Sick of this....

This may be true in the "here and now" sense, but the focus is really on the future, not on sustaining the current economic structure. The land trade will be a grain of sand in the desert at some point in the future of Second Life.

Oh you caught me before i could add to my post. Yes those free accounts are important. But not in a way that most consider. They are the unsuspecting flocks for the major corporations moving into SL. The day is coming that even the mighty land barons will be overrun by corporate USA. SL or whatever form this platform ends up taking will be driven by corporate advertising like everything else. Then it will not matter who is premium or basic.

Personally I'm really getting sick of all the whining to and from the free accounts. We all know there is a danger involved in having unverified accounts. Either it be Population, economy, griefer issues, or scammers. The fact is not many people who come to SL to be annoying or cause problems are gona wana pay for it. Your just falling into the same catagory because you also are not verified. We all know already... Your not personally responsible for what some griefer does, but your just 1 person in a flood of millions. Just because your a good person doesn't mean that all people are.

The fact is griefers/scammers choose not to upgrade because their credit info will be on file and they actually risk prosecution. Then you have your endless flood of newbies who come here thinking SL is a MMORPG where they can go kill and blow people up. Then they get sick of it and leave. Then theres people only coming here to milk the economy for all the cash they can get. Not very likely they would all want to go premium either.

Now... Having said that, i know that not all premium holders are good upholding citizens either, but they are taking a risk of being on trial when it comes to these issues. So they tend to be a little more careful. For example, theres a few land barons that completely stay within the TOS when they cause their problems. But being unverified doesn't necessarily make you invulnerable. Theres people highly trained in tracking down unverified accounts that cause problems.

So next time one of these topics comes up or one gets derailed in such a manor, stop and think before you whine about it. You may not be the cause of the problems, but your caught in the middle of it. i myself am a Basic Account, but my payment info is on file and used. I was a premium account for 1 1/2 years before i tiered down out of frustration do to how much LL sucks at maintaining them. I know what it's like on all sides of the fence.

I'm 'premium'. Have been for long enough that anyone is welcome to accuse me of having forgotten what being 'verified basic' was like. (I've never known what 'unverified basic' life is like.)


I'm strongly in favor of having unverified accounts though.

ID checking at the door lends to a police state like environment that turns into an "insiders-only" club, which is not very welcoming to new residents.

While not checking RL ID at entry does allow a percentage of scum in, it invites in many people that ARE good for SecondLife.... people that wouldn't have bothered otherwise.

This is a world about freedom and imagination.

Let's not argue for unecessary restrictions and limitations.

Jig, sl is having big problem now. everyone is ending up on help island that is able to get in. Can't tp anywhere for last hour, puts you where they want. Be sure and have clothes on, we are all going to PG

For those who believe that a Basic user can set up shop on SL and make money without paying a dime to Linden Labs I refer you to this...

LindeX Fees

While there may be other exchange options I feel that if they were taking a big enough chunk out of LL profits LL would simply make such things illegal (insofar as one can...eg...WoW gold, etc). It appears that enough people use LindeX that LL isn't concerned.

As for me, I downgraded to a Basic account. I have no interest in owning property on the Mainland and if I want more L$ I can simply purchase it without having to rely on a stipend. I buy and sell L$ fairly regularly on LindeX so LL is still receiving money from me.

I also try to do my part by helping new residents when I can...firstly and mainly to make their experience more enjoyable and less overwhelmingly confusing but, from a business viewpoint, I realize a person who comes to SL and enjoys him/herself is more likely to become part of the community and economy.

I understand the concern with the Basic-No Payment Info residents however. I must admit I wince when I see someone begging for money and my helpful advice to 'click the blue L$ button in the upper right of your viewer' is met with "I'm just a kid, my parents would kill me if I used their credit card". *___*

Merry, one does not have to use LindeX to convert L to real cash. If the kid has paypal, there is an out. And as for that... the people that buy L are currency traders or on that level, so LL gets their money either way.

How does that work? If I use LindeX to 'cash out' my L$ I then have the USD sent to my PayPal account... Last I checked PayPal doesn't accept L$ directly. (My worldview would take quite a hit if it did. ) Or are you referring to a non-LindeX method? Or am I just completely missing what you're saying (bear with me...I'm a Seattleite with only one cup of coffee in me).

I think I see what you mean by the other currency traders...basically at some point it all funnels through LindeX.

SL Exchange, Ginko Financial, and a number of other institutions will buy your L and pay you via paypal. Example: I am a Ginko account holder. I put L into my account, and then on their website, I sell them my L. They pay me via paypal. I get my money from them, not LL. But they use my L however they see fit. Maybe they cash out and put it into rl investments. Maybe they loan it to an SL business. But I got my cash, and they got my L.

Maybe Second Life should do what any self-respecting country should do--set immigration limits!!

Limit new free accounts to increase in as bandwith increases allows. First come, first serve. On the other hand, premium accounts could get in immediately

That would be a nice extra for premium accounts.

You are correct, it is entirely possible to own an island sim without being a premium.

My disagreement was with the part of your post that said there would be no tier charges.
If you were to buy an island, there would definitely be tier charges. Even if you were not a premium member.

And having no checking at the door, walking in and being pushed infront of a tram while you're still rezzing and working out where you are by an unverified griefer is a great way to enjoy your first minutes in secondlife too. Very welcoming.

Verified users do that too. So.. not seein' the point here.

I got hit by a car in my first minute in-world.

But, it's a small price to pay for freedom. At least you can't really die in SL.

SIGNEDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

Geez guys, this is getting soooooo old! Premium, verified, unverified, schmerified, enough already! I think it's true, the SL economy is founded on land trading, although gambling probably runs it a close second. That means premium accounts buying mainland, but mainly in the future will be individuals buying private islands. But do you guys think the game would survive simply as a land trading game, with no one doing anything else? Land trading is only of any value as a basis for all the other good stuff that goes on here.

Seems to me (and I'm not very bright) that the real financial distinction is between contributors, freeloaders, and leeches. I'm a freeloader. I've built up a small business that covers my rent and outgoings, so I no longer need to spend my own hard-earned RL cash on the game. That means I contribute nothing directly to LL. I'm no different from anyone else in the same financial position, free, verified or unverified. Perhaps we should be banned.

There are many people who may transact tens or hundreds of thousands of l$ business each month and who, at the end of the month clear a profit, and end up taking real US$ out of the system. These are the leeches. They suck resourses out of SL into their own pockets. Good luck to them. They risk their own money, work hard and turn a profit. Fine. But they contribute NOTHING. Perhaps they should be banned too.

Finally there are the contributors. They put their hands into their pockets and spend RL US$ each month. They buy clothes, pay rent, buy land, pay for hookers, gamble in the casinos and so on. Maybe they buy their own islands. It's these people who actually put money into LL's bank account. They pay for the grid and it's maintenance. They're the ones who have the "right" to feel badly done by when things get rough. And they're more likely to be verified (thats FREE) than premium, and I've no doubt lots of them are unverified too.

So maybe it behoves us freeloaders and leeches to shut up and keep our heads down.

Just a thought

Love Suzi

OH GIVE IT A BREAK!!!!!!!!! This is so full of Sh@T its not funny anymore!!!!!!!!!! The real number are not even close to what your being lie to by the comapny! They don`t buy anything they just cashOUT!!!!!!!!!! Come on this is just stupid this joke!

Usagi, there's no need for such rudeness

Its not rude hun its just the truth..... of what llabs is doing nobody is being flamed.

I agree with Emily.

It's the law of numbers. You see an ocean of free accounts and take a small sample of them and say "this isn't causing the erosion!" and it's just doesn't make sense in how numbers work.

The current numbers I've heard are 10% of 4 million are premium accounts. That's 400,000 paying users. Back in June there were 600,000 accounts and 90% were paying users. That 540,000 accounts More than what is paying now...

You can't tell me the flood of free accounts is making SL a better place, not with those numbers.

I'm not buying 10% of 4 million are premium. Sorry.

10% of the accounts active in the last 60 days... perhaps, but not 10% of every avatar name ever to successfully pass through the registration page.

At some point "unverifieds" may be restricted again... maybe they'll have lotteries or new resident quotas... who knows.

What I'd like to see is TRAFFIC abolished. I have no doubt that much of the lag we feel is from people running several alts in camping chairs to wring a few pennies out of this game. They probably funnel their profit to one verified account and cash that out.

Enough of paying people to idle and waste resources.

Cut off the benefits for paying campers.

It's not a permanent lag solution.. the population will still grow... but at least it's not being squandered on people that aren't even at their keyboards enjoying SL.

In January LL had 57,702 premiums, if they missed 342,298 please do let them know, they'll be delighted .

January also had 1,974,607 active users, back in June that was 234,691 with 19,685 premiums. It's not hard to see that while the numbers are up, the actual percentage of premiums is taking a rapid dive downward from 1 in 12 then and 1 in 34 now.

The economic statistics don't go back prior to unverifieds, but the number of people actively spending money in-world only makes small, little jumps every month: 9 out of 10 don't even spend L$1 in a whole month, and only 25 in 1000 spend more than $20 US equivalent.

LL said 57k members were premium, I believe. (Or actually I think they said they were land owners.)

Anyway, I think that is .014% of 4 million. In other words, slightly over 1 percent, not 10 percent.

coco

P.S. Suzi, you're cute! I like the way you think, lol.

Sorry, I believe what I said. I may be new around here, but I don't think I'm being stupid. What would happen if they eliminated free accounts? Do you think there would be growth? How many existing free accounts that contribute to the game would be really pissed off and quit? Who would be the ones that switched to the premium account so they could buy that nice parcel of land from the land baron?

This game may exist primarily because of land sales, but without the bottom of the food chain (the free accounts), the whole system comes tumbling down eventually.

Want to argue with this because it doesn't make you feel good about being angry with free accounts? Go ahead. Maybe I'm just a naive newbie.

BTW - I am premium.

Paying users means they have credit cards on account and registered. There were no free accounts in june and you have to have a credit card registered.