The Journey: Adventures of a newb

Warning: This is not fashion related but more of story of my recent experience. 

I did something a little different recently. I decided to make a new alt. It's been a few years since I've had a new avatar and I decided to give it a go. I should start off by saying I decided to relive the old magic of Second Life. I didn't pass money, clothes or LMs to my new avatar. I wanted to experience what the truly new folks of SL see for the first time.. So here we go...

Meet Caliope. Or really MissCaliope.  Choosing a name was my first ordeal. I do have a resident or two in my cache of alts but back when it was new it was a LOT easier to pick a name. I miss being able to choose a first and last name. Choosing a first name that doesnt include a lot of random numbers and letters would be awesome. I just randomly picked the first female name my eyes came across while browsing some websites. Ity took a lot of random spellings and the added "Miss" To create a new me. I miss legacy names :(

I also have to note how much the new orientation island SUCKS now. I remember being a newb and having a mini city you learned to drive cars in.. a dome to learn to fly in and all kinds of click-able learn-able things. When I first started I think I spent a few weeks there because I thought it was cool and tons of people stayed around. The new place? Not so much. It consists of some mesh signs in a semi circle... they are neon colour swirls with things like "popular", "media", and whatever on them. The whole island? has been shrunken down to a plot of land surrounded by water. There are a few cheap trees and rocks around and the building is a bunch of archways. Suffice to say visually it stinks. There are absolutely NO signs telling you what to do or where to go next. Hoping for the best I clicked a sign. When I clicked this sign I assumed It would transport me to another part of the sim where I would be... tutored? NO. After clicking the first sign I saw I was immediately teleported into a massive warehouse style club. There were overbearing gestures, lots of chatter and noise. If I had been an actual new user of SL I would have been horrified. I went from being a supreme newbie to being shoved into a mass of half naked people. WTF. Where is the whole learning experience. Without thinking I tried to TP back to orientation island which as we all kn ow.. you can't do. Iwas given a pop up telling me if I wished to further learn I should go to Public Orientation island.

I suppose If I was using my already gained knowledge I would know to just pull up search or map. For someone brand new that's like being told to meet someone on 4th Street but not being told what town or given directions. I did however power on.

I decided to check out search. Again, I was squelching my knowledge and acting.. well.. new( not obnoxious, just toddling around looking at everything. clicking on some things..)! I clicked around a bit and somehow found some newbie friendly places. Time to mingle! I teleported to the first location- NCI Kuula. It boasted help and friendly workers. Newbie friendly and yadda yadda. I landed and saw a tn of people. For 10 minutes I wandered around. Stood near people and generally acted like someone who seemed a bit confused. I asked for help at one point. It took another 10 of my leaving my avatar just standing while I did dishes for one of the helpers to finally even greet me. The attitudes of people helping new folks is SO much different from when I first started. I remember when I started there were actually people to help when you first rezzed. And anyplace I went- especially these newbie friendly centres people were always there lending a hand. Sometimes it was overwhelming but there was someone there to tell you how to change clothes, find things, unpack- all those things we didn't know we needed to know.

I'm analizing this in the most BASIC level. Because honestly if I was truly new I would probably have hung up the towel at this point. I finally got greeted by a helper whop pretty much stopped his flirting long enough to tell me to follow an arrow to the help board. I followed the arrows that led me to a wall with all of these pictures and some scripted board. Even as someone not new it was overwhelming. Clicking. Waiting, being interrupted by someone else clicking it. It was a mess. This person never said a word after doing his "duty". I was pretty disappointed. This supposed help center was anything but. For one- I managed to toddle to the freebie section that was a fully scripted vending system that I was supposed to know how to work. Furthermore I was expected to know how to unpack a box. I remember actually being new and getting a box. I thought I had been scammed. I had NO clue what to do with it until someone told me.

I also tried the Shelter. Another bust. Here I said hello. No one helped. There were no signs to help. Just a bunch of people dancing and gossiping. Disappointment. I wasn't expecting handout or free things. I was more hoping someone continued the tradition of.. I don't know.. caring? Heck, I would have settled for another newbie hitting on me. Being ignored was worse.

Overall I'm disappointed in Linden Labs and the Second Life Community. I found there was little to no help out there for new people. The helpful signs may seem tedious but actually helped a lot when I was new. I also noticed the lack of freebie stores anymore. Places like the Gnubie store are gone. Quality freebies by generous people. 


If I was brand new I can say I would probably never have stayed if it had been like this 5 years ago.

So.. Do you have and newbie friendly hot spots? How about free stores, quality items, and the like?

Bah Humbug

Just a bit of a quick downer post. oh.. and a holiday sale thing.

I needed a mini rant.!

DO you know what annoys me? The feeling of not being "worthy" of a designers. I completely missed Christmas in SL land last year because I was travelling. As the days have loomed closer this year I've made more of an effort to stop in and not only find gifts but to spend my hard earned Lindens in stores I may not always remember or have the cash flow to go to.

This past week I've been pretty much horribly weak and sick so I haven't really been on except to promote the store sale. About 2 nights ago I went into scramble mode to catch up on advent calendars and what not. I stopped in one rather well known store (I won't bother naming it because I hate the drama llama, but yeahhh) There were some supreme items that I would have gladly paid the back prices for. Only one minor issue.. The advent calendar was VIP group only and some brilliant soul had decided that the group should be closed to new entries until AFTER it was over.

Maybe it's just me but I see SO many stupid problems with this:

In this case for someone like me you not only lost out on the money from my joining the group, you lost out on any money I would have willing paid in back pricing for days I had missed in the advent calendar.. You also annoyed me so much you've lost out on any future sales as well. By shutting down a group you've pretty much made it clear you don't care. You don't care that someone new stumbled into your store and now feels like their prospective membership and sales don't matter. You don't care that someone would have been a loyal member and would have spent enough money to feed an entire wardrobe. You don't care that I no longer wish to give you my time and money. Because I was late to the party I have to wait like the bad kid in class until the masses have made away with their goodies and then by the time you deem I am again worthy of joining your group you'll also decide to inflate your prices to a point where it's not even worth the effort any more.

I'm really annoyed about this. As a designer I understand that many people join and leave just for the free stuff. But for the most part having a pay group tends to stop that. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Anyway. Merry Holidays or whatever. Also [Blossom] is having an uber sale until the beginning of the New Year or longer (whenever I decide to stop being sick. Bleck)

you can find Different discounted items At BOTH [Blossom] locations- Reasonable Desires and Superior

Ho HO HO @ [Blossom]

Hello loves,

It's been a while! I've been working super hard on getting the new store location up. It's not even half done but I've temp opened it for Christmas goodies! I've got new boots, sweaters, jeans pants and dresses! I haven't even put up most of my older stuff.. But I will. eventually!

I've also started a new Group Rewards program. Basically you join the group for 50L. You get first dibs on sales and awesome discounts. For example I'm currently offering my new sweaters for 100L to group members compared to the price of 175L none group members can pay. I've also got 5 special edition dresses for the holidays I'm offering for 150L for group and 300L for non. I'm hoping more for a lot of things with this. I'm hoping to easily offer more group related and non group related sales more often, I'm hoping to build up a loyal group base that can benefit from better pricing.. SO much. We'll see. I'm only offering the group discounts at the new location right now to see how they go. You can read more about it by locating the signs around the new location

 - HERE-

Sneak peek! Come check it all out!

There is also an ice skating rink, The Blue Lotus (Lilly's hangout club), and a few random buildings. As soon as I finish the store set up I'm unveiling my branch of Makeups and we hope to put in a few more little hangouts as well! Hope you enjoy!

And in case you haven't seen. These are a few of the newest releases at the new location:

[Blossom] Black Friday Weekend Sale

Here! - all heels, boots and mesh items

Boobies.. uhm yeah

Hellos!

Quick post to let ya'll know [Blossom] has a little something for the Boobie Thon!

 

I've priced this custom dress and heels set @ 250L. All proceeds go to the 'Feel Your Boobies Foundation'. Please support :D -HERE-

ALSO!

If you haven't seen I've opened a second store recently. As a little incentive to check it out I've placed a limited edition cheapie @ 50L for you to snag! It's a little preview of something I'm currently working on! Hope you like!

What do you wear under there?

Hello lovelies!

If you've ever scanned my blog then you know I'm a huge mesh fan. For the most part I've stuck to dresses and sweaters but I've been expanding into tops and even jeans as of late.

On a recent shopping trip into a mesh filled store one thing really struck me. There were a LOT of naked people walking around. A LOT. At first glance it looked like the nudist colony had decided to run a raid and I was a bit appalled. As things began to rez a bit for me those naked folks were suddenly wearing mesh items.

A lot of people who wear mesh slap on the alpha layer to squeeze themselves into a size and that's that. Most folks never consider the fact that while the alpha layer might suck up your extra thigh junk and erase the junk in your trunk... it leaves some private parts on total display.

My computer runs pretty fast.. in fact it's pretty kick ass. But there are days when SL is just laggy and it takes time to rez in. During those moments I see a lot of naked people and or people covered in alpha layers and little yellow triangles until they properly show up. It can be a bit daunting when the girl standing a few meters from me has an AO that jumps up and down and then touches her toes all while her naught bits are bouncing and full frontal. I'm not a prude but YEESH.

I guess I've always kept a close eye on what I wear with my mesh. When mesh was first introduced I would wear some now and then and I almost always got told I was naked, invisible or some variation. So I started wearing a few extra layers.l Let's face it, this is SL.. extra generally doesn't bulk you up. So I now have a cute collection of underthings and plain layers that I can toss under something. I might wear a cute undies set or even a set of jeans under my jeans. You never know who doesn't see you the way you see yourself!

SO that leads to the question? What do YOU wear under there? Are you a bare it all kind of person or are you conscious of what you have on and how someone might view you?

Focus

Hello loves!

Just a quicky to show some new poses I picked up recently!!

Focus Poses has been pumping out tons of new goodies at way affordable prices! I tend to be a huge fan of their model line because they have just the right amount of visual attitude without going overboard. I'm showing this time around a jumble of poses from the Model packs 100, 101 and 102! Believe me when I say this isn't even all of them, just a few of my favs! enjoy