Annotated 9 Year Timeline of Social Controversies in SL

SL blogger Botgirl Questi recently created this annotated, interactive timeline of controversies in Second Life, going back to 2003, and it's pretty damn cool:

Several, such as the Iraq War-flavored battles in Jessie, were originally covered on NWN. "As I browsed through the last 3 1/2 years of my posts," Questi tells me, "I realized they included what amounted to a history of Second Life controversies." So now she's implementing them into this timeline, and taking tips from other SLers for controversies to add:

"I posted the first draft of the timeline in a blog post and asked readers to suggest additional controversies. About a week later, it's grown to 125+ events, each linked to a blog post or article. There are plenty of items I've missed, so the history will continue to grow in addition to whatever new issues pop up in the future."

Tweet

Comments

[Kim Anubis]

Very cool!

[shockwave yareach]

I was not even aware that their "Solution Provider" program was still in place. I put my name out and I was put on the list many years ago. And nobody ever contacted me, check the quality of my work, evaluated my skill set, or anything. Basically it was nothing but a list of people who said "hey, put me on the list!"

I cannot imagine how it's costing them money -- nobody seems to be doing anything with it. And I'll bet 4/5 of the names on it don't even log into SL anymore.

[Kim Anubis]

shockwave, there was more to joining the Gold Solution Provider program (which had more to offer) and together these SP programs employed a couple of Lindens. Labor costs money. Anyway, I found the Gold program worthwhile enough to sign on for a second year.

The SP programs ending at this time makes sense to me. The programs were, I believe, never about helping out FIC developers (as at least one perpetual complainer has opined in the past), but were rather intended to make it easy for enterprise customers to locate and select developers and other SL consultants who were able to meet their needs. As the Lab has stated they're after consumers rather than enterprise now, maintaining the SP programs no longer makes sense from that standpoint.

The announcement is no shock to me, and I appreciate the Lab's unambiguous communication about the end of the programs. Feels like someone took the disused bureaucratic yoke off my back and maybe I can dance again.