Further Cost Savings Planned at Linden Lab

by Alphaville Herald on 13/06/10 at 5:06 pm

First they came for the animals…

by Journey Yellowlist

office hours

At great risk to this reporter’s virtual health, I have obtained plans by Linden Lab CEO Mark Kingdon for additional cost saving as his company prepares for acquisition by a firm run by adults restructuring to focus on the consumer market.

This reporter gained access to files written on yellow legal pads, the CEO’s preferred collaborative technology, from his office recycling bin.

1) Reduce Linden Sims: “Office hours generally are a waste of employee time,” Kingdon wrote. “Moreover, most Linden-owned sims generate no revenue. Henceforth the posh locales used by our staff will be repurposed as adult-zoned entertainment districts or cleared for tract-homes. Infohubs like Calleta will serve for employee-resident meetings. We will simply need to relocate the layabouts and slackers who populate such regions.

2) Sell Pony Linden to the Glue Factory: This Linden was an early creation that, in a more innocent time, provided rides to residents in Second Life. Kingdon plans to raise several thousand dollars from a snuff machinima of Pony’s disincarnation.

pony linden
pony linden to star in snuff machinima, visit glue factory

Apparently Pink Linden has already been sold for medical experiments, judging from a receipt from a cosmetics firm found among Kingdon’s documents: “$10 US for pink bunny.”

pink linden's final resting place
pink linden’s final resting place

3) When All Else Fails, Use Lawsuits: “The company cannot continue to permit the blatant violation of our copyrights,” Kingdon notes in another document. “Henceforth, Linden Lab will have zero tolerance for all uses of S or L, not merely both, from any for-profit company.”

A drunken shyster respected attorney who has previously represented Linden Lab, Junius Oglethrope Timberlake Hawthorne III, confirmed that NabiSco, Siemens, UniLever have all been served cease-and-desist orders.

As evidence Hawthorne showed this graphic, prepared by multimedia analysts found in the gutter kept on retainer by Linden Lab to show why one company has been served two orders.

sara lee

4) Outsource coding: “Top Notch talent must be found in-world and outside it to build the next-generation resident experience,” Kingdon scribbled in another note.

Reports have circulated that several notable coders have been fed booze hired by Linden Lab to begin employing “cutting-edge applications to take the company into its next decade of growth and innovation.”

web based client in computer lab
web based client in computer lab

5) Switch to logo with lower rendering costs: Kingdon asserted that “Every pixel, every electron is special and potentially expensive. While several designs are currently being considered, we need one that effectively communicates our level of support for the community.”

 
newsllogo
one finger logo cuts rendering costs, effectively communicates Lab’s community support attitude

17 Responses to “Further Cost Savings Planned at Linden Lab”

  1. Ric Mollor

    Jun 13th, 2010

    Amen! On the money on all counts except for point number 5. In the opinion of many expert analysts LL has been using that logo internally for quite some time while training customer support and community management staff.

    Only after years of “Special High Intensity Training” were they able to effectively communicate the message to the resident base at large.

  2. Ari Blackthorne

    Jun 13th, 2010

    Priceless.

    *****

    Since one word is “too short” as a comment, this dribble is all fluff and bullshit just to placate the system. Quite enough like how Linden Lab blog posts are much the same for the same purpose to the intended end: to get the system (users) to STFU and swallow what’s being fed.

  3. Zauber

    Jun 13th, 2010

    #5 definately describes how Linden Lab’s customer service is. They haven’t actually been helpful to me in all the times that I’ve filed support tickets.

  4. Karen Palen

    Jun 13th, 2010

    Absolutely hilarious!

    This brings back memories of a “kinder gentler” Second Life where the goals was (gasp!) to have fun not just pump out $$$$!

    Sadly though I have to wonder how much of this is really the future.

    Linden Labs and Second Life have managed to “pessimize” (the antonym of optimize) just about everything they have done for the past two years.

    Fortunately the suckers (err CUSTOMERS) do have choices!

  5. Little Lost Linden

    Jun 14th, 2010

    One things is for certain. This year’s SL birthday that starts in a week or so, is going to be very……________. Fill in the blank. :)

    Little Lost Linden
    http://www.thebotzone.net

  6. Wayfinder

    Jun 14th, 2010

    LOL. This is brilliant. Poor Pink. She was one of the good ones. How can anyone fire a Tiny?

    Maybe she was scarfing all the cookies from the hall vendor…

  7. Coke

    Jun 14th, 2010

    It makes perfect sense that Linden Lab are reducing staff numbers. They don’t need them, because they’ve also been reducing Resident numbers for the last few years too!

  8. JustMe

    Jun 14th, 2010

    Wayfinder, I think Pink was hoarding the waffles. Tinies LOVE waffles !

  9. CookieSnarf

    Jun 14th, 2010

    Is Hatchies wots ets cookies.
    Dat is wen der not watching da world cup futball.
    Best is when dey can snarf cookies AND watch da world cup futball.

    Oh.. and bite da stoopid ref’s ankels

  10. Antonius Misfit

    Jun 14th, 2010

    Wayfinder, have you forgotten so quickly? Pink was the one responsible for that “freebies mitigation roadmap” for XStreet which consisted of putting a $L99 per month, per freebie tax on listings(it’s thankfully now shelved). That resulted in monumental de-listings from XStreet, a popularity surge in third-party sites(meta-life, metaverse exchange, slapt.me, etc) where the Lab doesn’t get a cut, and a lot of bad blood between merchants. So if any Linden deserved the axe, it was her.

  11. Father Jones

    Jun 15th, 2010

    Kingdon can try whatever he wants. As long as he is supporting the massive illegal gambling in Second Life, he basically is the master crook of it all. When push comes to shove, he will have to deal with it letting go all those million dollars they earn through illegal gambling. That day, nothing will help Linden Lab keeping head above the water. What goes around comes around !

  12. General Drama

    Jun 16th, 2010

    Illegal how? The majority of the countries that SL serves have legalized internet gambling. The US was about the only exception, it has changed that, and now New Jersey is on the verge of passing a bill to officially establish online gambling in the state: http://www.recentpoker.com/news/nj-online-gambling-bill-7487.html
    http://www.recentpoker.com/news/house-Committee-gambling-7238.html

    For the record, the federal government has never investigated, charged, or prosecuted a single person for gambling in Second Life, since what goes on in SL qualify as games of skill.

  13. Father Jones

    Jun 16th, 2010

    Is bingo a game of skill ? Is that the reason why it is regulated as a game of chance in the Californian gambling law ? Are Zyngo-casino’s in SL licenced as it must be according to law ? Online gambling may be allowed in certain states, BUT ONLY TO LINCENSED COMPANYS THAT PAY TAXES. No, Zyngo-casino’s in SL are not like that. They don’t have a licence, they don’t have any kind of internal customer regulations, they can’t let government inspect their games, they are just there offering highroller games to anyone on the planet with an internet connection. Linden Lab’s TOS prohibits gambling and organising gambling, but they allow a game like Zyngo that is definitly a game of chance. The government did not yet interfere, that is true. But it will happen soon.

  14. General Drama

    Jun 17th, 2010

    Father Jonesy,
    “The government did not yet interfere, that is true. But it will happen soon.”

    Nice grammar. Anywho, we’ve all heard that horseshit before, the feds have NEVER made a public statement about any enforcement action on anybody in SL, despite many claims to the contrary by various hypochondriacs and haters.

    They don’t give a shit cause the size of the SL economy is so pissant small and shrinking that it’s not worth their time and bother to enforce shit here.

  15. Father Jones

    Jun 17th, 2010

    “They don’t give a shit cause the size of the SL economy is so pissant small and shrinking that it’s not worth their time and bother to enforce shit here.”

    -> you clearly don’t have a clue what size we are talking about

  16. Dave Bell

    Jun 21st, 2010

    There are two other very common gambling games on Second Life.
    Find The Lady and Poker.

  17. [...] earlier speculations were not mere hyperbole. Pony Linden, the fun-time animal from simpler times in Second Life’s [...]

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