Linden Lab’s announcement that it was developing a new
virtual world platform caused a huge fracas.
Now that the dust has settled somewhat and Project Sansar has gone into
beta, they would it seems, have reapplied themselves to keeping Second Life
alive and well, and gasp, have actively created new programmes to rejuvenate
the community and retain new residents.
Originally when new residents joined SL they would go
through a community gateway. A Community
Gateway (CG) was a starting point for new residents of
SL which was not maintained by Linden Lab, but by an established
community in SL. These gateways offered their own orientation path to give
Residents an easy start, providing them with assistance and hands-on support in
getting started in SL.
The programme was discontinued in August 2010, with the Lab
citing several reasons for doing so, including issues around scalability and
management oversight, together with question marks around the overall
effectiveness of the programme.
There were, however, repeated calls from within the
community for the Lab to bring the programme back, but they were a little
distracted by their other projects to heed these calls.
But now Linden Lab has Second Life back on its radar. At the recently launched Chat Lab*, the
Gateway Programme question was raised …
“So, the Gateway Programme is of significant interest to us,
because again … we want to make it possible for creators to attract their own
audiences. We are in the testing phase … Laws, and all kinds of things have
changed since we had gateways way back in the day, and it comes to who can
collect what information, and what information can be stored where – so we have
to get those pieces right. So the team has been working on it for quite a
while, and we’re also going to make some improvements to the API so we can have
a better experience for the Gateway Programme.
Obviously, we want to work
first with people who are likely to be able to bring-in meaningful numbers of
audiences. There’s no point in us having to manage thousands of gateway
programmes that each bring in one user a week. So we want to clearly work with
people who have the capacity and know-how to be able to attract meaningful
numbers of users.”
The new programme is therefore designed
to allow communities and groups to bring users into Second Life, present them
with help and support in getting started, much like the original Gateway
Programme. The intention is to offer
new residents interests and activities to keep them engaged with the platform.
These gateways will include web pages to attract new users to them, this will
include a registration API to allow those users to sign-up to SL and create an
account without necessarily having to go through the central registration
process at secondlife.com.
In addition, those running the gateway
can provide dedicated links for downloading a viewer (official or TPV).
Enter the Phoenix Firestorm team, who are all about enhancing
the user experience. In a previous interview with Jessica
Lyon, founder and boss lady of Phoenix Firestorm, I asked her what their
rationale was in getting involved with The Gateway Programme -
She said “To
improve the user experience… Perhaps not as much lately, but historically I’ve
always felt LL never had a good grasp on what this product “Second Life” really
is or how to market it. Let’s face it, SL is not an easy thing to pin down or
describe to outsiders without writing a book because it really is so many
different things to so many different people. When LL approached me a few
months ago with the prospect of opening a gateway, I couldn’t help but feel I
was being offered the spare keys to the bus that picks up new riders. Finally,
I’ve been given the chance to try my hand at drawing in new users to Second
Life, which could potentially be what makes the biggest difference, even more
than the viewer itself. But what a challenge this would be, and if we’re to do
it, we’re going to do it right. What keeps
you in Second Life is different for each and every person, so a successful
first-time experience is going to have to have a bit of everything, or at least
the most common things. So with six regions, we’re trying to incorporate a
little taste of as many things we can in hopes that new users will find that
unique thing that ties them into SL. But while we’ve got a large gateway with
so many different activities, there is nothing to really encourage them to try
such things. Humans are goal oriented, and MadPea is renowned for their ability
to create addictive, immersive games and activities in SL, so it only make
sense to me that they will bring a lot of value to new user retention. We’re
really excited to have MadPea on board with this.”
The result is that the Firestorm Gateway comprises six
regions in total, including the original Firestorm Support region, which has
been re-purposed to fit with the Gateway approach. Jessica said “One of the new
regions is a Firestorm Orientation for new sign ups only. It’s similar to our original orientation
island.”
The rest of the regions offer an assortment of facilities
and activities intended to help new users get better acquainted with Second
Life, using the viewer, and participating in some of the activities they can
find during their in-world travels. A staffed support area provides practical
help and support, for example, while users can also enjoy activities such as
jet skis, sailing, boating, and flying within the regions, or try their hand at
a scuba diving adventure.There’s also an
amphitheatre which will be used for events focused on new users, viewer Q&A
sessions and the like. The social areas around the island offer new users the
opportunity to relax and meet with established SL users.
As part of Firestorms Gateway initiative they are collaborating
with Canary Beck. She is inviting all SL
residents to share their photos with Firestorm this weekend to promote Second
Life.
“Fancy yourself a
good Second Life photographer? Do your pictures make Second Life look as
amazing as it can be? A little while ago I asked you if you’d help promote
Second Life. Well, this is your first chance to do it this weekend!
I’m looking for a
select number of SL photographers to share their photos for me to use on the
new user landing pages I’m making for the Firestorm Gateway Project. In return,
I’ll showcase the chosen works on the Firestorm blog and its social media
properties, with links back to your photo online. That’s a big
deal because the Firestorm blog has over 80,000+ subscribers.”
Follow the link for
more information on where and how to post your photos -
http://www.canarybeck.com/2015/12/11/share-you-photos-this-weekend-to-promote-second-life/
People yearn for a return to community, seeking a sense of connection
with others and that essentially is what Second Life offers. Linden Lab appears to have finally taken cognisance
of this fact. Now it’s our turn to
participate in the rejuvenation of Second Life, let’s start with our photos,
and show the Firestorm team our enthusiastic support of their community gateway
endeavour.
*Chat Lab - “an opportunity for you to ask Lindens your
questions during a live taping that is recorded and archived for everyone to
view.” The first Lab Chat was held on November 19th, at the Linden Endowment for the Arts Theatre – with guest Ebbe Altberg, CEO of Linden Lab.
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