Sunday, January 4, 2009

Shut Up and Take It Like a Man

Well, it's official, after much outspoken criticism of Linden Lab by it's own Second Life Community, Linden Lab has decided to go ahead and move forward with their plan to either convert OpenSpace SIMs (OS) or critically limit them, as of January 5, 2009.

Let's take a little stroll down the History Path shall we?

For you that missed it, Linden Lab announced that they would be selling OS to users for just $75USD each. Apparently Linden Lab thought these OS would be used merely for water property, sparce forest land, or just cute gardens that took no critical resources to run. In the TOS of the OS purchase, it did state that these OS were to be used in such a manner, but, in their usual way of "screwing the pooch", Linden Lab failed to sale these OS with the current prim/script limits. Instead, they gave the user 3750 PRIMS and did NOTHING to curtail scripts. Not only that, but there was no enforcement of the TOS Policy, and people do what people do when they are given 3750 PRIMS and no script limits, they use them!

Last August these OS Servers apparently hit a Critical Mass and things began lagging out badly on these OS; never mind the horrid lag on the mainland. So, after "careful inspection" it was decided that the problem of the OS lag (never mind the mainland lag) was due to the CUSTOMERS who used up all those resources they were given and never managed by Linden Lab. Now, during this same time, Linden Lab opened a new land mass called Nautalis; this point will become important soon, bear with me. It was decided by the "brainiacs" at Linden Lab the best way to handle the OS meltdown issue was to blame the customer and force them to either abandon their OS or convert them over to a much HIGHER PRICED private sim; in the retail world this type of action is known as 'Bait and Switch'. This action caused a public outcry not seen before in Second Life. Over 10,000 Complaints were logged (thought I didn't know that eh Auntie Robin?), and many of these pointed out that the new land mass made generous use of OS Sims; that's right, Linden Lab used these OS just like their customers did, but did they blame themselves? Those "brainiacs" over at Linden Lab then said they were going to push back the time limit before ROBBING their customers and have a meaningful discussion with the Second Life Community concerning the OS issue. Once again, Linden Lab proved they didn't know the meaning of "Open and Transparent" communication, as during this time, they received more complaints about their new pricing and time table, then positive comments, and in true Linden Lab fashion, they went ahead with their plan, making absolutely no changes to it; during this time Linden Lab changed their motto from "Where Worlds are Born" to "Where we steal your money":)

So, here we are today, one day before Linden Lab begins 'ripping off' their customers. Jack Linden is the latest to drink the Linden Lab Kool-Aid as he Blogs about this upcoming crime. As done before, this Blog Post is closed to all comments and has no Forum open for their Customers to comment. Most likely Linden Lab is just tired of reading all the complaints, as I would be if I "screwed the pooch" this badly.

Once again, "Open and Transparent" communication has a completely different meaning at Linden Lab then the rest of the world. At least this time "Open and Transparent" isn't the only saying that gets beaten up, so does the meaning of "Fair Market Practices".

No comments: