Tag: SL Mobile

January 2025 SL Mobile UG meeting summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
Campwich Forest grounds: location for the Monthly Mobile User Group (MMUG)
The following notes were taken from the Thursday, January 30th 2025 Monthly Mobile User Group (MMUG) meeting.

These notes should not be taken as a full transcript of the meeting, which was largely held in Voice, but rather a summary of the key topics discussed. For this initial meeting, video recording was not permitted, we hope that changes with future meetings.
Table of Contents

Meeting Purpose

  • The Monthly Mobile User Group provides a platform to share insights on recent mobile updates and upcoming features, and to receive feedback directly from users.
  • These meetings are conducted (as a rule):
    • The last Thursday of every month at 12:00 noon SLT.
    • In Voice and text.
    • At Campwich Forest.
  • Meetings are open to anyone with a concern / interest in the above topics, and form one of a series of regular / semi-regular User Group meetings conducted by Linden Lab.
  • Dates and times of all current meetings can be found on the Second Life Public Calendar, and descriptions of meetings are defined on the SL wiki.

Re-Cap on Recent Releases

  • Version: 2025.01.538 (Android) / 0.1.530 (iOS)
  • Push notifications for group notices.
  • Mobile chat history.
  • Avatar Improvements.
  • Streaks rewards testing (see here for more).

Upcoming Updates and Roadmap

A look at upcoming features for SL Mobile based on information supplied to bloggers – including myself – at the end of 2024, and referencing my blog post on that meeting – see: Second Life Blogger Town Hall, December 2024: Mobile, marketing and more:

  • Ability to create accounts via Mobile, including creating an initial avatar and logging in using the existing new joiner workflow.
SL Mobile – the ability to create a Second Life account from within the app
  • Addition of an Address Bar to the app,  making it possible to:
    •  Search landmarks /create landmarks.
    • Share SLurls with people on other apps (Discord, Reddit, WhatsApp, etc.) via the native share cards found in Android and iOS.
    • Allow maps.secondlife.com work on the Mobile App.
Coming soon – the SL Mobile: Address Bar
  • The new Lobby feature, intended to enable communications, allow users to see who is on-line and provide general information whilst the app continues to load things like the 3D world view in the background.
    • This is also seen as a means for those on lower / mid-tier mobile devices to make use of the App as a communications tool.
Coming soon: the SL Mobile: Lobby
  • Other work in progress includes:
    • Providing quicker access to chat when using the app.
    • Providing the means to indicate which Group notifications  you wish to see pushed to your mobile device.
    • Improving in-world interactions within the app – making it easier to identify objects with which an avatar can interact, and know that something is happening when long-pressing an interactive object.
      • The identification will initially likely be the display of a timer under the finger when placed on an interactive object – when the timer expires (approx. 1 second), the interaction (e.g. a dialogue box) will be initiated.
      • Once available, this will be iterated over time to include selections form things like list views, where appropriate, limiting selection by distance, etc.

Roadmap Approach

  • Grumpity Linden reiterated the approach to Mobile development is focused on batching together requests and feedback on what users would like to see (allowing for us all having different expectation / needs / wants), to build end-to-end experiences covering a specific aspect (“journey”) in using the app.
  • To help with this, Grumpity also indicated that feedback (preferably through the Mobile app using the Feedback option in the menu) is greatly appreciated and does go into thinking about the roadmap and feature set for SL Mobile.

Avatar Rendering

  • As there are numerous differences between avatar rendering / operation in Second Life and Unity (e.g. in SL the Z axis references vertical movement; in Unity it references horizontal back / forth movement; each system handles rigged meshes differently, etc.), the entire rendering system for SL Mobile has had to be built for the ground-up over a period of over a year.
  • While much progress has been made, the team acknowledge avatar rendering within Mobile is not as yet on a par with avatar rendering in the viewer, therefore more work is to be done in this area.
  • However, because the SL avatar system is so open, there are still numerous specific issues where avatars may not render correctly in SL Mobile for assorted reasons (such the the way an attachment has been made, how it attaches to the the avatar, etc).
    • These issues require fixing on a case-by-case basis (and the team already have a library of 50 such “avatar classes”), and each one must undergone extensive regression testing to make sure any custom fix does not break avatar rendering elsewhere.
    • This is a current focus of work, and users noting persistent rendering issues as a result of clothing / attachments are asked to report it via the Mobile app’s feedback option, including information on the attachment / item which seems to cause the problem they are seeing, and where a copy of it might be obtained.
  • Once the focus can turn from the above work, there are plans to further improve avatar rendering performance, making it more efficient – and thereby improve app performance as a whole.
  • There are some tonal differences in how avatars appear SL Mobile (e.g. skin tone). This is because SL and Unity use different approaches to rendering ambient light. Again, the hope is that in time, lighting in the Mobile app can be made more “viewer-like” to help reduce such issues, but, this work will take time to develop and deploy.

Avatar Transparency Issues

  • During the run-up to the initial release of the Mobile app there was concern as to whether or not the app would get through the vetting process and onto the major app stores, particularly in terms of the risk of avatars appearing nude during rendering.
  • The transparent avatar approach was specifically to solve this risk; keeping the avatar transparent until such time as it has fully loaded and be preventing it from rendering properly should an attachment fail to apply as expected.
  • Unfortunately, the system is not fool proof, and false positives can be received which result in an avatar becoming “stuck” in the transparent mode.
  • There is thought being given to help overcome this (e.g. by forcing the avatar transparency mode to time-out after a set period to allow the avatar to complete loading), but this has yet to be finalised.
  • Those who do have repeated issues with being stuck in transparent mode, even after an outfit change (e.g. via the Desktop viewer) should file a feedback report, and if possible indicate the item they think might be causing the problem.

Memory Use (and PBR Rendering)

  • Another key difference between Mobile and the viewer is (obviously) available system and video memory.
  • Computers running the desktop viewer generally have at least 4Gb of memory to play with, with those with dedicated GPU cards also have dedicated VRAM.
  • Mobile has around 500MB-1Gb to play with. This necessarily limits Mobile in some ways (e.g. dropping texture resolutions as limits are more easily hit, etc.). However, there is work being put into this in the hope of again making Mobile more efficient in its use of memory.
  • In the meantime, the fact that memory is limited is one of the primary reasons why, as yet, there has been no attempt to implement PBR rendering into the Mobile app, and it significantly ups memory use.
  • The memory limit is also the reason why the number of avatars SL Mobile can render is set so low: avatars have a high rendering / memory cost, and can push the app to its limits, stopping other things from rendering – including leaving avatars transparent.

In Brief

  • A run-down of the top requests for Mobile (and the official viewer in some cases).
    • HUDs: something the Lab would like to implement for Mobile, but the volume and complexity of HUDs in use, the screen space they require, etc., does make coming up with a suitable means of handling them difficult.
      • The likely approach to this will again be iterative: initially offering support for very basic HUDs, and then working up from there.
      • However, team resources are such that focusing on this as a multi-month project when there are other areas of Mobile to be enhanced and features possibly more easily implemented, means it is somewhat lower on the list.
    • Inventory:
      • Another intensive task.
      • A preview of the work currently being done is in the Mobile app – the Select Outfit option, which is seen as a first step towards inventory support in Mobile.
      • Exactly what will follow this as it is implemented, is still subject to a final decision.
  • Mobile is generating a lot of new user traffic into SL, although precise metrics were not available at the meeting.

Date of Next Meeting

Looking at Streaks reward testing on the SL Mobile app

Posted on by Inara Pey
Streak rewards are available to some users of the SL Mobile app as an experiment

The most recent update to SL Mobile – version 2025.01.538 Android) / 0.1.530 (iOS), dated January 14th, 2025 – introduced an experimental rewards scheme for some of those those using the app to log-in to Second Life, in order to encourage daily engagement through the app.

Encouragement of this kind is referred to as “streaks”, and can be used as a form of incentive to encourage or maintain specific routines or achieve daily goals through game mechanics, or some form of reward in return for engagement. Snapchat for example offers “collectible” emojis to users who exchange Snaps through the app with one another on a daily basis; meanwhile Roblox includes the ability for users to build their own streaks rewards systems into their games. With SL Mobile, the rewards take the form of modest (and incremental) offerings of Linden dollars.

The idea behind the experiment with SL Mobile is to see how rewards might influence people’s use of the Mobile app – particularly those referred to as “lapsed” Second Life users; those who have walked away from the platform and who have, according to Brad Oberwager, cited a lack of Mobile access as being one of the contributing factors for them doing so. This aim was also reiterated by Bridie Linden, the Project Manager for SL Mobile during the inaugural Monthly Mobile User Group meeting.

Some of you may have noticed we are doing an experiment that is trying to encourage follows to come back to Second Life and increase their engagement. So [it is] a log-in rewards offering. Not everyone will see the same thing, because we’re trying different variations in incentives.

Bridie Linden, SL Mobile Project Manager, January 30th, 2025

As it is currently an experiment and subject to A/B testing related to the general use of SL Mobile, not all users downloading the app or currently using it will be able to engage with the streaks rewards, as Grumpity Linden also explained during the same meeting:

Currently, log-in rewards are only available to subscribers, but not all who are subscribers will have the same experience; so I’m not going to say you should subscribe if you want to get log-in rewards in Linden dollars, because that’s not always going to be the case. But if you’re already a subscriber, you should check-out Mobile, and come back every day and see whether, maybe [you have the option]– because we’re going to continue tweaking this programme. Obviously, we want people to be happy, and we want this to be successful.

– Grumpity Linden, January 30th, 2025

To find out if you are eligible to join (and have not already done so – I am intentionally late in reporting on this scheme as I’ve been poking at it for the last 8 days), proceed as follows:

  • Start SL Mobile on your device and log-in.
  • Click the Menu button (top left, three horizontal bars) to open the menu.
  • If you are eligible to join the experiment, you will have a Streaks button displayed in your menu Highlighted below, left).
  • Tap the Streaks button to opt-in to the scheme and start the clock counting down to when you can claim your first rewards (which appears to be set to L$15 for everyone).
Those who are included in the initial testing can opt-in to the Streaks rewards by going to SL Mobile’s menu and tapping the Streaks icon (if available), to opt-in to the the rewards
  • Note the two sliders t the bottom of the Streaks screen allowing you toggle daily streak messages as soon as you log-in to the app off/ on, and to opt out / in to Streaks, both of which are enabled (“on” and opted-in) by default.

Once you have joined Streaks, rewards can be claimed daily, starting with the initial L$15. In addition, please note:

  • The amount of the reward offered each day increments (e.g. L$15 on “day 1”; L$20 on “day 2”).
  • The amount by which the daily rewards increments also increases the longer a streak continues (e.g. rising from a L$5  increment per day to (first) L$10 increments per day).
  • Streaks appear to last for 7 consecutive days before the reward amount automatically resets to L$15 (or you miss a daily log-in), and you start over again.

To claim a daily reward:

  • Log-in to the SL Mobile app. Your Streaks status should be automatically displayed unless you have turned off the daily login message, in which case, open the app’s menu and tap the Streaks button.
  • The display should tell you the amount available to claim, and the incremented amount that will be available for you to claim in 24-hours’ time (below left).
  • Tap the Claim button to claim the available amount and have it added to your SL amount L$ balance, and update your Streaks status (below centre).
Claiming daily Streaks is required to transfer them to your account L$ balance (left and centre). Streaks appear to rest to the baseline L$15 after around 7 days
  • Per the notes above,  Streaks rewards appear to increment of a 7-day period, and then reset to the initial L$15 (see the image above right) and build up again. However, whether this is an infinite cycle or also limited; I have no idea.

As a means of encouraging users (current and “lapsed” to use SL Mobile, this is an interesting approach; I’d been particularly interested in how much traction it gets amount its intended primary audience  – “lapsed” users – over time, and in how well it might act as incentive as new users are able to sign-up to Second Life through the app. However, we’ll hear more on both in due course.

Lab adds SL Mobile User Group to in-world meetings

Posted on by Inara Pey
Campwich Forest grounds: location for the Monthly Mobile User Group (MMUG)

In response to various requests, Linden Lab has announced that a new in-world user group meeting is to launch at the end of January 2025.

The announcement of the Mobile Monthly User Group (MMUG) was made (oddly) via a Feedback portal post by Bridie Linden (have Linden Lab completely given up using their own blogs to make announcement?), who noted:

We will be using WebRTC Voice and text to share updates and listen to feedback. Use the Second Life desktop viewer or Second Life Mobile to join the conversation. We look forward to seeing you there!

– Bridie Linden

The meetings will take place as follows:

  • Last Thursday every month, commencing Thursday, January 30th, 2025.
  • Time: 12:00 noon SLT.
  • Location: Campwich Forest.

The new meeting brings the current total of Second Life active user group meetings to seven (with the Governance user group currently on hiatus). The other active meetings are:

  • The Simulator User Group:
    • Purpose: to discuss simulator issues and technology.
    • Frequency and time: weekly, every Tuesday, 12:00 noon SLT
    • Location: Simon Linden’s place, Denby.
    • Format: text (local chat)
  • Sill Gaming:
    • Purpose: to discuss anything pertaining to the Skill Gaming Programme. How to be part of the SLSG Programme, questions about processes, and any known issues or concerns.
    • Frequency and time: generally, the 2nd Tuesday of the month, 11:00 SLT.
    • Location: Gaming Island.
    • Format: text / Voice.
  • Content Creation User Group:
    • Purpose: to discuss of SL content creation.
    • Frequency and time: generally, alternate Thursdays, 13:00 SLT.
    • Location: Hippotropolis Camp Site.
    • Format: Text / Voice.
  • Open Source Development:
    • Purpose: to discuss SL development, including open source contributions.
    • Frequency and time:  every 4th Wednesday, 07:00 SLT.
    • Location: Hippotropolis Camp Site.
    • Format: text.
  • Land and Support:
    • Purpose: discussion of topics related to land and Mainland issues.
    • Frequency and time: every 4th Wednesday, 12:00 noon SLT.
    • Location: Linden Estate Services.
    • Format: text / Voice
  • Web User Group:
    • Purpose: discussion of Web properties such as Marketplace, Profiles, Place Pages, Search, etc.
    • Frequency and time: generally every first Wednesday of the month, 14:00 SLT.
    • Location: Alexa Linden’s Barn.
    • Format: text / Voice.

To keep abreast of all meeting, please refer to the SL public calendar:

 

As a reminder, I attempt to provide summaries of as many meetings as I can attend, and Pantera Północy provide videos of the meeting she attends on her You Tube channel.

 

Second Life Blogger Town Hall, December 2024: Mobile, marketing and more

Posted on by Inara Pey
Via Linden Lab

On Friday 6th, December, 2024, Linden Lab hosted the second of its Zoom-base “Blogger Town Hall” calls with invited bloggers to discuss Second Life in a session. The topics discussed were wide-ranging, covering Mobile, marketing, the desktop viewer, support and other issues.

Participating directly in the meeting from Linden Lab were: Executive Chairman, Brad Oberwager, CTO Philip Rosedale; VP of Product and Engineering Grumpity Linden, Pluto Linden (Mobile UX), with Brett Linden hosting the event.
Table of Contents

The following is intended to be a summary of core topics, which I hope people will find of interest / benefit, with a focus on:

  • Why these sessions are being held.
  • SL Mobile update and future plans.
  • Marketing Second Life and top-level goals for the platform.
  • The desktop viewer and matters of accessibility and performance.
  • Notes on SL support.

The following is a summary of the key topics discussed that are likely to be of interest to Second Life users.

On Why These Zoom Sessions are Being Held

After the first Zoom session (see: Second Life Mobile: free to all users & Lab execs discuss the product and goals). Some consternation was expressed by users on Social Media as to why the meeting was held and why people were / were not included, etc.

As reiterated in this meeting, the Lab is experimenting with routes of engagement with the broad user base of Second Life – many of whom may not read the official blog posts on secondlife.com, but who may follow one or more bloggers. Further, these bloggers know how to communicate with their audience / have come to enjoy an audience because of they was they blog – written or video, etc., and so they offer a far-reaching channel of communications. Most particularly, the zoom meetings:

  • They allow for face-to-face interactions between users and those at the Lab, allowing the latter to be seen as they are.
  • The format allows LL to easily bring together different groups of bloggers relatively easily according to the core subjects the Lab would like to discuss and take feedback on.

Given this, these meetings are not replacing other forms of meeting / channels of communication – the Lab is experimenting with multiple ideas for improving their overall communications with users – and leveraging existing communicators / bloggers within the broader SL community is just one aspect of this work.

On The SL Mobile Roadmap

SL Mobile Credit: Linden Lab

Pluto Linden provided a presentation to highlight some of the upcoming features and capabilities that will be coming to SL Mobile in the coming months (approximately December 2024 through to Quarter 2, 2025), although as with everything, time frames for precise delivery on the following is subject to confirmation / change.

In doing so, Pluto emphasised the fact that all that has happened with the SL mobile product is foundational; “and now, a lot of the really exciting stuff is to come, and on the horizon for 2025”.

The presentation itself highlighted the following upcoming new features and capabilities:

2024 Plans

  • Ability to create accounts via Mobile, including creating an initial avatar and logging in using the existing new joiner workflow – also see below for more on this.
  • Extending the work on push notifications to include Group notices, including the ability to specify which of your Group from which you wish to receive notifications .
  • Persistent chat / IM conversations between log-ins.

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SL Mobile plans for late 2024

Quarter 1, 2025

  • Implement an Address Bar, making it possible to:
    •  Search landmarks /create landmarks.
    • Share SLurls with people on other apps (Discord, Reddit, WhatsApp, etc.) via the native share cards found in Android and iOS.
    • Allow maps.secondlife.com work on the Mobile App.
  • Shipping the first version of a new feature called Lobby, intended to:
    • Reduce the time between launching the App and in-world interactions.
    • Provide information and a focus on communication within the App, allowing the user to see and respond to incoming messages; see who among their friends is on-line,  even as the App is loading the world, .
    • Provide an ability for those on lower / mid-tier mobile devices to make use of the App as a communications tool.

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SL Mobile plans for Q1 2025

Quarter 2, 2025

  • Better and faster access to chat, avoiding multiple taps on the screen.
  • Better selection of, and interaction with, in-world objects.
  • Laying the groundwork for item-level avatar editing, which is seen as a springboard to offering other / further ways of interacting with Inventory, including the potential of eventually making Marketplace purchases through the App and being able to unpack and use them.
SL Mobile updates planned for Q2 2025

Mobile App – Audience and On-Boarding

As noted in Second Life Mobile: free to all users & Lab execs discuss the product and goals, SL Mobile is being broadly developed at the moment with two primary audiences in mind: existing users, as a means for them to enhance their SL experience through being able to engage with the platform whilst away from their desktop viewer access; and “Lapsed” users who have left SL, and who have stated a reason for them doing so is because SL doesn’t address their preference for using mobile to access the things they want to do.

This was reiterated by Brad Oberwager when discussing the fact that SL Mobile will have the ability to create new SL accounts in the very near future.

We built the Mobile App for current residents with the hope it brings lapsed residents back. But because we’re not putting any marketing dollars behind getting people into [Second Life] through the Mobile App, the join flow is really going to be getting an alt put together [so] while you can do all sorts of things through the join flow, this is really designed for current users. 
We wanted to put the full experience on the Mobile App, because that would cool if VentureBeat was going to write something, and they want to come through, it would be cool to have that happen; but that’s not what we’re marketing towards. 

-Brad Oberwager, December 6th, 2024

Measuring SL Mobile’s Success

In terms of measuring the overall success of SL mobile, the Lab is not focused on technical elements (features, crash rates, bug fixes etc.). The key performance indicators (KPIs) for measuring the App’s success are focused on usage, for example:

  • How many times a month is the App being used overall / how many times a month is an individual using the App.
  • How many times a day is the App being used overall / how many times a day does an individual log-in to SL using the App.
  • How long does an individual spend in-world when logged-in via the App.

How many people are downloading the App is considered a separate measure, as it both leads to the above three as meaningful measures, and is more a “ego statistic”.

On Marketing Second Life and Top-Level Goals for the Platform

What our goal is as a company … as we start to gear-up marketing dollars and things like that, is to  do two things. One is to bring folks back who have recently been engaged as residents [and] who have now stopped that engagement for whatever reason, to bring those folks back in to enrich the community; and to do outreach to bring in new residents.  New residents that get excited about living in Second Life [and] they spend a lot of money because they’ve got to dress their avatars and get their houses and things like that.
So everything that we’re doing now is designed for those two things.  So that means making Second Life easier – high priority; giving a better experience for current residents – high priority, because if you can satisfy that, then you can have those current residents bring-in lapsed residents. So everything that we’re thinking of goes in that lens … We’re spending our money towards the desktop, getting ne folks in through that channel so that they can spend more money on our creators, so our creators are reinvigorated and the community continues to be invigorated.

– Brad Oberwager, December 6th, 2024

He went on to confirm that with all the work that has thus far gone into Second Life and the Lab over the last few years, including the recent restructuring is to pave the way towards growing the platform and in Marketing it more and more clearly.

Everything we’re making [in SL}, we’re putting it back in. What I am going to do, is I’m gong to start to change where I’m putting that money. And I’m going to start putting that money into marketing dollars because I want to bring folks into the world. … I think that our product is relevant; I don’t think it is relevant for everybody … but I think there’s an imperative that [Second Life] continues and it’s extremely valuable for folks out there to learn about and come in. That costs money.

– Brad Oberwager, December 6th, 2024

This work as actually starting now, with money “dribbling out” with a focus on SL on the desktop and in bring people back to the platform, on getting existing users to log-in more, and on bringing-in the people who would likely find Second Life a great place in which to spend time. Some of this will be experimental, with the Lab continuing to analyse what works and what doesn’t over the next few months, and the marketing work will, interestingly, be synced with new product releases.

On SL Desktop’s Accessibility and Future

The focus with desktop viewer development over the last several months has been on making the platform more accessible to lower-specification computers (as reported in the likes of my CCUG meeting summaries). This work has most notably included significant performance improvement work on the viewer, and the purchasing of a lot of older hardware / graphics cards on which Second Life ca be tested and better determinations made as to how best to handle performance shortfalls / bottlenecks / enable SL to perform reasonably well on such hardware (affectionately referred toas the Potato Farm at LL).

We did identify various pain points for people on lower-end machines, and there’s been a lot of work our team has been doing to address them. They’re working quickly and they’re working together with Firestorm so that those changes [many in the ExtraFPS viewer, which at the time of writing was in Release Candidate status and close to being promoted to release status] are rolled out to everyone as quickly as possible once they’re ready.
There’s going to be changes to viewer settings that will improve performance and some controls people are able to have over  choices that they make in terms of how good things look and how fast they run. And we’re also looking to put together some recommendations for [hardware] configurations where we know Second Life will run really well at different price-points.

– VP of Engineering and Product, Grumpity Linden

The overall goal of this work is “to meet you where you are, on the hardware you are [on], and we want you to have the best possible experience in Second Life.

In addition, Philip Rosedale noted that LL have a lot of “different tools in the hanger” which can help further improve the viewer when running on older hardware, including the Unity-based rendering engine developed for Mobile.

It is, as you know, not exactly the same by any stretch as other engines that are out there, but we have it as a tool. How we use it to, say, improve the desktop experience, we’re not sure yet. But we’re definitely happy that we’ve got a pretty good Second Life renderer running on Unity, we’re just not sure how we’re going to use it. But we are going to make Second Life more accessible on all machines.

– Philip Rosedale, December 6th, 2024

In this, it was also emphasised that the presumption at the Lab is that the primary mode for accessing and using Second Life will remain the desktop viewer (in some form), and that SL Mobile will be very much an adjunct / companion to that use.

We do not believe the the experience of Second Life at this point in time  can be transitioned entirely to a a “black mirror” experience, as I like to say, because it is more the small size of the window that is the challenge here … Even if we could do anything technically we wanted to, we remain cautious – in fact sceptical – about the ability to do all the things one wants to do with Second Life on a mobile device.  

– Philip Rosedale, December 6th, 2024

On Matters of Support

It was noted that in the recently company restructuring (which saw a number of layoffs and was geared toward a focus on customer success and trust and safety, the ball was dropped on matters of general user support for a time. This is not improving, and Brad Oberwager, whilst taking full responsibility for the slip, believes that by the years end, support responses will by “100% better and faster”.

Linden Lab blogs full availability of SL Mobile App

Posted on by Inara Pey
Outside my Linden Home on the SL Mobile App, November 14th, 2024 (unedited / retouched)

A little over a week since quietly making it available to all Second Life accounts types, on Thursday November 21st Linden Lab officially blogged that all Second Life users can now download and make use of the SL Mobile App (available on both Android and iOS) – see Second Life Mobile is here!

The original November 14th move to make SL Mobile available to all was followed by a special Zoom telecon with a number of Second Life bloggers, during which – and among other things – the Lab specifically discussed Mobile and its development and their hopes for it.

Engaged in that call were Executive Chairman Brad Oberwager, CTO Philip Rosedale, VP of Engineering and Product, Grumpity Linden, and chief Mobile developer Adam Frisby  – who some may know for his former involvement in Second Life and his role in creating the Sine Space virtual world (or as it was once known, sinewave.space), whilst being hosted by Brett Linden.

As one of those able to participate in the discussion, I presented a summary of the commentary surrounding SL Mobile in Second Life Mobile: free to all users & Lab execs discuss the product and goals, and a few of the points made in that article are likely worth repeating here:

  • Currently, the product is still officially regarded a “Beta” – it is still being improved based on feedback, and new features are being developed for future integration.
  • Capabilities are being added in terms of user “journeys” – that is, if someone wants to do X in SL, what capabilities / functionality / abilities do they require? The first such “journey” focused on going something in-world – such as a club or venue, etc., – and doing something, and what that would entail (being able to see the scene, move, chat, IM, view profiles, tip performers etc).
  • The App is not – and most likely will not – ever be seen as a “replacement” for access Second Life via a desktop / laptop; not is it ever likely to be as feature-capable as the desktop viewer.
  • Broadly speaking, SL Mobile has been developed with two primary audience in mind:
    • Existing users – as a means for them to enhance their SL experience by continuing  engage with the platform and their friends during those times of the say when it might not be practical to utilise the desktop viewer in order to do so.
    • “Lapsed” users who have left SL, many of whom have responded to the Lab reaching out to them by saying Second Life doesn’t address their preference for using mobile to access the things they want to do, rather than being reliant on a desktop environment.
  • Linden Lab is seeking feedback on the App, particularly if issues are encountered / persistent. However, when reviewing the App on Google Play or the Apple Store, LL do ask that users keep in mind that SL Mobile is not feature complete, and is being built iteratively, and so not all desired functionality may be there when using it.

Alongside the announcement, the Lab promoted a short video first seen with the “soft” opening of the App’s availability on November 14th, and which is presented below.

Personal Notes

I’ve been using the SL Mobile App since it was first made available for Premium account holders, and as such have watching its development since then. While my own experience with the App has been problematic – and potentially the result of a range of factors outside of SL and the Lab’s control (quality of wi-fi, for example), I’ve been impressed with what I’ve seen in terms of development and progress. However, given I personally have little use for the App (I work from home and so my PC is always within easy reach when I have time for SL), and given its (until recently) limited availability, I’ve not covered it to a great degree going forward.

That said, I will continue to cover the App in my Viewer Release page and weekly viewer release summaries, and as as result of the App now being available to all, I will attempt to report on significant updates going forward, for those interested.

Related Links

 

Second Life Mobile: free to all users & Lab execs discuss the product and goals

Posted on by Inara Pey

On Wednesday, November 13th, Linden Lab quietly made the SL Mobile App available to all users.

The release was somewhat low-key to help minimise the impact of users piling on to the Google and Apple stores and becoming frustrated if they found themselves unable to access the app and download it due to the volume of demand. 
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As a part of the opening of availability of the App, Linden Lab hosted a mini round-table via Zoom at which SL Mobile was discussed, and a little look behind the curtain for the App and its history was given. The following is a summary of some of what was stated / revealed.

SL Mobile Credit: Linden Lab

On Developing the App and Initially Limiting Access

There were many ways SL Mobile could have been developed; in 2019, for example, it was indicated that LL was working on an iOS client focused on communications (see: Second Life: LL confirm iOS client in the making). However, this work was suspended at some point, most likely so a better solution could be sought.

As was noted in the Zoom discussion, there were multiple paths to take, and how best to present the a Mobile app to an audience of Second Life users. One question in particular that had to be addressed was how to present the app to users; its development involved many challenge such that simply opening it up to all users from the first instance was not considered as really feasible, because the feedback could be overwhelming. The release needed to be limited in some way whilst still allowing for the necessary feedback.

So what is the best way to limit it? It is to limit it to people who have really committed financially, as well as in various other ways [to Second Life], and subscribers were they way that we could do this. It’s not like we really wanted to paywall it forever; we just wanted to open it up to smaller audiences, get feedback, get a lot of iteration, and that’s what we’ve been getting from the community, and it’s been fantastic.

Senior Vice President of Product and Engineering, Grumpity Linden

Features and Intent

In terms of which features the Lab decided to focus on in particular for Mobile, the approach taken was to think in terms of “user journeys”: identifying a specific activity users enjoy doing in Second Life – such as socialising, be it at a club or similar venue, or getting out and about with others – and what are the key capabilities involved in that experience: moving, teleporting, communicate, see what’s going on, hear what’s going on (music), look-up profiles, etc. Then building-out those capabilities iteratively, before moving to another journey – such as enhancing avatar customisation options, and start an iterative process that could result in a more rounded means to management inventory on Mobile.

This next journey – subject to official confirmation – might be enhancing avatar customisation through the App. Again, this will not mean a complete set of customisation and inventory management tools being made available at once, but will again be an iterative process, with options and capabilities  added over time to improve the experience.

However, it is important to remember that the aim with Mobile is to augment people’s Second Life, offering an adjunct to the viewer. It is not intended to emulate / reproduce all of the functionality available within the desktop viewer.

The idea is not to create a simpler experience, say akin to Fortnite, on Mobile, where one can “play” Second Life and have the whole experience on the Mobile App.  We don’t actually know, and are inclined to disbelieve, that would ever be possible. What we’re trying to do instead right now somewhat better by using Mobile; maybe it’s getting messages; maybe it’s finding new places … maybe it’s doing something you like to do every day, but do it in Mobile because you’re on a bus or something; but we’re not trying to design the Mobile client to replace Second Life on the desktop. 

– Philip Rosedale, Linden Lab CTO

SL Mobile (Credit: Linden Lab)

Audience

Broadly speaking, SL Mobile has been developed with two primary audience in mind:

  • Existing users – as a means for them to enhance their SL experience by continuing  engage with the platform and their friends during those times of the say when it might not be practical to utilise the desktop viewer in order to do so.
  • “Lapsed” users who have left SL, many of whom have responded to the Lab reaching out to them by saying Second Life doesn’t address their preference for using mobile to access the things they want to do, rather than being reliant on a desktop environment.

One thing the Mobile app is not intended for – at least for the foreseeable future – is the on-boarding of users entirely new to SL; the learning curves involved in becoming comfortable with SL and engaging with it are seen as being too complex / steep at this point in time. Which is not so say the Lab will not be seeking to resume marketing SL to potential new users; far from it, as Brad Oberwager, the Lab’s co-owner and Executive Chairman, noted:

What we are going to do is to start driving people to the desktop and see what happens. That is in play, and that’s good for everybody here. The more people we can all bring in, the better Second Life will be for everybody.

Reception

One of the downsides to the iterative approach taken thus far with SL Mobile has been that it has received extremely poor feedback on both Google Play and the Apple Store. Much of this appears to revolve around perceived incompleteness, possibly as a result of users jumping in and expecting a fully-rounded product and becoming frustrated when they discover functionality is missing.

In this respect, it is again important to remember that SL Mobile is still very much in a beta stage of development, and the iterative process will continue; as such people do need to offer some patience in terms of “missing” features, etc. While the negative feedback has been a source of frustration and disappointment for the Lab, measures are being considered to correct it- be it by resetting the app on the Apple Store and by continuing to offer a better and better product. At the same time, as Lead Developer Adam Frisby noted, the number of poor reviews is hardly insurmountable in the scheme of things .

Trying SL Mobile

As noted, SL Mobile is now available to everyone on both the Apple Store and Google Play, and the links for more information are below. If you are keen to try out out, again, please remember, this is not a final release – as noted above, SL Mobile is still in beta, so please keep this in mind when reviewing the app. That said, if you do encounter issues or bugs, do please file a report with the Lab .

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