Month: June 2010

To market, to market…

Posted on by Inara Pey

The public beta of the Second Life Marketplace appears to be up and running. I had some concerns when the beta was confusingly announced. Are they valid? Here’s a brief tour and initial reactions. More will likely come when I’ve had a chance to digest more, unless others get there first.

  • It is SL website bland, with the theme introduced with the “new look” website out in force. It’s not actually bad – just bland
  • Pretty straightforward for the shopper:
    • The search bar is at the top of the page (once you have logged in), and is hard to miss (there is an “include mature content” check box beneath it, which I assume will need to be enabled on a log-in by log-in basis)
    • Shoppers can also take pot luck and click on the large “category” picture that updates periodically (so you can get a direct listing of clothing, furnishings, etc., according to the image displayed) – which I assume links to paid item listings, although I’ve not investigated this
    • Or there is the Featured Items listing that scrolls along beneath the larger “category” picture
  • A My Marketplace option at the top of the page provides access to an individuals account and – most importantly for creators, access to one’s “store” (what were “listings” in XSL).

As I sell through XSL, this store option was of primary interest for me. Clicking on it took me to a rather long-winded ToS page I that must be accepted before one can access one’s store the first time. Some terms here may well cause ripples among those taking the time to read them, such as clause 5.4, vis: License. When you submit Content, you remain the original copyright holder. However in doing so you also grant
Linden Lab a non-exclusive, world-wide, royalty-free, sublicensable right to exercise the copyright, publicity, and database rights  you have in the Content. These rights allow us to promote, sell, and distribute your Content. While this is intended to indicate that merchants are giving permission to linden Lab to actually host their goods in order to be sold, the License does imply a lot more than that, particularly given the inclusion of the words worldwide, royalty-free, sublicensable right to…., which given the angst around things like the TPVP and new SL general ToS may well cause gnashing of teeth as people take it to mean LL are claiming the right to sell what they like where they like (when in fact I would humbly suggest that the wording is intended to cover them should they opt to hive-off the Marketplace to one or more third parties to run on their behalf at some point).

There are other niggles within the ToS, which is the usual one-sided affair one tends to otherwise expect. However, I’m not going to get bogged down in minutiae here.

Once past the ToS page, one is confronted by something of a blank page, with a menu bar towards the top (beneath the banner) and a series of additional links down the left side of the page that mimic the top menu bar headings and include sublinks to the categories within each menu heading. Between them, these comprise:

  • Inventory: add new items to your store; manage the items in your store, perform bulk uploads, manage something called “coupons” (coming soon!) and generate reports
  • Orders: cancel a sale, redeliver an item and view transaction history – all of which intermittently and inconsistently kept flashing a “Coming soon!” pop-up at me when the Mouse hovered over them
  • Reports: also appears to be “Coming soon!”
  • Store Set-up: with Manage Assistants (“Coming soon!” ), Edit Store Information, Vacation Mode (Coming…you guessed it…), and View My Store
  • Help Resources: with links to the Merchant’s wiki, etc.

Looking a little more closely at some of these:

Edit Store Information allows you to enter limited info about yourself and your store. The boxes are free text, so it’s up to you what you use them for (within ToS guidelines). There are also boxes for you to include a link to a website and to an in-world store SURL.

View My Store displays your listed goods in an XSL-style format (images, name, price), with some degree of configuration in terms of the number of items displayed on a page. & limited sort options. Bland to look at, but actually smarter than XSL’s View My Listings format. As with XSL, clicking on an item takes you to its sale page, which includes an OnRez-style Revise Your Item button at the top right.

Item for Sale page - Merchant's View

Manage Inventory takes you to a clean (i.e. no images), paginated list of your goods, giving the name, number available, price, and options to Preview, Unlist and Edit. From here, Preview takes you to a Preview of a listing, similar to the image above, while Edit, rather unsurprisingly takes you to an editing screen where you can amend items….

The Edit page itself is vastly cleaned-up and easier to use than the old XSL – but is not without niggles. It would be nice, for example, that if a store SURL is entered in the Store Information page, it is by default carried over to all listings associated with the merchant. After all, the majority of people, I would guess, will have a URL to their flagship store – and having to re-enter the SURL over and over again seems to make a mockery of including it in the Info page (which is likely to be little-read. Of course, there will be some who’d like to send people to their different stores in-world – but by including a default, LL would save the majority additional copy/paste work.

I’d also like to see any website URL from the Store Info page carried over to individual listings, particularly as we’re limited to 2,000 character descriptions, so it would be nice to point to a web page where more info can be given.

A nice touch with the edit screen and the item display page is the inclusion of a FEATURES list, which appears on the finished listing as a tabbed item. This allows you to list specific features of the product for easy reference. Just a shame it is limited to 5 features, which really isn’t enough in this time of feature-rich products.

There are niggles, however: permissions set in XSL don’t appear to be carried over  – all my listings came out as being set NO COPY, NO MOD, NO TRANSFER – so I had no option but to edit every single item and reset the permissions. Also, the price of feature listings are now recorded on a page of their own, rather than in the listing options themselves. This means one is has to inconveniently open up a separate page and check the prices rather than simply reviewing and selecting when creating a new listing.

I’m sure others will find more and have deeper views on the merchant side of things, but this is enough for now.

On the customer side of things, Search still seems as hit-and-miss as ever….but again, if my listings are anything to go by, people will have a lot of tweaking still to do, so sharper keyword usage may help.

The new shopping cart is liable to cause some angst. No more quick visits to XSL, find your item and click to purchase. Now you have to follow the “web standard” of dropping things into your cart and then going to the checkout…

The shopping cart

This arrangement does have its advantages – especially when buying multiple items – but how many of us do? Be prepared for grumbles. Certainly, having more flexible payment options is a good step forward – but those paying in “real” currency, beware the hidden charges!

Overall, it’s not a bed attempt. Again, I really cannot see why they couldn’t allow so text formatting in the shape of BB code or even HTML formatting  – or why animate gifs have been banned. Neither would do a lot to damage the new layout; indeed, one could argue they’d actually brighten what is otherwise a terribly flat, bland affair when browsing.

There is a lot still to be done, given this is only “Beta” – and I hope LL have learned their lesson with Viewer 2 and won’t suddenly start ramming SLM at all and sundry. Certain things do need fixing & explaining, such as the “find your fav stores inworld” link….which currently takes you to the SL sign-up page *Ahem*. There are also rather a lot of “coming soon” items – some of which I would have thought would be “here already”, given they are needed by merchants (transaction histories, as an example); but providing they come along before SLM is declared “fit for action”, they shouldn’t be too much of an issue.

ADDENDUM

Since starting this piece, I got sidetracked into fixing my own listings….as such I missed the emerging thread on the Beta, wherein several major issues I’d overlooked have been raised.

No more LagNmoor

Posted on by Inara Pey

Maxwell Graf is one of the most talented content creators in SL; not only that, he is a true gentleman. He is also someone I regard as a friend.

Maxwell Graf's amazing store

Anyone who has visited his sims, Rustica and LagNmoor, cannot fail to have been visually stunned by his creations: houses, furnishing, sculpties, – all have been crafted with an amazing eye for detail and a beautiful brush of style. His store at Rustica is simply a work of art.

So in some respects it is unsurprising that Max is the victim of content ripping; anyone making their way towards even moderate success is liable to be targeted – which really isn’t much of a recommendation for Second Life.

But in other respects, that anyone would try to nab Max’s work is surprising – simply because it is so utterly unique and instantly identifiable.

So it came as a bit of a shock to read this report from Max. It speaks pretty much for itself.

This is not the first time that someone has reported their content continuing to be sold after it has supposedly been taken down. However, as it seemed LL were getting their act together at the end of last year, one would have hoped that diligence would be maintained, and physical checks put in to monitor against the “return” of goods after an initial removal.

Max points to the recent layoffs as being potentially a reason for LL being unable to suitably police matters – but to be honest, this is Max being his usual generous self. Now, it could be that there has simply been a slip-up within LL, and items have been missed. However, their reply to Max’s further plea isn’t entirely helpful. All he can do is e-mail the Removals Team until they see fit to reply.

As a result, Max is shutting down his LagNmoor sim today.

Max lists the offending sims and those responsible in his blog. I urge anyone reading this piece to show support for Max and his creations and boycott these sims and any products sold by the individuals concerned.

I’d also urge anyone interested to take the time to visit LagNmoor before it is gone  – and wander through Rustica as well. Both sims are a visual feast.

See and hear Max on You Tube in a video tour of Rustica.

Did he jump, was he pushed or was someone up to no good?

Posted on by Inara Pey

Mark Kingdon is gone. Philip Rosedale is “back” (although as Chairman of the Board, he never really left).

While I still hold the opinion that those expecting PS to now Messianic-ally resurrect  Second Life from its perceived “death” are in for not a little disappointment, I’m also really curious as to what really went on this week. And while the truth may never be known, I can’t help but indulge in a little idle speculation.

First off – was Mark Kingdon going to leave LL? Yes, I tend to believe he was. It is not uncommon for the head honcho to go when a company divests itself of a goodly portion of its workforce, and if Hamlet and others are right about the depth of disaffection within the Board following the apparent “failure” of Viewer 2, then it seems hardly likely that Kingdon would escape the fray. After all, he was pretty much brought in to drive the company the direction it has taken over the last few years – and which or not the likes of Kapor shame the blame for this direction in the first place – the fact remains that Kingdon is (or rather was) the most expendable.

Indeed,this might be one of the very reasons PR himself may have supported the contracting-in of a new CEO; while he may / may not have been a standard-bearer for the push towards bigger revenues faster, I suspect he was canny enough to surmise what might happen were the push to fail with him occupying the hot seat. Again, witness the clever wording of PR’s blog post: “Returning to the lab…”  – suggestive that he’s been away all this time and that he is “innocent” of all that has transpired…

But this aside, assuming that MK’s days were numbered  – whether because he was being set-up as the fall guy or because (and let’s not dismiss this) he was holding up a hand and saying, “mea maxima culpa” or whether a natural end of his tenure had been reached (“OK guys, I’ll take this on for two years, but after that, I’d like the freedom to move on if I’m not 100% happy…”) – one cannot deny the sheer timing of what has occurred to be a little – well, curious.

SL7B is supposed to be a time of celebration, of Lindens and residents together marking another year in SL’s life and growth. Coming on top of all the recent upsets and uncertainty – especially in the wake of the layoffs, with people far and wide speculating on the financial stability of LL, worries over what the layoffs would mean for SL (up to and including people pointing to a complete sell-off of the business) – one would have expected this week to be something of a show of solidarity within LL and towards Second Life as a whole, if only to give weight to PR’s assurance that we’re safe, the world is safe.

But no; instead we have a gathering at which MK is due to speak, at which PR himself is present, and suddenly MK is “called away” on an “emergency”, and shortly thereafter Hamlet issues his “breaking news” story.

Now, I could be reading this all wrong, but it does suggest to me that LL again got caught hopping around with underwear around collective ankles.

Did someone accidentally let slip what was going to happen in, say a week or two’s time? Or could it be that someone recently released from SL and who had been privy to plans decided to crank up the rumour-mill in the hope of wrong-footing the Lab into making changes far earlier than expected – and succeeded?

The whole change-over smacks a little of panic. *IF* MK was due to leave in time, the most obvious course of action would be to recruit a replacement. Then either once this had been done, or during the process itself, make a controlled announcement as to what is about to happen. Make clear the what and the why. That way you control the spin, and you limit potential damage.

Yet that hasn’t happened. Now it could be that more Machiavellian machinations were at work within LL, and MK opted to jump ship before the knife arrived somewhere between his shoulder blades. But again, this doesn’t seem credible.

For a start, such machinations would not reflect well on the members of the SL Board; MK may not have been around a long time, but he also probably knows where not a few skeletons are closeted, so a sudden Board-driven ousting could backfire badly. Which is not to say they don’t happen.

But there is another reason why I don’t think such a view is credible. And it is simply because it suggests that the Board are panicking. And a panicked Board isn’t good for the company’s image, not when, again, “stability” needs to be the watchword.

Similarly, MK himself isn’t going to want to unduly rock the boat himself. He has the rest of his career to consider, and is going to want to part company with LL on as good a set of terms as possible and with his resume unblemished.

No. I can’t see Machiavellian machinations or panic being the underpinning cause. CEO departures rarely just “happen”  – they are planned for. Even when one is falling on one’s sword as a result of poor corporate performance or for layoffs or for simply Getting It Wrong. It is an exercise in damage limitation to ensure the best face is put on things, that there is a “smooth transition”, etc., and that the business world retains its faith in your ability to do business – or the value of your business.

Which brings me back to a slipped word or an act of mischief.

We’ll probably never know the entire truth. There could well be a myriad of other reasons behind the extraordinary events of the last 24 hours. But that doesn’t mean we should speculate…just a little…

Marking time…

Posted on by Inara Pey

So Hamlet was right. Mark Kingdon is departing and Philip Rosedale will be back as CEO, at least on an interim basis.

Doubtless there will be much partying in the streets at the news, as Mark Kingdon has long been seen as the Big Bad Boogieman responsible for all of SL’s woes. Lord knows, I’ve questioned him enough over the last couple of years!

But what does this really signify?

The manner and direction in which Kingdon drove the company did not spring afresh from his head; nor did it exist in a vacuum. Yes, things seemed to teeter from crisis to crisis, yes some ghastly policy changes were enforced (OpenSpace / Homesteads) and others were royally messed up in their execution (Adult Changes) – and yes, Viewer 2 didn’t go down as well as expected.

But to hold Kingdon singularly responsible for these woes would be – in all honesty – wrong. He has to report to a Board, a Board that has in so many ways sought to influence and direct the future of Second Life. In this respect, Mitch Kapor (as I’m constantly pointing out) carries a portion of the blame. It was his SL5B speech which really set the tone for all that has transpired within Second Life over the last 24+ months. And if we look at the history of SL and LL as a whole, it has been racked by periods of turmoil, poor decision-making and what have you – as much under Rosedale’s leadership as Kingdon’s.

And leave us not forget that Philip Rosedale himself is a member of the Board – although one could argue that he was perhaps cajoled into towing the party line, rather than being a standard-bearer. While it is undoubtedly true that Rosedale’s SL7B presentation struck a much-needed note of contrition and suggests that there will be much in the way of navel-gazing and fluff weeding going on at LL – the hard truth is that much of the overall mindset that has been in play for the last two years will still be in play once the desks have been shuffled and the names on the pods changed.

I do find it amusing that the achievements that Kingdon has presided over during his tenure  – and they do exist – such as the investment in the underpinning network infrastructure, the investment in new hardware, the massively improved overall stability of the platform, the efforts to finally improve the asset database servers, etc., are being so erstwhile dismissed within the forum as “not being due to Kingdon” because the likes of Frank Ambrose ran point on the efforts.

Yet the very people who refuse to acknowledge Kingdon’s overall leadership in these achievements are quick to blame all the woes SL has suffered directly on his shoulders – when one could argue that just has he is “undeserving” of credit for the former achievements as he didn’t “lead” them, so to is he undeserving of the blame for any “failures” for much the same reason: Adult Changes were led” by Jack and Cyn Linden, for example; The OpenSpace fiasco was “led” by Jack as well…

While I don’t doubt that Philip Rosedale’s introspection at SL7B was genuine – at least to a point – I would still caution those busy putting on their Rose(dale) tinted glasses and loudly applauding Kingdon’s departure would do well to remember:

  • This is an interim move, pending the appointment of a new CEO
  • Philip’s introspection, in many ways, also isn’t new. He’s done so in the past – but the train has steamed on
  • as stated, Philip himself was at the helm during many of SL’s other crises: the tax revolt, et al – and he was technically still at the helm alongside Kingdon during the OpenSpace debacle.

As such, while I personally do – in all honesty – view the change over with some optimism – I’m not going out and joining the others in looking for M Linden’s “grave” so I can dance a little jig.

Philip has a potentially tough time ahead of him. While he may well come the closest of the Linden Board and management team to grokking SL’s user base, he’s going to have a hard time finding a balance between pleasing those same users and demonstrating to his fellow Board members that – despite all that has “gone wrong”  – Second Life is still capable of “making money” and has a broader appeal than currently appears to be the case despite the “failure” of Viewer 2.

That said, I will say this: Welcome back to a direct, hands-on role Philip – and thank you for stepping into the breach. We know times are hard, but you’ve also delivered what will be taken by many as a set of promises within your SL7B presentation. Further, others have (for the time being) opted to take a selective memory approach to LL’s history and management of SL over the years. So it might be said that you have a window of opportunity to “make good” on both the perceived promises and what people consider to be “wrong” with Second Life as a whole.

Use it wisely, because as you know, and Mark Kingdon likely rues, we SL users are a fickle crowd, and we’ll turn and bite the hand that feeds us as readily as we’ll roll over and let it tickle our collective belly.

And the mill continues to churn…

Posted on by Inara Pey

Hamlet is covering breaking news – um-  rumours that Mark Kingdon is departing Linden Lab and Philip Rosedale is about to swing back into the limelight as the “new” CEO.

According to Hamlet, the rumours have come from “multiple sources”, although he declines to indicate whether said sources are within or linked-to Linden Lab itself. Hamlet links the rumours to his earlier speculation about the reasons behind Tom Hale’s departure and, by extension, the “failure” of Viewer 2, and Rosedale’s own somewhat contrite SL7B address.

The mill has been further fuelled by news on the official blogrum that Mark Kingdon was a no-show at the SL7B celebrations yesterday, where he was due to give and address. The reasons for his no-show were stated to be related to an emergency.

It’s hard to tell which way to turn on this. While I doubt that the emergency that kept Kingdon had anything to do with any forthcoming departure on the grounds that Rosedale himself and several other leading LL luminaries were on-hand at the stage where Kingdon was due to speak: had the no show been connected to a sudden departure or a decision to remove Kingdon, I would have thought that the “emergency” would have been sufficient to call them away as well or that someone would have been prepared to step into the breach and thus prevent speculation and upset.

However, Hamlet does have the background that allows him to sometimes tap into the beat of things within the bastions of Battery Street (albeit an ability that is in the decline following the recent layoffs), so outright dismissal of the “rumours” cannot at this time be given.

One thing is clear. If this is no more than speculation, then Linden Lab need to nip it in the bud. While some may cling to the adage “there’s no such thing as bad publicity” this kind of rumour could be damaging if not dealt with properly.

Watch this space, as the saying goes.

Dem’s de rules….or is dey?

Posted on by Inara Pey

Feathers continue to be ruffled over the removal of pictures from the SL7B because of its depiction of nudity.

Those that object – including British film director Peter Greenaway – seem to think that the removal of a single item of art is someone an attack on the bastions of all art in SL. Others see it as petty pedalling on LL’s part, while others point to the rules laid out prior to SL7B opening, and specifically the “no nudity” clause.

For my part, I find it hard to side with the “art for art’s sake” lobby, as lead by Scylla Rhiadya, who first stirred the pot on June 19th. I will admit that I’m driven in part by the fact that it has been my observation that Scylla rarely starts a forum discussion of her own without some underpinning agenda, which leaves me feeling that there is more to her cry of “art for art’s sake” than meets the eye. But the main reason I cannot subscribe to the cries of “let it be” is simply because – as the majority state: dem’s de rules.

It is not as if LL slipped the “no nudity” rule in after the fact, or blanketed it under other clauses. It was there right from the start. As such, the inclusion of such a piece – however “unsexual” or “mild” or whatever, was in breach of said rules and subject to removal.

All other arguments in favour of its inclusion are thus, simply put, null and void. Particularly those that attempt – as Scylla does – to claim that the removal of this piece (or indeed two pieces it now seems), is a stormy foreboding of possible censorship from the upcoming Linden Endowment for the Arts amounts to nothing less than mischief-making.

At this point in time, parallels between SL7B – which has traditionally been a “PG-only” event, and the LEA are purely speculative; we have no idea if LEA will be “PG-only” or a mix of all the major content ratings within SL, and pushing this particular panic button at this point in time is little more than a false flag exercise – and Scylla is intelligent enough to know this.

Nor is the removal of one or two pictures from SL7B an assault on art, again as Scylla implies in her plethora of posts on the subject. An “assault” would be more along the lines of all such art vanishing from across the grid.

No, the rule was clearly stated and fairly acted upon. One can argue all they like about the picture being “stylised” or “non-sexual”, etc., etc., all they want and demand it should be allowed under the banner of “art” – but I wonder if Syclla and her supporters are familiar with the term the “thin end of the wedge”?

Allow a “stylised” version of nudity into the proceedings, then why not allow a stylised picture of “BDSM”? Let’s say the same nude, this time with her arms bound and an image approximating to a whip hanging in the air alongside her.  Again, non-sexual. Again stylised. However, despite her claims otherwise, I suspect Scylla would not have gone out of her way to create a thread decrying the removal of such an image, or participate in other threads against its removal – simply because of her own slanted view of BDSM would dictate that to her the work is no longer art, but an image of violence against women. Thus it would have no place in SL7B and should rightfully be “censored”.

Even without the “BDSM” element above, the fact remains that once you start sliding the bar on “no nudity” around, you enter the murky waters of censorship in a very ugly way – as no matter where you set the bar, it is going to cause outrage and outcry elsewhere. Ergo, the simplest rule is often the best, if not necessarily the fairest.

The flipside of this is, of course, the fact that LL themselves have a track record of decidedly wonky thinking where “nudity”and “art” and what might be considered “offensive” are concerned, and what measures as “acceptable” displays in PG-rated environments. The Second Life birthday celebrations are themselves no stranger to such wonky thinking, as Tateru Nino amusingly pointed out a few years ago.

Double standards were similarly shown around this time last year, at the SL Land Expo. This was again PG-rated, and saw a ban on “adult material” and “nudity”, but a “stylised” model of a man hacked in two and trailing entrails was perfectly OK. Personally, I’ll take a couple of bare nipples over that latter any day in terms of “public acceptability”.

However, the subject of what constitutes a “good rule” or “sound policy” is somewhat different to simply fanning the flames of controversy – which, at the end of the day, is really what both the “banned” pictures and the subsequent hue and cry are all about. There are better platforms from which to try to engage with Linden Lab on matter of policy than to simply break rules and then attempt to browbeat or throw out speculative rumours.

The latter approach may well serve SL7B well in terms of stirring-up much need publicity (and even then, it doesn’t really encourage one to go visit). It certainly doesn’t really benefit anything else, though.