I Think NWN's Analysis of How SL Should Grow Its Revenue Is Flawed

I think the reasoning in this article is deeply flawed. I don't wish to do an 'argument from authority' or something like that, but I have been involved in the strategic financial and business planning at the highest levels of a Fortune 50 company. So, I do have an inkling as to how you go about positioning the company for growth, customer retention, etc.

What I learned foremost is that if you have a handful of customers providing over 80% of your revenue, you do everything in your power to please them. You build features just for them, you continually meet with them to find out what their needs are. You analyze why they spend that much money with you and you make it easy for them to spend more money with you if possible. If they are big enough, you provide them with their own individual account managers whose only job is to keep that person happy, fix their issues, track down problems, etc. For the biggest, you send representatives and the account manager to where they are at to look at their workflow and find ways to streamline it or see how you can change things to help them. Gather their requirements and build things for them. Basically, you coddle them in every way possible.

These customers have already demonstrated they will spend large amount of money with you - the rest of your customers haven't. You give them specials, discounts, and every incentive you can create to allow them to spend more money with you. You do exit analysis and 'diving saves' when one leaves, offering incentives, even ones that temporarily mean you lose money on them just to keep them as customers. Hopefully things will turn around for them and they will start to make money for you again. The *last* thing you do is change things in a way that displeases them. And you definitely don't ignore them for the big pile of customers that provide you with less than 5% of your income. Those customers haven't demonstrated a willingness to spend anything appreciable with you.
Because of the analysis of 'what makes the big guys spend money with you', you can find the ones in the 'second tier' of customers that fit those models that you can grow into bigger customers using knowledge learned from 'the big guys'. Give them special benefits as well, this is how you replace the biggies on your platform when they do leave. Spend some people on this but not large numbers.

It'd be nice to know the percentage of new users that actually spend money in SL. It looks like the average 'low end customer' spends about US$6 per year in SL. If you estimate high and say 50% of new users spend money in SL, you'll see that you need to find about 24 *million* new users to replace the 5500. Even at SL's hey day of user growth that would take many years to accomplish. And anything you do now won't pay off in that large a number anytime soon. You spend a couple of employees in the entire company to worry about how to achieve that, it's a long shot bet. You definitely don't change things to please them that would in any way affect your most loyal customers.

You also analyze the new customer demographics and provide ways for them to mature into that 'second tier' of customers. Hopefully, one of those new ones will eventually grow into one of your biggies. But don't spend too many resources on achieving this, it's another long shot bet.

Given the analysis of who spends the most money with you in SL, you go out and market directly to those people who aren't already customers with you and who fit the demographics of the 'big spenders', hopefully you can attract a few directly into the 'big spender' fold. You offer them incentives, reduced prices and remove all barriers for them to become customers.

If the average big customer spends $11,000 a year with you, you know you can give about $11,000 worth of incentives to attract one of those - sure you don't make money on them in year one, but in year two they bring in more money for you than nearly 4000 new signups would. This could translate to something like, 'we will give you a free extra sim with no setup fees for a year if you sign a contract for two years.' Tweak this so you still make money, you might be able to squeeze that to less than a two year contract to attract more people willing to sign that contract. Find a way to lock in future recurring income as much as possible. The cell phone companies have that right. A diving save would also include a temporary reduction or hold on charges to give them a chance to recover financially, that little bit may be enough to fit their new financial status.

Sure, a lot of the biggest customers make their money by renting land, and for that you need new customers, you need to pull in more people to replace/grow their constituency. There are also a lot of people who make their money from creating content - improve content creation tools.

But whatever you do, don't piss off the people who actually spend money with you. Bend over backwards to please them, even reduce your profit margin on them if it means they increase their spending to compensate.

A company of LL's size needs to focus on their core and their strengths, rather than continually spending significant resources to reach out of that. It's like the apocryphal story of the American table tennis team that goes to China. After the US gets trounced, the US coach comments to the Chinese coach about how the Chinese players were all 'one trick ponies' using one or two swings all the time. He advised the Chinese coach to work with them to make them more 'well balanced' players. The Chinese coach responds, "Why would I spend time working with my players to improve a swing that wins 25% of the time to one that wins 50% of the time, when I can spend the effort to improve their best swing from a 96% win rate to a 99% win rate? They shouldn't use the swings that don't win as frequently as the best one."

LL should focus all their resources on reaching the point where diminishing returns make growing their biggest customers not worth it. I doubt they are anywhere near that. They shouldn't spend resources pursuing something else until that point.

There are a number of things that the number estimates I made don't take into account like costs to support them, but you get the general idea.

A Bimbo's Viewpoint on the highly charged 'Blonde Marriage' debate

Linda Strawberry outlines her viewpoint on the controversial subject of blonde marriage that has recently taken hold of the public discourse.

I believe that if we let people with Blonde hair get married it will cheapen the value of our non-blonde marriages. I define marriage to be between two non-blonde people. But don’t call me blonde-aphobic. I have a friend or two with blonde hair. I sometimes watch shows with people with blonde hair like Ellen. I just don’t think blonde haired marriages are moral

.

Many of you may be surprised to find out that I agree wholeheartedly with this viewpoint. Civil unions are more than enough, marriage is a religious institution and should be kept out of civil law entirely. I don't care what dark-haired people get up to in their religious enclaves, but the Constitution firmly guarantees a separation of Church and State. Let's keep it that way.

It's only because the dark-haired people controlled the early State that marriage and public law became so co-mingled. I know I'm a bit out there in my belief about this, but between the dark-haired people's desire to enshrine marriage in law and the deluded blonde's desire to mimic the poor dark-haired people who have been in control of the entire framework of society for too long, I think they are both fighting for the wrong thing.

I believe marriage should be removed from civil law entirely and not pollute it. Justices of the peace should only be able to perform civil unions for blondes and non-blondes alike and priests and the religious can have their marriages to themselves. I think it's a pity that so many blondes wish to ape their dark-haired counterparts, relinquishing their position as the people who push the boundaries of culture, breaking the molds of intolerance built into our society by the emotionally crippled dark-haired. We blondes embrace diversity and are accepting of all, regardless of their hair-color and fashion-sense.

This will serve both blondes and non-blondes admirably. The dark-haired and their regressive churches that refuse to marry blondes can keep to themselves, the churches that celebrate hair-color rights and diversity and allow them to marry may choose to do so, and everyone wins when old fashioned religious notions are removed from ensconcement in civil law.

Seeking marriage for all is a vane attempt by the blondes to achieve "equality" with the dark-haired people when, in fact, they are superior in every way. I call upon the other blondes to shake off the shackles of cultural convention and leave the dark-haired people and their quaint notions of marriage to molder with their rapidly obsolete non-light hair colors.

Blondes are happier, freer people when they are acting the most blonde. We lack the brooding, overly intellectualized and easily emotionally upset stereotype that haunts the dark-haired people. The poor, misbegotten people that go to ever darker haircolors with their 'Goth' and 'Emo' lifestyles and clothing especially need our acceptance. These people choose to ostracize themselves from even regular, dark-haired culture in an attempt to show their 'non-conformity' by coloring their hair black and dressing all in black like the other 'non-conformists'. They can't break away from their 'non-conformist' mold long enough to see that they have merely established another sub-culture that demands conformity to its conventions for full admittance and to be seen as 'one of them.'

Many of my friends are Goth and they have accepted me into their midst. I am truly grateful for that. They understand and appreciate oppression by the majority of the dark-haired culture, for they too have been rejected by 'mainstream' dark-hair culture. I fit in well there, they never prejudge me for not having dark-hair and all I need to do is show a bit of solidarity by wearing 'Gothy' clothing. And who doesn't enjoy 'walking on the wild-side' a little by wearing really 'out there' Goth clothing and it's taboo-pushing fetish styles. We blondes are often seen as overly sexualized and fetish ourselves.

Blondes are accepting and tolerant of many people with different hair-colors, welcoming them into our cultural refuges when we are denied entry into theirs. Our pride in our blondeness is evident with our very flamboyant Blonde Pride parades where even the dark-haired come to celebrate blondeness with us. And the acronym BDPR (Blonde, Dirty-Blonde, Platinum, and Redhead) has made it into the mainstream cultural landscape.

The poor redheads aren't mentioned much even by us, but they truly are the 'redheaded step-children' of society. Blondes have gained great cultural acceptance, able to hold hands and kiss in public for example, and many popular sitcoms now have a 'token blonde' to be the butt of stereotypical jokes. Whereas redheads are still mostly looked upon as rare 'freaks of nature'. Many comedians have dressed as redheads for a cheap laugh, but drag redhead performers like Bozo and Ronald McDonald have begun to open inroads into mainstream culture. But they are still laughed at and snickered at behind their backs as 'over the top' with their highly stylized makeup.

Only the foolishly serious, dark-haired people need marriage because that's they only way they can get regular sex - everyone wants to party and have fun with the blondes, not them. Marriage is only a trap created by the dark-haired people to capture a blonde and keep them captive so they can have regular sex with one of us. Keep the blondes free where they belong.

Even when married, the dark-haired people often sneak away from their partner to have illicit affairs with blondes. Many public figures have been caught with their pants down with blondes and their political careers have died because of it. Going so far as to hire blonde escorts or having frantic sex with a blonde in a dirty, public bathroom to avoid being seen as 'closet blonde' themselves.

So many people go through their "college blonde" phase and their "blonde-curious" stage of development, but we all know it's only a rebellion against their parents. They eventually return to their drab brunette ways, unable to cope with the blonde lifestyle and the disapproval of friends and family.

Blondes take better care of themselves, often looking and dressing better than brunettes. We dress in sexier clothes and wear better makeup than them. I fully support the metro-blonde fad with their blonde tips and highlights, their increased attention to personal hygiene, and their progressive fashion sense. Who wants to look at fat, ugly, dark-haired people anyway? This at least makes them publicly presentable. But that has it's problems, everyone thinks they are closet blondes and not as 'serious' as other dark-haired people.

Blondes define fashion and culture, often being the creators or modelers of the best and newest fashion. We are sought out to pose nude in 'blonde' magazines, which we know almost every dark-haired person has a subscription to and hides from perusal by others. Especially by their non-blonde spouses.

I deeply regret the attitudes of the conservative, religious dark-haired people who think they need to 'cure' blondes with re-education camps where they try to show us how 'unnatural' blondeness is and to brainwash us into accepting the drab, boring dark-haired lifestyle and convince us to abandon our blondeness and 'pass' amongst normal culture by dying our hair dark. Thankfully, we blondes often lack enough brains to wash.

They try to demonstrate that 'blondeness' is only a recent aberration brought about by the development of hair dyes and bleach when any person with a knowledge of history knows that blondes have been here all along.

I personally belong to the very progressive 'Blonde Bimbo' movement, with our increased emphasis on happiness and acceptance of everyone. Unhappy emotions are tiresome and unnecessary and we promote the appreciation of rainbows and butterflies as objects of true beauty.

I applaud early Bimbo pioneers such as Mae West and Marilyn Monroe who bucked the standards of their day and were open, obvious blonde bimbos paving the way for the rest of us to follow in their high-heeled footsteps. Especially Marilyn, who in the highly charged 60s Civil Rights era, made the culturally landmark 'Gentlemen Prefer Blondes' movie, asserting that blondes have a place in society and that we will no longer be ignored. Her performance of 'Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend', cemented her place as one of the blonde bimbo icons, expressing what we all hold dear to our hearts - shiny, expensive, pretty things.

It is a shame that she died during that era like many other notable civil rights icons, killed by a society eager to stick with the old ways and fearful of what it would become if bimbos were allowed equality. Perhaps her dying at her peak has set her up as a martyr for the bimbo cause and a pinnacle of acceptance, happiness, and bimboness that many of us can aspire to.

In More Barbie News...

The Reverend Barbie

It appears that Computer Engineers aren't the only people with their own new Barbie, the Episcopal church has it's own too. The Reverend Barbie even has her own Facebook page.

She presides over the parish of St. Babs-by-the-Sea in beautiful Malibu and her entire group of friends are joining the church as well.

She will soon be joined, I am happy to say, by a diverse group of friends. Bishop Barbie will be African-American; the soon-to-be finished Canon Ken will be Latino, and Ken’s friend will be Deacon Steve, also African-American.

I can't wait to see what her animal companion for this one will be. Probably a fish. Too bad it won't have legs or tentacles though.

Evangelizing Shopping

For those worried about her outfits, she has multiple clerical outfits as well, so she will always be at the height of fashion for the pulpit. She's planning on spreading the good word of Barbie.

“Barbie’s very versatile that way,” said her owner. “She’s open to new possibilities, so evangelism is definitely in her future.”

I can't wait to read the Gospel according to Barbie. "In the beginning there was shopping..."

I Want A Computer Engineer Barbie!

Okay, it's been a long time since I bought a Barbie doll (maybe 6 months *blushes*), but I want this one. Even though I don't like the glasses or the shirt or the bluetooth headset or the ... You get the idea.

Computer Engineer Barbie

As everyone knows, I don't mind being called a Barbie Doll, it happens all the time, often in a derogatory attempt to make me feel bad. But it never does. I like being tall, blonde, and fashionable. I always thank people when they say it, even if they did it sotto voce or as an aside to a friend thinking I couldn't hear it.

In my previous post I think I made a convincing argument why anyone should be happy to be called Barbie. I'm a weird combo many days, I work in the technical world and dress well, wear makeup, and often have some level of heels on. And I work deep in technology, not at the periphery, able to discuss technical matters at the most geeky level. With my extensive background in science and wide range of knowledge, I often surprise people with what I know.

This is one of the first Barbies that really get into the geek world, I can't wait for 'Molecular Biologist Barbie', although I won't hold my breath for that one.

Dakota And The Dakota-ettes

Dakota And The Dakota-ettes
Originally uploaded by Tiessa

The photo I was playing with when I accidentally deleted the prior post was this one which I dub, "Dakota And The Dakota-ettes".

This weekend, I spent sometime at Paradise Lost talking to some old friends about 'the good old days' when I was new to Second Life. I looked around on my hard drive and found this picture, which captures the group of people I spent the most time with back then. In the picture are myself, the one with dark hair in red latex, Helena Kirkorian, Brianicus Quintus, and Dakota Enfield. These three people were some of my earliest friends in Second Life. In this picture, Dakota had just bought a microphone which had poses for appearing like you were singing, so we danced behind her like backup singers and took this picture.

Just about every day, we danced and talked all night long, with conversations ranging from literature (the place was called Paradise Lost how could we avoid it?), philosophy, physics, astronomy, biology, and many more things. Everything was tied together with lots of jokes all a the club created by Malachite Seattle that looked like a cathedral.

The picture is from the original club before it was moved to its own sim. It even had an altar area and main altar like a cathedral. The next chapter of the Mistress Strangelove series deals with what happened to me on that altar. Repeatedly.

Grrrr That's Annoying

I was fiddling around with some of the features of blogger and how Flickr can post pictures to it from within the Flickr interface. I made an experimental post in draft and while experimenting, I deleted the prior post instead of the experimental post. That'll teach me to flip back and forth in between tabs and pay close enough attention.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled silence...

The Terrible Twos

I just received a RezDay present from Veyron, I got the notification in email. I'd completely forgotten about my RezDay since I've been largely absent from SL for many months now. RL reared it's ugly head and made my year pretty hard so far. I've been in 'survival mode' for a while now, which largely means an absence of fun and free time. I just turned three today, which means that my 'Terrible Twos' are over. Yay! I thought I was supposed to be inflicting myself on others, not the other way around.

However, I'm putting my life back into a semblance of order and I'm determined to restore the fun and energy to my life that's been sorely missing. That may or may not mean a larger amount of time in SL, blogging, and the other things I remember having so much fun doing. I feel pretty shattered by RL at the moment, but I can see blue horizons in front of me and I'm heading towards them.

Here's the present she gave me. She always did like to see me mostly naked :)

Blogger Mix And Match: "Mixing RL and SL – The dynamics and pitfalls of living and playing in SL with your RL significant other"

I participated in the Blogger's Mix And Match, allowing my neglected blog to receive a much needed new post and a good dose of something that I know nothing about, playing SL with a RL partner. That matches my post to Vint's blog about Non-profits in SL, another topic I know nothing about, but still wrote far too many words regarding.

Cat Magellan, owner of the Get A Second Life blog, wrote this wonderful post about her meeting, falling in love, and relationship with her partner. Thankfully, she didn't write in Portuguese like the rest of her blog, so I could read and appreciate her story.

Merrick Thor of the N0nslensical blog suggested the topic.

Without further blabbering by me...

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I wish – for the sake of my readers – that I could write a spicy piece about love, disgrace, sorrow, treason and flying plates and knives, but my impressions about the subject are boring, since my story is plain and simple. However, lately, I've found out that it was a very rare thing, so maybe by telling it, it may help some people. Or maybe not, who knows? These things don't depend solely on us…

Starting from the beginning,: one day I entered the grid and blogged about it on my RL blog. A lot of readers followed me. Some of them were bloggers and blog-friends for a long time. So, I've entered the grid and soon, some friends were sort of around. Everybody knows how this works: people get together and start exploring. And doing talking, a lot of talking.

To cut the story short and because 99% will remember that the same happened to them at some time or other, and know how things get going in SL, I became very close to one of these friends. We would walk around, talk, find places, talk, meet people, talk, discover things, talk and then, SL offline, send emails, then talk on the phone and write a lot of weird stuff on our blogs. And one day, with no fuss, not telling anybody else, no parties, we became partners on SL. And very very close friends in RL. We wanted to meet each other, but we lived on different countries, so that was quite difficult to implement, and we continued to talk and talk and talk (and not getting enough sleep…). For a long time we were friends and virtual lovers. For something like 8 or 9 months.

Let me tell you, it's hard. Very hard. Being together everyday and, at the same time, being apart, kills you. It's a very difficult mixture to manage; the completely stupid total happiness and the angst of not knowing. Oh, you know, you are so sure that this is the person you imagine it will be in RL. We started by playing houses in SL, we bought land, then a sim with some friends. You know your partners' favorite curtain colors and you know your partners' soul, inside out. Yes, you are completely sure…except for that 0,000001% of probability that there will be no "klick", no pheromones kicking, no hearts beating fast when you meet face to face. This is all very well, the soul side and soul mating stuff, but RL is made of more than that, let's be realistic.

Well, we survived all those months. Not without efforts, not without guts. As time went by, the more anguished we became. In the end we might as well had forgotten the whole thing, give it up, maybe it wouldn't be worth it. Your friends support you but tell each other you have gone nuts and need medication. I guess that what kept us both going, besides the romantic feelings, was our very strong friendship. We would dream about perfect encounters, but then talk about how we felt very openly with each other. We were very honest, from day zero. That's something to keep in mind, if you want to survive something like that.

Finally, D-day arrived. We met. We survived the first terrible five minutes and the next few hours just talking and looking at each other. And then it seemed like we knew each other forever. We became partners RL, till now. We are together for almost 2 years. We still do not live in the same country, we both have our lives quite settled where we are. We speak every single day, we spend all our holidays together. Some months ago, we found out we were speaking about SL too much. Funny this and a danger to a relationship: we meet in SL and speak about everything possible, and then we go from there and talk about SL most of the time. My partner almost left the grid. I took SL more slowly, and things started working out better for us from then on. Of course, all of this is not without pain or fights: we are an absolutely normal couple who gets mad at all the routine stuff. We argue about, well, almost everything, it seems. We also laugh a lot. Guess we are on the right track here. :)

Oh and btw…he's arriving tomorrow. :D

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Thank you Cat for the wonderful post and good luck with the relationship.

I'm Entering My Terrible Twos

Today, October 13th, 2008, is my second Rez-Day. Last year, my first Rez-Day passed without a post - I was in the middle of a two month hiatus in posting, it was a pretty down point in my life. However, things are looking better and better all of the time, I'm having a lot of fun building in Second Life, writing a bunch of scripts, and in general enjoying myself. When I started, I never would have guessed two years ago at all of the people I'd meet, the fun I'd have, the good times, and the sad times. I can hardly wait to see what will happen in the next two.

It's time for my 'terrible twos'. I pity you all, you thought I was bad before, I'm just beginning .

You Know It's Been A Good Night When The Police Get Involved...

Earlier this evening, I Plurked that I was going dancing this evening. I normally don't talk about real life, the last major post was when I was a real life neko exploring dirty talk in the back of a car. But, I'd like to give you another little glimpse into my real life and why I like policemen.

I went to my usual dance club, the bouncers know me, the bartenders know me and serve me my favorite drinks (without charge), and the DJs know me, playing my favorite music. I'm there about once a week. I go dancing, not to hook up but to dance, a fact that many men seem to not grasp. I frequently close out the club, dancing all night until they throw me out pouting.

Often, especially towards the end of the night, men become desperate and attempt to hit on everyone or anyone, hoping to get lucky. A usual night for me involves fending off 10-15 guys who won't take 'no' for an answer. Most guys who hit on me are fine with me saying 'no' and they go their way, the dozen or so each night that persist too far - grab me, grope me, forcibly kiss me, grab my hand and won't let go, grab my hand and put it on their dick (both outside and inside of their pants), show me their dick, tell me about how big there dick is and all the women they've had sex with, attempt to 'dirty dance' with me, and all manner of behavior that I'd normally associate with ill-mannered baboons.

Just because I gyrate my hips when I dance, that is not a license to expect sex from me. Speaking of licenses...

One guy towards the end of the night was particularly persistent, trying to dance with me, kiss me, put my hand on his dick through his pants, etc. Basically, your typical persistent creep. I left towards the end of the night as usual, saying goodnight to everyone who worked in the club on my way out, I jumped in my car, and drove away; heading home to rest my weary feet. Dancing for 4 hours straight in 5" stilettos makes even my feet tired.

As I pulled away, the creep waved to me from his silver Mercedes. I ignored him and drove away. I went a few blocks and turned to pull on the highway. I looked in my rear mirror and noticed a silver car behind me, could be a Mercedes, could be nearly anything. He can't be stupid enough to be following me, can he? I drove for a while, watching the silver car behind me, hoping it wasn't the creep. But, every time I changed a lane, a few moments later the silver car changed lanes. I began to wonder what to do, should I call 911, what?

I decided to test my theory that it was the creep, I pulled off at the next exit, noting that the silver car swerved over two lanes to follow me off. Crap, it had to be him. I decided to drive around a few blocks quickly in an attempt to lose him, otherwise it would be time to find a policeman and try to attract his attention, or call 911. My sore feet just wanted to get home, but I also didn't want the creep to follow me there and rape me.

I went around a couple of blocks rather quickly, and I noticed that he was falling behind, a few more blocks and I could zip back on the highway and he wouldn't see me. I sped up a bit and slid around a few corners, just one more corner to go and I would be around it before he could see which way I turned. I zoomed around the corner and headed for the highway...

Then, I saw the red flashing lights behind me. Darn! Where were you about two minutes ago?

I pulled over, turned off my car, rolled down my window and waited for my erstwhile savior. The cop swaggered out of his car and came to my window, I greeted him with, "Thank you so much officer for pulling me over, you saved me." I then babbled about leaving a dance club, a silver car following me, trying to lose the car, etc. The few times I've been pulled over have nearly always started with a 'thank you' to the officer, I think it confuses them, they probably hear nothing but excuses, insults, pleading, etc. Never a 'thank you', 'you're doing a great job', or any other acknowledgement. It's my mission to I brighten their day; they have a rough enough time without me making it worse.

"I didn't see any car following you Miss."

"I'm just glad you came to my rescue, Officer... Jim," I said glancing at his name tag and flashing him the biggest, most grateful smile I could. The name has been changed to protect the besotted.

"Anyway Miss, I'd like to see your license, insurance, and registration."

"Anything you want officer. It was sliding through a stop sign wasn't it."

"Yes, Miss."

I rummaged in my purse, produced my license and handed it to him. I then opened the glove compartment and began to look for the rest of the documents he wanted. Who knows if they were even in there, I haven't had an accident or been pulled over by a cop in years.

I started to pull things out...

"Hmm, no this isn't it, but... is this a tire gauge officer?"

"Yes Miss."

"I needed one the other day, I have to remember that I have one in here..." I toss it back in and continue to look.

I bent over, trying to show as much of my legs under my tiny black miniskirt as I could. Yes, I'm shameless, but I didn't want a ticket.

Everytime I brought something back from the glove compartment, I made certain to look into his eyes with my blue eyes, bat my long black lashes, and show off all of the cleavage I could muster in my gold sequined low-cut camisole. A few flips of blond hair never hurt either.

I began to hand him all sorts of junk, asking him very politely to hold it while I continued to look. I pulled out the owner's manual, flipped through it, took out a few random papers, unfolded them, glanced at them, and handed them to officer Jim, while I babbled on about him rescuing me, the silver Mercedes, how afraid I was, etc.

He had quite a pile of random odds and ends in his hands when he finally said, "Miss, please take these back, I'd like to check on something." Finally, I was wondering how much stuff I needed to pile on his hands before he'd just go check my record. He took my license and headed back to his car, looked it up in the database, obviously found out that my record was spotless and wandered back. While he was gone, I did eventually find my registration and insurance.

He handed back my license, "Here you go Miss, I'm letting you off with a warning tonight, make certain you come to a full stop at all stop-signs."

"Yes, officer," I looked directly in his eyes and smiled as sweetly as I could, "let my say again, thank you for saving me, I was so afraid." I blew him a kiss, waved, and drove off. Even if he'd given me a ticket, I wouldn't have complained, just to guarantee the silver Mercedes creep wouldn't find me.

All the rest of the way home, I kept looking in my mirror, paranoid about silver Mercedes cars near me. This incident is just another example of why I love cops.

M Linden, Here's Why...

Reuters reports on SLCC and the reception Philip and M, received:

“Last year when I was here I had the ‘Missing Image’ T-shirt,” Rosedale said, alluding to his apology for bugs at SLCC 2007. “I think we made pretty good progress.”

The Second Life community has its own ideas. New Linden CEO Mark Kingdon followed Rosedale and asked the crowd: “We’re working hard to improve stability. Are you seeing that?” But Kingdon’s question was met with a stony silence from the crowd.

In the last week:
9/4: Logins unavailable to some residents (Duration: ~20 minutes)
9/4: Multiple Regions Offline (Duration: ~2.5 hours)
9/5: 600 Regions Down (Duration: ~2.5 hours)
9/5: Live Chat Temporarily Unavailable (Duration: ~9 hours)
9/5: Network issues (Duration: ~11 hours)
9/6: Network Troubles (Duration: ~1.5 hours)
9/7: Network Issues Again Affecting Inworld Functions (Duration: ~3.5 hours)
9/8: Network Issues Affecting Inworld Services (Duration: ~2.5 hours)
9/8: Issues with Public Issue Tracker and Wiki Access (Duration: ~9 hours)
9/9: Network Issues Affecting Inworld Services (Duration: ?????)
9/10: About 400 to be restarted shortly (Duration: ????)
9/11: Server Crash Affecting Logins (Duration: ~1 hour)

Granted, some of these are more significant than others, and I'm very glad LL actually provides the status blog; it was worse before that.

But everyday for the last week (I was not inclined to go back farther), there has been something happening. It seems like every day or two when I'm in-world, there is a global message, "there is an issues yadda, yadda, yadda please don't spend money or do anything useful."

They ought to be glad that it was only a stony silence that greeted them instead of stones.

I Got Pwned!

Tiessa's New Look
Originally uploaded by Tiessa

Oh wait, I purposefully sold myself. To my complete surprise, I was not purchased by Codie, who seemed to purchase everyone else that day. She did bid on me, but the person who finally paid over L$14,000 for me was the wonderful and delightful Celebrity Trollop, editor-in-chief and publisher of Second Style magazine. I think I had only been at events with her once or twice in the past, and I don't believe I've ever spoken more than a word to two to her. But, I always assumed someone with such a clever name must be fun - I was right, she's very fun and amusing.

I think she's tired of my fashion disasters and wished to save the world from being exposed to them. Interestingly enough, she'd never heard of my Mistress Strangelove series, but assumed I was kinky. I wonder if selling yourself at a slave auction gave that away?

The reason I know she wanted to save the world from my current style, is that she immediately took me shopping and did a make-over on me.

Let's just say I'm stunned by the results. I realized I hadn't spent much time shopping for skins in SL in over a year - yes, a year. When I last looked at skins, semi-decent ones cost over L$3k for one skin and it wasn't much better than the L$1k for 5 I had already purchased. Also, I was away for a while and not very active for some time, but I didn't realize things had changed this much.

I'm very happy Mistress Celebrity or Mistress Trollop broke me out of my rut. But now she's re-awakened the shopping addict in me, there goes the credit cards again.

I'm having problems deciding what I should call myself, Mistress Celebrity's Pet or Mistress Trollop's Trollop.

Who Wants To Own Me?

Today, at the blogger party, I'm being auctioned off. Come, place a bid, and win my services for 24 hours.

I'll make it worth your while ;)

Wearing Latex In The Garden

Mistress Veyron instructed me to post a picture of myself in this latex outfit while in the garden at my palace.

AlienHearts "Die In Heaven" Homemade Video

These are pictures I took of the 2008 New Year's Party that AlienHearts played. The music is Amathaa's awesome song, "Die In Heaven"