"Views" or "Residents"

Are newcomers now being percieved as "views" instead of residents?

If SL is viewed as a "free use" platform like TV and radio in the US, or many internet sites, then it makes an odd sort of sense. LL would then be selling islands as advertising space to companies. Marketing entities would then be the main source of income for LL. The CEO says here that he insists on making free accounts available, which would be in line with such a model.

It would make the mainland into a sort of "resident showcase" which fits with all the new talk about "mainland culture" coming out of LL lately. The raise in island fees will have a strong effect on the current "flee the ghetto" fashion of people leaving the mainland to live in structured rental communities.

LL has just gotten rid of teaching stipends. That suggests to me that LL no longer considers long-term resident retention important. I'm guessing that the revenue streams they're getting from day-trippers converting $US to $L, Governor Linden land sales to newcomers, and conversion of new accounts to paying ones are now insignificant compared to other streams.

There's suggestions that this isn't the case; the search system and classifieds inworld, the lack of LL run advertising in the client or inworld, the poor accessability of web content.

I'm wondering if this is a recent vision change, and not part of the original plan... that would explain a lot. If it had been planned for, the technical features should already be in place. They aren't.