New World Notes

The Trees of Kenroku: Leaves Change With RL Seasons

Iris Ophelia's multi-language request for international fashion tips is turning up unexpected discoveries.  Shortly after she posted it, someone sent me a landmark to Kenroku, an island of marvels, with a Japanese castle by the shore, and a park forest of deep shadow on the other side of a stone bridge.  (SLURL teleport to Kenroku at this link.) Due to the language barrier, the developers evidently mistook Iris' search for international creations of all kind, and Ophelia for Hamlet.  Which is how I wound up talking at 1am to a small bear.  I was introduced to her by a well-armed man with a crutch and eyes which occasionally popped out of their sockets like inflated balloons.

"Kenroku created by Brue Noel, alone," Jets Fride announced with evident pride, after he'd put his eyeballs back in place. "She is genius."

"Good job for a little bear!" I observed.

Jets just laughed. "Bear?  She is seed."

"My face is seed," Brue explained, somewhat helpfully.

The pride of Kenroku from my perspective are their trees, which Brue built with only two to nine prims each, depending on variety (cherry blossom, broadleaf, and others.)  This is impressive in itself, but the clincher is that their leaves change to reflect the four seasons-- and that they've been scripted to do so in time to Japan's real seasons.  (To show the leaves turning color for me, they manually overrode their internal clocks.)

Office Hours

Late Monday I was on the deck of my Waterhead office praying to the rain gods so they might water Dingo's massive cannabis plant which grows brown from neglect, but gradually found myself distracted by the snow white griffin floating just above me.  Unlike most griffins I know, his wings were fully articulated, you see, curving and scooping the air every other second.  The griffin's name was xstorm Radek, and being polite, I said hello.  The griffin said nothing.  It was round 3am and quiet, even for Waterhead, which usually teems, due to the new citizen's Welcome Area nearby. 

So as sheets of rain poured across the deck accompanied by Dingo's private thunder, Radek remained silent and where he was, nobly hovering.  It was hardly the first unexpected, unexplained visitor to my deck, and hardly the strangest.  (There I slightly favor the penguin piloting the robot exoskeleton, and the zookeeper princess he befriended.)

New World Newsfeed: Second Life in ARTNews

Recent dispatches from the outside world...

ARTnews: All the Web's a Stage

Aimee Weber on the cover of the prestigious art magazine, no less, as part of a larger article situating Second Life in a broader movement to employ Web 2.0 platforms in the art world.  Aimee's portrait was part of an NYC gallery exhibit in which each image sold for a remarkable $10,000.  Second Front's ostrich-laden parody of Miami's art scene also gets a brief mention.  The central focus, however, is on noted "con-artists" Eva and Franco Mattes, who put on the 2006 avatar portrait show, and have also recreated several classic performance art pieces, some with a decided sexual edge.  (In one recreation, unsurprisingly, their naked subversion gets subverted by a suddenly naked audience.)  Second Life's art mavens are likely to be miffed at ARTnews' failure to note, say, ZeroG SkyDancers, Parsec, DynaFleur, RMB City, and the Avatar Orchestra Metaverse, among many others.  But it's a start.

Hat tip: Patrick Lichty. Image credit: artnewsonline.com.

New World Tableau: Torrid in Silent's Voodoo Shack

The unforgettable Torrid Midnight took this image in the Voodoo Shack in Saeya Nyanda's Silent, "a really fantastic place to visit for far more than shopping. It's mostly noir (not film noir) and inspired by New Orleans, you can't help but take photos when you're there," she says.  (Direct SLURL teleport to the Silent Shack at this link.)  "Inside it is very colorful and even though it should have a creepy feel to it," she says, "I actually find it rather warm and inviting.  Odd, eh?"  Donning a top hat from Menno Ophelia, she captured her avatar dancing in WindLight, with the slow motion setting in the Debug menu, then enhanced shadows and light in post-production.  "Sometimes a photo is better when you capture an avatar during movement," she chuckles, "funny coming from someone who [usually] creates still poses."  Of Silent, she says, "Everyone should check out the sim at least once, you're missing out if you don't!"  For more proof, she points to a startling Flickr stream devoted to Saeya's land. 

See more of Torrid's beautiful work in her Koinup account-- and see how to submit your own Tableau after the break.

Ophelia's Gaze: Advertising That Works, Made In Japan

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

Every now and then I'm amazed by some of the clever marketing techniques that are employed in Second Life, either by residents or by RL companies that are dipping their toes in the pool. I was absolutely blown away over the weekend by a joint effort between Mod's Hair Paris, BALS TOKYO, and NTT DoCoMo. These three real world groups (specializing in hair care and styling, chic furniture and home accessories, and mobile phone services. respectively) have found a way to make us look at all of their products, while rewarding us with something we actually want in SL-- fabulous hair.

iMetaverse

This video is several layers of brilliance.  We know Comverse recently demo-ed a limited version of Second Life on the iPhone.  (Though if you ask me, if it's "just streaming Safari-friendly video of your SL session", it might be better to create a iPhone friendly web-based Second Life interface, as on Katharine Berry's AjaxLife.)  We also know master director David Lynch doesn't enjoy watching videos on the iPhone.  However, it took Torley to bring these strands of Web 2.0 together into 33 seconds of strange hilarity.  The throat-clearing is a particularly lovely touch. 

SL on the iPhone?  Maybe.  For now, there's definitely Torley on Lynch on iPhone on Second Life.  In another words, get real about getting virtual.

Fashion Prototype: IBM Showcases SL As Design Platform

Of course, Residents have amply demonstrated SL's power as a fashion design prototyping platform for years, but the real world garment industry has been slow to notice.  So it's significant that a team of IBM staffers recently gave such a demo not at a tech show, but the National Retail Federation.  Here's a video report from the floor.  Hopefully they showed off some of the existing ecology of Resident-made fashion.  Hat tip: IBM's Eightbar.

New Labor: International Union Organizing Via Second Life

Last week, representatives from the AFL-CIO and the UK-based Trades Union Congress gathered at Second Life's Union Island to discuss strategies to combat union-busting moves.  Most concerning, according to the island's official blog, is how "US union-busting companies are increasingly crossing the pond to work for UK employers."   Though still unsure how effective SL is as an organizing medium, a British activist who attended writes about its potential as "an effective means for trade unionists to be able to communicate across the world."  While they talked, their avatars even had the option to drink virtual pints of Worker's Beer.

Update, 11:00am: Union Island, of course, is founded by organizers of the successful protest on IBM's Second Life campus last September.
 

Fun with Fiat in Second Life

Vint Falken recently came across the Fiat car company's official presence in Second Life, and though she's not one to be easily impressed, she was in this case.  So much so that she created a fun machinima featuring their working assembly line, which builds a car from start to finish with cartoon whimsy.  (Direct SLURL teleport at this link.)

If you haven't read about Fiat's arrival in SL (it certainly slipped my radar), that's probably because it seems to be Fiat's Brazilian presence.  (At least judging by all the Portuguese signage I caught on a brief visit, after reading Vint's post.)  Which suggests yet another instance of US/EU myopia; we know quite a lot about the few successes and abundant failures of corporate promotion in SL aimed at Western Residents.  But what do we know about campaigns targeted at, say, Japanese and Brazilian Residents, who comprise some of SL's very most active users?

The Week in New World Notes: Recap

This weekend I'll be joining Cory Ondrejka and a slew of metaverse luminaries in Stanford for Metaverse U.  If you're there, I hope to see you.  If you're not, then you can still catch the event being streamed into Second Life, in SciLands' auditorium--  here I am with the audience during an intermission. For details on joining them (and us), click the pic, or this link.

Meantime, other NWN highlights from last week:

- Bioshock to the system: The era of Second Life's libertarian utopia is over.
- A Muslim avatar walks into a virtual synagogue: Find out what happens next.
- Yes, that is a tornado in my pocket, and I am glad to see you.
- Are you a bot, how can I tell, and what do we do with you?
- Metaverse recession: Is it upon us?  And if so, who cares?