High Fidelity changes direction (3): layoffs & shuttering apps and access

Posted on by Inara Pey
via High Fidelity

In April 2019 during a High Fidelity General Assembly meeting, Philip Rosedale announced the company would no longer be sitting within the content creation / public space provisioning area, and would instead switch to focus on software / platform development. He followed-up on that announcement a few days later with a blog post outlining the company’s move to try to develop a virtual workstation / environment that would allow people to work collaboratively whilst geographically separate.

Since that time, the company has been working on the virtual workspace idea, apparently developing it to a point where a desktop versions has been undergoing widespread testing involving teams from some 75 organisations.

However, in a December 11th blog post, Updates and a New Beginning, Rosedale announced that while the company plans to continue use the technology they’ve developed, and hopefully carry it forward into the future, they  do not plan to commercialise it at present, and are again pivoting to a new project.

Simply put, having taken a close look, while we can see that remote work is going to continue on its growth trajectory and we do have customers using it—the opportunity is not big enough today to warrant additional development. 

The work we’ve done over the past six months has been valuable in helping us understand how to make a 3D VR environment usable, stable, and accessible to first-time, non-gaming audiences, and that is intellectual property we will take forward into future work.  

– Philip Rosedale, December 11th, 2019

The pivot means that the company is shedding a further 50% of its staff (approx 40 people, given 20 people, or 25% of staff were let go in May 2019). Further, and as from January 15th, 2020, High Fidelity will be shuttering public access to its code repositories on Github (although users are welcome to fork them, if they wish), and will also be withdrawing all their apps from the Steam and Oculus stores and from the Apple App Store and Google Play.

For now, Rosedale is not revealing what the new project is, but given the shuttering of the current platform code repositories and a comment in the December 11th blog post, it might be related to a more virtual world style of platform / application.

Giving up on the current generation of HMDs doesn’t mean we’re giving up on Virtual Worlds. A team is already working on a new internal project, and although we aren’t going to talk about it now, we will have more to share about what we are doing when we are ready.

– Philip Rosedale, December 11th, 2019

A FAQ has been produced to accompany the blog post, answering core questions existing user might have about platform accessibility, account registrations, blockchain use, buying / selling HFCs, etc. And those who have a High Fidelity account should refer to that document. 

The announcement comes on the heels of a blog post from Rosedale published on December 9th, 2019, in which he continues to ruminate on the hard realities surrounding the state of VR at this point in time.

In Requiem for the HMD, he admits something that many of us have always felt: the the current generation of HMDs can at best only enjoy a modest success, and the technology as a whole still has a long way to go before it is liable to reach a “mainstream” place in the consumer market. In particular, he notes four things he believes the technology requires in order to reach this point: comfort of wearing, the inclusion of see-through displays and at desktop screen resolutions, and the ability of people to be able to type tat normal speeds in VR. To these I’d actually add more fundamental requirements such as cost per unit, overall ergonomics and compelling use cases – but these are topics for another blog post.

In the meantime, Updates and a New Beginning makes for interesting reading, as it offers a further honest evaluation of VR as it is today from someone who has been one of its strongest evangelists. For those who are having to depart High Fidelity as a result of the company’s further shift in direction, the hope is that they are able to transition smoothly into other work opportunities.

For those users who would like to keep the spirit of High Fidelity’s VR platform alive, as noted, they have until January 15th, 2020 to fork the code into their own repositories. There also the likes of Tivoli Cloud in development by former High Fidelity alumni Caitlyn Meeks and Maki Deprez that may blossom into new homes for HiFi users.

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Sansar R38 release overview

Posted on by Inara Pey
A Victorian Christmas

On Tuesday, December 10th, Linden Lab deployed the Sansar R38 release, entitled “Rediscover the Party” release. It’s again something of a comparatively small update, but brings with it changes that have been requested by users and creators.

Key updates with this release that are covered in this article comprise:

  • Changes on logging-in.
  • Codex improvements to help world discovery.
  • Events changes.

As always, please refer to the formal release notes for full details of all the updates in R38.

Changes on Logging-In

With this update, existing users are no longer channelled to the Nexus by default (forcing them to cancel the world launch in order to reach their Home Space or Go Home from the Nexus). Instead, existing users are delivered to their Home Space directly on logging-in.

Also, with this release, the Quest Log is closed by default when logging in (as per multiple user requests). It will open automatically on accepting a new quest or can be re-opened manually via Go → Quests.

The Codex and Discovering Worlds

Since the introduction of the Nexus and Prime Portal with the R36 release (see: Sansar: R36 – Avatar 2.0 the Nexus, the Codex and more) there has been concern that forcing users to go to the Nexus and visit the Prime Portal in order to discover new worlds was causing a bottleneck on users willingness to discover new worlds and explore, and simply stick to those within their Codex.

At the time of the R36 release, Linden Lab stated they would monitor the situation and make changes as and when they felt it necessary. With this release, and following the voiced concern and their own tracking of user behaviour, the functionality found in the client version of the Codex has been updated to shift the Prime Portal functionality to the Codex with the Lab noting:

We (and you) found that after the change to make the Prime Portal in the Nexus the hub of all travel we noticed that it was actually much more difficult and confusing, especially for newer players, to find new interesting and populated Worlds to explore.

We’re bringing back the old view which we used to call the Atlas; where all published Worlds were always available from the Explore menu. There’s no longer a requirement to travel to the Nexus and interact with the Prime Portal in order to find new Worlds to explore and people to meet.

The new-look Codex – avoids the need for users to go to the Nexus and the Prime Portal to discover new worlds

As such, the updated Codex now resembles the Prime Portal panel. By default, it will open on the Explore tabs that offers:

  • A list of events ordered by time and date, with the most recent first.
    • Hovering the mouse over a thumbnail will bring up the Interested button (adds the event to your calendar) or transfer you to the event if it is about to start.
    • Alternatively, clicking on an event thumbnail will display more information about it.
  • Worlds ordered in terms of Popular (visitors at the time the Codex was opened); Featured (those selected by the Sansar team for special highlighting); Community Favourites (worlds that have previously enjoyed a high level of activity by users); New (worlds recently published) Recently Updated (self-explanatory).

Further:

  • In all cases of the above, a full list of events or worlds in each category can be accessed by clicking the See All buttons associated with each category.
    • Note that clicking See All from the Popular list will open a page of ALL published worlds.
  • Tabs at the top of the Codex allow for easy movement between the Explore page and those for Events, and worlds the users has: marked as a favourite; visited; or created.
  • The search and sort options from the Codex remain as per R36.

These changes have been welcomed by users and creators on Sansar Discord.

Events Update

Users can now see the level of interest in an event (web Atlas event page shown)

One of the problem with events – in terms of getting together with other users – is actually seeing how popular an event might be with others ahead of time, rather than on arrival.

To help with this, Sansar R38 introduces a count of those who have registered an interest in an event. This is displayed on the event detail page on the web Atlas or within the Codex / Prime Portal.

However, there is a slight issue with this in the initial release: the number of those interested in attending an event is not registering / updating in the Codex or Prime Portal event details pages.

Feedback

Another small updated compared to R36, but one that responds to multiple requests from users and creators, and which hopefully encourage exploration of worlds by users. I admit that since the introduction of the Prime Portal as the means for discovering worlds, I’ve actually been using the web version of the Atlas in preference to going to the Nexus / Prime Portal, so I’ll be interested to see how the new Codex changes my behaviour in future.  Hopefully the events interest indicator on the Codex  / Prime Portal will be fixed in an upcoming point release.

2019 Simulator User Group week #50 summary

Posted on by Inara Pey
The Boho Refuge, October 2019 – blog post

No major news again this week.

Simulator Deployments

Please refer to the server deployment thread for news and updates:

  • On Tuesday, December 10th, the SLS Main channel was updated to simulator version 2019-12-04T20:29:26.533447, originally deployed on Thursday, December 5th, and comprising:
    • A build of release 2019-11-15T21:13:13.532828 using new build technology.
    • Addresses some cases of scripts erroneously stopping.
    • Fixes a crash.
  • On Wednesday, December 11th, there should be an RC deployment to the BlueSteel RC. Simulator version 2019-12-06T21:03:45.533558 comprises internal fixes.

Deployment Notes

  • The Tuesday deployment started a little later than usual.
  • Further, as some of the processes managing deployments are being modified to increase stability, some deployments may run longer than usual. Once this work has finished, it is hoped deployments will be faster and more stable.

SL Viewer

At the end of week #49, the following viewers were updated:

  • On December 4th, the Maintenance RC viewer updated to version 6.3.5.533275.
  • On December 5th, the Love Me Render RC viewer updated to version 6.3.5.533347.

On Monday, December 9th the Copy / Paste project viewer updated to version 6.3.5.533365. The rest of the official viewer pipelines are as follows:

  • Current Release version 6.3.4.532299, formerly the Ordered Shutdown RC viewer, dated November 4th, – No change.
  • Release channel cohorts:
  • Project viewers:
    • Project Muscadine (Animesh follow-on) project viewer, version 6.4.0.532999, November 22nd.
    • Legacy Profiles viewer, version 6.3.2.530836, September 17th. Covers the re-integration of Viewer Profiles.
    • 360 Snapshot project viewer, version 6.2.4.529111, July 16th.

 

A B&B winter in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
B&B ‘Let it Snow’, December 2019 – click any image for full size

Occupying a quarter full region held by Belle Onedin and Blue Blauvelt that they’ve opened to the public as a winter setting for photography and appreciation. Using the title Let it Snow. It’s a charming, highly photogenic setting suggestive of a coastal village with a slight fairytale look to it.

B&B ‘Let it Snow’, December 2019

It’s a setting that doesn’t need an extensive amount of description. centred on a small square of over-sized cobbles, it features two snow-bound cottages and a towered house, all of which are in various states of readiness for the holiday season. Trees are decorated, presents are wrapped and snowmen are waiting to greet visitors in gardens surrounded by dry stone walls while paths wind their way between and around the homes.

B&B ‘Let it Snow’, December 2019

Around them, the snow falls steadily (which can impact viewer performance, but adds depth to the setting), encouraging visitors to wrap up and look the part – and the sense of frigid air is increased by the the off-sim snowy islands that have been placed off-shore.

B&B ‘Let it Snow’, December 2019

Opportunities for photography in this setting are manifold, indoors and out – and even on the icy water on a rowing boat (although the snow can make touching it to sit on it a little difficult).

There are also charming little touches to be found that help give life to the setting without making it appear twee. These include an Saint Bernard and her pups making the most of a igloo kennel, the shell of an old greenhouse turned into a cosy snug tucked away in the lee of an old wall and under the shelter of snow-laden trees and a wolf howls from a snow-covered hill, while pheasants fuss around a truck that seems to be filling-in for Santa, given the sack and gifts that has fallen from its flatbed.

B&B ‘Let it Snow’, December 2019

I could wax lyrical over this setting – but really, it is a place that that deserves to be seen (just do give things an opportunity and load and render). There is something decidedly delightful about the location, which also avoids a fair few of the props and items that tend to appear in multiple winter regions, and so offers a visit  that is very worthwhile. Those taking photos are also invited to submit them to the parcel’s Flickr group.

Do be sure to drop in and see for yourself.

B&B ‘Let it Snow’, December 2019

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FionaFei’s shuǐmò Reflection in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Shui Mo Gallery: Reflection

Shuǐmò, or shuǐmòhuà (suiboku-ga in Japanese or “ink wash”), is a type of East Asian ink wash painting that uses different concentrations of black ink to create an image. It first emerged in Tang dynasty China (618–907), and is marked by the emphasis of the brushwork being on the perceived spirit or essence of the subject, rather than directly imitating its appearance.

Within Second Life, it has become a form of art exquisitely brought to life by FionaFei, who uses it to produce the most extraordinary 3D art installations. I was first introduced to her work  at One Billion Rising in 2019 prior to visitingd her Shui Mo Gallery to see Wo Men Dakai, an art-as role-play environment she created using shuǐmò that had its inspiration on Joss Whedon’s Firefly series (see: Captivated by FionaFei’s art in Second Life).

I made a return to the gallery on December 10th, after Miro Collas pointed me to an announcement Fiona made via Flickr concerning her latest shuǐmò piece. Entitled Reflection, it presents a to-scale painting as a marvellous 3D environment, about which Fiona notes.

In this exhibit, I am utilising Second Life’s virtual platform to provide a new perspective on this traditional art style by adding depth, making what has traditionally always been portrayed as 2D paintings into 3D sculptures. When the viewer looks into the art, they are looking into a 3D space, and depending on the angle they are viewing it from, the art changes.

– FionaFei, describing her shuǐmò art

Shui Mo Gallery: Reflection

In this respect, Fiona is very much what Bryn Oh refers to as an Immersivist: an artist who makes use of virtual 3D environments such that the sense of immersion felt by an observer is more intense because as well as viewing the art as a static piece, they can become an active participant in it simply by moving through the piece and witnessing it from different angles.

In this respect, I do recommend stopping at the entrance to observe Reflection as a static observer first (perhaps in Mouselook). This reveals its richness as a painting. Then, after you’ve done this, either move or flycam around it to reveal the additional depth it presents as it beautifully transitions from traditional Chinese ink painting into a 3D sculpture that reveals many facets, each a painting in its own right.

Reflection is actually one of two shuǐmò installations on offer. The other might be described as a foyer / events area, sitting immediately beyond the huge red doors of the landing point. This includes elements from Fiona’s SL16B installation Umbrella Landscape. Interactive, these sit as part of a landscape where water falls to a pond of Koi and on which interactive umbrellas float. Painted board walks running from the red doors provide access to Reflections (to the left as you face the exhibition space) and a second gallery area to the right.

This second space contains Rising, an installation Fiona created for the One Billion Rising in Second Life 2019, part of the annual global event to raise awareness of the plight of women and girls who face violence and abuse in their daily lives, and the staggering fact 1 in 3 women on the planet is beaten or raped during her lifetime.

Shui Mo Gallery: Rising

Rising represents those women who have experienced abuse who have finally been able to break free of the pain that they’ve experienced, literally rising from the darkness they have experienced. The particle figures are all hand-drawn, while the abuse they have suffered is additionally indicated by the bruised hands also being lifted up out of the darkness.

Nor is this all. The entrance hall containing the landing point includes a collection of 6 more pieces of art by Fiona. These are 3D pieces that represent scroll paintings combining both shuǐmò and guóhuà (“natural”) styles of Chinese. These are exquisite pieces, some of which are animated, and all of which are available for sale.

Shui Mo Gallery: paintings

Fiona’s art is captivating in both form and style, marvellously capturing a traditional form of Chinese art and bringing new life to it.

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Team Diabetes 2019 Winter Showcase in Second Life

Posted on by Inara Pey
Team Diabetes 2019 Winter Showcase

The 2019 Team Diabetes of Second Life Winter Showcase event is currently open through until  Saturday, December 14th. As with previous years, the event includes live performers, DJs, concerts, tribute acts, hunts, ice skating, and, of course the Winter Showcase and the Kultivate Winter Art show. All of which is to raise money for the American Diabetes Association (ADA), through Team Diabetes of Second Life, ADA’s official and authorised in-world fund-raising team.

As is traditional for the event, it occupies one half of the Kultivate Magazine home region, with the Showcase shops for merchants and artists boutique style galleries built around the  central events and activities area.

The merchants participating in the event comprise: Kiliki Bikini, !!Firelight!!, chiffon,Christmas Delights, Couture Chapeau, Epicine, GalleryOne, HJM Designs, ikr, Jyst imagine by Vita Theas, Kalani’s Designs, Kitty Creations, Kittycat’s Creations, LC Fashion, Lissa’s Licks, Lunar Seasonal Designs, Mahlberg Tailors, Mara’s Mysteries,MMP – Muircastle Motors & Parts, Park Place Home, Potomac Signature Homes, Sassy Brats, Shylas Creation, Simply Shelby, trawberry Gashes, SynCo, Team Diabetes Shop, TORN, TYLAR’S TREASURES, and Xplicit Designs.

Merchants are each offering at least one item among their displays with 100% of proceeds from sales going directly to Team Diabetes of Second Life.

Team Diabetes 2019 Winter Showcase

The full shopping guide can be found on the Team Diabetes of Second Life website.

The artists participating in the art show are: Anders Franizzi, DreamMakerXDreamBreaker Resident, ettalaineteichmano Resident, Eucalyptus Carroll, Hadiya Draper, ilyra chardin, IsarValdetaro Resident, Isis Desmoulins, Jamee Sandalwood, johannes1977 Resident, Judilynn India, lena kopiak, Moora McMillan, MTH63 Resident, Myra Wildmist, paineful, Sheba Blitz, Teresa Firelight, Veruca Tammas, & wintergeist.

All artists are also offering at least one item of art for sale with 100% of preoceeds going to Team Diabetes of Second Life.

In addition to the shopping and art, the event features two hunts with prizes to be claimed:

  • 2019 Reindeer Hunt Information: this is an open hunt with tiny reindeer scattered throughout the 2019 Winter Showcase, in stores and in art displays. Find each reindeer and pay L$10 to receive a prize. 100% proceeds of the hunt goes to Team Diabetes of Second Life.
  • Santa Quest: purchase a HUD for L$250 from the kiosk near the landing point and help put Santa together again! Find the pieces, put things together and claim 16 prizes.

There is also daily entertainment through the event, with the remain days comprising:

  • Tuesday, December 10, 2019, 16:00-17:00: the Ugly Sweater Party with DJ John & L$1000 Gift Card Giveaway.
  • Wednesday, December 11, 2019, 16:00-17:00: DJ Vee & Ice Skating Party with L$1000 Gift Card Giveaway.
  • Thursday, December 12, 2019:
  • Friday, December 13, 2019, 16:00-17:00: Live Performer TBD.
  • Saturday, December 14, 2019:
    • 16:00-17:00: Live Performer TBD and Winter Showcase Photo Challenge winners announced.
    • 23:59: Winter Showcase, Reindeer Hunt, & Santa Quest Ends.

See the Team Diabetes 2019 Winter Showcase pages for more information on the event.

About the American Diabetes Association

Established in 1940, the American Diabetes Association is working to both prevent and cure diabetes in all it forms, and to help improve the lives of all those affected by diabetes. It does this by providing objective and credible information and resources about diabetes to communities, and funding research into ways and means of both managing and curing the illness. In addition, the Association gives voice to those denied their rights as a consequence of being affected by diabetes.

About Team Diabetes of Second life

Team Diabetes of Second Life is an official and authorised fund-raiser for the American Diabetes Association in Second Life. Established with the aim of raising funds in support of diabetes treatment and to raise awareness of the disease in SL, Team Diabetes of Second Life was founded by Jessi2009 Warrhol and John Brianna (Johannes1977 Resident), who serve on the Advisory Board along with Eleseren Brianna, Veruca Tammas, Rob Fenwitch, and Dawnbeam Dreamscape.

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