So your club is not doing so well....A guide to better club owning

[lonewolfryder]

So many clubs some and go in secondlife. Why do some succeed and many many many clubs fail?

Many club owners figure if they build it .....they (( patrons )) will come. That's the field of dreams mentallity right there:

 

If you build it, they MAY come but there is sooooo much more to running a successful club in second life.

First, you need good staff. DJ's that live for music, Hosts that are chatty and keep the audience entertained or at least involved. I may make another guide on how to obtain quality staff, but for real it is not that difficult to find staff who shows up for their sets and actually will care about your business.

That being said many club owners open clubs dreaming of dollar signs, lindens dancing around in their heads. The fact is most clubs will bleed money, so if you are in it for L's you may wish to rethink your club dreams. Sure some adult clubs turn a profit if well run and the owner knows how to hire quality adult staff and how to PROMOTE the club. I personally know of several who do run profitable clubs. Yet the vast majority of clubs do not turn a profit. My advice is to open a club only if you have a Passion for nightclubs in second life.

I will do a follow-up guide on how to promote your club in second life, that is a whole other beast of a topic to handle in one posting.

You are going to want to think about your hiring process. Are you using apps? Are you also doing interviews? If you do interviews make sure the person doing the interviewing knows everything the JOB entails. I once had a hostess manager "Interview" me for a dj gig, she knew nothing about being a DJ whatsoever other than we play music. Also if you do interviews with prospective staff try not to repeat questions already answered in your physical application, this is highly annoying and will just send quality staff away as no one wants to waste their time.

Do think about how you want to run your business. If you overuse managers and make yourself not approachable by your staff, your staff is likely not going to get close to you nor care overly much about your business. This is more so with NEW clubs. Many new club owners decide to hire 1000 managers for every micro detail of their club then make a rule to go to these people with any issue they have about the club. No manager is going to put the level of care into your business that you yourself will! Some issues will need to be addressed by you and you alone. You want your staff to be able to approach you. This fosters a feeling of belonging, of a unit. Sure you can hire a DJ manager who knows everything about DJing and can attend to say Dj's needs in your club, or a hostess manager who knows his or her trade inside and out, this is a good thing. A bad thing is where you have 12000 managers and state you will not be there if the staff has an issue but to go to one of the 12000 managers you for some reason decided to hire.

Another thing is how you treat your staff. Treat them with respect and they should in turn treat you with the same courtesy. I have been in clubs that constantly hound staff via IMs to fill in slots they (( as the club owner )) failed to hire someone for. If you need fill in's put a notice out to your staff but do not hound them for fill in's on a daily basis. You will quickly burn the remaining staff you have if you go this route of hounding staff to fill the voids in your schedule. If you are short on staff for slots do your job and find some new hires, do not stress out, and burn out the staff you already have over your failures to find enough hires.

Hiring staff who already have VIPs is for sure a nice thing, yet there is one key thing to remember here, those visitors who come in for said staff members tend to be "followers" of that staff member only and may never return to your club other than for said staff members set. You also have to advertise your own club. I notice roughly 95% of all clubs these days fail to advertise and promote their own club. I have in the past tried to help owners like these learn how to promote their clubs, sadly few ever listened thinking they can do it the field of dreams way, build it and they will come mentality. This frame of mind leads to this:

 

You must ALWAYS promote your club! This however takes work. I have noticed most club owners have an allergic reaction to "work" to ensure that their club succeeds.

If you rely only on staff to get your club bumping, your club is often going to be empty. It takes a mix of you + your staff's effort. The good news is yes your staff can actually help you promote your club. And they should as part of being your club's staff, but you too have work to do in this area.

If you have a club and have any of these issues going on right now you have an issue with how you run your own club:

 

• Staff continually or often fails to even show up for their own sets
• Your club is often dead or has very few people at sets or events
• You have staff quitting very often, IE a revolving door of staff
• Your staff does not care about your business at all
• Staff quits your establishment without telling you why they choose to end their business relationship with you.

 

Any of these issues is a problem directly in MOST cases with how YOU are running your club. You are not having a bad luck streak, you are doing it wrong.

Also do note that people enjoy a club that looks good. Ask people you care about for honest opinions on how your club is laid out and looks. Create a place people want to be. A good example here would be Club Mavi, she worked hard to create an atmosphere. Many of the better clubs in SL part of their success believe it or not is simply two or three things:

The club has excellent staff so patrons want to come back for the experience

The club is laid out very well, it is visually appealing to patrons.

The club owner + Staff both promote the club itself + every single set that is happening.

This guide is not exhaustive there is much more to it than what I have laid out here, but these are your basic building blocks to a successful club.

 

One last bit of advice , make sure you optimize your parcel for search. In the property description add the key words people may be searching for in second life. If your club plays some hard to find music for example say Slap house, Soca, Future bass as just examples you may want to put these "key words" into your parcels description. It helps your potential customers find your business! Also do run a classified in second life, it is mega cheap I think last time I did so it was like 100 L a week. In said classified put in a bit about your club and what genres of music you offer and if enough room left some details about your club.

 

Edited October 30, 2021 by lonewolfryder

[Chroma Starlight]

35 minutes ago, lonewolfryder said:

So many clubs some and go in secondlife. Why do some succeed and many many many clubs fail?

I believe that a club is a community, not a business. And so, it must succeed first as a community before it even makes sense as a business. You go to most of these places, they're just empty. Not a soul around. That's not community, is it. It's a waste of space, squandered potential, emptiness. Why do so many people persist in thinking we need more clubs when all the clubs are basically abandoned anyway? Ghosts towns. Where are the ghosts?

Edited October 30, 2021 by Chroma Starlight
That's why Luskwood is an eternal abject failboat forever. They didn't even try to get community right, did they. Did they? No, they failed because they were greedy narcissists.

[lonewolfryder]

Promoting your own club in secondlife

1) Use the forums! There is an event section here, there is even an adult event section. People do use these to find new places to go. Posting does not take very long at all, it is one more tool in your "arsenal" of promotion!

 

 

2) Use SL events for every single set you do! You yourself can only post I believe 4 per day so this is where your staff comes into play. Under the group your land is under you want your staff always in this group. Click on "allow event hosting" under group roles, Doing this allows your staff to use SL events to post their sets. SL events can be found here:

https://secondlife.com/my/community/events/index.php?lang=en-US

Once on this page your going to look for the link "Create event". It will ask what time said event (( set )) is and what date. It is here you want to fill in the details, put as much detail as possible ! You for sure what to list what type of music is being played! No one wants to TP into some unknown club for music they may hate! Waste of peeps time and they likely wont come check out the club if they do not know what to expect music wise. 99% of ALL FAIL BOAT clubs fail to post their sets to SL events page. You do want people to find your club don't you?

 

3) Use SL spam groups for parties ! Sure these have less traction than they used to back in their hayday, but you can still get new traffic going this route. You can even hire a bot that is scipted to spam the sl party and event groups in world at specified times. I think if I recall correctly these bots cost about $500 L per week, but they are well worth it! Also please avoid spamming non party / non event groups, it just makes you + your club look like bad citizens of second life.

 

4) SL radio stations that drop your Landmark into local chat. This requires you make or hire someone to make a recorded mp3 radio advertisement. Set it low catchy music with a voice over about why people should check out your club. When people hear the radio advert iin world the landmark to the club will drop into local chat. I personally used this to great effect when I owned my own (( very successful club )) in secondlife. This traffic method does cost you Ls but it is money well spent.

 

5) Flicker ! is your club photogenic? Make a flicker page for your club! You can even think outside the box here and offer a photo contest for your club , offering SL photograhpers the chance to win a $L prize for best picture inside your club. I did this and required all pics have the club name and URL (( landmark)) posted to the picture. Our clubs photos ended up in 100s of SL flicker groups! Seen by many. We got a good bump in traffic from people curious about the venue, some became regulars, was not a bad investment for $1500 L!

 

6) This one can be difficult, but try to get your club listed in SL destinations. Your SL family, friends and staff can help here by submitting your club to the SL destinations guide. If your club looks good, offers something special Linden Labs may very well add to the offical destinations page.

 

This is just 5 traffic methods.

 

Edited October 30, 2021 by lonewolfryder
Spelling lol

[lonewolfryder]

Just now, Chroma Starlight said:

I think a club is a community, not a business. And so, it must succeed first as a community before it even makes sense as a business.

 

indeed ! However I see it as a mix of both, a marridge if you will. If you foster the right enviroment, people will join your clubs group and want to belong, participate and even bring their friends.

[Ceka Cianci]

What's the name of your club?

[Chroma Starlight]

27 minutes ago, lonewolfryder said:

indeed ! However I see it as a mix of both, a marridge if you will. If you foster the right enviroment, people will join your clubs group and want to belong, participate and even bring their friends.

Well, then why aren't there more successful clubs in the furry/anthro/fantasy scene?

[lonewolfryder]

1 minute ago, Ceka Cianci said:

What's the name of your club?

It closed when we left SL. We used to pack in on a good night 60 people, it was a R&B and Hip Hop & Soca & Dancehall club. Me and the wifey are rethinking reopening, but clubs are a ton of work so I am debating taking that dive again. It was well worth it though. We miss the vibe we had going. We only closed it down due to real life which took us out of SL for a time.

[lonewolfryder]

5 minutes ago, Chroma Starlight said:

Well, then why aren't there more successful clubs in the furry/anthro/fantasy scene?

No idea there as I have never been involved in that community of second life. Having never been a furry / anthro nor into fantasy I would be a bad person to ask. I can only speak to the things I have done and did well.

[Ceka Cianci]

I was HM at GOL Elements for a time and worked there for a few years.. They may have been gone before your club though..

They were in the top of the search for years.. You wanna talk about drama.. Clubs are the breeding ground.. hehehe

That alone keeps me from ever trying it again.. hehehe

[lonewolfryder]

1 minute ago, Ceka Cianci said:

I was HM at GOL Elements for a time and worked there for a few years.. They may have been gone before your club though..

They were in the top of the search for years.. You wanna talk about drama.. Clubs are the breeding ground.. hehehe

That alone keeps me from ever trying it again.. hehehe

 We had the drama down low key as I do not tolerate it all. I don't even do warnings, people just get gone if they act the fool in any place I run. Our club was for the grown and sexy who knew how to behave according to accepted cultural norms.

[Kathlen Onyx]

You forgot an important aspect of running a successful club people want to go to and tip. Quit begging for money every five minutes from your customers. Honestly it has made me tip LESS because of this. Now you not only have to tip the DJ and Host you are expected to tip the venue and some clubs now have separate "dance leaders" that work the dances you are expected to tip. If it's a live singer their manager and host and dancers if they have them. Venue tip jars are each corner of the venue...really? Are we that clueless we can't find a tip jar? We need four of them for the venue?  Then you have the clubs that spam local with guilt message about how DJ's expect to be paid and if you request a song you are required to tip.  Those clubs I leave immediately.

If you can't afford your tier without donations you shouldn't be running a club.

 

Edited October 30, 2021 by Sam1 Bellisserian

[lonewolfryder]

17 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

You forgot an important aspect of running a successful club people want to go to and tip. Quit begging for money every five minutes from your customers. Honestly it has made me tip LESS because of this. Now you not only have to tip the DJ and Host you are expected to tip the venue and some clubs now have separate "dance leaders" that work the dances you are expected to tip. If it's a live singer their manager and host and dancers if they have them. Venue tip jars are each corner of the venue...really? Are we that clueless we can't find a tip jar? We need four of them for the venue?  Then you have the clubs that spam local with guilt message about how DJ's expect to be paid and if you request a song you are required to tip.  Those clubs I leave immediately.

If you can't afford your tier without donations you shouldn't be running a club.

 

 This is true, overly spamming for donations is a total mood and vibe killer and a turn off.

Now on "tipping" your DJ when they play a song for your entertainment, is the DJ having to download a song just for you? Many DJs in SL actually pay for their music, I do ! Many do not rip from youtube as that is priacy and is illegal, not to mention the sound on youtube rips is often subpar.  IE they do not have the song already? This creates work for a DJ and adds yet another song to his or her already large music libary. In this situation the proper thing to do is to show some love (( a tip doesn't have to be big )) to the one working for you. Not doing so is to a degree not a classy move.

And yes club owners should be able to afford the tier for their clubs or not bother opening them, as i clearly stated in the OP most clubs bleed money (( meaning your expenses including tier out weigh that which one "pulls" in))

[Kimmi Zehetbauer]

15 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

You forgot an important aspect of running a successful club people want to go to and tip. Quit begging for money every five minutes from your customers. Honestly it has made me tip LESS because of this. Now you not only have to tip the DJ and Host you are expected to tip the venue and some clubs now have separate "dance leaders" that work the dances you are expected to tip. If it's a live singer their manager and host and dancers if they have them. Venue tip jars are each corner of the venue...really? Are we that clueless we can't find a tip jar? We need four of them for the venue?  Then you have the clubs that spam local with guilt message about how DJ's expect to be paid and if you request a song you are required to tip.  Those clubs I leave immediately.

If you can't afford your tier without donations you shouldn't be running a club.

When I ran my club --- it was mainly live music and it was a one-woman operation - me! I ran the place to help support live music and enjoy the performers that played there. I was not in it for the money, but more for a local hang out. I have had some come in and say "you're running this wrong, need managers, hosts, etc" and I tell them to take a hike. Although the club had a tip jar, I never begged anyone to tip it and even had it to one side of the building. If someone felt like tipping, that was their own doing. I sold the club off when I was not well enough to keep going and discouraged when I caught one of the performers playing a recording instead of being live.

My man used to play at another club that's been around for some time and it was similar, a place to hang out. That came to an end due to owner having some serious issues and caused drama.

[Kathlen Onyx]

18 minutes ago, lonewolfryder said:

 This is true, overly spamming for donations is a total mood and vibe killer and a turn off.

Now on "tipping" your DJ when they play a song for your entertainment, is the DJ having to download a song just for you? Many DJs in SL actually pay for their music, I do ! Many do not rip from youtube as that is priacy and is illegal, not to mention the sound on youtube rips is often subpar.  IE they do not have the song already? This creates work for a DJ and adds yet another song to his or her already large music libary. In this situation the proper thing to do is to show some love (( a tip doesn't have to be big )) to the one working for you. Not doing so is to a degree not a classy move.

And yes club owners should be able to afford the tier for their clubs or not bother opening them, as i clearly stated in the OP most clubs bleed money (( meaning your expenses including tier out weigh that which one "pulls" in))

I always tip if I request a song. More if the song is something that I know that they might have to download. I just don't want to be guilted into it. If you require payment for a request then just outright say it. I don't need to know why every 5 minutes. 

The problem is that all the DJ's are the same. The only difference is the voice.  I wish I could find a club that the DJ actually put some effort into it. I know a DJ that doesn't play in SL but in Opensim that has a little quip for a song or something interesting to mention about the origin of the band or singer.  It's very entertaining and it keeps my interest. There are very few clubs that have DJ's that do that.  Also, hosts that only say hi when you come in and never talk to you again and just chat it up with their friends don't get tips from me. Do something to engage local chat that includes everyone. Make me want to come back, more so come back and tip YOU.

The only reason that some of these clubs in SL (and we all know who they are) are still in business is longevity.  They are entertaining but really nothing special. 

Edited October 30, 2021 by Sam1 Bellisserian

[Ceka Cianci]

46 minutes ago, lonewolfryder said:

 We had the drama down low key as I do not tolerate it all. I don't even do warnings, people just get gone if they act the fool in any place I run. Our club was for the grown and sexy who knew how to behave according to accepted cultural norms.

I guess it depends on how big your staff is as to how well it can be controlled..

We had over 250 in our staff group alone, then the management group on top of that..

It was a huge place though which took over 20 sims..  He had a huge mall and then the resident sims.. It was more like an enterprise than just a club.. hehehe

I know it wore me out when I was HM.. Enough to make me forget about ever working for any club again.. It felt more like work than my RL job at the time..hehehe

[lonewolfryder]

18 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

I always tip if I request a song. More if the song is something that I know that they might have to download. I just don't want to be guilted into it. If you require payment for a request then just outright say it. I don't need to know why every 5 minutes. 

The problem is that all the DJ's are the same. The only difference is the voice.  I wish I could find a club that the DJ actually put some effort into it. I know a DJ that doesn't play in SL but in Opensim that has a little quip for a song or something interesting to mention about the origin of the band or singer.  It's very entertaining and it keeps my interest. There are very few clubs that have DJ's that do that.  Also, hosts that only say hi when you come in and never talk to you again and just chat it up with their friends don't get tips from me. Do something to engage local chat that includes everyone. Make me want to come back.

The only reason that some of these clubs in SL (and we all know who they are) are still in business is longevity.  They are entertaining but really nothing special. 

 Me I always put effort into my sets, I create them often times ahead of time and even key them to be harmonious. All music falls into 24 "keys" ranging from 1a to 12B, for example you can play a 3B song then your next track should be a 3A or a 4A which is closest in "keys" to the last played 3B song. All my music is keyed like the set i am making right now the track I just dropped into the set is :

DJ Surda x Selena Gomez - Lose You To Love Me [J Bruus Remix] [Clean] 1B 125

 

so following that with:

DJ Allan Vs. Cyndi Lauper x ASOX & Reverse Prime - Girls Just Want To Have Fun [Bouncer Bootleg] [Intro Clean] 2A 126

 

Notice the BMP is close to the last too ( 125 and 126 )

Some djs just clobber together any old song (( often pirated youtube DLs! Yuck!)) , while some of us however take pride in the craft of doing a well made set. Also for example with my sets your not gonna hear those songs for the most part on you tube as they are remixes and club cuts from dj only music pools.

So not all DJs are the same, some of us like those of us who say remix live for example put extreme care into any set we do. it can be hard as a DJ live mixing to keep up with everything going on in the club, our primary focus is to deliver some eargasims, and try to keep up with the crowd during this entire process all the while taking in requests that we may not have the track for which requires us to download from a reputable site.

Edited October 30, 2021 by lonewolfryder

[Kimmi Zehetbauer]

10 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

I always tip if I request a song. More if the song is something that I know that they might have to download. I just don't want to be guilted into it. If you require payment for a request then just outright say it. I don't need to know why every 5 minutes. 

The problem is that all the DJ's are the same. The only difference is the voice.  I wish I could find a club that the DJ actually put some effort into it. I know a DJ that doesn't play in SL but in Opensim that has a little quip for a song or something interesting to mention about the origin of the band or singer.  It's very entertaining and it keeps my interest. There are very few clubs that have DJ's that do that.  Also, hosts that only say hi when you come in and never talk to you again and just chat it up with their friends don't get tips from me. Do something to engage local chat that includes everyone. Make me want to come back, more so come back and tip YOU.

The only reason that some of these clubs in SL (and we all know who they are) are still in business is longevity.  They are entertaining but really nothing special. 

My man when he DJed always put thoughts on the sets.  And sometimes a theme. For awhile he did a thing along with another DJ called the Top 10 at 7 where 10 songs were taken from a chart from the 60s and 70s like Billboard or a Keener Guide any play those. Sometimes we discover some little played gems. Every song was announced or back announced and no talking was done over the song.

Our music library is rather large and can fit most any request, if we didn't have the song he would PM the person for an alternative one and note the requested song down to grab from the DJ pool later. Much of the music came from CDs or record we bought in bulk from a few record stores that closed up and my daughter would put them on the server. No YT stuff. Sad when you see other DJs play a song and the title shows something like "My SL - Joe and the Lindens (HD with lyrics)."

[lonewolfryder]

27 minutes ago, Kimmi Zehetbauer said:

Sad when you see other DJs play a song and the title shows something like "My SL - Joe and the Lindens (HD with lyrics)."

Yep those kind are not DJs, they just youtube pirates dropping random songs into a random playlist. If you can't afford vinyl or to join a DJ pool (( you pay a monthly membership to download legal tracks with high quality sound )) and your just a youtube pirate ya not really a DJ.

Edited October 30, 2021 by lonewolfryder

[tailpa]

1 hour ago, lonewolfryder said:

Yep those kind are not DJs, they just youtube pirates dropping random songs into a random playlist. If you can't afford vinyl or to join a DJ pool (( you pay a monthly membership to download legal tracks with high quality sound )) and your just a youtube pirate ya not really a DJ.

I believe context matters. If it's simply a small gathering of friends sharing music they love and there's no profit being derived, that's very different from a commercial operation whose profits are derived from the content they spin.

Google handles all licensing. Isn't "youtube pirate" an oxymoron?

What is piracy? What does this symbol mean?

Quote

Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable goods. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, while the dedicated ships that pirates use are called pirate ships. The earliest documented instances of piracy were in the 14th century BC, when the Sea Peoples, a group of ocean raiders, attacked the ships of the Aegean and Mediterranean civilizations. Narrow channels which funnel shipping into predictable routes have long created opportunities for piracy,^[1] as well as for privateering and commerce raiding.

Historic examples include the waters of Gibraltar, the Strait of Malacca, Madagascar, the Gulf of Aden, and the English Channel, whose geographic structures facilitated pirate attacks.^[2] A land-based parallel is the ambushing of travelers by bandits and brigands in highways and mountain passes.^[3] Privateering uses similar methods to piracy, but the captain acts under orders of the state authorizing the capture of merchant ships belonging to an enemy nation, making it a legitimate form of war-like activity by non-state actors.

While the term can include acts committed in the air, on land (especially across national borders or in connection with taking over and robbing a car or train), or in other major bodies of water or on a shore, in cyberspace, as well as the fictional possibility of space piracy, it generally refers to maritime piracy. It does not normally include crimes committed against people traveling on the same vessel as the perpetrator (e.g. one passenger stealing from others on the same vessel).

(from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piracy )

And so it seems theft of goods, violence, and/or hijacking are necessary components of piracy's root meaning.

Playing a song is not theft. Playing a song to friends is not theft. Making a mixtape of songs you own is not theft, not is it true duplication or anticompetetive market offering. Playing a mixtape of songs to a friend is not theft. Loaning the friend the mixtape is not theft. Loaning the friend the LP record is not theft. Someone hearing your song play because your window is open is not theft. Taking the song and creating what's intended as a forgery of the original good, or claiming that it is yours or that you can do whatever you please with it commercially is probably something like piracy.

[lonewolfryder]

15 minutes ago, tailpa said:

I believe context matters. If it's simply a small gathering of friends sharing music they love and there's no profit being derived, that's very different from a commercial operation whose profits are derived from the content they spin.

Google handles all licensing. Isn't "youtube pirate" an oxymoron?

What is piracy? What does this symbol mean?

And so it seems theft of goods, violence, and/or hijacking are necessary components of piracy's root meaning.

Playing a song is not theft. Playing a song to friends is not theft. Making a mixtape of songs you own is not theft, not is it true duplication or anticompetetive market offering. Playing a mixtape of songs to a friend is not theft. Loaning the friend the mixtape is not theft. Loaning the friend the LP record is not theft. Someone hearing your song play because your window is open is not theft. Taking the song and creating what's intended as a forgery of the original good, or claiming that it is yours or that you can do whatever you please with it commercially is probably something like piracy.

  Actually YES downloading through a 3rd party is piracy ! the artists whose songs are on youtube they get a % of the ad revenue. learn how the business works before commenting lmao. If your using a 3rd party software to rip the " sound" IE play the youtube video then run the URL through 3rd party software to steal " the sound" converting it into an MP3 (( you tube is noit mp3 it is video media )) you are STEALING ! those artists sell their songs to make MONEY ! bypassing legal means to obtain the music is well duh stealing lol. You can BUY every single track on youtube. when you run a music video URL into a 3rd party website you are fully aware you are not PAYING for the music. If the artist intended you to DOWNLOAD the song there would be a DOWNLOAD button no?

 

Theft is Theft no matter how you justify it. Are you just IGNORANT of how many so called SL DJ's obtain their music? it has gotten so bad club owners need to ask DJs to have "clean music titles

 

as a prior poster said:

Sad when you see other DJs play a song and the title shows something like "My SL - Joe and the Lindens (HD with lyrics)."   that right there is a song ripped and stolen from youtube ! did the artist get paid for that download? Um NOOOOO he or she did NOT !!!!!

 

You just seem to want to justify priacy. Priacy when it comes to online content is defined as someone who illegally downloads the material in question without paying for it lol.

 

Nice try Bruh to justify out right theft !~

[Alwin Alcott]

24 minutes ago, tailpa said:

I believe context matters. If it's simply a small gathering of friends sharing music they love
 

thats no club and no DJ but a songchanger with friends.

 

25 minutes ago, tailpa said:

Playing a song to friends is not theft.

 Playing a mixtape of songs to a friend is not theft.
Loaning the friend the mixtape is not theft.
Loaning the friend the LP record is not theft.
 

yes it is,
sold music without license to make it public is theft.
ALL consumers music is for home and home living family only. Visiting persons at your home while you have music on is OK, but specially visiting people fór hearing your music goes over the limit of home use.

[lonewolfryder]

24 minutes ago, tailpa said:

Google handles all licensing. Isn't "youtube pirate" an oxymoron?

 

Um on youtube all videos viewed get the artist paid, educate yourself ! Googles "Licensing is not an open invitation to download the music on Youtube! Doing that is illegal and a breach of their TOS , have you taken the time to read thier TOS? Dont you think if these artists who work for a living wanted thier songs DL'd for free would just include a download button? lol you make me sick.

[Prokofy Neva]

5 hours ago, lonewolfryder said:

So many clubs some and go in secondlife. Why do some succeed and many many many clubs fail?

Many club owners figure if they build it .....they (( patrons )) will come. That's the field of dreams mentallity right there:

 

If you build it, they MAY come but there is sooooo much more to running a successful club in second life.

First, you need good staff. DJ's that live for music, Hosts that are chatty and keep the audience entertained or at least involved. I may make another guide on how to obtain quality staff, but for real it is not that difficult to find staff who shows up for their sets and actually will care about your business.

That being said many club owners open clubs dreaming of dollar signs, lindens dancing around in their heads. The fact is most clubs will bleed money, so if you are in it for L's you may wish to rethink your club dreams. Sure some adult clubs turn a profit if well run and the owner knows how to hire quality adult staff and how to PROMOTE the club. I personally know of several who do run profitable clubs. Yet the vast majority of clubs do not turn a profit. My advice is to open a club only if you have a Passion for nightclubs in second life.

I will do a follow-up guide on how to promote your club in second life, that is a whole other beast of a topic to handle in one posting.

You are going to want to think about your hiring process. Are you using apps? Are you also doing interviews? If you do interviews make sure the person doing the interviewing knows everything the JOB entails. I once had a hostess manager "Interview" me for a dj gig, she knew nothing about being a DJ whatsoever other than we play music. Also if you do interviews with prospective staff try not to repeat questions already answered in your physical application, this is highly annoying and will just send quality staff away as no one wants to waste their time.

Do think about how you want to run your business. If you overuse managers and make yourself not approachable by your staff, your staff is likely not going to get close to you nor care overly much about your business. This is more so with NEW clubs. Many new club owners decide to hire 1000 managers for every micro detail of their club then make a rule to go to these people with any issue they have about the club. No manager is going to put the level of care into your business that you yourself will! Some issues will need to be addressed by you and you alone. You want your staff to be able to approach you. This fosters a feeling of belonging, of a unit. Sure you can hire a DJ manager who knows everything about DJing and can attend to say Dj's needs in your club, or a hostess manager who knows his or her trade inside and out, this is a good thing. A bad thing is where you have 12000 managers and state you will not be there if the staff has an issue but to go to one of the 12000 managers you for some reason decided to hire.

Another thing is how you treat your staff. Treat them with respect and they should in turn treat you with the same courtesy. I have been in clubs that constantly hound staff via IMs to fill in slots they (( as the club owner )) failed to hire someone for. If you need fill in's put a notice out to your staff but do not hound them for fill in's on a daily basis. You will quickly burn the remaining staff you have if you go this route of hounding staff to fill the voids in your schedule. If you are short on staff for slots do your job and find some new hires, do not stress out, and burn out the staff you already have over your failures to find enough hires.

Hiring staff who already have VIPs is for sure a nice thing, yet there is one key thing to remember here, those visitors who come in for said staff members tend to be "followers" of that staff member only and may never return to your club other than for said staff members set. You also have to advertise your own club. I notice roughly 95% of all clubs these days fail to advertise and promote their own club. I have in the past tried to help owners like these learn how to promote their clubs, sadly few ever listened thinking they can do it the field of dreams way, build it and they will come mentality. This frame of mind leads to this:

 

You must ALWAYS promote your club! This however takes work. I have noticed most club owners have an allergic reaction to "work" to ensure that their club succeeds.

If you rely only on staff to get your club bumping, your club is often going to be empty. It takes a mix of you + your staff's effort. The good news is yes your staff can actually help you promote your club. And they should as part of being your club's staff, but you too have work to do in this area.

If you have a club and have any of these issues going on right now you have an issue with how you run your own club:

 

• Staff continually or often fails to even show up for their own sets
• Your club is often dead or has very few people at sets or events
• You have staff quitting very often, IE a revolving door of staff
• Your staff does not care about your business at all
• Staff quits your establishment without telling you why they choose to end their business relationship with you.

 

Any of these issues is a problem directly in MOST cases with how YOU are running your club. You are not having a bad luck streak, you are doing it wrong.

Also do note that people enjoy a club that looks good. Ask people you care about for honest opinions on how your club is laid out and looks. Create a place people want to be. A good example here would be Club Mavi, she worked hard to create an atmosphere. Many of the better clubs in SL part of their success believe it or not is simply two or three things:

The club has excellent staff so patrons want to come back for the experience

The club is laid out very well, it is visually appealing to patrons.

The club owner + Staff both promote the club itself + every single set that is happening.

This guide is not exhaustive there is much more to it than what I have laid out here, but these are your basic building blocks to a successful club.

 

One last bit of advice , make sure you optimize your parcel for search. In the property description add the key words people may be searching for in second life. If your club plays some hard to find music for example say Slap house, Soca, Future bass as just examples you may want to put these "key words" into your parcels description. It helps your potential customers find your business! Also do run a classified in second life, it is mega cheap I think last time I did so it was like 100 L a week. In said classified put in a bit about your club and what genres of music you offer and if enough room left some details about your club.

 

This is a great public service, thank you!

I'm going to cut and paste that section about the "fill-ins" for my daughter to send to her hospital manager in RL. It's a gem!

Also, you've reinforced my decision, made 15 years ago in SL, never, ever, to rent to clubs. Ever. Even tiny ones.

In fact, if ever a tenant talks to me about their grand idea about having a club (I was a newbie once; I had that grand idea; I, too, made a big, failed club) -- the first thing I tell them they must must must do is BUY AND CONTROL YOUR OWN LAND AND BE A GOOD NEIGHBOUR.

If you need to rent land from someone like me, who will not let you return group-set prims or let you have the powers to enable an endless stream of people not paying me money to have resident powers to deed their Mama whatsis vendors blah blah and eject all the griefers, then you are not in business, you are in illusion. That means you will not be my tenant for long because you can't pay even my cheap rent. If you are successful, why would I keep renting cheaply to you and allow you to make bank off my cheap land? I have no incentive but you shouldn't have any, either.

If you need to "buy" a parcel on an island where the manager is not comfortable with the kinds of people coming to your club, or the other tenants on the island constantly complain to the owner about your club, you are not in business, you are in a griefing cartel.

If you rent or even buy Mainland, and put a giant black box up on prime waterfront on the Mainland, you haven't built a club, you have built a conflict and hatred vector. Oh, you put your giant black box 100 m up in the sky to enjoy the grand view we spent years buying and developing for you and your patrons -- if you even ever look out of your black box? My, aren't you the big man, forcing yourself on the view on 4 sims around you. And you wonder why people don't like your club? You TP in your friends heedlessly, but everything in SL is connected. 

So buy your own damn land in a remote area and put your club in the sky so it doesn't harm the view -- your black box, considered cool in "Snowcraft," is not cool here and now. Buy some of the Lindens' abandoned land in the hinterlands on sims with no roads or water to have great FPS. Buy on the auction and even pay as low as 0.5/m for land no one else wants. Have the CIVIC DECENCY to put your club out of the way so you can enjoy it without inflicting pain on the rest of us, by harming the view, or taking up all the avatar slots on a sim every night so no one else can fly home to their land. If you DO insist on putting your club on prime waterfront that really should be used by end-users for residences, have the decency and civic pride to put a build that does not look like the Time Cube, a giant, badly built cube shack with spinning signs on glow.

Buy, control, and manage your land properly so you can ban people, put in music, etc. etc.  efficiently and be a good neighbour so that we will want to come to your club sometimes and tip your people, instead of banning you to make your flying around difficult because you are such a nuisance.

 

Edited October 30, 2021 by Prokofy Neva

[Kimmi Zehetbauer]

5 minutes ago, Alwin Alcott said:

thats no club and no DJ but a songchanger with friends.

yes it is,
sold music without license to make it public is theft.
ALL consumers music is for home and home living family only. Visiting persons at your home while you have music on is OK, but specially visiting people fór hearing your music goes over the limit of home use.

There is many catch-22s dealing with music. But when rather you're playing a radio in your store or have a full blown DJ system in your bar, the music rights organisations need to be paid.

Up here in Canada in our bar when you enter you'll see a sticker saying music licenced by SOCAN.  The music we play either comes from our own collections or a DJ pool, that which we pay a yearly charge for. I don't know how many times we get requests "can you play this off YT?" We say it's not legal, but if the song is in our collection we can put it on. If not we'll search for it in the CD pool and play it next time.

The costs of the licences cost us a small fortune, but it makes sure the artists, writers, publishers, etc are paid for their work. For awhile we did simulcast in SL when my man played Wednesdays in the one club I mentioned earlier. We do pay extra to SOCAN and another music rights org for playing on the internet.

[Kathlen Onyx]

This is an old argument and one side is not likely to change the minds of the other. If you DL illegal music you are taking a chance of getting caught and of course dealing with your conscience. 

But now the real question is do I need to contact my first boyfriend and get the mixtape I made him? I don't want to be in non compliance.