Fourteen years, Oh my!

Posted on by Inara Pey
Contemplating fourteen years

I logged into Second life to receive a greeting from Johan Neddings congratulating my on reaching my fourteen rezday – and I have to state that, but for his IM (And tweet, when I looked at Twitter!), the date honestly would not have registered with me at all.

While I try not to bring the personal and the physical world into this blog too much, the fact is that 2020 has been a real stinker of a year for all of us, thanks in large part to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which has impacted so many people around the world in so many ways, and in relation to work and things, I’m no exception. There have also been some personal matters, particularly in the last month or so and which will continue through the next few months to varying degrees, that mean SL is not currently a primary focus for me, although I am trying to keep abreast of news and articles.

Within Second Life, 2020 has certainly been interesting. On the technical front, things have clearly been dominated by Project Uplift and the Lab getting everything transitioned to run on Amazon AWS services. Much could be said about this,but I think the most important aspect to it is that while some remaining services have yet to be migrated, and we have yet to go through a period of fine-tuning / performance tweaking, overall, the entire process has been really smooth. Yes, there are some visible teething problems that need to be sorted, but when you consider there were a fair few SL services transitioned to AWS without users ever noticing they had been moved, LL have done a really good job with what might have been a really disruptive undertaking.

Of course, one of the visible changes to SL that has come along this year is EEP – the Environment Enhancement Project. While this also has some issues that are still to be sorted (and some UI niggles that may not be, given they tend to be subjective in nature), I’ve found it to be a very flexible and usable capability, if a bit of a beast to get one’s head around at first. I’ve particularly had fun creating a number of personal Fixed Sky environments, as well a 24-hour  day/night cycle for Isla Caitinara (and I will at some point get back to my tutorial on Day Cycles, which has again be pushed to one side due to the aforementioned physical world matters).

A gibbous Moon rising over Isla Caitinara, part of the Day Cycle for our island home

On the personal SL front, things have been pretty quiet. Circumstance / opportunity led to us shifting home to settle within the “new” Second Norway estate, now under the management of Vanity Bonetto and her team (which also includes Ey and his team), and as someone who has followed that entire situation from initial rumours through the takeover to becoming a resident there, I can honestly say Vanity and her team have done a superb job, both in maintaining the core of the estate in its “mainland” regions, and in revamping the estate’s island offerings, and in bringing in new opportunities and features to the estate, as I noted in Second Norway: a closer look. In fact, we’re so settled that we actually recently up and relocated to a slightly larger island within the estate!

2020 also saw me unexpectedly get involved in administrating an in-worlds arts group – the Phoenix Artists Collaboration. Things  haven’t gone quite as well as had been hoped, particularly in the area of exhibitions, largely due to all three of us who have taken on the responsibility for managing the group all being hit with physical world demands. But hopefully, once the page has turned to mark the start of 2021, we’ll be able to start properly pulling things together.

The garden of our new Isla Caitinara home
Fourteen years in Second Life is a long time, so do I have any insights to share? Oddly, no I don’t think I do. Second life is still offering me the three things I enjoy: fun, discovery and freedom, so I’ve little doubt I’ll be marking 15 years in-world in twelve months time. Perhaps the one thing I would say is that while fourteen years have passed since “Inara Pey” first arrived, I actually don’t feel any older than my first days in-world with her. Wiser (I hope!) perhaps, yes.  But not older. In this, I think my avatar has been a positive influence; largely unchanged in terms of looks for 10 of those years, she has – as past studies have pointed out in reference to people and their avatars – she has encouraged the vanity in me to exercise regularly and (generally!) mind my diet in an attempt to (in my own way) also look as good.

And of the future? perhaps the most burning question is that of Linden Lab and Second Life post the current acquisition process.

As I’ve noted before, I’m interested to see the overall shape of the revised board, and whether or not some current members will retain a minority holding. I’m not overly concerned about the risk of LL being stripped or sold on; as I’ve noted in these pages, the two incoming principals between them have good track records for long-term investment and company growth. Certainly, the Lab aren’t slowing down their own plans for SL: beyond / alongside of the “uplift” work, there are major plans for overhauling several aspects of the viewer to hopefully make it more performant and efficient, and projects to further improve things on the back-end as well. Much of this  work is fairly long-term, which speaks to a good level of confidence for the platform’s future, and I currently see no reason not to share in that confidence.

In the meantime, here’s to a happier time of things in general in 2021.

Published by Inara Pey

Eclectic virtual world blogger with a focus on Second Life, VR, virtual environments and technology.

20 thoughts on “Fourteen years, Oh my!”

  1. wow 14 Happy Rezz day! Interestingly the number 14 has to do with change and transformation… I hope you find time for yourself in both Rl and Sl. 💜🦉🌟🎂

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  3. Congratulation on your 14th year anniversary Inara. You are such an amazing source of information and for someone still new to SL, you are like a lifeboat. Thank you so very much for the effort you put into your blogs and the flow of information you share. It is so greatly appreciated ♥

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  4. Happy rezday, Inara, and may many more follow. I don’t care much about your involvement with the artists group but your blog is the most impotant and entertaining info source for me and many other SL resis.
    Long may you go on.
    xoxo

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  5. Congratulations Inara. Second Life is a wonderful place even after so many years. I will be 14 years old.
    Stays healthy.
    Greeetings
    Susann

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  6. Happy Rez Day!

    I have fond memories of Second Norway, back when the sim used to be called “Vancouver Island.” I can’t even remember now what year I sold it in to the Norway folks.

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  7. Happy Rez Day dear Inara and ty for your excellent, very useful blog; congrats also for your beautiful place in Second Norway, I always loved it, was used to stay there and still I am, I will wave you passing by with my boat, stay safe! :))

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  8. Congratulations Inara on your 14th rezz day. Second Life is still an amazing place and even after 13 and a half years I find I still learn something new every day. Thanks to your hard work so many of us keep up the happenings and changes on the grid. Here’s to many more years for you in SL.

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  9. Happy Rezz Day. I’m about 2 weeks older in SL than you. It’s been an amazing 14 years.
    You are my main source of information about SL and LL. Better even than LL themselves.

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    1. Thank you!

      Re: acquisition: yes, as far as I know.

      The thing to remember is, acquisitions of this nature can take considerable time, even when the parties have an agreement in principle or MOU (as I would assume to be the case when LL made the announcement). As I noted back in July, in trying to further address the announcement:

      A further point to remember is that acquiring a company isn’t something that happens overnight; it can actually take multiple months or even years to progress from an initial decision to sell, through reaching an agreement in principle, to that final closure.

      Actions such as Due Diligence, event with a relatively “small” company like Linden Research can take a considerable amount of time, intended as it is to make those acquiring the company fully aware of all aspects of its status and business. There may also be complications in investor buy-outs, etc., that can add overheads to any acquisition, together with negotiations as to things like roles and shareholdings, etc., if any of the existing board are remaining in place to any degree / any capacity (again an unknown at this point).

      Given this (and other potential elements that might influence things (LL’s changing business model as a result of the AWS move, for example), I actually would have been surprised if we had heard anything further by the end of 2020.

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