Cocoanut Koala

Summary Sentence: Lindens WILL do what individual Lindens want to do, and they WILL put it into SL, no matter who it hurts, and regardless of whether or not it actually works.

OK, so now we have the Showcase glommed into the viewer, despite me and a bunch of other people saying that it wasn't a great idea to give free advertising and spotlighting to actual stores (fashion and clothing, mostly).

We were told that our concerns would be "taken to the team" which, believe me, inspired not one iota of confidence that that would make any difference at all, because it was totally clear to anyone but a week-old noob that this was a done deal; we were LOOKING at the team; and we were at those meetings only to (a) ratify the plan, (b) serve as proof they had "consulted" us about it, and most importantly (c) provide any technical tips in implementing it that they hadn't thought of yet.

So, there it is, in the viewer, just as they originally conceived of it, as far as I can tell.

Or - there it WOULD be, if I could scroll it. I can't scroll it, and I still can't scroll the new (and benighted) Search All, either.

I had put in a ticket about the Search All problem, and received a response telling me that they knew this was an issue, and pointing out the JIRA entry for it. They suggested that I try going to windowed rather than full-screen mode, and seemed to think that would solve it.

So I tried that, but it does not solve it. I tried it on every possible resolution offered. There is no way that either the Showcase or the Search All can be scrolled.

Being able to use Search All and Showcase is surely, SURELY, something all people should be able to use. Not just some or most people.

And it is worrisome. Will the day come when I can't use ANY portion of Search? Doesn't seem terribly unlikely. And what will I do then?

Showcase Rant: The Showcase part of this - the fact that they forced it on us because some Linden thought it was a good idea, and other Lindens agreed or wrote love notes or whatever, and it became her/his baby - is just yet another in a long string of lost causes.

It was a waste to attend those meetings, and I'm not just saying that because things didn't end up the way I and others would like (with only non-profits shown on Showcase), but because it was clearly evident AT the meetings that it was a waste.

Evidently, the way LL is now, they do what they want exactly AS they originally wanted it, and only a riot will stop them, and likely not even that. (Or - probably more accurately, they will go ahead and do what they AND their resident cronies want; perhaps influenced, in this case, by someone like Greenies. We can't know these backroom discussions and affiliations.)

There will be no changes, no compromises, nothing. Absolutely nothing. Just - this is the way it is, and if you think it's great, well then, "Thank you so much for that excellent feedback," and to the rest of you, "We'll take that suggestion to the team." The rest of it is, "Let us pick your brains for technical tips on how to do what we want to do." ALL they wanted were technical tips, and that was quite clear.

At the end of it all, you're left hoping that this thing will not damage people too much, and - with any luck - will go the way of most Linden initiatives: forgotten and neglected forevermore.

How on earth anybody could possibly think that they are providing a reasonable place of commerce, when they actually go INTO it and pick out their own favorites to spotlight, is completely beyond me.

"Here, come into SL and run a business. Here's a tab for classifieds, and a Search All tab which is totally rigged and inscrutable, and oh by the way, here is also a tab of our list of places we like that we want people to go to, so they will buy their hair and not yours, and so we can undermine your classifieds. Have fun."

And no - none of the reasons given for "having to" include stores in Showcase held the slightest bit of water.

Scrolling Rant: The Search All thing didn't work at all for me. Then it worked for me for a brief period of time - say, a week or two. Then it stopped again.

And this is acceptable?

I am simply at my wit's end with this notion that it is fine to just launch something, and worry later about how well it works.

I mean, all my life, I have never turned in anything that didn't actually WORK. Nowhere I have ever worked would accept such a thing.

Yet, in SL, we have come to expect this level of competency.

How on earth could anyone put something into the viewer that flat-out does not work for a bunch of people? And then keep it there, that way?

I simply don't get it. To me, that's like serving a roast beef dinner, but for some reason, two of ten of the guests can't eat it and will have to go without. And that's OKAY?

Or someone sells tickets to a show, and most people can see the show, but some people - well, they are stuck behind columns, and can only see the corner of the stage. Oh well, too bad, necessary collateral damage, you know; gotta move on.

And yet so MANY things get put in SL that just flat-out aren't ready. Don't work, or don't work consistently, or don't work for all.

What is the benefit of that? There is no benefit when you have something that is full of things that don't work! It just means more and more of, for instance, me telling someone, "Well, that only works sometimes, and not for everyone; try this."

Now, what are customers going to do? Over time, they are going to stop buying and/or being interested in the thing, that's what. Would you keep going to see a movie that only sometimes worked, or worked for you but not your friend - even if that movie was free?

Or would you keep going to the same drug store if you knew there was a high probability that some of the things you purchased there simply wouldn't work, and no one would know why, and you were expected to just accept that?

I just do not GET it. If I were running the show, I would put in only things which work. If they didn't work, I would pull them until they did. You'd have fewer things, but you'd have a much higher confidence among those who use your product that they could count on it.

This is, to me, just incredibly shabby, incredibly slipshod, and only increases exponentially as time goes by.

By that I mean, the more things that get this way, the worse everything becomes, and the more the product suffers. For example, we have people banned right and left for no reason, and with no explanation, and with what amounts in practice to no or very little recourse.

And somehow that is accepted as collateral damage, and "to be expected". In what real world, I ask you? How is it okay to put in an automatic banning system - that does NOT work - and then just forget about it?

So that's another example. The problem is, there are so many of these examples. Before long, you start to look at the product as something that just really isn't very good. Isn't reliable. Isn't worth the effort.

Kind of like buying a bicycle, taking it home, and discovering there's this little funny quirk about the tires, that they don't inflate unless you take steps not necessary with other tires; and the brakes sometimes work and sometimes don't, but here's a workaround that may work; and the bicycle seat, well, you may just be one of the unlucky ones that doesn't GET a seat, too bad.

Or even getting the bicycle free. So what? You likely will still end up tossing it out, and just buying one that is reliable.

What kind of product reputation is that to have?

I guess what I'm saying is, something is wrong with the work ethic - or SOMETHING - at LL. Something is very wrong when so many things are now in this game that flat out don't work.

It wasn't nearly as much this way when I first joined, and I think there is some attitude or system (probably the TAO of Linden) which is making it possible for faulty things to be accepted, one after another after another.

And gradually, that comes to be accepted as the norm. It seems to no longer even be EXPECTED at LL that things should work, and work thoroughly, and well.

I never did a job in my life that wasn't done thoroughly and well, or it would not have been accepted.

IF you do each part of something well and thoroughly, then put it into your product, then you have a good product. You end up with a nicely-built thing. I thought everyone knew that.

If you keep cutting corners, putting in half-baked stuff, and continually deciding it doesn't really matter, then you wind up with a lousy product. Seems so elementary to me.

Why don't they do things thoroughly and well? Why do they think "mostly works" or "works for most" is good enough?

Also, why do they not realize that what happens to one person is IMPORTANT? Let alone, what is happening to hundreds, or thousands?

I know that in any company, you can't be 100% about everything, and someone is always going to fall through cracks, and there will always be new cracks. But this business of letting whole BUNCHES of people fall through cracks, and then shrugging it off, I don't think that works well.

Same thing for new systems. It should work just about 99.5 percent of the time - and where it doesn't, you need to know why it doesn't - or don't put the dang new system IN, or let it stay in.

coco

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Malachi

As someone pointed out to me recently on a RL subject: "this has happened the same way the last 100 times, why in the world do you expect the next will be otherwise?"

I was speechless.

Eata

Your rant is too long with too many new sentences, it doesn't flow well and isn't concise enough.

But I pretty much agree. Now we're stuck with certain people getting official linden approval. Even if it is well intended and without favouritism it's very unfair to anyone in competition with someone who makes the list. Terrible idea.

Joshua Nightshade

But Coco never minds when she gets Linden approval.

Eata

I'm in a industry they will never acknowledge even though I think we make some things that fly miles ahead in quality/design/function than things they would happily chuck in the showcase.

Not to be too big headed.

Cocoanut Koala

WTF ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!?!?!?

coco

Cocoanut Koala

A while after I wrote it all out here, I went on the Linden blog and wrote a much condensed version there.

coco

Joshua Nightshade

Your outrageous hypocrisy, nothing else.

Cocoanut Koala

Nothing, in other words. You just want to be a bitch.

coco

Joshua Nightshade

Tati

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Lordfly Digeridoo

Yeah, well, MY prefabs are going to save the planet, so nyeh.

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Ten

Sorry, Cocoa, but --

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Cocoanut Koala

Added-on mini-rant:

The Tools menu.

I just went looking for it. Knowing LL, I figured they had just hid it, so I thought I'd amuse myself by trying to discover where.

I looked everywhere, yes I did. Spent a good five minutes on it. Finally I went to the blog, fearing I would have to watch a Torley video to learn the answer. Luckily, he had included a link to a text place where this mystery would be unveiled.

And lo and behold, turns out that the TOOLS MENU will show up IF I put SOMETHING RANDOM into EDIT mode. Now who would ever have guessed that? Not me.

Went back and tried it, and sure enough - Tools pops up when I put something in edit, and disappears like magic when I get out of edit.

I just wonder who it is, with so much spare time, who thinks up stuff like this. Somebody needs to put these people to some useful work.

I understood from the text page I went to that whole bunches of people don't like this change, and LL is thinking about reverting it. I understood, too, that apparently this was supposed to be a nifty idea to make the interface less intimidating to newbies. Color me wildly unimpressed.

Even given some mandate to make the screen more friendly to newcomers, I still can't help but wonder who it is has time on their hands to come up with something as . . . er, INSANE (I'm refraining from saying "diabolical") as this. And doesn't stop to think that it means you have to grab something - ANYTHING - to be able to use anything on the Tools menu.

I'll tell you what's user-unfriendly, and not just to noobs, but to players of all ages, and that's these constant (and stupid) changes and constant updates that get so aggravating. Things hardly sit still long enough to use them.

This Tools change, for instance - it's like reaching for your toothpaste tube, but some little gremlins came in the night and moved it somewhere. And your job - is to find it again!

Yeah, that's lotsa fun.

coco

Cocoanut Koala

AND - a little mini-rave!

It is with great joy that I just noticed someone has fixed the color texture picker! Now we can drag down colors to the little boxes again, instead of having to re-enter the numbers every time we want to apply that color somewhere.

Yay!

coco

Ticious Trottier

*sigh* Most of the best, longest established and most prolific Live Music Venues in Second Life are NOT in the Showcase while small, mall based venues and a brand new corporate sponsored venue (which is more about selling guitars then presenting music, nothing wrong with that, but how many folks need those tricked out guitar animations other than the musicians who play on the stages of live music venues?) are. I've been running Rocky Shores for 19 months and presenting upwards of 20 hours of free Live Music entertainment every week for most of that time. And there are often Lindens in my audience. I submitted all the info they asked for a few months ago to be included in their "Venues Directory". Alas, not on the Showcase and not on the list on the Music page.

I guess I need to build a mall to get their attention and get included in a Linden sponsored list. Non-profits, great music and labors of love just don't generate enough linden sales.

Sooz Pascale

It is simply an arrogance born from a long running monopoly. They, LL, have basically the only "game" in town like this and know it. As long as hey stay a monopoly, the arrogance will continue or get worse. Once some sort of viable competition comes on the scenes and it will, it will, you will start seeing a mad scrample to adopt a more customer service based business model as well as some much needed humility. Of course by then it will be too late, everyone with money, skills, talent or brains will have bailed out.

Sooz

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Cocoanut Koala

I checked the Showcase last night, but since I can't scroll it, I went to it on the LL website (which is a bad enough thing to have, but not nearly as awful as taking a whole tab in Search).

Judging by the part of the page I can see on the Search tab, I'm assuming they are the same.

So I looked under "Fashion" and discovered . . . erm, furniture stores. (Note to self: If furniture is fashion, what ISN'T fashion?)

Well, I make a little furniture, but only a bit, so I don't think of myself as furniture. I think of furniture places as furniture, of which there are definitely a great many fine places. Depoz has some extremely tasteful furniture done by Mash Mandala, and there is just skads of lovely period sort of furniture stores on this island whose name I can never remember, but you can get there by looking up avatar Poppet McGuiness.

And that's just to name a few of many furniture places I have been to, loved, and bought from. And, of course, furniture stores owned by some of us here on SLU. So we can establish that I know a bit about furniture places.

So I go look at these two furniture places, and - mind you, I didn't even bother to look at their things, I was just getting a very quick and brief overall gestalt - and my overall gestalt was that there was pretty much zero reason why they were on the Showcase as opposed to any number of other places. (One appeared quite small. Interestingly, it also had zilch traffic.)

AGAIN - nothing against the wares there; I did not even LOOK at the furniture, and probably would like it if I had paid attention to it. I was just going for the gestalt, as in, okay, what is it about this furniture place that makes it so much more special than the others?

Nothing, of course. Not a blessed thing.

Now, there are several issues going on with this Showcase thing, some of which have had me somewhat perplexed, but I'll post about those after I get back from the store. My daughter is anxious to shop for college.

coco

Eata

If they really want to do this then I think they need to make it a short list of rotating entries. That's the only fair way to list points of entry, if everyone gets the same shot at representation.

Troy Vogel

Gosh yes that was too long.

I voiced my discontent with the situation a little differently and much more briefly.

I was offered to revamp, decorate, redo Catherine Linden's house in SL. I asked them if they were paying for my time and/or the items I am putting in the house. I was told no, it's an opportunity for you to get exposure.

I laughed and said, no thanks I do not need any further exposure. People who need to know my business already know it and shop at my store.

I am done doing free work for Lindens when you charge my business 600 dollars a month and offer such little up-time with the servers rolling over and dying, ruining customer confidence with all the asset server issues in the last 3 months and calling me names in keynote speeches.

AS if....

I don't think so.....

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Colette Meiji

Agree.

They should allow people to get in line to be featured .. otherwise its just unfair competition and favoritism.

Its amazing that the powers that be (tm/we) seem to be so out of touch sometimes.

You would think all these educated "software developers" would get complex kindegarden concepts like learning to share.