The Future of Second Life: Where Community and technology meet...

<sets up a new table, sets up the chairs, and sits down>

"Oh no. You guys bring your OWN food this time. I'm not running a free buffet here!"

<leans back in the chair and looks at the ceiling>

Where to begin. And such a big topic too...

All right. If one thing has been made perfectly clear, it's that I am far too concerned about the technology in my discussions, and leaving out too much of the social aspects and issues of Second Life and it's future. I figured I should start fresh based on that.

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I have been in SL for over a year and a half now, and have seen the ins and outs of most of the varied 'cliques' in SL. Interestingly enough, just about all of them accepted me happily, even though I never really 'joined' them. All they really needed from me was the idea that I was not going to judge them for their actions, and treat them like people.

How utterly sad.

Not them, mind you, but that people are so agressivly attacked, regularly, as a part of their daily Real AND Second Life that they are estatic just to have someone treat them the way they want to be treated for once in their life.

So simple, yet so complicated.

People agressivly attack furries for being 'people in fur costumes' and for being 'overly sexual'. Gorians are shunned by 'normal society' because it's demeaning to women in general. Creatives in SL that succeed are religated to a group of illuminati called the FIC. Lindens are the ancient greek gods that laugh at our troubles and create chaos in their wake. Clubbers are moronic bling toting children that just sit around all day 'doing nothing useful'. Oh! And NOBODY loves the land barons!

<sighs>

Can someone explain to me what is so hard treating someone the way they WANT to be treated? If I walk up to a woman in SL, and she starts talking in Gorian Slave 3rd Person, it's pretty obvious she WANTS to play that role. Allowing her to have her fun costs me nothing as a human being. It changes nothing in the way I view her value as a human being. It does not make me treat other women in an improper manner.

When you treat others as they want to be treated, you are making them happy. Perhaps the small Gor girl from above is a middle aged man home from work.

So what?

Life, both Real and Second, is about your impact on others. If I treat people in a way that makes them happy without doing harm, then I think of it as a GOOD day.

Now, is that to say I won't walk quickly away from some kinds of situations? Nope. I also don't start attacking them for it. Some people are into being hurt, for example. Such things make me beyond uncomfortable. Yet I don't think they should be verbally abused for it. I know nothing of their life. I can't judge them for it. I just not qualified to judge people's lifestyles that way.

On the other hand, people do not have the right to hurt others based on their lifestyle (a reason the above makes me so uncomfortable. Someone has to DO the hurting that someone else wants, and I get stuck in a if-then loop for hours). While it can be argued that those dealing in ageplay are doing something distasteful, the reality is greatly more disturbing. Is the SL role play as bad as the real thing?

Nope. Not even close. It's like saying shooting someone in SL is the same as RL murder. Disturbing? Aye. Worrysome about the involved people's mindframe? Aye again. But just as bad? Nope.

Now, why would I bring up such things in this thread? Well, not so it can become a flame fest. If you have problems with the above, keep reading a second, and I'll get to the point.

SL is NOT a single community. It is a set of smaller communities dumped into the same world, and leading to many of the same problems the real world has when differing cultures border each other: Conflict.

Gorians have issues with furries entering into their territories. Furries feel hunted and often react poorly to newcommers not wearing fur. Each group feels that the other groups are 'THEM'.

So the Furries and Gorians have their own sims and regions, and try to limit their contact with the rest of SL (many exceptions to this). Others use alts to enjoy their favorite groups without long term stigma.

So, what is a technological solution to this? There is not one. While better security and banning tools might allow each group to better protect their own borders, none of it treats the diseases that make such things needed:

Intolerance. Immaturity. Ignorance.

That's just part of the reason why I think the future of SL is going to be independent platforms where anyone can run their own world. This is also why I feel that in this case, most people are not ready for a true 'multiverse'. We are incapable of dealing with others with restraint and open minds. We are stuck in our own worlds, and most will never leave them. We see others as nothing but extentions of our own selves, and can't get our minds around the idea that someone might see the world differantly.

And all we can do, until we CAN deal with others in the manner they would like, is to seperate ourselves like kids in a playground so that we don't continue fighting.

And the Lindens probably get to see this daily. For every time I have seen a Linden called to deal with a technical issue, I have probably seem them called 10 times for dealing with social problems that are the SL version of "Mom! He's TOUCHING me! Make him STOP!" I don't even want to think about what their opinion is on it all.

Anyway, your turn!

WAIT!

<drops heat-proof shield into place around his chair>

Ok, sorry. Carry on!

There's a fairly serious bug in the above which needs to be nerfed.

Some people want to be treated like they're not arseholes, when in fact they are.

Well said.

You are entirely right on all counts.
<3s

Just one thing: Where do you draw the line? You said the roleplay that goes on in SL isn't as bad as the real thing, but what if someone is acting racist in SL? Is that okay because it's not in the "real world"? What about anti-Semitism? What about homophobia? It's just roleplay, right?

I agree.

*checks Foolish for fur. "You sure you're not a furry?"*

Anyways, I think it can be said that people in general do *not* have an great amount of empathy for others. In the past, it wasn't as big of a deal, because someone could only be in contact with a limited number of people. However, in today's age, the Internet lets those small souls who seek to make other smaller reach out and influence many people. THis makes their presence larger and I'm sure satisfies that tiny shriveled person they have inside.

I've always said; what offendes me the most and makes me morally outraged, are people who tell me what I should be offended and morally outraged by.

I do also agree that SL will not become one big community. It's no more possible than all their customers being in one big ocmmunity in RL. But that can also be a strength. If LL were to try and force us to be one big happy community, they'll just get a mud of mediocrity. But having separate and complete communities will foster a full range of participants, making each community stronger.

Yes, this opens up the door for inter-community comflict. But that will happen no matter what. I feel it's beter to have some dirt amongst gems than just boring mud.

Technologywise, I think moving to an open platform of standards might be a good move in the future for SL. It would open the door for even more creative outlets and probaaly win more customers. But I don't think this is something that they can, or should, do in the near future. There are many technical and logistical issues that should be worked out first before undertaking something like a move to an open platform.

I'm with ya on that, Foolish. It's just not that hard to be nice to people.

coco on vacation

Well, I think I did cover this:

"Life, both Real and Second, is about your impact on others. If I treat people in a way that makes them happy without doing harm, then I think of it as a GOOD day."

The line is grey and blurry, but it IS there: Hurting people.

Mind you, I'm not going to preach about it. People are people, and one thing mythology and history makes clear: Tell people to be nice to each other too firmly, and you get your guts handed to you. My point is that SL is NOT a single community, and that groups segregate themselves normally. This is not a good thing, but it IS factual. People want to be among 'their own kind' as much as possible to avoid being ostricised. They would rather exile themselves than let others do it to them.

Therefore, private islands and sims ARE the natural evolution of the SL community. Or so it seems to me. Mind you, I'm not saying it's a GOOD thing. Just that it seems to follow the evidence I've seen.

Okay, but segregation aside, if someone is roleplaying child abuse, how is that different than roleplaying hate, which is what your post stipulates as the problem? Are they both okay?

Well said, Foolish! I have nothing to add at this point! <applaudes>

...

You know. I think we need to get something straight right now. I'm not here to help you define your comfort levels of dealing with others, nor to comfort you by defining my own. The point of my discussion was made in the posts above.

If you want to define what YOU think, then please feel free! Aside from that, you're going to have to deal with the fact that in the history of the human race on this planet, nobody has come up with a universal answer everyone liked. I also never said people should be tolerant of EVERYTHING.

I just think we could do a lot better.

Agreed, very articulate and well reasoned as well.

I appreciate this thread Foolish. It is hard sometimes not to allow RL thoughts to interfere with SL enviornment. There are things that I will never be able to agree with (as is not your point here I know). It is not how someone else acts that we can change, but how we act in response.

Good post.. as usual.

So. We have proof that overall, conflict will happen. It's a given that in any given circumstance, two people with possibly have misaligned goals.

So, you have two choices:

A full time police force in SL to keep the peace.

Tools to allow residents to do the same for themselves.


Mind you, I said in the first options, 'keep the peace', not 'make everyone happy'. Any security force's primary job is to keep society running for the most number of citizens. While being 'fair' is a good thing, it's not the MAIN thing. Security forces normally deal with everyone in an altercation, and then allow a legal system to deal with right or wrong.

In SL, we don't have an exact idea of how the peace is kept, but to most people, lindens seem to travel the land and dispense rulings in addition to being peace officers. Does this make it any less or more effective than a standard arrest -> trial -> punishment/vindication? I have no idea. I DO know that since Lindens have access to Sim logs and can have full information on what happened in seconds, we have no reason to think they would be missing evidence to deal with the situation.

As to charges of corruption and favoritism in Linden, there is little to be done except remove a police force entirly and leave all peace keeping to be done by the residents using an advanced toolkit. I'm wary of this as well, since it seems to have several problems.

If a sim/land owner is dealing with a griefer, and only has the tools available on his own land, how does the said griefer get punished? He just changes targets and attacks someone else, and all of the banning that an individual does means nothing. If large numbers of residents make a master ban list to effectivly mass-ban people, how do you prevent corruption of THAT? Who do you appeal to when all you have is a list of random names being passed about of supposed 'troublemakers'. How do you prove you did not do anything, but that you broke up with x72 club owner and he did it out of spite?

So. Neither choice is perfect. Neither can be totally done away with either. We need the Lindens to deal with those that refuse to deal with society as a whole in a civil manner, but alos need personal tools to protect individuals from their deprivations until they can be dealt with.

And this is the way it's been for ages. Perhaps LL DOES have some idea what it's doing...

Ok. Let's look at the tools for SL security and peacekeeping.

First, banning is only partially effective since people can only ban from their own land. This means the individual can walk up and start attacking from the border. This is an unenviable position for the 512 meter land owner.

So, we not only need to be able to ban people, we have to totally eliminate his ability to effect the land he is banned from. How to do this is an exercise is determining all the ways someone can attack and finding simple and effective ways to eliminate the threat without allowing the tools to become a form of griefing in itself.

These tools also have to be able to be used by neigbors without bleeding into each other's property, preventing an escalation of 'defensive attacks' to begin, let alone be sustained.

As to Linden security, they should probably have two groups to be effective: Mobile Security and Researchers.

Mobile Security arrive at sites needing help, dealing with the issues that have the highest number of victims first. They arrive, freeze any visible troublemakers, check the logs, and begin dealing with those that disturbed the peace as is needed.

Need I point out these people would probably be feared and hated? It's a given, considering they will have to be brutally effective in a limited amount of time and move to the next disturbance. I really doubt that they would get many invites for tea...

They would then pass the information and all evidence to researchers. They would look over the logs, determine the interveining factors, and deal more permanent sentences based on a more detailed check.

<looks at the above> Wait... That's pretty much what they do now, right?

Hmnnnnn...

So what is differant? Why does it NOT feel like what they are doing?

They aren't making it VISIBLE. It's all behind the scenes. We can't see the wheels of justice turn either for or against us, and so we feel they don't turn at all. We only see the damage griefers do, and none of the process used to remove them. And this makes it seem like nothing is being done.

Perhaps we need more examples. Perhaps we need to know who was perma-banned. Perhaps we need to have examples of something being done, a piked head, so-to-speak, so that we feel the lindens are making good on their unspoken promise to protect us.

While I believe in privacy, perhaps something should be considered: If a person IS perma-banned, what is the harm of naming him? Why should we not know who was banned forever? It's not like his name will be anything but a ghost in the machine from then on. It's not like we will know who he really was. It's not even like his reputation will mean anything to him, since he is, effectivly, dead.

So, on that note, perhaps I'll close this post. For if their is one thing I have seen in every world I've been to, it's this:

In every story, people want to see the villian get what's coming to him. That includes the story they write for themselves in Real Life. Why not here?