Why do we encourage mediocrity?

Scenario A leads to a conversation, scenario B is just embarassing.

Like I said I don't care to follow any conventions, and I dont care if somebody is upset that 20p makes no difference to my life at all. Let me put it this way:

I earn somewhere between £10-20 an hour in my day job. That means that each minute I earn 25p or so. By the time i've taken a minute or two out to thank somebody and had the obligatory brief exchange over that it has cost me money to have received a tip. What's more my free time is worth a great deal more to me than money as my free time [quality time] is very valuable to me.

So if somebody is offended that I frequently dont thank tippers, boo hoo. I will still be having a laugh and mucking around in local chat, or whatever it is I do when i'm online. If what I think is that important to anyone then they can talk to me there.

I think the difference of ethos comes from the fact that I dont "work" in SL, I "play", i'm just another patron in a chat room that happens to have an audio stream and a barbie doll simulator built in. It's not a job, i'm just one of the crowd.

I can relate to this very closely..
I found even saying the word tip was something hard to bring past my lips..I never wanted to be looked at as up on stage for the money myself.. Dancing was so much fun when you get off the pole..
I never used the poles.. Even before the Dance Huds were popular.Even before there was a stop button on the animations..

My screen would be full of dance animations and my inventory open grabbing the animations out each time i had to close them..
It was fun taking pieces of the animations and trying to make them look smooth switching to another animation to make one long dance for each song..

It was even more enjoyable when people noticed and would say..Wow very nice dancing..

My screen was so covered with animations and my inventory open that i had no choice but to see who was in front of me..I had a very small window to see out of lol

When they came out with the stop feature on animations it was the best thing since ice water and it only got easier and more enjoyable..

Money was just so not a part of it and i used to get in trouble back then for not logging into my jar..I thought i was Helping the club by showing patrons we were more than about money and tips and impersonal things..That it was important that we were their choice and that i was their choice within that choice at that moment..

The thing was i was still kind of new to SL and clubs and not logging in to a jar and people think you are stealing from them..
Until i explained my reasons..
Well the owner and the manager of my first club felt there was something valid there,that i was not stealing but did mean well..they left me to do my thing at times as long as it was not all the time..I did log in more than not..

It was very important to me that people knew i was not there for the money..That i loved to entertain them and loved to dance and enjoyed being sensual and exciting..

In doing that i ended up actually generating more income for the club..

Any Patron that has sat in front of me knows that money is the very last thing on my mind..
They knew it was very awkward for me having to be in that jar but they knew I loved to dance and get upon stage for them..
It got to the point that people were telling me this was not a tip but a thank you..

It made it a little easier then, just knowing they were enjoying their time..

I've had patrons tell me they felt bad they could not put more in my jar..

I would tell them..
"You listen to me now..You could come in here every night and sit right there in that chair you are in now and never put anything in that jar..Don't you ever let that stop you from coming here and sitting in that chair..
If i were in SL for the money i would be in land or something else..I am up here because i love being up here and because of meeting good people like yourself..Don't you ever not come and see me because of money..now promise me this.."

They knew i meant it..My patrons knew they were sitting in front of someone that was not there to get rich or find a sugar daddy..
It was very important that my patrons new or old never felt obligated to tip me..
I wanted them to want to do it without any pressure from me..

A tip jar doesn't make a person a begger...Only the person can make themselves look the begger role..

If you are truly entertaining people and filling their time with fun and laughs,flirts or whatever it is that makes the clock on the wall tick faster for them..
Then there is nothing wrong with accepting their acts of appreciation..
Some get very upset if you don't accept..
I don't think i have ever typed out the word tip or comp on stage to anyone..

It was always words like Kindness or generosity.

Beggers to me are the ones up there idle expecting a paycheck for doing nothing or spamming for tips..100 more and my top comes off type of thing..
There is no room for Ego if you want success..
In the entertainment industry Success is not the amount of money we make but the amount of respect we get from those we have shown it to..
In my eyes We miss 90% of the ride if We are worried about the money..

There is so much more from just meeting the people we meet and getting to know them...
money was very awkward because it was never about being the best earner..
In entertainment you want to be the one people want to come and see because you are unique..

Money should be on the bottom of a dancers list of reasons they are on stage in SL..
I can relate to the awkwardness of taking tips..
At the same time it is the way a lot like to express a compliment to the entertainers..
Take it as a compliment and not as feeling like a begger..You are the one that determines if you are begging or not..


Bleh..i get to talking about dancing and clubs i just can't seem to stop typing..
sorry for this being so long but f some future dancers are reading i'd like to help them see a different outlook on things that do work other than guidelines from a note card they get from a club that has all their dancer up there doing the same exact format.

Bekka.

I haven't read through this thread so forgive me if it's been covered already, but...

When you DJ, do you have tip jar or equivalent out, or does the host ask people to tiop you? The reason I ask is because, if you do, or if the host asks people, then you are inviting tips, and it is courteous to say thank you when somebody gives you something. If you don't have a tip jar, and nobody asks people to tip you, then ok. Even so, if the host asks people to tip you, and you don't ask the host not to, and you don't publically ask people to ignore that request, you are still inviting tips, and it is courteous to say thank you.

Incidentally, the time you would spend saying thank you, costs you nothing. You are not at RL work when you're DJing and the time saved by not saying thank you would not have earned you a penny. So that argument is uselss.

I understand what you're saying about "purpose built" and all that, and I dont necessarily disagree with it. I was saying that if the listeners advantages of having you USE that "purpose built" software are NULLIFIED by the outgoing bitrate limits of a rented stream server (which 99% of SL DJ's use), then you're not giving your listeners a higher quality experience by choosing it over Winamp. The server, not the software is the limiting factor. You're effectively playing run-of-the-mill, low-medium quality tunes for them using expensive bloatware.
The great jocks of the RL stations don't use radio shack mics because the mic would degrade the sound quality and enjoyment factor of the services they provide... much the same as an SL DJ running a high quality "purpose built" output through a radio shack quality stream server. It's overkill, and what remains as far as benefits for having that expensive streaming software are (a) convenience in the form of playlist options, and (b) bragging rights.. Neither of which carries much weight when weighed against the cost of having those two things.
Your opinion is fine, and I'm certainly not offended. I don't think being biased against a cost-effective solution is justified, especially when the end result of using EITHER choice with a capped rental server is exactly the same for the listener. It's a different story if you have your own server and can open up the outgoing bitrate a bit.. then yes, I'd say you be dumb NOT to start with higher quality software.

Do you really need to ask?


It costs me my sanity! It would cost me next to nothing at all if I put a thank you on one of those gesture hotkeys and decorate it with some ASCII art. Otherwise i'll save the cartilege wear and tear (most of the time, I do sometimes thank for tips, but sometimes I cant be bothered or i'd rather local chat kept on talking about whatever it is that it is talking about - i'm not totally meen spirited).

We're also now loosing sight of the original position: I just dont get why the expectation is there for DJ's to get tipped. I do not understand why the defecto standard is to have a tip jar out and for people to put money in it.

I often get asked "Where is your tip jar?"

What I want to know is when the assumption came into being that I DJ'd for tips, I don't. I don't give a damn about them.

Incidentally the night that brought this all on I earned 20k in tips, I got sick of typing thankyou. I just want to chat and listen to music like everyone else. I'm not special because i've got the stream, it's the opposite, i'm the one who has control of it you should be begrudging me!

Now you have hit the nail right on the head. I hate that and that DAMN insidious child laughter. You can barely hear the music for those distractions. Then to add to the distraction, locating the avie(s) that are doing this to mute. To solve those problems I just leave.

I do have a gesture that doesn't produce the wooting, howling noises. It just says WOOT!Which someone actually noticed, complimented and thanked me.

A simple yes or no would have answered the question - and without it costing you as much of your precious cartilege. But I'll take it as a no you don't have a tip or similar, and that nobody suggests tipping the DJ to the visitors. You can correct me if I took it wrong.

Saying thank you would cost you your sanity? You are a bit precious, aren't you?

Just mostly mean-spirited then.

Allow me to explain it to you. Thinking that DJs do it for money came about because, surprise surprise, DJs *DO* do it for money.

And you kept the 20k??? You didn't ask people to stop tipping you because you're not doing it for the money? You're not very consistent, are you?

I think that it's all fine and dandy that some of the staff love the tip and some don't. I can also perhaps somehow remotely and very vaguely imagine that there is some kind of music that "needs" talkovers to entertain the listener. But aside of that: The opening question was not about pro and contra of granting or accepting tips or talking DJs. The question was why is mediocrity encouraged. Just two points that have recently come up during this discussion: Why aren't clubs enforcing strict rules on gesture- and/or particle-spamming? Why are clubowners even tolerating - if not encouraging - their hosts to spam gestures in the first place? Speaking just for me: I would rather pay for admittance if I wouldn't have to mute public voice, ambient and local sounds and switch off particles before I enter almost any given club. Why isn't the club's management intervening whenever the DJs are just dumping the famous "Walmart's Top 10 Greates Hits" CD on exactly those customers they (the clubowners) are expecting to spend money on "what ever they want to sell" to keep the club alive? Let's add one to this that has not yet been covered explicitly but I guess almost everybody can relate to it: Why are clubs notice- AND message-spamming their groupmembers instead of sending out usefull informations like (just an example) "this weeks schedule" which would actually make me consider joining the event and not remind me about what royal pain missunderstood marketing is and in the end make me leave the group (and eventually forget about the club alltogether)?

Quote of the week?

I am not saying the quality of the stream I am refering to.. it's the quality of the show. With Sam you can have 2 or 4 decks set up and seemlessly go from track to track while talking over the musical transision without having muiltiple components open. As I said, virutally all codecs are supported in ALL software used to stream to a server. So again.. my point has nothing to do with stream quality.


Everyone does have an opinion and thank you for hearing mine out. My issue is there are some "DJ" in SL charging 1000/hr and they aint worth the winamp DL. Sure there is convinience in everything and I can see one's issue with cost but if you wanna play with the big boys and girls you need the tools.



Ok great we agree to a point.

I guess I have met too many DJs who come in saying Yeah I am this good... I can do this this this, I have 1000's of members in my group.. you listen to them and it's like they have pushed play and walked away.

Hell, I am gonna at that to my picks... Though I agree with her.. too funny not too

Yes I am a DJ... Yes I do it for the money when it comes to having to play biligual and crazy bitch 20 times a week...


I should file an AR against Jose Nuneze (spelling on lastname shaky) and Buckcherry for writing those songs to begin with... Polution of society... that is a category.. right?

Winamp is free while SAM is costing roughly 300 US$ (Add to that the equipment you are asking, no, demanding, too, and you easily top out beyond several grand and don't forget the music or is that growing on trees today, too?) Which Clubowner is covering for that? Or paying enough to make that investment reasonable?

@Phil Deakins: For somebody who did not read all the thread and asked some dumb questions you sure are snotty about having had sarcastic answers. If you want to heckle / flame me go right ahead, if you want an intelligent conversation may I recommend google. I'm not responding to that tone.


I know one club that does not permit gestures, I TP'd a friend in a month or so back and she started gesture spamming, it turned out to be one of the more awkward and embarassing nights of my Second Life. After we'd all commented on the patrons of this bar not being keen on the use of gesture hotkeys... We gave up and waited for her to leave, all being too polite to kick her because she was TP'd in as a friend! *hides from the filthy looks*


lolz. I dont get to hear Jose Nuneze very often so I still like that song, I don't know the other one, but if you keep getting the same songs requested it doesnt matter what song it is it's going to drive you nuts. Have you maybe considered not playing it for a bit?

If you are not longer having fun and it's become about the money, then isn't it time to sit back and take a break? Unless the rewards you earn as an SL DJ are sufficiently justifying the burden of doing something you no longer enjoy.


Sam's lack of support for m4a and m4p is here to prove you wrong Although I take your point, for instance I like the fact that Sam is driven off a MySQL database - it allows me to do so much more than I could with WinAmp who's interface was great in 1990 but seems to have lost it's way and become a pain to use somewhere along the way.

Club hosts/owners brought this problem on themselve.
if nobody tries to change mentalities, well guess what. They won't change

You "not responding to that tone" doesn't surprise me at all. When you have no reasonable sounding answers, just post "I'm not responding to that tone." I works a treat - well it would if it wasn't so transparent

Can you guys keep your little personal vendetta in private? nobody is interested by that.

Then nobody should respond to it. Ah! I see that "nobody" did respond to it - sorry.

Exactly how much experience do you have as an SL club owner? Hell, let me make this easier on you: Exactly how much experience do you have as a member of SL club staff?

Remind me how much experience do you have with SL in general?

That's typical of someone who doesn't have an answer that suits them - ask another question to avoid answering the original one. Didn't anybody tell you that it doesn't work because it's so easy to see through?

can someone please lock this thread since it has obviously degraded into a flamefest between three people.

*sigh*
Recap:

You didnt read the thread, asked rediculous stuff that was already covered, got a smug response, and posted two flame attacks.

I can clearly see your position, but my position is an internet forum is not worth pulling my hair out over. I refuse to loose sleep over somebody on the internet being wrong.

*shrug*

Now if you would like to enter into reasonable discourse please do so, but you lost me with the first flame digging post, let alone the second.

A few of the real problems are the fly by night clubs..

1.You have new people that come to SL that get hit up right at the info hubs by club employees sent out to hand out land marks..
you have some that go check out these clubs...they get on dance balls and hear good music see beautiful girls and an atmosphere they like..

At some point they say to themselves..i bet i could do this..

so they look on land prices find a land and think they will be up and running in no time at all..
Some build their own places some buy prefab clubs or some have them built for them..

they put their adds out there saying they are the best club in SL..

they hire someone saying they are a dj and a bunch of girls under 30 days old as dancers looking to be stars..
The first month Teir comes around and"OUCH!!!" that hurt a bit..We can't have that happen again.Lets get this show on the road..

Ok lets set a date for our "GRAND OPENING"!!(Stands there looking to the sky raising her arms as she hails to the club gods in the sky)

ok now i want you guys to put the club in your profile and work on filling up this vip list..
does anyone wan to hit the info hubs and hand out land marks??

You have a lot of clubs with owners that just don't know what they are doing..
and no matter how much passion they have to get a club going..if they are cutting it close on funds..that tier fee sucks a little more passion out and replaces it with desperation..

if they find something that sounds like it works ..like say some dancer looking to be a manager that just left some club and thinks she has experience in running them now..

she will teach what she knows to a club owner that doesn't know..
he's gonna hear things like events are how you get traffic and and hitting them at the door with group invites and spamming friends lists and all kinds of stuff that is counter productive to making a good club..

i've seen it more times than i can count because i've dealt with a lot of struggling club owners club owners that were given some pipe dream they fell for..

they end up finding out events cost money..this costs money..that costs money..
Hey wait a second ! this is starting to cost a lot ..if we don't do something soon i am gonna have to shut down!!
at this point money is a problem and is a big factor..so it's get away with what you can for the least amount of money..

A lot shut down after a month or two..some turn to bots..

Some get traffic and are grateful for the traffic that is paying tier or part of it..

that club owner will stick with what the customers are enjoying..
if it's gestures or throwing up Rave lag or whatever..by this time they are just glad to have traffic ..
The only thing that will pull them from using what is working is something that they are 100% sure will work..

in all fairness when a club is having an event..it's probably the worst time to see what a club is truly about..because then not everyone is focused on the event..

the few good clubs out there have the financial backing to afford to do it the way they want..
the rest are going off of what they heard works or by public demand..

Thanks for articulating one big reason why I've stopped going to clubs.