Author: Inara Pey

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

Space Sunday: FRAM2, private missions, asteroids

Posted on by Inara Pey
Crew Dragon Resilience splashes down of the coast of California at the end of the 4-day FRAM2 mission. Credit: SpaceX

Previewed in my previous Space Sunday update, the FRAM2 mission lifted-off almost precisely on time from Kennedy Space Centre’s Launch Complex 39A at 01:46:50 UTC on April 1st, carrying the first humans to ever orbit the Earth in a low-Earth polar orbit.

The ascent to orbit, travelling south from the space centre, proceeded smoothly, the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule and service module (“Trunk” in SpaceX parlance) entering a low Earth orbit with an apogee of 413 km and a perigee of 202 km some eight minutes after launch. The orbit, referred to as a polar retrograde, due to the fact the vehicle travelled first over the South Pole then around and over the North Pole, lay at an inclination of 90.01°, breaking the previous high inclination orbit record for a crewed space vehicle set by Vostok 6 in 1963.

Aboard the vehicle were Chinese-born, but Maltese citizen and crypto currency entrepreneur Chung Wang, who will be the mission’s commander and is a co-bankroller of the flight; Jannicke Mikkelsen, a Scottish-born Norwegian cinematographer and a pioneer of VR cinematography, 3D animation and augmented reality, who is the other co-bankroller for the flight; Eric Philips, a 62-year-old noted Australian polar explorer, who will be the first “fully” Australian national to fly in space, and Rabea Rogge, a German electrical engineer and robotic expert.

The 4-day mission comprised an extensive science programme, focusing on human health in space, growing food supplements on-orbit (oyster mushrooms) and investigating the Phenomena known as STEVE (see my last Space Sunday update) from orbit. The mission also included educational broadcasts to schools and a lot of social media-posted videos.

A video of Antarctica recorded by the FRAM2 crew. Seen in the footage is videographer Jannicke Mikkelsen, and the voice-over is from Eric Philips

To assist in observations and measurements, Resilience was fitted with the transparent Copula to replace the outer  airlock hatch and docking mechanism within the forward end of the capsule, affording the crew near-360º views of Earth once the vehicle’s protective nose cone had been opened.

The launch itself required a complete update of the Crew Dragon navigation software, originally written for lower 51º inclination orbits. This included a complete overhaul of the launch abort software for both capsule and launch vehicle. The latter was made necessary by the fact the ascent to orbit carried the vehicle over parts of South America, so any abort situation had to ensure that both booster and capsule would not return to Earth over land, and the capsule would be able to splashdown safely with the crew.

What really marked this mission, however, was the sheer transparency of operations; nothing in the video logs was pre-scripted or rehearsed; camera were rolling with conversations going on in the background – including conversations between crew members and SpaceX mission control about “known issue” with the space vehicle (not sure how significant – but being told that there is a “known issue” with a vehicle when you’re sitting in it in space might not be the most comforting thing to hear!), informal chit-chat during observations and an introduction to the fifth “crew member”, Tyler.

A compilation video of the mission, including shot through the inner hatch of the airlock showing Earth beyond the Copula. Note the inner hatch could also be opened to allow crew to enter the forward are and look out of the Cupola

While the mission had a lot of science goals – including testing a portable MRI unit, carrying out x-rays of the human body, studies into blood and bone health and glucose regulation in the body in micro-gravity – it has not stopped criticism being levelled at it, with some scientists stating the period spent in space being too short to yield practical results in some areas, and other aspects of the mission being labelled “a notch above a gimmick”.

For Chung, Mikkelsen and Philips in particular, however, the mission was as much personal as scientific: they have spent fair portions of their adult lives exploring the Polar regions, carrying out studies and research (the four all actually met during an expedition to Svalbard (leading them to nickname the mission “Svalbard 1”).

The first ever x-ray of a human hand taken in space (right) during tests of a small x-ray unit aboard the FRAM2 mission. The hand (with ring) was used in homage to the first ever x-ray of a human, captured by Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen (of his wife’s hand) in 1895 (l). Credits: Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen; FRAM2 / SpaceX

FRAM2 came to an end on April 4th, 2025, when, following an extended de-orbit, the combined vehicle re-entered the atmosphere and headed for a splashdown off the California coast where the SpaceX recovery ship was waiting for the vehicle. This marked the first splashdown for Crew Dragon off the west coast of the USA – although more will be following.

SpaceX has been criticised for the fact that during several missions returning crews from the International Space Station, the “Trunk” service module has in part survived re-entry, with elements coming down very close to populated areas. To avoid this, the company is moving crewed splashdowns to the west coast of the USA in order to ensure that should any parts of the Trunk survive re-entry they will splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.

As a test of this, the module used by Resilience remained attached to the vehicle for longer during the initial re-entry operations, in order to ensure that if any part of it did survive the heat of re-entry, the debris would fall to Earth over Point Nemo – the remotest part of the Pacific Ocean relative to human habitation, and referred to as the “spacecraft graveyard”.

A re-entry seared Resilience is lifted aboard the SpaceX recovery vessel in preparation for crew egress. Credit: SpaceX

Splashdown occurred at 19:28 UTC on April 4th, with the capsule and crew safely recovered to the SpaceX recovery vehicle for transport to the port of Los Angeles.

NASA Opens-Out Requirements for Private Missions to the ISS

NASA has announced it is seeking proposal for two further private astronaut missions (PAMs) to be conducted to the ISS – and for the first time, the requirement that such missions must be commanded by former NASA astronaut has been removed.

The agency is planning to pivot away from the International Space Station (ISS) operations as it nears its end-of-life (some of the Russian elements of the station are already well outside their “warranty” – that is, their intended lifespan), with the hope that the private sector will take over low-Earth orbit research and station operations. Currently, there are a number of proposals for doing so – perhaps most notably Axiom Space and the orbital Reef consortium led by Blue Origin and Sierra Space.

Axiom Space already has a contract with NASA to add its own modules to the ISS, starting in 2027 with the launch of the PPTM – Power, Propulsion and Transfer Module. This will then be joined by at least a second module, Hab-1, prior to the decommissioning of the ISS. These modules will then be detached from the ISS to become a free-floating hub to which Axiom will add further modules.

An artist’s impression of the Axiom space station as it will look when completed and free-flying. Credit: Axiom Space

To prepare for this, Axiom signed an agreement with NASA to fly four missions to the ISS between 2022 and 2025, with the option on a fifth. Three of these form the only fully private missions yet flown to the ISS, and all have been commanded by former NASA astronauts – Michael López-Alegría (Axiom AX-1 and Ax-3) and Peggy Whitson (Ax-2), with Whitson also set to command AX-4, currently targeting a May 2025 launch.

Under the new NASA PAM requirements, private missions are now required to be commanded by any astronaut who has served as a long-duration ISS crewmember (defined as 30 days or more in the ISS) and who has been involved in ISS operations in the last five years or else shows evidence of “current, active participation in similar, relevant spaceflight operations”. This therefore opens the door for missions to be commanded by Canadian, French, German, English, Japanese, etc., astronauts meeting the requirements to command missions by commercial providers.

The move to relax the requirements is to help remove the reliance on purely NASA-based experience to lead private sector missions into orbit and allow companies like Axiom, Blue Origin and – most notably, perhaps – Vast Space, who have a MOU with SpaceX to fly two PAM missions to the ISS but have yet to meet NASA’s requirements to do so, to start formulating their own requirements, gain expertise and build partnership and processes to assist in their efforts to establish on-orbit facilities.

The Blue Origin / Sierra Space-led Orbital Reef space station design, which will utilise the Boeing CST-100 Starliner for crew transfers, and the Sierra Space Dreamer Chaser spaceplane for cargo transfers. Credit: Blue Origin / Sierra Space / Boeing

The announcement by NASA is of potential import to the UK: Axiom have an agreement in place with SpaceX to fly a total of five Ax missions to the ISS. However, the fifth – provisionally aiming for 2026 – has yet to be crewed, and there have been discussion between Axiom and UK officials about the mission being an “all British” crew, comprising Tim Peake as mission commander, who flew the Expedition 46/47 rotations on the ISS, together with fellow UK European Astronaut Corps members  Meganne Christian, Rosemary Coogan and Paralympic sprinter (and surgeon)  John McFall.

New Glenn Mishap Investigation Completed

The Federal Aviation Administration announced March 31st, 2025 that it has accepted the findings of an investigation led by Blue Origin following the loss of the first stage of the company’s New Glenn heavy lift launch vehicle during its maiden flight on January 16th, 2025 (see: Space Sunday: NG-1 and IFT-7).

While the overall goals of that mission were met, a secondary goal – recovering the rocket’s large first stage by landing it at sea board a landing vessel – failed, the booster stage falling back into the Atlantic Ocean. Whilst no debris was strewn across flight corridors or fell on populated areas (unlike recent SpaceX Starship launch attempts), the failure of the planned booster recovery, whilst always rated by Blue Origin as having a minimal chance of success on the very first flight of the rocket, meant the vehicle’s launch license was correctly suspended by the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA) until a full Mishap Investigation into the cause of the loss had been carried out by Blue Origin and the FAA had accepted the findings and remedial actions taken.

The investigation report was duly supplied in March 2025, and identified the booster’s inability to re-ignite its motors during descent as the cause of the loss. Whilst no precise cause(s) for this failure have been openly published, Blue Origin has indicated seven areas where remedial work has been undertaken on the vehicle’s flight systems, and the FAA now consider the investigation closed. As a result – subject to a final inspection of the changes made – the license suspension should be lifted before the end of April. In the meantime, Blue Origin has been given the all-clear to resume preparations for the next New Glenn launch.

The maiden flight of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket lifts-off from Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on January 16th, 2025. Credit: Blue Origin / USSF

All of this is in stark contrast to the handling of the last two SpaceX Starship launches (IFT-7 and IFT-8). Both resulted in the complete loss of the Starship upper stages well within Earth’s atmosphere, resulting in debris falling over the Greater Antilles (and some of it striking close to populated areas on the Turks and Caicos islands) together with a degree of disruption to commercial flights in the region. However, in the case of IFT-7, the FAA cleared the launch of IFT-8 before the Mishap Investigation was closed, and appears to be on course to do so in the case of IFT-8, with SpaceX already ramping-up for the next test article flight.

In the meantime, assuming the New Glenn license is renewed in April, the next launch for the vehicle could come as soon as “late spring 2025” (end of May). However, no payload for the flight has been specified, only that it will include a further attempt to return the first stage to an at-sea landing aboard Landing Platform Vessel 1 Jacklyn.

Some reports had suggested this next launch could comprise the Blue Moon Mark 1 lander – an automated vehicle capable of delivering up to 3 tonnes of payload to the surface of the Moon and intended to demonstrate / test technologies to be used in the company’s much larger Blue Moon Mark 2 lander, designed to deliver crews to the surface of the Moon. However, in discussing the launch path for New Glenn, Blue Origin CEO David Limp indicated that a launch of Blue Moon Mark 1 is unlikely to occur before late summer 2025 at the earliest.

2024 YR4 Seen At Last

As I noted in February 2025, 2024 YR4 is an Earth-crossing Apollo-type asteroid discovered on December 27th, 2024. It caused a bit of stir at the time, as there was a non-zero chance that as it pursued its own orbit around the Sun, in 2032 it could end up trying to occupy the space volume of space as taken-up by or own planet, with potentially disastrous and deadly results for anyone and anything caught directly under / within the air blast that would likely result from its destruction as it tore into our atmosphere.

Fortunately, continued observations of the asteroid – which passes across Earth’s orbit roughly once every 4 years – have shown the threat of any impact in 2032 are now very close to zero (although it does still exist on the tiniest of scales, together with a smaller chance of it hitting the Moon).

At the time of its discovery, 2024 YR4 was classified as a stony S-type or L-type asteroid, somewhere in the region of 50-60 metres across (roughly the same size as the fragment which caused the 1908 Tunguska event). That size estimate has now been confirmed, and what’s more, we now have our first (and admittedly fuzzy) images of the fragment, courtesy of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), and they reveal it to be a strange little bugger.

2024 YR4 imaged by JWST’s NIRCam on 8 March 2025. Credit: NASA/ESA

Imaged and scanned by the US Near-InfraRed Camera (NIRCam) and British-led European Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI), 2024 YR4 is indeed some 60 metres across at its widest. It is also somewhat unlike similar asteroids in its spectral type, in that it has a high spin rate as it tumbles around the Sun and appears to be more a conglomeration rocks banded together, rather than a single chunk of rock.

Observations are continuing to ensure the 2032 rick of impact is completely eliminated and also to provide data to calculate impact risks beyond 2032, whilst the data obtained by JWST – which mark 2024 YR4 as the smallest object the observatory has every imaged from its L2 HALO orbit – are being used to help scientists to better characterise NEOs of a similar size and spectral type and more fully understand how they might react were one to strike our atmosphere.

VWBPE 2024: Catching Up With the Lindens – a summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
Screen cap of Catching Up With the Lindens (l to r): Elli Pinion, Patch Linden, Grumpity Linden, Kali Linden and Kyle Linden
On Friday, April 4th, 2025 the Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education (VWBPE) conference held another of in their sessions featuring representatives from Linden Lab and various called over the years Above the Book, What’s Up at the Lab and now Catching Up With the Lindens.
Table of Contents

The following is a summary of the session covering the core topics raised. Notes are based on the official video of the session, which is embedded at the end of this article. Time stamps are also provided to the relevant points in the video for those who wish to listen to specific comments.

On hand for the session, hosted by Elli Pinion, were:

  • Grumpity Linden, Senior Vice President of Product and Engineering.
  • Patch Linden, Senior Vice President of Product Operations.
  • Kali Linden, Director of Engineering Web & Platform
  • Kyle Linden,  Product Manager (viewer).

Notes:

  • This is a summary, not a full transcript, and items have been grouped by topic, so may not be presented chronologically when compared to the video.
  • Timestamps are included to allow a direct jump to a subject.
  • Given these sessions are part of the VWBPE annual conference, there is obviously a lean towards matters of education and learning.

SL Mobile and Project Zero

SL Mobile

Resources:

[Video: 4:14-13:37]

  • A re-cap on work to date on SL Mobile, from the baseline starting point: could an app be built that could render avatars much as they appear within the viewer?
    • All the work tends to be iterative in nature – so, for example, avatar appearance and fixes form a tranche of on-going work as they are refined and improved.
    • Features are being added in terms of “journeys” – what would people like to do in SL when using a mobile app + what is practical to be able to to on a mobile device, and then building-out a specific “journey”.
    • The first such “journey” was called “going to a club” (although it can be applied to other in-world activities), and which incorporated capabilities  such as logging-in, seeing Friends on-line, finding an event / location, going to it, being able to chat / IM, listen to music, interact with objects, etc.
  • As the project has been opened out through the on-going Beta:
    • Development has been adjusted to try to take into account feedback and feature requests from users. developed and more and more feedback has been supplied by users (e.g. feature requests), and all of this is reviewed and considered in building-out the development roadmap.
    • One aspect of the Beta has been the need to better support incoming new users – hence the integration of the new user sign-up process with Mobile, the provision of an arrival / “welcome” area specifically for new users coming into SL via Mobile, etc.
One of the recent updates to SL Mobile was to integrate the new starter workflow – including avatar selection  – into it
  • The goal with the Mobile app is to have it as a companion means of accessing Second Life alongside of the desktop experience, with the eventual aim of having it stand on its own as a window into SL – but there is a lot of work / functionality to add before that point is reached.
  • However, some functionality will not be fully developed – such as the ability to build content from within  Mobile; screen size and other limitations do not allow for this, but users can expect the ability to interact / move content around on Mobile to customise spaces.

Project Zero

Resources:

[Video: 13:38-21:13]

  • Multi-faceted project:
    • Providing easier on-boarding for incoming / returning users by offering a direct path from sign-up to using the official viewer within a browser (Project Zero).
    • Providing a suitable new UI to with with the viewer when offered through a browser (React / HTML) (Project Zero).
    • Providing ability for existing users to access Second Life using a third-party viewer.
  • The payments aspect is in flux; streaming has costs associated with it, which LL need to cover (at the time of writing, around US $1.75 an hour per session – see: here and here for more), but at the same time those costs are gradually decreasing.
  • Firestorm Zero (see: Project Zero Update: Firestorm in your browser as well) has been a “first pass” at trying to offer access to a third-party viewer via a browser. This has been:
    • A limited-availability (in terms of available passes) offer.
    • A experiment in charging a nominal fee for access (L$250 for 5 hours) to see how that was received by existing users.
    • Testing the ability to have viewer settings persist across multiple log-ins using a browser-based version of the viewer.
  • LL are aware of the appetite among users to have browser-based access to SL, and more will be “coming, but not immediately coming.”
  • In terms of pay-to-use: LL are looking at various ways to reduce the cost to users (e.g. bundling so many hours of access per month to the SL subscription tiers before users on those tiers would have to start paying) – but this is all very much still in discussion.

WebRTC

[Video: 21:15-24:52-31:25]

  • Project recap: replacing Vivox Voice service and plug-in with the WebRTC communications protocol (RTC=”real-time communication”). Key benefits:
    • WebRTC supports a wide range of real-time communications tools in common use (e.g. Google Meet), supporting audio, video and data communications, and is thus something of a “standard” approach.
    • Offers a good range of features: automatic echo cancellation, better noise cancellation and automatic gain control, much improved audio sampling rates for improved audio quality.
    • Opens the door to features and capabilities to voice services which could not be implemented whilst using Vivox (e.g. text-to-speech / speech-to-text).
  • Currently, the majority of up-to-date viewer support both Vivox and WebRTC, and regions are running either WebRTC or Vivox on the back end.
    • The intention remains to turn off Vivox altogether on the back-end at some point, leaving only WebRTC.
    • This has been delayed due to the (now decreasing) number of users still using older versions of viewer which do not have the WebRTC updates, and so are reliant on Vivox.
    • It is hoped that, all things being equal, the switch-over can be made before the end of the second quarter of 2025 (e.g. by the end of June 2025).
  • In the meantime, region / estate holders wishing to try WebRTC on their regions can submit a support ticket to have their region moved from Vivox to WebRTC, with the understanding that (at the time of writing) WebRTC is still under development and might be a little unpredictable.

Combat 2.0

Resources:

[Video: 31:45-34:28]

  • Recap: a project (currently on hiatus) to overhaul the Second life Combat System (SLCS) and update it to support better combat capabilities and options, and make user engagement in combat simulations easier and more enjoyable.
  • Key additions to SLCS thus far include:
    • Damage Limit, Regeneration Speed, consequence of death (e.g. teleport victim home as per current SLCS or to a telehub  / landing point or take no action).
    • An on_damage event to account for intervening elements which may result in less severe damage being caused (e.g. when riding inside an armoured vehicle).
    • A new Region Combat Event Log (aka “Brigadier Linden”).
  • More work to come, with discussions often taking place during the weekly Simulator User Group meetings.

AI Integration

[Video: 35:51-40:45]

  • Recap:
    • LL originally launched the AI Character Generator utilising Convai, a platform for developers and creators proving an intuitive approach to designing AI characters, and with limited access in December 2024.
    • There was a lot of negative feedback, prompting the alpha test to be suspended, prior to re-opening in March 2025, with increased access, as a part of the March Membership Madness promotions.
  • LL is looking to work with various groups to make the capability more accessible / usable.
  • Due to the negativity from many towards AI (and some of the issues the wider use of generative AI has genuinely caused), the the Lab is looking to follow-up on Philip Rosedale’s promise to have a dedicated Town Hall / Community Round Table on the subject of AI, and get such a meeting scheduled.
  • There is acknowledgement that AI characters have a use within SL (e.g. the AI helper for new users that can answer questions, provide assistance, etc), and such use-cases could be widespread.
  • In developing AI capabilities for use with / in SL, LL is trying to be as thoughtful as possible, and respective of people’s views.
  • Concerns have been raised about people being able to know whether the character in front of them is an AI-driven agent rather than an avatar operated by a human.
    • Traditionally, the requirement has been for any scripted agent used in-world to be noted as so by the creator.
    • However, LL acknowledges that AI agents have a more nuanced capability over that of scripted agents (“bots”), and so a more granular distinction is likely required so that people do understand the nature of the avatar which whom they are interacting.

In Brief

From approx. 42 mins to end.

  • Mention of the SL server-side implementation of Luau scripting – referenced as “SLua”, currently in alpha testing on Aditi (the Beta grid).
  • SL22B: general notes that the birthday event will run from Friday, June 20th, 2025 through until Sunday, July 20th, and that (at the time of writing) performer and exhibitor applications are open.
  • Mention of the first cut of the glTF mesh model import to run alongside COLLADA – see my Content Creation User Group summaries for more.
  • Mention – without specifics – of two Linden Home releases that are on the horizon.
  • A reminder that SL users are welcome to attend all user group meetings.

2025 week #14: SL CCUG meeting summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
Hippotropolis Campsite: venue for CCUG meetings
The following notes were taken from my audio recording and chat log of the Content Creation User Group (CCUG) meeting of Thursday, April 3rd, 2025.

Please note that this is not a full transcript, but a summary of key topics .

 
Table of Contents

Meeting Purpose

  • The CCUG meeting is for discussion of work related to content creation in Second Life, including current and upcoming LL projects, and encompasses requests or comments from the community, together with related viewer development work.
  • This meeting is generally held on alternate Thursdays at Hippotropolis.
  • Dates and times of meetings are recorded in the SL Public Calendar, and they are conducted in a mix of Voice and text chat.

Official Viewer Status and Updates

Viewer Status

Upcoming Viewers

  • The current version of 2025.03 will remain in soak for the next few days in the hope that it will be ready for promotion to de facto release status “in the very near future”.
  • The April release – 2025.04 – is provisionally targeting:
    • The glTF mesh uploader (based on the current .DAE mesh uploader and doing pretty much the same). Again, please note that this is not the full glTF scene importer which has been discussed at previous CCUG meetings; that work is being broken down into smaller, more easily managed projects.
    • Possibly – and subject to confirmation – re-enabling subfolders within the My Outfits folder.
    • Hover height improvements.

glTF Mesh Upload / Importer

  • The outline of this work can be found in Add Simple (llmesh) GLTF Model Import.
  • In short: it should be taken that whatever can be done within the existing .DAE uploader will remain so for uploading glTF mesh models at the first pass, and enhancements will come later.
    • This means that anything that is compliant with COLLADA which can be currently imported to SL via the uploader will work under glTF.
    • Any “new” capabilities not available to the current uploader will then be duly considered an implemented over time.
    • This is not a replacement for COLLADA format uploads – it is an addition to; uploading of .DAE objects will remain possible unless support for COLLADA becomes untenable.
  • The reason for this approach is to avoid having a large-scale glTF import project (variously referred to has “scene import” or the “Post-Materials Features Project” or PMFP), which would take months / years to develop, enhance and ship, and instead be more spritely in development and improvements.
    • This does not mean that everything that had been targeting the scene import / PMFP work will be abandoned.
    • Rather, it means those aspects which could end-up delaying it due to the amount of research, development and testing required to support them (e.g. custom skeletons / rigged meshes) can be put to one side for future development, rather than preventing the foundations to enable them from being laid.
  • The back-end format for imported mesh objects (“SL mesh”) will not be changing at this time.  One of the reasons for this is the “SL mesh” format allows for easy upload of selected LODs.
    • However, this does not mean the format will not be improved upon in the future (and even a possible hybrid glTF / SL Mesh format implemented).
  • One aspect of the new mesh uploader will be the potential for adding materials-related glTF extensions to the current Khronos glTF specification.
    • These include (but are not limited to) the likes of the glTF specular extension, transmission, IOR, iridescence, emissive strength etc.
    • Geenz Linden is particularly interested in these, as the uploader allows them to be quickly added, and he would like to put together a package of extensions that a) creators can readily use; b) help move things towards being better placed to support other aspects of the PMFP work.
  • There was more discussion on support for uploading complete mesh region surrounds – this again was seen as something for consideration after the initial phases for implementing the glTF upload have been completed, and something possibly requiring the implementation of something like a node hierarchy.

Texture “Stutter” Issues

  • The recently introduced changes to texture use of VRAM have resulted in some users experiencing “viewer stutter” when the viewer is loading / uploading textures in a scene.
  • As a result, the options to define texture VRAM settings have been disabled in the 2025.03 RC.
  • Geenz Linden is anticipating being able to work on this issue later in April with a view to determine the cause and hopefully rectifying it.
    • This work will likely also look at texture streaming in general and make adjustments where textures tend to get loaded at resolutions that “don’t make sense” at the time of loading, and so improve that.
  • It is not anticipated that this work will start to surface much before the 2025.06 viewer development cycle.

Removing Scale From LI Calculations

  • Signal Linden highlighted a Feedback Ticket he has raised, proposing the removal of scale from Land Impact calculations, which has been touched upon at the last couple of SUG meetings.
  • However, there are now a few caveats starting to appear possibly impacting “everything from rendering to physics”, which require further internal discussion at LL.
  • One of these is the LI goes in both directions – so while removing scale from the calculation may be positive for a net reduction in the LI of objects that have been scaled up in size – it could have a net negative for objects scaled down (e.g. you have a group of objects each with 20 LI, and have scaled them down so each only has 10 LI, removing scale would reset them to 20 LI apiece).

In Brief

  • Allowing larger Linksets: raised at recent SUG meetings as well, this has not been ruled out for the future, but has some inherent issues, notably:
    • Limitations within the current physics engine, which would probably have to be updated.
    • Interest List issues – if a scene has a particularly massive linkset within it, it could simply fail to render in a viewer using a limited Draw Distance, simply because the root prim is outside of the viewer’s DD, even if child elements of the object are within range.
  • PBR Bakes on Mesh: this is seen as having a minimum of two requirements:
    • Providing PBR specular support.
    • Being able to set blend modes for different layers. This has some added complications in how blend modes should work for different types of maps, and this needs to be worked through in terms of implementation.
  • LSL Support for PBR:
  • The viewer / graphics roadmap is being reviewed, and it is hoped that and updates / decisions on direction will be available for discussion at the next CCUG meeting.
  • The is no time frame on the delivery of “water exclusion volumes” (i.e. the ability to hide Linden Water entirely from the inside volume of an underwater room). Again, it is not because this cannot be done, but rather there is other work deemed as having a higher priority LL wish to address.
  • It was found that the water shoreline fade was causing issues with shoreline water effects (e.g. things like mesh shoreline elements using alphas to simulate the ebb and flow of shoreline tide looking broken / patchy / flickering), and so the fading has been disabled until the issue can be corrected.
    • It is possible this might for a wider piece of work to improve water / sky environment assets in general to make the ambient environment rendering less likely to break content.
  • Improving light sources (e.g. punctual lights, better point lighting, etc.) is seen as a future issue to be addressed before of current limitations within the current forward rending. Forward+ is one potential way forward, but this would require proper scoping ahead of any attempt to change the current rendering system.

Next Meeting

Second Life Mobile “Dash for Cash”

Posted on by Inara Pey
Enabling push notifications on the SL Mobile App

On Thursday, April 3rd, 2025, Linden Lab announced a further promotion to encourage the use of the SL Mobile app through a giveaway of Linden Dollars. The promotion – called Dash for Cash – is available to all Second Life users – Basic and any subscription tier.

How It Works

  • Throughout April, the Lab will send out a notification to Mobile users.
  • Users then have a limited time period to log-in to Second Life via the Mobile app and claim a L$ prize.
  • To ensure a chance to claim:
    • Make sure you are using the latest release of the Mobile app (at the time of writing, 2025.3.548 (Android) / 0.5.537 (iOS)).
    • Enable push notifications on the app to receive the Dash notifications via Menu → Settings → Notifications → enable App Communications, per the images at the top of this article.
      • Note you may have to click on a blue button at the bottom of the Notifications screen and confirm you wish to allow the app to send notifications, if you are doing this for the first time.
    • You’ll also see a Dash for Cash announcement in the mobile app’s Lobby, reminding you to check in daily.
You can view the official Dash for Cash blog post in your device’s browser directly from the SL Mobile Lobby, if required.
  • Wait for the Dash for Cash notification & on receipt, log-into SL via the Mobile app.
  • Those doing so within the specified time will have the amount specified in the notification credited to their SL account.

Notes

  • Linden Dollar amounts may change.
  • Everyone can win, but Premium Plus, Premium and Plus members are eligible to receive higher L$ rewards than Basic users.
  • Note that Dash for Cash is in addition to the Streaks Rewards, which currently remain unchanged in format and availability.

Again, please refer to the official blog post for full details.

April 2025 SL Web User Group: Project Zero and AI on the MP

Posted on by Inara Pey
The Web User Group meeting venue, Denby
The following notes cover the key points from the Web User Group (WUG) meeting, held on Wednesday April 2nd, 2025. These notes form a summary of the items discussed and is not intended to be a full transcript.

A video of the meeting, recorded by Pantera Północy, is embedded at the end of this summary, with sections of this summary times stamped to the relevant points in the video for those wishing to refer to the audio. My thanks as always to Pantera for recording it and making it available.

 Table of Contents

Meeting Overview

  • The Web User Group exists to provide an opportunity for discussion on Second Life web properties and their related functionalities / features. This includes, but is not limited to: the Marketplace, pages surfaced through the secondlife.com dashboard; the available portals (land, support, etc), and the forums.
  • As a rule, these meetings are conducted:
    • On the first Wednesday of the month and 14:00 SLT.
    • In both Voice and text.
    • At this location.
  • Meetings are open to anyone with a concern / interest in the above topics, and form one of a series of regular / semi-regular User Group meetings conducted by Linden Lab.
  • Dates and times of all current meetings can be found on the Second Life Public Calendar, and descriptions of meetings are defined on the SL wiki.

General Updates Since last Meeting

[Video: 0:00-0:50]

  • Some clean-up of the What’s Next page – but no re-integration of the Destination Guide as yet (The DG situation is further discussed between 17:32-21:33].
  • Fixes for spaces within Map links, with more fixes for incorrect spaces in links still to come.
    • Requests were again made to be able to search maps.secondlife.com by region name, which is apparently a little harder to implement than had been thought.
  • Minor fixes to the Marketplace:
    • See Mature Content link was not working as expected.
    • Translations updates and added.

Project Zero / Firestorm Zero (SL  in a Browser) Update

[Video: 4:59-17:00]

SL Viewer Work

  • Recent work has been focused on stability and performance.
  • Work has resumed on the new viewer UI for the Project Zero SL Viewer, and the first iteration, featuring very small changes should be released “pretty soon”.

Firestorm Zero

  • A core focus has been on the Firestorm version of Zero (Firestorm Zero, launched in March), running through bugs and issues reported with that. Some issues include:
    • People purchasing time and having issues launching a session.
    • People being locked-out of Firestorm Zero after a session (or even during) – most likely as a result of Cookies being corrupted, thus requiring Cookies to be cleared from the browser & the browser restarted.
    • It’s also been suggested that using a private / incognito version of a browser works better, as this should clear all Cookies on exiting.
    • Note: I have experienced multiple “locks-outs” (one both “public” and “private” browsers – Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Brave) and have found that clearing / resetting Cookies within the browser does not work, and it requires LL to bang on things (indeed, as of this moment, I cannot access Firestorm Zero!). If you encounter the same, please file a report.

General to Both

  •  It was acknowledged there there is a degree of confusion around Project Zero and Firestorm Zero, and the fact there are differences between them:
    • Project Zero is effectively the official viewer, offered on a limited capacity basis, with the focus more towards incoming new users / returning users.
    • Firestorm Zero is the “paid” service utilising the Firestorm viewer and focused more towards current users.
  • Some aspects of this confusion might be seen in:
    • The link found at the top of the Second Life Dashboard (Launch Second Life in a Browser) will launch Firestorm Zero.
    • The fact that at the WUG meeting, people conflated issues of logging in to Project Zero which were likely due to the limited capacity / new user focus more than anything else, with a discussion on specific issues those attempting to use Firestorm Zero were experiencing.
  • As a result, Sntax Linden noted that there should be more / better differentiation between the two.
  • Shortfalls with both Zero and Firestorm Zero were (again) noted as:
    • Lack of ability to directly upload (mesh, textures, etc.) to your account.
    • Lack of ability to save snapshots, etc., to a local disk.
    • The noticeable latency in camera movement (and similar) for those more distant to the host computer running the viewer. [It has been hinted that this could be address by relocating host computers for Project Zero / Firestorm Zero in additional Amazon GameLift end-points such as Éire.]

AI Content on the Marketplace

[Video: 36:20-End]

A feedback request to Add marketplace policy regarding AI generated content sparked a request for clarification on what people would like (e.g. disclosure of the use of AI generated content / listing images; outright banning of anything related to the use of AI tools; filtering out content made purely with generative AI (as opposed to content which has been created by someone and which happens to use some AI elements), something in-between; limiting some forms of AI content, etc.).

  • Within the meeting, disclosure (e.g. clearly indicating a item uses AI generated content / the listing images are AI generated, etc.), was preferred by most.
    • It was noted that using purely AI-generated images (e.g. created using Midjourney) as a non-representative means to promote / sell content on the MP is already against policy (misleading advertising) and so can currently be reported.
    • Kali Linden indicated LL are looking to add reasons for flagging content, and something along the lines of “violates LL policy” might be considered, to make such reporting easier.
  • It was acknowledged that those using generative AI tools (e.g. Meshy) for content on the MP probably are not going to self-identify through marking check-boxes etc.
  • It was also noted that some people using generative AI images for advertising on the MP are not doing so with intent – but rather because it is the New Shiny for them to play with, and so some allowance should be made for this.
  • There’s also the issue with people who may take images of their creations and then heavily post-process them to the point where they are no longer fully representative of the item it promotes – so what should be done in these cases? Or with those using art pulled from the physical world?
  • Part of this conversation inevitably rolled over the idea of AI “companions” / bots and an expressed desire to “ban everything” about AI – including bots, despite there being nuances – such as with the latter (e.g. in-store CSRs, more dynamic role-play NPCs, etc.).

In Brief

Please refer to the video for details on the following.

  • [Video: 1:32-4:44] General discussion on the Second Life booth at the 2025 Games Developer Conference, which some at the meeting felt to be underwhelming based on the photographs posted to social media, etc.
    • LL also appear to have received feedback from the SL creators who attended the event, and it appears lessons are being learnt for future possible events / appearances.
  • [Video 17:32-18:50] Further  discussion over the lack of a visible-by-default chat bar in the official viewer.
  • [Video: 22:03-35:15] Discussion on use of the in-viewer browser vs. using an external browser – most preferred the external browser option.
    • However, most browser-based shopping stats the Lab has for the Marketplace point to the viewer’s internal browser being primarily used for purchases.
    • Sntax Linden noted that as the internal browser is the only option for accessing the web from within Project Zero / Firestorm Zero, LL do want to improve on it – such as making the responsive MP not only work on small device screens, but also work better within the in-viewer browser.
    • Traditionally, the in-viewer browser has been avoided due to concerns of general security (e.g. clicking on phishing links and opening them within the in-viewer browser). This led to a discussion on ways to block “bad links”.

Next Meeting

  • Wednesday, June 4th, 2025.

Previewing the VWBPE 2025 conference in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
via VWBPE.org

The 18th Virtual Worlds Best Practice in Education (VWBPE) conference takes place between Thursday, April 3rd and Saturday April 5th, 2025 inclusive.

A grass-roots community event focusing on education in immersive virtual environments, VWBPE attracts 2200-3500 educational professionals from around the world each year. Its primary goals are to foster discussion on, and learning about educational opportunities presented through the use of such virtual spaces, a defining core values and best practices in doing so, including:

  • Helping to build community through extension of learning best practices to practical application of those ideas and techniques;
  • Providing networking opportunities for educators and the communities that help support education; and
  • Offering access to current innovations, trends, ideas, case studies, and other best practices for educators and the communities that help support education.

In the context of the conference, a “virtual environment” is an on-line community through which users can interact with one another and use and create ideas irrespective of time and space. As such, typical examples include Second Life, OpenSimulator, Unity, World of Warcraft, Eve Online, and so on, as well as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest or any virtual environments characterised by an open social presence and in which the direction of the platform’s evolution is manifest in the community.

Every year, the event has an over-arching theme. For 2025 this is Transitions, which the organisers describe thus:

Transitions, like pivotal shifts in a story, capture the profound changes educators and students have faced in recent years. These shifts highlight the need to adapt and redefine social dynamics within virtual environments as education evolves to meet new challenges.
Join us as we all share experiences and successes in how virtual technologies used in the classroom have helped shape education for the better.
VWBPE 2025 Gateway

Programme

As with previous VWBPE conferences, this year’s event includes speakers, workshops, presentations, social activities and more.

The best way to find out what is going on over the three days of the conference is through the VWBPE programme page,  However, here are some of the highlights of major events (note: all times SLT and held at the main auditorium unless otherwise stated):

  • Thursday April 3rd:
  • Friday April 4th:
  • Saturday April 5th:
    • 07:00-08:00: Workshop Area B – Immersive AI Companion Design, presenter: ErlinaAzure (Helena Galani, TESOL International).
    • 08:00-09:00 Lecture Area B – Navigating Transitions Through Community Learning, a roundtable discussion with host: Rhiannon Chatnoir (RL: Joyce Bettencourt, Avacon, Inc.).
    • 09:00-10:00 – Auditorium Keynote – Rabindra Ratan (SL: Rabidth Rote) – Auditorium Floating Meadows entrance; Auditorium Rainbow Basin entrance.
    • 10:00-11:00: Workshop Area A –  Round the Campfire on Student Agency, presenter: Bluebarker Lowtide (Vasili A. Giannoutsos, VBCPS).
    • 12:00 noon-13:00: Lecture Area B – Go Ahead, Accept Failure, Fall Forward, and Fly, presenter: Zinnia Zauber (Renne Emiko Brock, Peninsula College).
    • 14:00-15:00: Lecture Area A – Transitioning from Virtual World Student to Pro, presenter: Kreatya Shannon (Shannon Broden, Graduate, San Jose State University).

If you cannot get in-world to attend any of these or the other major talks and presentations at the conference, note that you can watch them via You Tube – check the VWBPE Livestream Guide for the full schedule of events streamed to the VWBPE You Tube channel.

WWBPE Wetlands Visitor Centre

Region Themes and Facilities

For 2025, the conference continues with its Earth build, with each region representing a different terrestrial biome, including wetlands, desert, badlands, grasslands, and forests. Conference attendees will be able to explore 3D immersive virtual representations of these biomes.

The VWBPE Gateway

At the VWBPE Gateway you can find information on the conference – including the schedule for the day, a Swag Bag which includes the conference teleport HUD for easy access to all locations and venues, information on the biomes comprising the conference regions, and more. And, of course, VWBPE volunteers are on hand to answer your questions!

The VWBPE 2025 Swag Bag (from the conference gateway) includes a Teleport HUD for hopping around the conference more easily

Core Facilities and SLurls

Within these regions the following core facilities for the conference can be found – but please refer to your conference Swag Bag (and teleport HUD!) for full  information on all locations and facilities at this year’s conference.

VWBPE 2023: The Hearth

To keep up-to-date with the conference, be sure to check the VWBPE website daily.

Additional Links