We invite you to share your perspective and help us improve the Second Life experience!

[Jordyn McGregor]

I'm just wondering if/how they asked about "gender"...

[LittleMe Jewell]

Most surveys that I've seen lately make all of the demographic questions optional -- you can click a 'prefer not to answer' box or such.

Personally, as long as the survey cannot be tied directly back to my SL avatar or my RL person, then I don't have a problem giving demographic info.  Unfortunately, too often the link to a survey includes an identifier, that at the very least links it back to the email address they sent it to.

[bigmoe Whitfield]

1 hour ago, Silent Mistwalker said:

I'd tell you to ask them if they are apples or blankets but that would probably piss them off even more. Oh well. 

It may be that their nation(s) never occupied both sides of the present day Canadian-US border. Ours did. 

The vast majority of us consider ourselves <insert tribe here> before considering ourselves to be American, if we even consider ourselves to be American. Depends on who you talk to and how assimilated they are. 

yeah the american moniker isnt something they use,  just the native bit,   we get some new people that come through and see our native staff and it's instantly,  them getting schooled lol.

[ChinRey]

12 hours ago, LilNosferatu said:

those questions are asked almost every single time whether it seems relevant to the specific survey or not.

In the USA perhaps but certainly not in Europe and I doubt you'll see them very often elsewhere in the world either. You may see the income question but always with a "won't tell" option.

As for the ethnicity question, unlike Alwin I'm not really offended by it. It's just to weird for me to relate to at all.

[Akane Nacht]

It's more cringe than offensive. Nothing says "we care about our customers" like a lazily designed, copy paste survey with nonsensical questions for an international audience. 😑

That said, I'd be happy to give my feedback on a proper survey.

[ChinRey]

5 minutes ago, Akane Nacht said:

That said, I'd be happy to give my feedback on a proper survey.

Yes, the fact they finally try to run a customer survey is actually good news and if they got it wrong this time, we have to keep in mind that they still have to learn how to do it.

[StarlanderGoods]

43 minutes ago, ChinRey said:

Yes, the fact they finally try to run a customer survey is actually good news and if they got it wrong this time, we have to keep in mind that they still have to learn how to do it.

Are there any questions in the survey that could lead to LL improving their service for the user? Or is it all just about how to better monetize the platform?

[Hunny Bunny]

1 minute ago, StarlanderGoods said:

Are there any questions in the survey that could lead to LL improving their service for the user? Or is it all just about how to better monetize the platform?

[LilNosferatu]

Just now, StarlanderGoods said:

Are there any questions in the survey that could lead to LL improving their service for the user? Or is it all just about how to better monetize the platform?

In the email it said the survey itself was to find participants of certain demographics that they would later choose for interviews. The exact purpose wasn't shared (aside from the vague "help us improve the SL experience"), so they might be looking for specific types of people to interview for whatever they're looking into.

[Quistess Alpha]

For anyone curious, I did the thing. They ask basic questions, then a really open-ended one, then tell you that you may or may not be considered for an actual in-world interview.

[Silent Mistwalker]

Yay! I didn't get one so I can still fly under the radar! Whee!

[Maryanne Solo]

The vague "shotgun" approach of the questions leads one to view some of the staff mugshots in the Senior Management & Client Service section, to see who on earth would be involved with such an organisation.
Given the brutality of some questions one ponders the hereditary traits of some of the individuals involved.

There's a dude there who.... well... I can't comment any further I'm afraid.. 🤨
I think it goes some ways to explaining things tho..... 

[Alwin Alcott]

2 hours ago, ChinRey said:

As for the ethnicity question, unlike Alwin I'm not really offended by it. It's just to weird for me to relate to at all.

i'm also not really offendend ( can simply end answering and close it), but more how do they dare to ask such questions after their 200% support of the woke movement.. these questions should not pass their design table at all. Am "i" now only intersting for them if i miss a leg, am a lhbti+ member with a green skin and blue hair?... absurd.

Edited January 12, 2022 by Alwin Alcott

[Prokofy Neva]

On 1/11/2022 at 1:15 AM, Alwin Alcott said:

OK .. nothing wrong... till
asking for my income
and some other eyeroll questions....

and this....

 

sorry but what the heck is this of your concern??... what does this help to ïmprove" SL ????
and btw i'm not white, but European

at his screen i closed the window ... rewrite your survey or pick a different partner to question your residents.

( received from mc.secondlife.com)

 

Those are all standard for surveys in the US, by both reputable and non-reputable institutions.

But I personally won't fill out surveys like that unless they pay me, and I mean real money, not a whirl on their spinner where I "might" win a laptop.

UPDATE: Actually, I got that survey in my mailbox and filled it out as it is like many other surveys I'm happy to fill out because all the major platforms already have this information, and fortunately some have paid me for it. They do offer a $75 Visa gift card. BUT you have to be selected to take part. And for that FIRST you have to yield up your data. And I find I am never selected for these things because I'm not a high-spending demographic, I'm old and poor plus white and American, and they'll have too many of those from SL so if they want a better sampling hopefully they will broaden their reach.

I'm wondering if the people in this thread are not American or maybe not poor. It is very, very, very common for Americans to fill out these surveys, especially people looking to make points on various systems that reward you for them. I typically make $25 US in Amazon gift coupons a month from these things. The problem is that I'm seldom chosen for the reasons explained.

Edited January 12, 2022 by Prokofy Neva

[Prokofy Neva]

1 hour ago, Alwin Alcott said:

i'm also not really offendend ( can simply end answering and close it), but more how do they dare to ask such questions after their 200% support of the woke movement.. these questions should not pass their design table at all. Am "i" now only intersting for them if i miss a leg, am a lhbti+ member with a green skin and blue hair?... absurd.

No, you're not getting this. It's BECAUSE they are woke that they are asking them! If they weren't woke, they wouldn't. Woke is all about identity.

[Prokofy Neva]

1 hour ago, Maryanne Solo said:

The vague "shotgun" approach of the questions leads one to view some of the staff mugshots in the Senior Management & Client Service section, to see who on earth would be involved with such an organisation.
Given the brutality of some questions one ponders the hereditary traits of some of the individuals involved.

There's a dude there who.... well... I can't comment any further I'm afraid.. 🤨
I think it goes some ways to explaining things tho..... 

I literally have filled out thousands of such surveys, as have all my family, friends, and colleagues. I guess you are just not in the US (judging by the "s") and outside of this culture. It is extremely prevalent. And the goal is to get at least a coupon out of it.

[Prokofy Neva]

14 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

The irony here is that there is stuff that we all wish we could tell LL about how to improve the platform -- and none of this is it.

Marketing is so weird. Rather than simply ask us, "Do you want more games on the platform?" they want to slot us into demographics that they think will indirectly tell them the same information.

Because their analytics, they're pretty sure, know us better than we know ourselves.

Well, then, make your own marketing survey? Seriously. Design it properly in the way you think it should be done, get your fellow residents involved, and present a report to LL. It might differ starkly from the predictable results this one will get.

[Sid Nagy]

7 hours ago, animats said:

The trouble is, it definitively establishes where the product sucks. Many companies can't handle the truth.

This and this again.

Way too often LL is too convinced that what they are producing is the best solution for SL.
And stay with that view no matter what the user base is telling them at meetings in world, on forums, trough mail etc.

Asking us if we are Native Americans or Asian and how much we make a year will not solve any problem nor bring the platform any further. It is nothing more than window dressing: See how much we care?

Edited January 12, 2022 by Sid Nagy

[ChinRey]

3 hours ago, LilNosferatu said:

In the email it said the survey itself was to find participants of certain demographics that they would later choose for interviews.

Oh, that explains why Europeans and South American aren't on the list then; we're not in their target group.

[Syo Emerald]

1 hour ago, Prokofy Neva said:

No, you're not getting this. It's BECAUSE they are woke that they are asking them! If they weren't woke, they wouldn't. Woke is all about identity.

Nah, its not woke in the slightest. Not even, if this was directed at only the US territory. And since its for a product with an international userbase, it just falls flat on its face, by either leaving out entire ethnicities or oversimplyfying them. I hope LL didn't pay much for this half-assed survey.

[Prokofy Neva]

2 hours ago, Syo Emerald said:

Nah, its not woke in the slightest. Not even, if this was directed at only the US territory. And since its for a product with an international userbase, it just falls flat on its face, by either leaving out entire ethnicities or oversimplyfying them. I hope LL didn't pay much for this half-assed survey.

I don't know what the breakdown is now of the SL population writ large. I know in my own cheap rentals I likely have more non-Americans than Americans, so there are A LOT of non-Americans in SL. But I could understand that if LL, which obviously has this information, targets only those they view as the bulk of their population, they won't care. It's strictly pragmatic and they won't care if anyone thinks it is stupid or insensitive. I think it takes Americans a long time still to grasp that they are not the growing, green tip of the real world any more at all.

But it is woke to ask for ethnicity or race. That is exactly the center of gravity of woke. 

 

[Prokofy Neva]

3 hours ago, ChinRey said:

Oh, that explains why Europeans and South American aren't on the list then; we're not in their target group.

Like all surveys of this type, they will choose those they think have SPENDING POWER. That's all it's about. They don't care if it is a vehicle for improving the lives of people in poor countries, or empowering women, or whatever else it might actually do that is beneficial. They will care where the SPENDING is done. And that means people with job, high salaries, and the demographics and countries where that is the case. This isn't a survey about how to make SL a better charity. Or a better low-cost platform for more people. It's about how this business can make more money, in part so that its investors can make back their investment and continue to justify keeping it open.

That may seem cruel and insensitive and even evil, but it is a fact of life. They need SL to make a profit. I'm not sure it does these days. They may lure people in with the idea that they are really helping to improve a vital utility that is the prototype of the Metaverse where we will all live and move and have our being some day, as we do on the Internet. But that's not what it is about.

There are enormous numbers of Brazilians in SL, and cumulatively, they may spend more than white Americans in Ohio or something. But the Lindens and or their hired guns here will not think in any other categories other than those that determine how they can get more customers who will spend more money.

 

[Prokofy Neva]

10 hours ago, Jordan Whitt said:

I'm just wondering if/how they asked about "gender"...

I recall only 3 boxes, 4 tops, which is 15 less than on my hospital forms.

[Prokofy Neva]

21 hours ago, Syo Emerald said:

@LilNosferatu Well, its still a terrible example of a ethnicity question in a survey. Its incomplete and given the topic insensitive, if you adress an international audience.

The United States has a population currently of 329.5 million people.

It has representatives of every nation of the world in it who have come as immigrants in this or past generations. It is very diverse, and very different from many European and Asian nations that often have one large "titular nationality" or ethnicity with the largest population and other minorities with far smaller populations. For example in Norway, a grand 72% of the population are ethnic Norwegians, something you could never find in any American locale anywhere, even in the traditional Scandinavian immigrant population areas.

And yes, while incredibly diverse, and far more diverse and more accepting of refugees and immigrants than some European and Asian countries, it also has areas of incredible white supremacy, racism and extremism as the events of January 6 amply illustrate. But you do need to look at America as a big country, with lots of different people, and many different states which are very diverse in nature. And it's also helpful to recall that many of the people in the US have families with historical memories of fleeing pogroms, wars, ethnic cleansing, religious intolerance and more in Europe and Asia.

Here is the Racial Dot Map made by the University of Virginia, yes it is called that. Yes, the census didn't capture the entire population and there is probably a lot of untold news there, but basically, the outlines are likely broadly correct.

Here is what CNN said about this map and the census in general in 2020:

The United States is more diverse and has more people than ever before, with much of the growth occurring in and around metropolitan areas, according to the 2020 census. By plotting the population onto a map of the country according to density and group, it’s possible to get a bird’s-eye view of where we live and how we identify.

This map could be made because people filled out their ethnicity/race on the census forms, which were more granulated than ever before.

So it is in this context of diversity that the questionnaire you are all so furious about is made -- and PS it is like every other survey, form, questionnaire, intake sheet every where, all over America. It is a product of not just the "melting pot" ideology of the past but indeed of "woke" ideology currently. You are definitely NOT going to find ANY survey ANYWHERE now without a request for race/ethnicity because they want to capture the diversity in America, and they already have elaborate data sets broken down about the purchasing capacity and habits of all those races and ethnicities, by location. And people have so internalized that here that it would be odd if someone refused to write down their race/ethnicity for a hospital form, a school form, a form to answer a store survey and get a coupon. It is completely normal. The idea that asking for someone to tell you their race or income is offensive, intolerant or unacceptable just doesn't compute for Americans. It may compute for the purpose of this survey; but as a survey artifact in survey culture, it does.

I can't think of anyone here reacting as you all are to this list of ethnicities *in America* where "Native Americans" is the term used, not First Nations as in Canada, and without any objection by Native Americans themselves. And where you don't say "South America" but "Latin America" generally, as "Latinx" is something that Hispanic people themselves laugh at.

So sure, the SL survey is made by Americans for people they see answering it which they expect will be mainly Americans. And from what I can tell, that's what it will be, as you all are so offended you won't even fill it out, and they are likely to sift through and reject those with low incomes as such market surveys often do. So yes, the Linden overlords will get a group of people for their "focus" sessions who spend a lot on their game and may be useful to talk to in evolving their game.

I imagine this thread is destined for closure, but it has been instructive as to why the forums are the way they are.

[Syo Emerald]

@Prokofy Neva You know, sometimes I feel like you want to dominate a discussion by writing the most long winded answer possible without actually adressing whatever you have quoted. You waffle on and on and I paitently read, hoping that somewhere in there is actually something that is a response to what I wrote... but nope. After a lot of irrelevant information comes your conclusion, that we are all offended because they dared to ask for ethnicity/race and that this is wrong, because its normal for Americans. Glory to the perfect by default american surveys!

Hint: My criticism wasn't about the question existing at all.