JuicyBomb

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    Shine Bright Like Neon Lights

    Bygogo Fashion, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized
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    Shine Bright Like Neon Lights

    A friend asked me recently, “Gogo, why do you ask so many questions about how much designers are making on Facebook?”

    Yes, I ask a lot of questions on Facebook. I’m on pretty much all of the social media sites for Second Life, but people are especially chatty on Facebook, and I’m always trying to get a temperature check on the SL economy. Are people still making money? Are they making less than they used to? Is Second Life going to survive long enough for my Lifetime Premium Plus accounts to pay off, or will SL die before I’m profitable? So many questions.

    I think about the SL economy probably more than the average resident does. Besides being an SL nerd, I’m also a bit of a finance enthusiast, and I love reading about the economy in RL and apparently analyzing the SL economy too. I think it’s smart to know when something is still worth your time and when it’s time to move on. If you’re no longer making the money you used to make here, there’s nothing wrong with finding somewhere else where your time and talent are worth more.

    Another reason I ask these questions is because despite some designers doing very well in Second Life, I often see some saying they’re on the verge of being evicted or facing some other financial emergency nearly every week. There’s always a Second Life GoFundMe, and sometimes it’s from designers I would consider fairly successful from a distance. They’re talented, they have a recognizable brand, they have customers, so why are they still living paycheck to paycheck?

    I’ve watched a lot of designers come and go over the years, for all kinds of reasons, and I actually think there’s something admirable about knowing when it’s time to leave. If you used to make good money in Second Life and you’re no longer making what you need, why cling to it until you’re completely broke? Find greener pastures. Maybe that means another virtual platform, maybe it means taking your skills and working for a company in real life, or maybe it means doing something completely different. At some point, if something is no longer working financially, you have to see the writing on the wall and bounce before you’re broke. There’s no prize for hanging on the longest.

    Jian Pets announced last week that they’re leaving Second Life, and you can read their farewell message here. I think it’s smarter to move on and explore other opportunities than to cling to something that is no longer serving you. Second Life has been around for more than 20 years, but that doesn’t mean every successful SL business needs to stay here forever.

    Speaking of being financially well, I went to the FLF Bday Bash and came home with a bunch of goodies for FREE! Gogo may be loaded in SL, but I still love freebies. I didn’t grab every single gift, but out of the ones I picked up, these are my favorite things:

    • Movement – Ladies Handbag
    • ALT3 – Afterparty FX Shine
    • Exile – Jordan Hair, Birthday Confetti Edition
    • Glam Affair – Manu Skin (Summer Special L005) – The rain on the face is awesome!
    • Half-Deer – Neon Rainbow Wall Light
    • Octubre – Cielo wall decor
    Shine Bright Like Neon Lights
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    Linden Lab Paid Me for My Pain and Suffering

    Bygogo Fashion, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized
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    Ocean

    Gaeta 1 is staying, baby.

    This whole thing is going to go down as Gaeta Gate in Second Life history, the time Linden Lab tried to remove a small, unfinished continent, only to completely reverse course a few months later. I waited forever to be relocated from Gaeta 1 to New Zindra, but it never happened, so I eventually started selling off the land I’d bought there piece by piece because I’d already acquired quite a bit of snow land and figured I was simply going to move on.

    Then on Monday I received an email from Linden Lab basically saying, “We’re giving you some money for your pain and suffering, and by the way, Gaeta 1 isn’t closing anymore.” Suddenly the whole situation changed. You can stay if you want to. You can still move if you’d rather have a parcel in New Zindra and keep Gaeta 1 too. If you’ve already moved, you cay stay or come back to Gaeta 1! I have to admit I’m pretty happy with the outcome, even if this has been one of the biggest rollercoasters I’ve watched Linden Lab put residents through. From the original announcement until now, it’s been one surprise after another, and I still don’t think the ride is completely over.

    If you look around Gaeta 1 today, a huge amount of land is marked “On Hold,” which most of us assume means former residents are deciding whether to return. I’ve already noticed some of the larger land barons making their way back, but it does raise an interesting question about whether people will end up keeping both their new land or coming back to their original Gaeta 1 land. After all, the original reason Linden Lab gave for closing Gaeta 1 was the massive amount of abandoned land, and that problem isn’t automatically solved just because some previous owners decide to move back.

    I think Linden Lab knows they need to move quickly, and the August 17 deadline they gave everyone in the email makes that pretty obvious. I didn’t wait around because I’m easy. I replied immediately and told them I was staying, mainly because I have absolutely no interest in moving to New Zindra. I was originally interested, but have you seen the horrendous new grass texture? No thank you! My guess is they want to wrap this entire situation up as quickly as possible so Gaeta Gate becomes nothing more than a strange chapter in Second Life history, after which they can start selling and auctioning parcels in both Gaeta 1 and New Zindra again. I could even see them experimenting with more double-prim parcels if it helps encourage people to buy mainland, although I don’t expect they’ll spend time finishing the unfinished west coast of Gaeta 1 when they already have so much abandoned mainland elsewhere on the grid.

    Ocean

    I love land, so after all of this, I decided to officially move into my little Gaeta 1 parcel instead of letting it go. My friend Malayaa decorated the cozy 1,500 sqm oceanfront property for me, and it’s exactly the right size. As long as my neighbors don’t move back in tomorrow and completely ruin my view, I think I’m going to be pretty happy here.

    Ocean
    Ocean

    What I’m Wearing:
    Exile – Prisma
    The Kiwi Co – peaches Set (Top, Shorts, FlipFlops)
    Sparkle Skye – Emily Pearl Headband
    Glam Affair – Gwen (L003)
    LeLutka – Ubon Mesh Head

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    A Few Second Life Mysteries

    Bygogo Fashion, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized, What I think
    2 Comments
    Balloon

    One of the greatest mysteries in Second Life to me is why so many Third Party Viewers eventually stop development. I wasn’t always looking for something beyond the official Second Life Viewer, so I stuck with that for years before finally giving TPVs a chance. The first one I really used was Black Dragon Viewer, and while I eventually figured out things like the annoying WASD controls, I could never get rid of that music that played every single time the viewer launched. Maybe there was a way to disable it, but I never found it, so when Alchemy Viewer came along, I happily switched over. Alchemy ended up becoming one of my favorite viewers, but then development stopped. After that I moved to Aperture Viewer, and wouldn’t you know it, development there stopped too. Just recently I told you all about AyaStorm Viewer because I thought it had a lot of potential, and now they’ve removed the Windows version, so I guess you can consider that one effectively dead for most people too. At this point I’m starting to think TPVs are cursed. Every time I get excited about a viewer, development suddenly comes to an end. So now I’m sitting here wondering what I’m supposed to use next. How long do you keep using an abandoned viewer before enough little things break that you finally give up and go back to Firestorm?

    The curse of Third Party Viewers continues.

    Another mystery to me is all of these collaborations Linden Lab has been doing lately with residents and community groups. We’ve had SeraPlus, MadPea, Essential Inventory, and now The Collab Circle. The whole point seems to be adding value to Premium and Premium Plus memberships by giving members exclusive freebies. I’m Lifetime Premium Plus, so maybe I’m the wrong person to judge whether these promotions are working, but I haven’t been impressed with probably 90% of the gifts. The funny thing is, when an event has freebies, I’m so focused on grabbing them that I never actually shop. I teleport in, collect everything, teleport home, open all the boxes, decide what’s worth keeping, and delete the rest. It gives me the exact same dopamine hit as shopping because, really, shopping is just acquiring stuff. By the time I’m finished opening gifts, I’m completely over it and have no desire to go back and actually spend money.

    One of the gifts I did like was the balloon pack from SKVOST. The balloons themselves are really cute, but they’re meant to be rezzed as decorations. The only attachable version was the boxed package, and that included a no-transfer attach animation script, so I couldn’t even modify it the way I wanted. I ended up resizing one of the decorative balloons, wrote my own animate on attach script, and now I have a holdable balloon in exactly the color I wanted. It just made me wonder why they didn’t include a few holdable versions in the gift package to begin with.

    I do hope these collaborations work out because Linden Lab is obviously putting money into them. I came across a Facebook post from one of the Seraphim founders who mentioned they were paid by Linden Lab for SeraPlus, so these aren’t just casual community projects. That makes me wonder if Linden Lab is tracking conversions from these collaborations. Are Premium memberships increasing because of them? Are people actually spending more money after visiting these events? I honestly don’t know. When I visited The Collab Circle on opening day, I was literally the only person there. Even with Second Life promoting these collaborations constantly across social media, I wonder if residents are simply burned out on shopping events. At some point, another event with another gift bag just doesn’t feel exciting anymore, especially when so many of the freebies feel more like promotional add-ons than gifts people genuinely wanted.

    That brings me to the bigger issue that keeps sitting in the back of my mind. Concurrency has been trending downward for a while now, and I really appreciate Daniel Voyager for continuing to track these numbers because it’s one of the few ways we can see the long-term trend instead of just going by how busy our favorite regions feel. Whether Linden Lab wants to acknowledge it or not, the charts are showing fewer people online, and if that trend continues through the rest of the year, I think Christmas is going to be a really important test. Hopefully things turn around, because I’d much rather see those numbers climbing again than continuing to slide.

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    Dream Overlay: A Free Browser Photo Editor

    Bygogo iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Uncategorized
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    Dream Overlay

    Today I want to share a fun new project called Dream Overlay. It’s a free browser based photo editor that lets you transform your photos with dreamy, nostalgic overlays and effects, whether they’re Second Life screenshots or your real life memories.

    If you’ve followed JuicyBomb for a while, you probably know how much I love taking photos in Second Life. I’m also a huge fan of retro aesthetics, old film, film grain, light leaks, faded photographs, rainy windows, and all those little imperfections that somehow make a photo feel more like a memory. Dream Overlay was inspired by that style and by my love of editing photos.

    I wanted to create something that made photo editing easy and fun for people like me. You shouldn’t have to buy expensive software or pay for a subscription just to add a little nostalgia to your pictures. Everything runs right in your browser, so there’s nothing to install and no account to create. Your photos stay on your device, and if you’d like to continue editing later, you can export your project as a Dream file and import it again anytime. You can also export full resolution images or create high quality MP4 videos with animated effects.

    If you’re not sure where to begin, check out the premade Looks in the sidebar. They’re a fun way to get started with just one click, and you can always customize them further to make them your own.

    Photo overlays aren’t exactly a new idea, but I wanted to build something that was simple, completely free, and enjoyable to use. I hope Dream Overlay makes editing your photos a little more fun, whether you’re capturing moments in Second Life or in real life.

    A Few Tips

    Dream Overlay runs entirely in your browser, so editing very large photos or rendering MP4 videos may temporarily use more memory or CPU power. That’s completely normal and stops once the export finishes. If things ever start feeling slow, try refreshing the page (Ctrl + F5 on Windows or Cmd + Shift + R on Mac), use fewer fewer filters, closing a few browser tabs, or working with a smaller image if you’re using an older computer.

    I’m not a professional programmer, so building Dream Overlay has been a learning experience for me. If you happen to find a bug or something doesn’t work quite right, please let me know. I’ll keep improving the editor and fixing issues as I learn.

    If you enjoy using Dream Overlay, I’d really appreciate your support by sharing it with your friends. I’d also love to see what you create! Feel free to share your edits in the Dream Overlay Flickr Group so everyone can get inspired by each other. If you post your creations elsewhere, I’d appreciate a credit to Dream Overlay so more people can discover the editor.

    I really hope you enjoy using Dream Overlay as much as I enjoyed creating it. Have fun, and I can’t wait to see what you make.

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    I Thought Gachas Were Supposed to Be Exclusive

    Bygogo Fashion, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized
    2 Comments
    Gallery

    I mostly opted out of gachas years ago, but every now and then something comes along that I really want and I’ll spend a ridiculous amount of money trying to get the rare item. I do that with the understanding that this is the only opportunity to get it. Maybe it’ll never be sold again, maybe it’ll become impossible to find, but that’s always been the appeal of gachas. You’re paying for the exclusivity as much as you’re paying for the item itself. That’s how it’s worked for as long as I can remember. Designers have traditionally kept their gacha collections exclusive instead of retexturing them and selling them at a discount a few weeks later.

    That’s why I was surprised to see PurpleMoon release a retextured version of the Claudette Dress and Monique Shoes, which debuted at The Arcade just last month, now in The Saturday Sale for L$75. My friends and I spent quite a bit collecting, trading, and chasing those pieces through the gacha. Had we known that the dress and shoes would be available for L$75 less than a month later, I don’t think any of us would’ve spent nearly as much trying to complete the collection.

    For me, it changes how I look at the brand going forward. If something new catches my eye, why buy it immediately if there’s a chance it’ll show up in a weekend sale a few weeks later? I’ve always thought of weekend sales as a place for older releases or brand new items created specifically for the sale. I’ve never expected to see a reworked version of a gacha collection that was still practically brand new. I barely had time to unpack mine before another version appeared for a fraction of what many of us had spent.

    This isn’t about telling a designer how to run their business. They can sell their products however they like. I’m simply saying that decisions like this affect customer trust. People remember when they paid full price, especially when that full price came from a gacha system designed around chance. If customers start believing they can get the same item a month later for almost nothing, many of them will simply wait. I also wonder if this is happening because so many creators participate in weekend sales that they eventually run out of older products to discount and start dipping into very recent releases instead.

    Gallery

    Today’s outfit is a mix of PurpleMoon’s Claudette accessories from last month’s Arcade gacha with the retextured Claudette Dress from The Saturday Sale. Ironically, I actually prefer this printed version over the original solid dress. For anyone who missed the gacha, it’s an incredible deal. I just think there should be a little more consideration for the people who paid the premium the first time around. Gachas aren’t normal purchases. They’re intentionally designed to encourage people to spend far more than an item is worth in pursuit of the piece they really want, and more often than not, that’s the rare one. When that same design comes back almost immediately at a deep discount, it’s hard not to feel like you wasted a lot of money trying to get it in the first place.

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    Someone Won a Million Lindens at SL23B

    Bygogo Fashion, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized
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    Someone won a million Lindens at SL23B

    I love the idea of winning anything, so for 23 days straight I made the rounds at SL23B, clicking all five Golden Ticket kiosks every single day in hopes of being one of the 23 people selected for a chance to win L$1,000,000. In the end, I wasn’t chosen, but I still went to the live finale, and I’m really glad I did.

    The final drawing turned out to be surprisingly emotional. One by one, more than a dozen contestants clicked their mystery boxes, and none of them contained the million. Then, with only seven or eight boxes left, one resident picked box #19, one of the smallest boxes, and won. I had a feeling the prize would be hiding in one of the tiny boxes because that’s always how these random prize games seem to work. You always pick the little box, even in a virtual world.

    What surprised me most was that many of the finalists got on voice before making their choice. I wasn’t expecting that at all, and several of their short speeches were genuinely heartfelt. I even teared up a little when Spike Bloodrose gave a shout-out to his best friend. It was a really sweet moment.

    Linden Lab said they received more than 180,000 entries, which made me wonder how they were counting them. I personally submitted 115 entries by clicking all five kiosks every day for 23 days (23 × 5 = 115). If every kiosk click counted as a separate entry, that works out to roughly 1,565 unique participants, assuming everyone entered every day.

    As for the event itself, I found the daily clicking pretty tedious. It wasn’t much of a game, and it certainly didn’t encourage me to explore the exhibits. Even though kiosk #5 kept moving every few days, I still never stopped to look around. Next year, I’d rather see a simple one-time entry where everyone has the same odds instead of asking people to repeat the same routine every day.

    If you missed it, you can still watch the live finale on YouTube.

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    A New Face for Summer

    Bygogo Fashion, Hair, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized
    2 Comments
    A New Face for Summer

    I’ve been wearing the Lumi skin from Glam Affair since it was released back in March. In real life time, that’s not very long at all. In Second Life time, though, it feels like ages ago. But does time even matter when you like a skin? You could probably wear the same skin for years and never feel dated, especially with the current state of Second Life. Until LeLutka releases the new PURE mesh heads, most of us are still wearing EvoX heads, and skin designers continue to create beautiful 2048 skins with the same level of skill and quality. There is really no rush to change your look unless you want to.

    A New Face for Summer
    Glam Affair – Alix skin | w/ Tattoo Layers added to soften the pores/freckles

    That said, in Gogo time, four months feels like a long time. I spend an embarrassing amount of time staring at my own face, after all. So today, even though it seems like Glam Affair releases dozens of skins every month, I finally found a new face. The new Alix skin from Glam Affair is available at Equal10. I like most Glam Affair skins, but if I’m going to call something my face, it has to feel instantly familiar. It’s that little moment of, “Ah, there you are,” when I put it on. That’s exactly how I felt with Alix, even though I already knew I would be reaching for Izzie’s to remove the freckles and pores. As you can see, I did just that, and I love the result. The original version is beautiful too, and honestly, a lot of skins in Second Life are released looking more like my edited version. People then use Izzie’s or other tattoo layers to add freckles, pores, highlights, and other details back in. I sometimes go in the opposite direction and remove those details instead. The fact that we can customize skins so easily now is one of my favorite things about Second Life.

    ISON recently had a 40% off sale, so I picked up something I do not normally wear, a leather outfit. Paired with the new Truth Verse hairstyle, the whole look reminds me of an anime baddie, and I am kind of obsessed with it. Maybe I need to stop wearing pastel pink and white all the time and lean into dark leather. Then again, let’s not get carried away.

    A New Face for Summer
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    Happy Independence Day

    Bygogo Fashion, Hair, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized
    0 Comments
    Fourth of July

    A little late posting this one, but for the Fourth of July, I remembered the one song that should probably be the theme song for the USA: William Shatner singing “She’s Miss United States” in Miss Congeniality.

    I needed something that screamed patriotic pageant, and I remembered I had the Magnolia Gown from Just Because. Since it comes with a fatpack HUD, I was able to put together the perfect red, white, and blue look.

    I’m also wearing the new Odyssey hairstyle from Truth. It has that soft, windswept look that’s perfect for outdoor photos.

    Hope everyone is having a happy long holiday weekend!

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    Covered in Sand with Izzie’s Sandstorm

    Bygogo Fashion, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized
    1 Comment
    Sandstorm

    What’s this? It’s Sand. It’s on my face, my body, probably in my ears too. This is the new Sandstorm body layer tattoo add-on by Izzie’s, available now at Summerfest, and it’s pretty fitting for the Fourth of July weekend.

    This isn’t a subtle dusting of sand. It looks like Gogo has been stranded on a deserted island or crawling through the desert for three days. Compared to Izzie’s previous Beach Sand tattoo add-on, this one has a much finer texture, and I think it’s cuter too.

    Each Sandstorm tone comes with four different shades, ranging from a light coating of sand to a much darker, grittier look. The darkest shade is my favorite. If you’re into roleplay or just want your avatar to look like they’ve been through something, this is a fun little add-on. Pair it with some dirt or blood layers and you’ll fit right in. There’s a whole segment of Second Life residents who seem determined to look like they’re permanently in combat.

    Sandstorm

    My outfit today is another free find. Analogic has the Grazy Set (top and skirt) available as a free group gift, and the group is free to join. I’m also wearing the Abby Headband, which is another free gift. I only found this store because I follow TeleportHub on X, where they post freebie updates all the time. Freebies have always been a big part of Second Life, and sites like TeleportHub and FabFree have been covering them for years.

    Which is why I still don’t understand why Linden Lab thinks access to freebies is a worthwhile Premium perk. It isn’t. I’m already drowning in freebies. This was my first time visiting Analogic, and I found around 30 free group gifts that I could grab immediately. The store looks like it’s built around full-perm mesh products from a bunch of different creators, so the branding is kind of all over the place, but there’s a lot of stuff. I’m not really a snob about whether something started as full-perm mesh. It was free, and it was cute enough.

    Sandstorm
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    I Tried to Update My Male Alt and Immediately Regretted It

    Bygogo Fashion, iheartslFeed, JuicyBomb, Second Life, Uncategorized
    0 Comments
    There was an attempt

    There was an attempt to give George, my male alt, a wardrobe refresh because I realized I haven’t shown him on the blog since… probably last year. I logged in with the simple goal of changing his outfit and taking a few photos, but instead I was greeted with an update for the Signature Gianni body. George was happily wearing Gianni v6.1, and the new release is called Gianni X v7.5. I really should have known that the “X” meant “none of your old clothes are going to fit anymore.”

    After trying on a few things and realizing that most of his wardrobe barely worked with the new body, I did what any reasonable person would do and switched him right back to Gianni v6.1. I don’t have time to rebuild an entire closet from scratch, so I’ll either wait for brands like Deadwool to add Gianni X sizes or George will just be living his best life on v6.1 forever. A friend suggested that I switch him over to Belleza Jake because it has better clothing support, but I honestly can’t remember why I picked Signature Gianni when I made him last year. I’m sure I had a good reason at the time. Legacy isn’t even a consideration because… reasons.

    So instead of writing the blog post I had planned, I spent the evening wandering from store to store trying to figure out male fashion. I even stopped by Man Cave to grab the latest freebies and didn’t see much for Gianni X there either, which left me wondering how men in Second Life deal with all of this. Women’s bodies are already complicated, but I’ve been shopping for them for years and know exactly which creators I like, which bodies they support, and where to find things. Male clothing feels like learning a completely different game, and I am absolutely a noob who has no idea what she’s doing.

    The whole experience reminded me of a funny story from last year when I first made George. I was teleporting around men’s stores and IMing well-dressed avatars to ask where they shopped, and one guy replied, “I don’t have time for this,” before brushing me off. At the time I thought it was unfriendly, but after spending an evening trying to dress a male avatar, I completely understand. I’m not even mad because, honestly, I don’t have time for this either.

    Today’s photo brought me to another realization that somehow escaped me until now: couple poses don’t seem to fit anybody. Why can’t we edit multiple avatars with the built-in Second Life poser and actually see those adjustments in-world? Every pose edits fixes only my avatar while my alt just had to make do the pose he was in. By the time finished editing the photo, I realized George’s hands were still locked to the hand pose selected on his body HUD instead of the animation I was using. Oops.

    If you have any shopping recommendations for male avatars or some secret trick that makes couple photography less of a headache, please share, because I feel like I’m starting from zero and could use all the help I can get.

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