Second Life is too expensive!

[Thinkerer Melville]

I have another suggestion about cost of land in SL: Time share.  Check the map and you will see a lot of sims with no people.  They could be in use by someone else.  It is quite possible to put builds in a holodeck and rez them when needed.  

Maybe you could combine with someone on the other side of the world.    Each would have it for half a day and they would split the costs.  They could easily have different builds in a holodeck.  You arrive and rez your build.  Here is some info on usiing a holodeck

Save prims and space: rezzers and holodecks -- tutorial 

Art gallery in holodeck-- Tutorial 

TKR

[Drake1 Nightfire]

Bully for you.. Perhaps you don't realize how many people are making less than 25k in the US.  $295 a month is indeed expensive, that is twice my cable/phone/internet bill. about half my families monthly food bill, 1/4 of my rent, a car payment for a month, a mini 4 day vacation at a b&b... There is no way i could justify spending that much on a "hobby" every month.

 

[Sephina Frostbite]

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Amethyst Jetaime wrote:

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SinfulPrince wrote:

How can you enjoy a thing that causes your rl to downgrade?

Just me.

I would cut corners , but my corners would be the imaginary ones.

 

Signed, the guy who dumped his premium account and subsequently even his "owned" land on a private estate.

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SL does not downgrade your RL unless you let it.  YOU are responsible for the amount of time and money you put in it.  If you can't afford it then don't buy things.  If you are spending too much time in SL to the point it is ruining your RL, turn off the computer and do something else.  If you can't control yourself get professional help.

Many people in SL enjoy it as entertainment and CHOOSE to put time and money into it like they would going to a movie or out to a bar to enhance their experience.  For many disabled or isolated people SL might be some of their only entertainment or way to socialize..  It doesn't take much to live well in SL.  What you pay for a movie ticket here in the US will get you a couple thousand lindens.  You may choose to go to the movie or use the money in any way you want instead, but that is YOUR choice - to the only choice for a lot of people.

 

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Couldnt have said it better. I had a huge house and life was good. Rl kicked me in the butt when I was attacked by a dog/wolf so I couldnt make the linden. Back to my freebie linden home I went for a month or so. Now I am back cozy in my huge house again. I also was buy clothing hair etc like crazy. That stopped. Now I am back to having fun getting all those clothes I shoved on my faves list. I dont die if I dont play and I enjoy when I do. Even more so now because I am learning how to build.

[Staralien]

If I had to pay out of my own pocket, I would not be able to afford the tier fees. My rentals and furniture store both in-world and the market pay the fees. It really helps that I also get a few donations from time to time. I don't make much of a profit. The only way I could is if my rentals were at 100% most of the time, and I am lucky if they are at 90% most of the time. I am hoping my furniture store becomes more profitable this year. So far the sales are better than last year, so i am making some progress. I believe I will be able to maintain what I have in SL, but I could not afford any more and it all depends on continued occupancy, which I have no reason not to expect.

If you build some sort of business and work hard at it, it is reasonable to expect it will eventually be able to pay your teir fees. if all you want is some private place that doesn't make any money for you, then you have no choice but to pay out of your RL pocket. You can always consider downsizing the amount of land you hold as well.

[Lucretia Brandenburg]

RL entertainment: 79 USD a year for Amazon Prime where I can get free videos and discounts on ebooks for my kindle fire. Library card to borrow books - free of charge. I have a BA degree, I LOVE my job working for a nonprofit, but where I live, the pay scale for any job, let alone a nonprofit is not exactly high, and jobs are not plentiful, so even if I did want to get another job in my area, it would not be a walk in the park.  Even at twice what I'm making now, spending enough to buy a nice amount of land with a decent amount of prims without sharing the cost as I do now (I share a half sim with 3 other people)  would wreck my monthly budget. I'm a single person without children, but no, 195 to 295 a month for a full ML or island region is NOT chump change.

There are alot of disabled and retired people who are in SL, they are on fixed incomes, they can't afford that either.

[Solar Legion]

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Syo Emerald wrote:

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SinfulPrince wrote:

Actually, its HIS sl. And if he needs that to be a game then it is.

There is no great and mystical book that says it is or isn't this or that for everybody. Just because there's a population that likes to get all high minded about what it is for them, that doesn't write it for the world.

And if a body logs in to PLAY then it is a game.

---

But it is this kind of mindset that leads to people thinking everything should be free, there should be instructions on what to do, quests, gold, dragons....and everything for free and so easy that even a 3 year old can understand it.

All senseless complaining or crying about how stupid/lame this "game" is result in exactly that view on SL. If you are going to put it in a box with "the other games" then sure...it will look awkward if you expect it to be like Sims, WoW, CS and what not....

Thats the reason why the OP is speaking about these many games which are free and such...I'm not aware that there are milions of "games" which are just like SL but cheaper.

It reminds me of how a child developes its understanding of the world through expanding its inner categories. This process is not fast and it leads to cases where (for example) every brown animal on 4 legs gets called a dog by young child untill it builds new categories for new things and situations.

The same seems to happen with the people calling everything a game as long as its not some office program. Sadly, they are stuck in that step and refuse to remodel their categories.

 

Or in simpler words: Is the fish a loser, because he can't climb a tree as you expect him to do?

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If you are goiong to go the route of using your personal definition as the basis .... Second Life isn't a "world" either. It's a glorified chat program with interconected "rooms" and graphical representations of the users and "rooms".

Not all who view Second Life as a game view it the way you describe, Syo. Not all games have quests or a scoring system ... or even a real "end point" or goal. Some are VERY open ended and allow the user/player to continue to "play" however they wish, even after the supposedly "final boss" is dead and gone (assuming there ever was one to begin with or that there were any "bosses" at all)!

Furthermore, you've left out online Role Play. That most certainly IS a game. And like it or not, unless you truly believe that your avatar IS you .... you're playing a role each and every time you log into Second Life.

[Syo Emerald]

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James Samiam wrote:

Is that your solution to everything? Just quit? Sorry but I like SL and I don't want it to go down the **bleep**ter. I've been playing SL since 04, but I'm spending less and less time in-world because of the price to have my own little space. Don't you think that is a valid complaint about the game? How having just a small space in-world costs more than a WoW subscription fee, which is something a lot of people don't find very attractive anymore. Remember it's 2013, it ain't 03-04 anymore. 

 

It's most definitely not reasonable. A plot of land that I own is going to cost me $15 a week regardless if I actually log in or not. And that's a big part of the issue for me. There are times where I am busy in RL and can't play for a week or two yet SL is taking out of my bank account. That isn't reasonable at all.

 

 

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Thats what I do. If I don't like a product any more or can't afford it anymore...I don't buy/use it, because it doesn't bring me the amount of pleasure I like. If my favorite drink changes and doesn't taste as good as it did before, I stop buying it because its not worth its price anymore. Sure, would be sad and a bit of uncomfort to find a new one I enjoy, but in the end I will be more happy than with continuing to buy the old one.

How high the price is, is about you. I rent a tiny little parcel in a beautiful sim and thats all I need and I'm happy. Someone who wants more will have to pay more. Thats life. Sure, someone can come to the point of saying "Hey, tier could be less!" and maybe add some proof on this subject by doing some math on how much a region should cost (and in this case should be left out what the user would like it to cost).

Second Life itself is free. All its content is free as so far as its not in LL hands. So....how else, if not with land, should the company make money? Enough to let the servers run, enough to pay their people, enough to pay their bills and taxes...If all that is part of study about how high the land prices should be....then there would be a good reason to go to LL and say: "Hey guys, look at this. I proofed that reducing tier would help you!" Thats the only thing a company will pay attention to. Lowering tier to make you happy is not a reason.

You talked about fees in general, said its old fashioned in 2013 to require a soild amount of money from users to enter a game (in case of LL not even that!) and said its not fair, since you aren't able to use your land 24h a day.

Lets take a look at the first point: General fees.

More and more MMOs and other games move away from the fixed fees and adapt something that they call free 2 play. Free to play is often more or less a lie. The companies haven't changed, they only expect you to pay more...without noticing it. But how? I'll tell you.... They add shops to their game where you can buy not only fancy stuff (like it is currently in Blizzards shop, where you can get fancy pets and horses), but with stuff that lowers the effort for reaching a goal. Instead of earning everything while playing, you pay with your real money. On the one hand you could say its still optional....but on the other hand if everyone uses that, do you want to be left behind?

Or who guaranties you, that there will still be put effort into the free game content, if all new stuff could also be sold for real money? Also free 2 play divides the players into two groups by making the game less easy, comfortable or enjoyable for those who don't pay. Swtor is a good example for that.

Or lets take a look at the Sims. I have played the game since the first version came out and much has changed since then. Its the classic model of buying a game once and then play till dead. It got many creative people attached to it and there was always much user created content around to download. But with Sims 3, the abilities are limited. Why? Because EA want your money, thats why. They made their own store, where you are supposed to buy new items instead of getting free ones.

Now we come to the point of "I can't use my parcel all the time". Can LL use your parcel while you are at work or sleep? Compare it with everything you rent in RL. You always pay the same money for a car or house no matter if you are on a 3 week holiday trip or don't want to drive around between 2am and 6am. Its basically the same with land and it has the same reason as why you pay always the same for your house.

[Syo Emerald]

I'm a passionate roleplay...but not in SL and saying its RP just because I log in with an avatar would be kind of disrespectfull to real roleplay where a lot effort is put in. I'm not a total different person while I'm in SL. I still like to talk about the same things and still dislike the same stuff as I would in RL.

And on the game-part: Its the majority of games that have a goal or at least a brief structure that indicates what to do and its always more obviously how things are supposed to get done. And I saw it in the past countless times who people who came with a game-like setting in mind got frustrated, bored or had a great talent on annoying others with their behavior.

 

[Lucretia Brandenburg]

Well put, Drake. The middle class in the US is shrinking, half of the households in the US live on les than 50,000 USD a year income. For someone to blithely state that 200 to 300 USD a month is next to nothing to spend on entertainment indicates a lack of awareness of just how much the "average" American household has to spend.

[Lucretia Brandenburg]

Looking at the pictures of your world you created, which really is lovely btw, 15 USD a week seems like an awful lot to maintain that. is it the space it takes up? Do you need a huge parcel of land for it? Is it the prims? With nice low prim sculpted trees, regular prims set to convex hull, and the newer low lag temp rezzers, it seems like it wouldn't be that many prims. if its the square meters that are required, have you considered a dome or panorama that gives the illusion of greater space?

Panoramica makes great domes, and Panorama RealView makes great skybox surrounds that do give the illusion of a lot more space when landscaped well to hide the edges and lighting artfully placed.

  I know that might not be ideal but it can actually be a fun sort of challege to say ok, this is the space, these are the prims, my budget is 3 to 5 USD a week, how do I turn all that into what I want?

[Solar Legion]

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Syo Emerald wrote:

I'm a passionate roleplay...but not in SL and saying its RP just because I log in with an avatar would be kind of disrespectfull to real roleplay where a lot effort is put in. I'm not a total different person while I'm in SL. I still like to talk about the same things and still dislike the same stuff as I would in RL.

And on the game-part: Its the majority of games that have a goal or at least a brief structure that indicates what to do and its always more obviously how things are supposed to get done. And I saw it in the past countless times who people who came with a game-like setting in mind got frustrated, bored or had a great talent on annoying others with their behavior.

 

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My entire point Syo is that it is utterly absurd for people to go off on anyone who even hints at calling Second Life a "game" - everyone and their mother defines it in different ways and to assume that your own definition is the only correct one ... Well, like I said: It's utterly absurd.

Second Life is what it is to each person that uses it - the only thing we can say with absolute certainty is this: It is a computer program, with a large, world wide user base.

That's it. No two people truly have the exact same definition concerning Second Life.

[Sephina Frostbite]

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Ciaran Laval wrote:

A  private island, costs USD$295 a month and then some users have to pay tax on top of that, yes it is expensive especially for people who want to create environments for people to do something, rather than places that sell wares.

That's a monthly fee, you can get a car for less than that. It is what it is, but Second Life is most certainly an expensive pastime.

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I agree which is why I rent and use sandboxes. Well said Ciaran

[Sephina Frostbite]

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Guilliaume wrote:

I disagree. Second Life is not expensive. It merely puts forth the illusion of being expensive in our minds because each Linden, Euro, Dollar or whatever we spend on it has an impact on our real world lives. When you compare the price of Second Life to any other hobby or game out there fairly, I am sure that Second Life’s rates are more than fair and even profitable in some situations. One must only acquire the heart to put in some labor hours, really, or at least have the maturity to understand the impact versus other things in life that require money.

 

But seriously, have you even taken the time to explore Second Life’s rates? Or have you just been blinded by the fact that it takes money period? Even the most expensive tier of land ownership in Second Life requires $195 a month. That is $6.50 a day. I personally spend more than that during my lunch break at work… In Lindens it is about $1625L. The third highest tier, $75 a month, is a joke really. $2.50 a day is only $625L.

 

But those two land tiers are more than enough to turn your land into a profitable business model. Even if you cannot make a profit, you would at least make some money, if your idea was at least okay, to get a huge discount.

 

Let me paint a picture for you. Right now I have a friend in Second Life that pays for the $75 tier of land. In total for Second Life, including her tier, she pays about $100 or so in fees. However, she uses her land to also generate Lindens and makes about $60 or so. That means her hobby is only costing her $1.30 a day. I’d waste more money than that simply driving downtown to a bar just for the atmosphere once a week.

 

Second Life is nowhere near expensive and there are plenty of options out there to help you pay for it. Aside from options in game already such as Bletaverse or retail, might I also suggest taking a look at Amazon’s Mechanical Turk or creating a website/blog and using Google Ads? Both are more than enough to cover costs with a little time and effort.

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Glad you can afford to spend 300 plus dollars on a hobby however most people simply can't. SL is in fact expensive for some and not for others but to be so blatantly rude about it.. Wow. Reality check, not everyone makes good money. 

[Marigold Devin]

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James Samiam wrote:

So a few years ago I created my own environment or "World" within SL called Griffins Paradise. And I've returned it to the grid several times over the years, but never for long. The problem is the prices. It's so darn expensive just to have my own little creative space on the grid.

This isn't very attractive anymore, not like it used to be. Especially when there are literally dozens of other games these days that allow creative freedom, and usually for much cheaper and on a huge scale.

http://i.imgur.com/fGqCQ.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/U9PRO.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/doiVX.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/JYvjM.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/INVn1.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/7pJmr.jpg

It might not look like much but Griffins Paradise holds a special place in my heart. It just frustrates me to no end that I can not experience it when I want to, and when I do I can't afford it for long.

---

It frustrates me that I am unable to play the piano well in real life, in spite of having lessons when I was a child, and it frustrates me that I am really clumsy and totally inept at carrying out the most simple of DIY tasks in my RL home, and that it costs a lot of money to employ people to do these little jobs for me. And I fully understand your frustration about your leisure and pleasure being too expensive to fully enjoy, but such is life for most people. Most people are frustrated and disappointed about at least one aspect of their lives.

Regarding Second Life though, and your urge to be creative, without having to fork out for a whole sim or a large parcel of land, maybe there is a compromise.  I know of hundreds of very creative people in Second Life who have had to downsize their land, but get their creative jollies from exploring more, and setting up photo shoots either in sandboxes with a bit of photoshop jiggery pokery afterwards.  They focus on the positive aspects rather than the negatives and seem to derive as much personal satisfaction from their end product too, and some have said to me that it's rather nice not to be worrying about what's going on with their land while they're out in real life.

Try to cut your cloth according to your pocket, you can still create paradise within small spaces (thinking particularly of that place that people flock to over in Shinda off the top of my head - can't remember the name of it right now).

And remember that frustration is all part of being a human being.

[Sephina Frostbite]

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Marigold Devin wrote:

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James Samiam wrote:

So a few years ago I created my own environment or "World" within SL called Griffins Paradise. And I've returned it to the grid several times over the years, but never for long. The problem is the prices. It's so darn expensive just to have my own little creative space on the grid.

This isn't very attractive anymore, not like it used to be. Especially when there are literally dozens of other games these days that allow creative freedom, and usually for much cheaper and on a huge scale.

http://i.imgur.com/fGqCQ.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/U9PRO.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/doiVX.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/JYvjM.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/INVn1.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/7pJmr.jpg

It might not look like much but Griffins Paradise holds a special place in my heart. It just frustrates me to no end that I can not experience it when I want to, and when I do I can't afford it for long.

---

It frustrates me that I am unable to play the piano well in real life, in spite of having lessons when I was a child, and it frustrates me that I am really clumsy and totally inept at carrying out the most simple of DIY tasks in my RL home, and that it costs a lot of money to employ people to do these little jobs for me. And I fully understand your frustration about your leisure and pleasure being too expensive to fully enjoy, but such is life for most people. Most people are frustrated and disappointed about at least one aspect of their lives.

Regarding Second Life though, and your urge to be creative, without having to fork out for a whole sim or a large parcel of land, maybe there is a compromise.  I know of hundreds of very creative people in Second Life who have had to downsize their land, but get their creative jollies from exploring more, and setting up photo shoots either in sandboxes with a bit of photoshop jiggery pokery afterwards.  They focus on the positive aspects rather than the negatives and seem to derive as much personal satisfaction from their end product too, and some have said to me that it's rather nice not to be worrying about what's going on with their land while they're out in real life.

Try to cut your cloth according to your pocket, you can still create paradise within small spaces (thinking particularly of that place that people flock to over in Shinda off the top of my head - can't remember the name of it right now).

And remember that frustration is all part of being a human being.

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Couldnt have said it better!!

[Coby Foden]

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Guilliaume wrote:

... even $295 a month is not expensive. My free spending money for the month is somehwere around $400 and my combined household income is almost $50,000, which is like the lowest tier of middle class for the U.S.A.

 Maybe Second Life is expensive for people who do not have the money, but in the grand scheme of things, the fees are really chump change according to average household incomes.

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:smileyhappy:  $$$$$

:smileysad:  Sigh... ¢¢

 

[Tenyari Inkpen]

Yep:

...

/sigh

 

[Tenyari Inkpen]

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Guilliaume wrote:

You do not make very much money, do you, or perhaps you are bad at managing money? I am only saying this because, no, even $295 a month is not expensive. My free spending money for the month is somehwere around $400 and my combined household income is almost $50,000, which is like the lowest tier of middle class for the U.S.A.

---

Romney's middle class is most people's 2%...

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/03/21/1195808/-Republicans-have-no-clue-how-people-manage-their-budgets-Part-II

U.S. household consumer debt profile:

    Average credit card debt: $15,266

    Average mortgage debt: $149,667

    Average student loan debt: $32,559

    (Source)

vs Income:

    $44,389

 

Maybe you have $400/month lying around to spend on anything, but that basically puts you in the 'fat cat wealthy' category for us peasants down here in the majority.

 

[Czari Zenovka]

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Ciaran Laval wrote:

 

The tier in Second Life is too damn high, but there's no easy solution there. LL aren't going to dramatically reduce their main source of income by slashing tier and gambling on that generating a rush in land purchases.

 

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Agreed, although I personally believe that if tier was lowered that is exactly what would happen (more land sold), but I also understand LL not trusting that to happen.

[Czari Zenovka]

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Guilliaume wrote:

You do not make very much money, do you, or perhaps you are bad at managing money? I am only saying this because, no, even $295 a month is not expensive. My free spending money for the month is somehwere around $400 and my combined household income is almost $50,000, which is like the lowest tier of middle class for the U.S.A.

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You do realize that we are currently in a financial recession where people who had good jobs have been laid off, are having difficulty finding another job, and this current situation does not look to be getting better any time soon.  You think $50,000 is "the lowest tier of middle class for the U.S.A." - where I'm sitting, that's a fortune.

Although your first sentence was not directed at me, I find it very insulting. 

[Czari Zenovka]

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Porky Gorky wrote:

 

At the moment LL are doing everything they can to ignore the problems crippling inworld commerce and are instead focusing their developmental efforts on the MP, a tactic that I suspect is already biting them in the arse or more specifically their bottom line.

---

I personally think LL are focusing their developmental efforts on their new games.

[161488303349]

marketplace is the right strategy for LL in the longterm

sales of digital and virtual goods are ever increasing realworld wise. all kinds of stuff now being sold in online virtual stores. the big ones at the moment are music video games and apps. is a flood of pennies but is a monster flood. is getting bigger and bigger every day. as the mechanics and costs/prices of delivering it are evolving 

these all content. not spaces. at some point LL will allow creators to mark their marketplace products for sale to other worlds/spaces. mesh (collada) is the key to this. is a open standard and importable into pretty much any game/world/space

the biggest threat to LL isn't another inworld made by some one else. the biggest threat is people making content in SL leaving to create stuff for a 3rd party marketplace which don't sell back into SL and into otherworlds similar to SL 

[Penny Patton]

Are there two threads with this topic? Ah well, this seems to be the more popular version of this thread so I'll copy over my post from the other one.

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While it can certainly be argued that Linden Lab charges too much for tier, another thing to consider is that nearly everyone in SL builds to excessive scale. Most avatars are 7' tall or  larger (it's not uncommon to see human male avatars nearly 9' tall).

Due to SL's poorly thought out camera placement (click here for better camera settings) environments are scaled up even further. Most evironments are somewhere around double scale or larger.

Why is this an issue? Well, larger content eats up both more space and more LI cost (prims), For example, someone who builds to exactly double scale needs more than twice as much LI and four times as much land area as someone who builds the exact same structure to realistic scale.

 In effect, nearly everyone in SL is voluntarily paying for four times as much land as they need for what's on it.

If you're skeptical of how well that works in practice, there's a few sims that really show it off.

1920's Berlin - A historical, role-play recreation of Berlin in the 1920's. The city itself fits inside a single sim. Requires visitors to have realistically sized avatars in era appropriate outfits. Provides both at entrance.

Doomed Ship - A sci-fi horror sims. Not even the entire sim is devoted to the public areas, but you can still wander for hours here and not see it all.

Milk & Cream - A fantasy themed adult area, Has two main areas, both fit snugly into the same 1/4th of a sim.

[Ciaran Laval]

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Guilliaume wrote:

You do not make very much money, do you, or perhaps you are bad at managing money? I am only saying this because, no, even $295 a month is not expensive. My free spending money for the month is somehwere around $400 and my combined household income is almost $50,000, which is like the lowest tier of middle class for the U.S.A.

---

Considering you were blissfully unaware how much a private island costs and now you're suggesting that using 75% of your disposable income on Second Life makes it cheap, I'll take your response with a very large pinch of salt.

[Lucretia Brandenburg]

That's a good point Penny Unfortunately, I don't think anyone is going to jump on that bandwagon until they toss away their old too big content and I don't think many want to. I remember my first house in SL, the kitchen sink was big enough for me to bathe in, and I looked like a toddler on the staircase, and back then my avatar was 5'7". I think part of that is because people want to live "bigger" in SL than in RL, bigger houses, more land, etc.

My current shape is usually 5'5". I say usually because I change my appearance several times a week. and I have to say, it is very difficult to get realistic, attractive proportions on a "short" avatar. I mod my shape all the time and I'm pretty good at it, but to go that short, it took me nearly two hours of tweaking sliders. Heads are too large, hips are too wide, legs too chubby. The experience did make me wonder though, whether the plethora of distorted short female avatars with too big heads, too narrow necks, skinny thighs that don't meet, giant butts and hips so wide they look like they've been run over with a steam roller is an aesthetic born of impatience modding an in proportion, RL height shape :matte-motes-wink: RL sized avatars, even when not grossly distorted that way tend to have heads that are too big and shoulders that are too narrow. And really, unless everyone were to get with that program, most "normal" height people would be taken for child avatars and that opens a whole other can of worms. Your world, Your imagination ... just make sure your imagination includes being a 7 foot tall in bare feet woman or an 8 foot tall man or risk looking out of place and silly in a crowd.