Linden Lab just announced that they are rolling out yet another feature for Second Life, one I’m very excited about and have been, in parts, suggesting for a while; Place Pages.
They basically give every region and parcel in Second Life a page on the Second Life website where you can find out more information about them.
It is a bit like the information page you see when you use search inworld before you teleport to that sim, but bigger & better.
And all you have to do to visit these pages is click ‘visit this location’ and the teleport window in SL opens.
No more visiting the, if I may say so, confusing map first.
To make such a page your parcel and/or region needs to have “Show in search” activated in the land setting.
Go to https://places.secondlife.com/places to see a list of all these pages and click “my places” to see a list of your sims that you can make a page for.
The rest is self-explanatory.
And rather exciting; you can use 360 degrees photos and even stream LIVE via youtube from inworld!
But it gets better.
Place pages right now is still in the Beta testing phase, so it will get better and how we are going to use these could influence what will happen next with them.
Linden Lab promises future improvements and features, such as an event calendar!
I’ve written before (click here to read) about making more use of ‘my-sl’ profiles and perhaps creating pages for groups in SL.
Finding a way to allow us to stop using Social Media for all these things and start using the official SL website more for this.
Giving us online events calendars for our sims is a huge step towards this.
I hope that in the future the Place Pages for communities will include perhaps also a forum or place where people can chat with each other, an online photo album (or widget that allows us to show our Flickr pictures there), contact options that allow you to chat directly with admins and managers or at least send them a message, etc.
But above all; an events calendar.
Right now we have to send reminders, have a Facebook calendar, google calendar, etc.
I’d love to have a calendar for a sim that shows you right away ALL the events in that sim, region, all parcels in that region or just selected parcels in that region but that also gives you the option to subscribe to this calendar so you get IM’s when these events are about to begin.
And please, also the option for us to create recurring events so we don’t have to create a new calendar event for those daily or weekly events.
Can you think of more improvements and additions?
Let Linden Lab know, you can follow their forum post by clicking here and file a Jira about bugs or for your ideas and suggestions.
Either way, I’m getting busy making pages for all my parcels and sims!
Starting with this one for 1920s Berlin.
Jo Yardley's Second Life 
Confusing map? Those of us on mainland *rely* on that to get around. At its best, Our World is not a series of disjointed experiences, but an interconnected grid of places.
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The map hasn’t vanished, it is still there inworld.
But as an unnecessary in-between stop between clicking visit and arriving it is now bypassed, at least if you choose to use the Place Page.
You could always suggest they put the map on the place page 🙂
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In the long ago, when M Linden ruled the earth, the Map was buried, and attempts were made to devalue it. As a result, I’m a bit protective over that piece of real estate.
I think it’s likely one of those defining characteristics of a mainland versus a private estate person. The map is vital to us, so we may see the world, while an estate only need a map of their region or so.
You may see no value in it, and consider it “unnecessary,” but I will disagree every day of the week.
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I don’t think the map is unnecessary, I am not on mainland but use the map all the time.
However, I do think it is an unnecessary extra in-between step on the route to going to a sim from off-world.
Like when you click a slurl on a website to visit a place in SL, you first have to load the map and then click the teleport button while you already know you want to go there.
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I’ve always thought Linden Lab undersold what there was in Second Life. This is a really good feature and addition.
However, don’t expect it to replace social media. The way things currently work is a good web presence integrated with a strong social media presence across selected social media platforms. It allows individuals to interact and share thoughts, and things and it’s a response to how people actually do things on the internet, like it or not. The singular site that does everything is in the past.
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This is so conflicting. Not only valid for Secondlife.
The pull more and more things outside a virtual world.
With the result that people are less inworld, because all social stuff can be done outside a virtual world. This not help to keep people in.
This idea can be good, but you always need to switch to your web browser outside secondlfe. No i do not use the crappy dangerous bad readable and incomplete inworld one. It always give problems.
Am suprissed that linden lab is borrow this places idea from sansar. That is where i did read this idea for the first time.
This idea is only usefull so you can be in a better virtual world and still can visit some events in secondlfe without needless logins. So i expect a lower amount of users online in secondlife with this.
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People already use Facebook and Flickr, Twitter etc. for all these things.
Most SL places also have websites.
This at least brings it back to a SL website.
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The next step, therefore, is to integrate it into the inworld experience.
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Reblogged this on KULTIVATE MAGAZINE.
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