Cost Of Name Changes Out Of The Bag

[Lucia Nightfire]

For those curious, there were 11209 surnames on that wiki, trending as follows

A: 496
B: 896
C: 713
D: 548
E: 260
F: 499
G: 518
H: 597
I: 147
J: 211
K: 496
L: 558
M: 897
N: 242
O: 233
P: 549
Q: 73
R: 535
S: 1110
T: 441
U: 249
V: 212
W: 417
X: 38
Y: 104
Z: 170

Too bad they didn't include the start and end dates each was available for.

Edited December 17, 2019 by Lucia Nightfire

[Amanda Crisp]

I really wish that any unclaimed name combinations using *original* last-names could be opened back up.

 

[CheriColette]

5 hours ago, Garnet Psaltery said:

  If by some extraordinary luck I won, the problem for me would be deciding if I actually wanted that name.

I have the same problem but entered just for the fun of it.

And it was a shame that there wasnt a place on the entry form to say why we entering that name (like you have here). Good luck with yours.

Mine is: Curator (a keeper or custodian of our Avi)

 

 

[Mollymews]

i went with

Ardern (Jacinda. New Zealand Prime Minister)
Thunberg (Greta. environmental activist)
Rapinoe (Megan. USA women soccer captain)

i typed the whole line into the boxes, including the description in the brackets

if Linden do include these last names then I hope/suspect that anyone who does try to enter the real first name of these people will get informed that the whole name is unavailable

[Syo Emerald]

Thats probably the most expensive name change I have ever seen. 

But what annoys me the most is, that you have to be premium member. Completely useless additional barrier. 

[Alwin Alcott]

2 hours ago, Lucia Nightfire said:

Too bad they didn't include the start and end dates each was available for.

have a look here for more info about the names , some names were already old in that day so in that case missing dates.

[Alwin Alcott]

1 hour ago, Syo Emerald said:

Thats probably the most expensive name change I have ever seen. 

But what annoys me the most is, that you have to be premium member. Completely useless additional barrier. 

perhaps like the event fees, offer the premiums a ten dollar rebate, but open it to all residents. (resident as member, not excluding legacy)

[Alwin Alcott]

1 hour ago, Mollymews said:

Thunberg

like many don't want to talk to Trump voters and put that in their profile , i'd ban and block everyone, who uses this name to make a statement.  🚩

[Wulfie Reanimator]

3 hours ago, AmandaKeen said:

I really wish that any unclaimed name combinations using *original* last-names could be opened back up.

This... I'd pay twice the amount, but I'm also holding out hope that some specific last names make a return eventually. Until then I'll probably not change my name unless there's something clever to use. 

Edited December 17, 2019 by Wulfie Reanimator

[Orwar]

   $40, and picking from a premade list?

   My first SL account was made back when you could still write your name as two parts on sign-up. When I decided to give SL another go and wanted a fresh start, that was no longer possible. I didn't get why, but I figured that since the first name I wanted (i.e. my name), I'd just go with that - and add the surname I wanted in my display name.

   I just don't get the point, since you can put whatever you like in your display name anyway. I also don't get why they ever stopped allowing two-part names to begin with.

[BelindaN]

5 minutes ago, Orwar said:

   $40, and picking from a premade list?

   My first SL account was made back when you could still write your name as two parts on sign-up. When I decided to give SL another go and wanted a fresh start, that was no longer possible. I didn't get why, but I figured that since the first name I wanted (i.e. my name), I'd just go with that - and add the surname I wanted in my display name.

   I just don't get the point, since you can put whatever you like in your display name anyway. I also don't get why they ever stopped allowing two-part names to begin with.

Maybe I'm missing something but I still don't get what the fuss is about? Ok if they made Newell one of the surnames I might go for it, but really? Is it such a big deal? Why????

[missyrideout]

51 minutes ago, BelindaN said:

Maybe I'm missing something but I still don't get what the fuss is about? Ok if they made Newell one of the surnames I might go for it, but really? Is it such a big deal? Why????

13 pages in which many people offered personal reasons as to why it matters to them. 

 

[Wulfie Reanimator]

54 minutes ago, Orwar said:

I also don't get why they ever stopped allowing two-part names to begin with.

This is just a pure guess, but it could be the same reason why they removed last names altogether. It made it harder for new users to finish the sign-up process and integrate with SL.

Coming up with a name is hard, especially when you already have an online alias but it isn't available. Coming up with two names is even harder.

Changing last names to be picked from a preset list got rid of a thing called "overchoice," at least half of it. This didn't solve the problem though, because you still had to choose two names. If you didn't like any of the names available, you were stuck with a name you don't like and you're more likely to quit before you find reasons to stay. This is why the last name choice was eventually removed.

Bonus rambling: As for the reason why Premium is required to change your name (instead of one fee of $50), it's a way of getting you to try Premium even if you've never had it before. If they wanted better optics, they could've just offered "one month of free Premium when you change your name," but that would've encouraged name changes, which LL specifically doesn't want to do. The target audience for name changes are people who are already invested in SL (not necessarily monetarily, but in such a way that they aren't going to be leaving anytime soon).

[Solar Legion]

Entered in my own suggestion and would happily take up the offer of the name change, despite the sentimental value of my current name.

The suggested last name? Morningdale.

[Maryanne Solo]

Linden McLindenface ^^? ☺️

[Syo Emerald]

1 hour ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

Coming up with a name is hard

Well, its not like it got easier. If you create an account today, your creativity has to compete with the creativity and taste of everyone who created an account in the past ~9 years of SL. With lastnames you had at least the hope that your favorite name isn't taken on at least one of the lastnames.

[Syo Emerald]

2 hours ago, Alwin Alcott said:

like many don't want to talk to Trump voters and put that in their profile , i'd ban and block everyone, who uses this name to make a statement.  🚩

No, no! Give us the "Trump" lastname aswell, then sit back and watch them fight!

[CaerolleClaudel]

1 hour ago, Wulfie Reanimator said:

This is just a pure guess, but it could be the same reason why they removed last names altogether. It made it harder for new users to finish the sign-up process and integrate with SL.

Coming up with a name is hard, especially when you already have an online alias but it isn't available. Coming up with two names is even harder.

Changing last names to be picked from a preset list got rid of a thing called "overchoice," at least half of it. This didn't solve the problem though, because you still had to choose two names. If you didn't like any of the names available, you were stuck with a name you don't like and you're more likely to quit before you find reasons to stay. This is why the last name choice was eventually removed.

Bonus rambling: As for the reason why Premium is required to change your name (instead of one fee of $50), it's a way of getting you to try Premium even if you've never had it before. If they wanted better optics, they could've just offered "one month of free Premium when you change your name," but that would've encouraged name changes, which LL specifically doesn't want to do. The target audience for name changes are people who are already invested in SL (not necessarily monetarily, but in such a way that they aren't going to be leaving anytime soon).

If only choosing a last name was the biggest obstacle to integrating with SL. Everything is so complicated and opaque, especially if you are going mesh, and though they have a few tutorials when you first land in-world, you have to put in a huge amount of work to figure things out. You really have to want to be in SL and work at it to really get much out of it.

[Ivanova Shostakovich]

44 minutes ago, Syo Emerald said:

No, no! Give us the "Trump" lastname aswell, then sit back and watch them fight!

Edited December 17, 2019 by Ivanova Shostakovich

[cheesecurd]

40$

lmao are they serious?

that is above and beyond too much money, I could understand maybe 10$ if names were extremely finite, but paying 40$ to lock yourself to a specific last name you can’t even customize yourself is absolutely insane 

if I’m paying 40$ I expect to be able to type whatever I want into two text fields and have it show up ingame, even then 40$ would be a bit steep

in comparison a name change on Roblox, a very popular game with limited usernames left due to there being over 250 million accounts, costs you 10$

Runescape, another popular game with limited usernames, it costs you a bond which is 7$, or it’s free each month if you’re already a member 

Yall are being played, hard. There is no excuse to have to pay this much money to change your username and no excuse for usernames that are not fully customizable. 

[Beth Macbain]

I'd happily pay $40 for an eye roll reaction emoticon right now. 

 

[Alwin Alcott]

4 minutes ago, cheesecurd said:

in comparison a name change on ....

....... another popular game with limited usernames, it costs you .....

 

perhaps not noticed, but this is Second Life, not one you mention... go for namechange there?... LL wants to bills this amount.. their loss if many skip it.
Nobody forces or demands you change your name, everybody is totally free to get premium or accept the costs for this.

And for the totally customizable name?.. use the display name function, totally free, for premium and basics..and you even can use some unreadable unusefull fonts.

[Eva Knoller]

$40 seems reasonable to me. Like someone said above, they probably want to make it a bit cost prohibitive so people aren’t changing every week. I’m not that attached to Knoller, so I’ll change if something better is available.

[Qie Niangao]

10 hours ago, Mollymews said:

11 hours ago, Pamela Galli said:

So when someone contacts me about something they bought on their original name, is there going to be a way to check that? 

i think so.  From what I take out of Oz Linden's previous is that with LSL then the llName2Key() function will return the same avatar uuid for our current name as it will for any previous names we might have had.  llKey2Name() will return our current name

i think that with Marketplace then the avatar uuid will (or should be) surfaced a bit more prominently.  Prominent in the sense that from the merchant accounting pov, account numbers (uuids) will be used more commonly than they maybe have in the past

i think that lots of merchants will have a llName2Key() utility script in their inventory.  Betty Boo says they used to be  BettyBoo Resident. llName2Key() will confirm this 

Right. Well, not llName2Key() exactly, which will continue to work only on avatars in the current region, but instead llRequestUserKey(). I guess there's a potential problem when Sally Newname says "check my history" without revealing her old name. If that history only knows old names, it can't be searched directly. Instead, the whole history would have to be scanned row-by-row to get the UUID of each old name until one matches Sally's key.

Because you really don't want to keep doing that, you'll migrate any such history to be keyed by UUID instead of name.

Just in case it's ever useful, here's a quick-and-dirty script I just wrote that I expect will behave appropriately come name changes:

integer chan;
integer listenHandle;
key nameQuery;
key toucher;
string queryName;
integer awaitingQueryResponse;

doTextBox()
{
    llTextBox(toucher, "Of whose name do you want the key?", chan);
    llSetTimerEvent(600.0); // ten minutes to enter the name
    awaitingQueryResponse = FALSE;
}

default
{
    state_entry()
    {
        chan = -500000000 - (integer)llFrand(1500000000.0);
    }
    touch_start(integer total_number)
    {
        toucher = llDetectedKey(0); // probably the owner, but keep options open
        state touched;  // too lazy to multiplex touchers, so one at a time
    }
}

state touched
{
    state_entry()
    {
        llListenRemove(listenHandle);
        listenHandle = llListen(chan, "", toucher, "");
        doTextBox();
    }
    listen(integer channel, string name, key id, string text)
    {
        nameQuery = llRequestUserKey(queryName = llStringTrim(text, STRING_TRIM));
        awaitingQueryResponse = TRUE;
        llSetTimerEvent(5.0);   // some dataserver delay possible
    }
    dataserver(key request_id, string data)
    {
        awaitingQueryResponse = FALSE;
        llRegionSayTo(toucher, 0, llList2String(
            [ queryName + " ( secondlife:///app/agent/"+data+"/inspect ) has key "+data
            , "No key found for name \""+queryName+"\""
            ], NULL_KEY == (key)data));
        doTextBox();
    }
    timer()
    {
        if (awaitingQueryResponse)
        {
            llRegionSayTo(toucher, 0, "No response to query for name \""+queryName+"\"");
            doTextBox();
        }
        else    // awaiting textbox response from user
            state default;
    }       
    state_exit()
    {
        llListenRemove(listenHandle);
    }
}

(I'd hide that behind a tag if I could remember how that works. Why don't we have a button for that anyway?)

[ETA: You probably don't really want to wait 600 seconds for a textbox response from the user before allowing the next touch. Might also allow "submit" of an empty textbox to reset back to default state, unless that timeout is short enough it doesn't matter.]

Edited December 17, 2019 by Qie Niangao

[Alyona Su]

They know what they're doing. If $40 is too pricy for you then don't do it; you're not the target customer. There will be a lot of people willing to spend that money to do it. Linden Lab has data we don't know about and that likely includes the forecast number of people willing to spend different amounts for this service. They have chosen the most profitable with regard to revenue-to-cost ratio, and remember that a large chunk of that cost was all the development time in making this service available to begin with. They also know very well this is more likely than not, a one-time-only ever thing for the majority of people. 

For many people, whatever your name is, it is a very important part of your second life. For some people it is important enough to make such an investment into a quality name-change. 

Just because you feel it is too pricey doesn't mean it's the wrong price. It simply means the price-to-value ratio does not jive for you.