Help Island Goes Beta!

Today the Help Island project will begin its initial phase of testing and will be open to new Residents and SL Volunteers.

The goal of Help Island is to allow volunteers like you the ability to help new Residents as they're leaving Orientation Island. This space will be located directly adjacent to the Orientation Islands, allowing volunteers the ability to assist new Residents during orientation, focusing on:

1. Assistance in tweaking settings, helping with technical problems
2. Helping new Residents with their appearance
3. Answering any questions they may have

This is the first phase of the project, the second phase, which will be launched the week of Nov. 29, will include an integrated structure, with tutorials and other helpful content, which is still being created/gathered. After you've had a chance to spend some time on Help Island, please be sure to send your suggestions to me as to what you'd like to see on it.

Thanks again for all of your assistance.

Cheers,
Jeska Linden

Man this place is so awesome! The spirit of helpfulness is amazing. Everyone was so excited and I think invigorated again to give up their free time to help new residents. This is exactly what was needed to try and lessen the feeling of overwhelm that many face when being rezzed for the first time.

In the building area new residents were getting one on one instructions learning how to build, in another section a well known designer was handing out free clothes, on the other side of the island a new resident was getting a tour in one of those Dominus cars, and at the same time a MAC user was getting tips and tricks to improve their performance.

Yes we all know that SL is experiencing some major problems right now that need to be addressed ASAP! However this is a major leap in the right direction that should have been done a long time ago.

Help Island Photos

Sweet.

*marks down new place to spawn camp and... er, hand out n00b kits*

*goes to recieve free things*

But no seriously, i was there, Its... AWESOME.

A view of Orientation Island from Help Island. I made a sign from letters made by Lumiere Noir for the sandbox.

I enjoyed the opening day of Help Island, the night slipped away before I knew it.

It's great!

not to piss on anyones parade or anything but which well known designer and why just the one?

curiousity killed the cat, satisfaction brought her back

Hehe....

Can't wait to be a mentor (if I'm accepted!) so I can spend time actually helping newbies and not fending off oldbie show-offs and scammers.

One interesting anecdote from the first day of Help Island's beta opening was many people commenting, "I wish Torley was here." There is talk that you are considering submitting an application Torley...whats the scoop?

You know how they name buildings or schools or whatever after people? On Help Island I would love to see the "Torley Torgeson Welcome Pavillion" or maybe the "Torley Torgeson New Resis Help Center." And of course it would be properly designed in those now famous colors.

If I understand correctly the Help Island is only for brand new newbies, and once they enter the SL mainland they won't be able to come back.

So, it won't be quite the same as an open entry welcome area in that there won't be any people who are 2 or 3 or 4 days into the SL experience coming back to chat or get more help.

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at this moment only one o.i. seems to be visible from h.i.

orientatin island 3 is runing and has n00b in it but is not visible from the help island


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Just for some fun...

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c275/Sio_Taylor/Second%20Life/ShadowOI.jpg

It really needs a few trees.

Who was the well known designer handing out t shirts?

How do I get a piece of that FIC action?

I have trial-ware content, can I drop a vendor on help island too?

I don't know about setting up a vendor but you can always give free stuff to newbies, they love it. Just join one of the volunteer groups if you want to do it on help island or many still go directly to the WA, so you can find some people there who woule really appreciate some free stuff.

From: Ingrid Ingersoll

It really needs a few trees.

This is just the sneaky peaky version. Jeska says the real and complete version looks and is awesome.

From: blaze Spinnaker

Who was the well known designer handing out t shirts?

Who said it was shirts?

From: blaze Spinnaker

How do I get a piece of that FIC action?

Join one of the volunteer programs blaze. You can apply here.

I have trial-ware content, can I drop a vendor on help island too?

There is no hub advertisement. Everyone thought it was a good idea to take it down as others might claim (and rightly so) that volunteers would be given an unfair advantage in promoting their content/land/service etc.

Jeska did mention however at the recent Mentor Meeting that there will be, "rotating content - ie: maybe a model house one week and a mocked up store the next." Also a spot where new residents could pick up some "freebies" to get them started. She says, "If you have anything you wouldn't mind giving away for free, drop me a note."

I must say, the Help Island beta is extremely cool. It was real exciting to be able to offer help and a very positive first impression to new arrivals, and I know this sentiment was shared by the other Mentors and Live Helpers who were there to see this island's inception. It was also very nostalgic to be able to see Orientation Island again and watch people try out the tutorial stations (watching via camera that is- we were asked by the Lindens not to interfere with the island, and to stay only at the final exit to offer grettings and course congradulations).

On an interesting side note- when I stopped by Help Island this morning before heading off to work, I was only slightly shocked to see that ReallyRick was still there teaching new arrivals. The guy was so stoked about being able to mentor new residents distraction-free, that he totally skipping going to sleep last night! Heh.. go to bed already Rick, you deserve it.

I'm really at a loss for words as to what even say...

Personally this is a "Second Life Changing" event for me. I haven't been this excited about SL since my first day as a newbie learning to dance.

This will have a huge effect on new user experince, maybe even bringing back the positive effects of when SL had a low population.

Only RL work tore me from helping out and giving mini-classes.

I absolutely feel the exact same way! It's like you are in my head Blueman.

That looks amazing. Great work, volunteers. Thanks for your service!

Yup! It was pretty awesome, it also felt good to be in an area that was fairly lag free and free of people intent on neg rating and griefing those trying to help new people (one of the main reasons that I have been reluctant to frequent the Welcome area of recent).

The newbie tools were cool and it was just excellent overall.

Too bad it was during the week and I had to pull away for RL stuff - I'll be back tonight!

I hope that this was a bad joke entirely. This sort of favoritism would be completely inappropriate.

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On an unreleated note, does the parrot on the orientation islands work properly? It didn't seem to for the new users i saw trying to use it. Also, the parrent needs to not detect and respond to volunteers, it disrupts the chat the parrot should be saying to the new users.

Jeska told me on Wednesday that we could go all around the OIs and greet people and did not need to stay at the exit area.

You are correct SuezannaC, we are more than welcome to enter the rest of OI and help as we see fit. I personally have tried to stay back and let them learn OI on their own and then greet them at the exit.

The policies, not just on this but on other matters may change since it is a new undertaking and just how things should be done is not in a convenient manual.

One certainly doesn't want to badger people. They will get enough badger badger all too soon, quite possibly. You can't just trade friendship with them expecting them to call you when they have a question.

It gets a bit dull waiting for them to find you if you aren't working another window. One can only skate in circles for so long.

Pfft.