In the post Jack Linden tells us that he is listening and reading all the feedback - which is good news, but then he goes on to explain something we all apparently missed (including the Lindens themselves):Update regarding the Openspaces announcement:
I wanted to clarify one issue. As mentioned in the post, Openspaces were intended for space, empty areas of ocean or forest. Take a look at the Knowledgebase article description here. By that criteria, the large majority of Openspaces have more going on than was the original intent. We are not suggesting this is a bad thing, and of course we’re delighted that people have found them to be so useful. And we’re not saying that everyone is abusing resources. We are saying that the use has changed, and continues to do so as people find more creative ways to use them. So the revised pricing is about recognising that change of use and the additional costs and value associated with it.
I would like to ask Jack if he has visited the Nautilus sims? or some of the other well know openspaces owned by Linden Lab as showcases of what they can look like and what use they can be put to. Residents look to Linden Lab for guidelines and examples - Look to yourselves Jack and we will follow - set us Limits we will (in general; there are always some that will push) keep within them - give us prims and land to use as we wish and we will do exactly that.
Why raise the prim limit if you don't want people to live or build on these openspaces?
In this post Jack has basically said the price rise is due to the 'change of use' although in the previous post it was put down to more technical issues - either way Residents are hurt, angry and disillusioned and those not already packing up are planning on selling what land they do have before the price rises take effect, many will lose hundreds of USD with no way to recoup their losses. Already the demonstrations far outstrip the ones that happened due to the gambling ban as this hurts even the little people.
In an already failing SL economy - can it survive this latest blow? Only time will tell.
One thing that has been made obvious is that sign up rates for Openlife Grid are up to a phenomenal rate - residents are looking for alternatives. Without a quick reasonable solution to this issue we could be looking at the death of Secondlife as we know it. After all who wants to be in a world of newbies when everyone else has gone elsewhere to live their dream.
Dana Vanmoer
