Second Life Founder Quits ‘Crappy Job’
By DavidReece • Apr 27th, 2008 • Category: News, Software
Founder and Managing Director of online virtual world Second Life, Philip Rosedale is stepping down from his top position within the company to make way for successor, Mark Kingdon, after claiming he is sick and tired of people management, and wants to pursue a role more focused on invention, innovation and strategy.
Rosedale, who is set to step down in mid-May, made it clear that he still wants to work full-time on the project, and that his decision has nothing to do with problems within the company, and further went on to say of his replacement, Mark Kingdon..
“Mark is one of the few people with the right profile for the job, and will hopefully do a better job than I ever did. We’re about to become a big company, and I just can’t be bothered with people management.”
Second Life has seen a marked drop in return subscribers since its inception by Linden Lab back in 2003, and although subscriber numbers are over 13 million, only around 5 percent are said to be active users.
In January 2008, users spent an estimated 28.2 million combined hours online, meaning that around 38,000 users were logged on at any one time.
Second Life was originally launched with a traditional subscription fee model of $14.95 per month for an account, but Linden Lab abandoned that model later in the year when fewer than 2,000 subscribers had signed up.
Pricing has changed a number of times since then. Since February 2007, there are two types of accounts: basic and premium. Basic accounts have no recurring fee, but do not include the right to own land on the Second Life mainland, though ownership of land on private resident-run islands is possible.
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[…] Phil Rosedale is one fascinating character Posted on April 27, 2008 by Morris Vig It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to start a company and then decide you don’t like managing people. […]
I am absolutely fascinated by Second Life, and I totally get where Rosedale is coming from. In 1996 (after nearly 15 years with a fairly successful creative career in the film/’tv business) I co- founded an entertainment company with two respected partners. I believed having my own company would offer me the full creative freedom that I lacked as a freelancer. Little did I know that to have a successful company, the last thing you get is “freedom.” After several impossibly difficult years, though I am still a full partner, I removed myself from the day to day executive decisions and only work on creative projects. I now live 3000 miles away from the business and take a lesser weekly draw but share fully in profits and back-end and make it the rest in the creative work I generate. In fact, thanks to two best-selling books I’ve written for the company, we are now consistently operating well into the black (and then some!) for the first time since we started. That work would not have been possible had I continued to drag my ass into the office every day to sit glumly in financial meetings.
Some people are born to be creative, “idea” people - and it really is crushing to our process to have to deal with the day to day people management drama necessary to run a small business. The talent that we brought with us that allowed the company to be created in the first place is eventually stifled to the point where we are unhappy and no good to anyone else either.
Good for you, Philli Rosedale, for catching on early as to what your real strengths are. (It took me nearly ten years to figure it out!) You will have a happier life and be more valuable to Second Life because of it!
I’ve seen several notes from Rosedale (to the SL community and in blogs) and no place does he say he thinks his job is crappy. Also, I don’t recall him saying anything about being “sick and tired” of people management.
What he DID say was the the company has been so successful that he felt it was in the best interest in the company to employ a CEO who had more experience doing that kind of work. Rosedale is replacing Mitch Kapor as Chairman of the Board and will stay on to continue to help develop the project.
Here is Rosedale’s original posting
http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/03/14/changing-my-job/
and the announcement of the new CEO
http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/04/22/announcing-our-new-ceo/
On a different note, I believe it was Disraeli who said “Lies, Damned Lies, and Statistics”. Although I can’t say if the figures you present are accurate, I’ll take 5% of 13 million over 100% of where Second Life was about a year ago, less than 1/2 a million.
Used to be fun…. but no more.
http://secondlife.typepad.com
I used second life before but I lost interest, but it is a good concept, there is some potential and the company has to figure out
what it is…