Voice usage

... but that's a whole 'nother thread. Or threads. Lots and lots of threads.

Well, this person was one of those "I'm in SL what I am in RL and everyone should be the same" Put your real picture on your profile, your personal information should be available for all at the outset,etc, etc. Anyone who didn't was into deception, therefore was morally reprehensible. *shrugs*

I won't listen, either. I don't like listening to avatars that look like one thing and sound like another. It bugs me.

If people are using voice, I go somewhere else, it's not a big deal. I wouldn't be part of your group, but that's not anyone's "fault", and if you have issues with people who don't want to listen then that's your problem.

What is a big deal is that Linden Labs makes it impossible to tell the difference between "there's not much conversation going on" and "people are using voice".

What's "morally reprehensible" is that Linden Labs refuses to implement VWR-1317.

I find that typed meetings go faster, because you don't have to wait for people to finish talking, you don't have to repeat what you just said, you don't need 'rules of order'. A text stream naturally serializes a concurrent process, removes delay and improves communication.

I guess my Dad was right. Growing up he always told me, "You just don't listen, do you? "

So just connect to voice and mute the voice part of the audio (there is a setting for that). Then you won't hear anyone and still know who *might* be talking. I did that before I actually started using it.

Having voice connected doesn't mean a person uses it with just everyone at any given time. Actually voice is rather used occasionally, and many people just have the dots on and don't even have a mic. No big deal. If I talk to someone on voice and someone joins with no dot I text to them "Just a second, we are in voice, I will be right with you". It is the same like telling them "Just a second, we are typing in German, I will be right with you."

That is why corporations all over the world have their meetings with each partipant using a blackberry to chat with eachother while sitting around a table, and no one ever uses things like a telephone to facilitate long distance talking. )

Do I smell popcorn? =^-^=

And beer.

Eww.. Beer is stinky! (>_<

Yes, I know that stupid trick. That doesn't solve the problem because it means that everyone who does that shows up with a dot over their head as using voice, which completely and utterly makes the whole point of the process, to tell who is using voice and who is not using voice, entirely moot.

Sorry for the run-on sentence but there must have been a dozen people who posted the same suggestion to VWR-1317 as if NOBODY HAD THOUGHT OF IT BEFORE.
You must be the only one who does. It's much more common, apparently, for people on voice to sit there and make jokes about the people who aren't using voice. At least I've had people tell me that had been going on a hell of a lot more than I get a comment that people are using voice.
And as for this comment, I'm not going to bother explaining why it's a completely daft straw man because you already know exactly why it's a completely daft straw man.

Interesting thread. For my PhD I am asking the question "how does voice affect the user experience in Second Life?". I think there are three factors that affect people's choice of voice or text communication:

1. interaction of media properties with user personality and communication purpose
2. physical context (eg who can overhear)
3. technical problems with voice

I think most of the comments in this thread fall into one of these categories.

I have a sketch of a description of the first category at http://virtualgreg.spill-label.org/2008/05/30/communicating-by-voice-in-second-life/#more-13

Last year I wrote about voice in MMORPGs - if you're interested see http://www.dis.unimelb.edu.au/staff/gwadley/roc/IE07-SpeakingInCharacter.pdf

-gw

/me nods.... /327/d1/235384/1.html I do recall being approached by someone on voice at SL5B who responded to my typing back to him with "If you wish to stay in the dark ages, might I suggest IRC instead?" (>_<

I prefer IM and email over phone calls and voice conferences with people I'm doing business with, in person, any time there are more than a couple of people involved in the conversation. It's got nothing to do with my identity or whether I'm role-playing or not. It's simply that voice is not well suited for many-to-many conversations. It tends to break up into multiple 1-1 conversations (where the cocktail party effect comes in) or it turns into a series of 1-many presentations.

In text chat you'll get sequences like:

A: blah blah
B: blah blah
C: something funny
B: blah blah
A: C - lol
B: blah blah
B: C- haha!
C: blah blah
A: blah blah

C: has said something funny, both B and A "got it" and responded when they felt free to do so. In voice B would have missed what C said to A, because B was "presenting", and A would likely have missed some of what B said, because they were distracted by C. So you have learned mechanisms (learned at great effort and to different degrees while growing up, and called things like "paying attention" and "being polite" and formal mechanisms (rules of order) to minimize this problem. In text, nobody misses anything, and none of these mechanisms are needed, until the size of the conversation is an order of magnitude greater.

Because in text, while your output bandwidth is reduced (typing is slower than speaking) you use the higher *input* bandwidth of sight. So the total available bandwidth is actually higher.

Idiots like that aren't worth even responding to, but I'd probably say "What's IRC?" just to watch him freak out.

I wonder how much of the lines drwan are generational on this issue. We all know the MyFaceSpaceBookCrowd, which is primarily younger people, has no qualms whatsover with showing all about themselves on the internet for all to see, while a lot of us "elderly" types aren't as forthcoming. While not a rule per se, it would be intersting to see the percentages. Also for older types, their experience living on the internet. Some who have been in online social groups for a long time, others like me, who never heard of IRC before getting involved here.

It is not voice that is bad, it is rude, immature people who use voice to be mean to others. That kind of people would use anything to be rude and mean. You can observe the same behavior in people making fun of someone in a language they can't understand.

Oh, yes, I'm definitely referring to a small minority. The problem I'm getting at is that the people who make sure that people around them know that they're in voice, since Linden Labs refuses to make that information available to non-voice users without forcing them to look just like voice users, is at least as small a minority.

The majority behavior is "do nothing, ignoring the non-voice users".

Actually... That night... I did have to Google "IRC". Never knew. (>_<

And at that point, everyone who does like and use Voice who is near you will chatter away at you on Voice, and wonder why you're so rude and ignoring their witty remarks.

If I have a dot over my head, it's an indication that I should be able to hear them. There's no way to indicate that I have Voice activated just for the sake of seeing those dots over other people's heads. So they are GOING to speak, and expect to be heard. And eventually, maybe, someone will think to text a comment to me and ask why I haven't responded to their one-sided conversation. Then I have to explain why I have Voice active even if I have no intention of using it. No thanks...

It's like carrying a cell phone, and everyone can find out your number, but you only turn the phone on for emergencies. But worse, because they never get a signal that indicates you aren't hearing their calls. "Hey, you got a cell phone, so why won't you answer me? Are you screening all your calls? You think you're too good to talk to me, you snooty...."

I have enough noise in my family room without adding voices that don't even come close to matching the avatars around me. The few times I did try listening, and typing back, I could almost never tell what voice went with which avatar. It's not like at a real meeting, where you can hear precisely the direction the voice is coming from, and can see the person's lips moving. It's more like watching a badly dubbed foreign film, where none of the voice actors sound like the actors on the screen.

Or like a conference call.

I hate conference calls.

Seems like the kids today are going back to text anyhow... I got my daughter (15) a cell phone and I never see her calling anyone, but she it forever banging out text messages...

One day in the car she had her phone out and was happily texting away... I asked her who was she texting to? she Replied "Amy"....

Amy was in the backseat of our car......

*giggles* i've done that. ^.^ i've also IMed with my friend sitting across from me ^.^

Tell ya' what... Everyone texting each other is a bunch better than all the bla-bla-blah that usually goes on in cell phone calls. (^_^)

Oh especially on the train in the morning. Jeez people, shut up already.

I think I'll put "morally reprehensible" into my profile. I like that.