Madison531

And to be fair it costs lfar ess, given the stipend. But the increasedland allowance cost them almost nothing with all the empty land, so that doesn't justify making up for it.. I have trouble understanding why LL can have a huge price hike and be defended by many. People have said they should open financial info, and I understand why they won't do that. Ir's actually no win for them: They're either struggling financially and really need the revenue, which would justify the price increases but people would be screaming the sky is failling, that sl is in big trouble; or they're doing fine and just found a way they feel will make even more money. If that's the case, the price increases are awful. So, I want to restate they aren't obligated to share financial info at all, and I wouldn't if I were them regardless of the specifics, but so many want to give them the benefit of the doubt, though regardless there'd be better ways to raise money, which might have included a smaller increasein membership fees as part of it, but this is big. The old system was, in fact, a really great deal...but that's part of why it bothers me so much that they're making it a lot less great.

Lindens are money, but LL can create it at will. I really don't know if it would cost LL money to raise the premium stipend. There are probably some complications. "Printing more money" could lower the value of the Linden. But if it costs (and I don't know if it does; it seems it would but I can't claim to be sure) LL a lot less to provide L$ than the L$ are worth to the user, then they should increase the stipend to somewhat make up for the increased prices. It doesn't have to be proportional. I'll take half the difference in L$ and be willing to accept the tradeoff and stop complaining.

Okay, so maybe a way to characterize the changes is a "bail out" of the land baron business. I'd wish LL had let the move, probably largely brought about through increasing the free land with a premium account, toward small ownership and less land baron/renting continue, even encouraging it. Because, I think it's better without middlemen. I know that before this account price explosion, I told a lot of people how they shouldn't be renting and should be owning and only occasionally was able to convicne someone to make the change. It was so much of a better value, even before having no middleman. If land barons have trouble filling land, some will sell the 1024 sq m parcels they now rent, to people who can get them for no tier, and not have to deal with a middleman. And only the land barons who really treated renters well, would keep much occpuancy. I f LL was going to mnake more money from account holders, land barons should also have had to pay more, so the rest could pay less. LL should have been trying toi get as many people as possible into premium accounts, rather than actually indrecitly encouraging people to rent instead of giong premium.

I'd have tried to build the base of premium users further, rather than making a lot more moneyper premium user. The increased land allowance for a premium account was a great example of that sort of action. LL could have found more tnagible things that didn't really cost LL to offer but would have been valuable to premium users. Enough of them and I'd even accept a smaller price increase than the large one they implemented without complaint.

You posted why owning your own 1024 sq m parcel is still more for your money than renting one. Lots of people still rented, for, especially before the premoun account price explosion, reasons I couldn't understand. The fact is though that LLs' changes make owning a small parcel a much worse deal than it was (even if generally still better than renting), and land baroning a better deal (this is not an attack on full sim owners who rent parcels; if you have the money to invest it's a perfectly legit way to make money) I don't know why LL wants to make it even better when it was already pretty sweet though, while making everyone else with premum pay a lot more.

I know that landownees in general are a mix and there are many that do a lot of very nice things for their tenants. I don't mesan to imply they tend to love to abuse power or anything. My big issue is that LL seems to be accomodating landowners at all others' expense.

They get a cut, I get an increase. And when we did get the extra land, they got a cut then too. But if I were getting a cut, or more free land with membership, then fine they can get another cut too. But since I'm getting a 250% increase, they shouldn't get a cut that I'm helping to pay for. LL is pushing land baron/rent when they should do the opposite (which the increase to 1024 did) and encourage more to be members and own small parcels and less land baron/renting. The upfront cost is worse than meets the eye, because it means taking a risk that things on sl will turn bad and you decide to leave, and then youve wasted (the rest of) the year's fee. Quarterly was a good compromise for that, but for some reason LL decided they hate quarterly so are increasing that more than anything else, and new users can't even get it. In terms of cost counting the L$ stipend, then yes it's still a better deal than renting in almost all cases. But I tend to see that as a goal of LL, listening to land barons and wanting to make owning small parcels not as good a deal compared to renting.

I want to focus on the one idea in the original post I really like: Minor premium, though I'd make it "a la carte permium." You pick the premium benefits. Each has a cost. Some are worth more so might cost more than others. But different people have different priorities, so defined tiers don't work. Like, I might buy a package of owning land (1024 sq m free and the right to buy more, with a tier fee cost for more of course) and one of higher group/offline IM limits. Someone in another thread said they value easier access to crowded sims but don't care about owning land. They could buy that instead. Because there would be no stipend, each benefit would be quite cheap (don't underestimate how much the stipend made premium before the price increases such a good deal, though less with the increases), but buy more than 4 perks or so and you're paying more in real terms than premium, so you only do it if you only value a few of the perks enough to pay for them specifically.

What I think people are missing is that this is not an incremental price incrwase, as it might appear at first, but a huge increase percentagewise-- when you consider how much we will have to pay on top of the worth of the Linden allowance. Raising annual prices from $72/year to $99 (basically $100)-- that's still really big, over a 33% increase-- but it's even a lot bigger, because it was about $10 per year counting the value of the L$ allowance, and now, it's $37 per year counting the allowance. So it isn't really a little over 33%: It's 250%, in the real cost. That is exorbitant. make it actually a 33% increase after the Linden allowance by giving us most (not all) of the extra cost back in extra L$ allowance and it's reasonable. A 250% increase though is exorbitant. And make some of the miney back by not cutting full region fees. This seems designed to have less ssmall-user land owning and more land rentals-- the opposite direction the great change to 1024 sq m went. It seems to be driving toward fewer subscriptions but more cost per subscription. It's the exact opposite direction they should have been heading, trying to get more people to subscribe at the same price or even at an actual 33% increase (but not an actual 250% increase). Meanwhile, again in LL seeming to want less small land ownership and more rentals (where you're at the mecy of a landlord) they gave one group a price cut, the full region owners. That will, I'm sure, lower rental costs. But those of us who want true control over our land got badly screwed.

If I'm going to consider paying for it, I have to be able to make the choice and see if a combo I like is available-- I'm known enough my first name will be Madison regardless, and if I can't have that with a last name I think is decent (whether or not I change my display last name, which I'm not sure one way or the other if I will), I won't do it. Related, of course, is that if I have to pay first and then see if something I like is available, I won't do it. That's like buying something expensive without demoing it. That's pretty steep, but it doesn't price me out of considering it. It raises how much I'd have to like the name combo. It means that anything that leaves me with a Madison531 (or other name than Madison with no extra numbers or letters-- not that if I were starting out I'd need that name but now that it's part of my sl identity it's the only one I'll use) first name is not worth considering at that price, probably wouldn't be at any price, but for $10 to replace Resident with something decent forever I wouldn't totally rule it out; and that price also raises the bar for what I'd accept as a last name to pay. I'd easily pay that much if I got to choose my exact first and last name, but I guess some pay tons of money for that so LL won't sell that even for $35. It almost has to be a full name I'd be happy with as a display name for $35 (it still is a one time charge I could keep forever), whereas if it were $10 and I could have Madison as my first name and something I found not-awful-like-Resident as the last name I'd probably do it even if I didn't change my display name.

Well, now at least I understand why, so for custom last names they can continue to charge very large amounts. It defeats a lot of the purpose, though. Obviously as Madison531, I have that name because I couldn't just be "Madison." I don't remember for sure, but I don't think I even checked to see if that was possible. Since right now there's only one last name ("Resident") there's no way "Madison" wouldn't have been taken. I may keep my display last name regardless, but if my official name can be "Madison" as a first name with a last name that's even mediocre instead of "Resident" and that's $10 or $20 or something like that I'm almost certain I'll pay it, though I'm not sure if I'll change my display last name to match it (but I'll consider it). Just "Madison" as a first name would definitely be possible if I could choose a last name, not limited to a list. Unlimited last names would mean there could be 1,000 "Madisons". With a limited set to choose from, the chance of that will depend on how long the list of last names is and how soon I find out once that becomes an option. If I'm still going to have Madison531 (or anything else that doesn't sound like a real name) as my official first name, it's already a strange name to be known by, so I'm not sure I'll pay to get rid of "Resident" to change to a realistic official last name. So, if LL wants to sell a lot of people changing to a more realistic, but want to use a list so custom last names can still cost a whole lot, they should have hundreds of last names on the list or something. If there were, say, 300 last names available, there probably aren't many people who couldn't get their preferred first name (especially given that a lot of people will stick with Resident rather than even paying $10-20 regardless), so nearly all those inclined to pay for a realistic official name would be able to.

That'll probably determine whether I do it or not. If LL wants my money for it, then the same as I demoed my mesh head to make sure I could get the face I wanted before buying it, they'll have to let me see what name I can have before I pay to change. I still don't get the having to choose the last name from a list though. If you choose your own last name than everyone can have a first/last combo they like, and If you want a profane name or something you can choose it as the first name, so I don't see how it prevents abuses.

Wny a list of last names? Why not just let us choose any last name we want?

As far as I can see, my house is entirely on my parcel. But there were some unused parts I've been trying to unlink (those parts I moved well within my parcel), and it won't unlink them because apparently there must be some tiny spot in which my house overlaps the neighboring parcel. I'd be happy to fix that, but I can't find where it is. It could be an invisible part, though I looked with it highlighted, etc.. How do I find it? I was trying to even think of a reason for the rule in the first place (any encroachment if I unlinked them is already happening with them linked), but I suppose without the rule someone could sneak something onto someone else's parcel by linking it, moving it on, and then unlinking it. But there should be an easier way to see what I need to un-stretch or move to stop the encroachment.

It seems like edit shape makes your avatar look okay to you, but not to everyone else. They'll fix it of course, but until then Edit Shape only seems to help you look better to yourself (in my case at least).