Sansar in the News 2016 w45

We aren’t hearing much new about Sansar. But, Hamlet found and article by Joe Durbin published on UPLOAD, Preview: ‘Sansar’ Could Give Social VR Worlds a Second Life. I think Hamlet was responding to Dubin’s enthusiasm. I found the enthusiasm interesting.

Project Sansar: Mars landscape.

Project Sansar: Mars landscape.

Quoting Dubin:

Sanar is as hard to describe to the uninitiated as [is] Second Life. It is not a game, a film, a tech demo, or a specific social VR experience. Sansar is raw, limitless virtual potential that can truly be forged into the inter-connected digital world we’ve been dreaming about since Snow Crash.

That is my expectation of what Sansar is to be. I do believe that just as the Lab has used projects in Second Life to demonstrate its abilities so too will they have projects to show what can be done with Sansar.  Continue reading

Project Sansar and & VR

Hamlet has an interesting survey up in: In Survey, New World Notes Readers Overwhelmingly Interested in Trying Project Sansar This Year. 65±% want to check out Project Sansar. 23±% are undecided. 10±% are NOT interested.

Open up your heart .......

Open up your heart …….

Since Sansar will be free to play (visit), the 23% waiting to hear more makes no sense to me. I’m waiting to get in so I can see for myself. I’m far too jaded to trust anyone’s opinion more than my own eyes and firsthand experience. If you are waiting on more information, isn’t that an interest?  Continue reading

Second Life: Custom Mesh Head Animation

Project Bento is moving ahead. The AvaStar people are working on building tools to help people animate the new avatar. You can see a video of where they are now. YOU HAVE TO CLICK…

This isn’t something we will have access to this week or next. We may not see the final release of Project Bento for some weeks and possibly months.

We may have the AvaStar tools soon. Building the animation tool is a simpler task than building a player that works with the new skeleton and the legacy version animations.

Ebbe’s Speech Shaking Things

Linden Lab’s CEO Ebbe Altberg spoke at VWBPE 2016, Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education. There are some interesting points made in the speech. Some are changes and others are just making it more clear what the Lab is planning with Project Sansar®.

For about 12 minutes Ebbe was talking about Second Life™ and Project Sansar. Then the question and Answer part starts. The moderators were doing an excellent job of focusing questions. That got lots of ground covered.

I’ve done my summary style index. Paraphrasing. And I’ve added links into the video for those things I think have impact.

The most impactful thing I took away from this Q&A is how often Ebbe implies and says Project Sansar and the final resulting product will not be a replacement for Second Life. He provides way more information on why not. If you’re an educator, you may well be keeping your projects in SL with… I’ll say… links to very focused experiences in Sansar. Continue reading

What of Second Life will Sansar be?

Loki Eliot has a thoughtful article up about the NATURE of Second Life™. Ebbe Altberg, Linden Lab CEO, has said on a couple of occasions that Project Sansar will produce a world in the SPIRIT of Second Life. To have any idea what he means we have to understand how Ebbe sees Second Life. I can’t provide a clear picture of Ebbe’s thinking. What we are discussing is far too complex and I’ll get into that complexity.

Spirit 18
Spirit 18 by Ziki Quest @ Flickr

Loki goes with how he sees Second Life. See: What is the Spirit of Second Life?.

We have several opinions and quotes from Philip Rosedale, the attributed creator of SL, about what they planned for Second Life to be. There are more on what Philip says it became. There are also all the marketing campaigns that have spun what Second Life is in attempts to interest people in SL. Then we have all the opinions on what Second Life is from those that have used or participated in Second Life.  Continue reading

Sansar to use Unity3D?

SL Press has an article up about the rumor that Project Sansar will be built using the Unity3D game engine. See: Project Sansar to run on Unity3d. The title makes it sound like a fact. While they give good reasons for saying it is Unity3D, it is still a ways from a conclusive confirmation. It also is a bit misleading to my way of thinking.

PS: 9:50 AM PST: Note Pete Linden’s comment at the end.

Unity3D

Unity3D – June 28, 2010

The latest information I can find where Ebbe Altberg says anything about voxels is to say they are experimenting with them. Early on there was more talk about using voxels. Voxels were a big thing for High Fidelity too. But, recently we haven’t heard much about voxels from either project.  Continue reading

Asking about Project Sansar

Hamlet pointed us toward the Lab Chat thread: Lab Chat Returns January 21st, 2016 with Linden Lab CEO – Ebbe Altberg. The thread is about 5 pages long as I write this, if you use the linear layout. (The setting for that is in My Settings->Preferences->Display.) There are the repeated questions everyone asks over and over, the totally uninformed ones (What is Sansar?), and some interesting new ones. I’ll look at some of the ones I find interesting.

Arctic Leopard

Arctic Leopard

Several people are wanting more information on what basic beginner building tools will be like. I suspect these questions will continue until they can experience the process. Painting a word picture is likely to be too imprecise to satisfy most people.  Continue reading

Hamet’s Questions about Sansar

Hamlet has a post published where he frames questions about Project Sansar® he would like to see asked at the next Lab chat. See: Top Project Sansar Questions I’d Love to Hear Answered on the Next Lab Chat. If you have questions you would like to have answered, post them here: Lab Chat Returns January 21st, 2016 with Linden Lab CEO – Ebbe Altberg – you’ll supposedly find it in the Second Life Forum in the Events section every month.

~Retrato~

~Retrato~

Hamlet thinks there is a ‘massive’ controversy about whether Sansar will cannibalize Second Life. I suppose there is some controversy. I suspect nearly everyone has an opinion. I do hear people voice the fear. But, I’m not seeing the clouds of doom or marching protesters. Continue reading