When I moved the full sim into the City of Lost Angels, I had a few land owners left.  Not wanting to completely shaft them, I moved them over to a new Openspace sim I bought (you can see where this is going).  Ahhh, altruism.  No good deed goes unpunished.  Yes, with the new pricing scheme from Linden Labs on Openspace sims I am of course screwed with the lessors I have on the sim.  I figure this fiasco will cost me between $200 and $500 US before it’s done.  Why so much?  Well, I can’t sell the damn thing as they charge you $100 US to sell a sim.  At best I will be able to sell it for a pittance.  At worst I will have to just abandon the thing.  In other words a total write off.

A massive waste of time, money and effort.  But Linden Labs comes out ahead in the short term.  And that is apparently what this is now about, a new race to the end because long term thinking is over now.  I for one have found this whole fiasco to be very demoralizing.  It’s hit me harder than almost any other form of stupidity LL has done.  While it did hit my pocket book personally, what I find to be this to be is the beginning of the end.  It’s not the end by any stretch, but it’s the beginning of the end….

With one stroke they have set in motion the straw that finally did in the SL economy.  This will probably set of a disruptive chain reaction that no one may be able to stop.  I think mostly what this finally proves is that anyone who tries to make money in Second Life is a fool (I’ve given up that idea and am looking to basically break even).  Linden Labs controls too many of the levers, controls the rule books and can act in their own interests at will with no regard to the consequences.

I am constantly amazed at their ability to move from one bungled move to another.  For example, today they have announced that are rethinking their position on this price change.  Rather than just getting it over with and posting what the latest – thing – is, the decided to let everyone know that they will announce what they are going to do (which of course they’ve already decided since they’ve made this post) until tomorrow.  As if this will increase ratings or something for the LL blog?

Usually in cases like this I’d like to make some sort of pithy prediction.  I’m going to avoid that this time because I’m sure to be wrong.  I’d base my prediction on some basis in reality, clearly somewhere that Linden Labs is not operating.  They seem to operate in a separate dimension, detached from their own Second Reality and first reality.  Where that is I’m not sure a lot of people know.

If your living depends on the Second Life economy this is your first warning shot.  Disentangle yourself now.  Don’t get dragged down by them.  Businesses want predictability and stability.  It’s pretty clear here, you’re not going to get it.

Veyron’s predicition for the next shoe to drop:  the Linden Dollar’s currency to revalue.  Probably deflate.  The Linden Dollar is currently manipulated by Linden Labs.  Once they stop doing that and let it float, all hell will break loose.  If you think inflation is bad, try deflation.  Or it could inflate as Linden Labs prints money to make money.  They have a license to do that ya know….

-Veyron