Saturday, January 5, 2013

Vick's Wish List

Too often end-of-the-year retrospectives are planned and published well before the end of the year. For example, I was watching a television news piece about celebrities and notables who died in 2012 when news hit that another famous person died just that day. And then each subsequent day saw a notable death. Why can't reviews created when the year is over? Instead, I like previews and wish lists and resolutions. Quite a few bloggers from Second Life have published these but the wish list from Vick Forcella stuck out (see the original here). Here's my annotated look at what Vick would like to see in 2013:

This spot needed a pic and has
nothing to do with the post.
80 people in a mainland sim
No. Sorry, Vick, but avatars cause lag. I don't want to see more avatars on Mainland, especially in areas with roads. Someone who needs to have a high avatar account should consider owning parcels on sim lines and spreading the content/avatar load like they do for big official Linden events. Long ago when my brother and I owned about 3/4 of Nangrim a Brazillian casino opened on much of the remaining land and kept the "agent limit" maxed most of the time. On the rare instances when we could enter our property, the lag was so bad from well across the region, we could barely function. Raising the limit may have seemed like a good idea, but from a functionality standpoint, it would not have worked.

Distribution quota so that each parcel (>255sqm >2) on the mainland is always accessible.
This would work, especially for the situation mentioned above. There is a club in part of Bay City that often uses the full agent limit of the region but they have only 1024 sqm of land. That is an abuse of region resources, but it not a ToS offense (many have tried filing and failed).

Tier reduction
This might work. The Lab certainly has quite a bit of unused land laying about in unsold and abandoned spaces so I see that if tier fees are reduced, folks might buy up more land.

my.secondlife.com moderation tools
Yes,  please. A lawyer would be needed, though, to decide if this would be legal or not. An abusive comment is free speech, at least to a point. MySL is public to view, like comments on news/blog posts and can be moderated by the thread originator by deleting comments (again, just like other public forums). MySL might have to be taken private to enable a more expansive tool selection.

my.secondlife.com moderation based on TOS
Again ... Yes, please! I further suggest that MySL users be required to take a mini-tutorial and comprehension quiz to be able to access the microblogging service. Come to think of it, the same should be true for access to any part of Second Life. Violators should be required to retake the course after a to-be-determined number of offenses, too.

Linden Lab unmuted
No idea what Vick means here. Really, Vick? Did the whole Lab mute you?

Linden Lab finding a single platform for communicating with residents
Excellent suggestion. Several different blogs, status report pages, Dashboards, and in-world announcements that lag (I'll change viewers, for example, and see notifications in the second viewer that never showed in the first one).

Pro-active griefer reduction by Linden Lab, policing
This would require more tools or better tools in the hands of the Residents because even with GOD powers, the Lindens can't be everywhere at all times. And when you do see a Linden, they are often "back office" staff that may not be as familiar with Governance as we'd think they would be.

What should be implemented is a form of limited access for "free" accounts, the types that are often used by griefers. For example, limited resource sandboxes or tiered-rights to resources as an account "ages" –– this assumes that many griefers are just noobs that don't understand now things work but also rewards learning and loyalty.

A Jira that gathers errors instead of covering them up
My opinion of the JIRA is well known. I almost believe it should be suspended until it can actually become useful. C'mon, now ... why should ANY Resident be able to close my JIRA without Lab review just because they think they are smarter than me? And JIRAs can go years without being looked at ... ask my brother.

A Jira that welcomes improvement suggestions
Not gonna happen. JIRA is too broken.

A new policy for the Linden Memorial Park and re-opening
Hear, hear. I whole-heartedly agree. What the LMP needs is a caretaker. Make it a fee to place a memorial if you have to, but please open the LMP.

Clean up of micro parcels
This would require a complete rethink of how land is marketed and sold. Then thousands of parcels would need to be claimed under Eminent Domain for redistribution.

Clean up of abandoned parcels
I agree, but The Lab doesn't see an economic issue here otherwise they would have done it by now. If a Resident wants to buy an abandoned parcel, there are tools available here.

Clean up of parcels owned by inactive residents, plenty of oceans
Same as above ... not seen as an economic imperative.

De-activation of new (*) accounts that do not enter world in two days
Yes and no. If The Lab wasn't trying as half-hard as it was to be a social network, I can see this being viable. As it is, people are encouraged to have accounts whether they come in-world or not because they can still use MySL.

From the game Lili, available for iOS devices here.
Noob micro learning continent where noobs are forced to remain for one week 
The current new Resident experience is bloody awful. I had more of a tutorial from an iPad game I downloaded the other day than new Residents get now. The tutorial in Lili (see a a review here) is not only more intensive, but it is brilliantly implemented. The lessons are progressive in that they "pop up" as a skill is needed. If The Lab wants Second Life to be a gaming platform, it could create a day-long game each new Resident would be required to complete before accessing the full world and during which they would learn all the skills and conventions of Second Life.

A forum that is no longer Béta
What? The forums are still relevant? Any time I look the are filled with trolls and 'experts' that never seem to be in-world. Rather they seem to enjoy being big fish in the little pond of forum-life.

my.secondlife.com that is out of Béta 
My Second Life (MySL) is a wonderful tool that has been officially abandoned. I've been told that except for basic maintenance, no more development will be done.

Webcontent more tablet friendly 
Amen. Flash is dead but some of the world just doesn't know it. Heck, my iPad has a faster, more powerful processor and more RAM than did the first computer I used to access the Web on "back in the day." There is NO reason Second Life itself couldn't run on a tablet or even a more mobile device. Scalability is the key. Oh, and effort. And caring.

Scalable sims: Optional more/less residents/prims = higher/lower price
But this would require work on the part of someone. The Lab no longer has a focus on developing the Second Life infrastructure.

Linden Lab Gaming Viewer (LLGV)
Huh? Sounds like it would be a second world. Third Life?

Resident created games for LLGV
The Moles are very clever and have a ton of game/experience content in Second Life even as I write this but it isn't promoted. Let's get people using the world they have before luring them away to yet another world.

Second Life doesn't need to be a game. It is a way to have a life that isn't possible in Meatspace. No way in heck you'd catch me dressing like this iRL and laying on a boat. Not that I haven't, but you wouldn't see it. You should see what I've done on boats.
Linden Lab Communicator Client (IM/Voice/Groups without in-world avatar)
Sooooo .... like MySL? They could just buy Plurk and be done with it.

Pro-active copybot policing (used client, use of proxies)
I don't think that The Lab sees any economic advantage to this. At least none to them.

UDP(*) type implemented for SL (i.e. SLDP, blocking of SL ISP side)
Sound like a good idea, but I don't know enough about it to make a cogent observation.

Life membership reward if premium >5 years
This idea works for me and I can think of lots of rewards.

Tier-free 1024 sqm when Life Member
Like this one. This is a good idea. Or even double-prims on any land a Life Member owns.

LL attaches it’s hired developers with a life maintenance contract
Not sure I understand what this is. Could you explain more?

Easier ticket escalation towards Linden Lab
I've told you twice now .. JIRA IS DEAD. Take its wallet and walk away.

Return of the quarterly Linden Lab report, more in depth
Yes, please. Not gonna happen, but yes, please.

Linden Lab that treats it’s residents for what they are. Owners and creators
That is done, but selectively. Look around. There is a cadre of Residents that is regularly hired as "outside contractors" to do work for The Lab ... not to mention the beloved LDPW Moles.

Linden Lab that acts as a trusted provider
Again, I'm lost. Reason #9087 why folks just shouldn't listen to me at all.

A TOS that protects the residents
Ideally, the ToS does that now, but the way it is implemented is lacking.

World peace!
Still wraping my head around whirled peas. I'll have to get back to  you on this.

MORE RESIDENTS THAT STAY
Alas, therein lies the rub.

ETA: Flying over parcels that are Full
Allowance does need to be made for occupied vehicles to cross land that has reached its agent limit and its prim allotment. Too often I've crashed or had my vehicle returned or bot just because I'm travelling.

 * This is the Usenet Death Penalty (see here).

Interesting list, Vick. Thanks for sharing. I can't add anything, really, as I'm pretty happy with Second Life overall or I'm rather accepting of the status quo. If I had to pick one item, it would be Web/mobile access to Our World. It is possible and shouldn't be too much work. Maybe Google needs to buy The Lab. I've suggested it before.

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