So you want an SL girlfriend? Part 2: Express Yourself

SecondLife is an amazing medium of interacting with people, mostly humans, from all over the world. Visually stunning graphics and amazingly detailed builds, by people with a hell of a lot more patience than I, await to please the eye. SL is also full of sounds, artificially made or recorded to give the feel of the beach, jungle, or crackling fire, as well as a cornucopia of music, from every genre, played, performed, or sang for your listening pleasure. Now with the new voice enabled feature, you can even speak to and hear those fellow avatars you so desperately want to befriend... but, even with all that extra stimuli, SL is at its core, a simple chat program.

Yes, a type driven chat program, which will be at least 90% of your communication with those around you, so you had better learn how to express yourself in a way that conveys the real you behind the avy. "But Bender, I suck at typing!! Help me!!" Fear not ye fingerly challenged, I am here to guide you on the way to seducing that Pamela Anderson look-a-like avy with a nothing more then gentle strokes of your fingertips.

1. Learn To Spell. We all make mistakes, we all fall victim to the horrid typo monster from time to time, none are perfect. No, not even me. Spewing forth a steady stream of unintelligible words on the screen is a sure fire way to show everyone how proud you are of your 4th grade diploma, and that you don't belong anywhere near the Mature area of SL that your are standing in. Constant misspellings are difficult to read, no one wants to feel like they need a translator just to talk to you, when supposedly you are using the same language.

The solution? Take your time, read what you type, before, you hit the send key. If you don't know how to spell the word, don't use the word. Think of an alternative, even if it's simplistic and doesn't quite convey exactly what you meant. Claiming your are drunk or high is only going to work for so long before people think you need a dictionary or an intervention.


2. Chat etiquette. When communicating in open chat, there are some standard rules. Lay off the CAPS lock is one, it implies that you are shouting. If you want to emphasize a particular word, and since there's no bold or italics option, capitalizing a word is acceptable and effective, example: "You are an IDIOT!" Simple, direct, and clearly expresses what you are feeling behind your monitor.

Lay off the punctuation is another common rule. Adding 15 exclamation points or question marks behind every comment is unnecessary and very annoying. Directing your comments, by name, is also an important feature in chat. If you are wanting to reply to a particular comment you just read, just remember, everyone else in the conversation is not going to wait for you to dole out your tidbit of wit. Most likely, there will be multiple comments made, unrelated to your current focus, before you hit the enter key, so adding someones name to the end or beginning of your line will make it much easier to figure out what you are talking about and why. "Funny stuff, Bambi" or "Kelly, my frogs wear burlap" will keep the flow of conversation moving freely.

3. Pacing yourself. When communicating in open chat or IM, the idea is to keep a semblance of a normal dialogue. Typing to one another as if you were speaking naturally face to face. There are two kinds of posts that are frowned upon. The "I'm high on crack" posts and the "Did I just crash or are you still typing?" posts.

Posting comments like a junkie needing a fix is beyond annoying. Rapid firing one to three words at a time and sending and repeating so it takes twelve lines of chat to finish one sentence just screams, "this is the first time I've talked to a real girl and I don't want to stop talking because I'm afraid she'll lose interest in me and start talking to that other guy or worse teleport away from me because she's afraid that I'm going to stalk her across the internet and show up at her house and go through her trash and make a shrine to her out of hair from her brush and discarded toenail clippings." While that may actually be the truth, you don't want to give out that impression until after the second date.

On the other side of the spectrum, it is absolutely not necessary to post a chapter of War and Peace when replying to a simple, "Hi, how are you?" Normal conversation consists of questions, answers, comments, and replies. That's it. Keep your posts to a concise sentence that takes up one or maybe two lines of chat. Large posts tend to blow everyone's posts off the screen, causing them to be missed or ignored by those unwilling to scroll back to see them. Going off on a tangent in the middle of your own reply will lead others to believe that you have missed your daily medication and should probably go lay down for a bit.


4. Expand your vocabulary. Using the big people words in open chat is tricky business. Women are very attracted to intelligence, but very repulsed by people trying to make them feel stupid. I've found that the higher the IQ a person has, the lower the social skills they possess. If you are talking quantum physics, by all means expound away. If the conversation is about "What's your perfect date?", launching into a diatribe about the numerous ramifications that roses impart on the olfactory senses when proliferating them hither and yon on sheets of satin, may just get you the "oops, I think I'm crashing" reply.

Conversely, typing in what I like to call IM speak, or text speak, is equally annoying. Honestly, is it really that hard to just type out the whole damn word? While I'm sure those fluent in text speak have no trouble translating the gibberish you are putting on the screen, problem is, you aren't posting on a cellphone and I'm not your goddamn BFF. The only person who can get away with that style on a regular basis is Prince, because he was and still is the man, and you ain't him.

The main difference between being a good chatter and an excellent chatter is balance. Finding that balance that shows your true wit, intelligence, and depth. There are always exceptions to the rules. Rapid fire posting for comedic effect, posting a lengthy answer to a question that everyone is asking, or using a word that may be well over everyone's head but is the only way to explain what you mean, are all acceptable in the right circumstances. Most importantly, be yourself. Type how you really talk. The truer you are to your real self, the man behind the monitor, the more impressed she'll be.