I wrote about Linden Lab laying off 30% of staff here: Linden Lab Layoffs. I wrote that in the next few days we would see more information coming from those with an inside line to Linden Lab (LL). New World Notes (NWN) and Massively are following the layoff story and speculating. NWN’s Au is digging out more facts. I think my favorite SL blogger, Gwyneth Llewelyn, in [Reset] and do a 180º turn gives a vastly different insight than many headlines in the SL-blogosphere suggest.

As usual predicting the future is speculation. However, what Linden Lab is planning is not speculation. Whether they actually get it done… But, a direction is a direction and that can give us perspective. Gwyn’s writing gives us a new insight.

May be Linden Lab is not recession proof. New World Notes has an article, now confirmed, about Linden Lab laying off 30% of staff.

Looking into Linden Lab Layoff Rumors

Utopia Machinima Area

Both Second Life (SL) and OpenSim (OS) are advancing; changes, updates, events, people. Several are small things that I doubt deserve their own post but are worth noting. Also, I’m part of a Myst-Uru fan community. So, some things come from far outside the normal SL/OS circles.

A researcher working in the game THERE has written a thoughtful article about her findings. For those of us interested in what makes a game tick and succeed or fail it is a great read.

In-Depth: Requiem For A World

For those of from the Myst-Uru community it has special interest as Celia studied the community of Myst-Uru that fled into THERE when Uru closed. The result was a book: Communities of Play: Emergent Cultures in Multiplayer Games and Virtual Worlds

Many of us have heard that Blender 2.5 is on the way. Blender 2.5 Alpha 0 is out and can be downloaded. It is Alpha software. Some features from the 2.4 series are not all working in 2.5. How the missing features are implemented is changing, so there is some delay. There seems to be lots of changes coming. One thing that has not changed is installation information which is still limited and what is out there pretty much assumes one is a geek. So, I’ll provide some help I think is less geeky.

OpenSim

Running a standalone grid on your home computer is not big thing to do. Finding all the information you need to get it working as you want is a bit of a pain. All the people that are working on OSGrid know where everything is. So, they don’t write it down.

When I reinstalled my OpenSim server (I broke mine upgrading) it did not let me walk on prims. Everything was phantom. Setting things to physical did not help, they were still behaving as if phantom. So, I started looking for how to fix that.

Devokan Hot Spot

I’ve been busy with RL, moving, unpacking, getting what little work there is done, getting cable to my new home for a good Internet connection, writing proposals for the company I freelance for…

I have new articles planned for here. One that is most in my mind is about Devokan (SL Map). It recently made the SL Hot Spots (these scroll off so I can’t link). Fans from Myst Online, a closed MMO, are building and playing in Devokan (link requires SL account). There is a story to Devokan. One can read the story on the Guild of Maintainers site in Developments in Devokan (the guild is a fan group from Myst Online).

I have a story about the SL RPG Land of NoR and the RPG’s spinning off from it. I just have to figure out how write about the drama if that saga without it being boring.

I also have a review of Babylon 5 RPG in SL. I need to up date it and get it posted.

I just need more hours in the day…

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I tend to agree with Kanomi of Tiny Dancing in her funny post about Playing Blue Mars. It’s for boys. I registered weeks ago and watched my email and the spam folder too. Still no invitation. I opened a yahoo email account using a boyish name and four days later I have my invite. That could be coincidence. …right.

Updated 10/13/2009 – New Blue Mars Review Stuff Here
Updated 12/17/2009 – Blue Mars Goes Open Beta