Should the TG and MG really be separate?
If so, why?
Firstly, my opinion, so you know what my bias is (and will presumably remain once I finish writing the post): I like our little grid; it lets me do things completely impossible on the main grid simply due to its sheer size (statistics, anyone?). It’s also nice to be able to meet teens. However, it would also be nice to be able to visit some of these places on the MG, e.g. those covered on New World Notes.
Now, why shoudn’t we be part of the MG?
- LL might be sued by some over-protective parent.
- It would destroy the TG’s inferior economy, which is filled with inferior products.
- Teenagers might end up seeing things they really didn’t want to see.
- The MG doesn’t want ‘little kids’ running around griefing them.
Right. Let’s look at these.
So, are we really such bad people? Do we actually grief so much more than the adults do? My answer, using various complaints, comments on blogs, blog posts and forums, and personal experience of the Teen Grid, is no. In many cases, residents of the TG actually act more mature than their MG counterparts. We don’t all grief, a good number of us can in fact speak whatever our first language is without tlkng lik dis wit meny errors just cos i can filling our sentences with needless errors.
Similarly, if residents of the MG were actually mature and responsible, then there would be no reason for teens to see things on the MG that they shouldn’t. The MG does have mature sims – but it has PG sims too. There is still code in the system to prevent teens accessing mature sims – you can even see it in the open sourced client, and several people accidentally dragged to the MG by SL bugs have reported the same. Were the MGers reasonable and mature people (which they repeatedly insist they are, even if the Police Blotter disagrees), there wouldn’t be any “Mature” content in the PG areas.
Along similar lines, as long as LL are restricting teens from accessing the mature sims, they cannot be held responsible for what their users display in PG areas while breaking the rules. It’s not LL’s problem, it’s the immature adult’s problem. If you’re going to sue someone, sue them instead.
The only point not dealt with here in some way, the TG’s economy, is complete garbage in my opinion. There are numerous residents of the TG that are perfectly capable of producing products that could compete on the MG; especially since products tend to be so much cheaper here. If we maintain our pricing on the MG, even if our products are slightly inferior, we have a price advantage, which has to be worth something. If we raise our prices, as those who are capable of making decent products would, then we can benefit from the significantly larger audience with significantly more money.
Furthermore, as teenagers tend to have little money to blow on SL, the cheaper teen products would probably continue to be much more successful among themselves than the a similar, superior, but significantly more expensive, adult-created product.
Finally (and not listed above), there are the people who simply prefer the smaller, teen-only community of the TG. As such, my solution would be as follows:
Allow teens to access the PG regions of the Main Grid, while making mature regions inaccessible and blocking visibility into them, and possibly chat out of them. This would avoid any issues with mature content. However, do not merge the Teen Grid’s current sims. Instead, allow teens to roam around both grids. Additionally, provide a very easy way for parents of the teens to restrict their access to soley the TG, along with a significantly harder method (to avoid teens being able to invoke it) to restore access.
This would seem to me to provide the best of both worlds. Feel free to scream about how wrong I am in the comments, assuming you don’t mind me replying. 
I completely agree with this idea. Harbinger’s already selling his stuff to the MG using a hack simple enough to make the boundary between the TG and the MG meaningless.
I was going to rant about that, but decided that I had already posted enough gibberish for today. So I won’t. :p
I like having the TG separate. If I had MG people all over, I would never see anyone I knew in-world.
I also don’t want to risk mature stuff popping up on my computer while my little brother is trying to watch me. Even on the TG, people keep swearing and I have to send him away.
What would my parents think if some MG idiot started running around naked all over my screen? They don’t like SL too much as it is.
I like the idea of being able to goto a sim(s) and beable to meet and chat with adults from the MG but i do not like the idea of being able to transfer items between the grids. as Interfect said why should we have to have the pressure to compete with specialists and real companies.
also as interfect said I LIKE MY FORUMS! XD
“Allow teens to access the PG regions of the Main Grid, while making mature regions inaccessible and blocking visibility into them, and possibly chat out of them. This would avoid any issues with mature content. However, do not merge the Teen Grid’s current sims. Instead, allow teens to roam around both grids. Additionally, provide a very easy way for parents of the teens to restrict their access to soley the TG, along with a significantly harder method (to avoid teens being able to invoke it) to restore access.”
that i can agree with.
There’s the screaming I asked for. And there’s no reason that the teen forums should go, if the grid isn’t going.
But since the MG is so “mature” and “superior”, that wouldn’t happen in a PG sim now, would it? >.>
Not by their own arguments for us not being there, anyway.
You can’t hide here forever. Additionally, there would be no competition when you tried to sell to those tied to the TG, and given the huge pricing gap, and the teens’ lack of money, you could still easily sell to most of us that you sell to now, and adults who don’t want to spend a huge amount of money on SL. Plus, some of us are entirely cabapble of doing so anyway (e.g. Alex Harbinger, who is already doing so).
(Disclaimer: I’m only 15 and I also don’t do any form of economics. So I could well be wrong. :p)
An addition to the above:
That just shows that keeping the TG to avoid this is pointless – it’s against the rules on both grids, yet it happens here anyway.
@Interfect: You could stay in the TG if you wanted to avoid something like that.
Just about what I think, but in said in a much better way.
I’m up for TG, MG and G.
I think that it would be better if there where Teen only sims on “The Grid”. There would be a part of the Grid set aside for Teens, Some for mature sims, and most of the sims would be Universal access. Then we could have our little continent(sp) , but could venture off if we dared to.
I think the TG and the MG should be united BUT, the TG should have a “Teen Only” section to just go there and act goofy without being critisized by the mature players. The MG could have its relax area and we get ours. I also think that it would provide tons of competion for scripter and builders. So far, there is like 6 pro scripters (including you Kath.) and about 3 great builders. That is 9 people out of 20,000 that are well-known for their skills. We teens need to be challenged. FoXx and Alex have a total monoply over the scripting economy. They and the other scripters need to have challenges to improve their ideas. So, far we only have like 10 different ideas but, about 100 different names and variations of it.
LL CHALLENGE THE TEENS PLEASE!!!!
Somewhat belated reply here, but oh well:
Mashew, there are over 60,000 on the TG, as of well before you wrote that. And yes, FoXx and Alex do have a monopoly, and they overcharge too. Such is life.
And my stuff is original. Just useless! <_<
Alex and Fox dont Control The grids Scripting. They Control the Public Market. Yet Theres People who are in armys that Script Alot better then them. Armys have more stuff to do in them then the Public market place.
But Good Idea. LL will never go for it