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" I'm impressed with how willing Ebbe is to communicate with us here.  I much prefer him answering questions in the forums than just making a blog post."

I´d be impressed by posting some kind of informative plan covering the obvious and to be expected customer comcerns and questions. Not by causing a business harming stampede which is about to stall any kind Sl business and I am certainly not impressed by the repetitive mentioning of words like  "better", "greater" and "fantastic". I´ve heard these from the Lab since 2005.

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Yes, but there is a disclaimer in the text "The foregoing assignment and license in this paragraph shall not include User Content (defined below)." 

and then comes the definition of user content. It might that in the context of the MMO this is ok depending on how User content can be loaded and handled in the game.

SecondLife is not a MMO, and most of the user creations are these days created outside the SecondLife runtime (textures, mesh, sound, animations, sculpt maps, terrain files (raw) and possibly others.) When it comes to the raw prims and creations built on them inside of SecondLife it might be contested, but then again the creation can originate even as prims from opensim or other simmilar systems and is only stored and rendered by the SecondLife runtime (kindoff like a book in PDF format you display or music you play but don't have the IP rights to.) 

 

Further, it is most likely a one way declaration that would be void if it does not satisfy the minimum requrements of the law. 

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Ebbe Linden wrote:

You are jumping to all kinds of assumptions here. 
If you listen to the chat I had with the TPV crew you won't hear me say what you're suggesting I say or what you suggest it means. 

Iv'e link to it in several threads, it really should be a required viewing.

I all so have an idea on how to get rid of the fear of the SL closing, make an announcement  that the last person to log in to SL gets a free sim in SL2

 

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Ebbe Linden wrote:

I pretty much only said these things:

We are embarking on a huge project to build a better virtual world from the ground up.

We are not going to constrain how good it can be by forcing some levels of backwards compatability (Sine then I've added some detail that identity and social connections and Lindens$ will come across and quite a bit of content as well, but with content we need more time to figure out exactly what will be backwards compatible, people will have plenty of time to see how this plays out and get a chance to try the new while still also hanging out in SL)

We will continue to invest in SL and keep improving and have no plans for any shutdown. 

The rest is all speculation that has since then popped up. 

Thank you very much for re-stating that.    I'm struck -- maybe I shouldn't be -- by the vast, and frequently baroque, structures of speculation that people have built, both here and at SLU, on so small a foundation.

 

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OK .. there's also another option..

Till now i was thinking in terms of SL2 being a continuation to SL1 and under those circumstances I was (and still am) very worried about the present and the future of SL1 and about the lost of all the values we accumulated here over years ( see my post here : http://community.secondlife.com/t5/General-Discussion-Forum/Linden-Lab-is-building-a-NEW-virtual-world/m-p/2756644#M185270 )

But there is also another way to look at it : a complete CUT OUT betwen SL1 and SL2 !

If it's really so difficult to make SL2 backwards compatible to SL1 , if SL2 will really be so completelly different, so mind blowing and so shiny , then maybe it shouldn't even be related to SL1 at all !

Give it another name , make other rules , other prices , make it main stream, dont even think of porting SL content to it, make it just ANOTHER THING .. which by chance is run by the same company that runs SL.. but no other connection visible.

Make it something like IMVU or High Fidelity, make it better, make it something ELSE.. and let it compete with THOSE new worlds on THAT level. BUT DONT MAKE IT COMPETE WITH ITSELF!

AND .. in the same time KEEP the old "niche" SL1 AS IS and improve its "nichesness" by enhancing what made it successful, by bringing back what was lost due to wrong, forced and/or desperate decissions and by fixing what made users leave SL in the past !

- IF for instance the new wold will be really "family friendly" and not very much adult ok then .. send all the teenies THERE and enhance the ADULT character of SL1 with NO UNDERAGE USERS around. And forget about "PG regions" ..

If young people really think this is a world for "old perverted people" (as it appears from some postings in this thread and as i can also confirm when i see my son logging into SL only like once in a month just to say hi while running for the rest of his free time through the endless WoW forests ) then OK, SO BE IT! If this is really a world for "old perverted people", then let's just accept it and let's .. MAKE IT SO ! I know we can do that. If we are allowed .. :)

And generally SL1 should offer everything that SL2 doesnt!

At this time we dont know what SL2 will have to offer but.. we can guess a little ..

- IF the new world will cost more money out of pocket (as it appears) then restructure SL1 in such a way that it costs LESS ..

- IF the new world will be content creators oriented, make the old one more USERS friendly..

- IF the new world will require high end computers to run and to "shine", reconfigure the old one so that it works on any 10 years old laptop..

- Teach the new users in the welcome area how to use scripted objects , how to edit , how to build.. and not how to run cars over rats..

- Give the new users a few good free skins upon signup , without underwear on same layers so that they dont have to ask allover "how can I undress", give the male newbies a few good free cocks to chose from and to not have to wear that terrible freebie **bleep** allover, and tell all the newbies in the welcome area that in SL they must sit on balls or something else in order to be animated so that they stop sitting on tipjars ..

- Bring back the "money trees" and the "camping" which were for all the newbies years ago a serious reason to STAY IN SL! But bring them back ONLY in SL1. I know the arguments against camping but .. these are difficult times, SL fights for survival.. anything goes! And mostly.. anything goes that doesnt go in SL2 !

- We should also not forget that SL1 is more or less compatible with the OS Grid, which probably SL2 won't be. This is a huge advantage IF the problms related to teleporting betwen different grids could be solved. Then we could have a HUGE community in which SL would rule and a lot of new posibilities. Mostly if we also keep an eye on what High Fidelity plans to do with those sims hosted on the user's computer !

Shortly, what i mean to say is , if a smooth and COMPLETE transition from SL1 to SL2 including all inventory, identity, friends, groups, etc is neither possible nor is it wanted, then this move might end in a chaos. A maybe better option, that should be considered, would be to make these 2 words really and clearly SEPARATED.

In other words: If you cant join them.. separate them  :)

The present compromise "presented" (if i can say so) by Ebbe, according to which.. well.. some things will be moved there , some others won't.. but we don't know what and when and .. why .. and in the end SL dies .. is NOT a solution! It kills SL1 while not being sure if the birth of SL2 will succeed..

Let's not just break the cat in 2 coz that will pain.. Let's just make 1 cat and 1 dog and let them both live as they wish, and as they can. But LET THEM BOTH LIVE !!!

And each of us can chose to pet the cat or the dog or.. both.

But .. would you really want to pet a "docatog" ?  And .. could you ?  :)

 

Mony Lindman



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Innula Zenovka wrote:


Ebbe Linden wrote:

I pretty much only said these things:

We are embarking on a huge project to build a better virtual world from the ground up.

We are not going to constrain how good it can be by forcing some levels of backwards compatability (Sine then I've added some detail that identity and social connections and Lindens$ will come across and quite a bit of content as well, but with content we need more time to figure out exactly what will be backwards compatible, people will have plenty of time to see how this plays out and get a chance to try the new while still also hanging out in SL)

We will continue to invest in SL and keep improving and have no plans for any shutdown. 

The rest is all speculation that has since then popped up. 

Thank you very much for re-stating that.    I'm struck -- maybe I shouldn't be -- by the vast, and frequently baroque, structures of speculation that people have built, both here and at SLU, on so small a foundation.

 

And yet nobody has said that the sky is falling :)

 

(unless I missed it)

 

ETA: It takes very little to have plenty of people here either jumping ship, threatening to jump ship, claiming the people will leave in droves, stating quite categorically that LL has shot themswelves in the foot, done something that will cause SL to fail, kill their profits, etc. etc. It's always like that here. We are a drama-loving people :)

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If you typically hold hundreds of US dollars (or equivalent in Lindens) I see little point unless you are planning on purchasing land (most likely not NOW LOL). I take money out weekly, (previously monthly but making more now) just as a matter of good business.

 

I can't see that there was ever any advantage in holding a bunch of Lindens if you weren't planning on spending them.

 

If you are talking $10 US then really, you can easily lose more than that in shipping if you return something you bought on line. Hardly worth the effor worrying about it.  :D.  Just my opinion.

 

EDIT: Ebbe answered your worries as I scrolled through the posts after yours:

 

" Yes, Lindens will go across just fine."  So there you go.

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You asked: 

1 - What type of assets are more likelly to be transferable to SL2 and what probably not? (meshes, animations, sculpts, scripts, textures, builds made of normal prims, system clothing ?)

We don't have all the answers to this one yet, but several areas will have radical improvements and thus not possible to be fully backwards compatible. 

Mesh is ok (but with better lighting and other tech you may want to make tweaks)
Animations will change (major mprovements as we don't currently do it the way it should be done)
Sculpts (TBD, but not as is, but maybe converted to Mesh?)
Scripts (major improvement, so will change)
Textures ok
Prims (TBD, but probably not as is)
Avatars will be radically improved as well so a lot TBD 

Again, we will have years to sort this all out together...

2 - Is SL2 to be considerd "another grid" in which case the TOS of most full permission creators would prohibit the transfer to that grid? If that is the case, could LL speak a word of power and decide that for full permission items that CAN be transfered, the new SL should be considered as the "same grid" ?

ToS will not be an issue. 

3 - Will at least the L$ currency remain the same and will available balances be usable in both worlds?

Yes

4 - Will the 2 worlds be connected in any way and will an avatar be able to move from one to another with the same name and profile and groups and friends? And .. some of its inventory..

Identity and friends will be preserved. Inventory depends on above decisions under #1 but we clearly want as much of existing work to be possible to leverage as long as it will not impact how good the new platform can be. 

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Ebbe Linden wrote:

You asked: 

1 - What type of assets are more likelly to be transferable to SL2 and what probably not? (meshes, animations, sculpts, scripts, textures, builds made of normal prims, system clothing ?)

We don't have all the answers to this one yet, but several areas will have radical improvements and thus not possible to be fully backwards compatible. 

Mesh is ok (but with better lighting and other tech you may want to make tweaks)

Animations will change (major mprovements as we don't currently do it the way it should be done)

Sculpts (TBD, but not as is, but maybe converted to Mesh?)

Scripts (major improvement, so will change)

Textures ok

Prims (TBD, but probably not as is)

Avatars will be radically improved as well so a lot TBD 

Again, we will have years to sort this all out together...

2 - Is SL2 to be considerd "another grid" in which case the TOS of most full permission creators would prohibit the transfer to that grid? If that is the case, could LL speak a word of power and decide that for full permission items that CAN be transfered, the new SL should be considered as the "same grid" ?

ToS will not be an issue. 

3 - Will at least the L$ currency remain the same and will available balances be usable in both worlds?

Yes

4 - Will the 2 worlds be connected in any way and will an avatar be able to move from one to another with the same name and profile and groups and friends? And .. some of its inventory..

Identity and friends will be preserved. Inventory depends on above decisions under #1 but we clearly want as much of existing work to be possible to leverage as long as it will not impact how good the new platform can be. 

Thanks for the answers, Im sure everyone needed them. If possible maybe a few details are still needed..

you say :  Sculpts (TBD, but not as is, but maybe converted to Mesh?)

Converting to mesh would not be a problem indeed but the advantage of sculpts is that they are only 1 prim each . Meshes have usually more. And in the present SL if i put scripts in a mesh it doubles the Li. Will this be the case also in SL2 ?

And as i asked about the TOS i didnt mean the SL TOS but the TOS of the full permission creators who all dont allow the use of their items in other grids. So the question remains: is SL2 "another grid" ? And i also asked at point 4: will an avatar be able to move from one to another (grid)? Your answer to the TOS question sugests that its the same grid but .. how would that work? In the same viewer ? I would need a little more clarity here plase..

Genrally it dosnt look very good for someone like me who spent over 2 million lindens on full perm animations and if i understand well they can not be moved to SL2, nor can they be somehow converted .. This will of course affect all animators and also all builder who make animated items.. Therfore I would be very interested to hear your oppinion about the other possible "option" I just posted (bottom of page 51)

Thanks

 

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Ebbe Linden wrote:

 

ToS will not be an issue. 


I am nominating this for the "Least Meaningful Statement of the Year" competition.

Presumably it means that, as now, LL can do whatever they want, with whatever content exists, without compensation - until there is a legal challenge to the retrospective application of the ToS to content which existed prior to its forced acceptance.

Forget about trying to get the ToS revised; there's no chance of that happening. Instead, I recommend that creators consider initiating a class action as soon as possible, as it will have to be resolved before LL can "repurpose" the content - that it has effectively stolen - in SL V2. They are likely to settle faster if they are unable to even open the new world in beta.

"now there's no time left"

 

 

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There is so much wrong here, speculation, suggesting things I said that I never said, or somehow suggesting that I, or the great people here are responsible for what happened five or ten years ago....but here we go, I'll respond to some of this stuff, but I'll skip all the stuff about problems in the past...that was the past...and by the way, all that "crazy" stuff has given us the best virtual world there has even been and still is. So somehow people here managed to do something right over the years...

Then you say:

Now, How could SL 1.0 be future-proofed?

Get the Lindens back inworld - I remember the Linden Village area, inworld meetings, Lindens just hanging around just talking to passers by.  I haven't seen a Linden since M was CEO and their inworld presence got cut back.  It was reassuring to have staff inworld...proof they used the product they created.

Ebbe says: I removed the restriction that was in place for Lindens to be inworld. I'm not going to force people in there, but nothing is stopping them now. I go in as much as I can to hang out and chat with people. 

Ditch the TPV's - Figure out the best features of the various TPV's and implement them in YOUR client and OPTIMIZE, OPTIMIZE, OPTIMIZE.  There is no reason residents shound need a TPV to get MORE features, higher FPS AND less crashes than the official client.   Third party software should not hold back releases so they can implement features.   If you really feel you need TPV's, release new code even if it breaks their browsers and let them catch up.  I use firestorm, but losing it would be a small price to pay for faster releases (not that we have to worry about that, SL1.0 being in maintenance mode and all).

Ebbe says: I don't think doing that would be a meaningful difference in the success of SL. 

Incremental Graphics and Infrastructure Upgrades - To use MMO's for an example as they are the closest thing to SL, you could redo the graphics and optimize to fix the dated looks..  You could optimize the back end for current standards on a regular basis.   Instead you decided to build a product to compete with your flagship product.   This did NOT fill me with any degree of confidence or any great desire to remain a premium or use the Lindex.

Ebbe says: We have. SL is a lot better today than it was a couple of years ago. But there is a limit to how much better we can make it...and how much effort it takes to move forward incrementally. 

 

If you did all the above, ESPECIALLY the Incremental upgrade of graphics and infrastructure, with gradual depreciation of things that just cannot be carried forward, I see no need for a 2.0 SL.   We could get there by evolution rather than revolution.

Ebbe says: That is your opinion. But I know that the more distant future will have to go way beyond what incrementally can be done to SL. And it's either us or someone else...

> We are going to do our best to make it  smooth, but if we have to make a crappy product with crazy complexity and poor user experience to preserve some very specific content compatability we don't want to cause those problems. 

Make it smooth, I really doubt you can, based on past rollouts of new features.   If you need to depreciate various pieces of older content, do it and explain why.   Don't depreciate the entire world, which is what you are doing.   Rewrite what you have to current standards.    I'd rather lose a fraction of my inventory rather than 9+ years of collecting, outfits, and memories...and possibly my AV name.

Ebbe says: Again, your speculating a lot. You won't lose your name. A lot of content will work fine. Some won't. And that would be true regardless if we improved SL incrementally or started from scratch to get modern tech and capabiliteis done right. 

 

> A lot of what you have will be possible to move across and more specifics will come through over time.

You should not have announced this until you have specifics.    First it was no compatibility, maybe, now its a lot of compatibility.   Make up your minds.     It appears you announced early, shooting for some kind of PR boost, but all the vagueness and 'we can't answer that now' has just destabilized things for many.  

Ebbe says: I never said "no compatability". Where did you get that from? I said that we will not sacrifice how good a next generation virtual world can be due to backwards compatability (something you say is ok to do). 

Quite frankly, and this is strictly me speaking for me, I will be staying with SL 1.0 until you pull the plug, then I will find another home that does not involve giving money to LL.  I have NO desire to have to rebuild my VR life and possessions in a 'like SL, only better' SL 2.0, not with LL's track record."

Ebbe says: Let's see what you think when you see it. And sticking with SL is fine, it will be around for a very long time ;)

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Ebbe Linden wrote:

 

4 - Will the 2 worlds be connected in any way and will an avatar be able to move from one to another with the same name and profile and groups and friends? And .. some of its inventory..

Identity and friends will be preserved. Inventory depends on above decisions under #1 but we clearly want as much of existing work to be possible to leverage as long as it will not impact how good the new platform can be. 

I'd say about 90% of my communication with my friends and customers happen with out ever being in the same sim,  I think having some form of communication between the to grids would go a long way keeping people connect and not feeling left out or separated from there friends as people start to move to SL2.

Inter gird communication could open up some interesting possibilities and opportunities, DJ's playing a set in both worlds at the same time increasing their audience, media on a prim could be used for teleconferencing between the 2 worlds.  Having 2 worlds may lead to some surprisingly interesting user creations and uses.

I think people will get over the fear of change when they realize you don't have to chose one world over the other, it's not like there separated by the Berlin wall, it's more like owning a second vacation house over seas.

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Considering I dropped a few thousand dollars into my current inventory...what will happen to it going forward...will i suffer a complete loss that Linden Labs will claim they are sorry but not responsible for? OR will Linden Labs "insensitively" fall back on the TOS  saying "Too bad so sad not our problem" because the TOS basically gives them the right to do anything they damn well please, and rip everyone off of millions of dollars worth of material and expect us to reinvest all over again?

If i  stand to lose the revenue i put into my inventory and land i own why should i continue to put into it knowing Linden labs is going to pull the rug out from under my feet? These are hard questions that need to be answerd and not with technical mumbo jumbo they are legit questions that need simple legit answers.

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