We haven’t been getting much news from the Lindens on what’s up with SL. That is part of the reason I semi-retired from blogging. Now I just post when I have something interesting… interesting to me at least.
The recent Lab Gab (Episode #14 – Feb 21) video gives one of the better updates I heard in some time.
In it Ebbe and Grumpty are telling us about what is coming. The TL:DR… well… R=Watch in this case. Basically, 2020 and probably into 2021 the Lab will be focused on UPLIFT, the move to the cloud. Parts have already moved and those moves have given Lindens great expectations for how well SL is going to run in the cloud.
The feature add-ons we know about are being completed, EEP, name changes, new Premium Pluuuus… or however Grumpty pronounces it, and some other things will soon be completed. Soon is a couple of months for some things.
This focus on Uplift means we are not going to see much in the way of new features being added. However, after Uplift is complete we will likely see a frenzy of new features and lower land prices. The Amazon server farm, which is the cloud we are talking about, is going to give the Lab an interesting set of options for server power. They may offer a region owner a choice of servers. Think economy to high-end quantum… well maybe not quantum.
Ebbe has a few words about Sansar. The Lab is looking for a partner to fund development or to buy the Sansar project. I expect Sansar to no longer be a part of Linden Lab, but it may. All depends on who steps up and what they want to do.
I’m honestly really excited to be finally getting EEP. I remember hearing about that when I first joined Second Life in 2007. It’s been a long wait, but it will be worth it.
Regarding unoptimized content, it’s great to see that Ebbe recognizes that issue. And yeah, it’s primarily on content creators to create more optimized content, but there are things Linden Lab could do to encourage better made content and discourage poorly optimized content.
An official content creation blog, content creation contests, and ArcTan should remain a priority, too. There needs to be better feedback from the viewer combined with better tools to manage your avatar’s render weight and locate problematic attachments. Eventually LL will need to bite the bullet and introduce caps on avatar polygon counts and texture memory, and they’ll need to do that without causing the userbase to riot. Difficult, but not impossible.
All of these ideas need to be on the table with LL if they ever hope to enact meaningful changes to content creator habits.