2ndhub Review

2ndhub is another social network. The network is geared toward Second Life users. How much RL information one uses with 2ndhub is up to you. So, if you are into keeping you RL and SL separate, 2ndhub is catering to you.

I am unhappy with Facebook. I have an account for my avatar and wonder how long it will last.

2ndhub Social Site for Second Life

I still like a couple of games on Facebook, but those are wearing thin now. I play only once per day now and have given up on Frontierville (too many ads in my face) and mostly given up on My Vineyard (same reason). Backyard Monsters is becoming more and more of a grind. Backyard does have a constant flow of new stuff to play with. But, it is a laggy game and doesn’t always work. I think it depends on the time of day…

Google+ is very nice and I love the state-of-the-art interface. But, because of their confused stance on pseudonyms and my use of Google Web Master Tools I canceled my Google+ account.

User Interface

2ndhub has a Facebook style interface. There are no new user interface features. So, use of the service via smart phone is likely tedious. Use via a desktop or laptop is clunky. The interface is cluttered. Everything is a drop down list or simple hyper link. Menus are standard link with a drop down.

Images

Users are limited in the number of free image they can post. But, the service allows one to tie to their Flickr account to their 2ndhub account.

I put some profile images up. My first try was a disaster. They gave me no clue what size or shape the images need to be. May be there is a clue in the FAQ’s. I never read them. So, the images in my first try were stretched out of proportion.

Once you have an image up one can use a screen capture to get the displayed image size. I decided 326×326 pixels will work. I made new images and uploaded them. I guess that is a spoofer’s tactic. My first images were quickly approved and displayed. Deleting those and adding my revised images took a couple of days to be approved.

Link To

It took me some time to figure out how to get a URL to my profile to give to others. Try: Nalates Urriah (If you signup please use my name as your referral. I get points for that. More about points later.)

Finding the Link

You can get your URL from a link in the right-side column. See the image. Look for My Personal Profile in the right-hand column. That is the link you can give to friends.

Business Profile

A 2ndhub user can have a personal and a business profile. There is a point cost for creating a business profile. I see several prominent businesses have profiles and place ads in 2ndhub. There is a monthly point cost for ads. There is a definite business orientation in 2ndhub.

Points

Points in 2ndhub are used to pay for advanced features/services in 2ndhub. These additional services are; banner ads, business spotlights, and group management tools.

How does one get points? You can either buy or earn them. You can buy them for L$1. Today the approximate price of a Linden dollar is a half cent US$. There is a page in the site that sells points.

You can earn points by referring others. They must put your name is as the one that referred them. This only works if they sign up for 2ndhub. If they purchase points, you get even more points.

You also earn points by being active on 2ndhub. They say you can earn up to 450 points per month just by logging on and being active at 2ndhub. Since some advertising features only cost 100 points per month this seems to be a pretty good deal.

Getting Lucky

This adds another aspect to 2ndhub. There are some matchmaking tools in 2ndhub. But, most of the real match making apparently takes place in AvMatch.com a sister site to 2ndhub. It appears AvMatch is much more of a hookup place.

AvMatch.Com

One can use their 2ndhub account to open an account at AvMatch.com. Use the same ID and password. You are going to have 2 accounts using this password, so you want a strong password.

The signup asks all the nosy info needed to do matchmaking.

AvMatch.com Sister Site to 2ndhub

One of the questions that confused me is the Profile Display Name. I thought I could just use my name. Nope. Neither Nalates or Nal work. It seems this is the name Basic Members and the public, unregistered visitors, see. So, I guess like RL matchmakers one has to go beyond the free account to get real contact information. Also, the Display Name has to be made up of words on the Approved Word List. OMG! This is frustrating. Now I am Flirty Girl Glitter. It took a number of tries and was getting tedious find a combination not already used. At this point I was ready to try Bitch from Hell. Obviously the designers here have no user interface design education.

AvMatch Images

You get 16 images for free. They cannot have text or names. If you blow it and the management turns off an image it still counts against the 16. You can by another 16 for a token… I am guessing that is like points at 2ndhub.

Again there is no information about the size of the image needed for your profile. Assuming the same geeks programmed AvMatch as 2ndhub my first guess is to make then 326×326 pixels. That worked.

Summary

I’ll have to see how it goes with these two sites. I’m not as excited by them as I was with Google+. They certainly aren’t providing the polished user experience that Google+ offers. But, they aren’t discriminating against pseudonyms and that is a plus.

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