Where are the mentors?

I have been to Help Island Public and Orientation Island Public on several occassions and I am not seeing any mentors there. Where are they? I was a mentor a few months ago but failed to renew in time and no longer have access to the other islands. I would love to join the mentor group again but new applications are not being accepted at this time because there are too many mentors right now. Huh? Where are they? Most of the newbies that I have met have never met a mentor and are stumbling around lost. I met one newbie the other day asking for help from a camping bot and was getting frustrated that the bot wasn’t answering him.

I'm usually in Hanja, Kuula, Waterhead, or walking a Linden road when I'm not with friends. (^_^)

I'm usually never "in the tag" because I feel I can be helpful without labeling myself. Though, with the upcoming loss of HI access for Mentors that haven't become greeters, I wonder what meaning the group will have anymore beyond the group chat rescource. (>_<

/me, already a mentor, seems to be having a hard time finding out how I go about getting on the greeter list/role/group..

Somebody throw me a clue bone?

I don't think the greeters group is active yet.

True... Not yet... But with the sounds of things, a Greeter/Mentor will be one of the few reasons to keep the group tag anymore. The remainder of the group will have to stick to infohubs and welcome areas... Which EVERYBODY else already has access to. (=_=)

I sometimes go to the public islands but there are dozens of help islands not public and many of us are on those. I just spent a couple of hours on Help Island 208.

Hasn't this area gone alfully quite. or perhaps Im lost and that why no info was coming through.

From what I hear, the whole Mentor/Greeter role idea was dropped and there isn't any such change in the works. (^_^)

As for finding help, my original response still covers the question a few ways. (^_^)y

I am a total Newbie, but I can type and write. But I'm not blind.
I wouldn't know if I've already literally "run into" a mentor.
Do they have labels on them? I've not seen any, or any "greeters" whoever they are.

The "greeters" role was dropped a long while back. (>_<

I, myself, don't really believe in tags. So, I rarely put mine on, but I help anyway. When it seems like me slapping the Mentor tag on ~will~ help people open up with their questions... I'll wear it. (^_^)y

Now, while the Mentors group has shrank a lot lately, there are still plenty of us left. Along with volunteer communities like NCI, Dreams, and Help People... Surely, you can find the answers to the questions you have. Seek them out in search. Filter for "Education" and see what comes up. (^_^)y

If they are wearing their official tag, you'll see "SL Mentor" above their name.

Even if they aren't, you can check their profile. Look at the groups a person belongs to. If Second Life Mentors is in that list, then they are a Mentor.

An official one, I mean. There are lots and lots of helpful people out there. Some of them used to be Mentors, some never were.

Not to forget the yearly mentor appreciation party!

I do most of my mentoring either wherever I am or at a community gateway. Most of the time I will leave the tag off, but if I am 'on duty' and there are noobs around I will activate it so they know they can ask me questions.

Some mentors are great and very knowledgeable ! Most however are just noobs themselves. not that one noob cant help another noob out.. or at least point them to a forum post or something like that to help them out.

When I left they were shoveling people thru the mentor "Training Program"

Which basically mean , if you are smart enough to show up for a meeting.... have enough time to listen to a 30 minute speech... then POOF !!!! you now meet the prerequisites of being a mentor. OH !!! and you get to throw a pie at a linden when its done to boot !!!

SLDEV group that I am currently a member of is slowly becoming the same thing.
There are people that ask questions in the group that someone with 5 days on sl should be able to answer.... These are supposed to be LL's Preferred and Vetted Developers O.o
Unlike the mentors.. there is a 1 on 1 phone call with a linden via skype or something similar to "Evaluate" your experience and then subsequently add you to the dev group.


1 of 2 things are going on now... they have skipped the interview process altogether... and are now letting in folks who just proclaim to be developers... or.. their standards of what constitutes experience took a nose dive.

I had a client that told me that at first.. he actually overlooked me for potential work because I WAS in the sldev group. Apparently he had a bad experience with someone in the group who had no idea what content creation was... and offered to build a whole sim for 10,000 L

some of the help islands I've had the misfortune to visit, were little more than open warfare gangland city streets, with avis shooting up the place......when I complained to the 'mentors' on the deck, they weren't interested, so I won't go back.....I think noobs passing through there are likely to be negatively affected. The best one I've found so far is the help public one, where sensible pro-active multi-national greeters are always in attendance and order ensues......classes are run....and they have dances and meet and mingle sessions.........there are some pretty daft rules about vampires which cause trouble, but hey! what is SL without a little drama.

And yes it's true most people are helpful anyways and they don't necessarily have to be wearing a tag to provide that.

If it had been that way when I came, I may never have continued with SL. However, out of curiosity, I paid a little visit to an official "help" island last night and was astounded at the total rudeness and the filthy language, and yes..what you spoke of.

When I came, I got off help island and headed to the nearest in-world "civilization" as quickly as I could. I recommend present newbies do the same.

It is not that we do not care. It is that LL has thrown up every roadblock possible to prevent us from doing so short of disbanding the group and banning us.

That's a sorry state of affairs and it doesn't surprise me.

Since the subject of the character of the noobs at the initiation island has come up, I wonder if anyone else has noticed the not-very-subtle "invasion" of rudeness (by either ALTS or NOOBS) of newer avatars with no profiles? Our once peaceful sims have seen a huge influx in griefer types and rudeness. The character of SL could be changing...slowly..but the undercurrent is there..and it's not good.

Anyone else have similar experience or perceptions?