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Linden Lab Acquires Game Studio LittleTextPeople


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How much credence should one give to a writer who says this?

"Second Life in part revolves around its ability to let users create virtual objects and sell them for real money."

Users sell the virtual objects they create for Lindens.  Lindens are not real money.......Lindens are virtual money with no monetary base at all.  Users can sell those virtual "dollars" to others by putting them on the Linden Exchange and the people who want those Linden dollars can purchase them for real money if they choose.  The Lindens that the sellers of virtual items are not "real money".  It only becomes "real money" when someone buys those Lindens for real money......and that only happens when the seller places them on the Linden Exchange (or a couple or sanctioned third party exchanges). 

When I writer doesn't understand what a major point in their article, it makes me wonder if they understand anything about what they are talking about.

However, I don't doubt that LL has acquired Little Text.  Rod Humble said LL was looling at ventures that are not directly related to Second Life about a month and a half ago.  We even had a thread asking where that stood a couple days ago.

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Peggy Paperdoll wrote:

How much credence should one give to a writer who says this?

"Second Life in part revolves around its ability to let users create virtual objects and sell them for real money."

When I writer doesn't understand what a major point in their article, it makes me wonder if they understand anything about what they are talking about.

Its the difference between telling someone the entirety of the C++ programming language, or just pointing at the little button by the case that says 'power' when asked 'how do I use this'?

The quote is not wrong, its just not detailed. Its a perfectly decent way of getting the -concept- across to a 'lay person'.

 

 

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Sounds great, I like this part, 

“LittleTextPeople brings a depth and breadth of AI and interactive story development expertise that is a great fit for Linden Lab as we launch multiple new products,” said Rod Humble, CEO of Linden Lab. “The result of this investment will be a new type of digital entertainment that modernizes the novel as a shared story-telling experience.”

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Seems they are aiming for the mobile market, I think the human race is heading towards people having terminals instead of PC's, all tech is heading towards a centralized data base and only terminal access, that's the only way they can control the internet, they will say its a good thing because it cripple's most hackers and code writers, I think these terminals will lack the ability to program, only run apps created by approved people, big brother is coming if you like it or not, so I would just enjoy the internet while it last, in a few years it will be gone and the new system will be very one way, it to you and you will have little choice but watch, lol, think about it, what are these none playing people, see they are creating the role play for you, they will limit then what can be said and done, one day you will wake up and realize that all along you were farmed.

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....and just importantly how much Income will it add to the LL pot..

They''ve bought other businesses in the past and either shut it down (OnRez) or became a flop (Avatars United).

It seems like MySecondlife.com is a spin off Avatars United i.e can message can interact and share experiences by sending messages, blogging, discussing topics, uploading photos and videos. Wikipedia states "Linden Lab closed Avatars United in September 2010, integrating the underlying social technology into Second Life"

Likewise with Marketplace...it's not innovative, it's just a spin off from IMVU's "Catalog" shopping site.

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Well, I hope they didn't pay much for that. IMHO, phone apps are for kiddies to wow themselves. Even adult kiddies. The whole market is based on the fact that we have millions of people with lives where they are continuously waiting or stuck in line somewhere, but always busy and out and about. Outside of a few handy things, there is very little that impresses me at all with anything made for a phone. I don't see people having more crazy lives, but technology making our live more relaxing. So, to me, the trend will eventually be that we are not all running around all day.

Plus, there is a very big force in the market that limits it's use. That force is the service providers. I've recently decided that I'm cancelling all my extra services for my phone. I don't use them enough to actually pay crazy money for them.

There is still the issue of the battery. If you do use all the apps and everything on the phone, it will be lucky to last for more than a few hours to a day. Now, try to play a game in the middle of all that. The market is all hype and It's peak is emminent.

Personally, I would like to see more focus on getting the newbies logged into a web based viewer. This would give them an easy way to invite their friends, and solve many compatibility issues with machines. Once those newbs get comfortable in SL, then they can download the SL viewer.

What I think would be a valid app for LL to make, would be an SL Marketplace App. Plus, it would be cool to see this evolve into some1 on a phone looking at our products in 3D with the ability to pan around the item. The MP app would also have links to our demo videos, and this kind of app is exactly the kinds of things that a phone app is good for. If you ask me, every company should have an app for phones to buy their stuff from.

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Peggy Paperdoll wrote:

How much credence should one give to a writer who says this?

"Second Life in part revolves around its ability to let users create virtual objects and sell them for real money."

Users sell the virtual objects they create for Lindens.  Lindens are not real money.......Lindens are virtual money with no monetary base at all.  Users can sell those virtual "dollars" to others by putting them on the Linden Exchange and the people who want those Linden dollars can purchase them for real money if they choose.  The Lindens that the sellers of virtual items are not "real money".  It only becomes "real money" when someone buys those Lindens for real money......and that only happens when the seller places them on the Linden Exchange (or a couple or sanctioned third party exchanges). 


This is all symantics. The bottom line is the writer is not too far off base and get's to the core, rather than babbling on about symantics. His readers do not care about all that, and the monetary base is the exchange rate.

Wikipedia-

Money is any object or record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts in a given country or socio-economic context.[1][2][3] The main functions of money are distinguished as: a medium of exchange; a unit of account; a store of value; and, occasionally in the past, a standard of deferred payment.[4][5] Any kind of object or secure verifiable record that fulfills these functions can serve as money.

Gold is 1 of the best storer of value, yet few merchants will take gold as payment. Right now, those merchants are retarded, lol, but that's just my opinion.

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Exactly. In that LL press release LL describes it the the exact same way themselves ...

"The company pioneered the virtual currency and marketplace with Second Life, the massively multiplayer online platform, where hundreds of millions of user generated items are bought and sold for real money and which entertains millions around the globe."

At one point earlier on there was some hype over Linden Dollars becoming a currency outside of LL.

These notions are becoming somewhat obsolete now that Paypal and a handful of other companies are now able to process micro-payments directly, but they were a needed at the time to handle items of less value than the transaction fees. This is no longer the case. Newer ventures such as Diablo III will be using PayPal Micropayments with their auction house so that sellers can buy/sell/cash out with real money for game items.

On LL books, these tokens don't even need to be accounted for. For SL users however, they're representative of real money the way poker chips are.

Overall, LittleTextPeople is not a "bad" acquisition (although a relatatively unknown company with no real assets and cash). A bit late to jump into the mobile game, but mixing interactive storytelling with some game elements, virtual goods and currency isn't so bad. Their best bet is to go with real currency for that system, just as it would be for SL to move over to real currency.

These days it's less costly for a company to go with real-world micropayments, which would also help clear up the confusion and create more trust.

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Medhue Simoni wrote:

 

Personally, I would like to see more focus on getting the newbies logged into a web based viewer. This would give them an easy way to invite their friends, and solve many compatibility issues with machines. Once those newbs get comfortable in SL, then they can download the SL viewer.

 

That would be a good idea.....i thought they were developing one about a year ago?

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Here is what I don't get. Why is this not immediately part of SL, if nothing else more than a testing ground for it? It looks simple enough to implement easily, and it could be used in Role Play sim that kind of do a similar thing. I would think this could be a brilliant way for people to get interested in virtual, or imaginary worlds.

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Medhue Simoni wrote:

"This is all symantics. The bottom line is the writer is not too far off base and get's to the core, rather than babbling on about symantics. His readers do not care about all that, and the monetary base is the exchange rate.

..."

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Okay maybe it is symantics.  But the statement is decieving.  Linden Lab actually used to use the same "sales pitch" to entice members to join SL.......they stopped that a few years ago because it does imply something that is not exactly true.  If you read Answers much you might have noticed a recent increase in threads asking how to "make real money" in SL......in the past few days there is one user who has asked the question, in one or another, at least 5 times.  The user has the notion that he/she can make things and sell them for real money.  No matter how many times someone tries to tell the person that real money can not be exchanged for items someone might sell in SL.........only linden dollars have to be exchanged and then one can "cash" those linden dollars out in exchange for real money using one of the Linden Lab sanctioned currency exchanges.  We used to get those questions daily back when LL used the "make money creating" sales pitch..........the subsided greatly until very recently.  Statement like the writer of this article made foster that misconception.  The writer, through ignorance (and I don't mean that as a slam), made an oversimplified statement that borders on untrue.  A little research on the writer's part would have been nice.......but that research was obviously not done.  The statement could have said the same thing without giving the wrong impression of how one could turn their linden dollars into real life money  Something like;

"Second Life, in part, revolves around its ability to let users create virtual objects and sell them for the in-world currency Linden Dollars.  The Linden Dollars can be exchanged for real money using one of Linden Lab's sanctioned currency exchanges".

One more sentence added to the article and replacing the incorrect use of "real money" to the correct use of "in-world currency".  It doesn't require a lot of confusing details (which exchanging $L for $ is full of).  It just takes a little research.  And since the wrtier did not even do that little bit of research I tend to question most everything else in the article.  The writer is, at least, a semi-pro..........he/she should have done the work before writing the article.

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Seems to me that this quote from the article "Their studio specializes in text-focused gameplay where players explore narratives built on emotional nuance rather than just mucking about a giant sandbox" is somewhat telling. I assume that by 'mucking about in a giant sandbox' the author is referring to SL. I further assume that the author is not a resident; narratives built on emotional nuance is kinda what we do here.

Don't get me wrong, I've always enjoyed games in which the scenario is at least a little dependent on the actions of the players and unless I'm way off base it looks like that's what they're doing. I don't see any connection between that and Second Life, though.

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All the author was doing was re-wording what he got from LL's own press release and material.

It may not be what everyone wants to do in SL, to earn money to cash out, although it is supported by LL and it's still a draw for some. The ability to start a virtual business is what put SL on the map in the first place, and created the boom.

It should be cleaned up, have the tools vastly improved and promoted once again as one of the primary draws. Nothing draws people like the ability to earn money, as you can see by SL's current flatline state of growth as opposed to the gold rush years and hype. We don't need a gold rush, but we could desperately use another few million people hyped to come in and start creating and you get more people to do that by letting them know they can be compesated for their efforts monetarily, whether to support their virtual "fix" or to profit.

Merchants are still supported as heavily as any other group in SL, with statements and projections to back it up in various interviews with Rod, the announcement that tools are coming for land barons and merchants in 2012, etc.

To "users" it may be all about creativity, socializing and fun. To a large part of the outside world, LL is a business with a clear business model involving virtual goods (land is also a virtual good). When making a business announcement, you're in the context of business. In that sense, LL is all about virtual goods and the money involved. Without it, there would be no SL to socialize and create in.

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Lucinda Bulloch wrote:

Seems they are aiming for the mobile market, I think the human race is heading towards people having terminals instead of PC's, all tech is heading towards a centralized data base and only terminal access, that's the only way they can control the internet, they will say its a good thing because it cripple's most hackers and code writers, I think these terminals will lack the ability to program, only run apps created by approved people, big brother is coming if you like it or not, so I would just enjoy the internet while it last, in a few years it will be gone and the new system will be very one way, it to you and you will have little choice but watch, lol, think about it, what are these none playing people, see they are creating the role play for you, they will limit then what can be said and done, one day you will wake up and realize that all along you were farmed.

Over thirty years or so of companies trying to do this and it failing, the mobile market has moved it along somewhat but it always comes back to power and control by the user. I've been installing dumb terminal solutions for decades, then the seesaw shifts again.

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Dartagan Shepherd wrote:

 

These days it's less costly for a company to go with real-world micropayments, which would also help clear up the confusion and create more trust.

Barclays in the UK are unveiling a system whereby you can text payments to people, which is another boost for the mobile market, I'm sure other banks are doing this the world over.

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Medhue Simoni wrote:

Here is what I don't get. Why is this not immediately part of SL, if nothing else more than a testing ground for it? It looks simple enough to implement easily, and it could be used in Role Play sim that kind of do a similar thing. I would think this could be a brilliant way for people to get interested in virtual, or imaginary worlds.

I agree, although to be fair to Linden Lab they have been talking about additional projects for a while, the actual concept sounds like it could add value to Second Life itself.

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Peggy Paperdoll wrote:

One more sentence added to the article and replacing the incorrect use of "real money" to the correct use of "in-world currency".  It doesn't require a lot of confusing details (which exchanging $L for $ is full of).  It just takes a little research.  And since the wrtier did not even do that little bit of research I tend to question most everything else in the article.  The writer is, at least, a semi-pro..........he/she should have done the work before writing the article.


Peggy the writer has paraphrased Linden Lab's own press release which states:

"The company pioneered the virtual currency and marketplace with Second Life, the massively multiplayer online platform, where hundreds of millions of user generated items are bought and sold for real money and which entertains millions around the globe. Linden Lab is headquartered in San Francisco. More information can be found at
."

I'm all for writers being careful with what they write, but this is basically from the horse's mouth.

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