1. No way! LL doesn't answer every AR and email complaining about that person's rights being infringed by another SLer? Jerks and scammers ruin fun? SL isn't the most stable program out there??

You'll note that most of the people that complain about SL to such an extent are either trying to make money or have a social life that depends on one computer program. They expect WAAAY too much out of SL when you consider it's track record instead of it's potential. That includes LL.

SL is a lot more fun when you lower your expectations!

Posted at 7:17PM on Aug 29th 2007 by SqueezeOne Pow

2. To the extent that SL is, indeed, more fun when you lower your expectations I agree with SqueezeOne. However, SL is still incredibly frustrating at times; and this from someone who doesn't run a business. I should be tearing my hair out if I was in Cory Edo's position - trying to provide a professional service to clients on an unstable platform run by a capricious company like LL.

It strikes me that in the eyes of their customers, LL successfully abuse their monopoly. There is only one Second Life and if you want this type of virtual experience, it's pretty much your only viable platform at present. This allows LL to follow their own lead and agenda completely - they pay mere lip service to the requests and complaints of customers... sorry.. "residents". Customer service seems not only poor but even apparently lacking altogether at times, they paid scant heed to points raised in the open letter, voice was rammed through in the face of general apathy if not disquiet and when customers ARE given the chance to comment on features - the comments seem the be ignored (how is everyone enjoying the communication window?).

So yes, if not the "Killer App", then at least at some stage in the future Second Life WILL have serious competition.

LL might be number one and unassailable now, but nothing lasts forever.

Anyone remember Netscape?

Posted at 8:21PM on Aug 29th 2007 by Tyffany Flintoff

3. Agreed, SqueezeOne, Tyffany. As Calvin once said to Hobbes, the secret to happiness is lowering your expectations to the point where they're already met.

The way I've found to be happy with SL is to love it for what it is, not denigrate it for what it's not. Mind you, this isn't always easy, and I'm not a content creator by any stretch, but I enjoy SL for how I use it: a social networking tool.

Posted at 3:49AM on Aug 30th 2007 by Akela

4. Bound to agree with the other comments. Competition is inevitable, imminent and beneficial, but, as the original blogger makes plain, SL operates as a network of contacts. I can't see people abandoning that network lightly for some loss-leader competitor (or, more likely, competitors) unless the entire network moved or there was a bridge or other technology that facilitated free movement.

Posted at 5:44AM on Aug 30th 2007 by Graham Mills

5. See that's the thing. I go into SL knowing that there will be lag and crashing and no customer service to back me up.

I have a business that does alright by my standards and when there's huge grid-wide problems I get frustrated, too, but just like I get frustrated when the Polish, the Milanese and the Venicians all attack me at once in Midieval II: Total War!

Basically, I think SL is being taken too seriously. It's not LL's fault you quit your real job to live off of your income from SL. I don't remember ever hearing that as a talking point for SL promotion. Sure they bring it up as something some people have done but I don't think that was the point of making SL.

As far as competition I agree with Graham. I'm not too keen on basically starting over on everything I've made just because there is some competition with more resources to counter SL out there. It'll take more than that to get me to completely pack up!

Posted at 1:58PM on Aug 30th 2007 by SqueezeOne Pow

6. On the other hand Linden Lab uses as its strapline "Your world, your imagination" not a line to make you want to lower expectations.

Linden Lab says it protects your intellectual property rights, one of the attractive things for many content creators, and then fails to do so. Caliandris being depressed at how people are scamming others is one thing, but if we assume Ektran's story is correct, Linden Lab are not complying with DCMA notices correctly, and can lose their safe harbour status for this.

If you only want to read fluffy things about how good SL is, good for you - but SL has faults. You choose to lower your expectations to accept them all. I'd rather accept that some are inevitable, but produce and/or comment on well founded criticisms than ignore them. If no one ever criticises LL for SL, then do we have any recourse for the fact that they are capricious and do whatever they want rather than what the customer wants.

As for LL not promoting SL as a place to make a living, did you ever read the publicity about a year ago? It was ALL (and I do mean all) about people making a living in SL. Anshe, Shaun Altman, Justin from Rivers Run Red etc... they didn't say "come to SL and you're guaranteed to make a living" but they certainly promoted it through people doing exactly that.

Posted at 2:12PM on Aug 30th 2007 by Eloise Pasteur

7. I'm not saying "give LL a break" by any means. I'm saying "take a look at actual history when making your assessment of SL's current abilities and capacities". One only needs to try to walk across 5 sims from the welcome area to get a solid idea of SL's performance abilities and capacities for stable and reliable commerce. I'm not taking anything economically seriously that has me sink into the street at random! It's common sense.

You're bound to be dissappointed in just about anything in life if you believe the hype from people that are trying to sell you something! I think SL's great DESPITE LL. Maybe I'm unique but I haven't taken a salesman's word for it in years. I would hope that these people that want to be taken seriously as SL business people would know better than to buy into corporate gibberish and propaganda.

I was attracted to SL for the building and creative potential I saw when my friend gave me a demonstration with me looking over his shoulder. I wasn't even aware of their advertising until after I was already playing. Maybe that's why I find it hard to get worked up over how unstable and unreliable SL is as a platform and LL is as a company...especially when it comes to real money.

And I'm not looking for fluffy stories, I'm just looking for new ones that haven't been done to death for the last year!

Posted at 4:19PM on Aug 30th 2007 by SqueezeOne Pow

8. I think what Caliandris (and subsequently Eloise) are saying is that people are not playing nicely and nobody seems to care or do anything about it. As a newbie, I don't know whether there was a time when things were different. All I do know is that SL has grown like topsy and I don't see how LL can be expected to cope given that they're apparently borderline profitable and their first priorities are presumably scaling and stability. If LL service is partially borked, you can presumably appeal to intermediaries (onrez in Caliandris's case). I suspect, however, that ultimately you're back to the networks "thing": deliver a service or product personally and you have a limited network with repeat business based on reputation. Mass-market is ultimately just fire-and-forget.

Posted at 7:16AM on Aug 31st 2007 by Graham Mills

9. Hi. I joined 2 weeks ago as a premium. My expecation was to have fun which I was until 3 days ago. I guess the one thing I didn't expect is the following reality.
I have not been able to login to the client software for over 3 days. The main reason I paid money to join was for support. It has been taking Linden Lab about 12 hours to communicate back to me. Mostly they ask for more info (info which was already supplied with their own "pick one" boxes when the ticket was created by the way) or ask me to try something or whatever, which I do. However the problem remains and then I have to issue another ticket to tell them this... Then I wait another 12 hours for a response etc...
Initially, Linden Lab kept telling me (after I've waited hours and hours) that they've checked my account status and everything is just fine. It got to the point where I created a new basic account and then logging in using my one and only pc I tracked down my own premium account's avatar and then sent another ticket saying " I only have one pc and now I'm here with my new avatar looking straight at my "everything's just fine" avatar...
The saga continues.
Incidentally, my new basic account's credit card info was updated on the website over 2 days ago but has yet to show up in this accounts inworld profile. I have had no response about this yet. Having chatted to quite a few other newbies in the meantime about how long this cr cd info profile update usually takes it turns out most of us are still waiting, with some having been waiting for 3 weeks.
So if we want to buy something we can't anyway.
I was enjoying the "experience" until about 3 days ago. Now I'm pretty disgusted really.
And I for one am relieved that I'm not trying to run a business entity within such a system.

Posted at 10:03AM on Sep 6th 2007 by Qadellia Quinnell

10. I spent an hour looking for a reasonable blog that isn't full of name calling, and I'm happy to have landed here. In real life I'm a professional working at a university. The potential of SL is tremendous. I think, however, that Philip Rosedale has used rose-colored glasses in justifying LL's hands-off approach. I recently had to put a piece of property up for sale because a neighbor who allows people to use his property as a "sandbox" has allowed griefers to plant noisemaker boxes on it that make it impossible to use voice chat or even leave the sound on nearby. I have sent 7 complaints to LL and never received more than an automated response. I know others have complained about the boxes as well, so who knows how many complaints they've received altogether? I've also contacted the landowner 3 times and even tried IMing the box owner, who no longer appears in a people search. I seriously doubt my situation is unique. There seems to be no recourse other than abuse reports and emailed replies to the automated responses they engender. I wonder if LL's problem is its decision to push growth at the expense of support, or if its hands-off approach intentionally ignores what it considers to be minor problems.

Posted at 9:00PM on Oct 6th 2007 by Zann Canto