The role of Infohubs

LOL Same thing different day. Another thread hijacked by Lias so she can get on her soapbox yet again.

I'm just gonna tell it like it is here ....all of it is provable and these are the facts. I NEVER started the Bear Co op group it was started by 247 Whiteberry although I am a member. The Co op was started because Lias told the regulars that they had no right to use the sim because they did not own land there. We clubbed together and bought land in bear. We still own land there. The joining fee was ONE linden it was up to Lias if she wanted to join (she was more than welcome) Should we have made her a "special" case and waived the one linden fee?

I joined Second Life in 2006 I stayed a regular at bear because I found the people I met there when I was new very helpful and also good company. If it hadn't been for Bear I would not have stayed in the game. Many others can also say the same about bear. My point here is that there have been a close group of regulars at Bear ever since I have been playing and far earlier than Lias is suggesting. The regulars have changed over time so it isn't a case of the sim filling up with more and more people. Many have gone on to build business, some have made rl relationships etc etc.

When I joined Bear was a nice place (the actual hub is still pleasant to sit and chat in) Even Ryans shop was an ok build and was the place I made my first Second Life purchase (a Tee shirt for $L50) Lias owned just one small school. Lias complained about the Infohub a long long time before she started filling the sim with clubs. It has never made sense to anyone but Lias why you would build three or four clubs in a sim that you know has a reasonably busy Infohub? It's very much like buying a house next to an airport and realizing that it's noisy so then you buy the whole surrounding area and complain bitterly that you want the airport closed because of the noise!

Lias states thet her builds are not intentionally ugly.......All I have to say about that is go take a look for yourselves at what amounts to a private ad farm......What is laughable about this is that almost all the ads on her school point to the Infohub, If lias does not rely on the traffic then what is the point of that exercise?

Lastly ....In an attempt to appease the ever complaining Lias, Linden pushed the sim limit to 43 avatars. Lias then took it upon herself to make sure that all these spaces were taken by placing campers on her land and making sure that her club had avatars in it night and day.
In a second attempt Linden have now increased the limit to 50 avatars! The result of this was for Lias to increase the number of people in her clubs to fill those extra places. The club next to hers is her friend Ryan Radio's (well known prolific ad farmer) which also has regular avatars in it. the hub peaks at around twenty but the real number is usually anything from five to fifteen avatars. On the odd occasion (when Lias's friend held a meeting there) it may climb a little more but this is exceptional. I have noticed a number of avatars appearing on the rez zone in the Hub but then not rezzing and not speaking so maybe this is an area that needs looking at?
In a seperate post (one of a huge amount about this topic) Lias makes it quite clear that she intended to drive the regulars out of the hub by filling it with people and making her builds ugly. I can either post the link or provide a note card with the quotes on it. I can also provide screenies of land usage at the sim if anyone wants to see em but in fairness (and in all likelihood) it is easy to say that these can be manipulated. If you really need to know just visit the hub.

To be honest this is all very well documented and this is just a way to keep Lias's perceived problem in the limelight at the expense of someones thread. Isn't it about time this was dropped and we all just carried on our Second Lives in peace without being called Greifers, Loiterers, and the latest one....Vagrant's? For the record my account is premium I'm also a landowner.

**EDIT*** In the interest of an accurate post and kindly pointed out to me by Lias......The bear Buddies group was indeed founded by myself. The story behind that is simple. It was founded one day when a few of us went to a Kart track and we wanted to chat on voice. We formed a group and used this as a handy way of conference chatting to each other while we raced, since we all drifted in and out of chat range during racing. The group then became a handy way for friends to communicate and still survives today. It is flattering that Lias thinks it's purpose was to grief her but in reality this was not the case. Thanks for pointing that out Lias and as mentioned I'm impressed you noticed!

Mundane InfoHub question, just because I'm too lazy to create yet another alt to go once again through the new resident experience*: When jumping off the first time to an InfoHub, does one get to choose PG or M, or does one just end up at whatever InfoHub is predestined for you? Or are all InfoHubs on M land? Should they be? If so, I presume that all InfoHub-internal content is necessarily PG, but obviously not all InfoHub sims are PG, so... I dunno. It just seems like somebody should be able to choose to start out PG if they want to.

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*Typing this, I just noticed: It's officially the "New User Experience" now. I wonder why. Just because "NUE" sounds "newer" than "NRE" (and less like an accounting category)?

Yes and no. Infohubs are scattered all over, and the "exit" LMs at Help Island don't go to all of them. Actually, it's easier to find welcome area LMs over the rest there. They're not randomly handed out, but, the LM givers are scattered about. Basically, the average new resident will click on one, get see the "Teleport" button for the first time, and *poof* on over to whatever Welcome Area, infohub, whatever... place they've been handed. It's just a matter of how much they're willing to walk around. (^_^)

As for choice? No, there is no "Where do you want to go? What would you like to see?" options available. You'd think something like that would be helpful, eh? (^_^)y

I asked a few noobs how they got to a infohub from Help Island. They all told me they went to the toolbar and clicked WORLD->TELEPORT HOME. So I believe each avatar created is assigned a random home point on the mainland. Obviously in one of the Welcome Areas or infohubs.

Now, there's something I haven't tried yet, or ever suggested. Now you got me all curious. (o.o)

When I'm in Mentor mode, the first thing I ever teach is the use of search and landmarks. I rarely take a home location into consideration, since relatively I don't have one myself. While my home is set to my store, I just log in where ever I was last. (^_^)y

Maybe they don't remember correctly...

I remember reading somewhere that Home is set to the first place you TP to from Help Island, and that if you go back to Help Island and TP somewhere else, your home will be reset.

There's a portal that hands out landmarks to random infohubs, and this is how newbies get off Help Island, generally.

Incidentally, since this topic began, I've been spending time on Help Island and the infohubs, and meeting new newbies is an interesting experience.

I've found it takes about a half hour to get them on their feet.

I recently tested and verified this, sending a newbie alt a landmark to a place it would not otherwise be able to "set home" and, indeed, the alt's home got set to that parcel's landing point where it arrived, even before I invited it to the land group.
That I did not know, have you verified that?

That's true. As a Mentor, any visit I make to Help Island means jumping through hoops on my way out to be sure that my basement Home location stays where I want it. Of course, that's my fault, since I have a TP drop in front of my store, so teleporting home lands me there instead of my basement platform... So, I always have to walk downstairs and manually reset my home... Oh, the things I put myself through. (T_T)Yes and no. There are random portals, but, they give out a single LM each. The central "exit" portal has three LM givers; one for Waterhead, one for Ahern, and I forget the third.... (O.o) But, it's more a matter of which portal is used and how much the new resident is willing to wander around HI.I've always had fun helping other people. A lot of the reason I was a failure at school is because I was often going out of my way to solve problems for other people. I've grown to be a bit more selfish, but, not by much. If someone comes to me genuinely asking for help, I'm totally up to the task. Heh... Silly thing to get a thrill on, eh? (^_^)y

They seem to have topped it up. I sat there in my newbie alt and pulled out at least half a dozen different landmarks, including both welcome areas and infohubs.

Are there any signs describing what an Infohub is before you leave? How to set Home either through leaving Help Islnd again, joining a group or buying/renting land? Are the Infohub landmarks part of the Inventory Library?

I know I could answer some of these myself, but I wanted to type them all at once as a reminder for future discussion.

I think that it might be helpful to tell newbies how to return to Help Island (and there is a landmark in the Library), but I think it would be better to tell newbies that their Home is set when they leave Help Island. To say more just confuses things.

"Edit Appearance" is another thing that shouldn't be mentioned on the first day, since it turns out to be a dead end with many of the default avatars.