Wagner James Au reports on Second Life and other virtual worlds, and related topics, such as virtual goods, next gen gaming, and new immersive technologies (Kinect, iOS, etc.)
Iris Ophelia's ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style
In a perfect world, everyone who wanted to avoid buying stolen (or dubiously derivative) content could do so easily, but the reality is that most of the time we just don't know. Even with the help of the tips I posted yesterday, there's always something out there that can slip through the cracks. Maybe the stolen part isn't obvious, maybe we just wouldn't recognize it even if it was; no one has both the encyclopedic knowledge and psychic abilities that it would take to avoid every single case of content theft in their path.
So when youknow you've been duped, here's what you need to do:
What's "Photogrammetry"? Let the creators via Boing Boing explain:
The basic idea is that we build or find the objects that we want in our world, take a set of photographs for each object, and run them through a tool that creates a 3D model for us.
So almost like taking the models for a Henry Selick movie and turning them into a 3D engine, which sounds awesome in every way.
I spent Monday and Tuesday on a semi-vacation on the Northern California coastline, which is supremely beautiful and so also made me think of this recent video from Google Glass, highlighting the upcoming device's ability to automatically record real life experiences from a first-person point of view:
When we think about virtual worlds and games, technologies like this threaten to disrupt our assumptions about what they are and will be in the very near future. (Consumers are set to get Google Glass late this year.) We spend a lot of our time in games and online worlds living vicariously through virtual characters who are not us. A technology like Google Glass will enable us to live vicariously through real people who are not us. It's impossible to predict all the ways Google Glass will be used, but several scenarios are likely:
Inspired by Michel Foucault's Utopian Body, this is an SL machinima by Lala Larix called "Myself, Me & I", and it combines real life footage and impressive effects to visualize the divide between the material and the virtual, the physical and digital person. Do watch. It inspired me to read some Foucault, who I should have read more of already, I know, but turns out to have said this in 1966, seemingly anticipating the appeal of avatars:
Iris Ophelia's ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style
Stolen content is the bane of the serious SL consumer, and the reality is that almost all of us, no matter how careful we are, have probably bought some. Now I'm not just talking about ripped or copybotted SL content either. Don't forget that plenty of creators who have been stolen from aren't even in SL themselves; mesh resources purchased or taken from elsewhere and resold in SL (from game assets to 3D models) plague the SL Marketplace, and original artwork has been taken from portfolio websites and used in SL since before my time.
But that doesn't mean that we're helpless. You may not be able to prevent yourself from accidentally supporting these shady practices all the 100% of the time, but I've got five tips to share with you that will dramatically decrease your chances of getting duped by dubious goods.
Iris Ophelia's ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style
Although the third season of Downton Abbey (or at least its American airing) has ended, Sim Downton Abbey is only beginning. It took me a full weekend of excruciating troubleshooting and bug-squashing, but by the mercy of the universe Sim Downton is now running as smooth as silk. Soon Mary will be out rubbing elbows with the social elite, Sybil will be getting her passport stamped across the sim globe, and Cora and Robert will be gearing up to throw a society party the likes of which the Abbey has never seen before... And potentially trying for a brand new baby shortly thereafter.
Until then, it's the perfect time for a recap! Here's where the characters of sim Downton stand as of right now:
Iris Ophelia's ongoing review of gaming and virtual world style
At first blush Vivacity Interactive's Splintered Rock might not seem much different from a lot of webcomics still in their infancy, beyond its use of SL for its artwork. Venture a little deeper and you'll see a surprising framework for a one-of-a-kind interactive storytelling experience with a serious RPG twist, which might even be helping to support a venerated sci-fi sim in SL. Here's what I mean:
