Here's How AI Bots Could Help Improve Second Life's New User Experience (Comment of the Week)

In our latest post about improving Second Life's first-time user experience, longtime reader/retired tech exec Luther Weymann details how AI might help with that:

AI bots are assigned to each new user. Read the IP address; if the new user is using it for the first time, they cannot disconnect the AI bot until it finishes. If the IP is a repeat user, allow disconnect.

The AI bot takes the new user through most processes, including how to rez, change clothes in a sandbox, tour important SL sites, and click a dance ball and dance. How to Add or Wear, how voice and text work, just a great list of things to know.

It takes 30 minutes, maybe longer if it's fun, entertaining, and you're getting a great intro to SL.

He contrast that with the current first-time user experience, which involves reading many in-world signs:

Reading signs on a walkway has never worked. I've tried for 16 years to help Day 1 people. Almost none of them know how to rez, that free clothes are on the SL Market, what a rez zone or sandbox is, how to change clothes, or what a dance ball is where you can join a group dancing.

You guys at SL have to overcome this. Lead them by the hand and see if concurrency increases.

This all sounds right. I think the key thing is differentiating the AI bot from a human-controlled avatar. I would actually recommend making the bot part of the viewer, a disembodied voice which can also enable relevant controls in the user experience to light up, when giving tutorials.

I've even recommend making the bot a character in a Second Life world narrative.

For an idea of what I mean, check out this first-time experience from Scavengers,  a recent multiplayer game with a lead designer who once worked at Linden Lab: 

Call this AI bot, say, Governor Linden, a hip and humorous uncle/aunty type with a backstory, leading new players step by step through the core experience -- even assigning them special exploration/scavenger quests to get them into the larger world and culture.

I actually wouldn't be surprised if something like this is already in development. When Philip Rosedale announced his return to full-time SL development, he hinted that it's the kind of AI application he'd like to see emerge. Anything to replace those infernal ass signs!

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Comments

[William Gide]

I would immediately quit out of any game/world/etc. with this constraint: "if the new user is using it for the first time, they cannot disconnect the AI bot until it finishes." Forcing someone to interact with an AI is just a way to tell them they don't deserve the attention of a real person.

[Zane Zimer]

Microsoft's Clippy is still a point of jest, all these years later. A 'character' is not the answer. Simple, intuitive, perhaps even guided, viewer help is a good idea. I would argue simplification of some of the innate SL complexity would go a long way to that first experience though. Heads/bodies (and other parts) are a disjointed mess. AOs, vehicles, needing to learn to 'build' to basically change your look. At the end of the day though, if there isn't anything to keep them in SL...it doesn't matter how good that first experience is.

[MythElyrynn]

This is an excellent idea, although I'd say an angle mesh HUD might be a better option, and also make it so it can literally become your SL assistant, and make it customizable over time. Even add an extra HUD slot specifically for it. So it doesn't have to take a slot something else would use. Make it somehow able to interact with the users voice would likely be asking too much, but yeah. AI has a lot of potential.

[FireEverybodyStartFromScratch]

Any game server or platform in the past that started to fill in bots because there was noone around was a sure fire sign of death.
Even if you could trick people into interacting or visiting sims with bots, after the first time, or the second time, people declare it dead and spread the word even faster "place is dead, all it is is bots now"
Good luck with that
Phillip is drunk on AI, can afford to mess up SL "tinkering" around as they do, just another nail in the coffin or detriment to growth.
People come to SL because their friends come to SL. It needs nothing but a reason for friends to join together, play dress up doll, and laugh at and with each other.
AI bots won't bring anyone, but go ahead and try. When does LL listen to their customers anyway, right?

[Luther Weymann]

Not all that's for sure, but many Day 1 avatars who I have shown around SL on their first day and followed my teleport lead to sandboxes, free dance places, underwater, rezzed things, I've taken out on a boat, and taught to chat, have repeatedly gone back to a free Day 1 dance place (Muddys) and clicked the dance ball I taught them to click and dance and then gone back many times to socialize. And socialize is the heart of feeling good about a virtual world for many people. My idea for AI to help avatars is some attempt at a personal experience in SL. The idea of Governor Linden or some personalized AI bot is the right path. I have proven to myself that a personalized experience for Day 1 avatars is one of the best ways to make people immediately feel comfortable in SL's non-gaming, figure-it-out-yourself world, and want them to come back for more.

[Nadeja]

I was helped when I joined and, in turn, I gladly helped other people who joined later.
On a human level, being helped and helping someone is a completely different experience from following an automated tutorial. Furthermore, it demonstrates to new users an example of the social interactions, as well as sharing your experiences, having fun together with other people on the platform. The automated tutorial should serve as a backup option, not a replacement.
On the other hand, often nobody is available to help. And some individuals offer assistance with ulterior motives, i.e. to hit on newcomer girls. Also social anxiety exists.
The AI assistant, available 24/7 and at your pace, could be welcomed if it's optional, not forced, and doesn't pop up always, unsolicited like Clippy, but allows users to call it when needed.

[Nadeja]

I like the idea of quests to familiarize with SL controls etc, making learning more enjoyable (to that I'd add achievements as rewards, as another feature to further increase engagement). Note that you can do that with a simple script, no need of neural networks, unless you want a chat interaction.

Current models are helpful with many things. Language models are good at natural language processing. The most immediate use for Second Life, if integrated into the Viewer, would be for real-time translation (a more seamless experience without Google Translate, nor HUDs using the API, and your chat won't be sent to third-party companies). Then, Speech-to-text can make SL more accessible to who has hearing impairments. There are projects on GitHub that classify and organize your files, which in theory could be used also for SL inventory management. There is a myriad of potential applications.

But if you want an AI assistant for newcomers, then you need a model fine-tuned with newcomer-mentor interactions and a robust grounding system. For example:
Newcomer: "How do I meet other people and make friends?" AI: "What are your interests?" Newcomer: "Airplanes." AI: "You should search for airports and aviation groups." [opens SL search]. Newcomer: "How do I ..." AI: [starts the relevant scripted tutorial or fun quest]
This approach reduces hallucinations and instructs the user on how to use the SL Viewer tools.