Green dot on sim map = Opt out

I dont know how many times I've been 'visited' because someone was curious and just wanted to stop and stand there a moment in great wonder at my green dot spot on the map.

....w00t...

..w00t..

*..

I'd like to request an option to NOT be a green dot on the map at all. And unless a person has my calling card would not see me as a dot on the map or whatever. Back in beta you didnt have green dots to track down and you had to run around looking for them if you wanted to chat. Please consider bringing that back.

Let some of us who want to be left in peace have that option. Yes if me and another are in a sim and both not green dots that we'd still show as '2' people in the sim if you held the pointer over the sim but not WHERE in the sim we are.

That is, to me, an extra measure of privacy I wish to request from Linden Labs. I am sure I am not the only person who wants this. Everyone else, please speak up.

Bah Humbug !

I love to hunt Green dots.

I was even thinking of starting a group to do just that.

I am sure I have interrupted on accassion AND been interrupted myself.

BUT

I love it.. It is a great way to meet neighbnours and others.

I love to go where the "action" is.

Trying to meet people at events etc is much harder due to crowd confusion.

I am very sad to hear you don't want to meet anyone new Julia but that of course is your right.

Maybe we do need more options like :
- do not appear on Map
- Send Im's to answering machine
- appear offline
- toggable - On line status advices

This is how I met Siobahn and I was pleasantly surprised by her house which I would have never seen if not for Hunting Green dots.

I support this service or product. Being able to go anonymous, so the only way to know someone is online is to walk up and see them (no green dot, no highlight on calling card), would be useful. IMs should still go through though. This is basically how it works in DAoC.

I think as the world grows and so does the population, it will be more and more desired to be able to "hide" at times.

I am not saying it has to be a permanent thing but an option to 'turn off' for when you don't want to be bothered. As many know there are those who will simply show up, interupt your talk or build and just sit there staring and then run off, leaving you wondering what the whole point of visiting was to start with other than 'you were a green dot on the map'.

Not being able to be found has its advantages and I'd like to flex it a bit with this option to 'hide' from public for a while if I dont want to be bothered.

Indeed it is good to meet new people. I am a lot like Siobhan in that respect but there are times she and I both wish to be left in peace and not 'tracked and hunted for' where our green dot locations are.

This would be a way to counter the issue of 'seeing through walls' or the Alt issue that Ryen brought up. No one (well almost no one) is going to hunt the WHOLE DAMN SIM for however many people but no locations (especially if its a small number of 1-3 people but no locations shown).

It gives those who want privacy, to have a bit more of it. And the option to be in the public eye again when they are ready.

I thought the whole point of SL was to meet people.

However, for those who require privacy, there must be a way of locking a room so that no one can get in. I would have thought that was the best option.

I again will bring up Ryen's suggestion of making "no Alt" option. Locks can be bypassed easily. Ask anyone who's been around a while. Even I do it from time to time since I learned how.

Locked doors also mean jack when you can use the alt and mouse to move/look through the wall just as easy as walking in.

Again suggestion my point on wish for privacy. If they know you're in a sim but not WHERE, they have to really bust butt to find you because they have a LOT of builds to rummage through to even begin to attempt to find said person(s).

Like I want to be tracked by a old player or even a new one to be walked up to say and 'uh huh huh.. nice breasts' *flies off* Yah. I realize its a minor occurance but its an increasing one as SL grows.

Right now they can track you down to the dot and mill around looking for you because they know you're exact area locale vs if you were again in the sim but not a dot, they have to seriously work to find you.

While SL is a social game about meeting people. Do you like it when you have someone staring into your window in RL? Do you spend all of your waking hours socializing? I know I dont. Its not an attack but a point I am trying to make. There is a time for social and a time for privacy. I want to see LL please bring some of the later to folks by giving the option to not be a dot on the map.

Maybe an option could be :

Privacy toggle on your own land -
So when you are "home" you are not seen on map but still open for IM's

But as soon as you come out into the world Julia...we will hunt you... I too noticed your AV but it was more the cool hair I liked. Maybe I said nice "bits" and you misunderstood

This could apply to group land too.

I think that would be a better option than the horrible Red Stripey Keep Out Thingies...I really hate them

LoL. No, it wasn't you I was refering to. It was a few others we've had bad encounters with recently. 98% of our visitors are great and we love them. We just sometimes would like the option to hide and not be bothered.

The idea you give is a good one, I think that may even be better than the original idea mentioned.

Some suggestions...

I personaly would *REALLY* like a Invisible Mode, this would make you invisible to anyone (your green dot gone, you would appear offline, may or may not be in user count for a sim) unless they are standing directly infront of you, then they would obviously see you.

Another option which I would LOVE is a folder option in Calling Cards for "Set Invisible For All But This Group", then to everyone you will appear offline/invisible except for the calling cards in that folder.

The land option may also work, but I personaly would rather have the above ones. My thought on how the land option could possibly work is you set up a "Privacy Fence", anyone who then enters your property their green dot will not appear on the map and maybe/maybe not in the user count, however they would see the green dots of other people on your property. Privacy Fence would not have the ugly red lines, but would have the same area coverage, such as anyone casualy flying over will not be included in the privacy fence, they'd have to land and get within the fence to see other people in it. You could also maybe set up an allow/dissallow list for people to be included in it.

I would rather have the Invisible Mode than anything else.

I usually don't bother single "green dots" unless I know them. But it still would be good to be able to just be left alone when you want to. Like if you are working on something you don't want anyone to know about yet, or to spend time with someone without being disturbed.

If the Lindens can get the avatar ghosting problem fixed, I'd approve of this. Right now, a quick way to find out if that av hanging in mid-air is a ghost or not is to look for a corresponding green dot. If the dot isn't guarenteed to be there, the only ways are to try talking, or to try running into them.

Yeah. I want this too.

Exactly as described, really... a toggle to turn myself off from being tracked or dotted. It can sit right there as a 'set private' or 'set invisible' option in the menu along with 'set away' and 'set busy'.

Do it, LL... do it!

And just a comment re Seladors comment...



Erm. SL is a lot of different things to a lot of different people. I didnt come here to meet people... I came here to build and script.

The fact that I now have a lot of great new friends is obviously a big bonus, but it's not why I came here at all. I guess I must of missed the point

Why dont you just use the land access tools to restrict access to your land to members of a certain group.

Well dunno bout anyone else here, but for me I'm not always necessarily at home or alone when I don't wanna be tracked or hunted down.

If I were, then I would.

I find that the Ctrl-Q command works really well when I don't want to be contacted in world.

Less facetiously, I have rarely encountered an avatar with BUSY mode set, but when I have I have left them quite alone and should hope that people would tend to respect that. Am I a dreamer? Really high skyboxes tend to work well enough for "privacy" that I have found it difficult to get to them when someone *wants* me to join them there. People also seem to forget or dislike the "Talk to" feature which gives you a degree of privacy whereby someone has to be next to you (therefore visible) in order to listen in.

It is entirely possible that I don't have enough "stalkers" so cannot fully appreciate the issue. And I have been known to "harrass green dots" (i.e. go talk to them) when tired of building, but always in public areas.

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I forgot about how the ghosting issue would present a problem with this. So I agree, that needs to be fixed before we see anything like this.

Also its not about not liking to talk to people, atleast for me, its about wanting some alone time in SL. Setting Busy does little as most people don't get what it means or don't care. Sometimes if you're in the middle of a project or just want to be alone Busy does nothing.

Look at almost every Instant Messenger that exists, they all have Invisible modes (exception being AIM). People use those, and no one hassles people for wanting to have Invisible mode on them either.

I highly doubt the world will become a barren green-dotless place with Invisible Mode leaving you to just sit there and cry. Probly not everyone will keep it on all the time and most people will probly not even know it exists.

I could say "Ban Busy Mode!" because if I really want to IM someone and they have busy on, I can't talk to them!!

Let people have their options of privacy if they want.

I agree more privacy options like these are needed. Turning off the green dot (as an option)... and selective calling card tracking as suggested by Oz are the ones I would especially like to have.

There's one temporary hiding method that still works...
You may not be able to hide your X,Y coorindates, but you can hide your Z in a sea of amiguity. Just get an object which sets your bouyancy - and enjoy peace up in the sky without that pesky gravity.

-Adam

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Different people enjoy different ratios of socializing and creating in SL. I agree it'd be nice if the tools made it easier for people to sepnd their game time the way they like. Right now when I'm concentrating on something, I check to see if anyone I know (like Malachi Petunia) is online. If they are, I'll usually keep myself not Busy in case they drop by. Which is obviously not ideal.

Time is an important issue. Being with other people is obviously a fundamental part of SL, but obvioulsy so is building things, which takes time. I know for myself, limited time is usually the factor that makes me want to go to Busy, or wish I didn't appear as a green newbie magnet on the map.

Perhaps we could simply not appear on the map when set to Busy?

Imagine a new Second Life World...

1. Where everyone is invisible.
2. Where everyone is silent.
3. Where everyone is unresponsive.
4. Where everyone is automatically banned from people's land.
5. Where everyone has to be quiet.
6. Where everyone can opt-out of the rules of the game (physics, turn off push, etc.)
7. Where interaction is shunned, and forbidden.

Humans are curious, interactive, social creatures. Second Life is about that kinds of life, not a shut-in, G-Rated, non-interactive, padded-wall world.

If you want that, start a sim with rules like that. Please don't apply it to the world as a whole, or we will be left right back where we started (or at least I started): The Sims Offline Version.

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Note to Flamers: This is not directed at anyone personally, just my opinion related to several posts in several threads throughout the past few months that have followed along these lines of thought.

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Which, Hank, is precisely why all these kinds of options are suggested as options.

But are you saying that because I want a little privacy that I should go do it in a specific sim? And if I want privacy to build I should go LIVE in a seperate sim with seperate rules?

I hope not. You want to penalise and ostracise me for wanting some peace and quiet!?

Doesn't it make more sense, as suggested, that I can just turn my green blip off? Let's not get carried away, shall we? How is ME turning off my green dot gonna spoil YOUR Second Life?

Edit to continue a bit of extra ranting.... and what good is a sky box when certain people will gatecrash them, and appear pretty damned pleased that they managed it, as if there was some huge trick to getting into a walled, windowless, doorless build that was obviously designed for privacy? If I didnt have the green dot, they wouldn't know to try, would they?

*sigh*

Please read my bottom note. It wasn't directed at anyone in particular, and I wasn't suggesting anyone be penalized or ostracised. I just wanted to inject my thoughts into the discussion, not flame anyone.