Linden Lab changes traffic scoring, ignores elephant in the room

In a move reminiscent of 2007, Linden Lab made a change to traffic scoring in order to lighten the workload on its systems. The only problem is that the company failed to address any of the concerns regarding ways to trick the system in order to be drive in more traffic.

Yesterday, LL made its announcement to the way scores are given to land plots. Currently, it is a complex formula that compiles data regarding the number of people who visited, how long they stayed, and how much time they spent at each location.

"Traffic, says LL in its statement, will be the cumulative minutes spent on the parcel by all visitors to the parcel within the previous day. It will be calculated from the total seconds spent on the parcel, divided by 60 and rounded to the nearest whole minute (up or down). It is calculated in real-time, and will be updated every morning at 1am PST for the previous day."

According to the statement, this will change the numbers you see for traffic in the About Land window and the first updated numbers will be available on September 1. But they won't have much of an impact on the rankings of a parcel in search results.

Therefore, LL ignores the elephant in the room since it does not entirely reform the way traffic is used for search results. This leaves the incentive to game the system by letting bots or simple avatars standing around for hours just to rack up the traffic points.

More limits such as counting only unique visitors might have been welcome. Simply separating traffic from search results might have been even smarter to put the focus squarely on relevance. LL only makes a vague promise about this.

This is a sad situation. Even today, despite all of Linden Lab's efforts to create a Showcase area and earlier adoption of Google search technology, finding very relevant results when searching can be a challenge.

Sure, LL wants to reassure by saying "we will be pushing harder to make sure that unfair use of Bots or other means to game Search are stopped."

The only problem is that when tackling this issue, they gave first priority to their resources, not to in-world usability. Only a "customer focus" makes a project viable in the long run.

When will LL stop being self-centered and adopt a customer-based approach?

moreless

Disappearing Lifesaver

It seems that there is a move by the lindens to do away with camping in sl.
Perhaps not deliberately but as an offshoot of the traffic issue and bots.
Now, you know I love freebies and you have to figure that I love camping.
I started camping as a newbie 2 years ago. I thought it was great to be getting some lindens for sitting, or even better for dancing.
There was one place I loved. It was in a New York sim with a camp master where you could just sit at a lovely pond quietly in the midnight mode and earn lindens for that enjoyment and sleep at the same time..
To my favorite I make a daily visit, of course, I will not mention the name but I feel as if I have a job there. The owner is so pleasant and caring to inform us of changes occurring.
It is not like that everywhere. Some owners just use the avatars for gain and pay very little for our presence. I have found one that charges to join the group.
They do not know us and we do not know them.
I have lived with both. Actually I do not need to camp. I am addicted to the idea so I still do it. I have that feeling that it is great to get lindens for so little, But I use the money I earn for good. Much of it is for someone else who needs it. Some goes to help newbies, some to charities, some for shopping, ( but not that much since I love those freebies too) and a lot for tips.
I am not clear on what the problem is with traffic being “bloated”.
It puts some sims in the top of search and I guess there must be money involved somehow.
I wonder what the newbies will do for money.
Of course I have met those owners who have no love for the camps. It just causes trouble they say.
I know I will miss it if it disappears but I will be fine.
Some of my friends will not and that is a worry.
One newbie told me of two really good camps that have gone down in the past week. They are scrambling to find new ones. Well, we can only hope.
Gemma Cleanslate

moreless

Camping bots, an overdue change with side effects

Finally. After years of lax policy, the Lindens have let the community know that they will actively seek camping bots and crack down on their existence. The move is long overdue but we have to recognize its side effects and the poor state of search in Second Life.

First of all, this is something we should embrace and rejoice over immediately. Camping has been used to trick the traffic numbers ever since people knew how they are attributed daily. Even with the “new” Google-based search, this made a place come out on top because traffic is part of the relevance criteria.

This had heavily perverse effects, as you can guess. Business owners who wanted to play a fair game had a major disadvantage. The ones who did not want, did not have the means to pay for occupied camping spots or to set up bots paid the price for their choices.

Even some of us had wrong visitor counts. I cannot remember how many times when I saw an avatar landing and leaving within 5 seconds, after not having found a camping spot. This kind of “visit” makes it hard to figure out your true level of success in attracting people.

If the ban is mainly a positive element, there will be some negative consequences. Many business owners will actually lose traffic and, eventually, sales. This includes top quality content creators. They will have to find out different ways to make sure their stores come out on top of search results. But there is an element of fairness which could push them towards more traditional forms of advertising around the grid.

This is no small deal when you think of it, however. Despite adoption of Google-based search technology, Second Life search results still lack in quality. If so many people tricked the system, it was partly because the system was not very efficient. The state of SL search can still be compared to Web search before Google made relevance king.

This is yet another major challenge for Linden Lab. Will they come up with a solution?

moreless

Jack Linden Says Camping Bots to be Banned

On the Second Life blog post on Thursday April 23, Jack Linden stated the following:


“Almost everyone agrees that using Bots to manipulate traffic (and therefore Search rankings) is unfair. Not only with respect to Search itself but also due to the load on Mainland Region resources and how that can impact other Residents in the area.

"Therefore we are setting policy that attempting to gain an unfair Search advantage, by the use of Bots to inflate the Traffic for a parcel, will be considered a violation. This policy applies to both Mainland and Private Estates as both are represented in Search.”

Jack Linden posted that residents would not need to report violations, but next week Linden Labs would “routinely look at the Search results” to look for camping bots. Where they found clear cases, the owner would be given a warning, followed by “an account suspension or removal from Search if it persists.”

He went onto reassure users of other bots, “We will not be banning or removing Bots from Second Life. There are many amazing and useful ways to use Bots and the fact that in some circumstances they can be misused should not impact the more constructive users of Bots. We wouldn't remove Scripting because it can sometimes be used in bad ways, and Bots are no different in that respect. ... ”

Of land bots, Jack Linden stated they would take no action against them for now, except when overused, saying people would later be able to buy and sell land on the website.

Read the full post HERE

moreless

Eye on the Blog

Monday, April 28th, 2008 at 2:50 PM by: Jeska Linden

Second Life Showcase, Popular Places and the Future of Traffic

"Looking for cool places to visit within Second Life? We are too! We’re pleased to announce that the Second Life Showcase is coming to the 1.21 viewer release, which is planned for Release Candidate in 2-3 weeks and in final form in 6-7 weeks.
For a sneak peek at this new feature, please visit Second Life Showcase on our website. The Showcase is an editorially-managed guide that highlights a variety of inworld venues and intriguing locations to new and existing Residents. For more info, read our Second Life Showcase FAQ; it includes information on how to suggest a venue for feature placement. We are currently developing an easier way to nominate inworld experiences for the Showcase from within the viewer, so keep an eye on this blog for more news!"

"Brief History of Traffic
Popular Places was initially created as a list of the 20 parcels with the most traffic on the previous day. The data that drives Popular Places has been based on raw traffic numbers, which do not differentiate between bots, campers and active Residents, and as some have pointed out, this has resulted in the tab not being an accurate reflection of true popularity among Residents."

"It is clear that the current Traffic system is not an effective means of determining the success or popularity of a parcel, nor does it provide useful information about Residents visiting those parcels."

Key phrases in this post that show that maybe they are listening: some have pointed out, opening up the discussion, brainstorming sessions, We look forward to your ideas!

WOW!
They have actually started to listen, and yes I am amazed. Have they finally got fed up of all the bad PR and are working on generating some good for a change?
This is certainly a step in the right direction finally bringing the traffic stats under scrutiny.
They have as yet no idea what they will replace it with and to be honest do we really need it at all? The showcase mentioned will only show a few places and will obviously reflect the opinion of those editing it, rather than the community, so its not really an alternative.

There is a spark of hope that if traffic is removed it will mean the end of 'bots' used to cheat the traffic stats - as mentioned before I can't honestly see LL doing this as it will reduce their user stats probably by as much as half, if not more, immediately; they need those stats to keep people believing the figures businesses see!
Well we shall see what we shall see, but at least its a step in the right direction Kudos to whoever finally began to listen, long may it continue!
Dana

moreless