New World Notes

Weekend Viewing: "Singularity of Kumiko", Dream-Like Second Life Machinima Funded by Canadian Government

Last January I told you that Bryn Oh received a grant from the Canadian government to create a Second Life machinima, so I'm glad to show it to you now. Get comfortable, get popcorn, it's nearly a half hour of beautifully moody, dream-like viewing:

"The Singularity of Kumiko" was funded with a New Media art grant by the Ontario Arts Council, and it's a good thing they helped -- because, Bryn tells me, the most difficult aspect of producing this Second Life machinima wasn't artistic, but financial:

"I think the most difficult practical aspect would have been [SL land] tier," as she puts it. "The story had to be written, then built in the virtual environment, then exhibited for months. I was tempted to say writing the story was hardest, then was thinking of the many months it took in building each model for the story... but really in the end the hardest part is paying for a region for so long as it is being created. I accept that it is a part of working in this medium, but it is still a difficult barrier."

Since it was funded by real life arts organization, will "Kumiko" be shown in an IRL museum or gallery?

Friday Open Forum: What Link Should We Look at Today?

Any link, long as it's got a virtual twist. And if it's a particularly lovely link, I likely may link to it in a follow-up post!

Too Many Pokémon GO Players Ignore the Real World, So Why Not Add Real World Challenges to Pokémon GO?

My girlfriend and I recently attended an art show held next to the Hollyhock House, a designated landmark of Los Angeles because it sits on a hill with a panoramic view of the city, and the house itself was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. The place was packed, which seemed great at first. But then we gradually realized most of the people there weren't there to see the art, or look at the view, or take in the Mayan-influenced building by America's greatest architect.

Most people were there only to catch goddamn Pokémon.

Which isn't such a bad thing in itself (I was playing too), but what really bothered me is how little attention or interest the players paid to this great landmark. Eyes stuck on their phones, scarce looking up (and then, only to tell friends which Pokémon they just found). On a cultural and moral level, this example is somewhere in the middle on the annoyance spectrum, with the very, very worst example probably being people going to Auschwitz to catch Pokémon.

Rather than just rant, however, I thought there must be ways to encourage GO players to look up from their phones once in awhile and actually take in their surroundings. And then it hit me:

Based on What We Know, Magic Leap Making Augmented Reality for Google Glass-Type Hardware - But How Can It Avoid Glass' Fate?

Magic Leap is still super secretive about how its augmented reality technology will work, but there's a fair amount that is public via "talks, patents, job applications and the background of people working at the company to try to find out", as Jono MacDougall explains, proceeding to cobble those clues together to explain how Magic Leap will probably work:

"I Stand for Peace" - Flickr Pool of Virtual World Images Calling for Real World Peace

"I Stand for Peace" is a Flickr pool of SL images which anyone can contribute to, since there's a public challenge attached to it. Let SL fashion blogger Strawberry Singh explain:

The challenge is pretty straight forward; You create an image with the theme of “Peace” in mind and then you share it in the Flickr group. You can also nominate some of your friends to do the challenge too. I nominate anyone that is reading this right now and wants to do it. I figure it is a good way to express ourselves and distract from all of the chaos and destruction going on in the world on a daily basis. I hope you can also participate.

Moderated by "Goodcross" of Second Life's White Canvas gallery, it's already becoming quite a collection of striking imagery, such as the one above, and the one below, an avatar-based riff on a famous Bansky image.

Strawberry, by the way, has special insights on this call for co-existence as a Muslim-American who found herself the victim of bigoted attacks on social media in the wake of terrorist attacks committed by violent, fringe Salafists:

NWN Reader Presidential Survey: Who Do You Most Support?

Now that all party nominees have officially been nominated, here's an updated survey of the US Presidential race. So virtual world fans, who do you want to run the real world? Note the wording: "hope" as opposed to "vote", so non-US readers can take this survey if they like. Also, to prevent ballot stuffing, Google registration is required.

Results posted next week! Will be interesting to see how this compares to our February survey.

High Fidelity to Protect User-Made Content Through Certificate System, Says Philip Rosedale

High Fidelity founder Philip Rosedale stopped by this blog to comment on the topic of how his upcoming virtual world will protect user-made content, a concern for many SL brands considering or preparing for the leap:

"High Fidelity will protect content by issuing certificates that validate authentic content by providing a proof-of-purchase and link to get your own copy, etc.," Philip writes. "Server operators will have the ability to require all content on their servers to be authentic. As you say, we agree that the most important thing for content creators is to be able to make money selling content if they choose to."

(By "you", he's responding to my point that the ability to reliably earn revenue from what they create is the key requirement for content creators when choosing a platform.) The certificate system he's describing sounds similar to SSL Certificates commonly used on the web today. On the face of it, this is a much stronger form of content protection than the permission system that currently exists in Second Life. In any case, hope to get more details on this from Philip and company soon.

Speaking of which, NWN reader "Leni" recently raised a question about High Fidelity's Terms of Service, which on the surface, seems to make some pretty draconian claims over user-created content (see "License Grant to High Fidelity" section):

Here's the Inevitable Pokémon Go in Second Life Machinima

Because every Internet-powered trend inevitably winds up in some form in Second Life:

Created by Mistell Production Film, the answer to your first question is no, this is not actually a version of Pokémon Go that's playable in Second Life, but a fan-made tribute machinima to the augmented reality game/TV show/etc. However, according to one viewer, there is at least one playable Pokémon Go game for SLers currently in production:

今週、Mikati Sladeの“伝説級”“重量級”“村上的”なセカンドライフバースデーケーキを観に行こう

Original English language version of this post here.

展示場所はこちら。Mikati Sladeはセカンドライフ誕生記念イベント“Second Life Birthday (SLB)”での巨大できらびやかなバースデーケーキの作者としてよく知られる日本人3Dピクセルアーティストだ。通常このケーキはイベント終了後に消滅するのだが、 その縮小模型をこの数日間に限り眺めたり写真撮影をすることができる。

Majority of SL Brand Owners Already Planning to Launch in High Fidelity or Project Sansar - NWN Survey

Here's the results of our survey last week, asking how many Second Life brand owners are already preparing to launch their brand in Project Sansar, High Fidelity, or another nex gen virtual world. Just under 47% say they've not done so, while 48% say they're preparing the transition in either High Fidelity or Project Sansar or both. Among this group, Linden Lab has the more popular platform thus far, with 19% solely focused on moving to Sansar, versus 8% concentrated only on High Fidelity. However, nearly 1 in 5 are keeping their options open, exploring how to transition to both platforms.

Why the pronounced preference for Sansar? Most likely because Linden Lab has stated they plan to allow some level of content transfer from Second Life to Sansar (without explicitly saying what that entails), allowing for a smoother transition. By contrast, some content creators have raised concerns about High Fidelity's digital rights protection system: