Writing the Sonnet

I signed up for the SL Bloggers Mix and Match a bit ago, and as a result, I’ve written a guest post about paying it forward in SL (topic suggested by Ganymedes Costagravas) for Living in the Metaverse. The topic I suggested – the impact of socialization outside SL through sites like Flickr and Plurk on relationships within SL – is being tackled by Uccello Poultry on the official SL blog. The guest writer here today is Quaintly Tuqiri of Quirky Quaintly, and the rest of this post is her detailed look at keeping new male residents engaged in SL as suggested by Eliza Wrigglesworth.

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How many of you remember your first week in SL^®? I vividly remember bumping into people all the time and apologising, “Sorry, I’m new, I can’t walk straight yet.” Everyone who heard that laughed, not at me (at least I hope not) but with me, because they’d all gone through it themselves and totally knew what I meant.

When you’re new in SL, there’s this learning curve, especially for someone like me who’s never played computer games before. No MMORPGs, no nothing, the only thing I used to play regularly was Minesweeper. And occasionally Solitaire. Oh yes, and back in my previous office we’d play Yahoo’s TextTwist. But all those hardly count, next to SL (okay, okay, I know SL’s not a game! Give me a break, will ya? )

Right, where was I? Oh yeah, the learning curve. I’m supposed to be telling you about “The lack of encouragement for new male residents to stay in Second Life”, but since I’m, err, female — does a quick check, right, okay, definitely female — I decided to conduct an Extremely Unscientific Survey among male residents to see what they had to say.

16 male residents responded, and the general consensus is that… [drum roll] … friends are generally the greatest form of encouragement for new male residents to stay in SL. “I came and went my first year. I hung around when I finally started making some friends and started going places and doing things with them,” says Dyami Jameson.

Adds Jerremy Darwin, “I think to stay interested in SL one needs to start making friends. The most wonderful places or builds don’t mean a thing if you don’t have friends to share it with.”

Guys need friends to monkey around with

However, at least two of the guys also noted that SL functions more like a social network than a game (okay, okay! I told you I know it’s not a game!). And, err, unlike women, most guys aren’t that much into socialising. Hold the rotten tomatoes! I didn’t say this, they said it! I’m just quoting! I’m not the one stereotyping and being sexist here!!

“I think men in Second Life are more motivated by ‘goals’ and scoring systems, which makes SL less attractive to them than women, who are more attracted to the social aspect of the metaverse,” comments Prad Prathivi. “Guys are naturally competitive and aim to lead the pack, which is harder and less obvious to achieve in SL.” I’m imagining all the guys reading this flexing their muscles now…

Peter Stindberg explains it this way: “Males want challenges, tasks and goals — all this is not apparent in SL. You need to find your own purpose in SL, make your own goals, find your own tasks. This makes SL less attractive compared to a kill-all-enemies-grab-all-gold type of game.” He suggests converting orientation stations into games which might offer a reward, perhaps a small amount of L$ or some sort of avatar clothing or equipment.

“It’s a stereotype, but give each new male resident a fishing rod and a shotgun, fill the Linden seas with fish and the forests with deer, reward each trophy with L$1 or status points or gadgets, and the crucial first days and weeks will pass more easily,” adds Peter.

Other suggestions included sending male avatars to a different starting location, for example a space/sci-fi sim, or one where weapons were welcome and combat enabled. Some of them come from MMORPGs and are used to shooting things, going on quests, having a goal. Let them shoot things! Give them a comfortable, familiar environment to start with! Lure them in, and before they know it, they’ll be stuck here like the rest of us. Muahahahahah!

It was also noted that there is not enough information about all the other things going on in SL apart from clubbing, “playing house”, and sex. “A quick look at the SLCN website reveals a lot more than you find on the main [SecondLife] website. For example, I discovered there was a football tournament,” Ciaran Laval says. Oooh football. As a mere female, I’ve never understood this fascination men have with that tiny round thing they go chasing around the field…

This difference in male-female perspective leads Jerremy to believe that there should be different types of marketing strategies targeting different demographic groups. Ads targeting males should focus on things that interest men more: “The power to control their world — building, scripting. The ability to watch or participate in unique sporting events. Machinima. Role-playing. And, as these are men, hot sexy women can’t hurt,” he grins. Of course, some… um… many males might enter SL for the sex, but that’s bound to pall after awhile. I think. Does sex ever get boring? Err… lemme rephrase. Does pixel humping ever get boring? Is that a resounding “NO!” I hear? o.O

The sex thing is part of the visual aspect of SL, though. If SL weren’t so dependent on visual content, and weren’t so open-ended, things might be different. But because visual content is an important aspect of SL, the avatar’s appearance is one of the crucial factors that will encourage a new male residents to stay on. Girls want to look pretty; guys want to look hunky. Or at least, they don’t want to look like ridiculous newbies. If they have to look ridiculous, they’d rather not be there at all. I mean, come on, if I had to stare at an ugly avatar on the screen all the time, I wouldn’t want to go inworld, either.

“There’s a certain ‘Ken & Barbie’ aspect to SL that seems to appeal to both sexes, and I find that most male residents enjoy ‘fixing up’ their avatar with the best-looking and highest quality items just as much as females,” Merrick Thor comments. I’ve seen Merrick as Captain America, the Human Torch and Bob the Builder, so I’m not sure what he’s referring to when he talks about fixing up his avatar with “the best-looking and highest quality items”, but never mind XD

So the prevalence of the fashion industry and the corresponding difficulty of finding good — or any — men’s clothing can be a stumbling block. “On the surface, SL seems like a place for women to buy clothes,” jokes Bone Mosten.

In fact, the lack of clothing for men is what has led Rik Pfalz to, more often than not, socialise as a female alt, Osiris Pfalz: “Although she was initially somewhere to hide out when I didn’t want to be disturbed, I soon realised that with so much more content in SL designed for women, Osiris became the obvious choice for parties and socialising. Well, that and I do have an interest in fashion, so was happy to have the excuse to buy more clothes!”

Men rarely get to be this pooped from SL shopping

However, Gahum Riptide, self-confessed male fashionista, notes that men’s fashion “has really begun to take off in the last year”. Male fashion blogs have blossomed, among them Winter Jefferson’s blog,
In Cold Blood; Lawless McBride’s blog, Half Arsed; Takeshi Ugajin’s blog, Shop with Takeshi; Lustinian Tomsen’s blog, Second Life Male Style and Fashion; Monta Horan’s blog, Monta; and Oscar Page’s blog, Oscaresque. Of course, one can’t leave out the collaborative blogs Men’s Second Style and SL Men, and now there are even two blogs covering male-related freebies: Free Finds for Men and Free for Men.

Having tried my best to help by fixing you guys up with these blogs, sometimes no amount of encouragement is going to get a male to stay (they’re stubborn that way). “Some guys won’t see any appeal in SL as it’s not a proper ‘game’, so they’re always going to be a lost market,” shrugs Prad.

**This post was brought to you by Quaintly Tuqiri of Quirky Quaintly. She would like to thank the other respondents not named/quoted here for participating in her Extremely Unscientific Survey: Tiyuk Quellmalz, Arne Lauridsen, Fricker Fraker, Crisitaly Pennell, Aldo Zond, ArminasX Saiman, and Bon Berman. She would also like to thank her photography models Merrick Thor, Elora Henig, and Immortal Wingtips for their patience

**This topic was brought to you by Eliza Wrigglesworth of the blog Free Finds For Men.