What Have The Forums Given SL?

Me? Well, I've found places, people and products I simply wouldn't have found otherwise. I've discovered things happening that I wouldn't have known about. And the forums have given me a sense of 'community' that you just don't get in-world.

I can only hope that the forum community doesn't become too fragmented by this decision by whoever's in charge these days and that a 'leader' will emerge among the competing SL-centric forums that exist and will appear.

Running a forum is a fairly complex task - I should know, having run a special interest forum for nearly three years now. Only some 1500 members, not all of whom are regular users. Nevertheless, with a careful initial choice of forum categories a relaxed attitude and a single volunteer moderator it's run without many of the problems I've seen here.

Let's hope someone can manage something similar. And no, one is quite enough for me, so I don't expect to jump into the fray myself!

ROFL! Time for a break Baba

The forums have given us a community.

Yes, it is easier to find things in the classifieds. I like being able to find events so easily, too.

But what about the scripting, animation, building forums where people come together to help each other with CONTENT, the one thing that LL touts so highly: Seond Life is a 3D online digital world imagined, created, & owned by its residents.

It will be harder to create without the forums. It will be harder to find, without the forums. And what is "owned" by its residents? I can't think of anything but content and they are making it harder for us to create and find that.

If LL has a weakness, it is in the realm of customer service. I don't think they understand how important the customer really is. Atm, we are all just cogs, hopefully dumping USD into a slowly declining economy. Customers who are engaged in the product not only create interesting content, not only volunteer to work as ResMods, Live Help, etc, but they also SELL the product, making more residents, making SL a bigger and hopefully bettter place.

LL is showing once again that they believe that the difficult task of customer service is too expensive in time and resources. Perhaps if they saw the financial benefit of continuing the customer service aspect of their business, they would put the additional effort into improving their customers' experience here.

Have you posted this in Robin's blog?

i've read many many useful, funny, insightful posts and replies from people, most of whom will not have blogs, and i'll likely not hear from again without the forums.

Yes there is a lot of useless information in the forums, people gripping, complaining, etc; however as was stated before if you dig deeper into most of it there is a lot of usefull information as well. I have learned an awful lot about SL and mainly the techincal aspects of SL. This will really be missed. Where do we go from here on getting all the useful information??????????????????????????????????????????????????????

h8.

And some community support that lead to well-needed fixes.

But mostly h8.

Inspired you to a Life of Brian parody? Don't forget that.

True - but its a funny screechy voice like the one used by the bad guy in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. If the voice gets too annoying, it gets ignored or silenced. guess someone got annoyed!

Phil has his problems too, certain of the upper management seem hell bent on pursuing their own agenda, regardless of the harm this will cause in the long run. Phil isn't perfect, who is? But he does his job - publicity and investment sourcing. I disagree with some of his, shall we say, unconventional methods, but to be fair SL wouldn't be here at all without him.

And as you point out there are quite a few Lindens who have a real passion for SL - and know the score too.

For me, this isn't true. My SL community is the friends and family I have made on the grid -- the people I play and laugh with everyday, the people whose weddings and clubs and store openings I attend, the people from around the world who, when that little blue box pops up to say they've logged on, make me smile. They range from well-known designers, to newbies who happened to wander into our dance hall. Some I've know for a week, some I've known since the day I rezzed. I had a great weekend with many of them, I stayed up way too late, I had a couple of disagreements, shed a couple tears, brainstormed some exciting new ideas, learned a new building trick, played games, laughed, danced, sat in a chair listening to the surf. And, not one of my friends, not one of the new people I met, said a word about the forums.

For me, the forums were a way to get an SL fix when I have to be at work. I've enjoyed browsing the classifieds, honing my building and GIMP techniques with the help of masters and novices alike, hearing about special events and discovering places to check out the next time I logged on. They have felt fairly cliquish (as many things in life are), but have been a bit amusing. In no way, however, have they felt like my SL community. At most, I've occasionally bumped into an in-world friend and waved hello.

The forums have indeed given SL a wealth of documented knowledge in the content creation threads, all of which I hope will continue to grow and exist. But, IMHO, they are not a community -- and not even on the radar -- for the vast majority of SL residents.

The forums have given me new friends, a lift up when I've been down, and hours of entertainment.

I am not sure what the individual linden employees think.
I am just pointing out that with all the posts we make as a board about "those lindens" it is good to see that there are many Lindens who are helping us every day. I think it is one of those things where the "Lindens" becomes a focus on everyone working there. There are some great employees of LL that are in the trenches doing great things for us. That is all I meant.

i'll focus more on what the forums have given SL proper, instead of what it has given to me (or even the forums community).

it could be argued that the forums gave us P2P (current version), by way of the voices on the forums.

bug fixes and new tools were encouraged and grown through forum discussions.

a stronger sense of community. knowing your fellow SLers better, which translates into knowing the in-world community better, which means a stronger in-world community. knowledge of each other that we then share with in-world friends who then know more of the community at large (and small).. a feedback loop that helps build the community.

it has increased and inspired content creation. even the Gallery.. where someone sees something and thinks how they would like to either do something "like that".. or simply do something!

SLurls. the forums created a wider interest in the front page map, it's use in other resident-run manners and the eventual creation of SLurls. these have helped to commerce to have a wider selection of tools to easily spread information and share locations.

Radio Linden, or at least it's rapid growth. without the forums, many wouldn't have known to submit anything to it, nor would it have been even as widely recognized.

Mt. G'al sacrifices. but really, would anyone have been anywhere near as aware about this fun past time without the forums?

Feature Voting. without the popularity of the forums, which having General, The Sandbox and the Bulletin Board spurred on to heights that otherwise would not have been as populated, Feature Voting would not have the voices that it has had.. or the positive impacts that it has created. SL has benefitted from this tool immensely.

knowledge of in-world events. how many people would have known of Suzanne Vega or Kurt Vonnegut appearing in SL had it not been for the forums? how many would have been aware of MANY of the events? or opportunities related to them? would i have known of the need for an avatar for Harvey Smith without the forums? would teams of content creators have been aware of the opportunities in multiple instances for large scale projects?


i'll stop there for now, but i'm sure there are many mreo examples that could be brought to light.. in addition to everything else that you all have already listed. (and that's not counting what it has done for us each personally or what the forum community has had to show for with the forums.. from intelligent debates to the first forum party and so on)

Herpes

Pseudo-credibility?

Im gonna miss being utterly ignored on these forums ; ;

Waves at Richie

seriously..

those who know of me, know of me because of these forums! i would still be an unknown alt with no promise lurking in the shadows if it weren't fopr the official forums.

of course, now.. i'll have to join the fray over at Second Citizen.. you know, they're my kind over there.. rough and raw and fun.