Month: February 2011

RedZone – security, scam, or scraping?

Posted on by Inara Pey

A while back I wrote about so-called Client Detection Systems and their potentially odious nature, as well as the potential for such tools to lead to a raising of “hostilities” within the Second Life Community.

Just why such “tools” are actually pointless in the “war” on Copybotters has been excellently reviewed by Janck Antonelli – and I strongly urge anyone considering any such system to go read her commentary before parting with their cash. It could mean more than saving pennies. That Copybotters can circumvent CDS tools so easily tend to point to such tools being both a placebo for store owners, lulling them into a false sense of security whilst also being fairly regarded as a scam: money is changing hands on the basis of an easily circumvented promise.

One of these CDS system in particular has become the subject of intense debate on the official forums – as just one thread on the subject shows. Redzone not only has the word FAIL stamped across it in terms of Copybotting “protection” for the self-same reasons Janck raises – it is actually an exceptionally odious tool because it steps well beyond the realm of attempting to “stop” Copybotters and move well into the realms of possible stalking  /griefing.

Why do I say this? Well, for a number of reasons. The one that is causing the most concern is the fact that RedZone attempts to connect avatar information with IP addresses. The creator justifies this as a mean to help “identify” “copybotters”. However, both the gather of IP address and the creator’s justification are unpleasant on a number of levels:

  • It makes the highly inaccurate assumption that because two avatars have the same IP, they must be alts of one another – failing to take into consideration factors such as dynamic IP addresses (such that the IP address your ISP assigns you today could be assigned to Joe Schmoe’s – someone you have never met or associated with anywhere – tomorrow)
  • It fails to take into consideration that some buildings (colleges, offices, apartment buildings, Internet cafes) may have an homogenized IP address – thus everyone logging in from such locations will all appear to be “alts” of one another
  • Thus, through these assumptions, it promotes guilt through association: if A is on IP address Y, and flags as a “copybotter”, then if B shows up with the same IP – then even if B is not an alt, they are still a Copybotter, and thus should be banned.

Worse, by scraping this level of information and making it available, RedZone is presenting the unscrupulous the ability to grief and / or stalk – and potentially bring the stalking into the real world. The risk here is that while the majority of us are protected to a degree by dynamic IP addressing, such addresses are not totally random;  they have a degree of regional relevancy. This is particularly true for people using local (“homegrown”) ISPs to connect to the web, as is often the case in large countries like the United States, where and ISP may reach no further than the county or city in which it is based.  Thus, those who access this information, if they are so-minded, could use it to focus down on another individual’s area of residence or work. True, no actual RL information is captured per se, but t6hat is no reason to completely dismiss the concerns surrounding RedZone’s ability to collate avatar / IP information and make it available to whoever is willing to pay $17 USD for it.

While RL stalking may appear to be a worst case scenario, the matter of in-world stalking /griefing is not: it’s a very immediate risk. Redzone apparently has some 8 million records (according to RedZone’s rcreator) of avatar movements across the grid stored within it, logged by, among other things, avatar name and location scanned. In other words, sufficient information for someone to monitor and even track the movements of any number of residents were they so minded.

Things wouldn’t be so bad if the creators of the tool limited themselves to recording only the information relating to “positive” scans by their tool – i.e. Viewers that indicate they are potentially malicious, and that data relating to negative scans is discarded without ever being stored. But this isn’t the case. RedZone retains information on every single avatar scanned. This is gross overkill, and no reasoning on Earth can justify it as being purely in the interests of stopping Copybotters.

Assuming, of course, we can take the creator at his word, and this isn’t all hype. While one can accept 8 million records of user movements (after all, these will be individual avatars logged time and again over possibly dozens of sim over a period of some 18 months), other statistics published by the tool’s creator are somewhat more questionable. Take for example, the fact that out of those 8 million scans, the tool has only ever recorded 2,000 hits on Viewers classified as “Copybotters” – but that as a result, over 63,000 avatars have been recorded on the RedZone banlist; put these together, and it would appear that each of the 2,000 “positive” scans is running 31.5 avatars! This is suggestive of one of three things:

  • Guilt by association is the mainstay of this tool, rather than any “accurate” identification of Copybotters, or
  • The figures confirm avatar / IP matching is a complete FAIL, leading to thousands of inaccurate bans, thus damaging the businesses the tool is supposedly protecting by denying them customers, or
  • The figures are wildly exaggerated, enhancing the potential that the tool is little more than a scam with some unpleasant “benefits” for the less-than-scrupulous.

Beyond all this, is the unshakable feeling that this tool is about stalking and griefing: the creator, in advertising it, makes it clear that it can be used to “identify” alts, and lto list functions that griefers would find very welcome: the ability to attack (cage, etc.), users outside of the area “protected” by the tool; the boast that the tool can eject users and crash their Viewer in the process, etc.

It’s also hard to dismiss the tool as an enabler of stalking / griefing when “pro RedZone” users post to the forums boast they can use the tool as an attachment and “come after” those speaking out against it (to say nothing of the ability – if true – for them to set out “sim hopping” and gathering data on avatars which can then be perused in the hope of “outing” alts and creating further grief).

Theia Magic provides advice on how to help reduce the risk of RedZone grabbing your own information and provides a list of stores / sims running RedZone, should you wish to avoid them. In her notes, she references the GreenZone HUD; note that this will not actually prevent you from being scanned by RedZone, but it nevertheless useful in two ways:

  • It warns you if a location you have teleported is running RedZone. While have, in turn, already been scanned by RedZone, this nevetheless helps you to note and avoid such locations in future (and remember, if you have media streaming disabled when scanned, RedZone will not capture your information)
  • It helps to confirm the location you are in is “RedZone free”, thus allowing you to enable, say, music streaming – particularly useful if you are visiting a club and wich to hear the music (just remember to disable media once more before teleporting elsewhere!).

Thus, while limited in scope, GreenZone is a useful freebie to have.

Blocking communications with the RedZone website is more effective – but relies on the RedZone creators using the same domain for their information-gathering, or ensuring you are updated should the domain change. However, there are concise instructions for doing this on both Windows machines and Macs and for Linux machines.

There are JIRAs open on the matter – not specific to RedZone itself, but aimed at stopping the kind of behaviour used by such tools – and these are certainly worth voting on (before voting on JIRAs goes away) or – God help us – watching).

In raising concerns about such tools via the JIRAs, we should possibly focus on the in-world impact of such tools, rather than linking back to IP logging etc. While the latter is a worry, it is not one that particularly concerns Linden Lab, as evidenced be statements from the likes of Samuel Linden (Feb 2010) who, when responding to concerns about IP logging and Viewer 2.x, said: We do not consider IP gathering to be  an actionable security exploit. This has been possible for quite some  time with 1.23 and earlier viewers. Obviously, there is a world of difference between clicking on a shared media prim that links to an external website  – which amounts to “volunteering” your IP address, etc., – and someone deploying a tool thank actively harvests such information without your knowledge and making it available to others are vastly different concepts. Sadly, I tend to think it’s going to be hard to get Linden Lab to acknowledge them as such.

Hence why emphasis on the in-world problems / risks / threats presented by such tools would potentially be preferable – particularly where issues can be directly linked back to ToS / CS violations. They would in theory be a lot harder for LL to justify ignoring.

For myself, I’ve actually battled over posting on this subject for the last several days. To be sure, I don’t like RedZone, but I’m aware that these matters can become so highly charged they can spiral out of control into a flame fest. However, having witnessed the attitude of those attempting to defend RedZone, I’ve been moved to publish and be damned; there is simply no genuine justification for a tool as extreme as this being in-world – and I’m certainly less than sanguine about ending up on its malodorous database.

It is because of this latter risk – winding up on someone’s dirty little database – that I’ve largely disabled media screaming on my Viewers ever since Gemini CDS reared its own ugly head (although for a time I *did* keep media enabled while on my home sim – possibly unwisely given the Onyx bot farrago that accompanied Gemini). Given the RedZone situation, I now also use GreenZone and I restrict myself to the in-world browser and keeping cookie acceptance turned off in the Viewer. I appreciate that these precautions are by no means foolproof, but they do help limit my exposure to RedZone and (with the exclusion of GreenZone) to other similar tools that might be floating around out there. And Like Theia and others, I will be dropping any store that I have frequented in the past which sprouts a RedZone device with a note politely noting why they have lost my custom.

And I’d urge you to do the same – protect as far as you can, and write.

I’d also like to address any potential user of RedZone on the matter of the tool they are using: if RedZone’s creators are collating information on SL users based on a scripted device you are deploying on your land – how much more information might they be gathering on you each and every time you log into their website?

Further Information

Website investigating RedZone (Forceme Silverspar)

Theia’s notes on disabling media

Instructions for blocking the RedZone website communication with your computer*:

* Will only work for the current RedZone domain. Keep an eye on Forceme’s website for any possible moves made by the RedZone creator.

GreenZone HUD on SL Marketplace (free).

Location for testing your IP is hidden from tools using the media exploit (Surl).

Store Lists:

JIRAs on the subject of privacy:

SLU discussion on the subject (warning: lengthy, but worth-while reading)

Note: post revised after the initial publication, due to the fact that in a blonde moment, I hit PUBLISH rather than SAVE DRAFT.

ADDENDUM – Feb 15th.

Concerns have been raised that GreenZone may itself be compiling a database of its own (see comments below). While initially cynical of this – the conclusion seemed drawn on the misunderstanding of an IM exchange posted on SLU in which the term “list” is used; I have nevertheless contacted GreenZone’s creator, Fart Admiral to request clarification.

Fart has confirmed that, indeed, a static list is maintained of all locations running RedZone. Essentially, the GreenZone HUD scans for RZ objects and if it identifies one, the location of the object is recorded, together with the Ownerkey and sent out to the GreenZone server. Separately to this, the GreenZone HUD triggers an alarm.

Fart assures me that absolutely no information relating to the GreenZone user is transmitted or stored.

Obviously, even what is transmitted may be objectionable, and could be construed as putting GreenZone into the same basket as RedZone. That is not my call to make publicly, but rather for anyone reading this article and considering GreenZone to weigh for themselves before making their decision.

Who is gaming what?

Posted on by Inara Pey

The debate is getting heated. Following Amanda Linden’s blog on the new communications channels, people are making their feelings clear on one item in particular: the removal of voting from the JIRA.

Prokofy Neva has posted a constructive essay on the matter, and it is clear that people are getting very upset about things – and equally clear that, despite claims that the new channels are to help Linden Lab do a better job of listening and that as customers, your satisfaction and input is critical to the success of Second Life (quotes from Amanda’s post), it is abundantly clear that in the issue of JIRAs, the Lab has set its face on things and will not listen.

I have to admit, in my initial post on the new channels, I was somewhat flippant on the subject of JIRA voting being removed, which may have given the impression that I don’t care. Actually, I do. At the end of the day, it matters not whether votes are tallied and acted upon by Linden Lab, they are whichever way you look at it, a measure of gauging customer satisfaction – no matter how “small” a segment of the community they may appear to represent. What’s more, whether Linden Lab like it or not, they tend to represent the views of those who are the most passionate and caring when it comes to Second Life, and who want to see it succeed.

While voting shouldn’t be the single criteria for action on any given JIRA, that the people who live, breath and work Second Life take the time and effort to raise issues, track issues, and vote for them frankly, should account for something.

And this is where I find the excuses LL roll out around the concept of voting laughable: “voting can be gamed”; adding a “vote against” option alongside the current “vote for” won’t work because they will still be “unrepresentative” of the “larger population”; “watching” is easier because people will be more willing to register an interest than take a vote.

Taking the latter points first: Linden Lab has a long history of “listening” to minorities in order to justify an action. Most recent case in point: the changes to the Adult Policy and creation of Zindra. LL stated this was because “residents” wanted the change. I’m sure some did – but compared to the massive outcry against the move, those that were in favour had to have been in a minority.

The same to, with the case for establishing a G-rated continent. LL set their face against it, because it was “not what residents” wanted, when again, there was overwhelming support from all sectors of the community.

And as to the idea that the JIRA is gamed – one has to ask precisely who has been doing the gaming? Lets face it, JIRA voting has been absolutely fine and dandy with LL when it has suited their agenda. They’ve actively encouraged people to go vote on this, that and the other regardless of how many / few have lined up and voted – and often trumpeted it afterwards.

Yet when it is something they are unwilling to face – again, the Adult Changes – then a high vote count doesn’t matter because of the relative insignificance of even high vote counts compared to the size of the user base overall [Yoz Linden]. In short, it is easy to come to the conclusion that LL are themselves guilty of gaming the system as much as anyone else.

Watching is supposedly the preferable means of gauging interest – but the problem here is that Watching inevitably leads to a veritable snowstorm of e-mails. This was a major cause of angst when the JIRA system first came in, and nothing has been done to solve it – and Oz Linden himself admits people are liable to be inundated.

This being the case, it is hard to see how “Watching” is going to be a better measure, because a lot of the people who are aware of the e-mail problem aren’t going to sign-up, because they are not going to want to have to face the influx, even with spam filters running. The same goes for many who come to the JIRA for the first time: they’ll register with one or two cases, get hit by the flood and think, “Sod this for a game of soldiers!”

So Watching, in and of itself, is hardly a more “telling” means of weighing the relative merits of JIRA X against JIRA Y and voting for one or the other…or both…

I also don’t hold this Oz’s view that watching is more valid that voting because people get to read comments. So what? The chances of getting more people engaged in the discussion as a result are slim; so again, it’s hard to understand the logic / justification here. Certainly, I don’t follow that abolishing voting in favour of watching will  put a premium on thoughtful commentary as Oz asserts – because I don’t have to comment in order to watch. Period.

A further argument against Watching over voting is that watching doesn’t imply support for. I’m deeply interested in politics. During the run-up to the General Election, I watch all of the major parties at both a national and local level. I receive their bumpf I even read it. But that doesn’t mean I necessarily support any or all of them. That doesn’t happen until I actually come to vote. And its the same with JIRAs: I may watch, but that’s not indicating anything beyond (potentially mild) curiosity – but when I vote on a JIRA, I’m making a clear statement.

Given JIRA voting does account for so little in the LL scheme of things, I fail to see why the system – as Ciaran Laval suggests – remain, but with “vote for” being replaced by “show interest”. It would achieve the same result, it would encourage participation, and it would avoid the headache of spam.

And anyway, is abolishing voting in favour of watching really making things more relevant? All it is actually doing is moving people listed in Column A into Column B and nothing more. So whether you call it “voting” or “watching”, the more cynical among us might say that a high count on any JIRA is still meaningless because of the relative insignificance of even high counts compared to the size of the user base overall – to paraphrase Yoz somewhat.

Thus, the whole thing comes down to a game of semantics and little more.

As it stands, it is more than a little ironic that in a blog post that is supposedly aimed towards ensuring Linden Lab does a better job of listening, and to provide a means by which we can all have a more productive dialogue there is very little evidence of any form of dialogue coming from LL on this matter, other than “this is the way it’s going to be, so there!” And that is hardly an encouraging start to things.

I’m gobsmacked

Posted on by Inara Pey

Amanda Linden (with whom I’ve had some interesting exchanges in the past) finally gets the word out about the new means of communications, um, “within” Second Life.

Now, a part of this is something I’ve been looking forward to – the new User Groups, together with new Participation Guidelines. Providing balance  – on both the Lab’s and the users’ side – can be brought to the User Groups, then these might work out a lot better than the old Office Hours, and I’m in broad agreement with all Suella Ember has to say on this. My only worry is that, while Office Hours could be hideous slanging matches in which more is vented than listened to, User Groups could become sycophantic FICs, either deliberately or accidentally – or become perceived as such.

That LL are dropping voting from the JIRA system seems to have surprised some. Me, not so much; it’s been evident for a long, long time that LL take about as much notice of voting on JIRA issues as one regards gum on a shoe soul: to be ignored as far as possible and then scraped off when no longer convenient to ignore. Removal simply takes away a source of embarrassment to the Lab. Quite how monitoring the number of Watchers on an issue will help progress it is unclear, but ho-hum; in some respects it smacks of the same emptiness witnessed in LL encouraging people to vote on JIRA issues (up until now, at least) while knowing full well they (quote) do not use voting to triage or to make product decisions.

It’s interesting to read that next month we will be rolling out a new community platform–an integrated system that will include SL Blogs, SL Forums, SL Answers, and the Knowledge Base. Is this a tacit admission the current system does not work? I’m curious on this simply because the much-vaunted “blogrum” system currently in place is in so many respects an abysmal failure.

  • The software is irritating and unpredictable. Posts and edits frequently get “eaten”; threads don’t always fully appear when in “page” mode (I’ve frequently come across replies to posts that make no sense. Originally, I thought the posts had simply been deleted…then I discovered that I could *sometimes* find them by switching over to the mind numbingly slow threaded view and then working my way through a thread)
  • The system, whether admitted to or nor is either being unevenly moderated by LL-related staff or it is being openly abused by one or more cadres, shall we say, of forum users (regulars?), with threads seemingly pulled simply because one or more didn’t like what they were reading
  • Whether they admit to it or not, there are a number of individuals who seem to view the General Discussion forum are their personal playground. While one always expects a degree of heated “debate” (aka insult-hurling and abusive disagreement) to enter into anything that people feel passionate about and willing to discuss, it has to be said that the levels of vitriol, dislike and sheer melodrama evidenced in the SL General Discussions forum far outstrips what is tolerated elsewhere – up to and including individuals carrying over personal vendettas against one another into threads that have absolutely no bearing on their original cause of angst with one another.

As such, the forums do need a major overhaul, both in terms of the technology and in the way they are moderated and managed – however thorny the latter issue.

However, it’s after the news on forums (potentially beneficial and good), Users Groups (potentially very beneficial and very good) and the JIRA changes (no surprises) that I find myself a little more gobsmacked in the negative sense.

In both “places to connect to one another” and “Get the latest Second Life and Linden Lab news” – and with the exception of mentioning the SL forums – never once does Amanda Linden suggest or encourage people to actually log in to Second Life.

Now, I may be accused of nit-picking here, but the fact is, we’re all involved in Second Life to participate in the marvellous world(s) of Second Life. As such, I don’t want to have to traipse over to Facebook to find out what the hell is going on in “my” world. Not because I’m worried about FB’s privacy rules (I am, but they have no bearing here) – but because I’m being told to “go away” and fart around with software I’ve no interest in using, rather than being encouraged to get involved “here”. The same goes for Twitter.

Telling me to go elsewhere is, frankly, bordering on telling me to take my business elsewhere as well – and that’s not a healthy perception any company should be promoting. Period.

Where’s the encouragement to log in, meet friends, joins in-world Groups – gosh, even create a Group or two? I’m not being facetious here. Groups – despite issues with the Group chat – are a phenomenal way of keeping in touch with the pulses of Second Life we enjoy. We know LL are working to improve some of these tools – so why no mention, why no encouragement to just log in? It doesn’t matter if the new tools are a little way down the road: the new integrated forum tools appear to be down the road as well, yet they get a mention.

Frankly, as far as informing people as to what is going on, Amanda should at least be pointing to the events calendar (web and in-world), and making it clear the tools to do so are there, waiting to be used, and are going to be subject to enhancement to further encourage direct interaction between users.

And why the heck are we being steered to FB to get the latest news from LL themselves? I mean – and this may well sound a bit radical – surely the best way for LL to promote themselves to their users is through their own bloody website!

One also has to wonder why Linden-lead meetings aren’t a part of this announcement? Were they considered and dismissed?  Not even on the agenda? One of the healthiest ways for Linden Lab to promote goodwill among users and get important messages across would be to come out of their sanctums and engage with us in-world. I appreciate that management tend to be busy – but would it really be that inconvenient to give up, say, 90 minutes once a quarter or so and come in-world to address a pre-planned, pre-advertised meeting that includes a Q&A session featuring questions from the audience and received in advance by those unable to attend due to factors such as timezones?

It could even be called the Linden Village Roadshow. Lord knows, there are plenty of venues that could be established for said meetings (after all, its done for the likes of SLCC).

I have no idea if the User Groups will work – I really, sincerely hope they do, and that both sides will approach them openly and sensibly. I do look forward to seeing the new “integrated community platform”  and very much hope that this time, LL hit the nail on the head rather than mashing their own thumb. But as to the rest? Well, it’s disappointing.

Rod Humble on Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey

Hamlet, over at New World Notes, lets us have the low-down on his interview with new Linden Lab CEO, Rod Humble.

It’s an interesting piece which, doubtless, many will find disappointing. Restructure the land pricing model? No; and much that others will take heart in: greater Facebook integration? It’s a nice idea, but…

What is interesting about the interview is that on the one hand, it again repeats themes that LL keep hitting on time and again like a needle hitting a scratch on a record: make it easier for new users; *click* need to fix lag; *click* make it easier for new users… But on the other hand, it shows a solid perception of where the company has been going wrong in jumping from bandwagon to bandwagon in vain attempts to drum-up new users, damaging both itself and Second Life in the process.

For me, I have to say that I’m a little disappointed by the new user / fix lag mantra. As I’ve said elsewhere, what is need within Linden Lab is an ability to look at the platform a lot more holistically, rather than trying to poke things into individual, easy-to-tick boxes.

Yes Second Life is exasperating when one comes to use it for the first time; yes lag is an ongoing issue. Yes customer service sucks worse than a vacuum cleaner with a hole in the cylinder – but constantly mucking around with the “new user experience” or simply reducing lag and getting friendlier, more knowledgeable people sitting on the end of the phone or responding to tickets isn’t going to revitalise SL.

Let’s face it, when I joined SL originally in 2006, we had lag. We had sim crossing that would throw you into the middle of next week rather than the middle of the next sim; we had a new user experience that was both frustrating and confusing (and with a bloody annoying parrot, to boot). We had a Viewer that was somewhat arcane and needed to be looked at sideways via a mirror to make any sense of it. But – it didn’t matter! Why? Because suddenly our computer screen was a window – a door into a marvellous world where we were – to all intents and purposes – limited only by our imaginations!

When I came back to SL at the end of 06, after a few months away, things were as aggravating: lag, asset server failures, Black Wednesdays without the grid for up to 8 hours – sometimes longer (maintenance time coincided with the afternoon / evening here which made it even worse). The Viewer still required several belts of the forehead against the desktop  before it made a degree of sense. But – it didn’t matter! The Wonder was still there. A Wonder encouraged and nurtured by residents and Linden Lab employees alike.

It’s easy to say I’ve got rose-tinted glasses on as I write this and that the “old days” always look better; but that’s not the case. We accepted Second Life warts and all, because we could immerse ourselves here. There were precious few barriers preventing us from exercising imagination and mind.

Over past few years, that ability to freely immerse ourselves has been eroded. Policies have been drawn up and implemented with the barest consideration of precisely how they might impact communities. Where residents have raised valid and considered concerns over them, the response from LL has run the measure from trying a deaf ear through to the blandly patronising. Even where the changes have been necessary and potentially beneficial, LL have handled matters in such a cavalier manner, they’ve frequently managed to alienate those that initially supported their efforts. In short, these newer policies have left users feeling as if they are being fenced in on either side and herded and prodded away from the very things that enticed them into SL in the first place.

As a result, our tolerance for dealing with technical issues has been eroded; lag has become more and more of an issue for us – along with matters such as crossing sim boundaries – not because they are any more annoying to people than they were in the past, but because it seems that it’s only when dealing with these tangible problems we feel anyone at LL is listening. As a result, rather than people within  LL looking at SL as a whole, we find them drawing up – as I’ve said before – laundry lists of things to do to “fix” SL and make it a “happy” place.

And it is somewhat frustrating to hear Rod Humble roll out the same mantra so early on.

That said, I have to admit to smiling at his candour around Second Life as a brand and the tacit admission that Linden Lab have messed this up for themselves. I’m not convinced his candour will result in anything substantial in the short-term – but taken with the introduction of the new User Groups, I’m hopeful that we might at least see a redressing of the balance in corporate / user interactions which may just filter back into the company; possibly returning it to the core values that made SL work through the early years. In short: seeing the platform as an inspirational, collaborative environment in which they provide the tools, the means and the general guidance – and the users provide the content, the dynamics of interaction (creativity, roleplay, gameplay, etc.), that together make Second Life a vibrant, healthy growing place.

Elsewhere, Mr. Humble struck a chord that is doubtless going to please a lot of people, stating that linking Second Life with the likes of Facebook – while not an outright no-no – should be handled with caution and a respect for the privacy of Second Life users (something LL have blundered around with up until now). I certainly had to smile at his nixing of Hamlet’s overly Facebook-oriented suggestion of “first fixes” for SL. Again, there is nothing wrong with providing the hooks for those that wish to use both platforms, but the future of SL should not be defined in terms that actively push the user base into FBland.

I doubt, on the other hand, Mr., Humble’s views on the current land “sales” revenue model will be received so well. While promising that LL will be seeking to improve what is on offer, he made it clear the pricing model won’t shift.

Where I was disappointed in the interview is that it avoided all mention of Mr. Humble’s belief that user creativity is important to Second Life. He’s said so in his own initial blog post and again in meeting with the “SL Press Corps”. While hearing the CEO of LL say this (especially after Philip Rosedale seemingly denigrated in-world content creation last year when he voiced the opinion most users won’t “even rez a prim”) is exceedingly positive, it needs more meat on the bone.

What is LL going to do to encourage in-world creativity? While mesh is exciting and has a lot of people all hot and bothered, the fact remains it isn’t “in-world creativity”. So what else will there be because, with respect, people in a year’s time will want to come to Second Life because they know they can be who they want to be.. and when they join, they’ll be able to meet interesting people, and they can have a home… that’s more than enough? is a deeply worrying statement. People can already “be who they want to be” and “meet interesting people” and “have a home” without ever setting foot in Second Life. That’s what they’re doing in Facebook right now.

If people come to SL for self-expression, they need to be confident that they can express themselves, that they have the means be which they can find self-expression through an engaging, exciting medium, whether they are in-world to build, socialise, play or role-play.

As such, LL have got to start helping define (redefine?) the environment so that residents feel they can contribute to it, help nurture it, grow with it, and by a part of it.

“Your world, your imagination” is regarded as jaded and beyond its sell-by date with some quarters of LL. This being the case, I offer Mr. Humble an alternative that may help embrace the idea of Lab and users working together:

“Our worlds and our imaginations”.

Apez sold

Posted on by Inara Pey

After all the confusion, Apez has now been sold. It appears that Egoisme is now the new owner. Some Apez users are reporting on SLU that service continued more-or-less “as normal” during the last few months, and Cenji has indicated that all accounts have / are being honoured in terms of payouts.

How things will pan out for people remains to be seen. Certainly, with the demise of Slapt.me, the apparent disappearance of Metaverse Exchange and the wholehearted chewing-up-and-spitting-out of On Rez in favour of the SL Marketplace (nee XStreet SL nee SL Exchange), a good, solid, competitor is required to face-off against Linden Lab if only to encourage further development of, and enhancement to, current services. Whether this can be Apez / Egoisme remains to be seen.

Certainly, no-one can deny that Apez as a brand is now  – pardon the pun – damaged goods. Therefore, any attempt to “restore” the Apez name (as Egoisme state they would like) is potentially going to be akin to trying to push water up a hill.

However, the Apez system – servers, vendors, etc., did and do work well, and retain a lot of potential. Put them together with a reliable level of customer service (which many complained was a major issue with Apez), develop a really solid front end that disposes with things like “Sekrit Naughty Words Of The Day” lists, which offers both consumers and merchants a flexible means of both finding and promoting goods and services under a brand entirely distinct from Apez, and Egoisme might just have something. It’s still going to be an uphill climb – especially given the overall state of stagnation within Second Life and LL’s ability to massively steer people towards SLM; as such whether the possible rewards of persevering with such an effort prove worthwhile for those concerned remains to be seen.

Update: Egoisme apparently sold Apez not long after acquiring it. When this took place & to whom is unclear. All reference to Apez (including the press release announcing the acquistion linked-to above) has been removed from the main Egoisme website.

Communications and the Lab

Posted on by Inara Pey

On Tuesday, we were apparently supposed to get information from Linden Lab as to the future of user / Lab communications, following the gradual winding-down of Office Hours.

Seems it didn’t appear.

However, Suella Ember grabbed the scoop on the way things may be going – and in the process raises very valid points and ideas for future, more robust interactions between Lab and users. As she points out, since writing her piece, information on the new User Groups has gone up on the SL wiki.

Going off the wiki, these new forums for discussion are already active. One certainly hopes that someone within Linden Lab will get the official word out via the blog before too much longer!