I'll start with the press release from Linden Lab today:
Linden Lab Restructures
Highlights - 30% personnel reductions, combining engineering and product teams into one, restructuring customer support to provide more "scalable services" and moving toward a browser-based technology. Uggggh.
Is Linden Lab on crack? Why do I get that feeling all my content creation and that of others is destined for the trash bin? Why do I think we're headed for a Habbo Hotel morphed with Facebook experience? Maybe it's because Mark "Im a God" Kingdon seems to be pushing that direction with every executive decision this company makes. Does Teh Lab honestly think everyone has the bandwidth for a rich browser-based technology? Or am I thinking it's going to run on Flash? And can support get any worse? (Don't answer that, it probably can.)
Maybe combining engineering and product teams isn't such a bad thing -- after all, right now the two don't seem to talk to each other. Commerce, for example, makes decisions, announces them and then finds out months later that it can't be done. JIRA's go unanswered. Resident ideas are ignored. Even with Torley pushing big-time on the snapshot to email bug, it's still not fixed.
<sarcasm> But don't worry folks, all is OK. The balance sheet looks great. We're doing well. Ignore the man behind the curtain.
I'm getting a little tired of being whipsawed back and forth by this silly company that created a playground (where its residents can make such a rich experience for many of us) but seems destined to chuck it all in favor of the next new shinies. How about you?
We are the ones who made the "rich experience." Not Linden Lab.
ReplyDeleteMade, and continue to make. Unless (until?) the lights go out, it's still our world and our imaginations. Resistance is not futile.
ReplyDelete@ Ghosty...yes, this is ours.
ReplyDeleteand
@ my friend Lalo...
I saw a quote on Woodstock Burleigh's profile last eve that still resonates with me.
It's a quote from Ted Kennedy..and I see it as a call for us today.
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."
Exit strategy time..
ReplyDeleteYes you're right we made the rich experience but Linden Lab (of course) made and owns the sandbox we play in. And they keep replacing the grains with needles and burrs and rocks and snakes and other things not conducive to fun or business. :(
ReplyDeleteI changed the closing paragraph since you were all quite right that it wasn't correctly stated. Thank for all being great editors. :)
ReplyDeleteWell, Snickers, according to the NWN poll 70% think this is heralds a negative turn....I agree, I think that changing the whole idea of SL to a consumer-based experience, rather than a creator-based one will just mean loads of talent will leave for the new grids.
ReplyDelete