Tag: Second Life

Trends are interesting things to observe. Sometimes you can learn a lot from them – other times, you can end up looking a complete twit for ever getting involved.

I’m really not sure which way this will go, but I’ll mention it anyway, given I’ve already posted on the SL blogrum.

There has been a lot going on around the subject of SL and RL identities of late – almost all of it initiated by Linden Lab. Vis:

• Drawing ever closer to Facebook
• Wallace Linden’s utterly mishandled posting on the subject of aligning rl and online identities
• Running a Valentine’s day “scavenger hunt” in which the main prize can only be won by those prepared to “out” themselves on Facebook
• The arrival of Viewer 2.0 with the Profile section rearranged to place rl information right below SL information
• Running an advertising competition that encourages residents to reveal their rl selves in return for some unspecified prize…

And now, to add to the list, we get Lexie Linden initiating a conversation on residents meeting up in RL (which, at the end of the day, is the most intimate means of linking one’s rl and SL identities).

Leaving aside my astonishment at Lexie initiating a discussion, rather than stomping on one (oh, me bad!), as far as I’m aware, she’s not come anywhere near starting a discussion on anything up until now.

So I can’t help but feel that her choice of subject is not entirely…random, shall we say?

Given the trend demonstrated to date, I cannot help but put “ulterior” and “motive” in the margin alongside Lexie’s thread. After all, if people indicate that, under the right circumstances (such as at events like SLCC, etc.), they’d be prepared to reveal their rl identities, might this not be seen by some in LL as a sign that closer in-world linking of rl and SL selves would be acceptable…?

Or should I simply lay off the cheese late at night?

Linden Lab seem hell bent on making XStreet as merchant-unfriendly as possible.

First we had the Freebie and listing commission debacle. Yes, freebies can be a nuisance – but no more so that low-priced goods, and freebies all too frequently serve a constructive purpose. However, the issue here was not so much the road LL decided to take in order to “handle” freebies and “reduce clutter” on Xstreet, but in the fact that any attempts to discuss the matter was met with a flat-out “no” from the likes of Pink and Colossus Linden (both going so far as to warn people attending Commerce Office hours that attempts to raise the issue of listing fees, etc., could lead to people being ejected from said meetings…).

Then we started having issues around customer service – this is one among many complaints.

Most recently, we had the stunning situation where ripped content (animations) not only got to the number 1 sales ranking on XStreet – but LL allowed the goods to stay on sale for several days (including a weekend), despite protests.

None of the above are liable to inspire trust or confidence.

Now it seems as if one of the most useful tools at a merchant’s disposal has gone: the ability to send your own items as gifts.

Why was this useful? Simply because it presented a merchant with the ability to deal with customer issues quickly and easily when unable to get in-world to handle problems. Customer failed to receive an item purchased via an in-world vendor? Send it to them via XSL. Customer has problems with an item received? Send them a replacement via XSL….

And now the function is gone. What is more, it has gone without any warning or discussion.

Surely LL cannot be so desperate for income they begrudge merchants occasionally slipping an item out of XSL that avoids the commission it would otherwise have earned LL had it been purchased?

A jira has been started to get the function restored. Merchants and customers should vote for this. LL should consider it carefully and ensure the function is returned.

Either that, or face the fact that this move give us all yet another reason to simply drop XSL altogether in favour of Metaverse Exxhange, Apez, Slapt.Me and the rest.

William Linden posts today about Viewer 2.0 and the SLE product in what I can only assume is a piece intended as light relief. Our announcement last week of the Second Life Viewer 2 Beta marks a significant evolutionary step on many fronts he gushes in the opening sentence before going on to give us some real corkers.

Like many other technologies, the value of Second Life derived from within the organization increases with adoption, for many reasons: shared learning, reduced setup times, more productive time spent on the tasks at hand, resulting in more in-depth, creative and productive uses of the product.

No shit, Sherlock. One might also say that the value of a Nintendo Wii or an XBox 360 “increases with adoption, for many reasons: shared learn, reduced setup times…” and so on. However, that doesn’t mean either the Wii or the XBox 360 are going to be valid corporate tools. This goes for Second Life as well.

However, stating the bleedin’ obvious is still only the tip of the iceberg as William pulls up an impressive table of Things You Can Do With Second Life… document sharing! Whiteboard collaboration! *gasp* video sharing! Document collaboration! OMG!!: web conferencing!!!

Wow! Amazing! Brilliant! Fabulo….err, hang on a minute….aren’t these all things most self-respecting corporate entities can already do through that thing, oh what is it called? Oh, yes the, umm “corporate Intranet” via something called the “web browser”, as well as other tools they already have at their fingertips? And, umm… can’t they already do these these things without having to fork out $55K a pop to support up to 100 staff, all of whom will need to have their moderate business desktops replaced with pretty high-end graphics / gaming machines?

No….William must be pulling our collective leg. Kingdon et al at LL must be playing an early April fool on us.

I mean, it’s obvious they’re not serious, isn’t it? Just look at this from William: Further, because some of the most valuable media content is secure behind your firewall, SLE will be the go-to solution for easily sharing this secure data in private workspaces. This includes things like company Intranet pages, internal wikis, SharePoint pages, project planning output, and any number of common web-based workgroup mediums.

This really has to be a joke, doesn’t it?

I mean, no-one in their right mind would sit down and suggest to a corporate executive that they should encourage their staff to stop viewing the corporate Internet, internal wiki pages or SharePoint site directly on their desktop / laptop browser and should instead:

• Log into to some upmarket game-like thing
• Create something called a “prim”
• Play around it to size it etc.
• Then go to their web browser, pull up what they want to see and copy the URL before closing their browser
• Then paste said URL into the properties of this “prim” thing
• Then view the information they were seeking?

Surely William isn’t seriously suggesting companies throw out the means to let those engaged in meetings or collaborative efforts fart around in a game to shar what can be shared quickly and easily, desktop-to-desktop, meeting room to meeting room directly via a web browser…..?

No – it has to be one big joke, doesn’t it!

Doesn’t it……?

Sadly, no. And that’s where the comedy turns to tragedy.

From reading this about search, I can only assume LL have hired spinmeister Alastair Campbell to handle their PR.I’m really having trouble coming up with an adjective that expresses my reaction.

Talk about spin – I was doing about 2,000 rpm myself just reading it!

There are many things allegedly “wrong” with Viewer 2.0. If I’m brutally honest, many of them boil down to inertia – people don’t want to change. Well, tough on them. But…it has to be said, there are some glaring issues with Viewer 2.0 that really do need to be addressed. One of them is the Sidebar. Another is Search.

Let’s not fiddle fart here. Search has always ben an issue in Second Life – we all use it in different ways, and what is “good” or “popular” for one set of residents is going to be scorned by others. Ergo, getting a tool that can successfully mix the concepts of searching, filtering, calculating and displaying results in a manner that pleases everyone is going to be hard.

But that’s really no excuse for a) pumping out something that is almost entirely inappropriate for Second Life; and b) trying to pass it off as the proverbial best thing since sliced bread.

I’m very happy to announce that, as a core feature of the new Viewer 2 Beta, Second Life Search has been redesigned inside and out to make finding the people, places and content you’re looking for easier than ever before. Liana Linden gushes, before spelling out why the new engine is so wonderful, and then concluding. The bottom line is that the new Second Life Search benefits everyone within the Second Life economic ecosystem–most importantly business and Residents–as it plays a crucial role connecting inworld buyers and sellers.

Well great. Only one problem. Search isn’t necessarily “all about” the buying / selling of goods. And eve if it was, this new tool leaves much to be desired.Let’s look at just some of the issues:

• You cannot filter searches in terms of overall category. No matter what you’re looking for, whether you use the navigation bar shortcut or the main Search window, you have to enter your search keyword / phrase and hit return first. Only when you have a set of results can you then filter down.
  • So you cannot, for example, select PEOPLE and then search on an avatar’s full name or a first / last name. You have to run a default search of ALL categories first.
  • So cannot search for a specific place, as PLACES will not be available until after your initial search has been run.

• If you’re searching for an event, you’d best know where it is, rather than what it is, or you’re initially stuffed.
• Searches that originally took 3 or 4 clicks of the mouse now seem to take forever – both in terms of mouse clicks and (all too often) having to mentally filter results as well as scroll endlessly
• Land search is borked to the nth degree. Again, great if you know the name of a parcel / region, otherwise not so hot
• The window does not retain information from previous searches. Close it, and the results and keyword(s) / phrase entered are gone – not great if you want to use Search as a reference aid, but need it out of the way for extended periods (yes, you can minimise and retain information – but that’s at the expense of screen space)
• Too much space is wasted on irrelevant information, leading to the need to repeatedly click through pages of around 3 result each
• Sorting is hit-and-miss
• There is no convenience usage in the new interface. As I’ve previously noted, on of the beauties of the old Search was the ease with which you could view results: a nice two-pane window in which you’d get a list of results on the left, which you could then click on individual items, and display more information on them in the right pane. Simple, direct and easy. Now Search is frequently a matter of two PAINS:
  • A somewhat counter-intuitive interface window that wastes time and effort both in terms of usability and in the eay in which information is presented
  • The need to go to the Sidebar to get detailed information on a selected item appearing in Search – thus generating a further unwelcome intrusion into the sol-called “immersive experience” Second Life is allegedly supposed to be.

I could go on – but enough points are being made over at the discussion group. And as per usuall, seem to be getting little or nothing in the way of any response from Liana….or anyone else for that matter.

Issues with Serach are not new. It has been the subject of intense debate and upset for years. Yet with each iteration, it seems to get worse and worse when it comes to functionality, ease of use and relevance of results. Add to this the amount of negative feeback that was apparently received during the closed Alpha testing of Viewer 2.0 and the fact that  – by their own admission – most of Linden Lab’s own staff “hated” the new Viewer (but were, it seems, nevertheless forced to endure), I think I’ve come up with a new byline to replace the much-missed Your World, Your imagination. It’s this (with apologies to Paramount TV and the makers of “Frasier”): We’re not listening.

I’m not overly technical. I make no bones about that; but I do have two redeeming characteristics that help overcome this shortfall, however: generally, I’m a quick learner, and while the devil of th details in terms of coding, etc., may well elude me, I can quickly grasp concepts, and meanings; secondly, I’m ready to got out and read-up / find out about things that aren’t obvious to me, even after they’ve been patiently explained.

Which is why, amidst all the Linden spin and twirl, I’ve always appreciated posts from Frank (FJ Linden) Ambrose. Here is one of the few senior members of LL’s staff who is prepared to communicate openly and honestly with residents. His postings are refreshing because they are devoid of spin, and he tends not to simply cherry-pick the rosy replies residents post in response, but actually takes the time to tackle the harder questions and deal with concerns and fears head-on.

This is visibly demonstrated in his latest post on recent updates to in-world services. What is warming about FJ’s posts is the disarming and genuine honesty, We have tried (and failed) in previous attempts to upgrade our mysql version he openly admits, before going on to express both pleasure that the updates performed on Wednesday 6th Jan 2010 went smoothly, and regret at the fact that Residents were still inconvenienced in order for the update to be rolled out.

Personally, I see little cause for regret, Frank: you and your team worked hard to develop this much-needed update, you carefully planned and communicated it to all – and the resulting outage  / issues users experienced during the update process were, frankly (no pun intended) absolutely trivial.

Leave us not forget that a few short years ago, this kind of work was regularly shutting down the grid every Wednesday for anywhere from three to six hours at a time; in this respect, the technical bods at Linden Lab have performed a marvellous job, and if anything, they should feel a justified sense of satisfaction in the professional manner in which this update was handled, with residents being “inconvenienced” for around an hour.

Kudos all!

FJ’s post is not limited to what has happened, however. Rather than simply dwell on the past, or make (in contrast to others I’ve recently commented on) sweeping generalisations about “future directions”, he takes the time to spell out what he and his team will be looking at in the coming year to further enhance grid performance. Of course, some of the technology being looked at does raise concerns – as shown in the responses from residents on the subject of cloud computing and outsourcing. And again, FJ wins kudos for responding to these concerns, rather than (again as is the wont of some of his colleagues) to sweep past such questions and simply respond with touchy-feely la-la-ness at comments that are more gushing with praise towards LL or which focus on trivialities.

Indeed, his responses are considered and balanced. No promises are made (such as guaranteeing no outsourcing will take place), while every assurance is given (such as LL retaining as much control over data as possible). In this it is again evident that  – refreshingly – there are efforts being made in LL to improve the grid not just for a select few or “emerging market”, but for us all.

So thank you again, Frank, for taking the time and effort to make sure our virtual lives suffer minimal disruption during what are very necessary (and beneficial) changes o the grid infrastructure, and for advising us on how you see things developing and the options you and your colleagues are considering for further improvements over time.