Category Archives: Virtual World News

Viewer Evolution User Group Closed?

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Communication?

Once upon a time we had a group that dealt with the evolution of the Second Life Viewer. Esbee Linden ran the group for a time then left Linden Lab. After she left Oz Linden ran the group for a time. When Esbee came back to the Lab Oz dropped the meeting. Presumably it was Esbee’s to deal with.

Office Hours – User Groups

The User Groups page used to have a Viewer Evolution User Group (VEUG). That has been removed. Some of the meeting archives still survive. Some links for VEUG now forward to the Open Development User Group (ODUG) or so I’ve heard. I haven’t found any links left.

The ODUG meets Wednesdays at 1:30 PM SLT/PDT. See the User Groups page for location.

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Language Translation in Second Life

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Some time ago I wrote about Google shutting down their free Translation API. This is the service Google provided and Second Life Viewers use to handle language translation. Google has now come out (8/24) with pricing for the Paid-Translation-Service-API. So, what happens to our viewers?

Google Translate

As It Is Now

It only works in Local Chat and is disabled by default. One enables it in Me->Preferences->Chat. At the bottom of the panel is a check box to enable machine translation.

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Second Life Rod Humble 2011 Keynote

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Each year the CEO of Linden Lab addresses the residents on the future direction they plan to take Second Life. This year Rod Humble gave the address. I like to get the audio of the address and summarize the key points. I think people can read faster than most people can talk. Plus later when I need to remember what Rod said, I have a searchable summary of the address. So, here are the key points as I see and understand them.

If you want the bottom line, jump to my Summary at the end.

Rob Humble’s Keynote Address

UStream

The events and meetings are being streamed through UStream.com. The first meeting I went to, Future of Mesh, they changed the stream. We had to scramble to find the correct stream. In Rod’s keynote it was a bit easier. But, in both cases those attending in-world had problems. So, I suggest if you are planning to attend any of the meetings, watch via UStream in your browser. The URL’s are in the schedule. See: http://schedule.slconvention.org/. Also, the videos should be archived there.

The crowded regions were crashing my SLV 3.0.1 and Dolphin 2 viewers. Bummer.

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Second Life’s August Update

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It looks like the Lab is going to do consistent monthly news updates. This month we got a new update Monday as to what is happening in Second Life. August Update If you regularly read this blog, you’ll probably find you know most of the things announced in the blog post. But, there are some things I did not know about, so you won’t have found out about them here.

The New Splash Screen

Splash Page

I think everyone is now seeing the new Second Life Splash page. This is the one a wrote about: New Login Screen Arrives a few days ago.

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Favorite Social Network?

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Daniel Voyager is taking a poll of which network is your favorite. Jump over and give a click.

See: Which social networking site is your favorite for Second Life in 2011?

Some choices are not what I would consider social networks, but that is just me. I suppose I can see how Flickr might be a social network. I just never thought of it that way.

With 16 votes Twitter is leading… we need more votes to get an idea of where SL Residents hang out.

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Major Linden Oops

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Tateru in a post on Dwell On It tells about the Meeroos account being blocked. This is the fulfillment  account used for all the Meeroos orders in Second Life. So, for now the provider of Meeroos is screwed.

Seems this was an enforcement goof. Similar Meeroos account names were being opened by those hoping to scam on Meeroos somehow. In an effort to remove those accounts the enforcement team got the real one.

See: Meeroos master account blocked by Linden Lab. All Meeroos stores offline

That has to hurt.

Privacy

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If you think Google was a problem for you with its pseudonyms policy you have no idea what is in store for you.

HR 1981 is in process in the US House of Representatives. This will require ISP’s to log all activity on their networks and retain it for 18 months along with all the personal information they have on you in their accounts records. A search warent is not needed to access and study the records. What your date with that hunk reviewed by a bureaucrat?

If you are a US citizen call your Representative and ask that they oppose this bill.

You can read more about it here: Is Congress’s ISP-Logging Bill A Violation of the Fourth Amendment?

 

2ndhub Review

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2ndhub is another social network. The network is geared toward Second Life users. How much RL information one uses with 2ndhub is up to you. So, if you are into keeping you RL and SL separate, 2ndhub is catering to you.

I am unhappy with Facebook. I have an account for my avatar and wonder how long it will last.

2ndhub Social Site for Second Life

I still like a couple of games on Facebook, but those are wearing thin now. I play only once per day now and have given up on Frontierville (too many ads in my face) and mostly given up on My Vineyard (same reason). Backyard Monsters is becoming more and more of a grind. Backyard does have a constant flow of new stuff to play with. But, it is a laggy game and doesn’t always work. I think it depends on the time of day…

Google+ is very nice and I love the state-of-the-art interface. But, because of their confused stance on pseudonyms and my use of Google Web Master Tools I canceled my Google+ account.

User Interface

2ndhub has a Facebook style interface. There are no new user interface features. So, use of the service via smart phone is likely tedious. Use via a desktop or laptop is clunky. The interface is cluttered. Everything is a drop down list or simple hyper link. Menus are standard link with a drop down.

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