For those of you that don’t know, I’m a Second Life Mentor. Now the mentor group has had it’s fair share of trashing from all over. Those that think we are all just little Linden wanna bes or suckups trash the group as a whole as being useless and just after a tag. Now for some, yes that may very well be true. But it’s not true for all. Mentors who spend hours on end at the Help Islands assisting new residents in the first hours of Second Life are a gifted group of people. They’ve got patience, understanding and a wealth of knowledge to share. You try standing in a group of 10 brand new avatars all asking *Where is sex?*, *I can haz sex with you now?*, *Give me money, job*… I could go on and on. Everytime the media does an article on SecondLife, we are flooded with new residents. Which leads me really to the point of this post.
What’s the best way to introduce someone to SecondLife? The Lindens have been working on the new user experience for quite a while now. I don’t know what their plans are, what viewer will be used, what or if a tutorial will be out there but I do know the way it is now, isn’t good.
I’ve been in SecondLife for 2 years now and my experience as a brand new resident was much different. I had orientation island which had a bunch of posters to read which told me what to do. I followed along and at the end, I went to Help Island. Didn’t stay there long. I ended up at the Hanja Welcome Center which became my home for several months. I wandered the area and was tp’d around the grid by people I’d met. At that point I was trying to decide what to do with it and whether or not to stay. I met Aribeth and the rest is history but my point is, I stayed past that crucial first hour. I was given direction and tasks to complete. They weren’t hard. Learn to walk, talk, fly and how to change my appearance.
So what makes a good new user experience? If it was up to you, what would do? If I think about all the games I’ve played, every one has a tutorial that you must complete before you enter the game. You read the prestory, do the tutorial and your dumped into the game. That’s what I’d do with SL. Intro page of what SecondLife is, a good tutorial. Rezzing, attaching objects, changing appearance, buying something, walking, flying, communicating in open and IM. Then dump them on a help island where they can practice. Next stop main grid. Put them in a welcome area or info hub. If I was the lab i’d also ask sim owners if they want to have their sim/venue as a stopping point. The Crown gets loads of new residents constantly. I’d certainly add it as a new resident entry point. Provided someone was at the Crown of course. I know LL can limit it to sims with residents only.
So what’s your idea? I really wanna hear what you think.
Tags: Crown and Pearl, Linden, mentor, new resident, NUE, second life
Hmmm.. when I came to Second Life I had the same kind of experience as you, I wandered around looking at a series of posters which told me how to do certain tasks. Personally, I quite liked this approach to introducing people to Second Life, but I think once I had been through this stage I was left a little clueless, mearly wandering round hoping to find some friends (which I did luckily).
I think it’s a very good learning technique for people to get in there with residents who have been around for a while, like at the Crown (like you said).
I think that the intro should definitely take place in world, so that the new residents can have the chance to try out what they have learnt, whenever they want, rather than having to wait until they actually get online to try it out.
Your tutorials are great BL. Can you have a sign at the crown or a link to them? Maybe if you take the lead and teach these people, they will eventually come back and actually spend! You’re a mentor, go for it!
Hmmm. I hated SL when I first joined; I almost left and never came back. I was confused, disoriented and all-round over-whelmed. What made it OK was not a manual to read or places to try skills, it was the coincidental friendship I made with someone when I first logged in. He as good as took my hand and taught me not just what I needed to know but also gave me a friendship worth coming back for.
Now I know that mentors are meant to perform this function these days but they aren’t scheduled to orientation islands so they’re not always there, and after that initial help if you do get it, you’re on your own again because mentors have lives too – it is simply not fair to expect an unpaid volunteer to sacrifice all their online time to your own beginner needs – it couldn’t be done for the number of people required anyway. If people were paid (even a small amount) to do it and perhaps were scheduled on to make sure someone was available at all entry points – hell give them a mentor account with a small stipend or something – then that might work.
I do like your idea of putting up some general “read this” guide followed by putting what you learn into practice. But for me SL was about the people not the game, and without an actual person to talk me through it and to be my friend from the get-go, it wouldn’t matter how many skills I mastered, I wouldn’t be in the “game” today.
I agree with Lands, to a point. If I hadn’t of met you at the Welcome Area and had spent my first few weeks just wandering aimlessly around Second Life, I probably wouldn’t of stayed. It was nice for me to have someone who I could share my new experiences with – someone who was just as clueless as me to begin with!
I am naturally a social butterfly anyway. I don’t find it hard to meet new people and strike conversation, so I have no doubt that the social aspect of SL was always going to play in my favour. And stumbling upon The Three Lions… well, I hit the jackpot for sure =)
I firmly believe that the only person that can teach you the rules and methods of SL is *yourself*. You can talk to all the mentors and Lindens you want, you’re not really going to get a firm idea of what to do until you actually try it out. That’s what I did… I read the intro posters two years ago, and then just got on with it. I shared new tips with you and other around the welcome area, and just basically allowed myself to get a feel of the place.
I’m not saying Mentors arn’t necessary at all – I admire those that dedicate a fair few hours of their time in a day to help new residents. As you know, I didn’t commit myself to it at all when I joined the mentor programme as I had no patience with noobs (I have to have lots with my RL children, why should I in SL?!). But people should learn to take initiative and just explore… enjoy SL for what it is =)
I had a bit of an odd introduction to SL. I did indeed rez onto Orientation Island. But I was so naive and clueless and I had no idea what to do. I could barely move, didn’t understand the camera, didn’t know about chat boxes. I ended up in the bushes (literally) and thought my monitor was broken.
Sent an anguished email to the coworker who had encouraged me to try SL. When he couldn’t “fix” my monitor (never occurred to him that I was in a bush), he tp’d me off the island. So I never saw any of the signs, the tips, anything. I had to learn everything from talking to people.
Which leads me to why I think I stayed. Because I talked to people. I made relationships right from the start. A friend joined 2 days after I did. She kept tp’ing about looking for things to do. She “couldn’t be bothered” talking to people. But she got bored and left – didn’t see “the point”. And I’m still here.
I like Lands’ idea of always having mentors handy. I think NCI does this well. I think Shengri La has this as a goal as well. Certainly that’s where I spent the vast majority of my first few weeks – hanging at NCI and listening to people and making friends and experimenting slowly. And like Ari – I never really learned anything until I started doing it myself. But it was nice to know that I had a group of friends who would answer questions and give suggestions as I tried my metaphorical and digital wings.