While you can't do these things in real life any more, you can do them in Second Life.

[animats]

Here's a potential marketing direction, for about three weeks from now, when people are starting to go crazy from isolation.

While you can't do these things in real life,
you can do them in Second Life.

 

Large family gatherings.

 

Public meetings

 

Group religious activities

 

Life without fear

Reproduce each of those scenes in Second Life. Perhaps fade from those famous Norman Rockwell paintings to the Second Life scenes.

(Copyright on those paintings has expired. Those images are from the National Archives. See Wikimedia.)

Edited March 13, 2020 by animats
Tighten up copy

[Scylla Rhiadra]

lol, Norman Rockwell? Seriously???

Not even America looks like this anymore (and in fact, never really did): it's utterly unrecognizable for most of the rest of the world.

I get your overall point, but yeeeeeeesh . . .

[Coffee Pancake]

I think we can do without everything those pictures symbolize. In and out of SL.

[Lyssa Greymoon]

Furry orgy...

[animats]

Bellisaria is Norman Rockwell land. That's what people seem to want in SL. Yards, picnics, American suburban home life. Something millions of people just lost. So, promote SL as a way to get some of that life back.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

6 minutes ago, animats said:

Bellisaria is Norman Rockwell land. That's what people seem to want in SL. Yards, picnics, American suburban home life. Something millions of people just lost. So, promote SL as a way to get some of that life back.

Which is one of the reasons that I haven't gone premium yet.

Besides, that's a simplification: even Bellissaria is more diverse than those pics. Pretty sure there are people of colour living there, for one thing. And, you know, gay people. Maybe a smattering of furries? Oh, and practitioners of various kinks and fetishes the likes of which would make Rockwell's head explode.

SL isn't going to expand its user base by narrowing its appeal.

[Beth Macbain]

I thought we already decided it was tacky af to try to cash in on tragedy.

Yes. Yes, I’m sure we did. Thankfully @Brett Linden agrees.

[animats]

SL offers people a way to socialize that many will desperately need in a few weeks.

[Beth Macbain]

I understand that you are serious about this. There is no way, though, that LL could market this in a way that wouldn’t come off as smarmy - because it is smarmy. It would bring nothing but bad press. Snotty little tech bloggers the world over would be writing snotty little blog posts about LL trying to make themselves relevant by capitalizing on a global pandemic that is killing people.

This would not be a good look for the Lab.

There is a reason no reputable company is doing anything like this.

Also, Skype exists.

[Alwin Alcott]

19 minutes ago, animats said:

SL offers people a way to socialize that many will desperately need in a few weeks.

i seriously dare to doubt many people will think about sign up and log into SL when they are in stress about RL. ( we know many people don't even know about SL, or left it 10 years ago.. those won't come back, but use FB, twitter and what there's more around)
What i dó expect is that the current users will spend more time online.

[animats]

2 minutes ago, Alwin Alcott said:

What i do expect is that the current users will spend more time online.

Fortnite usage in Italy is up 70%.

[Alwin Alcott]

3 minutes ago, animats said:

Fortnite usage in Italy is up 70%.

i was somehow thinking this thread was about SL ?
 

 

31 minutes ago, animats said:

SL offers people a way to socialize that many will desperately need in a few weeks.

 

[cheesecurd]

5 hours ago, Lyssa Greymoon said:

Furry orgy...

I mean...

they happen.

irl

[Lyssa Greymoon]

32 minutes ago, cheesecurd said:

I mean...

they happen.

irl

There’s a reason I didn’t post a pic and it wasn’t because I didn’t find any.

[Tolya Ugajin]

6 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

lol, Norman Rockwell? Seriously???

Not even America looks like this anymore (and in fact, never really did): it's utterly unrecognizable for most of the rest of the world.

I get your overall point, but yeeeeeeesh . . .

You might want to put away your Virtue Signal, because it's making you look silly in this case.

[OptimoMaximo]

6 hours ago, KikiJadyn said:

At least 99% are gonna be burning forever in hell so you should start leaving your hands on a turned on stove now just to practice

Yeah but the remaining 1% are those  who don't believe in judeo-christian myths and they're going to reincarnate, so screw your practicing on the stove.

Seriously, keep your beliefs for yourself along with such religion based comments. 

[Qie Niangao]

6 hours ago, Beth Macbain said:

I thought we already decided it was tacky af to try to cash in on tragedy.

Yes. Yes, I’m sure we did. Thankfully @Brett Linden agrees.

Really? Cuz I think there's another way to look at it: An alternative, virtual social environment such as Second Life may encourage people to reduce RL social engagements that promote spread of the virus, even among populations that are not themselves particularly at risk if they contract it.

At least in North America, we're still seeing a lot of voluntary social distancing; at this point it probably has more effect on slowing the spread of this disease than (the still underwhelming) government-imposed measures. Right now, if SL helps people stay at home, it's a win for public health.

(It's bound to be more effective than the utterly feckless public health officials where I live.)

[Prokofy Neva]

Here are some OTHER Normal Rockwell paintings that actually depict Second Life scenes more than those above -- he was more complex than some people imagine. Perhaps they better depict the insularity, prejudices, hatreds, browbeating, and horror-story recounting that is particularly concentrated on the forums. Like cynical and suspicious attitudes towards religious believers -- who still make up a large percent of the population. Like attitudes towards minorities and those who are different. Like attitudes towards those with terrible experiences. Like attitudes towards those who refuse to go around with the received wisdom of the "crowd". 

 

Edited March 13, 2020 by Prokofy Neva

[Prokofy Neva]

6 hours ago, Alwin Alcott said:

i seriously dare to doubt many people will think about sign up and log into SL when they are in stress about RL. ( we know many people don't even know about SL, or left it 10 years ago.. those won't come back, but use FB, twitter and what there's more around)
What i dó expect is that the current users will spend more time online.

That's a reasonable prognosis. I do see some indications, however, that people who fled SL might be back, especially universities and some businesses. Certainly every company from Subway to Via to Google is flooding my email box now telling me what good deeds they are doing now with this virus epidemic. So LL will be no different, and there are ways they can do this tastefully and with sensitivity.

[OptimoMaximo]

6 hours ago, animats said:

Fortnite usage in Italy is up 70%.

I live in Italy. Such thing doesn't surprise me at all, since we're forbidden to get out if not for vital reasons, and it has to be done filling out a form declaring where you're from, where you're going, where you're moving through and the exact reason for the moving. And police stops people and checks that, if you're found to provide false info the fine starts from 200 to 200,000 euro (in case you're found positive to the virus test), plus a penal proceedment. Fortunately my job allows me to work remotely, as I've been doing every now and then on the last year without damaging production, as the workflow and communication standards have been tested and refined already. But all other activities are suffering, either from complete shut downs or for the implementation of remote work that, in this backwards country, is not something widespread (or even known to be possible to begin with). I'm literally overwhelmed of phonecalls from friends and neighbors for help setting up proxy settings and VPN softwares for them to connect to their workplace's net and keep working instead of being forced to take their earned leaves hours/days. Plus, going to buy supplies has become a nightmare, with Neverending lines in which each individual has to keep 2 meters distance from the others, entrance is allowed only on a 1 out-1 in basis, depending on the store footprint size and never exceeding the number of 5 people in the store at any given time (staff excluded, who anyway have to wear masks and gloves and change these latter every customer they serve). 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

1 hour ago, Tolya Ugajin said:

You might want to put away your Virtue Signal, because it's making you look silly in this case.

What are you on about?

[Scylla Rhiadra]

36 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

Here are some OTHER Normal Rockwell paintings that actually depict Second Life scenes more than those above -- he was more complex than some people imagine.

This is fair comment -- or would be, were those the images employed in the OP.

37 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

Perhaps they better depict the insularity, prejudices, hatreds, browbeating, and horror-story recounting that is particularly concentrated on the forums.

This, on the other hand, is not.

[Madelaine McMasters]

9 hours ago, animats said:

 

Hey, that first Rockwell's a ripoff.

I grew up lookin' at this picture on dumpling night...

9 hours ago, CoffeeDujour said:

I think we can do without everything those pictures symbolize. In and out of SL.

Nooo, I need the dumplings!

[Theresa Tennyson]

9 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

lol, Norman Rockwell? Seriously???

Not even America looks like this anymore (and in fact, never really did): it's utterly unrecognizable for most of the rest of the world.

I get your overall point, but yeeeeeeesh . . .

There were places in America that looked just about exactly like those pictures. Not everywhere, of course, but that doesn't mean that they didn't exist.

9 hours ago, CoffeeDujour said:

I think we can do without everything those pictures symbolize. In and out of SL.

You aren't reacting to what those pictures symbolize, you're reacting to your assumptions of those people's other beliefs and actions when they weren't doing what is shown in those pictures. 

Being reactionary is seldom rational no matter what triggers it.

Edited March 13, 2020 by Theresa Tennyson

[Madelaine McMasters]

8 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Oh, and practitioners of various kinks and fetishes the likes of which would make Rockwell's head explode.

I imagine Rockwell's head as accepting enough to hold those ideas without much stress and that he was savvy enough to know how far he could reach without falling off his soapbox. As Prok shows, he did reach.