[sldev] Opening the server source?

Adam Frisby adam at gwala.net
Fri Jun 29 13:57:52 PDT 2007


The key here however is that LL wants to be ready to accept outside 
servers before they enable it. Right now the server is extremely trusted 
- everything occurs on the server. Money handling, etc is just a few of 
the things that could be exploited.

Kelly's email from earlier is really worth looking at for the reasons as 
to why LL wont be opening the sim any time soon (however I dont doubt it 
will happen, just probably not in the next 12 months.)

Adam

Mike Monkowski wrote:

> Chance Unknown wrote:
> 
>> Putting on a Linden Hat : Why would I open source that item that is 
>> generating me lots of cash? I know that my cash cow island owners 
>> would be flirting with another hosting company if I did that. So open 
>> source my sim software??? mmmmmmm nah.
> 
> 
> Remember that the server side is more than just sim servers.  Those sim 
> servers require investment in hardware and maintenence.  That is 
> expense.  That is a major scalability problem.
> 
> Suppose LL allowed private sims that were virtually connected to the 
> main grid, but still required the standard LL login to get the database 
> services.  Users logged on to both the private sims and the main grid 
> would see a seamless connection.  Users on the main grid, not logged on 
> to the private sims would see a locked door, that would be opened by 
> logging on to the private sim.
> 
> Without logging on to the main grid, the private sim would be 
> essentially inoperable.  So LL makes its money by charging for access to 
> the database servers.  If you take away the cost of the sim server, the 
> access charge can be significantly less, but the profit can remain the 
> same.
> 
> It's a matter of separating the physics and scripting functions from the 
> rest and applying proper security to messaging.  OK, so it's probably 
> not that easy, but you get the idea.
> 
> LL gets a benefit because it gets subscribers without having to host the 
> whole thing.  Private hosts get the benefit of minimal lag, privacy for 
> confidential information, and the ability to customize the behavior of 
> their worlds.
> 
> It's really a question of what business LL wants to engage in.  I don't 
> think their goal is to manage more and more server farms, because their 
> focus would have seen a support staff that scales with the size of the 
> farms.  That doesn't seem to be the case.
> 
> Mike
> 
> 
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