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Second Life in 2014


Porky Gorky
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Porky Gorky wrote:

 

I spent time analysing the data for 2012 and changed my mind to some degree. I don't think SL will remain sustainable through to 2014.

on the present course then i think is more accurate to say that the profits that linden currenlty enjoy are unsustainable

the first question i think is will linden change course in terms of their financial structuring or just let it run down

on the technical side they still on their upward trajectory. making fixes and innovating like always. navmesh and riigged to come with some client side enhancements re physics. server side stuff like avatar baking also. the baking thing quite important i think in the area of asset theft mitigation. in time i think server baking will apply to all assets. is the logical roadmap for that

the second and zillion dollar question i think is do linden have enough time left now to finish the technicals they need to do to keep maintaining customer interest if they stay on their present financials course

 

 

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To say that SL will cease to exist by 2014 is only giving LL one year to throw everything they have in their corporate bag of tricks at it.  Who knows what'll happen by maybe 2018, but I see the recent developments as a sign that they'll certainly be around in 2014. Why else would they have spent resources on the changes to mesh, pathfinding, going on steam, now the new method of avatar baking... Businesses don't operate without a plan. Whether that plan is a success or not is a seperate issue altogether. If 2013 sees significant losses, the amount of money that sl makes for ll will probably lead at most to a significant change to the business model. There is no threat of SL "shutting it's doors" until we stop seeing any updates altogether.

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solstyse wrote:

To say that SL will cease to exist by 2014 is only giving LL one year to throw everything they have in their corporate bag of tricks at it.  Who knows what'll happen by maybe 2018, but I see the recent developments as a sign that they'll certainly be around in 2014. Why else would they have spent resources on the changes to mesh, pathfinding, going on steam, now the new method of avatar baking... Businesses don't operate without a plan. Whether that plan is a success or not is a seperate issue altogether. If 2013 sees significant losses, the amount of money that sl makes for ll will probably lead at most to a significant change to the business model. There is no threat of SL "shutting it's doors" until we stop seeing any updates altogether.

Pretty much what Porky said to me a month ago.  Amazing what a difference a month can make. ;)

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I don't see SL going anywhere but forwards. The number of new account sign ups daily are the real life's blood of SL. There are new sims being deployed every week, one look at the land section shows an active "real estate" economy. The measure of any economy. SL is equivalent to a city in terms of scale and I don't see LL pulling the plug on something that is viable and probably pays the bills at LL.

There was a lively debate on the gor forums recently about moving citys and continents lock & stock to virtual highways. This was met with considerable resistance, one of the main factors being a lack of traffic and non transferable inventory contents.

Then there is the perceived usage of SL. In the early 2000s I remember reading an article about how virtual worlds will be used. The authour of the article got it wrong, he was convinced that virtual worlds would be used mainly for RL shopping, kinda like a 3D amazon or ebay. That never quite got off the ground however as we all know RL events do happen in SL. All you need to do is look at the baby post. As long as we sit increasingly cut off from one another in RL, then jumping inworld for whatever reason will become a reasonable alternative to other modes of interaction.

The format and interface may change, I see in the future a time when available bandwidth allows true 3D content along the lines of 'avatar'. For my money that's the next big thing that will come to SL. Its up to LL to embrace the future however. A close second is catering for other senses in the interface, touch and smell come to mind, particularly touch. Further forwards is some sort of direct interface with the mind however that's probably far down the road.

In conclusion SL will move forwards as the tech gets better, I simply don't see LL binning a cash cow as profitable as SL probably is.

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Porky Gorky wrote:

 

I spent time analysing the data for 2012 and changed my mind to some degree. I don't think SL will remain sustainable through to 2014.

I tend to disagree here. Predictions like that are prone to miss the target. We have a commission here in Germany,

that predicts yearly, how the economy progresses in the next year. They miss the target regularly by a wide margin.

And these guys have master degrees and doctor titles in economy.

In other words: Only a short prediction would be possible, e.g. when there are clear signs visible, that something goes

seriously pear shaped. From the data Tyche has collected, I don't see those signs. In fact, the numbers look quite good,

seeing how the economy has developed in some countries, notably Greece, Spain and Portugal.

I expect SL following the RL economy to a certain degree and unless LL makes big mistakes, SL is here to stay.

 

However, there is room for improvement, especially in regards of customer service and handling of ARs,

hardcore griefers and copybotters. See for example the relevant entries in Prokofy Neva's blog.

 

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Porky Gorky wrote:

Well technically 
Tyche Shepherd did the checking over at the grid survey site. I just read the data and formed an opinion. So in the event that it all goes belly up I  can just blame Tyche and slip away unnoticed like 
Keyser Söze.

Ok then. It'll mainly be Tyche's fault and not yours. But you must bear some responsibilty for spreading it around ;)

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Czari Zenovka wrote:

Pretty much what Porky said to me a month ago.  Amazing what a difference a month can make.
;)

You must be easily amazed then :matte-motes-big-grin:

You seem to be having trouble accepting my change in opinion so let me explain what has driven it.

In the last month I have learned that SL lost about 10% of it's total privately owned regions in 2012. The rate at which the number of privately owned regions have been lost increased in Q2 and further still in Q3/4. If the rate of loss continues to increase as it has done in 2012 then it's likely that by the end of 2013 another 15 to 20% of the total number of private regions will be gone, that is on top of the 10% gone this year. 

Also in the last month I have learned that during 2012 the number of concurrent users fell at the fastest rate in SL history and that the number of new sign up's is also declining at a faster rate than ever before. 

So taking all this on board in addition to other opinions I expressed earlier in the thread about the % of resources that LL seem to have taken away from supporting SL, I have to ask myself, how much longer will the investors go on risking their money in a failing platform? LL are trying to generate new streams of revenue but based on the products that have been released so far I fear it is too little too late.

Others in this thread have pointed out how LL are still developing Second Life and adding new features so they must still be invested in making SL work. I don''t think the ongoing development of the platform offers any insight as to when SL will close. In my experience a company keeps on going and developing and operating as usual right up until the axe falls. 

Based on the fact that LL's revenue must be falling year on year at an increased rate, the investors are only going to tolerate this for so long before they pull out. Even if the company is still profitable then this can happen if investors loose faith in the company's ability to increase profits down the road. The fact that we have seen such a increased rate of decline in 2012 in all the areas I have previously mentioned must be very worrisome for the investors.

So getting back to your issue with me Czari. If I had known then what I know now then I would not have criticised you in the post you made last month, as referenced by you earlier in this thread. At that point I didn't appreciate the rate of the decline and felt your comments generally about CTL were defeatist and would have an unnecessarily negative impact on the people who read them. I now think you were right and I was wrong.

 

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I keep seeing investors mentioned in all sorts of threads. Does anyone know what 'investors' arrangements or details that LL have? To be honest, I think the idea of investors doesn't belong here at all.

Suppose LL got some investment capital early on. What happens then? Do the investors leave their money in and just take a cut of the profits? Or do they get paid off over time with a substantial profit? I don't know. Maybe investment capitalists make various types of arrangements. I know from a UK TV programme (Dragons' Den) that the investors get to own a percentage of the business, but it's not a loan. It's a partnership, and what happens to the business happens to all the partners. I think that another way of investing is as a high interest loan.

So what kind of investors does LL have - if any? Do you know? And, if you don't know, why inject the argument that investors won't accept some things, with the implication that they'll pull their money out, or stop "risking their money"? The latter sounds like LL can only continue in business because investors keep on investing, and I don't believe that at all. Not after all these years.

So, all in all, I don't think that 'investors' have anything to do with this discussion.

 

You stated some decline percentages - lost private sims and decreasing usership. But remember that SL was going very well when it had a lot fewer private sims and active users than it has right now, and I don't believe for a second that it kept going back then because of continued money injections.

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Porky Gorky wrote:

In the last month I have learned that SL lost about 10% of it's total privately owned regions in 2012.

It's a pity to see very beautiful regions dissappearing from the grid.  Like Costa Rica.  It had multiple regions.  Beautiful islands all over with nice houses and landscaping.  I visited there many times.  Now all of them are gone.  What I found very odd was that even though the regions were very lovely there were always very few people present there.

I wonder when the Eden regions will be gone and from south there the North Sea regions and still further south the Fruit Island regions.  All those are great looking island regions, good for sailing.  The problem I see with them again is that there always are very few people present.  Only time when some region has more people is when there is some concert going on.  When the concert is over everybody vanish and all the regions are again hauntily empty.  :smileysad:

 

 

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Porky Gorky wrote:


Czari Zenovka wrote:

Pretty much what Porky said to me a month ago.  Amazing what a difference a month can make.
;)

So getting back to your issue with me Czari. If I had known then what I know now then I would not have criticised you in the post you made last month, as referenced by you earlier in this thread. At that point I didn't appreciate the rate of the decline and felt your comments generally about CTL were defeatist and would have an unnecessarily negative impact on the people who read them. I now think you were right and I was wrong.

 

I appreciate that, Porky. 

For the record, my opinion - and it is *just* my opinion is that SL will be here in 2014 unless Rod pulls a Sims Online move.  That is and was my only concern in this regard.

 

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It's actually surprising how large sl has become. Thousands of sims, at a cost to the sim owners of $300 per month. Millions of items on the marketplace. All for something that started out as "just a 3d chat." It has grown to be much more, and I don't think even LL could have predicted it would have become as profitable as it is.

A business shrinking is never good, but in the case of SL, it seems like the whole time it was inevitable.Just about every rl market is shrinking too. And with the economic uncertainty that exists now, of course regions that were sparsely populated are disappearing.

To say that as early as 2014 SL will stop existing doesn't give sl real estate a chance to stabilize. I do see a smaller grid possible by 2014, easily. But as long as SL remains profitable, it'll still exist.

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I can see a somewhat smaller SL staying in business for quite a time.
I also can see a rise in demand for mainland, as some businesses still see a
presence on the grid as a worthwhile enterprise, but cannot justify the
expenses of a private estate.
A growth is also possible, if the economy picks up pace again.

I'd say, it is waaay too early to write off SL as dead.
SL is alive and well, just on a slightly smaller scale.
I even see that around my parcel, the three empty lots around
mine are all rented out. Nearly in one go.

 

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Porky Gorky wrote:


 

Based on the fact that LL's revenue must be falling year on year at an increased rate, the investors are only going to tolerate this for so long before they pull out. Even if the company is still profitable then this can happen if investors loose faith in the company's ability to increase profits down the road. The fact that we have seen such a increased rate of decline in 2012 in all the areas I have previously mentioned must be very worrisome for the investors.

 

 

 

Sorry no facts here... merely speculation. :matte-motes-tongue:

I fail to understand how you can make financial valuations without any knowledge of a company’s physical assets, overhead ECT.   You are looking at the virtual statistics and trying to draw real world conclusions,  it’s just not that simple.  I might put some stock in your theories for “the demise of SL in 1214” if you had produced some actual data showing that LL was hemorrhaging capital but so far you haven't.  Just another gloomy Gus...  See ya in 1215 :matte-motes-tongue:

 

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Mimi1 Nikitin wrote:


Porky Gorky wrote:


 

Based on the fact that LL's revenue must be falling year on year at an increased rate, the investors are only going to tolerate this for so long before they pull out. Even if the company is still profitable then this can happen if investors loose faith in the company's ability to increase profits down the road. The fact that we have seen such a increased rate of decline in 2012 in all the areas I have previously mentioned must be very worrisome for the investors.

 

 

 

Sorry no facts here... merely speculation. :matte-motes-tongue:

I fail to understand how you can make financial valuations without any knowledge of a company’s physical assets, overhead ECT.   You are looking at the virtual statistics and trying to draw real world conclusions,  it’s just not that simple.  I might put some stock in your theories for “the demise of SL in 1214” if you had produced some actual data showing that LL was hemorrhaging capital but so far you haven't.  Just another gloomy Gus...  See ya in 1215 :matte-motes-tongue:

 

You are right in that I do not know what LL's overheads consist of, my opinion is based on the company's revenue decrease based on the metrics available which you are free to research on Grid Survey or other metric sites. The statistics are not virtual they are real. When a private region is abandoned it costs LL real US dollars in revenue. When over 10% of all the private regions are abandoned over the course of a year as was the case in 2012 it cost LL close to 10 million USD in lost revenue. When the data shows that the rate at which private regions are being abandoned is increasing, then I assume that trend will continue into 2013. So if SL looses a further 15% of all private regions this year, which based on the current trend, is an underestimation, then in a 2 year period between 2012 and 2014  LL would have lost revenue from close to quarter of all privately owned regions. That's a loss of revenue of well over $20000000  USD over a 2 year period

So based on the data that is available, the writing is on the wall for SL. If you choose not to believe that then that's fine. But don't assume that I am merely speculating without a basis in fact or just being a doomsayer for the sake of it. SL is in allot of trouble and the numbers for 2012 prove it. If you and others choose to ignore that fact then that is your prerogative.

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Madeliefste Oh wrote:

Which open sim grids have shown increased growth in 2012? Figures please...

To be honest I don't care about OS so you will have to Google it yourself to get exact figures for which grids are growing. As an overall summary though hypergridbusiness.com reported in 2012 that OS as a whole is showing growth in users whilst SL is showing decline

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Doesn't surprise me. But - We have to keep in mind, that most of these Grids are cheap as chips, especially compared to SecondLife.
However, what about Support, when things go seriously pear-shaped? A point important especially for commercial estate owners.
As I mentioned in another thread before, judging from the statistics provided by Gridsurvey,
SL seems to follow the RL-economy relative closely, so the development we see currently doesn't surprise me at all.
Just as a reminder, the real estate bubble in the US and especially in Spain exploded with nuclear force,
in Greece, the s**t really hit the fan financialwise, Italy and Portugal don't look that good as well.

The only thing I'm a bit worried is the retaining rate of new users. Seeing recent threads about the new user experience,
I have the impression, that Linden Lab is trundling through the landscape like AnnMarie Otooles automated abominations.
All over the place with no real sense of direction.

 

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Eileen Fellstein wrote:

I would really hope at some point soon a new SL would be created using info gleaned from all the things that have gone wrong in this one to avoid the same pitfalls.

I think we have more hope of Cloud Party pulling this off than LL. 

Although I will admit, that deep deep down a small part of me believes that LL are developing SL v 2 and have been doing  so since Rod Humble came in 2 years ago. This is purely based on a few off handed comments Rod has made on Twitter.

 

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