Founding Linden on the Trouble With Tech Turnarounds

Founding Linden Lab exec Hunter Walk has an interesting conversation on his blog, starting with the question, "Do 'tech turnarounds' even exist? Can a struggling but once high performing company ever return to its winning ways?" While the discussion isn't specifically about Linden Lab or Second Life, I think a lot of his insights there are applicable to where both are now. For instance, when Hunter mentions "struggles are often born in having missed a shift in technology, platform or markets", I immediately think of three tech/platform shifts that we (for I was at Linden Lab when the first two happened) missed:

• In Linden Lab's early years (1999-2004), we missed that desktop computing would soon be supplanted by a shift towards laptops.
• Back in those years, we also gambled that broadband connectivity would become a pervasive means for connecting online. That turned out to be true, but because we missed the shift to laptops, we also missed that broadband connectivity would largely be wireless.
• In early 2007, at the height Second Life's hype wave, the iPhone was launched, and Linden Lab missed another shift, away from laptops, and toward mobile smartphones.

Of course it's easy to see these missed opportunities in hindsight, so hopefully this doesn't come across as snarky or bitter, because it's not meant to be. Gambling on the pervasiveness of broadband was a pretty bold (and correct) gamble to make in the post-9/11 years. So it was hard to see how quickly broadband would go wireless. In 2003, I vividly recall a Linden Lab company expedition to the Giants baseball stadium a few blocks from the office, where Linden engineer Doug Soo cracked open his laptop, to see if he could log into SL from the bleachers. (Which made me say something like: "Suck it, Barry Bonds, we work on the metaverse!") Doug could, if just barely. And while that was cool, I also remember thinking it was just a cute stunt that wasn't really important to how SL should evolve. So it's hard to second guess myself for not saying "YES! This is how we're going to use computers in the next few years, so we better make SL relevant to this!" Though in retrospect, surely I should have.

Anyway, be sure to walk over to the whole Walk talk.

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Comments

[Metacam Oh]

I think the SL platform has kind of hit a dead end, it seems like its nearly impossible for Linden Lab to do anything with it. It also did not help that they became so successful back 5-6 years ago. They became so profitable at the time that what we see today is a Second Life that is just trying to keep up with that profit, not a Second Life that is innovating and getting better year by year. Now any crazy change is too risky for them. They are just trying to keep that profit up, that's all that matters, and it what will be their death as well.

[Ann Otoole InSL]

LL's issue is board members forcing hr decisions. Eveyone knows what I mean.

[DBDigital Epsilon]

What I see as the large problem is not that "they don't see" where tech is going but rather have no idea how to (truly) fix SL in the first place. Sure having a SL that works on a variety of platforms might be a help but they don't even know how to fix group notices so they work every time with every member receiving them much less rework other basics so that what you are discussing can be possible.

But then again who would want to fire up a full 3d world just to do something simple such as messaging a friend. Sadly I doubt they would. And unless you have a simple and fast client for mobile use and the full blown one for home use, I don't think it would be much of a help.

However, aren't there such 3rd party clients already? And has it helped SL that much? I don't think so. Certainly not to the level you seem to think it would be. In fact I know people that talk with me in SL on their phone with a regular basis and it is very slow response time. But yes it does work. Perhaps that might be different if LL actually made the client, but I have my doubts. :)

[Pussycat Catnap]

Turnarounds are possible though. Apple being the most dramatic example. Sadly this also means companies needing a turnaround look to an Apple like solution: get in a new shiny CEO - but fail to realize all of the many other things that need to come with that.

For the bold new move Hamlet so likes to preach about - that moves needs to be internal. A bold new change in LL culture. Not external through some gadget, gizmo, or product.

[Hamlet Au]

In the post, Hunter sez: "And no pointing to Apple - they might simply be the exception to the rule, unless you can cite other companies which followed their pattern."

[Renmiri Writer]

Motorola missed a lot of ground after teh Startac then recovered with the Razer.

It's not impossible, if you remove the dumba** executives who missed the shift the first time, you got a fighting chance.

PS: I was using wireless laptops on 1999 / 2000. A lot of people knew it was coming. What gets me with LL and SL is that they always required high end computers for the client, yet the performance and quality of the tools was low end: No good Group management, not fast enough to even make a vehicle move, etc..

It is like opeing a gourmet food store and charging gourmet prices then deciding to sell junk food. The customer you get is not going to accept your product. People who buy high end pcs want quality and fast performance. They won't have patience with lag and haiur that attaches to their arse!

[Renmiri Writer]

On the other hand, people using wireless early were aware things were on the developing stage and would have had a lot of patience with the SL quirks.

[Orca Flotta]

SL is a cool product as it is! Period.

What SL needs is evolution rather than revolution. Fix the little things, fix big things, but fix them, don't substitute them with other stuff. We needed less lag and less crashes, we didn't need an impractical new GUI. Give us shiny new stuff like voice and mesh, that's ok; but stay away from demographic stuff. Stuff that effects the initial idea of SL.

SL is complicated, it's not supposed to be approached wirelessly from your not-so-smart telephone. Deal with it, that's how it is.
All tries to switch SL into a social network, a game or anything else already existing will just result in a even more and faster dwindling user base.

LL can get more customers by carefully and slowly implementing new technologies (when needed, not just because they are the latest hype). LL can drastically widen their userbase by giving us more value for our money and making our time in SL more worthwile, not with shiny gimmicks like that stupid realms game.

There are still thousands of new people downloading the client and logging into SL each and every day. Most of them won't need that silly game, but a good tutorial/training phase and the first hour in SL without any network failings and lag and other muckups.

[Casper Jideon]

Apple returned to profitability by carefully choosing a few potent "vectors". They did not embrace to do "everything". They still have a tight product scheme they deliver to market. If you look at the SL viewer you'll see nothing of that sort has ever happened to SL.

[A.J.]

Not everyone has the attention span of a goldfish.

Pussycat Catnap called it correctly.

Second Life has come to a point where it simply can't support the corporate fat. It takes too much and gives too little. There is plenty of money to be made and loads of good times to be had for everyone, but nothing about Second Life is ever going to be easy money anymore.

The virtual world will survive without the name of Second Life because it really is about the people. The corporation is secondary. We all know what changes need to happen inworld. Those changes can't be managed by or outsourced to people who don't "love" the product.

[Stone Semyorka]

The simple answer is port SL to iPad. The world has gone to iPad. SL has not. Put the SL viewer on iPad and millions will find it again.

All this rehashing of the old micro-gripes is obfuscation that keeps everyone looking away from the simple answer: take SL to the iPad.

[Ezra]

How about Linden Lab gets the viewer working as stable and smoothly as other 3D graphics clients we install on our PC and then we talk about where Second Life should also be?

Right now, Second Life is only usable by 1% that ever install it. It's useful to observe changing trends of where we also might want to access the grid, but that talk is premature so long as wearing a purchased pair of pants involves rezzing, unpacking, figuring out which of several different varieties of sizes to wear, whether to 'Wear' or 'Add', what order to 'Add' so textures bake correctly, what alphas are, etc.

I know its tiresome to have and talk about the same ol' usability problems, but fact of the matter is our friends and family don't quit Second Life because they aren't able to log into their account from their iPad, they quit because it isn't usable.

[Dizzy Banjo]

I think it is very possible for Linden to make their business more suited to todays technology market.

However, as I have said before, I think this is unlikely to include Second Life as it is, without significant change. A different line of products new products might be more viable.

[Vivienne Daguerre]

I think you are operating on a faulty assumption. So many of your posts are on the theme, "Linden Lab is failing." I have not seen sufficient proof of that. Even if some stats are down, they remain highly profitable. They are working on a second product so that they will not be a one product company, which is a wise move. Blue Mars did not destroy Second Life or replace it.

Second Life has a loyal core group. Content creators are heavily invested in Second Life. The past year has seen great leaps in platform stability, reduction in lag, and introduction of important new features--mesh, and soon pathfinding and experience tools. I think Second Life is alive and well, and will be around for several years to come.

[David Cartier]

Has LL even started to develop a Second Life app for Windows 8? I know
That it doesn't currently work with Win8 computers, but that's because
Of the graphics drivers available now. They need to think about being on that desktop as a native application.

[Windows8doeswork]

@David Cartier

SL/ and most if not all third party viewers run fine on Windows 8-if you don't install the drivers via Windows Updates. Those are make do drivers at best.

Official drivers WILL install, get the ones for Windows 7 64/32 bit, depending on what flavor you have. There is no metro button for SL , however, that will have to be added in at some point but it's not a big deal at all.

I've been running Windows 8 preview for roughly 3 months now with zero issues for what it's worth.

[allfrog]

er. LL would have done better headed to XBOX then to ipads for the last 7 years....

this is why they fail... ex lindens especially.

[Orca Flotta]

@ Stone Semyorka:
Yeah, a move to iPad is the last thing we or LL needs for SL. iPad is a "stupid" product, a hype, a consumer appliance rather than a useful tool. All those iPads are soon to be found out to serve no purpose as real computers. They are too weak, too small, they can't deliver the graphics and ... hell ... you can't even type on them. Obsolete.

iPad is the morning paper I read in the subway, SL is the big fat heavy literature book I read in the comfort of my home. They just don't mix.

@ Ezra:
What "other 3D graphics clients we install on our PC"?
SL is not a static 3D client like all the others. You don't install SL on your PC. You install only the browser (viewer), SL itself is located on remote servers. Like the internet, which you don't have on your PC neither.

And I guess there are more than 1% able to wear a pair of jeans. SL isn't for friends and family, SL is not for dummies. And SL is surely not for iPad users. You can't blame it on Ferrari if you are too slow in your old truck.

[Ravik]

How many people play WOW on their mobile devices? Or Diablo III or Modern Warfare?

Second Life is, or at least has the potential for being an immersive experience. One that does not translate well to the IPAD. Yeah, being able to play SL on an IPAD would be occasionally useful. But, most of the time, IF SL would work decently, I'd be involved in a user created, multi player role playing sims from my desktop.

That's what Linden Lab really missed. They missed the potential of Second Life as a game, where the players could create their own worlds, rules and interactions.

To that end, Linden Labs needs to lower the costs to the user, kill lag, update graphics to be competitive with the current generation of video games, while keeping the freedom users have today of tailoring their own experience.

Sadly, I don't see much indication that LL is going to do any of these things...

[Ezra]

@Orca

"SL is not a static 3D client like all the others. You don't install SL on your PC. You install only the browser (viewer), SL itself is located on remote servers. Like the internet, which you don't have on your PC neither."

And I guess there are more than 1% able to wear a pair of jeans."

Linden Lab doesn't explain that before a new user installs the client. Instead they show machinima of Second Life running as smooth as 3D games we're all accustomed to with shopping and clothes changing that happens instantly with twirls and sparks of magic.

"SL isn't for friends and family, SL is not for dummies. And SL is surely not for iPad users. You can't blame it on Ferrari if you are too slow in your old truck."

A Ferrari is advertised as a Ferrari. Second Life is advertised as something easy to use and for EVERYONE that meets the minimum system requirements published next to the download link. There's still those Keiko ads floating around on the net inviting people to become their virtual selves. That's as 'for everyone' as you can get.

[1angelcares Writer]

I started losing interest in SL right around the time that LL took away last names and let in minors. It is no longer a sexy, fun, friendly place for adults to play.

[Kim Anubis]

"update graphics to be competitive with the current generation of video games" ... Oh, you mean like Minecraft?

"(iPads) you can't even type on them" ... Really? That's what I'm typing this on right now.

"iPad is the morning paper I read in the subway, SL is the big fat heavy literature book I read in the comfort of my home. They just don't mix." hahaha ... I read both the morning paper and the big (but not fat or heavy) literary works on my iPad on public transit.

I've been running my company from an iPad for, what is it, over two years now, or more like three? I only turn on the desktop to use SL or one or two large graphics programs, or to watch a DVD on the big monitor. But you know what? I usually do that from across the room, using the touch screen on my iPad to control the desktop system. The rest of my computers, desktop and laptop, are collecting dust.

I will admit, though, that until I had an iDevice myself and learned how to make it geek for me I thought they were trivial toys, too.

Btw, way before 2007 I was at an event where Cory Linden said that the future of computing was phones. Most folks looked at him as if he was out of his mind.

[Iggy]

Mr. Walk nails it, in the shift to laptops + wireless.

Others disagree with me at NWN about the shift to tablets and phones, and I may be wrong. My students are not the entire populace, but they are a key segment for tech companies' plans. Tech-savvy, always online Millennials drive the market.

Making SL work well on fast wireless and laptops would be enough to staunch its slow bleed. My machine (2 year old, pimped out Macbook Pro) sizzles like a paella pan when I run SL for too long, however...and we all know of Hamlet's problems with his newish Alienware laptop.

As for tech turnarounds? Sure. I'd cite Apple Computer, whose products I nearly abandoned in the dark years of the late 90s, before the "Second Coming" of Steve Jobs.

Could LL pull that off? Like Apple, they have a dedicated, indeed fanatical, user base (though one far smaller than Apple's in, say, 1999). LL had a visionary CEO whose attention has wandered to other projects. They even had a disaffected Woz figure, in Cory.

But Mr. Rosedale is not Steve Jobs. Jobs cracked the whip and cracked heads; he was a scary man. I don't see Philip Rosedale coming back for a third round at LL with that sort of thuggish brio.

[Valentina Kendal]

well, as far as the laptops go, since that is the only computer that lots of people I know have, I'm guessing lots of people run SL on a laptop routinely - are there are stats on that? I do both, and it runs equally fine on a new iMac or a eight year old Macbook Pro (can you say Ivy Bridge! *salivates) - on neither do I run with all the graphics bells and whistles though

SL on an iphone - fail imho. SL on an Xbox or Playstation - would have been a win. SL on a TV streamed from an iPad - probably a win if it isn't too slow

I didn't read the original post, and it's not the kind of work I do, but I was wondering - it seems to me that the kind of people who are hired when a company is new and doing the 'next coolest thing' must get kind of bored years later when their job is to get the Notice system working right - there must be a certain malaise that sets in - how do you get around that, or does employee turnover just solve it?

[CarloAntonio Negulesco]

How in the world do you miss the boat on wireless? How could people in the tech industry NOT realize that wireless was the wave of the future? When I worked for a company that contracted System Admin and Help Desk services to several ISPs back in the late 1990s, my boss had asked if I thought wireless was going anywhere (There was a "wireless" cable service who was also at the time beginning to offer wireless internet). I asked him how many cables he saw on the Enterprise in Star Trek - because that's how the future will be.

[Arcadia Codesmith]

It's not that Second Life missed the boat on portables. Rather, the portables have yet to catch up with Second Life.

That's not to say that Second Life doesn't need to be aggressively modernized and ready for them when they do catch up.

And smart phones? Probably not viable for any application of this sort without mass-market visors. Too much text, not enough screen.

You use the tools to you need to do the job. You don't modify the job to suit the tools.

[Pussycat Catnap]

"Has LL even started to develop a Second Life app for Windows 8? I know
That it doesn't currently work with Win8 computers"

Windows 8 isn't even really compatible with PCs...

Its a tablet OS, that they are letting you view on a PC, but not really use. They expect everyone to go buy touch screen monitors, or learn to drag the mouse as if it were fingers on your screen...

It makes VISTA look like a grand success...

I predict Windows will commit suicide over this one - and people will cling to older versions until Windows 9 sorts it out, if ever... Sadly they won't jump to Linux because Linux has marketing skills that make LLs marketing look as good as Apples by comparison (having even more tech geeks than LLs), and they won't switch to Apple because Apple has a perception of being too pricey.

Microsoft has become the new Yahoo - ever following the wrong trend in the right ways, or the right trend in the wrong ways. And too late either way.

(Note that the Mac does have a $599 desktop that is better than most $600 PC desktops - they just never market it. Its that little square one you can find hidden in the back of your average Apple store - the Mac Mini. The problem is the market is moving into the $300 PC range and the $1500 PC range, and not the middle ground).

[Pussycat Catnap]

"How many people play WOW on their mobile devices? Or Diablo III or Modern Warfare?"

Tablet people got pwned. :D

The Tablets will in time migrate to the direction of the new Kindel and Nook. That's a space they can own very well:

An eReader with a browser that also plays flash videos like youtube / netflix, and handles your music collection.

The top end tablets will move towards laptops, and lose out to them. The low end ones will conquer the Kindle / Nook market.

[Pussycat Catnap]

"How in the world do you miss the boat on wireless?"

I've "Played" SL quite a lot on wiFi. It'll work on a 3G hotspot too. I've loaded it up at a Starbucks twice I think - only because I don't need folks giving me that "OMG its a colored geek, in a hoodie, we better call the police before the place gets shot up" look while I'm sipping my latte.

LLs doesn't make networking hardware. So I have to wonder why the comment about wireless was even in there.

[Pussycat Catnap]

"Others disagree with me at NWN about the shift to tablets and phones, and I may be wrong. My students are not the entire populace, but they are a key segment for tech companies' plans. Tech-savvy, always online Millennials drive the market."

When I went back to school in 03, I bought a plam pilot and a wireless keyboard for it, and used to to take notes. Had a lot of people think I was cutting edge or whatever.

But I still had a real Mac at home, and often in my bags - that was just too bulky to plop on the desk in class. And the palm pilot had a battery on the scale of weeks, whereas the iBook was in hours.

What your students bring to class might simply be a reflection of note taking portability. That said; one big downside for Tablets when I first went to look at them was the lack of a word processor.

How on earth will this be the next wave of computing if it doesn't even run standard office software? Word, Excel, Access, Power Point - or even their competitors like Open Office...

Instead, they're running the -SAME- application I used on my palm pilot in 2003: Documents to Go... an app meant for quick short work without many details, that you then upload to a real machine for refinement.
- And its barely been updated in 10 years. Its in color now, but that's about it.

[Kim Anubis]

Iggy, don't think I've mentioned it before, but I really like your writing style. "Thuggish brio" and "sizzles like a paella pan" both in one post -- wow! :)

Pussycat, Microsoft Office for iPad is supposed to be released November 10.

While I don't play the sort of games you mentioned (just not my thing anymore) I play games like Pirates and Waking Mars on my tablet. I like the touch screen for gaming, and I'm sure not feeling pwned. Your vision of a simple media consumption device doesn't bear much resemblance to my experience with my tablet. I wrote a book in the Storyist app (and there's going to be a Scrivener app soon, too), turned the thing into a Wacom tablet with Wacom's app and stylus, take notes at meetings, edit textures with Photoshop's app, plan and manage projects with Basecamp and OmniFocus and SmartPad and SmartPlans (Gannt charts!), lost fifteen pounds with FitBit, and my cat has her own apps too, like Game For Cats (no joke, and she loves it). I feel the same sort of excitement about tablet computing as I felt about SL when I was a noob. YMMV, of course.

[CarloAntonio Negulesco]

Pussycat: I use wireless exclusively throughout my home, and don't have any problems with it (so far as I know, I don't believe I have ever used SL cabled to a network). My response was to what Hamlet mentioned in his article, that the thinkers at LL - as recently as this century even - did not see wireless as the next thing for connecting to the world.

[Iggy]

@Pussycat, you wrote:

"So I have to wonder why the comment about wireless was even in there."

Though you are correct that LL does not make networking hardware, any company making what purports to be a mass-market product needs to consider how mundane users, and not just we OCD geeks, run their rigs.

Despite heating up my MacBook, I run SL fine on it with reasonable frame rates and in meetings with 30 other forlorn and often grumpy SL educators.

My students have cluttered desktops (full o' files, not a shortcut in sight) and refuse to plug in an AC adapter until the laptop dies. Both of these factors make SL and OpenSim run slower than an '83 Rabbit with one bad cylinder.

That's certainly not LL's fault. But if they want the mass market, they might think about optimizing their world for it. Right now, they are doing a great job of building a world that does not work for mere mortals...hence the 10% retention rate after hour one in-world.

[Iggy]

@Kim, thank you! I worked on that turn of phrase about Jobs for a while. He was quite a piece of work. I do miss him.

As for the paella? Try La Paella Real when you are next in Madrid. Next best thing to Valencia!

[Orca Flotta]

@ Ezra:
"Linden Lab doesn't explain that before a new user installs the client. Instead they show machinima of Second Life running as smooth as 3D games we're all accustomed to with shopping and clothes changing that happens instantly with twirls and sparks of magic."
-------------
Maybe the fact that I had never ever played any 3D game or any sort of video game before I joined SL in early 07, made me more accepting technical flaws. I found and still find it a friggin wonder that SL runs at all.
And just fyi shopping and changing clothes works for me instantly. Double click the jeans in inventory, plopp, it's on my body.
And why dowes it work so good for me, even on my high pinged, slow connection from Africa? Because I plug into my router! And why shouldn't I? The router is only 1 meter away from my rig and/or laptop. Call me an oldfashioned housewife but I log into SL from my study room, from my work desk. Never would I use any computer in the lounge or bedroom or in the café, on the bus, in the subway or airport.

"A Ferrari is advertised as a Ferrari. Second Life is advertised as something easy to use and for EVERYONE that meets the minimum system requirements published next to the download link."
--------------
When I joined SL it wasn't advertised at all. At least not taht I have ever seen any advertising for it. There was some media hype going on, but according to that SL was a virtual world. Just that, no more, no less. It sparked my interest. I didn't expect to find some easy to grasp game-like stuff, I was prepared to fail completely in this hitec geek world.
Maybe that's why I have a rather satisfying second life ;)

"There's still those Keiko ads floating around on the net inviting people to become their virtual selves. That's as 'for everyone' as you can get."
-----------------
Keiko is hardly anyone. She's as geekish as a girl can get. She's a musician first and foremost, and she wanted to play her music live in SL. So she had a goal and she followed her dream and made it work for her.
Keiko didn't join SL on a tablet and wanted to have a pretty avie and always the newest clothes. I betcha she has an above average setup in her home studio ... that's why SL works fine for her.

True, SL, needs a bit of effort and thinking to get something out of it. SL is not (or wasn't) made for a consumer's market and it's not a mass market product.

[Orca Flotta]

@ Kim:
"(iPads) you can't even type on them" ... Really? That's what I'm typing this on right now.
-------------
So you ...
- either type on screen and get your fingerprints all over and reduce the little screen size even further ...
- or use an external keyboard of sorts which makes the whole idea of a portable device meaningless.
Also, I wonder how the quality of your screen will be should you try to run SL on that iPad? No eyecandy, minimal DD, worst FPS ever.

"iPad is the morning paper I read in the subway, SL is the big fat heavy literature book I read in the comfort of my home. They just don't mix." hahaha ... I read both the morning paper and the big (but not fat or heavy) literary works on my iPad on public transit.
--------------
Yes, true, I read real books digital too. Not on a iPad tho but on a dedicated e-reader which is much better for the eyes and battery life. Never would I play SL on any of them tho. I wouldn't read ebooks on my PC neither. They are just not the right tools for the job.

I've been running my company from an iPad for, what is it, over two years now, or more like three? I only turn on the desktop to use SL ...
-------------
Aha. Ahaaaaaaaaaa!!! So you're running your company from an iPad but for SL you use your desktop!
And why?
Because only your desktop delivers the needed ooomph to run a highly complex virtual world kinda smoothly.
My point exactly ;)

[Connie Arida]

Umm..I have been wireless connecting to my ADSL modem since day 1 (2007 i think) with minimal or non existent issues.
I started SL with a 9600 geforce card ( not cutting edge at the time) and had minimal issues.
So the tech issues, in the main, are a furphy.
To my mind SL should run on Android. Asus latest transformer pad seems to have the power to run 3d with some success. However with luck Win 8 tablets and phones will bring SL into Tablet land. Apologies to Apple, but iPads and iPhones are not all there is in the mobile space.

[Kim Anubis]

Orca, I make money from SL, so I am still willing to fire up the desktop behemoth. However, if I wasn't already established in SL for many years and just learned of it today, I wouldn't be. I admit that I am an early adopter type, and that I am pretty darn attached to my tablet. But I mean, heck, I would love to not have to upgrade and maintain and buy software for that big expensive graphics rig, even though it makes me money. (These days, even the noise and heat it puts out is a nuisance to me.) In fact, I didn't join SL in the first place for months after I discovered it, because I didn't have a computer able to run it. I only bought a system specifically for accessing virtual worlds when I was hired by one of LL's competitors. Otherwise, I would have been doing something else altogether, because I wouldn't have bought a computer to try SL.

More people have phones and computers unable to run something like SL than do have them, and that makes SL much harder to sell. You wouldn't log into SL from a cafe or whatever, so your view on this is going to be different from that of kids who are growing up now with iPhones permanently attached to their texting thumbs, or a corporation that would like to collect some money from those kids.

I'm a Resident going way back, since 2004. I liked SL better then (as a user, not as an income stream) in part just cause I was a noob, and in part because it was a different world then with different policies and goals. I also know that keeping it static then, or keeping it from changing now, isn't practical at all. Yeah, I liked it as it was, but the Lab is after more fresh customers. And that's what they're gonna do, chase customers. Perhaps those who like SL as-is should be thankful that the Labbies are pursuing other projects to increase the cash flow instead of bolting Facebook onto our prims or something else as awful.

Anyway, as for the iPad thing ... Yeah, I type on the screen. There are fingerprints on it all the time, and sometimes pizza sauce, dried on coffee drips, etc. The big monitor on my desk is, when the sun hits it right, evidently about as filthy most of the time, unless I specifically remember to clean it, plus it has cat snot sneezed on it. When I read a paperback, there are dark flecks in the paper, there are places where the last guy made a note or dog eared, there are pizza stains and coffee stains. Same difference. Except it's a lot easier to clean the iPad screen. I used to clean it a dozen times a day or more, but now I just don't even notice anymore unless the sun hits it just right. You might be the sort to keep your screen really, really clean all the time, but I am not unless working on a graphic or something where I have to see a lot of detail. However, I do scrape the crud off my keyboard and mouse from time to time.

I understand eInk tech on a dedicated device like a Kindle is easier on the eyes, etc. But I do so much more with my tablet than just read, on the go, and carrying one device is plenty. I don't find reading on an iPad any harder on the eyes than staring at chat in SL all day on a regular monitor. In fact, I need reading glasses when I read a paper book, but not with the backlit iPad, which spares me having to figure out where I left my glasses, and I don't have glasses marks on my nose (vanity, thy name is Kim Anubis!).

Re eyecandy ... For me, SL was never about that. It was about creating and sharing in a world together, with a great big dollop of optimism and idealism. And now I hang around because it has paid my bills for most of a decade, and I still have SL friends, nostalgia, and hope. But I find SL to be much like other avatar-based worlds, going back even prior to Habbo Hotel in around 2000 or so ... Except instead of cunningly placing bar parts and refrigerators and sofas in order to create a volcano of a casino, we get to build with prims (and now mesh). Otherwise, people do all the same stuff -- the exact same stuff. Better graphics are nice, but they aren't what it's all about. Not for me -- if you're a fashionista or someone making a living selling mesh, you won't agree, of course!

I actually don't figure a tablet-based SL-like experience will take off until the tech is far enough along to include voice chat instead of text. This is another reason it's smart for LL to focus on something else for a while, instead of just hanging around watching Minecraft eating their lunch.

[Orca Flotta]

I see, different strokes for diferent folks, Kim. As a dedicated housewife I do indeed keep my dear machinery clean, fatty spots on my screen would kill me. And yes, for me SL is not about making a living (did that long enough), it's about the immersity. And to get really immersed I need good graphics, period. When I log into SL I stay for at least 2 - 3 hours, I almost never spend less than 5 hours/day in SL.

What I don't need however is voice! I think it steals from the immersive effect and kills the imagination. Couldn't understand most of the english anyway. Also I never used my PC for any graphical or game stuff before I found SL. I was on a 12" subnotebook at the time and slowly, throughout the years bought new and better hardware in order to run SL more smoothly. Before I found SL I mostly used my lappy only as a typewriter. I just love to sit here, hunched over the keyboard, and produce 1000s of pages of text.

Yes, sounds boring, right? But that's me, the oldstyle computer worker. I just can't imagine doing it "on the fly". I have no use for mobile computing, and so far the technology keeps me away from it anyway. Too expensive, too weak, not easily upgradable. Just too many compromises. Laptops are nice, I have 2 myself, which I use when I travel. But I don't connect to SL when travelling ;)

[Medhue]

Personally, I'll agree with the laptop part, but that is as far as I will go. The phone stuff is all based on propaganda and hype. The same goes for Ipads. They are neat little toys, but hardly worth all the hype. They are complete techno fads which are completely controlled by the service providers. Now, maybe if we didn't have greedy Mega corporations behind these service providers, than everything would be different. I said from the beginning that service providers would limit phone and Ipad technology and I've been completely and totally right. Yes, there is a market but all those are akin to facebook apps. To this day, as far as actual work goes, the laptop and desktop are still the kings for those that actually make money and will be making money in 5 years. I got a smart phone a year ago, just cause the phone company gave it to me for free. Now, I wished I've of said no, cause now I'm forced to pay for crap that is completely useless.

[Medhue]

OH, and I was 1 of the only people texting in like 1995, and I saw how the service providers completely control when and how that technology went mainstream. I was also 1 of the first to use WIP sites on phones. I thought it was great back then but also saw the pitfalls of the controls the service providers had, and the limits of using a phone for anything. We still don't have a phone with a decent battery life, and now the apps soak it all up way faster than what we dealt with 10 years ago.

[Kim Anubis]

Orca, I'm not really a fan of voice in SL either. I had a better time without it, even if some of my clients find it very valuable (for language classes and that sort of thing). But SL or other virtual worlds just don't work out so great on tablets (let alone phones) because it's much more difficult to chat without a real keyboard. I mean, I touch type on a tablet, but most people don't! So that's why I don't think virtual worlds on phones and tablets are going to really take off until they incorporate voice chat.

Anyway, I totally get where you're coming from. SL is different for different people -- we use it differently, use some different features, etc. One of the best things about SL is how it can accommodate so many different sorts of users. :)