Auctions

[Arwen Ansaldo]

Anyone have any idea when the Auctions will be back ???? Its been well over a month now , and last update was 7th September....... 

[Cindy Evanier]

26 minutes ago, Arwen Ansaldo said:

Anyone have any idea when the Auctions will be back ???? Its been well over a month now , and last update was 7th September....... 

https://secondlife-status.statuspage.io/incidents/t9pl3rrl7g03

Same as you know

Edited September 25, 2018 by Cindy Evanier
pressed save too soon

[Garnet Psaltery]

I have no facts to back this up but my feeling is we won't see auctions back this year.  They've failed badly now on more than occasion, and I doubt they're a high priority, given the small numbers of parcels being auctioned and the tiny profit (presume LL make something of of them but it can't be much).

[Arwen Ansaldo]

Thanks Garnet, shame as it hits the the people trying to sell it land from the the auctions...no land to buy from LL, less business... Just frustrating that updates are far and few between at the moment . 

Edited September 25, 2018 by Arwen Ansaldo

[Arwen Ansaldo]

5 hours ago, Cindy Evanier said:

https://secondlife-status.statuspage.io/incidents/t9pl3rrl7g03

Same as you know

Yep, I think we HAVE ALL SEEN that for the past Month, But Completely NO HELP what so ever ....

[Ethan Paslong]

14 minutes ago, Arwen Ansaldo said:

But Completely NO HELP what so ever ....

 ... Our Auctions systems are still under maintenance - we will continue to post updates here.  ... is pretty clear i think... no updates since that date, there seem to be a few things that are hard to repair/roll out. It's nothing more than a little inconvenience,. you can always do a direct buy... it only asks for a little more search skills.

[Love Zhaoying]

12 minutes ago, Ethan Paslong said:

 ... Our Auctions systems are still under maintenance - we will continue to post updates here.  ... is pretty clear i think... no updates since that date, there seem to be a few things that are hard to repair/roll out. It's nothing more than a little inconvenience,. you can always do a direct buy... it only asks for a little more search skills.

LL borked the auctions real good, din’t they?

[Qie Niangao]

43 minutes ago, Garnet Psaltery said:

I have no facts to back this up but my feeling is we won't see auctions back this year.  They've failed badly now on more than occasion, and I doubt they're a high priority, given the small numbers of parcels being auctioned and the tiny profit (presume LL make something of of them but it can't be much).

I think they may be a higher priority than that, not so much because of the relatively small L$ sink they represent (indirectly benefiting the Lab) but more for the anticipated ability of residents to auction to other residents, which will significantly improve the "liquidity" of the Mainland market, compared to now when there's a choice between abandoning the land, trying to sell it yourself (while continuing to pay tier), or "selling" it at a giveaway price to the most willing flipper.

Of course flippers will buy resident land at auction, too, but I really do expect this to change the market fairly dramatically. I just wish the web team and the land team (and maybe third party developers?) could somehow get this working. With no updates, though, it seems like internecine lassitude, where the participants can't quite bring themselves to point fingers.

[Alyona Su]

I'm willing to bet it has to do with something 'under-the-hood' regarding resident-to-resident auction abilities.

[Alyona Su]

/me pinkie-ties with @Qie Niangao and shouts JINXIES!

[OthirMan]

Still no progress on Auctions, nor any explanation?

Since Auctions were working well before this upgrade attempt, it does seem likely that the resident-to-resident auction abilities posed a financial threat to the essential-monopoly on Adult-rated land.

 

[LittleMe Jewell]

2 minutes ago, OthirMan said:

Still no progress on Auctions, nor any explanation?

We only know as much as has been posted on the grid status page:  https://status.secondlifegrid.net/

 

[Qie Niangao]

The only further update that I know of comes from Ebbe's September Town Hall, courtesy of Inara Pey's blog

Quote

• New land auction process was deployed, but has had issues, so user-to-user Mainland land auctions still to come.
  (See Second Life land auctions get a face-lift for more.)

I'll just add that I think it's absurdly paranoid to ascribe some pro-monopoly motive to the delay. We're talking about the Lab here so Hanlon's Razor is always the baseline assumption. I do think that resident-to-resident auctions will change the Mainland market dramatically -- and not necessarily in favor of large-scale resellers -- but I think the Lab is super eager to make that change. And in the meantime, the Lab must be anxious to resume auctions of abandoned land to reduce the burden on the Land folks.

 

[Macrocosm Draegonne]

No reason to stress it, if they're taking the extra time to assure its all proper then that's a good thing, it will only help assure the upgrade is a success everyone will love, with FAR less trouble support tickets and customer service issues to contend with lol, thats a serious metric to contend with. 

After all these years they know what it takes, they know how to do all the things, I would be hesitant to question their motivations in that light, and given that in SL's whole history they've never shown themselves as monopolists.  SL is a labor of love & creativity, and... don't forget, the auction upgrades are only one aspect in an array of upgrades and expansions to the system that have been ongoing since last year, they're investing millions of dollars and tons of work into SL's evolution.

As for that new mainland adult grid, I have two of those lots there, I got a really great deal on them too, double prim, in horizons, you can sail from your back yard all the way thru and down around in the zindra continent, there is no overwhelming monopoly,  there are many different groups and people that have land over there, its not all one person owning it, after living there for a year I can also say its become a lot more active lately too.  Adding the extra land allowance to premium members was such a smart move!   Ill be moving into a new private SIM soon though lol. 

Edited October 5, 2018 by Macrocosm Draegonne

[Annabell Wandsworth]

Still, it's been a while. It should have been up by now.

[Love Zhaoying]

LL must not make much money from auctions. Just sayin’.

[OthirMan]

On 10/6/2018 at 4:55 PM, Love Zhaoying said:

LL must not make much money from auctions. Just sayin’.

I'd have to disagree --- affordable Adult-rated private land ownership (as opposed to sell very low, buy very high) translates into Premium Memberships.  Certainly the changes to mesh, to double the land impact, and to double Premium's base lot size have made it possible to have both a decently-furnished home and a stocked playspace.  Now the only real hurdle is the land price (as low as L$1.1/sqm for decent Moderate-rated but nearly three times that much for the worst Adult-rated).

I think playability is also affected.  If the standard Adult-region practice, without private-to-private auctions, is to have to sell your current land low but have to buy high, then obviously there's an implicit incentive to "churn the market" by inducing people to move (for example, there's a burning house on a plot for sale next to mine: it was standing alone in an area with many plots for sale when I bought).  Less playability translates into fewer players and so fewer Premium Memberships.

[Love Zhaoying]

My point was, if Auctions were a big source of income, LL would be motivated to fix them faster.

[OthirMan]

And I gave actual reasons for why I disagree with that. 

If LL's #1 goal is to sell Premium Memberships, then maximizing the actual ownership of land by individuals is the way to go -- because a player can do everything else without a Premium Membership.

EDIT: Perhaps LL is "fixing things faster".... but a different way.

Edited October 14, 2018 by OthirMan
Addenda:

[Qie Niangao]

3 hours ago, OthirMan said:

If LL's #1 goal is to sell Premium Memberships...

It's not. It's a goal, sure, but land is very nearly a zero-sum game between Mainland and Estates, so revenue from Mainland tier + Premium membership must be balanced against much the same revenue generated by Estate owners' fees from renting out comparable parcels to the same land-using residents.

Certainly Premium membership + Mainland ownership appeals to some folks who wouldn't be attracted to Estate land (and vice versa of course) so it's not quite zero sum; they're both worthwhile distinct products in this market.

Auctions, too, serve a slice of the overall land market: getting more abandoned land more visibly available helps part of that Mainland market. Moreover, resident-to-resident auctions will affect the entire market -- for the better I expect -- so it's a shame progress has been so halting.