January 28, 2010 by Ciaran Laval
Posted in
There's a sneaky sign in the estate HQ of Linden Lab, it simply says that Jack can't make his office hour today, but he will be back next week. The thing is that the sign was there last week too, but I guess those fun a minute Lindens can chuckle because hey, it's not next week yet, and next week they could leave the sign out again and still we won't have reached next week.
Now Jack may have just been late today, I didn't hang around, but someone was claiming that Which Linden (I think they mean THE Which Linden) had indicated today was some sort of special Linden day...which is kind of worrying! Anyway, moving on, the blog about Linden Homes, which can be read here, has turned into a mudslinging fest for some reason. I'm not quite sure how this has happened, I know a few people were miffed about the concept and claiming it will kill their business but I'm not convinced it will have quite the impact on other rental business as people fear.
Let's take a journey back in time, March 2007 and an eager Ciaran joined Second Life and spent the next few weeks looking for his first land, which was all over the blurb at the time. What those fun loving Lindens hadn't made clear, was that the first land program had finished, so it was a wild goose chase, a bit like waiting for next week and Jack's office hour, hey there's a theme here! Now the first land issue is important because it was a similar concept to these Linden Homes, I mean it wasn't as controlled, there were no covenants, but it was a first step on the ladder and plenty of people have bemoaned the loss of first land. I'm told the reason it was scrapped was due to it being heavily gamed and people making offers to noobs for their land, under market value. This is all hearsay, but it seems that first land was far from perfect.
Present day and Linden Lab are making a new program to offer premium members a benefit, although I'll get one of these plots I wouldn't have grumbled if they'd said there were for new premium accounts only, well actually I may be telling porkies here, I would have grumbled about the missing land incentive between my joining Second Life and today. However it's a hook, a way of drawing people into premium membership and we need more options.
I have seen other suggestions that would probably be more palatable all around, such as only allowing ownership of one of these plots for 60-90 days. Initiatives such as this probably should be aimed at the noob market, but Linden Lab don't want to upset existing premium members. We also have to remember that you need 512M of tier free to engage in this program, so it's not an additional premium perk, it's an additional choice and I'm all for choices, I'm also in favour of a premium perk that doesn't involve land, such as classifieds to the value of, or show in search places for free for x amount of parcels if you forego your free 512M tier allocation. Not everyone wants to own land here, so options are good.
However there are issues, it is competition for landlords, there's no two ways about this, however let's not forget that Linden Lab are the Daddy of all landlords, so it could be argued that private landlords chose to enter the fray with them, rather than the other way around but without those private landlords Second Life wouldn't be as successful as it is today, they've invested a lot of money upfront and people shouldn't forget this when they're trying to demonise the evil land barron.
Linden Lab however can not only offer double prim land at lower costs than a private landlord, they can also advertise to their entire userbase via email. Nobody else can do this, nobody else has the reach that Linden Lab have, so yes there will be people who lose tenants who opt for these Linden Homes and there are potential tenants who will instead take a Linden Home.
However it's not just landlords, people who create prefabs for small plots could also be impacted for similar reasons, someone won't buy a small prefab because they can live in a ready built home for no extra costs for the building.
So yes, there are aspects of this that will upset people, but if the aim is to increase premium memberships and attract new blood, then stepping on a few toes has to happen. When it's your toe being stepped on it hurts, I know this from past experience but the bigger picture suggests that this is a sensible move. The balance for Linden Lab is to not upset large swathes of their residents, not that this has stopped them from upsetting large swathes of residents in the past, but on this issue, Linden Homes, I think they'll get away with it because well managed rental communities on both mainland and estate offer something different and Linden Lab will never respond to issues with as much richness as a well managed rental community.
I'm cautiously optimistic that this will work out well, but I do agree that those who are concerned about competition from Linden Lab should make their voices heard.
- Ciaran Laval's blog
- Add new comment
- 557 reads
Re: The Linden Homes conundrum
My concern - if that is the right word for it - is whether there is a wider aspect to First Homes.
As I've blogged elsewhere, Premium Account retention doesn't hasn't really been on LL's list of priorities for a long time. To whit:
Now, granted M's words could have been pure spin to offset the continued shrinkage of the Premium Account user base.
But what if his words were genuine? That Premium Accounts simply do not - or have not - featured in LL's bottom-line thinking since his arrival.
If that is indeed the case, then its is fair to say that either:
Taking (1.) first - what has been so systemic so has to change the view that Premium Accounts are immaterial?
Turning to (2.), you and I and others have all commented on recent moves by LL to court major land barons. We've had MOTD banner being made available to the likes of Azure (with the unfulfilled promise others will get the same benefit); we've had news that Jack is offering closed-door deals to selected estate owners / barons offering bulk discounts on sim purchases (a deal Jack himself had to hastily backtrack over in one of his own OH meetings, with someone at LL rapidly firing out "invites" to the scheme to stave off cries of concern from tose attending said meeting).
Could it be that "First Homes" is actually not solely about revitalising Premium Subscription revenues, but is also about corralling and syphoning the user base as an incentive to their big land baron friends? These homes are supposedly "temporary", a "stepping stone" on the land ownership ladder. If this genuinely is the case - then one has to ask "a stepping stone to where?"
One possible answer to this is that having a "captive" audience of new users / home owners (and it IS new users this scheme will target - right from the sign-up process, have no fear on that) - LL can steer them towards land barons who already enjoy "favoured nations" status with LL?
The pay-off here is clear: LL encourages barons to buy large numbers of sims at preferential rates whilest at the same time assuring them that they are building a customer base that will ensure said barons are not left holding a lot of empty, finance-draining sims. Thus both sides win: the land barons enjoy a mutual elevated status in dealings with LL; LL get to enjoy a rise in Premium subscriptions and get to control the flow of new residents, etc., into the wider arena of SL living.
Even if this sounds too far-fetched, leave us not forget that LL themselves are gearing-up to move into the "larger" land / home market with their "developed" Mainland and "themed" private sims waiting in the wings. Could "First Homes" be more about getting people into the mindset of the "one stop stop" from LL itself, thus making them more willing to take on these other offerings, once fully launched, rather than shopping around elsewhere?
The other aspect to First Homes - leaving aside all the conspiracy theories - is the impact this scheme will have, should it be wildly successful, on the community as a whole. What if people opt not to see their First Home as a "stepping stone", but simply as their home in SL, warts and all?
Again, the worrying thing in this case is not (to a point) that it could stifle this business or that business, but rather the banality of thinking it could imprint on SL. Again, we're seeing much angst voiced over the concept of the "virutal hive mind" following Wallace Linden's recent post, but what does rows and rows of residents all living in homongenised (sanitised?) houses say about SL? What happens to creativity when your home life is so rigorously defined, controlled and limited - but you'll toss such freedoms to one side in return for your "free" house...?
"First Homes" may not be the Great Evil that many have painted them to be - but one cannot deny that the whole exercise in making them available does smack of LL continuing to play at being social engineers - even if the reasons / outcomes for such manipulation currently themselves lie in the realm of conjecture.
I.P.
Re: The Linden Homes conundrum
Interesting points, it has certainly crossed my mind that they may deliver those who rent Linden Homes into the arms of large estates and I was extremely vociferous in my criticism of the MOTD advertising for large estates, anything like that via Linden Homes would be disgraceful. I don't know about discounts for large estates owners but I do know people pressed Jack on the issue after a large estate were releasing new homesteads after the July increase and renting them out for less than the new cost should have been, Jack rightly wouldn't answer that, but it was an uncomfortable observation. I say rightly because he can't reveal customer payments between Linden Lab and the customer, that would be a privacy breach.
I asked Jack once why they hadn't produced more sims like Shermerville, I don't know if you have ever been there, but if you haven't take a look. Jack told me the concept wasn't popular, that people want to create their own spaces, not live in pre-built ones.
As for the land market in general and whether LL now value premiums more, the old money making trick of auctioning off mainland sims is a dead horse, they simply can't do that anymore. How much would one go for? They used to go for between three and four grand in US dollars quite regularly but then the bottom fell out of the market, the resellers could no longer make it work. I'd say they'd struggle to get USD$750 for a full sim now in many cases, resellers were the people who often put the money forward, but with no markup, they won't do it, so this is probably why LL are looking to generate more income via premiums.
Re: The Linden Homes conundrum
Jack will always flip-flop in his views. I've not been to Shermerville, but will take a look - assuming its still around. Truth be told, I tend to avoid Mainland as much as possible, other than for occasional in-world shopping trips.
With regards land and income generation, I'm aware that the Mainland market is as dead as the proverbial Dodo in many respects - but does this extend to the private island market, where LL stand to make more on a purely volume basis (especially if they can create more of a captive market for the product)?
It's true that the entire economy is shifting - as reflected in the way in which LL flip flop over the quarterly stats (again, look at how "important" resident-to-resident transactions have again become when not so long ago we were being told they have "no bearing" on the economy). Ergo, a re-focusing on Premium account subscriptions does seem a natural means of bolstering income - even allowing for the recent e-mail confusion relating to bonuses - on a limited basis.
One thing we all seem to forget is that everything that is happening in SL right now mirrors pretty much what Mitch Kapor stated back in his SL5B keynote address - in which he signified that it is more-or-less time for the pioneer users of SL (i.e. the likes of you and me) to step aside for the the more "pragmatic" users - which he largely signified as being "big business".
Given this, one cannot help but wonder if there are those in LL who view the existing users base as little more than a commodity; something that can not only be siloed through policy directives like the Adult Changes or through "programmes" such as Linden Homes - but also one that is there purely for experimentation, be that experimentation be technicial or social.
It's an interesting thought. Possibly.
I.P.
Re: The Linden Homes conundrum
Re: The Linden Homes conundrum
It changes things slightly as it's more akin to a return to the first land concept, but rentals flourished during the period first land was available, which is one of the reasons I feel this might not be as bad as people envisage. The land market is so cheap now that any premium member who chooses to rent a 512 as their only plot is wasting money, the only reason they would do this would be if their plot is compelling and if that's the case then that's because a landlord has created that experience and the renter sees value in that, which is another reason why I don't think this will be as bad as people envisage, people rent because they like the location.