New World Notes

OpenSim Community Contemplates Future Competing With Upgraded, Cheaper Second Life

Interesting article and reader comment thread in HyperBusiness where users of OpenSim, the open source spinoff of Second Life, contemplate the future of their virtual world activity in the wake of news that Linden Lab is massively upgrading SL and will probably discount land prices. For instance:

“For me, the main reason to leave Second Life, and I believe for many others, was the relation of land size verses land fees and OpenSim has a huge strong selling point — ten times more land with ten times less fees,” he said. “No matter which other aspects you bring to the equation, this is the determinant factor at the end of the day.”

Loff himself has three large projects currently underway in OpenSim.

“All this said, and with no offense to many wonderful OpenSim efforts, we must keep recognizing that OpenSim still has a bit of an refugee camp feeling,” he said.

This from Carlos Loff, owner of the OpenSim-based Virtual Lisbon project (pictured above). In comments, however, Han Held has another opinion:

Monday Open Forum: What Should New World Notes Cover This Week?

Tell us what deserves coverage in NWN over the next few days and why, including links to pics and video where possible. And yes, self-promotion is permitted, as long as it's awesome.

SPACE LIFE: Indie MMO Project Created in OpenSim Inspired by No Man's Sky & Other Open Universe Games

SPACE LIFE is a mini-MMO that's also a mini-universe, currently being created on a grid of servers using OpenSim, the open source spinoff of Second Life, and as you might have guessed, it's pretty damn ambitious:

"Inspired in Star Citizen, No Man Sky and Dual Universe, I'm building a huge Space Sim on the OpenSim grid - Digiworldz," lead developer Carlos "Loff Auer" Loff announced in NWN's open forum last week. Loff's been creating in Second Life and other worlds for a decade. "It's a 36 sims-wide megaregion where you can free flight between Planets, Moons, Suns, Comets, Asteroid Fields and Space Stations, and on each one you can land, explore and in some even colonize. There will be kind and rough places, dead and live ones, harsh and gentle, also possible to complete missions and get rewards and later on even have your own sim alien planet connected to my space wormholes system." Follow the Google+ community for more updates and info.

Comment of the Week: Grandmother of Six Contrasts & Compares Second Life and OpenSim

Last week a post on Second Life subscriptions re-ignited a regularly occurring reader argument on the merits of SL versus OpenSimulator, its cheaper, open source spinoff. (Which for my money, seems a bit like still arguing whether Orkut is better than MySpace in 2016, but OK.) Into the breach rides Ms. Dykoda Desmoulins (pictured), who speaks from experience:

I am not going to get into an 'Opensim vs. SL' debate, but there are a few things I would like to address.

I have been in Second Life since October 2005. I've watched it grow from a primitive virtual world into what it is today. I am a fashionista to an extent. I spend a LOT of time shopping. I find a lot of enjoyment, and spend a lot of time decorating my house, however, I tend to shop at various well-known stores, rather than Gachas (though I've been known to do the latter occasionally). I absolutely LOVE Second Life because I can satisfy my desire for all of those things, and much more. SL offers me things that I simply can't get in OpenSim.

I am a RL grandmother (of 6, actually). I love spending time in a sandbox building. I rent regions on several OpenSim grids. I love to travel the Hypergrid, exploring what others create, what others have built. I love the fact that I'm not limited by various things in OpenSim such as the linkset limits, etc.

More from this metaverse exploring grandma:

Manager of US Army's OpenSimulator Project Proposes Oversight Be Transitioned to Civilian-Run Foundation

Interesting proposal from Douglas Maxwell, manager of the U.S. Army’s MOSES OpenSimulator project, which recently got an open source, web-based viewer, for an independent, civilian-run foundation to manage development and evolution of the codebase:

This organization would not be controlled by MOSES in any way, but a parallel civilian entity that shares our work ethic and philosophy for the application of virtual world technology to civilian educational and training uses. Ideally, this foundation would be supported through membership fees, research grants, and service contracts. The foundation should support a staff of code and content maintainers. This foundation would be responsible for the maintenance of a source code repository that would serve as an official residence for a safe and secure open source simulator.

On the surface this looks like a great idea and boon to the future of open source-based virtual worlds:  

Open Source Web-Based Browser for OpenSim Coming Soon

Really interesting post on HyperGrid Business about an HTML5 viewer for the MOSES project, the US Army's OpenSim grid. Set for release this fall, it's developed to be usable on any device supporting HTML5 and WebGL, and even more crucial, will be released as open source. Another intriguing hook is that they're aiming to greatly improve the graphics with some new back-end:

One-Click Viewer for OpenSim Goes Open Source

OpenSim is an appealing open source virtual world platform for hardcore coders and such, but user friendly it is not. Veteran SL/OpenSim developer Fred Beckhusen has a solution for that, and he just made it open source: "It copies the necessary files to disk, sets up Firestorm all ready to log in, and has pre-configured avatars that can log in to a Western town all ready to explore on a horse." Get it here on Github.

Lumiya SL Viewer for Android Gets Major UI Update

Lumiya, the SL viewer for Android devices, recently got a whole host of updates that longtime SL artist Douglas Story just e-mailed me excitedly about. (Disclosure: Lumiya and its talented creator, Alina Lyvette, were NWN media partners a few years ago, but I sadly haven't heard from her in awhile.) I don't regularly use an Android device or currently have one on-hand, so let Mr. Story tell you what's in store:

This is the Nicolas Cage/Tangled/OpenSim Mash-Up You Didn't Know You Wanted But Now You're Glad You Did

Hypnotic, disturbing, glorious:

Acclaimed Metaverse Artist Bryn Oh Creates Virtual Therapy Environment to Help Treat Military Personnel With PTSD

Violence continues shredding the real world, but virtual worlds may be able to help. Acclaimed Second Life artist Bryn Oh (pseudonym of a Canadian painter), recently announced a project she did with the US military, creating a tranquil, beautiful virtual space as therapy for military personnel suffering from PTSD.

To the uninitiated, this may seem like a strange idea, but veterans and active duty service members have been using Second Life for just that purpose for years:

After all, some vets are uncomfortable about discussing their PTSD in public for many reasons, and are often physically disabled and/or live in remote areas, making it logistically difficult for them to commune in person with fellow service people. In these cases and others, a virtual community of avatars embodied in a shared space seemed like an ideal solution. That intuition was recently confirmed by an individual infinitely more qualified to speak on the subject: retired Marine Lt. Col. Jay Kopelman, who's now director of the vet support organization Freedom Is Not Free. In a speech at East Carolina University, which is experimenting with SL as a PSTD treatment platform, Kopelman addressed the subject of Second Life as a therapy tool: “I know Marines that say that Second Life is working when nothing else has," he said.

Today (like many other days), with real world news of terrorism and violent unrest at a fevered pitch, it's somewhat difficult to write about virtual worlds and games, but knowing that they can offer some healing to the wounds we keep inflicting on ourselves may offer some solace. Bryn writes on a similar theme in her announcement: