I’m amazed….

…that there are people willing to accept this ploy.

It’s probably fair to say LL have played somewhat fast and loose and got precisely what they wanted. Forget the hype over the original 66% tier hike – that was never going to happen in one bite, and they knew it.

So, bravo, Mark et al! You’ve achieved what you set out to do, and what I suspect you wanted to do from the start – introduced yet another tier level, a “new” form of sim, & got residents to readily accept it. In doing so, not only have you managed to portray yourselves as “listening” and “responding” – you’ve actually got people congratulating you on the “new policy”!

It’s been a very clever game plan. No doubt this outcome is more-or-less what you wanted from the outset. However, you knew that if Jack simply annouced this in his blog entry of October 28th, the backlash would be huge, and you’d have been left with nowhere to turn or alternatives to offer….

So instead, you cleverly got people’s blood up by overstating the intended price-hike on existing OS sims. Rather than 15%, you went for an improbable 66% – and then you left it up to residents to suggest what you were hoping they would – the introduction of an additional sim type with reduced capabilities.

No wonder Jack so quickly leapt on this during his “impromptu” Conceierge meeting a couple of days after the 28th October announcement.

Thus, by clever baiting and slight-of-hand, you lured people into a backlash against non-existent massive hikes in tier rates, leaving you free to play things out for a week or so before putting forward your intended changes by way of a “compromise” in the knowledge that people would a) come to you in thanks, b) go away believing they had “won” over the issue.

BUT – the “victory” may yet be pyrrhic. OpenLife is maturing and is gaining backing (and not just from disaffected SL users). The pricing policy over there for both “Mainland” and “private clusters” is attractive and is set to allow any increases that might be required in the future without hitting people in the pocket. Yes, it has got some way to go before it can offer all the positive aspects of SL – but they are coming. What is important is that you’ve already caused a lot of talent from SL to make the cross over and start work there.

You may yet find that, as OpenLife (in particular and its sister open source grids in general) continue to rapidly mature, you have through these games, opened the floodgates and will be unable to stem the flow of users out of SL – and with growing competition, can you be so sure the influx of “new blood” you hope the Big Spaceship deal will bring, will compensate?