Home Sweet Home

After a couple years in SL, I've decided to take the plunge. I've signed up for the premium membership. A quick bit of math revealed, for what I seem to send on SL monthly for a supply of Lindens, I could get a Linden House to go with it if I got a premium account. So I decided to give it a shot.


The main reason for me to sign up was for the house; it would be nice to have a place to change clothes that wasn't so public and to easily rez boxes and objects for review. I realize I could have rented mainland or some island sim, but wanted to give this a shot.

Currently there are four different themes to choose from; a Japanese theme, a fantasy theme, and forest/chalet theme and a suburban theme. I liked the modern style of the suburbans so I went with them. You get 512 sq of land which is covered by your house. In between houses is public protected land and each sim has common areas with places to sit to meet your neighbours. The house is is counted separately from your land (it actually belongs to some guy named Governor Linden), so you get 117 prims to fill it with. Not a lot, but with more and better sculpty furniture, a short supply of prims is becoming less of a problem.

There are a few rules though. You can't build a skybox there, commercial activities and adfarms are not allowed and there are no adult Linden Homes. To me, none of these were drawbacks - in fact they were positive attributes.

The neatest thing about it to me is the ability to customize the look of the house. Every detail in mine can be changed, from trim to floors to the patio stones. It is all controlled via a web page, either in the viewer or a separate browser. Windows and doors can be set to open, shuttered or curtained for privacy and doors can be locked to keep newbies from wandering in.

After just under a week, it seems to be working out fairly well, and I am happy so far. The biggest challenge is to stay under the 117 prim limit and I'll have to get suitable low prim furniture to do so. I'll keep the blog updated on how it all works out.