Metaverse SHOCKER!!! — Free SL Accounts Locked Out?
by Alphaville Herald on 13/06/08 at 12:06 am
Why are free accounts sometimes disabled to make room for paying customers?
by Avil Creeggan
Dear Linden Lab,
I am a free account. I have been a free account for the past two years. During that time, I’ve dealt with a lot of stuff that, frankly, shouldn’t be happening; flagrant asset loss and dehabilitation, incompetent customer service representatives, seemingly-random suspensions and bans for which there is no notification, having to provide my identification on multiple occasions… But it’s been pretty much okay.
You see this dialog box?
This changes everything. You know why?
Forget the fact that you didn’t tell me this was coming, at all. Forget the fact that, not only can I not login, neither can my friends. Realize that you consider me to “just” be a free account, now, and nothing else. You are completely wrong.
Step back, and ask yourself:
*How many of your over one million residents don’t pay for premium accounts?
*What happens to the economy when the currency these non-premium accounts hold is effectively frozen?
*How many corporations, content creators, and land barons are paying for simulators and asset hosting for the sole purpose of marketing to these residents?
*Where does your profit go when the grid is composed of premium accounts attempting to sell their content to uninterested premium accounts?
I’ll answer the scenario for you:
Public opinion of Second Life falls from “target of mockery” to “a worthless pit”. Corporations drop their (already worthless and ineffective) simulators due to the reduction of visibility, and reduction of effectiveness, caused by free accounts vacating the grid. New user registration drops to record lows. The emphasis on open source simulator development increases, and open source grids become viable. The Linden Lab grid is outmoded. Linden Labs, lacking additional offerings, fails.
My contribution to Second Life is greater than any hundred premium accounts. Not only do I directly create content (as many Herald readers can attest), I am the reason you can rent your simulators. I am the reason you have a public presence. I am the reason that Linden Labs is a publically traded company. If you’re reading this as a member of Linden Labs, I’m the reason you have a job.
I’m not the reason the grid is less stable than Britney Spears. Your incompetence is.
Fix it, or face the consequences. I am not picking up your tab.
Sincerely,
The Free Account.
archie von lukas
Jun 18th, 2008
/me creeps up and sets fire to the Linden Trousers………..
.
.
“No charge matey”
Cee Ell
Jun 18th, 2008
As others mentioned, this is an explicitly stated Linden Lab policy to handle grid overloading, although it’s rarely (never before?) been invoked. I’m not sure why the author had such a hard time finding it on the SL(tm) blog, as it took me about 2 minutes to do so:
http://blog.secondlife.com/2007/02/16/contingency-measures-to-ensure-service-as-second-life-grows/#more-777
Anyway, why get your panties in a knot over a temporary restriction? If Linden has to find a cut point, a tiny perquisite for paid-subscription Premium accounts, lasting just a few minutes or hours, hardly seems extreme. We ALL get locked out far more often, and for far longer, every month, in less controlled ways.
The author is right, in the main, about the essential contributions of Basic accounts — many, certainly not all! — to the Second Life world. But save this kind of fulmination for something that matters, not a few minutes of downtime. Enough hyperbolic foghorning and you’ll start sounding like PN — and I don’t mean Patriotic Nigras.
shockwave yareach
Jun 19th, 2008
Well, I’m a free account now myself. I just rent instead of own. I dropped down because SL didn’t function at all for 2 solid months. I won’t pay if I get no services rendered. If SL wants more premium accounts then this is only part of a way to get it – if it’s always busted and that damned Asset server never works right, I’ll live with having to go get some Fritoes and try to login again. Right now, paid or unpaid, it doesn’t matter – none of us can login.
RYker
Jun 19th, 2008
SO, I visited Sword of the New World.
How come all the MMO’s look identical?
I m-e-a-n they might as well be triplets
or quadraplets or are they just clones?
Is there an MMO template everyone uses?
There is such little creativity taht
even lil ole me can think of a
new game in five minutes.
oh…second life? who cares. good riddance.
Rip
Jun 19th, 2008
You account freeloaders better be glad im not in charge of policy matters at Linden Lab!
Freeloaders account would have far fewer privileges and a much larger incentive to be paid members.
See some examples below:
1) No use of scripts.
2) No joining Groups
3) A L$1000 transaction limit monthly
4) All paid accounts would have the ability to send you home (log in point) at anytime
5) The ability for paid mambers to map you grid wide all the times.
A policy like this would give some real incentive for people to become a real part of the community and not just a parasite on paid members backsides.
soul4sale
Jun 19th, 2008
“If you’re a free user, you have no right to be on SL at all, LL are essentially giving you a free gift with your free account…”
There is an essential error to claiming that a free account is somehow a “gift.” They don’t provide a “gift” anymore than a public chat board does. Unlike other MMOs, LL has not designed, built and populated its virtual world with much of anything entertaining. The only reason to come to SL is to see what other users have built and are selling. The vast majority of those users are on free accounts.
LL is on the road to being just another worthless has-been tech startup if it cannot make SL the standard platform of the 3D Web. This may come about with its Open Grid initiative, but it won’t if its software and servers cannot be accessed for free at will by endusers. It needs to be the next Firefox or IE, but it’s on its way to becoming AOL.
Rip
Jun 19th, 2008
Well the opensim project (OSP) will likely be in beta sooner than later. A few days ago two lindens TP out of the linden test grid and directly into a opensim grid proving limited interoperatibly and very few people noticed. Also IBM and Microsoft are now both involved in the OSP. IBM even has a OPS test grid up behind a fire wall using over 40,000 prims per sim. Lindens opensource viewer is being used now on many OSP grids popping up everyday. So to be honest the days of SL being a free service and a profitable tech company maybe coming to a close faster than some people might think. Add to this the headaches Linden is having policing IP rights issues of the artsy fartsy whinners and you start to see a problematical curve here thats getting steeper every passing day.
Lykurgus
Jun 20th, 2008
“LL have to understand that free accounts are bringing an enourmous value to SL and they would be swallowed by the competition if they wouldn’t have these accounts.”
How?
Plenty of MMORPGs offer NO FREE ACCOUNTS OF ANY DESCRIPTION! And last I checked, wether they’re charged by one-time purchase (eg. Guild Wars) or subscription (eg. WoW), they were NOT getting swallowed, except by similar MMORPGs that don’t offer free accounts either.
And if a game offers free accounts, of course they’ll be a “poor-mans possie”. Why that is, should be common dogfuck, but just in case it’s not…
Free accounts do not contribute to the setup, maintenance or expansion of the servers.
Nor do they contribute to the staffs wage bill.
So in almost every important sense, your presence will be subsidised by paying members.*
And it’s the same story across the entire MMORPG landscape, not just SL.
Which, if you insist on a freebie (like these happy little teddies I’ve quoted below)…
“You fags troll yourselves.”
“oh…second life? who cares. good riddance.”
“Go away you fuckwits.”
“Just because you dish out $10 a month on a GAME, doesn’t mean I have to.”
“Without basics, the SL economy will be ruined.”
“Go die, everybody who supports this bullshit.”
…offers three choices:-
-Shuffle off to another MMO that will most assuredly offer you the same deal you’re getting now,
-Count yourself lucky that these babies can be picked up for free at all (unheard-of five years ago), or
-Write a MMO of your own, set up the servers yourself, and then offer free accounts unrestricted.
*the creativity of this or that Resident doesn’t have the irreplaceable worth you might think – not with the glut of creative people in SL, paying or not, paid or not (thats why so few creators can make a living here).
Grapeskin Patriotic
Jun 20th, 2008
Quote=Rip
“4) All paid accounts would have the ability to send you home (log in point) at anytime
5) The ability for paid members to map you grid wide all the times.”
Wow, man. Like, wow, for real.
Do you hate in real life, for example, the poor? Why do you feel that some of the perks of being a “paying member” should be worsening the experience of “non-paying members?” I mean, you think you should be able to pay to bugger others?
That’s sadistic, for real, and I wonder what your motivation is. Look long and hard inside, man, because your problems aren’t about Second Life at all.
Oh and BTW anyone who pays for Second Life is a real, super-duper idiot who is being taken for a ride. Real talk.
Solar Legion
Jun 21st, 2008
Well this just keeps getting better and better doesn’t it?
I do not and will not pay for a Premium Account until such a time as it is made truly worth my while. Imposing restrictions on my Basic Account, which I DO buy Lindens with (and incidentally, the Lindex system is keyed to shunt as FEW Lindens between residents as possible), would cause the exact opposite reaction.
If those of you who would like to impose restrictions on Basic Accounts would like to purchase for me a suitable 3D modeling studio which can be easily used by someone whose hands contain the artistic ability of a stone, not to mention the proper classes, plug-ins and other costly additional charges … THEN you may impose such restrictions. I use SL more for the 3D engine in it (as outdated as it is) than for anything else.
To get me to go Premium you would need to do the following:
1. Jack the Stipend up to something that is actually more in line with how much I’d be paying for said account. You know what I mean right? No? Here: $9.95 (monthly) = l$2,553 Lindens (total a month or per Stipend period), $22.50 (quarterly) = L$5,867 (total a month or per Stipend period) and finally, the whopper $72 = L$18,935 (total a month or per Stipend period).
2. Far greater than a piddly shit 512 plot as free tier. Better yet, bring back the one time payment option to have a lifetime account and 4096 in free tier.
3. Actually allow Premium Accounts that are members of specific groups to do SOMETHING other than file a useless Abuse Report on Griefers in public spaces.
Those are about the only things I can think of at this time … I will more than likely add more in another comment later.
Oh, and about item one? As unreasonable as it may seem, it is not a point I’d negotiate on if asked by a Linden what I’d like to see as a Premium incentive. The current Stipend is quite literally piddly shit.
Rock Ramona
Jun 21st, 2008
linden lab created free accounts so more people would come check it out and use it…i was a paying customer in the good old days of 5k people logging in,those were truly the good old days,but ll wanted stardom,so they created the free accounts and all the false hoopla about how wonderful it was,the log ins kept going up..and service and usability went down..if ll made everyone pay to use it would empty out like rats running from a sinking ship,i know that if they told me pay to play tomorow id never return,so the free accounts will stay,it is the only way for them to stay somewhat relevant,there,everything solved,go play with your kids,take a nice walk outside and smile
Prokofy Neva
Jun 21st, 2008
Currently, the premium account is worth exactly US $5.89 in real terms.
512 m2, if purchased in bulk on a full sim for $195, is worth 512 m x .002960, or US $1.51.
$300 a week in stipends, or $1200 monthly, is worth $1200 x US $3.65, generally the price at which you can sell Lindens if you put a sell for a day: 265/$1000 or $4.38.
So $1.51 plus $4.38 = $5.89. The annualized account, for $72 a year, would put your premium cost at $6.00 per month.
So, what else do you get for your 11 cents a month as a premium? Well, mainly less ban lines, as a lot of people check off “ban No Payment on File” from their land in the belief that this cuts down on bots, griefers on day-olds, and clueless newbs — and it does, although it also prevents plenty of normal Europeans and Asians willing to spend money in SL from your stores. That’s why I never set anything to ban to NPIOF.
Is the $5.89 compensation you get out of the $9.95 account per month worth it? Well, I think it’s not quite worth it these days, and the Lindens need to increase the stipend or increase the tier in it to bring it up to a cost that really reflects the $9.95 in today’s values. Then they are stuff with a loss if people annualize or go to the 90 day accounts, but perhaps that’s a sweetener for them then, and then the Lab gets their income in advance.
2 cents
Jun 22nd, 2008
“Free accounts do not contribute to the setup, maintenance or expansion of the servers. ”
Ehm, wrong.
Suppose, club A.
Owner of Club A is a premium account holder, and nicely pays their tier for the land and the cost for the account to LL.
But, tier is expensive: Clubowner of Club A needs to put up a begbox.
Luckily! A lot of people really like club A.
A lot of donators to begbox of club A are free accounts, and with their donations they allow clubowner of club A to continue paying his tier.
As opposed to the demise of club A and no more tier being paid, losing the land.
SO. How is it again that non paying accounts do NOT help in paying for the horribly expensive costs to run the servers?
Mind you, this is not just a hypothetical situation either. This is a situation as we have in a lot of places and not just clubs either.
How can a place of buisness on SL survive without customers? To keep a store running well enough to account for the costs of the land the store’s on, one needs customers. And customers can be premium as well as basic accounts as well as ‘freeloaders’ who do seem to spend a lot of L$ left and right.
And as I understood, there are a LOT of free accounts around. Just imagine, if you have a club or store, having to miss out on every single L$ coming from those accounts. Getting enough L$ together to be able to keep your store suddenly becomes a little difficult, dont it? cause, lets just be honest here: a store cannot survive on the profits made by paid accounts only. There’s just not enough of ‘em.
Freeloaderhaters, non paying accounts are actually NOT freeloaders. They dont pay LL, but that doesnt mean they do not shop and pay other residents.
I think maybe, LL needs to keep out non paying accounts for a whole week for once, instead of just a few minutes. Just to show the little difference they DO make in the SL economy.
Dr. Internet
Jun 22nd, 2008
If LL treated their customers better, they wouldnt have to worry about losing customers if they went paid only.
I wouldnt give them a dime for the service atm.
Let’s review the reasons:
Corruption = check
Certain citizens being given priority over others based on how much brown nosing they perform? = check
Shitty service = check
Unstable client = check
Shit Graphics = check
Shitty customer support = check
Lack of any real fun value = check
Being able to actually make money that has any use in the real world = nada.
Yeah fuck that. Pay $9.95 a month for all that? I could pay that for a 3 day porn subscription. I’d get much more value out of it. But hell, most good porn is free anyway.
Artemis Fate
Jun 22nd, 2008
@Rock Ramona
“if ll made everyone pay to use it would empty out like rats running from a sinking ship,i know that if they told me pay to play tomorow id never return,so the free accounts will stay,it is the only way for them to stay somewhat relevant”
Easy solution. Go back to asking only a one time fee out of free account no tier set ups, maybe with a free heavily restricted trial account (limited time, limited use), and grandfather all existing accounts under free accounts. The need for credit card or payment would still cut down on bots, revolving door griefer policy, and get them a little more revenue from where they were getting none. The griefers left over on old free accounts would eventually dwindle down as they get caught and banned.
One time fee accounts would have all the same abilities as current free accounts, with the same inability to own land except rent.
Free Trial Accounts would be restricted like normal MMOs, 2 week/1 month access, but with the inability to hold transactions with other users (trading objects, paying money, etc.), inability to call certain script functions (ones that could be harmful or used by griefers, such as the ones used to create Grey Goo). They would however still be able to build, Use the Library inventory for clothes and gadgets, and join groups, granted those groups didn’t have a one time fee to get in. Trial accounts would likely have to start in a different areas developed specifically to inform and advertise getting a higher account as quickly as possible, as well as have a list of places to go that would represent what can be done with and what’s interesting about SL.
I really don’t expect LL to drop Free accounts for anything now though.
Oh and to people saying that there’s absolutely no reason to have a premium, remember that your ability to rent land only exists because a premium account owns the land and has decided to rent it off. It wasn’t LL’s idea to allow land rentals, and they’re not the one doing it. I was kind of expecting them to crack down on it honestly, since having a personal space in SL is about the only bonus a premium got at that time.
Solar Legion
Jun 22nd, 2008
Artemis: Private Island Owners are not all Premium Account holders. They are a different class and type of account.
Just ask big name companies like IBM and Dell. They are yet another kind of non-premium account.
Oh … regarding the one time fees? Sorry, Second Life is not worth paying even a one time fee for basic access.
I’d like to see just how many casual users Linden Lab would lose if they instated such a thing.
Artemis Fate
Jun 22nd, 2008
@Solar Legion
“Private Island Owners are not all Premium Account holders. They are a different class and type of account.”
Still people who pay for Second Life, quite a bit in fact, whether or not they’re technically called premium accounts, they’re still defined under “people who pay for SL”.
“Oh … regarding the one time fees? Sorry, Second Life is not worth paying even a one time fee for basic access.”
Well if you don’t care about Second Life enough to pay 10 bucks forever for it, then I shouldn’t expect to see you or anyone else who refused to pay complaining about not getting access for being a free account then no?
“I’d like to see just how many casual users Linden Lab would lose if they instated such a thing.”
At this point, losing new users isn’t a bad thing for SL. SL is already completely unable to handle the amount online it has now, and every new free user adds to the lag and server load without contributing a little income to handle that lag and server load. If you have a party out on a deck, the “more the merrier” concept of inviting people to the party only applies up to the point that the deck is able to withstand.
Solar Legion
Jun 23rd, 2008
@Artemis:
“Well if you don’t care about Second Life enough to pay 10 bucks forever for it, then I shouldn’t expect to see you or anyone else who refused to pay complaining about not getting access for being a free account then no?”
Cough up the $40 – 200 I’ll need for a damn good 3D rendering program and then however much it will take to turn these damned hands of mine from piss poor with any sort of graphic art to a master’s hands and maybe then you’ll have some ground to stand on when talking to me.
Until such a time as you and any other arrogant Premium User is willing to do so … You’ll have to deal with me. Second Life is my 3D Rendering Program first and a method to keep in touch with some of my friends second.
I switched to a free America Online account the moment they offered them … Do you really think I’m going to pay for a Second Life account when the damn system is in the same state as Q-link was when it first became America Online?
Sorry Charlie, not going to happen anytime soon. The only ‘payment’ Linden Lab will see from me is the occasional Lindex transaction.
Torley Linden
Jun 23rd, 2008
Shut the fuck up everyone. White power and disco!
2 cents
Jun 23rd, 2008
“”I’d like to see just how many casual users Linden Lab would lose if they instated such a thing.”
At this point, losing new users isn’t a bad thing for SL.”
How about losing a good majority of the users it has now? you forget if people are gonna have to pay, it will also drive away the ones on year old and longer free accounts.
Could any of your buisnesses handle the drop in customers?
Artemis Fate
Jun 23rd, 2008
So basically you want to complain and demand that they improve their product for you, but you don’t want to actually pay them any small amount to support such changes, just take from the overall server resource quota?
Ever heard that whole “You can’t have your cake and eat it too” saying? Unfortunately it seems LL hasn’t or they wouldn’t have had free accounts to begin with.
Massive and increasing server load + no new income from that server load = recipe for disaster.
Uncle Bill
Jun 23rd, 2008
I have to agree that that ‘dialog box’ looks like a fake. The wording is all wrong, of course, since no corporate communication would work so hard to put such a thinly veiled divisive statement in a notice.
I suspect that if free accounts are throttled to make room for others, the dialog box would most likely just inform the user that their login failed, and to try again later. Why explain everything out?
If LL needs to throttle free accounts to make room for paying customers, its their right, especially if they feel it improves performance for the other users. The problem is, I wouldn’t go for the premium account unless I was sure that my experience in SL would be appreciably better.
Rip
Jun 23rd, 2008
Lykurgus – Ever heard of free account griefer attacks? If you have ever been to a SL event they disrupted with their silly script kiddy BS and their stupid looking avatars, you would see why i say we paid accounts need a few special powers over them beyond filing a AR with Linden. Non-paid accounts should not be stopped in SL, but for the good of the community (the Game)and to insure person responibility of each player, these types of accounts need to have their overall privileges serverly restricted. You may not like this solution, but the fact still remains that its unfair to the poeple that pay for this service to be exposed to this sort of behavior by childish freeloader account types that can be banned one day and renewed the next.
Lykurgus
Jun 23rd, 2008
I take it then, Solar, that you won’t be making a public-spirited donation to the poorbox of 2Cents’ clearly-starving but equally-clearly-fabulous “Club A” to help with a tiny sliver of its owners tiers? You know, that not-hypothetical club to which he won’t even throw some clearly-much-needed publicity.
Because somehow I don’t think 2Cents would return the favour… at least not by gifting you with a high-end 3D Modeling studio that even YOU can use. Or pay for the training in said art-form, hardware and so on that you tried demanding of us.
Lest you think I’m just getting off on being a turd to freebie-holders, I have free accounts in almost a dozen MMORPGs.
I have all the problems you insist on crowing about.
I had eight characters in Requiem, for example.
They just did the official launch…
…and every last one of them had just fucked off.
That’s the kind of customer service you get for free. Stamp your feet all you want, but you’re still here. Scream about how LL will dissolve into shirt-rending fits of grief if you left them, but you haven’t done it. Kick every “we the people” can in your path to pretend you’re not getting something for nothing as it is, but you haven’t rejected it. You’ve tacitly accepted the deal.
So get used to it.
Lykurgus
Jun 23rd, 2008
Rip, are you sure you got the right bloke? I’m the one who said…”Free accounts do not contribute to the setup, maintenance or expansion of the servers”.
I think it was Grapeskin Patriotic that was having a go at you.
Azzura Supplee
Jun 23rd, 2008
Funny thing about this – I have been a paying customer for 2 years+, Owned full sims, owned an island, and I was locked out too. I wasn’t too happy about it – especially since I just started to get back into SL. I tend to take extended breaks from SL when I get booted or can’t build without interruptions
Artemis Fate
Jun 23rd, 2008
@2Cents
“And as I understood, there are a LOT of free accounts around. Just imagine, if you have a club or store, having to miss out on every single L$ coming from those accounts. Getting enough L$ together to be able to keep your store suddenly becomes a little difficult, dont it?”
Considering that of the 5 years my account has been active (and the 5 years that my store has been around), and that 3 of those years were during a time where there WERE no free accounts, I can honestly say I know what it’s like, and it wasn’t that bad.
“cause, lets just be honest here: a store cannot survive on the profits made by paid accounts only. There’s just not enough of ‘em.”
And yet my store has.
“Freeloaderhaters, non paying accounts are actually NOT freeloaders. They dont pay LL, but that doesnt mean they do not shop and pay other residents.”
And free accounts paying some other account matters to LL how? It’s still not getting them anything to fix the servers or hire more people. All it means is you’re using the servers without contributing anything to counterbalance the grid-stress from your use.
Really it seems to me that if a person is absolutely against shelling out any money to LL for their product, then they’re going to be pretty tight-pursed on buying anything in the player economy as well.
“How about losing a good majority of the users it has now? you forget if people are gonna have to pay, it will also drive away the ones on year old and longer free accounts.”
You think people who’ve got year old or more roots in Second Life are just going to up and leave when SL asks for a small bit of money one time or monthly to improve the things they’re constantly bitching about? They’re going to abandon all their friends in SL, give up the vast inventory you seem to suggest they have, because you claim the economy is driven by free accounts, and all their hang outs and just leave because they have to put in a small amount of money to make things BETTER? I figure if anyone leaves, it’s going to be the people who didn’t care about Second Life that much, never bought anything unless it was free or extremely cheap, never bought L$, and definitely didn’t want to pay for it. The people you so tout as the god’s of second life, the free accounts who buy things, aren’t going to give all that up because LL asks for money to improve their program, something everyone (except the griefers) desperately seems to want.
But guess what, LL nor anyone else, don’t have a magic wand that they wave and presto-chango all things are fixed, if you want better performance in SL, better customer service, a more stable grid, and more updates, then LL needs money, and you need to pay for your stay or shut up about the bad service.
Witness X
Jun 23rd, 2008
Listen to Artemis. Artemis knows what’s really going on here.
The one thing that free accounts nearly always lack is their own money to spend. If they had it, they’d spend it, but they don’t. The camping chairs are all but gone, and the users that can take a free account and actually make money with them, but that don’t convert to full memberships are very VERY rare – they don’t account for enough of the economy for Linden Lab to worry about one way or the other.
If Linden Lab stops giving out free accounts, it’ll be business as usual. Except more of it per person for the people who are left, the money pool won’t change noticably.
Rip
Jun 23rd, 2008
Yes Lykurgus your absolutly right, it was that free account touchy feely whinny butt Grapeskin I was replying too….Sorry bud, my mistake!…..:)
2 cents
Jun 24th, 2008
“”Really it seems to me that if a person is absolutely against shelling out any money to LL for their product, then they’re going to be pretty tight-pursed on buying anything in the player economy as well.”
Seems being the keyword. Hey, guess what? I have spent literally thousands of L$ inworld, without spending a real life dime on it! All earned in world.
How about this one, first LL fixes SL, THEN we’ll see if I want to give them any money. Till then, fuck it.
And yes, I will up and leave if suddenly I have to start paying for my free account. After 3 years inworld, I would indeed abandon all my inworld friends, because this piece of shit software that crashes all the time is not worth paying for.
And if you do think it’s worth paying for as it is, yes, I’m calling you an idiot.
In the real world, a product is supposed to be finished and in perfect working order before it ends up in stores for people to buy. If it isnt, it will result in a lot of angry customers demanding their money back. That’s normal. First good product, THEN money. Not the other way around…
In this case, I guess I see it as a “Try before you buy” deal. And I dont want to buy yet, simply because I’m not satisfied with the product yet. I have faith it will improve, and when it has, then I’ll buy.
So keep on giving them money, actually *please* do, saves me having to pay for the development and finetuning of SL, if you and others keep on doing it.
Of course I dont have anything against any of you, paid accounts or not.
But I bitch about SL needing some serious fixing. Everyone does, cause everyone agrees on that. And when you tell me that hey, I cant bitch cause I’m not paying… GUESS WHY I dont pay? Seriously. Of course, I’ll just continue bitching about it, regardless what some paid accounts might think about it. you pay LL, but not for the exclusive right to have a negative opinion about their product. So if you dont like my bitchings, take a hike.
Lykurgus
Jun 24th, 2008
Not your fault Rip – the formatting just does that to the poster names.
But why pick on your last two ideas? You proposed more severe things than those… why does having his whereabouts known, fill him with white-hot fear?
Topic in itself.
Solar Legion
Jun 24th, 2008
Lykurgus, when I make my Lindex transactions at the start of the month I usually do dump a small amount into a donation box. I have no trouble or problem with helping other users stay afloat … I simply refuse to pay Linden Lab directly.
Artemis, you may want to rethink your train of logic concerning Basic Accounts wanting to purchase goods. I may not want to pay Linden Lab any more directly than the Lindex but that does not mean I am not going to support a business either.
Dumisani
Jun 24th, 2008
Wow, a lot of anger here from all sides. Hey, firstly I love free accounts. I think they have a roll to play in SL. I am myself a premium account and a concierge account, only as I own 6 sims in SL. I am not mentioning this as a brag of some sorts, damn no, but wanted to give some balance to some of the views above that free accounts somehow spend so much in SL that they should be better treated somehow by Linden Lab than they are. This comment will hopefully show that regardless who you are, what account you have and how much you spend in SL, LL dont particularly care at all. My sims cost me US$1675 per island for four full sims, and US$250 per sim for two Open Space sims, and one them we have mostly huge open spaces offering free access games, activities and water sports to anyone regardless accounts. To offset this we have sold some land on two sims to residents, and we have been forced lately to sell off two more parcels cheaply (unsuccessfully as yet) to further offset the slowdown in SL, and in particular the overnight 40% drop in land value for island owners due to new LL pricing policies. On our sims we love any account type residents, though we don’t have any money trees or camping sites, we do offer a lot of free stuff to anyone who comes.
Now for the crunch, this is all paid out of my own pocket, initially the premium account, minimal per month as some of you so painstakingly analysed here, then the spend to buy those sims, +-US$7,200 upfront, often waiting on actual island delivery prior to the new land store, for weeks, and then add my monthly bill just for tier, +-US$295 times 4, and then again US$75 times 2, making my monthly tier bill US$1,330.00 excl VAT.
Now that is small compared to many island owners in SL, but it will serve as an example here. Despite that cost, and not withstanding the HUGE (for me) investment in L$ I made for content for the islands (you’re welcome to pop over and see this first hand) I receive no response from LL when the islands go down for any reason, no response when I get, regularly now, the same message as you do with a few changes in text, mainly blocking my login for 5 minutes at a time due to some problem, and no compensation for loss in the service when SL goes down or my sims go down.
What I am trying to show everyone, is that unless you are somehow personally connected or have been a member of SL when it was much smaller and therefore have some excellent in-company contacts, the service to you is the same as the service to me. And as a last point, if I show you how LL sometimes respond to my requests for assistance, you may just give up SL completely, because THAT will show that they have ZERO regard of who you are or what account you have. They simply dont work that way
Rip
Jun 24th, 2008
The major problem Linden has today in sl and the number one cause of the unstable system failures is the 20 or 25 thousand+ Zombies being used everyday to increase traffic stats of sim and other individual landed business owners. Most of these zombies farms have 8 to 100 free accounts hidden someplace on the owners property. The worst part is that Linden refuses to do a damn thing to resolve this issue because it ups their log in stats and membership numbers. So yes the issue of free account privileges in SL is a very real problem and until these account become unattractive to maintain we will continue to have a unstable games system.
Witness X
Jun 24th, 2008
The only way to limit the zombie accounts is to limit the creation of new free accounts – which is unfortunate, because there are legitimate uses for them. People use bots to do things that you can’t write scripts in LSL to do. There’s no way to extend the functionality of SL beyond the scripting language EXCEPT to use bots. But the overriding issue is the griefers. Let the PN bawwww over the loss of their ability to abuse the system and they can go back to Habbo Hotel or IntLibber’s basement or wherever they came from – the inconvenience of the loss of free accounts for bots is outweighed by the nuisance issue. Making the SL experience better by limiting or eliminating free accounts will strengthen, not destroy, Second Life.
Artemis Fate
Jun 24th, 2008
@2Cents
“Hey, guess what? I have spent literally thousands of L$ inworld, without spending a real life dime on it! All earned in world.”
Considering all that money has real life value, you have spent a dime, because that’s a dime that you didn’t pull out.
“How about this one, first LL fixes SL, THEN we’ll see if I want to give them any money. Till then, fuck it.”
So LL needs money to handle all the server stress, hire new employees, and make new changes. And you (and other free accounts) refuse to pay anything till they fix those changes. See a sort of never-ending loop problem here?
“In the real world, a product is supposed to be finished and in perfect working order before it ends up in stores for people to buy. If it isnt, it will result in a lot of angry customers demanding their money back. That’s normal. First good product, THEN money. Not the other way around…”
Incidentally, the “product” was doing quite well before free accounts were open, it was becoming stable(ish), lag was getting cut down, the servers weren’t as stressed, the grid only went down monthly instead of weekly etc. The influx of free accounts who tripled, quadrupled, the population, stressing those servers and lagging everything equally as much as premium customers without paying a dime to LL to offset their lag has pretty much turned it into what it is now.
Secondly this is a virtual product, not a real life product, they can’t be compared. There’s no point where LL will suddenly go “There! Second Life is finished! We no longer have to touch it or deal with it in anyway besides Customer Support”. Second Life will always be evolving, reacting, and changing, till it dies. It can’t even be compared to other Software, because there’s really nothing else that allows users to have such huge amounts of control over the environment.
But if you want to continue thinking in such archaic terms of comparing the marketing of Second Life to your toaster, then don’t be surprised when you’re disappointed when SL never become stable and perfectly running.
“I have faith it will improve, and when it has, then I’ll buy.”
Glad you have faith, but LL isn’t a religion. They can’t buy new servers and hire new people on faith, they require donations in the till.
“I’ll just continue bitching about it, regardless what some paid accounts might think about it. you pay LL, but not for the exclusive right to have a negative opinion about their product. So if you dont like my bitchings, take a hike.”
It’s not exclusive right to give a negative opinion about Second Life. But if you’re not pushing the cart, then don’t sit on it and complain about how slow it’s moving.
@Solar Legion
“Artemis, you may want to rethink your train of logic concerning Basic Accounts wanting to purchase goods. I may not want to pay Linden Lab any more directly than the Lindex but that does not mean I am not going to support a business either.”
Ever seen one of those old camping chair farms? I’m not so sure they exist anymore, because shitty club owners found they could cheat their traffic ratings even more and for free by just logging in 50 free accounts with bots and have them sit in an empty box in the sky. But anyways, camping chairs used to pull tens of thousands of users, and if you looked at the people sitting at camping chairs, you’d find that almost all of them if not every one was a free account.
Now to buy Lindens is what? 200L$ per dollar? And Camping chairs were about 1L$ per 10 minutes, meaning that to equal one dollar in linden value, you’d have to sit at that chair for a about 33 and a half hours. You think someone who knows that dropping one single dollar into buying Lindens is going to sit at a camping chair knowing that to get the same dollar there would take almost a day and a half straight? I wouldn’t think so. So that means that probably every free account found in a camping chair doesn’t buy L$ and gets all their income from camping chairs and maybe misc club event prizes. That means their spending money was very slim and therefore these free accounts were not making a noticeable difference on the player economy. Expound that even more now with camping chairs lessening because sleazy club owners have found a better way to cheat, and now the free accounts have even less of the pittance they had before, left only to operate off of whatever club event they manage to win (or money ball or hippiepay scam), and that’s pretty much their spending income.
Of course, that’s not to say that ALL free accounts are like that, but you as a free account who buys L$, do you think you’re in a majority or a minority in terms of these tens of thousands others who would prefer to sit on a chair in a horrible club for hours to get literally pennies rather than pay a dollar into LindeX.
I think that’s a better train of logic at least then the one that was claimed before that “Free accounts are a huge part of the player economy and player stores wouldn’t be able to exist without them” through the logic that “there are more free accounts therefore they must be paying more and be more important”.
2 cents @ artemis
Jun 24th, 2008
Okay, time to disassemble…
lol this is gonna be good. Please do note that I’m making this and previous ( and prolly future) posts purely for my own entertainment, I actually dont give a rat’s ass. E.G. TL:DR for anyone. And, I am not sober atm, so dont bother correcting typo’s there’s gonna be alot. Just being honest.
“Considering all that money has real life value, you have spent a dime, because that’s a dime that you didn’t pull out.”
Concidering that you’re concidering I see the L$ as a real money value. I dont, even tho for every L$ given to any account, LL does take it’s share and thus makes money. No matter the account type, important detail. I see the L$ purely as Anon calls it ‘spacebucks’ or, if you will, game points. I have zero interest in making any profit from SL in any way, shape or form. Why? Because, first, it is a game. a game, and nothing more. Secondly, a way to express myself without the cost of art materials if I would do my work in the real, RL, touchable realm. Without the cost. It’s free, and therefore, I like it. If it would not be free, I would like it a lot less. Especially with all the buildlag and other annoyances. But I’ll get to those.
Yes, a game with the ability to directly communicate with other players, but still a game. For my RL money, to buy RL food and pay RL rent, I have my RL job. Unless SL would enable me to instantly start earning the amount Anshe Chung makesnowadays, it’s peanuts, and I wont quit my RL job yet.
SL is entertainment. Nothing more.
“So LL needs money to handle all the server stress, hire new employees, and make new changes. And you (and other free accounts) refuse to pay anything till they fix those changes. See a sort of never-ending loop problem here?”
Ehm…
NEWSFLASH!
EVERY game and program on the market works that way! They create a game, PERFECT it (in caps because it is the key word here!) and THEN sell it and make a profit. They gather developers, designers, and whomever they need for a game, pay them for years to make the game, then in the end, they start selling it and FINALLY make some revenue and if they did their thing right, some profit.
Example? GTA 4. Cost a MILLION to develop. They sold it like water, and PRRRESTO! they made five milion out of it. 500% profit! AFTER perfecting the game. What would have happened if GTA would be as faulty and buggy as SL? then Rockstar would be no more.
I dont really get what is so backwards on this, while in the real world, the way LL works is kinda backwards instead.
Sure, WoW wasnt perfect when it launched probably, but at least it didnt have the amount of problems still plauging SL. After YEARS from launch now. WoW is at least playable compared to SL.
“Incidentally, the “product” was doing quite well before free accounts were open, it was becoming stable(ish), lag was getting cut down, the servers weren’t as stressed, the grid only went down monthly instead of weekly etc. The influx of free accounts who tripled, quadrupled, the population, stressing those servers and lagging everything equally as much as premium customers without paying a dime to LL to offset their lag has pretty much turned it into what it is now.”
oooh, nice one. The problems are all CAUSED by the free accounts.
Welll….. BULLSHIT!
I’m not denying that since the free accounts were introduced, some problems have become bigger… But, I still call bullshit. I been around since before that time, and the shittyness of SL hasent been around since the free accounts, it already was there before. Nice try, tho.
“Secondly this is a virtual product, not a real life product, they ca n’t be compared. There’s no point where LL will suddenly go “There! Second Life is finished! We no longer have to touch it or deal with it in anyway besides Customer Support”. Second Life will always be evolving, reacting, and changing, till it dies. It can’t even be compared to other Software, because there’s really nothing else that allows users to have such huge amounts of control over the environment.”
Lol WHAT?
I will only add to your post, and replase Second Life here:
Windows will always be evolving, reacting, and changing, till it dies.
Photoshop will always be evolving, reacting, and changing, till it dies.
Flash will always be evolving, reacting, and changing, till it dies.
games will always be evolving, reacting, and changing, till they die.
Oh, so very DIFFERNT is SL from other software!
How VIRTUAL it is! Like, no other software you CANNOT touch, and is NOT like SL, where you can be in a VIRTUAL world!
Really, you make me think this post you made here was the first time you ever heard of a device called a com-pyuuuu-tor!
“But if you want to continue thinking in such archaic terms of comparing the marketing of Second Life to your toaster, then don’t be surprised when you’re disappointed when SL never become stable and perfectly running.”
At least my toaster works when I want it to. That’s what I expect from it,. after paying for it. If it wouldnt, and half of the time would say “Sorry, something unexpected has gone wrong” I would take it back to the store and ask for my money back. I would do the same with anything else I payed money for, no matter how touchable or virtual it is. Toaster, TV, computer, Windows, my bankaccount, my rent…
“Glad you have faith, but LL isn’t a religion.”
Gods. I… I’m not even GOING to comment on that. Are you serious?
“They can’t buy new servers and hire new people on faith, they require donations in the till.”
Uh-huh. Donations… What is it, the red cross? lol. You surely must mean investors. But hey, donate all you want. I’m not.
“It’s not exclusive right to give a negative opinion about Second Life.”
Here we go. We agree on that one then!
“But if you’re not pushing the cart, then don’t sit on it and complain about how slow it’s moving.”
Let’s cut back one step here shall we? You just said above, I’m allowed, just like anyone else, to have an opinion. The problem here is not this, but rather the problem is you and others complaining about others (who do not ‘donate’) to have an opinion.
Why do you complain about others complaining, if you agree that we can all complain?
The following is directed at Solar Legion, but hey, I’m on a roll so I’ll take the liberty of adressing this as well.
“Ever seen one of those old camping chair farms? ……
…..found a better way to cheat, and now the free accounts have even less of the pittance they had before, left only to operate off of whatever club event they manage to win (or money ball or hippiepay scam), and that’s pretty much their spending income.”
Of course, my free account has spent time camping as well. However, like probably everyone after an initial day or two, three, has found there are WAY better ways to make money on a free account in SL.
What you’re basically saying is, that free accounts dont matter anything in the SL economy ecause they only spend one or two L$ made on the camping chairs.
Let me remind you that, as I stated before, in my few years of free accounting, I have spent a LOT of spacebucks in SL, which I all earned in SL. Thousands would be an understatement. So, free accounts spend only “pretty much their sp[ending income” of hippypay or camping chairs, is kinda pretty much bullshit. Only noobs camp, and only noob landowners use camping chairs, as it frankly only gets you lag, enough to drive serious customers away instead of drawing them in. I know I TP out of a place as soon as it becomes clear that all the green dots are zombies. No fun in hanging out with a crowd of mutes or shop at a store that takes an hour to load.
“Of course, that’s not to say that ALL free accounts are like that, but you as a free account who buys L$, do you think you’re in a majority or a minority in terms of these tens of thousands others who would prefer to sit on a chair in a horrible club for hours to get literally pennies rather than pay a dollar into LindeX.”
Again, camping is for noobs or those who do not yet realize there’s better ways to earn money in the game itself, WITHOUT spending real money on spacebucks.
“I think that’s a better train of logic at least then the one that was claimed before that “Free accounts are a huge part of the player economy and player stores wouldn’t be able to exist without them” through the logic that “there are more free accounts therefore they must be paying more and be more important”.
Ehm… might be the beer, but that last bit doesnt really makes sense to me…
More important? I dont think anyone has ever claimed free accounts to be more important then paying accounts, I have only seen paid accounts claiming the free accounts didnt have any right to complain whatsoever. Which is what annoyed me slightly, I have never liked that attitude in anyone, RL or SL or whatever. Hence I at least jumped in, not to bitch about SL or LL, but to bitch about those elitist.
In my vieuw, you still must be insane to pay for a game annex chatclient that delivers only half of what it promises, if it is not completely unavailable. Which, luckily, has not happened all that very often lately.
I have no problem with LL or SL, I do have a very big problem with the “You cannot complain because YOU dont pay as much as we do!” kind of person. So, for them, a big F-E-C-K U.
K, thnxbye.
Neogrinch
Jun 25th, 2008
@Vince
Yea I sure as hell did think about what i said before I wrote it. When you are purchasing your lindens to go and spend it on clothes and skins, you are buying them from the RETAILERS in second life. not LL. So yes. they make the majority of the money from those who are PREMIUM members and own their own sims. People who buy Lindens from the exchange are simply paying out retailers with businesses. Why don’t YOU think before you write.
LL makes all the money it makes from premium members… the businesses in sl make most of their money from the many many free members.
Neogrinch
Jun 25th, 2008
and yea, i have spent thousands and thousands in world as well without spending a dime of my own RL dollars with income my business..lindens dollars that were given to me by others avatars… and those dollars i spent in turn didn’t go back to LL… they went to another avatar who sold them in the Exchange to another avatar for more LL.
Neogrinch
Jun 25th, 2008
I should mention that I certainly don’t think that free accounts don’t matter… that is not true! they are a big part of keeping the economy working properly. But all I was getting at is that someone paying 10-300 dollars USD a month to LL should have a little priority over someone who doesn’t pay a dime to LL.
Artemis Fate
Jun 25th, 2008
@2Cents
“I see the L$ purely as Anon calls it ‘spacebucks’ or, if you will, game points. I have zero interest in making any profit from SL in any way, shape or form.”
Well as much as you close your eyes and plug your ears and go “LALALALA it’s not worth anything!” L$ has value, and thus every time you spend it instead of save it, you forfeit that value. Even if you don’t want to make money off of SL, that doesn’t mean you can deny L$’s worth, it just means you’re not bothering and don’t care about losing the money.
“Sure, WoW wasnt perfect when it launched probably, but at least it didnt have the amount of problems still plauging SL. After YEARS from launch now. WoW is at least playable compared to SL.”
Well first off, SL isn’t a game, so it can’t be compared to GTA4. Major difference? GTA4 has nothing but static developer made content in the game, when you turn on GTA4 5 years from now, it’ll be the same content. SL has almost no developer made content, all of it is user made, which means that it’s not all professional so it’s not always done in the most resource friendly way, and it’s constantly shifting and growing. When I started in SL in 2003. There were probably 30 sims. Now there’s thousands. I bet if you turn on GTA3 now, you won’t suddenly find a couple of new cities added to the old one will you?
It’s not even appropriate to compare it to WoW even, though with MMOs it’s a closer analogy since it’s very player driven. However, the content is still fairly static, only changing when they add a tightly controlled and thought out expansion, or when they patch it over time to fix problems. And if you look at MMOs, pretty much ALL of them are unfinished on launch, and are constantly updating, bug fixing, and changing thereafter. WoW had a horrible launch, AoC right now is still full of bugs and they’re still trying to put in a ton of ideas that were originally planned to put in at launch. But even then, the content is entirely developer made and will only expand when the developers choose to do so.
Second Life can’t be compared to anything in terms of it’s stability. It’s entirely user made, it’s land size is entirely user dependent, and it’s quality and skill of graphics and scripts are entirely dependent on the user’s skill and professional working knowledge. There’s nothing like that out there.
“I’m not denying that since the free accounts were introduced, some problems have become bigger… But, I still call bullshit. I been around since before that time, and the shittyness of SL hasent been around since the free accounts, it already was there before. Nice try, tho.”
I wasn’t saying that SL was a utopia of perfect happiness with everything stable and working before the dark cloud of free accounts came. I was saying that the servers weren’t as stressed (thus less grid outages, and less asset server lock ups) because there weren’t as many people. When free accounts came, the population expanded exponentially and inevitably it takes it’s toll on the servers, especially when they contribute nothing to the upkeep. I’m sorry but you can’t deny that, more people on the grid simply equals more lag and lag related problems, and free accounts represents a time where population suddenly doubled/tripled/quadrupled in size.
“How VIRTUAL it is! Like, no other software you CANNOT touch, and is NOT like SL, where you can be in a VIRTUAL world!”
To cut down on the tl;dr inevitability of this post, I’m just going to refer to the above GTA4 response, since that characterizes how it’s different from other software and games in terms of it’s evolution.
“Gods. I… I’m not even GOING to comment on that. Are you serious? ”
I was turning a phrase, not meaning it literally. Meaning that you can’t just have “faith they’ll fix it”, it’s a monetary support problem, they have too many users, not enough servers, and not even income to deal with that influx. Honestly they brought it on themselves by putting free accounts in in the first place, and they continue to bring it on themselves every day they don’t take free accounts out, but for some reason they see it as beneficial while the grid falls apart.
“Uh-huh. Donations… What is it, the red cross? lol. You surely must mean investors. But hey, donate all you want. I’m not.”
Again. Turning a phrase. Not meaning it literal. I thought people understand things like that.
“Let’s cut back one step here shall we? You just said above, I’m allowed, just like anyone else, to have an opinion. The problem here is not this, but rather the problem is you and others complaining about others (who do not ‘donate’) to have an opinion.”
I don’t think I could answer this any better than the metaphor you were referring to with this. But then, looking at the above, it seems you have trouble with metaphors.
So I’m just going to post it again: “But if you’re not pushing the cart, then don’t sit on it and complain about how slow it’s moving.”, and dissect this: If you’re being a burden to the people who are working or supporting work, AND getting a free ride, maybe you shouldn’t complain about how fast it’s going. I’m not saying you have no right to complain, I’m just saying it’s not very welcome when you’re a part of the problem, and not a part of the solution to grid lag.
“However, like probably everyone after an initial day or two, three, has found there are WAY better ways to make money on a free account in SL.”
You’d think so, but if you got out of camping chairs that likely makes you a minority in terms of free accounts. Until they went on the decline due to bot traffic, Camping chairs were still the pretty much number one thing taking a crappy club into the top 20 popular places list, because thousands camped and got their income from only camping and other things like that. Because people are generally timid about spending real money on something virtual, people want something physical that you can touch and see, virtual items don’t have that. If you’re one of the ones who found out that Camping Chairs were a waste of time, and it’s faster, easier, and probably cheaper to buy L$, great. But I don’t think you can claim that the majority of your free account brethren went down that same path.
“I have spent a LOT of spacebucks in SL, which I all earned in SL. Thousands would be an understatement.”
Yes, thousands would be an understatement in terms of the total economy. Thousands of L$ over your allegedly long career (from your earlier claim that you were there before free accounts, which I don’t really believe), is such a minuscule amount. My store is only somewhat successful, and I still make thousands on a daily basis, and spend it on a weekly basis. So if you’ve only spent “thousands” in 2+ years of use, you’re not as large a part of the SL economy as you think.
“More important? I dont think anyone has ever claimed free accounts to be more important then paying accounts”
From the article itself, spoken in the “voice” of free accounts: “My contribution to Second Life is greater than any hundred premium accounts.” Then of course people suggesting that the SL economy would collapse without free accounts, and that if free accounts would be canceled, that all of SL’s population would leave and SL would fail and die.
Lykurgus
Jun 27th, 2008
(Solar Legion):”I simply refuse to pay Linden Lab directly.”
Then by definition, you are not contributing to the hardware (or upkeep and salaries thereof) which, wether you like it or not, are the reason Second Life exists. Which makes you the SL equivalent of “on the dole”.
(2Cents):”"Glad you have faith, but LL isn’t a religion.”
Gods. I… I’m not even GOING to comment on that. Are you serious? ”
You dispute the remark?
(2Cents):”So if you dont like my bitchings, take a hike”
We already know you want no such thing – you’ve already admitted your dependance on us.
(Artemis):”But if you’re not pushing the cart, then don’t sit on it and complain about how slow it’s moving.”
Exactly my point (I just didn’t put it as nicely) – the unanswerable fact of free accounts being the proverbial “gift horse”.
Not sure if I’ve disclosed this, but I freeload off a dozen MMOs. I have no illusions about what I’m doing. Surrounding CUSTOMERS know this. I do not bore them with the fact that I didn’t get a golden ticket. I do not suffer the “persecution” complained of here. Other than Artemis, Dumisani and Rip, does anyone else see a pattern?
But I did wonder about something… are Solar, 2Cents and the original author TRYING to make free account holders into an oppressed ethnicity in SL?
I’m not taking the piss… if I was them, this is exactly how I’d do it.
Grapeskin Patriotic
Jun 27th, 2008
Heh heh, I almost forgot I posted here, but I checked in on a whim and I have got to reply to these internet addicts.
quote=Lykurgus
“Not your fault Rip – the formatting just does that to the poster names.
But why pick on your last two ideas? You proposed more severe things than those… why does having his whereabouts known, fill him with white-hot fear?
Topic in itself.”
OK Lykurgus. In case you are deluded into thinking you got some kind of wicked burn in on me, let me just lay it on you straight: This game is slow, glitchy, COMPLETELY filled with morons, and not worth the effort. I played SL for a few weeks and then realized I was being an idiot and I stopped, and my life is much better for it.
Rip, too, appears to be predicating his rebuttal on the assumption that I’m one of the “free players” he hates so much. Sorry, you idiots, but I disliked the SL experience so much that, unlike you two, I put action to my words and stopped playing. So indeed, more than either of you I actually have a right to complain, since you two are still there, saying WITH YOUR ACTIONS that nothing is really wrong.
No, Lykurgus. No “white-hot fear” here. Couldn’t give any less of a shit about what happens. Because I don’t play. The rest of this comment is addressed to Rip.
I don’t disagree that there are griefers, Rip. I disagree with your stance that “paid players” should have “perks” that consist of making the experience of “free players” worse.
Read that again, because it’s important. I do not disagree that bad things are caused by free-playing griefers. I disagree with your apparent stance that the solution is to utterly ruin the experience of free players and to leave that ruin largely in the hands of “paid players.” That is, your stance appears to be that the solution is YOU should be able to PAY to BUGGER OTHERS.
Lykurgus, has the picture gotten any clearer in your mind about why I cited those last two suggestions specifically? The first three, well he hates free players, I don’t give a single shit what he hates and, fortunately, neither does Linden Lab. But the last two, where he suggests that one of the things his monthly payment should buy him is the ability to make free players’ experience worse? That is worrisome, and it doesn’t make me worry about Linden Lab, or Second Life. It makes me worry about Rip and his apparent latent hatred for this “in-game underclass” of free players.
I think there is something wrong with him, that he is basically sadistic, and that he might ought to stand back, look at himself, and ask if he needs some kind of help.
As an aside, Rip, if I really AM to address your other brilliant “suggestions,” how about the L1000 “transaction limit?” Well, gee, genius, why don’t you think about that a bit? You say free players are “parasite[s]” on “paid members backsides.” Charming. If you even devote an INSTANT OF THOUGHT to the idea, you realize that they are “parasite[s]” on the “backsides” of LINDEN LAB and they are costing you nothing except a little frustration and, well, grief. I don’t apologize for griefers because even when I did play, I wasn’t one of them.
But if you give the free players a “transaction limit,” they will be much less able to use L$, which the vast bulk of free players would need to buy from LL. So you’re taking away from Linden Lab with your suggestion. And then of course, what L$ they DO buy or get, they can only spend 1000 of per month buying items from in-game vendors. Oh gee. In-game vendors. You mean your suggestion takes money out of the ENTIRE ECONOMY, from EVERYBODY? What a brilliant idea!
In short, in this comment thread, two idiots got utterly owned by a guy who doesn’t even play the game.
Feel free to post rebuttals, but I’ll only respond if they’re as funny as your last attempts to dismiss my true statements about what’s wrong with Rip.
vince
Jun 29th, 2008
Go to hell you elitist bastards. Stop saying free accounts are worthless, stop saying shit like “LIMIT FERE ACCOUNTS,” all this will do is hit the SL economy. Killing free accounts, will kill the economy. GTFO if you don’t think that.
Rip
Jun 30th, 2008
Lykurgus…I think we did hit a sore spot on the old freeloader Grapeskin… I’ll give him a 5.50 on the whinny butt scale though for his post. What will you give him?..
Grapeskin do you really think we give a flyin brown doggy t#rd what you think? Tell you what, I’ll be sadistic if you’ll be moronic? Is that a deal or what?.
Oh! Vince anything free is relative and worthless! Look at Grapeskins posts as an example if you dont believe me!…Oh! and stop whinning your not very good at it, I gave you a 1.2!
Ella
Jun 30th, 2008
some people here are missing the point. the point is that there are more free accounts than premium accounts. if you have a rl store, let’s say in a mall, and less than 50% of persons are allowed inside the mall, you wouldn’t have the same amount of earnings that if all people were allowed inside the mall.
restricting access hurts economy.
some people here with premium accounts think that a person deserves to be treated badly because he hasn’t purchased anything yet. the person is a potential customer.
and some people that are free accounts here think that they deserve to be treated bad, and swallow all the pain they can get because “we deserve it”.
because of this way of thinking: “don’t care and treat the poor badly, is a poor person anyway” and “treat the rich very good, it doesn’t matter if he is the worst person in the world” the world it’s like it is.
when we start measuring the way we approach people based on economy, we only make everything worse, giving power to destruction and cutting potential, and guess what, that destructor who you treat good is going to get rid of you, and that poor guy with big ideas that was going to save you, well, you already drown him.
Angelus
Jun 30th, 2008
OMG we couldn’t log in for five minutes.. the horror the shere horror!
The sky is falling, the sky is falling!
2cents
Jul 1st, 2008
SL is fun, but it sucks too much to pay a single cent for it. I’ll keep playing it for free, untill perhaps it becomes WORTH something to pay for.
OOPS, I did it again!
Rip
Jul 1st, 2008
2cents you just made my point exactly. “Until its worth something” privileges are worth something to most people, and a whole lot more to people that dont have them. So only kids and the uneducated see the world as free. Most people dont realize that when something is free it usually has very little in the way of true valve to the person giving it away. If sl accounts stay free with the current privilege sets what incentive will Linden have to make things better. The answer is none! Heres a question to those people that think freeloading is helping SL. If you owned a business and you had two people working for you, one making you income and profit and the other making you nothing, how long can you keep the latter? The answer is not long with going out of business!
As far as this liberal clap trap about poor people goes. How is it they can afford a computer? Dont tell me they use public equipment either, because SL requires a viewer download just to access the grid and not allowed by public machines. The poor people argument is lame and only comes from a touchy feely mind devoid of reasonable thought processes. No, Sl needs to seriously restrict free accounts privileges if the place is to survive.
Concerning the SL economy, linden lab controls every aspect of the inworld economy and because its a socialist based command economy it can survive a long time with heavy free account restrictions.
One more thing about the economy, less than 5% of the people in SL make a actually living from the place. Most of the others bearly make their tier payments to break even. If you look at the Lindens own graphs and then realize that 100l$ = .04 cents you begin to see the true nature of this silly artificial play money economy.
Lykurgus
Jul 2nd, 2008
(Grapeskin):”…deluded into thinking you got some kind of wicked burn in on me,”
No, what I THINK I did was goad you into self-immolation, but leaving that aside…
(Grapeskin):”I played SL for a few weeks and then realized I was being an idiot and I stopped, and my life is much better for it.”
Yet you come here – to enjoy all of SLs pain and none of its pleasure.
(Grapeskin):”In short, in this comment thread, two idiots got utterly owned by a guy who doesn’t even play the game.”
A guy who comes here instead, for all the grief and none of the game…
(clap clap clap clap clap clap clap clap clap)
Stand up that man, take a bow for that splendid ownage!!!
But on a more serious note…
(Rip):”Lykurgus…I think we did hit a sore spot on the old freeloader Grapeskin… I’ll give him a 5.50 on the whinny butt scale though for his post. What will you give him?..”
Hard to say… parliament is televised in this country, and half of our papers are owned by Rupert Murdoch, so the competition’s tough. As much as I enjoyed the charge of seething, venomous foaming-at-the-mouth hatred of free-account-holders (made especially piquant by the fact that I happen to be one elsewhere), I really do feel that he took the easy option. That he had to keep falling back on it, speaks volumes about the material he had.
Next time, I would like to see a more honest attempt at character assassination – Hint specifically at hidden scandals, a bit of “Chinese Whisper” rumour-sowing perhaps… the occasional conspiracy theory wouldn’t hurt either.
I give him a 3. Anyone can flop, but this was just lazy.