river swells and breaks its banks, acting up instead of thanks

[10:35] Txxx Rxxxxxxx (god): LALALALA

Handy life tip: if you have to specify you're a god...you're not one.

Also, unless you're specifically playing an idiot god, might be a good idea to upgrade the level of pronouncements from "LALALALA". Just sayin'.

In other news, I got a card today from the creator behind Caverna Obscura, and I will honestly be shocked if more people don't follow her lead:

Greetings!

Maybe some of you have heard the news that Linden Labs will raise Marketplace fees to 10% on December 2. Here is the blogpost with the official announcement:

https://community.secondlife.com/blogs/entry/3016-the-return-of-last-names-and-changes-to-marketplace-events-premium/

It is a 100% raise from what we are paying now (5%) so many creators/merchants will be raising their prices on Marketplace by 10% come December 2.

Caverna Obscura will also raise MP prices by 10% on December 1 (for all mesh items and some of the older prim/sculpt items). The in-world prices for everything and MP prices on most older prim items will remain the same. Here are a few examples of the price difference:

an item that is 595L$ in-world will cost 660L$ on MP, or

an item that is 395L$ in-world will be 440L$ on MP,

just to give you a feel of what it all means. I encourage everybody to use MP for finding items you like, then going in-world stores and using your viewer’s Search Area tool to quickly locate the item you are looking for on the sim. If you can’t find something in-world please don’t hesitate to contact Elvina Ewing. Of course those who prefer the convenience of MP and will not mind the price increase can continue to buy on MP.

Now, for me personally, I am likely going to see how this plays out, and make the decision then on what to raise. My biggest seller on my tiny MP store is still my very, very vintage Sukkot kit, which desperately needs revision, and the only reason I charge for that at all is because I want to track who's bought it in case I do find a way to revise it. (There are, still, no Sukkot poses on Second Life. It's not that they're hard to do, just that a) I'm not an animator, and b), I'm not Jewish. Shouldn't someone more qualified be doing this?)

But that seems to be where things stand. It's either a cash grab on the Lindens' part, or they're trying to drive traffic back in-world, and honestly, not sure which.

To the rest of the blog post, bringing back last names is a great thing, and everyone's been asking for it for years now, but what's cheap and underhanded in that is, they're requiring people be premium members to make the change, and they're charging an additional fee on top of that. It's baffling.

From the article linked above:

THE RETURN OF LAST NAMES -- UPDATE and CONTEST

We heard you loud and clear.

That's difficult to believe.

Soon it will be possible to change the name of a Second Life account. This is one of our Residents’ most requested features and we’re working furiously to make it available by the end of January. Name Changes will be exclusively for Premium members at an additional fee.

But note, they're not mentioning what, precisely, will define that fee, nor whether the fee will be in Lindens (as most in-world transactions) or in actual real currency (as in in-world divorces).

Changing one or both of your First and Last Name will be available as a single transaction. Last Names will be picked from a list, which you can help us curate.

Yay?

What’s a last name you would choose for yourself? We’ll soon hold a contest seeking your contributions to the pool of last name options. From all of the suggestions, we’ll pick five, and those five lucky Residents will be able to change their names completely free of charge! You will not need to be Premium to participate or to win. The contest will run December 16 through January 15th, and participation details will be announced shortly.

How...lucky for those residents. I don't want to enter, because I'm pretty happy with my last name, but this all seems very strange. Especially that post-January, people who choose to pay $12 a month (which feels like a forced choice, because elsewise, they're stuck with Resident until the end of time) will gain the ability to pay more to change their names, which is something Linden Labs shouldn't have completely screwed up so badly in the first place. Great. It feels like they're asking us to pay for their mistake.