WoW Losing Subscribers
For years I have heard how Second Life is losing subscribers. It is true, but the new users and returning users keep the number of people in SL about the same. SL has gone from 1 million plus to about 900,000 from 2007 to 2015.
Blizzcon – Official World of Warcraft Art // Illidan Stormrage
Let’s try to put some perspective on that. Take a look at World of Warcraft’s numbers. In Q4-2014 there were 10 million subscribers. By the end of Q1-2015 it was down to 7.1 and now at the end of Q2-2015 it is 5.6. That is almost half the users in 6 months. (Reference – nice graph) In December 2005, 15 months after starting WoW, they passed 5.6 million. In October 2010 they were at 12.0 million, the peak I think. So, this is the fewest subscribers they have had in 10 years. In the long term take Wow has been losing about 125,000 subscribers per month since 2010. But since December 2014 they have been losing about 740,000 per month. Look at the chart I linked to. Obviously they need to stop the current rate of loss. If they can’t, they only have about 6 months left. They say they have stopped the bleeding. The company running and building WoW is doing well according their latest financial report. It looks like other games are making up for the income loss from WoW. Linden Lab has no where near the problem that Blizzard has with WoW.
Top Regions in Second Life
Every so often Hamlet publishes a list of the regions with the most visitors. He has a new list out. See: Top 50 Most Active Second Life Sims for July 2015.
Mouse, Cinematic, or 3rd Person View – Poll
Trifina is running a poll over on SLUniverse asking which view you use in Second Life™. See: What Camera Position Do You Use?
Giardini di Vita by Loverdag, on Flickr
From the few that have taken the poll at this point it seems very few use mouse-look. A good portion of those responding use Penny’s Settings and cam around (Alt-key & mouse).
Windows 10
People are installing Windows 10 and running Second Life Viewers. The Firestorm Team has a wiki page dealing with some of the problems they are encountering. See: Windows 10 Issues.
So far it is a really small list, three items as of 8m/6d.
Virtual Flycam
For those into machinima a flycam is an important tool. To understand what a flycam is and how to add one to your viewer see: Virtual Flycam for Second Life. A to B Software has this viewer add-on you can use to simulate having a flycam.
I got a SpaceNavigator and love it. You can get used ones on eBay cheap. But, free is even cheaper. So, try the Virtual Flycam.
Second Life: Adult Magazine
A new adult magazine titled SLBM – Second Life Bondage Models has just released it’s premier issue. You can read about it on Jennnnna Jameson’s blog. Get your copy in-world in SSC Roadrash (SLURL). It is free.
Mesh Addicts Poll
Mesh Body Addicts has a little poll running. They are asking about what you would like to see them cover and what types of events you would like to see them sponsor. Mesh Body Addicts
Their current event opened August 1st, HERE.