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2nd Life Source Code Released Under GPL

As reported on Boing Boing, 2nd Life source code has now been released under GPL. Smart move: as long as Linden Labs is making money of the exchange rate between 2nd Life currency and real world currency, they could give a damn about who runs it on what servers. If anything, they'd love to have a ton of people voluntarily hosting it on servers; it decreases the amount of money they have to spend on hosting and customer support, which I believe is probably the majority of their operating costs.

I disagree with Boing Boings assumption that "This turns Linden wealth into real-world wealth. And it also takes an enormous stride towards turning Second Life residents into real citizens instead of mere customers. Citizens get to petition for redress of their grievances from a state that represents them; customers can only take their business elsewhere. Customers only ever get to love it or leave it. Citizens get to change it."

I suspect that a 2nd Life user is still going to have to go through Linden to convert currency between dollars and 2nd Life money. That means that you can't get around paying Linden; as long as you want other people to pay you for the objects you create in 2nd Life , you're going to need Linden's currency, and you'll still need to deal with Linden's rules. The source code may be free as in speech, but I doubt 2nd Life will be free as in beer. Maybe people don't really care, but it's probably worth noting.