One of the most important 'answers' in years?

Thats a really interesting article. And I agree with it completely.

I can't really say much about not being heard by LL. I've never spoken out. I've never tried to make my voice heard. But really, thats only because I know I wont be heard. By the time I had been in SL for long enough to really care about anything, it had already become well known that they wouldn't listen, so I never tried.
I don't know enough about inworld SL for it to really bother me, a lot of the policy changes haven't affected me yet (or I simply don't know that they have), and though I have no doubt that one day they will, I'm just lazy enough not to worry about it until that day comes. And yes, thats probably stupid and selfish of me, because maybe if I take notice now, I could help head off those issues earlier.

The only thing that really bothers me is the forums. This place is my family and my home. Almost 2 years, and even after a couple of disappearances, I still love it here. But not as much as I used to.
When I first came here it felt like people could be helped, and I enjoyed helping them. I don't know a lot of things, but what I do know I like being able to share if it helps.
Now I spend most of my time in one thread, occasionally popping out to answer the more opinion based threads, because I find I just dont like what the forums are becoming - I'm finding I just don't care or can't be bothered, and I dont like that.
LL isn't listening, and its showing in here! If they really wanted to know what the customer wants, these forums are the place to find out.

I might not be a premium member or pay anything to LL, but I did once, and could again in the future. But instead of being a potential customer, I just dont matter. I'm not a business person, so they don't want to know. And even then they don't listen to the people who really do put money into SL.

*sigh* it just bothers me that they have the potential for such a great thing here, and they are ignoring it and not listening or communicating. They need to read that article, and learn from someone else's experiences.

I'll stop yabbering on now. Thanks for pointing to the article Des

But the blog post does say they told people what they were doing and why. Rolled out in stages. Told them what was going to happen every step. Tried to make policies that treated the effected people fairly. I am also sure this is just how LL feels. Yes, they told us about the Adult content changes. Sort of. There are still people coming in and asking what this Adult Content thing is all about. And that is just those who are finding the forums. What classifies as adult anyway? When can I buy Zindra land? Why did I get an email about not being in compliance? What word am I not allowed to use in my mature parcel's announcement? Why are we going to a less efficient blog software for forums? Kat did her best to sever any lateral communications and in her defense it was to keep a handle on what was said because anything said by any Linden becomes official, but the resulting loss of two way dialog has never been recovered. They ask, we tell, they do as originally planned. That is the perceived outcome whether it is true or not.
"What do you want in communications?"
"A reliable way to IM in world from the web would be great."
"Here's a telephone so you can voice for a modest monthly fee. We are shelving the SLIM project."
"Can we get the forums updated?"
"The forums will be eliminated. You will be using a blog type question and answer format. This way you can rate posters and bump up your friends' scores. Form you guild now. It's discussion group PvP!"
"Can we get something done about rampant content theft?"
"Absolutely. We are working hard to make the environment more accessible for the corporate world."
"Cool, that's nice. how about those copybots?"
"Bots are not allowed. But do not AR them. we don't want to have to deal with them."
"Not bot's you deaf apes, copying. Stealing. What are you going to do about IP rights?"
"Oh, stealing is against the unenforceable TOS. If you see it, file a DMCA and fax all pertinent information in for each specific infraction."
"So any plans to do something to prevent this?"
"We are working on shadows. They are really cool. You’re gonna love it."

LOL!! Nice one Rhonda.

It's a great article and everyone who works in virtual worlds should read it.

That said, I bet that LL *is* listening - but not to residents like us. I think they are listening to three groups:

1. Corporations, schools, and other institutions whose SL project manager represents a good chunk of users, and expresses the institution's needs in a concise and corporate-friendly way.

2. Users with whom LL has a direct relationship, which may include perceived opinion leaders & major contributors to the economy. For example, LL recently held a meeting with some major landowners to discuss theming the mainland.

3. Marketing surveys of target groups from whom LL would like to recruit new users.

To be honest, the people reading this post are very difficult to listen to. We are a miscellaneous mass of long-time users with very diverse needs and strong opinions, and we don't speak with a unified voice. That was why I suggested forming the "Imagine" user group, which seemed to me something that could represent a big chunk of us.

.

I remember back in 2005 picking up the telephone and calling Linden Lab to complain that my land was 'broken' because I could not drop anymore of those prim boxes on it. Then Michael Linden would appear on my property in world and explain to me that I used up all of my prim space and he would show me how to remove the Linden Trees from the property so I could build more.

Fast forward to 2006 - The end of Develop Incentives when Robin Linden said 'Welfare' was over and then to 2007 with free accounts and an continued sharp decline in customer service.

2008- The end of Adfarming

2009- The end of camping

2009 - I complained about an issue, loudly, for two years and finally Blondin Linden (Community Manager) contacted me to discuss the issue. he gave up immediately (after trying to convince me to accept the change and then attempting to bribe me to accept it) - but at least some one-on-one acknowledgement by the company was attempted.

Perhaps Linden Lab will stay on the path and start valuing their non-corporate customer once again.

For those that say Linden Lab cannot deal with customer issues on a one-on-one basis - Then Linden Lab cannot survive another four years.

Is it really corporate policy that Linden Lab staff cannot speak to us in these forums?

If so, we may be seeing some of the symptoms of the community/corp communication issues outlined in the article mentioned.

That's what the article says. It's hard to listen to your customers. It's also vitally important.

Insightful article, and good comments. Two things jumping to my mind-

-the value of these forums to LL, considering the importance of keeping an ear on customer opinions. What a waste to them to bin RA when they have such a resource, and

-the value that adults put on adult-only space in a virtual world, (independant of sexual activity and so not picked up by IMVU's one simple question). I so hope LL is listening to this.

Not exactly. Some can do whatever they want, obviously.

As I understand it, they currently have a training class or something where anyone customer or press facing needs a bit of basic training before they can say stuff.

Which is a sensible policy, really. You don't want the guy in the mailroom making seemingly official pronouncements or "getting into it" with customers on forums.

The reasons that the corporate management does not listen to costumers is because the management assumes that it is just far smarter than the customers, and entitled to the customers' time and money.

That is why I don't think that, if Linden Lab's management were to read that article, it would cause a sudden epiphany. The author of that article was humble enough to learn from a mistake. To do that, the author had to understand that the customers were actually smart people who could do whatever they wanted with their time and money, and ultimately it was the company's job to make the customer happy, rather than the customers' job to be happy with whatever the company handed them.

The management of Linden Lab views its customer base as sheep or lemmings. As long as it holds that world view, nothing in that IMVU article is going to make any sense to the Linden Lab management.

I think it's more that, a couple years or so ago, they realized just how much we outnumber them. In-world Live Help got to be too much for them to manage (so I've heard, anyway), the Linden Answers forum here was getting lots of angry residents asking questions LL didn't want to answer. I'm sure their IM windows go nuts every time they log in and they probably get tons of notes and etc, etc, etc..

LL took this as a reason to pull back from the community rather than as a challenge to figure out new and clever ways to work the linden:resident ratio. Yes, there are more Lindens with office hours but those either tend to be very structured and difficult if you're just showing up with a couple questions and don't know the magic protocol to ask a question or they're a free-for-all where a few people dominate the Linden time with the same old topics they were talking about a year ago.

To be fair, I don't have a lot of ideas how they could make it better. Then again, the really good ones I've heard and supported were ignored by LL so I haven't really put that much thought into it.



Sheep!!

:0 a great read! many bits of it i had thought along the way, but never read another article articulating them or connecting them in a nice pretty row like that... many things to say for both sl and rl.

p.s. i would echo desmond that i took it more personally than expounding it instantly to the lab... though sure, it can apply lol ;0 and to many more rl examples...

Particularly interesting was the way they viewed their early adopters/content creators - as nuisances who should leave already. That insight answer a LOT of questions.

While I agree, having our own “voice” within SL would be wonderful. I think it would be impossible to do however. The problem I see with forming an "Imagine" group to represent a diverse group of SL users is in its management structuring. Corporations, schools, and other institutions have a board of directors who oversee appointing a President, who is paid to run the institution/business, who “hires” project managers and/or marketing directors to represent the company or institutions interests. All of these, from the board room execs down represent one common group with one common goal... the share holders or board of trusties, who’s only concern is to make and maximize profits, or in the case of non-profit organizations to simply grow. Therefore these entities have but one commonly shared goal. Any group formed to represent SL users would end up with dozens if not hundreds of diverse goals and needs. This would make appointing an effective spokes person very difficult if not impossible. Even within the SL business community there is a wide spectrum of “needs”. Some of us run a SL business as a hobby, some as a virtual challenge, some just to pay for their SL activities, some for a small part time income, others as a real business and some for multiple reasons. It would be like GM, Hershey and Bank America going together to hire a single PR or marketing director. While I’d love to see something like a “Imagine” group form, I’m very skeptical it would ever be effective. For this reason I don’t think us SL “users” will ever really have a voice in what LL does or wants to do.

Here ya go, starting at post #3:

/me nods and sighs...

I find this quite fascinating. The attitude of early adopters is very different (happy to admit I'm generalising) to the often more consumeristic and passive late adopters. Early adopters like to make decisions and take control. They like to contribute and create, as their skills lie in this area. I see this whenever I spend time with those in OSGrid (despite it being a few years old now),...and this is a very different society to today's SL (I wonder if it's the same as when SL was young).

I believe that early adopters are the ones who leave their personality stamp on a virtual place, and that then becomes diluted as the owners realise their need to pull things back to appeal to the safe masses. Thinking aloud here.

I understand the reasons why a company may think like this. It still can't 't feel very nice to get the equivalent of "Thanks for building the world, now don't let the door hit you on the way out."

I don't think the issue is Trolls, it's about management not listening if you read the article quoted.

I think he just words it badly, reading the article he calls Trolls, "defenders", in parts of the article, I think he's saying what he assumed to be a troll isn't really a troll when you start to scratch beneath the surface.

Pink posted on the Xstreet forums last weekend prior to their demise and she made a very careless comment, that was all. She seems to be a nice person with a lot of enthusiasm. The more someone talks the more their chances of making a careless comment rise so it was just one of those things.

Interesting article. I thought it all sounded eerily familiar.

Everyone yearns for security.
It's classic that someone new into a management position will surround themselves with people who "think their way". They will hire in from outside and groom suitable insiders.
People who don't give their enthusiastic support to the new regime get marginalised.
A bandwagon is put into motion and can't just be turned around.
Incidents that some might describe as failures are put down to normal parts of a transition. You haven't failed if you are still on the way to where you are going - sort of argument.

The safe predictable corporate and lowest common denominator market seems to be the target. It's going to take more than an article to halt the juggernaut.

True, in the case of the article it appears to be a couple of punctures that halted it, here in SL they still seem to be running full speed ahead.

And more importantly, the customers have shown they will stay and take the shit the company throws at them and clamor for more, no matter how bad it gets.