Beebo Brink

I have my SL account and transaction pages bookmarked, and I get the blog news through RSS feeds, so I haven't actually looked at the SL home page in quite sometime.

Until tonight when I accidentally clicked on the wrong link and ended up on the front page.

Have the SL photos of residents always been this bad? My memory is of some intriguing avatars and glimpses of a world I wanted to explore, and what I saw tonight was so awkward looking that I cringed. It's entirely possible that I was a lot less critical when I first signed up and anything having to do with SL filled me with wonder.

Is it me or is it them?

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Noob: "okay.... im in a house with cages and people in gags and the door just locked and i cant get out :c"

Ann Launay

They did change the images when they updated the site a while ago. There was much discussion on RA of how lame the new pictures were.

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Beebo Brink

When you see some of the eye-popping portraits that are regularly posted to the Second Life photo threads on most any of the outside forums, you really have to wonder how LL manages to make SL look so bad.

Verkin Raven

I fucking hate the current pictures. They're small, uninspired, bland and downright creepy. The one with the girl in the green shirt makes me physically ill.

When I joined, I saw a large picture of a guy on a snowmobile, and Cubey flying a biplane. Those were cool.

Envoy Costagravas

They are professionals.

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"When Men differ in Opinion, both Sides ought equally to have the Advantage of being heard by the Publick;
and that when Truth and Error have fair Play, the former is always an overmatch for the latter."
~ Benjamin Franklin

Clancy Sullivan

You 5%, them 95%.

Any online game I ever liked, I always took a greater interest in, and, therefore, found the owners of the game to be more incompetent than of games which I didn't care about. Same percentage stats applied as above, I'm sure.

Ingrid N

Most of the current batch of pictures just scream "Hey look! People standing around! Amazing!"

LL seems to be advertising SL as a 3d chatroom these days. I suppose they figure all the creative-type people who'd be interested have found SL by now, or maybe that their only growth options lie with the people who use SL to hang out with friends and buy things to customize their avatar. Look at their new tagline: "Discover a new world of friends, fashion, music, videos and fun!" They definitely seem to be moving away from advertising SL as something where you can create things.

Psyke Phaeton

That would now be false advertising.
Standing is the only thing LL can promise you can do, if you can log in.

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Reality Control

Well they're probably trying to lower expectations because the snowmobiles and planes barely work these days.

'Course, it's not a very good 3d chatroom either.

You're better off talking in AIM with polaroids of each other taped to your monitor these days.

Reality Control

But will your head go up your butt when you're standing? That's the question!

Jessyanne

There's a pic of 4 avies on the first page at times... and they seem to suffer from the tiny head/waist, large shoulder, hips, breasts syndrome. The tiny head is the scariest

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Malachi

If you are talking about the couple in lounging in the chair together (the image I get on 8 out of 10 refreshes) GAH!

Her head is smaller than his biceps, her breasts are bigger than her head. I can only imagine the art board mock-up for this page: "insert picture of mutant female romantically entangled with giant".

And I'm not one to give quarter to subliminal messages, but given the condensed font choice combined with my high-res monitor, and at first glance, I saw the couple kissing in front of a Bauhaus style home and did a double take on the caption "Build your Dream House / Get Laid". Except they aren't nearly clever enough to have done that intentionally.

Ayu Sura

All the guys seem to have the pin head or effeminate problem. wth?

The pictures all look like they're trying to copy clothing ads.

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"You broke the rules! Now I pull out all your pubic hair!" - Tenacious D

JenK

Even this is getting questionable. It seems the majority of times I teleport or login for the last week or so, I get stuck in the floor in the 'falling' pose and can't get up without sitting on something.

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"All sorrows are less with bread." ~Miguel de Cervantes, Don Quixote

Ann Launay

lol, I went to Illusions last night and tp'd in on someone's head. I could NOT get down and was stuck in the 'falling' pose, except my avi kept flapping her hands, which she normally doesn't do. I finally had to fly in order to to get off of the girl's head...twas very odd.

Cindy Claveau

Funny. I was thinking this very thing when I checked the website this morning to see what the downtime schedule was this week.

The poses were the awkward, unnatural "model" poses that float around SL for free (or are sold for $100 in rip-off shops). Nothing in that pic would make me want to join SL, but I was thinking "If I have been in TSO or WoW, it might be different".

Jesus, you can go to Snapzilla and pull random shots that would be 500% more appealling and interesting!

Am I a lost cause because I could name the hair and skin makers shown on the avatars?

Troy Vogel

yes the website pics are horrid. I wish they would take a hint from Flickr -- look at the pictures they use on their main homepage. They choose absolutely the most stunning stuff.

And like you said, it's not like there arent enough in world photographers that are cranking out some major work...

Give Linden lab a chance to do substandard work and they will always take it...

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Beebo Brink

This is one way to throttle new registrations.

Ewan Took

Barbies cuddling, buying shoes and making home with their Kens. Their website pics are like something out of 50s America. Where's the fantasy towers, the cityscapes, elven forests etc? Plus SL has a huge diversity of residents, how about having also two women together cuddling, furries or two men if they want that type of pic? Are they scared?

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"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."

Beezle Warburton

Did they put generic photos to cut down on the "ZOMG FIC" response people may have had to seeing particular residents on the website?

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Marx Dudek

Absolutely. They should present avatars the way they really are: in "Missing Image" clothing with one shoe gone, and bald because of pending attachments.

Beezle Warburton

Crowds of grey Ruths in front of partially-rezzed buildings.

JenK

And prim hair sprouting from their butts. Where's that tidbit?

Marx Dudek

I honestly wish that we could promote the idea of having "crash parties". Amassing people in the same place (when TPs work) when things get really buggy. Standing in furniture because scripts won't work. Ruthed with half-rezzed prim hair over Linden hair. Greyed out. In large groups. Take many photos. Create a Flickr photo pool. Publicize the pool to death - particularly as IPO day is announced.

Wildefire Walcott

I'm not too excited about the pics they use, either. I admit, though, it's got to be tough. Some of my all-time favorite images from SL don't really say "this is Second Life" in the way you'd want a web portal to convey:

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