Philip Rosedale (Philip Linden) No Longer on Linden Lab's Board

Hamlet Au of New World Notes reported yesterday that Philip Rosedale, Second Life's founder and also known here as Philip Linden, confirmed that he was no longer on Linden Lab's board of directors.


"I left the board around the start of the year [as] I was starting High Fidelity, but on great terms -- both Mitch [Kapor] and Linden are both investors in High Fidelity, and I'm still a big shareholder in Linden."

No longer on the board, Rosedale "no longer has any more input on company management decisions, overall direction, or policy formation." Hamlet saw this as a milestone in the history of Second Life as it means for the first time, "no Linden board member has direct day to day experience with Second Life as a product or personal memory of it's development of its hardcore user base." Most of it's current board comes from the gaming industry, which "suggests a very different direction for the company" than it's founder. "Veterans of the traditional game industry tend to take a very aggressive view on intellectual property," Hamlet noted, suggesting that might in part explain the recent Terms of Service controversy.

While he still has shares in Linden Lab, this news means the last "old hand" has truly left. How this affects the residents remains to be seen.

Source: New World Notes