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Wednesday, November 5, 2008

The People Have Spoken

No, I'm not referring to yesterday's U.S. presidential election, but LL's amendments in M Linden's Letter to Second Life Residents to its recent Openspace pricing changes. The widespread consternation and protests expressed in user blogs and inworld seem to have gotten our concerns made known to the SL gods.

Here's the new setup according to M Linden:

Here is how we are amending the price change:

1. We are going to retain the Openspaces product at its original price point and its original intended use (forest, water, etc.). We will have technical limitations to help regulate their use, initially avatar and prim limit restrictions, eventually event, classified and script limits. Those of you who chose to use the Openspaces as intended may stay at the US$75 rate, but will need to contact the concierge team to do so.

2. If you want more than an Openspace, we will offer you the choice of moving to a new product called Homesteads that is intended for light use such as low density rentals. For existing Openspace owners we will phase in the price increase for this new product over the next 6 months. Homesteads will also have technical limits for avatars and prims, and eventually script limits as well.

* January 5, 2009 – non-compliant Openspaces will transition to Homesteads and the maintenance fees will go from $75 to $95 per month. We will offer an educational discount to qualified educators on the new Homestead product. The discount amount will be the same as Private Regions, roughly 30%.

* July 2009 — the maintenance fees for Homesteads will go from $95 to $125 per month

This was exactly the solution that I had hoped for, and one that I think is fair to all concerned.

The cannons can still roar at Beek Haven!

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