My First Month in SL What an Experience Part 2

OK so it’s been 4 months since part 1 and all I will say is Life Moves Fast in SL. You make friends, form relationships and partnerships, and they end quickly. So in this part 2 I will go into some of the pitfalls we have encountered in our short time in SL. Then Part 3 will be back to the fun of SL I hope.

Well, here is my list of hard lessons in SL:

1. First, if you buy land from a private land owner you don’t own it.  It’s for the most part just giving them up-front money to lower your monthly tier. Just like paying points on a loan to bring down your interest. And don’t count on getting any of your money back
2. Check your land out before you buy; sit there for at least 1 hour in the morning, noon, and evening with a lag meter running.
3. Open Spaces are just that, Open Spaces.
4. SL moves fast and friendships form quickly and with that trust does also.
5. Understand Groups and how they work before you allow anyone to help you create one.
6. Theft is rampant in SL and there is little you can do about it.
7. Drama, Drama, Drama, it’s rampant in SL.
8. Mod Rights to your items are important. If someone helps you and needs mod rights, fine, but as soon as the work is complete take them back.

We found out quickly that in SL if you deal with a private land owner they can do whatever they want. You do not own the land, they do. After we got our ¼ we found that the land we had bought was having real lag issues. It was ¼ of a full sim that had over 5000 scripts running on the sim. We were also sold an Open Space and were told that it could support the same amount of prim and scripts as our ¼ full sim.  We soon found out that it could hardly support our two private homes, no less a Riding track at 400M. Open Spaces are just that, Open Spaces, a few trees, water and a few boats.

In SL friendships form quickly and end quickly. We found ourselves in the middle of people that were friends trashing each other and pushing for us to take sides. In the end, because we would not pick sides we no longer have them as friends. And to be honest we are better for it.

As far as Groups, here is the deal: if you form a group, do not allow anyone to be in an ownership position  that is not a true partner financially and time wise.  Ownership in a group in the eyes of SL makes the parties equal in assets and all income derived from the group. And in fact they can even steal your ideas and become a competitor under the same name.  Never let anyone tell you, "Make me an owner so I can help you with your land." You can make them an officer and give them the permissions to do any land work.  Once they are an owner, you cannot remove them.

So Life lessons are hard in SL. The only good thing in the grand scheme of things is they are cheap.  So my suggestions are, if you’re looking for land for a business or need an Open Sspace. I am sure there are some great land companies out there. If you are looking to get land from a private land company, ask for references of people that have been doing business with them for at least one year. Or, get your land from Linden Labs at the auction, get land on Mainland or a private Estate.

In our short time we learned some hard lessons, but now we have a great Mainland sim that is connected to 12 sims of LL oceans and all the room and prim we need to build a great, fun area.  So all I can say is SL is a trip and we are still learning.  But above all we are keeping it fun.  And doing the right thing even when others are not.  As in life, in SL we look to treat everyone with respect and conduct business in a business-like manner.

Batista Bardasch

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Weltenville/181/168/33