Second Life and Virtual Worlds
Penny Patton is one of those people that think, which usually gets me in trouble. She has an article out titled Virtual Space/Infinite Space. Her paradigm for conceptualizing land in Second Life™ is different from how I suspect most people think of SL land.
If you are looking for land or feeling confined by borders or just looking to reduce the cost of tier then her article is something you will be happy to have found.
Virtually free land…
I like to have a collection of tutorials to which I can send new Second Life™ users. Every so often I update my in-world note card list. I give that to new players I meet.
Strawberry Singh has a series of introductory(?) videos and she is adding to and updating her collection. Her post Introduction to Second Life is pretty much an outline of those videos. She has done a good job of answering questions new users have. Including signup, downloading, and installing the viewer, something often missed by tutorial makers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7t3tNQ_53us
I find 1 or 2 posts a month in the Second Life Forum asking how to get into SL. These are people that signed up but somehow didn’t realize they needed to download the viewer. It has been a while since I signed up a new avatar. So, I don’t really understand how they miss understanding they need to download the ‘game’. I just know they do. And these are people that write well when posing their question. So, they aren’t mentally handicapped or simpletons.
April Linden has posted about Second Life’s down time last Tuesday.
See: A Play-by-Pl
I enjoy hearing what’s up with the system when there are problems.
Word is getting around that the Marketplace (MP) has shifted to the new search feature. There are some problems with the new search. I like it, but nothing is perfect.
One problem is items removed from the MP are showing up in search. Another is how title words and keywords are ranked in the search algorithm has changed. More weight given to title words. The fear is this will lead to cluttered item names. Some believe people will start cramming there keyword list into the items name, title.
Whatever the case on these problems, there is a place where you can discuss the problems you have with the new search. See the SL Forum thread titled: Marketplace Search Issues [ New ].
This is an interesting update on the current bugs and progress on the head bones. Matrice Laville, the programmer for AvaStar speaks about several issues.
One of the people working with Bento is totally frustrated. She provides us a textbook case of victimization and projection. Wow. She is having problems with the Bento Collada file in the SL Wiki dated Aug 6th. Even after several people downloaded and checked the file during the meeting then told her the file was complete but had bone position issues, which were talked about earlier, she couldn’t hear them.
A new post appeared in the SL Blog, 8/2 @ 9:33 AM… hmmmm… See: Recent Second Life Developments – What’s New and What’s Coming!
Project Bento is the first mention. If you have been following you know Project Bento is nearing a point where the viewer can promote to RC status.