The Voice Rush - it has caught on amazingly quickly hasn't it?

Yeah, that's the thing about voice that bothers me the most, even more than the gender problem, for my friends who are in a avie of the other gender. Bringing back people's accents, even if they are all native English speakers, seems to bring back differences and distance. And non-native speakers can get unfairly shut out. I try to be inclusive with everyone, but a lot of people will treat someone who's different as a curiosity. If voice ever became widespread, it could lead to exclusion.

Brenda, yours is my only worry about voice (being the world's worst RPer). I LOVE the egalitarian nature of text only conversation. Levels the playing field immensely. Being from the US, I have made more international friends and learned so much more from them than I ever would RL, even if they were in the same RL coffeeshop with me. Grammar, accents ... so much less visible in IM. And I can occasionally trot out my feeble 2nd language skills, since I don't have to spit it out real-time.

If we were in RL, I wouldn't even attempt to talk to half the people I know in SL. I would assume the language barrier was too large.

I've only once seen voice being used. I've had a lot of people ask me to use it but the one experience I had was so disturbing I will never want to use it again. I do not want to hear your voices. I like the fact that SL is a literate place. Voice ruins it ... I hope they remove this feature ...

Meh.. I think it is in fad mode right now..

It's new and novel, but after getting burned a couple of times, most folks will just go "feh", and go back to text chat. A few will get hooked on it, though.

We're already seeing its use slacking off quite a bit at the Isle.

Today was the first time I was aware of that anyone has actually tried speaking directly to me with Voice, and had to deal with my not hearing them. I was visting a new client, getting their specs for a build, and one of the pair asked partway through "did you hear what I just said?". I replied with the last thing I had received from him in text chat. At the same time, his friend there said. "No, Ceera doesn't use Voice." (He's read my posts in the forums...). I simply explained that as far as Voice goes in SL, my avatar is deaf. Then we continued in text chat. The fellow who had tried speaking to me in turn explained that someone had started a voice chat with him, and he had mistakenly though it might be me.

They both were quite eager to hire my building services, so both were happy to continue in text conversation. No harm done, in that case, from my not being able to hear them. However, he hadn't noticed that I have no indication of being voice enabled, and I didn't see any indication at all that he was doing anything other than typing to me. I can see where, in a less cordial environment, that could have caused bad feelings.

As time goes by, I'm finding it's only getting more and more prevalent.

It's not a majority usage by far; maybe 10% - 20% of people communicating to me 'in person' will try voice, and generally they have been quite respectful and not used voice if texters were around at all. Voice is known to be a hot button issue in my sims, so maybe that helps.

Interestingly, absolutely no one has attempted to 'call' me via voice IM, save one person testing the feature for its own sake.

I think the reason people speak to me person to person is because they can see the voice 'dot' over my head when they walk up. Ironically, however, I don't have my headset on about 60% of the time and have to get it.

My sample size is about perhaps 50 people a day that have face to face contact with my avatar.

Just to put another perspective on the no-voice camp...

1) It's harder to follow voice conversations with multiple people. I can tune out room noises and concentrate on multiple screens of stuff (you get used to doing that in my line of work) with a lot less hassle, and my brain can juggle that much more easily.

2) My current computer - old, slow, BADLY in need of an upgrade that I cannot currently afford - can barely handle the current LL NON-voice client, forget the voice client. I've gone to the Nicholaz version so I'm not crashing every hour or so.

And then add the additional processing power of converting MY speech to something that can be shoved over the 'net into SL?

Heck no! I got enough computer problems. Bad enough the voice sims are lagged beyond all belief when I go there already, even though I'm NOT using a voice client.

hee, this is why I turned it off on most of my parcels. Most of the time I am not even wearing the headset, so I would not even hear them.

Only one person has called me via voice IM, admittedly I have this feature restricted to my friends list (for good reason - I don't want to be voice called by strangers, I'm funny about that kind of thing...)

I use voice. I dont use voice.

Usually I have my headphones disconnected. So for voice use, it takes me a few seconds to plug in the mic & headset.

NOW- if SL was in 7.1 Surround Sound.... I'd probably not use headphones.

The OP's initial observations are his own and no one can dispute them, BUT they do seem a bit exagerated and hyped in self-serving optimism. Maybe it's because my experience has been totally opposite. I have yet to encounter anyone at all using voice. What I find most surprising is that not only are people not using it, but they are totally ignoring it, behaving as if it was never even introduced into the grid.

I guess you need to hang out at the Guvnah's mansion more frequently, when the Guvnah is around. (Desmond)

I have had a few really nice voice chats there, but talking to my fellow Caledonians is a pleasure, I must say. (and Des is really fun to talk to, as well)

Depends on the environment I guess. Caledon is much tighter knit than strangers bumping in the night across the mainland.

Yes pretty true

The freinds that I know using the new voice chat were using Skype or Yahoo with voice already.

Other than that its pretty pretty much same old.

Cept for my one freind who has gotten so lazy she only wants to chat on voice with people any more. (her words lol)

To echo Miss Callisto's comments, you don't know Mr. Shang very well, or you wouldn't accuse him of "self serving optimism" re: voice. He has been genuinely concerned about the ramifications of its implementation, both in regard to the social aspects, as well as the less talked about fiscal aspects (essentially, charging islands whilst giving the mainland a free ride sets unfortunate precedent).

I don't use voice, probably never will, but despite its (previously unknown to me) popularity in my home sim, I've never felt left out of conversation. Perhaps this might change in the future, and certainly I can see how it might be an issue in less genteel areas.

i dont have a voice client installed, so voice is pretty non-existent to me.
i've never been asked about voice, or had a friend suggest voice either.
so far as the op goes, hes never come off as a voice fanatic or whatnot so i doubt this thread is a 'plant'.

I never enabled it and never will. Luckily the groups I hang out with don't use it either. First I was upset by all that voice thing going on, about being ignored and harassed, but now I treat voice like a language I don't undestand, like someone typing Japenese characters. I ignore it. If anyone won't talk to me in a language I understand, it's fine with me. There are thousands of other nice ppl out there who will.

I attended a party last night and it was the first time that I've experienced a group using voice. WHAT A NIGHTMARE.

Some people were on voice, some were in chat, some were IM'ing. Very hard to follow anything and you could never tell who was talking. On top of all that, people not on voice for whatever reason were feeling very left out.

This isn't the only time I've tried it but from now on when in a crowd voice will stay turned off. If an individual asks me directly to chat with them in voice I may oblige, but it's not likely to ever be me that initiates it.

You are right in that I do not know Mr. Shang very well. And I have no doubt that he is a fine gentleman. But I am just calling it how I see it. The title of this thread and his words in his initial paragraph speak for themselves. My calling it "self-serving optimism" is not an "accusation." It is an observation. And based on the responses on this thread, an accurate one. If you can't read "self-serving optimism" in the following title and paragraph, then you are simply not being honest with yourself (I've bolded sensationalized key words for easy reference).





BTW, calling it "self-serving optimism" does not necessarily have to be a bad thing. Unless of course, you opt to see it as such. But the reality of it is, that he made the decision to enable voice in his sims, and as such, perhaps he would like to see that decision supported and strenthened.

Elementary psychology.

Not sure what sort of psychology you are using: I admit it's been a few years now since I graduated with my degree, and really haven't kept up on the literature.

Leaving aside the issue of whether or not "self serving" is pejorative, or simply a sweet nothing you might whisper in an intimate's ear, it doesn't describe voice implementation in our sim at all. Desmond didn't make the decision to enable voice, so much as it was enabled, even in the lower tier sims. Caledon is not yet being charged for this. He would have had to conciously turn voice off, something he is on record as saying he would do if it is an issue.

On our forums, he has stated that the current plan is to let voice chat expire in lower tier sims unless it is some nominal amount (such as $5USD) he can "eat" without passing it onto the renters. The future will probably be a mix of voice enabled and non-enabled sims. Right now, Caledon culture has text as the default method of chatting, with voice chats between friends. Think of voice as a sort of IM more than anything else. Not my cup of tea, but I don't worry about it taking over, not just yet.

I've had several discussions with Desmond on this very subject and I'm hardly alone in that regard. Caledon is a model for how a sim owner can listen to the inputs and accomadate the needs of many different residents, even on so divisive as subject as voice in Second Life.

I'm not sure why you feel so inclined to offer such a lengthy explanation on something that has nothing do with my point that he was being self-servingly optimistic on the specifc issue of the wording of the title and first paragraph of this thread. But I'll just consider your post as an "as for the record" post and leave it at that.

I can't help but mention, however, that the following statement does have "hmmm" written all over it.

Yes I just had my first two encounters with friends using voice.

I was invited to a party last night in the southern part of the estate I live in and my neighbor told me everyone was chatting away in voice over there. Told him (along with my partner) that we weren't using it and he spent like 15 minutes trying to sell it to us and waiting for us to go "oh okay". When we didn't he went back to the party.

Later me and my partner buzzed the party continuously at about 30 feet in my helicopter. They switched back to text fast LMAO!!!

Not cool dude, that guy could text-spam you for the rest of your Second Life, from anywhere on the grid P:

Erm, well, one might say that the particulars of voice implementation in Caledon and whether the residents had any input on it had an awful lot to do with whether he is being disingenuous in this thread. Just providing information for the curious, and all that. Sorry if I misjudged your interest.

Write "hmmm" over what you wish, but it hardly makes sense for a sim owner to turn off free features unless there is broad-based protest from the entire rental group. Desmond says there hasn't been and there is no reason to suspect he is fibbing.

Caught on amazingly quick? I been trying to find people using it for 2 days on hundreds of sims. I find a few people always using it at Bear Info Hub. A few people at a couple crowded beaches use it now and then but over all find hardly anyone using it.

I find more people abusing it than anything. People have the damn thing to their radio thinking everyone wants to hear their music. One place they had their mic to a porn movie. Another was going around talking nasty to any girl he could find. Another place 2 out of 35 people were making fun of the people not using voice.

A lot of people I talk to about it don't want to use it because they have people around them and don't want them to hear. many other like the chat history to reflect on. A LOT of people are playing a character that doesn't fit their RL voice. Not just men as women but also robots, animals and such.

I have tried those voice morphers to try and talk like a robot but they drag the computer down pretty bad. Not using the morph voice works ok using it is like sever lag but it is from CPU usuage.

Probably a good thing it has NOT caught on quick as the system is not very stable as is yet.

Nah he's too busy peeking in when I'm changing and having sex in full view of my living room windows for all that

We adore each other. They all knew it was me anyways. I'm the only one in Kazami with a whirly bird...

We need to hang out i think...(Or hover)