Qarl Linden Axed – Sculpties Burn In Protest
by Pixeleen Mistral on 06/08/10 at 11:10 am
Sculptie fires rage across the grid, as angry content creators protest the layoff of Qarl Linden – a senior developer deeply involved in various forms of mesh support for the previously prim-based virtual world. It appears that Qarl did not signed the non-disparagement agreement that was a compulsory part of the severance package for the last round of layoffs. Rather than meekly logging out from his former place of employment, Qarl questions his layoff in a blog post saying "i’m completely baffled at the decision, as are all my coworkers (and my boss, and…)"
Qarl goes on to document assurances that any layoffs would be based on performance and his most recent manager review.
Can I say how invaluable you are to the render team? You burned through a large number of crashes and critical rendering bugs. Without a lot of direction, you completed the feature/gpu table on S3 project, thought through a LOT of the complexities, and produced something incredibly useful. You enabled RenderDivisor to work on low end hardware (even if the hardware couldn’t take advantage of it in the way we hoped.). You did a ton of work to get mesh ready for public beta. You’ve fought long and hard trying to get Apple to fix their drivers while seeing if we can handle our textures better. And that was just this quarter (And you did all this while the company was undergoing a major reorg and giving us TONS of direction changes). You consistently brought things to fruition that worked well the first time. I love working with you. As does everyone on the team. You rocked it.
23 July 2010 – Q210 Manager Review
Apparently management reviews now count for little inside the Lab – perhaps because the Love Machine has taken over?
Qarl’s departure appears to be part a continuing blizzard of pink slips at the struggling metaverse service provider. Second Life resident Latif Khalifa has been tracking Linden dissappearances from the search people list and noted these departures over the last two weeks: Dana Linden, Driscoll Linden, Ferny Linden, Heff Linden, Kate Linden, Molly Linden, Norm Linden, Perry Linden, Qarl Linden, Reuben Linden, Sejong Linden, Silver Linden, Tay Linden, Tess Linden, Weber Linden, Zen Linden.
Overall reaction to the removal of Qarl and Zen Linden varied from "wtf?" to "WTF!!!!!!", as players parsed the implication of the departure of significant members of the rendering team. Is the Lab packaging itself for sale to Electronic Arts? Further development of the basic platform seems unlikely.
hobo kelly
Aug 6th, 2010
sculpties slow down everything – good riddance
Selene Putzo
Aug 6th, 2010
Oh what a demanding bunch of customers SL has. “We demand an answer.” Well sorry but the fact is, we are the customer, not the company, so an answer does not have to be given. Without Qarl in Linden Labs, I (as a sculpter) would have no “buzz” creating content for other people to use and enjoy in their builds. So yes, a valuable employee in my biased mind has been shed from the clock cards of Linden Labs. Their loss is someone else’s gain. I am sure Qarl will find new work elsewhere and maybe he needed a push? Maybe there is something that would be really interesting for Qarl to get involved with. Thank you Qarl for what you have done in SL and I wish you a bright horizon to follow.
OK – the SL customers. What to do with all of you who will be trolling this page seeking Linden blood. It won’t be forthcoming, your point of view and your screams for attention will not be noticed by LL. If you really feel you are not being listened to, then vote with your feet and your purse. As said many times before and many times over again there are plenty of virtual worlds out there to play with – and yes, some of them are well matched competition. The rest of SL customer base will continue working in SL giving this world a content edge.
Huge changes in SL are happening – I hope there are good reasons.
Edna
Aug 6th, 2010
Something happening here. What it is ain’t exactly clear. Step out of line, man come and take you away.
Persephone Bolero
Aug 6th, 2010
@Selene Oh, now you done it. See, the dissatisfied customers can’t leave. They made friends in Second Life.
FRIEEEEEEEENNNNNNDDSSS!
So, yeah, residents are powerless to leave Second Life because they really, really like the people they met here. So, they aren’t dissatisfied customers. No, they’re more like Jews in a concentration camp. And they’re living under the evil, oppressive thumb of a tyrant that’s kinda like…well, you know.
And boy are they going to be mad at you for daring to suggest that these helpless victims actually do have choices that can affect how the company does business. While voting with their feet and purses would have a significant and real impact, it would deprive them of the fantasy that their complaints are something more than just basic dissatisfaction. They prefer the sense of righteousness that comes with being crusaders against injustice. So, rather than making choices that would have actual results, they prefer to wail at the injustices (dissatisfaction) they endure on a daily basis in the cold, cruel Dachau known as Second Life.
swedishfox ghost
Aug 6th, 2010
thank you, actual news
Gaara Sandalwood
Aug 6th, 2010
“sculpties slow down everything – good riddance”
Actually it depends. I’ve seen incredibly detailed sculpts that barely slowed anything down. The only sculpty I’ve ever even owned that did was a scythe but it was a few hundred prims and all too incredibly detailed.
Yep
Aug 6th, 2010
Something needs to be done. The grid has hardly even been far from usable the past month. Maybe Linden Labs Doing away with the incompetent employees and hiring new ones that will actually fix things for once.
Little Lost Linden
Aug 6th, 2010
Holy flying Lindens!
I’m not sure what is happening down at the lab, but it is definately most bizarre that Bill Paxton predicted this was going to happen way back in 1986:
http://thebotzone.net/2010/08/05/bill-paxton-predicts-the-fate-of-qarl-linden/
Darien Caldwell
Aug 6th, 2010
Obviously LL doesn’t value it’s employees. At most companies, the high performing employees are valued. And nobody who knows of Qarl’s work can claim he is anything but.
I can only see this as a bad decision. And you know what LL says about decisions:
“Good people make good decisions, and vice versa…”
So I guess we know what LL is now.
Bill Paxton Predicts the Fate of Qarl Linden. «
Aug 6th, 2010
[...] to have Dynamic Shadows implemented in the regular Second Life viewer will be minimal at best. Sculptie fires have begun cropping up all around the grid. Are even more dark times ahead? Will Second Life [...]
Bubblesort Triskaidekaphobia
Aug 6th, 2010
They really screwed Quarl. On his blog he said they made him a contractor before firing him, so I’m guessing that means no unemployment pay (at least that’s how it works in Pennsylvania, I know California has crazy laws).
It’s just like a slow motion train wreck I can’t stop watching. I did get out of the way, though, LOL
I only use SL for sculpt studio now. I’m developing in OS ever since Harry Linden decided to jerk me around for 2 months on a single ticket.
Speaking of good lindens who got the boot, I noticed Pathfinder is going to be at the Linden Labs meetup in Boston. I wonder if they are trying to get him to come back?
We
Aug 6th, 2010
Aah, and I remember when there was a bunch of celebration to Philip coming back and M leaving. Guess what, it’s the same shit!
Emperor Norton hears a who?
Aug 6th, 2010
Little Lost Linden @” most bizarre that Bill Paxton predicted this was going to happen way back in 1986″
Nothing bizarre about it. Billy Paxton predicted everything. Just the way he rolls. :
had enough
Aug 6th, 2010
I guess this eliminates Mark as being the bad guy with the first round of layoffs. Is everyone still happy to see Phillip’s return?
J
Aug 6th, 2010
Non-disparagement agreement? Linden is too broke to take anyone to court.
DilSpi
Aug 7th, 2010
Hey LL, You may be dressing for a special marked move.
But its a wide spread misbelief to do with laying off the developing employes is a smart way.
LL, don’t be so silly.
Take a short break and think about Your moves.
Look back the long way of ten Year You already have gone.
LL, think about it.
THINK!
and please rethink Your actions.
Be smart not silly!
IntLibber Brautigan
Aug 7th, 2010
That they would can someone like Qarl who has contributed so much to SL but keep around complete and utter douchebags like Harry and Jack is total confirmation that LL is on a death spiral.
Alyx Stoklitsky
Aug 7th, 2010
LL has a 5 year record of making idiotic decisions.
Why would you expect anything different now?
Kae
Aug 7th, 2010
@Gaara
“Actually it depends. I’ve seen incredibly detailed sculpts that barely slowed anything down.”
It depends solely on the number of objects in the sculpt for the most part. There is no difference between one sculpty and the next other than the way the geometry is laid out. Every sculpty, no matter what the geometry, is rendered with 1089 vertices.
Sculpties are really inefficient. The way they’re set up– you cannot have any less than 1089 vertices– which means 2048 poly. An object that hits the max linkset limit (255) prims, made entirely of sculpties, would yield an object with 522,240 polygons. That’s one single object, 522,240 poly.
An entire player model in Left 4 Dead, including the meshes for all of the equipment and guns, is only around 13,000 polygons.
Sculpties are a travesty of design, but they serve at least one purpose well (proprietary, limited design means little ability to just rip content from games and sell them in SL).
Mary Elizabeth
Aug 7th, 2010
Showing prim feet and shoes isn’t the best way to prove that Qarl deserved to keep his job. They CAN be nice things but mostly they contribute to some real ugly avvies.
Glenn Beck
Aug 7th, 2010
Burning sculpties are we now? Sounds like an ol’ fashioned book burning to me. And you know who else was big on book burnin’?
…Hitler.
Gaara Sandalwood
Aug 7th, 2010
“It depends solely on the number of objects in the sculpt for the most part. There is no difference between one sculpty and the next other than the way the geometry is laid out. Every sculpty, no matter what the geometry, is rendered with 1089 vertices.
Sculpties are really inefficient. The way they’re set up– you cannot have any less than 1089 vertices– which means 2048 poly. An object that hits the max linkset limit (255) prims, made entirely of sculpties, would yield an object with 522,240 polygons. That’s one single object, 522,240 poly.
An entire player model in Left 4 Dead, including the meshes for all of the equipment and guns, is only around 13,000 polygons.
Sculpties are a travesty of design, but they serve at least one purpose well (proprietary, limited design means little ability to just rip content from games and sell them in SL).”
Ah. Thanks for that. I know next to nothing about sculpts.
qarl
Aug 7th, 2010
@Kae
by reducing the size of the sculpt map, you may control the number of vertices used.
Glenn Beck
Aug 7th, 2010
@Garra & @qarl
Sculpties work great on paper but fail in practice, much like communism. Someone needs to tell Phillip Linden and Barack Obama.
Glenn Beck
Aug 7th, 2010
I think it’s time we take Second Life back to a time when you could gamble and not have to rez horrific and laggy sculpted furries and feet. Back when Second Life was freer place! Let’s call it the 5/32 project! We’ll paint our faces and throw sculpted prims off the boat and demand no more socialism! It’s makes me sad to see how we’ve come in this metaverse. *cries*
Kae
Aug 7th, 2010
@qarl
I was referring to any of the “standard” resolutions that most people use (32×32, 16×64, 8×128, etc.). My point was that no matter how the vertices are laid out in them, the vertex/polycounts will stay the same. Obviously using a 16×16 map will say, take it down to 384 vertices or so, but for probably 99% of Second Life users, such small sculptmaps are completely esoteric.
Willow Loordes
Aug 7th, 2010
The more I hear of Linden layoffs, and knowing that filing tickets for the problems I see in sl are fruitless and mind numbing experiences, the more appealing other grids become. While, as a content creator, I have invested a lot of my heart, soul, and Ls into making sl a beautiful place, I cannot help but wonder at what point will I break and leave myself. There is a point, so I hope Linden will soon see the reality that people are fed up. I can liken the current sl experience to another set of content creators who created a perfectly lovely product only to point the gun at their own feet and pull the trigger due to greed and a lackluster caring for their customers. They, like Linden, think they are beyond reproach. While I see both swirling the toilet bowl, I have no doubt that both will eventually fall by the wayside as more and more competition does it better! Take note Linden…a day of reckoning is on the horizon! To stay on top…you have to do it better! I am sick to death of forking over linden after linden to get nothing in return from you! NOTHING! Horrible support, inventory eaten yet you will not let us back it up, etc., etc., etc. People ask me why I stay, well it’s simple. I have not been to the breaking point quite yet, but it is close. At some point I will simply say screw what I have invested in this world and will go to create in another! I have already had several friends do just that and have had invitation after invitation to leave. I fear that I am soon to follow. Linden Labs is the cause…plain and simple. I was a software consultant for years and I dare say that if I had supported my product the way LL does theirs, my career would have never developed!
qarl
Aug 7th, 2010
@Kae
i’m not sure i understand your point, then? you say you cannot have a sculptie with fewer than X verts, but then you say you can.
i agree that sculpties can be abused to cause an increase in scene vertex count and lower framerate. but that’s not a design error – that’s a use error, as Gaara suggests.
beaker
Aug 7th, 2010
We’re Transparent… just dont tell anyone about us….
here’s youre $2500.00 and dont even try to get Unemployment Insurance.
That’s how SF rolls.
Little Lost Linden
Aug 7th, 2010
“I can liken the current sl experience to another set of content creators who created a perfectly lovely product only to point the gun at their own feet and pull the trigger due to greed and a lackluster caring for their customers. They, like Linden, think they are beyond reproach. While I see both swirling the toilet bowl, I have no doubt that both will eventually fall by the wayside as more and more competition does it better!”
Have you seen the prices of toilet bowls lately? Expensive:
http://most-expensive.net/toilets
Out of my price range, that is for sure.
Anon
Aug 8th, 2010
Seems to me that Qarl got the pink slip because some bean counter who had no idea who Qarl was and how valuable he was to the company was trying to shave a few dimes off the expenses column.
This same person probably has no idea that the users of Second Life even know who Qarl is, or that any of them care.
At0m0 Beerbaum
Aug 8th, 2010
Linden Labs suffers from modern management. Ie, accountants and people who are impressed by numbers more than actual results.
I’ve witnessed and have been affected by this firsthand. My last job succumbed to this kind of management.
I saw a man who took a dying program in the company that could barely get clients, into one of the biggest sources of income all within 6 months. We get this new operations manager in, and he starts cleaning house within 2 weeks of starting. Hell, I almost got axed initially because he didn’t see me useful as I was not being a good personal assistant to him. (he thought that IT people were people who wrote emails for him) but I managed to dodge the axe for a long time. However, many other people in the company were fired, some were justifiable, but however, instead of firing people, they would pull this demotion crap. They’d give them two options, take a huge cut in pay or walk. Not actually firing them.
Now more to my point, The man who brought the company tons of money, he was presented with this option, to take a huge cut in pay (almost a 50% cut, from $20/hour equivalent salary down to literally $10/hour. Why? Well simply because they had no evidence that he actually did what he did. Why? Because his performance couldnt be put in numbers or on a pie chart. Thus no proof. Despite the fact the program blossomed once he took charge.
he took the cut, then about the same time I quit, he took off and started his own company, which has been doing about a million times better than that one.
Last I heard they’re trying to make people work on coffee breaks, their computer systems have gone to crap (my boss, who built the infrastructure got fired, they hired some contractor who was “good” who fucked the system up by replacing shit and reconfiguring things, and then when they hired my replacement, he didnt even know how to remove viruses from computers other than “buy a new computer, you’re rich”
It’s never about actual performance, it’s about what looks good on a financial report. Development is a negative earning, no money is made from development directly. So in the eyes of some bean counter moron, and some business suit type who really has no idea what he’s doing, the person looks useless. These people also believe it’s everyone else’s fault that things are going south.
One more point: it was never M linden or Philip who made the calls.
The real evil in the company comes in the form of Cyn Linden. She’s really calling the shots. just fyi. M was the fall guy for a set of planned bad decisions, which they knew would be risky, and the poster boy would look better than ever.
Oh well, sucks to be anyone who has anything invested in SL.
By the way, how purple is the mainland now?
Concerned Resident
Aug 8th, 2010
seems a good number of lindens were switched to contractor status this year…
Maybe Qarl can elaborate on that
I'm just sayin'
Aug 8th, 2010
It’s Linden Lab. No “s.”
Sheesh.
Bubblesort Triskaidekaphobia
Aug 8th, 2010
@Atom: You have an interesting theory, but Cyn is gone. She left last month.
http://redexec.wordpress.com/2010/06/18/omg-change/
I think Torley is the mustache-twirling accountant of which you speak. His watermelon-worship got out of hand. I bet he ran into Phil’s office wild-eyed, dressed in watermelon colored robes and proclaimed that Gerry the watermelon god has revealed the one true way to him! (I think the watermelon god should be named Gerry) Quarl must be sacrificed to regain Gerry’s favor and bring the magical traffic back. Gerry doesn’t care much for progress, but he loves sacrifices.
Seriously, though, I never understood the watermelon thing. Or the hippos. Or viewer 2.0. Or… well… anything.
ra ra rasputin
Aug 8th, 2010
actual news FTW!
At0m0 Beerbaum
Aug 8th, 2010
really now? that’s interesting.
Marx Dudek
Aug 8th, 2010
My theory?
Qarl’s replacement will be found somewhere in Bangalore. Along with replacements for all of the other smart, essential people.
@Bubbles
Aug 9th, 2010
“Gerry doesn’t care much for progress, but he loves sacrifices.”
LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!!!!!!!
Wolf Baginski
Aug 9th, 2010
You all missed the Philip Linden meeting. Part of what he said was that mesh import, if it was to get used, couldn’t be something that slowed down rendering.
There’s something funny about what Qarl Linden said, but what I know about graphics rather suggests that a “proper” mesh could be more rendering work that the equivalent sculpty. A sculpty has a fixed UV map. A mesh has whatever UV map you can devise–look at the texture-mapping for the figure/clothing–and that might cost you some optimisations in the rendering code.
And mesh import is a huge can of worms from the point of view of copy protection. I could take a mesh, outside of SL, upload it to SL, and sell the result. There would be no way that anyone at Linden Lab could tell it was original to me. But somebody with the original mesh might be able to. There are widely-used file formats for meshes with no copy-protection. I could take out file comments in several ways.
(There are ways of detecting a copyright infringement. Look at the detailed structure of the mesh.)
So there are plausible reasons why somebody might think Qarl Linden wasn’t needed any more, but it still looks odd. There’s other stuff he could be working on.
Bubblesort Triskaidekaphobia
Aug 10th, 2010
LL seems to be hiring more business managers and shedding developers (a web app developer is not the kind of developer who could replace Quarl, IMHO). According to the Gervais principle, this is a sign that the clueless have taken over and the sociopaths are ready to vivisect the company and move on.
New Hires:
http://dwellonit.taterunino.net/2010/08/09/new-lab-hires-and-linden-accounts/
Gervais principle:
http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/
Nidol
Aug 11th, 2010
“As said many times before and many times over again there are plenty of virtual worlds out there to play with – and yes, some of them are well matched competition.”
I’d love to hear you name off another virtual world platform that is on par with Second Life… yeah this could take a while.
IntLibber Brautigan
Aug 12th, 2010
Wow, Cyn is finally gone eh? That woman set the bar that defined failing upwards, from being responsible for the Bragg lawsuit debacle to the homestead debacle, to oh so many thefts of resident property.
Now if Jack and Harry would leave… hmmm they are subject to immigration work restrictions aren’t they? Did they get their green cards and how much did they lie on their applications?
Anon
Aug 12th, 2010
Funny hearing you say this, Int, since everybody knows it was YOU who failed in all directions possible.
Do us all a favor and go back to your mom’s basement.
Selene Putzo
Aug 12th, 2010
@ Nidol
I am not getting into a flamewar about other MMORPGs, so put your fuse out.
Nonymous
Aug 12th, 2010
Nidol? Yet another banned Woodbury chimes in. This must be the last place on the net they even exist. They’re not posting on their own web site and forums anymore, only here.
So Waht?
Aug 13th, 2010
Oh my God! SL is a big fat ugly BUG and the Lab DARES to fire the ones who “coded” this sick piece of software alled !Viewer”? Oh, my God, that´s true injustice!
Little Lost Linden
Aug 14th, 2010
Holy Moly! Teen Grid gets the ChainSaw!
http://thebotzone.net/2010/08/14/second-life-teen-grid-gets-the-chainsaw/
First Qarl gets it, now the Teen Grid gets the same treatment.
Hellos
Aug 14th, 2010
@Little Lost Linden:
Oh shit!
We don’t want teens on the main grid!
had enough
Aug 14th, 2010
Rumor has it that the 16 yr olds on up will be joining the adult grid. As for under 16, they might have to play elsewhere.
If this is true, this could be a disaster. There are still many parcels outside of the adult areas bucking the system and containing adult content. Picture the pissed off parent now whose 16 yr old daughter is involved in some gorean slave gang bang. Keep in mind this 16 yr old is now able to legally access the the adult grid. Or the guy who is partnered with the 16 yr old daughter having sex when the parent walks in.In many states ” I didn’t know her age” is not a valid defense. No difference than that of some adult talking dirty to a child in a chatroom.
The Feds will have a field day with this