Where have all the classes gone?

Reposting because I see somehow my post was either removed or didn't take.



I described it, I didn't invent it, and you have only to look at the earlier post in this thread by Cocoanut Koala to see that any intelligent thoughtful person coming to these forums will have the exact same response -- there is a core of players who are self-referential, smug, know-it-all, and in needing of some shake-ups and questioning by new people.



Yes, 40 is pretty large, and they are large beyond their numbers with their presence in the morpegs world. Yeah, I get that intent, and I challenge it. Because it gives power to some people who endlessly wield it arrogantly and brook no dissent in many cases. Sure, there are those who are more skilled with the toolset, but they don't get to rule the roost just because of those skills. I challenge their rule. I'm not in the wrong place, but you might be : ) And if dogs can't have sex with cats in a virtual world, it's not a virtual world worth it's salt, is it???



Duh, I know that, cuz I buy some of their stuff, lots of it even. So? Good for them. We can buy, or not buy. God bless them if they don't paralyze the world with free but not-really-free stuff. Er, I think feeling perceptive and morally superior might be YOUR beat LOL.



Silly, I could have been in SL ages ago, but I didn't get a new graphics card until I had motivation when Sims II came out. Yeah, I"m a simmer and proud of it. I wasn't impressed with crappy game-within-games that didn't work (I remember my first visit to SL I saw some sort of hockey game I think). I wasn't impressed with a world that gave pride of place to arrogant geeks and had a steep learning curve. If TSO hadn't tanked so badly, I might not have come, but so what? There's enough room for everybody in SL -- it's a big world, much more than your cramped imagination.

Um taking my nose out of what other people do? Hmm...I think that might be a more accurate description of someone who obsesses about someone else's game histories, interviews them under the guise of a private convo then announces it is going on a blog, attempts to trap them with all the known intelligence interrogation techniques, etc. etc. Could you go find some real enemies to fight, Nolan?

This crazy idea that you keep perpetuating that I "tried to take down Will Wright" has got to be from your reading of the already feverishly tabloidy SLH. Um, hard to see how I could "take down" the designer of a multi-million dollar Internet game ROFL. As far as I know, he is still thriving. I think there was some tension between Maxis and EA.com but that has nothing to do with me. I think he moved off the TSO project to other Maxis or EA.com projects but that has nothing to do with me. Gah, you ascribe all sorts of powers to me that don't exist, take off your tinfoil hat and get a grip. I am a member in good standing in TSO and have always been, and if I was banned for 3 days from the forums once, so what, wasn't everybody lol? The motto of TSO is "Challenge Everything". So I did : )

As for the BDSM debate, that's not relevant to SL. That had to do with the question of children as young as 9 being in TSO. Go over and read SLH if that issue is of interest, but it has no bearing on SL where children are not allowed formally, where lifestyle issues are a matter of choice and privacy on one's plot of land and not the subject of the game company's business if they don't violate the TOS. The issues are different here, and the question of kids on the grid is as heated here -- or even more so -- so your effort to try to portray me as some rabble-rouser will fall flat, if you ever got that debate going here, believe me.



Um, which of a million threads should I pull up about game commercialization, ugly box clubs, blah blah blah. Sit on one of the FIC lots for five minutes and you will hear this in spades.




Whether I mean lesson or lessen, the point is not lessoned that ranting against people based on your perceived notion of their sexual orientation is a TOS violation, so get off it.

So anyways...

I'm holding a Q&A hour at the Learning Center sandbox in Mauve (125,100) Wednesday night. Got the ok from Jamie. It's going to be fun I think until the people attending realize how incompetant I am. Cocoanut, hope you can come!

When your done playing with your tinker toys Make me some supper hun..

Cutter and I have been working on an extensive building class...... coming SOON..
Due to 1.6 coming out we have to redo a lot of the snapshots we took before the release of 1.6........ barring any more interruptions we should have the class notes completed by the middle of next week, end of at the latest. We're really excited about this class and have put a lot of time and effort into making it the best it can be. Taking a bit longer than the 1/1.5 hr classes I attended over a year ago, it will be more comprehensive and with 1 mentor and 1 instructor, both of opposite ends of the creative spectrum, we think it will make the most of the length of the class.... * smiles* not sure how long that will be until we do our first one ...... *Crosses fingers & dances*

I've held a few discussions and really the interest just isn't there anymore. Where I used to have 30 people talking over each other now I am lucky to see 5 show up and 2 speak. Same thing with classes. No one is teaching them because no one is attending.

Sorry, I disagree. Cocoanut is just another Prokofy (albeit less vitriolic) for me. I have no doubt that both of you are intelligent, which is a shame, because you seem to distort everything you see into some sort of us vs. them thing. You are one of us (an SLer, nothing more, nothing less), whether you realize it or not, and hopefully, eventually, you will quit trying to find fault with people who enjoy SL for what it is, not their own personal vision of what it should be.
See, this is what I am totally mystified by. No one is ruling the roost. I am more skilled than some others at certain things. I give that knowledge freely to those who ask. You yourself are already more skilled at certain things than others. If anyone is trying to rule the roost it is you, just by sheer weight of bellicose, grandiloquent posts and threads that even midbies and newbies take issue with. It's funny that you used to try to pin this on the "beta love festers", but once non-beta people started to take issue with you, it became a "state of mind". Classic adaptation of indictment to fit your needs.You can't have it both ways. You complain about those folks, and then you praise them for selling. For what it's worth, most of the stuff that is given free is junk, stuff that wouldn't sell anyway. That is NOT paralyzing the world. As far as perception and superiority - puhhhhlease, do you even listen to yourself? Why do you think so many people of various SL ages think you are so far out of line? It really appears you are incapable of lucid self-examination.
That's right, room enough for everyone, so leave people alone. I still say you are pissed you came into the race later. I really believe that. Your posts reek of it.
Could you find some real enemies to fight? you had none here until you made them by virtue of plastering labels all over people. I, and may others have been reactionary, i.e., not the same thing at all. You instigated class warfare, worry about what everyone else sells, how much they sell it for, if they give away stuff, what they build, and on and on and on. Again you attempt to turn it around. If you instigate, and people react, you are to blame. You're NOT the victim. You seem to have done this in TSO too, I was looking for a pattern, and I found what appears to be one.
I said EA, not Will Wright, quit misquoting me for your own purposes. I know you can't take down EA, DUH, but not realistically being able to do something desn't seem to have stopped you from thinking you can change SL, has it? You ascribe powers to players here that are simply that - players. I was told you tried to sue EA. I was told you impersonated Will Wright. I know that you had a fucking hissy fit when Will Wright traded a damned balloon with a player. You are the one with the tinfoil hat on. You think you know what drives everyone here because of what a couple of dumbasses may have said on the forums. That is dangerous thinking and it has caused RW wars. There are assholes in all age brackets, quit unfairly casting others because of what a few morons say on these forums. I challenge you to find one example of me sneering at a new player's questions on these forums, for that matter any of the regular oldbies here who are generally helpful. See, you can't come into an existing world with guns blazing, shooting up the town recklessly without some folks pushing back, especially when you try to categorize people you don't even know.I think it is relevant. You specifically told me BDSM, that is not an age group, it's a segment of a population. You could've just as easily said "I went after sexual exploitation of minors in TSO", but you didn't, you singled out a group. I think you are afraid to single them out here though, because you know they would hand you your ass.
Um, you are the one bitching about "white cubes of death" and the like. Some folks may have complained about boxy builds, however, I have never seen someone crusade ad nauseum about it until you came along on your high horse and started trying to tell LL how to run SL and the rest of us how to act in SL.Whatever. You know damned well that has nothing to do with my issue with you. Those titles do not indicate sexual orientation and my use of them was in response to NOT KNOWING your gender. I told you, I used to refer to you as "he" until a couple of people told me you were female. Nothing more, nothing less. I felt a bit awkward after that, because I felt I may have been misaddressing you, which is why I asked you your gender. Did I ask you if you were homosexual or straight? NO. Does it matter to me? NO. For God's sake, your orientation means NOTHING to me. Get over it. Ask any of my myriad of gay and lesbian friends here in SL. I won't go into details about my RL, but suffice it to say it's a fair representation of the set I hang with in SL. That said, I am done with you. You are sour grapes and make bad whine. Oh and please report me for "Mr./Mrs./Miss/Ms." I need a good hearty laugh. Have fun Saladin.

Here's a little prokofy for everyone to see over at SLU:
http://www.sluniverse.com/forums/shwmessage.aspx?ForumID=1&MessageID=4890

That is what strikes me as the odd thing. I think the problem is less that the incentives to teach are not enough but that no one shows up. Even in absolute numbers there are far less people showing up to classes than a year ago even though the SL population is much higher. Why would that be? It might be that the culture has changed. Or it might be the events tab is so littered with tringo events that no one notices the classes.

Assuming the latter has something to do with it the events listing needs some serious reworking. It is quite harmful to the health of SL. I think just adding a tab for educational events is a bit simplistic. Maybe LL should keep an eye out for which events are most popular. Then not show any events until a choice is made of which types someone is interested in. Taking a look at today's events I would have:

Tringo
Parties
Best Dressed Contests
Other Contests or Games
Other Fun
Educational
Uncategorized

This way we could choose, say, the last four and some gems would stand out such as the one educational class I see which is on texturing, or Snail Races or Bad Women of History.

David Valentino

Someone should offer a private tutor service, if they aren't already. That way, if I want to learn scripting, I could hire a scripter and we could move at my pace, taking into account my fore-knowledge of certain areas of SL experience. It would save me time, allow me to ask direct questions without the worry of delaying a class full of folks, and also offer the teacher/tutor monetairy compensation for thier time.

Same could be done for building, poser, PSP, PS, clothing design, specific areas such as vehicles or particles, etc.

This wouldn't help newbs overly much if the cost were restrictive, but would be great for us older dogs that would like to learn new tricks.

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With no previous experience of anything used in SL to create items, I am still climbing a steep learning curve, actually it's more like Everest .

What David is suggesting is precisely what I need, desperately. For example, I have bought Paint Shop Pro but cannot, no matter how hard I try, manage to make a plant texture, ie one with the background to the actual plant transparent. I would pay good money for someone to sit down with me and talk me through the process. Once I've made one, I can then move ahead. If anyone is interesting in earning money by teaching me how to do this, please IM me in world.

I joined in mid December 2004 and have been very disappointed at the lack of lessons. Hower, having read some of your posts here, I can understand why you hesitate making the commitment. The Ivory Tower is fantastic but its when I'm trying to make an item and get stuck, I would really love to have a building mentor, to whom i could go for advice. Again, I would be happy to pay.

Another alternative might be for LL to actually write up some decent tutorials on the various subjects.

I did attend a beginner's scripting class but didn't understand a word of it; my brain is obviously not properly wired lol. So I'll leave that one be.

Alexa

This is actually pretty interesting, well maybe. Here's a perspective:

Back in the day, classes were attended in droves. Hmm why...

- there was nothing else to do
- the world primarily attracted builder/scripter types
- there wasn't so much free stuff around
- (in such a community) building/scripting ability was prestigious

With a crop of noobs like that, you're bound to pack the classes. Nowadays though, you can get a TON of stuff for free (a lot of it pretty decent, back in the day we would have been like WOW), there's tons of things to gawk at, the world isn't just full of programmers anymore and the culture has evolved to the general populace (which are good at, and interested in, a lot of things, but not modeling and programming). Programmers and scripters often think in terms of classes, technical materials, and so on; essentially they're intrinsically motivated to pursue both structured and unstructured learning (believe me I know I take classes all the time). Most people do not share this passion for ongoing schooling and technical problem solving and/or do love schooling but not for programming (nothing wrong with, say, foreign language or dance classes...but they don't help you build hovercars).

I know I've seen a few requests for more classes here, but even with the small population slice represented by the forums, they are infrequent. I've posted a few times that I was considering taking on classes again if there appeared to be interest, and never get more than two or three replies saying I'll definitely go.

Anyhow, I think the issue is more complex than "nobody is teaching". But I'm going to find that out for sure, since I just bought a new plot of land, partially to put up a learning area. I have some people I work with on the grid now and need a place for them to blow things up, so decided to put out a learning area...then decided meh why not make it public and see what happens.

Since I've returned to SL I have just had two classes, which will grow soon. What struck me the most was the size of the 2 classes. Basic Building 9 attended. Advanced Water Techiques over 20 attended. This makes me wonder something and its this....... since the population has grown so much during the last year, and the amt of people giving help at the welcome area and sandboxes, could it be we have to rethink the old classes, such as any of the Basic lessons and start offering more classes that go beyond the basics?

Im not going to decide till I have more numbers to work with but I still find teach fun and interesting and will continue giving classes

Not this weekend tho, Im working the new changes into my classes

Cutter & I have spent weeks working the "basics" into our class. I wanted to add to it somethings I thought were missing when I took them. I loved my class teachers. They are/were all amazing and I still look up to them........ including you Toy. Won't know how the class goes til we have one but I expect a full class.

If you need another person to stand around and answer questions I could probably do that.

I find Second Life to be a very awkward mechanism for teaching how to use Second Life.

A system that would allow you interact through voice, and to see the other persons screen, so you know what they see and what they are trying to do, and whether they have the right objects selected, and in which you would have your own cursor separate from theirs, to point to what they need to do, would be vastly more efficient. I believe that Windows come with such a group meeting system built in. Just a system using some kind of free long distance internet telphony, or something like teamspeak, would be a vast improvement.

We have live audio streams for DJing music, why not for classes too?

The new welcome area doesn't have a classrom building, does it? If Lindens wanted classes, they could make a building for classes within visual range of the welcome area, and let that have some assigned Linden peacekeepers there to reduce griefage. Maybe this could be worked out in the Morris sandbox.

Another thing that used to make classes get attendance was the event announcements. People would go because they got made aware of the imminent arrival of the class, and were sick of standing endlessly at the welcome area. As noobs, they weren't too good at finding things on their own, so they would go to whatever was announced. So maybe a system that would announce classes to new members by default, also available for non-new members, optional for all, of course , would lead to classroom attendance.

Having the Lindens at least provide high resolution images of the menus and dialog boxes would be nice. Screen captures imported back into SL take time, cost money, and look blurry when done. Since the technology for displaying the menus and dialogs is already built into the Client, why not make these elements available in a form that could be applied to a texture?

Of course some celebrity instructors might get some attendance, like say a class on scriping by Catherine Omega, sculpting by Starax Statosky, Clothesmaking by Chip Midnight, Airplane Construction classes by Cubey, Etc.

Enough rambling.

I second what Toy said. I've been in SL for about 3 weeks and have taken one basic scripting class and one basic building class. Both classes were helpful in getting me started but after a week of playing with the knowledge learned from those classes, I'm left with more questions.

I would pay to attend intermediate and advanced building classes since that is what I enjoy the most...well except for shopping!

I'll add my n00b voice to the others... there is a serious lack of classes for those who want to really learn how to do things, build things, make things.

I have been picking at the clothing templates Chip provided ever since they were released (and thanks for the psd versions, Chip!), but as I'm not an artistic person (I'm a writer, not a drawer) it is highly likely that my dreams of contributing with fashion are soon to be dashed.

I would LOVE to learn how to build. But my attempts in the sandbox are monstrosities that I would be ashamed to show anyone and, being dyslexic, the Tower of Prims was an exercise in utter frustration.

I'm toying with scripts now, as they are purely abstract and writing based. Hopefully I can contribute that way. Maybe. But trust me, there is nothing as depressing as thinking you can't really add anything to the world because you're not good at anything that would be considered a contribution.

I'd love someone to show me how to make my ugly ducklings into swans... but all I ever see on the events list are the trio ingos (i.e., slingo, bingo, and tringo), or various cut-throat club competitions. All well and good, but not learning experiences, ya know?

Part of me thinks the personal tutor would be more effective than the class simply because focused attention is always better in a learning environment. But my wallet cringes from the thought and that bothers me as well -- people who take the time to teach you should reap benefit from that greater than the 'warm fuzzy', if you take my meaning.

I'd like to think Linden would support (via $L) those who commit their time to teaching, be it tutor or classroom style. In the end, they are the ones who net the greatest over-all benefit from teaching efforts.

I've been in SL since early December, have taken all the building courses, and would really be interested in more advanced and detailed classes. I still want some real basic scripting classes too, as I know computer hardware extremely well, but scripting not at all I hear ppl all the time that are interested in taking these classes, but dont due to time constraints, or they took a class with 20 people, and didnt get their questions answered. Twenty in a class is fine, if you're gonna be there 8 hrs....not good for a one hour class. Some of you guys have great ideas about holding classes. Hope some of you can pull it off.

While I haven't much to say on the actual thread topic, here's the quick guide to doing that:

Place your plant on a background of a color that does not appear in the plant. You may wish to do this with layers. Let's say you've got a nice green pine tree and a bright screaming red background. Using the selection tool, select the pixels that make up the tree (so only it is outlined by the "crawling ants" looking selection line). Under the selection menu, select "Save to Alpha Layer" and replace any alpha layer that might already be in the picture.

Save the lot to a .tga and all the bits that you didn't select (that is, the red background) ought to be transparent.

I get discouraged looking in the Instructor group and see around 60 people yet only 5-6 of us actually give classes

Well I applied for Instructor certification and I'm still waiting for them to clear me. I have already been teaching people the basics and fundamentals of LSL scripting and have received positive feedback that they were able to continue on from that point on their own with minimal extra help from other people. I am eager to start instructing in a class situation and have already compiled my LSL Scripting 101 folder of step-by-step scripts and objects that can be used to teach a class with as examples that everyone can follow as I explain the concepts.

Now just have to wait for the Lindens to clear me to be an instructor.....

I also think that part of the problem with advanced courses is that by the time people get that far, they have specialised their imagination into wanting to something in particular rather than learn what the class has to offer and then go back and try to manipulate that knowledge into their vision.

May the Lindens could implement a feedback voting system of some kind that allowed people who had attended an event to receive an object containing a notecard that they fill out and return to the Instructor, with their feedback and what they would like to learn about next. It could work off a visitor list style script, and send out the notecards a week or so after the event to give the students some time to use what they have learnt. May be one of us scripting instructors could make the object ourselves.

Anyway.. with that kind of feedback, the instructor(s) could then decide that because 15 of their 20 students want to learn how to make jewellery, they will hold a Jewellery making course, or come here to the forums or whatever and find another instructor who knows how to make jewellery to do the class.

Tonnes of classes these days... Teazers is doing some really awesome stuff