Second Life News 2019 w20

A berry good introduction to Second Life™ popped up on YouTube yesterday, How to Get Started in Second Life New User Tutorial.

Save a link to the video. You can refer people to it that ask about Second Life™.

Servers

There is currently no DEPLOYS post which is sort of expected this week as a maintenance project is in progress this week. From Grid Status a few days ago,

Scheduled – Our engineers will be performing maintenance on the Second Life network May 13 – 16. We hope to perform most of the maintenance early in this window, but it may extend several days if needed.

Residents may experience problems connecting to, being disconnected from, or an inability to log in during this time, as well as possible issues rezzing objects, teleporting, or crossing regions. We hope to keep these disruptions to a minimum and greatly appreciate your patience during this time as we work to make Second Life more robust.

We will resolve this status once the maintenance has been fully completed.
May 7, 16:16 PDT

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Catching Griefers/Cheaters

In Second Life™ we have griefers. I think that is because cheating in Second Life isn’t really possible in the word’s common sense of usage. It’s that long term debate about whether Second Life is a game that I think drives use of the word griefer. If it isn’t a game, how can you cheat? It pushes us to more precise language.

Black Desert Online

Black Desert Online

However, in Black Desert Online™ (BDO) there are cheaters. Recently they have been causing a problem. Apparently a number of us sent Massively Overpowered links to a video of hackers at play. No one was hearing anything back from Daum in response to complaints, so put it on Massively. Result: Daum, the creator of BDO responded and is now following up with a hunt for hackers. See: Black Desert Turns to Its Playerbase to Hunt Down Cheaters for PrizesContinue reading

Second Life: How to Stop Mean Comments…

I seldom see bloggers in the Second Life™ sphere tackle deep philosophical ideas. There are plenty of rants and opinions. But, I seldom see people go beyond their personal outrage or anger over something that has touched them. So, Strawberry Singh’s Mean Comments Meme was a bit of a surprise.

Secret Thoughts

Secret Thoughts by Mr S. is looking at you, on Flickr

Ms. Singh has seen Monica Lewinsky’s 20+ minute address caught by and promoted by TEDTalks. If you don’t know  TEDTalks is a part of the larger TED – Technology, Entertainment, Design – a non-profit working to promote ideas worth spreadingContinue reading

Second Life Griefing 2013-24

Every release of the viewer and server software has more fixes to stop griefing. But it is an escalating problem. Sort of an arms race.

A recent casualty appears to be the Pornstars group. It seems that group is going to close because of griefer infiltration. It will be replaced with a new group:  The Sexiest® : Pornstars click the name to find the group.

You may be unexpectedly ejected from the group. That will be the group closing. There is some hope this may be avoided. But, that depends on whether the Lab helps out.

Many are hoping the coming Group Ban Lists will help with this problem.

More Griefing

Fifteen or so region owners were at the Server & Scripting meeting Tuesday. They are having horrible griefing problems and are looking for help.

Post Server & Scripting Meeting 2013-21

Post Server & Scripting Meeting 2013-21

Seems repeat griefers are plaguing SL. That is not news. If you have looked at these problems, you know there is no easy way to get rid of repeat offenders. Those not familiar with the technology of the Internet always think there is a technical solution. Griefing is a human nature problem as in many cases the solutions are not technical but a matter of law enforcement.  We see that in games, forums, and real life where problems of violence and hate are ongoing. Humans bent on anti-social behavior find ways around the technical solutions and legal restrictions. Technology is not going to stop humans from misbehaving. Nor is government, even when it has its foot on everyone’s neck… the complete removal of freedom. People misbehave.

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Second Life News 2013-13

This week we did get a rollout to the main channel. The code running on Blue Steal and Le Tigre was promoted Tuesday morning.  This is a package that has a bug fix or two and a crash mode fix, which I think is mostly a security fix. So, we won’t see much change in the main channel… may be a bit less griefing.

Server-Scripting Meeting - Baker's Estate in Background

Server-Scripting Meeting – Baker’s Estate in Background

Release Channels

Wednesday we will see the Blue Steal and Le Tigre RC channels get the exciting rollout. SVC-3755 is included which changes how the CHANGED() event works. Now CHANGED_REGION and CHANGED_TELEPORT will work from child prims.

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Designing Worlds on Griefing

There has been on ongoing discussion on new developments in the nature of griefing.  In mid December I wrote: From #SL Griefing to Extortion. Also, we have seen the DMCA case between Curio/Hush resolved… sort of. No one is overly happy with that outcome. Rod Humble said the Lab would be doing something to make griefers very unhappy. As of now he certainly has not done anything about griefer to make legitimate users happy.

Guests on the show - left to right: Rails Bailey, Robert Galland, Frolic Mills, Dina Petty and Kiff Clutterbuck.

Guests on the show – left to right: Rails Bailey, Robert Galland, Frolic Mills, Dina Petty and Kiff Clutterbuck.

Several Second Life bloggers have been covering events. Designing Worlds recently did a show on the topic. It aired and is now on the site: Designing Worlds discovers when griefing turns into extortion. 1 hr 8 min.

Kiff Clutterbuck and Dina Petty, the owners of Junkyard Blues, are in the show. Robert Galland, the owner of Galland Homes, a Member of the Second Life Bar Association, and real life attorney, gives a legal perspective on what has been happening.

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From #SL Griefing to Extortion

This article got way longer than I intended. Even after I went back and did a trim pass to reduce the size. But, I did not want to write another piece on griefing that didn’t place a new perspective on the subject. Griefing is advancing and getting more sophisticated and dangerous. I’ve pointed out those dangers and possible defenses. Also, anti-griefers are starting to become self-righteous griefers abusing others in the name of fighting griefers. It is a mess.

Crying Leo by storyvillegirl on Flickr

Crying Leo by storyvillegirl on Flickr

In RL we see the same mess with Pro-Life and Pro-Choice people. The idiots on one side kill doctors that perform abortions. The idiots on the other side try to force people with religious objections to pay for abortions. Both are insane and display disregard for their ‘stated’ principals. Getting the rational people on both sides to work it out is the only solution.

In recent months griefing has progressed to include extortion. Extortion is a RL crime. Griefing in Second Life™, particularly in the SL fashion industry, has been a part of the drama of SL. Griefing via extortion is probably only a new-to-some-of-us thing. The old song the Lab does nothing continues and is lame now as it always has been.

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