Default avatar light-skinned? This could change ASAP :)

[Ceka Cianci]

7 minutes ago, RowanMinx said:

Exactly and as most new people aren't going to be attached to their specific look as a lot of people become over time, if they can get something they at least feel a bit comfortable with, that should be fine.  They have white and black, male and female (some of each can certainly be thought of as non-binary IMO), short and tall.  That's more than enough to START.  

omg this reminded me of something funny when I was new..

I spent like 30 to 45 minutes on my starter shape and was actually happy with it..

This was like ,before I ever seen any avatars with skins on them..

This one guy came up to me and told me he could improve my avatar if I put this skin on and this shape.. He told me how to put them on.. I put them on and thought he griefed me.. I started typing in caps , You wrecked my avatar, why would you do that to someone!! \o/  OMG all that time down the drain..

Then it finished rezzing.. I never apologized so hard in my life than I did to that guy.. I still when i think about it feel bad about it, but he was really good about it and laughed afterwards..

 

[FairreLilette]

11 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

I've only ever really used this one until recently..  The tools or sliders were there so you could adjust your avatar more to what you wanted at the time and still today.. if we didn't still have those tools today, we'd all be looking like the bodies and heads we are buying today from the creators.. it's the little tweaks and jukes that we put in them that change say, one genus head from the other.

No, not the sliders.  There are tools where you can make your own hair, skin, clothes, etc and not have to buy anything.  Those look terrible.  I don't think you know of what tools I'm talking about but I'm not talking about the sliders at all.  I could make one today and show you...the skin you can make with the SL tools have not much detail at all...I think you can add freckles.  

Edited October 30, 2020 by FairreLilette

[Lyssa Greymoon]

26 minutes ago, Solar Legion said:

Treat the Starter Avatar as a Placeholder - that is exactly what it is.

There are four pages of starter avatars, and a lot more they've retired in the library. Obviously Linden Lab is trying to please as wide an audience as possible with them, and good on them, they should. The OP's suggestion for a bit more diversity in the starter avatars seems like a good one, and not unreasonable.

[Solar Legion]

Just now, Lyssa Greymoon said:

There are four pages of starter avatars, and a lot more they've retired in the library. Obviously Linden Lab is trying to please as wide an audience as possible with them, and good on them, they should. The OP's suggestion for a bit more diversity in the starter avatars seems like a good one, and not unreasonable.

That's nice. Nowhere did I say anything whatsoever concerning adding in more.

[Ceka Cianci]

1 minute ago, FairreLilette said:

No, not the sliders.  There are tools where you can make your own hair, skin, clothes, etc and not have to buy anything.  Those look terrible.  I don't think you know of what tools I'm talking about but I'm not talking about the sliders at all.

Oh I see what ones you are referring to now.. some of those are still pretty useful today actually, like Hair base for instance is used a lot for brows a lot, to like raise or lower your eyebrows.. I've got tons of brows just to try out with the different mesh heads.. Sometimes  I'll put on a new head and the brows I have on at the time will make me look like I'm always  surprised.. hehehehe

With BOM, system skins are being used more as well..

Clothes, I'm not really sure about  actually..

[FairreLilette]

3 minutes ago, Ceka Cianci said:

Oh I see what ones you are referring to now.. some of those are still pretty useful today actually, like Hair base for instance is used a lot for brows a lot, to like raise or lower your eyebrows.. I've got tons of brows just to try out with the different mesh heads.. Sometimes  I'll put on a new head and the brows I have on at the time will make me look like I'm always  surprised.. hehehehe

With BOM, system skins are being used more as well..

Clothes, I'm not really sure about  actually..

I'm talking about these make your own avatars with the SL tools which I just made quickly where you can turn the horrible blah skin any color, add ruddiness, add freckles...and then you can see I'm making hair and adding make-up - all with the built-in SL tools.  See to the right where I'm wearing what I named MY SKIN, MY HAIR.   We all can make these but they are horrible to say the least.  That's what I meant when I said I don't know why Phillip Rosedale put these tools in here.  I wasn't talking about the sliders that make our shape.

[Solar Legion]

Were you even in Second Life in the earlier days, @FairreLilette?

[AdminGirl]

What could work is when someone first signs in, they appear as a poofy cloud or something and the avatar selection window is open by default so they can choose right away instead of having something allocated to them.

[Wulfie Reanimator]

2 hours ago, Robin Kiyori said:

Also choice paralysis is hardly going to kick in the moment other options for skintones are added? Like... that's a reach.  Much like your whole post really. I am not seeing what you seem to see. Because I don't see the issue in letting people choose a starting avatar or having a selection of skin options.

It won't make it too complex. Trust me, many mmos and other virtual places  have managed just fine with selections.

I'm not saying something so reductive as "adding skintones is too much choice."

I'm saying that a new user -- who knows nothing about Second Life -- may think that these are all the choices they're going to get when presented with a set amount of starter avatars, or that some aspects of their avatar (such as gender) would be unchangeable.

You haven't even finished signing up but you're already disappointed because you don't like your options.

There are very few games (even MMOs) that have as much customization as Second Life. Not every game/MMO allows you to switch genders, especially without paying a fee every time. Heck, there are people who play Second Life but have never touched another "game" in their lives.

Besides that, it's an extra step in the signup process. Any step, no matter how simple, adds complexity that will turn some people away. LL has said as much and they actually have stats to make decisions with. The removal of last names is the most notable feature they cut because of its effect on new user signups.

I'm not here defending LL's decisions, I don't even agree with them. I'm only explaining the what/why.

Edited October 30, 2020 by Wulfie Reanimator

[FairreLilette]

4 minutes ago, Solar Legion said:

Were you even in Second Life in the earlier days, @FairreLilette?

Yeah, I was here but people bought their own stuff; some was primitive but not like making your own avi (skin and hair) with the SL tools.  I wasn't hanging out with people who were making their own avi's with the SL tools.  That was probably the building crowd which I was with the stripper crowd at the time.  There would not have been strippers if people were just making their skins and hair with the SL built-in tools.  

[Chaser Zaks]

So I posted last night something I hoped would calm the situation down, apparently it did not.

While I am all for including everyone, the hard truth is, it simply isn't possible. That'd mean LL would have to tailor a avatar for every single person who joins, because what people count as identity could be as simple as race and gender, but can also include various other things as well.

For example, I have various disabilities and a deformity. To be specific(I am NOT seeking pity points or "so powerful" points. I own these, they are me, but they do not make me any different than anyone else and do not deserve praise):

• I am Autistic, more specifically Aspergers. This cannot be visually represented.
• I have pectus excavatum, this isn't represented by a slider and would need a custom mesh.
• I have super pale skin because I don't go outside because of severe germaphobia. While there are super pale skinned avatars, I could easily adjust this via skin tone sliders, even on the default avatars.
• I am 5'8", which is under-represented in this world of giants, resulting in me being called a child avatar sometimes. All these avatars are giant.
• I am slightly overweight. There do not appear to be any slightly overweight avatars.

While I can speak for the above, here are some more things that are not me that can also be represented:

• Physical handicaps. Wheelchairs/crutches/etc, Lost or artificial limbs. There are none of these in the default avatar selection.
• Age. There are only two old people in the avatar selection. Considering 16 is the minimum age requirement, teens could also be more represented.
• Fashion sense. This is as much as a identity as anything else because it speaks about who the person is. Fashion is tied to the avatar, so we have to either pick the avatar or pick the fashion.
• The way one holds themself(I think that is the term?). I don't move much, but I know some people move themselves around a lot. There are no default AOs in the current starter avatars from what I recall.
• The list can go on, what some may see as a choice can also be a identity, and visa versa.

Now, while some of those cannot be represented, most of which can be adjusted via the appearance slider or through picking attachments once in world. The starter avatars are intended to get people started. There is no sense in providing 1,000 different choices with 100,000 different combinations for something that someone will very likely change shortly down the line.

If we really want to stretch, some people prefer their online identity as anime, furry, feral, etc. The only furry avatar is the werewolf, and there are no anime or feral avatars.

Personally, for me, the online me is quite different than the RL me(idc at this point everyone has seen me by now, also too lazy to green screen):

SL Me	RL Me
Very soft and fuzzy 5'8" dumb No copy/Mod/No trans can't dox a pixel hahaha CAN'T WEAR GLASSES EASILY	Very pale and oily 5'8" also dumb No copy/No mod/No trans doxxed can wear glasses easily

I can understand why some may want more choices that would more match themselves when registering, but I think it may be more important to teach people customize their avatar to be their self.

Edited October 30, 2020 by Chaser Zaks
tripped on my own words. pectus excavatum can be represented with a mesh, not autism.

[Solar Legion]

Just now, FairreLilette said:

Yeah, I was here but people bought their own stuff; some was primitive but not like making your own avi (skin and hair) with the SL tools.  I wasn't hanging out with people who were making their own avi's with the SL tools.  That was probably the building crowd which I was with the stripper crowd at the time.  There would not have been strippers if people were just making their skins and hair with the SL built-in tools.  

Early days as in pre-windlight and such.

Those tools are there for customization and bare bones 'creation' and pre-date the majority of external/additional content creation tools.

[Ceka Cianci]

7 minutes ago, FairreLilette said:

I'm talking about these make your own avatars with the SL tools which I just made quickly where you can turn the horrible blah skin any color, add ruddiness, add freckles...and then you can see I'm making hair and adding make-up - all with the built-in SL tools.  See to the right where I'm wearing what I named MY SKIN, MY HAIR.   We all can make these but they are horrible to say the least.  That's what I meant when I said I don't know why Phillip Rosedale put these tools in here.  I wasn't talking about the sliders that make our shape.

The tattoo layer, they didn't come out with until later.. you could only wear tattoo's where you could wear clothes, otherwise they had to be imported into SL as part of the skin..

The eye makeup for your freckles is a tattoo layer.

 

All this stuff is options after the starter avatar that I got back then.. I was comparing what starter avatars were like back then compared to today.. The picture I posted might have people that used some of these tools to improve their avatars back then.. But that only expresses even more, how bad they were out of the gate..hehehe

[Gabriele Graves]

2 hours ago, FairreLilette said:

Yesh you are right there are those but most people don't know about the library.  And, what I was really meaning is all those free "monsters" as shown in the post by Chaser Zaks.  Some of those are very cool.  I could see people just making accounts to get the free Monsters.  Do we have all those in our library - the monsters?   If so, I never knew that. 

Yes, those monster avatars are in the Library.  They are also available via "Avatar->Choose an Avatar" (under the Vampire category) which is about as prominent and obvious as it could possibly be for a menu item.  Sure, not as good as a big button on the UI saying "Choose an Avatar" but at least it isn't obscurely named and/or located in an unrelated menu several options deep.

I think that new users can discover "Choose an Avatar" quite easily because I have witnessed many newbies changing avatars in their first few days.  I think it is more the people who have been here a while who don't know about it and just don't seem to see it there on the menu.

[FairreLilette]

27 minutes ago, Solar Legion said:

Early days as in pre-windlight and such.

Those tools are there for customization and bare bones 'creation' and pre-date the majority of external/additional content creation tools.

Early days is not beginning.  I was in SL's beginnings but not the actual beginning.  I would never have stayed if avatars looked like the ones you can make with the SL built-in tools of making your own skin and hair although I did see a few avi's that looked like they made their own avi's with the built-in SL tools they were few and far between.  As a matter of fact, some hang out with the tinies today because making your own avatar is very low lag as is making your own clothes with the SL built-in tools.  There are still some around today hanging out with tinies.  Tinies pretty much accept everyone with the exception of nudity.

Edited October 30, 2020 by FairreLilette

[Gabriele Graves]

1 hour ago, Syo Emerald said:

Just delete all starteravatars and give people a round, grey ball as a replacement. Let them also select non-effective boxes during account creation, so they can play pretend that this gives their avatar any gender, orientation, religion, ethnicity, nationality, color preference, favorite pizza topping and more. Leave some blank boxes, too, so people can write in whatever else is missing. Problem solved.

There is an easier option.  Everyone starts as a cloud (probably happens a lot of the time anyway) with the text above their head saying "You are a cloud, your first objective is to discover your first avatar!".  That would make the goal orientated people who expect a game happy.

[Velk Kerang]

1 hour ago, Ceka Cianci said:

That's how you started out back then.. like a lump of clay with a basic shape, bewbies or no bewbies.. hehehehe

that's what i mean by it could be worse.. we could have those starter avatars still.. hehehe

 

 

Thank you. That's what I was thinking. The same exact thing basically. lol I mean I read the word non-binary and thought to myself is that actually a thing now when creating avatars? lol We need a label for it now? lol Because I am sitting here thinking ya news flash any of us old timers can tell the OP we were basically, technically non-binary right out the starting gate. lol At least they have choices now days. We had to build our avatars from scratch, straight from the ground on up. lol I don't recall ever being asked to select a gender at all. lol In fact I had to go shopping at the freebie place for my first little wee wee. Lmao!!!!

Edited October 30, 2020 by Velk Kerang
Corrections.

[Arielle Popstar]

1 minute ago, Velk Kerang said:

 lol In fact I had to go shopping at the freebie place for my first little wee wee. Lmao!!!!

My second visit they were actually raining out of the sky. That's when i was sold on S/L!

[Dakota Linden]

Greetings, All!

2020 has already been rough as it is, please TRY to be nice to each other.  I know it is a hard ask, but try.  If you are starting to post a comment, stop, take a breath, and ask yourself "is this worth possibly getting suspended for"?

If the answer is no, then do not post the comment. 

If the answer is yes, I strongly recommend not making the post and instead taking a break and going and sitting outside in the sun for 20 minutes and getting a bit of Vitamin D. 

[Solar Legion]

16 minutes ago, FairreLilette said:

Early days is not beginning.  I was in SL's beginnings but not the actual beginning.  I would never have stayed if avatars looked like the ones you can make with the SL built-in tools of making your own skin and hair although I did see a few avi's that looked like they made their own avi's with the built-in SL tools they were few and far between.  As a matter of fact, some hang out with the tinies today because making your own avatar is very low lag as is making your own clothes with the SL built-in tools.  There are still some around today hanging out with tinies.  Tinies pretty much accept everyone with the exception of nudity.

Sorry but no - from your own text you were not in Second Life at any point prior to Windlight, which is the Early Days.

The only time period where people actually (and seriously) used the built in tools to make things from scratch predates many of the earliest content creators.

Edited October 30, 2020 by Solar Legion

[FairreLilette]

4 minutes ago, Velk Kerang said:

Thank you. That's what I was thinking. The same exact thing basically. lol I mean I read the word non-binary and thought to myself is that actually a thing now when creating avatars? lol We need a label for it now? lol Because I am sitting here thinking ya news flash any of us old timers can tell the OP we were basically, technically non-binary right out the starting gate. lol At least they have choices now days. We had to build our avatars from scratch, straight from the ground on up. lol I don't recall ever being asked to select a gender at all. lol In fact I had to go shopping at the freebie place for my first little wee wee. Lmao!!!!

For me, I cannot remember how the first avatars looked that we choose from the year I first joined.  Now I've said my first account was probably 15 years ago.  I've been in SL three times.  My 2nd time I choose the female rocker.  The 3rd time, now, for this account, I choose the Angel.  I don't remember at all what avatar I started with nor even how it looked.  

I do remember it took me about a month to begin to have an avatar I was beginning to be happy with.  I also remember an early SLifer telling me about a skin and that I needed to get my own skin and I remember thinking...'say wha?' more or less.  I finally found a skin to buy in my first month here as ads started appearing to buy skins and then I found one through an ad.  

[Arielle Popstar]

11 minutes ago, Gabriele Graves said:

There is an easier option.  Everyone starts as a cloud (probably happens a lot of the time anyway) with the text above their head saying "You are a cloud, your first objective is to discover your first avatar!".  That would make the goal orientated people who expect a game happy.

That is actually a not half bad idea. I'd bet it would help with the retention rate. No more "What is there to do in Secondlife"

[Scylla Rhiadra]

27 minutes ago, Gabriele Graves said:

There is an easier option.  Everyone starts as a cloud (probably happens a lot of the time anyway) with the text above their head saying "You are a cloud, your first objective is to discover your first avatar!".  That would make the goal orientated people who expect a game happy.

This is, as per Arielle's comment above, an excellent idea.

The OP made a suggestion that had, I think, an interesting point to make about the new user experience -- they did not call anyone "racist" or suggest that this was a social justice issue, so I remain puzzled as to how this has become an issue here. It would be great if we could focus on recruitment and retention, as, in fact, the OP does.

I've suggested that a more diverse array of initial choices might be more "welcoming" to the really diverse range of people SL attracts. I'm not sure I don't like Gabriele's idea better. Much better in fact.

[Gabriele Graves]

25 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

My second visit they were actually raining out of the sky. That's when i was sold on S/L!

I was sold when I found out how wonderful flying was.  I didn't really care how I looked for ages, I just zipped here, there and anywhere exploring the mainland.  I remember even appreciating the fact it has a whoosh sound and how wonderful that was.  Without exposure to that aspect early on during Orientation Island, I may well not have stuck around.

[FairreLilette]

26 minutes ago, Solar Legion said:

Sorry but no - from your own text you were not in Second Life at any point prior to Windlight, which is the Early Days.

The only time period where people actually (and seriously) used the built in tools to make things from scratch predates many of the earliest content creators.

Early days is plural and is not the same word as beginning.  Beginning is the beginning is the beginning, and I don't know what the heck timeline for windlight is.  As a matter of fact, I don't even use windlight now and never liked it.  I can use the ENVIRONMENT EDITOR now.  Also, as a matter of fact, there was a thread recently and most said they only use MIDDAY and that's what I mostly use.  I only use the ENVIRONMENT EDITOR for photographs.  I haven't even upgraded to EEP yet.

But, you can keep your know-it-all view of what early days plural is and please leave me out of your definition of early days plural.  Thank you.    

 

Edited October 30, 2020 by FairreLilette