Linden Lab, the company behind the the 3D world of Second Life has plans to institute a certification scheme for resident builders and scripters. Though many have signed up to participate in the forming of such a program together with Linden staff, there is an undercurrent of fear among some residents generated by the belief that the plan will cause a divide, and that it goes against the spirit of open sourcing the client and server software as has long been Linden's stated plan.
Linden says that they "believe this will benefit Residents, Developers, and anyone who wishes to use Second Life by clearly identifying both key skills and the holders of those skills" and that is is their "intent to work with an external certification provider to offer certification testing and maintain a list of those Residents who have been certified."
This has caused Tony Walsh to declare:
In my opinion, this is a stupid, unnecessary plan which runs contrary to the company's stated goal of opening up its entire virtual world system from server to client. Various company reps have suggested at one time or another that the logical pathway for Second Life is a form of 3D World Wide Web. Guess what? The web doesn't have a certification program: Any idiot with the right tools can slap up a web page. That's both the beauty and horror of the web, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
And I can't say I disagree. It would seem that providing such a governmental scheme and creating such a divide would run totally against the spirit of Open Source. But then we do have a Redhat certification program for Linux engineers, and even Google and Microsoft run similar programs, so why not Second Life?
Prokofy Neva says, in a scathing condemnation of the plan:
While some will welcome the system as representing a much-needed quality control for the world, the system poses serious questions not only about openness for creativity inworld and the free market of goods and services, but the Lindens' real intentions about "getting out of governance" when in fact, they're instituting a quisling/overlord system with a program that certifies what are likely to be their long-time pets as "the most skilled".
And therein lies one of the biggest problems for Linden I think. The move toward certification, which they say will launch late this year cannot help but to create a divide between those that have and those that have not been certified. Only time will tell for sure, but my gut feeling is that this is a bad move for Linden and Second Life that will leave a sour taste in the mouths of many skilled inworld creators.
It makes a lot of sense to have virtual equivalents of RL bodies. For example (using UK)in RL we have: RIBA for building architects; Federation of Master Builders for constructors and so on.
Within a virtual worlds environment (I'm looking to the future Metaverse here), having standards bodies that help regulate and QA their members, and arbitrate with disgruntled clients would be one sign of a grown-up virtual world. But this would, of necessity, have nothing to do with LL per se.
However, I see no reason why artisans and craftsfolk need to be certified by LL or anyone else. For QA and arbitration membership of a guild or union might be thought useful - but certification will deliver limited benefit, and would be a totally unreliable measure of creativity.
Aleister I dont disagree with your points there, I just don't think Linden should be the ones doing it....
I didn't know you were in the UK, for some odd reason I had you down as German :)
I have to disagree with Tony Walsh and Prokofy. There are plenty of places out there "certifying" PHP, ASP, and HTML web designers as well as just about any other activity you can think of. On LL website it also says that:
I don't know if it will do any good for newer big businesses coming in as they already have a Developer and Consultant list of businesses, but it may help those who are doing smaller projects for other residents.
Honestly, I see this program being more of a list of things for people who are interested in learning building or scripting. This might give them a checklist of sorts: can script a money object, check; can build a low prim staircase, check.
Other then that I don't see a reason either way for it existing or not.
Note, also on their website was this:
On that last point Anthoney I took it that they were outsourcing the management of the certification, but it's still Linden behind it right?
Good to see you here, and I certainly take those points on board - well made!
...and welcome to Metaversed!
They had the process for volunteers in LiveHelp, Instructor, Mentor, and Greeter fields. Yet, they got rid of them because it was "managing the world and that was against their vision".
Isn't this the same thing? Sounds like another way for them to "control", and of course, it's just another tag that has to suck up database resources in our profiles.
*Spits the sour taste out until this develops more, since WE have little control over it*
Don't worry, it won't matter.
As Tony Walsh said, "The web doesn't have a certification program: Any idiot with the right tools can slap up a web page."
There have actually been many attempts to certify web developers, and there are a million certs out there for them. As an iT project manager I can tell you I could care less, and my clients and superiors could care less if they have a cert or not. It helps, but I don't even ask during interviews.
Either SL will evolve into THE virtuality, and the certs won't matter because anyone could get them, or it will become a highly complex, difficult system to work with, in which case the vast majority of people aren't even going to attempt to provide those services. In that case, a cert doesn't matter because the people working with such complex tools will be highly-skilled knowledge workers. It is pretty easy to tell if someone knows their stuff or not within a 15 min. convo, so I certainly wouldn't care abut a cert if I were hiring.
Just my 22ยข (inflation).