History of the TG Transition

Here’s my follow up post about the history of the TSL Transition. You may find it interesting to read about previous milestones since the very beginning of the idea of merging the grids. Friday 21st January 2011 marks the end of an era for Teen Second Life, after running for almost 6 years, which is 2, 167 days in total.

Terrance Linden has put in a lot of hard work in the past 6 months to make the transition as smooth as possible. Let’s Make February “Teen Welcome Month” in Second Life. The transition of hundreds of teens will arrive on the Main Grid immediately and I wish the teens the best of luck in their new Main Grid adventures.

Timeline of TG Transition Events

• Back in 2007, there were rumours spreading around about a possible grid merge with the main grid in the near future. There were plenty of discussions at office hours and on the forums on a weekly basis. Linden Lab kept on saying “We have no plans for a grid merge”.

• During 2008, at TSL5B, Mark Kingdon announced that Linden Lab are working it on, relating to the grid merge was “to better incorporate teens in a much broader way in the future”.

• On 19th January 2009, Philip Rosedale gave an interview to Metanomics, mentioned that “the future of Second Life needs to be one where people of all ages can use Second Life together”. The community took to the forums and blogs shortly afterwards roaring about it.

• Last February during 2010, TG residents were integrated into the Second Life Forums. The TSL forums was shut down and only a tiny part of the forums were archived apparently. Teens and adults now share the forums.

• Back in August 2010, during SLCC 2010, Philip Rosedale announced that the closure of the Teen Grid. Linden Lab wanted to keep Second Life “sustainable” and “growing” apparently. The plan was to have 16-17 old users transfer over to the main grid.  For the younger part the plan was for 13-15 year accounts to be turned off.  Since August 2010, Terrance Linden has announced a number of blog posts from the Second Life Blog on the transition informing the rest of the community on what will happen. There has been tons of mixed reactions on SL blogs, forums and inworld meetings ranging from excitement to disbelief on the closure announcement of the teen grid.

• In October 2010, Terrance Linden talked about the transition at Plush Non Profit commons region on the Main Grid.

• In late November 2010, Terrance Linden apparently went to have a meeting with the teens about the upcoming transition. The Teen Second Life Website was taken down by Linden Lab in late November 2010.

• In Mid-December 2010, Linden Lab changed the Terms of Service that pointed towards the under 18 year old residents moving to the main grid and closing of Teen Second Life. There was some confusion over teens creating accounts on the main grid when this update came into effect. In late December 2010, Global Kids hosted a “Youth Forum about TG Merger“. This youth forum allowed Teens to come and share their thoughts, concerns, ideas, and hopes for the future of Second Life.

• In early January 2011, Linden Lab created 4 regions on the Main Grid called Bonobos Isles. Linden Lab renamed these islands to Chimp Isles a few days later because the name was unsuitable. The first few days of 2011, Teen Grid Transition 2011 was delayed due to in-completed work. LL told us that the Teen Grid Transition will be happening on Thursday 20th January 2011, which didn’t happen because of technical issues.

• On 21st January 2011, after 1pm SLT teens were able to teleport anyone to any region on TSL. LL transferred teen accounts by last name, so many residents had to wait longer. The map should refresh any time between 12am-6am SLT on 22nd January 2011, so that you can see the TSL regions because they are currently hidden at the moment.

• Official Second Life Blog Post: LL Welcomes Teens to Second Life
• Check out the FAQ about the TSL Transition can be found here

========================================

RIP TSL

Check out the History of Teen Second Life and Second Life

14th February 2005 – 21st January 2011

About these ads