy.php

I agree with most of what you have said. However... This is the wrong time. In recent memory the value of the L was alot higher. The L took a RAPID loss of value. Many producers still value their Lindens at 250/1. Right now the L has the potential to reachieve that value. As long as LL prevents the L from reaching that value they are fighting the market. Once the L reachs 250/1 producers will be happily getting the value they expect for their Lindens and won't object if LL infuses money to keep the value from rising much above that. LL should first let the $L recover the way it collapsed then infuse more money as needed that way they work WITH the market instead of fight it.

As a 3 year player who rather quietly makes and sells content daily and who sells services and pays tier at 2.5 sim level of US$480 approx per month to exist in a computer game, and is non political, having read all this and looked around my view is that it's entirely wrong and unethical for LL to be operating the money system like this.

Bring back GOM.. let's have a proper non Linden owned market that can achieve anything based on daily events, ok so this will still be manipulate by rich and powerful people just like 1st Life, but at least it won't be manipulate by the game owners and controllers for their own benefit as this is entirely unfair and seems to anger many people. However I don't see any of the 'super-rich' favoured Linden-Friend names making any points here so maybe they all doing well out of it.

No surprise there then.

Well even if GOM was still around LL could still sell on it if they wanted to, its easier to do when the market is run by them but would still be possible if it were not.

Another option is selling content via paypal and cutting the L$ out of the equation completely, some big land sellers do this already although mostly for tier payments on private island plots.

Of course that wouldnt be too easy to set up and a lot would not like the idea, I suppose it just depends how bad the L$ situation gets.

I agree, and i don't think LL is doing it to "stabilise" anything else except its own bottom line at the expense of content creators, Land & Currency Traders, and other in-world businesses whom they initially allured by showing vast green fields.

If LL honestly believes that they need monetary control over L$ circulation in economy after they have cut stipends and dwell (which they believed was harmful to L$, and some conmen who kept shouting sky's-falling helped them in it), then the way forward is not arbiterary control over the L$ supply through "Open Market sales".... blah blah b;lah

Well, thats what everyone is saying... hey hold on, I am a content creator, and i am not dumb. What I believe LL is doing is favourable to small guy, Mr Content Creator. this is actually big business that stands to lose from it, and thats why they are shouting IN MY NAME. Who stands to lose if LL has more control on LindX? Not me by long shot, and not other content creators. The first hit is actually big time currency traders who d lose their ability to manipulate market and rob me off my hard earnings, and this is them who are shouting and some simple hearted content creators (as artists always are) are being taken in by them.

I support any measures suitable that LL takes to exert control over LindX and stabilize it BUT there should be some counter mechanism in control in case L$ devalues rapidly. In absence of that mechanism, sense of insecurity may hurt everyone eventually hurting LL.

And content Creators shouldn't be worried by these steps, they may look bad, but they aren't.

Artists are simple-hearted? Artless; innocent; naive? Way to trash the backbone of SL in order to discount their opinions. If you believe that artisits are always naive maybe you should read a bit up on art history, as most of art reflects and expresses to the rest of the world what is going on in that paticular time in terms of politics, religion, and society. How that is in any way simple is beyound me.

While those who make money as day traders stands to loose quite a bit more, everyone who sells on the Lindex (most of which are content creators) will lose if the L$ tanks. Yet have been very clear they will not buy L$ if the market tanks. Currently, LL is keeping a tight lip on anything they might do to curb this from happening. You can not play only one side of the market and expect to control it. That is not simple, innocent, or naive. Its plain common sense.

You can be naive and believe everything LL says all you want. Disagree with anyone you want. But a blanket statement that anyone who feels this is the wrong path are either evil currency traders who steals from you or simple-hearted people being taken in by them is insulting.

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Well what if you need to pay tier and then all of the sudden here comes LL with a huge 2 million Linden sell order undercutting yours and everyone elses?

Currency traders can hardly manipulate the market. They are even limited to buying and or selling $5,000 USD worth of currency per 24 hours no matter which trader tier they are in.

The rest of your post is a blanket statement with no backing or evidence. Simply coming on here and saying, "This may look bad, but isn't."won't cut it. I have had my stipends cut, new premiums have had theirs cut, dwell is gone and now LL is selling fresh Linden on the LindeX? That is just wrong. I remember a few months ago people were actually BURNING their stipends to try and help the L$ value. Boy did they get shafted...

And yes, content creators have been hurt by this. There is less money in the hands of players because of the stipend cuts and so players don't spend as much, and now at the same time you have to compete on the LindeX with LL which creates their L$ out of thin air and has nothing to lose...

The reason there is no counter mechanism is because to do so they could easily lose it all. If LL were to say they will never let the value fall below 350 then if a panic ensued and everyone dumped, they would have to buy hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of L$ which would bankrupt LL. They could hold all the money they make by selling L$ and promise to use it to buy L$ if the value falls, but then they won't be making money (which they want) and if a real panic ensues, their efforts would be futile anyway.

Sinks should equal adds and LL should get off the LindeX. If the economy needs more money in circulation as the population grows, add it in as adds, not L$ sales.

The LindeX and the L$ were interesting at one point, now they are both just a controlled market to make LL money. The luster of the LindeX has flailed, for me. I think I'll go back to following the ForeX markets.

wow...wow...wow...don't get angry guys, just look what I mean to say.

Say, I decide to "play" lindX and want to profit from artificial market moves, in real life its not that easy unless I am Soros. But in Lindx, anyone with spare USD50k can do it to a very significant detriment to SL, LL and remember content creators will only win if SL wins as long as there is no alternative venue (LL's competitor with same platform).. Ok, here's scenario:

I decide to play LindX, and buy every L$ there is in the market, hold and artificially overvaluate it, and then start releasing small bunches, making huge profits AT THE EXPENSE OF CONTENT CREATORS....hmmm

What LL is trying to do, in my opinion, is provide a safeguard to this kind of manipulation. through adds, LL can't effectively control LindX, and even if it tries to do so, it would be too late already before such adds bring effect. LL needs effective control on LindX to safeguard.

This is good for content creators only if they could see the broader picture. If LL undercuts you, undercut LL, that small loss is better than the otherwise. Remember, as a content creator, you are cashing profits and are always able to undercut, the rouge trader who is trying to manipulate does not have that luxury and will go into red after a certain point. This will eventually safeguard content creators, I honestly believe so.

However, I will repeat again that there must be a mechanism on the other end to provide assurance and security.

And, don't get angry... i love ya all

Haha, not angry at you at all.

Even if I took $100kUSD and slowly bought up every last L$ I could, I'd still be restricted to the 30 rolling day limit. As I bought more and more, the price at which I would be buying would go up and up and then as I turned around and started to sell, the value would go down and down as I sold and hit tier limits. Then there is the risk that LL may announce something and cause a panic while I'm holding all those L$ and I could lose a lot. With the restrictions on the amount you can buy/sell there is very little you can do to actually manipulate the market without dealing with a huge risk. Thus it doesn't happen very often. Even if there were no tier limits (as LL seems to be fazing out as they add the new withdraw limit feature to combat fraud) it would be difficult to manipulate the market and make a profit.

The main reason LL is selling on the LindeX is to make USD$ for themselves, not to combat day traders, which are not a problem, and if anything, help to balance the market price. Most day traders buy and sell at very small, risky margins and don't hold the currency longer than a day, and many times just a few minutes. LL slowly cut out in world adds (dwell & stipends) with the full support of most citizens as the L$ was losing value, only to after fixing the value drops turn around and start adding L$ to the economy via LindeX sales rather than in world adds. Hmmm.

Not saying LL is evil or anything, but they sure did blunder on this. Let the market stay free and find its own equal librium and stop changing the policy on L$ and the LindeX every other week.

Just my 2 cents.

And that in my opinion is the real problem. I know for myself I have lost a great deal of faith in both LL and Lindex. The rule are the rule till they get inconvienient for LL and are changed.

Lack of faith destabilises the market which causes LL to change policy again which destabilises the market ...and on and on it goes.

Change is fine but for God sakes give a change time to work. All markets have corrections we had a big one last weekend. In response LL changed policy and from what I can see it looks like we are headed for another one this weekend. Is LL going to change policy again?

problem is I don't know. Going on past history probably.

So is LL saying the magical 250:1 rate no longer exists? If they are selling Linden's, very unlikely it will reach that ever again.

Well I have just gone to premium from basic, I know I should have done it when you got $L500 each week (now $L400) but it is now getting to the point where you still come close to break even on basic premium tier vis-à-vis Lindens received. Plus you can own 512 square meters of land if you want to with no additional tier

If this trend continues then content providers can simply put their prices down (in Lindens) and still receive the same reward in US dollars.

Linden Labs benefit from more premium accounts.

I am NOT a currency trader but in all fairness I cannot see anything really bad here pardon my straightforward statement

I don;t know, the value just dropped another 12 bucks in 12 hours.

I logged out last night at about 288 or something, and I check here at noon and its 276 per dollar.

It got this low a week ago (*or high depending on how you look at it*) and then rallied for the past few days slowly climbing up *or lower value of Linden heh*, and now its falling back down again .

I'm not a content maker, I"m a buyer. And I have put off buying things and investing in this game because of this. I was figuring on 10K Linden being about 35 bucks which would get me some main avatars I wanted, a few clothes, and a few extras and I was find with that to begin with. But now its gettin' onto 40 bucks for the same amount of linden...and that's starting to be too high.

Personally I wish it would stay around 300, 3bucks ish Linden for a dollar seems like a fair rate to me. Not so high that little buyers like me feel they are spending too much (that makes your typical regular outfit about a dollar, really nice outfits buck and a half, that seems fair to me - and reallky nice avatars at about 8-10 bucks), and not so low that people cant' make money. *shrugs*

250 per dollar is definitley going to limit my spending in this game, and even possibly limit my staying here. Because if the player doesn't feel they can afford to be buying pretty little digital pixels, then the rest of you won't be selling as much - and that's not good all around.

(and no, economic theory is latin for me, this is just how one pure-consumer sees it)

You are still missing the big picture. What happens if the L$ tanks to L$500/1USD? Every single content creator looses money. I repeat, LL has never stated a plan of action for extreme devauling. You can not expect to control a market when only playing one side.

If LL undercuts everyone, and everyone undercuts LL, and the value of the L$ tanks then that is not a security for content creators. We are not just 'cashing' profits. We work hard at creating the world. We work hard and making things people will actually purchase. And most of us use that money to pay for our land.


Most content creators priced their items based on a 250/1 exchange rate. Most of us then rode out the extreme devaluing in recent months hoping for a bounce back. If it does stay at 300/1 for a long enough period of time, people will raise their rates. While you might consider it 'pretty little digital pixels' some of us consider it really demanding and hard work.

300/1 or even 330/1 was a bit too low of a value for everyone and it was never the real value as far as I remember. If things stayed at the range, eventually prices would get more expensive in world anyways costing consumers more L anyways. I even lowered the prices of my things the past couple of weeks because it will be easier to pay tier now.

One last thing, if you want to save a little, put up a buy order at the rate you would like.

One small correction for those who do not know how it works. Put up a LIMIT BUY order. Only the Limit Buy lets you dictate the exact rate you want.

If you do not see Limit Buy as an option

go into your account on the web page and change the lindex settings. It does not by default show you all your options.