Talk To Feature

No one uses it. Kill it and bring back "Fly To" or "Focus On."

Yep. Other quick suggestion: make chat history one of the "main" GUI buttons so it's easily accessible. Put "History" in place of either the accidentally-clicked "Snapshot" button (already have a shortcut key) or the never used "Leaders" button (put this in a dropdown menu). Who uses that all the time anyway? I view history almost every time I have a conversation but I look at "leaders" about twice a year.

Oh and btw I'm posting this as a test using the Opera 7.51 web browser once again so if it posts okay, thumbs up to LL for the compatible webpage.

Only newbies who haven't yet been told otherwise use the Talk To feature. If we are the only two there and within 20 meters of each other, there's no reason at all to use it.

I've NEVER used it. I can see how it COULD be used, but I've never been in a such a situation where it would be called for.

I think Linden Lab should add some data-tracking code to the clients to collect anonymous data on how often any menu item, keyboard shortcut, UI button, or pie wedge is clicked. It could REALLY help streamline out the useless interface elements and help point out the ones that should be easier to activate.

Talk To is the single most useless, pointless, and pathetic feature ever implemented into SL. THe only people who use it are newbies and people who are so bored out of their minds they'd probably resort to eating their mouse right after using the "Talk To" feature.

Come to think of it, I used it just yesterday and I need a new mouse

The Talk To feature could be made usefulk if it was implemented right. As it stands now, people can still hear us talking, the camera gets all weird on me, and it doesnt really accomplish anything that isnt already accomplished by normal chat.
I say, screw the camera weirdness, use instant messages instead of public chat, and reinvent the Talk To button as an easy way to start a private "conference call" without having to rearrange the calling cards in your inventory.

Right-click on the person and select Send IM. Instant conference call, no calling card required!

What would be better is if the talk to feature dropped a Cone of Silence around both the avatar's heads.

LF

Actually I think LF and Eggy are right Eddy--this would let you type to one person without having to use the IM window, and mute all other other conversation. I don't think pure IMs can really have that same effect.

So change that unused feature and change those unused UI buttons.

Why don't we have the group chat system that THERE had. I know you're all going to say, "ew THERE has cooties, icky," but they had A LOT of good features. And I'm still waiting the Lindens to make the default animations as smooth as There's. But the group chat system that There had with the viewpoints and all was really pro for socializing.

I don't know what There had, but it might be good.

How 'bout a hybrid? Selecting "Talk to" doesn't mute you or the recipient, but makes their text stand out significantly compared to the rest of chat (and history). Just a change in color might make this feature at least a little more useful.

That's a very simple change, could be very useful in big chats, and easy to implement too. Not bad.

I think it would be especially useful for games like Jeopardy where there's a host: Everybody "talks" to the host (assuming that "talk to" isn't 1:1, which it shouldn't be; *:1 should work fine). Convenient way to avoid the cheap hacks that're used now, e.g. SPEAKING IN ALL CAPS or repeating everything several times. times. times.

Hrm. And now that I think about it, maybe the feature would be better titled "Hilight."

Obvious possibility for extension: Allow a user to hilight more than one person at a time, automatically cycling through unused colors (with an option at hilight time to specific color, of course).

Thoughts?

To THAT end, I'd like to be able to assign different colors to my friends so that I (and only I) see their chat text in that color.

[EDIT: That is, what Mallecho said while I typed. ]

But that's outside this thread's issue of Talk To (and other UI elements/butotns) not being as useful as they should be.

Newbies frequently Talk To me. I Refuse, then start chatting with them. But it is a royal pain the butt, as I fear that they think I am uninterested in talking to them.

I played for awhile without using this feature. At first, I thought it was something that we could actually use to talk to another player using voice. Anyway, it is an awkward feature to use. And I've since forgotten about it.

And the chat and social interactions in There were good. It wouldn't hurt at all if SL took a page from that book.