KB2/Private Regions

• http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Private_Region_(Island)_FAQ
• http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:About_Homesteads
• http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Estate_FAQ
• http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Information_about_Openspaces_(Void_Regions)
• http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Linden_Lab_Official:Some_landowners_seem_to_be_charging_their_own_tier_for_land_in_US$_through_Paypal_or_some_other_system_--_what%27s_going_on%3F

Estate FAQ

This article answers some general frequently asked questions about Estates, which are groups of Private Regions (islands). For information on Private Regions, read the Private Region (Island) FAQ.

Perhaps you have an idea for a huge project that you want to realize and you need a lot of open space to build. Maybe you and a group of friends and colleagues are looking for a gathering place that can expand as your community grows. Or maybe you have visions of a world under your own control, where you add land with each increase of your population.

In general, Estate ownership is an excellent choice for those who:

• Desire to acquire a large amount of land easily
• Wish to enjoy land ownership separate from the ever-changing Second Life mainland
• Want to build and control their Second Life experience without adjacent neighbors
• Require more land controls than those provided on the mainland
• Want to name the Region their land is in

How much will it cost?

Read the quick FAQ covering Private Region and Estate billing and ownership here.

We offer a discount to verified real-world educators and academic institutions (i.e. universities and schools) or 501(c)3 non-profit organizations that will be using the Regions to support their organization's official work; see this page for details. All educational and non-profit Estate orders can be placed from the Special Orders page.

Can I include multiple Regions in my Estate?

Yes. Estate-level tools make it convenient to manage multiple Regions. If you have three Regions (A, B and C) in an Estate called Z, then to get to each of them you'll still need to teleport to those Regions by name. But if you wanted to, you could ban someone from the Z Estate, which will keep them from getting to any of Z's Regions. Also you could set the day/night cycle by Estate, so all your islands have night at the same time.

Can a group own and use an Estate?

Estate owners can deed out the land parcels on their Estate to a group. The actual ownership is not conveyed to the group (you still own the Estate) and group members cannot pay for the Estate by contributing land allocations. The owner (you) will always be billed the full Estate monthly payment no matter how the group land is set up. Read more about Estates and groups here.

What if I don't want my Estate anymore?

You might consider transferring the Private Regions in your Estate to another person (see below). If you instead decide to simply terminate the ownership of the Estate, please contact us with your Second Life name and the name of the Estate.

Can I transfer my Estate?

Yes. You would need to transfer all of the Private Regions in your Estate to another Resident. See the Private Region Transfer FAQ for more details on Private Region transfer.

Can I sell a parcel on my Estate to someone else?

Yes; parcels can be sold to other Residents, but you remain responsible for the monthly payments. You can make arrangements for these new parcel owners to pay you for use of the Estate, but that's between you and the other residents. Many Estate owners use the Estate's Covenant to explain their payment structure.

How do I allow others to post events for my Estate?

Estate owners are allowed to post events on their Estate by default if the Estate is visible. If you would like other residents to have the same ability, simply add them to your Allow list in the Estate tab of the Region/Estate window.

What other controls do I have?

Plenty. See this article on the Region/Estate window for more details.

Someone mentioned a "rollback" to me; what is that?

Get the right information regarding Estates and rollbacks here.

Who should I contact if I have any questions or additional request for my Estate?

Submit a support ticket using the Region Issues ticket type.

Private region FAQ

This article answers some general frequently asked questions about Private Regions (islands).

In general, Private Region ownership is an excellent choice for Residents who:

• Wish to enjoy land ownership separate from the ever-changing Second Life mainland
• Want to build and control a Second Life experience without adjacent neighbors
• Require more land controls than those provided on the mainland
• Want to name the Region their land is in

How much will it cost?

Read the Estate and Private Region Billing FAQ.

We offer a discount to verified real-world educators and academic institutions (i.e. universities and schools) or 501(c)3 non-profit organizations that will be using the Regions to support their organization's official work; see this article for details. All educational and non-profit Estate orders can be placed from the Special Order page.

How long will it take?

Orders for new Private Regions placed through the Land Store may be filled as quickly as 30 minutes, depending on hardware availability and other factors.

Can I have a custom design?

To load your own custom terrain, you can upload a .raw file in the Region/Estate window. There are specific parameters for this - please see the .RAW File Format article for further help.

What can I name my Private Region?

See the Guidelines for Private Region Naming.

How do I place an order?

The easiest and best way to place and order is through the Land Store. If you have problems using the land store, you can contact the Concierge. All educational and non-profit Private Region orders can be placed from this order page.

What if I don't want my Private Region anymore?

You have a couple of options:

• You may transfer ownership of the Private Region to another Resident. This requires both you and the buyer to enter Support tickets with certain details about the transaction. See the Private Region Transfer FAQ for more details on the transfer process, cost, and timeframe.
• You may abandon your Private Region to Linden Lab. There is no fee to do so. No refunds will be given, and you will have the use of your region until the end of the current billing cycle. You need to notify the Concierge staff of your intention by submitting a ticket.
  1. Go to the Support Portal and click New Ticket Submission.
  2. In the Ticket Type dropdown, select Land and Region Issues.
  3. In the Region Request dropdown, select Region Cancellation Request.
  4. Fill out the requested details, and at the bottom, click Finish to submit the ticket.

You can see billing dates and fees for all of your Private Regions at the Land Portal. If your Private Region fees are invoiced, you can see the date your billing cycle ends by logging into your Netsuite account.

Note: If your next billing date falls within 5 business days of when you submit the ticket, please notify Concierge by phone or chat, so that you will not be billed automatically. Provide your ticket number in that conversation.

When your ticket is processed, you'll receive a response indicating that the Region will be taken offline on its next billing date, and that you will not be charged any further maintenance fees. Please pick up or return any content on the Region; any inventory remaining on the billing date will be deleted.

Can I transfer my Private Region?

Yes. See the Private Region Transfer FAQ for more details on Estate and Private Region transfer.

Can I sell a parcel on my Private Region to someone else?

Yes; parcels can be sold to other residents, but you remain responsible for the monthly payments. You can make arrangements for these new parcel owners to pay you for use of the Private Region, but that's between you and the other residents. Many Private Region owners use the Private Region's Covenant to explain their payment structure.

What is the prim allowance for a Private Region?

The prim allowance for a Private Region is the same as any other Region: 15,000.

Can I choose where my Private Region is placed on the map?

By using the Land Store, you may chose your Private Region placement. The Land Store map displays land you already own, making it clear where you can place possible new Private Regions if you want to purchase another one next to your existing land.

Please be aware it is dependent upon the flexibility of the map whether or not this will be possible. Your Private Region may also be in a restricted area, which may happen under the following circumstances:

• It's old and therefore was placed too close to the mainland
• It was moved by someone in the Concierge team to a spot "off the map" for some reason
  • Sometimes Residents request that their Private Regions be moved far away from "other stuff," which can result in an unusually distant location
  • Land purchased through the Special Orders page is typically set far away from other, unrelated Regions

There's a chance we may need to move the Private Region as the world expands.

Can I change the terrain texture on my Private Region?

Private Region owners are able to change the texture on their land by using the Ground Textures tab in the Region/Estate window.

Can I terraform my Private Region?

You can terraform your Private Region plus or minus 100 meters.

Can I move my Private Region?

Yes, you can request your Private Region to be joined with another person's Private Region or with another one of your own Private Regions. See this article for more details.

How do I allow others to post events for my Private Region?

See "How do I post an event?" for details.

What other controls do I have?

Plenty. See this article on the Region/Estate window for more details.

Someone mentioned a "rollback" to me; what is that?

Get the right information regarding Private Regions, Estates, and rollbacks here.

I've heard about Openspaces and Homesteads -- what are those?

Openspaces are low-prim Private Regions that can be purchased by Residents who already own Private Regions. See Information about Openspaces (Void Regions).

Homesteads are another type of Private Region that can be purchased by Residents who already own Private Regions. See About Homesteads.

The Private Region Types article provides a convenient table that describes the differences between each type of Private Region.

Who should I contact if I have any questions or additional request for my Private Region?

Submit a support ticket using the Region and Land Issues ticket type.

Homesteads

A Homestead is a new type of Private Region intended for such uses as:

• Low-density rentals
• Light commercial use
• Quiet residential use

Other specifications for Homesteads include:

• Available to Full Region owners only
• Lower price than a Full Region
• Comes with lower usage limits than Full Regions:
  • Prim limit set at 3750
  • Concurrent avatar limit set at 20
• Events and Classifieds are permitted

Pricing for Homesteads is as follows:

• Setup fee of $375
• Monthly fee of $125
• Discounts are available for qualified education or non-profit institutions

See also

• Homestead FAQ
• Private Region Types

Openspace regions

What are Openspaces and what do they cost?

Please refer to Openspace FAQ for changes effective January 1, 2009.

For those estate owners wishing to provide empty areas such as water, hills and forest -- we offer Openspaces, light use Regions sometimes referred to as voids.

Openspaces can be bought singly, for a setup fee of USD$250, followed by a monthly fee of USD$75 per month. An existing Region can also be converted into four Openspaces, although you cannot convert your last remaining Region.

Each Openspace Region is limited to only 750 prims and a maximum agent (avatar) limit of 10.

Tip: You must own a Private Region to be able to own an Openspace.

Why are they "light" use?

Normal Regions run on their own dedicated CPU, but the Openspace Regions run four per CPU; as you would expect, this limits their performance. Openspaces only ever share with other Openspaces on a server.

It is therefore important to understand what these Regions are. They are provided for light use only, not for building, living in, renting as homes or use for events. As a stretch of open water for boating or a scenic wooded area they are fine, but we do not advise more serious use than this and will not respond to performance issues reported should you not use them in this way.

How do I order an Openspace?

Openspaces can be purchased in the new Land Store for a setup fee of $250.

Tip: You must already own a regular Private Region in order to purchase an Openspace.

Converting Regions into Openspaces (and Back Again)

If you wish to convert one regular Region into four Openspaces, you can, so long as you still own at least one regular Region after the conversion. Similarly, you can convert four Openspaces back into a regular Region if you wish. Either way, there's a conversion charge of USD$100.

Important: As part of the conversion process, content on the Region is wiped. We cannot transfer existing content to your new Region. Please remove or return anything you wish to keep before the conversion.

Converting One Region into Four Openspaces

If you're converting an existing Region to Openspaces, submit a ticket of the Region Issues type with the following information:

• The name of the existing Region to be converted
• The four Openspace Region names
• The estate they should belong to
• Any Region-placement details that you wish to pass on.

The single existing Region is converted into four standard, Region-sized Openspace Regions. You are charged a conversion fee of $100.

If any of your Openspaces will touch another Region, please ask the other Region owner to add you to their Allowed Neighbors list.

Note: The new monthly billing date for a converted full Region is the average of the billing dates for the Openspaces used in the trade.

Converting Four Openspaces into One Region

If you're converting four Openspaces into one normal Region, submit a ticket of the Region Issues type with the following information:

• The name of the four existing Openspaces to be converted
• The name of the new Region
• The estate it should belong to
• Any Region-placement details that you wish to pass on.

The four Openspace Regions are converted into one standard Region. You are charged a conversion fee of $100, and the monthly billing date for the new Region is reset to the average of the four billing dates of the Openspaces.

If your Region will touch another Region, please ask the other Region owner to add you to their Allowed Neighbors list.

How long does a conversion take?

After you've submitted a ticket to Support, you can normally expect your Private Region conversion to take 5-10 business days. Depending on the size of our current Region conversion queue, your conversion may occasionally take longer than 10 business days.

Other rules relating to Openspaces

To continue to own Openspaces, you must also continue to own at least one normal Private Region (Island). If you transfer your last island, you must also transfer the Openspaces to someone eligible to own them, or give them up, as you cannot own Openspaces on their own.

You can sell Openspaces to another Resident if you wish but the new owner will need to own an estate already to be eligible to own them. The normal transfer fee of $100/Region will be charged to the seller.

Multiple Openspace transfer:

If you are transferring multiple Openspaces to the same person, the fees may be different for that transfer. For up to 4 Openspaces in the same transfer, the fee will be $100 total. After the first 4 Openspaces, the transfer fee is $100 per Region.

Examples:

• You're transferring 3 Openspaces to the same buyer. You'll be charged $100.
• You're transferring 6 Openspaces to the same buyer. You'll be charged $300.
• You're transferring 2 Openspaces to one buyer, 5 to another, and one last one to a third buyer. You'll be charged $100 on the first transfer, $200 on the second, and $100 on the third.
• You transfer 2 Openspaces to a buyer this week, then decide to sell them 2 more next week. You'll be charged $100 for each transfer.

If you want to rename Openspaces, there's a charge of USD$50 per Region.

If you want to move Openspaces, there's a charge of USD$150 per Region.

The owner of an Openspace must be the same as the payor.

How long does a transfer take?

After both the buyer and seller have submitted their tickets to Support, you can normally expect your Private Region transfer to take 5-10 business days. Depending on the size of our current Region transfer queue, your transfer may occasionally take longer than 10 business days.

If the next billing date for the Region is coming up soon, and both the seller and buyer want to have the transfer done by then, we will try to make that happen. We need to have at least 5 billing days' notice from both parties. Please submit your transfer ticket and include the next billing date in the summary line (for example, "NOVEMBER 12 transfer Oleo Isle to Pony Linden"). Then contact Concierge support through chat or phone, provide your ticket number, and confirm that the billing date has been noted.