General News

Firestorm + MadPea

by

Inara has an article up about the new testing of Community Gateways. We have seen the idea of community gateways appear a number of times over the years. We are now on the eve another iteration. In this one Linden Lab, Firestorm Developers, and MadPea Game Designers have teamed up to create a new gateway.

See: Firestorm ready to launch Gateway; MadPea join as partners.

The new gateway will be open Saturday 10/31 with events at; 13:00 SLT – Mankind Tracer, 14:00 SLT – Nance Brody, 15:00 SLT – The Changhigh Trinity Sisters Fire Show, and 14:00 SLT onwards – DJ Quad.

Check Inara’s article for more information.

Wayward Peaks Halloween

by

There are a lot of interesting places in Second Life™. Dolls and Demons, love the pictures, has an article up about a Gotcha Event: Hanging With The Bad Boys. Checking out the regions mentioned I came across Wayward Peaks. It is an awesome Gotcha event. There are Gotcha vendors are all over the region. So, you’ll be exploring.

Do you believe in Angels? *FGC Nov 2015*
Go to AllesIst Klaar’s photostream – Image by AllesIst – Outfit @ her blog

The region is full of mesh. Much of it has poor LoD modeling. If you have set your RenderVolumeLODFactor set to 4, a bad move, you won’t notice. Using 1.125 I noticed. At 1.125 you have to be close to things for them to look right. But, in general the place is interesting. 

Read more

Second Life in the News – Week 43-2

by

The Boston Globe has run an article titled: Second Life shows new promise as virtual forum for diabetes education. The article is about the Boston Medical Center training diabetics how to manage their condition via classes in Second Life™.

Blowing my diet on Food Friday 9.13.13
Blowing my diet on Food Friday

The Center did a study to see how effective the class was. They assigned half the study participants to a class in SL and the other half to a class at the hospital. Quoting the Globe:

The trial was a hit. Mitchell said the Second Life participants didn’t just sit in on the course sessions. They made friends, swapped recipes, had dance sessions, hung out. Most tellingly, participants wanted to know if they could involve their families in the game too.

The results were both groups progressed at the same rates and improved in equal amounts. But, it was the SL group that evidenced more engagement and learning persistence.

Second Life in the News – Week 42

by

Most of the news coverage of Second Life™ is about SL. But, the blog Business 2 Community has an article about how one can use SL to promote a web site. Different.

See: How You Can Use Second Life to Promote Your Website.

The author Lori Soard promotes SL as having 20 million users… that should tell you something about this author’s knowledge of SL… or lack of… At best we probably have about a million or two unique active users in a year.

Cirque de Seraphim
Cirque de Seraphim

Lori presents a couple of case studies; Novelist Karen Kay and the idea of Health Promotion.

The odd thing is the novelist used her RL connection with readers to promote a class in SL. Seems this isn’t using SL for promotion, just the opposite. Then Lori says, “…This is a fun way to attract new customers, or in her case readers, you might not otherwise attract.” Have you ever tried to attract people in SL to an event? What results did you get?

Read more

Second Life’s Render Complexity – Discussion Starting

by

We have been here before. A feature like the old Avatar Render Cost (ARC) was used by what became known as ARC Nazis to abuse people. You see a type of person that has basic authority issues, control issues, or a bullying nature adopt a fascist mentality and start telling people what they can do. Some in those groups start trying to enforce their will on others. Abuse, shame, hate, anger… and more is called into service in attempts to enforce their will on others.

Geisha Shadows
Geisha Shadows – Think this gorgeous outfit has a high ACI?
If it does, is that good or bad?

We could call this politics… In SL it is more often called drama. But, whichever we call it, it has the same source: human nature. Humans are different, unique. But, we all have the same basic traits, just in different degrees and we learn to cope with issues in different ways. We call the result character. 

Read more