SL Bloggers - Your Thoughts

[Perrie Juran]

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Prokofy Neva wrote:

It will be fanboi stuff.

But that's ok. It's their game. Write on your own blog about your own game.

The Lindens have a problem: they can't get refreshed content on their blog. Rodvik hasn't written for ages, none of them have. They are too busy just running the platform and doing their thing. It's hard. And expensive. They can't justify hiring another Hamlet again or having Wallace Lindens, er, "curate the conversation" or whatever it was that...Wallace did.

They have to use/exploit the resident fanbase, and that's ok. It's a great idea. The Linden who has to edit the stuff will have enough work but at least it will be passionate.

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It's absolutely their turf so absolutely their game.  And they want good PR. 

The thing is that people see through Fanboi stuff.  Or maybe that is an assumption on my part.

If you want good PR you have to treat your customers with respect, courtesy and dignity because word of mouth is still your best advertising.

I always get a kick out of this quote because of his reputation as a womanizer, but it is still a great quote:

“You can be the most artistically perfect performer in the world, but an audience is like a broad - if you're indifferent, Endsville.”         Frank Sinatra

[Medhue Simoni]

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Prokofy Neva wrote:

 You no doubt supported the anti-SOPA campaign. Ok, well, then you made the Internet free for piracy and rip-offs of content and driving it to cost $0. You should have supported it then.

 

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Well, I know we were on separate sides of the fence, but I don't see SOPA the same way. IMHO, the war is not between creators and those that want what we make for free, but rather the war is between corporate monopolies and creators. Yes, half the creators still work for those monopolies, but they refuse to see the chains placed on their work, and their lives. SOPA give those monopolies even more power, and does not help any1 like myself, at all. Even the DMCA goes way overboard.

Plus, in general, I'm against, almost all, regulation. Piracy is a technical and moral issue, not 1 that can be regulated by more laws and guns.

Now, back to the blog thing. I just want to make 1 more ploy for SL to have it's own blogging system. At some point, I've read all the blogs that people have mentioned here. I don't read them all the time. Why don't I? Well, I forget where they are. I can't remember the names of every blog. Yeah, I can save the link, but I'll forget about the link, or I will forget the name of the link. If I had quick access to every blog, I'd probably read most of them. This needs to be part of the things I'm already doing tho, not forcing me to seek it out. This is why I feel that we should not be using all these outside services, like wordpress, or even flicker. It hurts SL promotion for things to be spread out like this. When I click a link to a picture, or a blog, and I goto some isolated page somewhere on the internet, that is not as good as if all those links sent you to an SL domain. Even videos.

Considering all the unused land or lost islands, LL should have more than enough server space.:smileytongue:

 

[Thinkerer Melville]

I do have quick access to every blog I have wanted to follow.  I use Google reader.  I check it several times a day. It shows me the titles of new posts from every blog on its list.  Tha'ts about 130 now.   I can them skim the titles and read any of the posts I want.  

If you want simpler way to follow such blogs, start paying attention to the blogrolls on some of the blogs you read often.  My blogroll follows over 100 blogs related to virtual worlds.  It always shows the 25 most recent posts, with a little of the beginning text to help you decide whether you want to read more.

http://virtualoutworlding.blogspot.com/

TKR 

[Medhue Simoni]

Look what happened before 2011. We were ignored. Everything we said was ignored. Things are definitely different now. They are listening, and taking action, when they can. I still think they are listening to some of the wrong advise at times, but It's not hard to understand how confusing it is to distinguish the good ideas versus the bad. SL, has to easily be the most complex system with an unlimited amount of variables.

All that said, you can't fear your community and what they will say. Expect bad comments. Expect negativity. Embrace it. Learn from it. Believe me, if you do even a decent job, there will be many more praises than curses. Just my opinion. It definitely is not easy to except the curses, but to reject them would be a disservice to yourself, or your company.

[Perrie Juran]

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Medhue Simoni wrote:

Look what happened before 2011. We were ignored. Everything we said was ignored. Things are definitely different now. They are listening, and taking action, when they can. I still think they are listening to some of the wrong advise at times, but It's not hard to understand how confusing it is to distinguish the good ideas versus the bad. SL, has to easily be the most complex system with an unlimited amount of variables.

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I agree, there are some things that look promising.  But their are still some things that I find discouraging. 

Even at ten some odd years old, SL can very much seem like a petulant adolescent at times.

[Phil Deakins]

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Prokofy Neva wrote:

I think truth is actually my brand. But I can understand if traffic infusers don't like my truths.

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But your truths are sometimes unrelated to actual truth. In fact, your truths are sometimes invented to make a point that you have a chip on your shoulder about. Would you mind posting a link to the blog you wrote about my bots? It's all very self-explanatory in that one - unless you've doctored it, of course, because it was very emabarrassing for you. If it's still as it was when it was currrent, it doesn't even need any commentary

[Pamela Galli]

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Amethyst Jetaime wrote:

 

I also have severe reservations that this is going to turn out like everything else they do.  Their 'favorites' will get in and reap any benefits and everyone else is just wasting time, just like any other time they've allowed non Lindens to post an entry.  I wouldn't be surprised if they already have chosen who they want and this post is just a screen so they can say it was open to everyone because of the complaints they get about it.

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Bingo -- and that is based  on pretty much every promotion they do.  I have been lobbying for mesh information and education by LL, but requested that they not just turn it into another opportunity to showcase selected creators.

 

[Pie Serendipity]

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Prokofy Neva wrote:

The Lindens have a problem: they can't get refreshed content on their blog. Rodvik hasn't written for ages, none of them have. They are too busy just running the platform and doing their thing. It's hard. And expensive. They can't justify hiring another Hamlet again or having Wallace Lindens, er, "curate the conversation" or whatever it was that...Wallace did.

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They have more of a problem than just their Blogaganda. The Lindens have been run off their Twitter accounts because they can't control what is said on them and of them. They have been told not to use LinkedIn because it is too public. They have been told not to use personal accounts, but to communicate under the supernym of "Linden.Lab". They have been forced to restrict access to their profile feeds.

Their attempts to muzzle criticism by bans and muting are unenforceable. Their marketing function has been reduced to penny-ante "contests" and overt commercial promotion of last-year's thing (sorry Vamps, you're a dead loss) or Disnified microadventures, presumably aimed at the immature of all ages.

LL has lost control of its internet communications channels. An appeal to the vanity of bloggers who are driving the nails into the coffin of LL's credibility was always going to be doomed to failure. I will be fascinated to see which brown-tongued commercial opportunist is going to be first to offer up weasel-words that will rebound on them.

Pie says "Just don't!"

[161488303349]

never thought about it as a  form of promotion for the author. linden will probably get heaps of ppl lining up to do. that be good bc will bring more bloggers to the front who i never heard of

so maybe thats even better than only put ppl who already well-known on the front page. like i was suggesting before

some ppl can make even the most mundane things interesting. just by how they approach it and make some new insight that makes you think about other things. sometimes things not even the subject of the article. i quite like when that happens

i like diversity also in what i read. some ppl like same old same old and only read authors they agree with already. is ok for them to do that tho. is just not for me. i not really learn anything that way

[Medhue Simoni]

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16 wrote:

i like diversity also in what i read. some ppl like same old same old and only read authors they agree with already. is ok for them to do that tho. is just not for me. i not really learn anything that way

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Exactly!

What LL is proposing, is nonproductive, or overly time consuming. Essentially, the result will be hundreds of people wasting their time for every posting. Not just the writers, but the LL personal having to read all the articles. In the end choosing 1 each time. Now, maybe, overtime, the LL editors could have a backlog of articles that they can have ready to be posted, which would save some time, but they still have to read all those new submissions. This, to me, as a business man, sounds extremely nonproductive. Plus, what does the end result get you? 1 blog that might be interesting to 20% of the community, at best.

Every1 knows we have a HUGE blogging community here. To me, it just makes sense to have our own builtin spots to blog on, drawing all that scattered attention onto the domain of the actual world that we are talking about. The end result equates to a very productive climate where every1's work, warrented or not, gets public view. The only work involved for LL, after the systems creation, is maintenance, and dealing with a few naughty people. Whatever SL topic you could ever want would be right there in a search with spots for most read blogs, or most commented of the day, or maybe blogs with the most LOVE. Who knows, but that would surely be better than a few lindens having to read hundreds of blogs, and then choosing 1, or however many.

This is also another spot where LL's titles idea might come in handy. Our blogs would need to be properly identified as to who, and what relationship the blogger has to SL. This would keep any1 from thinking 1 of us are speaking for LL. So, after my name would be some title I choose, like Animator/Developer/Resident.

[Caitlin Tobias]

I do like the idea of LL giving an opportunity to their resident-bloggers, to share blogposts with the rest of the community. Not so much for exposure of the blogs, but to show the different views and experiences we all have. It may be a nice idea.

However, for me...not in this format. Yes, I am one of those 'happy' bloggers, you will not find any nasty or grumpy posts on my blog. I love to share the beauty and the fun - as SL is my escape from every day misery.

I would rather see LL features blogposts directly from the original blog, they should be able to do so if they have an RSS or google-reader with blogs from residents, that's not that difficult.
A bit like they currently do already with the Flickr pic of the day.

I will not submit any 'original' post as they ask now, nor would I like to give them editrights to my writings. And no, my English may not be perfect, but hey..I write as me and who I am, isn't SL all about diversitiy, I am sure readers can skip over a typo or a grammar mistake here and there.
Editing my words into a smoother text would take away my identity and my way of blogging, not something I would feel good about.

 

ETA: wah to typo

[Pie Serendipity]

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Caitlin Tobias wrote:

I do like the idea of LL giving an opportunity to their resident-bloggers, to share blogposts with the rest of the community. Not so much for exposure of the blogs, but to show the different views and experiences we all have. It may be a nice idea.

However, for me...not in this format. Yes, I am one of those 'happy' bloggers, you will not find any nasty or grumpy posts on my blog. I love to share the beauty and the fun - as SL is my escape from every day misery.

I would rather see LL features blogposts directly from the original blog, they should be able to do so if they have an RSS or google-reader with blogs from residents, that's not that difficult.

A bit like they currently do already with the Flickr pic of the day.

I will not submit any 'original' post as they ask now, nor would I like to give them editrights to my writings. And no, my English may not be perfect, but hey..I write as me and who I am, isn't SL all about diversitiy, I am sure readers can skip over a typo or a grammar mistake here and there.

Editing my words into a smoother text would take away my identity and my way of blogging, not something I would feel good about.

 

ETA: wah to typo

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Anyway, Caity, if your English was perfect the Subhumans would only start accusing you of being Pep again.

Pie says "But your English is nevertheless considerably better than that of the Subhumans"

[Ciaran Laval]

The idea has some merit, there are some showstoppers for some folk, the exclusivity clause and the loss of editorial control being two, although the latter is part and parcel of collaboration it would be better if the edited version was approved by the blogger before going to press, LL are bound to want some editorial control for posting something in their backyard.

There's a value tradeoff here, which includes extended reach, although people are bound to want to be self promotional, that's part of the value tradeoff.

If it kicks some lif back into LL's ailing blog it will be a good thing..

[Phil Deakins]

About the "not previously published" bit...

It doesn't say that an article has to be exclusive. It only says that it mustn't have been published previously, which is very normal for this of thing, and there's nothing wrong with that.

Where it can get wrong is if bloggers take it up. Bloggers write articles for their blogs. It's why they have blogs. So, if a blogger writes an article that would normally have gone into the blog, but sends it to LL and holds off from publishing it in the blog, how long would they hold off for? If LL expects to take their time deciding whether or not to publish the article, expecting the blogger to hold off, then they aren't thinking straight. But it's what I think LL will do.

I think this thing is very suitable for anyone who fancies writing an occasional article and who doesn't have a blog devoted to SL stuff. But I don't think it would be any good for real bloggers.

 

My overall view of it is that LL wants something for nothing, and they want the 'something' to be rose coloured. They want to paint a rose-coloured picture of SL life - as written by the users, so it must be true.

[Pussycat Catnap]

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Prokofy Neva wrote:

It will be fanboi stuff.

But that's ok. It's their game. Write on your own blog about your own game.

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If fan-stuff brings us more residents, who stay, that's not a bad thing.

But they should hire a few online marketers.

Seriously, anyone who's ever worked with marketers knows, LLs may have what it claims is a marketing staff, but they don't have marketers. I don't see any of the normal things I'd see with any other company.

 

[161488303349]

i had to think about this for a few days. so here goes

i think linden asking if ppl want to do guest blogs is a good thing. i would prefer tho to see linden pay some l$ for published work. person who writes will get some publicity out of it but i think is not any different to hiring a mole to make stuff, or contracting out support or development work sometimes. i just think that linden is being a bit inconsistent here. making a special case for writers compared to other creatives. essentially valuing their work less, like 0. is unequal treatment compared to other things linden wants. even 10 or 14 guest articles each week isnt hardly going to break the l$ bank. i like that the offer is open to anyone to contribute and that they not picking bloggers, just picking articles. that way better i think now i had time to think about it more

+

i dont want to see linden awarded titles or ranks for anything

for inworld and web profile titles and ranks then i way prefer resident-run programmes that allow them to give profile titles, awards, bouquets, etc to other residents. the residents can choose to show/hide, delete even, as they choose. is easy to see how that can work for roleplay, combat and quest games. but can also work for other things. example. builder brewery runs a class for prim building level 101 and master classes as well. when student completes then can get a title/award on their profile from the school to say they done that. caledon oxbridge, nci and other schools could do the same. not just for building but other things as well. DJ and hosting classes, etc. all kinds really, same like in reals. is some kudos in this for some ppl and some will not like if other ppl get and not them. but they are resident kudos and not linden official so i not see any majors with this

edit to add: maybe the schools can do to help with their tier. like can come to classes for free like now. but if u want the certificcate on ur profile then can pay a fee for that. more for advanced certs. i think most ppl will be happy to do that if they been to the classes and complete the course. specially, if they going on to build stuff themselves for sale. is quite hard for inworld schools to make tier just on donations, so maybe this might help as well