Frankly, LL, we don't give a damn?

I'll go if they hold it in Seattle or Portland next year, but I just couldn't spare the money or the time this year. Plus, as an average recreational resident, the only thing there for me would be the social aspect. i know a handful of people who went and I really would have loved to have met them, but I don't think there were any sessions at all that would have had any value for me. It looks like a good party, though.

Exactly how I felt about the 2005 event.

CONVENTION, not CONFERENCE.

SLCC has always been about Community first. That means lots of socializing, and it does feel like a bit of a family reunion. We actually debated before SLCC 1 on whether to name it "Convention" or "Conference", and we went with Convention because we wanted it to feel a little more like a family barbecue and a little less like "serious business." If you're more interested in the business side, the Virtual Worlds Conference is always very well run, and has a lot more of a business angle than SLCC. I hope the tip helps!

Regards,

-Flip

While panels are great and everything, is there anything else that can be done at the SLCC that is fun and social? Say a machinima contest where the viewers are the judges? SL trivia event? Dress up as your favorite avatar contest?

See, and I think the other way ... I think partying is fine, but it would be great to hear about exciting meetings at SLCC where people learned things that changed their Second Life.

I'm surprised that this thread isn't hearing from sub-communities of people that work together in SL, met at SLCC and were invigorated by it ... I sure hope that happened, too! Perhaps the performing arts/Live music crowd, the United Sailing Sims (126 sims of navigable water!), the therapy/medical community, AWG (Architecture Working Group), GOR sim builders anonymous, etc.. If I were involved in organizing SLCC, I'd be wooing subcommunities like that.

The idea of a machinima contest where the viewers are the judges would be great. Something like theatre festivals I've been to, where after the show the audience offers praise and suggestions. And where theatre groups host parties where they come in costumes from their productions.

I also have some curiosity about simple things ... do people walk around with name tags of their avatars? Do any immersionists attend, people who would never dream of telling people their avatar names?

I'll say it again, I think it would be a shame if this event were to dwindle through lack of promotion or diversity.

I wondered about that, too.

(The news reports I saw on the first day of the convention all mentioned that there were 'rows of people with laptops, immersed in SL'....as if there were no social interaction at all, just isolated people sunk into virtual life. But surely that must have been the prejudice of the reporter at work.....)

As Flip pointed out, it's convention, but the idea does seem that it's more "conference" than "convention."

The thing is, from my albeit limited understanding, that the SLCC seems geared more towards the companies and large groups within SL rather than attracting a lot of the casual users that make up the diversity of SL. I really don't want to sit through a lot of discussions about Fashion, even though I'm in that sector, for example. Or if I do, I'd like to be able to turn off that portion and then go do some fun things that are related to SL. (I'm not a big party/drinking/clubing type.)

I'd love to hear the live artists not streaming into SL. I'd love to see the machinima and rate it. I love the idea of a real costume contest such as "Dress like your avatar," and such. Things that we do in SL, brought into RL. Only.. minus the text spam. Sadly, I don't think we'll get rid of the howling.

And yes, this year, it seemed that LL didn't care to get it out there. They've been so big about it in the previous years, but this year, they were too quiet about it. I admit that even though I haven't gone (mostly for the lack of the money thing), that bothers me.

Basically, SLCC would be considered a baby con. And apparently, in spite of the volunteer (user) organizers, LL wants the big boys to come to a baby con. Gotta make the convention bigger before you can attract the big names.

The hotel wouldn't let me put 40 traffic bots on the roof, so why bother?

That hits the nail on the head for me.
Plus the other reasons (expense, hurricanes, etc.) are also contributing factors.

Twenty years ago I flew across the country to a gaming convention so that I could meet up with a small sub-group that were playing a play-by-mail game. The game had role-playing elements, not so much in the acting sense (it was snail-mail) but in the role sense. It was a game where nearly everyone had a "job", even if it was just trading or building. You could do as much or as little wheeling-and-dealing as you wanted, and this being pre-internet boom it was done by telephone, one-on-one. The convention was not only an opportunity to meet other players, it was an opportunity to do group wheeling-and-dealing, and even one-on-one's would progress more quickly face-to-face. Want to interest another party in the dealings? Go talk to 'em. Wanna see if you have a common interest with the leader of the pirates? There he is, over there. Get bored? You're at a larger gaming convention, with its own attractions.

For the most part SL isn't like that. I don't really "deal" with other residents, other than offering them something for sale or buying something they sell. Partnerships tend to be small, and communication is a lot easier than it was 20 years ago.

But there are smaller communities within SL. Did they consider SLCC as an opportunity to get together? Furries, sailers, machinographers, mentors, welcome area helpers, live musicians, Caledon residents, Dreamland residents, NCI, role-players, weapons makers, Open Latte regulars (pick your favorite pub), open sourcers, etc. Did they ask among themselves if there was interest in meeting up? Why does Caledon need its own get-together? Was it cheaper to do that? If you'd met at SLCC you'd have had the other tracks (and people) available. Did anyone ask their friends list, "wanna meet up at SLCC?"

If not, maybe next year's promotion could instigate these kinds of sub-meet-ups?

I only knew of SLCC from hearing SLUers mention it. It's the tightest large group of residents I'm aware of. Are there any comparable large groups who'd like to meet each other?

I also didn't hear about this year's SLCC until it was over, and I'm in-world at least briefly almost every day. I'm sure this truly wonderful ploy of marketing it by not telling the public about it had a sizable effect.

Even more than the SLCC non-turnout, I'm concerned about the growth. I long ago stopped putting any stock in the concurrency numbers which basically measures the bot population, and started keeping an eye on the real metric: Money. The daily spending in-world has hardly changed at all in quite a while, and I think that is the most worrisome thing of all. Bots may multiply. but they don't spend!

SL growth had better be in things like the educational sims that are logically populated by nonspenders, or they have a big problem.

ROFL

It all goes to the SLCC program and what the organizers want to accomplish. I've been on both sides, as a staffer and a volunteer. I suspect this years organizers spent a lot of time trying to come up with what they thought would be a program that would draw. While I spend a good bit of time in the education world, there may have been too much emphasis on education resulting in a program that lacked the large draw from SL's diversity. Even with a major marketing push, there may not have been any increase in attendance based on the program and it's appeal to all, or large segments of the SL community. It all goes to who is on the organizing team.

Do we know what the actual "paid" attendance was?

First of all, i believe there were 3 main factors to the attendance numbers (not including those who showed up without registering)..

1) Cost - gas, economy, etc.. things aren't so happy in money-spending-land these days and choosing between paying rent and going to a convention would be an easy choice to make.

2) Offerings - the panels/discussions this year, as earlier mentioned, were largely geared towards education. while that is an exciting and important part of SL, there are also other areas of SL that could use some attention. (for instance, various resident communities)

- Personally, there were a total of maybe 5 - 8 panels/presentations that i wanted to make it to.. even though i ended up not making it to a single one of the official SLCC offerings. (too much hanging out with friends, old and new! )

3) Timing - i can't believe nobody has mentioned this yet. last year the convention was in August, this year.. September.. on the weekend following Labor Day. This means, by and large, that teens couldn't make it.. they were in school. many parents couldn't make it, they have children in school. college students were also back in school. by having the event in September instead of August cut off the ability to go for many people.. which i think is probably the biggest cut into the numbers.
(granted, this wasn't just a "hmm.. let's do this instead" decision.. it was more of a "this is the only time we can get the hotel" thing)

----

Overall, i felt panels/presentations weren't as diverse or exciting as previous years and i would love to see more of a "content creation" slant next year. (not to say it wasn't worthwhile to many who attended) Also, something to keep in mind is that the convention largely changed hands after last years event.

My personal time there was a tremendously awesome time. even though i basically hung out the whole time i was inspired by interacting with the community, as well as by several of the sponsor tables. (Rockcliffe University and Avatrait stand out in my mind) i have returned with renewed vigor for my involvement in SL.


and on a side note... nametags. i have to believe that this was not the intended design and needed to be replaced "on the fly". at least, i truly, deeply hope that's what happened! (if you have seen the tags from all 4 years, you'll know why i bring this up)

all of this being said, i will certainly be attending next year, and every year after that. (a personal goal) i won't wait to see if LL mentions it.. they're a sponsor, not the organizers. i'll go visit the slconvention.org site, or just Google it for that matter. i know it's going to be sometime next summer/fall, most likely August if it can be done. no need to wait for announcements, we're all tech-savvy enough to know how to type "SLCC 2009" into a search engine and hit "Enter".

Cybin, perhaps you can answer my questions above:

> Do people put their avatar name, as well as their RL name, on their nametags?

> Do any immersionists attend, who would presumably refuse to share their avatar name?

TIA!

Now if it was in B'ton I would go lol I'm only an hour away from there

I think it is RL economic things first and foremost. Then there's the fact that it was in Florida for chrissakes, so one cannot justify going by there being anything else interesting in the area.

A Transformer fan? You will want to see the new "Robots in Disguise" T-shirt, then. Available for pre-order at http://www.comedity.com

1> some do, some don't. it's up to you as to what name you want others to see. the tags were also separated into two slots.. so, you could have the official tag on bottom, then make one for the top. this means you could show more than one name if you wanted (i think there was an option to do that on the official tags as well)

2> yes, absolutely. again, the choice is yours.. SL name, RL name, Alt name. there were multiple options on the form.


i really liked the new dual-pocket tags, i think that was a great idea! Part of what made registration/tag creation odd this time, is that there was no images to show what it would look like if you used the "add extra info for tag" option. in past years it was set-up so you could actually see what you would be getting.

42

I cannot compare it to any previous year because I am newish, but I attended the SLEDcc inworld this past weekend and thoroughly enjoyed myself. I sat in on presentations by some great educators and innovators (already recognizing them by their avatars) and interacted with a lot of inworld and in-Tampa attendees during workshops and sim crawls. Like any real life convention, I began to recognize other attendees during the weekend. I "left" with fresh ideas and a few new contacts.

I didn't realize that SLEDcc was part of a greater SLCC until after it was over, it seems like it was the main focus this year and if you weren't interested in the education possibilities of Secondlife it didn't seem like there was much else going on.

But is physical attendance the true mark of success? The inworld educational events were all heavily attended, I doubt the system could have handled more avis than were there. Is it possible that inword attendance was up even if RL attendance was down?

Also, Tampa? During hurricane season?