BREAKING: Linden Lab Test Launches Browser-Based Streaming for Second Life -- And You Can Try it Now!

Above: At my office in Waterhead via Project Zero

Starting now -- and starting 2025 with guns blazing -- you can try out browser-based streaming of Second Life, enabling you to experience the virtual world with maximum graphics settings displayed on a web browser, even on low-end PCs/laptops -- go here to access it for up to 10 minutes.

I just tried it out, and it's pretty impressive, even in this early test phase. Teleporting to sims is quicksilver fast, taking less than a second. Right now, you access it through Linden Lab's existing default browser, but in future iterations, the streaming user interface will completely change. (More on that below.)

This streaming project, internally dubbed “Project Zero”, has been in development even before Philip Rosedale rejoined Linden as CTO in late 2024, is hands-on proof that the company is not completely pinning the future of Second Life to the new mobile app. Project Zero is shaping up to be the way new users will first experience the virtual world, seamlessly and beautifully, whether or not their machine can manage SL's full 3D graphics.

A Surprising Solution to Post-PBR Problems

Project Zero also an answer to a problem Oberwager acknowledged during another briefing last year: Second Life’s recent upgrade to PBR graphics caused a drop in log-ins among the existing user base, as people with lower end machine had trouble displaying physically based rendering.

“We have come up with an incredible fix that will have an amazing impact on all current and future residents," he told me last month. I initially thought he was referring to bug fixes, but no: It’s a whole new way of experiencing Second Life, and when it’s officially rolled out, will come with a modern upgrade to the UI, re-built from the ground up.

I should say a new old way: Linden Lab originally tested out browser-based streaming of Second Life in 2010, then again in 2015, from well-funded startup OnLive. (Disclosure: I helped OnLive launch that project on the marketing side.) It worked pretty well, but broadband and computing costs were too expensive back then to make it scalable. Since then, however, those prices have come substantially down, driven in part by the recent boom in large language model AI programs like ChatGPT.

2025, Linden Lab believes, is the year Second Life streaming is finally ready to deploy with Project Zero. 

In internal testing, Philip Rosedale told me on a recent briefing, they’re getting zero latency. It doesn’t even necessarily require super high-end broadband. “If you can watch Netflix [on your machine],” as he put it, “you can do this.”

Another key difference from the 2010 and 2015 deployments: 

This time, after refactoring the UI, it won’t just be the existing Second Life streamed to browsers in all its complex cruftiness. The company has started the design framework built on a highly responsive modern UI, beginning with basics like chat/IM, and avatar movement. The final challenge will be the most difficult: Upgrading the avatar customization UX. 

As for the first-time user experience via Project Zero, that will change immediately when it officially launches.  

Pricing for Project Zero cloud streaming is still being worked out, but long term, Oberwager believes the costs will be minimal. In the short term, the cost of streaming is still "highly non-zero"; it may be offered as part of the Premium subscription.

Will Project Zero Succeed Where Other Cloud Streaming Failed?

All of this is highly exciting, though I’ve become skeptical about streaming immersive experiences over the years. OnLive collapsed and was sold for scraps to Sony; Stadia, a highly ambitious AAA game streaming service from Google, also went defunct. Part of the problem is, well, the speed of light: Even with the best broadband, there’s a momentary delay between user input and what you see on the screen; with hardcore fighting and racing games, that split second difference can cause someone on a streaming service to lose the round. 

A more subtle but entrenched problem, I believe, is that we’ve become so accustomed to interacting only with 2D content on browsers (videos, text, images, etc.) that we unconsciously reject fully interactive immersive 3D content on them as something that doesn't feel natural to the platform. That’s just my speculation -- but then again, why has no browser-based streaming service succeeded on the mass market?

Philip believes it’s mainly a matter of the existing gamer market. “If the person is already playing Destiny,” as he puts it, “they probably already have a top machine." But Second Life isn’t a traditional hardcore game and it certainly doesn’t require twitch-based reaction times, so it may just fit in a middle ground that previous streaming services didn’t touch.

The streaming of Project Zero is so fast, it makes the virtual world feel like a modern social media experience. Philip speculates that they might even present first-time users with many multiple worlds, one after another, similar to how TikTok streams videos.

Much more soon. Meantime, click to try it here yourself, and share your own first-time reactions. And again, keep in mind you have a ten minute session time limit to experience this future version of Second Life.

This post brought to you by Patreon metaverse partner Hari Sutherland, author of the new coffee table book Second Life: The First, Best Metaverse in Words & Pictures.

 

 

 

This post brought to you by Patreon metaverse partner Hari Sutherland, author of the new coffee table book Second Life: The First, Best Metaverse in Words & Pictures.

Comments

[Peter Stindberg]

Katharine Berry would be proud. https://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2007/07/web-to-world.html

[Curious George]

Not yet available for a Mac, I take it? When can that be expected?

[sirhc desantis]

News broke just when my wing and a prayer sys/Net did :) Of all the things a monitor... Joys of dumpster diving. Was looking forward to trying it Friday local but a minimal reworking box trip to the 'official' forum asks why bother. ETA to attempt is 04012025 poss 0900 UTC. ETP

To Curious George - Macs don't do the web yet? You might need to have a word with the dude in the polo neck. I have a Ouija board somewhere

[Ava]

I'm curious how far in advance of the blogger network meeting you received all the info on this? To be able to create a lengthy detailed post, while the meeting was still taking place.

[Come on now]

No, Kathrine Berry would not be proud. This is not running in a browser it's just cloud computing video stream. It will require a subscription because it's not actually running in your browser.