3 years and no friends to show.

[Moz Artful]

So I got an email from Linden Labs last night letting me know that yesterday was my "Rez Day".  I logged in and accepted my Rez Day Cake and logged off a few minutes later.  I started thinking about how strange it is that Second Life is supposed to be a "social place" and after 3 years, I still don't have any friends... well one if you count my female alt. :)  I don't go in-world too often, but I'd say I'm online at least a couple of times a week.

 

I've had a few friends over the three years I've been here, but I lost touch with them.  One woman was way too demanding... I barely knew her and she was harrassing me about my whereabouts and wanting to know what I was doing all the time.  Another woman I met because when I was brand new, our Linden homes were next to each other.  She became a vamp and moved in with her clan and I never kept in touch with her after that.  A third woman I met when I purchased some mainland... she lived across the street.  She was very nice.  I was still new, so she showed me around a bit and we spent a nice afternoon together.  After a short time, I moved to another place and haven't talked to her since.  She was the only person I regret losing touch with... unfortunately I don't remember her name so I have no way of getting back in touch with her.

 

I don't know why I'm posting this here.  Maybe I'm hoping to become part of the forum community and I can meet some people here.  Sometime I feel a little intimidated talking to people in-world.  Anyway, that's my story... feel free to say hello if the mood strikes you.

[Syo Emerald]

Lucky you, I've never seen my neighbours. They seem to be always offline or elsewhere, leaving their more or less beautiful houses empty. But sometimes strangers passed the way in front of my house...sadly always when I wasn't around to say hello.

[Frawmusl]

I'm in a similar boat, I've got a lot of people on my friends list...Yet I can be online for eight hours without a single one of them IM me. Typically only IM'd for help or asked to make something for someone.. It kinda sucks, but I can relate ^.^ Its hard to connect in SL, even crowded clubs are silent because everyone is in IMs rather than wating to take part in the nonexistant conversation..Its a bit strange.
Welcome to the forum community! -stabs a badge into you- there, that will do nicely

[Sephina Frostbite]

Ive been in world for three years as well and I have a huge list of friends and very few I talk to on a regular basis. I have experienced a few rather weird people and some that were awesome but friendship short lived. So I know how you feel. I wave hello and welcome you IM me anytime sweetie. Its always nice to meet new people.

[Raven1 Short]

That's sad about the rez day thing. But your people on your friend's list don't get notice of rezz day dates.

I've been around for five years and have a couple of close friends and my partner. 

When my partner isn't around I end up alone a lot because I don't relate well to people too often until I get to know them.  I have to hit it off just right.

We should have a group gathering of "I can't find people to hang with" people

[Czari Zenovka]

At least you got the Rez Day email/cake from LL.  May 1 was my 6th Rez Day and I didn't receive the email and haven't any year; neither have my alts.  Hrummmmphhhsss!  :matte-motes-sour:

At any rate...I was partnered for my first three years in SL and did meet quite a few people since I was involved in a large rp sim for awhile and worked in a quaint jazz club (where I met my partner) but he and I pretty much did our own thing.

I have met many people during my time in SL and some have become friends.  The majority of them I saw regularly when we were involved in similar activities but once they or I moved on to other areas of SL we lost touch.  Some of them I do consider friends but we may only chat a few times a year but know we are there for each other if needed.

There are about three people that I speak with in SL with any regularity - meaning maybe once a week; so I am pretty much a loner in SL, partly by choice and partly because I enjoy interacting with people on a one-to-one basis rather than attending large gatherings.

Just about all of my recent (as in the last year) friends are from the forums, many of whom I have never seen in world, but enjoy interacting with here.  In fact, I spend more time in the SL forums than I do actually in world.

It doesn't sound like we are that different.

Edit: Clarification

[FairuzaB]

Hi there,  I don't have many friends and I was alone for my rezz day as well.  If you want to say hi sometime feel free!   

[Tamara Artis]

My third rezz day was in April, I found out I forgot about it when I was cleaning my inbox, there was some message from LL but no cake! I bought myself a 4k house as a late birthday gift lol, it didn't last long bc it had almost 500 prims!

Anyway, its hard to connect with random people, often I meet cool individuals, we have great chat but after few days each goes on its own way. I rarely open my friends list and remove only people that spam me. But ones that last and that talk to me almost every day are people that share same interests with me. Thats the whole secret, find something new that sounds interesting to you and go explore what you can find about it in SL. 

Most of the people around us are spammed with all kinds of cr*p almost daily and people simply forget you after some time.. Thats perfectly normal. If you sit somewhere silently and wait for someone to say hello you will spend many lonely hours. 

Coming here and simply saying hello is a great way to start, so welcome to the forums! What do you want to do now?

[Marigold Devin]

There are friends, and there are "friends"/acquaintances. Some people think they have a lot of friends, but truly how many of them would give you their last Rolo or be there to look after your cat while you went on holiday (even your virtual cats?).

I suppose what I am trying to say in a clumsy way is that it can be quite difficult to meet people quite on the same wavelength.  Length of time in a place does not automatically mean we accumulate friends either.

However, reading through your post, there would appear to be reasons why you have no friends. You don't seem to be putting down any roots. When you had the Linden home with the neighbour, you had a friend for a while until she moved in with a clan. Some friendships are meant to be transitional, and in a virtual world, where people are coming and going and being tugged at by real life distractions constantly, it can be harder to develop good long-term friendships. 

Maybe also your experience with the woman who was way too demanding is making you sub-consciously keep people at arms length. 

But, do you know what?  If you hang around these forums for long enough, keep dipping in and out, get the measure of the regular people on here, you will, I am sure, find quite a few friends on your wave length, and have many laughs (and probably a few disagreements) along the way. 

Some of my best friends in Second Life are not even on my friend list, and I met them right here.

And you might be surprise to know that a heck of a lot of people feel exactly like you do, slightly intimidated talking to people inworld. It can be quite stressful too, I find, in group situations, where people expect IMs and local chat to be followed. 

[Marigold Devin]

---

Raven1 Short wrote:

That's sad about the rez day thing. But your people on your friend's list don't get notice of rezz day dates.

I've been around for five years and have a couple of close friends and my partner. 

When my partner isn't around I end up alone a lot because I don't relate well to people too often until I get to know them.  I have to hit it off just right.

We should have a group gathering of "I can't find people to hang with" people

---

I laughed at that, for it reminded me of when I worked on a holiday camp around 20 years ago, and people would sit in the staff canteen in their little departmental groups. They always sat in the same part of the canteen, at the same tables. I was on late shift and worked in a kiosk in night time venue, so I did not know the people on day time shops, and didn't feel I could just wander up to them and sit with them,  they seemed so cliquey, so I sat alone, until one day I found that all the 'oddments' had come to join me at my table - a German girl who worked as a chalet cleaner, but who felt she did not fit in with the others in her team, a girl from Holland who was still improving her English and because she was slow to wait on tables, the other waiters had shunned her, gardeners who were a little bit grassy and grubby from their toil, a bars supervisor (no one wants to sit with their boss), one of the retail catering chefs (did not eat what he had cooked!), and several others.  Before long there were 16 of us in any one sitting, we had pushed several tables together to make one big table, and joked about it being "the table for people with no friends".  I still keep in touch with some of them to this day.

[Randall Ahren]

"Hello" and "Hi" are two of the most poweful words against loneliness.

 

[Raven1 Short]

---

Marigold Devin wrote:

---

Raven1 Short wrote:

That's sad about the rez day thing. But your people on your friend's list don't get notice of rezz day dates.

I've been around for five years and have a couple of close friends and my partner. 

When my partner isn't around I end up alone a lot because I don't relate well to people too often until I get to know them.  I have to hit it off just right.

We should have a group gathering of "I can't find people to hang with" people

---

I laughed at that, for it reminded me of when I worked on a holiday camp around 20 years ago, and people would sit in the staff canteen in their little departmental groups. They always sat in the same part of the canteen, at the same tables. I was on late shift and worked in a kiosk in night time venue, so I did not know the people on day time shops, and didn't feel I could just wander up to them and sit with them,  they seemed so cliquey, so I sat alone, until one day I found that all the 'oddments' had come to join me at my table - a German girl who worked as a chalet cleaner, but who felt she did not fit in with the others in her team, a girl from Holland who was still improving her English and because she was slow to wait on tables, the other waiters had shunned her, gardeners who were a little bit grassy and grubby from their toil, a bars supervisor (no one wants to sit with their boss), one of the retail catering chefs (did not eat what he had cooked!), and several others.  Before long there were 16 of us in any one sitting, we had pushed several tables together to make one big table, and joked about it being "the table for people with no friends".  I still keep in touch with some of them to this day.

---

Yes that's how it should work!

I'd suggest we do that....but then what if no one showed up? :matte-motes-stress:

[Raven1 Short]

I met one of my best SL friends from just "Hello"

[Randall Ahren]

If you have a partner, people are going to think you're doing things with your partner when you're online. So you have to be more outgoing when you have a partner.

 

[Ren Toxx]

---

Moz Artful wrote: [...] 

how strange it is that Second Life is supposed to be a "social place" and after 3 years, I still don't have any friends [...]

---

Socializing has to go both ways.

[Thinkerer Melville]

Check out this article:

• How do I meet people? 

TKR

[KatelynDawne]

You havn't lost her, look in your inventory, under "CALLING CARDS"  Her name and profile info will be under her name in this folder.  Good Luck and Hugs

[Raven1 Short]

I know. That is part of it.

[RiriKim]

I'm glad to see you had some and lost them than three years with none :matte-motes-agape:

I had looked forward to my rez day, but had tests that week and missed it.

why don't we have a belated rez day party?

[Raven1 Short]

---

RiriKim wrote:

I'm glad to see you had some and lost them than three years with none :matte-motes-agape:

I had looked forward to my rez day, but had tests that week and missed it.

why don't we have a belated rez day party?

---

I'm game for that, but not sure when people are online. I'm on during the day. SL mornings.

[Moz Artful]

I like you're suggestion of finding people with similar interests, but it seems like whenever I do that I come up empty.  For example, I'm into skateboarding,. but whenever I try to find some places in SL to skate, it's like a ghost town.  I'm an old man though, so maybe I'm just an out of touch hipster.  Does anyone know what the average age is of people in SL?  It seems like the only places that I find that are hopping are dance clubs or some kind of bondage sex club.  Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it's not exactly what I'm looking for.

[Moz Artful]

Thanks for all the responses everyone... definately some thought provoking ideas being tossed around.  I'm a bit of a contradiction when it comes to how I socialize.  On one hand, I'm a shy person, so I do tend to keep to myself most of the time.  On the other hand, I wear my heart on my sleeve and when I do meet and get to know someone I click with, I tend to jump in with both feet and develop meaningful strong relationships.  So although I'll never be the social butterfly who is friends with everyone, I will usually have a few very close friends who I click with and understand beyond someone who is just a casual friend.  My personality probably isn't very well suited for interacting with people in a virtual world, a place that is (by the nature of what it is) a more casual social atmosphere.

[Raven1 Short]

---

Moz Artful wrote:

Thanks for all the responses everyone... definately some thought provoking ideas being tossed around.  I'm a bit of a contradiction when it comes to how I socialize.  On one hand, I'm a shy person, so I do tend to keep to myself most of the time.  On the other hand, I wear my heart on my sleeve and when I do meet and get to know someone I click with, I tend to jump in with both feet and develop meaningful strong relationships.  So although I'll never be the social butterfly who is friends with everyone, I will usually have a few very close friends who I click with and understand beyond someone who is just a casual friend.  My personality probably isn't very well suited for interacting with people in a virtual world, a place that is (by the nature of what it is) a more casual social atmosphere.

---

You've had someone offer to throw you are belated rezz day party. You could give it a whirl and maybe click with someone.

[Czari Zenovka]

There was a study done some years ago on the average demographics of people who play MMORPGs.  Since SL isn't an MMORPG, the results may be a bit different, but I would think skewed even more toward the older age since not everyone likes to kill things but enjoy the other pursuits in SL.  I posted part of those findings here. (My name there is Azalysa - 8th post down.)

You'll receive many answers on the average age of SL residents, primarily because many people tend to stay within their own age groups; thus you'll have 20-somethings saying they make up the majority of the population, but others who are involved in other aspects of SL who have a different experience.   The oldest person I have personally met in SL (at least who offered his age) was 80.  He was a patron at the small vintage 1940's dance club with a WWII theme where I worked when I first joined SL.

I would say a great many of the "regulars" on the forums, many of whom have been in SL since 2005+, are 40ish.  I was never a "hippy" but I clearly remember the 60's. *Grins*  There's a lot more of us "mature" residents than you might think.  It's just a matter of finding them.  At one point when I went to dance venues (ballroom & jazz) more than I do now, I had a line in my profile that indicated my preference for a dance partner was *45+ RL 40+RL.  I had a lot of dance offers from men who ranged from 45-70ish 40-70ish.  We're here.

ETA: Misspelling

*I just referred to my profile notecard again (I keep all past profiles in a notecard) and it was 40+, not 45+.  This was also during a time I got a lot of "Hi, how r u?  How old r u?  I'm 22" IMs at dance venues and, when dancing with them, saw that there was no commonality, in general.

 

 

[Marigold Devin]

---

Raven1 Short wrote:

---

Marigold Devin wrote:

---

Raven1 Short wrote:

That's sad about the rez day thing. But your people on your friend's list don't get notice of rezz day dates.

I've been around for five years and have a couple of close friends and my partner. 

When my partner isn't around I end up alone a lot because I don't relate well to people too often until I get to know them.  I have to hit it off just right.

We should have a group gathering of "I can't find people to hang with" people

---

I laughed at that, for it reminded me of when I worked on a holiday camp around 20 years ago, and people would sit in the staff canteen in their little departmental groups. They always sat in the same part of the canteen, at the same tables. I was on late shift and worked in a kiosk in night time venue, so I did not know the people on day time shops, and didn't feel I could just wander up to them and sit with them,  they seemed so cliquey, so I sat alone, until one day I found that all the 'oddments' had come to join me at my table - a German girl who worked as a chalet cleaner, but who felt she did not fit in with the others in her team, a girl from Holland who was still improving her English and because she was slow to wait on tables, the other waiters had shunned her, gardeners who were a little bit grassy and grubby from their toil, a bars supervisor (no one wants to sit with their boss), one of the retail catering chefs (did not eat what he had cooked!), and several others.  Before long there were 16 of us in any one sitting, we had pushed several tables together to make one big table, and joked about it being "the table for people with no friends".  I still keep in touch with some of them to this day.

---

Yes that's how it should work!

I'd suggest we do that....

but then what if no one showed up?

 :matte-motes-stress:

---

Sometimes no one showed up on that table at the holiday camp, especially if I was on a bad day - it was like The Power That Is Bigger Than Us decided to emphasise the loneliness of one.  But then sometimes the table would be overflowing and raucous.

So who is gonna start this group then? :matte-motes-wink-tongue:  Obviously, unlike the hostility that can sometimes arise in other groups, everyone in this group MUST be prepared for group chat, and that might be quite inane and random.