The First Land For New Residents Programme

I recently got my RL partner to join the game and she got lucky and snagged some first land. I doubt if she would ever have gotten it without me helping her because it just goes so fast. Our computers are next to one another and I was playing in search and saw it available and stood behind her in our office talking her through it while she got it. Even at that, it was next to the last parcel in the block sold.

In terms of who else bought that land? Where she got her land there were two rows, one roadside, and not. The entire roadside space was under control of a single owner, reparcelled into 1024s, landscaped to be completely flat, and available for sale -- all within 30 minutes. There's no way I can possibly believe that this wasn't a pro. The same owner has about half the plots in the non-road area. (And yes, it all definitely sold as first land, I saw it go as we were flailing with the upgrade of her account from basic--the upgrade with purchase thingie doesn't work right.)

I would hate to see First Land stop being an entry point into the economy. But I think a delay in how soon it can be sold would put an end to most of this. My suggestion would be no resale for 90 days unless the account is under a quarterly, semi, or annual sub. The idea being that the profit on the land should not be out of proportion to the cost.

That is very interesting, Kathy. And it is hard to argue with your conclusions. It sounds as if one person had several new acounts and similtanious computers running to pull that off.

I am pretty sure I was a Premium member for quite a few weeks before I went shopping for my First Land. Personally, I'm sure LL does its best to keep pace with demand, but given the surge in membership, its no wonder they have fallen behind.

I just wanted to add a different experience - I bought my First Land plot in a perfectly nice, boring sim more than a year ago and was reasonably happy there for quite a while. I then started a business and went on to renting increasingly large pieces of land to house my home and store.

Six months or so ago, I bought a sim, so I now own all of that land... plus my First Land. I never sold it. It just sits there, with a tiny outpost of one of my shops.

I consider it a security blanket of sorts, I suppose, and I will never sell it. I mean, if my SL businesses go to hell in a handbag and I can't support the sim or something... well, you really cannot beat the overheads on that first 512 plot, you know?

I concur that firstland is being gamed excessively to the point that it is countering Linden Lab's flagship selling point to new Residents going premium. I witnessed it yesterday evening. Within the space of 30 seconds I counted at least 3 "art shops" owned by residents 8 months or older, and 2 or 3 for sale signs on parcels, ranging from 12k to 15k. It did appear that a few "legit" residents were able to obain parcels as well, excitedly building the plywood boxes they will eventually call "home".

I was under my alt at the time, which is also a premium account, and was able to purchase a parcel myself. 10 minutes of me standing around, and there he was.. the owner of an adjacent parcel, in a business suit, same dude I had seen a few minutes before trying to convince someone that their land was worth TWICE as much as they paid for it, and he'd buy it right on the spot.. now he's trying to con me into joining forces with him to find ways to scam the new homeowners out of their $L.. being a relatively obscure character, my alt, I played along, played dumb, and then the inevitable - I'll pay you double what you paid for your parcel..

The more I think about it, the more I think a 90 day waiting period would be pretty smart. It may not completely resolve the problem.. some people have more patience than others, as well as more capital to invest in their scams, but clearly something needs to be done here. Of course, more investigative work needs to be done first, so we can have the best understanding possible of the problem.. Solutions based on hunches can often have undesired consquences..

I guess I must have just lucked out. I was pretty much giving up hope and was going to start a thread on these boards looking for advice, ideas, mentorship for the landless who'd really like to build stuff. After work yesterday I logged in and did my ritual, futile search for first land and there were ten listings! Every single link said I couldn't teleport and they wouldn't show up on a map. I was a little flustered, messaged LL and was told there was a problem and real first land would be up soon. Within minutes there were new listings. I perused briefly and then decided to just bite the bullet and buy any one that I could. It was fun and exciting hitting that buy button as dozens of people were dropping out of the sky! Some adjacent lots are for sale now, of course but...


....my entire perspective and feeling of connection/emotional investment has completely changed as far as SL is concerned. The land plus the fact that I've actually chatted with a few people has made a huge difference. A week ago I was contemplating cancelling my account.

I'm glad you decided to stick around, Bodhisatva. The First Land issues, like many other issues in Second Life, are growing pains that will eventually mend. I was amused by the mile high stacks of green dots on the map over the area where FL went to market last evening.

What was most pleasing was being there, and seeing the new residents who had captured their First Land, and immediately made it "home".. the nostalgia that brought on was intense, and I'm only a few months old.

The most encouraging image from last night was one person who simply erected a sign over their parcel.. "Home Sweet Home".

zk

Interesting. I had no idea about the opportunity to buy "First Land" as a perq of going Premium. Not really interested in buying land at all yet - been there, done that in other games, and content to just explore for awhile before I make that kind of commitment.

I'm just a newb who went Premium simply because I assumed there would be benefits for doing so.

But so far, the benefits of doing so have escaped me.

I got some initial cash, and get $L300 a week for $9.95 a month. I can buy $L 1000 in game for $4.08, the same rate as free accounts.

This makes me feel a bit math impaired for going Premium, or is there some other benefit I get for going Premium? I'm a game addict, with well over 95% of my gaming dollars spent in online subscriptions to MMORPGs for the past 8 years, so I don't mind rewarding devs for entertaining me, but this situation makes me feel uncomfortably stupid.

SL puts a new spin on mmorpg's ... the objective/goal is to create. you can interact with a bunch of people (but then again, you can do that with any mmorpg game), but, what's more, you can build stuff in the world -- and shape the world to your image (muahahha!).

the premium account gives you access to land, which (without further upgrades) is equivalent to having 117 prim's worth of "storage space" on a 512m^2 parcel. it's like renting out a hard disk drive hooked to the main grid.

But I did that for free in Alpha World!

And does that mean that free accounts can't do the same here?

Edited note: Meaning that it's not a new spin for me, just trying to figure out what the advantages are for going Premium account status vs. free account.

If barons / baronesses are ripping off our fellow players (yes players - this IS a game) then name names - its not illegal - don't comment on your opinion (maybe), but state facts.

We may not be able to do anything at the time - but we CAN and SHOULD shut these people out in any way that we can. Also with the lots of "First Land" now all owned by one person WHO - don't give opinions just facts - I am sure we will have an opinion. No flames, but we are intelligent people that want to play the game, in every sense of that phrase, and its just worth as many people knowing as possible who just might be a conman (or woman).

I am not proposing that we destroy people - anyone - but when we are all collectively being ripped off - best let us make up our own minds.

Liralen, going premium allows you to buy mainland land. It also entitles you to buy First Land 512sm plot ofr 512$ guaranteed price (for now!)
There are arguments for renting against buying elsewhere so won't expand but having that cheap 512 plot and having sole rights to build what you like is it's main attraction I believe.

Zaphod, I would love the name of the above individual so i can avoid him and tell others to do the same. Can you IM me that info in-world? Thanks.

Thanks for the answer. But the main premise of this thread is that benefit is virtually non-existant.

Not that it's your fault! I very much appreciate your answer.

But I must conclude that I was an idiot for going Premium without researching. And that the devs have a very poor business model.

Liralen, Bilbo99 has it spot on. You have "bought" the right to own land - don't underestimate that though - your own land is the way that you can start to work on all of the building aspects of SL (to me one of its main attractions) - without land you CAN build but only in places where it has been allowed for "public" access and these places (eg Public Sandboxes) are unlikely to let you keep your creations in place for any length of time.

And.... although you will read LOTS (and lots and lots and lots) about the "First Land" program it lets you buy this "land" at one twentieth of the price you can get it on the open market (well approximately anyway - and only a tiny slip of it - but its a good start)

So the OP was incorrect?

OP asked two questions and vented impatience. What's to be right or wrong there?

edit: sorry Liralen, did you mean your OP? If you didn't want land, then there's little point in going premium.

Sorry Raymond, but for now I'm going to avoid going down the 'naming names' road.. even in-world

This thread is becoming an illustration of what is so great about SL. What one can do in the SL world is wide open. For some people it is a financial opportunity. Those people are finding all kinds of ways to aquire $L, including the land grabs mentioned above. To others it's the fun of designing and creating just about anything. For some it is a place to meet others for business, classes, socializing etc. And for many it is "just a game". Most of us probably enjoy all these and other aspects of the environment. Some people will happily bring more money into the SL economy than they take out, some will make a profit and some will have a rewarding experience without engaging in fiancial transactions at all.

Maybe I'm just a lucky renter. I've made the decision, after abt 3 weeks, to try and continue holding out for first land. I've rented a very nice place in a quiet pretty area, residential only, that is cheap and allows 200 prims for me to build. It works very well for my newbie building/scripting needs. I did a lot of looking before I found this place - but I'm a happy renter and will probably continue to rent for quite a while as i continue to research real estate - and wait for 1st land, I hope! It's buying me the luxury of time to do the necessary research.