Month: February 2022

Space Sunday: Starship update

Posted on by Inara Pey
Starship S20, supported by the launch system “Mechazilla” arms, sits atop Super Heavy Booster 4, the Quick Disconnect Arm sitting between them, the sands of Boca Chica beyond. Credit: SpaceX

On Thursday February 10th, Elon Musk gave the first large-scale update on the work SpaceX is doing to develop the world’s first – and largest – fully reusable space transportation system in the form of the starship vehicle and its super heavy booster, and where things stand at present.

The presentation, which took place at the SpaceX Starbase facilities close to Boca Chica in Texas, came amidst on-going activity to both complete the first orbital launch facility for the massive booster and the payload-carrying starship vehicle, an in refining and finishing the first booster that will make an orbital launch attempt – Booster 4 and further testing of the first orbital attempt starship – number 20.

This incredible view, shared on Twitter but originator unknown, shows the base of Booster 4 as the rocket is lowered onto the launch table, the outer ring of 20 fixed Raptor motors surrounding the inner 9 that can be gimballed to provide directional thrust note the protective skirt between inner and outer engines.

In terms of the booster, this now appears to be pretty much launch complete: all of the anticipated protection has been added around sensitive equipment at the base of the rocket, the Raptor motors have been given a coat of protective paint, and work has been carried out into the rocket itself.

On the launch platform itself, work has been completed on the huge “Mechazilla” system that is designed to roll up and down the side of the launch tower, lifting both boosters and starships onto and off of the launch table using its two massive “chopstick” arms. Not only has the system, together with the Quick Disconnect Arm that provides fuel and power connections to the starship vehicle been put through their paces rising up and down the tower on their respective tracks, Mechazilla has also carried numerous tests using water-filled ballast bags to simulator the suspended weight of a booster or starship vehicle as it lifts, rotates and lowers them.

The Quick Disconnect (QD) Arm extends two claws either side of Booster 4, reaching for the hard points just visible below and between the grid fins. February 7th, 2022. Credit: Lab Padre

Such was the status of testing that many pundits had asserted that Mechazilla would be used to hoist both Booster 4 and Starship 20 from their transport cradles and hoist them up onto the pad and one another ahead of Musk’s presentation.

As it turned out, this was not quite the case. During the first part of the week ahead of Musk’s presentation, Booster 4 was moved the short distance to the launch facility, but one of the large cranes SpaceX has been using was used to hoist it from its transport platform and up on onto the circular launch platform, where clamps within the table’s ring to locked it into position. Following this upper Quick Disconnect (QD) Arm was positioned and connected.

The QD arm has two functions: holding the booster steady by extending two claws outwards and around the upper section of the booster so they mate with hard points mounted on the booster’s frame. Its second role is to similarly help secure a starship vehicle once stacked on top of a booster, and to provide with fuel and electrical power ahead of a launch. As the name implies, the QD arm is designed to rapidly disconnect from both booster and starship and swing out of the way at launch.

Gripped between its chopsticks, Mechazilla gently lifts Starship S20 upwards to where it can be swung over Booster 4. Credit: SpaceX

Following the securing of Booster 4, and under a night sky, Mechazilla did finally see action as Starship 20 was delivered to the launch facility and the huge arms of the mechanism were moved into position either side of the vehicle just below its forward canards and then gently closed so that they could engage with hard point on the starship before hoisting it clear of its transporter.

After what appeared to be a period of load testing / check out and a retraction / removal of the QD arm, Mechazilla was finally winched up the side of the launch tower, lifting Starship 20 up above Booster 4, prior to the mechanism and vehicle being rotated directly over the booster and then gently down onto it for mating with the booster, after which the QD arm rotated back into place and connected to both booster and starship.

Another view of the stacked Booster 4 and Starship 20 at the Starbase orbital launch facilities, Boca Chica. Note the tank farm, lower left. Credit: RGV Aerial Photography

This marked the third time booster and Starship had been mounted together on the launch table – but the first time in which both they, and the entire launch facility have been very close to being ready for that first launch attempt.

Mechazilla itself is a remarkable system. Not only will it lift and stack boosters and ships, it will (eventually) catch them out of the air. The animation below pretty much demonstrates how this will be done with a returning Super Heavy Booster, although after it was released, SpaceX revealed that rather than “dropping” onto Mechazillia’s arms, the booster will in fact come in to hover between the arms, which will them adjust their height and “hold” the booster, allowing the engines to shut down. When watching the video, note also the conveyors on the top of the Mechazilla arms correctly orient the booster ready for it to be swung over the launch table and lowered onto it, and also the V-shaped arms under the “chopsticks” that also connect to the booster to provide additional stability.

Continue reading “Space Sunday: Starship update” →

Aliens, felines, crypto and cartoons in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Seanchai Library

It’s time to highlight another week of storytelling in Voice by the staff and volunteers at the Seanchai Library. As always, all times SLT, and events are held at the Library’s home in Nowhereville, unless otherwise indicated. Note that the schedule below may be subject to change during the week, please refer to the Seanchai Library website for the latest information through the week.

February 14th, 19:00: When They Came

I was never afraid of monsters—at least, not until They came: the visitors from outer space.

Now They’re in our skies, on our streets, always watching, forever waiting.

At seventeen, I’m just about to graduate from the Juvenile Education System and declare my career of choice. The Midnight Guard—who protect our community from the vicious things that lie outside our walls—calls to me.

It’s hard, dangerous work, with gruelling hours that offer little sleep, but it’s the one thing I know will help make a difference in our ever-changing world.

– Ana Mia, When They Came

Having graduated from the juvenile education system, Ana Mia decides to join her sister as a part of Fort Hope’s Midnight Guard. Fort Hope is a stronghold, protecting its inhabitants from Earth’s alien invaders; and the Midnight Guard forms the eyes, ears and guardians of the stronghold’s Wall.

Without the Guard and without the Wall of the stronghold, the aliens would be free to harvest humanity, using their ships and the Coyotes who form their eyes and ears in opposition to the Midnight Guard.

Gyro Muggins read’s the first volume in Kody Boye’s When They… saga. Volumes two and three to follow.

Tuesday, February 15th

12:00 Noon: Russell Eponym

With music, and poetry in Ceiluradh Glen.

19:00: Klawde: Evil Alien Warlord Cat

Klawde had everything. Sharp claws. Fine fur. And, being the High Commander of the planet Lyttyrboks (think about it if you need to!), an entire world of warlike cats at his command. But then he is stripped of his feline throne and sentenced to the worst possible punishment: exile to a small green-blue planet that is, as they say, “far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the galaxy”, known to its dominant bipedal race as “Earth”.

On that planet, Raj is a young man who had everything: a cool apartment in Brooklyn New York, his three best friends living in the same apartment block and comics and pizza always within easy reach. Then, courtesy of his mother taking a job on the other side of the country, he finds himself exiled to the community of Elba, Oregon.

These two lost souls, one seeking friendship (and, hopefully, pizza and comics) but forced to join a nature camp, the other a cunning, brilliant feline emperor, both exiled and seemingly lost, are destined to meet. And when they do – whether Klawde likes it or not – the emperor cat will find his plans for revenge on those who would oust him from his empire running somewhat secondary to becoming Raj’s new Best Friend as the two of them become bound by a series of new and hilarious adventures.

With Caledonia Skytower.

Wednesday, February 16th: The Great Simoleon Caper

Neal Stephenson  is often credited with foreseeing “the Metaverse”, the immersive, 3D interactive successor to the Internet, as given form in his 1992 novel, Snow Crash. However, what may not be widely known is that he was also one of the first science fiction authors to attempt to plumb the potential depths of crypto-currency.

This is did through a number of his novels and short stories, and in the case of the latter, one of his more well-known “shorts” on the subject is The Simoleon Caper. First published in 1995 by Time magazine, the story is set within the same universe as Snow Crash, but at a period that precedes the events of that novel and within a United States that, whilst similar to that presented in the novel, is also in a slightly earlier form, as is the Metaverse.

The central story involves one individual’s apparently innocent work to help promote a non-governmental electronic “currency” called the Simoleon. His work attracts the attention of a  group of “crypto-anarchists” who operate an entirely virtual nation, the First Distributed Republic (FDR – get the play on the initials?) and believe the government is going to use the individual’s work for their own subversive aims.

Featuring ideas of misinformation, subversion (including the ability for e-currency to circumvents government taxation), The Great Simoleon Caper perhaps has more relevance in today’s world as it balances on the edge crypto-financial, metaversally-hyped digital abyss, both in the story it tells. It also  – as with much of Stephenson’s work – lends itself naturally to the “traffic jam test” of critical reflection.

With Seanchai Library guest Mike Lorrey.

Thursday, February 17th 19:00: Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

Here’s a bit of fun for you: A novel based on a screenplay based on a novel.

In 1981,  Gary K. Wolf published Who Censored Roger Rabbit? In doing so, he introduced the world to hard-boiled PI Edddie Valiant and second banana comic strip character Roger Rabbit, who both live within a strange universe in which real humans, like Valiant, co-exist with comic strip characters like Roger Rabbit – and Snoopy, Dick Tracy, Hagar the Horrible and others.

That story was then used as the basis for the Disney / Amblin Entertainment film Who Framed Roger Rabbit, leased in 1988. Shifting the core of the story from the 1980s to the 1940s and exchanging cartoon strip characters (complete with speech bubbles over their heads) for animated characters, the film was an instant success and remains a much-loved madcap adventure involving Eddie Valiant and the halpless Roger.

Who Framed Roger Rabbit: The Novelisation by Justine Korman Fontes takes the screenplay for the movie and presents it in a novel format for further enjoyment. And, to complete the circle, both it and the film prompted Wolf to write  Who P-P-P-Plugged Roger Rabbit? in 1991; an attempt to recon his original story into that of the film whilst also acting as a continuation of characters and stories found within the film.

With Shandon Loring.

Previewing One Billion Rising in Second Life 2022

Posted on by Inara Pey
One Billion Rising 2022

One Billion Rising in Second Life will once again be taking place in Second Life on Monday, February 14th, 2022. As with previous years, the event opens at midnight SLT of Sunday 13th / Monday 14th February, with entertainment and activities then running all the way through to midnight SLT on Monday 14th / Tuesday 15th.

When launched in the physical world on Valentine’s Day 2012, One Billion Rising (OBR) was the biggest mass action in human history; a call to action based on the staggering statistic that 1 in 3 women on the planet will be beaten or raped during her lifetime. With the world population at 7 billion, this adds up to more than one billion women and girls who are at risk. OBR aims to bring people together, raise greater awareness of the plight of those at risk the world over, and bring about a fundamental change in how vulnerable and defenceless women and girls are treated.

One Billion Rising 2022

This year, the global movement takes as its theme RISE for the Bodies of All Women, Girls & the Earth, which the organisers note is a move towards more direct political awareness / activism:

[T]o connect both in a deeper, more purposeful, political, transformative and yet also empowering, hopeful way. And to make this coming year a truly radical, bold, fearless escalation of artistic risings … This past year has seen global lockdowns, government neglect, health crises, proliferation of authoritarian regimes, endemic exploitation of labor, escalating corporate greed, worsening poverty, racism and exclusion, the grave ongoing destruction and pillaging of the environment for capital, as well as the deterioration of the climate. At the core of all of this is the injurious hold of patriarchy and misogyny ––on women’s rights and freedom.
We call on the world to hold Artistic Risings for the bodies of all women and for the ‘ultimate body’- our Earth. Using the body as your call. Using the body as your resistance. We call on the world to use ART. Dance. Visual art. Physical and immersive theatre. Film. Sculpture. Painting. Sports. Performances (Live and Recorded). Photography and digital art. 
One Billion Rising 2022

Within Second Life, the event presents four full regions as a square with the primary stage for music and dance straddling the adjoining corners, allowing up to 200 people at a time to share in activities and events.  Each region – Dance, Resist, Rise and Unite, has its own landing point – SLurls at the end of this piece (which will open to the public shortly before the event officially opening). These provide information on the event, links to discover more about the global One Billion Rising movement, freebies, and paths to both the main event stage and other event spaces within each of the regions.

The latter include the Poetry Corner (OBR Resist), where live readings will be taking place; the Resist garden with its water feature and sculptures; plus the dance theatre and performance spaces (OBR Dance) where some of SL’s top dance and performance groups – such as Misfit Dance and Performance, TerpsiCorps ARTWerks, Guerilla Burlesque, Elysuim Cabaret and the Changhigh Sisters (to name but a handful) will be performing through the 24 hours.

One Billion Rising 2022

Artists participating in this year’s event include: 2lei, Burners Without Borders, Instituto Español SL, Darkstone Aeon, Roxelo Babenco / Museo del Metaverse, Illyra Chardin, Fiona Fei, Daark Gothly, Johannes Huntsman, Kicca Igaly and Macel Mosswood, Rubin Mayo, Krystal Rabeni, Tempest Rosca, iSkye Silverweb, Jennifer Steele. BB Woodford, AngelaThespian and PrtrickofIreland, Jaz, Kalyca, and Tansee,

Their installations can be found around the outside edge of the four regions, with information available on each display available touching the sign board in front of each of them. In addition, One Billion Rising will once more feature the #MeTooForest, a place of retreat and meditation / contemplation (OBR Unite), together with the Heroes Pavilion, featuring inspirational stories about women from many different cultures and communities (OBR Rise). These can both be found along the outside of the region alongside the art display. In addition, the four corners of the OBR region offer park areas providing further places of retreat. quiet and meditation for those who may need them.

The full schedule of events is now available, covering all live performers, DJs, dance performances and poetry readings.

One Billion Rising 2022

Why Dance?

A critique sometimes levelled at OBR / OBR in SL is that the issues it raises cannot be solved by dance. Well, that’s absolutely true, just as marching through the streets carrying placards and banners is unlikely to have a lasting impact on whatever it is people might be marching about.

But – like marches and protests – dance and music does serve to draw attention to matters. It provides a means by which people are encouraged to stop and think, while also providing a focal point of attention that allows information and ideas to be disseminated. What’s also important is that it’s a lot harder to see dancing as a threat than might be the case with an organised march or protest – something to take into consideration given there are countries where the right to march or protest freely does not exist. Hence why, as well, OBR in Second Life is marked each year with a dance video to the OBR theme song.

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Spring at Aurora Falls in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Aurora Falls, February 2022 – click any image for full size

I was drawn to the setting of Aurora Falls after coming across it within the Destination Guide. The work of Suite Belle Stark (Suitelady DeCuir) and Zaccai J. Stark (Robesz), it utilises the western half of a Full region furnished with the private island LI bonus to present a mix of public and private spaces available for exploration and / or rent.

With a north-south orientation, the setting offers a rugged coastal setting, a place that would look perfectly at home along the northern coastlines of the United States or Canada, or perhaps along the Scandinavia or more rugged parts of the Baltic. To the south and north are upland regions, the former somewhat higher that the latter, the lowlands between largely given over to an inlet that cuts into the landscape to form a curling bay, a single channel, crossed by a bridge, facing the open sea to the east, and high peaks rising to the west that give the sense that this is a small island hugging the coast.

Aurora Falls, February 2022

The landing point sits on the southern highlands, where a broad road emerging from a tunnel; quite where the tunnel, topped by a crown of trees, might lead is left to the imagination. From it, the broad road rolls down from the uplands to double back on itself as it reaches the lowlands and what might have once been a little fishing hamlet. Here it eventually comes to an end facing the furthest reach of the inlet.

What appear to have been the original buildings around the bay have a distinctly working appearance: a warehouse here, a boathouse, shacks built out over the waters as if ready to receive fishing boats as they come alongside. However, if this had once been a little commercial fishing haven, those days are long gone. The buildings built out over the water and the old warehouse have all been repurposed; the former has been converted into an over-the-water restaurant, the piers close by now home to an old houseboat that has been converted into a little bar. The warehouse, meanwhile, as become a den for music and, shall we say, other recreational activities!

Aurora Falls, February 2022

In its current design, the island now appears to be given over to a vacation retreat. A little grocery has been built close to the local gas station, and a pair of small holiday cabins have been built along the curve of the bay cutting into the land. Part of the old fishing village even seems to have been knocked down and turned into a Zen garden; a place to release the mind and spirit (if the items available at the warehouse haven’t already done so!), in meditations and / or yoga. Only the old boathouse appears to have retained its original purpose – although perhaps this is just to support recreational fishing trips off the coast, rather than any commercial enterprise.

The vacation cabins form the core of the rental properties in the region. Two sit on the inner meanderings of the setting’s inlet, the third facing the open waters on the east side, where the land points towards the northern highlands across the single wooden bridge. Whilst within their own parcels, these cabins are located directly adjacent to public spaces such that it is possible to visit all of the latter, such as the local camp site, without passing them and possibly invading privacy. However, they offer comfortably furnished spaces for those looking for, say a short-term vacation home.

Aurora Falls, February 2022

Atop the northern uplands sits the largest of the rentals: a sprawling single-storey house. Reached via a single footpath, it sits behind high waterfalls that face the rest of the setting and is given additional privacy by a surrounding screen of trees.

Whilst this northern headland is largely presented as a private residence, the highlands here do hide a secret. Tucked into their eastern corner (and outside of the parcel given over to the large house above), a watery tunnel winds its way into the hill to where a large cavern sits. Lit by torches, it is the home of an over-the-water bar and little snuggle spaces extending from its circular wall.

Aurora Falls, February 2022

Throughout all of this is a wealth of detail awaiting discovery – including clues to the more North American setting for the island (just look for the racoons!). There are also numerous places to sit and appreciate the setting and – needless to say – many opportunities for photography. Those requiring props can join the local land group for rezzing rights.

Those on medium-to-low end systems may find they need to make adjustments to their viewer in order to enjoy a smooth experience in the region when moving / camming – but this should not deter people from visiting; Aurora Falls is an engaging visit to make.

Aurora Falls, February 2022

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Milena’s reflections on Light and Life in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Milena Carbone: Light and Life

Since entering Second Life in 2019, Milena Carbone (Mylena1992) has demonstrated her talent as both an artist and as an agent provocateur in the way she has utilised her art to encourage us to think about matters of import to us all: the environment, climate change, the preservation of wildlife, the nature of our relationship with God and the controversial role religion has played in both that relationship and on the course of our history as a growing civilisation, and the greed that has also played that central role in the unfolding of our history. At the same time, Milena’s work serves as all art should: as pieces that stand as images to be individually appreciated in their own right for the beauty and / or simplicity of appearance and statement.

With the recent overhaul of her gallery space to form The Carbone Studio – a reflection of Milena’s expressiveness in art and dance – Milena opened her latest exhibition Light and Life, a selection of portraits that follow the lines of her more recent works in that that are engagingly minimalist in form whilst offering a depth of meaning and story.

Milena Carbone: Light and Life

Life and light are – as the introductory notes for the exhibit state – deeply intertwined. Both are born out of darkness, both express all that we have and are – and from whence we came. Between them, they offer us a chance too be renewed each and every day as we awake from darkness as the light of day calls us, and the life of wakefulness returns.

Within the nine images Milena presents in this exhibition is a glorious minimalism that personifies a part of the relationship of light and life: images that express the richness of life as captured through the message of photons travelling through space to be captured by the eye and lens to capture a moment; a memory.  At the same time they also speak more broadly to the themes noted above the birth of life from darkness, its growth through the nurturing warmth of light from simple organisms lost in a drop of water through to the complex creatures we are today, able to take joy in each new day, to share, create, to give and receive -even if darkness still sits within some of the poorer more selfish decisions we make as individuals and as a civilisation.

Milena Carbone: Light and Life

Whether you wish to enjoy Milena’s images and portraits of her avatar and life as she expresses it through it or whether you which to ponder the deeper questions and ideas Milena postulates in her introduction to the exhibit, Light and Life is again, a rich collection of images with an engaging, provocative core theme. It is reached via the main landing point for the Carbone Studio; while there, and before jumping to the gallery space, I also urge you to read Milena’s statement about herself and her art.

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An immersive Wonderland 2.0 in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Wonderland 2.0, February 2022 – click any image for full size
Go down the rabbit hole and find yourself in Alice’s abandoned park.

– The invitation to visit Wonderland 2.0

A region design apparently focused on Lewis Carroll’s Alice stories is nothing new within Second Life; I’ve visited a number through my time in Second Life and written about several in this blog, and thoroughly enjoyed each of them. In addition, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass have both been the subject of art installation and special events within SL.

Wonderland 2.0, February 2022

However, Wonderland 2.0 is decidedly special. Designed and built by Lucifer (Samael Morningstar) and Violette (Violette Rembrandt), and occupying a Full private region, it has grown from a 1/3 region parcel through a half a region to this new iteration, which Lucifer and Violette are still nipping and tucking. It offers an immersive trip into not “the” Wonderland of the books, but “a” Wonderland – a marvellous place of imagination and adventure put together by Lucifer Violette in which the stories of Alice are the jumping-off point for a journey into the fantastical and the captivating within an incredibly eye-catching landscape; a unique adventure in which Alice’s experiences sit as touchstones throughout, and with a richness of interaction.

These touchstones commence at the skybox landing point, where jut outside of a small cabin, the Cheshire Cat grins through a giant keyhole at those stepping out of the cabin’s single room. A short walk past a not-too-friendly rabbit (Bryn Oh’s Mr Zippers) delivers arrivals to where light swirls within the open maw of a rabbit hole visitors are invited to jump down.

Wonderland 2.0, February 2022

Doing so delivers people to a further room where on a table sits a little bottle with the familiar invitation: Drink Me. Those who do so (by touching the bottle), will find themselves instantly reduced in size, the room grown large round them (through the neat use of a quick teleport), and the way forward marked by a previously tiny door of what might have once been a little moue hole but has now become a full-size door. Touching the RED arrow pointing at the door then delivers visitors to the region proper.

To describe this landscape would be to defat the purpose of a visit: that of taking a journey of discovery and adventure through a literal wonderland of colour, space, art and more. Throughout this landscape of paths and fields, flowers and hills, over which whales swim, boats float and island drift, lay rich vignettes, visible and hidden. Some embrace Alice’s adventures, other provide their own ride into immersive fantasy.

Wonderland 2.0, February 2022

Nor is what awaits restricted to the ground level; there is a lot more over it (and under it!) than the route down from the Landing Point. So much so, in fact, that I genuinely  doubt a single visit will suffice for someone to catch it all. These elements in the sky can be reached through one of the major means of exploring the region: the network of Anywhere teleports. Some of these take the form of the usual Door form, sitting on or floating serenely just above the ground. A click on them will open them, and a second will walk you through them – and on to another vignette, one generally – but not always on roughly the same level.

Some of these teleports, however take the form of rabbit holes, wells, and more (like a dip in the water of a stream, for example). These are indicated by 3D arrows which, when clicked, will carry you through them (again with animations) to another location, this time usually involving a vertical move to a location in the sky, or back to the ground. In places the two types of teleport combine to lead visitors from setting to setting – such as with the caves, pirate ship and winter vignettes that all await discovery. Thus, exploration is gently teased out of visitors, and given the manner in which these doors and jumps might be found, no single route through the region’s settings and vignettes might match another.

Wonderland 2.0, February 2022

Nor are these the only teleports: also to be found within the region are a number of Experience-based portals. If you accept the associated Experience, they will teleport you to other locations within Second Life. Meanwhile, for those who prefer to wander rather than just teleport around, there are paths to be found, undulating across the fields of flowers and also up some of the highlands of the regions – and I do urge visitors to follow them as well.

Wonderland 2.0 is a genuine treat for those who love exploring – and one of those places where, at the risk of repeating myself, I don’t want to delve into a huge amount of detail about for fear of spoiling the pleasure of direct exploration. It is a place that fully deserves special attention and time when exploring. In fact, such is the the design, it will take more than one visit in order to capture everything. In this, as well, I’d like to thank Lucifer for taking the time to show me elements within Wonderland 2.0, and I’d also like to pass my congrats to him and Violette on this latest, and largest iteration of their vision. I look forward to returning and seeing even more!

Wonderland 2.0, February 2022

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