A brief note on pricing changes, which ran long.

[Fox Wijaya]

Just now, Monderas Bristol said:

 

The announcement states that new quarterly subscriptions are no longer possible

you still can subscribe now i think, the new rules aren't active yet .. and if you have it you can keep it 

[Alazarin Mondrian]

37.5% increase on the Annual Premium. That's a steep price increase and, as someone on a fixed [and low] income, this will probably mean having to scale back my land holdings in SL. It's a shame, but I've had a good run of things here. I arrived in SL in 2005 in a state of burnout. Within two years the people I'd met in SL got me back on my feet and playing [and writing and recording] music again. Around that time I also got lucky building and selling treehouses which meant I was able to do the premium alt thing and keep some land on the mainland for a home and music venue. They're all old accounts with 500L / week stipend so they'll just be able to scrape through the new regime although any overhead that I used to have to spend on things like audio stream / mesh uploads / clothes / costumes / stage props / etc., is now a thing of the past. I make next to no money from performing music in SL and have financed it out of my stipend [plus any money made building and selling stuff] from the get-go.

 

For me, the price increase is the beginning of the end. Not this year. Maybe not next year. But I can see that I'll have to start scaling back in SL eventually. It's a shame... I've built up a virtual band using avatars and alts which I've been live streaming on YouTube and Facebook for the last 3+ years. Yeah, I could ditch the Second Life virtual band thing and keep going but a live stream of an old hippie faffing around in a home studio doesn't quite have the same SciFi ambience that my band of alts has. One thing Second Life has taught me is that the visual component of live music is a lot more important than most people would think. After all, sight is the most important and powerful sensory input we have. So it makes sense to craft the visual element to fit / augment the themes / narrative in the music. But I digress....

 

Here's to the good days that have passed and the tough times ahead.

 

Edited May 31, 2019 by Alazarin Mondrian
Fixing grammatical gibberish

[Grumpity Linden]

18 hours ago, Blueberryxx said:

I am not against the fee increase in fact I am okay with it and welcome it, but I just want to show you a different perspective. For someone making 2000$ a month, an increase of 2.5% equals $50. That's a bill. For someone living off of 2,000$ a month $50 makes a significant difference. Please remember to be kind. Some people would rather live on less money but work a job they love doing, and for those people this is a big change.

Blueberry, you're right.  We do think about this, quite a bit in fact.  We've actually made changes a few years back to make the process credit fees more "fair" - where we used to charge an effectively higher % from small amounts than larger ones (by having a cap on the fee), we had been disproportionately charging the little guys.  

I'd like to point something out, because I understand that it's really not obvious. There's a lot of conversation about people with basic accounts spending just as much or more than the cost of premium.  That's awesome, and you can chose how to spend your money!  However, not all the money you spend in SL is equal to LL. When you buy L$, you're buying them on the LindeX, from another resident.  Linden Lab takes $1.49 fee, regardless of how much you spend.  When you spend L$5000 on the marketplace, Linden Lab takes 5% of that, not the full amount.  The rest goes to the creator. When you spend it inworld, we take none of it (however, the store owner pays us for land - either directly or through a landlord).  OF COURSE we want our creator community to thrive. We have been jumping through regulatory hoops year after year to make sure that Second Life continues to be a place where you can make money and not just spend money - and this has come at a cost, which, unfortunately, we are partially passing on to those who are making money in SL.  

With that, it's late. Thank you to all who have been willing to engage in conversation.  This thread has grown very long, and I cannot promise to continue monitoring it.  I'll do my best when possible. 

 

[MelodyMai Guardian]

all the new changes are really ok for me. Linden Laps is not a at home friends group, them are a corporation a 1st life business and them need real money.

so $99 per year for a premium account is really ok and i got a lot back like the free parcel or linden home, and the weekly pocket money

bun one thing drive me crazy: the the fees for sims …. i dream since a few years of a own mini mini huge isle, i need for that 2 full sims and maybe a hs. right now with the new fees would that cost more per month as my 1st life apartment thats way too much.

I'm ok with 10% MP fees or 200L fee for creating a new group.

How it is if every new resident just have the levels G and M and if you want A you have to pay 100L up to 200L ?

or raise the partner fees a bit

Creating a MP store is right now for free, make one time fee of 500L (by the way that will keep maybe all the really bad stores away)

maybe the same for activating mesh upload ….

but i wish a full sim with a Monthly fee of $100 and a HS with $50 would be so nice. i okow so many real good places and them all gone forever because the fees was too high for them

In my fist life i make with my job so $1400 per month, then i pay my tier, food, power, clothes, all the stuff for my kids, then i just have a tiny rest who i can use for sl ….

I love sl and all the things there ❤️

[Kimmi Zehetbauer]

50 minutes ago, Grumpity Linden said:

Their billing date will be pushed forward by a year if they pre-pay for a year.  They would then get charged on the anniversary date in 2020.   

Thanks for clearing that up!

39 minutes ago, Fox Wijaya said:

perhaps better no pony ...

Ahh --- the REAL reason for the hikes! LL needs to purchase boatloads of rollators (4 wheel walkers) for their staff. Those things aren't cheap as I had to get one of those for an aunt. I can picture Grumpity rolling one of those into the office! :D

[Ors Quan]

12 minutes ago, MelodyMai Guardian said:

16 minutes ago, Grumpity Linden said:

Blueberry, you're right.  We do think about this, quite a bit in fact.  We've actually made changes a few years back to make the process credit fees more "fair" - where we used to charge an effectively higher % from small amounts than larger ones (by having a cap on the fee), we had been disproportionately charging the little guys.  

I'd like to point something out, because I understand that it's really not obvious. There's a lot of conversation about people with basic accounts spending just as much or more than the cost of premium.  That's awesome, and you can chose how to spend your money!  However, not all the money you spend in SL is equal to LL. When you buy L$, you're buying them on the LindeX, from another resident.  Linden Lab takes $1.49 fee, regardless of how much you spend.  When you spend L$5000 on the marketplace, Linden Lab takes 5% of that, not the full amount.  The rest goes to the creator. When you spend it inworld, we take none of it (however, the store owner pays us for land - either directly or through a landlord).  OF COURSE we want our creator community to thrive. We have been jumping through regulatory hoops year after year to make sure that Second Life continues to be a place where you can make money and not just spend money - and this has come at a cost, which, unfortunately, we are partially passing on to those who are making money in SL.  

With that, it's late. Thank you to all who have been willing to engage in conversation.  This thread has grown very long, and I cannot promise to continue monitoring it.  I'll do my best when possible. 

 

 

Ok , I have several questions but I will be happy if you can answer just this one.

Is this new cashout fee , it´s going to keep increasing every year or there will be a limit?

Since I think most of content creators are worried about this double % cashout increment.

Thank you.

 

 

[Kadah Coba]

1 hour ago, Grumpity Linden said:

There will be a new and shiny premium level, which you would be able to upgrade to from your old yet still pretty awesome premium level.  The specifics of how upgrades (and downgrades) will work are going to be announced at a later date, but the general idea is - you will get credit for the "old" premium towards the new shiny.  

If its increased script mem limits or adding something useful to experiences, I'm on board for that.

[FyreRose]

I’ve been in SL pretty much since beta granted my current main isn't the one I started with, I understand a lot of things have been given to those of us that have premium. And I am not griping about the price difference I really man not. I like many live on a fixed income and I make do with building in world. But at the same time, LL has a bad habit of making decisions over the course of months yet not warning us than you guys wonder why the backlash or the thousands of questions.

Now the main thing that’s irking me is you guys are taking groups from non-premiums yet you are giving more to those of us that pay the premium. Honestly, 60 groups are more than enough. Hell, I am sitting at 50 or there about I don’t even use the full 60 I know some do but honestly, it's stupid if you think about this logically.  With all the money that pours into Linden Labs, why haven’t you guys hired some code monkeys (IE tech guys) to fix the bugs that are causing problems with the groups in the first damn place? You guys have been rolling out new servers that are supposed to help with some of the problems that have been going on yet you won't shake cash loose to higher some techs to work on the code that will fix the group bugs that are causing strain.

On top of this, you are rolling out new linden houses and all sorts of other changes again very little warning for any of it. I get it you wanna keep us happy but honestly after sitting at an event hearing three different people boast about how they managed to nail down multiple new linden houses on their alts who have premium makes me wonder just how many people were jerks and did that very thing. I have a gaggle of alts though I use them as models for my shop funny thing is I didn’t even know about the new houses until the Shop owner of Moda whom I buy shoes from posted on her FB and by the time I went to get one they were all gone.

Anyway, I guess what I am getting at is this, You knuckleheads are on the ball sending automated emails about everything from land tier to premium payments yet a simple mass email to all your users outlining all the changes can't be sent?

Edited May 31, 2019 by FyreRose

[Kia Kiyori]

1 hour ago, Asadora Summers said:

 

Wow... I find that hard to believe..not implying that there is an untruth in that - just... literally finding that hard to believe. No offence intended at all. Just being honest. 

I can only think of one group I'm in that would have close to that many members if not more - and she works her butt off keeping us all addicted to her creations.

[ananoelle]

18 minutes ago, FyreRose said:

Anyway, I guess what I am getting at is this, You knuckleheads are on the ball sending automated emails about everything from land tier to premium payments yet a simple mass email to all your users outlining all the changes can't be sent?

You've been here since beta but cant figure out how to keep up with changes hmmm.

Maybe you could check your account page more often. The new linden homes didnt just pop up overnight. You can also follow any blog post to have updates sent to email. 

[Desudesudesuka]

26 minutes ago, FyreRose said:

With all the money that pours into Linden Labs, why haven’t you guys hired some code monkeys (IE tech guys) to fix the bugs that are causing problems with the groups in the first damn place?

One of the "bugs" is easy to fix too. Alt accounts and dead accounts inflate group counts, yet there is no way for group owners to clear inactives automatically. And that cannot be the only optimization that could be made. I find it really hard to believe it's just impossible when that wasn't even done.

[TheSunTheMoon Starlight]

58 minutes ago, Grumpity Linden said:

With that, it's late. Thank you to all who have been willing to engage in conversation.  This thread has grown very long, and I cannot promise to continue monitoring it.  I'll do my best when possible. 

 

Still have not addressed my concern and confusion?  How can taking basic groups away and adding them to premium be a good thing?  and why is it blamed on bad programming/coding for groups.  I get that groups have issues but -1 +1 does not have any more or less effect on the issue?  Give basic back their groups!  Premium do not need more groups!!!  and it if it just to try to justify the extra 33% increase that is bullsh..t!  You want to charge more and maybe it is time to but doing the switch does not justify taking groups from basic members!

[Kia Kiyori]

1 hour ago, Fox Wijaya said:

now LL only has to deal with a limited group of owners... imagine all resident get a sim, i'd love it, but support would be unworkable.

and it's simply not how most things work... lets call Bugatti.. lower your price to 10k for you top model .. or mercedes or any other brand. We have a capitalistic system, most of us in rl but also in SL. ... and LL needs income.
The real SL experience isn't about having, but being and doing. Thats not limited to the rich few.

Except this isn't Bugatti or Mercedes. This is a platform that's only able to keep running thanks to users spending rl money, many of whom are creators. No users + no creators = no SL.

I've always paid my way and don't object to paying my way; I love SL to bits, I believe in SL and wouldn't be here forking out hard earned money hand over fist if I didn't, but I do think there's potentially better ways of going about this issue that perhaps haven't been considered.

[FyreRose]

16 minutes ago, ananoelle said:

You've been here since beta but cant figure out how to keep up with changes hmmm.

Maybe you could check your account page more often. The new linden homes didnt just pop up overnight. You can also follow any blog post to have updates sent to email. 

I said pretty much since the beta I started about 5 months after beta. What little time I spend in world right now I spend with friends I don't have time to sit reading forums or going to my "My account" page.  I am in the middle of moving I have two autistic teens I have to keep an eye on so when I am able to steal 30 mins to an hour to be in world I choose to spend it with my SL family rather than combing the forums.  and I am not the only one a lot of people I hang out with say the same thing.  Just some food for thought.

[Fox Wijaya]

7 minutes ago, AnyaJurelle said:

Except this isn't Bugatti or Mercedes. This is a platform that's only able to keep running thanks to users spending rl money,

but isn't Mercedes and Bugatti exactly doing the same? Just with cars?

If you can't afford one of those brands your car might be made by Chrysler or Skoda... in the worst case Trabant ... all has his price. so also in SL, if you cant have a fp sim, perhaps renting a homestead, or parcel is more your thing.
But like many that Bugatti is only to look at, never to have it.
We'll have to accept our limits a bit more, and with less jealousy to others. Those that have aren't more happy than the less havers.. nothing wrong with wanting more, but stay real.

[Jessicatje Artful]

On 5/30/2019 at 11:05 AM, Crim Mip said:

As far as raising the premium prices, I'm not upset or surprised. I'm actually more surprised it's taking so long. I think the timing stinks though. They should have gone up prior to or at the same time as the new Linden Homes were released out into the wild. As it is, there are going to be people feeling like they are getting bait and switched and not entirely without cause. You've been doing so well making premium worth getting for a lot of people who hadn't had premium accounts before and in one badly timed move, you're wrecking a lot of that good will.

I know groups have been a problem, but you don't encourage basic members to go premium by cutting a basic mainstay in SL that drastically. You will encourage people to leave doing that though. I guess that would also lower the strain on the servers. Better yet, fix the stupid code! We've heard repeatedly that it's hard and would be lot of hours of dev time. At least it would be for something people use instead of something like cough...cough..pathfinding...cough. Group function is pretty much the one legacy thing in SL that is pretty much just as crappy now as it was 10 years ago. Also, why add more groups to premium if it's an issue? 60 was more than many of us use as it was. If you'd really wanted to make it more attractive, another raise of the land allowance would have been nice. People who get a usable size parcel often find they want more and hey another 1024 is only another $7 a month with half of that coverd by the stipend. 

As for the sim prices going down, wonderful! Want to get a bunch of people and groups buying them? Cut the setup fees. There's no good reason it should cost what it does to transfer ownership and change the name of an existing sim. Does anyone other than LL themselves even create totally new sims anymore? Charge the equivalent of a month tier to do a transfer, rename, and move of location (combined, not for each) and I promise you'd have a LOT more people buying and keeping sims long term. As it is, the initial hit for doing that is just prohibitive for a lot of people. I know the group I'm part of that holds land on the mainland for our homes and some nice build areas would jump at a reduced price estate if the setup were reasonable. We already pay within $40 of that now for tier.

and here i applaud ! i totaly agree with all of this, instead of cutting groups for basic members keep it as it is and work on the stabillity, because it does not make sense to me, before we all fighted for more groups and than finaly you guys gave us more groups and everyone went nuts ! and aplauded ! but now you are taking this away again and taking the basic members back in time, meanwhile the group issues like groupchat still remain

[Fox Wijaya]

4 minutes ago, FyreRose said:

Just some food for thought.

LL has several ways they communicate with their residents, can't blame them you don't use one of those

Edited May 31, 2019 by Fox Wijaya

[Kia Kiyori]

2 minutes ago, Fox Wijaya said:

but isn't Mercedes and Bugatti exactly doing the same? Just with cars?

If you can't afford one of those brands your car might be made by Chrysler or Skoda... in the worst case Trabant ... all has his price. so also in SL, if you cant have a fp sim, perhaps renting a homestead, or parcel is more your thing.
But like many that Bugatti is only to look at, never to have it.
We'll have to accept our limits a bit more, and with less jealousy to others. Those that have aren't more happy than the less havers.. nothing wrong with wanting more, but stay real.

I'll stick with a VDub   Not disagreeing that there needs to be price hikes, just saying there's potentially better ways of milking cows.

[ananoelle]

1 minute ago, FyreRose said:

I said pretty much since the beta I started about 5 months after beta. What little time I spend in world right now I spend with friends I don't have time to sit reading forums or going to my "My account" page.  I am in the middle of moving I have two autistic teens I have to keep an eye on so when I am able to steal 30 mins to an hour to be in world I choose to spend it with my SL family rather than combing the forums.  and I am not the only one a lot of people I hang out with say the same thing.  Just some food for thought.

Yet here you are. Check your email prefs and follow the blog post before going to hang with your friends ... and tell them to do the same. 

If LL have these functions in place but the user doesnt bother to utilize them who is at fault?

[Fox Wijaya]

1 minute ago, AnyaJurelle said:

I'll stick with a VDub   Not disagreeing that there needs to be price hikes, just saying there's potentially better ways of milking cows.

true... using barbed wire isn't very comfy... but i don't see that happening

[Love Zhaoying]

Let’s assume the premium cost increase will be used for good things even though that wasn’t stated: keeping SL alive, improving SL, marketing to attract more new users, paying for more and better support. Is this a fair assumption, @Grumpity Linden?

Edited May 31, 2019 by Love Zhaoying

[FyreRose]

1 minute ago, ananoelle said:

Yet here you are. Check your email prefs and follow the blog post before going to hang with your friends ... and tell them to do the same. 

If LL have these functions in place but the user doesnt bother to utilize them who is at fault?

Ok, I am here because its 3am my kids are asleep and it’s the first time in three months BOTH of them are asleep before midnight so I have spent the evening combing threads trying to find out how the upcoming changes will affect me and my business I am trying to get off the ground. I posted my two cents on my opinions and concerns; I didn’t do so to be belittled!

Excuse me if I choose to log in and interact with people I know and love and I don’t know actually enjoy my second life what little I am able to enjoy right now rather than sitting and reading dozens of boring ass forum threads trying to find information on the one topic I am looking for when its just as easy for them to send us an email too!

[Froukje Hoorenbeek]

Dear Lindens, 

2 groups of our community are hit disproportionately hard by the coming changes, the basic members and the content creators. 

Basic accounts punished 
Basic accounts are punished with lesser groups and im’s capping sooner while premium accounts get more groups they didn’t ask for and don’t need. It’s also made harder for them to get into nearly full regions, experiences and premium area’s then premium members. Taking it away from one group to give it to another. 

Only natural they feel upset. They deserve to be seen as full members of our community. Because basic accounts bring a lot to the SL economy too. 
They pour their money in through microtransactions. They buy, they rent and there are great innovative content creators among them. And after they have invested in their Second Life for a while, they may go premium. Or not. And that is ok too. Because premium is really expensive, too much for most people in the world to spend on a game in one go. 

Bonding and communicating inside SL

But the results of punishing them with lesser groups and capped im’s are more harmful than just offending the basic residents. It will make it harder for them to communicate and to bond inside SL. 

You say groups and im’s are hard for you, or costly. No matter how hard this is to fix, this should be a priority for you. Enabling bonding and communicating inside SL should be a priority for you.  Your technical and financial people no doubt have looked at this. Have your community managers too?

Groups make you feel part of something. It's super important for human beings to belong to groups. It is they only way clubs, musicians, roleplay communities and content creators can reach their targeted audiences inside SL. 

Content creators

Which brings me to the content creators. The people that have been making the incredibly important content that kept SL innovating and interesting for 16 years. The user created content every other virtual platform, including your own Sansar, has been lacking. And which is why all other virtual platforms have failed and SL is still on top. 

As a content creator I pay you for 2 sims, I pay you for ads on the MP and inworld, I sell mostly on the MP where a percentage of all my sales goes to you, I pay upload fees for every model and texture and I pay download fee for every picture. I pay premium, I pay you for exchanging L$ to US$ and I pay cash out fees. I’m sure I forgot a few things I pay you for. 

Now you are taking an even bigger cut of my income. Double my cash out fees, raise the price for premium. What do I get in return?

What do content creators get?

The perks and benefits you give are only useful for a very small amount of residents. Only a handful gets into one of your prefabs. Most sim owners in SL are premium, what do they need prefab linden houses for? What do they need a 1024m plot on the mainland for? 

Premiums already have more than enough groupslots. I turned off offline IMs because as a merchant it's horrible to get work-related im's 24/7. I have no use for the gifts you have sent. Expanded live-chat customer support? I live in Europe, you are not open when I am awake. 

Whenever I contact support, I get copied and pasted from the textbook. When someone sells an empty box on the MP with my brand on it, you do nothing, no matter how many times that empty box is flagged by your customers. They have to come to me for support over this empty box they bought from you. It should not be our job to police your MP. In fact, a lot of work we merchants do, like replacing lost inventory and such, is not our job, but yours. 

5% of all cash outs is also 5% of all copybotted or otherwise stolen content. How about some more protection for the higher prize I have to pay? I would not mind paying more at all if I got something back for it. Like more protection of my work, against copybotters, grievers, trolls etc.

SL’s content creators are your greatest asset. This anonymous workforce has been giving you the content that kept you the biggest platform in virtual reality for 16 years. For free. How about you give us some perks as well? 

How this will play out

Anyways, best possible scenario is you roll back one or two of the minor changes and we all go back to business as usual. The content creators can't go anywhere anyways, right? Please keep in mind that it takes a lot of work and commitment to be a good innovative content creator, it is a full time job that most of us can barely live off. Skimming more of our income will force us to look for other jobs.  Not because we want to, we love this world, we have given it a lot. But we have families and rent too. 

Don’t kill the goose with the golden eggs. 

Thanks for reading. 
 

Edited May 31, 2019 by Froukje Hoorenbeek
Tried to reformat so it is readable in the black layout too. Hope it worked. And changed Every sim owner in SL is premium to Most sim owners in SL are premium

[Naria Panthar]

My opinion into this topic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NU3zpbhajy8

[Fox Wijaya]

6 minutes ago, FyreRose said:

Ok, I am here because its 3am my kids are asleep and it’s the first time in three months BOTH of them are asleep before midnight so I have spent the evening combing threads trying to find out how the upcoming changes will affect me and my business I am trying to get off the ground. I posted my two cents on my opinions and concerns; I didn’t do so to be belittled!

Excuse me if I choose to log in and interact with people I know and love and I don’t know actually enjoy my second life what little I am able to enjoy right now rather than sitting and reading dozens of boring ass forum threads trying to find information on the one topic I am looking for when its just as easy for them to send us an email too!

 

nobody blames you for spending the time as you do, but that is a choice, and you choose not to look at information that's freely and available at several channels... choices...choises, but don't complain for a choice thats easy to change by yourself