Rezzable is Moving-on from Second Life

Thank you for being in Second Life :-) just where did all the kind people go?

Rezzable is run by a guy with very little experience in marketing and sales. It's hard for some people to mix art and business. There was no evil plot to disenfranchise the talented builders that made it all possible, just bad business sense. A successful business requires careful planning, good communication, and daily monitoring.  Without marketing savvy and a lot more attention, Rezzable will never be more than a hobby.  Too bad for SL, too bad for Hobo, too bad for the builders that hoped for a happy mix of creativity and success.

The Carnival of Doom is the only sim I ever even play in on SL. I've been there with my partner since we first rezzed into SL. Without it, there won't be another place that we enjoy to be at as much. This is really sad to read and hear from a blog entry. Many of our friends love the sim, too. First the trailer park, now The Carnival! It's offical. Come mid-july (which is like, next week), SL won't be a fun game anymore. Homeless.

@ Hobo Islander, if you want to find out about me you can look on this website http://rezzable.com/rezzable-team . We never hid behind avatars. We paid to host the Hobo community when everyone else turned them down--including the Lindens. We always appreciated what the Hobos are about and were glad to be able to spend time together. Is that naive or sympathetic? We were hoping to see more flow from the Gateway program that dropped tons of noobs but were unable. I think if you don't try something you won't really know what can work. And really our SL experience has been about a lot of experiments, some worked, some flopped.

It is not at all true that Rezzable (or myself) "screws some people" or is arrogant. We have been fair and firm with people. We treat people with respect. That doesn't mean we haven't made mistake--but we have stood-up  to all our commitments, sometimes way beyond the call.  It is even an unusually low and cynical set of comments from a typically dyspeptic Prok to suggest otherwise.  Clearly we do not accept at all that because we are leaving SL that simplistic "common sense" of how the web is like a corner shop at the end of the day is really anything more than just the best thing that certain people can come up with.  We will continue to explore and take chances--the spirit of which is essential even though the outcome is uncertain.

@  Titanium--sorry if this announcement was a surprise to some people. We had discussed with some people, but really best this is to get the news out and plan to make the last few weeks on the grid fun enough.

@ Peter -- thanks for comments and your feedback over the years. While OpenSim is not a high-performance machine yet, it has a lot of potential. It is a question of one's objectives. We simply could not make and operate something like Heritage Key with SL the way it is set-up.

@ Raggedy--Doom is a great area. We will run it on the Rezzable Grid and hope you will visit and enjoy it there.

This news moves two emotions through me as I've been lucky enough to be a part of Rezzables from the on start.  So much beauty will leave SL with them going away.  Jon brought so much inspiration and character to life in Second Life with the Greenies, King Tut, and most of all Black Swan, which became a second home for me.  Rezzables projects not only put me in complete awe but inspired my imagination beyond limits and at times brought tears to my eyes at the beauty that was created through such creative minds that built the projects. 

It all makes me really sad to see them leave SL but at the same time I know they will go on to do bigger and better things.  I hope to be as fortunate as I have been to be a part of it as well. 

They may be gone from SL but they will never be forgotten within that world.  I for one will never forget the impressions your legacy has left in my mind. 

Much love and see you on the other side

Rebel Hope

As a past employee of the Rezzables, there were definately struggles working with everyone. When I worked for this company, no one was ever on the same page. There was little communication between the builders/scripters and the actual sim workers, such as I was. I simply hired and worked with staff to hold events and sort of keep up with what wasn't working in the sims I was put in charge of. For whatever reason, nothing was ever fixed.. but while I worked in these sims, they were amazing. They were my home and where I felt I belonged. The troubles within the staff or not, the 40 sims that were created were amazing and there will probably not ever be another group of sims quite like it. When Surfline closed, many residents who practically lived there asked me why it was closing, and even though I didn't have an answer.. it was amazing to me that a few people can create such a place where people want to be. Those group of 3 sims beautifully depicted wonderul beaches and they were extremely relaxing. Its been almost a year since I left the Rezzable company and I've actually regreted leaving. But, I do wish RaR, and who ever else worked closely with him, good luck. May your new adventures bring you the sucess you desire.

Kameko Insoo

I am thankful for my experiences with rezzables. i have not only learned a lot, but have been inspired as an artist. i had the opportunity to work with them and share many long conversations with jon who i think is an amazing thinker, artist and very much a visionary. their sims inspired so many ideas in my mind that i truly couldn't contain them all. i sitll have a HUGE rezzables folder full of fun projects i hope to do one day.

i always loved getting random tp's by jon to see a new build and was always blown away. i had the opportunity to model in the black swan show and participate in a few of those :) the first show i participated in inspired me to make "swan song" which ended up being chosen to be shown in florence in an amazing virtual world exibit.

i have been totally honored to work with the rezzable team. i will say to profky, if one thinks any business dealings with anyone will be easy or perfect, then one should not do business. in any dealings i had with rezzables, things always worked out due to what i believe was a mutal respect and commitment by both parties.

also one must understand that with any business things need to be sorted thru, there are often changes, misunderstandings, and how one chooses to deal with those things effects the outcome. i can say, all of the outcomes of my dealings were great and i admire and respect the rezzables team. none of us is perfect, knowing that it's our responsiblity to sort out any differnences. playing "victim" often is just giving up and wanting to blame others for choices you made yourself.

i wish you all the best thank you for everything AND...

THANK YOU FOR LETTING ME HIJACK BLACK SWAN FOR MY BIRTHDAY PARTY AND... not only doing that but having your builders build and letting me bug you, and all you did for one of the best birthday's i have ever had in my life. it was very generous and a dream i never imagined :0)

selam to you sweet lokum, and jon too, (you ask her what it means!) hahaah

i hope to dream more with you in the future.

xoxoxoxooxox,

caLLie

What does Rezzable know that LL isn't telling us?

And yea LL needs to look outside at that 10% and more unemployment and the fact a depression really is happening. I guess one rich guy attitude could be "Hey they will pay high prices in abysmal economies or we will close it all up and lock the playground because, after all, we have plenty millions and the bad economy in no way affects us rich guys personally. Let them eat cake!"

I don't like some aspects of what all went on but business is business. The only question remaining is if LL actually knows how many businesses and sims are really closing up in Second Life because the tier is no longer a justifiable expense during a real live depression. Do the numbers get "jimmied" before they make it to the executive level? Do the execs at LL never read the blogs? Are they completely out of touch with what is going on inside SL. a place they do not directly depend on for income? Each business running a sim in SL pays one Linden's monthly food bill. The more close the tighter it is going to get. LL better start waking up and doing something to staunch the arterial bleed going on right now.

Hey RAR,why are you not beta testing bluemars (or maybe you are!) That seems to be high octane full emersive potential right there!!! Open sim broken sim!! The builds you hosted on sl were refeshing awesome hangouts, I will always rememeber the epic grid you had for a while with lovely builds all connected together. peace and good luck

There's a curious statement here claiming that "the Lindens wouldn't host the Hobos".

Huh?

The Lindens have hosted the Hobos for years in Calleta, and are still hosting them on Governor Linden land. The Lindens gave them the largest parcel of any of the dozen or so resident-designed infohubs of the 2005 era. They have a great build, lots of content, and lots of newbies they help there. Of course, they have their struggles there because they can't control the land, and the Lindens, after initially showing interest in helping the resident infohubs more had their attention wander -- and then began competing with them with a dozen of their own new infohubs, as they always do.

But to claim that the Lindens "wouldn't host the Hobos" is just wack. They are hosting them.

I've been an Opensimmer for over a year now, I discovered Opensim, OSGrid to be precise shortly after discovering SL, and someone there just gave  me a region for free, to build on. For SLers this is hard to imagine to be given an entire region just like that -knock yourself out-, 45.000 theoretical prims inclusive. Back then it was mostly techies running test sims, very few builders and the lands looked still largely bland and wild.

Things have changed a lot, the progress has been tremendous both technically and from the builders/creatives side, and while I'll never understand why people would choose C# to create non-proprietary code, I've really loved seing the development and progress happening.

With Rezzable leaving SL and choosing Opensim as their new platform, a new phase has begun. Sure, there are some good builds and creative minds in OpenSimulator based grids, but it's hard to find anything yet with the type of creative power packed into the Rezzable sims. When I found out today, I went WOW.

However, it's not a feeling of victory over SL, most of us Opensimmers love SL and the creativity which forms an entirely new kind of digital art genre. I visit SL regularly, and the Rezzable sims were on my top 10 destinations always. I hope the Rezzable people will enable HyperGrid so it would be easy to drop by without registering a new account, however I'll register a new account if I have to of course.

As for the people being upset that the Rezzables are moving shop, it's totally understandalbe, albeit that Profoky character strikes me as someone acting out a horrible cunth, that's clearly over the top, nasty. It's good trolling no doubt, question is, does he/she know sie's a troll? Few good trolls know they are and regain mental health before they realize the glory of being master of infuriation. Hehehe.

So my feelings are mixed. I cry on one eye for SL, and laugh on the other for OpenSimulator. Opensource or not, this age is not kind to monopolists.

So, dear Rezzable Crew, I send some good energy towards you, may your plans bear lucious fruits!

@ Ann -- actions speak loudest.

@ Prok, i think the full apology posted from the builder that insulted us would have closed that matter to which you are refering (which is about 18 months ago I think).  Pehaps your are not current--or trying to fling some mud for effect.  The Hobos for the record, were turned down by the Lindens and they needed a host for Hobo Island which we eager supported as we believe strongly in their spirit of sharing and helping people.  I really hope they will join us over at our new grids. As far as land business goes, we have never been interested in it. I think it is a strange business when LL is wholesaling and competing in the retail market at the same time. But I guess there is still some chance for people to make money and good for them. I think it is suspect that LL offers certain companies different land pricing, but I guess you must benefit from that.  and of course the OpenSpace rip-off and the fact that LL is not publishing land data any longer( or ever again ) makes any business related to land unattractive as only the market-maker has the information and controls capacity.

 There's a diversity of opinion over on Hobo Island but many of us Hobos are actually sorry to see Rezzable depart SL.  For many of us the Rezzable sims were always special places to visit and marvel at what imagination and skill could pull off.   The few Rezzables we met over on Hobo, we were always kind of interested in knowing more about them and what they were up to.  But, like I said, the hobos are a  diverse lot with lots of opinions.  

I shutter to get in between Prok and her target but most of the Hobo group moved to Hobo Island from Calleta a good year or two ago.  We managed to obtain the island, did a nice build here (continuing the urban decay post-industrial  aesthetic from Calleta).  We were subsidized at first by someone who also departed SL,  had the island empty for a while and offered it to us.  When that ended the Lindens were approached about incorporating the Island into one of their new residents places.  Well, no sale there.  So, Rezzables picked up the tab and moved the Island adjacent to Doom.   Nice while it lasted.   

In the larger scheme of things I worry SL will die the death of a thousand cuts.  You can't point at any one thing but  a tipping point is there.

Argo N. 

@profky

why do you have to call lokum names? i'd HOPE someone who worked for me would be a "fan girl" of my brand. duh. or no, i want someone who hates my company, me and brand??? hello????? if your employess aren't "fans" and don't believe in what you do, why have them?

also... rezzables is NOT the goverment. they don't have to give and keep people employed if they don't need them  anymore. i dont' see what your question is for other to imply negativity and put them down.

are they perfect? of course not. have they made mistakes? i'd hope so just so i know they are human. there's dirt where ever you look if you wanna find it.

cc

I'm going to miss rezzable sims, I love Black Swan, I think it was one of the first sims I went In SL that left me speechless with all that creativity. beauty and talent.

I wish you luck on the new adventure.

Well... what other reaction can I honestly say I have?

I haven't been around much in SL the past seven or eight months because of circumstances beyond my control--I was involuntarily recalled back into the US Army after getting out a couple of years ago, and I am currently in Baghdad.  While I do have an internet connection here, Iraqi internet isn't really very good for connecting to SL, although I do try from time to time.

I hadn't really been in SL for long when I stumbled across Greenies; I fell in love with it and made it my home.  I made many wonderful friends there and had an insane amount of fun there... and I hope I don't sound somewhat selfish when I say I'm glad that Greenies Home will still be in SL, because I've been looking forward to returning to it.  I will, however, miss the other Rezzable sims.  I was sad to hear that Greenies Lawn closed recently, and I've enjoyed irregular visits to Tunnel of Light and Black Swan.  Say what you will about business ventures and other nebulous concepts; SL is richer for having had Rezzable and its artists, and will be poorer--much poorer--to have it leave.

If Greenies is indeed still around when I am finally able to use SL again like I used to (which may not be until I redeploy home), I still plan on spending much of my SL time there, and showing newbies around and recommending it to people as I always have.

Prok, I have never met you in SL or otherwise, but you're a well-known personality inside and outside of Second Life, and not always for good reasons.  You're welcome to your opinions about Rezzable and its business approach--or any other topic, of course--but the old saying "you'll attract more flies with honey than with vinegar" is a true statement in the real world as it is in the virtual world.  Publically displaying your distaste for RightAsRain's business approach or outlook on what virtual worlds can be capable of is one thing; making your views as acidic and spiteful as possible is really just a waste of your time.  If you have a better business model, apply it to your own business--and for the sake of keeping SL alive, please, feel free to share your wisdom with others.  There is no need to play the "I told you so" game by jumping at the chance to rub it in someone else's face... and on their website, no less.  If you have an opinion to share, even if it is a criticism, it is perfectly possible to present it in a reasonable and constructive manner.  You may find that people will take such opinions more seriously as a result.

I will miss not getting to see new projects, new ideas, and new content from Rezzable's creative minds.  I truly hope that the new course you've chosen proves to be a success, and I hope to see Greenies in SL as long as possible, even if it's just me selfishly clinging onto my favorite part of SL.  I also hope to still glimpse the Rezzable folks in Greenies once in a while, once I make my way back.

Best of luck, you guys.

your excessive junkyard freebies, non-buyable art shows, and strange lingerie lol.

some artists, brilliant artists unable to reclaim their own content, working slave jobs in reall life to keep their power turned on whil LL makes so much dough they are like kings, and we still have asset server problems and giant lag spikes.

WOW has better servers

Crimson Shadow's Last Dance 7-15-09 @ 12 Noon SLT - You're Invited!

lol @ Prok - after all these years and you're still after my men I see *grins*

I have worked for and with Rezzable for at least 2 years, in many different capacities. Jimmy Thomson created a wonderful gothic castle in a sandbox. Little did we know that this sandbox is what would bring us together with Rezzable. But it did! And, the rest is history!

I want to thank Rezzable for hosting our home, Crimson Shadow. They've went beyond just hosting the sim. They've paid for our salaries, they've paid for the build, they've paid those wonderful content creators to fill the boutique with original art, and they've maintained relationships with the staff through the years.

We will be very sorry to see Crimson Shadow leave the LL grid. Yet, we are very excited to see what new things Rezzable will have in store for us on their own grid.

The Crimson Shadow Family will live on in SecondLife. Till Staked Do Us Part!!

Without Rezzable, I would not have met some of the people in SL that have become the most dear to my black little heart. So, I thank you for that too!

I see alot of talk about the faults and the flaws... don't we all have those?

I wish Rezzable many more happy years as they experiment with new technologies and continue their work and support of their artists.

~ Dreams Lightcloud

I'm sad and really sorry for all those people who called creative, unique and stunning sims like Tunnel of Light, Crimson Shadow, Carnival of Doom, Black Swan or Greenies Lawn their home. It is a big loss for Second Life and its community.

I have worked for Rezzable, just like dreams, since august / september 2007. I could follow the development of their brands and projects as manager of many beautiful sims such as Surfline, Cannery, Dump and Greenies Home. You need a clear concept, a clever marketing strategy and a connection to the SL community to keep so many sims alive. The most important thing for a company is to keep and acquire consumers, push the sales with a successful marketing mix and realize sustainable profit to cover personell costs, rental charges and variable costs. Rezzable did many unintelligible mistakes in the past and I agree with critics that they could have done it way better.

But fact is that they gave us many memorable experiences, supported art, fashion and music in SL (Garden of NPIRL Delights, live concerts at Greenies Home), invented useful tools like the virtual directory and gave many different groups such as vampires, carnies, aliens or hobos a home.

I cant tell much about the RL Rezzable staff because our contact isnt such close at all. Jon / RaR is a visionary. He loves to try new stuff and is very excited about whats going on in direction virtual world and new internet technologies. But it seems he rushs too fast and forgets about important things. Lokum is very helpful and more involved in the SL community. Sometimes you need to be very patient with her but it pays off. The magic formula is to talk with her and be dogged. She does her job well and is like always busy. Because Jon is the boss she needs to acquiesce time to time .. or maybe very often. That doesn't make her a fan-girl. You don't always agree with decisions your boss renders. But thats life. Sometimes i doubt the business sense of my RL boss too, although I really like him.

I wonder why people like Prokofy slader so much. Seems he didnt like Greenies Home and all the other sims. Thats really pitiful. We all make mistakes which do have consequences and I am sure he isnt innocent at all. One consequence is that people will lose their SL job. But for most it isn't about the money ... more about the loss of their home and the sim community. I hope some member of the Carnival and Crimson staff will join my team at Greenies. I am not sure what Rezzable's plans for this sim are but i hope we gonna have more events and can give many people a new home.

Big thanks to Rezzable, the sim creators and the sim staff who filled all those wonderful places with life and fun. I wish you for the future much luck and success and i hope Rezzable's open grid will work out. The Heritage Key grid is already open for public. It has still some problems but it's a visit worth.

I marvel how normal, ordinary criticism about the obvious facts here is taking as "trolling" or some other ridiculous nonsense.

The Hobos, for the record, are in fact hosted in Calletta, Open your map, go there, and stop being an ass. That *is* being hosted by the Lindens. If they are turned down for the Community Gateway program, I can imagine that's for one simple reason: the Lindens seem to have cynically conceived of this newbie stream giveaway as a perk for only one thing: buying lots of sims, or hosting lots of stores that sell content that give the Lindens commissions on XStreet. Cynical, but then, the Lindens are still in business for being cynical land dealers and merchandisers. And...you aren't. Your hosting of the Hobos is even MORE cynical if you have no means to sustain it financially. Shame on you, for posturing around them and trying to look like a community hero.

I'm hardly referring to some matter of 18 months ago whose reference is entirely opaque to me. I'm referring to other builders who came and went  -- or even remained, with decidedly negative experiences, and it's indicative of your bullying that they are silent. Or of their desire to keep their resumes free of drama. even if they know they are in the right.

Once again: how many people did you fire inworld, before you hired Prad?!

The idea that the land business is a "strange business" is part of your whole ideological, technocommunist, dysfunctional shtick. It's hugely stupid. The Lindens laid down the business model. There are few other ways to make sims pay for themselves but land development, services, and content sales. Only RL foundation or government grants, or some really exotic RL tie-in with a commercial ad campaign or something would substitute for those basic facts of the grid -- and of the Internet, in fact, if you can't sell RL products trucked by RL trucks.

Um, I don't benefit from any special land pricing. And in fact, I don't see that in fact there is such a discount chart, but if there is, I wouldn't be surprised or shocked by some sort of hypocrisy, because giving people who are large buyers or long-term customers bulk discounts is normal in any retail business.

The Lindens recently published the land data as you know. Of course, those in the land sales business (that would NOT be me) have scripts that regularly count the land owned by major land dealers, including Governor Linden, and more or less keep tabs on these figures even without publication. Of course it's good to publish them, and I've been pushing for this a lot longer than you have.

You are out of touch with basic business realities, but then, that's not surprising given how ideological you are, and how spectacularly you've failed with this cynical ideology of Free. The openspace sims were a commodity that were too low-priced given the resources they hogged when exploitative land dealers simply bought huge quantities of them to flip. They are smarter than you or me in exploiting these windfalls that come along due to the basic ideological rather than pragmatic nature of the Linden business. The Lindens then react abruptly and hysterically when they discover once again that their models are too idealistic. Despite all the fake howling and propaganda, openspaces were used for overburdened rentals, not art, and those land dealers howled the loudest who had flipped them the hardest. They learned how to play this game. You didn't. There is a balance, however, and many people remain in the land development and content sales business without the spectacular and cynical failure that you have perpetrated, all the way congratulating yourself.

Er, I think "what's wrong" with us is that we are not German Romantics.

And that's a good thing.

German Romanticism has led to more than one type of doom in our real world.

Sooooo....

"I want to thank Rezzable for hosting our home, Crimson Shadow. They've went beyond just hosting the sim. They've paid for our salaries, they've paid for the build, they've paid those wonderful content creators to fill the boutique with original art, and they've maintained relationships with the staff through the years."

Rezzable is going to keep paying your salary? Keep paying for builds? Keep up relationships? Could you confirm that?

The new project "Heritage" seems to me to be doomed. It takes a hugely tacky and low-balling "popular" approach to trying to be "educational" by trying to ahistorically and even falsely dig out of history the most mass-culture sort of "appealing" aspects like drinking, sex, and rock 'n roll, and try to lure in the masses this way. It's retarded. It will fail, even with those masses.

As a person that has been working with OpenSim for the past two years, I've come to believe that it's just what the doctor ordered. I love it. I do. Just as I have enjoyed the SL platform and the Linden technology.

Thank you Rezzable for your work and contributions to SL. You have helped to make SL a fun and exciting place to be. Much best wishes in the future with your new endeavors. Keep being creative.

Ticket for removing regions just sent. On to the next adventures...

LL confirmed that the Regions will be deactivated as of 17 July. So maybe a last chance to visit them now. ;(

Ravin,

Wishing you Godspeed and God bless your safe return.

Many hugs of appreciation to you and all of you guys and gals out there.

 Vary well put I agree and thank you for posting.

Well i find it a damn shame that its all gone ....

I was Always very intriged by the charmes of the nicest neon glowy place Tunnel of Light , and 1st time there i fell in love with the place and actualy never left due to one of the nice mannagers there that employed me @ the club inside the tunnel of light .....

To bad there was no room for my bed to place ... :D

I found out that Resseble had alot to offer in artists that worked for them , what you saw there mostly wasnt seen anywhere else , like the statues @ the black swan for example , awesome detailed , expencive , but worth a price , party's where best in glow and always came to there right @ Haze due to its original enviroment ...

I wasnt so keen on Crimson tough , anyway also a detailed place for the one who where in to vampiric stuff s im sure it had its charm aswell :))hehe , Anyway , i loved djing for Rezzeble and find it a shame sinds its very artistic , good pepole , and we gave our best to give the pepole a nice party next to the awesome vieuwz :))

Id like to thank the mannagers Dreamy & Hiro for believing in me , thx u 2 :D , the top of mannagement aswell ! And i like to thank Rezzeble for this awesome Sim expirience they have provided us and a nice work enviroment to work at :))

My 50c to you all :) Thx for all :)

GrtZ , Dj Indigo

@venk--always a pleasure to work with and thanks for all the great shots and for making stuff look more amazing. You rock.