SLCC 2006 Feedback Survey (Even if you didn't attend)

This post is getting...

Word...

All you who think you could do it better? Put up or shut up. Volunteer next year - of course that means you will have to do something besides bitch. Amazing how suddenly people can vanish when real work starts.



I don't blame you.

Considering the hard work you have done, I don't see why you should have to take shit off of anyone. If people have questions or suggestions for improvement, they could try posting like civil adults, instead of using the license of anonimity to act like assholes.

I hope to make next year's conference (provided it's in Las Vegas!!), so I'll be happy to volunteer.

On a side note...

All you folks who have basically derailled this thread into a troll-fest, I am glad the forums are closing... and you are why.

The collective forum IQ and civility has dropped 90% in the last month or so.

Some people in this thread remind me why I stopped doing anyting free for the community.

The organizers are not paid to set this up. It is not up to them to keep a stream going in world. We are lucky we have people at all that are willing to put so much work into these conferences.

oops, didnt realize I was on my alt.

This is degenerating away from what it was surely meant to be. An examination of SLCC, how it went, and what could be improved, and how.

To me there was one huge technical failure. No inworld streaming video.

If we don't examine and resolve why this happened, whether it could happen again, and how it could be prevented, we need our heads examined.

That is why I have put my teeth into this one issue, and hung on hard.

But my (and others) rational pursuit of this purely technical question has become tangled up with personalities, defensive reactions, talk of conspiracy theories, degrees of gratitude for what went so right (obviously the huge bulk of it).

The only reason for examining Flip's last minute "no videoscreens" decision is to see IF IT WAS TECHNICALLY WELL FOUNDED.

Don't you see - if it was and we just nod and pass on, we are storing up big problems which could screw up the next attempt.

Can we stream video in world to large audiences, or not ? Can anyone rational say, as so many here are saying "drop it, we don't need to know".

If the decision to kill the videoscreens without even an attempt was RIGHT, future events are in BIG TROUBLE.

How can I make the importance of this any clearer ?

We must learn to distinguish between the questioning of a controversial technical decision, and an attack on the person who made it. For heaven's sake, can no-one see how Flip must have been run off his feet ? He could easily have been given faulty advice. Someone may easily have misunderstood his question, or he could have misunderstoof their answer. Everybody has agreed we need next time a fully dedicated inworld-only organiser. All that remains is the crucial question of technical viability. It MUST be sorted.

I can't get dragged down any more in all this non-technical stuff on a vital technical issue.

Anything further I have to post on this topic will go in the "Technical Discussions" forum where I suggest we hunt down this critically important question.

It's actually a bigger principle than just the SLCC.

If this is a real problem, does that mean that any event in the future that wants to run an in-world video stream is essentially screwed?

I had 20 watching it on a little 700 sq m parcel on a mainland sim and was not aware of any problems (once it was working, of course). I recently went to a machinema evening with 33 people watching a stream and all was fine (apart from sim lag).

Lewis

I'd seen that comment... but I don't quite understand the full technicalities of streaming servers so I was hoping someone more knowledgeable could elaborate.

Torley indicates its not SL that's the issue though, generally, if I'm reading that right?

Lewis

Why don't you ask a technical Linden - or someone at Apple - about how much computational power it takes to initially connect, buffer, and handshake versus how much it takes once the video stream is up and running per client? Don't take my word for it, and I look forward to you moving the discussion to Technical Issues rather than derailing this thread any further.

Thanks.

-Flip

right Lewis- the broadcasting service can sometimes become overloaded with demand and not send the requested data at the rate it's requested client side.

I'm not sure it is 'derailing' actually.

Discussion of the in-world presence and in particular the video streaming facility is obviously a big concern from this year's SLCC, and it is something that needs to be fixed - or abandoned - for 2007. There is obviously a lot of worry that SLCC will become a 'meatspace only' event, limited to a few hundred people with a large enough disposable income - rather than the entire SL community to participate in some how.

Seems quite on topic to me, as long as it keeps away from personal attacks.

Lewis

Ok, I have a thread up in Technical Issues here.

Might I respectfully suggest we discuss it there, on a purely technical basis, away from this thread? As far as "SLCC feedback" is concerned, perhaps all that need to be said further is that the feedback here has thrown up this very serious technical problem, which needs urgent resolution in a different arena ?

I'm not sure if "urgent resolution" is going to be possible. If Apple has yearly problems with it when they stream MacWorld, and CNN's video is constantly choppy and unreliable, how do you expect smaller outfits to make it glitch free and perfect?

The first thing that needs to happen to make it work is to get the simulators reliable to avoid the connection problem I've described over and over, not to mention to make it possible to WALK around on SL's estates again!

Once that is done, then streaming to smaller numbers (up to several hundred) shouldn't be too difficult. Trying to video stream on a larger scale than that? That's far beyond the typical know-how of anyone but the most expert level video streamers, and even they (see CNN or MacWorld for proof) have fairly big problems getting it to work in a glitch-free manner.

Regards,

-Flip

I'm guessing that an easy solution would be 2 or 3 simultaneous streams on different URL's, which would of course reduce the load on the stream; just increase the cost?

Lewis

I think (and again, I'm not expert on video streaming; just relaying what I've been told by people who know much more than me) that the best way of doing it is setting up a centralized server which then passes off clients to a farm in a round-robin style to reduce the load. That way, you can use one "gateway" that actually passes off to a farm of servers. We didn't have time to switch to a configuration like that at the last minute.

Even those types of configurations fail, however, as I've pointed out above.

You've probably seen this in practice on the web as well; for example, if you visit www.AmericanExpress.com, you'll soon find yourself on a server like "www99.AmericanExpress.com" to distribute the load.

Regards,

-Flip

I would guess, given the responses so far, that the importance of the in-world part of the SLCC is beyond any doubt to the general community.

The question, therefore, is not "will there be an in-world presence", but more of a "what will the in-world presence be".

Consequently, someone knowledgeable in these matters needs to be found fairly soon, that is able to put together a package similar to the one you mention of multi-servers, provide costings, and be responsible for its implementation. Complex as it may be, there is about a year to sort it out, as you do say it is technically feasable (although of course I understand nothing online is 100% foolproof).

Lewis

Hopping in this after standing beside for a bit too long...



With each SLCC, this can only evolve - this year when we sat down and discussed the SLCC we really did want to focus on the in world, but knew it would be different. I can only say that every year something new and something old will be tried. Obviously there were some things that did not work - maybe we should have put out a call to the residents who wanted to host parties on the sims that were available, maybe there should have been an inworld tour, or parties in different spaces with an SLCC kit that people could have used to host their own real world parties. These questions really don't have answers, and these thoughts really require not only logistics, but persons to help assist in this - and to be honest we were a small group of people considering all of the factors that took into account. Technical problems, streaming issues, etc, etc, that were involved, hey we did do our best, I would say though that rather than just ask the question, provide some suggestions.



This year we tried a different process than we did last year, but the root of the problem is really this. Everyone thinks that line streaming media is easy as pie. Listen to any online radio station or watch any shoutcast tv video stream and you'll realize that it isn't. Streaming audio has been made down to almost a science, to the point where it is relatively stable (I'll say 80%), but not as stable as a FM dial. LIVE streaming media is further off, as it is the newer technology and requires the same process of streaming audio (an upfeed to a server, and the downfeed to the client from the server), but it is a process that is around 50% stable. When it works, it's beautiful, when it doesn't work, well... it's ugly.

I would really recommend that person who felt that his years inworld items were not as to be expected, if you want a party at that space or at your own space celebrating it, contact one of the organizers, a list is being put together along with what that person would like to help with.

If it's in Las Vegas you know where you can stay

You know what, Jennyfur and Flipper? I'm sorry I ever fell for the bait. I know that you know that I am trying to be helpful, and that I wanted the SLCC to succeed. You also know that I can't go to these things, and I am interested mostly in the in-world portion.

I credit both of you for being able to take my suggestions - which I spent some time communicating - in the spirit to which they were intended.

I appreciate your kindness to me, and I would have liked to help out (in-world) next year.

However, some people aren't allowed to speak on these forums without being griefed for it, and I'm one of those.

Taco Rubio, not content with writing earlier, out of the frickin blue,


has now sent me a poison pen IM, replete with name calling and profanity. I guess he is afraid to get a warning if he posted it here.

You know, these things just really aren't worth it.

What with him and Phoenix, I find it most distasteful to try to have a conversation with you in public about this, because they will not allow me. Why? Because I am friends with Prok. That is it, and only it. I'm friends with a lot of people, and kind to all of them.

Really, after SUCH a long time of this (ever since I joined SL), and with no let-up in sight whatsoever by various hateful, truly hateful, people who I have never done a damn thing to but who hate my guts for being Prok's friend - I don't know that there is any future for SL, or for the SLCC.

And I really don't think I give much of a damn anymore, either.

coco

I'm quite sure that in-world IM's are governed by the same rules as all other communication - and I would gladly report any message like that.



It's people like you and me who care that are the people who make a difference in SL. Idiots who only feel the need to throw abuse - not because of what you say or do, but because of the people you choose to mix with - are only showing their lack of grasp of reality. My guess is that, just like in the real world, people lash out because they are threatened by what we stand for, and can't figure out why. Not only that, it makes them feel inadequate and insecure because of what they are, and they don't like that feeling.

SL and the SLCC has plenty of future, but it takes people that care to do something about it, and if others attack you because they don't like what you're doing... ask them what they're doing to contribute. Chances are it's nothing.



If you quit, they win. You're better than they are, don't give them the satisfaction. The biggest thing you can do to piss them off is to stay here and put them in their place, which is somewhere between amoeba and excrement on the food chain.

Why do you think I'm still here, despite all the crap I get? It's because I love SL and the friends I have made, and I see the potential for entertainment within it. It doesn't bother me what some other people might think of me, they only become important if I allow them to.

Lewis

My sentiments exactly, Surreal.

My one constructive suggestion regarding the seemingly huge issue regarding the video streaming would be a decentralization of that function. (Yes, I know that isn't the sum total of what caused the problems this year.)

Rather than emphasizing that there is an in-world SLCC location (which, realistically, even if there were four 100-avatar capacity sims, could hold less than 5% of the concurrent logins we're having now), provide the video url freely and say, "Tune in to the RL SLCC events through your land's video stream."

Anyway, I thought that the real world portion of the SLCC was fabulously run, and I think that is the more important part.

P2

I wasn't able to participate in this year's on any level, so perhaps this has already been done. As soon as the decompression period is over, I'd suggest tasking one person to take point on finding out the following:

- what does the virtual SL community want to see happen around SLCC 2007 - prioritized
- what resources would be needed
- what's doable and what's problematic

I'm not sure if one person is responsible for the in-world component this year, but it would certainly make next year's smoother. A team is good, and an in-world team will be essential, but it's also important to have a Go-to person.

A lot of work - at the same level of committment as what Flip, Jenn and others did. Not for the faint-hearted.

Of all the comments made in this thread, and there were some doosies <----is this even a word?. Your comment was the most rude and aimed to deliberately attack a content creator. Neither you nor I have any right to determine what worth or value a build in SL has. Each individual has his or her ideas and visions and for you to attempt to beliittle someone by calling their creation a 'thing' SHOULD be beneath you.

I couldn't figure out quite what it was supposed to be. Therefore it's rather difficult to describe something unknown.

If something isn't obvious as to what its purpose is, then it shouldn't be beyond the realms of common sense to have some kind of explanation there. Not all of us can think in abstract terms.

So... evidently you understood immediately what it was. Kindly share that insight with the rest of us.

Lewis