Second life goes walkabout (again)

“*[2:44 a.m. PDT 6 Sept. 07] *

*Approximately six minutes ago, inworld services such as mapping, teleporting, and L$
balance display stopped performing reliably. *

Our Operations Team is responding as rapidly as possible, and we’ll keep you posted until
services are restored.

We apologize for the inconvenience.”

Linden Lab are having a problem maintaining the service on Second Life. The continual outages and service disruptions are doing no-one a favour and are reminiscent of the problems after release 8, when the grid remained unstable for about a month.

While a developmental platform is inevitably going to have problems, and Second Life is really still a Beta product, these continued failures are a disaster for Linden Lab, who want to position themselves at the forefront of the new wave of 3d virtual spaces.

New platforms are springing up all the time, some of which plug in to the Second Life construct.  (see deepgrid on this blog)

With pressures on in-world residents, such as recent land price collapse, the ban on gambling, thanks to the nanny state called the USA and derogatory remarks from the business community, the inevitable call that Second Life is doomed, will be shouted loudly.

I hardly think this is likely, but the very strong growth of the resident base in Second Life, will be harmed and developers will continue to search for a more stable and user friendly platform on which to develop their services.

The new secondlifegrid website launched yesterday, will not alleviate the problems and the continual reliance by Linden Lab to provide support services outside the 3d platform can only lead to further confusion about what Linden Lab really are all about.

Investors in Linden Lab, must be considering exit strategies, as the leading light of Second Life, continues to tarnish and it’s high profile, only hurts the more.

~ by anarchyintheuk on September 6, 2007.