Second Life and Virtual Worlds
Ziki Questi just blogged about another artist stopping work in Second Life™. This artist is Johnas Merlin. In the middle of an LEA project (Linden Endowment for the Arts) Johnas has stopped work. The reason given is the textures Johnas was planning on using can no longer be used in Second Life. So, this piece of art is going to remain unfinished.
You can see Ziki’s article here: Quantum Reflections, Victim of the ToS.
Hamlet Au ran a poll on New World Notes asking if creative types had stopped creating and uploading to second life. Of the 266 poll participants 121 answered they have. There were 32 others that selected the other option. That gives us a total of 153 or about 57% that stopped uploading content to Second Life™.
You can see the poll result here: Linden Lab ToS Survey Results: Majority of Respondents Have Stopped Created/Selling Second Life Content.
As family points out, this TOS change has gone far beyond just drama. We are seeing a change in resident behavior. I have to wonder if this is starting to show up in the stats Linden Lab tracks. This would be a good question for people to be asking of the user group meetings.
For a time I had the Linden particle test object sitting on my porch at my Second Life™ home. It is a nine prim object. So, once I got tired of it I took it down. But, you can still get a copy of it. The Old London Docks blog (written in German) has a link to a copy of the test object.
This is the object that lets you see the different blending modes for particles. You need to be using the SL Viewer 3.6.7 to see the new particle effects. AFAIK, none of the third-party viewers can display the new particle effects. Expect to see that in the next releases.
I’m not that creative with particles, but I expect to see some really amazing effects from people that are. It should be fun.
Another third party Viewer meeting and some more interesting news.
The Lindens have promoted the Maintenance RC viewer to the main release. That makes the main viewer 3.6.7-281793. You can see the release notes here.
This release has improvements for avatar render speed and other fixes and improvements. Most notable are:
Ouch! I just saw where Gaia Clary, mover and shaker of Machinimatrix.org, has just posted how Avastar® is being changed to be an OpenSim focused tool rather than a Second Life™ focused tool. I think that strongly suggests how Gaia sees things going in the future.
Cloud Party is advancing. New stuff is being added. There is a video out that shows a hover-bike in operation. Looks fun.
[youtube bOhChjVw2E4]
I still think vehicles in Cloud Party, Second Life, and OpenSim are lame. But, they can be fun.