While most actions people take in the flesh are ephemeral - performed fleetingly, and unmarked - MMOGs and virtual environments keep that data as a rule, usually most or all of it.
Three social researchers from the University of Michigan obtained data from Linden Lab about the possession and acquisition of 'gestures' (preprogrammed sequences of text, avatar animations and/or audio) and data about account creation dates and friends-lists, and studied how gestures passed from user to user.
1.) build a world 2.) add it to your web site 3.) profit? by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk If the name of the game in MMOs is to grow the user population in preparation for an eventual IPO, Metaplace...
Lab too embarrassed to publish land data? by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk In February, Linden Lab halted publication of resident land "ownership" statistics after what is believed to be thousands of regions were returned by players reeling from October's...
Some consider him a kook or an eccentric, while others think of him as a technological visionary. Either way, the accomplished Raymond Kurzweil will be taking the stage to keynote the Second Life Community Convention in San Francisco next month, a spot traditionally afforded to a Linden Lab executive.
Kurzweil, a famous futurist, author and inventor, is notable for his many inventions (from the first CCD-based flat-bed scanner to reading machines for the blind), his notions about transhumanism and technological singularities and a significant number of awards and honorary degrees. He has strong opinions on virtual environments, and it will be interesting to hear what he has to say.
The Second Life Community Convention 2009 will happen in San Francisco, on August 13th - 16th, 2009 at the Westin St. Francis Hotel. Registration for the event is open and attendees can register at the convention's Web-site.
Are you a part of the most widely-known collaborative virtual environment or keeping a close eye on it? Massively's Second Life coverage keeps you in the loop.
by Idoru Wellman, staff writer The Netflix "Find Your Voice film competition" is a great new game where everyone can participate by forming gangs to vote for the independent film maker that best represents their community and interests. Consider this...
Linden Lab is reporting that server version 1.27, currently in quality assurance, represents a 300% improvement in group chat reliability over version 1.25 (or almost 1000% more reliable than what is currently operating on the Second Life grid today). As yet, no deployment date has been announced, but for many, the update cannot come soon enough.
Are you a part of the most widely-known collaborative virtual environment or keeping a close eye on it? Massively's Second Life coverage keeps you in the loop.
The hairy edge of augmented reality colliding with virtual worlds by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk At a much anticipated game god gabfest yesterday, Raph Koster and Cory Ondrejka neatly avoided the controversy over Metaplace male's second-class sit animations -...
It's been a long run for the Gossip Girl simulation on Second Life, two years in the making actually, but all good things must come to an end. The well trafficked sims will be closing the doors tomorrow, as Warner Brothers and The CW discontinue their virtual marketing campaign for the show of the same name.
But that doesn't mean the Gossip Girl community is dying...
Fans of the simulation will be overjoyed to hear that the Gossip Girl community is transitioning to a new home thanks to the Metaverse Mod Squad, the builders and moderators of the original official sims. While the official sims, and the setting of the Upper East Side, will be retired on June 30th, the new doors will open on July 1st to large fanfare and a great number of festivities.
Warner Brothers has a very successful setup in Second Life, centered around its popular Gossip Girl property. All isn't exactly rosy there, of late, as WB's actively moderated environment collides with Second Life's and Gossip Girl's rather broad popularity demographics.
Warner Brothers uses the Metaverse Mod Squad for active moderation of the Second Life presence. The question is, how do you moderate conversations in languages you don't understand? The answer, it seems, is that you don't. Visitors who communicate in languages other than English are warned to switch to English. Failure to comply sees the visitor ejected.
There are several sets of rules for users of Second Life. The Terms of Service (TOS) and Community Standards (CS) which combined form your explicit service-contract with Linden Lab, and assorted implicit ones, like following any additional conditions the owner of whatever land-parcel that you are currently on may have chosen to impose.
Well, the Linden Lab have updated the Community Standards for the first time in, well, perhaps forever. While the Lab has said that it has updated them in the past, the document has remained unaltered since at least 2005. What's new, however, isn't necessarily as interesting as what's missing.
by Tenshi Vielle Concerned Australians in Second Life are donning chicken little avatars and chirping that the sky is falling, with news of Australia's proposed ban on adult online games including Second Life circulating. The Sydney Morning Herald reports that...
by Jessica Holyoke As Zindra edged closer to completion, one of my Feminist groups popped up saying that now was the time to remove rape from Second Life, or at least its advertisement or feature in Groups. They said now...
[Senban Babii is, to my knowledge, the only Post 6 Girl to get hit by a train during her shoot. She was there on the tracks, she saw it coming, she threatened to haunt me if it hit her and...
by Suzie Skybeam In Second Life, crossing a boundary between sims is slow, and, to be honest, a bit buggy. So most designers create their builds so that the sim boundaries are in places where there will be as few...
You mean I need permission to sell your Flickr photos in SL? by Tenshi Vielle Besides nameless SLobrities showing up at SL6B friday evening, the talk of SL6B has been claims that PhotoLife's recently violated the Flickr standards - and...
Mysterious rot13 and secret decoder rings at SL birthday party by Tenshi Vielle SL6B is a copycat! Some darn robots copied Gigs Taggart's Shanti encoded promotion from last year for the Meerkat viewer, but twisted it, turned it, put it...
Four sims and 134 hair designers for the next two weeks by Tenshi Vielle Hair Fair 2009 has successfully kicked off! Another year of raising L$ to donate to Locks of Love, a public non-profit organization that provides hairpieces to...
by Bunny Brickworks She called and they all followed. Loglady Loon is one of the most banned non-griefing avatars in SecondLife. She is highly disputed, either loved or hated and the creative mastermind behind Freak Show. The first exhibition of...
But sexual ageplay is not by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk Friday, Jack Linden delivered a stunning rebuke to anti-child avatar advocates, saying “Child avatars are allowed on adult land as long as they are account verified like any other...
Linden's new Community Standards include broad Adult Content powers by Jessica Holyoke Linden Lab uses the Big Six of the Community Standards as an addendum to the Terms of Service (ToS). Until now, the Big Six were Intolerance, Harrassment, Assault,...
Australian Communications Minister, Senator Stephen Conroy, has promised to extend Australia's proposed network-level content filtering regime to block games, online games, downloadable games, and websites that sell or allow download of games that are deemed not to be suitable for a 15-year-old audience. This, despite research by the IEAA (the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia) that the average age of Australian Gamers is 30.
Even though Australian Federal and State laws say otherwise, some MMO titles exceeding that classification are already sold on Australian store shelves, by simply bypassing compulsory classification. Australian Federal and State authorities refuse to respond to any enquiries about the topic.
The matter becomes even more confusing and complex, however, as it introduces a new, defacto classifications body to the mix.
by Bunny Brickworks If Second Life residents are one big family, www.flickr.com surely is their family album. Whenever something important happens, we take a snapshot and share the pictures with the community – our first, second and third wedding, a...
PCs with DirectX10 video might already have it made in the shade by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk Are the Lindens sneaking support for shadows into the Second Life viewer? Rumors of a shadowy Second Life in the near future...
A while back, Linden Lab's Philip Rosedale announced a new Second Life viewer development project. That project ultimately grew along lines similar to that of third-party viewer project, Imprudence, breaking down many barriers to user contributions, and adopting a more agile methodology. After only a couple of release-candidates, the result is already available.
One of the biggest developments you might see in the Snowglobe viewer is that the map is now an order of magnitude faster to load, rather than taking several fractions of forever, as is traditional. This is the start of a new texture-transfer pipeline, which we can reasonably expect to become standard in future viewers, and to encompass more kinds of textures, however there's a new caching architecture which should benefit all textures.
by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk Cory's Second Life profile After parting company with Linden Lab last year, Cory Linden Ondrejka joined EMI, where he seems to be doing well - and was recently promoted to senior vice president for...
How Linden Lab profits from adult verification by Jessica Holyoke The Internet and Virtual Worlds have tried to monetize pornography in different ways. Red Light Center, and other pornography web sites charge a monthly fee to access the naughty parts....
It's the sixth anniversary of Second Life opening to the public (not the sixth birthday, which is actually in either March or April depending on how you figure these things), and as usual, Linden Lab is organizing a soiree for the occasion - though once again this year, it's a week later than usual, starting on the anniversary date of 23 June, rather than ending on that date.
Generally, just after 23 June, community (and the Lab's) attention is inevitably drawn away to Linden Lab's SL Community Convention and SL Relay For Life, both taking place later this year, and requiring considerable amounts of organizational attention.
Nevertheless, there's a packed schedule of eclectic events and discussions, starting with Philip Rosedale's opening speech in just 30 minutes time (10AM Pacific time), and 20 regions packed with user-contributed art installations and displays, so there's plenty to see and explore.
Are you a part of the most widely-known collaborative virtual environment or keeping a close eye on it? Massively's Second Life coverage keeps you in the loop.
I am a unique individual. And so am I. by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk My graphics card has nearly recovered from attending Vaneeesa Blaylock's "I Rez Therefore I Am" performance art event in early June. The artwork consisted of...
[Jenna Thurston has one of those avatars that you see and you just have to stop and look, which is exactly how I found her and begged her to pose for us this week. I was thrilled she said yes...
by Idorua Wellman, staff writer MetaPRIDE is a day-long Metaplace celebration of the diversity (racial, cultural, demographical, gender, and sexual orientation) featuring a variety of performers and speakers all day Monday June 22. The event will take place in the...
You can dance. You can give balloons. But where is the love? What if you lived in a world where shaking hands was impossible? A world where you couldn't even hug your best friends? A world without love... what kind...
Someone unloaded their Linden Lab holdings - but who? by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk With reports circulating that an individual investor's equity stake in the Lab had been sold to Stratim Capital, the rumor mill can be expected to...
There is no primary private-equity market for Linden Lab. The company does not seek investors, and by all accounts is making enough money that it doesn't need additional investment capital. There's also no sign of an IPO on the horizon, nor indeed, any compelling reason why the Lab should want to have one.
Are you a part of the most widely-known collaborative virtual environment or keeping a close eye on it? Massively's Second Life coverage keeps you in the loop.
by Jessica Holyoke In the U.S., the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals denied the re-hearing of a man who was convicted for e-mailing child sexual fantasies that he had. Dwight Whorely is currently serving 20 years in prison for 74...
Empty adult storefronts just as boring as PG/mature mainland by Jessica Holyoke Mixed messages from LL: a safe hub on the new Adults-only continent Today I had a chance to travel to Zindra, the new adults-only continent, and plumbed new...
Linden Lab has released the new viewer, bringing Second Life up to 1.23 a few days earlier than expected, off the back of a very short release-candidate cycle.
The new viewer brings three things with it: The new Adults-only continent (formerly Ursula and now Zindra), user-verification by documents or payment-status, and a new Adults-only content rating that opens up Second Life to more extreme sexual and violent content.
[I bumped into Zonra Darkmatter one day, fell in love with his kittycat avie and I was thrilled that he agreed to pose for us this week. During the course of explaining the Herald, and Post 6, I learned that...
Will avatar poses lead to matriarchal society? It works for hyenas! by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk Fiend sits uncomfortably The story of how Fiend Ludwig and I discovered of the transworld omnigendered nature of Metaplace started simply enough. Fiend...
New media watch by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk Our attention was recently drawn to www.SLchan.com - an image-driven site catering to the tastes of Second Life’s /b/tard community - mixing the ironic hypercute, the profane, and a smattering of...
NoH8 Proposition 8 silent protest picture campaign comes to Second Life by Bunny Brickworks The ordinary Second Life resident is a lazy, unmotivated and unpolitical slob hiding in mom’s basement without knowing or caring what is happening in the real...
This week we managed to get a look at an early build of what calls itself Second Life 2.0 - though the final version numbering is up for grabs and it could wind up being called 1.24 or 1.25 yet but Linden Lab has been amending their Second Life trademarks to allow "2" to be added. The only really major changes in 2.0 revolve around the user-interface that interactive design agency Big Spaceship has been working on for the last 6-8 months.
And quite a change it is. We're under no illusions that the new user-interface is entirely set in stone. A few parts are confusing, and it has a ton of rough edges and little quirks. It's fascinating to see the direction that it's going in, however.
Don't date guys who think brushed out perms are hot, and evaluate their success on the number of levels their EQ2 elf -❋Łƚƪą❋ by Dr. Penelope Hydra - Internet love and sex expert It all started so innocently. A Plurk...
Linden Lab have made a new Second Life viewer release-candidate available. RC4 is the fifth release candidate in the 1.23 series (Linden Lab starts counting from RC0). It's looking increasingly like the objective is to release before the Second Lifesixth anniversary (23 June).
Barely any changes this time around, so either Linden Lab isn't really aware of any showstoppers or doesn't perceive them as such. The context menus have had one small reversion, there are updates to the Mac crash reporter, and a fix relating to object updates that affected poseball visibility.
Part 6 in a series by the Wanderer “Welcome, stranger.” I was not in Gor anymore, at least the Gor I'd known. Maybe it was the kajirae, dressed in their finest silks and not rags. Maybe it was the “wedding”...
Hypergrid Business is reporting that an unknown person or persons destroyed a large number of OpenSim regions over the weekend, by exploiting a weakness in LxLabs' Linux-based HyperVM management software. OpenSim is a popular third-party reverse-engineered implementation of Linden Lab's Second Life server software used in a variety of commercial, non-commercial and educational virtual-environment grids.
More than 100 regions are reported lost, along with any data that wasn't backed up off-site. Apparently more than just the simulators were taken down, Web-pages and other ancillary data and files on the affected servers were also lost in the attack.
OpenSim regions using virtualization software other than LxLabs' HyperVM were unaffected. The attack hit more than just third-party Second Life compatible grids, however, as more than 100,000 other websites and servers were wiped over the weekend using the software exploit.
In the wake of the attacks and massive data-loss, LxLabs' founder, K T Ligesh (32) allegedly committed suicide in his Bangalore home on Monday.
Are you a part of the most widely-known collaborative virtual environment or keeping a close eye on it? Massively's Second Life coverage keeps you in the loop.
While online economies can seem to be (and often are) fundamentally different from AFK economies, there's a key component that makes any online economy function in ways that are all-too-familiar.
That's us. You and me. People.
Whether bags of treasure fall out of dead rats, or the economy is reliant on texture artists, modelers and scripters, it's people that make online economies with fundamentally alien premises work in some very surprisingly quotidian ways.
[I was walking through the park one day, in the merry merry month of May, and I spotted this week's Post 6 Grrl, Ulaa Coronet as you see her here in the first picture. I thought her avie was great-...
Is unleashed client a threat to Linden Lab supremacy? by Tenshi Vielle The long anticipated Meerkat viewer has been released for both Windows and Mac - and features radical goals such as cross grid access without a central authentication authority...
by Fiend Ludwig I like that you can't die when skydiving in SL. The blood pool animation when you hit the ground (much) too hard is about as real as it gets. Or is it. Why would anyone want to...
The Imprudence project has reached the end of the second release cycle for their Second Life viewer. Imprudence is now in official release. Imprudence is one of our favorite Second Life viewers.
Context (pie) menus have been reorganized again, there's improved support for sound and streaming media through gstreamer, some backported fixes from the official 1.22 viewer, and confirmation popups have been added for a number of operations. There's also a Mac version, which last year's 1.0 release lacked due to hardware and development constraints (though only for Intel-based Macs, unless there's significant demand for a universal binary.
Dancing to DJ Cuppycake's tunes in an embedded Metaplace world by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk Thursday night, after a disappointing Bruce Schneier event in Second Life, I stopped by Metaplace community manager Cuppycake's blog to see how well embedding...
The best way to get into it is to go where it isn't and wait for it to come - Richard Bartle by Idoru Wellman, staff writer [Richard Bartle recently visited Metaplace, and although the most of the Herald staff...
No questions from the audience makes for a bad show by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk Security guru sinks into his chair while talking to disembodied voices in virtual world Second Life - a fancy dress party trying to become...
Looking back over the rather long, rich and tumultuous history of Second Life, it seems that Linden Lab finally has their griefer problems more or less eliminated. That doesn't mean that they're gone, by any means. Griefing still happens every day, but it's now a problem for individual users and communities. The problems that Linden Lab itself had with griefers are, pretty much, over.
Back in the day (before free accounts) griefers were a big-time problem for the Lab. A small group of griefers could take down or impede significant quantities of the Second Life architecture, eliminating any semblance of service for thousands or tens of thousands of users. Those days are long past.
Linden Lab have made a new Second Life viewer release-candidate available. RC3 is the fourth release candidate in the 1.23 series (Linden Lab starts counting from RC0). The 1.23 series is being fast-tracked, as it is scheduled to go live by the end of June.
We're expecting this one or the next one to be the last before official release -- because frankly, there's not a lot of time-left before the Lab's self-imposed deadline. Probably the biggest reason you'd want to try this one out, is that it fixes a bug introduced in an earlier official viewer where cached information was discarded too aggressively, leading to things that should have been cached having to be redownloaded.
Oh, there's a bunch of good bug-fixes besides that, but that's really the one you want. Read on for the rest.
Inconsistent Linden Lab censor can't make up his mind by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk Orion Shamroy was surprised earlier this week to learn that all of his XStreet offerings had been pulled by Linden Lab for a ToS violation...
The 1.23Second Lifeviewer with the necessary support for Adult content is still being rushed to meet a June deadline, the exact reason for which seems a little unclear. There's some outstanding issues with the viewer release-candidates, but it seems fairly low on actual showstoppers and looks likely to make an official release in the roughly one fortnight remaining.
Definitions for the content ratings have been finalized, though they show little noticeable deviation from Linden Lab's originally proposed drafts. It appears that all the changes have been simple explanatory wording changes. The PG rating holds a couple of surprises, though.
Reuters has closed its Second Life bureau after more than two years of in-depth coverage on the virtual world’s business and economy. Our technology team will continue to cover Second Life on Reuters.com.
Please explore this archive of our ground-breaking Second Life coverage.
SECOND LIFE, Sept 30 (Reuters) - Will the marketing of real world brands in Second Life find a second life?
Maybe. Nestea, a Coca-Cola brand, announced today it’s sponsoring Second Life’s “Junkyard Blues” venue.
Neither Nestea nor Junkyard Blues’ owners were available for immediate comment. But a visit to Junkyard Blues shows a “Sponsored by Nestea” banner over the main stage. Don’t try clicking on the banner though — it’s non-interactive.
The sponsorship, while modest, represents an affirmation of Second Life as a continued destination for real-world companies to market their goods. A recent survey by BusinessWeek ranked Coca-Cola as the most valuable brand in the world.
Nor does the choice by Coca-Cola of a Second Life blues venue seem coincidental. Last month, Second Life bluesman Von Johin signed a record deal in what’s believed to be the first virtual musician to break into the real-life mainstream.
Coca-Cola was among the companies that made a strong entrance into Second Life during the first wave of corporate marketing with a “virtual thirst” campaign. However in recent months, the company has stepped back its Second Life profile, taking the virtualthirst.com website offline.
Many Second Life users cherish their avatar identity so highly they sign up for other online networks, like LinkedIn or Twitter, under their avatar name. But Second Life enthusiasts who register for Facebook under their avatar name should watch out: the Syndey Morning Herald is reporting Facebook is terminating accounts it suspects don’t represent real-life names.
The SMH follows the story of Sydneysider Elmo Keep, who got banned from the site with no warning when Facebook officials suspected her name (which is real) was fake. Only by supplying copies of government-issued identity documents to Facebook was she able to get her account restored.
Valleywag has video of Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg laying down the law. “You can’t be on Facebook without being yourself,” Sandberg says. “We kick you off.”
How many Facebook users are registered under their Second Life name, and could be banned at any moment under the policy? It’s impossible to tell, but even a casual search reveals that there could be more than a handful.
The latest poll average at RealClearPolitics has Barack Obama up 2.5 points over John McCain in the tight race for the White House, at 48.1 percent to 45.6 percent. But if the election was being held today in Second Life, Obama would win in a landslide.
Researcher Andrew Mallon of the Social Research Foundation, known in avatar form as Andy Evans, polled over 1,000 Second Life residents about their usage of Linden’s virtual world. But while he had an audience, Mallon threw in another question:
In the upcoming election, who do you plan to vote for (USA Citizens), or prefer (International residents)?
Among American citizens, Obama beats McCain handily in the unscientific poll.
Candidate
Respondents
Percent
Obama
224
45.6%
McCain
102
20.8%
Undecided
79
16.1%
I don’t plan to vote
29
5.9%
I prefer not to say
29
5.9%
Other
28
5.7%
491
100.0%
Among Second Life’s large population of non-American citizens, the preference for Obama is even stronger.
Candidate
Respondents
Percent
Obama
330
57.5%
McCain
41
7.1%
Undecided
41
7.1%
I don’t plan to vote
109
19.0%
I prefer not to say
37
6.4%
Other
16
2.8%
574
100.0%
Mallon’s poll remains open to the public until September 30, at which point he’ll publish his data about Second Life usage. Second Life residents can take the poll by clicking here.
SECOND LIFE, Sept 11 (Reuters) - OpenSim remains in pre-release and the interoperability standards to allow avatars to travel between virtual worlds are still being drafted. But that’s not stopping entrepreneurs from creating a fledgling industry around what’s to come.
Enter Metaverse Ink, which its creators say is the first search engine to find objects on both the Second Life Grid and in OpenSim worlds.
The product presents both a vindication and challenge for Linden Lab. OpenSim-using startups demonstrate the enduring faith of many in Linden founder Philip Rosedale’s vision for virtual worlds. But Metaverse Ink is also a competitive threat. In a July interview with Reuters Linden VP Joe Miller named “search services” as a potential revenue stream for his company in the coming age of interoperability.
Traditionally within Second Life, as residents grow more adept at building content they form in-world businesses and sell their creations to other users. Linden Lab frequently touts the number of users with a positive currency inflow — over 61,000 according to the latest statistics — in its marketing.
But with OpenSim in the works, some of Second Life’s most talented programmers are beginning to form businesses that compete directly against Linden Lab.
“Linden Lab’s search is bad, it’s like AltaVista in the old days,” said Metaverse Ink co-founder William Cook (Second Life: Felix Wakmann), a computer science professor at the University of Texas at Austin.
Cook and co-founder Cristina Videira Lopes (Second Life: Diva Canto), a computer science professor at the University of California at Irvine, have designed a series of automated programs, called “bots,” to search through both Second Life and OpenSim. The results of their searches are indexed and made searchable to users, in much the same way Google does for the World Wide Web.
To date the MI database catalogs over two million virtual objects, spread over 100,000 regions.
Problems with Linden’s built-in search functionality have been ongoing, and this isn’t the first time a third party has tried to create an independent virtual worlds search engine. A similar attempt to index Second Life by the Electric Sheep Company last year was abandoned after a protest campaign by Second Life users over privacy concerns.
MI says their product respects user wishes. “We’re only publishing things marked ‘for search,’” Lopes said. “These bots can ’see’ everything, but not everything should be seen.”
Cook said his new company isn’t yet looking for venture capital, and is currently focusing on attracting users beyond MI’s current average of about 900 a day. A third MI partner from Techcoastworks, a California-based incubator, is helping to commercialize the product.
But Cook, a serial entrepreneur, has worked with VC firms in the past, having raised US$60 million for a previous start-up from sources including Benchmark Capital, which also funded Linden Lab.
Lopes said MI is the first company to be indexing OpenSim worlds for search. But how does she feel that Linden Lab has said search is an area it wants to explore in the future?
Lopes paused. “Well, we’re doing it already,” she said.
SECOND LIFE, Sept 7 (Reuters) - As they have every year for four years, the Second Life faithful tore themselves away from their computers for a weekend of real-life travel to celebrate Linden Lab’s virtual world at SLCC, the Second Life Community Convention.
But this year far fewer of them came out.
SLCC was in Tampa this year, and some said hurricane fears were keeping people at home. Others blamed a sluggish real-world economy and rising airfare prices. Event organizers said only 400 people attended SLCC this year, half of last year’s attendance in Chicago.
Notably absent from the conference were any real-world businesses from outside the virtual worlds industry, or the consulting firms that only last year built Second Life presences for real-world brands. “We invited the Electric Sheep Company and Rivers Run Red, but both apparently decided they didn’t want to attend,” said SLCC organizer Peter Lokke (Second Life: Crucial Armitage).
“In terms of external business use of Second Life, what we see now isn’t marketing but businesses using Second Life for things like training and meetings,” said Linden Lab’s Glenn Fisher at a panel on SLCC’s sparsely-attended business track. Unlike last year’s conference in Chicago, most of the discussions revolved around issues of relevance only to in-world L$-based enterprises.
Fisher argued businesses were still using his company’s virtual world despite the lack of attendance at SLCC. “Businesses are keeping it quiet because they see being in Second Life as a competitive advantage.”
Second Life founder Philip Rosedale kicked off the event at a Saturday morning breakfast where he was received with warm but not ecstatic applause.
“Last year when I was here I had the ‘Missing Image’ T-shirt,” Rosedale said, alluding to his apology for bugs at SLCC 2007. “I think we made pretty good progress.”
The Second Life community has its own ideas. New Linden CEO Mark Kingdon followed Rosedale and asked the crowd: “We’re working hard to improve stability. Are you seeing that?” But Kingdon’s question was met with a stony silence from the crowd.
A handful of sessions about open source attracted large crowds with people sitting in the aisles and standing in the back of the room.
But the breakout star of SLCC was the burgeoning virtual world educational community. Second Life’s teachers ran three tracks simultaneously all weekend and held an extra full day of sessions on Friday before SLCC formally started. The educators had their own parties, programs, and event name (”SLEDcc”), acting as a conference-within-a-conference.
While the interest of real-world companies and the consulting firms catering to them has waned, most attendees weren’t bothered. Talks formal and informal ran all weekend, with attendees bragging to each other about scoring invites to the exclusive Linden Lab corporate party. And on Saturday night, Second Life dressed up for a night of kinky fun at Kevin Alderman’s (Second Life: Stroker Serpentine) annual “Leather & Lace Ball.”
But even Alderman’s masquerade ball reflected the more modest nature of SLCC this year. Fewer partygoers dressed up in costume than last year, and there was nary a furry in sight.
Nicolas Barrial (Second Life: Nick Rhodes) claims to have been among the first 1000 users of Second Life and the first French national with an avatar. He traveled 14 hours from Paris to Tampa for the event.
Barrial reveled in the chance to link with friends old and new. “First and foremost, SLCC is like a family gathering,” he said.
A year ago at the Second Life Community Convention in Chicago, Reuters asked: What will the next year bring in Second Life?
Some of those predictions didn’t come true. Jeska Linden’s hope for open-sourced servers didn’t happen (although OpenSim is doing something very similar), and Izzy Linden’s prediction of 20 million avatars didn’t materialize (total registrations just topped 15 million). Other forecasts, like whether Second Life residents enjoy better sex or a more stable environment than they did a year ago, remain a matter of personal opinion.
But with an eye towards the future, once again Reuters asked SLCC: What will the next year bring in Second Life?
Philip Rosedale, founder of Second Life.
“More use of Second Life to support education and business collaboration.”
Dick Dillon (”Coughran Mayo”), Addiction Recovery Professional
“OpenSim is a reality which is coming. The Second Life Grid isn’t the only place avatars will hang out.”
Chadrick Baker, virtual worlds consultant, former Linden Lab employee
“It depends on what Linden does! I see Linden having some serious competition.”
“Phoenix Linden” (declined to give real-life name), Linden Lab employee
“We’ll go six months without a central server crash.”
“We see virtual worlds going in the same direction the World Wide Web did. A company like Reuters will be able to host its own virtual world without relying on Second Life.”
Peter Lokke (”Crucial Armitage”), SLCC Chief Organizer
“There’s a lot more competition in-world. People aren’t going to be making as much money in Second Life as they used to.”
Chris Collins (”Fleep Tuque”), SL Education Track Organizer
“The development of the metaverse moves as slow as molasses. I don’t expect much change at all.”
When a question was asked on Saturday about poor Second Life performance on the Apple Macintosh, Philip Rosedale leapt up from the SLCC audience and took the microphone.
“We’re serious about support for the Mac,” Rosedale said. “But we’ve had our problems with Apple.”
Linden employee “Phoenix Linden” joined in, saying Apple doesn’t release information about their proprietary video card drivers in a timely fashion, making it hard for Linden to keep the Mac version of the viewer running smoothly.
Rosedale said Linden had done a good job with the Mac viewer despite the difficulty working with Apple. “We have access to crash rates,” Rosedale said. “Crash rates on the Mac are the same as on the PC. Frame rates too.”
Linden Lab and OpenSim developers shared the stage at an SLCC panel called “Open Software For Open Worlds,” and said there was nothing in the works to support spending Linden dollars anywhere but on the Second Life Grid.
During Q&A, Mike Lorrey (Second Life: Intlibber Brautigan) told the panelists he thought Second Life’s “killer app” was money — Linden’s own virtual currency and residents’ ability to start a Second Life business and turn a profit.
Could the Linden Dollar ever come to OpenSim worlds? Linden’s director of open source development Rob Lanphier said he had no idea how to make that work.
“We’re not going to pretend we know how to export that in a way that protects Second Life’s economy,” Lanphier said. “I can’t project a timeline.”
Leading OpenSim developer Adam Frisby disagreed with Lorrey on the importance of virtual currency to the Second Life experience.
“Money doesn’t belong in the core [OpenSim] product build,” Frisby said. “Better to ask again in six or nine months.”
So what has Second Life founder Philip Rosedale been up to since handing over control of Linden Lab to new CEO Mark Kingdon four months ago?
Hanging out, mostly. “I’ve had a really relaxing summer,” a broadly smiling Rosedale told Reuters.
Rosedale had just come out of the morning breakfast at the Second Life Community Convention in Tampa, where he praised Kingdon’s leadership of the company he started. But Rosedale was quick to add he wasn’t done with Second Life or Linden Lab. These days, he’s concentrating on two projects: Working on improving Second Life’s user interface, and efforts to spread Second Life technology to developing nations.
But Second Life fans shouldn’t expect interface problems to be solved soon. “Look at Lively or Vivaty, they’re dealing with the same thing. This is a hard problem,” Rosedale said. “If there was a trivial solution, we would have done it already.”
SECOND LIFE, Sept 3 (Reuters) - Second Life users who frequently access the Internet from consumer-grade computers and laptops are about to find keeping touch with other avatars a lot easier.
Yesterday Linden Lab announced the launch of “SLim,” pronounced “slim,” an instant-messaging client that allows users to communicate with users inside Linden’s virtual world without running Second Life.
“When you’re running a system that doesn’t have a 3D card, SLim allows you to take your friends list with you,” said Linden VP Joe Miller. “Visually it looks a lot like other IM apps.”
Second Life only runs well on high-end gaming machines. On many computers, particularly laptops, the Second Life viewer software runs so slowly even typing can be difficult. Miller said SLim was designed to tackle that problem.
The software will tie to an avatar’s friends list of contacts, and users inside Second Life will be able to see who’s on SLim but not in 3D virtual space.
In addition to sending text messages in and out of Second Life (or to other SLim users) like AOL’s AIM or Google’s Gtalk, the SLim client will support voice-over-IP calls in a manner similar to eBay’s Skype.
One notable feature of SLim will be support for VoIP voicemail. Users who register for the service will be able to set up a voicemail greeting and accept VoIP messages of up to five minutes in length while offline, Miller said. Linden’s servers will email the voice message to its recipient as an MP3 file.
Miller said the service is expected to debut in a “First Look” version of the Second Life client software next week. Participation in SLim and voicemail will be on an opt-in basis, and users can set the destination email address for voicemail to a different address than the payment contact for their secondlife.com account.
The service will be available on all platforms which support Second Life, including Windows, Macintosh, and Linux environments.
SECOND LIFE, Sept 3 (Reuters) - IBM, a company long at the forefront of exploring the business applications of virtual worlds, announced on Wednesday it has added support for 3D chat to its Lotus Sametime instant messaging software.
Users of “Sametime 3D” who are collaborating on a business document will be able to meet in a variety of virtual worlds, with IBM’s software handling the logins transparently, said Neil Katz, a company spokesman who worked on the project. Platforms supported by IBM include OpenSim, SecondLife, Forterra, and ActiveWorlds.
Katz said IBM will initially be working with select customers to test the new software’s capabilities, before rolling it out to the mainstream.
IBM foresees uses for corporate 3D chat such as walking customers through the replacement of a computer part by rezzing a 3D model. The Sametime 3D integration also smooths the process of importing data from an application such as Powerpoint into a virtual world.
While reliability issues have plagued virtual worlds such as Second Life, corporate applications may be made to run in a more stable manner, particularly using OpenSim.
“We’re creating a room with 20 or 30 users, we’re not building a persistent virtual world with thousands or hundreds of thousands of concurrent users,” he said.
SECOND LIFE, August 26 (Reuters) - The real-world economy may be slipping into recession, but the global slowdown isn’t impacting Second Life. According to recently released company statistics, Linden Lab’s in-world economy is larger than ever.
Over 61,000 avatars earned more Linden dollars (Second Life’s in-world currency) in July than they spent. That’s a 5.7 percent month-to-month gain in the number of profitable in-world businesses and the most on record.
User hours grew for the fourth consecutive month to 34.7 million in July, also a new record. However, the user hours number may be unreliable given the proliferation of computer-run avatars, or “bots,” throughout the Grid.
Economic activity grew briskly. Over US$9.5 million was traded on the LindeX, a 5.5 percent gain from June and a new record. User-to-user transactions in July stood at L$8.4 billion (about US$31.3 million), a 7.3 percent gain from June and the most currency transactions since the gambling ban in July of last year.
The sole dark spot for Second Life was the continuing decline in premium accounts. Linden shed an additional 1,410 premiums in July — over 45 a day and the seventh consecutive month premiums declined.
The principal benefit of a premium account is land-ownership privileges on Second Life’s mainland, where avatars have neighbors and enjoy a sense of community. Linden Lab has been unable to grow the mainland for three months due to weak demand, but private islands have grown to occupy 1.7 billion square meters, an 8.7 percent gain from June.
In recent months Linden Lab has announced a series of beautification and zoning initiatives in an attempt to restore user interest in the mainland.
SECOND LIFE, August 21 (Reuters) - Browser-based virtual world Vivaty, currently accessible through Facebook and AOL Instant Messenger will be embeddable by users on blogs and pages throughout the Web within the next two months, CEO Keith McCurdy said this week.
McCurdy also said Vivaty is internally testing the technology on the Firefox web browser, and expects to announce official support for Mozilla’s browser “in the next few weeks.” Presently Vivaty only runs within the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser on Windows.
There’s no timetable at present to extend support for Vivaty to the Macintosh, he said.
While every virtual world is scrambling for users and attention, the competition closest to Vivaty may be Lively by Google. Like Vivaty, Lively is a browser-based virtual world embedded in IE. Vivaty and Lively launched on the same day.
McCurdy said Google’s presence only validates Vivaty’s idea. “Before we launched, people asked: Why be in the browser?” he said. “After Google launched — or echo-launched — we get almost none of those questions.”
“Their product looks very different. They have a cartoon look, we have more of a Sims look,” he said.
Vivaty’s goal is to allow avatars to create a virtual space that ties into the rest of their web presence. Already users can hang a virtual picture frame on their wall, and have it display images from a Flickr account. Tighter integration between Vivaty and Facebook (already a partner) and Twitter are all in the works.
“People will have a lot more ability to pull stuff in from the rest of the Internet,” he said. “Brands love that.”
Coke Zero and Target are early Vivaty branding partners. “Second Life has brands coming into Second Life, but then they’re locked in,” McCurdy said. “We turned that inside out.”
Embedding a Vivaty scene on a corporate web site is more attractive to advertisers, he said.
Further expansion of Vivaty Create, a user-generated content tool, is planned. McCurdy doesn’t expect problems with pornography or griefing. “We’ll have people who will check content, and you’ll have the community check content,” he said.
But while McCurdy wants to further open up his virtual world to outside developers and add more avatar customization, he doesn’t see that as Vivaty’s draw.
“We’re not trying to be a 3D modeling program,” he said. “We’re erring on the side of simple, easy-to-use, and mass-market.”
The newest destination for talent scouts looking to sign fresh acts is Second Life.
Boutique label Reality Entertainment has signed popular Second Life musician Von Johin to a record deal. Wagner James Au runs a lengthy interview with Johin, who performs weekly shows in the virtual world.
For the most part, however, he no longer has any interest playing live in person. “This is more fun,” he says, referring to his virtual stage. “No gas costs, no travel, worldwide audience, exciting new people, no smoke, no drunks on the road, no hassles.”
But what does “sign a record deal” really mean in 2008? The Metaverse Journal takes a contrarian approach to the news: “Any individual can now publish their music worldwide on iTunes using services like TuneCore for the princely sum of US $9.99 per year.”
Regardless, any deal can only be seen as encouraging news for Second Life’s burgeoning music scene.
In This Issue: SLCC 2007 and Het-Grid | Civic Center: Casinos Away | Name Dropping: Robbie Dingo | As We See It: New Features vs. Bug Fixing: A defense of features | Your Letters: SL Voice: Another Valuable Choice | Developer Focus: Real Estate in Second Life: Coldwell Banker Enters the Market | Teen Grid: Interview with Katharine Berry | Tips & Tricks: Don't Miss the Active Speakers Window | Fab Five: Outstanding EDU Spots | Best Bets: Romantic Spots
In This Issue: Virtual Fundraiser | Name Dropping: Second Life Birthday Volunteers | As We See It: SL Voice - Another Valuable Choice | Your Letters: Missed Opportunities | Teen Grid: Second Life Best Practices in Education | Tips & Tricks: The Public Issue Tracker | Fab Five: Sculpted Prim Contest Winenrs | Best Bets: Nashville's Blurbird Cafe & The Avastar!
In This Issue: Second Life Turns 4! | Civic Center: Local Governance Control to the Grid | Name Dropping: Thanks are in Order | As We See It: Missed Opportunities | Your Letters: Education in Different Forms | Developer Focus: Second Life: Sitting High on Capitol Hill | Teen Grid: Teen Grid gets a remake | Tips & Tricks | Fab Five: Five Outstanding Environments | Best Bets: Live Music Venues!
In This Issue Radio Linden Is Being Replaced With Podcasts! | Civic Center: If It Sounds Too Good To Be True | Name Dropping: Thanks are in Order | As We See It: Education Is An Essential Part Of The Second Life Experience | Your Letters: Lindens Need Parties Too | Developer Focus: Dublin: Creating Community One Pint at a Time | Teen Grid: Eye4You Alliance | Tips & Tricks: Knowledgebase | Fab Five: Role Playing Games | Best Bets: Voice in Second Life: Beta Test Opens!
In This Issue SECOND LIFE GOES OPEN SOURCE! | Better World: Never Underestimate the Value of a Virtual Yak | Civic Center: The DMCA and YOU | Name Dropping: Thanks are in Order | As We See It: Linden Presence in Second Life | Your Letters: Diversity and an Open Community | Developer Focus: Cybraries: More than Just an Online Library | Teen Grid: Private Islands: Teen Grid Style | Tips & Tricks: Knowledgebase
In This Issue --> The Winter Festival: Join Us In Celebration | The Teen Grid: Campus Visit | Name Dropping: Teaching Others | Developer Focus: Infinite Expression | Civic Center: Bigger and Better | Tips and Tricks: Torley's Video Tips - Take Two | As We See It: Diversity and an Open Community | Your Letters: Growing the Community
In This Issue --> End Real World Hunger in SL? Help the UN | Virtual News: Now Read This! | The Teen Grid: Checking In | Name Dropping: Welcoming New Friends | Developer Focus: Need Advice? | Police Blotter: Renewing Customer Support | Tips and Tricks: Advanced Snapshot Magic | Editorial: Growing the Community | Your Letters: Serendipity in Disaster
In This Issue --> Burning Life: Burn Baby Burn | Global: We're Going International | Teen Grid: Claudia's Tour, Part Two | Name Dropping: Beyond Helpful | Developer Focus: Goin' Fishin' | Police Blotter: Alt Accounts and Griefing | Tips and Tricks: Account Security | Editorial: Serendipity in Disaster | Your Letters: Blog Your Way to the Future
In This Issue --> Second Life Movie Trailer Contest Winner: Second Life - Get One | Developer Resources: Learn How to be a Developer Superstar | Teen Grid: What Ming Chen did on his Summer Vacation | Name Dropping: Superstar Groups | Developer Focus: Architecture and Second Life | Police Blotter: Disclosure!! | Tips and Tricks: Lateral Features for Better Second Living | Editorial: Blog the Way | Your Letters: Open Channels
In This Issue --> Trailer Contest: Call for Entries | Spreading Hope: Second Annual Relay for Life | Teen Grid: Teen Grid Fly-Over | Name Dropping: Thanks are in Order | Developer Focus: Coming Soon - Second Life Developer University | Police Blotter: Disturbing the Peace | Tips and Tricks: Taking Snapshots | Editorial: Welcome to the Free Press | Your Letters: How Much Growth is Enough?
In This Issue --> Second Life Community Convention: Register Now! | Call for Entries: Submit Your Art | Teen Grid: Making Learning Fun | Name Dropping: Helping Residents Find Their Niche | Developer Focus: American Apparel Breaks New Ground | Police Blotter: Assault | Tips and Tricks: Creating Machinima | Editorial: How Much Growth is Enough? | Your Letters: Open Channels
In This Issue --> Radio Linden: Its Live | Teen Grid: Earning Money | Name Dropping: Who Let the Dogs Out? | Police Blotter: Indecency | Editorial: The Evolution of a Self-Sustaining Economy | Your Letters: Linden Subsidies
In This Issue --> Teen Grid: First Anniversary | Developer Focus: Marvin the Robot Comes to Life | Name Dropping: Stroke Support, Helping Partners | Police Blotter: Intolerance | Editorial: Linden Subsidies | Your Letters: Bush Signs in SL
In This Issue --> The Second Opinion Gets a Facelift | Getting Creative: Study The Artistic Promise of Digital Life | Name Dropping: Do Unto Others | Police Blotter: Getting Terminated | Developer Focus: Attach a HUD | Editorial: A Sign of the Times
In This Issue --> FREE Account Giveaway | In-world Video Simulcast on Second Life Website | Cory Doctorow Book Signing | SL in the Press | New World Notes
In This Issue --> Coming Soon: Mozilla-powered web browsing in Second Life | Hair to Share: Big hair and big hair discounts | Breaking into the Game Industry with Second Life | SL in the Press | New World Notes
In This Issue --> Private Detectives Come to Second Life! | Numbakulla Adventure Game | Developers Corner: Export Poser Animations | SL in the Press | New World Notes
In This Issue --> Resident Profile: Chip Midnight, Master of Skins | Snapzilla Conquers Second Life! | Movie Magic - Stream Quicktime Movies into Second Life | GDC: Post-Party Report | SL in the Press | New World Notes
In This Issue --> Fall Fashion | For Sale! | Bush vs. Kerry | Philip Linden's Blog | New World Notes
11-9-6
This is going to be my journal of my doings in Second Life®. If you don't know Second Life is a virtual world, technically a MMORPG (Massively Multi-user Online Role Playing Game). I've heard stories of people quitting their real job and just surviving on the money they make in Second Life®. Now that's something that gets my attention. Not that I want to quit my job, but I like making money. I think there has to be a way to make some money off this site since so many other people are doing it. If Scion has a car dealership in this world, selling 3d models of their cars and Lexus is considering it, then I have to think that there can be some money made here. My plan is to create some 3d applications and sell them through a kiosk based store. So I never have to be there and as long as I make more money than my monthly charge, I'm in the gravy.
So I created my character yesterday and of course I had to give him a mohawk. You can really chose every aspect of the character to customize, from the angle of the eyebrows to the amount of wrinkles in their pants. There are a lot of people selling virtual clothes and people offering to make the avatars (that's the character that represents you on the screen) look just like you or anything else you like. I've also heard that there are people that are walking around looking like a T-Rex but I haven't seen that yet. I have seen elephants for sale here. I don't know what I'd do with it but I'm thinking about it because it sounds pretty cool.
So I'm thinking of all the ways that I can make money in this virtual world and I've got a few good ones. I was amazed at all the porn related shops that there are, so I don't want to milk a dead cow so I'm not going down that road, but I did have to investigate it and people are actually paying for sex in this game. Not for real world sex but for cyber sex with 3d characters. I couldn't believe it when I stumbled across a section of town that was filled with escorts! So I had to check it out. I wasn't looking to have cybersex so I was able to talk her down to 100L (1 cent US) to have her play the lapdance animations and the blowjob animations.
While most actions people take in the flesh are ephemeral - performed fleetingly, and unmarked - MMOGs and virtual environments keep that data as a rule, usually most or all of it.
Some consider him a kook or an eccentric, while others think of him as a technological visionary. Either way, the accomplished 
Since the rollout of 
Australian Communications Minister, Senator Stephen Conroy, has 
A while back, 
It's the sixth anniversary of 
Stratim Capital, an institutionally funded secondary-market private-equity firm, 
Linden Lab have made a new 
While online economies can seem to be (and often are) fundamentally different from AFK economies, there's a key component that makes any online economy function in ways that are all-too-familiar.
