The SL vampire above left is currently featured on the Second Life homepage, meant as an example of cool content new users can enjoy in-world. Which only caused SL fashionista Alicia Chenaux to complain, "Is she a vampire in a snowstorm? Do vampires usually have big curvy teeth hanging out on their bottom lip? I just don't know. But what gets me is that with SO MANY amazing artists in SL, this was the best they could do?" (Emphasis mine.) Which led to the SL vampire above right, a screenshot Alicia whipped up in about 20 minutes, with a fine analysis of how she did so, along with all the shortcomings the SL vampire (now standard in new users' inventories) has. This is yet another example of how poorly Linden Lab is promoting Second Life content, an ongoing problem:
Iris Ophelia blogged about another just yesterday, and last week offered detailed pointers on how to improve the SL homepage. This continues to be a paradox with Linden Lab: Second Life's chief (perhaps only) key strength is its content creation tools, and the ecosystem of of high quality user-generated content it's engendered. But somehow, the company consistently fails to convey that quality to the outside world. While its paying customers, who have far surpassed it years ago, are largely kept on the sidelines.
Naaaa, the vampire that should be there is one of the ones from SL's old NoR. They aren't showing teeth but the women in the background were both bad news vampires.
http://www.landofnor.com/
Posted by: Nalates Urriah | Friday, January 20, 2012 at 01:51 PM
This really needed coverage. I'm so sick of that lame LL vamp. In a word:
LL Vampire on L: plastic-fanged, jaundice-eyed Mall-Goth in snowstorm.
Alicia's Vampire on R: /me hunts for the garlic...Alicia wins!
Posted by: Ignatius Onomatopoeia | Friday, January 20, 2012 at 01:57 PM
re. the bigger picture. There appears to be a significant faction at Linden Lab that resents any input from outside the lab itself. Qarl's alignment tool is the example du jour. This is the same faction that lobbies against third party viewers. Their life would be so much simpler if we just accepted whatever crapola they shoveled our way and kept paying the bill.
Posted by: Shug Maitland | Friday, January 20, 2012 at 02:19 PM
Why is everything right now all about vampires? Should just be telling peole to go watch Twilight and shut up. Breedables and vampires is this lame PR stunt to attract users by gaming on their interest in Hollywood movies like "Avatar" and now "Twilight". Who cares?
Breedables is gaming on people's emotions to get them to feel sorry for fake animals. Those people are on the lowest rung on socieity. I've been a member of Secondlife almost 6 years and I never thought the only two things people cared about would be fake region ruining breedables and people who want to look like vampires. What is this Halloween?
Of course posting this I'm sure all the SL universe '09ers and 'graphic artists' will yell at me but think about it. This is just stupid.
Posted by: Will Szymborska | Friday, January 20, 2012 at 03:33 PM
Well we all know the 2d Internet grew to the way it did today by advertising that you can play dungeons and dragons :)
Posted by: Metacam Oh | Friday, January 20, 2012 at 03:41 PM
Alicia's picture may be technically better; but, the LL artist has the better eye for pose and camera angle. The LL vampire is more intriguing and invokes a sense of horror that is lacking in Alicia's work.
Posted by: Mariko Nightfire | Friday, January 20, 2012 at 03:52 PM
If LL wants horror, sex, and vampire in one shot they can take a picture of me at Gothika during the Wednesday night dark rave anytime they want.
Posted by: Ann Otoole InSL | Friday, January 20, 2012 at 07:44 PM
SL's marketing is horrible -- always giving a false impression of SL and then disappointing or confusing the noobs so that they never log on again. Advertising that SL is all about Vampires is like the Green Bay Packers advertising -- come and watch our linebacker coach call signals -- its ancillary and is way off of center.
Posted by: Ajax Manatiso | Friday, January 20, 2012 at 09:14 PM
Yeah, LL's marketing is horrible. But I haven't seen any vampire that actually looks better than the one LL used despite reading over a dozen similar criticisms.
The larger question, which the community has completely missed, is: Why in the world is LL using a vampire for marketing in the middle of winter?
Why aren't they instead using any of the great winter attractions or themes with more mass appeal at this time of year instead?
LL fail? Yes. But, community fail, too.
Posted by: biffingbiff | Saturday, January 21, 2012 at 04:00 AM
You can actually tell that Alicia only spent 20 mins though, which isn't a good thing. Only noticeable significant difference is the hair and windlight setting, plus a background that works against the characters form melding the blacks into more blacks.
Isn't the annoyance more to do with having seen it for so long instead of a renewed campaign across other topics?
Posted by: Adromaw | Saturday, January 21, 2012 at 04:02 AM
Adromaw, the point is that it looks like LL spent about 30 second on their shot. :)
Part of Alicia's point (not covered in the NWN post) is also how "terrible" the vampire avatar is that's included in the Library. "Shouldn't someone be in charge of quality control as far as Library avatars go?" In other words, there isn't a way to take a half decent photo given what the Lab chose to work with.
Posted by: Ziki Questi | Saturday, January 21, 2012 at 07:06 AM
I have NEVER claimed to be an SL artist or photographer, and my Photoshop skills are pretty minimal. :) My annoyance is that while yes, the newbies are lucky to have new things pretty much immediately [a far cry from the 'Girl Next Door' of yesteryear!], some of these things do not really show off the amazing talent that is in SL. If I were brand new and came to the SL website, I would be a little put off by the photo. My first thought would be "Is this for kids?" My second would be "Yuck. Twilight stuff." I love SL and I want others to love it as much as I do. But the front page of the website needs a lot of work, as do SOME of the starter avatars.
Posted by: Alicia Chenaux | Saturday, January 21, 2012 at 08:19 AM
Alicia's vampire shot is technically and aesthetically a win. However, Linden's vampire look and background are much closer to the in-world experience, for the average user with a non-supercharged computer. It's called "truth in advertising"...
Posted by: Nahasa Singh | Saturday, January 21, 2012 at 08:20 AM
what mariko said. the eyes on the linden vampire quite chilling
Posted by: elizabeth (16) | Saturday, January 21, 2012 at 07:40 PM
Yes, though I think Alicia's works most ideally for the largest online market for vampire-themed entertainment: Girls in their late teens and 20s into the sexy romantic vampires of Twilight/Vampire Diaries (and to a lesser extent True Blood.)
Posted by: Hamlet Au | Saturday, January 21, 2012 at 07:52 PM
in ur other story hamlet u reported that sl signups for the target audience, younger ppl, is up. maybe the linden vampire actual has something to with that. is quite edgy in its own way
is funny tho. in the past linden often been criticised for pimping overstylised and pretty avatars on their page. when they do try something different then get criticised for not being overstylised and pretty
i quite like the alicia vampire as well, it have its own merits. it tell a different story tho to the linden vampire, seems like to me anyways
Posted by: elizabeth (16) | Monday, January 23, 2012 at 04:24 AM
sorry. should have explained better
linden vampire says: i am vampire. i am dangerous
alicia vampire says: i am vampire. i am beautiful and imperious
Posted by: elizabeth (16) | Monday, January 23, 2012 at 04:38 AM
The fact remains, Linden Lab needs to make sure that Second Life is not only about vampires,in reality that it can be a World for vampires as a World for any kind or any wish!
And they really should promote, on this time of year, the amazing winter sims that exist.
But as we all know we never know when one of them will close due to outrageous (they are, don't tell me that they could not be lower, much lower then they are now!)tiers cost!
Posted by: foneco zuzu | Monday, January 23, 2012 at 05:44 AM
My 2L is that the teeth look all wrong. Generally, in movies and such, the pointy fangs are the canines, or "eye teeth". They're called "eye teeth" because they line up with one's eyes. The teeth in neither picture do that.
Posted by: MIstletoe | Tuesday, January 31, 2012 at 03:14 PM