I was so excited to go to the Gaeta 1 / Zindra Town Hall, and I ended up leaving that meeting feeling disappointed.
First of all, I didn’t want to say this, but I will. The Town Hall could have been planned so much better. Dear Lindens, please make a question submission form, collect questions throughout the week, then choose the most informative ones to answer live. Letting everyone ask questions in local chat was complete chaos, and a lot of people couldn’t stay on topic. I was also surprised it was entirely handled through chat. You know that meme that says, this could have been an email? Yeah. That.
This meeting could have been genuinely informative if they had come in with a clear list of answers, explained exactly what residents need to know, then saved the last 15 minutes for open Q&A. Why that didn’t happen is anybody’s guess. Sometimes these meetings feel like Linden employees struggle with creating an agenda and sticking to it.
I was also disappointed to learn that residents who bought in on April 15 or after the expansion blog post went live seem to be treated like second class citizens. The relocation process should not prioritize only the biggest landowners or the people who have held land there the longest.
If I were managing this move, I would contact every current landowner, I think they said there were around 349, and ask two simple questions:
Do you want to move to New Zindra?
Can you move now?
If the answer is yes to both, put those residents at the top of the migration list and start moving them immediately. The people with more complex requests, unusual parcel needs, or plans to relocate elsewhere can be handled afterward.
Residents who are ready now should be first in line. Tier doesn’t stop while people sit in limbo, and it would be nice if Linden Lab remembered that.
I hope this whole thing wraps up within weeks. If the new continent is ready to go, I’m ready to move too.
And now onto what I’m wearing, because even when it isn’t a fashion post, it somehow becomes one.
Another round of Anthology just opened, and this shimmery dress is the Artemis Dress by Madame Noir. This dress is an example of when PBR is done so well it creates reflections and highlights correctly. With this outfit, I needed to find a place to serve as the backdrop for my photo. I opened the Destinations menu in-world looking for a music venue, and somehow ended up outside an 80s movie theater. I love The Breakfast Club, so naturally I had to take the picture in front of the poster.
What I’m Wearing:
Madame Noir – Artemis Dress @ Anthology
Cheezu – Bias Phone
Stealthic – Vesper
Yummy – Luxury Earring Collection (Wrapped Pearl)
Glam Affair – Lumi (L004)
LeLutka – Billie Mesh Head
The Lindens have a lot of experience with town halls, which are always fascinating sociological experiments on people, and certainly know how to run this railroad by taking questions in advance and sorting them.
This format of text and free-for-all was chosen for a DIFFERENT reason: to hand-hold, to let people vent, to see how bad things were, to convey information NOT in Voice, which some people can’t get to work, and which creates a power imbalance. Why? Because the Lindens are in Voice, and everyone else has to type, and who ever can type the fastest and the most wins.
The drawback of course is that you couldn’t tell which questions were answered already if you were late or unable to scroll through a fantastic wall o-text. Still, I actually think MORE information was extracted from the Lindens in this format than their canned performative Voice dog-and-pony shows. Really.
The operative figure is 349 — I asked that question. HOW MANY PEOPLE affected. When you hear sad stories of individuals scrolled doomfully in chat — my 20-year hideaway with my my friends precious treasures who died in RL is going to be deleted! — or “my 14-sim community of 50 people is going to be impossible to move without losses” — you think that’s the face of Gaeta.
But it’s not, and the Lindens spell it out: there is more demand for Adult land. They have trouble breaking the cartel of land barons who buy and hold and sell for a huge price as there is no mechanism, given their “free land market” concept, to break. the ONLY thing is to dilute the supply. But then how to justify spinning even more expensive Amazon servers? Answer: delete Gaeta, which has…349 people “and groups”. That means MORE people of course. But it’s not more than 1000. And likely less. So the Lindens conveyed the facts, and most of all, face-to-face, in chat, accessibly, live, rather than canned, they hand-held and listened to sad stories. That was the purpose. They made reassurances over and over. That’s what this is for. They even promised a town hall JUST with Gaeta citizens (pro-tip: only include land owners with claim dates before April 2026!).
Yes, it might have been an email, but I think most people in the actual situation of having to move their homes felt better after this psychological group hug.
All posts are fashion posts.