Gavin Hird
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Blog Comments posted by Gavin Hird
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If so, they charge a durn high fee for server space. Linden Lab is an entertainment industry company
Ummm, actually no. They don't provide any entertainment. They provide sim hosting in addition to SAAS for both the server and client software. Apart from that they don't provide any content but some starter kit found in the Library. So they are not an entertainment company.
You can liken it to Apple and the App Store. Apple provides a hardware platform (iPod Touch / iPhone / iPad), a client in the form of iOS running on the hardware, in addition to the iOS SDK which to a certain extent is similar to the building tools provided in SL. The majority of the Apps in the App Store are provided by third party content developers, consumed by customers in the store.
Apple is not an entertainment company. Linden Lab is not an entertainment company.
If they try to evolve to become an entertainment company, it will be at the expense of all resident developed content and experiences, and they will never be able to replace it - the cost would be astronomical. This is true for both Apple and Linden Lab.
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Very true Prok that LL is in the server space lease business with SAAS on top of it. What we have seen, however, over the last 2 years is that Linden more and more encroach into what used to be resident territory and this creates a lot of friction as residents have increasing problems sustaining their business model and that undermines Linden Lab's. SLM, Linden Homes are just two examples, and the latest wholesale of the profiles for ad space is contentious to say it the least.
Frankly, I believe Linden lab would do better as a pure play SAAS catering to businesses that want to create virtual world experiences – experiences that could be tailored to themes, interest groups and adapted to local legislation. In such a scenario the ability to wander between grids and inventory portability is important for the overall environment and experience.
In this way, Linden Lab could get out of the business of trying to play big brother, sweet mother, dictator and judge; all of which they hardly master at all. They need to get out of governance, and start to be a focused business with the grid software and a tailorable viewer as their core. SecondLife; the world could be spun off as an own entity separate from SecondLife; the infrastructure.
To the comment about servers idling, you are correct, they can't take the mainland sims offline without creating gaping holes in the landscape. Hence, it is better to utilize that space and place things like the Linden Homes in the existing landscape, after which they would free up server capacity.
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Darrius Gothly wrote:
Gavin.Hird wrote:
The logical thing to do would be to send the list to the email address of all registered merchants, in addition to post it in the wiki.
It is not like 16 yos have never seen such words before if they stumbled over the wiki page...
Pardon my interruption here but .. can you imagine the outcry that would occur if only ONE email got sent to a minor? "Yup, good old Linden Lab. Sending email laced with rude, offensive and disgusting language .. to MINORS .. via email."
Can we say "Witch Hunt"? Maybe "Rioting Villagers with Torches and Pitchforks"?
You can choose between that and mass exodus of merchants when this fully dawns on them.
As we have discussed in the 4Q economy blog thread:
"...if LL expects a monthly contribution of $470 from each of these few accounts (85k) to make their business model work, they must do everything they can to support OUR business model so we can make payments. If not their business model will collapse faster than they can remake it into something else."
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Marx Dudek wrote:
Gavin.Hird wrote:
Will these guidelines be detailed enough to also apply to goods sold in-world? I mean there is no point i locking them out of the marketplace if they can purchase the "forbidden fruits" in-world.
There's a marked difference between a sale taking place on SLM and a sale taking place inworld - SL is not a direct intermediary in the sale. The same restrictions will apply - technically. Will Lindens be actively policing the G mainland for adult products for sale? No.
Further, will this keep a TG resident with a MG alt from buying a transferable adult product and transfering it to their TG account? Nope - because inworld objects do not have any kind of rating flag. Even if a content-rating flag could be added to objects/textures/snapshots by their creators, it would not cover anything made prior to that point by creators who are no longer on the grid. Nor could it be protected against circumvention on copybotted items.
With no personal judgement made against Linden Lab, this is a "due diligence" action on their part to protect the company as much as possible.
Yes, I understand that, but I am not sure that will hold any more now that they are going to the lengths of publishing profiles, groups and classifieds unfiltered on the net.
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Suella Ember wrote:
Having said that, it would be handy if LL could somehow find a way to publish the list in a location ...
The logical thing to do would be to send the list to the email address of all registered merchants, in addition to post it in the wiki.
It is not like 16 yos have never seen such words before if they stumbled over the wiki page...
Message was edited by: Gavin.Hird We cannot have a repeat of the situation we had when people had to move to Zindra, and would have to go through daily guesswork on what was acceptable in classified, event and land descriptions and whatnot.
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Thanks Wayfinder and Rene
... and my main point (buried in the above) is that if LL expects a monthly contribution of $470 from each of these few accounts (85k) to make their business model work, they must do everything they can to support OUR business model so we can make payments. If not their business model will collapse faster than they can remake it into something else.
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Rene, Linden Lab does ONLY take payment for land from land-owners.
These land owners can be full sim owners - being estate or mainland. They can be parcel owners on mainland sims, and they can be premium account holders who don't have any land holding.
There are about 85k such people.
How the money flows to these 85k people does not have any bearing on Linden lab. They all come - ultimately from external sources flowing via these 85k people to Linden Lab.
The money these 85k people pay to Linden Lab on a monthly basis is a mix of subscription fees and setup fees (for new land purchases - not resold resident owned land.)
These 85k people pay each, on a monthly basis about $470 amounting to 40 MUSD per month or closer to 480 MUSD per year.
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"All the above I call TIER - paid for by "premium account holders". <-----Wrong you don't need to be a premiun account holder to own Estate sims......it only applies to Mainland & Linden Homes.
You understand the meaning of quotes, right?
Let me use another word rather than tier; subscription fee
So one of the revenue streams are subscription fees, paid for by subscribers on a monthly basis.
The other revenue stream is land sales and the requirement for being able to purchase land is that you accept to pay a subscription fee in addition to a setup fee (the land purchase of sims and recycled abandoned land.)
The subscribers must, through setup fees and subscription fees, contribute 40 MUSD per month to keep LL float.
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Rene, you are just being bone-headed about this
ALL land owners - whether they are SIM or mainland holders pay a monthly fee, $295 for a sim, $125 for a homestead, $195 for a full mainland sim. In addition there are some premium account holders who pay the monthly fee ($9.95 less discounts and stipend) that possibly don't hold any land, but that fee gives them the right to "own" 512 sq.m for "free". It is for all practical purposes a tier.
All the above I call TIER - paid for by "premium account holders". There are approximately 85k people who fall into this category. It is one of two big revenue streams for Linden Lab.
The other major revenue stream is sale of fresh sims and recycled abandoned land.
In the calculation that was set up last year, it was estimated that all these 85k people must contribute, on an average - through tier and land purchases, $470 per month each to keep Linden Lab floating. That is about 40 MUSD per month, or 479 MUSD per year, which is reasonably consistent with the estimate of the overall revenue generated by LL in 2009.
The main point here is that these 85k people carry the annual burden of about 475 MUSD to keep LL and SL as we know it floating. Anything Linden Lab gives out for free, still comes out of the pocket of these people.
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If it does not come from the premium account holders, where do you think it comes from?
Linden Labs two main sources of income are land sales and tier. The rest is just pocket change.
Who pays for the land they sell? Premium accounts.
Who pays tier? Premium accounts.
If you can take the servers being utilized for the Linden homes out of service and put these parcels on idle mainland, there are net saving in the datacenter, on server lease, network bandwidth and system admin cost. Savings that can be put into marketing, or development.
In addition you would most likely contribute to increase the value of the surrounding land since people would be there, which again could be the base of a hangout, a bar, a club, a mall, more attractive homes, what have you. This again would result in more land being paid tier for.
Donating 300 sims to a select group of accounts only gives those accounts free marketing and push the cost of the 300 sims (tier) over on the remaining premium accounts who pay for their land in addition to all idle and free sims. Those accounts would possibly lower their own landholdings too, resulting in even less tier being paid.
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Well, they have the sims, but they don't have the staff to develop them on their own. That is where the overhead will come from when you say LL should develop.
200-300 sims donated does not come out of the pockets of Linden lab, but of all the premium account holders. So no, they should not give them away.
To reduce the number of sims, they could merge the Linden homes into the current mainland. That would create new opportunities for everyone and get mainland more crowded. Yes, there is overhead in doing that job, but it might be worth the dollars as it would upgrade the neighborhoods and make it possible for small communities to flourish.
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If you don't see it yourself type "site:my.secondlife.com group" into google searh or "site:my.secondlife.com resident" or "site:my.secondlife.com picks" to see what google has indexed for others.
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Instead Linden Lab could invest and develop in mini-Continents as public areas.....an Arts continent (That was actually a good suggestion by M.Linden), Gaming & Entertainment (non-commercial, but free activity) continent.....a continent that houses some of the best ever SL Sim builds like the Nemo Trilogy or Rezzables or whatever (again non-commercial).
I disagree that Linden Lab should develop. Why?
Because in doing so they would have to add significant overhead to their own staff either salaried or consultants both for the content creation, management and support.
What they need to do is cut the red tape, get out of the way and make it easy for content providers to develop also mainland. That will get their revenue flowing.
In reverting back to be a platform provider - and being a great one at that, and let the residents develop their offerings, their content, their fantasies and worlds on top of it, I believe LL will have a much bigger chance of long term success.
They could even (gasp) license out the platform to people who would build worlds with other TOS and adapted to other localities and jurisdictions than CA law.
In addition they need to move into the mobile space urgently and with vigor.
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Not sure all paid is the way to go, but one could adapt the system many adult sites have; you can only get to the juice as a paying customer. In SL that could translate to you can't reach mature and adult regions without payment.
The main challenge is that the burden on the premium accounts are too large to safely carry this forward. Someone, about a year ago, made a fairly detailed estimate that every premium account must, on average, contribute $470 per month for Linden Lab to break even. This was based on the size of the world, premium account holders and LL staff at the time. I am sure the number would be about the same today – could even be higher.
So either LL needs to find a significant alternative revenue stream, or they must scale down as was evident in the 30% layoffs.
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Frankly, the whole thing makes me embarassed on LL's behalf. I wish they would stop treating SL as some sort of in-house development project - where bugs don't get fixed, and where half thought out, half developed, half planned features and functions are deemed good enough to be released - and in stead start seeing it as the commercial service it is and start planning features from start to finish, concider what their customers want and need, and actually develop SL based on this. I don't think ANY other company who provides a commercial service like SL would go about things the way LL do.
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I agree.
As I have said elsewhere in the blog, at times it seems like Linden Lab's beta program is totally out of control – at least when it comes to customer facing applications and services.
They have made great strides in increasing performance and stability of the grid. But when it comes to the marketplace, the blogs and forums, the viewer and support it is close to disaster, both in terms of information, features, usability and privacy.
My main beef in this particular case is that they – under the cover of a beta, have thrown people's trust in reasonable privacy on the boat, for who knows what. Even without telling anyone. The damage for the current customer base is already done.
If they need to generate more revenue, for heavens sake tell us and don't just sell us out for ad space.
I am sure that, in a positive dialog with land owners and content creators, together we could make the platform grow with revenue increasing for everyone. We understand this is your little baby, but there are thousands of babies riding along with you who also wants to grow up. You don't have go it alone Linden Lab!
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Try remove words such as lovingly, kissable, lustrous, You also break the new listing rules by using names like Angelina Jolie and Lady GaGa in your text. See if that gives you any milage.
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Make one of the products active as adult and give us the name of it so we can look at your text.
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Ai Velde wrote:
I changed everything. I changed the name, I changed the image, I changed the description, I changed the keywords.
Nothing fixes it. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. It keeps going right back to adult even when it's a bare ass listing.
I give up. LL doesn't want me to have a business, fine.
Anything in the other language sections that could trip it up?
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Gonna twitter my feedback here:
Upgraded to 2.5 beta 2 (Mac) and when I want to open a profile I get the SSL handshake failure message as some had seen before (worked fine in beta 1).
Then I switched to the web based version in my browser to delete a classified, and that was not possible, but clicking the classified it switched me back to the viewer that opened that portion of the profile in the sidebar. How to delete the thing was guesswork till I discovered a trash can in the lower left corner. Very convoluted I'd say.
Pls advice on the SSL message in beta 2?
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I am rather surprised that so much mainland is now on Linden hands. Last time I checked the figure was quite a bit lower. Perhaps TG sims are now part of that number? It does seem alarmingly high.
Intuitively I would think the Linden homes have had a chilling effect on mainland, and as I have blogged before, I believe the effect would have been much more positive had they been intermingled into mainland on existing abandoned land.
Another thing that strikes me is that Linden Lab seems to be in a "go-it-alone" mode, rather than both take input from, and cooperate with land-owners and content creators to generate new accounts and revenue. These two groups of residents do have an interest of generating more income, which again would create additional revenue for LL.
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You can find the answer to many of these questions at the Gridsurvey website. But I agree, yes, they should have been answered by Linden Lab.
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Yeh, I just posted this to the general forum.
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Well, if i ran a company and would allow unrestricted access to adult and illegal content ( e.G. sexually motivated cannibalism) on my pages and would risk to lose about 10 (germany) to 50(europe)% of my clients by publishing this to everyone, i'd most probably would be concerned about that and think over the decision of publishing such stuff publically. I absolutely understand that parents report such content to the authorities. Sometimes, the responsible people in companies should think first about possible consequences of making content from a closed communtiy publically available without any control by the persons who created this content inside the closed community and without age verification instruments.
Jeannie
Well, I am not sure if publishing profiles with said content is illegal anywhere per se – that is highly dependent on the local legislation. There are tons on US based web-sites that have profiles with similar content.
BUT, the difference is that such sites also have privacy settings in effect and don't just blurt out the juice in a beta with no warning on the unsuspecting community. They also usually have mechanism to control how much will be displayed, which this new "feature" seems to be highly lacking or is buggy to prevent proper operation (which should of course have been removed in a controlled beta and not on live data.) As far as I can see, Google has started indexing and caching these profiles.
What might get LL in the slammer is the publishing of the child avatar profiles which must be highly controversial if not illegal in most countries. A child (underage) may very well like or friend a child avatar (which there presumably is a grown up individual behind) without understanding what is going on.
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I don't think having a public section of the profile is such a bad thing, but it must be managed carefully. You could create a simple Privacy matrix (kindoff like the friends list) for things like:
public visible in SL friends private
---------------------+------------------+-------------------+-------------------+-----------------+
group name x x x
group name 2 x
group name 3 x
real life information x
picks x x x
adult region picks x
classifieds x x
linked-in x
twitter x x
Facebook x x x
homepage/blog x x x
other items..... like gallery, whatever comes up in the future
I guess you get the idea?
Ads would never be displayed for premium account holders.
It would require a restructuring of the profiles, but it would result in higher flexibility that would satisfy all parties. It could live in a privacy tab in preferences.
... sorry for the awful table. I could not be bothered to do it in html :-O
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The Second Life Economy in Q4 2010
in Featured News
A group blog by Secondlife in General
Posted
According to gridsurvey.com there are a total of 32444 Linden homes. I think they put 48 of them on a sim, so that should make 675 sims.
Each home takes 1024 sq m so there could be 64 on them on a sim, but I don't believe I have seen any sim that dense. If that was the case it would be about 507 sims.
They would have to be dispersed throughout where they could find space for the homes.