Virtual World Response to Coronavirus: Linden Lab Discounts Virtual Land for Education & Non-Profit Orgs Who Want to Work in Second Life

Update, 3:45pm: Hacker News has this post and an interesting conversation on it here.

We were just talking about this Wednesday, and now Linden Lab is actively encouraging it:

Many individuals and organizations are being affected by this unprecedented public health crisis, and we recognize that Second Life can provide an important and valuable way for people to stay in touch with their friends and co-workers amidst new social distancing protocols, mandated remote work requirements, and other precautionary measures... One of the first things we’ve implemented to help is a reduction in pricing to a flat $99/month per region to qualified accredited nonprofit or educational institutions. Effective immediately, this limited-time price reduction is applicable to any new or added regions including renewals of existing regions. 

Great news and a smart move by the Lindens. This is the first discount for education and non-profit organizations in Second Life since (as I recall) 2013, when private sim tiers were cut to $150/month.

Should interested organizations take it? That really depends how many people within it are already conversant with SL -- and more key, aren't concerned that SL, like other virtual worlds, still lack the key things that make them non-viable for most real world work uses:

Specifically, Second Life doesn't come with default "serious" non-human avatars, it's not really cross-platform beyond PC and Mac, it's a heavy client, it doesn't have highly spacial audio, nor tight integration with cloud services like Google Docs, nor frictionless firewall support. And most of all, Linden Lab itself only occasionally uses Second Life to conduct its own day-to-day work activities. (More on all that here.) But if those aren't hurdles for some, so they may want to get on this deal while on it lasts.

Pictured: Harvard's virtual campus in Second Life. Yes, it's still there. (Not sure if Harvard knows that.)

Comments

[Ilsa]

What is their promise long term? I worked in and around non profits in SL... by and large they felt burned before they left before

[A resident]

How about some discounts for the residents?

[Scotyy]

How does it go? Fool me once shame on you...

[Pulsar]

Too late for Exploratorium, that closed down in SL about 3 months ago.
https://www.exploratorium.edu/worlds/secondlife/
Happy pi-day (3.14) everyone, anyway.

[Large Marge]

One one side...
This would be were Regions on Demand would shine, never too late for Linden Lab to license the code from them. who is doing business strategy at the lab? let me guess its not qualification but diversification.

One the other side...
I think many are losing sight who is running university's today and how many are closed to free discussion and free thought, but most importantly pushing degrees that have little or no real world value making the majority slaves to hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt.

Linden Lab has made a good choice holding out an olive branch but not investing to hard in it. Regions on Demand would make it worthwhile for many purposes including schools, but not limited to it.

[Iggy 1.0]

Now that I've stopped laughing...the Lab can go right to hell.

Ten years ago they screwed educators and nonprofits with a midyear loss of the discount for .edus and .orgs. That was the middle of our fiscal years, and there was no way to go back to the various Mister Bumbles at granting agencies or Deans' Offices and ask "more please, sir?"

So nearly all of us left. Now a desperate Lab wants us back?

Now that I've stopped laughing, a second time, one colleague asked me "since that we are all forced to do distance learning, until the end of the term, will you use Second Life again for class?"

My answer was simple: No. Clunky interface, unneeded complexity, no need for avatars and no use case for how I teach. I'm not about to build a complex new simulation for a class only to have Linden Lab jack tier back up when this crisis passes.

You are a decade too late, Linden Lab. Universities have free video conferencing, robust course-management systems, and social media in-house and out. We all have VPN clients and two-factor authentication. And it can all run flawlessly on the laptops and phones and tablets that many of our students use for their computing needs.

Funny that we academic eggheads are further ahead on the technology curve than is a once-darling of the tech media.

[Rick Tracy]

Soon it will be 5$ a month for a sim. Shows you how desperate these Lindens are.

PLEASE buy a sim, for you only 95$ no 89$ no 79$ no cause of Corona 69$ and if you wait till next year we are more desperate by then, so how about 54$.

WE HAVE EXCITING NEWS TO SHARE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

49.99$ and free premium for a year? anyone? please?

[Chucky]

Knock, Knock.

Hi, I know we broke up about ten years ago. Due to the unprecedented health crisis, I thought you might be up for doing the old in and out for a limited time?

[MisterPeterson]

Anyone going to boot up and install an old Second Life, with outdated technology and graphics, run old texture and model styles, and try to inspire the kids who have since learned programming through Minecraft, students raised on free Unity and other projects - who demand more modern means. Oh please lets clamour to a decade+ old platform who wants to court us again. Dunno what you did with that new Sansar platform, but the students I teach liked how that looked much more, some of them even made stuff and sold it on the store. We got so much more now for online teaching dont know why I would use an avatar when i have group meetings, streamed group chat and other to fill in the void rather than using a clunky old software noone cares about anymore.

[Fionalein]

Oh the hubris, ... while educational institutes are almost spammed with pffers of free services for students and teachers alike LL insists on "selling a service".

Dear LL,

if you want universities back ib SL, offer them free serverspace. Sounds like an investment only on your side? Well, isn't that true for all kinds of advertising? Because that is what educational institues using your service is in the end: advertising. But you insist on charging them for doing the advertising. No idea what rock you were hiding under the last years but welcome to the 21st century, now please get accustomed to the new ways of business and start acting like professionals.

Thanks,
a concerned customer

[Iggy 3.0]

Not sure a discount is going to be Enough!
Create Campus Regions already furnished & ready for Free! recover that by using RoD:RegionsonDemand while recouping the cost from the free advertisement.

Who is in charge of Linden Labs these days?

[TD Gunner]

@Iggy Big Eb is in charge. For my money you could not find a more inept manager.

[pixels]

This is great news, you say.

Then you follow that with this whine and cheese nonsense:

"Specifically, Second Life doesn't come with default "serious" non-human avatars, it's not really cross-platform beyond PC and Mac, it's a heavy client, it doesn't have highly spacial audio, nor tight integration with cloud services like Google Docs, nor frictionless firewall support. And most of all, Linden Lab itself only occasionally uses Second Life to conduct its own day-to-day work activities. (More on all that here.) But if those aren't hurdles for some, so they may want to get on this deal while on it lasts."

Hopefully no-one who may be considering this deal will read your I Hate SL blog.