New World Notes

Blue Mars Black Friday Fashion Specials Today

Several Blue Mars developers have special Black Friday discounts on items like skins, sweaters, and secret items, available all through today. If you're looking for other avatar enhancements, here's a zombie apocalypse-inspired look modeled by Iris Ophelia, and an adorable, face-ripping polar bear avatar modeled by, well, me. Full disclosure: Iris and I consult for Blue Mars developer Avatar Reality. Fuller disclosure: I like my polar bear avatar so much, I may ditch the white suit.

Thanksgiving Open Forum: Who in the Metaverse Are You Thankful For?

This Thanksgiving Day like the previous Thanksgiving Day, I ask a simple open forum question to all who read this blog: Who in the metaverse are you thankful for? Please post in Comments.

I'll start, if sadly: I'm thankful for the community who rallied to support Delinda Dryssen, who fell into a coma last weekend. Though she ultimately and tragically passed away, the community members who spoke and sung to her in Second Life through the laptop by her ICU bed made sure that her last hours were spent with people who loved her. Which in the end is all anyone of us can hope for.

There are many more to be thankful for; hope you share below.

Peter Greenaway's Inspiring Second Life Speech on the End of Film and the Beginning of Machinima as an Art Form

Peter Greenaway speaks at 48Hour Film Project Machinima 2010 from Chantal Harvey on Vimeo

This is a long but inspiring speech by acclaimed filmmaker Peter Greenaway, who recently appeared in Second Life to judge a machinima contest. (Ideal viewing over the long Thanksgiving weekend, at least here in the States.) During the awards, Greenaway encouraged machinima makers to strive farther and higher, transcending old forms of narrative associated with cinema, which he sees as a dying art. I don't totally agree with that claim, though I do think there's no question feature-length cinema has lost its centrality in popular culture and will never get it back, supplanted as it has by YouTube and other online platforms for user-generated content. And as the importance of cinema recedes, it's incumbent on machinima makers to create a new medium that better connects with the digital age. Watch and discuss here!

Minecraft Machinima: Discovering Diamonds of User-Generated Content

A Minecrafter goes searching for diamonds and mostly finds gems of invention instead. If Second Life was invented in 1993 instead of 10 years later, it'd probably look something like this. With the wacky vocal stylings of Eric Fullerton.

Hat tip: Robustus Hax of Metaverse TV

Loco Pocos for Sale: After Earning Mid-Five Figures With the Popular Second Life Avatar Brand, Damien Fate Moves On

Loco Pocos, the extremely popular cartoon animal avatar brand in Second Life, is being put up for sale. Created by longtime SL content creator Damien Fate with the help of his wife Washu Zebrastripe (who he met in SL), the brand has had enormous success since launching two years ago: By Damien's accounting, "Loco Pocos has sold over 10,000 avatars and over 50,000 accessories." With avatars selling for L$350 a piece and accessories going for L$100, that translates to a very impressive US$35,000 gross.

He's putting it up for sale because most of his focus is on Circ.us, a social media advertising house which now employs a number of staffers from the Electric Sheep Company, the metaverse development studio which had its heyday during Second Life's 2007 boom times. "I've been working on artwork for iPhone and web apps mostly," Damien tells me, "with a little bit of machinima thrown in. It's kept me quite busy and taken me a few steps away from SL, so if that ever fails I won't have all my eggs in the one basket." So Damien's move answers two questions: How successful can a cartoon avatar brand in Second Life be?, and, Whatever happened to folks with the Electric Sheep Company?

And that's why the Loco Pocos of Second Life are for sale. Proceeds will almost certainly go to the care and feeding of Linden. No, not Linden Lab, but baby Linden, the boy Washu and Damien welcomed into their family last year, and named in honor of the company that helped bring them together.

Hat tip: Toady Nakamura. LOLBaby macro by Hamlet.

Blue Mars Custom Makeup Tips (For This Weekend's Contest)

Speaking of Iris Ophelia getting stylish in other worlds, she also has all the tips you need for customizing your makeup in Blue Mars (where she and I consult.) It's also a great guide to consult for the Blue Mars custom make-up contest, which has 5 days left!

Ophelia's Gaze: Iris Explores MMO Fashion, Starting With Nexon's Vindictus

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

For years now, Ophelia's Gaze has been a column about style in Second Life, but I've decided to try something a little different this week, branching out to talk about fashion in MMOs. I'm a virtual fashionista first and foremost, but I'm an avid online gamer second. Fortunately, fashion is starting to play a larger role in gaming, from broader customization options to cash shop gear (a big business for free-to-play MMOs!) And while I use MMORPGs as a way to unwind from school, work, and even Second Life stress, I've noticed that I'm far less likely to stick with a game if I don't like the look of my avatar.  Given the recent trends towards more avatar variety, I suspect I'm not the only one.

My current favorite is the graphically stunning Vindictus, which had my interest since its Korean beta stages, and with the North American addition of the sweet and stylish mage character, Evie, Vindictus is my new MMORPG addiction. Keep reading to find out more about Nexon's most stylish mage!

Live Metaverse Music as Magic Performance Art

This is a live music performance in Second Life by Soleil, a collaboration between Tasuku Ghost and ColeMarie Soleil (who also covers SL's arts scene for this blog.) To be exact, the audio performance is from the live show, but the performance was reshot after the show for the audience, to account for lag. I'm slightly biased, but I think it's gorgeous, dreamy, with just enough magic to seem perfect for the holidays. As with Grace McDunnough's shows, I also think Soleil's performance suggests a great way of doing live performances in 3D worlds:

Blue Mars Education Event: Meet IDIA Staff and Get a Tour of Their Immersive Learning City Today at 2:00 PM Pacific

Today at 2pm Pacific, IDIA director John Fillwalk and his staff will be in Blue Mars (where I proudly consult) to talk about their massive immersive education site which recently launched in Blue Mars, featuring historical site recreations and sculptures that have been recreated by laser scanning the originals. For educators especially, I think it's a cool opportunity to learn and talk about 3D spaces as an pedagogical tool. IDIA, a lab with Ball State University, has also done several cool projects in SL, including this sim which hosts an AM Radio interactive art installation, so I'm sure John will have insights on working in both platforms. His Blue Mars avatar name is conveniently named "John Fillwalk", and he sports a black blazer and anime-flavored hair. I'll be there too, at least for awhile. Meet us at 2pm -- just go to the IDIA Lab city in Blue Mars (Blink teleport page here) and find us waiting for you then near the first spawn point. And if you haven't created a Blue Mars account yet, remember there's a special sign-up bonus of 1000 free BLU$ this month.

New World Tech: Open Sourced Kinect Projects Transform the Virtual Into an Aspect of the Real

Fat Cat from flight404 on Vimeo

With the open sourcing of Kinect and the explosion of amazing hacking projects built around it (like the one above, which is explained here) I think we're seeing a conceptual transformation of what it means to be virtual, that will soon impact the metaverse in very interesting ways. I'm quite sure we'll see Kinect linked up to 3D virtual worlds soon enough, but perhaps the even more potent applications will discard the idea of a world entirely. Instead, the virtualization will be inextricably linked to real world interaction. For example, why bother bringing your avatar into a separate world, when you can project it on a wall of your living room, like so:

Interactive Puppet Prototype with Xbox Kinect from Theo Watson on Vimeo

(More on that video here.) Interestingly enough, the campaign to open source Kinect was led by Philip Torrone, who for a time, was a huge advocate of hacking Second Life with similar coolness. In any case, let your imagination roam: What Kinect applications would you love to see transform our understanding of the virtual?

Hat tip for the top video: Jason Kottke. Bottom: Extropia DaSilva.