Second Life Product / Business Ideas for Generation Alpha

[Love Zhaoying]

I think some already miss the point: assuming Second Life IS still around, how will it attract / engage that next incoming group?

Current projects as examples that may help include ongoing graphics improvements, Mobile viewers..

Assumimg current trends and past flops, it's far from certain that any other metaverse "like Second Life" will succeed..

One possibility is, since the Gen-A's are not old enough "yet", time and trends will reveal what they would want from Second Life, and whether Second Life and/or its user-generated content (often left out of the equation) will be able to deliver that.

[Extrude Ragu]

I mean by the time those who are 14 now are mature enough to be playing SL, their interests will change and evolve and I suspect in many ways SL will have its own natural appeal over these platforms targeted at a younger audience.

With that said, maybe it would pay its dues for some residents and the SL Marketing team to create roblox accounts and play for a day. Figure out what features from Roblox are really good/popular and should make their way into SL.

[Love Zhaoying]

37 minutes ago, Extrude Ragu said:

 

I mean by the time those who are 14 now are mature enough to be playing SL, their interests will change and evolve and I suspect in many ways SL will have its own natural appeal over these platforms targeted at a younger audience.

 

Yes! This is what I meant by:

4 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

One possibility is, since the Gen-A's are not old enough "yet", time and trends will reveal what they would want from Second Life, and whether Second Life and/or its user-generated content (often left out of the equation) will be able to deliver that.

 

[Zalificent Corvinus]

4 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

time and trends will reveal what they would want from Second Life

"Wai r SL not a 1st persun shoota? Wai u no hav levuls? Wai r it alowd to haz reelee old peepul wot r over 25 an neerlee ded! Dis gaym  r suk!"

[Spiffy Voxel]

17 minutes ago, Zalificent Corvinus said:

"Wai r SL not a 1st persun shoota? Wai u no hav levuls? Wai r it alowd to haz reelee old peepul wot r over 25 an neerlee ded! Dis gaym  r suk!"

Reading that made my brain hurt. I suspect only slightly less than it hurt you to write it. >.<

[Love Zhaoying]

4 minutes ago, Spiffy Voxel said:

22 minutes ago, Zalificent Corvinus said:

"Wai r SL not a 1st persun shoota? Wai u no hav levuls? Wai r it alowd to haz reelee old peepul wot r over 25 an neerlee ded! Dis gaym  r suk!"

Reading that made my brain hurt. I suspect only slightly less than it hurt you to write it. >.<

I was going to add in my original post, that SL will need a real-time translator between "Gen-A" and "Old-Sp33k"!

With my earlier "never actually type" option, it would need to be a "stack" of voice/text translators!

Gen-A's will need:

- Voice->Text (final language will be in a form of "Gen-A") for Outgoing messages

- "Old-Sp33k" Text-> "Gen-A" Text for Incoming messages

Old-Sp33k's will need:

- "Gen-A" Text-> "Old-Sp33k" Text for Incoming messages

- "Old-Sp33k" Text-> "Gen-A" Text for Outgoing messages

 

[Blaise Glendevon]

ITT: People who don't interact with young people in any meaningful way. 

[Rat Luv]

17 minutes ago, Spiffy Voxel said:

Reading that made my brain hurt. I suspect only slightly less than it hurt you to write it. >.<

Straight bussin fr fr no cap 🙂

[Ayashe Ninetails]

1 minute ago, Rat Luv said:

Straight bussin fr fr no cap 🙂

Those are the older Zoomers. 🤣 Gen Alpha's a bit too young to be whipping out the "bet" "king" "AF."

[Love Zhaoying]

16 minutes ago, Blaise Glendevon said:

ITT: People who don't interact with young people in any meaningful way. 

LOL! I had to lookup "ITT".

15 minutes ago, Rat Luv said:

Straight bussin

I had to read this twice, to make sure you weren't making a reference to the recently popularized "bussy"!!

 

 

[Rat Luv]

4 minutes ago, Love Zhaoying said:

LOL! I had to lookup "ITT".

I had to read this twice, to make sure you weren't making a reference to the recently popularized "bussy"!!

Plot twist: Generation Alpha ditches all internet speak and uses SL to throw exclusive Great Gatsby style parties 🍸 "PBR...it's terrifically vulgar!" 🧐

[Love Zhaoying]

1 minute ago, Rat Luv said:

Plot twist: Generation Alpha ditches all internet speak and uses SL to throw exclusive Great Gatsby style parties 🍸 "PBR...it's terrifically vulgar!" 🧐

I can see that happening if Gen-A realizes that "their dumb parents" are a big part of the problem, and "the man" wants to "keep them down" by being uneducated.

This could all backfire if AI's create most Web information in the future, as it could be "made up", "use bad English", etc.  But Gen-A could rebel against that too, since AI will be taking all the jobs!

Idea: Second Life will be an excellent platform for Gen-A's to connect and plan their uprising against the AI's!! 

Assuming that "social media" will be scanned more than SL (one should hope) for any rebellious thoughts or tendencies.

 

[MissSweetViolet]

It's hard to predict what someone will want by the time their old enough to be in SL, but some things I think would help, not just with this, but in General include;

1. Something that explains the UI on character creation, I assume this doesn't exist and someone can correct me if I'm wrong. But a simple tutorial describing the main features of how the UI works and things like how to move, how to make an outfit, etc. While I'm in the SL is not a game camp, with the complicated UI SL has, it could learn a lot from gaming tutorials in this regard. It should be with the character creation, mandatory [not the biggest fan of forced tutorials by any means, but to many do not pay attention otherwise and then they wonder how to make a basic outfit or the like], and cover the basics, long enough to orient the user with controls/basic features, but not so long it gets tedious. I realize not an easy balance to strike maybe at first, but could be adjusted as needed.

2. Immersion, just because SL is not a game, doesn't mean SL couldn't lean into some of the aspects, something that probably will appeal at least in part to Gen A. I'm not even talking graphics or anything like that [though with some that might make a difference too]. But like, I've seen some amazing haunted houses, Christmas displays, escape rooms, tours, etc. A lot of that is user generated, but LL could do more of this too, this could actually attract a lot of people who don't know what to do.

3. Access to what is out there. Whatever someone's interest does little good if no one can find it. There has been effort to try and help with this, but not enough in my opinion, we need a better way to search for different activities of varying interests, and one that doesn't "pick and choose" what gets added like the Destination Guide feels like it does.

4 [maybe?]. Platform options, SL is already working on this. I would not be surprised if more from Gen A gravitated more to mobile. Though this one I'm less sure on, because I somewhat think regardless of generation, I'm beginning to think most people in general when it comes to something like this, care less then you think about a mobile platform. Think about it, who really wants to try and dress their avatar, adjust that little hat in place, or try to move in a crowded space on a tiny mobile device over a big screen? I think that's large in part why we don't see VR everywhere yet, who want to try and do that in VR? [Don't even get me started on motion sickness]. Most YouTubers that this Gen would be watching aren't playing mobile games, that have gaming desktops, and if one of them ever did decide to take on SL [I doubt it, just do to the reputation for some content creators], I'm fairy sure they would be on a desktop. Which could make a huge difference as to the platform they would choose for SL.

If I think of anything else later I'll try to add it, but this is what I thought of at the moment.

Edited March 4 by MissSweetViolet
Spelling corrections.

[Rowan Amore]

49 minutes ago, MissSweetViolet said:

Access to what is out there. Whatever someone's interest does little good if no one can find it. There has been effort to try and help with this, but not enough in my opinion, we need a better way to search for different activities of varying interests, and one that doesn't "pick and choose" what gets added like the Destination Guide feels like it does.

There are 27867 distinct regions in SL.  Some public, some private, some a mixture of both.  People who have public regions are the ones responsible for making their region searchable and using language that describes their region for people searching.  LL can't be responsible for populating a list of any of this.  They've given us the tools so we need to use them.  I can't even think of a way LL could make it better.  Regions/groups/people come and go in the blink of an eye so any list would have to be updated daily.  LL can barely deal with what they already have on their plate.  Hand holding people to help them "find what interests them" is never going to work.  The new community thingamajig is their current attempt.

[Love Zhaoying]

3 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

There are 27867 distinct regions in SL.  Some public, some private, some a mixture of both.  People who have public regions are the ones responsible for making their region searchable and using language that describes their region for people searching.  LL can't be responsible for populating a list of any of this.  They've given us the tools so we need to use them.  I can't even think of a way LL could make it better.

Maybe "more details for 'place' search listings", and "better 'place' search"?

For example:  Let's say I want to list a place that is "friendly to furries", and "voice friendly", "has scheduled activities", "is new-user friendly", and "does not require PIOF".  Not all those things are "searchable", right?  (I left out "ratings" because that is a "basic" search criteria.)  At the least, it would be nice to know if someplace does not require "PIOF".

[Sid Nagy]

Gen A will wait for mom or dad to show up and fix things for them, like they fix everything for them. Always.
So every Gen A sign up will automatically generate two more.

[Arielle Popstar]

3 minutes ago, Sid Nagy said:

Gen A will wait for mom or dad to show up and fix things for them, like they fix everything for them. Always.
So every Gen A sign up will automatically generate two more.

Mom and Dad should fix everything since they raised that generation to be what they are! They raised them then don't like the result and blame the child rather than themselves. Parents should take responsibility for what they produced.

[Love Zhaoying]

6 minutes ago, Sid Nagy said:

Gen A will wait for mom or dad to show up and fix things for them, like they fix everything for them. Always.
So every Gen A sign up will automatically generate two more.

I thought that was Gen Z. 

[Orwar]

6 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

The new community thingamajig is their current attempt.

   And this is how I would describe that effort in one picture:

[Ayashe Ninetails]

1 hour ago, MissSweetViolet said:

4 [maybe?]. Platform options, SL is already working on this. I would not be surprised if more from Gen A gravitated more to mobile.

Gen Alpha (and Z and others, for that matter) are very much on mobile and consoles. Cross-platform is huge and very necessary these days. Though more specifically, mobile gamers are lured by slightly different mechanics than the console/PC crowd. If you want to get mobile users to yeet cash around, turning SL into an anime RPG with gacha mechanics is the way to go. 🤣

Console and PC gamers typically find that sort of thing to be ultra-predatory and go in the other direction - wanting earnable (via gameplay) in-game currencies and cosmetics. Battle-passes are tolerated (somewhat). F2P + cash shop is treated with skepticism, but some are accepting and definitely spend quite a bit, so SL might appeal to them. B2P (with or without purchasable DLC) is the most comfortable option.

At any rate, all gens are currently messing around with games that have embraced some pretty fancy tech regardless, so that's likely what's needed to catch their attention.

 

1 hour ago, MissSweetViolet said:

But like, I've seen some amazing haunted houses, Christmas displays, escape rooms, tours, etc.

Escape rooms is actually a neat idea. There are a ton of escape room games being released these days. Spot the difference/anomaly games are coming in hot as well, but that might be a bit harder to pull off in SL.

[Love Zhaoying]

Me to Gen-A'ers:  "When I was a cub, we had PONG. And, we LIKED it!"

 

[Zalificent Corvinus]

14 minutes ago, Ayashe Ninetails said:

If you want to get mobile users to yeet cash around, turning SL into an anime RPG with gacha mechanics is the way to go.

I'd rather it just closed down than that. That mess wouldn't be SL any more.

Goodbye SL. Die with dignity.

 

16 minutes ago, Ayashe Ninetails said:

Escape rooms is actually a neat idea

SL already has one, it's called "Welcome Hub", the goal is to see if you can escape without rage quitting forever, before your account is more than an hour old.

Most contestants fail apparently,

 

[Orwar]

   The only games mobile phones are good for are Sudoku, Snake, and that bouncy ball game my first phone had. The only games consoles are good for are platformers and driving games. People who want the ability to place accurate clicks and type coherently use a computer with a mouse and keyboard. People who play first-person shooters and real-time strategy games on console shouldn't be allowed to vote.

[Love Zhaoying]

8 minutes ago, Orwar said:

People who play first-person shooters and real-time strategy games on console shouldn't be allowed to vote.

/me quotes you for posterity!

[Ayashe Ninetails]

5 minutes ago, Orwar said:

   The only games mobile phones are good for are Sudoku, Snake, and that bouncy ball game my first phone had. The only games consoles are good for are platformers and driving games. People who want the ability to place accurate clicks and type coherently use a computer with a mouse and keyboard. People who play first-person shooters and real-time strategy games on console shouldn't be allowed to vote.

Lol, I'll never understand how people tolerate something like Terraria on a phone or Valheim on an Xbox, but here we are. Even SL on a phone sounds like a nightmare to me, but what do I know. I ditched consoles after PS2 and refuse to play games on tiny screens.