This is a really good new segment of Science Friday on the life and death of Science Friday's own Second Life islands over a decade ago, where the much-loved NPR show hosted an audience of avatar fans during the live broadcast, with host Ira Flatow even occasionally taking questions sent in-world via group message. Produced and hosted by Daniel Peterschmid, it expands from that story to talk about the value of virtual communities and virtual world play, especially now in the COVID age, and ends on a nice rebirth and reunion segment that I won't spoil here. (Also, a couple nitpicks: Suggesting Second Life's graphics "haven't changed" since 2009 only seems true if you're running it on a low-end PC, and Jim from The Office doesn't actually say Second Life is only for "losers", but that's a whole other post.)
For longtime SLers, it does introduce a mystery: Why exactly did the Science Friday sims disappear, especially when the in-world group had grown to over 2000 members? The segment's answer (around 20:13 in) only raises more questions:
Continue reading "The Life & Death of NPR's Science Friday in Second Life Ends on a Mystery" »
William Gibson & Others Note, Celebrate, Mourn SL's Hangars Liquides
Here's the correct teleport link to visit and explore Hangars Liquides, Second Life's legendary cyberpunk city that's still set to close at the end of this month. Thanks to a retweet of my story by William Gibson, this viral Reddit thread, and massive social media shares by Second Life users past and present, the city has been inundated by visitors. However, my post originally included a teleport to a store in Hangars, and not the official landing spot. (Shopkeeper Beev Fallen helpfully added the proper teleport to his showroom.)
The original post also includes some lovely tributes to Hangars and its lead creator, Djehan Kidd:
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Posted on Monday, July 15, 2019 at 04:17 PM in Comment of the Week, New World SLURL, Sim Deathwatch | Permalink | Comments (3)
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