Lack of Linden Communication Causes Community Concern

SL blogger Tateru Nino wondered aloud last week why a large group of Linden Lab staff recently met in SL, noting that such convocations are "considered to be portents or harbingers of bad news by Second Life customers". I've checked with various insiders, and received no hints of impending bad news for SL; the large in-world meeting was probably a standard all-hands assembly that Linden Lab has every quarter. (Yes, Linden Lab sometimes uses SL for meetings, especially to connect their remote workers with each other.)

However, as suggested by the long thread of reader comments which followed, there's quite a lot of SLers who are concerned about Linden Lab's direction, and are worried that bad news might be imminent. Though I think their concern isn't really based on one large in-world meeting, but the company's general lack of communication in recent months:

Far as I can see, company CEO Rod Humble hasn't made an announcement on the official SL blog since last December. I may have missed it, but I believe the very last general public announcement Mr. Humble made was last February, and that had nothing to do with SL, but the purchase of a game studio; in fact, the company consciously declined to communicate that acquisition with their main user community. Announcements by other Linden staff have also been sparse. Meanwhile, SL usage seems to be flat or declining, as is revenue. Given all that, it's not surprising a large in-world meeting would cause so much concern. And given the continued lack of active communication from Linden Lab, new concerns, justified or not, are soon likely to arise.

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Comments

[shockwave yareach]

Well, at the risk of invoking Murphy's law, what more could LL do to us or to SL? The customer service and support can only get better, and shutting everything down would almost be a mercy for some of us.

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

As already being stated in the commentsover on "Dwell on it" this was supposed to be a quarterly held company meeting in world. Nothing more, nothing less.

So why still this blog post when we already got an answer?

[Hamlet Au]

I can't verify who posted in that blog's comment thread, though I can verify who I talked with to confirm it was likely a quarterly meeting.

[Orca Flotta]

Bartholomew asked: So why still this blog post when we already got an answer?
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There is obviously nothing else to report about. No scandals, no technical probs, no personnel changes. SL is running fine for most of us, technical probs are sorted or being worked on. All fine and dandy. That's why we don't hear much from LL .. and I'm happy about it. They host the world, we're playing in it.

Every message from LL could just be a bad one. "Hey freaks, we made a brandnew shiny viewer for you and you won't be able to connect with your old TPV" or "We have to inform you that we will raise tier fees by 20% from next month on" or "Come, check out our newest half baked senseless gimmick we made especially for premium members!" or something like that.
So I'm rather happy about LL shutting up and just doing their job.

But let's have a heart for the yellow press gossip bloggers; they are just trying to survive in these troublefree times.

[Emperor Norton]

So you say Hamlet that an ace virtual reporter like you has never worked in Silicon Valley?

All Hands Meeting of Doom(r) are always done after the fact on bad news. Seriously, it would be dumb to panic your employees and give them a chance to upset your customers. If something happened we would know about it now.

[Tateru Nino]

No, I didn't wonder why the meeting was held. I just asked the Lab for some words of reassurance on the behalf of people who contacted me expressing concerns about it, and published what I got alongside an explanation of why I asked.

There's a difference there.

[DMC Jurassic]

I pointed this out recently in an AW Groupies chat.

[Jellyroll Woodget]

This is easy. It's SLB time. Stuff Always happens at SLB time.

[Little Lost Linden]

Oh, I thought the meeting was to talk about the new proposed inworld water physics upgrade that SL is maybe moving to very soon:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzQjchtWjvw&feature=player_embedded

[Sans]

Semantics: You said it was "likely" a quarterly meeting from your source, but that is not a solid confirmation that it was a quarterly meeting. Did your Linden sources decline to comment also, Hamlet? Linden has still failed to state what the meeting was, though some "Former Lindens" have stated it was a regularly scheduled "cheerleading" meeting. LL should consider maybe hiring someone to do PR (and if they already have someone in that position, that person should be freaking out right now). It's been two months since the last blog post, other than the Pic of the Day. That's a long time to leave customers wondering what's up in the central office.

[Dave Bell]

Do any of us know for sure what that meeting was about?

[foneco zuzu]

Hope good news, now that i finally can login with a mesh viewer (yesterday Nvidia latest drivers allow me to override in viewers AF 2x to 16hq and that is a bless to my eyes, no i can use firestorm, singularity or any other mesh viewer with the same quality of Imprudence or pre mesh phoenix) so i can go to any Sl place and see all as they deserve!
Still as im having lots of cross sims issues, be on mainland or islands, can't cross more then 3 sims before crashing, LL already tried to see the reasons but to no avail yet, even opening ports 12043 on my router didn't help, so i have to delay my project of riding a bike from one side of mainland to the other, cause it took me 1 h just try crossing 12 sims on route 9 and same time on Zindra (There i can go naked riding my hog, lol!).
So i hope these meetings will mean good news to All and if possible sorting out hardware issues as well (As i read that im not alone on this problem!).

[Recka Wuyts]

Was there a meeting?

[Tateru Nino]

@Dave No. I never even asked about the meeting itself, because I assumed it was routine. Outside of the official channels, someone would have to break their contract to say anything about it, and so I'm not going to chase for any "sources".

Besides, like I said, I assumed it was routine.

[foneco zuzu]

And Btw, How about a article regarding Slb9 festivities!
Some said, and i believe its true, lack of communication is also part of not sharing what is going to happen, despite the LAb be or not involved!