AFK Away From Keyboard

[Lureo]

Am I the only one to notice that more and more when I try to communicate with people. There is no answer. Sometimes people reply sorry I was afk.  As I expect that when I see someone online he or she is available. I notice that often not. 

[Ethan Paslong]

32 minutes ago, Lureo said:

Am I the only one to notice that more and more when I try to communicate with people. There is no answer. Sometimes people reply sorry I was afk.  As I expect that when I see someone online he or she is available. I notice that often not. 

sometimes people simply ignore IM's from strangers ... or check the profile and than think..ehm no... or indeed afk, or busy with other things

[marinathewitch]

If I like music stream playing on a parcel I might leave SL running while being busy other things. Happens quite a lot. 

[Cindy Evanier]

Ethan is right, I don't always ignore IMs but I am often afk or not even AFK but not active in the viewer because i am browsing the forums or other places.  I might also have a screen full of notecards and the edit window active, working on something and the chat minimised.  Or even busy doing things with someone  um like dancing.

[Syo Emerald]

Some people don't log out, when they go afk. Sometimes, because they estimate their break to be short or they had to leave quickly. One time I forgot, that I had logged into SL and realized it hours later. Many people also turn off the visible sign of being afk, because they don't like it.

[Resi Pfeffer]

1 hour ago, Lureo said:

As I expect that when I see someone online he or she is available

Sure. If i spot a wooden cube in a sandbox, i expect it to turn into amazing mesh boots. 
Better lower your expectations, snowflake.

Nonetheless, my choice is an autoresponse when im AFK. "Hello friend, currently im not able to read IMs at the moment. Maybe im drowning in the abyss of my inventory or RL got all my attention - anyway, I´ll answer you as soon as i see your message, i promise."
 

[Orwar]

23 minutes ago, Resi Pfeffer said:

Nonetheless, my choice is an autoresponse when im AFK. "Hello friend, currently im not able to read IMs at the moment. Maybe im drowning in the abyss of my inventory or RL got all my attention - anyway, I´ll answer you as soon as i see your message, i promise."

   Mine went something like "Alas! I am currently unavailable - whether I shall return shortly or less shortly I cannot prophecise, but I shall let you know the instant I have returned. Meanwhile, to simulate polite conversation, what is your favourite A) Colour? B) Food? D) Drink? E) Assault Rifle? F) Musical movie?"

   Not sure if it's still there, I haven't used the busy/AFK status for years.

[Love Zhaoying]

Maybe those who don’t answer are..unregistered bots! Dun dun dunnnnnnn!

[Resi Pfeffer]

7 minutes ago, Orwar said:

Alas! I am currently unavailable - whether I shall return shortly or less shortly I cannot prophecise, but I shall let you know the instant I have returned. Meanwhile, to simulate polite conversation, what is your favourite A) Colour? B) Food? D) Drink? E) Assault Rifle? F) Musical movie?

I would like to sign up for your refined enunciation classes, if you offer some  
The only thing i dont need, are questions B to F. I just need A): Hello. Thanks for asking, im fine.

[Orwar]

1 minute ago, Resi Pfeffer said:

I would like to sign up for your refined enunciation classes, if you offer some

   I could offer them in Swedish, if you're interested? I'm afraid that, with English being a secondary language to me, I don't believe I'd be an appropriate instructor. 😃

[Talligurl]

I am rairly technically away from the keyboard, but I am often on Flickr or some other site when logged on to SL, it is easier to just say AFK. 

[Alyona Su]

Some funnies! 

Though I think the OP does have a point (though the expectation things needs a reevaluation) - I taken the opposite approach in my profile for quite some time, to paraphrase:

"I don't AFK-camp, I'm here, watching you, observing, probably dropping notes into your profile. I don't usually speak unless I have something meaningful to say."

That way when I *do* go AFK  hopefully they would realize that I'll likely be back in a couple of minutes at most. (BUTTTT, I think I changed it away from that in the last month or so LOL) 

 

Edited April 3, 2019 by Alyona Su

[LittleMe Jewell]

I go AFK a lot because it just seems silly for me to log off and back on every time I leave my computer to go do some stuff in RL when I plan to be back shortly.  Granted, that "shortly" can sometimes turn into hours, but not always.  Like others have said, sometimes I'm just busy focusing on stuff and don't see the IM for a long time.  Sometimes I remember to set my AFK notice and sometimes not.

[Fionalein]

I often ignore IMs becaue I am busy with many IMs already - I do not ignore you on purpose... I just don't notice folks sometimes.

[Shudo]

Mostly I will stand in world with blender or photoshop open and taking my concentration.

I will look at SL to upload a model, or texture. And during those times answer anyone who happened to IM me, and look at group chats. I've been known to reply hours later.

I don't use an away message, as those are so easily knocked off. One nudge of the mouse and away status is gone. Unavailable sticks, but that stops a few things I like to see. If away was sticky, I would use it with a nice message.

Edit: a lot, a real lot, of my friends sleep in world. Leave their avatar logged in 24x7 and go to sleep.

Edited April 3, 2019 by Shudo

[Miakis Littlepaws]

12 hours ago, Ethan Paslong said:

sometimes people simply ignore IM's from strangers ... or check the profile and than think..ehm no

I do this virtually all the time

[Laoise Rumsford]

I'm a Caregiver to my Mother; my AFK game is strong. A lot of the time I don't see messages in a timely manner...Then there are times when I DGAF and close the message out and move on. 98% of the time I am not friendly so if anyone takes my silence personal, it's on them.

[AyelaNewLife]

I never say anything if I'm just going to grab a drink. What's the point? Going through the "back in a sec" "okay back" dance across several IMs would take almost as long as it does to walk to the kitchen and back. Other times I'm tabbed out reading something else, or editing, or typing in another IM window, or focusing on something else. I'll get around to reading the message in a few minutes. I don't think that makes me "afk".

There are some that aren't happy with that though. If you take more than a minute to respond, they start twitching and the follow-up IMs start rolling in. "Busy?", "Guess you're busy then", "Helloooooo???", "You there?", or the classic "?". Sometimes I'll tab over to a wall of "woe is me, no one will talk to me". Other times it's raw abuse. Now I don't know if these types are so coked off their ***** (t i t s, it's not a naughty word wtf) that it genuinely seems like I'm taking an hour to respond, but if a three minute gap between messages causes you to flip out, you need to get off the internet and get some professional help.

Edited April 4, 2019 by AyelaNewLife
Who wrote this censor?

[Zeta Vandyke]

3 hours ago, AyelaNewLife said:

There are some that aren't happy with that though. If you take more than a minute to respond, they start twitching and the follow-up IMs start rolling in. "Busy?", "Guess you're busy then", "Helloooooo???", "You there?", or the classic "?".

Those type of people do not last very long on my friends list.

In my case, people would probably be more surprised if I respond directly, since I'm always fashionably late with responding in general.

[Maitimo]

If I'm not hanging out with friends I'm often doing other stuff on the internet, with SL in the background just for the music. But I have keyword alerts set up in Firestorm, so if you say my name in local chat, I'll hear it and respond. Doesn't work with IMs though.

[Selene Gregoire]

I'm one of "those people" who don't bother to log out every time I have to use the bathroom, get a drink, talk with the other half about life in general (which is far more important than anything in SL), answer the phone, feed the cat, comb the cat, make dinner, and a myriad of other things. If someone has a problem with that, it's on them, not me. They can have a say when they pay my bills for me with their money.

[Coffee Pancake]

Have been known to go AFK* for extended periods.

Have been known not to respond to random hotdog vendors needing assistance to make some kind of sandwich. Add your own mayo.

*I'm still here, just focused on blender/netflix/reddit/cat/here/steam/wow/guildchat/notyou/cat/inventory/cat/building/wii/rl/soldering/3dprinter/cat/

[MoiraKathleen]

Most of the time I'm not conversing with anyone in-world, so If I'm going to get up to do something around my RL house, I just hit the "home" button in the viewer so that at least I'm in my SL house before I get up from my desk to do whatever.  If I happen to be conversing with someone in IM's or local chat, and I think I will be AFK for more than a minute or two or three.... I will tell them "just a sec..." and "ok, back". 

If I get an IM from a stranger, I do check the profile first before responding.  There have been a few rare cases where I couldn't get past what was in the profile and therefore did not respond at all because I knew that we had absolutely nothing in common. 

[Skell Dagger]

On 4/3/2019 at 12:23 PM, Lureo said:

I expect that when I see someone online he or she is available.

As you have seen from the responses in this thread, other people in Second Life are not there for you. They are not there to "be available" to speak to you

My autoresponse to non-friends is on all the time. As a CSR for a major Second Life brand I receive a lot of IMs asking for help during each login session, and I simply cannot get to every one of them, so my autoresponse tells people that I may be either AFK or busy and gives them a link to the group support chat where they can ask their questions.

Each of those support requests for help easily takes between 10 - 20 minutes of my time, and sometimes someone needs more in-depth (AKA: simplified, step by step hand-holding) help that can take up to an hour or more. I sometimes have multiple of those IM sessions on the go, as well as helping in group chat support while I'm waiting for responses to my IM help.

However, even as a CSR I am not expected to "be available" every second of every hour of every login session. If that were the case I simply wouldn't get anything done for myself. I choose when I'm available to work, so - if there are is least one other CSR logged in and available to offer support - I will occasionally ignore the incoming IMs, purely because I'm busy, or I need some downtime, or my partner has logged in and I want to spend my time with him.

Sometimes I can even be at a party or event and still be helping in IM or group chat. I love to help; it's rewarding and it's something I'm good at, but if someone then came along and got annoyed at me because I happened to be out shopping when two IMs had come in asking for my help, thereby making me "not available" to be chatted to then they might be even more annoyed by my eventual response.

Edited April 5, 2019 by Skell Dagger

[Lureo]

I understand why I am not normal now. I mean as I read you. When I am on SL I am on and active. when I stop I log off and do other occupations. I understand why some people think I am weird or odd or awkawk (sorry I need to learn again all these words)