Tag: SL News

Lab: share a Valentine’s vision and help promote SL

Posted on by Inara Pey

With Valentine’s Day roughly a month away, the Lab is inviting residents to share what that special day means to them by means of a photograph – and gain the opportunity to be a part of the Lab’s advertising campaigns for Second Life.

The post reads in part:

Valentine’s Day is just on the horizon and will be here before you can get through a handful of heart candies! We’re looking for some great Second Life pictures from the community to feature in upcoming email and banner campaigns – with credit to the photographer – of course!

In a snapshot, let us know what Valentine’s Day means to you in Second Life.

Share your story in a picture and on our Official Flickr Page with the tag “SLVday2016” so that we can see all of your amazing works. You may submit as many as you like between now and January 29, 2016.

We’ll showcase the chosen image(s) in an email to Residents, as well as in some banner campaigns. We’ll let the chosen image creators know via Flickr and ask for an avatar name for the credits.

The submission guidelines are fairly straightforward:

  • Images must be at least 2048×1207 in size
  • Avatars must be shown in-world,and suitably lit so they can be seen
  • All images must be free of additional text or logos, and must be appropriate for all audiences.
  • Images that tell a story are going to make an impression.

As noted in the Lab’s blog post text, the closing date for submissions is Friday, January 29th, 2016.

 

Lab explains Second Life’s weekend woes

Posted on by Inara Pey

We’re all used to Second Life misbehaving itself at the weekend, but it with rezzing or rendering or region crossings and so on. However, Saturday, January 9th, and Sunday January 10th proved to be a lot rougher than most weekend in recent memory, with Sunday in particular affecting a lot of SL users.

When situations like this arise, it’s easy to shake a verbal fist at “the Lab” and bemoan the situation whilst forgetting we’re not the only one being impacted. Issues and outages bring disruption to the Lab as well, and often aren’t as easy to resolve as we might think. Hence why it is always good to hear back from the Lab when things do go topsy-turvy – and such is the case with the weekend of the 9th / 10th January.

Posting to the Tools and Technology blog on Monday, January 11th, April Linden, a member of the Operations Team (although she calls herself a “gridbun” on account of her purple bunny avatar), offered a concise explanation as to what happened from the perspective of someone at the sharp end of things.

April starts her account with a description of the first issue to hit the platform:

Shortly after midnight Pacific time on January 9th (Saturday) we had the master node of one of the central databases crash. The central database that happened to go down was one the most  used databases in Second Life. Without it Residents are unable to log in, or do, well, a lot of important things.

While the Lab is prepared for such issues, it does take time to deal with them (in this case around 90 minutes), with services having to be shut-down and then restarted in a controlled manner so as not to overwhelm the affected database. Hence why, when things like this do happen, we often see notices on the Grid Status Page warning us then log-ins may be suspended and /  or to avoid carrying out certain activities.

Sadly, this wasn’t the end of matters; on Sunday an issue with one of the Lab’s providers had a major impact on in-world asset loading (while April doesn’t specifically point at which provider, I’m assuming from her description it may have been one of the CDN providers). While the Lab is versed in working with their providers to analyse the root cause of problems and rectify them, this particular issue appears to have had a knock-on effect in a quite unexpected way, impacting the avatar baking service.

This is the mechanism by which avatar appearances are managed and shared (and is also known as Sever-Side Appearance and / or Server-Side Baking). Designed to overcome limitations with using the viewer / simulator to handle the process, it was cautiously deployed in 2013 after very extensive testing, and it has largely operated pretty reliably since its introduction. As such, the fact that it was so negatively impacted at the weekend appears to have caught the Lab off-guard, with April noting:

One of the things I like about my job is that Second Life is a totally unique and fun environment! (The infrastructure of a virtual world is amazing to me!) This is both good and bad. It’s good because we’re often challenged to come up with a solution to a problem that’s new and unique, but the flip side of this is that sometimes things can break in unexpected ways because we’re doing things that no one else does.

Taking this to be the case, it doubtless took the Lab a while to figure-out how best to deal with the situation, which likely also contributed to the time taken for things to be rectified to the point where people weren’t being so massively impacted. Hopefully, what did occur at the weekend will help the Lab better assess circumstances where such problems – unique as they may be – occur, and determine courses of action to mitigate them in the future.

In the meantime, April’s post, like Landon Linden’s update on the extended issues of May 2014, help remind us of just what a hugely complex beast of systems and services Second Life is, and that how even after 13 years of operations, it can still go wrong in ways that not only frustrate users, but also take the Lab by surprise, despite their best efforts. Kudos to April for presenting the explanation and for apologising for the situation. I hope she, together with all involved, have had time to catch-up on your sleep!

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Lab Chat #2 announced

Posted on by Inara Pey

Lab Chat LogoLab Chat is the name of the new series aimed at providing Second Life users with the opportunity to have their questions put to Lab management and personnel.

The first such event, which was recorded and made available as a three-part video, took place on Thursday, November 19th, with guest Ebbe Altberg, CEO of Linden Lab. I have a full transcript of that event available, complete with audio of both the questions asked and Ebbe’s replies.

The second on the series have now been announced through the Lab Chat blog and via an official blog post from the Lab. It will take place on Thursday, January 21st, again at the Linden Endowment for the Arts Theatre, starting at 10:30 SLT.

Ebbe Altberg, in his alter ego of Ebbe Linden, will again be facing questions on Linden Lab, Second Life and "Project Sansar" as put forward by SL users
Ebbe Altberg, in his alter ego of Ebbe Linden, will again be facing questions on Linden Lab, Second Life and “Project Sansar” as put forward by SL users

Once again, the guest under the spotlight will be the Lab’s CEO, Ebbe Altberg.

As with the first event, people are being invited to submit questions via a Lab Chat forum thread they’d like to see asked during the show for consideration. The deadline for such questions is Friday, January 15th

Questions to be asked will be selected by members of the Lab Chat production team (of which I’m listed, although my role is focused on producing written transcripts of recordings, rather than being hands-on with the actual production). Those submitting selected questions will be invited to attend the recording of the session, and put their question directly to Ebbe in voice if they wish; otherwise questions will be asked the Lab Chat hosts, Saffia Widdershins and Jo Yardley.

As per the first Lab Chat, I will (hopefully) be recording the event, and will certainly be providing a full transcript a few days after it  has taken place.

Lab offers a review of their Second Life year

Posted on by Inara Pey

The end of the year always brings with it reviews of what’s happened during the unfolding 12 months. Some can be lengthy (*coughs at her own 3-part series of late), others brief.

The Lab is no exception to the rule, and in Second Life 2015 Mix – A Greatest Hits Compilation, they offer a thumbnail sketch of some of the more positive developments and events within SL which have marked the year.

Starting with the Project Bento announcement (a project I’ve been able to observe and will be bringing more background on in the future as well as tracking developments through regular project updates), the post provides a grab bag of technical changes to the platform.

These include the arrival of the Viewer-Managed Marketplace, which had its initial main grid beta launch back in April, following a long lead-in over 2014 / early 2015,  with full migration starting in July, in one of the more successful Marketplace updates Second Life has seen. Also getting a mention are the arrival of Chromium Embedded Framework, through the CEF viewer, the notifications updates, and Hover Height, both of which were viewer updates suggested by users. Mention is also made of the 28 simulator updates made through the year,

Away from the technical updates, The blog post refers to the new “Classic” starter avatars, which were introduced in November.

PaleoQuest; Inara Pey, July 2015, on FlickrPaleoQuest, the Lab’s dino-ish adventure game gets a mention in the official look back at the year, which i admit to rather enjoying

2015 saw a change in Premium membership perks, as they gradually turned away from the usual (and often basic) gifts and more towards more practical offerings, as the Lab’s blog post mentions. These have included things like the increase in the group membership allowance, and the removal of VAT on membership fees, which gave rise to speculation on what was going on to allow it.

Also getting a mention are the recent changes in land set-up and transfer fees, although how effective this will be is perhaps debatable, as I commented at the time, and also – with regards to grandfathered fees, seemed to have a slight edge of giving with one hand, taking back with the other.

Ending with a look at the Lab’s on-going engagement with the community through in-world meet-ups and other events, and giving a mention to forthcoming capabilities designed to help improve the user experience, such as Avatar Complexity, this may seem a lightweight look back at the year; however, it does constitute a fair round-up of the positives SL has seen internally through 2015.  In the meantime, I’ll be offering my own more extensive review of things – SL, Sansar, VR, et al, as reported through these pages through the year, over the Christmas and New Year period.

Flash: Lindens and Moles in Winter Wonderland meet-up?

Posted on by Inara Pey
Winter Wonderland village - Linden and Mole meet-up?
Winter Wonderland village – Linden and Mole meet-up?

There are rumours circulating that members of the Lab and a number of moles will be present at the Winter Wonderland, near the landing area and later at the snowball fight arena.

The rumours appear to originate with Patch Linden, who is reported to have been heard whispering:

Today at around 11am SLT we’re going to be doing a Linden/Mole meet and greet in the Winter Wonderland regions near the landing area.  We’ll probably hang out there for a bit handing out gifts and then we’re going to spend the rest of the afternoon in the snowball arena.

So, if you’re looking for something to do, why not hop over to the Winter Wonderland and see if the rumours are true?

Singapore to be Lit Up by Second Life machinima

Posted on by Inara Pey

Lit Up logoLit Up Singapore is an annual international literature festival held in Singapore, organised by Word Forward and The Writers Centre, Singapore Ltd. Founded in 2009, the festival features writers and performers from around the world who come together to celebrate literature, story telling, the spoken word as performance art, and more.

Second Life storyteller Singh Albatros contacted me about Lit Up 2016, which is set to include a unique collaboration between himself and four noted Second Life Machinima makers, something which may open the door for closer ties between The Writers Centre in Singapore and Second Life.

Following the successful UWA 3d Art and  Machinima Challenge, Pursue Impossible, the organisers of Lit Up have invited the makers of the top three winning machinima films – Kobuk Farshore, Tutsy Navarathna and the team of Lilia Artis and Haveit Neox – to each produce a short machinima film based on Singh’s poems and micro-fictions.

Kobuk Farshore, Tutsy Navarathna and the team of Lilia Artis and Haveit Neox have all been invited to collaborate in making films
Kobuk Farshore, Tutsy Navarathna and the team of Lilia Artis and Haveit Neox have all been invited to collaborate in making films to be shown at Lit Up Singapore 2016

“We are delighted the artists have accepted the invitation and commission,” Singh told me. Better known in the physical world as respected storyteller Chris Mooney-Singh, he is the festival’s Artistic Director, and recently his verse novel Foreign Madam and the White Yogi was highly commended in the prestigious Victorian Premier’s Literature Award’s Unpublished Fiction category.

He continued, “We’ll be conferring further with all four after the holiday period, and as Writer in Residence at The Writers Centre Singapore, I am excited to see how these top artists each interpret my work; it will be a fascinating project, and something unique: debuting a virtual collaboration for a physical world festival.”

Chris Mooney sigh, Writer in Residence at The Writers do and Artistic Director for Lit up 2016, will be providing material upon which the three films will be based
Chris Mooney-Singh, Writer in Residence at The Writers Centre and Artistic Director for Lit up 2016, together with his digital alter ego, Singh Albatros

“These diversely talented machinima makers have each been offered a commission to create something for a cutting edge live literature digital arts festival in Singapore,” Lit Up’s media contact, Rahimah Rasith, said of the invitation, when announcing the news on December 16th, 2015.

“In a sense we feel we have been passed the torch by the UWA’s Art Challenge director Jay Jay Zifanwe and the University of Western Australia in forging a creative alliance,” she continued. “Following UWA’s lead we hope to execute other in-world events and stream them live to Facebook.”

If there are sufficient funds available, it is hoped that the festival will be able to fly all four of the machinima artists involved in the collaboration to the 2016 event in November 2016, where they will be able to meet with members of the Writers Centre and with Chris, in addition to seeing their films premiered at the festival and participate in panel discussions on the relationship between virtual art and the physical world.

Kobuk Farshore’s winning entry in the UWA’s MachinimUWA VIII: Pursue Impossible – one of the prize winners offered a commission for Lit Up 2016

This could be the start of an exciting new collaborative effort between art and media spanning the physical and digital worlds, and I look forward to covering this project, and any developments which spin out from it, in the future. In the meantime, I extend my thanks to Singh for contacting me about the project, and extend my congratulations to the four machinima makers.