I found myself on this map in VRChat not long after signing up for the game. I didn’t know what was going on at first. People were waiting in this lobby like it was a real club. I could hear muffled music as if I were outside a real building. A group of girls chattered away near me, talking about what club to hit up next since their favorite dj’s set was over.
Inside, people were dancing. A moderator was positioned off to the side and looking over the crowd like a bouncer. As I had no one to talk to and didn’t have a VR headset at the time, I left once my curiousity was satisfied. I wouldn’t return again for half a year. That’s when my experience changed entirely.
Do you like my outfit today? As soon as Neve announced this new release, I ran to get it! Grime and Grit are a respective top and shorts set that makes me feel like it’s the 90’s again. Not that the 90’s were a particularly great decade for me growing up, but sometimes it’s fun remembering the fashions from back then. You can grab this set from Uber.
So, who called for Ryan Schultz to be banned from Second Life and Sansar for correctly reporting that Sansar was due to be shut down after a round of layoffs? Who did that? You owe Ryan an apology.
The poor guy was reporting on what he knew. He got a reliable source that said shutdowns were happening. Despite the shortage of comments I found on his blog entry about it, he says he got a lot of backlash and someone calling for him to be permabanned from Linden Lab’s social worlds. How petty! What a trifling thing to do, especially when he was right all along.
Look at today’s announcement. You really think Sansar’s going to come back strong and have another EDM concert featuring a famous dj?
It’s time to get a Flickr Pro account if you are a fan of the photo hosting service/social media platform. The Flickr commercial use policy has been in effect for years, so even though they have not enforced it in the past, they are now. It’s time to pay up or risk having your account terminated. According to this blog post on NWN, many Second Life residents with FREE accounts are in violation of the commercial use policy.
If you are a designer in SL and make money, consider Flickr Pro the cost of doing business, if you actually want to do business and not call it a “hobby”. As my friend says, even hobbies cost money. I’m surprised at the pushback from some SL designers and bloggers since Flickr is the photo social platform of choice for SL residents, and not even prohibitively expensive. It’s only $50/year! I’ve been a Flickr Pro member since November 2007 (proof below) and an SL snapshot addict with over 19,660 photos. I definitely see value in Flickr from the moment I started using it to cross-post my blog photos and saw that I could multi-task by promoting my blog and follow my favorite brands at the same time!
There are so many reasons that Flickr is superior to other photo hosting services, that it would be a huge loss for designers and Second Life residents if it shuts down. Would you support a service that you use for pleasure or for profit, for $50/year? Many brands in SL don’t even update their blog nowadays, so they rely on the social power of Flickr to share their new releases. And what will become of “flickr bloggers”, if they can no longer credit brands and post links? If you find value in Flickr, it’s time to go pro before it bites the dust.
If you want to remain a FREE Flickr account, here’s what you need to do to not have your account terminated:
Not long ago, I bought an Oculus Quest and have been diving into the world of virtual reality. Doing everything from establishing a boxing practice routine with Thrill of the Fight, to exploring different maps in VRChat, there’s been a ton of things to see and do!
There are a few things I’d like to show you, though, just to bring home the point of how lovely and how immersive virtual reality can be.
Happy 13th rez day to Gogo! For the first time ever, I actually remembered and want to mark the occasion with a blog post.
Like everyone in SL, I think of my avatar as an extension of myself. She is me, of course. Without me, there is no Gogo. However, in recent years, sometimes I look at Gogo and I think of her as my virtual friend. Gogo is reliable, she’s always there when I want her to be, and she keeps me company.
Is your avatar you? Is your avatar also your friend? How do you celebrate your rez day in SL? Let me know in the comments!
There’s so many things happening in virtual reality and gaming lately, that I absolutely have to blog my opinion about it! Everything from Facebook Horizon, to the Oculus Quest headset, to the brand-new SL Blogger Network. Are you ready? Grab some tea and let’s have a chat!
Standing at the “Hotspot”, a fire pit located in the Nexus social club.
And so it came to pass after the lands of Juicy faded away in favor of nicely built houses, and the Mainland slowly became more barren, a new land rose up out of the depths of metaverse seed grants. It was fairer, and its people with new bodies milled about to create and speak to one another. They spoke of VR implementation and a Steam store page–
Sorry. I’ve been reading LoTR again lately.
Today I’m taking a look at Sansar, lovingly referred to by SL citizens as “Second Life 2.0”. I took a look at the game because my other friends on Plurk were kinda scared to, so I volunteered to step up and poke around. Yes, that was really a conversation on Plurk and I said I would go on behalf of everybody. So! Here I am, back from my trip and writing about it.
Before I begin, let me state that what I write here is my impression of the game. If I missed a fact or got something wrong, then that’s the fault of the user experience I received. I’m just going to present what I know.
As most people who read the news know by now, the Linden Endowment for the Arts is closing. LEA provided a space for many artists in Second Life to express themselves. For them to shutter is something truly sad, but I’m also happy to note there’s an effort to begin again–a LEA 2.0, possibly! A group in-world has formed pooling suggestions on how to change the arts program so that it lasts longer this time. I’m so happy to hear of this!
As someone who’s gone through a serious roller coaster with the last LEA council, I’ve seen the uglier side of their machinations. Hazing, bullying, and power struggles are what I experienced and saw in the short time I’ve sat on their roster. After quitting, I wrote up my experiences here on this blog. It was met with both praise and criticism, but you know what? I spoke my truth in an earnest effort to bring about change, and there’s no way I would ever let anyone invalidate my experience. And as we all know, it’s the truth that will set you free in the end.
So what’s the one simple trick I think that can save the Linden Endowment for the Arts? It’s one I’ve suggested all along.
Why is it that whatever I say sometimes causes so much fuss? A couple of weeks ago, I compared VRChat‘s avatar grading system to Second Life’s avatar complexity numbering, stating that we should adopt grades instead because it’s simpler for users to understand.
But Second Life likes to play the telephone game with re-quotes and paraphrases. Soon, my suggestion morphed through other mouths and turned into “I want us to pare down our avatars to Ruths”, and that’s not what I said at all. Do people read around here? Do they just like being outraged over things? Make a little cash with clicks in the process?
Whatever.
In an effort to retain my goal of an ultra-chill summer, I took to the seas of the Bellisseria continent to invest in deepwater fishing. And while I’m here, let’s do that “VRChat versus Second Life” comparison. We’ve already gone halfway with it. Why not take the whole kit?
