Here's an announcement from Linden Lab that I've been dreading to write about for over two years:
Ebbe Altberg started with Linden Lab as our CEO on February 5th, 2014. He took the helm of the company and immediately went to work on reinvigorating our spirit and culture. Ebbe brought a profound openness, and transparency in his operation which was key and that had many effects on all of us internally, and externally. Lindens were encouraged to be part of the vibrant community in Second Life, to participate in and to cherish it as part of our daily duties… As I am here before you today, it is with profound sadness that I share with you Ebbe passed away yesterday evening restfully and surrounded by the love of his family.
What this means for the future of Second Life, recently purchased by a massive holding company, is a conversation for next week. What I'd rather do now is talk about Ebbe, who in my opinion was the most ambitious and inspiring CEOs of Linden Lab since Philip Rosedale himself. He galvanized the community and the company around a new vision to energize virtual worlds, and boosted company morale beaten badly by lack of revenue growth, layoffs, and the entrance and quick exit of two CEOs before him. (It's why the company made T-shirts for employees emblazoned with Ebbe's immortal words, "We are still the shit when it comes to virtual worlds.")
Also worth noting that Ebbe guided the company through rough waters while dealing with his illness since at least 2019:
After posting my March 2019 interview with him (watch above), many readers noted his extreme weight loss. Several insiders subsequently went into more detail with me about his illness, but in my view, that was a private matter for Ebbe and his family to deal with. What surprised and impressed me is that Ebbe soldiered on since then, still leading the company through several major (and often painful) shifts, including:
- The sale of Sansar.
- The final deployment of Second Life to the Amazon cloud.
- One or two rounds of layoffs.
- The launch of spinoff payments company Tilia.
- The sale of Linden Lab itself.
One insider told me that his illness didn't undo him, but rather, gave him a serene confidence in his mission and his life course. Second Life seems set to survive as long as its established users keep using it, and that is in great part a credit to Ebbe. I only got to meet with him in person that one time in March 2019, and found him warm, ebullient, and youthful despite his illness, eager to show me with boyish enthusiasm the latest inventions he and his team were working on. All my condolences to his family, friends, and the staff at Linden Lab.
Update, 1:35pm PT: Gizem McDuff, owner of the major Second Life fashion brand Blueberry, posted this to her Facebook:
While respecting his privacy, as a member of this community, you should know that he worked tirelessly, selflessly, quietly to set up a bright future for Second Life under the circumstances he was in. I will forever be grateful for all that he has done for our community and I hope we can honor him by supporting Linden Lab staff as they navigate through the path forward. Rest in eternal peace, Ebbe.
Update, 2:00pm: Strawberry Linden, who was recruited to Linden Lab after becoming Second Life's most popular YouTuber, says this: "One thing I'll never forget about Ebbe is how genuinely warm he was when I met him at the office in California. The way he spoke to me and listened to me, I felt heard, and I could feel his love and enthusiasm for Second Life. It was absolutely wonderful to have him as a CEO, and I am going to deeply miss him."
Update 2, 2:40pm: Linden Lab founder and former CEO Philip Rosedale sent me this tribute: "I can't say enough about Ebbe. He was such a warm, smart, optimistic person who was loved by everyone he came into contact with. I will miss him a lot, and we were so lucky to have him."
Update 3, 3:45pm: Another point worth remembering is Ebbe's strong moral leadership of the company — under his guidance, Linden Lab was one of the first prominent tech companies (and the first VR company) to strongly and publicly condemn Trump's racist anti-immigration policies in strong terms back in February 2017, along with this photo of the startup's diverse staff (relative to most technology firms):
We at Linden Lab are extremely disappointed in and adamantly opposed to Trump’s recent executive order on immigration. We reject racism, intolerance, and xenophobia.
We are proud to include immigrants among our leadership, colleagues, and customers, as well as our families, friends, and communities. We value diversity, compassion, and understanding, and we are proud that our products enable people to come together and form meaningful connections regardless of differences in their offline lives.
Trump’s order is counter to what we value and antithetical to American ideals. We join the many voices calling on the US government to remove this restriction as quickly as possible and to refrain from imposing additional barriers that threaten opportunities for immigrants, under-represented minorities, and women.
Update 4, 6:00pm: In my first interview with Ebbe in 2014, he talked about he learned about Second Life and fell in love with it — through his son:
Though he is Linden Lab’s new CEO now, one of Ebbe Altberg’s first experiences with Second Life occurred over 10 years ago, and as it happens, actually involved a violation of Second Life policy. It was around that time, you see, that Altberg’s son fell in love with Second Life, and became an avid builder there. Which is usually a fine thing, but here’s the problem: Altberg’s son was a young teen at the time, and back then they were strictly not allowed:
“So yeah, he was underage,” Altberg admits now, “so SL booted him correctly.”
Altberg convinced then CEO Philip Rosedale to be lenient, but by that time, Altberg’s young son had become a well-known content creator in Second Life, and had revealed his age to his adult collaborators in SL (who were very surprised to learn how young he was). So Altberg’s son was booted from the main grid of Second Life, and when Teen Second Life opened around 2005, found himself exiled there. Frustrated by how comparably poor the quality of content was there, Ebbe’s boy began working with someone in the main grid to export content from Second Life proper to Second Life’s teenage wasteland. (As one of the early teen users described it to me, back in the day.)
Despite all that, Ebbe's son stayed engaged in Second Life for a couple years, and even co-founded an in-world design company. And being among the first explorers of Teen Second Life, one of that world’s original islands was even named after the avatar of Ebbe Altberg’s son. And Ebbe Altberg watched all this amazed: “For a kid to have this experience so early was fantastic,” as he puts it now.
Wagner James Au / New World Notes 
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