"Ecosystems of Support"

The Lindens have changed their Tao, according to Tateru, who knows what the Lindens are doing about 6 hours before most of the Lindens themselves know what they are doing -- and serves it up with her usual pompous veneer of having spent her entire life on corporate boards and in top management of software companies and is speaking from experience (when asked if it is true if she actually has this experience she implies she is speaking from, she falls silent).

But...that's not news, because they aren't doing that much to their Tao. They're taking out that weird passive/aggressive spike that Philip put in, "Might makes right -- oh, fooled yah, just checking!". That's just a good editing decision. And they're putting in more dreck about "transparency," by which they mean efforts to shine on harder for bosses and look as if you aren't gold-bricking by snowing them with TMI. Something is added about "walking a mile in the resident's shoes" -- if Moopf Murray's eskimo snow shoes were transferrable, I know some Lindens who would have gotten a pair of those upside the head recently from some angry residents, which of course reminds me of Bush and the Iraqi journalists...but where was I.

Oh. Ok, but here's where the creepy stuff is, that the Tao is only indicative of: the Ecosystem of Support. This is a long-in-the-making entity  of Pathfinder's, which is, of course, all about that Better World with those Better People In It that the Lindens are so keen to make -- after they turf off all of us abitrageurs, campers, furries, etc. and clean up the grid for Real Things.

On the one hand, who could be against support groups, and things like World AIDS day? That's a perfectly fine use of SL -- er, like that big meeting in Poznan about global warming that broadcast into SL...but did not have interactivity out of SL -- which would, of course, be the point, in order to save energy by using the virtual world for access to the meeting. Ok, well, Better Worlds aren't made in a day, next time...

On the other hand, there's just something awfully creepy -- my favourite phrase from Amanda Chapel, "smarmy shill" comes to mind -- because you feel as if this "ecosystem" is selected by the Lindens (a kind of initially invisible showcase of Betterness), non-conducive to criticism and democratic debate, and terribly smug and self-satisfied. It's of course hard for most people to come up to something doing "World AIDS Day" in SL and criticize it because that would seem to be not only politically incorrect, but detrimental to the worthy cause. Yet...This has to be said:  you can't get AIDS by using SL. People using SL for cybersex and fantasy diversion are miraculously protected against AIDS. If you're going to fight AIDS, you really need to go to the populations of people having unprotected sexs and shooting drugs to be able to, er, better the world. And those people are not likely sitting on SL -- although, of course, there might be some overlaps.

If you aren't using the Better World Application (TM) to help these typical clients of a typical NGO, what are you doing? Well, you're bonding and strategizing with each other, and fund-raising, I guess -- although not a terrible amount of that gets done in SL. People tend to size themselves down in SL and treat their Linden dollar as a US dollar and give you a fraction of a penny in the tip jar instead of a real donation.

Visiting the island indicated (it's called Karuna), I was disappointed. There were ugly flashing textures on some sort of display with people's RL pictures which just didn't work. I have to be honest and say that I have my doubts about the effectiveness of "World AIDS Day," which is one of those UN concoctions, mainly because the reality is, in many poor countries needing assistance, AIDS is not the disease most people are dying from. It gets the lion's share of attention, resources, research, campaigning, but this entirely skews some country's medical systems when they get overdosed with AIDS help -- but then don't have the support for tuberculosis patients or for children with dysentery. Some of the things that need doing to stave off these diseases aren't as flashy and expensive as retroviral drugs -- they just involve things like getting clean water to people or pushing the cots in an overcrowded prison farther away from each other and opening the windows -- but those sorts of things aren't as glamorous when you're fund-raising. So in some settings, people land an AIDS grant so they can support the entire medical practice of a desperate hospital that has more problems with maternal mortality or cholera than "AIDS". The AIDS campaign is sort of a victim of its own success at this point, in part driven to huge prominence by Bill Gates. So...this sort of discussion I'm trying to raise right here is exactly what you will NOT get with Pathfinder at the helm -- as we well know.

I make it a point of checking out various non-profit sims now and then in SL -- and they are always deserted. Oh, sure, I realize there are big events now and then that pack sims, but by and large, real NGOs are just too busy to hang out on SL, far from their needy clients. That's not to say SL doesn't have its uses -- it does, and they are more long-term and complex. Mainly, what I find with SL and non-profits is what I find with SL and politics -- it's being used mainly by left-wing groups, like most of new media is, and therefore the results are decidedly biased --  like the obsession by most of the human rights displays in SL with Guantanamo -- myopic and unjustified obsession, given that there are powerful RL forces already at play (and have been) that will close it and bring the perpetrators to justice -- yet with other situations in the world, even Sudan, but less-visible situations like the frightening cholera outbreak in Zimbabwe induced by government authoritarianism (the government blocked international health care teams from entering the country, and now has become so dysfunctional it can even turn on the water in the towns).

When something like Karuna Island gets a thunderous love pat from the Lindens (and is already financed by the National Library of Medicine with the support of the Alliance Library System, how dare you say anything negative? Well, of coures, that never stops me, and when I visited the languorous tree houses on this tropical sim, taking a rickety wooden cage elevator up to the top branches in third-world versimilitude (instead of flying or TPing) I had to just...goggle. There at the top was a modern blue wheelchair-accessible symbol. The teleporter below was described as an access for the handicapped. Now, I know that some disabled people in SL decide to make realistic avatars just like their real selves, just the way some people make fat or balding selves, for a familiarity and comfort level and versimilitude project -- or as a pride thing, to instill awareness.

But calling teleporters "access for the disabled" is just...unreal. You have a virtual world -- use its affordances. And stop the PC pretentiousness.

It reminds me of the demise of the Rezzable dump, that was cut when the OS debacle occurred, and I made a scramble to grab the freebies. Quite a few of them were "ecologically aware". So, for example, I could get a spinning compost tumbler and a big plastic rain catcher jug. So, making a camp site (the old fashioned kind) at Botany's grove, I put these items out...and felt completely retarded (which is a word which is *ok to use in the vernacular and is not a dis to those who suffer from disabilities* (we always have to go over that each time). I mean, here I am in this gorgeous virtual world with fairies twinkling nearby, and peacocks fanning their tails, and birds chirping, and little plants growing, and all kinds of flowers and particles and stuff, and I'm going to put out...a big-ass plastic jug??? WTF? I'm supposed to "build awareness" with a stupid prop like that? (Of course, I have to wonder how many pollutants I'd imbibe if I were drinking unfiltered rain-caught water out of a plastic jug...)

Says Pathfinder:

"As Second Life grows and matures, I think we are seeing the emergence of a particularly beautiful pattern of organizations and individuals creating larger projects that change people’s lives for the better.

I like to call it an “Ecosystem of Support.” In a healthy developing ecosystem, life complements and depends on other life. Complex relationships between species translate into a robustness that helps all species thrive. More and more, I see this pattern in Second Life between people, groups and organizations."

Well, no. I think what we're seeing is a few dozen groups, maybe even a hundred, who have set up some sort of presence in SL, but it has not become either a compelling fundraiser or media value-add for them (beyond the OMGZORZ we raised money for cancer inside a game!) A few very hardy souls flog this stuff (like Rik Riel, who has taken to flogging RL special causes and stories lately and shunned SL per se as it has no real use to him, really). 

And I think what really gets in the way of true progress with this platform on various causes is pretending there is something developing healthily when it isn't. To pretend that various plugged-in and granted and feted people just talking to each other and not going beyond themselves are actually making that Better World.  When Pathfinder says, "A vibrant new community of support has been created, kicked off by a very successful event that was attended by thousands of individuals," he doesn't mean they were all on one sim at one time. You can fit 70 on a sim. Perhaps the site had thousands of visitors over time -- but what is the *reach* of those logging on? And why are those logging on stalled at 1.4 million? Those are the hard questions that have to be asked by people with scarce funding that is growing even more scarce in the recession.

I have no idea what crypto-intent is signalled by Pathfinder with his comment about "complex relationships" but I know one complex relationship: the Lindens, refusing to give educational, non-profit organizations the educational discount on the open-space sims. That's just inexcusable. all of these groups were able to thrive, and many less-resourced ones were able to build up a presence in SL, by being able to have discounted sims. Some of us thought that was apportioned rather unfairly -- only to those literally with 501-c-3 charitable status, and not to any actual demonstrably good charitable project (which could have easily been done). But still, it was an important feature of SL that the Lindens, while going about making their goofy NPR world, understood that it has to be subsidized, and the cost knocked down for non-commercial entities. So for them to drop that now on their favourite pupils just doesn't make sense.

I don't know where the Lindens' other theory applies by contrast to this "healthy ecosystem," that theory of theirs of social Darwinism and their demand that people survive an obstacle course of learning curves, management challenges, and performance headaches in order to be "in the ecosystem" -- but I guess that's how they keep the numbers down -- and it's all part of that, uh, beautiful and robust "complexity".

Forgive me if I'm not getting with the program here, but I'm not given confidence thinking about how the Lindens, and Pathfinder in particular, will "work to support this" "ecosystem". Ecosystems don't really form in an artificial setting (like Svarga!) where the state -- the corporate executive power without any checks and balances -- or the company town -- Linden Lab -- gets to decide who is featured on the website and who isn't, who gets graced with a Linden in their group and who doesn't, who gets in Showcase and who doesn't, who gets a prize and who doesn't, etc. I wish I could have more faith in the Lindens in their gambit to make a Better World. I'd have that faith if they made this virtual world better with more consistency and speed than they've been able to. I think you have to start in small places, as Eleanor Roosevelt famously said.

I think the "ecosystems of support" are made more organically than the Lindens are willing to admit by people much more informally, through their friendships and blogs -- and people help each other with RL causes as well. And that an "ecosystem of support" doesn't come by the Lindens managing and culling and curating, and putting the imprimatur of political correctness on this or that cause, but by actually creating the conditions for good work. A restoration of the non-profit discount on the cheaper open-space sims would seem to be what's really required from LL.

Comments

[Sioban McMahon]

"I make it a point of checking out various non-profit sims now and then in SL -- and they are always deserted."

I manage the in-world branch of a non-profit, the West of Ireland. We raise donations for and awareness of Project Children (projectchildren.org). We run events 365 days a year in European and North American hours in Nancy Blake's Pub (live music, dj's), the West of Ireland Library (storytelling, poetry, etc), the West of Ireland Art Gallery (exhibitions changing monthly), and a series of venues in which we do various weekly theme and special events. (Our schedule: http://www.irelandsl.org/about/events-live-music)

We are able to send an average of around $750 usd each month to Project Children. The money is used to pay for transportation costs (mainly airline tickets) so that kids may participate in the program.

In February, we'll be two years old. We are active and we're here to stay. Come by and visit us.

[AlterEgoTrip Svenska]

That was a long bunch of wind Prokofy!.. I got tired after a few paragraphs once you started ranting.. sorry.. I guess I will have to shock myself awake next time, but it obvious, I didn't really miss much.