Marci Yalin and Arcadia Daniels twirl at Phat Cat's
In Second Life, is ballroom dancing a more popular activity than sex? It seems that way, because if you don't count any area which advertises camping chairs, excessive freebie/free money giveaways, and shopping-only-- that is, almost all the 20 sites listed in Popular Places, which merely lists raw foot traffic-- you come up with a much different register of popular communities. Last Thursday, with a little advice from Tateru, I did some extensive browsing and assembled a tentative, subject-to-amendment, truer top twenty list, with its attendant Traffic rating:
- Phat Cat's Jazzy Blue Lounge (PG ballroom dancing) - 91K
- NORSIM MultiSIM Roleplay/Combat-Live (Mature RPG)- 77K
- Bound and Determined: A Fetish Playland (BDSM sex community) - 57K
- HEAVENLY ROSE GARDENS ROMANTIC (Romance and wedding) - 57K
- Hedonistic Isle - Home of the Tiki Lounge ("Hedonism, baby!") - 54K
- IceDragon`s Playpen Island (Casual gaming) - 53K
- BONDAGE RANCH (BDSM sex community)- 53K
- City of Lost Angels (Goth/Cyberpunk RPG) - 50K
- SHOP&JAZZ Club ("Formal Lounge Ballroom Dance Romance Dating") - 48K
- TOXIAN CITY (Cyberpunk RPG) - 48K
- Capture Roleplay (BDSM sex community) - 46K
- ROMANTIC STARLIGHT BALLROOM ("Formal Fun Dancing Romance") - 45k
- Blackhearts Cafe ("80's Bar, Lounge, Music, Dancing, Romance") - 45K
- City of Midgaard (Cyberpunk RPG) - 43K
- Club Boss Island Club Boss Night Club And Shopping Mall - 42K
- BareRose (Japanese-themed shopping/RPG) - 38K
- Avilion Grove (Fantasy RPG community) - 38k
- The Lost Gardens of Apollo (Romantic PG environment) - 38K
- NCI Kuula-New Citizens Incorporated (Newbie help in 7 locations) - 35k
- La Vista Island (Nightclub&Shopping Mall) - 34K
What's fascinating to me is how diverse this list is; in the twenty, you have three sites devoted to hardcore BDSM sexplay, nestled up against PG-rated ballroom dancing and other romantic sites (six of those!), along with six RPG-oriented sites, and other assorted hangouts. Another observation: last time I checked, all of the sex-themed sites in the top twenty in Linden's Popular Places also advertise camping chairs, making it unclear whether people are there for the sex, or the free money.
Again, this is just a tentative list, because the Search function in SL is so broken, it's impossible to definitively know what Residents are doing, besides the 20-50,000 or so who are going to the top twenty Popular Places on any given day recently.
But what are some 400,000 other Residents doing, during that same 24 hours? Please suggest other sites I missed, which roughly fit in the 30-100K traffic bracket, and fit the "true community" criterion I mention-- no camping chairs, no excessive freebie/free money giveaways, and no shopping-only areas. (And yes, I'm thinking of making this is a regular feature.)
Great idea for a true top 20 SL list - but surely Tateru's own posts on your site from 3 days ago suggests that branded areas can be strong community ones too? The Pond is just behind Apollo (in your list) for example http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2007/08/taterus-mixed-4.html
And many community sites are made up of a range of parcels as shown using the Linden figures
http://www.theprojectfactory.com/images/stories/TPFStats070910.jpg
Gary
Posted by: Gary Hayes | Friday, September 14, 2007 at 12:10 AM
Oh forgot - where is my favourite place, Midian City!! ;-)
Posted by: Gary Hayes | Friday, September 14, 2007 at 12:11 AM
If only the Lindens could work this out. While I'm sure the people giving away lots of money count for the lower end of the SL Economy, ergo the newer players and those that remain, for some reason, terminally disadvantaged in the area of buying Lindens, regardless I have always believed the following equation in SL
Money != Content.
When I first got here the first few people I spent my time around told me that you couldn't get people to come to your place without giving away money. I shot that theory full of holes.
This list is far more representative of the real content in Second Life. Though if I was to be honest Phatland is about 2/3rds shopping, 1/4th dancing. But still not a bad place as non camper content goes.
Posted by: Suzanna Soyinka | Sunday, September 16, 2007 at 11:30 AM
THANK YOU! This list is a most welcome sight. I am the owner of NoRSim and I cannot tell you how frustrating it is to see pseudo-traffic sims pushing down legitimate traffic sims. I can say for a fact that NoRSim and CoLA both actively eject idling people after a certain amount of time (10-30 minutes to be fair to RL emergencies). So our traffic is true traffic and its good to see a list comparing places with true traffic. Thanks again and WAY TO GO BALLROOM DANCING!
Posted by: Luxa | Sunday, September 16, 2007 at 01:36 PM
What about The Shelter? It's traffic may be misleading since it crosses 2 sims.
Posted by: Neptune Rebel | Tuesday, September 18, 2007 at 06:57 PM