DD Migration Schedule

[TatianaDokuchic Varriale]

From Marketplace Direct Delivery migration guide:

Here is the planned migration schedule in 2012:

• April 2 through 13, 2012: Inworld Q&A sessions on using and migrating to Direct Delivery
• April 18, 2012: All listings priced L$10 and lower must use Direct Delivery
• May 16, 2012: Magic Boxes no longer allowed for any Marketplace listing

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You could argue that the proposed schedule is a tad ambitious but I'm really glad that they are closing out the Magic Boxes sooner than later mainly because it will finally eliminate all those products that have been orphaned by people who left SL so long-ago.

I found the conversion itself to be quite painless and now I'm just holding my breath as we get through this initial startup.  So far so good.

 

[emmettcullen93]

so they are easing us into it now?

[TatianaDokuchic Varriale]

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emmettcullen93 wrote:

so they are easing us into it now?

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Seems more like "full speed ahead" than "easing us into it"

[Gavin Hird]

Glad to see these steps. Should provide for a bit of a clean-up of old items in the marketplace. 

[Inara Pey]

The only thing I'd suggest is that if the planned turn-on of ANS for DD is delayed (we only know that it is in a "couple of weeks"), then discontinuing Magic Boxes is delayed a similar length of time.

Many merchants are holding-off on migrating pending the implementation of ANS alongside of DD. If the ANS turn-on for DD is unreasonably delayed, it would be unfair to push merchants against the wall of a MB switch-off date. 

[TatianaDokuchic Varriale]

Good point, Inara.

[emmettcullen93]

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TatianaDokuchic Varriale wrote:

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emmettcullen93 wrote:

so they are easing us into it now?

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Seems more like "full speed ahead" than "easing us into it"

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ha

[Toysoldier Thor]

What is really frustrating about LL ramming in DD and forcing a very quick end to the Magicboxes is that last year when LL sat down with the TPV vendors to tell them all about the up-coming DD function and they entertained questions / concerns from the TPV vendors, Brooke Linden was asked explicitely about backward compatibility and if LL will still support magicboxes after the release of DD.  Brooke responded that LL did not want to create any potential instability and as such LL fully intended to support MagicBoxes indefinitely.

Her statement of LL's initial intent to let magicboxes and DD exist together for an expected long period of time seems to be proven out by how the new MP Merchant design has incorporated DD.  As you all can see, the Merchant inventory management screens have very nicely integrated the ability for every listing to exist and operate and be managed as either a Magicbox or DD delivery mechanism.  It even has its own column to display which delivery method is being used for each listing.

Ask youselves this... if your intention was always to deploy DD and within weeks shut down MagicBoxes, why would you spend so much time developing the logic for both systems to exist in harmony with such elegance?  This DD deploy - to me - looks like LL did actually intent to let Magicboxes hang around for a very long time "indefinitely" as Brooke promised the TVPs.

So the question we all have to ask LL and which we all know LL will not answer......

Why did LL decide all of a sudden that it has become critical that MagicBoxes get ripped off the face of the MP system as fast as is humanly possible?  This is not a sublte change of plan.  Clearly someone in LL must have told Brooke and team that "I WANT MAGICBOXES GONE AND I WANT IT GONE FAST!!"

I mean - they went to the extent of even putting marketing effort behind it be promoting the migration by using a BEAR BURNING A MAGICBOX as a promotion of making Magicboxes look like down right evil that must be gotten rid of fast.

If fact, although there have been complaints about magicboxes, there has also been proof that magicboxes in and of themselves were not the only source of the delivery problems - it was and likely will continue to be other MP system processes that caused / will continue to cause delivery problems.  In the 3+ years I have used Magicboxes, they have RARELY caused me delivery problems.  Yet LL has used Magicboxes as a vilified scapegoat for all the delivery problems.

So now here we sit, a massive transition and tons of rushed work by all the Merchants to meet an arbitrary deadline... when there are still reported problems with DD transactions, the MP infrastructure has fallen to its knees with intolerable user page response, and LL has not even fully replaced all the functions that MagicBox had.

 

So LL.....   Who in LL Sr. Management has forced you to break your promises to the TVP's and Merchants about the future of MAgicboxes and why is there such a rush for LL to get rid of LL when the new MP code can clearly support both delivery systems transparently?

 

[Gavin Hird]

The short answer to your question is the need to force a purge of old and obsolete merchandise from the marketplace. Just my 2 L$

[Mickey Vandeverre]

Magic boxes have reputation of being slightly inferior and unreliable.

Direct Delivery is fancy and new and an upgrade.   (ok, stop snickering)

You can charge for upgrades.

[emmettcullen93]

mmmm -shakes head-

[Josh Susanto]

>Magic boxes have reputation of being slightly inferior and unreliable.

Inferior to what, exacly?

If there has long been nothing relative to which for them to be considered inferior, how have they earned such a reputation?

They may be inferior to imaginary options that don't exist yet, but so is everything else.

That they are inferior to what DD promised to be, and yet not inferior to what DD turned out to be quite clearly underscores the gap between what we were led to expect from DD and what we were ultimately given.