New World Notes

"Creepy Mark" Bot Becomes Top Seller in Original Metaverse of Second Life

After so many stories about Meta in the Metaverse, the inevitable finally occurred: Meet "Creepy Mark", a chatty bot with a suspiciously familiar appearance which you can buy to silently stalk you in the OG metaverse of Second Life.

I just got my own personal Creepy Mark, and now he won't leave my side, following my every move while promising not to abuse my personal data and so on.  (Watch above. He does seem to get confused with climbing hills!)

The smartass brainchild of Moon Bunny Inc & Subculture X, Creepy Mark was the brand's #1 top seller in animated objects in the first days it went on sale, and became a mini-viral hit, ironically enough, on Facebook.

"My business partner created him," Moon explains. "I have been known to complain about Facebook censorship and such, so am guessing that had a hand in inspiring it!"

I'll be impressed with Meta's Horizon Worlds when it has a Creepy Mark bot of its own. (And all the technical and community prerequisites needed to make that possible). But until then, he's available to creep on you in the metaverse before the metaverse was cool.

As for how Creepy Mark works, here's a brief summary from Scribzy, who scripted it:

Final Photos from Tempura, the Beloved Second Life Sim Recently Removed from the Virtual World Due to High Server Fees

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

“Last memories from Tempura” is a gorgeous picture by Romuśka commemorating the lost of the beautiful sim. As reported earlier in New World Notes, the beloved sim will be leaving our world after fourteen years. I love the way this picture captures its pacific beauty, quiet, placid, and restful. It is a restorative place for battered spirits. For today, I thought as we said goodbye, we could also look at some of the best pictures from that gorgeous island. 

For more Tempura memories, click here:

Excellent XR Video Effect Turns Real Life Face Into Avatar - Here's How

Hi! I’m Heather. I’ve been an interactive designer/illustrator/animator/developer (flash, web, app, & mobile games) for 15 yrs. Now, I’m using those game dev lessons in AR/VR: creating immersive art experiences that blur the line between art & audience. #WhatAGameDevLooksLike pic.twitter.com/NHyXiGvSdd

— Heather Dunaway Smith 🇺🇦 (@dunaway_smith) March 24, 2022

XR game developer Heather Dunaway Smith recently shared this seriously cool AR effect she created, where her real life face temporarily "pops" into her avatar persona. (See her video above to see what I mean.) It was created, she explains on Twitter, through a combination of Procreate, After Effects, and Spark AR. (The latter being a Facebook/Meta app, so caveat avatar.) "Yeah, you can export animations as PNG sequences (in After Effects), then bring them into SparkAR as textures, using an animation controller."

Heather even created a tutorial for creating this effect on her TikTok -- watch below:

Boudicca Amat Turns Avatar Screenshots Into Powerful Portrait Art

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

Boudicca Amat has made portraiture a fine art. Her stream is dominated by striking head shots such as Olenna that seem to say much more than here is a pretty avatar. They suggest entire stories and not with a filter creating wild smiles. Take this picture, she has the resting face of an avatar but we get more from her headdress and outfit and the contemplative pose of her body. She seems to be looking inward, more than at anything in particular and one has to wonder what she is thinking. 

For more extraordinary portraits, click here:

Fewer Than 1 in 3 US Consumers Are Excited About the Metaverse, and Other Important Findings from Forrester Research's "State Of The Metaverse" Report

Infographic via Forrester Research

The well-reputed tech analyst Forrester Research just published this extensive report on the Metaverse, "The State Of The Metaverse: Look Beyond The Hype To Uncover The Real Opportunities". As the title might suggest, I was one of the many SMEs they interviewed for it, and it's nice how much it aligns with my enthusiastic-but-allergic-to-hype perspective. You can see that in the chart above, suggesting that less than half of all Internet users (Digital Immersives and Digital Socialites) are prime early adopter targets for Metaverse platforms. Personally I'd estimate that Digital Immersives will always remain metaverse platforms' core user base. (Which is still quite a lot of people!)

As part of the report, Forrester conducted a consumer/business survey which brought out some surprising (occasionally vexing!) findings. For instance:

• Marketing executives are way more excited about branded campaigns in metaverse campaigns than actual consumers.
• Only a third of all US consumers who understand the concept are excited about the Metaverse and consider it a positive technology.
• Nearly half of all consumers who understand the Metaverse concept associate it with Facebook/Meta (!!!).

Details below:

Image Inspired by a Ukrainian Grandmother's Curse & Other Powerful Virtual World Images by Downboy

Downboy‘s “Seeds” was inspired by the Ukrainian woman who confronted a soldier, telling him “Put these seeds in your pocket, so when you fall, your body will fertilize the ground and sunflowers will grow in your place.” Such a curse. I love how he imagines those sunflowers blooming on a small mound. I also noticed he used the Golden Ratio  placing his sunflowers and the horizon. 

For more beautiful and extraordinary pics, click here:

Top 3 Posts Last Week, Including: The End of a Long-Lasting Virtual Location & a Good Guide to Community Management in the Metaverse

Tempura photo by Jerilyn Acajou

• Last Chance To Visit Tempura, Beloved Second Life Sim Leaving The Virtual World At The End Of This Month After 14 Years & Millions Of Visits
• In Praise Of "Painterly" Avatars - Stylization & Personality Over Ultra-Realism
• Anil Dash's Guide To Good Content & Community Management Applies To Metaverse Platforms Too

Last Chance to Visit Tempura, Beloved Second Life Sim Leaving the Virtual World at the End of This Month After 14 Years & Millions of Visits

Click here this month to teleport into yet another Second Life landmark that's going away: The luminously beautiful island called Tempura, which since its inception 14 years ago, has attracted well over 2 millions visits.

It is, however, leaving the virtual world grid at the end of this month. Owned and lead created by Japanese SLer "Kikunosuke eel", Tempura is a dreamscape of forests, gardens, and ancient buildings. But with his real life work taking up more of his time -- and Tempura costing him well over $2000 a year in landlord server costs to Second Life owner Linden Lab -- Mr. Eel decided it was finally time for Tempura to end.

For all these years, he subsidized Tempura at a loss, partly subsidizing it through sales from MANDALA, his virtual jewelry brand. Completely free to visitors, it's been full to near capacity since launching, with thousands visiting and exploring every week.

Mr. Eel subsidized their visits despite the expense as an expression of personal faith:

Watch: New SeraCast With Del & Kess, Featuring Seraphim's New In-World Event Launching Today, Literally Called FUN

Here's the latest episode of Seracast, the fun and chatty YouTube vlogcast hosted by Del and Kess, co-founders of Seraphim SL. The top highlight of this show is the launch of Fun -- yes, literally called that -- an event full of, as Del puts it, "Truly just stuff that's fun and gives us a good laugh... we don't want to show you because that just makes it more fun." 

Fun is open now for, well, fun, on Seraphim's official Second Life sim: Click here to directly teleport.

Many more highlights from this show include: 

Friday Fashion Blog: Beauty & Grace Covers Second Life Style With Descriptions Worthy of a Real Life Fashion Blog

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

Beauty and Grace is Cheyenne Sadee’s fashion blog and it is gorgeous. Balada al Amanecer is her most recent post. She features a wedding dress which has a blush of pink on her skirt which explains its name, Ballad at Sunrise. The tiger is a nice touch, adding color to the subdued color palette. But rather than just post a nice picture, as most other SL blogs do, she also describes the dress so beautifully:

“This gown has a strapless dress beneath a gorgeous sheer overlay drape that fans out the back like a veil. The wrinkles and shadow detail are, of course, impeccable. This gown also has a headpiece that is a wide spread flower, much like an opened lily with incredible shadow detail on it as well.”

That is real fashion-quality blogging. It is currently at the Bloom Event. Details:

• Dress: POISON ROUGE Balada al Amanecer Wedding Dress – Bloom , Mainstore
• Headpiece: POISON ROUGE Balada al Amanecer Bridal Headdress – Bloom , Mainstore

For more traditional fashion blogging of virtual style, click here: