On Monday November 11th, Linden Lab issued a Commerce blog post indicating that there were changing the requirements which much be met in order to sell goods via the Second Life Marketplace.
The move, clearly aimed at preventing the ease with which suspect accounts can create a Marketplace presence and start selling goods which may have been ripped from elsewhere was announced thus:
To increase security for Merchants and shoppers alike, all new Second Life Marketplace Merchant accounts will be required to enter payment information on file (PIOF). If you would like to check your account to see if this requirement has been met, please see the Mesh Upload Status page.
Only newly created accounts will be required to meet this requirement at this time, and existing Merchant accounts will not be affected. However, we strongly recommend that all merchants complete the steps necessary to meet this new requirement.
Unfortunately, the announcement was immediately followed by confusion and negative feedback, largely as a result of the system not appearing to work as advertised, and being relatively easy to circumvent.
I contacted Peter Gray, the Lab’s Director of Global Communications about the announcement and confusion, and received the following reply:
Hi Inara,
Thanks for your email. We’ll be adding the below to the blog post on this topic momentarily:
Thanks to reports from Merchants, we have discovered a bug in the system that determines whether an account has payment info on file. We are working now to resolve this issue as quickly as possible and expect to release a fix in the next couple of weeks.
In addition, we have had some questions about the 5-day age requirement for accounts trying to become Merchant accounts. This requirement is not new, and there are no current plans to change it.
best,
Peter
This update has now been appended to the original blog post, and will hopefully help alleviate immdediate concerns, although it may also lead to further questions as to why the update was not more thoroughly tested.
To anyone reading this blog, it’s pretty obvious I like taking pictures of the places I visit in-world. I’m the first to admit that I have an awful lot still to learn in terms of technique and in post-processing (where required). However, I have to admit that the ego in me does sometimes wonder what it would be like to put on an exhibition.
The reality is, of course, that I am just a happy snapper; therefore exhibitions are best left to those who know what they’re doing and who create some of the most memorable, creative and eye-catching images of their in-world experiences. People like Ziki Questi.
Ziki is rightly well-known and admired by many (including me) across Second Life for her incredible photographs which capture scenes and regions in amazing detail, and which are presented in a format and style she has made her own. Her blog is a veritable travelogue for Second Life residents, constantly offering rich and evocative images each and every time she posts, while pointing readers to places to visit and witness for themselves. Her gallery, which recently relocated, is a must-visit for anyone who enjoys her work or who wishes to see some of the most eye-catching SL photography available.
Some of Ziki’s work can also now be seen at Anita Witt’s gallery space on her region of Dryland. The theme for the exhibit was also suggested by Anita, “Lost Second Life“, which Ziki admits to both intrigued her and worried her at the same time, as she reveals in the exhibition notes:
I thought it would be easy, just sifting through images and selecting a few here and there, but it turned out to be a surprising challenge. For starters, there were more than 15,000 photographs to look through … And then there was the title itself: Lost Second Life somehow implied a comprehensive survey of all that had come and gone, and that’s not really what either Anita or I originally envisioned.
The result certainly isn’t a comprehensive survey; it’s far more than that. It is a very personal look back through those 15,000 images to present a fascinating look back at regions and builds which will be both familiar and new, but all of which have now passed into history as Second Life continues through its own evolutionary process. By carefully curating the images used for the exhibition, Ziki is allowing visitors not only a window into SL’s past, she is also presenting a means by which memories can be shared as we come across places that we’ve visited and can now see again through her eyes, making this a very intimate exhibition.
This feeling of intimacy is further increased by the mix of older works from Ziki’s collection with more recent pieces. In presenting both, Ziki shares her evolving approach and style to SL photography with us, something which draws us into each of the pieces on display here.
In a similar way, Anita’s gallery design means that the pictures are displayed in relatively small spaces on three floors. This helps create a feeling of a more intimate space which is aided by the warm colours of the default windlight, both again drawing us even closer to the pictures Ziki has chosen to share.
Fallingwater from the Frank Lloyd Wright Virtual Museum, 2010 – Ziki Questi, Lost Second Life
Lost Second Life opened on November 12th, 2013. I’m not sure how long it will run, but I do recommend that when you get the chance, you go and see it. When you do, make sure you grab the note cards from the info board at the arrival-point; not only do they provide background to the exhibition as a whole, they also provide notes on each of the pieces, together with links to Ziki’s original blog posts where each is featured.
As always, please refer to the week’s forum deployment thread for the latest news and updates.
Main channel: Tuesday November 12th
No deployment.
Release Candidate Channels, Wednesday November 13th
BlueSteel and LeTigre should receive the maintenance package originally scheduled for deployment to all three RC channels in week 45, but which was cancelled as a result of a last-minute issue being found. This package comprises further infrastructure changes for the yet-to-be-announced Experience Keys (experience tools) project
Magnum should receive a new server maintenance project this week. This project fixes some bugs, including BUG-4152 related to vehicles crossing region boundaries, as described in this thread; and which also includes some changes around script behaviour, comprising:
The fix to allow objects rezzed by sat-upon objects should have a fresh auto-return and temp-on-rez timer, This will allow them to last the full ~60 seconds (for temporary) or parcel auto return time. This should help is situations where combat vehicles in regions with short auto-return times can have their ordnance immediately returned when a weapon is fired, and any temp vehicles are unable to rez attachments, even when sat upon
Fixes to prevent estate managers / owners being teleported home through a misuse of llTeleportAgentHome(), and to prevent estate managers / owner being affected by “Trojan” objects manipulating ESTATE_ACCESS_BANNED_AGENT_ADD
Updates to the grey goo fence do that it is stricter for large object rezzes in a further attempt to limit the ability of griefers to bring down a region through multiple rezzing of large objects
More robust handling of inventory management within objects
Cleanup of controls-grabbing in LSL scripts (no functional changes).
A simulator UG meeting (stock)
SL Viewer
The SL release viewer updated on Tuesday November 12th to version 3.6.10.283403, formerly the Maintenance RC comprising finer access control for estate/parcel owners; CHUI: toggle expanding Conversations by clicking on icon; GPU table update + more.
It is thought the project viewer containing the last of the current viewer-side updates for interest lists should be appearing very soon now. After recent setbacks in getting the viewer publicly visible, the time frame for its arrival had been noted to be unlikely before November 12th. However, speaking at the Simulator User Group meeting on the 12th, Andrew Linden indicated he believed the viewer may well be out in the next few days.
Other Items
Andrew Linden’s Bug Fixing
Andrew Linden
Andrew Linden has been taking time to fix a some unusual bugs. The first, which is not generally visible, he describes as, “In some cases our servers will upload an asset multiple times before it successfully creates an inventory item (on take to inventory for example). Which creates garbage assets in the asset system.” This issue could also result in multiple notifications being sent to the avatar uploading the item, if they remained in the same region.
The second issue he’s fixed is that of “ghost objects” appearing in the viewer but which are not present on the region server. This issue appears to have been caused by a race condition which could occur under certain situations such as deleting the objects too fast on a region crossing, so they’d be removed server-side, but not from the viewer. Both of these fixes should be appearing in an RC soon.
Group Management and Culling
Request have been made to have the limit of banned avatar lists raised from 500, particularly for regions that are popular with users. Whether there is a widespread need for this is entirely open to debate, but during the discussion of the problem being faced by a particular estate, suggestions were put forward by which such lists might be made easier to manage, including:
Auto-culling from all ban lists of any account name banned from the grid
Such auto-culling to take place only as a ban list approaches its upper limit
Add a feature by which would allow the removal from a list any avatars that have not logged-in to SL for a given period of weeks / months / years. If implemented, this could either take the form of a selectable set of options (e.g. something like 6 months, 1 year, 2 years), or possibly be a free-format field the owner can use to specify as the time period.
Whether any of these options eventually get implemented, remains to be seen (and doubtless on whether feature requests are filed).
This conversation was also bound-up with matters of group chat and group chat lag. Various suggestions were put forward for trying to address this as well, ranging from replacing the current group chat mechanism with something like IRC and whether it would actually work / scale any better, through to implementing a server-side change so that when someone leaves a group chat, the channel is actually closed, rather than messages still being sent to the viewer, which just disregards them, as is currently the case. Commenting on the status of group chat in general, Simon Linden stated, “Just FYI, practically speaking we’re not going to be re-writing the chat system any time soon.”
While running through various blogs, I came across an interesting post from Lelani Carver about an emerging on-line alternative to the SL Marketplace.
Primbay.com is operated by the folks at CasperTech, whom many may be familiar with through their in-world CasperVend dropbox and vending system.
Note that the marketplace is in its nascent development, but SL merchants using the CasperVend system are already able to use it, and CasperTech appear to have some significant plans for the future.
PrimBay: an alternative to the SL Marketplace
A Quick Overview
The Merchant’s Perspective
The first thing to note about PrimBay.com is that in order to be able to sell through it, you must use a dropbox from one of the CasperVend systems. These essentially come in two flavours: the free system, which charges a 5% commission on all sales, and the Premium system, which costs L$1,995, but which is commission free on direct sales and charges only 2% commission on affiliate sales (note there are other CasperVend package options, and the two mentioned represent only the core needs for PrimBay).
Those who already use the CasperVend system are essentially good-to-go with PrimBay, and will find their items already listed.
For those who don’t currently use CasperVend and would like an overview, Casper Warden has produced a short video on getting the system set-up. While it doesn’t cover PrimBay, it gives you sufficient information to get a feel for things.
With the arrival of PrimBay, the CasperVend website has been updated so that anything listed through it can be automatically listed on PrimBay. All that is required is to set the desired options within the product listing itself. If, for any reason, a merchant does not wish to have items listed on PrimBay, they can disable the automatic listing function from the Overview section of their CasperVend web page.
Use the blue PrimBay options to define whether and how an item is to be listed on PrimBay
Individual items are listed through the PrimBay section (displayed with a blue background) in the main listing page for the item on the merchant’s CasperVend pages. The options here define whether or not the item is to be additionally listed on PrimBay, whether or not it is Adult in nature and to define the search categories under which it is to appear.
Note that there are no listing fees associated with PrimBay, and that when modifying listings, changes may take up to an hour before they are reflected on the PrimBay website. If you intend to sell adult content, please note the guidelines, available from the Adult Content link on the PrimBay home page.
The Customer’s Perspective
To use PrimBay as a consumer / customer, and assuming you are not already using CasperVend as a merchant, you need to register a CasperVend account. This is done via a number of in-world terminals. Note that if you want to be able to access Adult content on PrimBay, you must register an account and then go to a terminal on Adult-rated land and verify yourself (you can of course register and verify at a terminal on Adult-rated land).
Once you have registered an account, you’ll be asked to verify it via an e-mail sent to you as a part of the account registration process. Also, note that in order to buy anything through PrimBay, you must deposit L$ into your CasperVend account. When this is done, you’re ready to log-in and go shopping!
The current default PrimBay homepage. Logi-in (top right), search for something, or browse the categories (bottom centre)
Using PrimBay is currently a little like using Google search. Once logged-in, you are presented with a search page in which to get started. If you prefer, you can click on the Browse Categories link and start from there.
The website is currently fast and responsive, and while there are no merchant stores at present, you can use the search to try finding merchants / brands by name. The categories are perhaps a little on the broad side, but should again help with finding things.
If you’re after Adult stuff, make sure you click the check box alongside the search option on the top of displayed pages.
Christmas is a time for giving, and on Sunday the 8th December, 2013, Bay City will be hosting their annual Christmas Tree Lighting and fundraiser.
Activities will commence at 13:00 SLT and run through until 16:00 SLT and will take place at the Bay City fairgrounds. On offer will be:
Live entertainment
A skating party
A silent auction
refreshments and fun.
This year will see Grace McDunnough and CelticMaidenWarrior Lancaster take to the stage to provide the live music performances, and GoSpeed Racer will be spinning the tunes as the event’s DJ.
The silent auction will take place throughout the event, and will conclude at 16:00 SLT, when activities officially draw to a close. All proceeds from the silent auction and from donation bins at the venue will go to Child’s Play Charity, a 501c3 non-profit organisation offering online communities such as the Bay City Alliance an opportunity to help seriously ill children around the globe during their hospital stays with the purchase of games and gaming equipment.
Grace McDunnough (l) and CelticMaidenWarrior Lancaster (r) will be performing on stage at the event, and GoSpeed Race (c) spinning the tunes as the event’s DJ
Request to Second Life Designers and Artists
To assist with the fund-raising auction, the organisers of the tree lighting are asking that SL designers and artists to consider donating fun, interesting, unique, or other transferrable items (or a no-copy object that an auction winner can use to redeem their prize in the case of no transfer items) which both reflect well on Second Life and which can be offered as auction items.
If you are willing to provide one or more items, please contact Marianne McCann for details on how to participate.
About Bay City and the Bay City Alliance
Bay City is a mainland community, developed by Linden Lab™ and home to the Bay City Alliance. The Bay City Alliance was founded in 2008 to promote the Bay City regions of Second Life and provide a venue for Bay City Residents and other interested parties to socialize and network. It is now the largest Bay city group, and home to most Residents of Bay City.
The Machine is the latest in the LEA’s 2013 Full Sim Art series to open, and will run through until the end of November. Located on LEA 6, the installation is by Lilia Artis & Moeuhane Sandalwood, and represents their view on what might happen if humanity seeks technological perfection above everything else. It presents, at first look, a self-fulfilling world where technology exists for the betterment of the human mind, and the human mind exists to maintain the machine – but is it really so?
The creatures have created a perfectly functioning world. They live in the ever-present. As a sound community. With joined minds and spirits. Interconnected. Completely. They run the machine – and are run by the machine. They are the machine. The peak of innovation. The end of evolution. Their creation.
They are a society without memory. Their history a mere shadow. Because there is no need to remember. Why remember what is of no value. They are perfect.
So states the opening description of the installation; and when you arrive, you get to see this perfection first-hand; in a technologically pristine environment sits the Machine, surrounded by the minds that both gave birth to it and give it purpose, and who are given life and purpose by the Machine, in a closed and chilling cycle, apparently devoid of past or future.
At what cost has this come? In the pursuit of perfection without thought of the consequences, what has humanity, as seen in this great hall, actually lost? This is the question visitors to the installation are invited to explore through their “inner archaeologist and ethnologist”.
The machine and its “perfect minds” both literally and figuratively sit at the highest plateau of human evolution; but explore the build and you’ll discover that the plateau itself is made up of many layers sitting one atop another, each harkening back to earlier times and hinting at what has been lost – and what may yet rise up once more to haunt those minds so earnest in their dedication to running the machine that runs them.
Each level is there to be explored in turn, although the passages between them may not always be obvious, so take your time exploring. The way down to the lowest level and the further point in the past – what we might consider the present – isn’t particularly obvious, keep your eyes peeled for a hole in the floor of a building.
This is a thought-provoking piece. As you descend through the various levels, you’ll doubtless form your own answer to that question as to the price of human evolution when only technology is seen as holding the key. In this, Lilia and Moe are to be congratulated in only providing the most subtle of pointers to direct any thinking on the matter, leaving it up to the observer to draw their own conclusions.
On Monday November 11th, Linden Lab issued a Commerce blog post indicating that there were changing the requirements which much be met in order to sell goods via the Second Life Marketplace.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 