What can we do to help? and a Modest Proposal

I'm soliciting constructive suggestions for how residents can give back to the SL community. Different residents will have different skills, so it would be nice to have a diverse set of "SL-philanthropic" contributions from which anyone could find something they could do that would enrich the experience for others. Demonstrating my usual flair for the obvious, some that come to mind:

- Fixing bugs or adding features in the viewer source,
- Participating in the Helper, Greeter, or Mentor programs,
- Giving away lots of good creative content in-world,
- Setting aside tier for some community service (specifics?), or
- Giving genuinely helpful answers to forum questions (like this one? )

For this purpose, I'll just stipulate that the buying and selling of original content or services doesn't qualify. Yes, it's more enriching than brokering land transactions, say, or any number of other in-world activities, but just for simplicity, let's say that if you receive L$s or goods or services as part of the activity, it doesn't qualify.

Now, the Modest Proposal: Henceforth, as a community, we hold that engaging in such activities is the only way for a resident to establish credibility to comment on any aspect of SL. (Sure, Anshe Chung can still get LL's attention by virtue of L$ volume... but that doesn't mean that, as a community, it has to get *our* attention. And, yeah, it's Most Unfortunate that your Inventory may be missing something you bought, but really, unless you're contributing more to the community than L$ and complaints, nobody but you really cares.)

So, whichever formulation is motivating: What else can one do to have legitimacy to b*tch? or, now equivalently, How else can one give back to the SL community?

Notwithstanding the fact that it is inappropriate to use the Resident Answers forum to "bitch", all one has to do in order to have a legitimate "bitch" is to pay for something and not receive it. Contributing to the community is honorable, but it does not serve to legitimize that which is already legitimate.

This is snobbery of the highest order and you know what, those who contribute L$ allow those who are creative to create more beautiful items.

To ignore the contribution of consumers is a huge mistake, without the consumers the economy here would collapse. The idea that consumers should have no voice is absurd to say the least.

Yes. By paying our Premiums, tier etc, we are entitled to the best service possible. Some of us are Community Oriented in RL. We don't come here to make a social statement. While SL wouldn't be what it is without creators and what not I don't believe any resident has a better status as a citizen, beyond how they conduct themselves in world vis a vis,courtesy and respect for others. I found your suggestions to be a bit elitist. Especially with Bullshit like this:

1) I answer any question here that I have the knowledge to do so.
2) I do give away many items in-world.
3) While not a "volunteer" for LL, I do help new Residents with a helpful newbie pack I created jsut for such.
4) I fill out Bug Reports and e-mails to LL constantly to help improve the system when I see, what appears to me to be, bugs/errors/explots.
5) I PAY Linden Lab to do their job.

What I do not do is spout off nonsense that all others need to do any, all, or more of those things to be heard by LL. The brand new Resident may very well have a valid complaint. New eyes see things not blinded by familiarity.

As stated in previous posts; Help SL and quit with elitist crap like this. RA may not be for "bitching" but it's not for ponticating either.

~Jessy

It's up to the Lindens to fix bugs, add features, etc. Residents can participate in Feature Proposal voting and the JIRA. How many residents are aware of the JIRA I wouldn't even speculate and even when a resident is aware or made aware it doesn't mean they'd feel an obligation to participate. It's an educational problem (making people aware of the JIRA).



Participating in the various Help programs is a matter of personal choice, not obligation. And people can't be expected to participate in the Help programs forever. Even if there's a perceived obligation plenty of residents already fulfilled it by volunteering. And there's no restriction on residents forming their own Help groups. It's a recruitment problem (finding people willing to volunteer).




Second Life residents already derive a number of benefits from the SL community. Many residents leave their homes open. Many residents distribute free objects and scripts. Many residents host educational events. Nearly all events are free. Nearly all groups are free. Both residents and LL provide free space for residents to gather, build, script, tinker, etc. Residents can derive help from within their own friends networks ("Does anyone know how to <blank>?". All of these things can be used by newer and older residents alike.

A specific example to your two points above would be a Freebie "shop." Items are given away gratis on a parcelholder's land. How "good" and "creative" any of it is subjective and the parcelholder isn't under an obligation to find the coolest thing in all the land for gifties. If all the world is a soup kitchen, does the soup have to be good? It's an educational problem (telling people about the cool new freebie).

I have a small amount of extra tier (256) that I have been looking for a community service to give to. If you know of one let me know.
You might want to start a SL-philanthropic group. I'll give you the 100L

The top post in this thread is a good example of one of the strangest things about the SL experience. And that is the notion, that "we are all in this together" in some sort of equal way, so that problems with the service are somehow our fault, and we should not
complain.

I feel that LL capitalizes on this in subtle way, encouraging us to identify as "residents' and downplay what we really are, which is "customers."

What do I contribute? how about $30.00 or so per month, is that not enough? Have I not earned my right to be here or is it only for the 'special" people?

It is great that there are such creative people here who contribute beauty/ingenuity to the world. One day after I've learned enough, I hope to find some way to do that as well. Until then, there seems to me to be nothing wrong with "helping" by supplying cold, hard cash (and I'm talking dollars not lindens, you know that $tuff that buy$ your food).

And yes, LL should expect complaints when stuff is going wrong. If my cable goes out, I complain , if I hire a gardener and there are still weeds everywhere, I complain, If LL upgrades and creates chaos with my inventory, why is that any different?

I, too, feel I contribute enough to complain when I feel it "necessary" (yeah, I know it's never REALLY necessary). Complaints, even petty complaints, are indications of where improvements can (and maybe should) be made. Anyone telling me that I should not complain and only be "constructive" by contributing even more for the betterment of the "community" is telling me that I should subscribe to a Utopian philosophy of how life is. Even in a perfect world such a "community" could never exist......real or virtual. All such talk is only making the talker feel good.......does nothing to help the community in any real way.

I feel the OP is pointing a finger at me and telling me that I don't contribute enough to complain..............so I should just shut up and do more.

I pay $90 USD a year
I make clothing, and textures of which I've not sold a single one......yet quite a few fellow residents have copies (strangers and friends alike). I give full permissions on them too............so some may in be someone's vendor or freebie box. It matters not to me.......I had my fun making them.
I offer help to many newbies when I run up on them.....even the obnoxious ones.
I give landmarks to places like the Ivory Towers of Prims to people who show interest in building...........if I'm building on my land I even show a few tricks I've learned if they are interested.
I've taken the hint and removed my ban lines on my land in an effort to show a little friendlier attitude to newbies.
I offer help here in the forums when I feel I can help.
AND, I bitch like hell when I see stuff that needs bitching about.......like lost inventory items, broken teleports, searches, and friends lists. I've "earned" my right to do that. And I don't volunteer.

this is a stupid thread.

I have the THiNC publisher and would offer that and myself to put together some helpful guides that newbies can 'take' at designated points.

I often contribute to new residents monetarily.

And I hang out at the Help Island station and the Library to answer questions.

I know there are those that complain about the service they receive, the problems with lag, missing inventory and such...but we are all facing the same issues...perhaps a little help from others would make the rest of the problems seem smaller...

Ehm... excuse me, but do you make the same proposal to all customers of your phone company, your electric power company, your hairdresser and the garbage collectors?Should the whole community of customers get together and help them too, as well as helping out each other, before they have the right to complain about a lousy service?

Sorry, but that's ridiculous. A service company gets paid for their service as well as for dealing with customer complaints. LL already did the right thing by restricting customer service options to paying customers only. Now they only need to greatly improve this service.

On the off-=chance that this isn't an elaborate troll....

1) I pay for a service. I am a customer. If my electricity conmpany fails to deliver electricity, I complain to them. I don't go down to the generators and try to fix them. Likewise for SL.

2) I tried, I honestly did. LL never replied to my application, or even acknowledged they existed.

3) Giving away content for free would be rather stupid of me, considering I make my main income from selling such content.

4) I do. Some of the land of mine which is used in a community project is due to be profiled in a major international magazine in the near future.

5) hth

Well, this got off to a somewhat rockier start than I might have hoped (about which, more below).

There were some very good suggestions for additional ways to contribute. I really appreciate the attention of the respondents, whose ideas have inspired me to do some things I hadn't thought of before.

I'll attempt to enumerate, but please repeat anything I missed or misunderstood:

- Informal help to other, often newer residents, including answering questions at Help Island and the Library, monetary assistance, giving building and scripting tips, "open door" builds, etc. (thanks to several respondents) (Though not an official Helper, I tried to lend a hand at Help Island while they were overwhelmed by the recent password-reset mess, and can say it's a really interesting experience seeing SL "fresh again" through brand new avatar eyes.)

- Structured assistance specifically targeted to new residents, including a "newbie pack" (thanks Jessica) and offer of THiNC publisher for "newbie handbooks" (thanks Amalia). I'll contact some Helpers and solicit suggestions for how to make these available where most likely to be useful.

- Generating publicity for SL with community projects that get prominent RL notice (thanks Warda).

- Filing bug reports on jira.secondlife.com. (thanks again, Jessica) This is critical for improving the quality of resident experience, and the more complete the description--especially details of how to reproduce it--the easier it will be to fix. (I'd add that noting links between related bugs that you find filed separately in the jira might help get them resolved quicker.)

- Acknowledging when LL improves things for us (thanks Aliester).

- Starting an "SL-philanthropic" group to promote and exchange information about ways to contribute. (thanks Destiny) I'm having a little difficulty creating this group at the moment, but I'll follow up with details on this thread when I get it working. (Note: It will be an information clearinghouse for contributors and community projects, but won't take any donations itself.)

Finally, about the controversy over the "Modest Proposal" side of the thread: This isn't the first time I've gotten in trouble with an (apparently) obscure literary reference. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_modest_proposal for some background. In a way, I suppose, this is a kind of "trolling" as Warda suspected, in that I was trying to be controversial enough to get this posting some attention. But as it turned out, the Swift allusion didn't succeed in flagging the semi-ironic intent of the "earning a right to b*tch" idea--which I'd (somehow) expected to catch people's attention just enough to respond to the plea for suggestions.

(Just in passing, though, and I mean this to be helpful: some respondents may want to consult other threads and non-LL blogs that analyze LL's long-term business model for reasons why revenue sources like land tier and premium membership may not have the expected leverage in seeking improved service. Compromises to asset integrity--lost inventory items--is, however, a bit like eating Linden children.)

Still looking for more suggestions...

Actually, its a matter of Linden Labs gaining the trust of people to make JIRA worthwhile. Given my experiences, I haven't put forth into it, due to LL's lack of hearing.

http://spotlight.macfound.org/main/entry/invitation_virtual_world_event_philanthropy/

Save the date (22 June, 9am PST) for an historic conversation on the role of philanthropy in virtual worlds featuring MacArthur Foundation President Jonathan Fanton and Second Life CEO Philip Rosedale

Great link--looking forward to it! Thanks, Destiny.

Incidentally, as promised a while back, I created a Group, "Second Community" with the charter to act as a clearinghouse for information about opportunities to benefit the in-world community. Those soliciting help for community projects and those seeking ways to contribute are cordially invited to join and share.

All of those things you mentioned are very mature technologies... the ones that even are technologies. SL is an innovation, something that didn't exist in any form just a few years ago. On top of it, delivering electricity or telephone connections is simple compared to the complexity of SL.

I don't want to come off as a defender of LL because I completely agree that they do need to communicate better, provide better customer service, and fix some longstanding bugs that never seem to go away. But I also think it's really unrealistic to expect something this novel and ambitious to work as reliably as delivering electrons to your house through wires.

As complex as it is, SL works pretty well most of the time, and it has improved noticeably in the few months I've been here. We're early adopters. It's not always going to be flawless, and sometimes it gets really bad. But it's not a simple thing nor a mature technology, and it's come a long way in a short time.