The Phoenix-Firestorm Survey

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The Phoenix hour is a bi-weekly show facilitated by Phaylen Fairchild (the nosey heifer – hilarious inside joke – see 52:00±). In the video Jessica Lyon is speaking for the Firestorm/Phoenix team. This week’s meeting is mostly about the recent survey on five features in the viewer, which the Firestorm team ran. The following is a summary of the meeting. The times are HH:MM:SS or just MM:SS and they are approximate. The words here are my paraphrasing of the video not a transcript. So, my take may be different than yours was or would be or than what Jessica intended. Simply it is what I took from what they were saying.

The Phoenix Hour

If you watch the video be warned that while the video starts at 00:00:00 the sound failed until about time mark 07:00±. So, you can skip into the video without missing anything. Also, the video is mostly just talking heads. So, if you listen without watching, you won’t miss anything. The only URL presented I give as a link below.

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Google+

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This is a new social networking idea. With something like 90% of Facebook users unhappy with Facebook it is not surprising that someone is going to try and compete with Facebook. Google is going for it. For some time rumors have been that Google Circles would be an attempt to create a new social network. Now Google+ appears and it looks like it will be the project rumored to be Google Circles.

Google+

Google+ is in limited Beta, field testing as is said on the web site. Google+

If you take the interactive tour, you’ll see a menu item labeled Circles. As Google puts it, social networks are about sharing. The trick here, as Anthony Wiener found out, is sharing with just the ones you want. Circles allow one to easily create and control their groups. The interface is drag and drop. It makes Facebook’s processes look positively ancient. Drag a person to a circle certainly beats drop down menus.

I know from playing Facebook games where you must recruit people to advance that managing friends  gets tedious. Their posts and likes and stuff begin to clutter the wall so that it is hard to see what my friends are doing. Figuring out how to deal with all this is about as much fun as learning to use a new SL viewer.

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Deleting Facebook Accounts

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You may have noticed that it is nearly impossible to delete a Facebook account. Some believe it is impossible. However, on the ReadWriteWeb.com blog they have the steps needed to backup your profile and delete it.

See: How to (Actually) Delete Your Facebook Account

There are other ways. As one person has said, just post something politically incorrect and Facebook Staff will delete it for you. Another is to have a friend report you as a fake person, one using an alias. Another is to convince them you’re an avatar.

 

 

#SL Server Updates Week 26

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Servers - Image by: dumbledad @ Flickr

Today one of the long pending updates has finally rolled out to the main grid. With any luck, it will work fine and a roll back can be avoided. So, what is in this new roll out?

Mono2

The big gun in this roll out is Mono2. Kelly Linden is generally blamed for the Mono2 Update… well… attributed is probably a better word. But, since no good deed goes unpunished… we can thank him while gathering tar and features. Whatever your feelings on Mono2, it has been a long time coming. Today it was rolled out to the main grid.

Mono2 is an update to the Linden Scripting Language (LSL) system. The original language is one created by Linden Lab for use in Second Life (SL). Scripts are used by residents to make things like doors open and teleports teleport. Scripts are written in a language. Many of you will have heard of JavaScript, which is used widely with web pages. LSL is a somewhat JavaScript like language used exclusively in Second Life with a dialect used in OpenSim (OSSL). I suppose one could say the relationship between JavaScript and LSL is a bit like English and Spanish being Latin based languages. Your ability to speak one does not allow you to speak the other, but any other Latin based language will be a bit easier to learn.

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Second Life Mesh Meeting Update Week 26

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Mesh cost is still an annoying topic of conversation. It is still undefined. But, we are getting closer to a cost and we are learning more about the reasons for the costs. The Lindens are definitely being more open about the Linden costs. That hasn’t done much to improve the manners of residents participating in the meetings. 🙁

Mesh Meeting

Mesh UUID Swapping

This subject keeps coming up. Kyrah Abattoir  asked the question in a new way. Quoting, “Figuring out a sane and conservative way to implement “set by UUID” for Meshes, builtin delay by link set for example, to prevent excessive mesh swapping/animating attempts, yet allow loading and unloading a mesh for legitimate uses. It seems to me this question assumes a swap can be done and that it is frequent swapping that overloads the sim. Originally many hoped that mesh could be animated as sculpties are.

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Firefox 5 Released

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I just saw a new Firefox browser is out, version 5. I started looking to see what is new in Firefox 5. The hype is 1,000’s if new things. The reality is; not much… from the users perspective. There are the ubiquitous bug fixes, plus new security measures and a few new features.

Firefox Twitter

Popularity

Internet Explorer has the largest number of users. However, that does not make it the most popular browser. As it is built into Windows, new and novice computer users have no clue that better browsers are available. Among intermediate and advanced computer users alternate viewers are popular. They actually make a choice as to which browser to use. So, while debatable it is Firefox that is the more popular browser. Behind it is Google Chrome, my favorite.

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