Logos representative only and should not be seen as an endorsement / preference / recommendation
Updates for the week ending Sunday, December 24th
This summary is published every Monday, and is a list of SL viewer / client releases (official and TPV) made during the previous week. When reading it, please note:
It is based on my Current Viewer Releases Page, a list of all Second Life viewers and clients that are in popular use (and of which I am aware), and which are recognised as adhering to the TPV Policy. This page includes comprehensive links to download pages, blog notes, release notes, etc., as well as links to any / all reviews of specific viewers / clients made within this blog
By its nature, this summary presented here will always be in arrears, please refer to the Current Viewer Release Page for more up-to-date information.
Official LL Viewers
Current Release version 5.0.9.329906, dated November 17, promoted November 29th – formerly the “Martini” Maintenance RC – No Change.
The end of the year is once more approaching, which is often a time of reflection as we look back over the old before pausing to await the arrival of the new. It’s become something of a tradition in these pages for me to look back over the articles and coverage of the year’s events I’ve managed to write-up, and offer a chance to revisit the ups and downs and the good and the bad the last twelve months have brought us.
To keep things digestible, I’ve broken this year’s review into two parts. This one covers January through June, and July to December will be along later in the week, and I have a review Second Life’s technical enhancements through 2017 available here.
January
Second Life
The year started with a look at Tyche Shepherd’s 2016 end-of-year grid survey summary. This was followed by a behind-the-scenes look at the Bento project, with an article linked to a piece written for Kultivate Magazine. The Horizons project land sale reached its mid-point, and I offered a summary of sales to date. The Second Life Place Pages beta launched, while there was the usual weekly SL Project Updates from assorted meetings and Spoonful of Sugar announced their 2017 fund-raiser for Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), also known as Doctors Without Borders. January also saw me note the fact that the Lab would, through 2017, be requiring people to verify their e-mail addresses if they wanted to keep receiving SL-related e-mails and things like off-line IMs being forwards to their e-mail.
Sansar
Sansar opened the year with a Creator Profile video featuring Loz Hyde, on which I offered some thoughts, in general and concerning monetisation. The latter also came in for a little thought when I considered Ben Lang’s piece on Sansar for Road to VR.
2017 would mark NASA / ESAs Cassini Mission’s Grand Finale, repeatedly diving between the innermost rings and Saturn’s cloud tops before finally burning up in the planet’s upper atmosphere in September. Credit: NASA
Personal
I started on the first of my fiddling around with the island home sessions for 2017.
Linden Lab spoke out against Donald Trump’s Executive Orders on US immigration. A new maintenance viewer with inventory management improvements surfaced. One Billion Rising put out a late call for volunteers, with the event taking place mid-month; the organisers of the 2017 Virtual Worlds Best Practice in Education also put out a call for volunteers. The Founder of the East River Community, Indigo Mertel, put out a plea for help to secure the community’s future. Michael Linden of LDPW fame, departed the Lab.
The second round of Skill Gaming applications, launched in January (but which I previewed in December 2016), closed after a run of a month. The Lab offered their traditional Valentine’s Day celebration, and I gave a final round-up of the Horizons land auctions. There was the announcement of a new Community Platform for Second Life, which took a little longer than planned to get up-and-running, and MadPea held an International Food Fair to raise money for Feed A Smile / Live and Learn Kenya. The final UWA art show – Transformations launched with a call for entries, and also among the event announcement / calls came the first for SL14B – which was directed towards infrastructure builders.
February also saw ALS Awareness Week take place, and an appeal went out on behalf of Ceredwin’s Cauldron creator Elicio Ember, who faced a severe family set-back, and the RFL Home and Garden Expo was announced.
Space and Astronomy
The focus for the month was very much on the discovery of seven Earth-sized planets orbiting a red dwarf star 39 light years away, which I covered in two posts here and here.
Personal
February saw Holly Kai Park overhauled – notably around Caitinara Bar, which reopened in time for a celebration of the Oscars. The Park’s Pavilion also played host to an event in support for Feed A Smile. In addition, Caitlyn and I also returns to the greens and golfing.
The VWBPE social calendar was announced together with the Above the Book series, new for 2017. The event itself kicked-off at the end of at the month. I was honoured to be able to announce Filling the Cauldron in aid of Elicio Ember and his family, and the 2017 RFL kick-off weekend took place. The Lab revamped the Second Life Home Page and the 2017 Fantasy Faire regions were announced, and blogger applications opened. The new SL community platform launched, and with the help of Tommy and Corky Linden, I looked at raising abuse reports. The 2017 Sci-Fi convention beamed-in to SL, while SL’s monthly process credit limits were revised. With changes being made to SL’s asset fetching, I took time to look back over the HTTP project and SL’s use of CDNs.
2017 SL Science Fiction Convention -“Water”
Space and Astronomy
March saw Elon Musk announce his lunar ambitions, I looked at options for exploring the icy worlds of the solar system, and the question of when is a planet not a planet – and how many might be in the solar system before catching up with Mars news.
VR / AR
I offered a quick catch-up on highlights from the worlds of VR and AR.
Personal
I became enamoured of the composite designs by Morgan Sim Designs, some of which found their way onto the island home (and can still be found there). I also revamped the Holly Kai Park website.
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 