Linden Lab Introduces Sansar Monetization System, Reveals First Video Footage

[Derek Torvalar]

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/sansar-video-footage-monetization-system,33300.html

 

[Rhonda Huntress]

TH: So, you’re taking the opposite approach to YouTube, which focused on opening a platform up to consumers and then focusing on bringing quality creators to the platform later? You’re focused on attracting creators first and consumers later?

EA: Yeah, I think that's fair.

 

I'mnot sure how the exchange is going to pan out.  From what it sounds like, you can only buy from other users and the initial amount of curency will only be sold to the initially invited creators Surely I am rteading that wrong..

[Derek Torvalar]

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Rhonda Huntress wrote:

TH:

So, you’re taking the opposite approach to YouTube, which focused on opening a platform up to consumers and then focusing on bringing quality creators to the platform later? You’re focused on attracting creators first and consumers later?

EA:

Yeah, I think that's fair.

 

I'mnot sure how the exchange is going to pan out.  From what it sounds like, you can only buy from other users and the initial amount of curency will only be sold to the initially invited creators Surely I am rteading that wrong..

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No no, you are correct. It's clear as mud.

 

Ebbe: he business model is still being tweaked, but in broad strokes, yes. It's an exchange where someone can convert FIAT currency to the Sansars. We’re hosting the exchange, but the exchange is between users. So, users buy and sell Sansars between themselves. We're not the central bank in that sense; we’re basically just facilitating the exchange between users.

 

eg: approx500-600 creators are allowed to buy approx 20,000 Sansars each to trade amongst themselves. When public admitted person 601 et al purchases Sansars from the "exchange" of those creators willing to sell some of their Sansars. You then buy creator's stuff giving them back their Sansars.

 

Is that right?

wtfk

 

Oh wait, maybe we can creae our own Sansars. If you know Maya and blender or whatever. What do you make Sansars out of/with?

[Rhonda Huntress]

So ... there will be a set and limited amount of dollars put in world.
No other way to get dollars except to buy tose already in world.
Every transaction has a tiny amount drained as transfer fees.

And this is intended to be sustainable?

[Derek Torvalar]

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Rhonda Huntress wrote:

So ... there will be a set and limited amount of dollars put in world.

No other way to get dollars except to buy tose already in world.

Every transaction has a tiny amount drained as transfer fees.

And this is intended to be sustainable?

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Aparently.

Though even with PG there to translate and elucidate what it is Ebbe is saying it doesn't seem to be viable in its current state.

Tweaking needed indeed.

LOL

ETA Is the "cut" a % or a flat rate per transaction?

[Amethyst Jetaime]

Obviously LL will have to release more currency into the market as time goes on and the user based expands (if it does), just like the fed puts more currency into the system when the present amount in it is insuffient.

Sansars will be more expensive than Lindens. The initial cost for purchasing $S being $1US to $100S compared to SL's exhange rate.  Those selling $S I doubt will be willing to sell at much of a loss, if any.  Also there is that sales tax to consider, which still hasn't been really defined as to what rate it will be.  If it's 5% then really $1 will only buy $95S worth of stuff, at the current rate.  It will be interesting to see how many people are willing to lay out that kind of money. 

If the exchange rate eventually reaches SL levels it makes me wonder how many of the creators will stick around and how many will replace them, since there is no word yet as to when Blender will be supported.  Not many people other than professionals have the money to purchase Maya or other expensive 3D modeling software.

[Bree Giffen]

Lots of news articles coming out. Still reading.

http://uploadvr.com/linden-lab-sansar-creators-money/

[Chic Aeon]

Thanks for posting to the articles (both of you so far ). One of the things that has been bothering me the last month or so is that all those creator got into Sansar in August and we hadn't seen anything but a couch and some flowers.  Well a tiny bit more. Other articles (I think it was WIRED but I may be mistaken on that) mentioned that most creators were still (this was a few months in) figuring out the interface which as a creator didn't make me too happy -LOL.

 

Someone over there mentioned (so much for NDAs) that you would need to build things as a complete set (like with cast shadows). I did note that there were very obvious cast shadows on the grand ballroom.  Also things would need to be very low poly (not too complex) in order for that framerate to stay above a healthy 90.  It did look lovely. Obviously lots of repetition on the ballroom. Less it seems on the house photo. 

Anyway we'll know when we'll know. If they don't work out the Blender interface that WILL leave a lot of creators from having a choice.   IF they left the original seed dollar from the pre-opening as the only dollars, then naturally their value would go up as people coming in needed them to buy. For CREATORS this wouldn't be a big issue should the idea of no upload fees still be in effect (ideas change and it has been a long while since this started). Creators could make things and then earn money FROM those things, hence having spending money and perhaps cashout money. That worked well in Cloud Party although there was no cash out. 

I think having as much content there as they can and things running fairly smoothly is a very good plan. If we are looking at summer, we are looking at summer.  I am pretty busy here anyway.   It is questionable still in my mind how many creators might leave SL for Sansar. In the beginning there was lots of talk, but not so much lately. And how enmeshed the VR hardware is, will be one of the deciding points I think. 

 

Anyway, VERY nice to see some new news. 

[Codex Alpha]

"The value of the Sansar ultimately would be set by supply and demand of the market."

"In general, Second Life, we collect very very little, you could almost say the zero, on the exchange and on the transactions. We mostly are actually charging people hosting fees for having access to simulators for Second Life. One thing we've decided with Sansar is that we want hosting fees to be much lower so that it's much cheaper for people to own experiences and to create experiences. And then, instead, for us to capture a bit more when it comes to the G.D.P."

"So think of Second Life as having a fairly high property tax and an almost non-existent consumption tax, which makes for a bit of a lopsided way that we collect fees.

Sansar will distribute that a little more evenly with a lower property tax (hosting fee) and bring up a consumption tax so that we can spread the cost amongst the different types the users more evenly."

- Ebbe Altberg

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Chic Aeon wrote:

Someone over there mentioned (so much for NDAs) that you would need to build things as a complete set (like with cast shadows). I did note that there were very obvious cast shadows on the grand ballroom.  Also things would need to be very low poly (not too complex) in order for that framerate to stay above a healthy 90.  It did look lovely. Obviously lots of repetition on the ballroom. Less it seems on the house photo. 

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Sounds like making rooms on IMVU (not that I have, but I had looked into it), which are pretty static and then you invite people in to chat. Sansar sounds very similar, as you would be creating a 'sim' that people enter much like a room in IMVU, which is already pre-rendered.

 "We want to empower people to create their own social VR experiences, share those with others, reach their audience, and also profit from them" - Peter Gray

 

 My main question about Sansar is.. what the hell is an 'experience' exactly.. Nice buzzword, but doesn't help me visualize how this will work at all.. Is it an IMVU-like environment,closed off, or will it be somewhat visually connected, like the mainland is now, where you can fly around hitting ban lines everywhere and such?

[Pamela Galli]

I am not clear on what the creating of experiences will be like. I assume something like Experiences in SL, which I have not bothered to investigate. Not that it matters, I have a Mac and Sansar is not for Mac.

I do know this, about my clientele: most of them like designing their own environment, using things they did not personally create, and for quite a few, even rezzing an object can be confusing. I spend a lot of time explaining basic things about SL and teaching basic skills. ( I would spend 100% of my time providing services rather than making and marketing content, if I did not set limits on what I can reasonably be responsible for.)

I don't know how much of a factor this kind of customer support will be in Sansar, and I wonder if LL gives much thought to how much time content creators (and landlords, etc.) must devote to support services, in Sansar or SL. Are they factoring that in? Imagine if LL had to provide all the support that creators now do -- they would close their doors in a week. Anyway these are things I wonder and have no clue about.

[Alwin Alcott]

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entity0x wrote:

 My main question about Sansar is.. what the hell is an 'experience' exactly.. Nice buzzword, but doesn't help me visualize how this will work at all.. Is it an IMVU-like environment,closed off, or will it be somewhat visually connected, like the mainland is now, where you can fly around hitting ban lines everywhere and such?

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not often agree with you but... this is also my main thing....wth is it...

perhaps just my lack of understanding the full meaning of some words.. 

 

experience is as vage as fog for me...

 

 

@pamela ... as far i'm able to see forward, i'm going nowhere else than SL 

[ChadUnfroyd]

I haven't read through the thread but I have been prompted by its title to say that I have a RL wife that I would be happy to offer the guy for free. Since he doesn't seem too choosy.

[BilliJo Aldrin]

I suspect something like 99.99% of all SL users don't have a computer powerful enough to run Sansar, plus it will be optimized for VR headsets. I'm sure Sansar will have a wow factor, but that won't be sustainable. LL is setting themselves up to be the next great thing years before most people are ready for it. It would be much better if they put their efforts into improving Second Life, which has a proven cash flow and sizable customer base.

Also, the only thing that will "migrate" to Sansar from SL is your username.

 

[Prokofy Neva]

Chic,

One wonders why such a grand thing wouldn't have lots more press though, leaked press if nothing else.

Also, I wonder whether there will be a clearance system for creators, that you can only come inworld and sell creations and get money for them if you are approved in some process. 

 

[Amethyst Jetaime]

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entity0x wrote:

 My main question about Sansar is.. what the hell is an 'experience' exactly.. Nice buzzword, but doesn't help me visualize how this will work at all.. Is it an IMVU-like environment,closed off, or will it be somewhat visually connected, like the mainland is now, where you can fly around hitting ban lines everywhere and such?

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From what I understand listening to Linden interviews and reading....

LL will only be renting server space to "experience" creators, other than probably a few LL sponsored experiences, such as a welcome/orientation area.  There will be no mainland and no renting direct from LL unless you are renting server space.  An experience creator could be a game developer, a university, some type of RL comercial interest, or someone wanting offer a virtual world experience, or just an average joe.

There won't be any sims as we know them in Sansar.  An 'experience' can be visually small or large depending on how the creator configures it.  It can be private, in that only certain people can go there, like a single residence estate or corporate conference room, semi-private, as in a number of residences and access is only for residents and their invited guests, or public like a game, store, club, a city or town. It may be free to go there, a one time charge , or maybe even a subscription fee where you can go for a set time period for one charge.

The person who rents the server space will have complete control over their 'experience'.  They can build it out all themselves, hire someone to do it, or construct it using items they buy from creators on some kind of market place.  They can set their own prices, whether that's for entering or subleasing space in their experience.

In SL terms, think of the person who rents the server space as the estate owner.  People who sublease a space for a home, shop, club, classroom, conference space etc. from this person as tenants. I have no idea if tenants can set entrance or subscription fees, I guess that'll be up to the owner.  It will be up to them also, if tenants can build out their 'space' or everything is provided for them.

You won't be able to TP around between all the various experiences as we can in SL.  You'll have to log into each one, unless the owner or owner(s) of two or more experiences allow you to travel between them somehow by TP, walking through, or even riding a vehicle.  Perhaps you'll only have to enter your Sansar password once to get to the website where all the experiences are shown and be able to go to your choice from there, but the owner's of the experience may also be able to require you to log in if say they charge a subscription fee to enter.  It's just not been made clear yet as far as I know.

Not a peep about pricing has been released yet, as to how much server space will cost, or the sizes of spaces available.  It's supposed to start at a lot less than what LL charges for a region though.  I have  no idea if there is any measurement like LI in SL, but I am sure there will be some way of measuring max capacity  for the server space rented.  But from what I understand that won't have any bearing on the visual space someone sees in your 'experience'.  I say visual space as an experience doesn't even have to have virtual land.

If anyone knows of anything different from what I have said above or can clarify any unknowns, please post what you've heard.

[ChadUnfroyd]

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Prokofy Neva wrote:

 

One wonders why such a grand thing wouldn't have lots more press though, leaked press if nothing else.

 

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Probably because the CEO is so dim that he says things like this, presumably while his PR spinmeister was still on leave coming down from his festive chemical romance:

“We learned some positives but also a lot of ‘that’s not how you do it’ from Second Life,” said Altberg. “So we’re having a much more user-centric approach from the beginning, and try to make sure we stay away from the territory of complete geekdom.”

Way to go on the alienation of existing users front, eh!

[Rhys Goode]

Very, very underwhelmed. I've seen plenty of builds as nice, without the isolating head set. At least they did not balyhoo articulated fingers.

Some my enjoy the ehnhanced graphics, and come to SL for that only.  Good for them. I, myself, come for the social things, and nothing I have seen about Sansar speaks to that at all.

[Parhelion Palou]

A couple comments:

LL wants companies for customers (who will want to get in on the VR goggle hype). Companies rent, hire creators to build the game or whatever, then the company advertises it on their own website and provides a link to the experience. As you said, they'll have full control over registration. I suspect they'll also be able to control the avatar appearance as well, since it would be problematic for a company with an experience for kids to have inappropriate avatars popping in.

I haven't heard that experiences/worlds can be connected in a way that allows walking or vehicles to travel between them. It'll basically be a portal that loads the next experience for you. If you could travel to or even see into other experiences it could affect the all-important framerate -- adding complexity that the experience's pre-publish optimizer couldn't deal with.

Subleasing isn't likely unless the experience owner is renting out pre-built areas. Ebbe's example: An experience owner creates a neighborhood with houses to rent. The renter gets their own experience to represent the inside of the house. They can then decorate the interior as they wish. The door to the house would be the portal to go back and forth between the renter's experience and the landlord's experience. The renter won't be able to do anything with the exterior since they'd have to have permissions to do the mods off-line.

I plan to check out Sansar, but only as something to visit occasionally.

[ChadUnfroyd]

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Parhelion Palou wrote:

A couple comments:

LL wants companies for customers (who will want to get in on the VR goggle hype). Companies rent, hire creators to build the game or whatever, then the company advertises it on their own website and provides a link to the experience. As you said, they'll have full control over registration. I suspect they'll also be able to control the avatar appearance as well, since it would be problematic for a company with an experience for kids to have inappropriate avatars popping in.

I haven't heard that experiences/worlds can be connected in a way that allows walking or vehicles to travel between them. It'll basically be a portal that loads the next experience for you. If you could travel to or even see into other experiences it could affect the all-important framerate -- adding complexity that the experience's pre-publish optimizer couldn't deal with.

Subleasing isn't likely unless the experience owner is renting out pre-built areas. Ebbe's example: An experience owner creates a neighborhood with houses to rent. The renter gets their own experience to represent the inside of the house. They can then decorate the interior as they wish. The door to the house would be the portal to go back and forth between the renter's experience and the landlord's experience. The renter won't be able to do anything with the exterior since they'd have to have permissions to do the mods off-line.

I plan to check out Sansar, but only as something to visit occasionally.

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Sounds massively dull to me, although obviously it is a perfect set up for creating a brothel palace.

[UnchadFroyd]

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ChadUnfroyd wrote:

...

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I know I was naughty doing this, but I just wanted to say, OMG - you're still alive! Stay, er, effervescent!

 

[ChadUnfroyd]

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UnchadFroyd wrote:

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ChadUnfroyd wrote:

...

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I know I was naughty doing this, but I just wanted to say, OMG - you're still alive! Stay, er, effervescent!

 

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As Botgirl Questi, William Shakespeare and the Department of Homeland Security would probably confirm, names are an irrelevance; identities are much more interesting.

[Phil Deakins]

Having read the details of what people such as you have managed to glean and post about Sansar, I've finally arrived at some conclusions.

One is that it really isn't going to replace SL, and SLers won't migrate. Yes, we will visit a few Experiences in Sansar, and we may even like one or two and spend some time in them, but it seems to me that no Sansar Experience will replace SL, even if the creator set out to do just that. At least for a considerable time, the Experiences will be comparitively tiny and are extremely unlikely to convince SLers to make it their 'home world'. Therefore, imo, the demise of SL is nowhere on the horizon - yet.

Another conclusion is that LL is dead right to create Sansar. When we originally thought that Sansar would be SL2 (a suped-up SL), I decided that LL was right to do it. Now that we know it isn't going to be SL2, I still think they are dead right to do it. It's the next generation of virtual reality, and LL needs to be at the forefront.

Yet another conclusion is that we should stop being concerned about the impact that Sansar will have on SL. I've concluded that any impact will be relatively small. SL is currently static at best, and probably still in very slow decline. Sansar may add to that a little but I don't envisage a large migration from SL to Sansar. Sansar may even aid SL due to people joining there, then hearing about all that they can do in SL, and coming here. It's a definite possibility.

Those are my current conclusions, and they may well prove to be totally wrong.

[UnchadFroyd]

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ChadUnfroyd wrote:

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UnchadFroyd wrote:

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ChadUnfroyd wrote:

...

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I know I was naughty doing this, but I just wanted to say, OMG - you're still alive! Stay, er, effervescent!

 

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As Botgirl Questi, William Shakespeare and the Department of Homeland Security would probably confirm, names are an irrelevance; identities are much more interesting.

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Happy to see you still around!

 

[ChinRey]

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Prokofy Neva wrote:

One wonders why such a grand thing wouldn't have lots more press though, leaked press if nothing else.

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Lack of interest. I can't find the quote right now but I think Ebbe once mentioned how hard it was to get the general media and even VR oriented media outside SL to show much interest in Sansar.