What started as a simple idea quickly became a successful product launch, the biggest one for me, and transformed how residents now share their second life on the internet.
I had the chance to receive so much support from everyone involved. This journey still feels unreal to me. Through this first article of the new blog, I will share my feelings about the launch, what happened in the first weeks of the launch, and where Primfeed is heading for 2025.
The beginning of everything
I’ve been working for quite some time on EasyBloggers, a blogger management system, which has familiarized me with the blogging scene in Second Life™. I knew the good and the associated issues with blogging, including the risks of losing your account when sharing your art on the existing platforms.
On Facebook, you risk your account because you have a fake name.
On Flickr, you risk your account because you’re not paying, and you posted a mature picture, shared a marketplace link, or a SLURL.
On May 16th, I published a Google Form on my social media, asking residents if they would enjoy a social media dedicated to Second Life™. The initial idea behind this was to understand and gauge if there is an opportunity to create something unique and worth the time to develop the platform.
However, I never expected this form to be so successful. In only a few hours, it had over 10,000 views on X, more than 240 residents shared it on Facebook, and more than 400 people answered the form.
It’s happening, let’s prepare the foundations
The engagement and the form confirmed that people were waiting for something dedicated to our beloved game, and the pressure and expectations were huge.
Right after the announcement, I was already working on this new incoming social media:
- How do you manage the storage of the pictures?
- What future name and identity should this social media have?
- What are the minimum features I want to include for the first version and the launch, and how much time do I have?
Storage of pictures
This subject was quite challenging as it would determine if this social media can be sustainable in the long run. My number one priority was keeping Primfeed active and running as long as Second Life™ is alive, and managing the cost right from the beginning was my number one priority.
Today, Primfeed uses Cloudflare, a third-party system that helps with security and performance and serves the pictures you see on the platform.
One method to increase performance and ensure that Primfeed is always fast at loading images in the feeds or the Public Gallery is to split the photos you’re uploading on Primfeed into four sizes.
Multiple sizes are used to show your picture in the feeds when you scroll, and one when you click on the picture to see it in full resolution: you don’t want to show 4K images in the feed.
Defining the name
The name is the central part of the project. It needs to be catchy, easy to pronounce, and easy to remember. I also wanted the name to be unique (e.g., Nothing should appear in Google besides this product when typing the name) and related to Second Life™.
Primfeed felt like the perfect name. It reminds me of where everything started in Second Life™. Creating a prim was probably one of the first actions you took when you first started playing, and I liked the name’s nostalgic element.
Building the features in a meaningful timing
MVP, Minimum Viable Product
I’ve received hundreds of feature suggestions in the form, and while I would have loved to include every suggestion, it was impossible to do so.
To keep it simple but functional, I choose to work on:
- Basic profile for both residents and stores.
- Two feeds to show the latest posts from your following and everyone on Primfeed.
- Integration with EasyBloggers and EasySubscribers
- EasyBloggers: Bloggers can add products to their posts, making it possible to view product details and locations right from the post.
- EasySubscribers: Subscribing to the store’s newsletter right from their profile, without any in-world extra steps.
- A gallery with a collage style showcases the best artworks on Primfeed, and it had a unique rule: AI and Render content for commercial content must be labeled as such.
With this in mind, Primfeed was features-proof enough to be launched, and it was now only a matter of time.
Timing
One advantage I had with Primfeed was my work on EasyBloggers. Most of the systems were done: Connection with avatars, payment in L$, stores profile… It saved a lot of time!
The anticipation for Primfeed was real, and this is something that needed to be kept on.
For the first two weeks, I slept 5 hours per day and worked pretty much the rest of that day because even though many systems were done, a lot still needed to be worked on.
After weeks of intensive work, on June 9th, I’m announcing that Primfeed will be released on June 20th, only 33 days after the initial announcement.
Being fast in this context was crucial. People have been waiting for a dedicated social media for Second Life™ for so long. From a business point of view, it was important to keep Primfeed in people’s minds.
In today’s standards, it’s hard to keep an interest in things that have been announced and are set to be released in 6 months, and that’s why I’ve continually shared work in progress and planned features during the month of development.
June 20th, it’s launch day
The launch day was something special and will forever be in my mind. I didn’t sleep much due to the excitement, but everything was ready for the launch the day before. I just had one mission for the day: Open Primfeed to everyone.
Then, at 9AM SLT, it was time to click on the button. However, I forgot some technical steps that made the website crash and made it unavailable for 20 very long minutes. Oops. 😬
But 20 minutes later, Primfeed was open for everyone, and it was truly something special. I remember having my mind stuck, broken, seeing the amount of support and having what I had created get out of my hands. It blew up, and I was like, what did I just create?
Two fun facts:
- In the first 24 hours, I’ve received messages from more than 1,400 residents. I had to keep my computer logged in, thinking aloud, please don’t crash.
- For the first night, I was awake all night and only went to bed when my partner woke up for her job. I told her, “Please check these metrics. If it’s red or at 0, wake me up and refresh this page when you can to ensure Primfeed is still alive”. Good times!
Highlights of 2024
Primfeed is only 6 months old, but many things have been done to include and add requested features, and here is a quick summary of the main features.
Open your profile to the public
One of the top request feature for Primfeed since the launch: Opening your profile to the public, allowing visitors not logged in to view your posts or profile.
This restriction was a considerable downside for discoverability or knowing what to expect when you click a link. It has been fixed this year, and a nice embed now appears when you share a Primfeed link on a messaging app or social media.
Enhanced editor
Initially, the editor for your post was homemade. While it allowed me to work on the unique integration with SLURL that Primfeed offers, it quickly became an issue when I wanted to add more complex syntax to Primfeed.
The new editor, Tiptap, allows adding more complex syntax. Italics, bold text, and underlines have been added, and more will be added in 2025! (Emojis for instance)
The Public Gallery is the main feed
Most users have been waiting for a replacement for Flickr, the main platform for sharing their pictures from Second Life™. While I wanted Primfeed to be more of a mix of everything, ignoring what people really want would have been unfair.
I’ve decided to make the Public Gallery (Collage layout style) the main page of Primfeed, and the results were excellent: a 10% to 15% increase in the number of daily likes. Now, my job is to make the Feeds more appealing for people to check out because even though the focus on Primfeed is the pictures today, many residents are making only text-based posts. (Which can be highlighted by the filters)
Primfeed Pro
Between the additional perks and the gift option, Primfeed Pro received many features without any price increase, which will remain so!
Events, get notified
Probably one of my top 3 favorite features on Primfeed: Events. Every Primfeed Pro member can create events in a dedicated space, with the date, an image, a small description, and the SLURL of the event.
Something even more awesome has been added to this feature: Get notified. If you decide to Get notified of an event, you can get notified 24 hours and 1 hour before the event starts by receiving a message in your local chat.
Primfeed Community Meeting
One of the recent additions to Primfeed is the Primfeed Community Meetings. These meetings aim to discuss Primfeed, answer your questions, and share last month’s progress.
The response has been very positive, and I will keep going for 2025. It’s been both fun and very challenging to do!
And so much more… I cannot list everything done in the last 6 months, but feel free to read all release notes on the dedicated page.
What’s planned for 2025?
Honestly, a lot. Thanks to your support, you’ve made it possible for me to work on Primfeed as a full-time job, and I don’t plan to go anywhere this year. This is a small peak of what you can expect for 2025:
- Videos and GIF
- Multi-languages support
- Giveaway tool
- Different profile types (Venues, stores, DJs, writers, etc.)
- Custom handle
- Albums to sort your pictures
- Request DEMO of products directly from posts thanks to the integration with EasyBloggers
- A more polished mobile app
- Recommendations:
- Simple trending tab. I don’t want to go into the farm of engagement like other platforms
- Who to follow
- Paid subscription to access exclusive content from other residents
This is not a complete list. More surprises will come along the way.
If you made it this far into this article, I hope you enjoyed reading and learned a few things regarding Primfeed and myself, and I can’t wait to use this blog to share more insights regarding the projects.
Thank you, everyone. Enjoy your holidays, and I will see you in 2025.
