Mentors and ethics

Not at all. Anyone avatar that has been abuse reported too much or has been suspended cannot be a Mentor. Why is this rule in place you ask? Because of the implied STANDARD that Mentors are to be judged by. No one is wearing my tags and doing wrong across the grid. When reported to me they either straighten up or get booted.

I don't believe the Lindens have a set procedure in place to remove Mentor tags from residents. But they realy need to develop a policy and enforce it.

Every resident has to abide by the TOS and CS or face a potential sanction at LL's discretion.

"Every resident" happens to include mentors, so whether someone is a mentor or not indeed has absolutely no relevance. If a resident breaks the TOS or CS you AR them, the fact that they might be a mentor simply does not come into it.

If you see someone orbitting others, it makes no difference whether that person is a mentor or not, you simply AR because it violates the CS that covers all residents. If they do happen to be a mentor, the governance team will decide whether or not to inform the VTeam for a possible additional sanction (warning, kicked out of the group, etc) on top of the one that would apply to all residents (warning, temporary suspension, etc).

If a mentor is tagged up (or acting in a way that implies they're using that role, for instance being on HIP or an HI or OI) then they are subject to the additional rules for mentor behaviour as well and you report any violations of those additional rules to any of the VTeam Lindens.

If you see someone being a pain on HIP, but not to the point of actual griefing then there isn't really anything you can report since just being rude/disruptive doesn't violate the CS. However if that person is a mentor you can report them to the VTeam whether they're tagged or not since being on HIP implies they're acting as a mentor.

Since the OPs story took place in a store, as long as both residents weren't tagged up, it falls under resident-resident interaction and not mentor-resident interaction.

Hmm.

Some misleading and/or incorrect information seems to have crept in.

Mentors do give out freebies. A lot of us exchange freebies among ourselves, to have a good collection of things to give to the newbies.

LL doesn't provide any of this, exactly. But they do have a "freebie store" at the SL Volunteer Education Center where people can put out freebies for others to take.

Mentor selection does involve standards. A certain amount of time in-world, a clean "rap sheet", and a short essay that shows the applicant has some clue about what being a mentor means. Additional qualifications and/or recurring training has been discussed.

There is training for mentors. Just recently, a "shadowing" program has begun in which an apprentice Mentor accompanies an experienced one for some period of time before being fully qualified.

Mentor behavior is monitored (though not real closely) and violators may have their tags taken away, either temporarily or permanently.

That only works if the group was being maintained as quality over quantity while it's currently the opposite with hundreds of new mentors being added every month. As far as I can tell the Lindens are barely, if at all, involved in interacting with new mentors. All that is handled by other mentors, some of which are too caught up in their own perceived importance of "training" new mentors to care about who they're actually blindly qualifying to go from apprentice to mentor.

We trust new Lindens because they're handpicked and interviewed as part of being hired, and are actively supervised if not monitored and fired if they don't display a certain mentality, skill and integrity. New mentors on the other hand are an anonymous literal flood that flow into the group without any requirement or supervision. You can't assign any such group with "trust" except on an individual level since there is nothing maintaining skill or mentality.

Anyone can get into the group, turn off notices the moment they're in and be entirely oblivious to what they're supposed to do or how they're supposed to act and they will remain that way for months. As long as it's possible to slip through the cracks and go unnoticed like that, I think mentors should be seen as open enrollment group that everyone can join and stay in without any kind of expectation of the group as a whole.

Expecting everyone in a group of an odd 3500 people to conform to some kind of standard is impossible without constant involvement and follow-up by the Lindens and ends up reflecting negatively on the entire group to the point where individual mentors who do act the way they're supposed to and are actively involved and do do a lot of good are painted with the same undeserving brush.

They do actually, although I think it could be communicated better on how people can/should report a mentor who's doing something they shouldn't.

When it concerns regular ARs (violation of TOS or CS) the governance team should inform the VTeam who can take their own action, in addition to how the governance team decides to resolve the AR.
When it concerns breaking mentor guidelines, you should report those to any of the VTeam Lindens since an AR isn't necessarily going to work (being rude to a newbie doesn't violate the CS so the governance team could just ignore the AR).

Longer version: /204/d6/243571/1.html#post1901350

There is the crux of the problem. While your statement may be true, that's not the perception held by most residents of what a Mentor is.

They see a Mentor as someone basically *endorsed* by Linden Lab as being someone knowledgeable, trustworthy, honest, and chock full of integrity. But clearly from what you say, that is not the case. I think many (note i'm not saying all) get the tag just to gain that 'superiority' as some mentioned. They have no real desire to help anyone. Clearly the program needs revamped.

Most Mentors I think do want to just help out. I was over at Waterhead earlier, I love the Voyuerism aspect of it, I sit on a chair and just listen. The Mentor there was in the center of the pavillion, with a fairly large group around her. I must applaud her for her patience. The stream of idiotic banalities coming from the assemblage was unbelieveable.

She was patiently trying to explain Ess El* to a new person who didn't know what to do, was handing out notecards to repeated "How do I get money?" inquiries, fending of the davances from a guy who looked like he stepped out of the Space Marine Company in Aliens, and dealing with a really obnoxious girl who claimed to be French and Living in Boston *Great Combo, Eh?*. Who made it her point to tell everyone how lame they were, that only desperate people look for sex there, and how much Ess El* sucks, IMVU is way better, and has better sex. She made great use of the F word, upping it every time the Mentor reminded her it was a PG place. Add that to the the usual comedy of a Welcome are, including one highly entertaining , self professed "Game designer" who claimed how he could put together a much more efficient program with his eyes closed. How she kept it going is beyond me, she is a saint.

*Ess El=SL.

Quick, trademark Ess El - before LL does and sues you.

I think it is more important to look at mentors and the mentor program from the point of view of the newbies.

Think back to when you yourself were new. You arrive, all bewildered, at a newbie dumping point, wondering what the hell, and you see a person tagged SL Mentor standing around waiting to be asked for help. Well, dang, you believe (all right, HOPE) that person will be helpful. You figure they are more or less representatives of the management - okay, maybe semi-official, but at least designated epresentatives. The mentors I have met in general are trying to do the right thing; of course they vary in ability, but don't we all.

But suppose you get some asshole who misdirects you, plays dirty tricks on you, or turns out to be indulging their Inner Totalitarian. How likely are you to persist with the steep learning curve in SL if your presumed management representative turns out to be an adolescent sociopath?

I think LL should limit the number of mentors it puts out there in front of the newbies to the number it can be sure are good examples of what LL is and aspires to be, and to the number it can monitor and control.

In the real world, companies that delegate the protection of their good name to others (e.g. franchise operations) send anonymous "customers" around to report on what their stand-ins operating under their good name are doing. The bad actors get bounced. LL should do the same. If it doesn't, LL is just asking for trouble - and should already know by now what it gets when it goes around asking for trouble.

Har I agree but this has all been presented to LL before..... note this from almost 2 years ago:


the following is a presentation several of us presented to Jeska at a meeting this friday...... below it is a transcript of the meeting. We are in a short wait and see mode right now but something needs to be done soon about the problems.


* Mentors are increasingly fractious, ill-informed, misinformed, prone to CS/TOS violations (eg: Using weapons on people that annoy them), and getting bad habits from each-other, and generally tarnishing the reputation of the corps and of LL.
* As that reputation worsens, it attracts more problem people to the volunteer programs
* This situation arises from ill-preparedness of new mentors joining the corps
* The mentor program alone has grown to the point where it can no longer sustain itself without external supervision and oversight.
* Self-support and organisation may be possible in the future, but that time is not now.
* Most of these issues have become problems, because they are not seen unless you are inworld, all day every day. There's only Torley and she has her hands full on broader usability and quality issues.
* There's a LOT of new registrations. How many are we /retaining/? Isn't it foolish to lose that momentum while we have it? We can do better.

* Freeze the intake until existing issues can be largely resolved.
- The freeze is needed because current organisational models simply cannot deal with the intake.
- The situation is getting out of control. Pause for reflection and reassessment.
- As a prerequisite to identifying specific problem areas and solving them. We cannot continue to add new mentors AND address the problems in the existing system simultaneously.

* Establish a code of conduct.
- Hold volunteers to a better standard of behaviour than other residents. That's part of the cost of doing business. As representatives of SL and LL, the average residents should expect no less.

* Institute training.
- The ability to act as a greeter, mentor or live helper is not instinctive. It is learned.
- Training of volunteers will allow better cohesion of the corps. It will ease communication inside it, both horizontal and vertical, set the foundations of quality, and help foster trust, respect and a sense of community.

* Full-time Torley-equivalent for new-user/volunteer matters.
- Quality does not happen in a vacuum. It must be constantly overseen and encouraged.
- Rules and procedures and codes of conduct only allow a climate where quality can occur. They do not promote it, in and of themselves. Only LL can foster quality within the corps at this time.
- Monitor orientation and retention, in-world. Tap the volunteers for collective wisdom. Deal with spot issues. Resolve conflicts. Constant evaluation, experimentation and improvement of in-world processes.
- Empowers volunteers as individuals and as a community.
- With the best planning, and highest quality materials, a golf-course needs constant maintenance, otherwise it becomes just a rough jungle.

* Evaluation.
- Quality assurance requires ongoing evaluation, to meed the changing needs of SL. The changing needs of new and old residents, to identify improved practices and techniques in the field.
- Volunteers cannot fall too far out of date or they become harmful to the program and to the interests of the residents they serve.

* Selectivity when intake resumes
- Maintain quality. If you can't scale identification and approval of talent, you must work the counter-hypothesis and exclude what will be too costly to bring up to minimum standard.


Attending meeting
Gwyn
JayJay
Moon
Tat
Lethe
Toy
Mera
Torley
Jeska

Signed on to the above thoughts
Baccara Rhodes
Catherine Omega
Sky McGann
Ali Maltz
Kai Sachetorte
SignpostMarv Martin
Angelique LaFollette
Psyra Extraordinaire
Fairge Kinsella
Blueman Steele
TXGorilla Falcone
Travis Lambert
Coal Nelson

Toy - very interesting. But nearly two years ago?! That is discouraging.

If I may comment, the program you folks set out then sounds to me pretty labor-intensive from LL's point of view - especially remembering they are stretched to the max just keeping the grid operating, more or less, and costs must be a big consideration to them. That may be the reason why people are still reporting problems today. Maybe a handful of trusted individuals spot-checking the mentors would help - maybe they would a lot, once it's known that LL takes the matter seriously and makes it painful indeed for people who abuse its good name.

Hah. Well, we all know what the results were:

1. Nothing much has changed;
2. Being a "mentor" is no sort of badge of honour as far as any experienced resident is concerned, despite the many admirable folk who do their best as Mentors;
3. New residents will still not know about any of it and will expect Mentors to be responsible, reliable and _vetted_ helper-type people. Much like they might expect "SL Police" to be so.

Well, exactly. And whatever the reality of the mentor program is, I don't think newbies can be blamed for assuming this, especially since they have no choice but to deal with Mentors on the private OIs and HIs. I mean, when you hand over your debit card to the cashier in your supermarket, you expect to be able to trust them with it. You don't expect to have to study the supermarket's cashier hiring policy to check that you couldn't possibly be handing it to someone with a cloning machine under the desk.

That email was done on may 12th 2006 Har

I would think that the newbie facing portion of mentors is actually quite decent really? I really have no idea, it would just be a guess based on how many people complain that "someone who's in the group did and said this and that" vs "I saw a mentor treat a newbie badly". I wouldn't think that the bad apples really have the patience or the motivation to really interact with newbies.

On the other hand, I do think it's quite likely that a newbie (both true newbie or new in the widest sense) is going to get the wrong advice from a mentor when/if they run into a problem due to lack of knowledge or repeating hearsay but that's a different problem altogether .

I know from experience that many people mistook helpers for Linden Lab employees (but then everyone including Lindens and other helpers could see everyone else's chat so there was a lot of Linden and peer monitoring there), but is that really true for mentors unless they somehow imply differently?

I would expect someone on an official help channel to be related to the company running the whole thing so I can see confusion there (and I did make the same mistake ), but a random person is just a random person regardless of what title they claim for themselves?

problem is there are too many non related Mentor groups that stir issues.....

Don't you mean "El El"?

It's already being done. Plus I'm still waiting to hear back on "FugQ".

A lot of the points in Har's presentation have been/are being addressed. The Linden V Team has been very active with the Mentors and other volunteers. Standards have been raised, and consideration is being given to raising them further.

Training, via a shadowing program, is being implemented.

Mentors who don't meet standards of conduct are being suspended or removed from the group.

Maybe you ancient, creaking real oldtimers don't consider the Mentor tag as a badge of honor. But I'm not exactly a new resident any longer...and I do. I've seen the job the Mentors do, I've done it myself. I'm proud to be a member of a group that has so many skilled and dedicated people in it.

its the people. that will determine if its a badge of honor, calling it that doesnt make it so. It used to be but it started downhill in 05 and now its turning around, finally 2-3 years later. I would even consider rejoining Mentors once it has cleaned up its act but for now its a 'wait and see'. In the meantime I will continue to help others at NCI.

I'll eventually make time to come and haras... er.... visit.

to the OP are you sure they were mentors? did you check the groups they were in to see if they were indeed in the Second Life Mentor group?
People can make a Second Life Mentor and Second Life Coach, or Mentor Coach or any other type tag they want, with their own group, and have done so.

If you see someone with an official looking mentor tag, check their group list, if they are not a member of the official group ar them with the screenshot added... and even if they are part of the official group, an they are behaving in such a way that it is against the TOS AR them.

The problem is that newbies are not experienced Second Life users, and they're the ones that *some* mentors appear to be ripping off.

And it is important that LL deal with the mentors who do abuse the system; I agree with what Lindal has said in this thread, and it's a shame to let a few bad apples spoil the reputation of mentors in general.

I have to say, the only place I tend to meet other mentors is on the non-public OIs and HIs, and although some have been good, and some have been less-good, and they've all had different ways of mentoring... they're all genuinely been there to help.

There's very little reflected glory in perambulating around HI and answering the questions "what can I do here?" and "how do I get out of here?" for the umpteenth time that day, since it's only newbies who see you, and most won't even remember you in a few days.

(I keep meaning to test out how Help Island looks with default settings and draw distance, because the number of English-speakers who completely fail to notice the big green EXIT sign still astounds me, and I've been mentoring on and off for three months now)

I was thinking this same thing. If you look up "Mentor" in world there are lots and lots of groups with mentor in the title that are nothing to do with the official Mentors.

I feel a group tag keyword ban coming on.

This is why i never followed through with the mentor program when selected that I left it that and the people asking in the mentors channel for help to stop spamming it when they had a legitimate question they needed answered. The mentor tag is becoming something else. I wanted to help out people on orientation island and the only way to do that was to become a mentor however I could not stand that channel and what happened pretty routinely so I never bothered to keep at it.