Eye on the Blog: Lindens "to Retire the Current Mentor Volunteer Program"

Upcoming changes

The company has decided the time to evolve and grow as a volunteer community has come. While the official Mentor Volunteer Program has been an extremely valuable endeavor, its sheer size has made it increasingly difficult to support, and we need to reallocate our resources at the Lab for other Resident-focused programs. We've decided to retire the current Mentor Volunteer program—launching new opportunities for expanded volunteerism within Second Life.

For more information about the close of the Mentor Volunteer Program, please take a look at our FAQ.

We're sad to see the Mentor Volunteer Program go, but we're also excited about new opportunities! Now is the time participate in new offered programs, create your own programs or groups, or simply volunteer on an individual level. On our end, Linden Lab will work even harder to create the framework that highlights your efforts and supports the efforts of even more volunteers—heralding in a more sustainable and more creative phase of volunteerism. Rest assured that we will always want and appreciate volunteers in Second Life!

Announcing two new programs!
Linden Lab is focused on building robust volunteer programs in collaboration with the Residents of Second Life. Not only do we plan to help support their amazing work, but we also want to increase the visibility of their contributions for other Residents to enjoy.

If you're looking to volunteer, here are two Linden-supported programs that might interest you:

1. Second Life Answers. Residents submit questions and other Residents answer them—it's both simple and awesome at the same time. With over 200,000 page views, the Second Life Answers Beta has been a huge success, thanks to our Residents who participated by sharing knowledge, guidance, and friendly support on a wide range of topics in multiple languages. As Second Life Answers continues to grow, it will become even more effective as it attracts even more questions from Residents and more knowledge from our volunteers.

2. Coming Soon: The Resident Help Network (RHN) Beta! This program, which is expected to launch in about a week, will highlight the “best of the best” Resident-run help groups. There's a lot of great information out there among different help groups, and this network is designed to help our Residents find what they need. To apply to be part of the network, help groups must meet a high standard for helping new Residents, maintain over 50 active members, have an established history, produce documentation on how they help, and submit three Resident testimonials. There are more criteria for applicants, which you will be able to read when the blog and wiki information is available at launch. The accepted RHN groups will be listed on the website, featured inworld, and help shape future new Resident experience. We also hope to have an inworld Resident Help Network Fair early next year, so you and other Residents can learn more about the first groups accepted into the network.

Read more in the complete blog post by Lexie Linden Here.

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Open the Box with Dana

Meet the crew - This week saw us doing new crew pictures since we have had quite a few join our team of intrepid reporters, we now have an office manager, Christina Munro. If you see any of the crew about be sure to say hi, without them we wouldn't have such variety of things for you to read. Thank you all for the hard work you all do.

Well its that time again, no not time to get out into the real world but Relay (Relay For Life) time again and I have been helping out with quite a few things and finding out how it all works from behind the scenes to the point where I was overwhelmed.
I can honestly say I have a great deal of respect for all the organisers behind the scenes of RFLinSL they have to give 150% to getting everything just right and most of the time they get a lot of pressure from people, who have absolutely no idea of the work involved, and often forget that everyone behind the scenes does this voluntarily - I don't know how these people keep their tempers I know with the amount of disrespect I saw I could not do it, I am human after all.
All these volunteers have my utmost respect and admiration for all they do.

I have also been helping with the RFL Clothing fair run and organised by the Relay Raiders, each year this gets bigger and better, but again I get shocked by the attitudes. Some seem to think they have a right to tell the organisers what they can and can't do - talk about temperaments!
Its amazing what these volunteers do, it is absolutely astounding the hours and work put in, on every aspect, they do not deserve the disrespect some give them.
I appeal to all those involved please remember the organisers are volunteers for a great cause that is important to so many people, the way some have spoken to them and argued with their decisions would be enough to make me not want to do it again next year!!!!
Thankfully they have a lot more patience with peoples temperaments than I do!
Great job from a dedicated group of people.

We have spent some time this week exploring some new places and found Southern Fun a themed community and a beautiful place to visit you can find out more about them on their Sponsor page HERE
Southern Fun is 8 sims with shops, ranches, homes and so much more well worth visiting for the beautiful surroundings and friendly people.

I guess this last couple of weeks has opened my eyes to how much of themselves people are capable of putting into Secondlife and just how many dedicated people there are here with us.
I know that not everyone appreciates them but I bet those that abuse these volunteers don't realize the damage they can do to a volunteers willingness to do this year after year.
So if there is a moral to this weeks Open the Box its remember 'Volunteers don't have to do what they do - give them the respect they deserve!'

Dana Vanmoer

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Burning life 2008 - The story unfolds

Hidden away on 22 sims out in the SL ocean is the desert playa for Burning Life 2008.... remember the the drama from last year. Well this year will be different... it's a Zero Drama Tolerance Event (no Shakespeare allowed either). Watch the wiki at this link for new details...
http://wiki.secondlife.com/w/index.php?title=Burning_life
Burning Life was first held in 2003 when the grid was still in it's infancy, and this is it's 6th year running.
Because Burning Life is a mirror in spirit of a real life event, albeit with the unique and creative twists only Second Life can offer, we follow suit. Together, we will build a city, and we voluntarily accept many of the same restrictions that Nature imposes on the real thing. We do this to see how creative we can be with the same palette of materials and to revel in the beauty of simplicity. We use the same blank, desert landscape, and many of the things we build are naked or primitive in structure, easily revealing to the casual viewer how they were constructed. Just pretend that you're bringing everything you need with you in your car or truck and you're going camping. Extreme Camping. Really Extreme Camping.

The other thing you need to know up front is this: Both Burning Life and Burning Man are completely non-commercial. There is no buying or selling in this city...no sponsorships, no logos, no advertising, but acts of unconditional gift-giving that play a large part in Burning culture. It's all about about the radical inclusion of participants, it means welcome and respect — with no prerequisites for participation. It's all about us and what we have made for each other to enjoy.

Zero Drama Tolerance

If you are thinking of volunteering to work on the pre-event set-up, read this: The Burning Life Production Team will be a no-drama zone. It's goal-oriented, get-'er-done work, all accomplished behind the scenes. While it's very fun and satisfying, it is no place for a big ego or someone who needs to be the center of attention or in control. It's collaborative. "Team" is a big word around here; be prepared to work with others and be good at reaching a goal, even if the road to it is not the one you might have chosen if working alone! We're all about "get 'er done, lighten up, and have fun".
Source:http://wiki.secondlife.com/w/index.php?title=Burning_life

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