Month: February 2011

Metaversally speaking – where are they?

Posted on by Inara Pey

I build. No secrets there. I sell through an in-world store, SL Marketplace and Metaverse Exchange (MVX).

Or rather, I did.

A couple of weeks ago, I did a huge price restructuring for my house and home builds to reflect current market trends. As a part of this, I obviously updated prices on both SLM and MVX – noting in the process that the latter was now supporting several other grids – good oh! I thought.

Around the middle of last week, I was fiddling around and needed to log into MVX- only to find it’s no longer there.

What on earth has happened? Currently, going from the page that is displayed, it would appear the site is held pending renewal – but the fact it’s been like this for the better part of a week is a little worrying; and others are noticing as well, with questions being asked on forums including SLU. Siann Beck, creator of MVX apparently hasn’t logged-in to SL since the 17th January. Nor have there been any e-mails through the MVX channels (or at least, none that I’ve received).

*IF* MVX has gone, it’ll be a shame. I didn’t sell much through that channel, but the site was well considered and, even with the massive improvements LL have made in developing SLM, had several options that LL would have done well to adopt.

Here’s hoping this is just a hiccup, and MVX hasn’t permanently vanished into the ether…

BSG returns to SL

Posted on by Inara Pey

In November I blogged about Battlestar Galactica within Second Life being on the receiving end of a DMCA from Universal Studios. Now it appears, by way of a cheese-loving investigative resident and a delightfully easily to tease medieval lord that an agreement has been reached with regards to Battlestar Galactica in Second Life.

Some had said that the NBC/Univseral move was to quash opposition to their own upcoming BSG MMOG, now about to enter beta. Well, not so.

The actual news was broken by the Harrisburg Second Life Examiner (as was the original information relating to the issuance of the DMCA) that following intense negotiations between a number of parties, including NBC/Universal’s IP licensing office and the International Federation of Trekkers representing BSG interests in SL, an agreement has been reached whereby BSG roleplay can now continue within Second Life.

This is an encouraging move, and shows that major corporations are prepared to act in a reasonable manner towards activities in Second Life. While it is true that several BSG sims have folded in response to the original DMCA and the statement from NBC/Universal contains a very specific caveat, this outcome should nevertheless not be taken with any sour grapes on the part of SL residents.

The caveat itself  relates to BSG goods within Second Life; specifically, NBC/Universal state:

users may continue to create and interact with each other as BSG fans, so long as such interaction does not include the creation and sales of unlicensed of real-life or virtual items featuring our intellectual property

Note my emphasis. “And”. It implies that NBC/Universal might be willing to allow the creation of BSG material (uniforms, vehicles, etc.) providing the evidence can be provided that the creator is not profiting from such items. That this seems to be the case has been confirmed in a follow-up telephone call from NBC/Universal to those representing BSG activities within SL, wherein it was confirmed that the company will tolerate goods made under the fair use act (i.e. not sold or re-sold), but that lawyers for the company will follow-up on individual cases involving the creations and sale / re-sale of BSG-related material.

The cynical might say that nevertheless the caveat still “kills” BSG as no-one will “want” to create BSG items that they cannot sell and thus receive some benefit for their hard work. Frankly, I say “not so”.

Fans of series like BSG are extremely loyal both to the franchise and to the idea of keeping the concepts, philosophies and appeal of such shows alive – and in having fun doing so. As such, I have little doubt there are BSG content creators out there who will be willing to forego profit and see some of their wares available for use in such sims under the fair use act.

As it stands, those running RP sims have a green light, providing they clearly demonstrate they are neither creating BSG goods for sale and that they are not in receipt of any proceeds from the sale of such goods. Indeed, those directly involved in the major remaining sims have indicated their full support for the agreement, and one group is already working on a comprehensive roleplay scenario that takes the BSG concept in something of a new direction.

Kudos should be extended to those that kept the faith and put in such positive effort to keeping BSG alive in Second Life. Such kudos, should especially go to Anthony Haslage (“Ntaniel Swordthain” in SL) for acting as mediator in this matter and to NBC/Universal themselves for being willing to engage so positively and work towards a satisfactory conclusion.

So say we all!

Rodvik Revealed

Posted on by Inara Pey

Rod Humble (Rodvik Linden), the new CEO at Linden Lab attended a short “meet and greet” event with members of the “Second Life Press Corps” on Friday.

The meeting itself appears to have been a bit of a curate’s egg: on the one hand, it *is* good that Rodvik is taking the time to meet and greet. On the other…but the time the greetings were all done, there wasn’t really much time for the actual meeting this time around – although a fair few of those attending did get some points across to Rodvik – which I’m sure he’s taken note of and some of what he said vis-a-vis in-world creativity within SL was encouraging.

The really sad thing here is that once again, this smacks of LL operating by stealth. The meeting was very small, with a selected audience who (one cynically suspects) were selected as much for their positive attitude towards LL as for any “journalistic credentials”. Certainly, Rodvik cannot hope to meet with everyone, and really large audiences can make for difficult meetings – but one cannot help but be disappointed that no-one at LL has made mention of the fact that these meetings are happening (assuming this was not a one-off), or indicated that larger audiences may be possible in the future. To be sure, LL are in a rock and a hard place: Town Halls, etc., are hard to organise and small meetings smack of talking to the anointed: but at the moment excitement around Rodvik’s appointment is running high and favourable – and as such, it would be good to see LL engender more goodwill among residents by holding somewhat larger, more open meetings that allow for a wider opportunity for people to see / hear / chat with Rodvik Linden.

Again, these needn’t take up great swathes of his time – but putting aside a couple of hours each week for a two or three-week period and scheduling meetings at times that suit international meetings (as was done with this first one)  isn’t really beyond the realm of the doable.

Anyway, here’s the transcript of the meeting, and my thanks to Chestnut Rea for posting it.

On a side note…Rod’s avatar is a fabulous (photo?) rendering of himself, and one of the freshest approaches to a Linden Avatar I’ve yet seen.

Rodvik Linden (right)

Facebook can work

Posted on by Inara Pey

Mention Facebook around SL, and people – including me – invariably growl, get annoyed, jump up and down and / or generally blow a blue one.

However, as I’ve also pointed out in difference to others, FB can actually have a place in life where SL is concerned, and (despite the negative feedback he’s received) Hamlet over on NWN has made this somewhat clear (albeit via LL’s own statistics numbers).

It would appear that many SL users do in fact user FB to promote the places they like / spend time in within SL. Given the nature of some of the sims in this “top seven” list, it is hard to imagine the likes have been generated by non-SL users, because several of them are character-driven roleplay sims (including the no 1 spot occupying City of Lost Angels) – so it is far more likely that SL users with FB accounts are showing their approval.

The FB Likes also appear to be driving up traffic to the sims as well – although some of this could easily be anecdotal / coincidental. However, what would appear to be clear is that FB does provide a means for SL users to link-up and many SL users have no issue with using the service.

Which is why I have no major issues – despite concerns expressed by others – other FB buttons appearing in the web Profiles; as long as people are aware of the issues, why not? It gives a means of sharing – and not everyone (as I’ve repeatedly said, clacking on like a train over points) there are those who don’t mind the links between SL and RL being made.

Of course, none of this points to FB users actually crossing the bridge into SL, as perhaps LL would like to make out / hope for / have – but this is really besides the point inasmuch as what we’re seeing is FB being a useful means of communication for and between SL users.

FB also offers an exceptionally flexible way of reaching a broad audience when it comes to events. How much easier it is to post a notice in FB than it is to get the word out in SL. Of course, this doesn’t mean that people should be made to use FB to get the word out more effectively. Rather, LL should be looking to provide us with such tools as to do the same within Second Life.

Another interesting point Hamlet makes is about the misconception that FB are going around deleting avatar accounts (and by extension, “forcing” people to use RL information). As Hamlet states:

Facebook doesn’t have a policy of deleting avatar accounts. It has a policy of deleting fake accounts reported by other users, and filtering obviously fake accounts. Very big distinction.

So….I’m not a Facebook fan. I won’t use it. I don’t like LL blatantly pushing us into using it for their own ends, as I’ve stated. But, on the flipside, I still have no issue in allowing people to use FB to promote their second lives and activities within SL if they choose to do so.

Firestorm: take two

Posted on by Inara Pey

So, I’ve been working with Firestorm for a few days now, and I have to say, I’m still enjoying it. I’ve not had any significant issues, although there have been a few things that had caused passing annoyance:

  • The CONTACTS list seems a bit ropey at times: on logging in, name frequently appear either in reverse alphabetical order or completely jumbled, and require the window to be closed and re-opened to correct
  • I still cannot figure out how to enable Map for friends, should I wish (or indeed, disable it)
  • Some Preferences seem to fail on persistence occasionally – although this could simply be the age of my graphics card

But…these aside, I’ve have no crashes or other major upsets attributable to the Viewer itself. True, I’d like a more powerful graphics card to run all the nice things, but sadly, due to power supply limitations, that’s not going to happen on my current PC.

I really do like seeing shadows rendered, tho. After tweaking and playing, I’ve managed to up my frame rate to an average of 12-13fps – with peaks around 15-16 and troughs around 10fps. not perfect, but workable with only one or two other avatars near me. Any more than that, and things crawl to a near standstill.

Anyway, a couple of shots to demonstrate why I’m coming to love shadows – nothing new or radical for those who are already familiar with them.

Me – without shadows

This is probably the way most of us see one another in SL, so no big surprises. However, turn shadowing on, and not only does the house and the trees cast nice shadows, but…

Me…with shadows active

…I get much better facial definition, and shadows cast across my feature from my hair – shadows with move in time to any hair movement.

One thing I have found is that shadows, like Windlight, demonstrate the need for subtle face lighting: illumination points really need to be considered carefully, and face lights are best “turned down low”, rather than being left full-on. I’d especially avoid lights that are very face-on: a couple of friends have these, and under Windlight it’s like having a car headlight shining during the dusk / night / dawn. With shadows and lighting combined, it’s like having a set of mobile spotlight illuminating anything within a 10-15 metre range, to say nothing of washing-out facial detail.

Now if only I could take courage and upgrade my power supply and then get a higher specification graphics card….

*sigh* They’re at it again…

Posted on by Inara Pey

Brett Linden posts about spring break, encouraging people to:

Share your favorites [in-world destinations] with us here OR ON our Facebook page [emphasis mine]

And then extolling people to:

Show off your freshest “Spring Break” look … by submitting your head-to-toe avatar shots to our Facebook page.

Now, I’ve recently posted on having no problem with some aspects of LL pointing at Facebook, particularly with regards to the web Profile pages. As I’ve said, there are SL users who use both FB and SL and who may well have no problem in establishing links should they wish. Granted, the system should be opt-in, but it shouldn’t simply be chucked out because Facebook=evil in many minds.

BUT…openly pushing people at FB, as Brett is doing here, is not in the same class of acceptability. It is openly pushing people to sign-up with Facebook in order to participate in what is ostensibly a Second Life activity. As such it stinks almost as badly as last year’s Valentine’s Day Hunt, when LL offered a cash prize – but only to those hooking up with their Facebook page.

The vast majority of responses to Brett’s post have challenged this latest push – and Brett has responded. But his reply is rather disingenuous, claiming people have a choice as to whether they post to the blog or to the SL Facebook page. But this is only true to a point: while people’s favourite SL destinations have the either / or choice over where they are posted – full avatar shots are being directed solely to the Facebook page.

As Gavin Hird points out, this exercise smacks of a cynical attempt on LL’s part to promote SL as a vibrant, exciting place to Facebook users in the (dare I say) forlorn hope of gaining new users.

In this, it yet an further continuance of the same failed philosophy that has marked most of LL’s attempts at “growing” the user base over the last 2 or 3 years. A philosophy that continues to annoy and upset the very hand that feeds Linden Lab.

And if LL claim that trying to generate such an image on FB was not their intent – why have they not given people a choice of venues in which to post, as they have with destinations? What is wrong with having people post pictures (in accordance with the ToS) directly in response to the blog post? Doing so would have avoided the largely negative feedback Brett has received and it would have potentially encouraged more people to join in the fun and ensured the pictures are more likely to be seen by an audience who actually care – other SL users.

It’s been said time and again: Second Life is not Facebook. It’s also not, in and of itself, a social networking tool per se. But that doesn’t meant that it cannot embrace such functions and activities – providing it embraces them in and of itself. Repeatedly shunting people out of SL sends entirely the wrong message, as it runs the risk of people slipping into a feeling that they are not actually wanted in SL, and so why should they even bother logging in?

And the feeling of not being wanted, when it comes down to it, is something that is already very prevalent among many users as it is, thanks to LL itself. The company is doing itself no favours by adding to it.