Why I'm looking forward to Voice Chat

I continue to be stunned by the negative posts about voice chat, especially since if you don't want to use it you don't have to (I don't get it... "hmm, I'm not interested in Voice Chat so I think I'll head over to the forum and dis' it" [?]).

So I'm sharing what I am looking forward to in the voice chat client.

I sometimes use SL to conduct meetings with my colleagues and when we have a situation where one of us is explaining a complicated subject, it will really help to have a voice stream that everyone can hear. It is quite a challenge to type dense explanations.

I also expect that in training, we will use the same technique we use for synchronous meetings where a presenter will speak with voice, but learners will ask questions via text chat. That system works really well - like the Linden town meetings.

I am also looking forward to being in-world with RL friends. My best friend and I catch up with voice on XBOX live while playing cooperative games. I can hardly wait to be able to do that in SL - he's not willing to dl the beta client and our region isn't available there anyway. Sure, we could be on the phone, but being inworld is so much more fun!

Anyone else excited about voice chat?

You are correct. There are a lot of good uses for Voice in SL. And a lot of bad ones as well. we just have to see how it plays out. But to answer your question: No. I'm not excited about it. Nor am I worried about it's arrival either.

Same here, maybe I'll use it maybe I won't. Dunno yet, I have a lot of non-US friends who have time to think before they type, using voice for them will be horrible. But we'll see...

Mandy C

Well if you do use it...don't be surprised if your hear "That Song"..

At least I'll know you're near...*grins evilly*

Mandy C

I'm looking forward to voice myself; having it as an option. Sometimes chat is great especially for classes but when I'm exploring with my RL/SL husband, its nice to be able to speak with each other as we usually do.

Also, there is gonna be Karaoke for sure!! How cool will that be!

Karaoke alone is enough to keep me Voice Unenabled.

amen sister!

we got voice already in paradise heights since we took the region online. It's stand-alone from SL and I have been using this system for years. so far it has beaten any ingame voice system. So let's see what LL comes up with. Though the stand alone has many advantages over any other ingame voice I know about. It allows multiple channels, private channels with password lock, "press key to talk" (cause I dont want to hear people having dinner over a open mic), whisper across channels etc etc. + you can use it grid wide and offline from SL as well

If someone has something to communicate or share then they should not be limited to typing it out. I’m not usually a shy person but when I first entered SL I was overwhelmed by how limiting it was for me to type, and I quickly found myself sitting on the sideline wondering ‘how is this fun?’ Fortunately thanks to some friendly, supportive and truly patient people I was encouraged to try and chat, and now I do quite well thank you. I think this will hold true when voice comes to the main grid. There will be those who for many reasons will be apprehensive about it, and possibly find themselves putting off experiencing what could be an equally satisfying form of expression.
Having spent time on the voice beta grid for over a month now and from what I’ve experienced, I believe voice will benefit so many here in SL. Yes many and not all. Yes I’ve heard arguments for and against it. But please…I encourage all who can to visit the voice beta grid and give voice an honest try.
http://www.secondlife.com/communtiy/bhear.php[/url]

I agree, I think voice will be a great addition, but that it should be a choice whether or not to use it. From what I've heard, that's the majority of the opinion too (with the second place opinion being that voice chat sucks and will destroy SL as we know it). I see no problem with having voice chat enabled so you can hear things, but you don't have to use voice chat yourself if you don't want to. In fact, in the early days of the public voice beta, that's what I had to do because I didn't have a headset. As well, folks had no problem with me doing that (well, most anyways... Some just wanted to hear people talk because it was new and avoided my typing like the plague. >.> ). I, myself, have no problem if people choose to communicate by text, and in response I request that they have no issues accepting that I'd like to talk most of the time.

I just wanna use it to play music at other people without owning the land. Put my boombox I have to good use.

Funny you should mention that, I met a robot in the voice beta a couple weeks ago who didn't have a microphone, so he hooked up his guitar as audio in and was using that to communicate. Very neat, though sadly he wasn't very practiced.

Oh that is cool! I hadn't come across that, but I'm going to have to try it.