Month: December 2008

Following-on from yesterday’s posting, Jack is out in blogland again, with an announcement which seems to have a lot of people going, “tilt?!”

Certainly, the announcement has lead to a lot of speculation – and even near-hysteria (“favouritism!” “bailout!”).

On the surface, it seems something of a reasonable deal: USS stood to be very badly mauled with the OpenSpace sim debacle, and thus Linden Lab have stepped in to help out and at the same time found a means of bolstering interest in their mainland Nautilus project, while allegedly giving the community as a whole something to enjoy (a new sailing sea – although contrary to the cries of the likes of LL and USS, I’d question just how popular sailing is overall & when compared to other sim-intensive activities like flying…).

But since when has Linden Lab been reasonable? What’s more – what is with the sudden willingness to hand over mainland controls to other groups, as Jack Linden has stated to Prokofy Neva will be the case here? Granted, he hints that the handover may be temporary (thus bringing it loosely in line with the festivals Prok mentions in her post) – but USS tend to have an active events calendar, which could call into question the “temporary” nature of the handover of powers.

Could it be that Linden Lab are themselves loking for ways to hand-off broad management of the mainland to users – thus relieving themselves of the mundane grunt work while charging users for the privilege?

Or could the reason run deeper? Again, while people quickly shout “favouritism” on reading Jack’s post, I tend to side with Prok and some others in the forum thread itself who pick up on Jack’s own reply to this cry, vis:

“First of all, this isn’t something exclusive and it will not be the only such project of its type. In deciding that we wanted to look for ways to involve estates to the benefit of both themselves and the Mainland, someone has to go first…..

“The USS are a particularly good fit because they are large, well established and have a strong theme that is PG in nature and appeals to a wide range of residents. They also happen to be extremely well organised.”

OK… the first part of this comment is reasonable enough inasmuch as someone has to go first in a project such as this….but the second part of this comment certainly hikes my eyebrows, as it implies that LL will only engage with groups that meet some pre-ordained criteria (hidden under the banner names “PG”, strong”, and “well established”).

However you look at it, this does smack of favouritism in-the-making: if your group doesn’t measure-up the the criteria, Linden Lab won’t engage with you, and thus you’ll be left wanting while others get leverage.

And this borders on this being another potential way of LL censoring SL content it would rather not have…since by Jack’s own admission, if you have any group or activity that is Mature rated (and remember, “Mature” doesn’t always mean sexual in nature – or even adult in extent) – then you are immediately precluded from the potential of a partnership.

The flipside to this is, quite simply that perhaps Linden Lab, in striking this deal, really is trying to make amends for earlier upsets. However, if this is the case, then Jack has once again taken the hand gun, cocked the hammer – and royally shot himself in the foot. If LL are indeed looking to leverage partnerships that will both benefit private estate owners and help develop / utilise the mainland – then why not be up-front on things from the start: state the intention, explain the process and aims, and invite submissions? All this announcement has (again) done is stir up a lot of resentment which no amount of spin from Jack is going to undo.

Certainly, given the controversy he has now successfully created, Jack would do well to take heed of Bryon Ruxton’s comment / warning. Although it has to be said, there is a certain genius at work here – at a stroke, Jack and his cohorts and split those protesting over the recent OpenSpace sim tier hikes right down the middle. Leave us not forget, USS were leading the charge on the matter….now they’ve been given a one-sided deal from LL that has left many of their erstwhile supporters deeply upset.

For my part, I’m curious to see what transpires in the future as a result of this apparent paradigm shift on the part of LL. If it benefits SL as a whole – and by that I mean all of us, whether or not we are “strong” or “well established” or “PG” – then it is all to the good.

However, the cynic in me is now waiting for not one, but two shoes to drop as a result of Jack’s announcements….

On Monday, Katt Linden issued the latest in what I refer to as KLiPPs (Katt Linden’s Pointless Posts). This one was about the much-vaunted “new” front end to the Second Life website that is being developed with Big Spaceship in order to “draw-in” potential new users.

However, rather than simply announce the fact that a demonstration version of the new site design is available for people to comment on, Katt made an announcement about the fact that some time next week, Linden Lab will be “testing” the new design, and that as such some of us might get to see it.

Thus, the tagged-on request for comments and feedback (coupled with a basic snapshot of the proposed layout), made at this point in time, is utterly pointless – how can one fairly judge what is (apparently) something of an interactive front end (Flash-driven) on the basis of a static snapshot or without actually seeing it in action for oneself?

One can’t.

So why not wait until the new site is ready for a proper look, and then make it available, together with a suitable announcement and request for comments on something that is tangible, rather than wasting our time with more hype?

Because let’s face it showing a static photo of what is supposedly a dynamic web front-end gives about as much idea of the appeal & actual usability of that front end as does sticking a penguin on a pair of rollerskates and using it as a demonstration of flying (it’s got wings, it moves – but it ain’t airbourne).

…Although in making the above comment, I do acknowledge the fact that I’m assuming the pictures within the new web front end are dynamic, rather than themselves being basic snapshots….

That said, there is one aspect of the new design that does deserve comment. That aspect is the use of Flash as the presentation medium. And the comment is, “Oh dear…”

Ostensibly, the idea behind the new design is to encourage potential new users into Second Life, and remove barriers to them getting in-world ASAP. This being the case, one cannot help but ask, “So what on Earth went wrong between coming up with this Big Idea and handing the assignment to Big Spaceship?”

Lets face it. Flash is not exactly the most popular browser plugin in the world. For a start, the fact that it is a plugin presupposes people have Flash installed on their computers (many don’t) or that they will be suddenly willing to install it in order to see the “exciting new medium” LL claims Second Life to be (they won’t).

And even where people do have it installed, coming across a website front-ended by Flash tends to provoke one of two reactions:

1. Either people get hacked off waiting for everything to load and initiate and go off elsewhere before the “exciting stuff” begins, or
2. People immediately hit the “Skip intro” link in the hope of getting to something more meaningful.

Thus, however you look at it – it is really hard to see how this new design is going to win over new users any more than the current (admittedly hideous) website – or even be seen, given point (2.) above…

Even Jamie Linden’s attempts to reassure people over the use of Flash stand as a damning indictment of the whole approach. “During the test,” he announces in the forum discussion on the subject, “for those that do not have Flash, we have a detection script which then serves those people a non-Flash homepage, similar to the homepage we have now.”

In other words Linden Lab is aware the Flash isn’t exactly highly regarded from a user perspective….

….so why even bother investing the time and effort into such a lame duck approach? Flash is not the sole media management technology that is out there. There are better ways of attracting new users without trying to be so – and pardon the unintentional pun – flashy; ways and technologies that are far less alienating than Flash. So why not cut to the quick and simply use those technologies instead, and avoid all the rigmrole of providing “alternative” sites and links and all the maintenance headaches that involves?

Could it be that at the end of the day the choice of Flash was not driven so much by the need for accessibility than it was by the fact that it appears to be the only medium Big Spaceship understands? If so, then a) Linden Lab has again managed to suck on alemon while trying for an orange, and b) the alternative meaning often applied when Big Spaceship’s initials are paired together may well be richly deserved….