A brief note on pricing changes, which ran long.

[Jo Yardley]

I miss homesteads in the land pricing changes.
 

[sourapplepie]

Would it be at all feasible for Premium members to get a discount on the process credit as they'd already be paying a fee? Cause I can se a lot of creators signing up for premium if that was a thing.

[Cam Mode]

Annual premium always made the best financial sense but doesn't ending the quarterly pay impact the educational users- they come in for a semester/quarter? Want one payment.

These maybe people who only needed basic to do the edu project  but went 'shiny!' and wanted to get more-- now - they either pay monthly- harder to hide on an expense acct or annual- too long.

Again, shooting yourself in the corporate paw, these are motivated new users you are saying buh bye to.

 

[Janet Voxel]

Here’s a suggestion, and I hope it’s constructive. Why not consider adding a premium plan that includes 3 alts for free or something?

The way I see it, the biggest legit complaint is coming from business owners that are saying this is going to hurt their business. So why not offer something that is an incentive to go premium and they get something of value in return?

[Selene Gregoire]

1 hour ago, Jeny Howlett said:

Nowdays people also scroll through SL Facebook fashion feeds to find the most recent items. and it costs nothing to scroll them only if you actually go to buy the said item. I guess the amount of sl facebook fashionistas will increase soon

Sorry, not everyone does that. Some of us view FB as a cess pool.

[Sammy Huntsman]

20 minutes ago, Beth Macbain said:

But you have free healthcare! I'll trade you!

I'm kidding. I readily admit that I'm only looking at this from the perspective of a US citizen and have no idea what costs go into it for international members.

I'm just going to stop reading these threads. The changes are happening, change is inevitable, and just like every single time LL changes anything, people are going to get up in arms and complain about how LL is shooting themselves in the foot, and how this is the end of SL, and they've ruined everything and then in a couple weeks (or less) everyone will forget and move on. 

Few of the people who ever threaten to leave actually leave. Just like I'm not actually going to stop shopping at the stores. 

I'd still dig some free healthcare, though. Maybe some poutine as well. 😊

Okay, free health care or not. With some of us, who are on say disability, and stuff. Who does live in Canada or other countries, and the EU. And especially with such high cost of living, this price change is a pretty difficult thing to swallow. I live in Ontario, the cost of living and other expenses, aren't cheap. So yeah, it does negatively impact these people, with all these added fees tacked on, on top of the exchange rate and if I were in Europe, I would have to pay VAT. I don't think you understand that portion of what I am trying to say. As I said before, the way you are talking. You clearly have no idea, how much more it will impact the people outside the US. 

Edited May 30, 2019 by halebore Aeon

[Phoebe Avro]

2 minutes ago, Selene Gregoire said:

Sorry, not everyone does that. Some of us view FB as a cess pool.

Hehe no one should be using fakebook its run by the CIA!

[Elvina Ewing]

12 minutes ago, Grumpity Linden said:

But we did just drop land prices a year ago, and we saw a reduction in rents, so we're going by precedent - it's what we saw happen in the market last year.  Landlords can, of course, argue what they want, but someone will drop prices and others will need to compete. 

*I* didn't see any reduction on *my* rent. Not even a 1$. And my landlord seems to be doing just fine to this day. I was hoping he would indeed need to compete, but apparently not at all.

[Phoebe Avro]

Just now, Elvina Ewing said:

*I* didn't see any reduction on *my* rent. Not even a 1$. And my landlord seems to be doing just fine to this day. I was hoping he would indeed need to compete, but apparently not at all.

My Landlord put the rent down instantly, you need a better landlord.

[Beth Macbain]

5 minutes ago, halebore Aeon said:

Okay, free health care or not. With some of us, who are on say disability, and stuff. Who does live in Canada or other countries, and the EU. And especially with such high cost of living, this price change is a pretty difficult thing to swallow. I live in Ontario, the cost of living and other expenses, aren't cheap. So yeah, it does negatively impact these people, with all these added fees tacked on, on top of the exchange rate and if I were in Europe, I would have to pay VAT. I don't think you understand that portion of what I am trying to say. As I said before, the way you are talking. You clearly have no idea, how much more it will impact the people outside the US. 

Yes, that's what I said. "I readily admit that I'm only looking at this from the perspective of a US citizen and have no idea what costs go into it for international members."

[Exosaint]

why not just do a  total revamp the group system for your group issues that would be less of a data hog on ur systems yall are smart u updated ur skeleton system why not ur groups and contacts

[Elvina Ewing]

Just now, Phoebe Avro said:

My Landlord put the rent down instantly, you need a better landlord.

I know, unfortunately i have a large store and moving is very bad for business. I still get angry IMs sometimes about how an old LM from my store now takes people to somebody's home...

[Lysana McMillan]

One other aspect of how groups work which I haven't seen mentioned (but this may be a legend I was told) is that one of the things going on in the back end is database checks every time an avatar moves to make sure they aren't approaching or entering land they're unable to access. One of the things that is checked is group membership. So when you have thousands of avatars moving across countless kilometers of virtual terrain, that is a lot of back-end processing. Groups always having land-related functionality is the thing. This is another reason I see the suggestions for inworld messaging that isn't tied to groups as a good idea. But it'd have to be a new thing instead of just re-jiggering the current thing. What with how interwoven the groups are with land access, it'd be catastrophic to try to change that much code.

Edited May 30, 2019 by Lysana McMillan

[Jo Yardley]

13 minutes ago, Selene Gregoire said:

Sorry, not everyone does that. Some of us view FB as a cess pool.

One does not exclude the other.

[hippopotomonstrosesquipedalian]

Just a quick note here to say that I'd love to be able to have a customized membership type thing (not sure how easy it would be to implement, of course).

See, I don't care for most groups (IMs are something else…) (yeah, OK, I'm in a minority, possibly a minority of one*), and I REALLY don't care about the premium gifts, the priority entry to whatever it is, or Premium only areas. I do care about the stipend (one of the best incentive for going premium, AFAIK) and I do care about having a Linden Home (especially the new ones, which are wonderful) and enough prim allowance for decorating it.

Other people will obviously value different things.

So being able to tailor what you're getting for your money would be absolutely fantastic. Any chance of that happening, or is it a utter logistical nightmare and a complete  non-starter?

PS I fail to see how lowering the group limit for basic members is a good thing - won't people simply be creating more alts, just to get group slots, anyway? And I wholeheartly second people who say - don't apply the lowering of group slots to existing users, apply it to new users only. How is taking something away from people a good idea????

PS2 group housekeeping on the Linden side sounds like a great idea to me. A lot of platforms monitor inactive users and deactivate their accounts. Makes sense to me…

 

*As far as keeping up with new releases by creators, that's what blogs and Flickr (and the RSS feeds associated with them) are for. Though certainly group discounts are a sweet deal.

 

[eretyd]

Increase price for new things for paid users it's ok.
But why are you taking groups from basic? Think that then they will pay you? This is not true. It just hurts poor people. 300 USD it's pay for month work in my country.

[Adam Spark]

8 hours ago, Grumpity Linden said:

 

• Land prices:  Full estates get ~$20/mo reduction in price. For the first time we are also reducing GF/BD region pricing.  This is not a frivolous gift to the 1%. This has real and proven effects on the rents many more pay. 
   
• Premium prices are going up on June 24.  Starting June 3 and until June 24,  Premium accounts have 3 weeks to pre-pay an additional cycle of premium at the old rates.  Best deal is, of course, prepaying for annual regardless of your current level. We hope you can take advantage of it. If you’re paying quarterly today, you can continue as quarterly. We will no longer offer it to new premium signups.  With the new prices, VAT will be charged on monthly and quarterly but not annual (of course only in the countries where VAT applies)

• We’re not lowering limits out of spite, groups really are quite a strain on our back end for a variety of painful historical reasons, including overloading group functionality instead of having other tools.  This subject alone is worth a novel liberally sprinkled with tears. So anyway, we don’t hate basic users, and in fact we work hard to retain our free-to-play offering as one of the most generous across many industries. But yes, no big surprise, we do want to nudge active residents to become subscribers, because we think it’s a great value, and - as many have noted - we’re also running a business. But no, we're not shutting our doors to non-premium residents. Rumors of our insanity and villainy have been slightly exaggerated.  

With all due respect and appreciation for the work you have done that positively affects everyone, I am kind of sick of premium being treated like the only way one pays for their experience in Second Life. Just because I choose when and how much to spend on Linden Dollars does not mean I have not paid for the right to expect better than this. If groups are such a difficulty on the servers, isn't the onus on the company to make them not a difficulty? Figure out how to solve these problems - don't restrict our usage. Maybe groups need a face lift? Maybe the land access tools need to be updated as to not rely on groups? Maybe land needs its own special group offering that does not have some of the communication tools that are currently in every group? Maybe consumer/customer-based groups can be offered without land tools?

And remember this - What a free user cannot do impacts premium members. If a premium member owns a group, they are impacted by the number of folks that have room to join it.

Can we all just be classified and treated as your customers instead of constantly being divided up into basic users and premium users. Basic users, while not entirely, ARE paying for your product.

[Selene Gregoire]

1 hour ago, Amras Martynov said:

I guess my only real point here is that whilst I understand the hardships of maintaining a service using inefficient software (cheap to develop, expensive to run, especially on a multiplier as large as the Grid itself, etc.) I personally know for a fact (from experience) that there are far better ways to handle this. LL aren't stupid, they've got to know that unless whatever it is they've got planned insofar as additions to Premium happens to be exceptionally and uncharacteristically great, that this is going to bite them in the bum. Yet based on LL's track record to date, I cannot shake the feeling that whatever it is will ultimately be found very wanting indeed. For me, that's one of the most frustrating parts of being a SecondLife Resident in the first place: Knowing full-well that LL could do so much better, but for some reason or another, they never do, and so the daily concurrent user count continues to slowly dwindle as the years go by. This is just the latest and greatest episode of that running gag, I suppose.

Another kicker for me is that I also strongly suspect if the devs were the ones fully in charge, this sort of bizarre disconnect between the cultural ecosystem of a userbase and the policies which affect it (for better or worse, usually worse) very likely wouldn't be happening. It's nearly never the developers deciding stuff like this. It's almost always the financial Elites of the business with little-to-no programming knowledge or experience to speak of, what with their financial whips lashing the backs of the devs for not magicking more money for the corporate throne. Yeah okay, totally hyperbolic way of putting it, but still... There have indeed been platforms wherein the devs really were the ones running the show (SL itself, once upon a time) and they were always the best to be a part of in just about every way conceivable. Ah well...

This. So much this. 

[Fenimore Hapmouche]

40 minutes ago, Grumpity Linden said:

Sannita, you would not get charged VAT on your annual membership at all.  

@Grumpity Linden Why not? What is the taxation difference there?

[FaintOutline]

For myself the raise in premium seems a huge increase.   With the stipend -- a premium account was about $12 a year, now it will be close to $40.   I wonder if there is any thought of raising the stipend to 350 or so?

[Malin Sabra]

Seems as most of the big content creators don't mind about the price hikes, and of course the land barons don't mind. I think the group limitations on the basic members seems to be the issue most have.

Easy fix. Let basic members keep their 42 groups, but still lower their offline IMs. Problem solved. This would eliminate probably a good 50% of the unhappy people posting all over the internet.

What I posted on the other thread "$99 Problems" I still believe to be true.

But overall I can live with these changes. I'm still gonna pay my premium (Specially since I get to up it another year for same price woot!) and I'm still going to be here tomorrow. Everyone is just in shock right now as usual and will get over it and accept it. SL is like heroin and we are all junkies, no way out except rehab and even then you will probably be back

So I think just allow the basic members to retain their 42 groups and lets go do what we do on SL!

[RoryVenom]

8 hours ago, Grumpity Linden said:

We’re not lowering limits out of spite, groups really are quite a strain on our back end for a variety of painful historical reasons, including overloading group functionality instead of having other tools.  This subject alone is worth a novel liberally sprinkled with tears. So anyway, we don’t hate basic users, and in fact we work hard to retain our free-to-play offering as one of the most generous across many industries. But yes, no big surprise, we do want to nudge active residents to become subscribers, because we think it’s a great value, and - as many have noted - we’re also running a business. But no, we're not shutting our doors to non-premium residents. Rumors of our insanity and villainy have been slightly exaggerated.  

REDUCIN FREE & RAISING PREMIUM GROUPS SEEMS AGAINST WHAT YOU SAID HERE

you know if groups are hard on the system instead of reducin them how bout chargin more to make them?? isn't it like only 100L to make a group? So almost anyone can toss up a group just becuz the felt like it, MAKE IT HARDER TO MAKE A GROUP & they wouldn't be such a strain.

How bout make ppl prove they are valid group now, cuz tell me how many made a group & probably

1 - is neglectin it cuz they not here anymore or just don't care,

2 - they made it for 2 ppl or maybe more but don't use it anymore

3 - they just thought it was funny & now have nothin to do with it?

If they make us prove our group is valid in some way then who knows maybe like half the groups out there would be disabled & open up more room or whatever they do to hurt the system

PREMIUM ISN'T WORTH IT to me just to get more groups, I won't rent on mainland cuz I can't deal with the lag & it's usually always ugly nearby someone has some ugly thing up, seems no one monitors that anyone follows the rules

The new homes are nicer I admit, but hard to come by & I need more than 300 pitiful prims & I can rent cheaper & get fully decorated home if I wanted

it's cheaper to buy the 300L a week

so bout the only benefit I would get is more groups? oh wait get in events I rarely go to? See if I'm poor why would I go to events? I buy lindens or earn them if I can. So why pay out money for somethin doesn't benefit me really? I don't go to events so the suggestion of usin events may not help me I keep my favorite creators groups to keep up with any new stuff they make.

[Garnet Psaltery]

9 hours ago, Grumpity Linden said:

• Land prices:  Full estates get ~$20/mo reduction in price. For the first time we are also reducing GF/BD region pricing.  This is not a frivolous gift to the 1%. This has real and proven effects on the rents many more pay. 

I love you, Grumpity!  *cough*  I  mean, thank you very much.   Anything that helps with the 20% VAT I and some other region owners have to pay is welcome.

[Selene Gregoire]

26 minutes ago, Elvina Ewing said:

*I* didn't see any reduction on *my* rent. Not even a 1$. And my landlord seems to be doing just fine to this day. I was hoping he would indeed need to compete, but apparently not at all.

One of my favorite creators. I love your outfits. I just wish I could afford to buy more... and more.... and more...

 

/ends exceptionally rare fangirling

[Cackle Amore]

53 minutes ago, Bitsy Buccaneer said:

The inactive accounts won't lose groups, they'll stay at 42. They'll only go down to 35 if the owner logs back in and wants to join a new group badly enough to ditch 7 + 1 groups.

Unless I'm missing something here, this will penalise active basics without doing anything about the bigger problem of those already inactive.

Would an awareness campaign asking group owners to prune their groups help? There's a way to turn off the thumbnail pics in group chat, a friend helped me with that and it did improve things. Would LL consider dropping them altogether?

If user count in groups is a concern, perhaps this is a good chance to give groups a new feature to prune out inactive members, "If user hasn't logged on in so and so years" Personally, if such a option was present, I'd set it to like maybe 4/5 years, a pretty reasonable amount of wiggle room I feel. While those like @Jo Yardley would be able to set it to 1 year.

Basically it'd be a win win, group owners that want to, can prune out the inactives of what ever specific amount of years they fancy, and it'll steadily take off some of the load of groups for LL.

Perhaps in a more bold move, they could have it automatically apply to all groups and default to 10 years. I'm sure that'd help flush out a good handful of the most ancient of dead abandoned accounts from the many groups. Obviously of course, if they did that, would probably need to have it slowly roll out so not to overload with a sudden mass influx of accounts being kicked from groups.

@Grumpity Linden wink wink nudge nudge