Archive for September, 2007
OpenSim: main chat ft. IRC and Reuters writes about it
September 7, 2007 5:04 am
As not all seem to be interested in OpenSim - or all but one, it’s not totally clear - I’ll give you an advance warning if I’ll be writing about OpenSim starting today: *points at the OpenSim picture on the left*. So if you are convinced that ‘open source = closed society”, stop reading after seeing those pictures. ;)
For those that are interested, there’s some news: main channel chat linked to an IRC channel and Reuters finding open OpenSim interesting enough to write about. Hear! Hear! ;)
Main chat ft. IRC on OpenSim
Ruth - one of the OpenSim servers, run by Dalien Talbot - has now added IRC functionality. All you say in main chat is send to #opensim-regions on EFnet. Likewise, all you say on that channel is send to main chat on the sim. Which means you can conversate with the avatars present on the sim without needing to login to the server using the SL client or SLeek. One of the possible uses I see: if for a group meeting in SL, not all can attend, it’s possible to follow and interact using the IRC channel. Also most IRC clients have the option to notify you when something new is said in a channel by a sound or whatever you prefer. So a sim owner could easily be notified of someone talking / communicating to him / in the sim without having to run the SL client the whole time. I quote:
Oh, another side effect - everything that is said in the central parser, now is echoed on IRC in efnet’s channel #opensim-regions… As usual - thanks to Michael for the code… It’s still raw but it works. :)
You can easily connect to #opensim-regions from the web:
- Go to EFnet Webchat IRC.
- Choose a nickname.
- Under ‘Channel’ choose ‘other’ and type ‘#opensim-regions’.
- Press connect. Voila. =)
I might try setting up a webapp that allows to connect to #opensim-regions here somewhere (which is hopefully faster and more stable then the EFnet Webchat), but I need some help with that. The ‘how to’ contained the word ‘binaries’. *blushes* and *grins*
Reuters on OpenSim
Some other good news is that - opposed to others - Reuters found OpenSim that OpenSim has ‘news value’. Adam Reuters reports on OpenSim, writing that about 300 servers are running OpenSim software at the moment, and at least 20 of those are interconnected.
He also tells that the New Media Consortum - a group of 300 universities and colleges exploring how technology can be used innovatively in education, of which over 75 are active in Second Life -, shortly put the NMC, follows OpenSim’s progress with interest. Indeed, for a lot of school projects, interconnecting the sims would not even be needed. Noting also the development features, as objects can be imported using XML files, I think it’s a great article. Yet I think my instructions on how to connect to - an - OpenSim are a bit more clear. ;)
Custom Appearance in OpenSim
The only thing I do not agree with Adam Reuters is that ‘there is no possibility to customize your avatar in OpenSim’, as I spend some time uploading my skin to Ruth and I now look a bit more ‘Vintish’.
I liked the mohawk for the hair, but when looking at myself through the mirror.. euhm.. snapshot function, I found a strange resemblance with Dandellion.
Maybe that is just wishfull thinking, but it made me decide to go with a more classic hairdo. What do you think?
I’ve written down the shape values I use in Second Life, but probably made a mistake somewhere, so I need to redo those and reenter them in OpenSim. (XML help, please? Is it possible? ;)) Quite shockingly to know there are that many: 75 I counted. So, this is Vint: 85 - 14 - 0 -52 - 33 - 76 - 42 -51 - 50 - …. . LMAO.
Ow, and before I forget: another neat thing about OpenSim is that they have other bugs then the default Second Life ones and change is always nice. Doesn’t my skin look great in the last photograph? ;)
10Lindens ACS - Anybody pro?
2:33 am
Yesterday Anshe Chung’s company flooded SLexchange with cheap furniture: 10 L$ / item and - because of her ’silent’ partnership with SLexchange - got her own category do to so right under ‘vehicules’. Well, it didn’t took long for protest to arrise on the SLexchange forums, understandable too as Anshe is planning to launch ‘a full range catalog of decent SL content’ at this price. For full time SL entrepeneurs that are into the content creating business, this is bad news: imagine a skin selling at 10L$. It would mean you have to sell 300 of those skins - at least - to pay for one hour of work at a RL wage.
- Anshe Chung, being a - now not so - silent partner of SLexchange, has full access to all search and selling date on this service site that is ment to sell third party goods. Using that data she has a head start over all other Second Life content creators - besides the sheep maybe, as they have Onrez data - which tells her perfectly clear what is most popular and what people are willing to pay for it.
- Anshe Chung says she does this ‘to help the content creation community grow as a whole’ and that this way more people will enter and/or stay in Second Life. Maybe. Although I think it will drive a lot of content creators out of business and Second Life. As said on many forums, this is not IMVU - where Anshe claims her tactics were effective and helped the uses base to grow.
- ‘10Lindens ACS’ is a very confusing name for the younger ones amongst us, not rezzed that long who might be thinking they are buying goods from a real Linden.
- If she is so willing to help the grid to get new residents and our the user database to expand, then why does she not give that precious.. euhm.. 10L$ content to them for free in her welcome area? I am sure new avatars are more willing to stay when they look good from the start as Lillie Yifu suggested. Chances of ‘disappointed people’ sticking around long enough to discover SLexchange is far from reasonable. The difference with Lillie Yifu’s proposal? That would help all beginning content providers, not just one giant ’supermarket’.
Slexchange removed the 10Lindens ACS category, and also all goods sold by 10Lindens ACS are taken offline. I wonder where this will lead. Hopefully to an apology or at least a reply of SLexchange towards the content creators that pay them good SL and RL money each month for getting their items listed on this virtual market place.
As for me, I’ve redrawn my money from my SLexchange account to now buy and sell stuff on OnRez.com and the MetaMart HUD hoping neither of them is involved with Anshe. It’s not going to help much, I’m sure, but I’m not helping fund such practices. Depending on a statement from SLexchange is published or not, my items there will stay listed or be delisted soon.
Anshe’s full reply in SLexchange forums:
All our artists work in a new fully air-conditioned studio in a class A office building and environment according to German workplace standards. They receive clearly above market compensation and full benefits and insurance package. Some of them already afforded to purchase their own apartment. At ACS we have regulated working hours and file regular tax reports contributing to the general society and social systems of the country we are located in.
In IMVU the average margin of content creators for items they sell is about 10-15 L$, while in Second Life content prices are still at almost the same levels as 3 years ago when the population was only a fraction of what it is now. We think this is one reason why IMVU is growing much faster than Second Life now. Therefore we decided to make Second Life more competitive and more accessible to players by providing high quality products at prices that allow Second Life to remain competitive in the long run. Our plan for the end of this year is to have between 50 and 100 internal designers and scripters working on 10 LINDENS, plus a network of local partners we are currently training here. We plan to create a full range catalog of decent SL content.
I think this is definitely good news for the content creator community of SL, much the same way ACS entering the IMVU content market helped the content creator community as a whole to grow their business. In IMVU, the increased internal competition and improved quality of the product catalog greatly accelerated growth of the platform and market as whole. Many content creators reacted by strengthening their brand’s focus and focusing on more complex / high end products, actually increasing their sales in the long run. I hope we can recreate part of this success in Second Life in the coming months and all benefit from economic growth again, after the stagnation of the economy here in August.
Consider reading Storm Thunder’s take on this ‘walmart’ principle too. ;)
Second Life web resources for September 3rd 2007 through September 5th 2007
September 5, 2007 4:31 pm
For me SecondLifeGrid.net is nothing that is just good or bad, it is something that was inevitable. LL announced already earlier that it was going to allow ‘private’ servers to connect to their grid in return for a fee and was outsourcing / sub-contracting ‘Second Life welcome area’s’ already for a long time. Recently they opened up the source code of their viewer. Gave out parts of their server code. So people, hear this: the sky.. euh.. I mean atmospheric rendering did not sudden fall down on our heads! We are not doomed!
If Second Life really is that Brave New Virtual World we claim it is, privatisation of all sort of services surrounding our digital lifes was, is and will always be inevitable. We, the world, has tried pure communism, and it didn’t really work out, did it? Innovations, new inventions, bug fixes.. euhm.. vaccins, … have never come that fast as since we left feudalism stage and gone into industrial age. So, insert the capitalism, please! Let the private connected sims fight over who offers best servers/sims, safest inventories, an in-world browser, etc. And let the best win.
But, yes with privatisations comes trouble too. Will they ’save’ on things that do not seem important to them, businesses, but are for us? On things like art, sharing knowledge, free expression, … . Will there come ‘monopolies’ on certain services, whatever they may be? And will basic things like uploading textures become unaffordable? I doubt it.
I think / hope we have enough learned from the drawbacks of First Life capitalism to be able to handle Second Life capitalism. We know how to look further then the ads? We know when something we buy is worth the price or not? We know when we are scammed? And it will be our free choice to deside which sims we visit and which sims we ignore. We are free to start our own Second Life versions of labour unions, consumer organisations, newspapers, civil liberties unions, … . We can work on more effective ways then open letters to communicate to the goverment Linden Labs what we want. Everybody was always complaining ‘all is in the hands of Linden Labs and there is sh*t we can do/change’. Well, now it isn’t anymore! We can move out of Second Life communism to a better version of capitalism than we have in First Life.
Yes, there is a lot here that I don’t take into account like accusations of giving some people / businesses a head start, the partners not being thrustworthy, etc. but I think whining won’t help us a but, and c’mon over time, we might even be able to choose which ToS we accept! ;)
Hear! Hear! The first three entries for the SL Bloggers’ logo competition are now on display on the first floor of Zoe Connolly’s office at Antiquity Cove. And I couldn’t resist to take a quick peak to check out my competition Tiana Meriman and Oolen Sputnik. Guess which one is mine:
Glad to see the contest inspired even some people to give logo creation a try. Dalien Talbot created a stylish ‘not-a-blogo for the SL loggers‘ that depicts the following ‘blog values’:
- It’s about keeping the balance.
- It’s about sense of humour.
- It’s about curiosity.
- It’s about tolerance (no, it’s not “his drawing skills just suck, but I be tolerant enough not to say it” - if you thought about this one, try something else)
- It’s about more than just writing.
Although it seems he’s not going to enter this SL Blogger’s logo into the contest, it’s a good occasion for all of us - and some in particular, even if he thinks he is ‘way above’ just being an SL Blogger - to give this values some time of thought. Maybe we can even put them under the general label ‘it’s all about dialogue, not about one way conversations‘?
Didn’t like any of the logos that you saw, or you know you can do better? Submissions are still accepted untill Sunday, so get your ass over to those virtual drawing boards! Except if you prefer to sketch it out in RL first, of course then you can move the ass to an old fashioned drawing board. :p Tobie?
Voting will begin on Sunday September 9th @ 12:00 PM SL time and end on Sunday September 16th @ 12:00 PM SL time. Votes will be tallied by Zoe Connolly and are accepted via IM, notecard and email address zoeconnolly (at) gmail (dot) com.
Vint’s personalised neko skin for Open Sim
September 4, 2007 1:11 pm
After Philo Sion, the creator of my cherished SL neko skin refused a dialogue on me exporting that Hybrid skin to Open Sim, I got a friendly offer from Storm Thunders to help me with a personalised vint-style neko skin for Open Sim. Full perm - a very much full perm even, Storm handed to me the layered photoshop file - and for personal use only, of course. *purrrrs*
Storm made me a kick ass striped - yeah, no more spots, I did not want a ‘copy’ of the Hybrid skin and these little tigers looked that cute - white neko skin, with small fluffy fur hairs - so I’m a softie now! - and recolorable spots. Storm, thank you so much for this great work and giving me an awesome very much evolved ‘template’ to work with! (Hint: SLurl to Storm Thunder’s shop)
But Vint would not be Vint if she would not change a few things:
- I changed the opacity of the base layer, so the effect on the stripes would resemble that on my Hybrids skin. With that I forgot to put full transparancy on the lashes, and thus ruined those, but luckily that’s easily to correct. I need to try out some more to the find the optimal opacity of the base layer - the ‘recolorable pastel color spots’ are created by making parts of the skin transparant. How much transparant, that’s the tricky question.
- The eye make up: I feel like dark, smudgy make up around the eyes at the moment. If there is an Open Sim logo, I might consider adding that under my eye as a small tattoo.
- Lips and shading around those: the shading around the mouth was neko style / cat like. I prefer a human face, but tried to give the lips a ‘cattish’ effect with the shading. Made the lips wider to fit my shape better, but I need to do some correction on the below lip still.
- The nipples: I think I’m going to photosource a pair of real life nipples. Google image search for ‘naked breasts’, here I come! *grins*
- Addes some overall shading and highlights on the butt - it’s cute! really! -, legs and breasts. Maybe a bit to much on the breasts.
Planned skin versions - probably I’ll change make up frequently according to my state of mind:
- A winter skin with longer, fluffy and softer hairs: my winter coat.
- A summer skin with tan lines.
Strange ideas that probably will never be executed:
- A skin with flees upon it.
- A skin with ‘rent out ad space on the breasts’. (Start the bidding, please! ;))
- A skin where pieces of skin seem ‘ripped off’, showing the flesh beneath it.
- An ‘old’ version of my neko self: hanging breasts, rimples, rash, … .
God comes to SL. Salvation for all but the furries.
September 3, 2007 4:06 pm
If the RL owner were to visit a mosque, she’d at least take of her shoes. If asked, she’d cover her body. If she visits an ancient monestary in Greece, she wears the obliged ugly skirt. If she visits a church, she’ll keep her voice down and clothing on. Whichever ‘holy place’ she will visit, she will keep to the rules of that place. As the place and religion were there first, and she is only a guest. But when God reaches out to us in Second Life, I’m not sure I accept Him forcing his rules upon us.
On saturday Andromega told me about a beautiful build in Second Life, the Kölner Dom. Close to perfection, it’s an impressive rebuild of the RL Dom in Köln. Builder Construction Project told me that they wish to build not only a Dom, but a community surrounding this House of God. As the RL owner is constantly complaining christians - and those in Belgium in particular - are not very open to ‘innovation’, I should applaud for this daring project. And really, if I could find the right animation, I would, if not for community membership being restricted.
The acces rules to the Kölner Dom in Second Life are the following:
Dont’s:
- Wings.
- Hats.
- Weapons.
- Furry avatars.
Construction Project also says they are following RL Dom access rules on this, but I wonder if those explicitely state ‘furries not allowed in the House of God’ or ‘Thy shall not be a furry’. The furries felt - which I can understand - insulted because they feel ‘furry’ is who they are, not a mask that they are wearing. If they would have to change to humans to be allowed to visit the Dom, now that would be ‘masking’ their personalities. Mr Project stressed that this is not a RL church decision, but one he made whilst waiting for guidance on this from the RL Dom peepz. But he fears it will not be that easy to explain to people that are not that familiar to Second Life, what ‘a furry’ is, and how they are creatures, equal to man (and fearies, and dragons, and vampires, and neko’s, and elves, and skeletons, and…).
My perspective on all this, as I wear ears, spotted skin and sometimes a tail too? Dear Dom people, this is not your world. You have no history here - except maybe for some moral values we imported from First Life. And as far as I’m concerned, if you force us to adapt to your rules, in stead of trying to let your religion and community find it’s own place in this brave new virtual world, you have no future here either.
Here in my world, the furries are a race. A furry is a member of the furry people. And thus, in my brave virtual world, discriminating upon the furries for their looks, equals discriminating on someone because of the color of their skin. The furries contributed to this grid as much as every other people, by building, scripting, being warm harted friends, … and thus deserve our respect. And equal rights! So I shall not set a foot or paw within that Dom until furries are allowed. I am willing to put on some extra clothing layers, detach the weapons and even the prim hair, for access to the Kölner Dom, but I shall not change skin or detach my ears. If I would do that, it is because of free will, and not because a diety that claims to love all, forces me to do so. This is Second Life, not First, and the first principle of our Community Standards is:
Combating intolerance is a cornerstone of Second Life’s Community Standards. Actions that marginalize, belittle, or defame individuals or groups inhibit the satisfying exchange of ideas and diminish the Second Life community as whole.
Call me a gnostic or a heretic, but if we all are children of God, we all are divine, and no person, be it a furry, a feary, a neko or a human, should be refused acces from the House of He Who Loves All.
Maybe Carter Giacobini - from Ir Shalom - said it best in an interview with Monalisa Robbiani: ‘But your avatar form doesn’t matter. It’s like putting a weight restriction or height restriction at a temple or church. That’s your avatar.‘
Monalisa Robbiani: Can I ask you a quick question? Let us see if I want to go to the temple here, would it be OK if i stay a pink lynx?
Carter Giacobini: LMAO. Sure!!! Just don’t leave hair on the benches.
Monalisa Robbiani: There is a big scandal going on about the cathedral of Cologne. The ban and kick furries.
Carter Giacobini: OMG. Really?
Monalisa Robbiani: So i wanted to know about jewish sites. They say furries desecrate the place.
Carter Giacobini: That is very christian.
Monalisa Robbiani: But tell me: if I put a pig avatar?
Carter Giacobini: LMAO!!! Well, you’re actually safer because we won’t use you for food. Lol.
(interview and Cologne Cathedral/Kölner Dom restrictions photograph: courtesy Monalisa Robbiano. Thank you!)
I went to the meeting today, between the furries and Mr. Project, as I promised on Saturday to think it over myself and to wait and see if an agreement between the Dom and the furries would be reached. When the sim went down - because of a stupid particles attack which was preceded by insulting messages aimed at the furries - both groups were close to a solution, and now the sign has been changed to say ‘or the likes’ and not ‘furries’ anymore. But the case still stands. If the RL Dom people are only willing to allow humans, as far as I’m concerned, they have nothing to look for in Second Life. Go and try There or Solitaire.
Dynamic reflections, my ass.
12:46 pm
First Bella March gives dynamic reflections a try and lays a very interesting egg. Then Smiley Barry takes - with the help mysterious CPU computing forces - that egg a bit further, cracks it open and gets a Second Life house, road and tree that far that they are willing to reflect in a shiny panel. Though he reports that we, the avies, do not have a mirror image. Yeah well, I always assumed some of the SL residents were vampires.
Of course I could not stay behind and had to try enabling Dynamic Reflections in the debug menu too.
What was in my DynamicReflections surprise egg?
- Broken altcamming (Bella reported that too).
- ‘Shifted’ snapshots results which included the UI although it was not ordered to include that.
- User interface pants that appeared out of the blue. (Check them covering my boots!) (UI up ass?)
- Shiny surfaces reflect all right, but only my user interface. I must admit that the UI was mirrord though. So it did do something correct.
- Editing objects was no more possible until reboot.
My advice? Kids, do not try ‘dynamic reflections = TRUE’ at home! ;)
PS. Bella, I’m curious about how the dynamic reflections will look with your ‘new gear’. Please try it again? Just for once? Until we have WindLight back?
