Jeska Linden: I can give a little more information on why we're making the change and what our plans are for the future if you'd like Rock
Jezzie McCellan: I am wondering why it has to be replaced, why not reform popular places and add Showcase.
Divinitee Dreamscape: yes please do jeska
Jeska Linden: The Popular Places tab was started a long time ago, when the world of Second Life was much, much smaller.
Ciaran Laval: Some of those popular places, like it or not, are indeed genuinely popular
Nalates Urriah: I am assuming that other parts of search will still allow us to find brands?
Jeska Linden: At that time it was also tied to a "traffice incentive" where LL paid the people who had the most traffic (which has not been done for some time).
Galt Hax: it should be balanced between business and non-profit venues, as well as a representative cross section of what existsin
SL Jeska Linden: It was one of my ye olde jobs
I used to "cut the check"
Jeska Linden: As the world has grown and many things have changed, it has been made pretty clear taht the popular places tab, while reflecting a certain type of popular behaviour in Second Life, does not even begin to reflect the vast diversity of Second Life
Divinitee Dreamscape: very true
Jeska Linden: The Showcase is something very different - it's been on the website for about the last few months and highlights various inworld locations.
Jeska Linden: Currently there are about 50 locations included in the Showcase, or more than twice as many as in the Popular Places
Jezzie McCellan: Why cannot it be made to reflect the diversity of
SL. We could include the categories of places. If we were to do something about bots and camping that would help.
Tray Dyrssen: How many locations will it grow too?
Ace Albion: did you see which places would be in the most popular list if you filtered out certain words, like "sex", "money" or "camping"? I just wonder.
Jeska Linden: It is still very much in its infancy, but with the addition of search flagging (which you may have heard about on some of teh Second Life mailing lists recently) will offer a way for Residents to "nominate" a location for the showcase and maybe in the future we can have a "Digg" or "Craiglist" style "Best of Second Life"
Jeska Linden: For the short term, I really believe this change relfects the vast array of experiences in Second Life, even if it is only a small slice
Parker McTeague: mm, the digg model might work pretty well
Galt Hax: agreed
Jezzie McCellan: are you not concerned about people using alt accounts to flag locations
boita Kohime: ll will kill residents buisness one more time
J
eska Linden: But remember it is a first step
Parker McTeague: i'm thinking back to those old "vote" boxes. sounds like it might come full circle
Ciaran Laval: Take the stores and brands out of it Jeska and you have a decent way of showing people new places, highlighting certain brands and stores just leads to accusations regarding fics. If you want to highlight someone like Sirena for her wonderful blog tutorials do it a different way
Jeska Linden: Jezzie - we're still in the design phase of the Search Flagging but it includes several "griefer" checks
Galt Hax: can't take stores and brands out. its part of
sl Jeska Linden: We have gotten lots of feedback in these meetings about non-business locations only and I will be sure to take that back to the editorial team, given the nature of Second Life, I'm not sure how to prevent some type of entreprenurial (sp?) experiences
Ciaran Laval: Places rather than specific brands helps
there Jeska. Especially in fashion, it's a really competitive area
Jeska Linden: Were there any other questions about the Showcase/Popular Places switch or any other suggestions?
Jeska Linden: I'd like to keep us moving along
Rock Paderborn: i'm not being insulting...shouldnt advertising or reputation be enough to drive your business
Ciaran Laval: Yeah hold events for something like builder of the year and showcase them that way
Divinitee Dreamscape: ut is amajor factor rock
Jeska Linden: (two other meaty topics for us still!)
Galt Hax: if the goal is to showcase examples of what can be found, you can't cut out commercial areas
Divinitee Dreamscape: yes please move on jeska
Galt Hax: yes please move on
Divinitee Dreamscape: most of pop places has been covered in previous meetings
Jeska Linden: Ok, thanks everyone (and thanks for reading the notes from other meetings!)
Ace Albion: How much time are Lindens going to put into managing the list? A lot of options and suggestions don't mean much if we don't know that.
Jeska Linden: Ace - we have a small internal team who have dedicated time to it for the last few months
Divinitee Dreamscape: wellace it's jeska's project... so all her waking momments
Ciaran Laval: Well if the website showcase is anything to go by it's not overly encouraging but hopefully it develops
Jeska Linden: Not my project I'm the messanger
Jeska Linden: If we determine this is successful, we may be able to add more resources to the team, like anything else!
Ace Albion: Picking and sorting takes time, is all. So the amount of editorializing depends on the resource
Jeska Linden: But that is part of the reason we'd like to move to resident suggestions sooner rather than later.
Jeska Linden: Let's move onto traffic, yes?
Jezzie McCellan: but If there is a group that chooses the showcase, there should be residents included on the committee.
Ace Albion: Yes, Ciaran, and my 75 alts.
... Then it goes on to metrics discussion, and various horrors about how to mess with Search and Classifieds
... Toward the end of the meeting:
Ace Albion: Well, in a way, aren't you bringing back Pathfinder's Picks?
Rock Paderborn: lol
Divinitee Dreamscape: lol
Jeska Linden ducks
Jeska Linden: The picks were never updated, Pathfinder was properly drawn and quartered
Ace Albion: It was a Linden edited list of places
Rock Paderborn: it still exists on some infohubs
Ace Albion: so there's a sense of deja-vu
Jeska Linden: Ok everyone - did anyone else have last thoughts?
Ciaran Laval: That's my worry with showcase, people lose interest
Ace Albion: Be prepared for lots of drama.
_____
An "editorial team" of Lindens is going to decide who gets the most business and makes the most profit in LL. They will help decide that for us. They will help make that come true. They will help other businesses to lose money, and possibly fold.
coco