Here's the reader response to that widely-discussed rant from an anonymous SL creator on all the challenges plaguing the Second Life economy. With 247 responses -- quite a large sample, as these things go -- a strong majority of 57% said they agreed with the essay, Strongly or Mostly. (Contrasted with just 16% in the Mostly Disagree or Completely Disagree camp.)
Personally I had expected the reaction to be much more evenly mixed; though to be fair, questions like these probably have a natural bias toward the negative. (If everything's going fairly great, why spend any time complaining in an online survey?)
If you missed it, read the whole essay here, where the unnamed creators inveighs against entitled customers, exploitative event owners, and lax bloggers; evidently, it all struck a chord among the SL community. While some of these complaints hold true in most other realms -- offline, we come across entitled customers quite often at our local department store! -- I think it fundamentally points to a need for more growth among the SL user base, so that there are other internal markets beyond high end mesh fashion, which comprises the majority of the Second Life economy.
As reader and creator Peter Strindberg puts it in comments, offering some advice as well:
I think this rant mostly applies to the fashion industry in SL. In my niche (business tools, gadgets, clubs, store-owners, real estate) it is much more civil.
There is one(!) secret sauce: I reach out to every new customer a few days after the purchase, and ask for feedback and offer assistance. Many do not reply, some reply simply with a brief thank you. But with some an interesting conversation starts that provides amazing feedback into their areas, and for product improvement. I sell a handful each day, and contact new customers once or twice a week.
I realize of course that a fashion shop selling hundreads a day can't do this. Hoever, in my 17+ years in SL, I never got contacted by a single fashion shop owner after having spent severel thousand L$ in a single spree at their shop. Every coin has two sides. That merchant rant could have it's buyer's rant on the opposite side of the coin. The truth, as usual, lies in the middle, and comes down to individuals on both sides of the counter.
More worthwhile advice from creator (and customer) Missa Sprout:
I make things in SL more for the joy of creating rather than trying to make a living at it or paying bills. I can do this because I have a RL job that is unrelated to SL and so it's more of a luxury hobby than a work product.
But I know many creators are trying to pay bills and even try to make it their living. I applaud their determination, knowing that they're having to pay entry/booth fees, produce exclusive event items, deal with ungracious customers and handle marketing of their creations or keep an eye on blogger output. It's such an unforgiving process and I can't imagine, especially for clothes makers, the pain in the ass it must be to rig for an ever expanding number of bodies. I do wish people would comment more on their purchases, and the nice comments too on how they appreciate a certain detail in the design. It seems a lonely business putting out a constant line of items without constructive feedback.
When I buy stuff in SL, on the MP and in shops and events, I make sure to post about it in the socials, with photos and links, because I realize how much effort these creators are putting in and we are all part of this community.
It shouldn't just be: SHOP BUY IGNORE, leave that for the Brick-and-Mortar RL stores, try writing more upbeat reviews for creators, they're not assembly line A.I. robots, they're people trying to express their creativity and maybe pay for food, or their mobile phone bill.
Another creator, JellyBoa, mentions how updates to the platform are also challenging for both customers and merchants:
Some creators are abusing things. Some customers are abusing things. Most people are not in either of those camps.
For every customer who literally acts like they have purchased a diamond ring at Tiffany's and expect the service, customization and fawning over them for their 199L purchase, there are still ten customers out there who genuinely enjoy the item as it, don't need support and quietly enjoy the item. It can be easy to get distracted by the outliers.
I am a new creator now PBR is here. So far I have had a few customers and one who was a total nightmare as they did not understand how to use the new PBR viewer.
Creators get hit with a lot of support that Linden Lab should be better at. I have been using SL for 4 years so know how to figure things out. I just had to ban them in the end as they said they would stand in my little shop and tell all customers that my item is broken so it had a blue hue on their viewer. (Their EEP setting/LL's PBR implementation).
I am not Tiffany's. I am not even an Etsy store. I am kind of the person who has a few random things on a small village market stall I cobbled together and they are priced accordingly.
Much more here, and please weigh in below!
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