The Linden Answers forum has closed
Friday, January 19th, 2007 at 6:35 PM by: Torley[Jan. 22 @ 9:48 AM PST] In response to a variety of great questions, Robin and I have made numerous comments below with further details. Scroll down to see them with yellow backgrounds, or use these links:
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Taking a cue from what Guy posted about the SLLM forums, we’ve closed the Linden Answers forum.
Linden Answers was intended as a place for us to pay attention to issues of broad usefulness to the community. Unfortunately, in such a swifty-expanding world, the format hasn’t kept pace: LA has been flooded with questions that belong in other avenues, including account-specific ones and bug reports. In addition, it’s difficult to search, meaning the same questions already answered keep coming up.
We realize this lack of focus causes you frustration and confusion; it wastes everyone’s time+energy, and this is precisely why we’re making these changes, and are expanding these resources:
- Knowledge Base - for your support needs
- Public Bug Tracker - for bug reports
- Linden Village - to meet Lindens
… but wait, that’s not all! Be sure to see Robin’s recent post: “Update: Customer Service Improvements“. Next week, I’ll be posting a clear list of our communications venues, so you have a convenient chart of the many options available to you.
Further details follow…
Where do I go to ask questions and find answers?
See our Knowledge Base. We’ve introduced a new Category called “Knowledge Base Request“, a parallel of the inworld “Help Request”. Each week, new and broadly useful articles — think eclectic! — will be published in our Knowledge Base. So ask us your best and brightest questions of interest to the community. (Some LA classics have already been included, and we’ll continue to mine the archives, including current answered questions.)
We hope to hire a Technical Writer/Editor soon to take the reins and dramatically boost the quality of our documentation; for example, this Preferences guide. For more info on the KB, stay tuned for the Jan. 2007 issue of our Second Opinion newsletter — which is another warm way we communicate with you!
As always, you can use our Support page.
I want to report a bug!
Aha! Public Bug Tracker — for the first time in our history, you can see other Residents’ bug reports, and file your own! You can even make comments to help. This is much better than thinking your report went into a black hole. Read the instructions, look at existing issues for examples… and get started! We also have the ongoing Support: Known Issues page, updated daily.
You can still file a bug report inworld via the Tools menu, but we anticipate this will be phased out in the long-term, due to the aforementioned.
But… where do I go to talk with a Linden personally?
Ever heard of the Linden Village?
[I edited the following to manage expectations. This is not meant as a support outlet, but an additional way to share ideas. Please see my comments below, such as this, for more info. -Torley]
It’s where Lindens have office hours… in Second Life! Pathfinder Linden’s been raising the flag on this initiative, and I’m wholly supportive. Why? Because I know how many of you want to interact with us, avatar-to-avatar, especially in a more structured way than “chance encounters”.
Some of us, like Rob Linden (times on his wiki page) and Jesse Linden (every Thurs. @ 4 PM PST) have already committed to holding inworld office hours where you can meet us and have fun. Expect to hear more about individual Lindens’ scheduled availability soon, and if you feel it’s important a given Linden or Lindens should be inworld more amongst Residents, let us know in the comments! What more appropriate way to talk about SL than be in Second Life ourselves?
Yes, this is a direct response to Residents asking where to find us inworld, as well as the perception that we’re not “consuming our own animal food”, as the saying goes. We want to share with you who we are, what we’re passionate about, and understand more about how you’re living your Second Lives.
I believe it’s important to be visible, connect, and communicate. I have a Linden Village office too — come and get your free textures! — and I hope you come by and visit me, and more of my Linden family.
I’ll be sharing more on the aforementioned developments in future blog updates.
January 19th, 2007 at 6:46 PM
So you close Linden Answers, but not Resident Answers, and Strife is still allowed to be a moderator despite trolling and insulting… everyone.
Wow.
January 19th, 2007 at 6:51 PM
Unbelieveable.
Yet another communication path closed off arbitrarily with no valid replacement offered.
Keep it up, at this pace you’ll have your residents fully silenced by summertime.
January 19th, 2007 at 6:53 PM
This was really the one place people could ask LL questions in public and get answers. I for one will really miss this forum - please don’t rule out bringing Linden Answers back in some form, some time in the future.
/me wishes LL her best with the new efforts.
January 19th, 2007 at 6:55 PM
Uh-oh, I can’t see this ending well…
January 19th, 2007 at 6:55 PM
I saw this coming awhile back :/
January 19th, 2007 at 6:56 PM
Torley — I might be mistaken but I don’t believe that Linden Village is visible/available to residents? (at least it doesnt appear in search or any other such places?)
January 19th, 2007 at 7:01 PM
Everyone seen this coming..And your shocked? I am not. NO The Forum mod is only doing his job. As they say there are other forums to spread hate and other harmful remarks.
Anyways Linden forums have had their use, but this new system of chatting with a linden Live is going to fail. I don`t understand the pattern of thought with LLabs and the anwer/Questen format. But As we grow so does the internal problems within LLAbs and those taht are support members. If they spent more time fixxing the game then pretty up the blog many would feel alitle less unhappy.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:01 PM
Erp, nevermind. Is accessible just not a place in search. Sorry about that.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:03 PM
Goodness. Took me quite a while to find that “Submit New Issue” button for bug reporting on that JIRA thing, and I had already created a password and logged into it when it was first mentioned a week or so ago.
Then the things you have to know and do once you get there are pretty hairy. It’s just not real clear, any of it. It’s like you need a Ph.D. to do it or something.
I used to think my bug reports were helpful, but from now on, I will save bug reporting for something that is really bothering me, like the texture bug that caused other faces to take on what you were trying to do to one. (Don’t know if that is fixed yet, but I heard it was.)
As for the Linden Answers, I do hope someone will bother to go through and answer the questions sitting there now? Maybe? I have one I was hoping for an answer to right on the first page.
As for the Linden Village, well, I was never much of one to go rub up to the powers-that-be for no good reason, so I think I will pass on that. My question to the Linden Answers wasn’t that important, really, and upon reflection, I guess I don’t care about it anyhow.
coco
January 19th, 2007 at 7:04 PM
I can understand to some degree why this had to happen, but I am not happy with it.
I will wait and see what happens, before I make up my mind.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:13 PM
We move on and we go with the flow……..Such is life on second life.
Also it appears that the mentor/greeter groups opening has been stopped as well…. Wonders what instore inthe future now a days in these groups as well.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:15 PM
[LINDEN VILLAGE] Searching for “Linden Village” should show Pathfinder’s office, as well as the balloon tour (which I think hasn’t been updated, but it’s still near). I’ll add the keywords to my parcel too so that’s another point.
The Linden Village isn’t intended to be a replacement of Linden Answers, but it does introduce several things we didn’t have before, such as putting more of a face to who’s asking-and-answering. Why is the important? Because it adds more conversational cues to “just text”, which gets misinterpreted more often than not.
While experimental, I hope we can get more Lindens inworld and you can meet us personally and ask us questions in a casual, relaxed atmosphere, where you aren’t waiting… days for a reply. I promise to make more of a committment to be inworld; infact, I’m *starving*. Similar to previous Town Halls (another communication venue), it’s not unlikely at all that we could post transcripts, or share reports on what we learn together, publicly. I’ve done it casually many times.
[GENERAL COMMUNICATION] We have a long way to go in meeting personally with Residents more inworld — in Second Life itself. For all the times I’ve gotten reminded with “So why aren’t you using Second Life to communicate more?”, I think this makes sense. Still too early to tell, in some regards, but we need to grow confidence in our own platform, and that comes from a better understanding of using it more. No substitutes.
Thanx in advance if you’ve looked at the overarching context and the steps that led to this — as you can imagine, decisions like this aren’t easy to make, but they never involve a singular, isolated piece of the system. The whole of support is quite formidable, and we need to make it better for you, cut down on wasted time+energy, and focus on the human, essential elements too — you chatting avatar-to-avatar has more presence and warmth than typing text on a forum.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:18 PM
Wow. With no notice, discussion or reasonable alternative.
That’s really… not a very good idea, in my opinion.
Particularly with all the major changes made/in the works. Will there be an LL-required population of Lindens in the Linden Village complete with signs to direct the residents looking for answers to the Linden “on duty” that particular day? Is this meant to be an improvement of sorts, or are you just cleaning house forums-wise?
Or will the signs not rez because of constant database issues.
Sorry to be flip, but cutting off residents’ means of communication in a time of great change doesn’t spell s-u-c-c-e-s-s in my book.
Good luck with that…
January 19th, 2007 at 7:19 PM
I saw this coming too. Just thought there`d be a warning first.
Typical though.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:23 PM
Well, I guess that shoots that one. I don’t have much hope that this will stay posted but have you ever really considered WHY the wrong questions are showing up in the wrong forums or the help requests?
Perhaps some people feel their questions do fall in a black hole.
Perhaps some people feel that there is no distinct EASY way to ask about things.
Perhaps some people feel that the responses provided are not understandable due to technical jargon.
I think the second is probably the leader of the pack with the others following close behind.
This was the one forum where it was possible to see a person’s concern and find a single succint response to it wiithout having to wade through all sorts of emotional responses. It is too bad it is going.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:30 PM
I really hope you guys know what you are fdoing with all this pr modifications and stuff…
I wish you guys the best of luck
January 19th, 2007 at 7:37 PM
Did you all ever wonder why Linden Answers had become “unscalable” to quote Robin, which I still don’t think it was had LL actually put some resources into it. Perhaps it is unscalable because your other methods of support are not effective! So now you’ve cut off our one public way of asking for help. Even though people asked for Linden help sometimes a resident could and would help yet someone wouldn’t think to put the question in Resident answers. How was the page or 2 of questions a day unscalable by the 16 people assigned to respond there?
Everything about this decision is a bad move and here is why…
#1 yet again you make a major change on a weekend when very few Lindens are around to respond to questions and nobody will want to respond the the hundreds of questions here by Monday. Yet again you prove that you have learned nothing from past mistakes!
#2 yet again you make a major change with practically ZERO warning (I hardly call a few hours ample warning), and without having a replacement already in place, tested, and resident approved….leave current systems in place UNTIL you have tried the new system out and found that indeed it does work…Yet again you prove that you have learned nothing from past mistakes.
#3 yet again you have not provided an EQUAL replacement for your now closed forum. So people can post questions to the Knowledge Base and MAYBE, perhaps, possibly, the person in charge will decide it is important enough to write an impersonal “article” about that may or may not answer the specific question asked with no direct method of asking a follow up question.
#4 “Linden Answers was intended as a place for us to pay attention to issues of broad usefulness to the community. Unfortunately, in such a swifty-expanding world, the format hasn’t kept pace: LA has been flooded with questions that belong in other avenues, including account-specific ones and bug reports. In addition, it’s difficult to search, meaning the same questions already answered keep coming up.”
What is the recourse for account specific questions that go unanswered by support? People ask those questions in the LA forum because their support e-mails and phone calls go unanswered…how is this going to change?? Back when Torley used to answer questions on the LA forum those account specific questions were forwarded to the appropriate person and help was recieved….how will this be provided??? Bug reports are admittedly NOT responded to through the automatic e-mail that you get when you make a report. And perhaps if LA was a forum divided into more specific sub-forums people could easily find previously answered questions like their own.
I don’t know who your PR person is but if they are suggesting you make changes in this fashion you really need to stop listening…
Here is what should have happened…
#1 a month or so ago an announcement should have been made that the LA forum would soon be closed and what would replace it…
#2 2 weeks or so ago the new system should have been in place for people to try out and suggest changes…consider it a customer support beta
#3 Torley should never have left the LA forum
What is needed at this point:
#1 If you are planning on Linden Village being a place where residents can get help please REQUIRE that there be a certain number of lindens there AT ALL TIMES!!! This should not be optional, voluntary, or “for fun”. You have listed this as a means of customer support so make sure it is ALWAYS available!
#2 Start responding to EVERY SINGLE support request through e-mail and phone calls within 24 hours, even on the weekend. Dell may have crappy phone operators but they are available 24/7 and so should LL be.
#3 Provide a list of support lindens, their area of expertise, and an e-mail address, and phone extensions, for people who have a problem with the support they are getting from the above mentioned support methods…a kind of “can I talk to your supervisor” thing.
#4 Provide an apology for 1) the lack of Linden Answers responses over the last month or so…nobody was aware that nobody was going to respond, 2) the unannounced closure of the forum with SO MANY UNANSWERED QUESTIONS!
#5 re-open the forum for a period of time so that the new system can be “beta” tested for effectiveness
#6 START LISTENING AND LEARNING FROM YOUR PAST MISTAKES.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:38 PM
You guys, this was a really, really bad move. Now the only way we have to ask questions without going inworld is gone, and no matter how much you say you value communication with the residents, this pretty much directly contradicts that.
I also have yet to meet anyone who’s actually received a reply from support@secondlife.com.
I’m very disappointed.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:47 PM
Most folks dont remember it - but there was a time when lindens would personally announce every event that was going on, on the grid. As in you’d get one of those blue boxes in the upper right that would say “Trivia contest starting on Bob Avatar’s land in 10 minutes! — whoever Linden” …
Then, there was the “huge” change of Lindens only announcing events en-masse once an hour. That was a culture shift.
Then finally that was eliminated alltogether - (OBVIOUSLY it could have scaled) - and that caused some outcry too.
As things grow, situations become less “family”, less “mom and pop” and more mechanized. To some degree, the choice was either - allow SL to reach as many people as it has, or keep it small and exclusive.
I don’t entirely agree with the move away from the ability to ask questions of LL more directly, or the idea of outsourced support. I do however acknowledge the scalability issues in them. (Most of the questions in LA were almost rhetorical or largely unanswerable - i.e. ‘when will lag stop’, ‘downtime is bad’)
The increase in liaisons and linden visibility in world will hopefully help mitigate the idea of a linden/resident ‘wall’. Like other changes, as residents we’ll have to roll with this one.
In a small town of 50, everyone may know the Mayor. In New York City, that isn’t possible, so other methods, routes, and representative functions have to be used. That doesn’t make the big city worthless, or that grievances can’t be heard. It just has to be more systematic and formulary out of neccessity.
SL is no longer the small town. But if you compare to other ‘game companies’, (I know, not neccessarily the proper term) - we have it pretty good, especially for an environment and format that’s never really been tested before.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:53 PM
To some, this may feel like a small band from their hometown making it big. To this day, I love the little pockets of creative chaos in Second Life that you don’t hear about in the news, but they’re alive, vibrant, and sometimes at 4 AM, I go ’sploring and visiting with the Residents responsible. It has this amazing, fresh feeling of discovery. I never wanna lose that.
[COMMUNICATION TOOLS] Just a gentle reminder as mentioned above, I’ll be publishing a list of communication venues next week, because there isn’t currently one. And yes, there should be one, so you get an easy look at your choices.
Linden Answers had all sorts of stuff asked in it that certainly belonged elsewhere; unfortunately it was definitely encumbered by many emotional responses. I’ve personally seen, dealt, with 1000s of variations on that theme, and the shared Community Team “hive-mind” has collected far more. (At this point, there’s very little new that surprises me — but I’m always eager to learn.) And recognizing we can do better in guiding you, that’s why the above is gonna get done.
We aren’t enforcing Lindens to have strict show-ups inworld; this is done on an engagement of personal interest, across the company’s departments. As I mentioned, you can help encourage us to see how important it is, and I know many Residents have wished to meet Lindens they like. Now’s a good opportunity to let us know.
Also… do you agree it’s better if Lindens experience problems inworld? That makes it easier for us to understand when things suck for you too. It’s one thing to talk about failed teleports, it’s another thing to experience it.
[KNOWLEDGE BASE] Remember, you can still ask us questions via the KB — and as stated, we’ll choose a selection each week which are of broad interest and use, and answer them as articles. A good example would be, better ways to deal with griefing like sitting on a non-physical prim (and you won’t get moved when shot); I know that’s not obvious enough. It should be!
New Knowledge Base articles will also be drawn from popular issues asked to support@secondlife.com, the Feature Voting Tool — don’t think I forgot about it!), and many other sources where Residents have a voice. I know there’s very much a perception that Lindens aren’t visible enough on these fronts.
Again and again, from personal experience, just about everything I do in a day’s work is influenced by something a Resident showed or told me. There’s not one thing I do in a vaccum — it all takes into consideration the influence of a person, a group, or the community at large. As part of the Community Team, this is essential to us. Again, I know the perception is off — more room for our improvement.
Improving documentation as we go along will address a spectrum of current weaknesses. It’s not easy to lose an old friend, and for some, Linden Answers was that familiar bar, like Cheers tavern. I spent many nights there myself.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:57 PM
Michi lumin - you make some good points however a person can still write a letter to the Mayor of NYC and someone from the office will respond to it if the Mayor wants to get re-elected
January 19th, 2007 at 8:01 PM
An unfortunate but I think necessary decision. SL Answers became swamped. It was a great idea that just couldn’t scale; It also lacked efficiency and search-friendliness.
My only hope is that as much work is put into the knowledge base as was put into SL Answers. Particularly with technical knowledge (like SL Server IP Address ranges for router firewalls, generic router settings for maximizing network efficiency with SL, etc.).
January 19th, 2007 at 8:02 PM
*not expecting this one to get through either, but trying anyway*
I know you said that “face time” is not required, but I think a certain NUMBER of lindens - even if it’s not the same ones every day or every week - should be available at Linden Village (which, now that I know it’s not just a group name I’ll actually make a point of FINDING once I get back in-world) - regularly.
A lot of perception is that LL staff don’t know enough about what goes on. This would give them the opportunity to see - AND BE SEEN BY (ye olde “face time”) - the residents and listen to what they have to say more regularly.
In past jobs, I know if I saw my boss more often, I felt more comfortable about s/he knowing what was going on. If the boss wasn’t seen often, and couldn’t easily be found…well, you get the picture.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:03 PM
“We aren’t enforcing Lindens to have strict show-ups inworld; this is done on an engagement of personal interest, across the company’s departments. As I mentioned, you can help encourage us see how important it is, and I know many Residents have wished to meet Lindens they like. Now’s a good opportunity to let us know.”
As I stated above Torley, this is a bad idea. If you are listing this as a means of getting in-world support you need to have it available ALL THE TIME. I agree with you though that being able to show a Linden, in world, your problem is a great idea but it needs to be available every day, in all time zones, at all times. OR specific “office hours” need to be posted somewhere and enforced. You NEED to dedicate people to this cause if it is going to work. It needs to be a contractual part of their job if it is going to work.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:04 PM
Communications is the key to good customer service. By closing down the only two-way communication venue you had, flawed though it may have been, you have just told your customers, “Screw you, we don’t want to talk to you.”
I have so much more to say on the subject but I I just feel it would be a complete waste of time to say anything else.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:07 PM
This is sad, but not unexpected.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:07 PM
^ Yeah, to Alexandra, that reminds me of the “cops on the block” analogy; neighborhoods that feel safer with police presence. Now, we ain’t law enforcement officers, but we are Lindens, and it helps to set a good example with “face time” and show up in-avatar. And not just stand there and look pwetty but do substantial things of relevance.
(I’m pseudo-secretly hoping many Lindens get thoughtful emails and IMs letting them know how important it is to be interacted with in Second Life!)
[LINDEN VILLAGE] It isn’t meant as a support channel, but rather, to converse with various Lindens on a variety of things — I’m emphasizing it because many of those off-topic questions ended up in Linden Answers, when it might have been done just as well — or better! — as a flowing conversation inworld.
As mentioned, Rob and Jesse already have their office hours up. And if this catches on, and I hope it will, we’ll need to post our office hours in a central place for you to easily find! So, let’s hope it catches on.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:18 PM
Things are all messed up with little understanding what is occuring. Why are you people making things so more complex then before? We had issues and problems but now there is more confusiong, more non answered questens etc…..I am totally lost in the through of why things are getting so complex yet, Somea re saying they are streamlining everything….
January 19th, 2007 at 8:20 PM
^ Please await the simple guide to our communications venues, telling you which is used for what. Coming next week!
January 19th, 2007 at 8:21 PM
It’s always good to shut down the perceived last ditch effort communications channel BEFORE you’ll “… be posting a clear list of our communications venues…” in a week, or when you get around it.
Makes it nice and tidy, so you don’t have to deal with all the valid complaints for at least a week.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:23 PM
So email to support get ignored or it seems from my experience.
Bug reports are not help request as per a blog post a few days ago.
Live help are not able to really help other than quote knowledge base information.
Linden answers now closed so we loose one more avenue of help.
No one has ever answered the phone when I have called.
The BBB was far to generous with their score of your customer service. Your product/service is seriously flawed but still a great concept. If you spent time dealing with customer support people would not say the crap that so many of us are saying.
I have dealt with companies that have poor customer service, it always goes up the line to those that make the policies that govern the companies opperations. Personally I am dissapointed in the leadership behind SL and have been for some time.
Good luck to those that stay in SL, I am very undecided if I will last to the end of this month with it. If not for some very dear friends I would of left at the 1.13 update when I suffered significant losses of inventory items.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:32 PM
Seriously, though, I have to say, this is probably a big mistake.
I have submitted about 11 or 12 requests to the support email, billing email, and phone line over two problems, I only received ONE response from billing, and it was answered a month after I sent the request. The only help I’ve ever received was in the Answers forum (From some kindly USER who risked banning by starting a new thread to answer one of my questions, after the Lindens ignored it for days.)
But, I’ve been watching the forum, and there ARE some users with fairly urgent problems that are getting the usual (no) response from other support venues, and the Lindens trolling the forum have been able to bump their issues up apparently.
So, even though I’ve been pretty bitter about the really bad service for the amount of money I spent with LL, my last little holdout hope was that there were Lindens who actually care, and you could see them occasionally in the Answers forum.
-blip-
Now your last vestige of positive visibility is gone from your web presence.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:38 PM
I posted a thread in Linden Answers asking for an explanation of how traffic works in sufficient detail to enable one to perform tests and verify whether the algorithm is being executed properly. It was never answered. I posted forum private messages to two Linden staffers and just today received a response indicating they would pass the request along to developers is search of an answer. It’s disappointing that such a form letter response was given when the person making the response must surely have known the forum was being closed, or if they didn’t know, it’s not too impressive that a person in their position wouldn’t have known.
How long till the rest of the forums are closed?
January 19th, 2007 at 8:41 PM
” Torley Linden Says:
January 19th, 2007 at 8:20 PM PST
^ Please await the simple guide to our communications venues, telling you which is used for what. Coming next week!”
Torley,
With all due respect, what good is sending an e-mail to support when they dont get answered or calling the 800 support line when the phones dont get answered or messages returned?
What good is “Help Request” when the interface dosent seem to function correctly?
You’ve just cut off the last line of communication that had even a REMOTE chance of getting a response when all else failed.
I’m sorry.. .but I dont see a single positive in this decision… .however I’m not at all surprised by it.
January 19th, 2007 at 8:57 PM
If we need a guide to navigate the communication venues it just shows that we have too many venues. People have a limit to the amount of work they’re willing to put in to “find the answer”. We don’t need a guide to the venues, we need fewer venues that are easier to use, and better responsiveness from the catch-all support channel when people give up searching on their own.
January 19th, 2007 at 9:02 PM
The knowledge base is currently of poor quality and little value, the topics are few and covered thinly, at least from the perspective of one familiar with SL. Opening it to residents questions is a good idea, but questions went unanswered in the forums, i don’t see how the knowledge base will be different. The expectation when dealing with tech support is that it will suck, so *shrugs* I suppose that’s just the general state of tech support everywhere. I wish it was different. The only company I have ever gotten good tech support from was Crutchfied.com.
The Linden village is interesting, and if the lindens who occupy it take it as their own it will be a neat place to be. You really need to make Linden Village show up in the search terms.
Residents need the capability to supply articles to the knowledge base. Your citizens here are intelligent, and they know the issues that matter to them.
I SEE YOUR CLOSING THE FORUMS AS A MOVE TO CONTROL THE PUBLICS IMAGE OF SECOND LIFE. I don’t think it was scalability, I don’t think it was the stupid questions. I think it was another move to silence the residents who voice dissident opinions through the questions they ask. If you had wanted to make the forums work you would have it’s possible, I’ve seen it done, and I’ve been a part of it, but the forums are on your site giving the people who express opinions on them the legitimacy of it appearing in an official forum.
By closing the forums the Lindens are trying to prevent new users and the media from getting a negative perspective of SL outside of their own personal experience.
From a cooperate perspective closing the forums is a wise move. From a cooperate perspective removing areas where opinion may be expressed is an excellent practice. Theres many things that are good from a cooperate perspective, but I wasn’t expecting to see LL act more and more cooperate. The way I would like to see the Lindens act is as citizen leaders, where they are first citizens of Second Life, and second leaders. Leaders who lead through their service as citizens.
January 19th, 2007 at 9:17 PM
“Next week, I’ll be posting a clear list of our communications venues, so you have a convenient chart of the many options available to you.”
Do your customers and yourselves a huge favor: don’t use multiple venues just pick one and attend to that. Otherwise you leave your customers uncertain of the right venue and you have to look too broadly to find what your customers need.
To date, the forums have failed - as is the topic of this post - the blog is widely known to be horrible for obtaining information, and the proposal to hold court in a sim that can hold 40 players is asinine.
From every country, from every client (working or not), email is a known, working technology. It is low tech, it has a plethora of tools to handle massive amounts of it. So pick support@secondlife to be the venue and then *answer* it. Allow users to check on the status of a ticket by auto-assigned number. Gather statistics on how rapidly support can resolve tickets and the mean time to close. Work to improve those numbers. Only allow the submitting customer to mark a ticket closed (or allow them veto with supporting information.
I just described to you how most technical support services operated. This is not rocket science, it just requires discipline.
January 19th, 2007 at 9:18 PM
So basically you guys got lazy and tired and never came to the forum, and people started complaining how nobody responded anymore and the lindens try to pass a lame excuse to close yet another communication tool for the residents of SL!
Those “New” tools are just a lame excuse for less work on the linden’s part. That “linden home” thing existed and no lindens actually came there, because they were busy dealing with in-world problems, and if you IM a linden you wait 10 minutes before they even say hello, and 60% of the time they ask you to “file abuse report” and let the abuse report departament deal with the issues.
The whole “Help request” thing is pointless i have tried over 6 times and nobody responds or they most likely don’t know the answer.
They need to hire a special linden to deal with issues (outside of sl, Via MSN, YAHOO, messenger ect) as well as keep the forum part open and that linden will respond to questions.
Im a resident of sl for almost 3 years and the value and quality of their customer service and their appreciation for the residents have dropped tremendously….. its like they don’t care anymore, its not about the residents anymore… its about $$$
January 19th, 2007 at 9:18 PM
Could just rename it to something else, like Open Discussion.
January 19th, 2007 at 9:18 PM
Problem1: Customer Service / Support forum has risen in traffic volume. Current staff cannot keep up with the increase in traffic.
Industry Best Practices Solution: Relocate staff or approve overtime while recruiting, hiring and training additional staff to handle projected forum traffic for the remainder of quarter and through the following quarter.
Linden Labs Solution: Close the forum and cut off user access to information, assistance and guidance on matters not addressed by other information sources.
Problem 2: Repeated questions in a customer service forum which, if answered truthfully, could lead to bad press and damage to image.
Industry Best Practices Solution: Address the source of the problems as quickly and quietly as possible.
Linden Labs Solution: Close the forum.
January 19th, 2007 at 9:19 PM
‘Relocate staff’ should have been ‘Realocate staff’
January 19th, 2007 at 9:21 PM
I SEE YOUR CLOSING THE FORUMS AS A MOVE TO CONTROL THE PUBLICS IMAGE OF SECOND LIFE.
Next will be forbiding post on the blog *smirks*
January 19th, 2007 at 9:22 PM
You should also close telephone support and email support since they don’t get responded to either…….
January 19th, 2007 at 9:23 PM
i feel we are like in cuba or something….
We dont have a voice in the decisions, specially when it affects all of us…..
January 19th, 2007 at 9:25 PM
One more observation about the initial entry…
“Linden Answers was intended as a place for us to pay attention to issues of broad usefulness to the community….”
Kind of hard to pay attention when nobody was checking it…
Torley, if it wasn’t meant as a means of customer service then why did Robin list in in her post for customer service improvements?
January 19th, 2007 at 9:29 PM
Another question Torley…in a LA forum answer someone was told to search the knowledge base for information on “Lag” I searched for “Lag” and it came up with ZERO hits….Why? Will problems like this be fixed?
January 19th, 2007 at 9:29 PM
Looks like you’re not upgrading customer support, you’re downgrading it without giving us an alternative…Spin it however you want LL, SL support has not been online for many months now. This just seems more like silencing naysayers than anything. I wonder how long it will take till only positive comments are allowed on the blog. :/
January 19th, 2007 at 9:32 PM
Customer Service Suggestions:
1. Create a site where any resident can answer questions posted by other residents, and people can rate answers and get points for answering questions. (www.answers.yahoo.com similar….)
- Fixes the need to hire more staff
- Residents will be able to trade points for $L
- Gives a new communication tool for the SL community, one that works.
2. Hire “out of SL” staff.
People will be using other sources of communication, (yahoo, msn,
skype ect to communicate to residents.
3. Keep that part of the forums open, and hire more staff to cover the forum.
January 19th, 2007 at 9:33 PM
“As mentioned, Rob and Jesse already have their office hours up. And if this catches on, and I hope it will, we’ll need to post our office hours in a central place for you to easily find! So, let’s hope it catches on.”
But what guarantee is there that they will keep them indefinitely? What is to keep them from getting bored and reducing and eventually removing them same as the forums have been reduced and removed?
January 19th, 2007 at 9:48 PM
Torley…one more question (tonight anyway)…
Looking at all the negative responses here….how can Linden Lab still think that this is a good idea? Nobody seems very reassured…again I ask, please re-open the forum, make sure it is checked and answered daily, while “beta testing” the new “methods” Don’t hang us out to dry. You don’t put out updates to the grid without a test grid, please don’t put out a new support system without first testing it’s effectiveness. You’ve pissesd off a lot of residents lately, take steps to win back their favor…be responsible.
January 19th, 2007 at 10:27 PM
Two things.
1) What do we do if we can’t get into SL? Telephoning isn’t an option for everyone - and even if you can, rarely can you get an answer. Support emails are never responded to either.
2) 4pm SLT is midnight in the UK, later in Europe. How about remembering the 50% of your playerbase who don’t live in the USA, and having some more worldwide friendly times to recognise the worldwide nature of your game?
Let me give you a useful tip. When starting a ‘new’ way of doing things, whether in SL or otherwise, most successful companies run the new and the old system parallel for a month or 3, to iron out any possible problems - you don’t just dump something completley, replace it with something untried and untested, in the vague hope that it might just work. What you are doing is *not* how professional businesses worldwide have conducted themselves for years.
Why, oh why, can’t you just be traditional for once in your sad, short lives instead of being so ‘hip and trendy’?
Broccoli
January 19th, 2007 at 10:29 PM
Oh… and whilst I think of it… why are these things always, without fail, announced on a FRIDAY, after business hours, when there’s nobody around with any authority around to try and deal with the legitimately upset masses?
Yes I know Torley has posted in this thread. That’s not the same.
Broccoli
January 19th, 2007 at 10:34 PM
have you ever thought that the reason things are asked more than once and in the wrong spot is that there is nothing to tell newbies what the hell to do in game i see and head dozens and dozens of timea day : “so what can we do here?” “how do i make money” “where do we go now” i used to help out alot as im usually always at an infohub watching the zoo. but now i just say search and F1 and ignore the rest. there is no in game help for the amount of people coming into it. Help island is a joke no one even remembers seeing it they just fly right thru it
wth happened to mentors and helpers have they given up on everything too? just my thoughts in case you care!!
January 19th, 2007 at 11:43 PM
The real reason this was closed is simple:
This forum was the one place in public view players and customers could ask the telling questions, the sometimes embarrasing questions of what the hell are you doing to this game and community..
Now its all behind closed doors and far easier to ignore, plus investors don’t see it..
I sold the island Bizzare this week after owning it for almost 2 years, I can no longer justify giving lindens my money..
I now come on SL only to talk to the very few remaining friends that stay, I go other places for fun.
And I know your not going to like it but its the truth, the free accounts caused this.
For 3 reasons
1)Not for the reason that everyone owning a free account is bad, they are not, but the simple fact that a free account uses up same bandwidth same asset server space as a paid account and gives nothing back to lindens except a miniscule amount from buying lindens 99.999% of free accounts money goes to other people not lindens, so us paying customers foot the bill and support/cuts loss of things like these forums go down the tube.
2)And at the same time shut down all the public viewable problems from customers in closing the forums so all the invensters see is look we got 2.5 million users hows that for marketing demograph
So no I don’t see free accounts as evil or people on them as evil but I see lindens business plan as snafu’d
When they opened the free accounts and businesses they let invest in SL started hooting to the press about ooh come see us in second life, ooh get a free account, lindens seem to forget:
Every one of those free account holders wants to use the forums and live help same as paying customers, but no extra revenue to cover it.
Shutting the forums clossing of public access and hiding away the problems is a symptom of a problem that is only getting worse.
Every free account opened drains lindens resources with no input directly back to linden (yes i know of the smallest of small amount lindens get for each lindex transaction but do you really think that pays for the resources and help time that each free account uses)
But once again I don’t blame customers its lindens who created this resource blackhole.
January 19th, 2007 at 11:43 PM
Ravanne Sullivan Says:
January 19th, 2007 at 8:04 PM PST
Communications is the key to good customer service. By closing down the only two-way communication venue you had, flawed though it may have been, you have just told your customers, “Screw you, we don’t want to talk to you.”
I have so much more to say on the subject but I I just feel it would be a complete waste of time to say anything else.
cool.
January 19th, 2007 at 11:44 PM
Broccoli Curry Says:
Yes I know Torley has posted in this thread. That’s not the same.
Broccoli
Because you say so, right?
January 19th, 2007 at 11:47 PM
Sean Clancy@
I got an answer by mailing support@ and got the issue even solved, it did just take about two weeks. Guess they try to make things going smoother by reducing the communication channels to the best ones, and wasting lesser time.
January 20th, 2007 at 12:05 AM
SL is starting to feel more and more like SWG everyday…. except not nearly half as stable…
Just as Sony did to ruin its rep, LL likes to do things whether residents (i.e. PAYING CUSTOMERS) want it or not. We have issues in game that have been there for months, but there’s a pretty new blog! Seriously, since the residents are pretty much developing the world and paying to beta test, you should A. Pay US. B. Listen to us and do what we want instead of pretending to be Bush and pulling up one issue to try to draw focus from another, C. STABILIZE this friggin’ thing, D. (insert the other 3 million things that could be done here.
Cutting off a major line of support with the lack of notice pretty much says it all about LL. “Face time” must be another word for BS in some insignificant language. I’ve even tried live support once… and they told me the credit accounts didn’t exist while I was quoting the whole web page to them verbatim. Of course then they stopped talking and disappeared… that’s the extent of support in this game. I’m going to be blunt here… get your heads out of your asses and start working with the people that put food on your tables, or starve to death.
January 20th, 2007 at 12:18 AM
Torley, you say:
“We aren’t enforcing Lindens to have strict show-ups inworld; this is done on an engagement of personal interest, across the company’s departments. As I mentioned, you can help encourage us to see how important it is, and I know many Residents have wished to meet Lindens they like. Now’s a good opportunity to let us know.”
There are some problems with that. How are we supposed to encourage them to see how important it is? Because if we go there, they won’t be able to see us there unless they are there.
This sounds more like Philip’s occasional appearance on the grid, and not like any kind of customer support thing.
If Lindens just show up when and if they get in the mood, then it will likely turn out to be more of a “sighting” by fans. It might be helpful for those residents who simply want to meet a Linden, but it sounds fairly hopeless for any sort of consistant communication, support, or answering of questions.
We already saw how the Linden Forums worked when the Lindens moderating it only got on to answer questions when they felt like it.
It didn’t work well.
I don’t buy this business about the SL forums becoming swamped. It just wasn’t. It was just that obody answered the questions.
I think the more likely and justifiable problems were:
(1) Not every Linden knew the answers to most of the questions, and
(2) the better you are at answering questions, the more likely people are to use that resource, and ask more questions, creating even more work.
I really don’t think that engagement of individual Linden’s personal interest should define which if any questions are answered or where.
And I don’t want to have to send Lindens thoughtful e-mails suggesting that their presence is desired. I think customer support should be a given. If this is supposed to be any sort of replacement for Linden Answers at all, then I shouldn’t have to send out personal invitations to entice Lindens into it.
Tell ya what, if anything, it should be the other way around. We’re your customers, and you need us more than we need you. We shouldn’t have to talk Lindens into providing customer contact. They should be assigned the job, period.
If we have to hope it “catches on” among Lindens, well, it’s no service at all. That also implies that if we make it fun and pleasant for them, they are more likely to grace us with their presence. They should make it fun and pleasant for us to take care of our needs.
I know your heart is in the right place, Torley, but for things like this, your heart alone just can’t swing it.
coco
January 20th, 2007 at 12:43 AM
Never mind, reading on, I see that I have misunderstood:
“[LINDEN VILLAGE] It isn’t meant as a support channel, but rather, to converse with various Lindens on a variety of things — I’m emphasizing it because many of those off-topic questions ended up in Linden Answers, when it might have been done just as well — or better! — as a flowing conversation inworld.”
Well, I really don’t want to attend a party. I just wanted my question sitting on the front page of Linden Answers answered, eventually, and by someone who knew the answer. And similar questions answered.
But you know what, I’m tired of raining on your parade. I know you are working hard trying interesting new things, and I hope you have fun with the Linden Village idea, and that others have fun there, too. It’s just not my cup of tea.
If there is no place to answer questions and get an answer, that’s okay, too. I don’t need to care about those answers anyhow. I mean it. I’m sure if there is ever anything really that vitally important, I will get an answer from a Linden about it somehow. Maybe by finding a Linden in Linden Village, then interrupting his free-flowing, off-topic conversation with someone else to get my question in edgewise! Rude and all, no doubt, but I bet I could do it if I had to.
And what I lose learning from reading the questions other people post, and the answers they sometimes received, well, I just lose it. No big deal. Helps me to care less, and it would appear that is a GOOD thing.
coco
January 20th, 2007 at 12:44 AM
Great. First the land forum, now the answer forum. Thank you for isolating yourselves from us even more than it was already.
January 20th, 2007 at 12:48 AM
[...] Linden announces on the Linden Blog that the Linden Answers forum is to be closed. I’m beginning to think that I’d like to [...]
January 20th, 2007 at 12:54 AM
NECK ATTACHMENT HELLLLLOOOOO where do i tell you linden about NECK ATTACHMENT THAT YOU WILL READ come on WHY NO NECK ATTACHEMT IT A NECK ATTACHMENT IS NEEEDED YES IT IS sorry im alite rude but really come on why dont you have one you have right eye left eye right ear left ear right hand left hand right hip left hip pellvis hmmm what else spine right uper arm left uper arm right lower arm left lower arm and more because cant think of them all BUT NO NECK ATTACHMENT COME ON YOU HAVE EVERY WHERE BUT NECK COLLAR SOULD BE NECK ATTACHMENT FOR IT AND WHAT ABOUT A SKARF NO NECK ATTACHMENT FOR IT THERE WHAT ATTACH TO MY BACK WOW thats nice shesh GET ADD A DAM NECK ATTACHMENT
January 20th, 2007 at 12:54 AM
Wouldn’t it have just made more sense to hold off closing this resource until you were ready to post the alternative resources you plan to share next week?
January 20th, 2007 at 12:55 AM
ill say it again NECK ATTACHMENT NEEDED
January 20th, 2007 at 1:28 AM
/me waves bye to the Lindens :~(
January 20th, 2007 at 1:36 AM
lol
Terish, I’m sure a Linden would love to be able to attach a long rope to your neck.
January 20th, 2007 at 1:50 AM
Before trying to write creative, eclectic articles in the knowledge base it would be more useful to go through the whole thing line by line and bring it up to date.
It’s kind of sad referring someone to the primary knowledge source and it’s full of stuff that’s wrong because it’s years old info about a simulation system that changes frequently.
January 20th, 2007 at 1:51 AM
First off, I love Second life.
Being a part of this community has enriched my life tremendously, and allowed me to make great friends I would have otherwise never had.
Having said that, I need to get the Staff at LL to listen Carefully to what I have to say - Torley - I hope you can make sure that Phillip et. al. read this
Linden Labs methods for handling Customer service are totally ineffective. Phone Calls and E-Mails to support are routinely ignored. Even when you do reach some one they NEVER get back to you in a timely fashion.
Additionally, you have closed off what was the only effective means of getting answers (albeit that had become marginally effective), the on line Linden answers forums, as well as having taken other steps to limit the ability of users to contact them. I have had one important question that has now gone unanswered for over 6 months, despite multiple phone calls and E-Mails. The few times I have spoken to someone, despite repeated promises of having an answer soon, NOTHING has been forthcoming.
There is a growing feeling among the community that the closure of the various forums has been done not so much in the name of efficiency, with the intent of replacing them with something better, but rather these steps have been taken to prevent outsiders from seeing the complaints which often paint Linden Labs in a bad light.
Massive improvements to Customer Service are needed, and NEEDED NOW.
1. the customer service phone line needs to be answered 24/7 by staff who can actually address “In World” issues, and answer questions. The SL community is WORLDWIDE, so it is grossly unfair that Support Lines run on Pacific time. The Phone lines need to be adequately staffed so that no call goes unanswered.
2. Much better in world support for time critical issues. Sometimes, having to wait 1/2 an hour or more for in world response is unacceptable, particularly when dealing with failures of the Server side software, or with handling users who have become obnoxious, are engaged in harassment, or outright destructive behavior. These things, especially the failures, can cost us in game resources, which cost us real world money, and/or many hours of hard work.
3. Restore the “Linden Answers Forum”, as it provides a vital method not only for posting important questions, but also for users who may be having similar issues to see the questions and answers. Commit that all questions in the forums will be answered within 2 business day, even if that answer is “were working on, but It may be a while” - and in that case - guarantee that the issues will be followed up on.
4. Better issues tracking for support employees, so that if a customer question or issue has gone unanswered, that timely follow up is guaranteed. Promises to return calls and e-mails will be kept. Commit to a maximum of 2 business days for and answer, and any follow ups.
5. Provide statistics available to all users on the efficiency and resolution of customer issues and questions. User specific data, of course, may of course, be omitted, but we need to know that progress is being made.
6. A Mechanism for addressing issues raised by users where they feel that have been ignored, or pushed aside.
Yes, you promise us better methods. Great. But make sure the old ones WORK. Run them in parallel with the old methods. After PROVING that they work, then take away the old tools.
Am I frustrated and angry! Yes, hell Yes. But am NOT going to give up. Oh, and Phillip - commit to have some in world “office hours” every week. This is VITAL.
Thank you.
January 20th, 2007 at 1:59 AM
What conversational cues are added to communication in the SL simulation as compared to using other systems like blogs and forums?
The body language and animations one sees in SL don’t provide information about anything but the programmers and animations that made it happen.
If one asks a questions such as “Exactly how is traffic calculated, in detail enough that one can test if the the values displayed are accurate?”, what benefit does SL have to offer in conveying that question as compared with a medium like the text edit box I’m typing in right now?
What value is added to communication between a technical service provider and a user of the service by having it take place in a sporadically staffed 3D virtual venue?
It might be interesting to put a “timeclock” on the Linden Village site that kept track of the hours Linden staff members spend there.
January 20th, 2007 at 2:07 AM
Look at this blog same thing is happening its becoming useless……only a few topics are worth reading and repling to……And what about the format? Its so bad a 3 grade teacher would say its so poorly designed：・
January 20th, 2007 at 2:21 AM
Basicaly what you want is to take our money. provide a completely useless service that barely runs at weekends, and hide from the resulting complaints.
Fine. Why bother with ANY communication? Close the forum, close the blog, you don’t answer the phone or eMails anyway…
Just hide there in San Francisco, taking our money.
It’s not going to last though - I hope you realise that?
January 20th, 2007 at 2:27 AM
Good Move LL’s and for the moaners i do believe we were all informed this was going to happen eventually when the other forums were closed. A far better way to reach the population by having more Lindens accessable in world imho and im sure we will see more customer services being more accessable in world, but these things take time.
Maybe if we supportted the changes the transitions would be smoother for all. Its not the end of the world and i can see personally that LLs are listening to us and making subtle changes on the fly and seriously guys no one is forcing us to stay here, we stay because we want to and it has been muted many times that if anyone is that unhappy with SL then we can always leave
We are in a unique enviroment so why