Pay / Play

This blog isn't usually a soapbox, but something should be said. I can empathize more than most with Bryn's situation, but I can't agree with her reaction.
About three years ago, someone thought me 'worthy' of having my own land and left me two lovely parcels with a total of just over six thousand prims. It was a very kind gesture and I had a lot of fun making things, and playing in the huge castle at Evora that some of you may have seen in this blog.

 After a while, I realized that no tier was being paid. Not being in a position to take on that responsibility, I just quietly accepted the status quo, and enjoyed my space.
However, all good things come to an end, and a couple of weeks ago a nice man from LL got in touch to say that it was pay up or leave time.
I chose to leave; all my building is done in opensim now anyway, and it's easy enough to find a Home nook in SL for little or nothing. Sad, not to be able to display the lovely art that kind and talented friends have presented me with over the years, but I'll survive.
All of us think we are a special case. But we're  really not. It's sad that Immersiva is gone, but it's sad that Sextan Shepherd's Nemo build, or Luctesa, or hundreds - thousands - of builds (dare I say it?) even better  than Immersiva are gone. To 'make a case' for being given free land, as Bryn has on her blog, is something all artists could do.  To make a special case for one or two elite individuals would indeed set an unreasonable precedent.
For a long time, the received wisdom in art circles has been that Bryn is LL's poster-child for 3D art, (omg someone say 'Shanghai') and one can't blame her for being saddened by the loss of her space and perhaps her perception as a being set above and apart from the rest of SL's artists. But you can't fault LL for informing the land owner, not  tenants, no matter how famous, when they're going to take land back. And if the registered landowner stopped paying, then Bryn should expect to stop playing - that's the system.
The Lab is in the business of making money, not building a community - that's our choice, we volunteer our time and talent, coming inworld to 'waste' our time making things. Looking back over the four years of this blog, and the weeks of unpaid work that has gone into it, could I rant against Blogspot if it disappeared tomorrow? Not if I want to be taken seriously. In the transient ocean of online creativity, every adventure is a gamble, and not all ships survive.
I have always been wary of putting too much faith in LL's generosity - I'm talking about the LEA - for this very reason: the Lab giveth and the Lab taketh away - and they have every right to do so.
 If you put all your creative eggs in that basket you may live to regret it.