Details on the Q2 2008 Island Price Change
Wednesday, April 9th, 2008 at 7:34 PM by: Jack LindenAs promised in yesterdays post, here are the fine details for the price reduction and how this affects those that have purchased recently. Before getting into that, I’m going to repeat my final comment on that previous post.
Several have asked if this is in some sort of panic move in response to poor sales. This is absolutely not the case, in fact sales of islands have been very consistent through Q1; we sell between 100-110 islands per week plus a fair number of Openspace regions.
Technology and service costs vary over time and we as a business have to respond to that in sensible ways. In addition, we have to continually assess our business model and make changes where we need to. By and large we have worked hard to keep prices static for long periods, and when we have had cause to increase prices in the past, we allowed grandfathered monthly fees to continue because we value the time and energy those people had put in. Nearly 18 months on and that grandfathered pricing is still in place for many island owners.
This was the right time to reduce the setup price of an island. As any business would, we will review the effects of these changes over the next period and make adjustments or leave them unchanged according to how it goes. If we are able to make savings, then we feel that passing those on to our customers is a good thing.
We believe we are on course for an April 16th/17th launch of the new Land Store, so that will be the day that the price change goes live. If for some reason we have to push that back a week, then the new island prices will move back too. Regardless of what happens with the Island price change, the Mainland auction start price will drop on April 16th.
When the new Land Store launches, setup fees will be:
- Normal Islands: USD$1000 setup
- Normal Openspaces: USD$250 setup
- Educational Islands: USD$700 setup
- Educational Openspaces: USD$175 setup
These prices exclude VAT.
The monthly maintenance fees for Q2 will not change from their current levels.
For anyone that has bought a normal island in the seven days prior to Mondays announcement, including any awaiting delivery now (so any orders placed in April PST), you will be offered a choice between:
- Your order cancelled with a complete refund of the amount paid, allowing you to re-order when the price drops if you wish to, or:
- Keep your order and get a free Openspace region with it. The Openspace would have no setup fee and no monthly fees for a period of 6 months after which normal monthly fees will apply.
For those that purchased a normal island between 11th and 31st March 2008 you will be offered a free Openspace, with no setup fee and no monthly fee for a period of 3 months after which normal monthly fees will apply.
If you have had an Openspace region delivered on the 1st April 2008 or later, you may cancel that order for a full refund.
If any of the above offers affect you, please let us know your preferred option before 16th April by contacting the Concierge team.
An further FAQ article will be added to the Knowledge Base shortly.
If you’re a prospective or existing island owner and have any questions or concerns, please direct them to the Concierge team via the support portal.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:07 PM
Will there by an changes to monthly tier? Or will tier continue to be the same?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:08 PM
How does the resompense your offering help me, i took savings (yes i know i took a risk how stupid of me) and bought an island from another i only saved 150 USD i cannot cancel it as it hurts them another person being shafted by the cut. Will I also be able to get an opensim to help cover my losses?
I am disabled, I do not make a killing but i could in a time make my money back. Now those who would rent and yes i have had them say so, will just buy their own. who can blame them. I see why the realestate groups are starting to dump their sims, further killing the market.. right now i understand why people jumped out of windows during the stock market crash….. just think how long it took to recover from that fiasco…..
Please tell me there is a solution for all of us who bought sims this past couple weeks (and yes my tickets are in the LL process).
Also what about grandfathered tier.. is it too going to change?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:08 PM
This drastic price move will definitely give serious pause to anyone considering building a REAL business (rather than a hobby-cover my tier “business”
within SL. At any instant in time, an arbitrary decision by Linden Lab, with no more than a week or so of notice, can totally and completely wreck your business model - and your business, for that matter. At the extreme, how many hundreds of thousands of dollars did you just shave off the value of Anshe Chung’s holdings with this announcement? I guess I’m lucky I only own 2 sims and a couple open spaces. But you’d have to be totally foolhardy to confidently build a real business within SL at this point, knowing it only takes one simple decision and announcement by Linden Lab to remove well over a third of your business’s net worth instantly. I’m afraid you’ve just taken a major step to assure that SecondLife doesn’t continue to be a real-life BUSINESS platform like eBay is.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:09 PM
Very nice for the people in the past 7 days, I’m sure they will be happy. I’m curious if the first month of tier is included at the new $1000US price like it was at the 1675$US price, I’ve not seen that stated anywhere any just want to make sure? Thank you for clarifying Jack.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:09 PM
“The monthly maintenance fees for Q2 will not change from their current levels.”
At what point can you reassure us that the monthly maintenance fees for Q3, Q4, and so on, will also remain unchanged?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:11 PM
How will this effect TGers will our orders still be 24 hour delivery if we call with our parents on the day of orders? I think you should make a comment/post on how this effects TGers were part of this too!
April 9th, 2008 at 3:15 PM
Can someone please explain to me the difference between a Q2 (as that tier or monthly maintenence wont change).. and Q3, or Q4.. I know i should probably already know..
But I really dont. I think I’m just a regular land holder, help.
Any help would be appreciated.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:15 PM
WOOT!
GOOD GOING LL! This could be a jumpstart to the SL economy, because with more regions, tier and rentals will drop thus residents have more money to spend in world!
April 9th, 2008 at 3:18 PM
whts openspace ?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:21 PM
@ Suhana;
The “Q”s represent quarters of a year
Q1 Jan-Mar
Q2 Apr-Jun
Q3 July-Sep
Q4 Oct-Dec
April 9th, 2008 at 3:21 PM
How about sims transferred from between owners. Seems like anyone buying privately should be included in this. Are they? Also I have asked you Jack to address the grandfathered tier sims. What have I missed? #3 is exactly on point….. Given how LL springs these things on its customers we can only assume LL does not feel we as customers also have legitimate business concerns. So let’s call it like it is. There is no economy in SL. The money isn’t money. Oh wait…. which is it?
I respect you immensely Jack. You have been a beacon during rough times with my first sim complex. But please address the grandfather tiered sims. If I have missed that I apologize.
Also to address Stetson Rail in the previous threat…. Hey Stetson.. they sleep just as you do after you steal. What are you belly aching about your stuff not worth anything….. it’s bought with money from people like me anyway. Oh and here is where he might answer back about how he is can’t help but be unpopular with one or two…. boo hoo….
So, Jack. Could you include those who transferred recently? They would obviously have to take an OpenSpace as they can’t really cancel the thing.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:23 PM
So, Your post last month selling openspaces at such a wonderful price(415) was designed to catch early adopting supporters like me?
Now they are 250 and I have no recourse? Bets I am not alone on this one.
I am now very disheartened now as I just over paid almost 500usd on 3 openspaces.
Surely You made a mistake changing the price 30 days after announcing it for the first time?
Jack please contact me inworld =)
April 9th, 2008 at 3:23 PM
Thank you linden lab, I am canceling my openspace sim order as we speak, I had been waiting about 17 days for delivery and had not received it, so I am going to cancel to take advantage of the new pricing & will re order when the new land story is up.
Please also let us know if Grandfathered tiers are remaining unchanged.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:23 PM
Yay. I purchased an island on the 15th of February. God I feel shafted.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:26 PM
Alex1, key here is when you say COULD. Supply and demand dictates that this will not likely occur. Simply put, the individual value of land (as seen in the auctions) is much higher than the arbitrary price dictated by the Lindens. Lowering the price will hurt existing land owners, because the analysis certainly did NOT exclude outliers on islands, such as land owners who “sell” the land for 1 linden as a deposit. When outliers are accounted for, the average price for island land is around 6L per sqm in my observations, and has been fairly constant.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:26 PM
#9 carmicheal Opespace sims are 65356 sq meter with 3750 prims, with a monthly fee of $75 usd
April 9th, 2008 at 3:27 PM
Yeah…. I know we cant get refunds on everything forever but… why 1 week? Why not one year? I bought one for a customer 12 days ago…. You going to tell me he’s not entitled to money back? I think refunds are good and someone will always be unhappy but you mean to tell us you are either this ruthless knowing you were going to lower prices or this incompetent that your prices change this fast? Either way Jack….come on….. a week doesn’t cut it.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:29 PM
We like to call Second Life®, Web 2.0 or the 3D internet. So just like the internet, most rent server space from a hosting provider. And pay “tier” or a monthly charge for that service. Linden Lab® is nothing more then a hosting company that proved server space inside of Second Life®.
See the way I look at it:
You do not “own” anything when you buy a sim. You do not own the server. The money is a set up fee or as I call it activation fee to use that server / sim. Just like if you activate phone service, cable TV or internet service. Then you pay a month fee “tier” for the service.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:29 PM
One final note - Considering how entirely plagued the game was for the last 2 weeks..
I think we are all entitled to tier discounts for a month at least..
3 cheers for tier discount.. lol
Tommy thanks for your help in clarifying the confusion.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:32 PM
please open the purchase of openspaces to people who do not currently own full sims. At these prices i’d consider opening up a chain of them. Seriously. 4 openspaces is the same price and tier cost as one full sim, but you can bet your butt that spreading 15000 prims across 4 sims will LOOK alot better.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:34 PM
#18 I respectfully disagree….
A web hosting company does not itself encourage and make the environment rich by providing currency, value and processes for its server space customers to profit. As stated at the recent conference on Virtual Law, many legal minds argue that once you provide an ecoomy and money and advertising and blogs and for sale pages and searches….. you are aiding an economy to flourish and thereby are not an innocent bystander. It’s argueable at least. So server company ….LL…. I don’t agree.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:35 PM
Seeming as comments were already closed by the time us Aussies woke up, and that the office hours will be impossible for us Aussies to make, I will post here.
The issues with Windlight that are plaguing many people:
Invisible system skirt
Memory Leaks (Nicholaz fixed this, why can’t you guys incorporate that work?) leading to crashes, etc.
ATI Render glitch bug still plagues many ATI cards. And no, turning off VBO is NOT a solution. It then slows everything down to 2-3 FPS in an empty sim!
There are others. But these ones have been consistently reported throughout Windlight development, and are still MAJOR issues.
(Now you land folk can all flame me for posting this in the wrong place, etc. But really, what other place is there???)
April 9th, 2008 at 3:39 PM
I was wondering what the rest of the announcement would be and I am very pleased with how it turned out. So now to cancel the pending openspace sim (just ordered at the beginning of the month and not delivered yet) and decide if I should order 2 of them (since it is almost half the original cost) or just pay a bit more for a full normal sim…
April 9th, 2008 at 3:39 PM
I quite agree that “If we are able to make savings, then we feel that passing those on to our customers is a good thing.”
HOWEVER. Why not reduce our tier? Why not recompense us in at least some measure for the fact our land is overnight worth $650US less than it was? Why not reimplement the cover of VAT on European users?
That is passing your savings on to your customers, where your customers are the people who have already bought something from you and continue to pay tier month in month out to you. This is not giving us anything back, this is pulling in the next lot of suckers for you to screw over while all we can do is impotently rant on a blog that I can 99% guarantee will never be glanced over by a Linden as it wasnt posted by Pathfinder.
The rest of it is PR.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:39 PM
OH yes how sweet it is lmao… Just bought an island on Feb. 25th and in one month roughly it depreciated in value 700 american dollars! lovely, just lovely!
I’m with you Dallas… secondly we must consider the stretching of the linden dollar here. This move promotes a move for mainland owners to move to islands, perhaps, but what are the costs?
The memeber in SL that actually spends time and their money here is only so many. Myself, of course, do not value much judgement inn the overinflated number of registered avatars in SL. What does this do to businesses in SL, the creators that revolve SL into what it is today and continues to be in the future?
Sure, an increase in maintence fees are nice. More islands will sell, heck I’m thinking of signing up for a few more myself now! We stretch out those businesses making a step up to their own private estate now, we stretch out the available money actually in circulation. We depreciate the dollars of the many whom have invested so much already. We increase the expendable real dollars people use in SL from RL on tier rather than keeping a momenteum of creators creating. And on top of it all we go to 12 hour roll overs instead of the 6-7 hour ones now and the previous 3-4 hour ones of just a few months prior to now.
I think back to a publication asking if Linden Labs had an economist on staff and they replied no. Do you have one yet?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:49 PM
@20
I would like to see Open Space sims open for purchase to all too!
April 9th, 2008 at 3:51 PM
The reduction in setup price is great (people moaned when it went up, and now the moan when it comes down) but the critical issues are the tier price and the search ranking problems when moving.
For instance I rent 1/4 sim atm for my store at just over pro-rata tier rate, which I can easily cover from sales. It’s a scenically great sim too, so no pressure to move on that side. I could cover whole sim tier without too much difficulty, but realistically I don’t need any more prims, so the only motivation to enhance the ‘experience’ of my customers by having more control over the environment - a marginal improvement and very fuzzy concept to hang a 3.5x increase in tier costs on. It’s not that I wouldn’t *love* to have my own sim, and the reduction to USD1000 brings it down to a level where I think the initial outlay is justifiable, but increasing costs by USD200pm to LL isn’t when I don’t need the extra space.
Even so, I’d still tempted by the control of owning the sim, except that I’ve spent a considerable amount of effort cultivating customers to add links to me in ‘my picks’ and have an excellent search placing on my top terms. If I move locations as the search stands at the moment I will loose the ranking as the links point to the parcel, not the business, and that will inevitably have a major impact on sales for several months - and ability to cover increased tier.
Solution? - what would definatly swing it would be an ability to ‘redirect’ links so I didn’t loose search placement - and a modest tier reduction of USD50 to USD245 or thereabouts too. Without these it’s tempting, but considered judgement says no.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:57 PM
As with a majority of the current island owners, I have to say this price reduction sucks for all of us who have spent the better part of a year or more developing our islands and paying the higher setup fees, just to see that initial investment loose $650 or more in one fell swoop.
Jack, I tried to send you a note in world of some ideas to get the sour feeling out of the long term investors, but it seems it was ignored or just plain trashed. So, to put it out for comment, here are the hightlights again:
1) Drop the island tiers to be equal to the Mainland, $195 monthly.
2) Credit the existing island owners the difference between the price they paid and the new price. For example, someone who paid $1675 should get a credit of $675 that can be used to purchase another island.
3) Give the island owners a vote on policy changes, esp on pricing and management issues, as we are the ones by and large who are paying the salaries of the LL employees.
I know Jack you are trying, but there has to be fairness in buisness when it comes to customers and stake holders. I know I am holding up some orders I had placed, because I personally don’t feel comfortable investing more of MY money into this company, unless I and the others have some say or are treated like the customers we are.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:01 PM
HERE HERE PONYGIRL!
I second the motion to give a voting forum to large investors in this internet application. And without a more stable economy… I have no part in it. Cuba has nice beaches, but u dont see my moving for a reason!
April 9th, 2008 at 4:04 PM
Again why not start cleaing up mainland? You know this issues is getting veryvery old. Are you EVER going to address it? Jack Linden Instead of pointing a few *** kissing people for pointing out important issues that ( YOU believe is important) why not just start putting words in to action. How many abuse reports of griefters abouts are reports and how many are solved or even looked at. What is worse they get deleted on the support portal as well. NOW you call this solving issues? They sit on the support portal for a year and they get deleted? Please instead of talking start doing. All talk to action just like AD Farms……….Then again its its who you know in the Linden ranks that solves people issues in the game these days. And not the SUPPOSE routes that we have to get actions done……
April 9th, 2008 at 4:06 PM
Guys it should be patently clear by now that LL do not place a value on our assets. They don’t now and they won’t in the future. As hard as it is to swallow, as soon as you pay the fee for your island, LL don’t see the value in it.
They won’t make a commitment that they won’t do this again and they simply will not see the value of our island as an asset as some of us do.
I’m afraid you’ll just have to accept that and change your risk strategy to one that accepts LL might reduce prices by large scales at any given time and simply won’t give a damn about how you feel about it.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:10 PM
This is really, this takes out all confidents for all bussiness, and bussiness for future. There are a lot of people who invested in the game, which made the game big, which made this game able to handle the many new users.
And the people who hlped achive this paid 1675. In 1 day the price of the sims some having 70 sims has been cut by 675USD per sim. Whole bussiness ruined.
Atleast what lindens could do is to be considered and make the tier for the people who paid 1675 lower. Atleast what could be done.
Since no consideration is mentioned, and we are only important when we invest, trust, and put so much energy into the game, but get a return a devaluation of very hard work. Thanx for nothing.
The people who will be investing and buying sims in the future, will surely notice this. Secondlife is no place for real bussiness. We are left hanging. I regret the day I ever stepped into this game investing so much and promoting this game, helping it grow.
Jack In your previous post you quoted a response which was along your own lines, quote mine and respond to it. Respond on how we are treated, how we should feel, and how fair this is.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:12 PM
It’s yet another example of,if you bought at wrong time Linden Labs shaft you,not only are you paying the higher tier charge you payed an extra 700 Dollars.
I don’t disagree with lowering land costs but isn’t it funny how you felt the need to do this after you made it more secure for private island sales?
Taking forever for island transfers to happen too,hmmmm if we were paranoid we might see something a bit suspect.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:12 PM
Well I personally dont see us as investors in the strict sense. I also know from experience that LL asking us to vote is a touch on the insanity side of the Lane. However…. … what I would welcome with open arms is LL even silently admitting that it has beat the bushes, advertised, supported, instructed, whatever other words you want to use that SL is a place to do X, succeed at Y. It has stood by with proud smiles as it should honestly as many of us have been reported about, chronicled and done well in RL at being heralded for our economic success in SL. But, with decisions like these, it is crystal clear that the economic effect LL’s decisions have on the eonomy it has jumped and down clapping for as it has grown (and profitted by insanely I might and I’m happy about that) are of no concern. Winds shift swiftly in SL with respect to LL’s decisions and the degree to which my real money…yes real money not the Linden Dollar I guess flies from my hand means nothing to LL. And you know what? That’s ok. Just don’t pat us on the ass and say Good Play boys and girls and take the profits we help bring to your bank letting us believe you care about the so called economy.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:22 PM
Boy, do I feel distinctly like an idiot for buying an island two months ago. After getting stung this badly do you think those of us who were stupid enough to pay $1675 for an island are going to be stupid enough to make another large purchase? I was willing to set all the grid woes aside and trust that LL would get their house in order and do the right thing. My faith is well and truly shaken. You really don’t give a *bleep* about your existing customers, do you? Just tack a slew more regions onto an already shaky infrastructure. How about building a little good will here?
April 9th, 2008 at 4:26 PM
Jack,
You’ve got my sympathies on this one. You are really taking an undeserved beating over this. It’s natural for setup fees to come down as the server purchase prices come down. It’s foolish for people to think of a setup fee as an investment, even if they are allowed to hand the sim off to someone else after it is setup. Given the amount of abuse you are taking over the sudden announcement of something that will benefit anyone that wants to continue in SL and expand (and only hurts those who were already planning to leave soon), why do you keep telegraphing an unnamed change for Q3? Can’t you see that telling people about upcoming changes as soon as possible will at least give people time to adapt their business plans? If there’s going to be another major change in the next few months, tell us already! Take the near-term uncertainty out of the equation, and everyone will fell better about it.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:28 PM
We, the island and large land owners trying to run businesses within SL should listen, and listen closely to this announcement. The “business” side of SL is happening with companies like IBM, who are going to be allowed to host their own sims on their own servers, interconnected. But SL is clearly signalling that this is NOT the platform to BUILD a business that you would actually like to make real money from. I believe there are 10s of thousands making $100,000 or more on REAL businesses via eBay now. LL is signalling clearly that their vision is NOT to provide an economically stable platform to allow a similar financial ecosystem to grow and thrive within SecondLife. The message is loud and clear - this is a sophisticated, graphically rich GAME, not a platform to build and grow a real life BUSINESS on.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:33 PM
wish something could be done to compensate the large amount of open sims purchased at the higher rate of $415 since you only adopted that 1 month ago at that rate, maybe a deal where for every 4 open space sims in last month you get 1 more open space free with 3 months of tier, no different then the other deals and same amount of money was spent!
April 9th, 2008 at 4:33 PM
This is a disgrace, I’m not so much concerned that I’m down $675 but this constant printing of land from LL is killing the economy rendering my 4 sims worthless. I’ve already cut tier prices to the bone and no one is interested.
If LL is the biggest disgrace of a company then I dont know who is.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:41 PM
Knee-jerk tactics by LL as usual.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:42 PM
i for one think this is great, now i can get my own Island quicker, were all you people complaining planning on selling up anyway. cos if you were that would have create a decline in the price due to over supply. and if you think your land here is worth anything, when more can be created with the click of a mouse your dreaming. just run your buisnesses cover your tiers and if you decide to sell one day you’ll have to take the market value at the time. it might be even lower, it might double, who knows thats all part of the fun. BTW LL tier fees Q3 and Q4? please make a commitment
April 9th, 2008 at 4:43 PM
Is there any chance to get just an idea what the direction with monthly maintenance fees will be? Increased or lowered? Or simply constant? I’d be glad to get a vague idea on how things will develop within the next months… the current situation is somehow unsatisfying…
April 9th, 2008 at 4:46 PM
Let’s face facts here. Why the price drop now?
1. Open Source. It has raped SL of its monopoly and they are getting scared.
2. Firing CTO makes crappy SL. Ever since Cory left, this place has gone to hell. I am like one of the sexiest grey avatars in my missing image outfit with my “Ruth” haircut.
3. CEO stepping down. Philip is a cool guy but a business man he is not. The business model of SL is Second to crap as there is never any thought to the customers. At least my cellular company sends me a letter with like a few months to comply before raping me.
4. Gambling/Banking Ban. Rather than dealing with the situation diplomatically, you act like a whiney girlfriend and leave because it’s too much work to work it out and stay. As a result, you lost some of the highest linden moving avatars and stifled the economy a bit. Sure it wasn’t a huge hit long term but in the short run, people lost millions being forced to comply with a rule in 2 weeks.
You have no consideration for your customers and it’s all about the dollar but realize your customers are who pay you the dollar. Get off your computers and do some real business. SL isn’t a pipe dream anymore. This huge beta test has evolved into something granduer but it seems that the team at Linden Labs has not evolved with it.
Can we get the children off the computers and get some adults running this place? I cannot wait until you go public. I will make sure to take off from work to fly into shareholders meetings.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:46 PM
Let’s see.. has LL taken the sims away from anyone? No.
Have they reduced the revenue generation capability of a sim? Not really
A sim in SL is not an asset because of the resale value, but because of the revenue generation capability.
A grandfather class 5 is “worth” more then a “new” class 5 because it can generate revenue easier. Either through lower cost to rent or through higher profit margins.
What LL has done is they have enabled a lower entry point to possible competition. Which doesn’t even translate to losing revenue due to that competition.
So there will be more land, there will be more people to fill it also….
Honestly the only people who would be possibly hurt by this change are people who buy mainland sims at auction and then turn around and resell the land at higher prices.
Anshe Chung isn’t going to have to close up shop because her land is now “worth less”.
So for all of you crying… here is the Cheese for your Whine
April 9th, 2008 at 4:47 PM
Orders for Openspace sims delivered after april 1st can be cancelled and refunded.
What if we want to keep them ??
Do you pay the difference back or do you offer a 2nd one for free or free tier for a few months ?
What with the open space sims that are not delivered yet. I have 2 that are ordered but not yet delivered.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:50 PM
Well for us who are in the middle of purchasing sims from others .. there is no recompense so sorry SOL… surprise…. but they do say we can cancel, thats sweet so not only am iI being screwed but told to not be screwedI can screw them by ditching my tickets LOL now thats truly amazing. Sucker that I am , I refuse to rape the other person, I will honor my agreement, makes me a sucker yes, but I have integrity, something the sytem here lacks painfully.
WHY did you choose to hurt those already with you over a more viable option of reducing tier that would in fact help those already here as well as those coming into the market , a gradual decline of sim prices .. I mean come on. to make that kind of cut seems to border insanity. Right now if you ask any sim owner who has bought a sim in the past 3 to 4 months they sell at a loss as is, most have not had a chance to make it up but long term will… or would…
Already 2 possible investors i had for my sim have backed out, they plan to buy there own as well as others talking about the promised land.
The confidence in SL is falling .. i love this place but in the time i have been here it has got prettier yes… but services continue to degrade, downtime(might as well call it offline cant go no where do anything just nag and wait til the new wave of issues is resolved) .. this is NOT the way to help.
the new Black Wednesday ! please please read and think, I realize its too late for us this time… but future? or is there one… time will tell
April 9th, 2008 at 4:50 PM
Got my answer, (not that it’s a reasonable one)
Rowan: Openspaces ordered prior to April don’t qualify for the new pricing options. I’m sorry, but we won’t compensate you for those orders. If you wish to cancel them entirely and have them taken down, we’ll do that and refund any that have not yet been online for 30 days. i’ll waive the restocking fee, and you can order them at the lower prices.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:51 PM
I had my open space sim delivered a couple of weeks ago - at the 415USD price - now 1 month after releasing them you”re halving the price???
as well as slicing 650USD off the value of my full sim
GET A GRIP! - what are you offering the Open Space purchasers???
I’ll take a second open space please - because I now have 1 worth half, so I’d prefer to have 2 for the full price I paid…
geeze
/me walks away shaking head at the totally unthought-through decisions made by this incompetent, unsupportive company.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:52 PM
Due to market fluctuations, the real life house I live in has dropped in value some $20,000USD. Who do I talk to about a refund of the difference in the value of a property that I’ve been able to use since it’s acquisition 6 years ago? After all, if I had known the economy would have changed I would have waited to buy it! Maybe someone could subsidize my monthly upkeep costs so I can recoup my perceived losses? Wait .. could I move it from the Maine, USA server to the Kent, United Kingdom server so the value is higher since the economy is better there?
April 9th, 2008 at 4:54 PM
@46 - that’s nuts - what about all the work we put into sim development in the pre April period - all those hours and hours of a team of people????
oh, we just wipe it away and start again - sorry for the inconvenience???
I”m not happy Jan - or Jack either for that matter.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:56 PM
Linden Lab will do whatever is in its best interest - This means that if they can allow more people to buy a private island than before, they may make more money in the end.
This move actually puts a sim of my own within reach - after a few things are taken care of in real life anyway.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:56 PM
Personally, I could careless about the price in the long run. I got my sims dirt cheaps and I have made my money back on them several times. My issue here is the lack of customer service that Linden Labs provides its customers and the lack of forth thought.
Do you just put ideas on a board and play darts? It sure sounds like it.
Have your polled concierge customers to find out how to better serve them? Not at all.
Have you thought about fixing the mainland issue with abandoned land before forcing more out? That’s a fat no.
Do you know the concept of supply and demand and how a limited supply can help you? You seem to be just technicians but know nothing about business.
Well, I am done speaking my mind because in my almost 2 years hear, you haven’t listened so why would you listen now. You will get the ticket for us abandoning our sims soon enough. You charge us the cost of an entire server and only give us 1/4th of the server to use.
How about allowing for half the server usage and give sims more prims? That would be nice but you probably wouldn’t think to do that because staff has no concept of customer operations. Ugh….I’m done now.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:59 PM
@48 You house will go back up in value. The economy has a government that will help stablize things like that and there are real economists at work. At Linden Lab, they pull straws. It’s NEVER clear what will happen around here.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:00 PM
Wait .. if I get reimbursed for my recent $20,000USD devaluation of my RL house, what if it goes back up in value and I sell it for a profit? Would I then have to pay some money back because a property went up in value? I so hate the free-market system. The proletariat can be best served if the state owns all property!
April 9th, 2008 at 5:02 PM
The problems here are MANY-fold. 1st and foremost you are announcing this on the blog while failing to make buyers aware of it on the buy land page. You are counting on the fact that only a select few read the blogs and you are doing so in full knowledge of the fact that you have already dropped the price out from under them. They will have the choice? will you tell them that when they by?
Your early move to push the sale of openspace sims by doubling the prim count and spearating them from the requirement of purchasing them 4 at a time has the same effect. In full knowledge of the coming “discount” you have shoved as many down the throats of the customers you purport to be looking out for as you can, before you start looking out for them. No tools on the land store will warn them that they could wat a week, no announcements will come to them unless they track them down.
This is organized theft plain and simple.
Sure drop your prices when it makes sense. but do so in a resoonsible manner. warn the people that are buying islands that this is going on. Do it slowly so that thos of us who purchased at the higher rate can have a strategy that does not include panic.
Manage your business with an ear to the ground and an eye toward the future. Rather then your hand in my wallet like some 12th street whore.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:03 PM
So.. whats going to make up for the loss? Thats an extremely high price cut considering it was at 1675$ forever now. Hmm.. maybe theyre going to get rid of the free accounts.. *rubs hands* Oh that would make a lovely trade off. To offset the revenue lost Id say the free accounts need to go! I want the one time 10$ setup fee for the account back!!
April 9th, 2008 at 5:11 PM
Jack,
I’d really love to know where you get the figure of L$11.5/sqm average for mainland, because as a (admittedly small-time) trader in mainland, I consider myself extremely lucky when I manage to sell a parcel at 10.8. I have several good quality parcels that I have held for a few weeks now, which haven’t sold at 9.4, so if 11.5 is the average, I would have expected those to be snapped up quite quickly at that price.
Of course, now… its all changed. Last week, I would buy parcels and mark them up to 9.4, and not have them snapped up, as one would expect if the average was 11.5. Thanks to the bombshell you dropped recently, mainland parcels are now selling at 6.7/sqm in some cases, when, for a long time, the lowest priced land in search (ad-farm junk and other wasteland) was no lower than 8.4.
Forgive me for not using my real SL name here (I did include my real email addr for verification) but since im quoting numbers that are the core of my business, I dont wish to say which business that is.
The figure you quoted of 11.5/sqm is JUST PLAIN WRONG, and does not even relate to the regularly published official figures. I would suggest that you spend some time inworld looking at land sales next time before pulling a random figure from a hat… of course since your announcement, that “average” went to something more like 8.5 overnight - Thanks for that…. not.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:14 PM
Unrelated, but I just want to say well done to LL. Instead of waiting until all of the graphical bugs in WindLight were sorted they instead decided to just implement it anyway, bugs included, so that they would affect everybody and not just those who chose to use Windlight. So now everywhere I go I have either heavily pixellated avatars or cavalcades of multicoloured triangles pointing at me. Good going!
April 9th, 2008 at 5:15 PM
[...] Linden has further clarified the pricing structure of private islands and Open Space sims in a blog entry this evening. Posted in Metaverse General. Tags: island pricing, land, prices, Second [...]
April 9th, 2008 at 5:15 PM
For those of you making the “RL propery loses value, who do I see” argument, there is something to remember. In RL, one has recourse if one’s property is devalued. For example, a house that was not in a designated flood plane, and is re-evaluated as being in one, can do a detail survey or other measure to make their property valuable. There is house flipping, too, where one takes the risk. But in RL, one has options to challenge for declared value of property.
In my particular example, I purchased my first sim for $1250 with a $195 tier over a year ago. The next sim was bought for $1675 and a $295 tier 6-8 months ago. Combined, the INITIAL money spent was $2925 setup and $490 tier for both sims. Working off that and the assumption that the price for sims was fixed, I did my budget to recoup the tier from my rentors as well as over time earn back the setup fees. My budget was set to last 1 year for the recovery.
Now, thanks to LL making ALL new sims worth $1000 and a $295 tier, while mainland sims have always had a tier of $195, that not only strips out $925 from the setup cost, but it creates an unfair marketing situation where those of us who want to offer BETTER land areas for rentors, without the crazy mainland land shapes and unsual terraforing plots, CANT because we have been trying to make it so that we can compete with the mainland for rental property.
Now, I know some of you might not understand advanced math planning, so let me spell it out simply:
Setup fees $1250 + $1675 = $2925
Tier Fees: $195 + $295 = $490 Monthly
VS. Mainland
Tier Fee: $195 Month
Land purchasing (dependant on bots or who is selling in the first place) but no where near $1675 or even $1000.
Simple math would say those on the mainland have a decisive advantage over those renting home plots on Islands.
How does one rectify the difference in pricing that is obviously making land bots and land barrons richer? Simple, set the islands and the mainland at a tier fee of $195 for everyone.
As Jack had mentioned at his office meeting today and in the blog above, Islands are still selling 100-110 per week. Obviously the demand is there, but there has to be some sort of equality in maintainence fees. If there were, I know I for one would be one of the first to go buy some more sims, to allow my islands to expand and offer more services to residents.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:15 PM
@2 why on earth do you have a ticket pending? cancel it. the other person took that risk dont put yourself under the bus. at the very least contact them to share the pain. frankly anyoen with a ticket placed right now is a bit… challenged.
@12 AND ANYONE THAT bought within the last 30 days. return your islands. What they arent telling you here is that you can return islands you havent paid tier on and pay a $100 cancellation fee. you will save $575 and buy it back next week. TELL YOUR FRIENDS! and tell em Joshe sent you
Ill pay $500 USD to anyone who can get me a list of the regions that were bought within the last 30 days. Lets do linden labs job for them. We cant save our own assets, lets look out for someone elses. Anyone care to join me? subscribe to Under The Thumb in groups and lets figure out how to send them a message they understand.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:17 PM
I doubt LL could afford refunding all the current island owners, at $675 times probably 30,000 private islands, LL would probably be refunding an amount equal to one year’s income before expenses.
Anyway, why do people have to whine so much about anything?
April 9th, 2008 at 5:18 PM
This is why i still have not got a premiun account, this is why i still have not bought land and island or watever….. untill LL develops a decent customer relations and a decent stable platform i will not invest any dam money into this place,if SL will ever become this seems to look bleaker everyday that passes.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:18 PM
How about no price reduction and for that money hire some lindens that handle dmca’s and take some care of all the theft. It’s like a country saying ‘Hey people we have low taxes, because we dont spend money on police or security’…way to way
April 9th, 2008 at 5:18 PM
how about just giving openspace people their 150 back?
why do we have to delete our openspace, its less work for you to let us keep it and just give the money back instead of having us cancel them all and redo them again. thats so unlogical
when i cancel it can i keep my sims name? or will it be lost? i hate to delete my openspace buy 150 real life dollars are an insane lot of money for 6 days of tier!
April 9th, 2008 at 5:20 PM
@ John
They hire just ONE linden for the DMCA’s. Can you believe that?!
April 9th, 2008 at 5:24 PM
This is the only choice for us Openspacers ?? OMG, what a crap??
Okay, i will give the Openspace-SIM back and become a refund, then with the new Landstore i buy it twice ….HELLO??? *knock*knock*….is all Okay by you ?? ^^ Why have we not the Choice for more month Tierfee free after the first Month, or a refund of 165$ ??
Why do LL make for his heavy working People, mor work for less ??
Okay, this is not a Choice !!
April 9th, 2008 at 5:30 PM
I’m sorry but I don’t see this as a bad thing. As mentioned by another member in a different forum, this won’t really amount to much. A good landlord will be able to get and keep tenants because they provide a quality experience. I rent land in FairChang and I love it there. Not only do we have a fair covenant that is evenly enforced but the sims look great and the management arranges lots of high quality events for residents. Would I love to have my own sim for all of my desires? Of course, but I can’t justify the tier and I’m not willing to put in the work needed to maintain a quality sim that can attract and keep tenants.
When I chose a rental spot it wasn’t just about the initial investment/deposit/purchase price and the ongoing monthly fees. It was also about the quality of the sim. If you provide a quality themed sim such as Caledon or a well managed sim like FairChang, then you will be able to thrive, even with lower start up costs. The ones who will be hurt are those landlords who either don’t take care of their sims or who are abusive towards their tenants. Bad landlords make tenants want to move to either new locations or to their own sims.
If you want to compete as a landlord, try actually working at it. Make sure that there is someone on your management team that is available for your tenants. Make sure that there are events for your tenants so that it becomes a community and not just a mainland replica. Create a quality environment through your own landscaping & theming. If you do all of that you will keep tenants and might even be able to charge more than you expect.
The problem is that there are lots of sim owners out there who thought that if they put up a sloppy batch of prefab islands that looks like a grid pattern and then set out rental boxes that their sim would immediately fill with tenants. Sorry, but that’s not how it works. If you want to make your sim attractive and tenant-filled you have to put effort into it. Try visiting sims that have no shortage of tenants. It’s almost impossible to get land in Caledon. And I’ve seen how fast the sims in FairChang fill up. But those sim owners have taken the time to truly care for their sims & their tenants.
Do I one day want to own my own sim? Yes. If I felt used and neglected by my landlord I might even take this opportunity to finally buy one. But as it stands, I feel that I get far more value by staying where I am. If you other sim owners did as good a job as landlords, you wouldn’t be so worried. Instead you’d be welcoming this price drop as an opportunity for expansion.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:31 PM
Openspacers are beeing ripped off here. Why don’t we get a proper offer?
@66 Why have we not the Choice for more month Tierfee free after the first Month, or a refund of 165$ ??
Yeah why not?
April 9th, 2008 at 5:31 PM
Phil Linden has no poseballs !!
Run more people out of business Phil !!!!!!!!!!!!
You may have “been” a good coder - but as a business person,
You dumb as a box of rocks !!!
Renee Faulds
Former business woman and creator
April 9th, 2008 at 5:32 PM
Jack this is a plea.
On March 24th, I placed a trade order for a sim. Being patient I waited, and waited for the order to go through. I spent two days unable to log in, another few days with reduced capacity and then last weekend where only 4k of us were able to log in.
After a while I contacted support and talked to dominick and asked, “hey guy did I do this ticket right?” He assured me that everything was ok.
At two weeks I contacted support again and was told that “Due to workload they would try to get this in a few days.”
Now this.
What’s the point anymore? I just spent the last few weeks wandering around waiting for land that just lost most of it’s value. I almost feel like I should be hanging out in the BDSM sims because I must be masochistic. I don’t run a business. I don’t have a club. I simply bought land to play to relieve stress from a job that drives me nuts. Lately ( the last six months ) this has become more stressful than work. I log in here at night wondering what is going to happen next, perhaps a new TOS that says Linden currency has been changed to something else and all my currency is now useless.
For all the apologists and people who are now going to rush in and buy sims. Enjoy them until they raise the tier to make up for this loss of revenue. Enjoy them until you don’t get a response on tickets. Enjoy them when the person in the sim that shares your computer opens up a brothel and lags both of you. Not to mention the joys of them all trying to learn about managing their estates.
Yup I’m glad summers here. I’ve just watched some very well managed sims start to fall apart because plans carefully managed over months of time were destroyed in less than a minute.
If you have any self respect left after this you will change the motto from, “Your World, Your Imagination,” to Our Lawyers, your money our whims.
The suspicious part of me wonders how many friends of LL knew about this before the announcement. Has insider trading found a new venue?
April 9th, 2008 at 5:33 PM
As always - the most common explanation that actually makes good business sense is what the actual reason is behind these ;controversial’ changes.
Unfortunately, there are just too many knee-jerk reactions to these kind of announcements. Now - I admit, I’m torn between wanting badly to scold Linden lab for such a sudden and drastic price drop. But i also am excited and happy for the change. it can only be a good thing in the long run.
I own a region, paid full price for it and deal with the monthly tier. But I also am not a land-flipper. I feel I got my money’s-worth and I’m still happy about it.
I’ve been considering adding another region to my estate and so I am now very excited at the new lower price which will allow me to move forward with that plan sooner.
As for all those who own regions and are lashing out - well, you investment is only lowered in it was an investment played like the stock market. And even in the stock market, you don’t lose anything until you sell.
Thank you for a clear and timely explanation, Jack. Personally, if I fell into one of these time frames where the special offers are being made, I’d be quite happy and satisfied with what I feel is a fair deal in it.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:34 PM
Well.. what a mess..
BUT.. If we take a look at the picture in the long run.. it’s all for the best. I like many others have lost money owning mainland this last few days. I think i’ll chalk this upto a
“err.. we should have thought that through a bit more first..”
kinda thing..
April 9th, 2008 at 5:34 PM
@ 67 Demonia
98% of people who buy sims are NOT landlords. A lot of us are people who hire a sim or openspace for a shop or house and we will never make that money back. How come that linden labs released the opensims and so quickly after releasing them changed the price. Nor normal real life business would do such a thing. Horrible management.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:35 PM
Yes - late afternoon - mind is much LOL
I meant to say - in a stock market crash - you don’t lose anything until you sell.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:37 PM
@66 Why have we not the Choice for more month Tierfee free after the first Month, or a refund of 165$ ??
That would be reasonable, but it’s not going to happen, linden labs never revokes any of its desicions in any way.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:38 PM
Hey! Sounds good to me! I love the new prices and since you did not have to do anything for recent sales, I certainly appreciate the gesture and offers.
No doubt that Linden Labs has studied this in detail and I applaud you for moving ahead with it, despiote knowing the backlash. But it sure seems funny that the complainers would have been fine if no reduction was made? That is kinda weird.
Not much goes down in price in life it seems. I welcome the change and offer my thanks to you for creating new opportunities that did not exist a few years ago,
April 9th, 2008 at 5:40 PM
I have baught a normal sim inworld, its not transferred yet, about the ticket is froim 3/28 .. so i get a open space sim too ?
lol
i pay to much and the old owner laughs
April 9th, 2008 at 5:41 PM
Where did this Openspace Sim thing come from? Over a year here and never heard of it. Only open to island owneres eh? Thats a damn shame because I woul lsnap one up like that - would suit this mainlander perfectly. And thanks for the clarification Jack. You get added to the Sidewinder et al good guy list. Oh and Stan too in billing who calmed this nervous kitty down.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:41 PM
“Openspaces ordered prior to April don’t qualify for the new pricing options. I’m sorry, but we won’t compensate you for those orders. If you wish to cancel them entirely and have them taken down, we’ll do that and refund any that have not yet been online for 30 days. i’ll waive the restocking fee, and you can order them at the lower prices.”
Cancellation is not an option for me. As the 3 openspaces that were delivered only 2 weeks are of course now occupied. I will not throw out people as I have a heart and ethics.
Please carefully reconsider the openspace situation. Changing prices a month after announcement is arguably actionable.
One may also note that for the last two weeks these new openspaces have not performed up to expectation, nor has the whole grid.
Believe me, I am holding back how I really feel.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:41 PM
I think its great what LL is doing because it will help me to start a busness here in SL its like now and can alsmost buy 2 sims for the same price as 1 so in my opinion ty LL
April 9th, 2008 at 5:42 PM
I want to return my openspace sim how do I do that. I don’t want a new one.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:43 PM
Question: What is an ‘Open Space’…I don’t recall ever hearing the term before.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:43 PM
So you advertise making money in SL and put land owners on the fronts of magazine covers. People buy islands and rent them out even though they know it will take over a year to even get their initial investment back. Even if the sim they rent out is rented all year round, any vacancy time is a loss.
So it takes a FULL year to re-coup and BEFORE a profit can be realized.
So what you do is you make owning a sim so cheap that anyone that is renting one only has to come up with a couple hundered dollars to just BUY a sim.
WHO WOULD BLAME a renter from moving out and buying thier own sim?
NOBODY WOULD
So if you owned a sim for less then a year you have ANY EMPTY PIECE OF JUNK, no matter how pretty you made it THEY WILL MOVE.
And Linden Labs just takes all your money laughing and asks you for next months rent from your EMPTY SIM.
And all the people buying islands now are happy, who can blame them? They should be happy.
Now Linden Labs sold two sims, ripped off the first owner not only when they first sold it to them but all the months they paid TIER.
And Linden Labs is laughing so hard because now they have thier hand out to the previous land owner demanding RENT FOR THIER EMPTY SIM.
ooooooooooooooooooo
I get it.
It’s rigged!
They DON’T CARE. One at a time they will take from any group that is ahead in this game. It started with the GOM, go read about it.
They said they would never sell lindens, not just trading them but SELLING THEM.
They did that too. Greedy
It hurt some people but it didn’t hurt “ME” or “YOU” … haha
Since they sell lindens the payment processors breath down thier necks and then they ban gambling.
Any warning? No
They don’t care.
Did they advertise as a way to make money in SL as a casino operator? YES
Did thier lawyer explain how it was ok to do that with thier currancy? YES
Did it help in all the SL hype? YES
Did people buy islands to come do what was advertised? YES
And what did they do the month after the one second ruling on gambling?
THEY ASKED ALL THEM IDIOTS WITH SIMS THEY BOUGHT FOR RENT!
Content creators,
Ad Farms,
Banks,
Sex,
in each case the ONLY people who cry and complain are those directly affected by it. There are lots in that list I do not like so I won’t cry when they are fleecing them and they know this. Only the current owners of islands will cry this time, none of the island owners stood up for ANY of the others on that list. And LL knows it’s that way.
Here is the thing
THEY DON’T CARE ABOUT US THEY CARE ABOUT THEMSELVES.
They will take ANY PATH toward that dollar they can see and call it keeping SL alive.
They’re killing SL.
Yes they fleeced everyone owning islands and they will have thier hand out to you next month as well. And there will be a lot of happy people from the lowered cost, enough around that for sure some of them will do something worthy of being fleeced themselves.
So all you currently happy people, please, when they do come around to fleece you … in god only knows what way they will figure out … try to remember reading this silly post from someone whom already knows and maybe just maybe you can have a chuckle for a moment before you are ejected into total rage again.
Have fun fleecing Linden Labs!
April 9th, 2008 at 5:44 PM
“Openspaces ordered prior to April don’t qualify for the new pricing options. I’m sorr