Telehub image by Ciaran Laval
How do you make Second Life feel more like a serendipitous social space? Expanding off some good points raised by EmptyEyes, I suggested this:
Add a small L$ charge to teleporting, and bring back free-to-use telehubs that are available across the mainland, and an option for sim owners. That would subtly encourage players to walk/fly/ride in vehicles and socialize more.
Lots of interesting reader comments (and guffaws) around my idea, especially this from Sue R.:
If Linden Lab had created towns, each with a community center or square, instead of an amorphous, giant expanse of Linden houses… maybe. Telehubs were an interesting compromise, but they had their cons too.
Charging for teleports isn't entirely absurd, there are MMORPGs that do something like that. In Ragnarok Online you had (still have?) to spend a gem to open a warp portal.
However:
– SL was still very social after teleports were introduced. [In the mid 2000s – WJA]. So I don't think teleport affected socialization so much.
– Other virtual words, like VRChat and Roblox, are basically a portal to different words/experiences/rooms and are more social than SL.
– Since the SL viewer mimics a web browser, teleporting is like changing web page. Can you imagine paying to change/open a webpage?
– If traveling around is so important, then I'd rather improve and encourage that and vehicle driving/piloting, which is rather poor in SL – and despite that, the Drivers of SL [group] is fun, isn't it? Imagine if SL worked better and there were better travel games/experiences – instead of discouraging and nerfing a very common, well-established and useful functionality.
– Without teleport, I doubt people would go to a nearby community anyway: most people don't wander, barely look around without any incentive to do so.
All very valid points! To discus them one by one:
Other virtual words, like VRChat and Roblox, are basically a portal to different words/experiences/rooms and are more social than SL.
This is true. However, neither VRChat and Roblox are single-shard virtual worlds, which is one of the key, unique aspects of Second Life. It is one of SL's few remaining differentiators in comparison to VRChat, Roblox, etc. — that you can in theory walk/drive/fly/etc. from one end of SL to the other without any load screen, relatively seamlessly, and randomly meet all kinds of people along the way. But this incredible feature been made effectively irrelevant by free and easy point-to-point teleportation.
Since the SL viewer mimics a web browser, teleporting is like changing web page. Can you imagine paying to change/open a webpage?'
This is actually an early mistake I pointed out In The Book — confusion over whether Second Life is primarily an immersive world or a 3D content browser. But the latter category, from Croquet to Mozilla Hubs, has met an untimely death. Without the frame of an immersive world, mere browsable 3D content lacking broader context, narrative, or above all, an active community, quickly loses its appeal.
If traveling around is so important, then I'd rather improve and encourage that and vehicle driving/piloting, which is rather poor in SL – and despite that, the Drivers of SL [group] is fun, isn't it? Imagine if SL worked better and there were better travel games/experiences – instead of discouraging and nerfing a very common, well-established and useful functionality.
Passionate agreement with the first point! But I'd also say the opposite observation applies: Point-to-point teleportation quickly nerfed the need for vehicles and made it an increasingly niche activity. By adding a small cost to teleporting (beyond telehubs), you gently encourage much more vehicular use.
Without teleport, I doubt people would go to a nearby community anyway: most people don't wander, barely look around without any incentive to do so… SL was still very social after teleports were introduced. [In the mid 2000s – WJA]. So I don't think teleport affected socialization so much.
This brings us to the crux of the issue:
If Second Life were growing and thriving in its current condition, we'd be in a "If it ain't broken…" situation.
But as Brad Oberwager just acknowledged, Second Life has in recent years dropped in monthly usage from 600,000 MAU to around 500,000 MAU. Concurrency is also steadily declining.
It's time to start experimenting with ways to bring back the world, bring the people in it together — and set it on a better course with a growing community.
Then again, Sue may very well be right, and I'm open to other ideas. We definitely need them!
Wagner James Au / New World Notes 
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