Temporary Mentors

I cant say that I am a Mentor. I would need to officially be one to proclaim this and I wont.

As a enthousiast second life citizen I do take a little bit of my time to help new citizens in getting their avatars in shape. I do this for free, I dont ask anything in return except that what I showed to the person he or she can also do this to others like them that are new to second life.

I've selected high end vendors that offer free good quality skins, shapes, clothes and collected note cards and landmarks that I have stored in folders to give out to new citizens.

I dont run out in search for new people but if someone ask's for help I give them my ready at hand material freely. Sometimes if I see someone having difficulties, I will offer support without insisting and if they do ask for help I do it tossing aside what I was doing for a moment or two.

I offer temporary friendship and give them quick knowledge base on adjusting hair, unpacking boxes and where to seek support such has good mentoring groups like Free Dove (I give this group because I am with Free Dove since day one but there is many others also). I give also reference to Fashcon group, lucky chair hoppers and Chair hoppers groups. Those groups give out a little bit of lindens quickly like lucky chair hoppers or weekly free clothing giveways like fashcon.

With all this, I really think a new citizen can do his way and spare them alot of time from running around freebies deporiums stacking up sometime useless items. Just this week, four persons asked for help and did offer temporary friendship to them. All of them where very happy with my momentary support. Gladly, I still see around people I have helped in the past and most are active in Second Life with is my greatest personnal reward.

I dont think Second Life team can offer a complete support to the flow of new citizens that are logging every day. That would probably be behond human ressources. Since Second Life is largely created by the citizens themselves, maybe if older citizens would pull out just a little bit of their time to offer a guiding hand I sincerely think this would mean alot between empty SIMS and large crouds in them.

There's a great and free SL guide at www.sldrama.com called the Complete Fool's Guide to SL (unofficial) in pdf form and online viewable web form.

It pretty much tells a new resident everything they need to know, some older ones who are walking around semi-oblivious to some obvious things could give it a read too. Even if you know the ropes its still a great read.

If more people would take a few minutes to read that before wandering around, attaching large phalluses to themselves and walking around the welcome area, we'd all be better off ^_^

Hi Annabelle! This is really great of you to do ... I agree that any new arrival who gets helped by an actual person is SO much more likely to stay in SL. I have an alt who looks like a slightly-better-than-noob who sometimes sits quietly in infohubs and takes noobs on a whirlwind tour like yours

You might want to look at Lucrezia Lamont's new resident kit, pulled together with help from a bunch of forum folks. This latest, slimmed down version is really good. Maybe there's a few things in it that you might like to add to what you do. /327/07/241657/1.html

Happy helping!

Good for you, Annabelle!

I'm a Mentor, but well before I got the "official" tag, I was helping people. And you're right, the "official" helpers can't do it all.

If you want to put a little more formal spin on what you're doing, there are many non-LL sanctioned helper groups you can join. NCI, Help People!, The Birdies, and GQ Start, among others.

You can spend some time at places where newcomers are thick on the ground, like Orientation Island Public and Help Island Public, or one of the Welcome Areas. But find a spot and sit on something, or have a defensive gadget like MystiTool...these places are also full of practical jokers who'd orbit you in a second if it would give them some lolz.

You can also assemble a pile of useful things to give new residents. Lucrezia Lamont's great newbie kit is a good resource to have and to give away. Freebie packages and starter kits are offered by many merchants, or you can assemble your own.

That SLDrama link didn't work properly for me. I spent a lot of time in freebie shops as a noob...although a "demon" lady gave me my first makeover. I'm glad I didn't have the L$ to buy the expensive skins as I'm sure I would have made a lot of costly mistakes.

I'd advise any noob lady to join FashCon Cafe as you get the inside scoop on all the best skins, hair, AOs, clothes and so on. FashCon stops valuable group slots getting clogged but Cafe allows you to ask useful questions on where the best stuff is.

The nooby look alt is a great idea...I think I'll try that myself.

Keep on helping!