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Comment by GoofballJones | Hacker News Reader

What is it about Second Life that keeps popping back up every couple of years with people writing stories about it.

Yet, it gets hyped again and people go there and it's a fricken ghost-town. There is no there there. It's just a whole lot of nothing. Since it's inception, I've tried and tried and tried to see what it's about, and there's nothing there except built-then-abandoned things, tons of advertising, and no people.

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A friend of mine was super into it for a while. All the people are hiding from new players. I had the same impression as you until my friend brought me to secret parties and stuff. But it has not kept my attention more than 8 hours in the last 20 years. I always wanted to like it, just didn't.

My favorite thing in SL years ago was probably the Rantmedia studio that was set up to do live radio shows (which were also of course distributed as podcasts). It tied in the live audience experience with the text chat, and made for some ability to directly interact with the hosts.

Now, admittedly I've seen much of the same thing achieved with an IRC channel, as the graphics didn't necessarily do a ton of heavy lifting, but it was still a fun ambience. Which is really what Secondlife was always good at -- making some atmosphere for your online chat groups. There's the ability to pull in streaming video or audio as well, to tie it all together.

But yes, it's just a framework. It's what you make of it.

If all the people are hiding from new players, how do new people get onboarded into SL without just getting bored and leaving?

Most do get bored and leave. It’s not for everyone. Most long time players would probably prefer no new players. It’s not anyone’s priority.

There are plenty of people, but most are in their own little niche groups. I've been coming back to SL off and on since 2006 or so. I think mostly I like creating and building and scripting things.

People. Connections. Friends.

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