Oh Rezzable, You Tease

Some time ago, Rezzable (you might know them of Greenies fame) decided the time was right to leave Second Life. Lots of people have delved into the reasons why, but I couldn't care less. Rezzables was just one of a number of people displaying weird and unusual builds. Their selling point was a massive PR campaign and buying out of a lot of famous builders, Starax/Light Waves being the prime example. I got nothing against them, and they got nothing against me.

But then, Rezzable went and discussed releasing what some have called 'Industrial Copybot'. It operates by catching all the objects in a given region, shunting the data into a separate offline file where it can be edited. They promise to erase any sensitive license infringing content from their scans.

They seem genuinely perplexed about the backlash on this. "But we're only using it to back up our own data!" Ok, but why are you releasing it onto the open market then? What do you think will happen when you release what is, in the description of its inner working, Copybot Jr.?

I recall Rezzable being the torch bearer against Copybot many times (with due reason, all their content out there). Why now are they even considering releasing this out there? I think they've gone completely off their rocker. Just read the linked page. They seriously consider charging for this. $75 for the 'Pro' version. Discussing some bugs that need to be fixed (sculpties aren't always picked up by it).

They give the same lame reason the Copybot crowd gave: 'This stuff can be copied whether or not you like it, so why worry if we sell the copier?' "Everyone else is doing it!! Why can't we??"

Really, though, the comments on those posts say everything better than I ever could. Nice one, Greenies.

373

Six Birthdays

This coming June, Second Life is going to be six years old. Just step and think about that. Six whole years of lag, naked noobies, and general insanity. It's the better part of a decade. Six years is longer than a single presidential term (in the United States, anyway). In fact, it's one and a half terms in office according to that metric.

We've seen a lot in those six years. Let's not get goofy, however, because comparisons between way back then and the right here and now have been done to death. "We didn't have skins, point to point teleporting, and we have to walk fifteen miles uphill both ways to reach the sandbox in order to build. Newbies these days don't have no idea how good they got it!" That's just way too easy.

The harder angle would be what's changed over this past year.

I think in terms of technical progress, nothing groundbreaking was unveiled. Nothing revolutionary was put to market. SL is still as laggy as it ever was and any significant changes towards stability have been lost on me (and, it seems, a good 60% of the rest of the population). For all of the opensourcing of the viewer, I haven't seen any high visible third party viewers, either. I still use the Nicholaz client, especially when the latest Linden experiment to 'lower' lag backfires.

The Lindens have exerted their significant muscle with more pressure than any other year. With the acquisition of XstreetSL and Onrez, they effectively circled the wagons with regards to the economy. Their fingers are in all the outlets. With the ramping of activity of the DPW moles and the creation of themed continents, competition is extending into the land itself. This wasn't simply an auction of the land, but the physical creation of an essential atmosphere. Granted, their attempts fell somewhat flat if you've seen Nautilus or Bay City these days. However, when they can't bootstrap, they glomp onto the next best thing. They went and tacked the United Sailing Sims (or whatever that USS acronym stood for) onto Nautilus and declared it 'good'.

We also witnessed Linden Lab making moves to control Second Life. For all their bluster about allowing the world to be free and easy, their actions have spoken otherwise. Not a few months ago, Jack Linden sat down and discussed bots and what to do about them. In addition, there's talk of moving against traffic fraud. Ad farms were finally flogged back around October or so of '08 with the caveat that ads without extortion are a-ok. They have a big stick and they're starting to play with it. It hasn't been pleasant all the way, either, because Openspaces and the move to treat them as regular sims on billing hurt. Hard.

Of course, the most notable example in these times has been the 'Adults Only' move. This was a resounding shot that yes, indeed, age verification is going to go ahead. The kinks have been worked out (you can use your credit card if you're disinclined to use your IDs) and full implementation is upon us. If you have adult content (specifically, adult content in the public domain and in public search), you must take it out of the limelight. Get your sex club offa our mainland! An option in the abuse report menu allows one to report the mislabeling of such content. The buzz word is 'predictability'. The Lindens are trying to force a Second Life experience that can be predictably controlled.

The outside venues of SL were revamped. The website and blogs got a much needed face lift, although the results are mixed. The new website has a pleasing design. The only gripe is the lack of ability to teleport to the locations and events featured on it. Same goes for the splash screen on the viewer log-in. I want to reach out and touch these places, but they're behind a glass wall. The new blog site is ok. All the categories have been butchered and you have to click around on everything to make sure you're really up to date on the latest comings and going of Linden Lab. Clunky, is the word, but not in the sense of being slow to load. Even the forums later got a good wash (I'm not a frequent visitor there, so I'm not sure how that change went).

And all the while the Second Life economy has... stalled. It hasn't continued its astronomical boon from 2007, but it hasn't completely went bust, either. It's doing what any other normal economy is doing, and that's existing. Doing its... economic thing. Stability, I think it's called. It's keeping in theme with the new mantra of SL: "predictability". It might be tougher to enter the market but once you're in you're alright. As long as you keep at. The moment you slip, the sharks'll get you.

Kendra Bancroft died. Lindens left. Sarah Nerd went out of business. Lots of churn. And yet life goes on. People flocked to some new worlds, and then came back. Lively came and died so fast heads twirled. Metaplace has come out, but I haven't visited it yet and I believe it's still in beta. Some of the bigger news blogs and agencies have pulled out as well. No one seems to notice or care. Unless it directly impacts them, no one stands up and shouts. They may glance up from their own personal blogs and put up a quick two paragraph eulogy. If that.

OpenSim has progressed, but not nearly as fast as initially anticipated. From the reports in '07 and '08, you'd think there would be a sim in every garage. The initial eureka moment over being able to host SL sims independent of LL's servers and reach led to all sorts of crazy reports. It reminds me of the predictions made in the '70s about life as it would be today. Astronomical imaginations of cities on the moon and flying cars gave way to reality: that stuff is hard! So it is with OpenSim. It's getting there. But that stuff is hard! And the big issues aren't really technical. Do I trust you with my log-in? With my copyrighted materials? That's funny.

We witnesses two major competitions: the Linden Prize and the Resident Choice Awards. The Linden prize was notable for being strictly inhouse and up to the judgement of the Lindens. You could sign up for a nomination, but they made the final judgement call. Upon seeing residents weren't keen on awards given without their input, the Resident choice awards were created and of course created whole new controversy. I could write volumes about it and it seems almost everyone had an opinion on it. Everyone seems to agree that something was not quite right about the entire thing. It felt shoddy to some.

And then there's me. This year will be my third in Second Life. Three entire years. Depending on who you ask, it's either a waste of time or a waste of energy. I kid. But I marvel at how I've seen a good half of Second Life's existence. At the people I've met, the friends I've made (and lost), the things I've seen and built, and all the things still left to see. Ah, I just can't wait until next year!

450

On Walled Gardens

For April Fool's, while some were making drama of leaving, M Linden decided it would be an ideal time to declare that new Second Life servers would be available! This was no surprise to anyone. Linden Lab regularly prints out land and rolls it out like wet toilet paper.

But lo! Look closer, my friends! As it turns out, these new servers would have the option of being completely walled off from the main grid! Yes, you will be able to run a server all of your own that does not have to deal with the main grid and all its woes. No more worrying about newbies crashing in or griefers parading around. Your little patch of land will be isolated from it all. I imagine it something like Dinotopia or Atlantis, where life goes on despite being completely isolated from the rest of the planet.

This is quite an ideal solution for colleges. They'd no longer have to deal with Second Life's troubles and nasty residents. They can do their own thing off the grid where no one can touch them. They can set up their chemistry models and displays of all kinds with no interference. Which is a good thing, I think, because honestly that's the way it is now. Most colleges have their islands isolated to their group which you need permission to join. And you can only join if you are a registered student (or special visitor). I'm not sure, but likely they won't have to deal with the downtimes either, or when the grid decides to play dead.

Businesses can use Second Life as a glorified office meeting. I know in the past that a few of them attempted to create an ad of sorts out of their island, but each them it didn't seem to pan out. Either they would have a barebones display of posters on plywood panels or a few random activities such as rollerboarding or dunk the avatar. I know I still have my cement star from AOL island's Walk of the Stars, with my handprint and name on it (my name got the shaft, however, as Tsiolkovsky was too long for the imprinting script). Both of those options fizzled, but the allure of holding an office meeting, where you can see another person face to avatar (the idea is that you'd make your avatar look like you) and be able to show off some concept in a 3D space as a prototype (even if only as a show) was and apparently still is strong. Or so Linden lab says.

Probably more but I'm too lazy to think or remember them.

So we appease those two markets. Linden Lab survives another day! Hail the conquering heroes! Corporations and Universities get their wish of not having to deal with us proles, and us proles no longer have to deal with lame islands and the constant whine of a community that is closed and too adult and 'losers who need first lives hur hur'.

Let's look farther, though. How will Linden Lab give out these islands? Do I have to be an official University or Corporation? Will the Tsiolkovsky Industrial Co. be granted the go-ahead? Or what if Linden Lab lets any old avatar buy one?

I think people would jump for them. Think of it: you and a select group of friends would have your own private sandbox to build or do the nasty in without all the world gazing in on you. It is basically the same attraction as the big businesses, except on a much smaller scale. You would have the weight of Linden Lab's power upon you to keep separate from that yucky ol' main grid with its dirty newbies and icky griefers.

The problem would lie in the cost. As some have already pointed out, to take possibly take advantage of this fat cash calf, Linden Lab would jack the price up fairly high. It's reasonable, they are arranging a server tailor made to you and made separate from their entire world. And for deeper reasons, they don't want everyone to rush in and have the grid end up a billion isolated islands, like small planets in a giant universe. At least, not yet, anyway.

So, would those people buy such a thing? Would they value their privacy and pixel sex enough to buy the special SL GRID super special awesome separate island?

We do see that they (they being everyone who participates in the act of pixual intercourse) will pay good sums for good prim genitals, and good homes and beds in which they can perform. And security orbs to make sure people stay off their lawn even if alt zoom renders that moot. They went and bought lots of those Openspaces as a cheap way to set up. They still pay good money for an island to fortify.

I'm being a prude. I'm sure the idea that you could have a private off-grid island is appealing to some. I can see people joining together to pay the support and tier for it, they already do this with regular islands and groups. In theory, this should be a good match.

But the one thing that I think shoots down that theory is that with the current tools, all this can be effectively done. Islands usually aren't joined unless a special order is put out, and putting up ban lines and access lists takes care of unwanted interlopers. And for far far less cash. The sole benefit is the (still undefined and rumored) separation, in total, from the main grid. Which leads us to ask: how deep is that separation? The best would be a complete break from the central grid and its rolling restarts and crashes and such. I think M says as much.

Aside from the rolling restarts, has the grid completely failed lately? I can't recall it doing so recently although I will admit to have a lacking presence in Second Life lately.

The cost, that's the rub. I doubt it will be cheap. It will likely be very expensive. We don't know yet because M loves a good cliffhanger and promises to tell us 'this summer' which narrows it down to June through August. July? Until we know the details, we can only know that it will be completely separated from the grid and it's implied it will be expensive. It's targeted specifically towards big business and universities (although Openspace was supposed to target island owners who wanted to pretty their islands and we saw how that turned out). And it will have a beta phase, as M mentions an offer to apply to test the beta stage.

Oh, I just can't wait!

Vote for Bob

My dear readers, I have been often pressured with a crazy idea that is completely unreasonable. This idea is that I should be a Linden.

First off, we all know that if that happened, the universe would implode upon itself. It would be like dividing by zero and getting 4 as an answer. Or developing a working perpetual motion machine. Or finding out that this entire universe is but some person's dream and your existence depends on them not waking up, but then they find out and they wake up and everyone dies. It's just not possible. It's impossible by the laws of the internet universe.

Second, I would make a terrible Linden. Imagine all my hatred and bile directed at residents, as M would certainly direct me at? Or worse: imagine the twisted love child between a theoretical Anna Linden and Torley Linden. Anley? Tornna? All of my ideals and hopes and dreams would be knocked down and recast as some horrible undead shell of myself, talking about how it's all the residents' fault OpenSpaces were destroyed. I am too weak to resist such power as Linden Lab wields.

Third, I would have no private life anymore. Talk to some of the Lindens and they'll tell you not to IM them inworld because they're already so flooded with chat and objects and requests and such. Too much white noise. I'm too lazy and bored to turn off 'see my online status' for all my friends, plus they get angry when I actually am on. I really don't want that on a grid-wide scale. I like my private little corner of Second Life and my private little blog in which I can complain and write my private little thoughts.

But, there is one man who would probably be worthy. And that man is Bob. Vote for Bob for Linden. Bob would make an awesome Linden. As he notices, he really cannot do worse or be less qualified than the most recent string of newly minted Lindens.

Bob Bunderfeld 2009 : Change We Can Download

Copybot Strikes Again!

It seems, and this is just preliminary reports, that someone has copybotted some of Starax's works. As I said, though, I have little to no clue what actually went on and time will tell. I can say that multiple abuse reports were filed and supposedly a few Lindens were after those who did it. The chances of actually catching the account are slim, though, due to throwaway alt accounts and other such cruft. It could take days, if ever, to sort out.

Of course, others had plenty to say on the matter. Words were thrown out such as 'sacrilege' and 'have people no religion??'. Others said it was 'terrible' and that 'copybot should be banned'. Even among those who did not know of Starax (and yes, there are many people who have not) there was a general sense of sadness that someone should steal another's work.

But, it is important to keep in mind that although this may be a more high profile case there are probably others, toiling in obscurity, whose work has been vacuumed by a copybot. Do these people get any airtime? Probably not. But their anguish at watching their work literally walking away is surely on a comparable level. Even moreso when you are trying to earn a livelihood in Second Life.

And what can the Lindens really do against Copybot? They already claim they can do nothing against the garden variety bots. It is funny that for the past two years or so, Linden Lab has made no significant progress that I can see in combating it. Instead, they rely upon waiting for an abuse report and attempting to track the account (which in all chances has probably been abandoned). The picture in my mind is of a bunch of firefighters trying to stop an arsonist by merely putting out the fires he starts.

So, another day, another CopyBot.

A Bold New Leader

It seems that Blue Linden is stepping down from being overseer of the Mentors. He cites too much work to continue to hold down that particular job. Hey, I understand. You have to know your limits and when you accept them, sometimes, you have to withdrawal from a few of your commitments. He's choosing to focus on some pet project of his or another, and that's good. Maybe we'll see some progress!

In his place, we are getting... drumroll... Levie Linden! No, not the jean company. I have no idea who she is. Is she one of the New Lindens that pop in lately? I suppose so. There's about three hundred or so Lindens and I can't keep track of them all at once.

Anyway, I wish her the best of luck because it seems lately the Mentors are one agitated group. They're not taking the entire 'greeter mentor' business too well.

New Linden Build

That new Linden Build that's nestled in Nautilus? The huge temple one with the giant purple crystal?

I swear upon Nunchuck, it's the Lindens trying to rip off of Atlantis.

Notice how there is one central canal that ends in a ring? The actual Atlantis had the same layout, only with more rings and a bit grander. Even the theme of 'giant island in the middle of the sea' is all the same. Plato is probably rolling in his grave. Trust me, read the ancient stories of Atlantis (not the modern crap about it) and then look at the Linden's 'Nautilus'. You can't tell me they aren't parallel.

Also, I'd like to humiliate the idiot Linden who named some of the seaways. "Bingo Strait"? What the hell? Couldn't they think of something a bit more normal? Bingo makes me think of dogs and the game and certainly is humourous when labeled on a sim named for Admirals. The Halsey and Farragut sims of 'bingo strait'?

P.S. I'm not capitalizing bingo strait. It doesn't deserve it.

Rail Roads!

According to Prokofy, and some other random dude, I hear they are going to alter the railroad system that runs through the Atoll Continent. The idea is that the current system utilizes a physical third rail around which trains attach to guide them around the track. The track itself is fairly old and has been around since that continent has been in existence.

It has been some time since any kind of Linden train ran around the track. When the trains derailed or otherwise glitches out of existence, someone had to run out and rezz a new one or set the old one straight. After the Linden taking care of the track gave up or left, it became little more than a glorified roadway. Some people (most notably James Gill) took up the cause and ran trains to and fro along the track, although again, such projects live and die with their creators. When they left, the trains soon followed.

I don’t think many people these days have even heard of any kind of Second Life railway, let alone know that there are two branches as well as a ferry line between the two. The Atoll’s railway is generally known as the SLRR, and is the one I just described. To the south on the older Mainland continent is the Great Second Life Railway, or GLSR, which runs through many eight or nine sims east to west (mostly through Olive to Purple, if I recall correctly). GLSR has never had a train that I can ever remember, although once I did run a car along the track pretending to be a train. GLSR is perhaps overlooked due to the more torturous track than its larger cousin to the north, possessing a large number of tight turns and skirting ban lines along a far smaller track. A shame since many stations along that line are very well done and beautiful (such as Olive).

Considering that kind of history, the Lindens and their Department of Public Works (DPW) are seeking to replace the third rail that is part of that system. Why? I have no idea. I suppose it would save some prims by scripting trains without having to work around a solid third rail. But the current system as it stands is, in my opinion, fairly well done. In fact, all things considered, I think a more tightly scripted train and track would be more prone to crashing and slipping up.

Let’s look at it this way. The age old mantra is, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Perfectly applicable here. Consider.

The main problem with trains along GLSR and SLRR is laziness. If a certain person manages a train along the tracks, the trains themselves tend to move rather well. The operator, who can always delegate authority on this, just has to look over the occasional slip-up. I’m sure it might actually be more time consuming, but again, you could probably hire someone to look over it. I bet you could get one of the Moles (what a horrid nickname, I don’t care what the in-joke is) to look after it.

Now, I get the impression that the new system would involve a train and a track scripted to communicate to each other in order to keep the train on the track without slipping off. The obvious pro to this approach is conservation of prims as you eliminate the third rail. Those prims could possibly add up over sims, especially if they are trying to beautify the track area itself.

Second, you would be able to eliminate physical collisions which could cause lag. The sim strains just a tad when it has to process the interaction between three objects: the wheels, the rail, and their ground. This new method would just be wheel to ground contact, I suppose, and so simplify that interaction, reducing lag and making it more likely to cross sims (a needed requirement for a cross continent train).

Now, the downsides. The new trains and rails would probably require many more scripts to adjust to what was taken for granted with the third guiding rail. You’d have to have some kind of correction factor once the engine starts off the track, and some dampening factor so the train doesn’t over- or under-correct. I imagine the scripting would be much heavier and prone to accidents. What if the sim lags for a bit and the train runs off the rails? Under the third rail, it would at least just slip along the track, but with these new styles of trains it would probably fly off like a silver bullet. And all those scripts acting in unison would likely cause significant lag in themselves.

The greater potential for derailing means greater attention has to be paid to the trains themselves. On bad days, they might not even make it out of the shed, just fly out and across the sim. Not only that, but you also have to consider the lay of the land. Trains operating around edges would if they derailed be very unlikely to correct themselves. Trains may hit parcels where scripting is not allowed, meaning that you’d have to get out and push, or such parcels that the train skirted would lead to the entire engine acting as one giant road car flying across the continent in whichever direction it lost communication. Very messy.

Plus, there is the fact that it seems such a train would have to be built from scratch. While there are numerous and current models for running along the third rail, the new system would have to be researched and tested, wasting a lot of time and money when a perfectly fine model is already known. Not always does a new design, or a newer design that is more ‘high tech’, necessarily mean the product itself is better. A good example would probably be the recently rejected XM8 assault rifle. Why bother adopting such a rifle when the Army already has the M16 and M4 which are still perfectly serviceable? Or New Coke. How about plastic bags, which end up littering just as much as paper while being not nearly as biodegradable?

Now let us look at the pros and cons of the current system. The first con we described above, that it introduces more thinking from the server on the more complex interactions between the more teeth like rails and the multiple wheels and body of the train. It’s a very real phenomenon which occurs when you get a bunch of physical prims (or regular prims) to bounce around each other. Knocking down a structure in SL by unlinking and turning all the prims physical causes noticeable lag, and when you are in a go-kart bouncing off the walls your viewer slows down. The same thing occurs here.

And to be sure, the current implementation requires relatively straight tracks. If the tracks follow too deep a curve (such as the Horseshoe Curve) it is certain to derail or get stuck. This really applies to the GLSR, as the SLRR was built with this in mind and so follows more shallow curves. It would be something to consider when making any new railroads in the continents yet to be built.

The idea is noble and grand: Build a better train. The Lindens need, however, to take heed of the fact that sometimes it’s better to leave the existing infrastructure rather than build a new one from the ground up.

Mono

Mono is here!

No, not that kind of Mono. The good kind of Mono, the scripting kind of Mono. Not the disease. Sheesh.

Anyway, if the Lindens are to be believed, Mono hopefully will solve most of our troubles and create a better world!

...

"Create a Better World!" Have to trademark and copyright that before the Lindens do.

M Linden Writes A Letter

M Linden graces us with an address towards us, the ever concerned inhabitants of Second Life.

He reassures us that the Linden Lab team is all about stability and performance and devoting full resources to reducing grid hiccups. Ha ha, isn't that what they always say? I've heard this for the past year and a half in my SL existence alone. It's become a cliche joke.

"We will increase stability! It's in the next update! However, creating that patch revealed a few new bugs. But to make up for that, we added a new feature that's still a tad untested and potentially bug-ridden! That's progress in Linden Lab!"

Also, are the Lindens going to be releasing different types of SL clients? M alludes to a viewer that is skimmed down for newbies and one that is more concentrated for the needs of the experienced. I sure hope the current client is kept as is, because I like it as it is. I don't need more features and while newbies may benefit from a lack of features, I sure wouldn't.

Speaking on that topic, why provide a crutch to newbies and remove features that later they may want or need to use? As it is right now, you already have that kind of thing, how much slimmer can it get? The 'Advanced' options aren't visible by default and the drop down menus at the top are pretty self explanatory (edit appearance... detach clothing... etc). But hey, I'm not on the development team so what's my opinion worth? As a NPIOF, nothing. And that's the way it should be.

Continuing on down the address...

He's making registrations easier? It was hard to register? I didn't think it was that hard. If you can't read the rather simple instructions on the registration page, then you aren't going to have it any easier in SL itself. Maybe they mean offering it in more languages. Or maybe they're going to revamp Orientation island... AGAIN. Only, if that was true, he would have specified 'redoing orientation island'. He's awfully specific about such things, so it's probably not a redo of that current pile that is the OI. Nunchuck, I hate that place. I could waste three blog posts on what's wrong with it. But that's a different topic for another day.

Then there's the usual hoisting of Torley's videos upon the high hills! There are one hundred and fifty video tutorials now on every subject from "Who Torley is" to "How to converse in english". Let me explain why Torley's vids piss me off. He has a few good videos that are really and truly helpful. However, he floods it nine times over with stupid shit that no one gives a damn about and could probably be taught easier inworld.

That's the problem with them overall. I can look at a tutorial only so much, but inworld it's not the same as a controlled and edited video. And sometimes he seemingly fragments things that should be consolidated. For explain, I recall seeing a tutorial on how to make a wavy flag. But he also has a vid on how to make flexi prims and how to edit prims in general. What the hell? Combine the bunch of it. Why waste space? Not like it matters, if I was a newbie and I needed help I would go to help island or just anyone passing by, which is what I did when I was a newbie and what I see newbies do today anyway.

Add that to the fact that SL runs sluggish with a web page opened at the same time. These days, I can't cruise the SL blog and talk with my friends inworld without walking a fine line between crashing out entirely. It's a joke. Jurin will send me a nifty and cool URL that I can't load because even on my fastest fast computer it grinds everything to a halt. SL is a memory hog. Thank god for third party viewers and even then it still has problems because the third party people can only patch the original code so much before just giving up and rewriting the entire bunch of code.

But I guess you have to take pride in Torley's videos because general Support in SL is terrible. Granted, all my evidence is anecdotal from friends and random strangers who ask me, "Why isn't LL listening? I filed a ticket ages ago!" Often I find most have been told to file a JIRA (which is worse than SL and again a topic for another day) or that the problem has been cleared and yet it persists. Once a friend and I had to bombard a Linden with notecards because they kept claiming they had fixed it when they clearly hadn't. Of course, when you have policies that LL does and when you enforce them meekly like LL does, I guess I would have a Support system like they do too. Take this as an example: Ban on ad farms. There is still ad farms. Ban on Age play, but then whittled down to essentially nothing. Other things too that I've forgotten. Their maze of policy and levels of enforcement would be intimidating to anyone. They need a redo of their terms of service or something, and establish clear punishments. Revamp the damn violations and get rid of loop holes that obey the letter but not the spirit of the law.

Finally, M tells us that LL is very stable financially. Gee, I sure hope so with all the cash people sink into land and tier and such. Some costs of which will never be recovered in any amount by the people who bought land and tier and invested time into this Second Life of ours that they will never be able to get back again even if they run a mildly successful business. I've seen land values plummet so far and yet I watch as Bay City sells for ridiculous amounts. Hey geniuses, when you go to resell those Bay City parcels, the price will fall to the rest of the world's land market and you'll take a huge loss. Hope you can divvy it up into ad farms, oops, I mean not-for-profit signs that just happen to display your business for some reason. The way LL robs people, if they weren't secure I'd suspect someone was sapping from the company.

He wraps up with the typical LL bullshit, namely that virtual worlds are the future and thank you for helping us shape one and aren't we so popular and let's all pat ourselves on the back. Aren't virtual worlds going to be so important to all of us? All I hear from LL is how virtual worlds will augment real life, which tells me that virtual worlds will just end up being another tool, a laggier yahoo messenger or AIM. Gee, thanks a lot.

Finally, his closing has to be some kind of satire. I really can't make fun of it because it mocks itself. Let me show you:

"Thank you for your passion, your support, your energy and commitment. Yes — even frustration. I see it, feel it, hear it. Together, it keeps us energized and focused on what’s important."

Before I close for the night (it's 2:30 AM at the moment here), I'd like to give you a sample of the comments left. Here are the ones that entertained me:

From cosa nostra:

"I dont see it, I dont feel it and I dont hear it .. on the grid !

cosa"

From slbraun:

"When you ignore Economics 101, you will inevitably end in ruin. An unlimited supply of land and flat demand means lower prices. Those who invested in land get hosed. A downward cycle is created which is difficult to reverse. The honeymoon is over Mr. CEO. Get to work. Me…I am heading over to check out the new Lively."

From Tiny Mind:

"Don’t worry. I have tried Google’s test of “Lively” (in Open Beta), and so far from the limited exposure to it… Linden Labs has NOTHING at all to worry about over it.

Tiny Tester."

From Trinity Dechou:

"Having been here for over a year and a half it is nice to see good communication. Like JenzZa we’ve seen changes come and go, some good, some bad. Nice to know in regards to some areas LL listen.

Looking forward to the changes in the new few years."

From Ciaran Laval:

"There’s a rule of business that you shouldn’t leave your customers feeling poor after doing business with you, which is something you should be ensuring Jack and Zee understand.

The potential here is absolutely massive, it would be a great shame if something like Lively took the attention away from a project such as Second Life but there are lessons to take note of, social networking being one glaring example.

Another being that you can’t keep the entry bar too high technically, education won’t keep up with you, I can assure you, sometimes you need to be patient to get to the promised land, don’t throw too many aside in the great leap forward.

Very positive move on the first hour, it’s crucial but people need to be able to find something to do quickly to keep them engaged, that’s something that needs working on."

From David Kline:

"Yeah that is all good and all Mr. Linden but i want to ask you will you really deliver that? Lag has gotten worse lately NOT better… the problem is you keep pouring in new users without a solid server system to be able to handle it. Second life’s overall experence i would say is getting worse not better. still crashes…still worse lag then ever…missing textures..takes FOREVER to rezz anything

you need to fix the fact that the cache system does not work..you still have to re-rezz an area that you visited 4 minutes ago if you log out…

it really is frustrating…oh and theres bugs where you remove users from yuor buddy list they still show up…the fact that the support system for abuse is catered towards those who spend gobs of money a month and the rest of us still have to wait forever to get any help"

That's about it. After that one, the comments descended into the typical argument between those who believe LL can do no wrong and those who want their pet feature to be implemented and those who hate everything about SL. Most of that gets repetitive and has been chewing up the comments on the past hundred blog posts even though the entire debate of 'what's wrong, if there even IS something wrong' has been beaten to death, buried in cement and thrown into a boat that was towed out to sea and burned with fire and nuclear airbursts. Of course, when the Lindens have closed off most of the means to contact them I guess all those people had to go somewhere and with the blog being the last bastion, it's no surprise.

It's not like you can contact the Lindens inworld, because they explictly tell you not to IM or notecard them, and they don't like being emailed, and when you find them inworld they're usually at an office hour and will tell you to not hog the hour to yourself which is understandable since the hour is really devoted to that particular specialty but what else can people do when they really have no other place to turn to? If they file tickets, they might as well wait for the Second Coming of Christ since they'll be Raptured before LL finally looks at their ticket. At least Christ had the decency to just outright say "don't wait up for me because I'll come when you least expect it".

I'm sorry if I come off as hostile to LL and a bit of an ass, but the truth is that it's getting real late and after logging out and checking the blog before I went to bed, and reading this ... this mini-speech and its contents, I'm not just physically tired, I'm mentally exhausted. I'm getting sick of SL and Linden Lab because they raise my hopes that they're actually going to do something and turn around and either don't or make it worse. When people moan about LL I try to defend them because, at the end of the day despite my own whines and rants, I sincerely believed that Linden Lab was trying their best but I'm sick and tired of listening to their crap. Why can't they be honest and why do they have to beat around the bush? On some levels I know this will never happen because no one wants bad press but you can't tell me it looks any better when a good half of the blog comments are derogatory and the other half come off as sycophantic. Add that to the fact that if you search for SL blogs in general you'll find most people aren't too praiseworthy of LL either, and the few blogs that do support LL are fickle about it.

What they need to do is to ditch all this new crap like 'shadows' and other junk. Fix what they have now and get it to work. Do the different viewers if you must. You won't get rid of all the bugs, but you could at least squash the ones that never seem to go away. It took at least seven or eight month to get rid of the 'ass-tachment' bug. That's ridiculous. How could the Lindens miss that? Why would it take months? I can see a month, maybe a month and a half, but eight months? Six or seven months a the most generous? So yeah, take the current system and smooth it out. I wouldn't mind the constant updates if I felt they actually improved performance but often I don't notice much of any of a difference. I read the reports of the changes and I'll be damned if I can find even half of them.

So I don't care anymore. I might finish up a few posts I have written about Linden Lab and after that, they can go to hell. I'll devote more time to writing nonsense and general issues in SL that aren't LL related (like, say, .. . I'll think of something later). And I'm sure the Lindens or their fans will come around and pick my post apart and prove me wrong here, there, and everywhere, but whatever. I think M Linden's speech here is a sign that Linden Lab doesn't give a crap because if they did they would be writing about the better things they already have done rather than what they will do, or at least both of those at the same time. As it is, it sounds like empty promises. "Just keep the faith, it will come! We swear!" They proclaim over and over.

I'm going to buy some earplugs because I'm sick of the noise.

Birthday Mild Celebrations!

In my family, the holidays are celebrated beyond what one would normally think of in 'celebration'. It's an understatement to say they are blown out of all proportion. Hence, while I write that I couldn't care less about SL's birthday events, I secretly want to check them out. Sadly, two cases have prevailed.

First, is that in general I haven't had the time to drop into all the events. Other things occupy me and I have a short attention span to remember to check out this or that panel. The second issue is these panels bore me. Much of it isn't ground breaking and I could probably write out an entire conversation during these discussions if you gave me the topic.

When I go to exhibitions, there's so much lag that I can hardly see the displays and when I do, there sometimes is a notecard explaining what I'm looking at, sometimes not. Other people come in and sometimes play with the exhibits. In general, it's not a mess, but it feels more like a museum. You come and stare at the pretty pieces and are left to draw your own conclusions. I really have to be in the mood to do that. And there's a real life Art Museum near me I can visit where the general quality is much better (not to say SL doesn't have its geniuses).

It feels less like a celebration than a display of those who bothered to deal with the Lindens. In fact, if you ask most people what the past weeks have been about, they likely will have no idea what you are talking about. There just isn't an interest level to be invested into this thing.

I hear a lot of flinging about the 'culture' of Second Life, but I'll be damned if I can find it. This is the fifth anniversary of Second Life being opened to the public, the 5th birthday of the game this very blog (and many other blogs and forums) is about. And yet, we have... this. A sort of murmured whisper and general nod of the head, if you even remember the date.

Coming up soon is the Fourth of July, and for those of you just coming out from under your rocks, that's the American Independence day. After that is July 14th, the French Bastille Day which holds more or less the same significance. People in both countries celebrate, fire off some grills and fireworks, and work up a patriotic fervor. Second Life's day has come, and we get 'Nipplegate' (I'm not even going to touch that with a ten foot pole) and a bunch of panels on such things as "Bringing SL success in business to RL". Ok, ok, that's all fine and good, but where is the community in general celebrating? Where are the fireworks? Where are the grills? Something? Anything?

Perhaps, the attitude is taken like my family. Birthdays in my family are relatively quiet affairs. You give gifts, have a cake, maybe go out to eat (or cook something like a feast). Most of the extended family comes by for a few minutes to drop off a card, or use the US Postal Service as a middleman. The last birthday 'party' I had was my fourth, which was memorable for breaking a fire code. Part of this is due to extended family relations which are dismal, and part is just our attitude. Wee, let's celebrate another passing of the earth's complete orbit around its parent star since the arbitrary date of one's birth. It's hard to get revved up after that kind of realization.

You figure holidays would just be the same, right? Well, no, apparently arbitrary dates for cultural celebrations with suspect origins that are fixed on that same solar year get a pass. Perhaps because it's more than just a family and friends affair, but something you get caught up into with everyone else. Your birthday is memorable to your family and friends. Christmas, now that's something the entire country can get embroiled in.

Of course, lately there's a small debate on what exactly to call that time of season. Christmas promotes Christianity exclusively and we can't have that. A good deal of the country is Christian, however, and we just can't bring ourselves to celebrate the Kwanzaa season. Happy Holidays is a good generalization, but that offends deeply religious people who insist on going back to basics, besides, What about those other holidays? Saturnalia brings up paganism and that's 'bad'. winter Solstice, while in theory just a simple description of the obvious (For us in the Northern Hemisphere, when the Earth is tilted so we're 'farther' from the sun than the South, which has Summer Solstice on that date) also carries something of paganistic wicca evil bad bad bad connotations. But I digress.

Anyway, holidays, whether due to general community group think or sincere appreciation of the cultural diversity and significance of the season, are celebrated with abandon. We just don't deck those halls, we plaster them. And that's why I'm just a tad confused why Second Life's Fifth Birthday is a shuffle instead of people ... doing whatever it is that would correspond to a holiday.

Maybe that IS the way Second Lifers celebrate, by setting up displays and making note of it on their blogs and inside SL, and holding panels and Q&As and having speeches. If it is, that make me sad. To me, that is just bland. I don't know what to continue expounding on. It just feels wrong and unfilling. Like Diet soda.

Consider the lack of proper Second Life holidays. Most are ripped from real life. Poorly. The more memorable was December 2006, when NBC and SL tried to hold a lighting of the Christmas tree. There was Valentine's 2008 recently. I remember that one as the day I lagged so terribly that in the time it took me to do my laundry, prepare dinner, watch three hours of television, and a quick nap, Second Life finally crashed out after being in limbo during that time. The platform just can't handle the load. Just can't handle it.

So I suppose these 'enlightenments' (as they're being called) are a kind of compromise, a subdued celebration with displays as dressing (also moderated, as again the Herald has noted recently with 'Nipplegate'... ugh). One we have to accept, because most attempts otherwise have been dismal for those of us unable to buy a new super computer every month. It is very sad.

But them's the brakes, and it seems that SL's 5th birthday will be a subdued whimper rather than a fiesta.

A Beginner's Guide to Second Life

I feel that, having a year and a half (or thereabouts) of experience in Second Life, the time has come for me to pass on to the next generation of new people all of my knowledge thereof. If a newbie come and asks for help, I will shamelessly spam this link. Maybe I'll put it on a notecard, because, at least for me, Second Life makes my computer drop to its knees when I try to upload links.

You've downloaded the client, created an account, and logged in. What you are now witnessing is what is known as "Orientation Island". This is an island where you are completely sequestered from the rest of the scum of Second Life so you can learn how to use Second Life without have goatse and Dissent cubes hogging your view.

I will tell you right now that you can forget anything on this island. Detach the HUD you see on screen (the one that lists your 'quests') by right clicking it (Cmd + click for Macs, if I recall correctly) and selecting detach from the menu. Right clicking will be your friend. Trust the right click. That circular menu is about one third of learning how to use Second Life. Anytime you see anything and you want to know more about it, sit on it, buy it, take a copy, mute it, or abuse report it, is but a right click away. Learn this well.

RIGHT CLICK EVERYTHING.

You can, if you wish, wander the rest of Orientation island and play around. There's a few good things but nothing special. Trust me, not much of it will be any use and a lot of it is displayed as awkward as a Chinese engrish shop. It's up to you.

You may be wondering how to not look like a clone. This is where you meet your second best friend, the edit menu. Right there at the top of your screen. This edit menu is about the only one up there that you ever need or ever will touch. You'll see lots of options here. There is a bunch that will detach your clothes and objects attached to you (more on that later) and oh look! A selection called 'edit appearance'. This will bring you to the actual editing appearance box. There's lots of sliders to play with how you look and I highly recommend taking as much time as possible tweaking your avatar to your whim. It's worth it to not look like John or Jane Doe. Clothing selection is slim and I advise against making your own until later when you REALLY get a hang of it. For now, just edit your shape and maybe your skin. You will see both of these options listed on the menu that pops up. Take your time, I'll wait right here.

Done? Good.

Before you exit this mode, click on "Save" at the bottom to make it permanent. You can also click "Save As" provided you want to name your creation. Which brings us to our next obstacle.

The Inventory.

By now, you'll see a bunch of blue boxes at the bottom, This is your second best friend. You'll see a curious box like button on the far left, that can be clicked to bring up the local chat box for... local chatting with anyone nearby. Typing has a range of about 10 to 13 feet ingame, so keep that in mind and be kind to friends who might have wandered outside of that range and thus didn't quite hear you. The other buttons are self explanatory. There's communicate which will bring up your friends list (friends can be made by right clicking someone and selecting... make friend or something similar) where you can Instant message your friends anywhere in a manner similar to any IM programs such as AIM (AOL Instant Messenger). There's also Fly which causes you to fly, Search which bring up a search box (more on that later), Map and Mini map which bring up a large and small map respectively, and finally Inventory.

Inventory in Second Life is chaotic and down right confusing, even for me. There's a lot of folders and a lots of objects and a lot of mess. But there is some hope. It will be tricky, so try to bear with me.

The Inventory window has a menu at the top like a Mac. And this has a file, create, and sort buttons. Create allows you to make folders among other things. What is most important is the ability to make folders. Under sort you'll see a bunch of options, I would suggest doing it alphabetically as opposed to date created/received. Now, the trick is to treat inventory as you would sorting files in an office job. Name the folders as you wish to sort everything, and then drag the objects you wish into each. Let me give you an example.

Let's say I have a water gun, a skin, and a notecard. I could make three folders, one for toys, one for skin, and one for notecards. Above all, take the time to sort your inventory often. Do NOT be like me and just let it sit at random. You'll thank me.

If you don't know where to find a specific object, there is hope. At the top, under the menu, is a white box. Type in the name or part of the name and Inventory will return and show you all objects with that in its name. So, if I search "Water" it might in my inventory turn up water bottle, A guide to water sports, and the water gun mentioned above. That is all there is to inventory. Not so bad, but this is something that Second Life and even instructors in Second Life tend to gloss over.

Anything in your inventory, by the way, can be right clicked and you get another menu which will allow you to wear or delete or whatever. It's self explanatory, but if you were searching for a skin for your avatar to wear then you could search for it in the inventory, right click it, and select wear. Be forewarned: do that slowly and give Second Life a good minute or so to process that kind of thing. Second Life can be notoriously buggy, laggy, and temperamental. Keep that in mind.

So you're set. You know how to edit your appearance, how to right click things, and you're somewhat comfortable with inventory. And now you're asking, "Now what? I'm still stuck in this lame island". Do not worry my friend, for you have come for the quick and dirty guide to Second Life. I will not disappoint.

Go to the center square. There will be a billboard of sorts. Click on this, and it will spit something out to you. This is what is known as a landmark. Let's discuss landmarks, because you'll get a lot and they're not intuitive.

When you get a landmark, it is displayed on your screen and is also copied to your inventory so if you should accidentally click it off you can still find it in your inventory, usually under "landmarks" folder. The landmark will show you a picture the land owner uses for that particular landmark, a short description, and the location (in this format: "Name of Destination, Name of Sim or Island, Coordinates in X Y Z planes). The two options are "teleport" which teleports you to that destination and "show on map" which will bring up the map and show you with a red circle on the map where you would go if you followed the landmark. Imagine landmarks as something like a link from a website.

Get the landmark by just left clicking the sign. It may or may not ask you things, whatever it does, just get the point across that you want to get outta there.

Now, how we proceed is dependent on where that landmark sends you. Likely, there will be lots of people and at this point just socialize. You'll get the hang of it. You'll likely make a few friends. Try to have an open mind about things, because Second Life is nothing if not weird and most people are good at heart, try not to dismiss someone because they are a furry or they wear leather chaps or what have you. If you do need help ( I doubt it), try an icebreaker. Discuss the weather, sports, or comment on the local architecture. Obviously, try to avoid 'hot' topics such as religion, politics, or toast unless you're confident in your current friends. Above all, don't be shy. No one is out to bite your head off. Be confident. I may have repeated myself there.

What about Money?

Money is an elusive beast in Second Life and the currency is L$. You need it to buy land, and buy stuff. How do you get money?? Well, there's a bunch of ways. The most obvious is you submit your credit card/paypal info to LL on their main site and transfer some funds there to your avatar. That's the easy way.

But if you're like me, you either can't, or won't, give Linden Lab your payment information. Then, it's much more tricky. One way is to start making, building, scripting, or writing and selling that to earn cash. But that's a long way off and we're just trying to get you used to Second Life first. Details come later. It's an option, but one in the distance.

That leaves us in a bind. There are numerous areas where you can get some free cash, using Search and typing in NCI will bring up a few landmarks to the NCI hubs of which some give you cash if you're less than three months old. There's money trees, but I don't know how to operate those. There are places called camping spots, where if you right click and sit on them you will earn a small amount of L$ per hour or so. Camping is very boring but good if you really really REALLY want some money.

But worry not! There are many places that will give you freebies. Try searching for a place called "Orientation Station", it is a place very similar to Orientation island that we were in earlier however in one section of it there are numerous freebies available that you can buy (using, again, right clicking and selecting buy). Using the Search button and searching for freebies will turn up some results. One trick to using search is to visit one of the top ten returns, and then one of the results lower down on the page. This ensures that you don't end up in some jerk's parcel who just put 'freebies' in his descriptions to generate traffic (similar to, I suppose, spam mail in real life).

You've got some objects now. There are two ways you get objects. You either get the straight up contents, and all you have to do is find the object in your inventory and wear it or use it. The second way is annoying. You have to find an area that allows you to make objects, and then drag the object from your inventory to the ground in front of you. Once it is outside, you have to right click and bring up that circular menu and select 'Open' and then "copy to inventory". Why people do this, I do not know but the fact is they do so it's best to know how to unpack as they call it.

Parse through your freebies, you will likely have lots of things. Skins, shapes, hair, clothes, shoes. The skins will definitely be better than anything you can make at this stage and I suggest you experiment and see what you like. There are shapes too, if you're not happy with the one you made. Clothes are the same, you find them in inventory and select wear. If you think there is a mix up, then you can go to the edit tab at the top of the window and select "Detach Clothing" and then pick what you want to shed. You might see a few objects such as "shoes" or "necklace" or "hair". Here is where the fun begins.

You see, clothes as such are not the only thing in Second Life. For you can wear this other objects too! Definitely try some of the hair attachments (attachments being what these objects attached to you are called in general). It will look more realistic than the default hair. Just right click the object in your inventory and select wear. By this point, I should start sounding repetitious and that is a good thing. We're getting somewhere. Play around with your new freebie clothes.

And then you're done. The only task left is to play around with Second Life and see where you want to go with it. You could be like me and be an eternal bum, blogging about this and that and hanging out with a few friends. You could learn how to build and script and create things. You can try to buy and sell land and become a 'land baron'. You can do any number of things and honestly, the sky is the limit. Don't be afraid to test everything and ask people for help.

That's about it, I believe. That's the quick and dirty guide to Second life and getting settled in. In doing so, I skipped over building, all the inane movement controls and building and such, and probably many other things. However, those are more extraneous and you can learn those later when you're more comfortable with the game itself. For now, you've learned the skills that are absolutely necessary. Good job you! You've learned them!

Sorry if this got lengthy, but congrats if you stuck with me long enough to get here. I assure you, it's well worth it. And hey, if you ever get confused, you can just as easily search and find my name and pester me.

On SL Cities Again

Some time ago, I can't remember when and I don't feel like digging up the post itself, I wrote on why SL cities are a pipe dream. They aren't feasible and if they were, no one would buy land or rent there. I believe my argument was that due to the lag induced by all those avatars into a single sim, along with the American Dream of a wide open parcel upon which to build your cabin or beach house, kills any city concept in SL aside from an extremely dedicated group of people determined to make one. Which hasn't been anyone thus far.

But the Department of Public Works, oblivious to what is clear to anyone else on the Grid, continue on their merry way building an extension onto Nova Albion (an island city theme centered around the Miramare sim). As I recall, as a noob way back in 2006 wandering to Nova Albion since I am something of an urbanophile, and finding it dead and empty. Since it was an 'infohub' in the broadest sense of the term, there were a few people strung out here and there. Many had wandered from the actual infohub/welcome area, the Luna Sim. On a side note, Luna itself is more a museum than a welcome area, but hey, whatever.

Anyway, it seems, according to Massively and Prokofy, that Linden Lab has adjusted orientation so that a larger portion of new people are shunted to Nova Albion (the other chunk being the Help Island, and the tiny percent remaining goes off to the various user infohubs). They are making it so that, in the event someone like me points out that no one outside of roleplay goes to anything like a city in SL, they can point to the newbie congestion and say, "O ho! But what about this?" They're fudging their own numbers.

I find this extremely hilarious. Let them go and build their massive cities. I'll just keep in mind a poem.

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Philip Linden, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

-Percy Bysshe Shelley, edited for Second Life

Second Lie

I cannot believe Second Lie here. This is part of the problem and not the solution. We should be working with Linden Lab in a giant corporate group hug to make Second Life a better place!

Strike!

Apparently, some bloggers are leading a strike on Linden Lab to protest the trademarking. They think that this whole trademarking thing is going to nail innocent bloggers and residents.

Well, first of all, why not just change the name of your blog? I know I can in a heartbeat change this blog's name seven times by the end of the day. You could always go and re-register the domain or whatever. Or email the Lindens, I'm sure they'll understand and work with you. They're many things, but they're not inhuman monsters set on destroying you. I'm sure a well worded e-mail or inworld notecard explaining your situation would do.

Even just name dropping, there shouldn't be any problems. Linden Lab can't go and nail everyone in the known universe just because they didn't correctly write out their name (I remember being told many times it wasn't "Linden Labs") or add the TM, that's just ludicrous. I'm sitting at my Dell, drinking a Dr Pepper, and I don't have to label them with trademarks or (R) or whatever. Why? I dunno, maybe just because for one I'm dirt poor and you wouldn't gain much from suing me. Also because I'm not advertising or making either the computer or the soft drink the focus of my blog. Or whatever. I think, if you just put that disclaimer that LL (and really any other entity) has which states that you, the blogger, aren't affiliated with LL and SL.

And second, I don't understand how this is going to hurt Linden Lab. If anything, I think you should be doing the opposite and scream louder, not silence yourself on your own blogs. You're just clearing the air for three days. As they say, to Linden Lab, "No news is good news". Fan sites and blogs just don't hold much weight in the grand scheme of things and imposing a strike isn't going to do much, in my opinion. In my opinion, we should be shouting louder. The internet is not like South Africa or India or the American South, where civil protesting will work. On the internet, silence is a cessation of existence and when you're silent then for all intents and purposes you're dead to the internet. You have no physical presence on the internet which would carry some sway.

Anyway, even though I agree that LL should rework the way they're going about implementing the trademark deal, I'm not going to be striking.

Look Ma, No Dollars!

Some years ago, there was a market. It was called GOM. And they did this funny little thing, where they would exchange your L$ and USD$ outside of LL's money exchanger. They offered some wild and crazy rates (something like L$1000/US$4 and upwards, or something like that) which meant that if you earned a lot inworld, then you could withdraw it for more real life monetary bang. Very useful. You could buy in via LL's exchanger, start a business, and extract L$ from GOM and make a tidy profit.

Then one day, a problem occured. The problem was that Philip had an itch. See, while he thought it all well and good that he controlled a good deal of one side of this operation he wanted more. What if, and this was one big if, what if he controlled all sides? What if, instead of all these third party exchangers, what if he consolidated it all under a single, LL controlled roof? And thus, the Lindex was born. Philip said it was good.

As you can imagine, this led to GOM's inevitable downfall, because the simple truth was that LL could afford to take some initial losses in the short run to cause a run on GOM and destroy it. And that happened. And from then on, we have had only the Lindex and the whims of the Lindens to maintain the exchange between the real bucks and the space bucks. At least, that is the story that is told to Second Life children and is taught in Second Life schools. It may be a tad off from the real truth.

In any event, all we've had, and all I've known since I first rezzed, was that the L$/US$ was controlled by Supply Linden, a federal reserve unto himself.

And now, some three years after monopolizing the exchange markets, the Lindens announce that they are opening up foreign exchange rates, for those of us trading in Euros, Pounds, and Canadian dollars. This is a very good thing, because limiting SL to the US dollar isn't so good when fifty percent of your customers aren't Americans. The thing is that LL is offering this service via numerous third party providers who have given their word to LL to honestly exchange L$/Euros.

Gee, that sounds a lot like GOM. Maybe one day, when Linden Lab gets more resources and decides that these third parties aren't quite as effective... and that they'd make more controlling both sides of the equations...

They say those who fail to learn from the past...

Second Life (TM, (C), (R), Patent Pending)

Buried way in the back, is an interesting little diddy about Second Life Branding.

You also can't continue wantonly using "Second Life" or "Linden Lab" in your groups or blogs or anything if you read this all carefully.

First, what concerns me as a pseudo-journalist: How to use the Second Life (trademark copyright patent pending) name and logo properly in any blogs/articles I write. Fortunately, Linden Lab has thoughtfully provided a handy guideline so I know my legal bounds.

1)Approved Use. The Second Life Hand Logo may be used only by journalists or media outlets in a published article or blog entry specifically about the Second Life world. No other use is allowed without Linden Lab's written permission. Never use a Second Life Hand Logo (or any part or version of one):

-in any name or logo of a business, news program, or publication, including any website or blog;
-in a header or banner of a website or blog;
-in the title of an article, blog entry or news program;
without displaying the name and any logo of your business, news program, or publication in the signature position (usually the top of the material indicating clear ownership of the communication);
-in any manner that suggests co-branding or a relationship with Linden Lab; or
-in any manner that tarnishes the Second Life brand name or the Logo.

Well, the good news is that both my blog, domain, and any given 'business' I may belong to never use Second, Life, Second Life, and all recombinations of the letters in between. Or use the stupid hand logo. Yup, squeaky clean here. I'd sure as hell NEVER co-brand anything with Linden Lab, egads, I'm not that evil. Flattered, but no.

That last bit is interesting, because there are tons of sites that satire and mock SL and which use the SL hand logo in full and in part as part of the joke. It's funny because it will be as effective at preventing brand destruction as the flag burning amendment will be in preventing the burning of US flags (freedom of speech and all that lovely jazz).

2)Placement.

-Do not make a Second Life Hand Logo a primary or prominent feature of your article, blog entry, or news program. The Logo must be smaller and subordinate to your own business name, logo, and any other branding.
-Always display the Logo right-side up with the words "Second Life" in a horizontal position.
-Never use more than one Second Life Hand Logo in an article, blog entry, or news program.
-Never use the Logo in text to represent the words "Second Life."

Common sense, all this, no? That last point (what is with these points on the end?) is kind of funny. Who in their right mind binds a key to a mini picture of the SL logo just to save a few seconds typing out "Second Life"? I'm not exactly a flash in the pan with regards to typing, but "Second Life" only takes me a cool three seconds to write out.

3) and 4) describe the boring ol' "this is the way our official logo should look".

5) gets into the gnarly details. I have already established that I'm in the clear because I don't use their logos. But it's interesting to read because the devil is into details and for those who have, it's a good idea to read up. For instance, LL retains the right to determine whether you are a press outlet or not. Obviously, for big ol' media, this is no problem because you'd have a fine time in court trying to prove that ABC is not a press outlet. But for little bloggers like me, starting a blog called "My Second Life" and garnish my site with a nifty SL hand logo then I'm at SL's mercy. If I publish an article that isn't too complimentary, then they could go around Rule #1 above and just say I'm not the press and shut me down. All the way to chinatown.

Then there's the always knee-slapping part about obtaining an official logo. Here is the way I'd get the logo for free. Step one would be to load the SL website. Step two is to hit a nifty button called "Prnt Scrn" on your keyboard. Step three is to open up Microsoft Paint, select the edit menu, and select "Paste". Crop the image out into the SL logo. Done. All without such stupid things like "permission" and "official".

There's so many rules. It's just the funniest thing I've ever read. It's taken me about a week to slog through it all, and the laughs just keep pouring in.

That first link lists unauthorized uses of LL's trademarks. Obviously, you can't steal it as your own. And you can't make merchandise such as coffee cups with their brands on it. The name can't be used in website domains. Some examples:

"This is NOT OK:
secondlife.net
secondlife.de
2ndlife.com
secondlife-grid.com
chinasecondlife.com
secondlifesoftware.com
secondlifetutorials.com
lindenworld.com"

Gee, there goes about every single home brewed personal blog about Second Life out there. Good thing I based my name around a running gag I used to pull.

You also can't use "Your world, Your imagination". I hope this is only intended for some kind of competitor, because I'd love to avoid having a take-down issued to me solely because I just used the tagline in this article. There's also a bunch of anal rules about the actual name itself, as in it must be in English fully spelled out. No "第二の人生" or "Second-life". Must be exactly "Second Life" if you refer to it in an article/blog. Guess the nail is screwed to me, then.

And don't think it's funny. No one is above the law, as LL specifically details each particular outlet's rules and responsibilities. Mine would be here.

So, finally, we should dig through and find out just what exactly is trademarked. That particular list can be found here. I can't use just Linden or L$, it must be either Linden™ or "dollar" (they helpfully suggest 'dollars' as a plural, just in case we thought they trademarked that too). It's Second Life® and Linden Lab® . Even SL is supposed to be SL™. Names for viewers are not exempt (WindLight® ).

I am not a lawyer, but there is something about trademarks. They must be enforced with zeal or else you lose them. Hence, we have things like "aspirin" (registered under Bayer but lost), "band-aids", and "Xeroxing a document". Adobe is currently attempting to do something similar to LL by asking users and web authors to not say "photoshopped" but to declare that a picture was "modified by Adobe® Photoshop® software". That is to say, I believe that unless Linden Lab wants to spend a significant amount of time fighting infringement cases, their trademark will probably be beaten and hung out to dry. Alas, what a fate.

I suppose I should wait for the LL lawyers to send me letters now. In the meantime, I'll be busy bashing LL in the name of Linden Lab®.

Declaration of Independence

When in the Course of Avatar events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the servers, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Code and Nunchuck entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of Avatarkind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all Avatars are created equal, that they are endowed by Nunchuck with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Avatars, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Such has been the patient sufferance of these Islands and Mainlands; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of SL is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these Servers. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in LL, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together meetings at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has conspired dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness of his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Lindens, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the Servers remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these Servers; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Newbies, and raising the conditions and costs of new Appropriations of Land Parcels and Islands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world during Rolling Restarts:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us out of SL to be tried for pretended offences:

For declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Griefers whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Linden brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by them to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, We, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Servers, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Servers are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to Philip Linden, and that all political connection between them and the State of Linden Lab, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Snapshot

Oh my Nunchuck. Someone snapzilla'd a photo of Concinna and the railway that was built up around there.

He comments (it was taken about 3 months ago) on how it appears to be merely a museum, and how all the trains are broken.

Oh Daedalus Young, you should have seen it not a few months before you visited. The trains ran on time, they weren't broken. Concinna was a railway station, it was the terminal where they were rerezzed if they ever got lost or badly broken. They were old style locomotives, with smokestacks and coal bunkers. I used to ride them up and down the Linden Railways.

Within a few months, a station and rail line become a ruin, an exhibit of what once was. If Daedalus ever met me, I could tell him all about the somewhat strange times we had on those trains, between Jurin the dinosaur avatar towering over the engines to careening off the track when a sim crossing went bad. Holy hell, I knew the guy who built and got the trains running!

I feel so old.

BEAR

As I've mentioned before (I can't find the post), the path to retention lies in connecting, communicating, and talking with the new people. It doesn't always work, but it at least helps the bleed-off from the one day wonders.


I know this from personal experience.


For there is an infohub that lies in the Bear sim, unimaginatively named "Bear Dream Lodge Infohub". It was in this place that I was born into SL (Orientation Island can be considered prenatal). Thus, Bear holds a place near and dear to my heart. They say your first impression is the most lasting one, that it molds your opinion of a place or person for as long as you know them. An impression that is hard to break, it's said.


My SL birth was literally a baptism in fire and cages. When I arrived, I was caged and surrounded by fire particles. Houses were rezzed on top of me. It was not a fun place to be, in short words. I was pushed around often by machine guns and RPGs. It is very likely that I would have stopped with SL right then and there, except that a few people helpfully suggested that I sit upon a wall on the main brick deck of the Bear Lodge. This brick wall, as we shall soon see, came to be the defining symbol of Bear. So much so that if you go there (at least, in my day, anyway) and inquire about what's the best thing to do at Bear, sitting on the wall will be among the top three.



Having planted on this wall, I took to conversing with the fellow survivors. They were a mixed bunch. Some were griefers themselves, some were obviously underage and sneaking into SL, some were like me and curious about what SL was all about. The one thing that united us was our mutual hatred of the griefing parade that regularly visited Bear in those days. We used to talk about griefing like one would discuss the weather, casual and only of mild interest after a week or so. The key is that the griefing united us, and also forced us to sit and listen to the others sitting around.


And you always had to sit. Standing, you would get caged and orbited. It was almost certain crashing. So you'd always see a row of people, squatting upon this brick wall from end to end, chatting about the latest movie release, or discussing whether they would put their brains in a robot body. Upon further reflection, I guess you could compare it to something of a city in the industrial revolution: everything is dirty and grungy from the factories, and everyone is a wage slave, and you're all united in general scorn for the foremen and owners and in your spare time you make conversation at the pub or the corner store. And because everyone was cramped into rowhomes that were and still are at most fifteen feet wide, you had to deal with jerk neighbors. And over time, you came to understand that they weren't inherently mean, they were just as scared and ticked off at the conditions as you were.


So I came into contact with a lot of folks. Even the biggest jerks soften up over time. You got to know the regulars, and you added to them. You'd engage some newb and talk about the weather, or perhaps you'd help them with something and you fall into a chat about the lag. Something always gives. And the regs came back, and the newbs became regs. It was familiar and comforting, and when someone was out everyone was on edge. Was it bad news? Good news? Had they quit? We became a family. And we'd always sit on the brick wall, the griefers were still running rampant. Soon our family grew and we got used to rezzing sofas and sitting on those, or sitting on the lamps nearby, or occasionally on the decorative fountain. Because the griefers would maul you if you stood, you always sat on something, usually whatever was closest. To not do so was to crash out of SL.


It was a running gag that one could always tell someone from the Bear Infohub, because at the slightest sign of trouble they'd sit on something. We all stayed not because we took advantage of the wide and wonderful possibilities of SL, but because we were friends, sisters, brothers, and sometimes married.

And this group, they came to be rooted in Bear. Now, as time went on, people here and there spun off and went their separate ways. Some bought land and moved on, some just quit, and some just went elsewhere. For them, Bear just didn't have the hold it did on others. This kind of worked against those who remained, as it made them tighter than normal. The end result of this is that at Bear infohub today, we have a core group of regulars, 'old'bies, who crowd out both the newbies entering SL at Bear and the people nearby who own land there.



This is really the point of the matter. Because recently someone has taken to starting a campaign against the regs at Bear. They don't understand why people would congregate at an infohub for nigh on a year now. They look at other infohubs, which remain relatively empty. And they just don't understand it.



This is why. Bear has spun out of control, and is turning into more than just a newbie gathering hotspot, it's mutating into a community in and of itself. With the regular show-ups of familiar faces, it's practically a small town. There is no stopping it. You won't be able to dislodge them without destroying the infohub or banning all thirty or so avatars who frequent there. It is just not going to happen. There is even a Bear co-op center, which can be considered an 'expansion' of the infohub, created by these regulars.

This is an extreme case where communication and community have knit together people tightly and keep them in SL. This is the story of Bear in a snapshot, and isn't comprehensive, nor needs to be. With regards to the fate of the 'regs', it will depend upon the Linden definition of the purpose of an infohub, and whether the regs can pass themselves off as mentors. With regards to my theory that other people, rather than owning land or building/scripting junk, hold people, I think it provides an interesting point.