Drax Files Radio

 Another show is out and I have time to listen and write about it. Ciaran and Daniel both have written about the latest show. I’ll try to add some more information to the topics.

SL Go

This week’s show gets into SL Go and its recent price changes, US$9.95 per month for unlimited use. That is a pretty good deal. SL Go also connects to Steam. So, you can play high-end games on Steam using your tablets and other low end computers.

I think many OnLive users are very happy with the service. I am certainly impressed with it. A number of SL users have commented positively about it too.

There are those that $10/month is too much. But, apparently the results from a recent survey by OnLive told them otherwise. They set their price at what they feel is half of what the majority of people said they would be willing to pay.

They also over an hourly rate of US$1.00/per hour. I personally think this is great. It should make the service usable for those of us that only have an occasional need to connect via mobile.

SL Go is now on the home page of SL Go’s site. They are still offering a free 20 minutes demo. I still think that is too little to know how well you do or don’t like it. Being able to get an hour for a dollar is great and I think gives people the time to make a realistic test.

They also offer a service to allow you to work in Microsoft Office and have 2gb of cloud storage. Form some people working on the go this could be a handy thing.

Jo’s Rift

Jo wrote about her experience using the Rift. She says far more in her blog than she has time to say on the show. (My first Oculus Rift experience in Second Life) But, the audio conveys her enthusiasm and excitement about the Rift.

We are hearing more people says they cannot describe the Rift experience. Jo and Drax are certainly saying that. Think about that. What words can you use to describe something people have no worlds for and have yet to experience? For instance. We can says something burns because we have all managed to get burnt at some point in our lives. We have experienced that and have a world for it. Now try to describe BLUE or RED to someone that has been blind from birth. We have words for those colors but the blind person lacks the shared experience.

Now realize that we are getting a new shared experience. Some have experienced it and some haven’t. So, the two groups have entirely different meanings for the words we are using to describe the experience. Jo is being accurate in saying we can’t know what she is talking about until we try it. That’s the way our language for describing these experiences works.

Privacy

There is concern about Facebook (FB) building a virtual world and forcing people to use their real names, be identified. There are good and points to be made for using real or fake names. Of course FB’s financial model is based on having people’s real names and being able to sell that marketing data.

Jo thinks FB’s requirement for real names is silly. While that may be debatable, there is no arguing that FB’s financial model is working for them.

Philip Rosedale wrote a blog article about privacy and avatars wearing name tags. He seems to be thinking that it will be possible to forego name tags in High Fidelity (HF). The system operator would know who you are, but you would have a choice to reveal or not your name in HF. We’ll have to see how those ideas are implemented. It might work.

TOS

For some time we have been discussing, debating, and ranting about the change to the Linden/Second Life™ Terms of Service (TOS). They were change months ago to give Linden Lab equal, complete, and perpetual rights to anything we create and upload to Second Life.

If you have been confused by the change or have never gotten a clear understanding of what your rights are, then this is an excellent section of the show to listen to. Drax Radio Show #13 @ 21:30.

This remains a problem. So, far I have yet to hear a Linden explain their problem in anyway understandable and specific, other than we need it for our other business related issues… Really!?! What might those issues be?

I suspect the Linden managers don’t really know. I think that is what the attorneys told them. No one is digging in and solving the problem because there is no reason to spend the effort. After all, it is not a problem for the Lab.