We hear about this in the news every day. Corporate restructuring in the new economic environment of heightened fiscal awareness. Business observes “the bottom line” more acutely these days.
Is that a bad thing? No.
In a press release dated June 9th, Mark Kingdon, CEO of Linden Lab (the creator of the virtual world Second Life™) announced “a strategic restructuring to increase focus on the company’s consumer business including investments intended to enhance ease of use and participation in its virtual goods marketplace through browser-based and mobile applications.”
To many private entrepreneurs in Second Life this may be very good news as the emphasis in recent years by Linden Labs has been to support brand name corporations develop a presence on the grid. New policies and changes to the Terms of Service (TOS) seemed to favor “big business” and stifle independent content creators from marketing their products successfully in-world.
Kingdon also forecast that the platform would eventually shift to a browser based format which would eliminate the need to download content. Based on the poor technical performance of other browser based virtual worlds many residents are not supportive of this move.
The restructuring announcement arrived with the closing of a small satellite office in Singapore and the departure of approximately seventy five technical and support positions at Linden Labs. An unofficial “leaked” list of job cuts was posted by an anonymous source on Pastebin.com and can be viewed here.
Reaction from the Second Life community and blogosphere have been varied.
“What often amazes me is this constant tail chase for say education or business or whatever. It’s never caught and each effort seems to be at the expense of the users who have been here and continue to do so.” – Adric Antfarm
“The elimination of several employees with a good handle on the user-base (Blue) in this round of cuts demonstrates that he is also incapable of identifying the team he [Mark Kingdon] needs to help him carry out these changes…” - Crap Mariner
“I just feel glad. That they get how it is. That for once they see what it has been like being a small business in Second Life for the last three years, which your livelihood wiped out from under you in one fell swoop one day, due to a policy decision…” - Prokofy Neva
With the demise of so many virtual worlds it is encouraging to see Linden Lab take a hard line look at improving efficiencies to allow itself to remain competitive and solvent. While restructuring comes at the unfortunate loss of jobs the organization is not immune to layoffs like any other employer, particularly in the information technology sector. Their talents and expertise will no doubt serve them well in their next career opportunity and we bid farewell to some wonderful people and close friends.
With a focused attention to operations and an eye for future improvements (including seamless integration with major social networking sites) can we look forward to a brighter future for Second Life? Time will tell.
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Dousa Dragonash
While the layoffs are sad, in this age of world in flux, the old saying is, “Change is good.” Survival is the key. Another old saying is, “Hold onto your seats, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.” Just be glad Linden Labs is not trying to plug a hole in the floor of the ocean that is poisoning our Eco-system.
June 10, 2010 | 9:17 am
For as many times as something “free” turned out to be a ruse designed to keep attention long enough to covertly re-introduce that same something as “almost free, but now new and improved,” consumers should be able to see this kind of chicanery coming a mile away. But we don’t. We get out teeth into something and make it our own only to have the rug tugged out when the makers discover they can cash-in… or whatever. No matter how those at Linden Control contort their “vision” to satisfy their financial Bob’s-your-uncle, it’ll be the Users of Second Life who’ll ultimately have to make due with what’s left over. Again. Way to go, greedy corporate d-bags!
June 12, 2010 | 10:52 am