Did You Hang Out in the WA When You Were New?

I'd like to hear what people's actual experiences have been.

I know I avoided the WA.

I'm assuming WA is welcoming area?

Okay, well, all I remember is walking around a saying "hi" to people, until someone rather rude questioned, "Don't you say anything else.."

This kind of pissed me off so I took the teleport to that vehicle shop (think it was Bubs something, not sure though), and bought a hovercraft. Then SL got better

When I was new, I was new last year on May 28 (just over a year ago). Everyone was extremely friendly and helpful to me. That is why I keep coming back to the Welcome Area and I have been appalled by the recent negativity and bad energy there.

It used to really *be* a welcome area.

You're right. There is bad energy in the Welcoming Areas. Also in some stores. I'm a little over a month old in SL--my best experiences have been at newbie Q&As, newbie parties, and in these forums. However, once you sort of get to know who people are via their forum posts, it's kind of shocking how rude they can be in SL when you recognize them and try to talk to them. Maybe that's something to work on, all those who are "forum celebs?"

When I meet a new member I answer all question I know about... or tell them to go to the welcome area... I was introduced before first entering so that area are a white spot for me..

Maybe there are a list at forum about more places that I and we can recommend for newbies to get info??

IF not - maybe time to do one??? A sticky one?


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Most people I meet (99%) are very friendly BUT there are men of all kinds from new to ”old” in SL that in a second are into SEX at first meeting... I hate that.. and I at once go away... or the more pushy ones (Yes they exists to) I must ban - yes its as IRL sadly...


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BUt 99% are great in SL!!

Howabout us nice people go and help the newbs to make the WA a better place. Where is it now?

I bought my first land within a week of starting SL - and I think I had checked the last location login box - so I really didn't spend any time at the welcome area when I first started.



I'd like to cast my vote for restricting access to the welcome area to new people/better or more liasions/SOMETHING to get those neg raters and shit talkers out of there. Its ridiculous that they're allowed to turn the welcome area into a text based Jerry Springer show - if anyone wants to study the fine line of (apparently) non-bannable griefing, there's a few performers in constant rotation there.

Yes, and I found it very helpful because Stage 4 was there and that's where most of the mentoring sessions were held. I learned most of what I learned the first few weeks from those and the instructor classes in Perry.

It's too bad that the population has outgrown that model. I'm hope the new greeter program and Cabinhead are able to replace it with an acclimation system as effective as the old. If it does, we won't need a centralized, Linden owned welcome center anymore and they can auction those sims.

I still spend some time each day there and I really do miss the old welcome area, I have seen it change so much recently and sadly for the bad. Stage 4 was so convenient and the sandbox easy to find. I learned a lot back in the old one and not only has the look changed, the whole welcome aspect has changed greatly. A new person can still go there and recieve some help but they also have to dredge through a lot of negativity.

I did hang around the welcome area a bit, but only when I saw that Toy La Follette was in world. She is the only one who ALWAYS helped and ALWAYS had the answers I needed. Thank you Toy, I know I was a pest but you're the reason I'm still here.

Somehow I found the WA .... from the orientation space (Orientation Island?) I was TPed away (I didn't even know what a TP was). Someone sent me a TP that said "Want to go for a ride?" Being the foolish, adventuresome sort, I accepted and ended up in a mostly vacant snow sim falling down the side of a hill only to find "land for sale" signs. This is when I realized I had realy been taken for a ride. I don't think I even knew how to fly. Luckily I found the Find menu and ended up in Island Sandbox where some people helped me out ... I'm really not sure how I eventully found the WA, but I wish I had found it sooner, because I finally learned some additional important skills once I found it.

Torley's right. Usually when someone seems to ignore you it's not intentional. Their screen may be cluttered with IM boxes, Notecards, sripts, and non SL applications. Also, if you address AvitarX when s/he's chatting with a large group of people, you may not get an answer right away.

I'm not a celebrity, but I'm notorious for being oblivious to the obvious when I'm engrossed in a script or an IM conversation. One pal even makes a joke of it, seeing how long he can talk at me before I see him and say hi.

If there was not a welcome area where anyone could hang out and chat... where there were people always... I would have probably quit secondlife very early on.

During my first 2 months in SL, I spent most of my inworld time sitting on a fence in the WA listening to the questions other people asked, and occassionally framing some questions of my own. I would have been completely lost without it.
It remains for me a favorite place to hang out at.

It's interesting to see the votes so far evenly split between "yes I found it helpful" and "no, I flew around on my own."

People just have different ways of entering worlds, like they have different ways of entering any new experience, which reflects their personalities, cultural expectations, other game experiences, etc.

I hated other online games where I'd get in them and be shot and scammed in the first few minutes and tended to avoid them.

In SL, I quickly sized up the situation as being the usual story familiar to me from TSO from the forums or game, which was official game company representatives (like Tigger) hanging around in a big "welcome lot" with fanboyz. The object of that game was to impress liaisons and gather points in an internal reputational game.

in SL, I often see oldbies showing off or sucking up to Lindens, and newbies staring on in fascination or dismay. In my admittedly limited experience lounging around Welcome Areas, including this week and just last night, I see Lindens and liaisons lost in IMs and answering slowly, a few idiots, including newborns bent on griefing, doing the "trash talk," and oldbies skating or doing loops of animations or being goofy out of boredom.

What I didn't see was anything violating the TOS like really gross obscenity, sexual harassment, and shooting. Didn't even see negrating or complaints of it at least.

In any transitional society, one of the group psychoses that takes place is "what about the children?!" A society in transition which fears for its future, which has real qualms about the huge adjustments it is being asked to make, adopts a clutchy, hysterical, near psychotic fear about children and their health. I used to see this in Russia and Eastern Europe all the time where people began to adopt all sorts of odd rituals they believed were saving their children's health like boiling all water, serving them only turnips, and never letting them play outside (which only served to make them unhealthy, of course).

By the same token, as SL grows and changes in some quite radical ways for some, they are clutching at the "what about the children" issue -- what about the newbies, their impressions, their treatment, etc.

Newbies are a hardier bunch than you imagine. We've all been newbies and we're still here, despite an often really vicious and vitriolic forums culture and an in-game culture that can range from brutal indifference to vindictive harassment with things like officer recall -- with of course a lot of nice, helpful people in between yet not a few of whom are doing this for a metagame of reputational points.

I came into the Welcome Area my first night, stood there for five minutes and listened to the conversation. It was all about skyboxes for sex, locking somebody's AV up in a cage while she was AFK, and whether a certain Linden had a thing for a resident.

Yawn.

I flew away and hit the side of a building. That was more entertaining than the WA, so I decided I'd stay for another ten minutes. Good decision, because ten minutes later I discovered a sandbox and somebody was building a really cool thing, and even though he wouldn't talk about it, I learned a lot from watching him.

Yes, and you do not have a reply that best fits my WA experience, so I have not voted.

I did not find the overly helpful, nor was it a negative experience. It was an okay place to chat and somewhat fun.

I still occasionally pop by.

That is also the one of the listed location of where one can hold class.

Would anyone want to teach class in the WA? Feel free to move this to a new thread.

Ok Torley and Olympia, I spoke too soon, lol. I have been unbearably rude to a newbie (my best friend, who I invited in to SL), because of too many IMs in my window and other distracting stuff. I completely understand why some people don't talk right away! I gave up too soon. Went to FairChang Linden dunk and made friends w/ lots of Lindens, got a bear and everything! Thanks for the welcome, I'm loving SL!

When I first arrived I left the WA pretty smartly and went exploring, quickly got bored with the 'stores - casinos - everything for sale' stuff I was seeing, so went and spent ages building a lifelike AV - as much like me as I could manage. Went clubbing, met people and things got rapidly better.

My one 'mistake' proved to be the slick AV - almost everyone assumed I was an old hand with plenty of experience with a sophisticated skin/AV! Amazing what you can do with just the basics...

Being new isn't easy in SL, but if you persevere and get lucky in the people you meet you can get into it pretty quickly. Even so, I do try and help out new folk when I come across them as I still remember how difficult my first few days were.

I jetted outta there fast, all I saw there was schoolyard squabbling, so decided to take my SecondLife in my own hands.

Stumbled on a club which, sadly, is no longer around, and had a blast. Chatting, dancing, basically exactly what I do now, when not laboring away on my latest disasterpiece of a building.

haha! funny post.

Sansarya - I'm sorry you had this experience. Along the lines of what Olympia & Torley said, I too sometimes hang out at the WA (mostly to play Prim Attack). One of the problems is that there are so many people chatting that I am never sure if a question is being directed at me or at someone else. Combine that with playing Prim Attack and responding to an IM conversation and I can also be oblivious to the obvious. Someone usually has to say something like "Hey Rose", before they get my attention.

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