Linden Lab Lays Off 10% of Employees

[Monica Dream]

Not loading for you? Me either.
Old-timey style HTTPS Link

 

[Casey Pelous]

Not loading for you? Me either.
Old-timey style HTTPS Link

Loaded for me. It ain't pretty.

 

[Madi Perth]

Loaded for me. It ain't pretty.

None of these numbers are very pretty. Losses like this are unsustainable. Unless Oberwager is willing to shell out of his own pocket to keep SL a float we might be seeing the begin of the end.

 

[Monica Dream]

None of these numbers are very pretty. Losses like this are unsustainable. Unless Oberwager is willing to shell out of his own pocket to keep SL a float we might be seeing the begin of the end.

If ActiveWorlds (and There, and IMVU, and even SimOnline IIRC) is still tooling around, SL probably won't go anywhere.

 

[Monica Dream]

Now what would be hilarious is if SL 2030 or SL 2035 ends up being run on Opensim to save costs somehow.

 

[Essence Lumin]

If ActiveWorlds (and There, and IMVU, and even SimOnline IIRC) is still tooling around, SL probably won't go anywhere.

Yeah. There claims to be alive if their web page is to be believed.

 

[Spirits Rising]

Now I really don't personally think that LL is out to get child avatars, but a lot of people do. LL should have addressed that fear.

No, they shouldn't have. Nor should they have had to at all. Frankly people in general - when it comes to spaces like Second Life and such - need to stop pretending every single action is "the beginning of the end" or some sort of witch hunt or ...Yeah, the bloody complexes need to be put aside. If they're coming for such users then they're coming for them and it will be obvious.

No, the changes do not make it such. A mass ban wave might (as in the entire community at once).

Fixed that for you.

No, you did not 'fix' it - you put your personal bias on it.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

No, you did not 'fix' it - you put your personal bias on it.

Of course I did, just as Madi Perth did before, because she's got no hard proof whatsoever that the supposed user/land loss is tied to the new ToS only. Or at all. This then is her own bias on the story. It's a correlation at best, there might be other good reasons at well which happened we don't know about or unable to think about. Or just economy going down, GPU prices too high, whatever.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

Of course I did, just as Madi Perth did before, because she's got no hard proof whatsoever that the supposed user/land loss is tied to the new ToS only. Or at all. This then is her own bias on the story. It's a correlation at best, there might be other good reasons at well which happened we don't know about or unable to think about. Or just economy going down, GPU prices too high, whatever.

Not to pick a side here, but the PBR updates upset A LOT of people in all SL communities. I honestly suspect that is a bigger factor than anything.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Yes, the PBR release desaster sounds quite plausible as well.

 

[mikka]

Fascinating. Well I log numbers too - when the lab don't stuff it up =^^=. Also PBR? I don't run bloatstorm and my old box has been fine.
Seen two names so far and frankly 'eye of sauron' means nothing to me.

 

[Madi Perth]

Of course I did, just as Madi Perth did before, because she's got no hard proof whatsoever that the supposed user/land loss is tied to the new ToS only. Or at all. This then is her own bias on the story. It's a correlation at best, there might be other good reasons at well which happened we don't know about or unable to think about. Or just economy going down, GPU prices too high, whatever.

I posted the numbers and they are there for anyone to look at. Yeah, my personal bias thinks the new TOS has something to do with it. Maybe its not and maybe its PBR then. PBR has been out for over a year, it came out last Christmas an there was no complaining or griping about it till firestorm got it. There was no mass exit at that time. Steady number then a drop in uses, June hits bigger drop in numbers, right when the tos come to full enforce. Here we are in October and the person who headed the department that would have been primary responsible for rolling out and enforce the new tos is let go.

But lets say its something else like PBR or avatar eating wombats are on the grid. Numbers don't lie and simple math shows a 10% to almost 30% user drop in participation in a few months. Second LIfe is a business and some of you seem to forget that. No business can survive a user loss like that, especially one with a small user base to start with.

 

[Soen Eber]

If we eliminate the COVID bump as a one-off, it still shows growth from before COVID hit. Linden Lab floated high for a bit from that but now the world is (epidemiologically) back to normal.

I'm still not going to exhale until after the elections.

 

[Madi Perth]

If we eliminate the COVID bump as a one-off, it still shows growth from before COVID hit. Linden Lab floated high for a bit from that but now the world is (epidemiologically) back to normal.

I'm still not going to exhale until after the elections.

I'm not sure what the elections will do for SL. I'm going to wait and see what the full release of the mobile app is like. How that goes will probably be the turning point.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

I posted the numbers and they are there for anyone to look at. Yeah, my personal bias thinks the new TOS has something to do with it. Maybe its not and maybe its PBR then. PBR has been out for over a year, it came out last Christmas an there was no complaining or griping about it till firestorm got it. There was no mass exit at that time. Steady number then a drop in uses, June hits bigger drop in numbers, right when the tos come to full enforce. Here we are in October and the person who headed the department that would have been primary responsible for rolling out and enforce the new tos is let go.

But lets say its something else like PBR or avatar eating wombats are on the grid. Numbers don't lie and simple math shows a 10% to almost 30% user drop in participation in a few months. Second LIfe is a business and some of you seem to forget that. No business can survive a user loss like that, especially one with a small user base to start with.

I know PBR existed long before firestorm got it but relatively few people used it or were affected by it. The early adopters I know sometimes used PBR viewers and sometimes not. Once it hit firestorm it affected a lot of people on old computers who didn't know what to do and were very annoyed. Many of them might come back once it's more ironed out or they get better computers.

The main reason I'm suspicious that the TOS change is the main driver is that I heard VERY LITTLE chatter about it among communities that already banned child avatars anyway, which is much of the grid. Clearly this was very upsetting to a subset of SL, but the botched firestorm PBR rollout hit users in all communities and subcultures very heavily.

I also agree Soen Eber that the COVID bump wearing off is probably another major factor.

In summary, I do think the TOS update probably hurt more than helped, but I think the 10% drop in users is likely due to many factors.

 

[GoblinCampFollower]

I'm not sure what the elections will do for SL. I'm going to wait and see what the full release of the mobile app is like. How that goes will probably be the turning point.

I think Soen was just venting about what was on their mind. I also doubt the elections will impact SL in a very direct way other than there just being a lot of political chatter.

 

[Madi Perth]

I think Soen was just venting about what was on their mind. I'm going to wait and see what the full release of the mobile app is like. How that goes will probably be the turning point.

Soen is a smart cookie. It is very possible he knows something or has thought of something we have over looked. I'm sure Soen will elaborate in due time.

 

[Spirits Rising]

Of course I did, just as Madi Perth did before, because she's got no hard proof whatsoever that the supposed user/land loss is tied to the new ToS only. Or at all. This then is her own bias on the story. It's a correlation at best, there might be other good reasons at well which happened we don't know about or unable to think about. Or just economy going down, GPU prices too high, whatever.

None of which was put forward as part of a spin. You altered the text to put your personal bias concerning a subset of users on it.

So in short: Nice attempt at deflection/dodging owning your own words/bias.

 

[Soen Eber]

I'm just generally anxious about the election and not trying to conflate it with SL. I've been holding my breath since whazizname was keeping even with Biden/Harris.

As for SL, it.s up to LL to try and bring people back. It'll be hard, but they're hopefully focused on that.

 

[Madi Perth]

I'm just generally anxious about the election and not trying to conflate it with SL. I've been holding my breath since whazizname was keeping even with Biden/Harris.

As for SL, it.s up to LL to try and bring people back. It'll be hard, but they're hopefully focused on that.

That is fine with me. I've already vented my frustration on the upcoming election over in another post. A single post but I made my point about how I feel about it very clear.