Are Lindens Lazy with Last Names?

Alright, it used to be hard to get that perfect first and last name match, but now it's just downright impossible for new people to get any names without having to resort to using jibberish for a first name. For 6 months there have been no new names added or taken away from the last name list, what is this telling us?

It tells me that no one at LL feels like making new last names. As we know, no one has to do any work there they don't feel like doing. (The Tao of Linden.)

On the other hand, it could be they have some new idea. When they get new ideas, they tend to drop the old structure, until such time as one of them feels like doing the new idea.

As of today, I came up with a new theory about why the last names available are almost uniformly awful (to say nothing of the names of the sims). I think it's an indication of contempt for their customers.

I'm willing to entertain any other explanations, though.

coco

theyve probably hired some new age focus group to sit around sipping skinny lattes trying to think up politically correct surnames. one is researching a short-list of muslim surnames. he's worried that the shia/sunni ratio isnt politically correct. another one of them is googling surnames, weeding out any that might be 'offensive'. he spends a lot of time looking at pictures... and of course another one is busy developing a small list that may be of interest to the young urban african american (while pretending to be doing something else in fact).

and thats probably just one focus group in dozens. theres the verification group, the voice group, the windlight group, the community liaison focus group, the list goes on and on. just ask me about any of them i would love to crap on about that.

There is a shortage of new names because the producers of Family Guy took back their manatees.

Wait dont we have our our comical Linden........thats very simalar to family Guy? Or is it a she.......I confused and he might be too

A new round of last names is badly needed.

I am seeing names like, Bob7564, Its getting as bad as AOL.

Wasnt LL tring to avoid this in the past by rotating names?

Its a quick fix really, just run a new last name contest or start using some of the sim names, no one will ever notice...

I made a first name with one of the last names just fine, without it being gibberish. People should be more creative maybe, instead of "Bob8848575"


The thing is, I have noticed that a ton of names were there for a long time before I finally decided to join. The same ones, over and over. The other day I saw a Vavoom, and thought, "wow, that's a great name." I looked, there's like a handful of them total... I looked at the Writers. There's like a bajillion of us. =(

TBH the Tao of Linden sounds like the thing that has the greatest chance to cause SL to fail.

Czervik = 289

Lane = ummm ... yeah

Why don't you rotate the names from the past LL? There are some names with THREE people etc ...

My partner said that he was wondering if this wasn't a sign that the database is teetering dangerously; generally you don't want to add more to a wobbly stack.

nah, it's cause they're using a sim name generator...

zonkster.com/simnames.htm

I really don't see how people can blame the Lindens for bad names, when it is the users that choose to be dumb with their first names to begin with.

If "Bob" is taken, try a variation. If they are taken, try "Timmy". If you must have a variation of "Bob", try a different last name. I don't see how that is such a painful thing to do.

If someone picks Gene777, then I would assume that it matches their Yahoo account or something like that.

I have to agree with the idea of Politically Correct last name scheme, or maybe something that differs from something that is common RL. This is a new world, so maybe they figure new world last names.

As much as people complain about to much RL intrusion into SL, why do they have to have a RL name? I might need to go make me a new avie and name it "x19 Hax", just so people have an excuse to "blame the Lindens".

Maybe they jes ran out of ideas for last names?

Think they'd like some help?

Mari

Chances are that the name with very few is one of the names introduced when they were still rotating them regularly. I believe some of the earliest names were only in rotation for 50? different name choices- at which point they were retired. Since then people have quit, which limits it even more.

DeCuir is one of the recent names, there's oodles of us. Took me 2 days to find an acceptable first name.

LOL

One cannot help but wonder..why are the names limited in the first place? Is it the same reason they can't seem to unload the archaic limit on group memberships? Some sinister artificial limit in the software structure based on them never having anticipated the growth SL has experienced?

It seems to me that SL may need a massive overhaul. As indicated by a Linden in the wired article referenced in another thread, there are software limitations that are hamstringing growth. Lets stop adding new "gee-whiz" features like voice when the engine itself doesn't have the power to pull the vehicle anymore!

The system really needs to be reengineered to lose the need for ANY limitation on group memberships, or lists of last names, or limits on avatars within regions, or how many avatars you can see at one time. These limitations are based on ancient technology and design concepts. They all need to be corrected before SL grows any more.

Oh..and if an avatar hasn't logged in over 90 days....DUMP THEM!

Er Gene, easy for you to say. You were born in 2004, I was first born in May 2006, and I remember having a *choice* of good names back then. I couldn't believe names like Demi, Roger and Dudley Moore still hadn't gone. Just goes to show how relatively unknown SL was even in Q1 of 2006. They would be snapped up within minutes of surname rotation today.

Today however, it is a different story. Pretty much EVERY first name you can think of has gone. Bob and Timmy are both unavailable regardless of the surname you combine them with. This is what happens when millions of registrations occur over a six month period - and the surnames are not rotated. Your choice is limited enormously so digits become essential. We may find it difficult to relate to avatars with digits in their name, but how an earth are *they* expected to warm to their own avatars; to develop a sense of identity? I even wonder if this surname situation is affecting new user retention.

I created another alt today, and I'm frankly amazed that it took me over an hour cycling through Japanese names before I hit on one that hadn't been taken. (You can forget about English names...like, months ago.) I can't tell you how tempted I was to put a combination of numbers at the end of a regular name, because even five minutes trying to obtain a decent name is five minutes too long. I wonder how many abandon the registration process completely because of this obstacle?

Anyway, here is my alt. Or rather, because I'm an alt, he is really my alt's alt.

http://www.sluniverse.com/pics/pic.aspx?id=192844

The only Japanese sounding name I could register was Koukin Kamachi. 'Koukin' being taken from a main character in the Ikki Tousen series. (I can think of about sixty preferable Japanese names -- but every single one is taken, even with non-Japanese surnames. It's an incredible state of affairs and about bloody time Linden Lab sorted it out.)

You did good. "Capella DeCuir" is a great name!

Thats another problem, LLabs loves to add Japanese names/ or meaning. There was a time everyone i mean everyone was choosing japanese names. Rather se more russian, chinese, german, dutch etc..............

First, Krasner and a couple of other names that were on the list as recently as February are no longer on the list. So if names have been removed, are you sure that new ones aren't being added?

Second, there are plenty of baby name lists on the web. I've visited one of those sites, picked a few unusual names, and had no trouble finding available SL names using them.

Third, there's a much, much better alternative to adding digits, and that's adding middle names, using mixed case to make them easy to read. A quick example, which I just tried and is available (until someone grabs it, I don't want it) is JohnGregory Allen. It's much, much nicer than using numbers, more distinctive, easier to remember.

Heh, I remember a time last year when the surname pool came under criticism for being dominated by Japanese surnames. I guess we must blame the success of anime in the West.

On a sidenote, I noticed HiPiHi lets you choose any unregistered name you like provided it's no more than ten characters long. That will be a problem for English users eventually, but not for the Chinese because HiPiHi allows names written in Chinese Characters.

A Kana/Kanji based SL name would be very cool, but it would probably confuse half the userbase...particularly when all they see is ????????????????? on their screens. Uh, I digress too much.

Heh, that's something else I did during my hour trying to find a suitable name for the alt. I even tried a random name generator. No good. In the end, the only suitable name without digits was to be found in an obscure anime. :/

Sadly the kind of changes needed to support that is a full engine overhaul. As an reference- new game engine development time is often measured in years, not months. Even if they started on a new engine a year ago (when the system was looking wobbly but certainly not in dire need of an overhaul) it would still be months down the pipeline. Even after a brand new engine is finished, however, retrofitting the current world into it isn't as simple as snapping a new battery into the grid... reverse compatibility would have to be engineered into the system to start, which would mean a halt of virtually all new features for the development time.

It's pretty much unheard of for a full system overhaul while a game is still active. You can get hardware upgrades and sidegrades and juryrig the software to do things it was never designed to do- but you can't create scalability if the engine wasn't designed with it to begin with.

The typical solution is to sideline the new engine to a separate development team and when the new engine is finished, either abandon or shelve the original system with only critical updates and pull the majority of new development into the new system. See: Everquest and Everquest2. You can't export your EQ1 characters into EQ2- they're entirely different pieces of software.

Asking for a total overhaul of the system while keeping backwards compatibility simply won't happen at this point in software development and release. At best we'll get ThirdLife in a year or three and have to start all over again with new clean grids... can you imagine the nightmare involved?

the current solution of bug fixing, stabilizing as much as possible, and adding whatever new features the engine can support is as good as it gets. Windlight and Voice are the equivalent of plug ins. They change the software, yes, but they're additions, not processor to user load changes. It's like adding a new mouse or keyboard to the software (Or a better example might be a Wacom board for the designers out there)- it's not going to unbalance the system like changing out the motherboard or graphics card can do.

Things like a rehaul of the land system, the group system, etc are more like changing programs on the computer- if you get too advanced it's not only not going to work- but it might just fry the processor even more.

There are limits.

admittedly, I don't see how adding additional names unbalances anything... but who knows =/

It's a combination of several factors

*Laziness
*Contempt for customers
*Workload prioritization to other areas (notice that the new continents have protected areas; but no roads built on them...i.e. dirt roads)
*Restructuring the organization itself brings choas within Linden Labs, so no one has really thought to change the last names.
*HUGE influx of new residents needing help.

Fact is, LL can't see the trees because the forest is in the way.

Lost me on this one.........

When you write in Kana or Kanji, most people outside East Asia just see question marks because they don't have the East Asian character set installed.