New World Notes

Who Wants a Silicon Valley Watch Party on New World Notes?

After a long, miserable wait, the trailer to the final season of HBO's scabrously funny Silicon Valley is here.  (NSFW warning: Very HBO dialog.) Whereas previous seasons focused on VR, looks like this upcoming season will hit on at least a few New World Notes-friendly themes, including:

• Real world advertising in virtual worlds.
• Unexpected spin-offs of Burning Man.
• Dick-punching Big Tech.

Anyone else a fan? Seriously thinking of hosting a watch party post/recap for every episode.

Why It Will Take Awhile for Bakes on Mesh to Make a Difference in SL

Commenting on Cassie's video comparing SL mesh bodies, and her note that Bakes on Mesh doesn't seem to improve performance, Patchouli W provides this analysis:

BoM's true value contribution will only surface once onion-skin geometry is stripped away from BoM-optimized versions of the same body and people stop wearing more than one copy of the body geometry because of the removal of said onion-skins. The other optimization that will need to happen - and this is trickier because of limitations on how BoM works currently as well as so many legacy mesh clothing items being reliant on them - is the removal of legacy alpha cutting in favor of a BoM model that can handle 'cuts' made by using system layer alphas - this would reduce the amount of duplicated geometry required to fake smooth transitions between disparate pieces of geometry as well.

Only when these two changes are pushed through in full will the full value of BoM in cutting the impact of mesh bodies on the SL grid be fully realized. Then there's the issue of trying to port this work over to cope with normal and specular/env channels baking, which is an entirely new kettle of fish since the way normals are blended is a little different compared to diffuse and specular texture layering.

This may be true or not true, but what's striking to me is all the 3D graphics technical jargon one must know to understand the state of Second Life mesh. Or as it was expressed in the immortal line from The Limey:

Linden Lab Couldn't Take Over Firestorm Without Killing Firestorm

The third party Firestorm viewer is used by about 90% of the regular Second Life user base, making any update to Second Life basically irrelevant until it's compatible with Firestorm. So that means Linden Lab should just hire the all-volunteer Firestorm team, right? Wrong, argues Bavid Dailey in Comments:

If Linden Lab were to take over the Firestorm viewer, they'd break it. Corporations do things differently to how volunteer groups do. Nothing kills developer enthusiasm better than meetings. I have no direct knowledge of how the Firestorm team works, but I hazard a guess that there are a minimal number of meetings. Also, Firestorm volunteers know that they are focused on a clear objective. Corporations tend to have other agendas, and upper management tends to change agendas without consultation, right of appeal - or much logic in many cases. Don't kill the goose that lays golden eggs. Perhaps toss them some gold filings from time to time....

This sounds right, which would mean that we are stuck in our current state: Highly profitable Linden Lab being totally dependent on non-profit volunteers. But yes, agree with the "gold filings" point. When is Linden Lab going to throw the Firestorm team an all-expenses-paid Thank You party at Linden's HQ in San Francisco?

Top 7 Posts Last Week, Including: Blizzard Employees Support Blizzard's Chinese Censorship, Philip Rosedale Goes #YangGang, And More Triangles Doesn't = Better Avatar Body

Blizzard HQ photo by Heather Newman

• Nylon Pinkney Is Online: Party Like It's Second Life 2019
• Philip Rosedale Supports Andrew Yang For President, Suggests Ways To Implement Yang's Freedom Dividend
• Blizzard Employees Strongly Support Company's Punishment Of Hong Kong Advocate & Player Censorship Of Sensitive Chinese Topics - Blind Survey
• Watch: WindLight Tutorial For Firestorm, Featuring Favorites & Notes From Cyberpunk Guide Ms. Ayla Pants
• Watch: Capture Real World Locations With Your Smartphone & Turn Them Into LEGO-Like Virtual Worlds With New SDK
• Highly Detailed SL Mesh Bodies Don't Require Excessive Triangles - Look!
• Firestorm Developer: I Want To Work For Linden Lab -- But Would Linden Lab Really Want Me Or Firestorm?

Nylon Pinkney is Online: Party Like It's Second Life 2019

Win $500 In Week 4 Of Sinespace's Creative Challenge! But First, Read Some Advice From Lead Dev Adam Frisby

Starting tomorrow (October 19), NWN partner Sinespace is opening up its fourth weekly content creation challenge, awarding $500 to the user who creates the best item or scene and submits it to Sinespace's developer server next week. (Last week's challenge, by the way, went to this realistic tugboat with puffing chimney by SecretWeapon Production, pictured here.) And yes, content previously created for Second Life and other platforms can be submitted. This is the challenge page.

Sinespace founder and lead developer Adam Frisby has some important developer advice to increase your chances of winning:

• "Please test your work! It hurts us to discount entries if they were broken, especially if they were well made.
• "You can update your work between submission and us testing it - but be aware, when we test could be anywhere in the following week, so your update may not be guaranteed to be tested.
• "Myself and @Jayden Catnip are not part of the judging pool, and will happily offer advice to entrants. So if you need more assistance, please reach out to us on Discord."

How to apply and submit:

Philip Rosedale Supports Andrew Yang for President, Suggests Ways to Implement Yang's Freedom Dividend

Second Life/High Fidelity founder Philip Rosedale just published a really interesting blog post that brings his long experience with virtual economies and virtual currencies to the very real idea of a Universal Basic Income -- or what Presidential candidate Andrew Yang calls the Freedom Dividend.

"I think Yang is great and I'd love to see him get elected," Philip tells me. So his post delves into the challenges of putting Yang's plan to give $1000 to every American adult per month into practice. Rosedale's key idea -- eliminate the fiscal middle man of banks: 

Most people (who aren’t economists) naturally assume that [the Freedom Dividend] would be very hard because… who would cover the bill to give away all this money? It has to come from somewhere, right? The actual answer is more complicated: when an economy is growing (meaning people are making and selling more and more valuable goods and services over time), the government actually needs to print more money, so that the value of the dollar remains stable.

But where does this newly printed money go? Mostly in the USA it gets loaned to Big Banks, and is more generally a tool that governments can use to to their own advantage. But a more direct (and democratic) approach would be to simply give newly printed money out equally to all citizens, which can very substantially offset the cost of basic income.

"As US President," Philip expands to me in e-mail, "I'd work with the Federal Reserve to change monetary policy to redirect funds to citizens that were originally going to be loaned to banks... That alone is something like $1 trillion per year. Plus, any gains in real GDP can also go back directly to everyone in the same way. "

Philip's latest virtual world, High Fidelity, uses its own cryptocurrency, and Second Life with its Linden Dollars (exchangeable for real dollars) continues to maintain a thriving virtual economy -- so thriving, the grassroots content creators on the platform make as much money as the actual company. So as you'd expect, Philip's blog post has suggestions for implementing cryptocurrency to manage the Freedom Divided -- and points to Second Life's own use of a Universal Basic Income (so to speak) as a potential proof point:

Cassie Demos a Dozen Top SL Mesh Bodies & Documents Their Performance

In case you missed it, here's the massive review of top mesh bodies from master YouTuber Cassie Middle -- which is how she created this super valuable spreadsheet listing them all by avatar complexity, triangle count, and so on.

Some of the bodies she demos here are Bakes on Mesh, but Cassie tells me she saw no difference in performance for BoM bodies, as compared to traditional mesh. (Probably because creators are still figuring out how to use and optimize BoM.) However, she adds, "It's very fun to use; I can use a ton of older tattoos and skins, I can stack them on top of each other, and it still looks amazing on the bodies."

The video itself is a labor of love and an insane amount of time: 

Watch: Chouchou Debuts First Experimental Album, Here's the Trailer

Here's a hypnotic and delicately beautiful video for your Thursday -- the trailer to "oort", the new album from Chouchou, the acclaimed Japanese duo with a beloved, now-preserved virtual world experience in Second Life, 

Ooort? It is, as the band's spokesperson told me: "[It's] the cloud-like origin of comets that are considered that they had information of creatures and struck the earth in ancient times. And that is how life arrived on earth, so it might be the origin of us."

The full album is for sale online here.

Watch: WindLight Tutorial for Firestorm, Featuring Favorites & Notes from Cyberpunk Guide Ms. Ayla Pants

Ayla Pants, a fun and chatty YouTuber who explores all things cyberpunk in Second Life and other game worlds (as here and most especially here), recently posted this tutorial for people just starting out with Firestorm's WindLight settings. Here's some further tips and preferences from her:

"[I]t might not occur to newbies that changing your WindLight settings changes them only for you. Back when I had a system body with all of its awkward, angular features, I loved 'Nam's Optimal Skin and Prim' WindLight because it was perfect for just that, smoothing out the rough, crinkly angles and shadows the cropped up especially around the face.  However, it's kind of a bummer to realize only you are seeing your best face, and you can't force everyone around you to see you in that same (literal) light.  Like I say in the video, I also love this particular WindLight setting because it evenly lights up the ad boards that weren't set to full-bright in poorly lit shopping areas."

 

"Also, many WindLight settings will look different if you adjust the time of day slider. Results vary, though, and some WindLights do this better better than others."

Here's some of her own favorite WindLight settings, which as you might guess, tend toward the Gibsonian:

Cajsa’s SL Flickr Pick: Striking & Brilliant Avatar Profiles by Grazia Horwitz

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

I seldom feature pictures from my friends. It’s not so much that “no one is a prophet in his own land” as it is already knowing how good they are so there is no discovery. Take Grazia Horwitz. She is consistently excellent and has been for years, so I know how good she is and don’t think to tell others. But, look what you’re missing out on if you don’t follow her. 

Take this profile picture called “Lucius.” It’s a beautiful example of chiaroscuro. Now chiaroscuro does not mean black and white, it means bright and dark, it’s about contrast. Contrast is what makes this photo so powerful. The brightness of his shirt collar against the darkness of the shadows. It’s brilliant.

Blizzard Employees Strongly Support Company's Punishment of Hong Kong Advocate & Player Censorship of Sensitive Chinese Topics - Blind Survey

Blizzard HQ photo by Heather Newman

Blizzard has been under tremendous backlash since its October 8 decision to punish Chung “blitzchung” Ng Wai, a Hong Kong-based Hearthstone champion, after he advocated for the city's pro-democracy movement during a live post-game interview. Anti-Blizzard memes have spread through the gaming world, along with calls to boycott the company's games, and protest at its conventions; unsurprisingly, Blizzard just cancelled an upcoming Overwatch launch event in New York.

However, aside from a small walk-out protest and other ripples of dissatisfaction, one point remains unclear: What do Blizzard employees think of punishing its players for expressing opinions considered taboo by the Chinese government on their gaming platforms?

According to a survey recently launched by the development team of Blind, an anonymous messaging app for tech company staffers, a strong majority of Blizzard employees actually support the punishment of Chung -- and in general, strongly support censorship of players criticizing China's government.

About 500 Blizzard employees are members of Blind's community for the company, Blind co-founder Kyum Kim tells me. Of that 500, fifty to seventy Blizzard employees took the two question survey, along with hundreds of staffers from many other tech companies -- raw data on the right.

Asked, "Should Blizzard reverse its banning of the Hearthstone player?", only 36% of Blizzard employees surveyed responded Yes. However, a solid majority of 64% opposed the reversal. This greatly contrasts with answers from employees across the tech industry, which supported a reversal at ranges from 67 to 92%. (With the notable exception being Riot Games -- like Blizzard, a game company that's heavily dependent on the Chinese market, with opinion split 50/50.)

Blind launched this survey last Thursday, just before Blizzard softened (but did not completely reverse) Chung's punishment. However, when asked a more general question about sensitive Chinese political topics, Blizzard employees were about as adamant in their support of player censorship :

Watch: Capture Real World Locations With Your Smartphone & Turn Them Into LEGO-Like Virtual Worlds With New SDK

Some cool videos from our creative teams building with https://t.co/Ob4co4nbsh. Who doesn't love turning a normal sidewalk into a lego land? #arcloud #mirrorworld #everythingisawesome pic.twitter.com/4Yhx6mtbt1

— 6D.ai (@6d_ai) October 14, 2019

Remember 6D.AI, the startup that's creating a 3D mirror world of real life from the input of standard smartphones? The company recently released its SDK, and it makes what you see above possible: Scan a real world location into a 1:1 scale 3D model... then turn into a LEGO-like virtual world.

"It’s all built on our SDK," 6D CEO Matt Miesnieks tells me. "Instead of mesh triangles we draw LEGO blocks." These blocks are the only texture available in the SDK, he adds, but users can create and add their own textures -- opening up incredible opportunities.

Cajsa's Flickr Pick: The Rapturously Romantic Second Life Photos of KiiKO

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

KikOO’s untitled photo was taken last year while she was listening to a live performance streamed in Second Life. That look of transfixed bliss is exactly how I feel while listening to a concert. I went to the Oregon Symphony tonight and heard the world premiere of Andy Akiho’s Percussion Concerto and I know I was rapt even though I was not enjoying the gentle fall of snowflakes. She followed the Rule of Fifths, centering her avatar at two-fifths.

Highly Detailed SL Mesh Bodies Don't Require Excessive Triangles - Look!

Pictured: A well-optimized body from Niramyth Productions

Some readers have complained about posts like this one last week pointing out how poorly optimized and resource heavy the leading SL mesh bodies are, basically saying, "We want a lot of avatar detail!" 

This, however, is a major misunderstanding: It's perfectly possible for a mesh body to be well-optimized and have high detail. By way of demonstration, take a look at the mesh body above, a picture sent over to me by Black Dragon developer NiranV. 

"It looks HIGHLY detailed and is super low poly with just roughly 24,000. Of course head, hands and feet add a bit more too but overall it seems to be around the 40,000 mark." By contrast, most of the popular SL mesh bodies have triangles in the mid to high six figures, and don't look any more detailed than this one.

"I mean just look at the details," NiranV goes on. What a difference good textures and a bit of normal mapping can do. That body looks right out of Unreal Engine and it doesn't use any shitty onion layers. But don't tell the Maitreya/Belleza fanboys, they will screech."

Maybe they will -- or maybe they will demand more from the owners of the Maitreya/Belleza brands.

Oddly enough, some readers (especially on Facebook) have claimed that calls for better optimized Second Life content are an attack on Second Life itself. They're really about calling for a better virtual world. As reader Tonia Thraw explains:

Firestorm Developer: I Want to Work for Linden Lab -- But Would Linden Lab Really Want Me or Firestorm?

Interesting conversation over last week's post about the paradox of the for-profit Linden Lab being utterly dependent on the free labor of the non-profit Firestorm team -- including this comment by lead Firestorm developer Tonya Souther:

Disclaimer: I'm speaking only for myself, not the Firestorm team.

Personally, I'd love to be hired by Linden Lab. I've even applied a couple of times. But I'm not the tiniest bit interested in living in either California or Massachusetts, and while they are now open once more to hiring remote employees (they weren't for several years), they do not as yet hire in Minnesota where I live. I think it would be a great place to work, even if I would have to give up my connection with the Firestorm team.

For the record, Linden Lab also has offices in Seattle, Charlottesville, and (this is new to me, but they're currently hiring at this satellite) Peachtree Corners, Georgia. (Which looks lovely!) 

In any case, Tonya goes on, most of the Firestorm team isn't even in the US. And then there's the question of whether Linden Lab would really want to take over the Firestorm codebase (another frequently raised suggestion), as it includes some rather kinky upgrades:

Top 7 Posts Last Week, Including: Apple's (Apparent) AR Strategy and the Non-Profit Secret to Second Life's Success

• Untitled Goose Game, Challenge: Stop Constitutional Crisis
• Why Apple's Rumored Partnership Third Party AR Glasses Makes Sense
• Does Linden Lab's SL Avatar Complexity Metric Make Any Sense?
• Second Life's Flickr Community Create Memorial Photo Group To Honor Member Who Died In Real Life
• Survey Of 16 Popular Mesh Bodies For Second Life: Nearly All Are Poorly Optimized -- Even The Bakes On Mesh Models
• Why Do Volunteer Second Life Software Developers Do So Much Unpaid Labor To Support Nearly All Of Linden Lab's Customers?
• Social VR Stats: Closer Look At Usage Trends For Sansar, Rec Room, VRChat

Untitled Goose Game, Challenge: Stop Constitutional Crisis

Win $500 in Week 3 of Sinespace's Creative Content Submission Challenge

Starting tomorrow (October 12), NWN partner Sinespace is opening up its second weekly content creation challenge, awarding $500 to the user who creates the best item or scene and submits it to Sinespace's developer server next week, i.e., between October 12 to October 18.  (The challenge page dates are currently displayed EU style, by day-week-year.)

The entry with the most usefulness, creativity, originality, interactivity and effective use of Sinespace components wins the $500 cash prize. And yes: Pre-existing, mesh-based content you created for other virtual worlds, games, and platforms like Second Life are also eligible for this competition -- as long as you port and submit it to Sinespace in time (instructions below the break).

New to Sinespace and want to learn how to create content on the platform? Dig into the wiki for everything you need to know to get started, and check out the “Masterclass” videos on Sinespace’s YouTube page. Post questions to the Sinespace team in Comments below or talk live with them and fellow creators on the official Discord. 

How to apply and submit:

 

Why Apple's Rumored Partnership Third Party AR Glasses Makes Sense

Rumors of Apple's jump into augmented reality glasses keep cropping up, and here's the latest (relatively credible) one:

Apple's augmented reality headset will enter mass production as soon as the fourth quarter of this year in time for an early 2020 launch, according to a new report out today from Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo and seen by MacRumors. In his latest research note with TF International Securities, the analyst says Apple will cooperate with third-party brands to launch its first head-mounted AR product in 2020, with Changying Precision tipped to be the main chassis supplier.

I tend to believe this rumor more than most, because it answers the most obvious question: Why would Apple spend billions to manufacture a new hardware device with no proven mass market, but a track history of notorious failure (cough Google cough Glass)?

Answer:

Does Linden Lab's SL Avatar Complexity Metric Make Any Sense?

SL graphics expert NiranV pointed out another mysterious finding in Cassie Middle's Mesh Body Survey (Google Spreadsheet available here):

"Vertices and Triangles do not change with neither skins nor alphas worn, unless alphas are separate wearable onion layers. Same for tattoos. Only VRAM changes," he begins, for background.

 

"But we already see something very important in this list:

 

"Lets Take Belleza, as example:

• 500,000 triangles
• 300,000 vertices
• Almost 60 megabytes VRAM

... but roughly 6000-7000 complexity.

 

"Now lets take Slink Physique Redux [pictured here]:

Second Life's Flickr Community Create Memorial Photo Group to Honor Member Who Died In Real Life

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

“Why did the chicken cross the road?” was one of the last few photos posted by Autumn Rose (aka Candy Gunpowder) before her real life death in mid-September. “To go on an epic adventure,” her answer to the age-old question, revealed her zest for life. New World Notes featured Autumn back in April, noting her love of story-telling with photos. That optimism and enthusiasm for grasping adventure inspired the “Love Life Autumn Rose Tribute”, a Flickr memorial group:

The memorial challenge was set by Kess Crystal and Autumn’s SL partner Trouble Dethly: “Her art spoke volumes when it comes to loving life, color and living for the moment. We're asking you to take a colorful photo, full of life and vitality, on the theme Love Life. We'd love you to frame with a polaroid finish, as Autumn often did, and posting it on Sunday 22nd September, exactly a week from her passing.” It is hard to choose what photos best exemplify zest for life, so I thought I would feature this photo from her partner, Trouble (below):

Survey of 16 Popular Mesh Bodies for Second Life: Nearly All Are Poorly Optimized -- Even the Bakes on Mesh Models

Pictured: Total graphics detail of a leading SL mesh body brand models. Note: Well under 50,000 triangles total (including hands and feet) is optimal.

SL YouTuber Cassie Middles just did some amazing work analyzing 16 of the leading Second Life mesh bodies, and documented their graphics detail in this huge Google Spreadsheet.

The results, as you might have expected, are appallingly bad in terms of being extremely resource heavy and poorly optimized -- with some exceptions.

Take a look and keep in mind the following metrics for a well-optimized mesh body:

• 20,000-30,000 triangles for a body is good
• 2,000-5,000 for hands and feet is good

These figures come from Black Dragon viewer developer NiranV, a passionate advocate of a better optimized Second Life. And as you'll see, many of these bodies are nowhere near that number, but instead, well into the mid-six figures of triangles. These bodies are so poorly optimized that (as a Linden Lab engineer once put it), "[Wearing them] is effectively like launching a DDOS attack on other players."

By NiranV's lights, only 3 bodies on this list of 16 qualify as well-optimized:

Caja's Daily Flickr Pick: Pepsi Sheen Creates Gorgeous, Whimsical Composites from Second Life Screenshots

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

Pepsi Sheen’s photostream is fun and lively. “今夜出て！” or “Get Out Tonight” according to Google Translate, is a bright, vivid example of her stream. The intrepid Pepsi waits for her opportunity to finish crossing the very busy street. It’s a great photo incorporating first and Second life photos into a successful composite, however, if I were her I would be looking at oncoming traffic rather than the street.

Why Do Volunteer Second Life Software Developers Do So Much Unpaid Labor to Support Nearly All of Linden Lab's Customers? Firestorm's Project Head Explains

It's probably the strangest symbiotic relationship in Silicon Valley: Linden Lab, the startup that's highly profitable from Second Life, open sourced its SL viewer software 12 years ago, and over time, various open source viewers have increased in popularity, among Second Life's user base. Firestorm, updated and debugged by dedicated team of volunteer SL users --  has become the most popular.

How popular? Far more popular than the official SL viewer put out by Linden Lab the company. So popular, in fact, that any update Linden Lab makes to its platform is effectively irrelevant unless it's supported by Firestorm.

Two years ago, project head Jessica Lyon tells me, "Firestorm was carrying somewhere around 72% of SL users. I've no idea what that metric is like today but I suspect it's higher now as many third party viewers around back then have dissolved." By a conservative estimate, 80-90% of SL users now use Firestorm.

In other words, an unpaid volunteer development team is providing the software for nearly the entire userbase of a highly profitable company. Which like I said, is pretty unprecedented.

"It's a rather unique situation for sure," Jessica agrees. "But is a matter of perspective how one looks at it. We see ourselves providing a better experience for 80-90% of the user population, rather than supporting a for-profit company without gains."

Firestorm hasn't even attempted to monetize its efforts, she adds: