a sci-fi / art sim will soon close...does LL only care for profits?

[Natalia Ballinger]

Hello, I just wanted to provide you information about a great loose that is going to happen within a few days. So if you have the time , have a look there. The sim made it even on Lindens featured destination guide. Also Lindens have taken a movie about the sim last summer.

The question came up to me, if sim pricings allow people to create such nice places in here. It is sad, that this place soon will be like any other sim. Having palms on it soon, and renting houses ..is this all SL is turning into..why Linden won't support such awesome places..it took 6 months for the talented builders to create it. I am just sad, and hmm you might oversee I am a bit ranting here. Farewell Next South *waves* ..good profits Lindens. So far, so long Natalia

 

http://secondlife.com/destination/the-next-day

[Chelsea Malibu]

Yes Natalia, unfortunately like most businesses, they can only operate, advance and/or survive by generating income.  I guess I am sort of the same way as this is the only reason I go to work each day is to get paid.

However, that being said, I do agree that a lot of great builds have bit the dust.  I have personally built 22 full Sims and all but 1 are offline today.  I owned 8 of them myself and of those, I tried to hang on to one or two of the best ones as they where incredible builds that took months but no one was interested in keeping them alive.

I had always thought it would be in Linden Labs interest to keep failing Sims alive by taking them over. Sort of like what our government does with companies who are two big to fail but without the insane price tag.  They used to do this but today, they are focused on revenues though I am not really sure many of them understand how to position their company for success.

Sort of like the Homestead sale system.  Why not sell anyone who wants a homestead and not force them to buy a full Simi?  Imagine the level of sales they would generate but they want to be greedy and keep the system they have now, then fine, it's not my bottom line being affected.  However, when it comes to keeping good Sims alive, it is my "experience" that is affected and my time means much more to me than my money.

[Adaeze Menizah]

Next South has been an amazing sim... For about quite some time it has been a place where I would go just to gape the amazing builds, lightnings and atmosphere the builders created there... It's too sad listening that it will soon be gone...Too sad for the efforts the builders placed in that sim and too sad cause it's gonna be one more beautiful sim lost...

I always thought SL was like a white canvas where people could draw anything they liked... Where creators could make a virtual world and invite others to join them on their exploration... Seeing how SL is going I think i am wrong and maybe we should consider it only as a dating yard for people who only care about asking contact info from other dating yards such MSN, SKYPE, YAHOO and blah blah blah...

A sincere thanks for the guys who made Next and all the builders who dare making beautiful sims against the absonant charges of the LL's.

[Shockwave Yareach]

Sims come and sims go.  It's a fact of life.  And while yes, LL has a little responsibility in this (principly for failing to pass along price drops in hardware, and for ruining trust in the platform thus driving away paying customers), most of the responsibility falls on the sim owners.  If a sim is a playground, than real cash has to go into paying for the playground.  If it's semi self supporting then customers have to exist and be willing to pay for their little piece of the bigger pie. 

the problems as I see it are four-fold.  Longstanding customers who have been barely hanging on for a long time are giving up hope on SL returning to a happy fun place that's worth the time and money to visit.  Two, as LL is learning the hard way (and we did warn them), the people who were willing to pay money for a VR world were the ones already here.  Most of the newcomers haven't exactly been big spenders, buying islands.  And three, while LL has improved SL somewhat recently, it and trust still have a very long way to go.  And without trust in the lab and in LL, there isn't enough money flowing in SL to support these nifty things.  If the price of the sims were lowered, they could survive the lower cash flow situation.  And anyone saying the lab cannot, I ask you to show me any computer servers or routers which get MORE expensive rather than less over time.  And fourth, yes, there's a worldwide reccession -- it was in all the fashionable papers...

SL has always been a moderately expensive escape.  In the past, when it was novel, money flowed fairly freely.  But with the poor economy and the poor trust in the providers, the money just isn't flowing anymore.  And those holding on waiting for better days are having to give it up, at least temporarily. 

If LL wants more land sales and more customers, as well as keeping the ones they have, they need to look at the prices of their products.  A 10% cut in the tier would be about right.  And having a "Come Home" special for a few months where people who abandoned their sims can have them again for nothing more than picking up the new tier again would put those idle servers to work and get them making money once more -- empty planes make no money and neither do idle servers. 

Of course some of us who have been stabbed in the back by LL won't contenance another land purchase until the lab says that yes, they said we would own the virtual property in SL and we do after all.  I personally refuse to do serious business with companies that run like the mafia, changing the contracts anytime they see fit.  I am hoping that lawsuit in the courts today firmly smacks LL's hand and they realize that they DO have to provide what they advertised, virtual or not. 

Things are improving.  But they are not yet good enough.  And only more about face by LL is going to bring more customers in and drive profits higher by making less per person but making up for it in volume.  The past 3 years have been ruinous (and again, we warned the lab).  I think Rod is honestly trying to get the ship off the rocks.  But it'll be hard to convince those who have and are abandoning ship to jump back on board once more.

[Bitterleaf Menges]

It is always sad to see something you greatly appreciate disappear from the Second Life, but to suggest, as you implicitly do, that Linden Lab should support efforts that their originators and users are unwilling to fund themselves is misguided.

But, in answer to your question, I for one do not think Linden Lab cares ONLY for profits, however they are not an nonprofit organization.

 

[Alazarin Mondrian]

I'm sorry to hear that your sim will be closing soon. I visitted it a few times and was thoroughly impressed by what I saw. I do hope you've got it all backed up in a set of rezzing boxes for the day that you find a new sim to unpack and set up your dark and mysterious city.

[Natalia Ballinger]

I know there are always two sides of the story. And sure Linden isn't a nonprofit organization. Maybe it's been a bit rushed to post this way, but hmm the facts are, that people invest a lot money to keep up a sim going for non-profit. Sure the have fun, and fun isn't for free..also Linden sure does take advantage by these creative persons. But in the end it's like they won't return anything, if the cash flow stops. It's just a bad way of marketing in this case I think. And yes, hmm the pricings are high, no doubts...just people, take your chance and visit the sim before it' gone is all I can add now. SL life can be fast ...

 

PS: am just a person that spent some months living there, not the creator of these 2 sims.

 

[Qwalyphi Korpov]

The resident who provided the previous content, if any, has replaced it with this generic statement.

[WADE1 Jya]

Sorry to hear you're losing the sim, it looks really cool! There's been a few beautiful landmark sims (like Hosoi) falling away lately :matte-motes-stress:

I know of a few long-term sim owners not having good times this year. Hopefully Linden Lab comes up with a hot new land product or something ($L cards out in real world stores perhaps?) to make SL really start booming again.

The inworld economy hinges entirely on LL policy & actions.

I would suspect that Rodvik must have something planned that would help things. He got them to finish Windlight and wrapping up a lot of other loose ends that had been hanging for years! Seems like a real professional is in charge.

It is sad that anything amazing Linden Lab might do in future to expand Second Life, it may arrive too late for some of its early-adopter hardcore supporters because a short-term rut (6 months to 1 year) of stagnant concurrency & softened inworld spending easily puts many sim owners out of business.

If sim owners run out of cash, sims simply close.... and yes they may be replaced with generic cookie-cutter ones... but SL loses something of its unique heritage each time :matte-motes-crying:

[Knowl Paine]

It is a shame Natalia, one by one pieces of SL's history are being lost. I enjoy scanning the World Map, SL has the resources to keep this Region online. It is a drop in a bucket.

As Residents, the money we generate and contribute supports every SL feature, function and program. We pay for 9? regions of vehicle sandboxes so that a few hot rodders can goof off. We paid for Zindra so other Residents could... hmm. I like water who doesn't but it appears the squeaky boater got what they wanted. And finally Roads, how many roads are we rendering?

Before I go too far, anyone know exactly how many buildings (regions) are preserved or deemed historical and are now Linden land?:smileytongue:

I'm sticking to my guns, SL has the resources.

The owner should be allowed to set the land with objects for sale to gov. Linden if the owner agrees (and LL). 

Any Region considered for preservation should hold significant historical value or display extraordinary content worthy of preservation.

 

[DTonyaTS1488303103]

Oh no,  I am a newcomer to second life but found The Next Day in one of my travels exploring this world. And with no exageration, this is one of the sims that convinced me to begin to spend RL $ in here. The ambience that exudes from this build is truly amazing.

It will be sorely missed by many, of that I have no doubt. Only today I was there, just seeing what the people wear there so I could go out and buy an outfit so i could wander and meet the sim regulars and fit in. If it is to close i feel it is a loss to the world. Hope in my heart that we do not lose anymore of these wonderful builds that people have poured thier hearts into.

[Natalia Ballinger]

thank you all for your support here, it is nice to hear people sharing the same feelings..sure it's nothing to celebrate in this case . I just want to say  that the creators and sim owners are different people, so it's making it even more complicated. Well, would like to hear more of your opinions please. It did help in some ways to read and feel a little better...

 

Thank you, I think also in the name of the creators

[Emerald Melbourne]

This sim is truly a spectacular example of what can be created in Second Life.. . ANd the ingenuity of incorporating a roleplaying game within the build just creates synergy.. It is a shame that LL does not go out of its way to preserve works of art...  They need to understand that sometimes thier virtual world is not a disposable one.. Business model or not. 

[Lia Demonista]

Today is one of great sadness for me .. as the process of tearing down, one of the two sims of the Next Day and Next South sims, has started..

For the past year, I have spent most of my time in the sims... these are not just any kind of sims, but ones that have been well designed and planned upfront, right down to the smallest of details, magazines, newspapers, picture frames all working in part and harmony with the sims main concept. It's something to be seen and appreciated.

It took me weeks, to explore all parts of the sims, to see the fine details that the builders placed all over the sims.. wouldn't surprise me too, that there is and was much more, that I still haven't discovered.

Sims like these should be kept alive, for all to see what can be achieved in SL .. pity that LL can't keep them.. what is the cost really for  just a piece of space of a hard drive running on an extra server for such sims ?

Sims that, for any reason fail to survive or mange to run... I'm not talking as for sims that you can see anywhere, and as Natalia placed it, sand and palm tree ones.  No...., but sims with themes and concepts that when you go and see them ... the 1st thing that comes to your mind is just "wow"

Yes a lot will say, that they have lost much loved places, clubs and ect..  that life moves on,  was all in history let's look into the future.... that's how SL is... sims go and sims come.

Well.....

For anyone to judge, first try to go and view the sims and then will see for yourselves what SL will be missing.. time though is running short.. the builders have started taking down parts of Next Day.

[Zippity Neutra]

I hope I have a chance to go see something of these sims before they're completed derezzed.

Things are transient in the real world, let alone the virtual. There were cool creations in the 2004-2006 timeframe that you won't find any hint of today -- and by contrast, you have something like Abbott's Aerodrome that's still there, but has changed and evolved over time. And honestly, what I thought was pretty cool in 2005 might elicit nothing but yawns now. Not to mention whether or not all the scripting and objects would continue to work as designed, when you have changes being made to the sim and viewer platforms over time.

Shoot, I'm very pleasantly surprised that whatever acts as the Asset Server now can still pull up t-shirts I created six years ago, and that my avatar didn't have to be recreated from scratch after a several year hiatus! But I wouldn't have been that shocked if neither of these things had been possible.

Let me turn this question of preservation around a little. In RL you have foundations and museums that take on the expense and effort of preserving works of art, landmarks, et cetera - some money does come from government sources, but in most cases nothing like the amount that comes from corporations and private donors. If we the residents want to see these things preserved, what have we done to establish - both founding and funding - the institutions that would take on the work?

 

Nothing I'm saying should be taken as a knock on the O.P.'s point - it's sad to see these things go, even when they were only intended to last a short time from the start.

[Jose Squeegee]

This sucks. But you should get organized and form a colletive trust fund so ya'all citizens keep Next Day sim running. Personally I am not a citizen but I have good friends there and I can cooperate with a monthly fee if you let me rezz a small kiosk to sell my comics there.

[Zippity Neutra]

Thinking more about this, and reflecting on Jose's point -- I was a member of a group that had a large part of a mainland sim to host the group's events, creations, and a small gift shop. The events were open to the public, mostly just so the members could share cool things they had worked on. The point relevant to this discussion is that many group members contributed the tier that allowed the group to hold that land for a couple years.

There's surely already a group (or several) involved in running the Next Day sims. What you'd need is to arrange for people who want to contribute tier to join a group that owns the estate (as non-officers, I'd think) so they can each contribute whatever tier they're able to. If you got enough Premium members who don't pay additional tier to contribute their "free" 512 sqm, you might even be able to do it without asking for additional expenditures.

Hope that wasn't offensively remedial, and of course I know nothing of the specifics behind these sims or the groups/individuals involved. So I've no idea if they'd already considered and rejected this...

The Knowledge Base has a section on how group land ownership works if you're curious.

[Natalia Ballinger]

I am not sure to bring up more detailed facts here, but situation is more complicated, because the creators and the owner of the sim actualy are different persons. Buying two NEW sims and restart  somewhere else is expansive. A small group of nerdies like us is doing hard collecting the money to get this up.  Wish Lindens would see this point. This thread mentioned already about pricings. I think Linden should really reward those creatives more, since they have spent their time to build for all to have some advantage by it. Even Lindens who put the sim in their destination guides benefit maybe by finding new people joining SL ...or giving those who are here longer this 'Whooo!' effect. Think longterm Lindens ;P

[Zippity Neutra]

Ah, yes, I think you had mentioned these complications at one point but I forgot.

How to get that initial sim allocated is an interesting question. Certainly in the past LL has made sims available for a month or two to a group or collective before clearing them and turning them over to the normal auction pool, but the examples I'm aware of were a long time ago at a time when LL was ordering servers and selling new sims on a very frequent basis. Hmm... maybe I'll go see what data is available on that now.