Why SL cannot succeed - a personal opinion.

Well, I can't argue with most of that - you're right. If someone just wants to hack through fields of goblins and has no other real interests, WoW might be a better place for them. My point was that there is an awful lot to do in SL and where LL and the platform as a whole fails when it comes to resident retention is that it is very difficult for people who are new to figure out where they fit in and are happy. That's not to say that SL is for everybody. It isn't. As for Vikki, it sounds from her post that she really didn't have anyone to hang out with. She went through building, owning land, trying all of the things that you can do solo, but never really hooked up with a group of friends to share her home with. Without other people, SL would be pretty boring for a lot of people. I wouldn't be here if not for the people. There are plenty of games I can play single player with better graphics, more action and stable platforms. Vikki needed community. That's where SL failed her, and it's unfortunate, because it should be a real strength of SL.

You can't get the exact experience of RL in SL, if you are looking for that, stay in RL. The hot tub is a good example. I don't have a hot tub in RL. In SL, I can get into the tub, put on a music stream and sit back and relax. Maybe I chat, or maybe I just relax for a bit. But I "feel" relaxed and refreshed.

When I fly my helicopter, I'm still in my chair, but I can "feel" like I'm flying to a fair extent, same with skydiving. You can go to a RP Sim, and be a great warrior if one exists for that particular genre, or a Space Pilot, or a Gorean Slave or a Kidnapped Heroine, whatever. Someone has to create the place to do it , but it can be done. The platform is there. Yes LL can manage and promote it better. But to enjoy it does take some effort on our part. If you have no imagination, creativity, whimsy, or personality at all, then no, Second Life isn't for you. First Life probably isn't that great either I'd bet.

Depends on whats on TV.

Forget my post - this one is better. Or QFT or QFMFT or whatever I'm supposed to say here. I'm thinking of plagiarizing this.

QFT. Excellent points all.



I'm curious. Because it's so interactive, is the typical SL'er the same as the typical tv watcher? I have never liked tv. In the past year I had my cable disconnected because I never watched it. Before I found SL I would guess I averaged watching 2 hours a week and now it's even less than that.

TV takes a lot less effort than SL.

And it does most of the imagining for you.

So its perfect for people with limited imaginations.

Can I hire you to Sue yourself if you do?

Nope - I'm too busy writing letters to the Lindens in the Thread about first names.

Wait! Yes. You can hire me to sue myself. All I have to do is make sure that my fees exceed any potential judgment I take against myself and you'll end up owing me money. Perfect!

I watch a lot of TV, always have. I don't blindly sit and flisp stations, I have my favorite shows, sporting events documentaries and movies and I watch them. My DVR is my most cherished posession because I can watch them on my schedule. I went into a minor panic last weekend when I switched my regular cable box/DVR for a new HiDef one for my new TV. After it was hooked up, I saw the blank DVR Screen and wondered if I had watched all the recordings on the old one. I think I did, at least I hope.

That is not quite true. You can declare yourself to be a great warrior or a space pilot, but you can only do it by chatting (talking about fighting or going into space), gaming (the warrior can play a fighting game, but it will be a fair game, so he will lose as often as he will win, thus not being that great really), or creating weapons or spaceships (which is a totally different process). Neither is really suited for running a business, but the space pilot could "explore" by flying to other people's space-themed sims, but that doesn't exactly feel like being a space pilot when ANYONE can just teleport there even if they aren't a pilot and have no ship.

You can do all those things.. but you can't fight in any great battles or go into space. So the key defining activities of those roles will still always be missing.



That I think is unfair, to attack people that way just because they don't enjoy SL, and it's black and white thinking either way. Imagination can always fill the gaps in for _anything_, that's how a little girl can imagine she's a fairy princess while standing in the garden holding a wooden stick. But if we are going to invest time and money in things to help us feel our imagination, then they need to provide a worthwhile amount of help for the money and time, otherwise we.. well, we might just as well stand in the garden holding a stick.

Someone who wants to be a great warrior can play WoW, someone who wants to play a space pilot can play EVE, SL is competing with these games. Yes, they are "grinding" games, but in WoW warriors grind by fighting, and in EVE pilots grind by flying through space - so they're getting to do their role-defining activities right away. Now, you can say that SL doesn't need to compete with them, but the problem is that the kind of social roles that SL looks (to an outsider) like it would support, it turns out not to (take the dancer as an example), or if it does it supports them only for a minority of the population.

Hey I watch a lot of TV too

I even love American Idol.


But if you want proof that TV is the perfect entertainment medium for those with limited imaginations - I only need state that my husband's favorite pastime is watching TV.

Sure! But what you quickly discover is.. once you meet people you really like, they're pretty much who they are and your friendships transcend everything in SL. Which is great.. until you realise that, once you've made such good friends in SL, you might as well uninstall SL and replace it with SLeeK. This isn't a problem for the SL community, but is possibly a problem for content producers.

OK how about this for new member retention?

Continue the "portal" thing; in fact, make it so that the ONLY way you can create a new avatar is to go through a portal. I'm sure a lot of people choose not to use portals now, and miss out on a lot of potential socializing.

In addition to the portals, make Orientation a GAME. Give it goals. Like, on Day 1, you learn how to walk and fly. When you do that, you get a prize (a real prize, like L$500.) The next day/hour/whatever, you learn something else, someWHERE else. You'd get teleported to a different area of your portal, to see new stuff, new people, etc. Make the learning segment an actual challenge that people want to complete, to get L$, or freebies, or whatever. Hell, why not reintroduce the free 512 to premium members who actually complete the entire orientation? Make that the ultimate prize. That would cut down on land flippers who'd create premium alts just to get the free 512. They wouldn't want to complete all the orientation steps each time. And make orientation last a week or something. People would always have the option to opt out, but then they wouldn't get the free 512 at the end.

By that time, users would be confident enough and hopefully will have made enough acquaintances/friends in their portal area, that they would be convinced to stay longer.

Would someone in Marketing hire this Girl? Quickly!

Way back when I joined SL, OI _did_ give out L$ prizes for completing each step. But, of course, this falls foul of the (free alts+starting L$=zero L$ sales) argument.



Touring multiple areas as part of orientation is a fantastic idea!!



I'm not what you'd do for steps, because an experienced user can finish all the Orientation stars (not just the mandatory four) in about 10 minutes under the current system.

I had a discussion about this with Fayruz, who came in thru the CSI/NY game. They have you solve a simple murder, I believe. She thought it worked well as a training regimen.

AND, their default avatars are SO much better than the regular SL ones.

And, backing up Trout's point about special-interest Orientation Islands, the Lindens actually call them Community Portals, I believe.
.

I had one of my alts go through the L Word portal. It's so much better than the regular avs. I hope I didn't just give myself away for the upcoming alt party at the hangout.

Easy, make this for something of worth that is not transferable, like decent skin or hair. Nicer clothes... a watch, decent shoes... a cool gadget... a good, basic AO... so many things that are helpful for making noobs less noobish. [/QUOTE]

And hear outrage from all the content creators and rightfully so. Maybe slightly less noobish like the portals are doing, but not too much.

Even if all you did when you finished Orientation you were given a "Real" Newbie kit, with High Quality items. I'd think a lot of content makers would donate something to this cause.
Again it takes a little creative thinking on LL's Marketing Team's Side, get the 4 Guys from the refrigerator box on the Embarcadero and put them to work. A case of Anchor Steam and the ideas will start to flow.

Kinda sounds like a Scavenger Hunt

A link to CNN's SL Blog re the Newbie problem...

http://secondlife.blogs.cnn.com/2008/01/30/the-newbie-experience/

Does anyone know what LL's vision of the SL future is? Have they made any statements anywhere as to what they would like it to become? I'm wondering if they reached their goal a long time ago and, since then, they've just been rolling along, adding things, increasing the user numbers which increases the money they can make, etc. I'm sure I read somewhere that they envisage interconnection with other grids but, with Zero's suggestion to OpenLife that OL creates a way to connect to SL, LL don't appear to want to create that side of it themselves. I'm wondering if SL really isn't going any further, and that LL's overall development intentions have already been fulfilled, and all that's left is to expand the current system and make money from it. I wouldn't criticise them if that's the way it is, because it's just like any other business, but I'm curious to know if they have a vision for the future of the SL-type platform, and their part in it.

Their goal is to replace the internet with the Metaverse.

Too much time reading Snow Crash I think.

Sadly, that does pretty much sum it up.....