cold reflections, they tell no lies, but eyes just scratch the surface

There was a thing that came up in ISC chat earlier...Leaving names in because there are no guilty to protect, per se. So.

[08:44] Kara2016: Did hear that LL is going too increase the linden exchange rate?
[08:44] Grimoire Hexem: yeah.
[08:44] Grimoire Hexem: it's 3$ per every 10k L
[08:45] Zantyago Mannonen: so evey linden is worth more or less=
[08:45] Justine (justinejohndory.amethyst): every linden will cost us more.
[08:45] Zantyago Mannonen: WHAT?
[08:45] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Err....no....
[08:45] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): 10K in Lindens is currently $41.67, not $3.00?
[08:46] Grimoire Hexem: they're adding a tax.
[08:46] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): In addition to the $1.49 they already charge?
[08:46] Isobel DeSantis: They're increasing the $1.49 - that will now be the minimum
[08:46] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Ugh.
[08:47] Kara2016: i use the Instant buy(Market buy) not the Best rate buy(Limit buy)
[08:47] Isobel DeSantis: Mari sent a notice about it the other day - it changes on the 22nd

The notice Miss Mari sent goes thusly:

Not polite [ but we're family ]
to discuss money but Linden is raising the BUY, not sell Linden dollar transaction fee eff 4/22 to 7.5%, $9.99 cap, $1.49 minimum (current max). So, if you long term rent you may want to save a bit and stock up before 4/22 to cover your tier for a while
https://community.secondlife.com/blogs/entry/7770-infrastructure-investment-update-buy-fee-change-effective-april-22/. {in case of error website info rules}

And I say again: Ugh.

[08:47] Grimoire Hexem: they must pay tribute to the new Amazon Cloud overlords.
[08:47] Isobel DeSantis: yeah, this is the instant one as well, [Kxxx]
[08:47] Isobel DeSantis: Those of us outside the US already pay a huge exchange rate charge to Tilia

Which sounds like the advent of Tilia gave the Lindens the ability to charge fees above and BEYOND VAT, which (at least personally) I think is a terrible idea...

[08:48] Kara2016: it may not be that bad..
[08:48] Zantyago Mannonen: CURSE YOU BEZOS
[08:48] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Well, bother. I appreciate her suggestion to stock up before the 22nd, but that assumes one has enough TO allow stocking up before the 1st.
[08:48] Isobel DeSantis: they give us the worst exchange rate of anywhere in the world!
[08:48] Isobel DeSantis: ikr, Emily?
[08:48] Isobel DeSantis: When my bank was giving $1.30 to the £, Tilia gave $1.18
[08:49] Isobel DeSantis: They make more on selling Lindens than anything else, I would think [08:49] Kara2016: Just be glade you are not paying $40.00 for $500.00 Rays on top of a $20.00 membership..
[08:50] Kara2016: a week
[08:50] Isobel DeSantis: what are Rays?

Yeah, I have no idea. I never played on Red Light District, Utherverse, or Oasis, though I'm sure there are other adults-only virtual worlds.

[08:50] Isobel DeSantis: "Linden is raising the BUY , not sell Linden dollar transaction fee eff 4/22 to 7.5% , $9.99 cap , $1.49 minimum(current max) "
[08:50] Kara2016: i used too be on an adult virtural site..those were the currancy
[08:52] Isobel DeSantis: I normally buy 15,000L at a time - so my transaction fee will go from $1.49 to about $4.50
[08:53] Kara2016: Thats a lot of Lindens..I like 2,500
[08:54] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Part of the annoyance with the new fee, for me? I had started buying my largest lump-sum amount of Lindens at the start of the month, TO avoid hitting that fee again and again, buying L$1K here, L$500 there.
[08:54] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): With this, it's basically making us choose--either accept the higher fee for the larger lump sum, or LET us charge you $1.49 for every smaller transaction.
[08:56] Isobel DeSantis: My rent is about 7500L$ a week Kara
[08:56] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr) nods
[08:57] Isobel DeSantis: Yeah it's capped at $9.99 which is about 30,000L$
[08:57] Isobel DeSantis: maybe 35,000
[08:57] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Still no. $9.99 is L$2397 in Lindens.
[08:58] Kara2016: if i bought 5,000L NOW, IT WOULD BE 22.33$
[08:59] Isobel DeSantis: I mean if you buy more than about 35,000L$ at a time, your transaction fee won't go up
[08:59] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): It won't go up from that four-buck-plus figure, probably not, no, but that's still more than double the fee for transactions $9.99 or less.
[08:59] Isobel DeSantis: so you can buy 50,000L$ and pay the same transaction fee as someone buying 35,000 is what I'm trying (badly!) to say
[09:00] Isobel DeSantis: not $4 - the max is $9.99 Emily
[09:00] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): The FEE is $9.99??
[09:00] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Oh good gods.
[09:00] Isobel DeSantis: Yes
[09:01] Isobel DeSantis: it's 7.5% with a max of $9.99

Thanks, I hate it.

[09:01] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Do they...want...people to stay in SL?
[09:01] Isobel DeSantis: currently the max is $1.49
[09:01] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Because this is how you drive people off a platform.
[09:01] Isobel DeSantis: From Thursday, the MINIMUM will be $1.49
[09:02] Kara2016: SO THE NEW FEE WILL BE 9.99?
[09:02] Isobel DeSantis: the new maximum, Kara
[09:02] Kara2016: sory for the caps.
[09:02] Isobel DeSantis: the new minimum will be $1.49
[09:03] Kara2016: what i seeibng now is the transactiuon fee of 1.49
[09:03] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): Right, but it's not the 22nd yet.
[09:03] Emilly Shatner-Orr (emilly.orr): It's the 18th.
[09:03] Isobel DeSantis: that's the current maximum yes
[09:03] Isobel DeSantis: it WILL be the minimum
[09:04] Kara2016: oh, well.

Now, I should add that since I captured this, I linked the forum URL to Hiro, and his perspective is that this is a good thing? To encourage people not to carry huge amounts of Lindens on their accounts (he suggests potential money laundering concerns, and maybe that's a thing?), but also, to make money in-world and not buy through the Lab.

Which, again--are they trying to discourage people to buy Lindens? Isn't that Second Life's chief microtransaction? Why would they want to make it less desirable to buy the in-game currency?