Tag: Mark Kingdon

And the mill continues to churn…

Posted on by Inara Pey

Hamlet is covering breaking news – um-  rumours that Mark Kingdon is departing Linden Lab and Philip Rosedale is about to swing back into the limelight as the “new” CEO.

According to Hamlet, the rumours have come from “multiple sources”, although he declines to indicate whether said sources are within or linked-to Linden Lab itself. Hamlet links the rumours to his earlier speculation about the reasons behind Tom Hale’s departure and, by extension, the “failure” of Viewer 2, and Rosedale’s own somewhat contrite SL7B address.

The mill has been further fuelled by news on the official blogrum that Mark Kingdon was a no-show at the SL7B celebrations yesterday, where he was due to give and address. The reasons for his no-show were stated to be related to an emergency.

It’s hard to tell which way to turn on this. While I doubt that the emergency that kept Kingdon had anything to do with any forthcoming departure on the grounds that Rosedale himself and several other leading LL luminaries were on-hand at the stage where Kingdon was due to speak: had the no show been connected to a sudden departure or a decision to remove Kingdon, I would have thought that the “emergency” would have been sufficient to call them away as well or that someone would have been prepared to step into the breach and thus prevent speculation and upset.

However, Hamlet does have the background that allows him to sometimes tap into the beat of things within the bastions of Battery Street (albeit an ability that is in the decline following the recent layoffs), so outright dismissal of the “rumours” cannot at this time be given.

One thing is clear. If this is no more than speculation, then Linden Lab need to nip it in the bud. While some may cling to the adage “there’s no such thing as bad publicity” this kind of rumour could be damaging if not dealt with properly.

Watch this space, as the saying goes.

To far to fast?

Posted on by Inara Pey

More theories as to what has prompted the recent “restructuring” at LL are popping up.

While Hamlet offers a concise argument, I still don’t buy his “Viewer 2 has failed to increase adoption” line, for reasons already stated. Viewer 2 doesn’t exist in a vacuum, to “increase adoption” it needs support – advertising and promotion well beyond the walls of the Second Life garden, and this has yet to happen in any real way.

Similarly, it is hard to judge what impact the SL Enterprise issue has had on LL’s fortunes – if any. In terms of straightforward revenue generation, I’m inclined to agree with Gwyn Llewelyn (to a point) and say, not a lot. SLE was, from the start flawed, again, for reasons I’ve gone into at length … several times … previously. However, I can see the Hamlet is potentially hitting the mark here in that there has been a negative outcome in so far as possible projections of cashflow into the LL coffers as a result of the SLE launch not achieving any significant levels are concerned.

Again, products don’t exist in a vacuum: some projections as to the potential take-up of SLE and the possible partnering of its use with the renting of SL Workspace sims must have been carried out at some point in Linden Lab. And having a company internally translate a projected income into something that influences their entire bottom-line financial structuring is not a rarity. Even big companies can get it wrong, issuing profitability warnings when sales fail to meet expectations / forecasts…

In both Viewer 2, the New User Experience, and SLE, I think it is more a case that those running Linden Lab simply took a gamble – risking stability and steady-state growth in order to re-invent the Second Life wheel and spin it up into a rapid revenue earning machine that could draw in the trendy and the shiny in terms of casual and business users.

In short, in the drive to make Second Life “profitable” in a very real sense and break free from the constraints of being considered a “gamble” for new investors, or still sporting the buffed-up shine of a “start-up”, Mark Kingdon and his fellow executives simply tried to drive LL to far to fast. The gamble required large-scale expenditure, it required personnel expansions that were perhaps not the wisest. Linden Lab simply over-extended itself.

This doesn’t mean that the management team themselves have massively failed; companies can and do get it wrong.  When they do, the wise ones take similar steps to LL: they retrench, they lay-off staff, they reduce overheads. And while some may see the laying-off of some 30% of staff as “massive” – the reality is, LL are in fact bringing staffing levels back to the “pre-expansion” levels of last October when, as Hamlet points out, Kingdon was talking about recruiting some 70 staff.

If anything at all, the fact that someone within LL has reacted so swiftly to the situation could be seen as completely positive: the errors have been realised, the need to retrench to firmer ground agreed to and the necessary action taken. While it has hurt a lot of people within LL in the process – surely it is better the hard steps are taken now, than the company wallow on in the face of potential waning income streams and increasingly upset investors edging ever closer to pulling the plug once and for all?

The flipside to this is, of course, that if the above is true – that those at the top misjudged their market and their platform – then the blame for this rests in one place and one place only. And it is not among the departed souls, so to speak.

As others have said, and I’ve analysed, and Grace McDunnough oh so eloquently phrased it, in careering in the direction of the shiny and new, Mark Kingdon and the executive management team again demonstrated that they simply don’t grok what they have. Rather than embracing the community already on their doorstep  – the community that has shown a dedication to their platform that has translated into hard dollars for the company, Linden Lab has time and again demonstrated everything from lip service through indifference to outright hostility towards its customer base since the end of 2006.

Under Mark Kingdon’s leadership these mixed attitudes towards the existing user base reached new heights; first came the OpenSpace / Homestead debacle; while not the blatant bait-and-switch many claim, it did hurt and upset a very large number of SL “residents”; then came the increasingly vocal and anti-resident demands of people LL chose as strategic partners  – people like Justin Bovington of Rivers Run Red, who gained somewhat tacit support from the likes of Amanda Linden; then came the entire Adult Change fiasco, in which Linden Lab blatantly demonstrated its lack of concern for the well-being of a sizeable portion of its community that represented a major influx of funds to LL in terms of land and overall in-world revenue transactions through the sale of goods.

This in turn gives rise to another, and very fundamental reason as to what “went wrong” at Linden Lab – and in fairness, it pre-dates Mark Kingdon’s tenure at Battery Street as well as cutting through a lot of Hamlet’s more corporate-perspective speculations. It is simply this:

Linden Lab lost sight of what their platform really is.

When all is said and done, all the debates held, the navel-gazing done with and with all the cows home, milked and safely in their stalls, Second Life is at its heart a recreational activity. True, it is a highly unusual one in that a) it doesn’t have any quantifiable goals in the same way that other “games” do – but then, I didn’t call it a “game”; and b) it enables those participating in it to not only spend “real money”, but also earn it as well.

Instead of focusing on the ability for Second Life to engage, inspire and ensuring it remained an “open” and balanced environment in which the words your world, you imagination had genuine meaning to whoever came into SL; Linden Lab chose to start tinkering with the fundamentals of the platform – not so much the technology – but the manner in which SL could be used. They started slanting it this way and that, trying to capture real and imagined markets, chasing illusive (and sometimes imaginary) goals. In doing so, they fell victim to their own  – dare I use the term – propaganda as to the potential of the platform, with the result that when things didn’t turn out “right” the first time (the ’06-’07 “boom”), they started tinkering and tipping things more aggressively, further losing sight of the potential before them, and thus created a downward spiral that has done much to alienate those who have most supported the platform and within whom, LL had perhaps the strongest allies who might have otherwise helped spur on the growth of the platform.

It may well be that the end of the road is now in sight and that, as Hamlet speculates, the company is quietly being prepared for outright acquisition; it may also be that the management team are attempting one last-ditch effort to make LL work by switching tracks and going the SAAS route, as I and others have speculated.

In looking at the ToS, it is easy to see that in its restructured form, it supports either of these eventualities. So does the restructuring. Were either to occur, one would have to say that, in purely business terms, the management team have “succeeded” in “keeping Second Life alive”.

In terms of the current user base and the potential that it once – and still – represents the truth is very much otherwise.

Restructures, ToS and licences

Posted on by Inara Pey

Gwyn Llewelyn replied to my post on the restructuring at LL, and while we differed in some views, she nevertheless raised a point that has taken a while to percolate through the grey fluff between my ears and mingle with something I posted regarding the sudden launch of the heavily revised ToS.

At the time the new Terms of Service came out, I asked if LL might not be putting the paperwork in order, suggesting that they might be moving towards a hiving-off and licencing of the server-side software.

Despite all the soft assurances from Mark Kingdon about the health and vitality of Linden Lab, as circulated in his recent e-mail, could it be that the announcement of the restructuring be a further step in that direction?

If I’m honest, Prokofy Neva spotted the parallel before me; although she takes a slightly different angle.

In the ToS, LL have pretty much redefined SL as software as a service (SAAS). This helps make the platform itself suitable for licencing – letting other companies come in a take on the task of hosting the platform, as I’ve previously mentioned. This benefits LL from the need to invest massively in additional hosting efforts elsewhere (such as in Europe) with the aim of reducing latency. It also relieves them of the burden of supplying customer support services, since this would fall under the remit of the licensees. At the ame time, LL generate income through a licence structure (based on the server count? the number of actual sims?) that also enables them to retain the IP on the software and thus control its development.

Certainly it is doubtful a purely “land sales” model is sufficient to keep LL afloat, and licensing deals have traditionally been far more lucrative to software companies, so I’d be very surprised if a shift towards such a model hasn’t been considered by some at the top of the LL tree.

They could even hive-off the operations they currently have into a holding company, as Prok suggests, which in turn could operate a number of sub-leasing deals.

Again, moving towards browser-based accessibility for the platform (or possibly offering as an option alongside the Viewer) fits this scenario, again for reasons I’ve stated: it encourages those who would otherwise fight shy of “trying” SL to do so, simply because it no longer necessarily requires them to download and maintain software.

The browser approach also increases the potential attraction business and education may have towards SL as a platform. A shiny new toy delivered direct to the desktop within an browser’s existing functionality is far more attractive than buying a “virtual world modelling tool” which requires you to install and maintain a clunky client front-end on every single desktop PC in your office / classroom environment.

Licencing the platform also offers potential benefits for LL’s business hopes: a couple of strategic “partnerships” with suitably focused hosting services could see the development of Justin Bovington’s longed-for “business oriented Mainland”: a secure environment to which companies using Second Life on the business front can meet and intermingle via “shop fronts”, as an example. Again, LL win in that they lose the overhead of running the service, but gain on the licensing of the platform and in the potential consultancy spin-offs.

Turning as well, for a moment, to Mark Kingdon’s e-mail to residents on the structuring, and risking going off-topic from the above speculation.

I’ve previously-suggested that the structuring PR may have been poorly-worded, giving people the impression that LL were going to overthrow the Viewer in favour of a purely browser-based method of access SL when in fact they may have meant the browser option might be in addition to the Viewer.

Mark Kingdon’s letter to users suggests this may well be the case, as he states: By bringing new people to Second Life, and by increasing the ways in which people can interact with the world and with the people, places, and things within it. Note the emphasis. Not “changing the way in which people can interact”, but “increasing the ways” – this really does suggest to me that the browser approach is intended to be in addition to the Viewer.

The very short “goodbyes” as the rumour-mills churn

Posted on by Inara Pey

The names of those “let go” following yesterday’s restructuring announcement are beginning to appear. Pastebin has one of the most comprehensive lists. Whether it in complete or not is another matter. Elsewhere there is much speculation that Cyn Linden and Babbage Linden have both gone – but this remains unconfirmed, while Prok Neva points to Blue Linden is among the casualties and also mentions Cyn.

Running an in-world search, it appears that the speculation surrounding Babbage and Cyn is misplaced. I’d actually have been very surprised if Cyn was on the list of the departed, given her very recent promotion. Similarly, given the mighty work that has been done around LSL and Mono, I would also have been surprised had Babbage gone – and would certainly looked at his departure as a negative portent.

Blue, sadly, has gone; and despite what some may say about him, I personally shall miss him. Despite a rocky start to our relationship, he and I went on to have many private conversations on a range of subjects that convinced me that, while the corporate need may have forced his hand at times (and indeed stifled a desire to provide greater support to users), he had a very genuine love for the platform and the people with whom he interacted.

I have to say that, while I wouldn’t wish redundancy on anyone (I’ve been through it twice myself and I know how devastating it can be), I find myself unable to feel much in the way of remorse at the loss of Pink Linden. Her attitude from day one was autocratic, and despite knowing little about SL or the SLX/XStreet SL environment, she was very quick to unbendingly follow the corporate line where a modicum of understanding might have been more welcome – and more appropriate.

If I’m honest, part of my opinion of her was shaped by the whole XSL Content Roadmap situation – particularly her determination to stifle any and all discussion on the subject at her Office Hours meetings, while at the same time using her real life blog to decry the fact that the owners of her apartment block had opted to cut down some fourteen trees around it without consulting the residents. Pot, meet kettle and please note its colour.

I also did wonder at her potential longevity at LL after a) Jack effectively took over matters of commerce; b) the Content Roadmap was shelved.

Beyond the names, the speculation and rumour mill continues apace with tidings of woe and doom for SL, and a general consensus that the platform is heading for a Farmville type future, or that it is about to become Flash-driven. Many are claiming that Viewer 2.0 and the new user experience have been complete failures and have thus precipitated the situation.

Me? I think it is still too early to judge. Let’s face it, the New User Experience hasn’t been around that long, and there are more than enough issues with Viewer 2 to possibly prevent LL pushing it into the spotlight in terms of widespread external advertising. Indeed, it is hard to see any signs of a concerted advertising campaign across the full breadth of the media that one would assume would be needed to raise SL’s real world profile.

As I’ve previously posted, Mark Kingdon and his colleagues are not stupid.  They may not get Second Life, but that doesn’t make them stupid. They are marketers, and they know the value of advertising. At the moment, Viewer 2 and the New Viewer Experience stand in a vacuum  – few, if any, outside of Second Life have ever heard of them. So is it really any wonder than since their “launch” new numbers haven’t dramatically increased?

Unless, of course, Viewer 2 has been put together in a Costneresque view of the world wherein if you build it, they will come. If this is the case, then I’ll gladly revise my view on the levels of stupidity potentially prevalent in a certain boardroom.

No, current figures on user throughput are simply too fresh to squarely point the finger at Viewer 2, etc., and lay blame. Q2 figures might start to revise this, but even then it might be a tad premature.

So… what has happened? As I said in yesterday’s post, leaving aside the hysteria around the “Web-ising” (or possibly not) of SL and the “Facebook joining”, layoffs and retrenchment of this scale (Singapore shut, Withdrawal from Germany (SL’s 2nd largest national market), closing down the Brighton, UK office) do all tend to point to a company scrambling to save money. And I think that Gwyn Llewelyn may have hit the nail on the head a little more squarely then the theories of Viewer 2 failures, identifying one factor of the equation everyone has been overlooking:

The SL Business Enterprise “solution” isn’t working.

SL Enterprise, and what is now SL Workspaces were launched a long time ahead of either Viewer 2 or the New User Experience (last October / November). Their roots go back a lot further than that, however, and have been the cause of much angst for many of us. Throughout 2009, Linden Lab was constantly being badgered by the likes of Justin Bovington of LL’s (former?) business partner Rivers Run Red to develop huge swathes of “business only” Mainland. For a time, even the likes of Amanda Linden displayed what amounted to a hostile attitude towards residents.

Everyone seemed to be far too enamoured with the 2006/2007 situation where big business suddenly “discovered” Second Life, with the likes of Nike, IBM, Toyota, NBC, etc., all rushing in to set-up shop here…before just as quickly vanishing again.

Many theories have been cooked up to explain “what went wrong” – both within and outside of LL – with many within LL thinking they’d potentially missed a golden opportunity, albeit one hovering just outside their reach that could be recaptured if they only get things right.

Among all the theories for the 06/07 “boom/bust” business cycle, I don’t think anyone considered the most basic and simple explanation: Second Life just isn’t really very good for real world businesses.

I’ve long been a critic of the “business is all” ethos that did pervade LL for a time. The idea that what amounts to a recreational pursuit could somehow become the nexus of corporate communications and technology development always struck me as simply ludicrous.

Yet it became a major mainstay of LL’s strategic development. But beyond a few “case studies” and the dozen-or-so companies using SLW just what – as Gwyn asks – has it actually achieved?

SLE remains in beta. While there has been some take-up of it (the US Navy, for example, appears to have pulled most of it in-world studies back behind their own firewalls where they use SLE), all news relating to it has dried up. There has been no move to move it out of beta; there have been no really big corporate fish hooked by the “promise” of SLE.

Even Justin Bovington has gone quiet.

So one cannot help but wonder if this might not be the reason behind the current situation. Was someone rash enough to pin LL’s future cashflow and turnover largely on the SLE / SLW tool and environment? Where the rose-tinted business glasses worn to the degree that projections were based around the $55K-a-pop sales of SLE and the ability for LL to pull in even more revenue via business “consulting”, rather than through resident tiers, and the chicken is now home to roost?

So what of the future? Does this all point towards LL going “solely” web?

It really is hard to judge – but I do remain of the opinion that those who are condemning SL’s future are speaking prematurely. While new user numbers have not skyrocketed – they haven’t actually fallen. As a recreational platform, SL remains viable and afloat. It is also going through a series of upgrades that point – if anything – not towards a flat browser experience, but rather towards a more immersive experience: we have Havoc 7 about to be finally rolled out; later in the year full mesh capabilities are arriving. While the latter brings with it a host of other issues, it bodes well overall for SL’s ability to remain competitive and engaging.

The virtual web?

Posted on by Inara Pey

This popped its head up today – and is now being reported on in the blogrum. And it sent some familiar alarm bells clanging.

The 30% staffing reductions aren’t surprising – worrying yes, but not surprising – given the recent high degree of staff “bleed” right across all levels of the organisation, as anyone who track these things will be only too aware.

The two core elements of the announcement that have everyone a-lather are cited together: First, the company aims to create a browser-based virtual world experience, eliminating the need to download software. Secondly, Linden Lab will look to extend the Second Life experience into popular social networks.

Both statements are indeed worrying on a first read. But are they indicative of anything that traumatic? I’m actually going to remain somewhat positive on both at this point – although with the caveat that this just could finally be the tip of the iceberg breaking the surface.

First off, the company aims to create a browser-based virtual word experience, eliminating the need to download software. Note the emphasis. This is not saying that Linden Lab are eliminating downloadable viewers (such as TPVs or the new Viewer 2). Rather, it is stating they are looking to develop the means to access Second Life through means that do not require people to download dedicated software in order to access the world if they themselves do not wish to.

This is  an important distinction; one I would respectfully suggest those already rending their garments would well to consider. Far from forcing everyone to move to some kind of browser-based means of accessing Second Life, this statement suggests that LL will be developing such a mode of access to work alongside the existing Viewer iterations.

Why do this? Simply because there are doubtless many people who are put off from using Second Life simply because it does require them to download, install and maintain a local client – and like it or not, there is a huge potential audience for Second Life out there who a) are not games players; and / or b) are dubious about downloading software who might very well leap at the opportunity to at least try this wonderful “new” medium if it can be accessed directly from their favourite web browser.

Of course, this does open the debate as to exactly what their in-world experience would be, whether they’d be able to create rich content through the browser (or browser applet?), etc., – but if it can be done, and achieve a further influx of users who can at least explore and potential invest in SL monetarily – that could be a very good thing.

And if the world can be made to function as it does now, but through a browser interface, is that such a bad thing? As long as we can readily access the tools we need to interact, to build, to play, to do business, etc., without having to mentally pretzel our thinking processes or risk carpel tunnel syndrome attempting to defeat an interface better suited to someone with four tentacles and three eyes – then surely moving the interface to the web might at some point benefit us all. (I readily and freely admit that this particular *if* is a whopper, so don’t beat me up about it, as I for one am actually not holding my breath on it.)

Further, browser-based access likely equally applies to mobile devices. Again, LL haven’t exactly hidden the desire to make SL accessible from such devices in some dank cupboard under the proverbial staircase to the basement. While SLIM may have gone (and the dressing-up of its departure the butt of deserved jokes) – the fact is there were and are better tools available from TPVs to access SL via mobile devices and indeed, there is something of a demand for such tools. Ergo, it makes perfect sense for LL to start looking to develop tools for themselves – or at least in cooperation with others (Judy Wade’s Hands-On, anyone?).

Of course, there could be some madcap desire to simply do away with the Viewer completely; but when one steps back an looks at things objectively, such a move wouldn’t make sense. Not yet. LL have made a massive investment in Viewer 2. I’m not saying they got it right – but it is an investment, and I cannot see them simply throwing it over the parapet. And if rich content is not on the cards (as in all the speculation that they wish to reduce SL to a simplistic web-based “world”) – why all the effort to finally get full mesh support up and running, etc?

So, while it is true this goal needs to be looked at cautiously, I really don’t think it is indicative that LL are planning something overly “nasty”.

Which brings me to Linden Lab will look to extend the Second Life experience into popular social networks. Again, why all the wailing? This is hardly new. Linking SL to social network environments has been on the card since last year. Am I in favour? No, not entirely; not at all if it means that SL is going to be steadily sanitised and watered down to the point where it is a pale. bland shadow of its former self.

But again, I don’t think that is what is meant here. Mark Kingdon is already on record as stating (several times each) that a) social network environments again offer a potentially massive audience for SL and the means to both increase user levels and user involvement in SL. He’s also made it clear that links with social networking sites will not automatically lead to the “outing” of human identities behind avatars; nor will it require the loss of anonymity for those who do not wish it. So again, while I may not like it, so long as it doesn’t infringe on the freedoms we all take for granted within SL – I really don’t see the point of getting worked up about it. And I’ve yet to see anything from the likes of Kingdon himself that suggests any of the nightmare scenarios of avatar outing, etc., are anything more than speculation.

This move will continue to be the subject of much debate for a while to come. And while I may well be proven wrong down the road, right now I don’t feel it is the Portent of Doom some are claiming. What, to me at least, is of greater interest is whether the two stated goals of the release (browser-based option for accessing SL and links with social networks) justify the degree of change  / cutbacks that are being implied within the announcement.

As I said earlier, staff cutbacks have been going on for the last two or three months with both notables and not-so-notables vanishing, seemingly without replacement. Whether the mentioned figure of 30% includes those already gone or not is unclear (and this announcement was coupled with the departure of several more “leading Lindens” – including none other than the former head of commerce, Pink Linden). BUT…”strategic restructures” and “staffing cutbacks”, however they are dressed up, tend to be indicative of one things no matter what business one is in: the need to save money. Fast.

If fiscal issues should lie (in part) behind staff cutbacks, the closure of the Singapore office, the apparent re-trenchment away from Europe at the moment; then one has to ask is it because LL are, like everyone else, feeling the economic pinch. Or is it because of something possibly deeper within the organisation that may be in part connected to why the senior management don’t always appear to understand their own customers.

So I do indeed wonder if there is more going on here than meets the eye – although not in the way others might be questioning things.

ADDNDUM

After writing this, the official word finally popped up in the LL blog for me….

Mything the Mark

Posted on by Inara Pey

I thought I’d flip the topic around, Mark Kingdon opened when giving a keynote address (via MetaMeets TV) to the MetaMeet conference being held in Dublin, The topic being ‘Old Myths and New Realities’, and talk about some of the new myths that are forming about Second Life today and some of them are new myths that I’ve been helping create; and since I’m helping to create these new myths, I’d like to try and debunk some of those new myths…

What follows is a 22-minute insight into the future of Second Life directly from the horse’s mouth, so to speak.

And it is both a fascinating and worrying insight into how those at the top see SL developing over the next year or so.

On the fascinating / welcome side of things Kingdon is candid in his view that while the core emphasis of his tenure to date at LL has been a drive to bring in new users, he is well aware that this is not enough to ensure the continued growth of the platform. Indeed, he openly states both consumers (“new users”) and creators are vital gears in the engine of SL’s economy, and both need to be supported. He then goes on to point to shared media as being a prime example of supporting creativity in SL and the forthcoming (i.e. end-of-year) arrival of mesh imports.

But then things start to get a bit worrying, as Kingdon intrinsically links “creativity” in SL with “art” and the Linden Endowment of the Arts (LEA). The LEA is a hand-picked group M and his colleagues have determined to be the “thought leaders” in the SL arts community to set a direction and curate submissions which we can display in our new arts centre. so Linden Lab’s contribution to this venture is going to be to contribute land…and lot of sims…maybe 70 sims…

BOING!!!

SEVENTY sims? Pardon me, but that is one BIG land mass. Now, art in SL is not a new thing – as Kingdon notes – and much of it is currently supported out of the artist’s own pocket (in terms of tier payments) or- more pertinently – by sim owners themselves who lease & run arts-related sims entirely out of their own pocket. If nothing else, the prospect of having to compete with up to seventy sims being provided (apparently) gratis to the arts community is something of a slap in the face with a large, wet fish for those who have supported arts and artistry for so long and so altruistically.

And it isn’t even as if this new facility is going to by open to any and all artists within SL: the selection of whom gets to display what on these sims is to be left in the hands of what amounts to an appointed quango.

Now, obviously, when setting up something like this, there needs to be a filtering of content to some degree – but one cannot help but wonder just how the filtering of submissions to this new “art continent” will be skewed by the “thought leaders” appointed to the LEA – and how many are simply going to find themselves excluded from participation on grounds that have less to do with the quality of their artistry and more with how the LEA’s own perceptions of what constitutes both “art” – be it visual or performance – and the “artist” making the submission.

Another niggling concern that tickled my mind on listening to Kingdon arose as I casually flipped through recent e-mails…and found one advertising LL’s latest “competition”: the chance to win L$50K in return for hoping your way through the Destination Guide.

Ciaran Laval is my hero on the call to arms over Search. He’s been unremitting on his calls to get Search fixed – and rightly so; and LL are promising “incremental improvements”. But…one cannot help but look upon a sudden and incentivised (to the tune of L$50K) drive to get people to use the Destinations Guide as perhaps being indicative of something deeper: could it be that LL want people to use the DG in preference to the borked-up Places in search? If so, then one cannot help be feel concerned for those that try to maintain private art-related sims; if they are reliant on getting listed on the Destination Guide to attract visitors…they are liable to be very small voices crying out against the background “noise” of LEA-approved offerings…

Another worry that crossed my mind while listening to M on this, was whither goeth the mesh creators? He seems to strongly align “art” and “content” as being one-in-the-same. Questions have already been raised on the subject of mesh and its potential to impact the economy (and creativity) within Second Life – by both myself and others. Tom Hale himself admits that the concerns need to be addressed….are we going to see the LEA somehow involved in this as well? Combined with some new “Gold Content Providers Program”?

If so…whither then for the “amateur” content creator?

Beyond this, M did lay to rest one welcome ghost: that LL are trying to “out” everyone. The paranoid androids of the blogrum have been rattling on about this every time words such as “face”, “book”, “tweet” and “plurk” have ended up strung together in sentences uttered / printed by LL. So much so, that this isn’t the first time Kingdon has sought to slay this particular beast – but this doesn’t make his clarifications here any the less welcome. And, to be honest, while I am no “social networking” fan (I don’t facebook, I’m no Twit and I still think “plurking” to be the kind of sound a man makes after a particularly filling meal) – but I can see the value in making tools available that make broadening the social reach people can enjoy while using SL as being potentially beneficial.

Another welcome point Kingdon made was around the subject of third-party development and the recognition – at least around the Viewer – that LL cannot possibly meet the demands of every single segment of the user community in terms of wanted / needed Viewer functionality. As such, M was at pains to point out that LL in fact need TPV developers if the needs of the more experienced users are to be met, and that Viewer development is very much a symbiotic relationship – with the given caveat that LL must gate keep the safety and security of the SL environment.

If there was anything here I would really liked to have heard, it would have been that the TPV policy itself is not the end of the process: there is much going on around SL that is causing concern due to a lack of some transparency that really needs to have LL themselves to be more forthright about. While I am not suggesting that there is anything remotely nefarious about these “private sector” programmes, one cannot help but feel that much of the FUD, misinformation and outright angst that they are causing could be done away with were LL to issue guidelines to help govern such activities.

Perhaps the most fascinating element of the presentation was in Kingdon’s “look ahead”, which formed both a part of his address and an answer to a question from the “floor”. I’m not sure I go along entirely with all of the ideas and memes he set up at this end of the presentation, but there can be no denying he has a deep-seated belief in what he perceives as being the future for SL and the Internet as a whole. But that said, I’ll leave you to listen and judge for yourselves in this aspect of things.

This is the second such “free talk” event at which I’ve hard Mark Kingdon speak – and, as with the first time at his February “meet’n’greet“, I was impressed by his sincere passion for SL, although I remain genuinely concerned for the future of arts in SL. This whole LEA thing, while it has been on the cards for a while now, smacks unpleasantly of a further effort to control, define and promote by proxy, and one that if “successful” could well (like Linden Homes) see further sims thrown at it “magnanimously” by LL – to the death of “art” anywhere else in SL.