We had two site updates since our last Mentors Group meeting:
- Added in-world people search (works in Firestorm and other v3 viewers)
- Added email notifications for offline IMs
- Added Like buttons in the forums
- Improved the idle user detection method so private IMs, saving scripts and uploading assets will be considered activity (was a request last week)
- Discontinued giving out new user referral bonuses: Kitely has been contemplating discontinuing giving out bonus Minutes for referrals for some time as their net effect on Kitely’s revenues was negative. In other words, the new users for which they were giving out those bonus Minutes were not generating enough revenue to cover the cost of those Minutes. Kitely was willing to absorb that cost as long as they thought that doing so earned them goodwill (i.e. positive word-of-mouth marketing) but when it turned out that at least some people felt more aggravation than appreciation for those bonuses Kitely decided that it was time to eliminate this expense.
Feedback on Colors: Black, Blue, Brown, Grey, Green, Orange, Pink, Purple, Red, White, Yellow, Other
(These options will be used for most objects but not for scripts, etc. where it doesn't apply. Certain things such as hair color have different values.)
Ilan asked where people would search for color variations such as Gold, Magenta, and Violet if the above were the only options.
Some said they would pick a color from the list (not everyone picking the same color), some said they would choose Other.
Some asked about color combinations, for items that are multi-colored.
Ilan noted that they haven't decided whether a product variation will be able to have multiple values for the same attribute.
After some discussion, Ilan noted that from this small sample of people it would seem that you wouldn't search for shades of a color under that color, and if all shades are going to appear in Other then there isn't much point to filtering via color.
Ilan asked "Do you agree that if there was no Other value option you'd eventually learn the system?" In other words would you choose the nearest color to the shade you are looking for if there was no Other value it could be placed under. Everyone agreed.
Illan asked "How would you define an outfit's color when there are multiple colors, would you use the dominant color?”
Dinero Wind said yes, others suggested a 'multiple color' option, others suggested being able to choose multiple colors. Others asked about a patterned option.
Ilan indicated that there may or may not be the option to set more than one value per attribute and/or search for more than one value per attribute. The more options the more complicated the UI, the longer it takes us to build it, etc.
Feedback on Movement: Static, Flexible, Animated, Interactive
This set of options applies to objects, could be for animals as well.
Everyone agreed the options were clear and understandable.
Feedback on Department: Boys, Girls, Men, Women, Unisex
(Girls/Boys cannot be set with objects that have Adult maturity rating)
Virtualbelfast Ireland suggested that some people would object to no furry option. Ilan indicated that that would fall under the avatar types attribute.
Feedback on Department: Boys, Girls, Men, Women, Unisex
(Girls/Boys cannot be set with objects that have Adult maturity rating)
Virtualbelfast Ireland suggested that some people would object to no furry option. Ilan indicated that that would fall under the avatar types attribute.
Feedback on Avatar Type: Animal, Anime, Fantasy, Furry, Human, Robot, Other
Everyone agreed these were sufficient options for avatar type. It was also agreed that Other may be redundant and removing it would force people to use the closest value which can help searches.
Feedback on Environment: Farm, House, Land, Sky, Space, Water
(This is used for where creatures can be found for example)
Everyone thought those were fine, except Dinero Wind suggested there should be an amphibian option.
Feedback on Breadable: yes, no
(This is used for creatures)
These options seemed to be fine with the group.
Feedback on Rideable: yes, no
(This is used for creatures)
These options seemed to be fine with the group.
Feedback on Tattoo Style: Biker, Celtic, Erotic <Adult>, Funny, Gothic, Military, Tribal, Other
After some discussion, the group appeared to like these options but suggested that Spiritual be added as an option as well.
Feedback on Hair Type: Facial, Long, Short
After some discussion, the group was satisfied with the options but suggested that Pubic option, which will only be shown for Adult rated objects, should be added as well.
Hair Color: Black, Blonde, Blue, Brown, Grey, Green, Orange, Pink, Purple, Red, White
No one objected to the hair colors.
Feedback on Skin Color: Light, Tan, Dark, Other
After some discussion, Ilan decided that this is a delicate subject and that we need more input on this, we'll discuss this attribute again in the next meeting.
Feedback on Clothing Style: BDSM <Adult>, Bridal, Business, Casual, Fantasy, Formal, Goth, Holiday, Maternity, Pirate, Uniform, Sci-Fi, Western, Other
After some discussion, the group agreed to the options for clothing but suggested that Steampunk be added as an option as well.
Feedback on Clothing Material: Cotton, Fur, Jeans, Latex, Leather, Silk, Suede, Synthetic, Wool, Other
Ilan suggested to discuss these options and the other attributes we haven’t covered yet in the next meeting.
Other:
More than one shop in marketplace:
Villain Baroque asked it if will be possible to have more than one shop in the marketplace. In SL he has to use alts for separate stores. Customers like to see similar products in a store when they search it in the SL marketplace. And steampunk and romance aren't the best match concerning customers.
Ilan: Our backend will support having more than one store per user but the front end will probably not support it by the time the marketplace opens. (the infrastructure is in our design it's just a matter of how many features we push into the initial release, the more we add the more we delay the opening) It is on the roadmap.
Excluding mesh, or other characteristics in marketplace
Dinero Wind: I would like to see mesh and non-mesh separated in the marketplace.
Ilan: We're working on making the search functionality / attributes / categories much better than SL. You'll be able to filter perms and maturity rating on Kitely as well. Adding too many attributes will make searches too slow so we need to focus on just the ones that will help the most people.
Mesh and viewer preference
Several people expressed preference for v1 viewers, disinterest in mesh. Ilan reviewed the performance advantages of the newer viewers on Kitely. Kitely developed several cloud-based systems that are not available on SL and other OpenSim grids and that improve v3 viewer performance on Kitely. Ilan also mentioned the likely demise of v1 viewers on OpenSim once SL implements server side avatar baking. Due to the difficulty of incorporating this in v1 viewers, this will cause all v1 viewer development to stop and make existing v1 viewers display gray avatars in SL and, as OpenSim will want to be able to continue using newer versions of the viewer, on OpenSim as well.
Marketplace test period
Virtualbelfast Ireland: will there be a closed test period?
Ilan: we intend to open the Merchant control panel before the marketplace opens so people will be able to create their stores ahead of time. But we aren't planning a beta period for the store itself.
"Big Name" Merchants in Kitely
Virtualbelfast Ireland: have any "names" signed up yet?
Illan: Several have contacted me by email, one is mentioned in the forums (http://forums.kitely.com/viewtopic.php? ... tions#p511)
Dinero Wind: I have quite a few that expressed interest and promised to look more into the program. I talked to DBDigital, Sent card to JCNY, NHC owner(s) Lotus Creator, and a bunch more. JCNY responded. plus I have just been spreading the word among builders I know, they responses were mostly positive. the biggest no response was a lack of time due to current projects, but they generally said they would look into it.
Ilan Tochner: great, if they wish to be considered for Featured Merchant status please remind them of the requirements as listed in our announcement. Primarily they first need to contact me. In either case if they let me know I can add them to the Kitely Merchants group and they'll get free access to the Kitely Merchants Sandbox world.
Inga Wind: I just gave out the notecards
Ilan Tochner: did anyone respond to them Inga?
Inga Wind: yes one (Alphamale, https://marketplace.secondlife.com/stores/7162) showed interest they make men’s clothes and ladies underwear. They said they would research it. I want to get N-Core here too.
NOTE to The People Reading this Summary
If you have anything you wish to contribute to the issues that were discussed in this meeting then please add your comment in this forum thread.
