What do you like to see in a good club?

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Make sure people can get sloshed in real while being in the sl club and enjoying themselves.

Lack of gesture spam by the people working there.

Policy against 'excessive' use of particles.

Good sized dance floor so people aren't packed together too tightly. Its nice if there's room to cam about - to see and be seen.

Someone working the room in local chat, to keep it chatty - but not via gestures. Actual conversation - in local rather than IM. And not some 'welcome bot' but actual chatting.

Good dance HUD. One that lets me avoid that dance that makes my avatar fly up in the air spinning...

No 'join our group / here's the LM / here's the rules' spam. I hate places that spam this - as they'll keep doing it everytime you come there, and you only need it the first time.

Ability to make a LM inside the club. Don't force me to do 'the long walk' everytime. Of course, it is in your business interests to make me walk through a mall to reach you everytime - but do too much of it and I might not return... Be aware that even if you must do this, it does alienate your visitors, so balance it (one club I know of you have to do a sim-sized snake curve every time through a dense mall to go from the landing point to the club... so I stopped going there. Another two clubs make me TP from the landing point to another spot. One TP's into the club, the other into a mall, and then walk... I stopped going to one of these, the other changed and let me use a LM I made inside the club, so I started going again...

If its a sex club, make sure to have a community manager there booting the jerks and males that get pushy. If its a no-sex club, make sure to boot people who get too naughty...

I'm much more likely to go to a club that lets me dance nude. That's just me, but I'm not alone in that.

I really like clubs that have dance poles or dance tables with a tipjar than anyone who joins the group can log into, and have no issues with the club taking a cut of the tips. I do not like clubs with dance poles / tables that only let official staff use them. If I'm there, willing to freelance for you, and let you take a cut of my tips - its in your interest to have me doing it - it drives up your business.

If your club allows sex, don't ban the use of xcite / sensations in the sex areas... People who like these things will feel alienated. If you've got a public sex area, a big part of the thrill is being an exhibitionist, or a voyeur, or both. But do remember what I said above about having a community person to keep the jerks in check over all of this. If the xcite / sensations gets out of hand, have it get toned down, but don't ban it outright.


If you have a bar that sells drinks, see my note above about dance poles. Why hire a bartender when random guests will do it for you if you split the tips with them?

Also for that bar, put in drinks that have animations. Drinks without animations are just a boring prim rezzed in my hand... If it animates me, that's a bit of party humor right there that people can get social around.


If you DJ has an obnoxious voice, keep her out of voice - don't let he speak over the stream. That's why I stopped going to Lesbian Paradise... I don't want to hear the DJ going 'gr-r-r-r-r-r-r rowrr, huga hooga...' every few seconds in a crackly, raspy voice...

Oh... and speaking of bad DJs... this isn't Karaoke hour unless its Karaoke hour... Don't get a DJ that sings along to the music, especially if they're louder than the music... unless its not a DJ, but a live music event or Karaoke hour...

I don't think I'm anyone's target club goer. But, like others, I can tell you what I DON'T like in a club.

I can't stand swirling, moving, flashing lights, moving or texture changing floors and particle poofer things. All that just makes me want to barf or, more accurately, run away BEFORE I barf. So unless it's a ballroom or simple jazz club type build, I can't stand to be in them for long. When I do end up in a club, I have to focus my camera on a blank wall somewhere in order to stay put for more than 10 minutes.

Host/Hostess who greet me personally are great, but I'm not giving them money for saying 'hi' and then spending the rest of the evening constantly reminding people to give money, usually by using a gesture. A large sign, a visible, and accessible, tip jar and maybe a once hourly mention of where the tip jar is, is enough. The host/hostess should, perhaps, write down a few topics of conversation before the event and introduce them whenever appropriate. Chatting, joking, etc. can be fun if it attempts to include everyone and not just those "in the know" like regulars or groups of friends and is not just 'oh wow, American Idol was, like, awesome last night'.

I really don't give a hoot if there are dancers of any kind, but if I am not in a club that is specifically a strip club, I'm not giving them money for riding a pre-programmed dance pole and copy and pasting emotes into chat. I don't go to strip clubs because I am not interested in strip clubs. If you have dancers in your music club, don't expect me to pay the slightest attention.

My ideal club would be lighting around the perimeter but no moving or flashing lights, no transparent floors, no texture changing floors, no "effects" floors. Besides making want to lose my dinner, the lights also get in the way of camming around or getting to tip jars and the first time I accidentally end up with my camera spinning around because it got stuck on a light, I will never, ever return.

An occasional "woohoo" WITHOUT SOUND gesture or some SHORT, ONE LINE, gesture WITH NO SOUND is okay to robotically inform everyone else that you are having a good time or that you like a song. Multiple line gestures (with or without sound) are annoying. SOUND gestures that are way loud, long or simply annoying (like whistles, horns, 30 seconds of a song) all should be banned from being used by anyone. I would like to actually hear the music if you don't mind.

So, after focusing my camera on the wall to prevent dizziness, my next step is to turn down sounds to prevent deafness and allow hearing the music and then pop the main chat window out and put it behind the IM window so I do not have to read the 10 line idiotic gestures. Or read about the latest episode of whatever reality show is on, sex, sex, implied sex, flirting, non-clever sex innuendo, about any body part, it's size, your wish for someone else' body part, emoting, usually, really, really, really badly, tummy talkers, etc. etc. etc. etc.

At some point I completely turn off particles too since there is always at least one person that finds it really cool to make particle tornadoes, fire, flying stars, etc. and my favorite, that really bright blinding light explosion thing. Wow, thanks, I now have retina damage. And, no, people are not now paying more attention to you after your attention whore particle display because they are NOW BLIND.

So now I'm not looking at the people and not reading chat. The only thing left is the music. I appreciate a DJ that can find the right balance between talking and not talking and occasionally being amusing, paying attention to main chat and addressing some things he/she may have read in chat between songs. I also appreciate a DJ that can put together a good set. "Good" being relative to each person listening, of course. However, those DJ's are few and far between for me.

I like a variety of different music and sometimes it just depends on my mood as to what kind of club I might want to go to if the mood strikes me. Another of my complaints about clubs is the lack of information regarding type of music being played on any given evening. Sorry but I don't know what kind of music "DJ Whatever" plays so I need more info than that in the ad, notice, event posting, etc.

So, since I am not socializing, reading anything said in chat or paying the slightest attention to the people in the club and the music is only occasionally so so, I might as well listen to the radio or my own music and not bother with a club at all.

Maybe I'm just too old for clubs anymore but I simply find them annoying instead of enjoyable. Perhaps if there were more real conversation that did not constantly revolve around sex, sex, sex, sex, gestures and reality shows, I might be more inclined to hang out and actually interact with others. However, since I am older, I actually have money and will tip, sometimes pretty darn well, if I'm having a good time. That usually only happens at live events. The only time I've had a truly good time at a DJ'd club was once at a slow jazz/blues/romantic club with a DJ that played a well thought out set, had a smooth voice, knew when to talk and when to shut up. And once at a rock club with a DJ who, again, played a good set, had a sense of humor and interacted with the people in the club.

I do enjoy some live music if the performers are pretty good and seem to be enjoying themselves and the audience behaves like civilized people. I tip the live performers and the venue, sometimes I tip very generously if I have been truly entertained.

It is not easy running a club because you can't please everyone even part of the time and usually you end up with a few regulars. Which is good except when the regulars talk only among themselves and exclude everyone who pops in casually. It is not cheap to run a club. However, if money (income) is the reason for running a club, you're doomed to disappointment no matter what you do, no matter how many people attend, no matter how high quality the club. People are fickle and today's hottest club is tomorrow's empty club. People are cheap and don't tip because they expect excellence for free. People are broke and use SL to escape the pressures of RL and don't tip because they can't. The most you can hope for is to be financially in the black for a few months before revamping, rebuilding, re-branding, re-whatever and gaining popularity again for a few more months before starting over again.