Linden Lab have blogged news of what may well be a very interesting move by Onlive in terms of their SL Go product aimed at mobile devices. The pricing changes include a reduced per hour pricing but more importantly, there’s a monthly subscription plan.
The update prices are :
- Monthly unlimited usage subscription plan for $9.95US/£6.95UK. No commitment – cancel anytime
- Reduced hourly rates – only $1US/£0.70UK per hour (the free 20-minute trial remains in effect)
However there’s more, when SL Go was initially launched it was only available to people living in Canada, United Kingdom or United States but now the product is available in 36 countries, including The Vatican City, I wonder if his holiness is popping in now and then. The full list of 36 countries :
Andorra, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lichtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, San Marino, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States, Vatican City.
These are really positive and brave moves from OnLive, when the product was first launched there was a lot of debate about hourly fees and what many perceived as a 1990’s pricing model. However Dennis Harper of Onlive did say to Draxtor Despres : “We need to study usage pattern and we may be able to in short order offer a subscription package! “
Well it seems they have indeed studied those usage patterns and decided that a subscription package can be offered.
There’s more about this on the Onlive Blog itself : SL Go: New Pricing, Support for More Countries where they say:
It’s been almost a month since we launched the beta of SL® Go, our mobile viewer for Second Life®, and the response from the SL community has been very positive. Second Life residents have said they love being able to access Second Life in full 3D using Wi-Fi or 4G LTE on a tablet or lightweight laptop. We also know they want a subscription plan with unlimited usage and would like broader international access.
So today, we’re releasing updates that will allow more people to experience SL Go and that offer more choices and flexibility in our pricing.
They also say that the Second Life community are passionate … I seriously need to get that meme deleted! I might have to start a campaign group. Anyway all in all, this sounds like good news. The pricing changes also make me ponder whether we’re moving towards a stage whereby Linden Lab can make deals with other companies to include services from other companies in a revamped premium membership package.
In the past I’ve wondered whether Linden Lab could do a link with Adobe on a premium package as Adobe products are now available on a monthly subscription, but in many ways, if Linden Lab were going to dip their toes into the waters of cross promotion, SL Go seems the perfect place to start. A Premium package for Second Life in which you subscribed to both Second Life and SL Go may have some potential, or Linden Lab could sell SL Go monthly subscriptions themselves direct from a Linden Lab store. There’s potential here.
Anyway, all in all, I’m please to see SL Go introduce the monthly subscription, I’ve tried it out very briefly on a Nexus 7 and it worked bloody well, I was very impressed with the technology, let’s hope this does reach a wider audience.