BREAKING: Second Life Mobile Finally Free to Play By All. Linden Lab Execs Explain Their Goals & Strategies With This Long-Awaited Milestone for the Virtual World.

Originally published on my Patreon

At long last, Second Life’s mobile app is now free for everyone to download here, and boasts new/improved features including direct and group messaging. (Watch the new trailer above.)

"Almost 2 years of work and millions of dollars of support just became available to everyone in Second Life,” as Linden Lab head Brad Oberwager announced today during a Zoom conference with SL bloggers. “The biggest milestone is, 'When does this open up to everybody'? That just happened yesterday. It's been a top project for this company." 

As he discussed with me last month, the mobile app has been a core focus since he bought the company in 2021. In fact, when he took over Linden Lab, "I shut down most of the external marketing and drove that into making SL better. That's what's starting to change." 

The mobile app was built with the intention of creating an amazing experience for current Second Life users, and an equal aim of bringing back the many tens of thousands of lapsed users who’ve given up over the years. “Being tethered to a desktop is not how we live anymore,” as he puts it.  

In market research, Brad notes, when Linden Lab asked lapsed SLers, “Why are you no longer coming to Second Life?", the primary answer they got back was, 'It doesn't have mobile”. 

So the company’s first goal with the mobile app is luring back those former or flagging SL users. For the short term, at least, "It's not for people who read about Second Life in a magazine”, and consider trying it out on a whim.  

Newly-appointed Linden Lab CTO Philip Rosedale, also on the Zoom, expanded on that, echoing what he said in our recent interview, about moving away from his “messianic” predictions from the early 2000s.

“The world is not as yet and may never allow everyone to be an avatar in a world like SL,” said Philip. “We're very respectful of that distinction.” So the goal with mobile is not to turn Second Life into a simpler mass market experience like Fortnite. “We're not trying to design the mobile client to replace the desktop."

NEXT: SL App Roll-Out Strategy, Its New Rainbow Colored Icon, and Overcoming Poor App Store Ratings

Philip and Brad were joined on the Zoom by Second Life’s VP of product, Grumpity Linden, and Sine Wave CEO Adam Frisby, who helped Linden Lab bring SL to mobile, and recently shared with me the long, hilariously blooper-filled road to bringing SL to mobile (read about it here). 

Those wacky bugs were actually a core reason why the mobile app was first only available to Premium subscribers. 

“As we encountered bloopers we realized we couldn't open it up to everyone,” as Grumpity explains. "It kind of hurts to see people on the app store trying to get in and they give us 1 star ratings" [because they can’t access it for free].  

While acknowledging they can’t please every SLer, Grumpity and her team have been focused on optimizing specific key “user journeys”, like going to a club where you can dance, hear music, and chat with nearby avatars. 

“Then we go to [optimizing] the next user journey,” says Grumpity. However: “We will never shove the entire SL experience into your phone."

As for the poor app ratings that have accrued since the Premium-only launch early this year -- and have hurt the app’s discoverability to potential new/returning users -- Linden Lab has a plan for that. 

"One of the things you can do is reset [ratings],” Brad explains, "[though] you can only reset it on the Apple side."

In other words, they plan to launch a substantial update and request that Apple reset user ratings to start from zero. The team is then hoping that the greatly improved app -- which is now also free to use -- will be fairly judged. 

“As we make it better,” as Adam puts it, “[previously poor ratings] will be overcome." He adds that there actually haven’t been that many user ratings so far -- in the low hundreds -- while popular apps garner thousands of them. 

To take one example, the mobile app of competing virtual world IMVU has been downloaded over 10 million times on Google Play, and -- despite reports of increasingly poor user experience -- has nearly 7000,000 user reviews with an aggregate rating of 4.5 out of 5.  

Linden Lab hopes the app will inspire current SLers to help bring back their friends and group members who’ve left regular Second Life activity, and start re-building the world’s active community.

One challenge for some returning SLers will be locating the Second Life icon on their phone, since it no longer has the solid dark green blue or bright blue colors of the past, but instead, now boasts radiant rainbow rays emanating from a sun gold eye.  (See above.)

"You can't believe how many discussions we had" about that icon color change, says Brad. “You know you've chosen a great logo when half the people hate it." However, he adds, the old version of the logo “looked awful” in the app store.

Besides, the new version of the Second Life logo is also meant to convey that the now-free app represents a new era for the virtual world.

 "We wanted to project that things are different in Second Life now,” says Brad Oberwager.

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Comments

[LindenLabsGoingDown]

Second Life is mainly an LGBTQ+ uninclusive virtual platform catering only to the politic and sexual preferences of its founders and staff, and as such alienate so many potential users, they will remain a minor and undesired niche platform with this rainbow icon final nail in the coffin.
Second Life was much better when none of us knew or cared about any of this stuff, and let people be as they want, hold the opinions as they want, etc but now it's just a stuffy Leftist progressive woke hellhole - the same thing that contributed greatly to destroying Sansar and now works to finish off Second Life.
But don't take my word for it, we'll let the market decide. And they already have.

[Zane Zimer]

Regardless of any 'agenda' people may or may not perceive, until the mobile client properly renders all texture properties, it's a less than attractive experience. Items with materials and/or rotated/repeated textures still do not display properly. At least for me, this renders my avatar and some surrounding items incorrectly. Navigation and chatting are also subpar when compared to the 'full computer experience' which have a large displays, keyboards and supports things like Space Navigator, joysticks and/or mouse caming & navigation. In order to effectively 'chat' in world on a tablet, a BT keyboard is necessary and then why not just use a computer?

[Adrienne Lowe]

I definitely don't think the app was ready to release, but I remain hopeful for its continued evolution. Ever time I try I end up in an infinite zoom. :\

Why do people freak out about rainbows? I guess all rainbows are gay now? So weird, but if it means the Trumpers will leave the platform taking their confederate flags with them, I'm all for it. Don't let the door hit ya where the good Lord split ya!

[Adrienne Lowe]

It's not even a rainbow, and Philip isn't gay. Again, so weird, these people!!

[Harry]

Tried it out, and seems ok for limited voice and fill chat. Just waiting for it to get voice.

[Ava]

My thoughts on this:
https://avadelaney.co.uk/musings/second-life-mobile-for-all/

[Imp Trollop]

@LindenLabsGoingDown The only political agenda is from conservatives that want everything that doesn't fit in their little square "normal" box silenced, so they don't have to hear another view point. If your worn out boomer BS mentality doesn't fly anymore, that seems more a you problem. SL is what people make of it, your not forced to interact with anyone. If you're out of fun places you don't feel welcome at, maybe it's not everyone else that's the issue.

And Sansar was never a success, it was dead before it started, and an agenda had nothing to do with it. I simply lacked everything that made SL a success.