New World Notes

Meme Challenge: If Facebook's Like Vodka Cranberry, What Drink Is Second Life Like, and Why?

A dude named Patrick Moberg has some fun comparing drinks and drugs to various Web 2.0 systems. Facebook's like a vodka cranberry, as we see here, and Digg's more like a bong, because it's full of "Sensationalist political and religious talk," but "Plans of overthrowing mass media fall prey to collective laziness." Second Life isn't included, so I figure we should help Mr. Mobergdo the heavy lifting. What drink is SL like, and why? Bonus challenge: No comparing Second Life to LSD or mushrooms, that's too easy. Image credit: Patrick Moberg. Hat tip: Andrew Sullivan.

Are the Lindens Planning a Cloud-Based Second Life?

When the Lindens introduced their behind-the-firewall, Second Life Enterprise solution, many scratched their heads at the high $50,000 starting price, which will surely limit its market. But taking a hint from Linden CPO Tom Hale, architect Jeanricard Broek thinks the Lindens have a longer term strategy in mind here: Introducing the next version of Second Life, which will be cloud-based, like the upcoming technology recently announced by nNvidia. "Just think," says Broek:

No viewer required, full IP protection, Natal ready. Remember Lotus & Mitch Kapor failed to lead with a GUI for 123 and Microsoft ate them alive. I don't think the lesson went unlearned.

I'd note that a cloud-based metaverse was recently suggested to me by OnLive's CEO. As Steve Perlman put it to me, "You could design the next Second Life on this!" So even if the Lindens aren't working on it, as Monsieur Ricard put it, "someone else will."

How To Make Second Life Truly Mass Market, Part 3: Linden Dollar Prepaid Cards Sold at Retail

I noticed this display in my local drugstore chain the other day, a whole section devoted to prepaid debit cards for all manner of goods and services -- international calling minutes, iTunes downloads, Amazon purchases, and so on. You're bound to see still more of these display racks in retail stores over the holidays, as they make an ideal last-minute gift. Looking closer, I noticed roughly a third of the entire rack were prepaid cards for virtual currencies, for videogame consoles, social games, and some of the major virtual worlds and MMOs, including the largest web-based title, Habbo:

One virtual currency selection is painfully missing, of course: Linden Dollars. While Second Life almost certainly has some of the highest average revenue per user rates of any freemium virtual world, the payment process (via credit card, for the most part) still remains frustrating at best. A prepaid retail card would make it generally easier to buy Linden Dollars, while fostering mainstream adoption in several ways:

• Organic Promotion: The mere existence of a Linden Dollar prepaid card in retail stores would turn Second Life into "impulse buy".
• Market Adaption: As with Habbo, most of the large virtual worlds and MMOs popular with kids have a prepaid card offering. A Linden Dollar card would align Second Life with their buying habits as they turn 18.
• Boost Conversion: Most people give up on Second Life within the first few hours of installation. A prepaid card instantly acts as a conversion incentive, nudging them past the painful learning curve with the reassurance that they're entering a new place with spending money in hand.

These would be the likely immediate effects of a retail card. The likely medium term consequence is also a good one: by adding more consumers into the Second Life economy, the best content creators will have a reason to build and expand their business beyond the existing market, which counts about 465,000 or so, a number that hasn't substantially grown in the last couple years. (It was 300,000 in 2007.)

If you live in Southeast Asia, you actually can buy pre-paid cards for Linden Dollars. A small Singapore company called First Meta recently introduced this service. Perhaps not coincidentally, the nations with the biggest spenders of Linden Dollars are (proportionally speaking) Hong Kong and Malaysia, where First Meta cards are sold. But with the majority of Second Life spenders in the US and EU, real growth awaits the appearance of those cards in your local Target.

Part Three of a series, introduced here, to explain why mass market adoption is so important. Part One: "Deep Integration With Facebook", Part Two: "Point-and-Click Avatar Movement"

Five Favorite New World Notes Posts From Last Week

• Are popular, bruised-up female avatar skins misogynist, or making a feminist point? Be sure to read the fascinating conversation in Comments.
• Second Life pricing policies seem to be sorely hampered by formulating them within Second Life itself.
• Readers offer Thanksgiving weekend thanks to Residents who make Second Life worthwhile.
• Willow Caldera clues in on the ambient live keyboard stylings of Torben Asp.
• Five ways the BBC's latest Second Life article fails.

Weekend Machinima: Creative Anarchy Still Reigns In Second Life's Public Sandboxes

As documented by a machinamist named nickiname Munro, here's some non-stop free build anarchy in Goguen, one of Second Life's original public sandboxes. Includes possible lewdness and highly liberal interpretations of the fair use doctrine:

Want to see how crazy Goguen can be? Go look for yourself: Direct SLurl teleport to Goguen at this link. Hat tip: SL Update.

NWN in Japanese:Philip Rosedaleの新会社は、リンデンLove Machineの新版を作っている--オリジナル開発者のCory Ondrejkaが意見を述べる

  彼の新会社のブログに載っているように、最近、Philip Rosedaleは色々と言われていたことについて認めた：彼の会社の手始めは、リンデンのインターナルシステムであるLove Machine、賞賛の言葉をスタッフみんなに広げ、積み上げていくシステムの新版を作ることだ。

Continue reading "NWN in Japanese:Philip Rosedaleの新会社は、リンデンLove Machineの新版を作っている--オリジナル開発者のCory Ondrejkaが意見を述べる"

Thanksgiving Weekend Open Forum: Who In Second Life Are You Thankful For?

Who are the creators, the volunteers, the leaders, the innovators, the artists and musicians, the catalysts, the educators, the thinkers, the lovers, the explorers, the comedians, the iconoclasts, the entrepeneurs, the joy bringers, and everyone else that makes Second Life worthwhile? Share them in Comments, and I'll highlight as many as I can.

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Chestnut's Choices: Royal Opera House London Mixed Reality Performace Art, Alice's Restaurant Masacree Live, "The Nutcracker" Ballet Live on Stage and Other Exciting Events

Chestnut Rau’s weekly round-up of upcoming SL events…

On Friday 11/27 and again on Saturday 11/28 at 1:15pm you are invited to a most unusual live mixed reality  performance, "The Second Death of Saspar Helenale" This show takes place in SL and onstage at the Royal Opera House, London. Caspar Helendale invites you to attend his death; a funeral service held simultaneously in the real and virtual worlds. He has been exploring mortality since he was first created, and in his last twenty minutes of existence he will share his thoughts with collected mourners. He will be accompanied by his widow-to-be, Trixiebelle Landar, whose requiem will be performed live and streamed back into the virtual world over the course of the service. Via live onstage musicians and a giant projection screen, the theatre audience will join SL residents to reflect and mourn, as the real and virtual worlds collide at the point where Caspar’s light is forever extinguished…

You may join the funeral service in SL at in a mausoleum, pictured above, constructed specially for the event by SL architectural guru Keystone Bouchard. There is a capacity of 40 avatars for each service. To book your place, please IM Drifter Rhode in advance (stating which day you'd like to attend). Or, at the Royal Opera House in London.  Go here  for further details. 

Also after the break: 16 Days of Activism to Stop Violence Against Women, Classical Music Thanksgiving, Alizarin Goldflake Immersive Art Installation and more

Continue reading "Chestnut's Choices: Royal Opera House London Mixed Reality Performace Art, Alice's Restaurant Masacree Live, "The Nutcracker" Ballet Live on Stage and Other Exciting Events"

Bettina Tizzy Joins New World Notes To Write Homages of Great Second Life Artists!

On Thanksgiving, an announcement to give thanks for: I'm very proud to announce that Bettina Tizzy, the Second Life art maven who recently discontinued her influential blog, will be writing a regular series on this blog, tentatively called "Bettina's Homage".

"I will be paying a monthly tribute to the greatest artists," she tells me. "Of course, I'll always be looking for great new artists, too!" Look for her first post here very soon, and if you know of new creators she should give her attention to, please suggest them in Comments. Meantime, be sure to follow her lovely mini-blog, A Digital Shoebox, for snack-sized selections of great creativity in SL and worlds beyond.

Willow's Playlist: Ambient Keyboard with Torben Asp - Think Kraftwerk Meets Mozart

Exclusive to NWN, Willow Caldera covers SL's burgeoning live music scene

On those happy days when there's nothing pressing to be done and the idle time stretches ahead, you need musical accompaniment that's as chilled out as you are. Torben Asp, quite fortunately, is on hand to provide a soundtrack to the laziest of days; his own personal brand of self-composed ambient keyboard is mellow enough to slow the most stressed of heartbeats.   

This video was shot by Sound'r at The Forest and features the original song (and my personal favourite), "Senses".

"In 1998 I bought the first music software for the PC and then things started moving with composing and presenting my stuff on different websites," says Torben. "Suddenly I could express everything I wanted to through my music... and today, well, it is a great pleasure to be composing and through SL I can get immediate feedback. 'Stay or Go?' I always ask the audience when I have presented a new composition... they most kindly say 'Stay!' every time."

Torben has been a Second Life resident for almost three years, performing live for two of those after Jess Oranos overheard him playing his music to test a Shoutcast stream and cajoled him into presenting it at an open mic night.

Continue reading "Willow's Playlist: Ambient Keyboard with Torben Asp - Think Kraftwerk Meets Mozart"

Ophelia's Gaze: Bruised Avatar Skins -- Stylish, Or Sexist?

Exclusive to NWN, Iris Ophelia's ongoing showcase of all things stylish in SL

In mid-October, one of SL's most successful skin designers released a set of skins that stirred up tremendous controversy. Gala Phoenix of Curio launched her Battle Royale skins, which feature her usual fabulous shading and high quality textures, adorned with some equally high quality dirt, bruises, blood, scratches, scars and gouges. Reactions were mixed, to say the least; in fact, they often verged on heated. Is a woman with a bruised eye presumed battered, or could she be battle-hardened? I've got a few thoughts on the issue after the cut.

Continue reading "Ophelia's Gaze: Bruised Avatar Skins -- Stylish, Or Sexist?"

Colossal Confusion: Lindens Explain User Feedback Approach For Shaping New xStreetSL Freebies Policy

The controversy over the Lindens' recently announced policy on freebies sold on the company's ecommerce site xStreetSL continues to roil. In a reader survey which garnered a disproportionately large response, nearly 90% consider it a bad idea that won't improve the Second Life economy.

In response to Resident objections, Colossus Linden pointed out that the policy was shaped in large part by three in-world meetings. In effect suggesting: If you didn't attend a session and offer your feedback then, why are you complaining now? But here is the chief irony: as a synchronous, system-taxing, international platform contiguously limited to several dozen users, Second Life is not necessarily the ideal venue for holding large feedback sessions which involve a lot of text chat. Context and conversation gets lost in the barrage of multiple public and IM chat threads, those who use voice are stymied by those who don't and vice versa.

Or to put it another way: In its current state, using Second Life to shape Second Life policy seems like a recipe for confusion.

Noting that many Residents have suggested as much, I put that point in a question to the Lindens earlier today:

A lot of Residents are asking why Colossus made her decision on freebies mainly (or almost solely) based on feedback from three in-world sessions. Why weren't better feedback channels pursued, such as a poll on the xStreetSL site?

Linden rep Pink Linden replied to me this way:

Continue reading "Colossal Confusion: Lindens Explain User Feedback Approach For Shaping New xStreetSL Freebies Policy"

Open Forum: Who Should Apply for the 2010 Linden Prize?

The Lindens have opened up the application process for their 2010 Linden Prize, which awards USD$10,000 to SL projects that best fit these criterion:

• Work in Second Life that also achieves tangible, compelling results outside of Second Life.
• Distinctive, original work using Second Life that clearly demonstrates high quality, execution, function, aesthetics and technical sophistication.
• Work that has the capacity for inspiring and influencing future development, knowledge, creativity, and collaboration both inside and outside of Second Life.

Last year the awards went well-deservingly to Wikitecture, the wiki-style architecture program, and Virtual Ability, a community for disabled Residents. What projects should win next year's award?

In Survey, New World Notes Readers Predict Slow Growth of Second Life Enterprise

Here's the results of a survey I conducted a couple weeks ago, on the potential market for Second Life Enterprise, the Lindens' new "behind the firewall" solution. There are 14 clients for it now, and 60% of readers said that number will double, stay the same, or retract. Given that there are more than 1400 real world organizations in Second Life proper now, I think it's fair to characterize that as "slow" growth. For the record, I go along with the majority in this case -- I'm skeptical there's a growing demand for enterprise-based virtual worlds, especially at the $50K price the Lindens are charging, and believe we won't see significant growth until Second Life itself shows strong mass market adoption. Corporations and large organizations are much likelier to experiment with SL-based enterprise use when their clients, executives, and employees already have an existing facility (and passion) for the consumer version. What's your take?

Bryn Oh Adapts Second Life Art Installation Into Real Life Book (Something More Metaverse Artists Should Do)

Just in time for the holidays, acclaimed Second Life artist Bryn Oh is selling an illustrated book version of "The Rabbicorn", an immersive installation originally created in Second Life, then described as "poetic narrative, subtle ambient sound and beautiful visual artistry, part Gorey, part Poe, part Velveteen Rabbit", on indie book publishing site Blurb.com. (Price starts at $25, not a bad deal at all for a coffee table book with such beautifully composed set pieces.) "[A]s Christmas is coming," Bryn explains on her blog, "I decided to try and warp my niece's mind with the 'gift' of the Rabbicorn story. She is admittedly only 3 years old and won't really understand it, but I am hoping as years go by she will appreciate it on deeper levels." Great idea for her niece, for her many fans, and just as key, for all the people who might be interested in the concept of Second Life art, but do not yet have the time or inclination to get past SL's high barrier to entry, to experience it first hand. Many metaverse artists and their supporters bemoan the lack of wider recognition their often awesome works garner from the art world, and I feel their pain. But until Second Life becomes a truly mass market medium, I think the only viable solution is to bring the SL art out of the world -- via machinima, or in a tangible form such as Ms. Oh is offering now.

Hat tip: Andrew Sempere.

Five Facts About Second Life the BBC Doesn't Understand

The BBC's recent magazine article, "What Happened to Second Life?", written by Lauren Hansen and edited by Jonathan Duffy, is so incandescently bad, to read it is to feel the entire institution's credibility undermined. After all, if the BBC can get one relatively simple technology story so patently, thoroughly wrong, you have to wonder: What other news items are they bunging up as badly? Some 800 words long, it boasts at least five significant errors which erode its thesis almost wholly:

1. The BBC Misreported Second Life's User Numbers

"The number of people joining the site jumped from 450,000 to four million in 2007."

Hansen offers no citation for these figures, and they're contrary to all known data. By mid-2007, the number of reported Second Life registrations were well over 6 million. However, it's unclear what Hansen means by "joining the site", and I suspect she isn't clear on the concept either. In 2007, the number of SL registrants who actually became active, returning users was closer to 500,000. (This is considerable growth from 2006, when total returning users totaled about 200,000.)

2. The BBC Misinterpreted Media Coverage Trends of Second Life

"But just as quickly as it had flared, media interest ebbed away. References plummeted by 40% in 2008 and dropped further this year."

While it's true media coverage of Second Life has fallen from its nosebleed peaks of 2007, it does not follow that media interest has "ebbed away". Take a look at Google Trends, where interest in Second Life began spiking in mid-2006, shortly after the BusinessWeek cover story, universally recognized as the start of the SL hype wave:

While there's a definite drop, there's also a definite stabilizing of attention which is far above pre-hype levels. And in fact, Second Life still gets prominent media coverage. In the last 12 months, for example, the New York Times Magazine (arguably the world's most culturally influential publication) published two features on Second Life -- on its architecture, and on its arts scene. No other virtual world receives such prominent attention.

For comparison's sake, consider SL against YoVille, the Facebook-based virtual world from current Silicon Valley darling Zynga, which now counts nearly 20 million active users:

Continue reading "Five Facts About Second Life the BBC Doesn't Understand"

Weekly Recap: My Eight Favorite NWN Posts From Last Week

• Is the Linden's Upcoming xStreetSL Freebies Policy Good For the Second Life Economy?
• Lyric's Desire: Erotic SL Machinima From Lyric Lundquist
• Ophelia's Gaze: Three Favorites From The Vanity Universe Skin Fair -- And How To Wear Them
• Linden Partners With Online Gambling Service To Handle Online/International Payments
• Willow's Playlist: Blindboy Gumbo, Slide Guitar and Cheeky Rhythm n' Blues From Northern England!
• Second Life Stat of the Day: Only 6% of SL Land Is "Adult" Rated For Pornographic Content
• Bettina's Back: SL's Art Maven Returns To Blogging, But Better Than Ever
• Philip Rosedale's New Company Building Version of Linden Love Machine -- Original Inventor Cory Ondrejka Weighs In

NWN in Japanese:セカンドライフ住人 最年長は97歳

ロサンゼルスの建築家David Dentonは、セカンドライフを仕事のツールとして使っている（近いうちにさらに記事にする予定）。同僚がSLは複雑すぎると嘆く時、彼は面白い答えかたをする。「私の９７歳の母親が出来るんだから、君だって出来るだろう。」

Continue reading "NWN in Japanese:セカンドライフ住人　最年長は97歳"

New World Newsfeed: The BBC Joins Second Life Media Backlash Two Years Too Late

The BBC's news magazine has a grotesquely lopsided article curiously entitled "What happened to Second Life?", which largely recapitulates points from Wired's notorious anti-SL piece of 2007, which was fairly skewed in the first place. (It's astounding any credible media outlet would cite the experiences of American Apparel and Reuters' ill-fated SL bureau of two-three years ago as if they were relevant to Second Life as it is now.) As it happens, I was contacted by the BBC about this article yesterday, but wasn't able to respond in time. Not that that would have mattered, as the article's dubious thesis was already set in place by then. "We're running a story tomorrow about what happened to Second Life," the BBC's Jonathan Duffy told me brightly, "it seems to have slipped off the mainstream radar." Which is a strange thing to assert about an online world that's more than tripled its active user base since 2006, is used by numerous Fortune 500 companies and several branches of the US government, and is run by a company that was just ranked among the top 25 Internet start-ups. However, the BBC makes the classic mistake of confusing media attention with general attention. Then again, were the article called, "What happened to Second Life (when the BBC wasn't paying attention)?", it would be framed more accurately -- but would also point the failure where it actually belongs.

Open Forum: What Are the Best Blog Posts on xStreetSL's New Freebie Policy?

Controversy and anger over the new xStreetSL freebies policies continues, which you can see in this comment thread from yesterday. Ciaran Laval of Your 2nd Place has a pretty good post wondering how much user feedback was actually sought before the Lindens' implemented it. What other SL blog posts are worth reading?

Oxford Creates Immersive SL Space For World War I Poetry

I haven't had a chance yet to explore the War Poets Exhibition in Second Life, an extremely ambitious Oxford project that presents World War I poetry contextualized in an immersive simulation of WWI battlegrounds. However, the agile Emily Orr has, and after taking care of some personal business, has an observant review of the experience here: "The aid station was stark, terrifying. Bodies laid out as best they could, desperate conditions, too few nurses and too many wounded men, as happens in any war, all wars." More here.

Image: razorblade-cookies.blogspot.com

Why SL Inventory Transactions Fail, and What You Can Do About It -- Peter Stindberg Explains

Peter Stindberg has a very lucid and useful post on why inventory transfers in SL often fail -- a problem that's become so acute, the Lindens are thinking of making guaranteed delivery a for-pay premium service. Fortunately Peter has several suggestions for minimizing delivery failure, at least from your end. For example, I had no idea belonging to groups which send a lot of group notices tends to exacerbate the problem, but Mr. Stindberg says they do.

Deshima, New Roleplay SL Space Station Under Construction

Paulina Oceanlane of Who Let the Dorks Out explores Deshima Space Station, a massive, impressively detailed space colony still under construction but already boasting its own greenhouse and surrounding asteroid field. [SLurl teleport link] And what better way to explore it than as Paulina does, as a disembodied head with its own life support on a motorized unicycle? Oh yes.

Bizarre xStreetSL Products Get Their Own Snarky Blog (If It's Not Too Late)

NextStreetSL is a fun, Schadenfreude-ish blog devoted to snarking on the stranger items found on xStreetSL, the Lindens' ecommerce site. Featured at left, for instance: Virtual Percocet. (Warning: Occasional NSFW posts.) Anonymously written and relatively new, NextStreetSL arrives on the scene during peak controversy over recent xStreet policy changes against freebie items. Ironically, many of the products covered by the blog are freebies, so NextStreetSL may wind up becoming a historical record of products soon to get pulled. (Then again, unless it's being created in Second Life by the good people of Endo Pharmaceuticals, SL "Percocet" is an unauthorized trademarked product.) Hat tip: Ms. Alicia Chenaux.

Lyric's Desire: Erotic SL Machinima From Lyric Lundquist

There are many Second Life machinimas that aim to titillate with sexual imagery, but for my mojo, at least, few are actually sexy. Then there's "Sideways Time", the latest from Lyric Lundquist, whose expressionist machinima I've celebrated before, a geometric burst of sensual imagery. Possibly unsafe for work viewing, but more evocative, than explicit:

"Although there are sensual undertones in a lot of my machinima," Lyric tells me, "I really wanted to take it to another level with this video." She was inspired by the discovery of Igor Ballyhoo's latest creation [SLurl teleport link here]. "I was floored with how sensual and powerful it was. I was also hanging out a lot at Selavy Oh's installation while obsessively listening to the 'The White Flash' by Modeselektor." Both builds are featured in "Sideways Times", Ms. Lundquist's attempt "to create something that would evoke the viewer to feel the emotions that both installations made me feel."

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Chestnut's Choices 11/19 - 11/25: Fleet Week in New Babbage, Celebrate Two Years of the Crown & Pearl, Virtual Praxis Women's International Conference and much more

Chestnut Rau’s weekly round-up of upcoming SL event.....

New Babbage is a steampunk city-state located inside Second Life.   The builds are extraordinary and the community consists of dedicated roleplayers who are friendly and welcoming to visitors.  You can read all about New Babbage here and see beautiful machinima here. 

If you are interested in all things nautical, make sure you visit New Babbage for the first ever gathering of Second Life's Steamland Navies now through November 21st. Tonight at 7pm there will be epic naval skirmish featuring the navies of the steamlands slugging it out on the open ocean. The Fleet Review is Friday at 1pm wherein the Navies present themselves in their finest regalia for review by the Public. Please be sure to pick up a notecard at the TP landing point for the rest of the Fleet Week activities including a Shipbuilders Contest, Submarine Races, Windjammer Race, Epic Ironclad Battles and a fancy dress Uniform Ball.While you are there make sure to explore the wonders of this Steampunk community and meet its interesting residents.  In Port Babbage.    [SLurl teleport at this link]

Also after the break: The Originals Day-long Live Music Festival, Drama Libre Hosts The USO, Live Comedy, Music of the 1920s and much much more

Continue reading "Chestnut's Choices 11/19 - 11/25: Fleet Week in New Babbage, Celebrate Two Years of the Crown & Pearl, Virtual Praxis Women's International Conference and much more"

Survey on Linden's Upcoming Freebies Policy: Is It Good For the Second Life Economy?

Online Surveys & Market Research

The Lindens just announced a policy for its ecommerce site, targeting low-cost freebie items sold on XStreetSL: "[Since] the increasing quantities of free, cheap and stale goods are hindering that experience for shoppers and merchants alike," as Colussus Linden puts it, "we will take action to counteract and balance them within the marketplace, for the benefit of all." This will be done by adding small fees and commission charges to all xStreet sales, effectively penalizing extremely cheap items. The announcement has riled many content creators, including talented figures such as Ordinal Malaprop, who's retaliated by removing all her wares from the ecommerce site. Outrage aside, my main curiosity is this: As quality content offered at very low rates, freebies are often blamed for harming the SL economy. So will this new Linden policy help improve the economy, at least the aspects that are part of xStreetSL?Please take the survey, and discuss in Comments.

Hat tip: Wizard Gynoid.

Ophelia's Gaze: Three Favorites From The Vanity Universe Skin Fair -- And How To Wear Them

Exclusive to NWN, Iris Ophelia's ongoing showcase of all things stylish in SL

Vanity Universe's Skin Fair (SLURL link here), is running until Sunday November 22nd, and features a lot of new designers who weren't a part of the last fair, along with new releases from old favorites. Better yet, every designer at this Fair has an item out to benefit Care International, a poverty relief organization. If you're in the market for a fresh new face or a trendy makeup, the Skin Fair is the place to be this week. 

My favorite three fair finds are after the cut -- along with tips on wearing them well.

Continue reading "Ophelia's Gaze: Three Favorites From The Vanity Universe Skin Fair -- And How To Wear Them"

New World Newsfeed: Linden Partners With Online Gambling Service To Handle Online/International Payments

The Lindens have partnered with 888 Holdings, an online gambling company, to handle payment services, especially for international Second Life users. As M. Linden puts it in the press release, "[W]e’re pleased to work with them to provide easy and secure payment options for our users outside the United States." I was curious that the selected company is mainly known for providing online services for large casino concerns like Harrah’s Interactive Entertainment. Did this partnership mean the Lindens planned to re-instate L$-based gambling, which was banned in 2007 out of concern for US laws?

"That's not something on the current roadmap," Peter Linden told me by email. "The agreement is technically with Gisland, their payment processing division (888 Holdings is the public limited company, Dragonfish is the brand name of 888’s B2B Division, and Gisland is the operating company.) We're working together with Gisland on a cashier interface and other tools that will give Residents more payment options and make it easier for Residents to pay in a wider range of native currencies than they can now. Gisland will also help Linden Lab implement appropriate anti-fraud measures as we expand these payment options. In addition, Gisland will assist Residents directly with payment-related issues, including failed transactions."

Willow's Playlist: Blindboy Gumbo, Slide Guitar and Cheeky Rhythm n' Blues -- From Northern England!

Exclusive to NWN, Willow Caldera covers SL's burgeoning live music scene

Any performer capable of bringing soulful melody to a song about an adult toy is one worth listening to, and Blindboy Gumbo's cheeky sense of humour defines his on-stage presence - along with his gruff and gravelled voice and the kick of his slide guitar. All just part of his irresistible Northern UK charm:

This video was shot by Sound'r at the Cup and Spittle and features the original song 'Sleeping in the Ground'

If you ask him, he'll tell you he was raised by wild Hunting Hedgehogs, who passed on the secrets of rock n' roll guitar and then left him to his own musical devices in the north of England. Where he developed, it seems, a love for the blues and indie, with a little alternative country thrown in for good measure. Add to that a portfolio of original songs that range from sing-along ballads and hum-along rock to the one about the aforementioned plaything and you have a live set that brings more than its share of pleasant surprises.

"I started playing when I was a kid, maybe 7 or so, but didn't really take it seriously until after I left school," says Blindboy. "Why? Cos music is the one thing that gets me lost, I can just drift away, best drug in the world." 

Continue reading "Willow's Playlist: Blindboy Gumbo, Slide Guitar and Cheeky Rhythm n' Blues -- From Northern England!"

Second Life Stat of the Day: Only 6% of SL Land Is "Adult" Rated For Pornographic Content

Awhile ago I mentioned the invaluable work of Tyche Shepherd, a Resident who meticulously tracks in-world Second Life data such as "Incident" reports. In a recent report posted on the SL Universe Forum, she has exhaustive details on the full scope of Second Life land, summarized according to content rating (PG, Mature, and Adult, a relatively new designation for SL content with graphic sex and violence). Here they are:

• Estate - Adult: 1303
• Estate - Mature: 19264
• Estate - Offline: 9
• Estate - PG: 3222
• Linden - Adult: 348
• Linden - Mature: 3835
• Linden - PG: 1422

"Adult regions," Tyche notes, "grew by 27 to 1651 (5.6%), PG Regions grew by 5 to 4644 (15.8%)."

Continue reading "Second Life Stat of the Day: Only 6% of SL Land Is "Adult" Rated For Pornographic Content"

Fun With Sim-Wide Havok 4 Physics in Second Life

This is one of the lovelier demonstrations of Second Life Havok 4 physics at its most, well, physical:

This mayhem is brought you to by a metaverse developer called Bytegang, helmed by the aptly named Loki Dancer. "We did the video just by the way, when cleaning up a simulator after a finished project," Loki tells me. The 'prim explosions' we caused by the physics engine of Second Life. I selected the whole sections of the build, unlinked them and set all the primitives to be physical. The results were rather amusing."

I'd love to see more full-fledged machinima using this effect -- imagine what you could do merging the footage to some well-placed sound effects and visual flourishes in post-production. Bonus: Shoot the physics footage in KirstenLee's dynamic shadow-enabled viewer.

Bettina's Back: Second Life's Art Maven Returns To Blogging, But Better Than Ever

When Bettina Tizzy announced she was suspending her NPIRL blog a few weeks ago, there was understandable sadness, for the woman near single-handedly catalyzed a metaverse art movement from hundreds of disparate talents. As it turns out, however, she's simply upgraded her blog into a better form:

Behold Bettina's new blog: Not Possible IRL - A Digital Shoebox

As that name suggests, it's a compilation of short and punchy posts (using Posterous), mostly devoted to art created in Second Life, but also OpenSim and other medium. Frankly I think it's a more ideal use of Bettina's tastemaking talent, than the old text-heavy, post-light blog. Though it's not even a fortnight old, it's already bursting with tasty posts. Just go forth and read already, and be sure to RSS on your way out.

Pictured: Kikas Babenco and Marmaduke Arado's wearable art.

Philip Rosedale's New Company Building Version of Linden Love Machine -- Original Inventor Cory Ondrejka Weighs In

On the blog of his new company, Philip Rosedale recently confirmed what some have speculated: His start-up is making a version of the Love Machine, an internal Linden system for spreading and aggregating praise to staff members. (However, that's not the totality of the company's plans, Philip coyly suggests, in true Philip fashion, by quoting the Third Stage Guild Navigator from Dune to say, "I see plans within plans.")

But will it serve a need to outside businesses? That largely depends on how well the original Love Machine worked. I asked Cory Ondrejka, Linden Lab's former CTO, co-creator of Second Life and inventor of the Linden's original Love Machine (before he was forced out of the company in 2007), for his take:

"The Love Machine was incredibly popular and allowed Linden to grow while reducing some management and communication problems, but it also raised new management challenges. Philip and Ryan will need to make it a more effective product if they're going to sell it to other businesses." Cory has a much more thorough analysis on his own blog, from the history of the original Machine and how it might be implemented on a broader scale.

My Seven Favorite New World Notes Posts From Last Week

• Meet Second Life's oldest Resident: She's 97 years young.
• How to Make Second Life Truly Mass Market, Part 2: Point-and-Click Avatar Movement! (Heated but interesting conversation in Comments)
• Philip Rosedale Unveils New Company: "LoveMachine Inc" Offers AI, Destruction of the Ego, Lots of Money-Making.
• Open Forum: If Second Life Notecards Are So Frustrating, Why Do Residents Keep Using Them? (Frustrating if enlightening conversation in Comments)
• Do you make your avatar more attractive to make more friends? (Awkward if revealing conservation in Comments)
• Willow reviews [Engrama] -- think White Stripes via Buenos Aires and SL
• Linden Lab CEO Mark Kingdon gives us a colorful look inside his thought process

Weekend Machinima: Torley Explores the Cyberpunk Wonderland of Sick

Here's what Second Life looks like with a high-end graphics card and all the viewer features turned up to full: Presented by Torley, a rollicking, single take trip through Sick, one of Second Life's best cyberpunk city islands, creation of a Japanese Resident named MK Curtiz. I interviewed him last year, who told me, amazingly enough, he built Sick as "a hobby". [SLurl teleport link to Sick here] Mr. Curtiz is also a superb machinima maker himself: After the break, have a look at the subtitled version of an anime-inspired short he made back in 2007:

Continue reading "Weekend Machinima: Torley Explores the Cyberpunk Wonderland of Sick"

NWN in Japanese:Willow's Playlist:ボーカリストPhoe Nixのアコースティックピアノ

NWN限定、Willow Calderaの新しいSLライブミュージックシーン情報

どちらの世界でも、クリスタルボイスを誇り、聴衆の髪を逆立てるような体験をさせるシンガーは少ないでしょう。エレガントなカバー曲とオリジナルソング両方で、Phoe Nixは自信に満ちたピアノの旋律で伴奏された、非の打ち所がない、情緒的な音楽を演奏します。

Continue reading "NWN in Japanese:Willow's Playlist:ボーカリストPhoe Nixのアコースティックピアノ"

I Like Banana's (Second Life Travel and Fashion Blog)

Banana Vella is the quirky name of a fashionista with a yen for SL travel -- and her blog is named the same. Amid sporadic fashion spreads, she lavishly illustrates her many travels in SL, and they're locations you'll want to visit too: say the underwater dreamland in Raimondo, the magical Bentham forest, and an island called Photon Pinks, "sim that looks like someone threw up candy all over it. I mean that in the nicest way possible!" Now won't you care for some Banana too?

Do You Make Your Avatar More Attractive To Make More Friends?

In Second Life, it's a truism that the more gargantuan a female avatar's breasts are, the more likely the owner is actually a man in real life. In an interesting if limited study, Pixels and Policy's Gatsby Crumb conducted a survey female avatars, and found that wasn't always the case. 70% of female avatars told Gatsby that breast size was an important consideration when creating their persona. Most of those surveyed self-reported as women in real life, and while many said they resisted making their breasts stereotypically large, several said they did so... so they could make friends easier. Not for sexual reasons, necessarily, just to encourage basic social contact:

"At first I played with an avatar that I thought represented me physically... But not many people talked to me. Now [with a large-chested avatar] people go out of their way to IM me and send me friend requests."

The study inspires feminist game blogger Tami "Cuppycake" Baribeau to wonder about the social expectations of virtual attractiveness: "I’m an overweight female in real life, yet my avatar in Second Life is thin and adorable," she acknowledges. "Why is it, that we fight the typical female appearance ideals, yet when given a choice to create our avatars as overweight or as similar to ourselves as possible, we don’t?" Image: pixelsandpolicy.com.

What RL Country Has the Most SL Spenders By Proportion?

Quaintly Tuquri, an SL Resident living in Malaysia, looked at the most recent Second Life economic statistics, and noted something interesting: Her compatriots are responsible for 4% of in-world user-to-user transactions. That would not seem like much, but then, Malaysia only has a population of 28 million. By comparison, Japanese Residents also account for 4% of in-world spending -- but Japan has a population of 128 million. (This may have something to do with the fact that SL users in Malaysia can buy their Linden Dollars with a pre-paid debit card sold at retail -- but Japanese cannot.) This makes me wonder which country has the most Second Life consumers by proportion. My quick eyeball guess is Hong Kong, whose citizens account for 3% of in-world spending -- drawn from a population of only 7 million. Or am I missing another country which proportionally counts more big virtual spenders? Image: quirkyquaintly.com

New World Tableau: Musique Gable's "Snowball Fight"

I love this bright and perfectly composed tribute to winter from Musique Gable.

"Not only was this cheap to shoot," she tells me, "but fun as well. I staged the area using sculpty snow (free from a friend), snow particles ($50L), Linden winter trees (free), an igloo (another freebie -- threw some pillows in there to add some warmth) and some Lost Angel poses. Grabbed a friend and started whizzing snowballs at him until he begged for mercy."

After taking several snapshots, the post-processing magic began: "Threw it into Photoshop -- making everything black and white, except for me and my reluctant snowball victim (to draw your attention to the snowball fight) and the pillows in the igloo (to give it a splash of color), along with a little brushwork to add depth and shadows."

See more of Musique's great SL-driven art on her Koinup profile, see the whole New World Tableau series here. To best submit entries of your own, join my New World Tableau group on Koinup, and start uploading them there; be sure to tell us a bit how you created your image.

Chestnut's Choices 11/12 - 11/18: Concert Series Blends Live Jazz & Immersive Art, Science Author Dorion Sagan Speaks, All-Day Fall Music Festival and Much More

Chestnut Rau’s weekly round-up of upcoming SL events…

If you like live Jazz and 3D immersive art, there is a series of mixed reality events that should tickle your fancy. JazzLive at The Crypt presents a short season of jazz concerts celebrating the wealth of talent in the UK jazz scene.  The shows will be broadcast live from the RL venue into a Second Life space filled with art by some of the virtual world’s most respected artists -- DanCoyote Antonelli, Oberon Onmura and Juria Yoshikawa. 

The art covers the entire sim and creates a wild, pulsing, colorshifting environment which serves as the background for the music.  As you can see from the photo above the art is large-scale. What you can't see is the work reacts to avatars which creates an engaging immersive experience.  During performances the RL audience will be able to view the art on a large screen and the SL audience will be able to see the action at The Crypt.  Jazz is experimental by nature and the same can be said about virtual art so the two seem like ideal partners. 

On Friday, 11/13 at  8pm in London and Noon in SL, The Dave O'Higgins Quartet will perform, featuring Dave O'Higgins on tenor & soprano saxes, Tom Cawley on piano, Arnie Somogyi on bass and Matt Home on drums.  For more information about this show and for a schedule of weekly performances please go here. As a special bonus this week, there will be a set by SL jazz musician Seba Sideways who will be playing starting at noon.  In JazzLive.  [SLurl teleport at this link]

Also after the break:NMC Covers 2 Sims with Work from 30 Artists, Political Humor in the Age of Obama, Old-time Thanksgiving Stories, AIDS Benefit and much much more

Continue reading "Chestnut's Choices 11/12 - 11/18: Concert Series Blends Live Jazz & Immersive Art, Science Author Dorion Sagan Speaks, All-Day Fall Music Festival and Much More"

How to Make Second Life Truly Mass Market, Part 2: Point-and-Click Avatar Movement!

World of Warcraft, the largest 3D online world with 12 million subscribers, has it.

Sims 2, which is often compared to SL, and is the biggest single-player 3D game for the PC, selling 13 million copies, also has it.

But Second Life, the largest 3D virtual world with only 750K active users, and a growth plateau, does not have it:

Point-and-click avatar movement.

With a point-and-click interface, the user clicks the mouse somewhere within the display, avatar goes there. Display camera automatically follows the avatar. The basic interaction is common to anyone who's ever used a modern computer.

With Second Life, by contrast, the default movement interface is still based on first-person shooter keybindings -- A strafes left, D strafes rights, and so on. The reason for this is simple:

Continue reading "How to Make Second Life Truly Mass Market, Part 2: Point-and-Click Avatar Movement!"

Willow's Playlist: Indie Rock From [Engrama]: SL's answer to the White Stripes, with added Spanish flair

Exclusive to NWN, Willow Caldera covers SL's burgeoning live music scene

For Pupito Abrahams and Lakua Arriaga, performing in Second Life has become a real-life career. Taking their influences from bands such as Joy Division and The Cure and sprinkling over them a dash of Spanish guitar, [Engrama]'s live presence has a whimsical quality that perfectly complements its indie cool.

The duo live together in Buenos Aires, though Pupito hails originally from Argentina and Lakua from Spain. [Engrama] was born from a shared interest in musical experimentation and blends Pupito's interest in the local independent music scene and Lakua's goal to 'musicalize' images, which comes from her background as a photographer. 

This video was shot by Sound'r at Idylls Club.

"We use to watch a movie and put down the sound and try to do the soundtrack of the movie, and one day we start playing without that mechanism and started making music," says Pupito.

Continue reading "Willow's Playlist: Indie Rock From [Engrama]: SL's answer to the White Stripes, with added Spanish flair"

Philip Rosedale Unveils New Company: "LoveMachine Inc" Offers AI, Destruction of the Ego, Lots of Money-Making

The mystery around Philip Linden's new company keeps getting, well, mysteriouser. Just announced on his Facebook feed (where he also created an invite-only group for it), the LoveMachine Inc site is pretty sparse so far, except to say, "We believe that the right band of people can work together, have a huge amount of fun, make a bunch of money, and try to save the world."

Adding a bit more meat to that mission statement is Philip's help wanted ad for an executive assistant posted to Craiglist, which mentions that "what we are doing is about Artificial Intelligence," then somewhat curiously, says the company will value "freedom, fun, greatness, and the destruction of the ego". (My theology is a bit rusty, but aren't elimination of the ego and massive money making usually considered mutually exclusive?) In any event, it does seem to involve creating, as I first suggested, a mass market version of the original Love Machine, apparently with some AI functionality. Part of me thinks this is all or largely a lark, especially since the job application requirements demand that you start by finding the "word written in sharpie on the lower edge of the sign outside the [Linden Lab] door." Then again, in today's economy, I wouldn't be surprised if several applicants have already made their way there. Image credit: www.lovemachineinc.com. More fun from Dusan Writer here.

In Survey, 90% Call For Critical Second Life Fashion Blog -- Here's Some Advice on Writing One

Noting the dearth of SL blogs that are critical of Second Life fashion, I recently surveyed the demand for same. Here's the results: nearly 90% are potentially interested in reading an SL blog with negative product reviews. Iris Ophelia wrote a classic guide for spotting poorly made Second Life fashion, so here's three suggestions for blogging about them with a minimum of drama:

Continue reading "In Survey, 90% Call For Critical Second Life Fashion Blog -- Here's Some Advice on Writing One"

Open Forum: If Second Life Notecards Are So Frustrating, Why Do Residents Keep Using Them?

Every time I go into Second Life, I'm inundated by all the text notecards that have been piling into my holding queue since I last logged in -- press releases, event announcements, long messages, and so on. Often they take forever to open, and in any case, there's no way to immediately reply to them (you need to discern who sent which notecard, then contact them, a process of several steps), and if you accidentally close or discard one you need, good luck trying to find it in your Inventory. There's no way to automatically export them out of Second Life, so if you want to blog about them, you have to arduously copy/paste the notecard text from multiple windows. For all these reasons and more, I have a profile message begging people to contact me via email, and a post announcing the same. Despite this, the notecards keep coming. I'm hardly the only one frustrated by them, so the mystery is why they're still such a mainstay of Second Life miscommunication. What's your take?

New World Newsfeed: Top University's Online Advisers Now Required To Maintain Office Hours on Second Life Campus

Penn State is ranked among the United State's very best public universities, and now the Chronicle of Higher Education reports it has another distinction: The school's online advisors are required to maintain office hours as avatars in Penn State's Second Life presence. Judging by the website calendar, that means 12 Penn State representatives being available in SL throughout the week. I wonder if the University's Second Life island gets enough foot traffic of students and would-be students to justify such an active schedule -- but then again, all it really requires is running a SL window in the background, and popping it open when you hear the clicky-clacky typing of a visitor. Direct SLurl to Penn State's Island at this link. Image: worldcampus.psu.edu.

Virtual King Tut Photo Contest - $100 Each For 3 Winners

NWN partner Rezzable is sponsoring a photo contest of King Tut Virtual, their Tutankhamen exhibit running on an OpenSimulator grid. (Direct link here on Rezzable's Heritage Key site.) Three winners will get $100 (USD, not Linden Dollars) for taking high-res pics around these themes: "Avatars exploring", "What in King Tut Virtual would you show to your friends?", and "What's real in a virtual world?" Go here for all the details. Pic by Prad Prathivi.