Public Relations Disaster - And I Missed It!

Being a member of the Second Life group "Things to Do", I get a daily notice about a new place on the grid that we as a group will visit.

Sometimes it's fun like surfing at the Weather sim or go-carting, other times it's seminars or press conferences.

I've been busy with RL work lately, so I've missed a few of our gatherings recently, but group leader and Metaversed.com author 57 Miles tells of a press conference gone wrong just the other day that he and the group attended.

It's tough, because a lot of these companies testing the waters here in Second Life don't know how to deal with this new world and it's rules. They don't understand the viral nature of the thing if they can make a positive impact. They also aren't used to being only able to speak to the 40-50 people that a sim will take before it buckles.

57 Miles does a very good job at explaining just what went wrong at the new Intel sim launch.

Atmosphere Upgrade - Before and After

These pictures were taken in Second Life, less than 30 seconds apart, in the exact same place, in each of the viewers.

There's no way to describe the way the clouds creep across the sky. You just have to see it to understand how nice it looks.

HINT: You will need to go into preferences and reset all of your graphics settings again as they are not retained from the primary viewer. The new "sky bling" might not be visible until you do this. At least that's the way it was from my experience. The viewer installs with minimum graphics frills.

More to come as time permits!

Viewing Second Life In A New Light

Linden Lab has just announced that the First Look viewer for Second Life's new atmospheric rendering engine has been released and is available for download.

Go ahead and download it to see what all the hoop-la is about, but remember, this viewer operates on the main grid, so changes made in-world are permanent. Don't go spending money or deleting stuff unless that's what you reeaaally want to do.

Rolling Restarts Begin On Second Life

Linden Labs just announced in-world at noon SLT, that rolling restarts will be taking place across the Second Life grid to address issues that arose yesterday.

As history would tell us, this means that they will restart sims in a north-south or south-north direction with warnings ahead of time so that you don't have to logout of Second Life entirely.

You will likely see a blue warning pop-up on your Second Life screen telling you if the sim you are in is about to restart. This means you'll have time to teleport elsewhere until the sim is back up.

Stay tuned.

Second Life Growing Pains And Voice Plans

After yesterday's Second Life update, Linden Lab discovered that there was a problem with group voting, which was shut down until the problem could be solved.

Today, while I was logging on to join 57 Miles from Metaversed on his "Things To Do" group outing at the Weather Channel's sim (look for an entry and pics tomorrow right here) I noticed that login was painfully slow, and that once I was finally in, part of my body was female while the Second Life client reassured me that I was the only one seeing this embarrassment.

Earlier this evening, Linden Lab confirmed that there are indeed widespread "slow logins, slow or failed group chat and teleports, and presence issues" (friends list to the rest of us). Their techs are looking into the situation, but expect slowdowns and other assorted weirdness until it's fixed.

They've also released an explanation as to why they waited to release voice chat, and gave a rundown of their plans for it, which involves a releasing the First Look viewer, which is basically a "test" viewer to be used on the Live Grid in the next couple of weeks. It will be optional to use this viewer, and if used they stress that anything you do with it "is for real". You can just imagine somebody thinking that the "test viewer" is running on the "test grid", spending all their $L on poseballs, and then using voice chat itself to complain. What a headache.

If you just can't wait to try voice chat in Second Life, check out these instructions on how to get on the Beta Grid where voice is live right now. You'll need a set of headphones with a microphone.

For the rest of the folks who aren't comfortable with a "beta" viewer, and aren't in a hurry, just keep using the viewer you've got and when voice is ready for good, it will be released in the main viewer at that time.

Second Life Sex In Five Random Clicks

If an average person were to judge Second Life by the mainstream media, they might think Second Life was crawling with furry, yiffing, bondage practising, sex club crawling, illegal gambling psychopaths.

The problem with this, for me, is that most of the folks I have met in Second Life are quite normal. I've only ever seen a few naked avatars, one or two furries, a few casinos, and I just found out a Second Life neighbor of mine across the road appears to be into bondage or dominatrixing or something but doesn't believe in roofs.

So I decided to do a little experiment. I decided to see if Second Life was the cesspool of sex and illegality that the media makes it out to be. I decided that the best way to get a gauge on the Second Life community's practises was to randomly pick five places on the grid, teleport to them, and then report on what I saw. Going into it, I expected to see lots of genitalia, lots of yiffing, gambling out the ying yang and more spikes and leather than what you'd find in Arthur Fonzerelli's closet.

To make my picks as close to totally random as possible, I switched off all of the beacons on the map so that I wasn't drawn to congregations of people or events, but I left 'Land For Sale' showing, so that I didn't waste time teleporting into a big empty lot. I also avoided the two northeastern continents since a lot of them are still just big empty lots. I also only chose Mature rated sims that weren't in areas I was familiar with to increase my chance of seeing some good ol' fashioned depravity.

Once I set my map, I randomly clicked on the map and teleported...

SIM: BaikUn (99,154,22) Mature

I land in a area called the Welcom Business Group(sic) which appears to be a home to a mall called the Karlsruhe Mall. When I go to the mall directory, a small distance down the road, I see two buildings called Sex and Sexy...perfect! Off I go.

What a disappointment. One only had clothing, maybe a little low cut and a few pieces of underwear for sale, but nothing rated 'R' unless you rate the Sears Wishbook 'R'. The store next door had not much of anything until you clicked on the spheres on the floor and realized they were sexual pose balls. I'd have never known what they were unless I clicked on them. Nothing flagrant at all here.

Overall the architecture is quite nice in this area. Very classy.




SIM: Gwangeo (116, 187, 91) Mature

I land upstairs in another retail building. Downstairs I find mostly unrented stores. There is a vendor which sells Remote Controls for your "slave" which basically lets you control another avatar from another sim and spy on their chat. No nudity is shown, and none is implied. Another wall sells avatar shapes. The pictures are a little underdressed, but hey, go to a real life breast augmentation doctor and he'll show you pictures with more detail...that's how you know what you're getting. Nothing overt here, but again...architecture isn't bad in this area.



SIM: Hawthorne (160, 75, 92) Mature

I land in an area called Chase's Manhattan which has nothing to do with the bank. From what I could tell, the land is owned by an avatar named Chase Rutherford. It appears to be just a lot of empty buildings, maybe an abandoned project or still being put together, but what is here is actually...pretty nice architecture. There is a fountain outside one building. Another building across the street is reminiscent of 18th century styles. What happened to all the crap builds I was supposed to be seeing on the mainland? Moving to the next sim south, which is Stanford, there's a mall with some sexy clothing, but again, nothing 'R' rated.



SIM: Winyah (207, 206, 104) Mature

Ok, now I found some crap builds. Upon landing I immediately see a particle emitter emitting giant yellow spheres. On the other side of the road is an absolutely huge plywood building with no windows or doors. But, no nipples or anything.

Expanding my search to the neighbors in the Great Pubnico sim, I find a mall selling jewelry. There is a kiosk for the adult SL magazine called Slustler, but nothing overt, and all the naughty bits are covered with black bars. Nothing worse than what you'd see in a convenience store magazine rack, and probably less.



SIM: Ziczac (151, 19, 151) Mature

I land near an Outy's Particle Paradise. Outy is one of those folks who are sort of like Starbucks...there seems to be one on every corner, but you know what...he's still around so he's doing something right. Nothing but particle tricks here, and none of them have anything to do with "flying penises", since that's a buzzword the media seems to have latched on to. Nearby is Forest Mist's skybox shop and some dreaded parcel cut advertising.



So, there's my five random locations, not influenced by anything except that there had to be something there...no empty lots. What did I find? Well, I found lots of clothing, some jewelry and all being sold inside some nice architecture. There were a couple of vendors selling things that wouldn't be intended for the average person, ie they were filling a "niche", but I saw nothing illegal, and certainly nothing blatant.

So, do I think that the Second Life community is perfect then? No of course not. There are some real perverts roaming around the grid, I just don't know any, and I've been hard pressed to see many. I don't know any on the internet or in real life either, but I know they are out there.

So what does all of this mean? Well, it basically means that Second Life is not a cesspool of illegal sex and gambling shops that the media is making it out to be. You probably have just as good of a chance of seeing an adult shop or a back alley hustler in real life as you do in Second Life. Second Life at best represents us as a reflection of our society in the real world, because without the people in Second Life, it's empty. Whatever you find in Second Life was brought in by real people. Plus, you can't find anything in Second Life that isn't already in the real world. Ok, maybe you won't find the flying people...or the talking foxes. But I digress.

In the movie Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, Luke Skywalker's question about the tree cave parallels a lot of curious people's questions about Second Life.

"What's in there?" Luke asked. Yoda replied...

"Only what you take with you."

Second Life Update Running Late

Well, the folks at Linden Lab are reporting that the 1.16.0 (5) update to Second Life is going to run past 12 noon PDT so it looks like you're either going to have to get your kicks on the Beta Grid for now, or just hang tight in your First Life. I mean, really...it was first.

You might want to go ahead and download the new Second Life viewer. All you need to do is go here, download the appropriate one for your system and then run the installer, as this is easier on the server. Or you can open Second Life like you normally would and it'll prompt you to download the new viewer from there. But either way works.

In the meantime, in case you missed it the first time, check out Linden Lab's official documentation on Sculpted Prims to pass the time.

UPDATE : The grid is now back up.

How To Sculpt Prims In Second Life

Ok so we're currently waiting for Second Life to come back up.

The main thing that we're all waiting to try, besides several very needed bug fixes, is sculpted prims. But, just what the heck is a sculpted prim? And how would you go about sculpting a prim?

Simply speaking, sculpted prims are basically flat image files, created from a 3D shape in a 3D design program, that can describe a complex shape to Second Life and use a bare minimum of prims...landowner's paradise! No more leaving creations half done because you're at 117 prims already. Imagine a human head; how many prims would you need to design one? With sculpted prims you could theoretically model one with only one prim. Amazing? You bet.

So while you're waiting on the grid to come back up, why not download and install a copy of Blender (an open source 3D designer) and head on over to Amanda Levitsky's excellent beginner's tutorial on how to sculpt your own prims with Blender.

UPDATE : Looks like the images have disappeared, but the instructions are still there.

Voice and Sculpties Coming May 23?

Well, the lid is about to be opened on a new can of worms in Second Life.

It's officially been announced on the Linden Blog that with tomorrow's update, there will be a required download of a new viewer which has several residents proclaiming that voice chat and sculpties are going to be released after a pretty short development cycle.

On the other hand, Which Linden has apparently said that voice will not be part of tomorrow's update, but sculpties are...a definite maybe.

Sculpties for the most part will allow modellers to work on models in a way that is a little closer to the method that is common to the 3D industry, allowing tools like 3DMax or Maya to be used to create shapes before importing them to Second Life. Sculpties are generally favored as an add-on to Second Life although there is a concern by some that this will distance the professionals from the hobbyists.

Voice on the other hand, while exciting some residents, is a concern for those role playing the opposite sex, such as transgenders and transsexuals who believe that it would "out" their true identities along with age verification.

One thing is true, no matter what improvements or additions Linden Labs makes to Second Life, it is now populated by such a wide variety of people that they will have to take the griping in stride as no addition will please everyone.

Hopefully Linden Labs will confirm one way or another later today on the Official Linden Blog which bugs will be addressed and which additions will make it into tomorrow's update.

UPDATE : It's official, no voice yet but sculpties are in as are some bug fixes.

Wait...Did You Just Say VRML???

In yesterday's post Do You Dream In 3D regarding the my predictions for the future of the web and the virtual worlds it currently houses, which was prompted by Raph Koster's post Web In World Or Web In World I spoke about my belief that one day the virtual worlds that today currently exist on the web, would someday grow up to house the web itself.

In the comments section of that post, Andrew Johnson made the following comment:

I remember back in the days of VRML and all of these predictions about 3D desktops and so on. Why isn’t this great 3D internet here? Its all about usability. I don’t need 3D to read and write e-mail. I don’t need to walk down a hall and open a door to launch my web browser!

While I can understand his viewpoint, it seems to me that someone with his interest in making money from a website would be very interested in a 3D implementation of a website. I mean, a 3D web would represent more opportunity for online marketers at the least.

VRML is brought up as a reason that the 3D web won't happen. The reason? Because it hadn't already happened back when VRML was the chosen way to show 3D on the web at its peak in 1997.

This argument already has a pile of holes in it. If in 1810 someone had told a horse owner about the automobiles of the future, they might have said, "I don't need a machine for that! My horse already does all of that, and I don't need to buy all that oil and steering and brake fluid you described." Well, that may well have been true, but if Henry Ford had heard that and given up we might not have had NASCAR or the F1 circuit today.

Which brings up another point. Automobiles weren't built for racing, racing was built for automobiles. In other words, racing was a side industry created by the invention of the automobile itself. Once the 3D web becomes reality, who knows what side industries will spring from it? One I can foresee is some of the pioneers of the 3D web will make lots of money consulting. Those in the know will make money simply because they know.

Another point about the horse/automobile example is that the technology wasn't ready at the time to be able to create the automobile. At the time, it might well have seemed an invention that was too impractical, too expensive, and too hard to do. But the day eventually came where it was possible and practical at the same time.

Justifying that something doesn't make sense at the time, isn't a good way to justify that it will never happen. At one time, people thought that it was easier just to type a letter on a typewriter than on a computer. But look at the improvements the computer has made in our productivity today, even if you only consider word processors, let alone e-mail.

I often look to Second Life for an example of what the metaverse will be like, since business has already noticed it, and started to populate it. And yet, folks still refuse to admit that something like a 3D web is useful for market share and branding purposes, the same way the 2D web justified itself before transactions became easy and secure. It reminds me of the naysayers when the 2D web was just taking off business wise.

No, you don't need a web presence for business. It's just a big waste of time and money. You can't make money from the internet. Nobody's going to spend money on the internet. Not enough people will use it.

Sure, there were a lot of ridiculous companies put onto the web, and yes there was a big shakeout of the ones that didn't make fiscal sense, but in the end, here we are. Business is booming because we invented the proper precautions and securities required to successfully do business on the internet. If there is money in something, business will pave the way for it to happen.

True, today it's easier to communicate on a cell phone, or e-mail but that's because that's the way our infrastructure is currently built. The 3D web is forming and anyone who gets in on the ground floor is going to be rich. True, it's not quite viable yet, but anyone who stands in it's way is likely to be as wrong as the folks who doubted business on the internet could fly.

You can't just say something doesn't make sense because it doesn't make sense right now. Because if you do, history will add you to the list of folks who doubted Christopher Columbus, the Wright Brothers, Henry Ford, and the value of having a web presence.

Do You Dream In 3D?

Raph Koster, world designer from such games as Ultima Online and Star Wars Galaxies has an article about the online community MyMiniLife. This morning many bloggers seem to have adopted MyMiniLife as the hot topic of the day.

In reading about this topic however, it appears to me that many people are seeing Flash objects as the future of the 3D web. That is, they are saying the web of the future will be based upon the same old 2D underlying structure of the ancient concept known as webpages, and the 3D experiences will be served on those webpages in the form of an embedded Flash client.

I, however, believe that while Flash clients may be where the internet is heading next, it will not stop there. When you look at computing history, you see games evolving from Spade Invaders in 2D, to Half Life in 3D. Windows went from 2D Windows such as Windows 3.1 to Vista which has now has 3D spinning windows.

It's just human nature to evolve our computing and entertainment tools to be more like real life. I don't think it's far off track to assume that the web itself will someday be presented in full, glorious 3D.

Flash 3D worlds on 2D pages may well be "destination NEXT", but I'm still foreseeing a fully 3D future for the web.

In the meantime, let's remember that Linden Labs has allowed secondlifelib to be developed and used to create alternative clients for Second Life. I wonder how far away we are from a Flash client for Second Life?

Although all of these current Flash client worlds are "cute", Second Life is on it's way to becoming the first large virtual world that has more than one way to access it. Sort of like the web can be accessed by IE, Firefox, Opera, etc.

Second Life has yet to prove that it is the web of the future, but Linden Labs appear to fully understand that the more ways to access their servers, the more eyes will see it and adopt it.

Now that Linden Labs have thrown open the gate to the open source community, we'll start to see all kinds of clients for Second Life, including Flash, I bet. It appears that whichever train leaves the station, whether it be a Flash-based environment, or a fully 3D client, Linden Labs will already be on it.

Areae, Linden Labs, and all the Flash worlds all appear to be going head to head within the same virtual space and market. It'll be interesting to see which way this shakes out.