Is The Openspaces Uprising History?

Call it "The People's History of OpenSpace"-- Danton Sideways of Virtual Jungle has written an epic, first draft narrative of Second Life's Openspaces, which the Lindens began offering to island/estate owners back in 2006, and eventually culminated in the price increases, protests, and price revisions of the last few months.  Danton's timeline is exhaustively researched and link-heavy, and Mr. Sideways does a good job capturing the big picture, and the Residents' reaction to it.  Some segments are bound to be controversial, since they involve questionably sourced allegations that aren't actually proven.  Still, no one can doubt the extremity of the upheaval caused by the Lindens' price increase.  So perhaps the most contentious point is Danton's conclusion:

The clamor seems to have died down... Second Life may have lost a few paying customers, but most of the rest will stay, because there is really no alternative.

And that may be the case, as well, though I'm not sure.  Though the world is literally shrinking in the controversy's aftermath, in-world activity in terms of concurrency continues to grow, and there's little evidence of a sustained protest.  At the same time, various OpenSim worlds continue to attract attention, explicitly as an alternative to SL, and last month saw a significant drop in active users.  So are we at the end of the controversy-- or in a brief lull before the real impact hits?

Image: "Mermaid home" by Wildstar Beaumont; "Sim to go away," he reports, "in December."

Comments

[radar]

I think we'll see some minimal (relatively speaking) impact on sim count now. I think the real upheaval will come when OpenSim is closer to SL in stability & features (assuming they won't always be lagging a certain distance behind) and things like hypergrid become widespread, and then people will have more choices about how to connect to each other in a virtual world.

LL will have to really become more customer-centric at that point, but let's not forget that while we all moan and bitch about stability, right now there's nothing close in overall experience. SL'ers have high expectations and it's going to take a lot of hard work by the open source folks to meet those. Meantime LL can keep on progressing.

It's going to be interesting to watch.

[Morris Vig]

"I think the real upheaval will come when OpenSim is closer to SL in stability & features"

Emphasize the "when". Then bold and underline it, because OpenSim is most definitely NOT ready for primetime. Maybe someday, but not now...and probably not for a while.

[Jovin]

The real impact will be when the price rises and reduced spec's actually begin, they haven't yet - you're in quite a rush to revolt? Patience, that straw hasn't quite landed on the camel's back yet. :-)

If we're seeing reduced user-hours and shifts in land ownership already doesn't that imply the real impact will be a sizeable one?

Expect to see some (probably cack-handed) damage limitation PR by Linden any-day now. They'll need to try and fill the blogs and wider media with news of something more positive so expect sudden "wow-gosh" initiatives starting in January. It won't work of course, but they'll try.

[Nightbird Glineux]

I agree with Jovin. Some of my friends have gone from owning or renting a whole openspace sim to either abandoning their sim or renting part of one, and others who haven't done anything yet will probably do so after Christmas.

Do you still think this is a "Crisis of Confidence", Hamlet?

[Chaddington Boomhauer]

History? The actual placard wielding protesters maybe - but so much land is going to disappear in the next few months. Even if the rumblings are over some people have no choice but to close down - look at stuff like this: http://rivers-rock.blogspot.com/2008/12/linden-labs-second-life-loses-another.html .

I think it's a matter of when, not if other OpenSim grids take off and replace SL.

[Hamlet Au]

@ Nightbird: Yeah, there definitely seems to be a significant "Crisis of confidence" among many, though I'm not sure if that translates into leaving SL entirely, versus just cutting back land holdings in it.

[Ciaran Laval]

It's way too early to tell, we have a couple of markers, first in January and then in July. I still don't think the July increase will happen.

When people start spending extra money, it generally leads to cutbacks somewhere else. So those who stay with homesteads will have less disposable income, this manifests itself in areas where people who had absolutely no interest in an openspace.

Even now with transfers taking so long, inworld business is losing money. That loss isn't all going to be on the individual business owner, it's going to also be felt by the business owners they'd normally do business with.

This was a very foolhardy move by Linden Lab, this message needs to be understood in San Francisco.

[Erasmus Hartunian]

It is not a matter of either or. There is little doubt that, in time, several grids will be competing. Not all of them will be SL style. VW like Twinity will also take a piece of the pie. The question really is: "Will the pie grow large enough for the SL slice of it to be larger than the whole pie they have now"

People will often live and do business in more than one world, just as they have more than one favorite web site. Much of the growth of OpenSim grids is indeed coming from SL, but it does not mean that people are moving, they are expanding, adding new choices. Businesses are setting up on these grids, but rarely closing down in SL.

In the end, I believe that the survival of SL depends on the success of these other grids. If they all fail, SL will too as it would be seen as a failure of the concept. But if they succeed, it will add credibility and viability to SL itself. It is also good for SL to have to become competitive and have think of potential consequences of their business decisions.

[Iggy O]

@Erasmus,

Let me second your claim, based on what I hear at our weekly SL roundtable meetings for educators. Several grids will compete for our business, EVENTUALLY.

When the competition becomes compelling enough is the question; universities already have heavy investments in hours, and in some cases, cash, in their SL builds.

OpenLife is the alt VW I know best, and it's far from "being there."

That said, in higher ed we are looking at the potential of other virtual worlds. Many of us now say "virtual worlds" in meetings with administrators and not "Second Life." That is an indicator of how we are thinking about this technology.

LL has identified education as an essential part of its business model. Wearing my other SL hat as a social user, however, I'm not sure that we won't be left in the dust as the Lab focuses on business, education, and government.

[Saffia Widdershins]

It's worth noting that on the same day as Danton posted, Sarah Nerd announced she was liquidating her holdings (see http://your2ndplace.com/node/1380 and my own post on that: http://primperfectblog.wordpress.com/2008/12/05/crash-and-burn-ii-classified-ads-and-sne/).

I've also just been writing an article for the December issue of Prim Perfect about the recent Grand Tour of Vintage and Steampunk sims (a two day event consisting of a range of parties and balls in over eighteen different locations). And there, it seems, almost everyone has been affected by the issue - several hosts spoke of the fact that these would be the last balls held in certain locations because they were closing or consolidating.

We've only seen the first few steps; more will come towards the end of the year when current tier payments run out and the prices rise. There will be a huge change - and if more land barons like Sarah Nerd go under, the repercussions will be felt across the grid.

But the lasting effect is the undermining of trust.

[Anony Mouse]

I know a lot of people who are signing up on osgrid. Please check it out at http://www.osgrid.org if you can. It's not ready yet, but it will be soon. I've logged in and it seems pretty good, but obviously very beta.

If you have the skills to help out, please do. If not... try it out and submit bugs. :)

I know that a lot of people are considering moving to osgrid when it is ready because of the profiteering of Linden Labs. I, personally, think that starting a group which advocates the mass exodus of people from SL once it is ready is in order as it might put LL on notice that they do have competition.

The fact of the matter is that LL's business model is fundamentally flawed since it means that all land must be bought and sold through them. The osgrid approach of allowing you to connect your own servers running the server software is the future and is more scalable and, unfortunately for LL, undermines their revenue stream.

I think it's time to demand change from LL or to leave and find better pastures.

And what Iggy said is also true... it does undermine trust. I'm not sure after this and IDV and everything else that I have any faith or trust left in LL. They seem to do whatever they want whenever they want without regard for customers because, the way they see it... they have an infinite supply of them and and unflagging belief that more will come.

We need to show them how wrong they are.

Sincerely,

Anony Mouse
"I'm back for good this time."

[Danton Sideways]

Thank you, Hamlet, for the article about my post. Here I was wondering if anyone would notice it - and it ends up featured on New World Notes!

Ciaran Laval points out something interesting that escaped me - the January price rise for OpenSpace maintenance fees will only go from US$75/month to US$95/month, so a lot of owners might hang on another 6 months. Conversely, those who are dropping them now must be truly upset, since the short-term price rise will be minimal.

Linden Lab goes back and forth between trying hard to listen to their customers, and then being firm to defend their own economic interests. This comes from what is called a structural problem, rather than a conjunctural one: there is a fundamental contradiction between their role as government of a virtual world, and their role as chief profit-making entity in that world. The only way to escape the contradiction would be to make structural changes in the institutional set-up, such as to establish a grid-wide resident government. Robin Linden actually suggested that a few years ago, but it was overwhelming rejected by the residents themselves....

[CyFishy Traveler]

Are we certain that the ONLY reason that people are downsizing their land holdings right now is because of the OpenSpace debacle? I'm not saying that's not a factor, but it seems to me it's also possible that some people are shrinking their land holdings because of things like, oh, half a million people losing their jobs in November in the United States alone. While, on one level, entertainment does well in such an economic climate, it tends to do better if it's CHEAP entertainment . . .

[Ciaran Laval]

Indeed CyFishy, I'm in the UK and the pound has taken (no pun intended) a pounding. This makes Second Life more expensive for UK users. This is out of Linden Lab's control but it comes at a time when like the US, the UK is losing jobs.

Zee thanked people for sticking by Linden Lab in these difficult times but this is another reason the price increase is a boneheaded move.

[Moggs Oceanlane]

I agree with Radar. I think the real upheaval will be seen when/if Open Sim stabilises (or another suitable alternative appears). I have noticed an increased interest in Open Sim amongst my social network contacts and lots of people seem to be actively exploring the alternatives... some are even purchasing land and setting up shop in these other spaces so they are 'ready' for when things do stabilise.

[Gahum Riptide]

Even sim owners I know who like the idea of reduced set up and maintenance fees and 45,000 prims still don't think Open Life is worth heading to and making it their prime social experience in any virtual world. I haven't really seen a rush of people except a small group who appear to be connected to eachother. Where's the mass exodus I've seen discussed on this blog? From what I can tell none of the open grid platforms will draw appreciable numbers of people until the technology is there. Hell, a lot of people I've spoken to won't even go simply because avatars look so primitive.