Category Archives: SHOWCASE

Love Made in Second Life: AvatarLove

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This week we are taking a look at the innovative niche of maternity roleplaying in Second Life.

For those who are curious, the Family Roleplaying section of the Destination Guide is a great place to start exploring options for your potential virtual family. Babies of all skin tones and ethnicities can be found at inworld adoption agencies, and vendors can help you find a bundle of joy that looks like you or even a combination of you and your partner. Once your love bug has arrived, feel free to go all out with tiny clothing and accessories! Chat away the new parent jitters with others at various family-themed regions.

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Carrie Tatsu has been one of the leading contributors to inworld maternity products for several years, with her first product line, Zooby Babies. This week her new product line, AvatarLove, is releasing the Love Momma: the first avatar capable of a live birth in Second Life. The body is streamlined to make it easier to use for Residents, with only one mesh layer. One of the key features is a HUD for both parents that aids in the baby’s growth and provides a mood meter for her partner. The partner and/or friends can do sweet things to boost the pregnant avatar’s mood or help her feel more comfortable. The layers of interactivity that have been woven into the creation of the Love Momma culminate in a meaningful shared experience. 

“I don’t want to say real and not real, I’ll say physical and virtual, because everything is real,” says Carrie.

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The roleplaying of relationships that Residents find in Second Life can mean many different things to people. Carrie points out that people often “reveal more about themselves in a virtual space than they necessarily reveal about themselves in real life,” and says that she creates these products to provide a segway into a unique type of emotional intimacy. 

“Communicating with each other is the ultimate connection,” she says.

Just as we often say it takes a village to raise a child, it took over a year for Carrie and her extraordinary team to bring this latest model to life. Piscine Mackenzie is one of the Lead Developers, and Brias Stardust is the Senior 3D Artist. Other 3D and texture artists that contributed are chobii Resident, ming lu, NODNOL Jameson, Astralia Resident, blaiseowl Resident, Aurore Clarity, benjaminlucas Resident, Katarzyncia Resident, Hoshi Kimono. She would also like to thank YouTuber/Blogger Mousy “The Ultimate Clout Chaser” and Customer Service and Product Testers Anne Whimsy, cindy kiyori, RoseSilverShadow Resident, and lilymai1 Resident.

The real life couple you see in today’s video illustrating the live birth is Ayambi, a contributing 3D artist and owner of Lovies Maternity Clinic, and Lord Ra.

Carrie invites other creators to play around with the mesh kit on Blender, and join the AvatarLove Group (secondlife:///app/group/fce15a14-4747-977d-e06d-65fc502547b7/about).

Video Production Credits:
Draxtor Despres

Have A Great Week From all of us at Zoha Islands and Fruit Islands/Eden

 

Second Life Co-Founder Cory Ondrejka: Responds

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How Mesh Devalued Prims in Second Life & Made It a “Consumer World”

Works by the artist known as AM Radio in Second Life’s pre-mesh age

Philip Rosedale’s open challenge to name another metaverse with dynamic, collaborative content creation evoked this response from reader Vivienne Schell:

I think that Second Life’s initial success was tied to in-world, collaborative content creation offering in-world tools. Leaving the Prim (do it by yourself) path and quitting further development on that field caused much of the decline SL went through after Sculpties and later Mesh became predominant.

The virtual sandbox has turned into a consumer world mostly, where many people pay money to a few people for creating some kind of “multiple social frameworks”, but much of the original thrill which keeps Minecraft big (and made SL big) is gone. As a result Second Life has turned into a self-centered universe, where the latest mesh head or the latest body or the latest whatever shiny has become the most important issue for a core of die-hard users. That may be enough for a certain amount of people to log in, but it isn’t — by far — enough to attract a broader audience.

Which sad to say, seems sadly true. Echoing that thought on Twitter is this from Jeff Berg, once best known as AM Radio, Second Life’s most famed artist:

AM Radio prims second life

“I have never seen a content creation tool accessible to so many stripped away so quickly in favor of complex external tools. Second Life shot its own democratized native content creation tool while declaring no one else has done it.” And yes, people can still create with prims in SL, but they soon fell out of favor: “The common devaluation ‘But it’s prims’ said it all the moment mesh arrived.”

Seems to me that you can have a virtual world with mesh, or a virtual world with prims/voxels — but not both in the same world. Now that Second Life has moved entirely to the cloud, I wonder how hard it would be to create a spin-off product that’s effectively an entire sandbox, with no mesh allowed. Market it the right way to kids and creative adults (call it “Second Sandbox”, let’s say), I suspect we’d see much of the old magic return.

 

Cory Ondrejka:

Adding Mesh to SL Was a Mistake

Fortnite creative Second Life AM Radio chairs

Last week’s post on how bringing mesh to Second Life was a mistake inspired this comment from Cory Ondrejka, a Second Life co-founder and first CTO for the company:

“Yup. Even among founders this wasn’t always clearly understood. Universal tools, available within the experience, differentiated SL from most everything before or since. Including later stage SL, Sansar, etc. Construction tools are insufficient, by the way, you need interaction and behavior, too.”

Cory, by the way, was the one who gave an early demo of Second Life when it was still prim-based to Epic Games and well you know the rest of the story from Fortnite. Jeff “AM Radio” Berg, an undisputed master of prim-based creation, also expanded on his thoughts there from the original post, and dismissed in-world mesh tools as an equivalent alternative:

Fortnite creative Second Life AM Radio train

“I know about the in world meshing. The complex nurbs-based modeling with considered texture optimization and baked effects will always be a step ahead. Minecraft proved high fidelity is commodified in a world that doesn’t need to push  past 4K and the kids don’t care if their AAA game is from 2017 as long as the gameplay still rocks. Prims were somewhere between Minecraft and AAA. It worked, and then it didn’t. Am I saying it’s not worthwhile to create and be an artist, of course not, as per usual being an artist is not a lucrative lifestyle without a champion of the likes of Bettina Tizzy et al.

“There’s more to being an artist than the media you’re using. As I said in the Polygon article, ‘Avoid showcasing a particular technological capability,’ Berg says, ‘but instead, build experiences that remind us how human we are and have always been.’”

As for the images in this post, while they look AM Radio’s Second Life creations, they were actually recreated in Fortnite by his son — using Fortnite’s universal building tools, available within the Fortnite experience.

Have a great week from all of us at Zoha Islands and Fruit Islands/Eden

Second Life Destinations: COVID-19 Resources

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This week we are raising awareness for the COVID-19 information center on Inspiration Island.

Lissena, who also goes by Wisdomseeker, guides us through the colorful and comforting realm of Inspiration Island, which she created with several other volunteers to promote wellness in a fun and accessible way. In this region you can also find Whole Brain Health, which Lissena describes as “the virtual arm of our nonprofit Ageless Mind Project. Our mission is to give people the tools to stay sharp, active, and healthy, based on research coming from neuroscience, gerontology, positive psychology, and creativity.”

The COVID display in the courtyard was built by Lady Brielle, a medical librarian who maintains the text as new data becomes available. Lady Brielle has been a tireless essential worker throughout the pandemic, and her work has not gone unnoticed. Lady Brielle us that “our outreach work in Second Life has been recognized by the National Library of Medicine and won an award in Research by the Hospital Libraries Section of the Medical Library Association.” 

Information on COVID-19 is displayed in Spanish, American Sign Language, and  English. The creators of Inspiration Island took a multidisciplinary approach to presenting information so that as many people as possible can be positively impacted by visiting. In addition to medical data there are stories submitted by other Residents about their personal experiences of social distancing to remind us that what we’re feeling is totally natural, and we’re not the only ones who feel that way. There are also many activities to facilitate mental stimulation and help people feel connected.

Lissena wants us to know that even the scary parts of sickness are addressed here: “Once a month Rob, a member of the Collective in Germany, hosts a Death Café — something he is trained to do professionally outside SL — conversations that help make death less {of} a forbidden subject. Amazingly, we laugh a lot there.”

This vibrant region is the labor of love of a devoted community. Marly Milena, a volunteer who provides “programs focused on creative expression on Inspiration Island. I have introduced a way of working with arts-based processes, called Symbolic Modeling (SymMod for short). We use the building tools so people can make art in SL, and then we guide them in exploring meanings, new ideas, feelings, etc.”

Thuja Hynes, the associate director of the project, builds educational exhibits and tours. Two of his current projects are called Simply Imossible and Hero Walk. There are also many weekly events. Faust hosts the Positive Change Circle at Whole Brain Health on Sundays at 3pm SLT, and Arisia Vita plays piano in the gaebo every Monday and Wednesday. Priceless contributions are also provided by community members Catseye Tennen, Ghaelen D’Lareh, and Marylou Goldrosen.

Second Life is proud to host a space that incorporates elements of education, creativity, and community, and Inspiration Island is a living example of the positive it can bring. Lissena feels that the activities found here “give you insight into yourself, encourage your creativity and your sense of purpose and reduce loneliness, which is really important.” It is open to people from all walks of life, so stop by for a visit today.

Video Production Credits:
Draxtor Despres

 

Have a Great Week from all of us at Zoha Islands And Fruit Islands/Eden ♥

 

Philip Rosedale Issues Metaverse Challenge

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Philip Rosedale Issues Metaverse Challenge: What Virtual World Besides Second Life Has Collaborative, Dynamic, Complex Content Creation?

Here’s a great Twitter thread: Second Life/High Fidelity founder Philip Rosedale challenging people to name a virtual world besides Second Life that enables collaborative dynamic creation of “interesting things” while users inhabit the same space as avatars. Based on his follow-ups, “interesting things” means it must enable complex scripting/interaction and 3D objects. So not just simple building blocks but, for example, a fully interactive 3D recreation of Van Gogh’s “Starry Night”, as in in this classic machinima above.

On that view, Minecraft wouldn’t count by Philip’s lights: “Love Minecraft, but: Can’t build together without elaborate specific permission from admins. Can’t build many important things (jointed objects, curved surface).”

 

Also, by one “place”, he means a single shard world that many thousands of users can inhabit at the same time, and not instanced mini-worlds or rooms: “Try making a pocket world like Anyland or Horizons or VRChat seamless,” as he explains. “Very difficult issues with asset transfer, serialization, load balancing (for example).”

Do any come close to meeting this criterion? A few standout candidates:

Philip Rosedale virtual world VR metaverse challenge

Possibly Rec Room:

“All Rec Room creation happens in game / in one place with artists, designers, and programmers (circuits system), sound designers, and musicians all working together to create their room or game,” one of Rec Room’s lead developers, Sean Whiting, says. “Most groups are voice chatting and hanging out the entire time they build.” And content can be moved from one scene to another: “Yeah you can definitely move your creations around or distribute them to the community for free or sell them. Entire rooms or games can be cloned, creations or rooms can be put into an ‘invention’ that you can list on the market.”

However, Rec Room’s blocky graphics may limit the “interesting” requirement, as would its lack of a single shard.

I suggested Dual Universe as a possible candidate, as it allows in-world prim-based (i.e. voxel) building and scripting that’s collaborative. I guess one could make the argument that it’s not as “interesting” as it could be, in the sense that anything built in Dual Universe must fit within its fictional sci-fi reality. (Something I discussed with the lead developer here.)

My own take is more meta: The keen irony is while dynamic collaborative 3D content creation remains unique to Second Life, it’s little used by the current user base nor promoted by the company. I seriously think most newer SL users have never even seen a prim, let alone know how to rez one.

I really mean that: Searching YouTube just now, I cannot find any recent user-made video depicting collaborative, dynamic, complex content creation in SL. Literally none that’s recent. (“Watch the World” is great, but it’s from 2008, and only features a single creator.)

And that might be the most frustrating if not most tragic thing: The aspect that still makes Second Life most unique is not that well known, even by its own users. 

Have a Great Week From All Of Us At Zoha Islands Fruit Islands/Eden

Second Life Destination Guide Is Still Under Maintenance

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Pictured: Digital Art

On December 22nd I announced that the Second Life Destination Guide was being uplifted to the cloud. That process is still underway, however, we have run into some errors. For this reason, the web publishing tool that allows us to update the Destination Guide is still unavailable and will be for the foreseeable future until these errors can be corrected. I am hoping it won’t be much longer than another week or two. I will continue to update you on this status every Friday. 

The submission form for the Destination Guide is also giving errors because of this, so please continue to email your submissions to editor@lindenlab.com and we will add them as soon as we have access again.

In the meantime, you can still find many destinations to explore on the Destination Guide, as well as events to attend on our Events page.

One very exciting event occurring this weekend is at the ACS region. The American Cancer Society is celebrating an important milestone – $4 million USD raised in Second Life to help fight cancer! The party, which features live music and many guest speakers, will be held Sunday, January 17th from 10am to 1pm PT.

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American Cancer Society

The official home of the American Cancer Society in Second Life. Since 2005, cancer patients, caregivers, and volunteers have been able to receive services and support from the ACS in SL without having to leave the virtual world.

Visit in Second Life

 

If you’re looking for more places to explore, here are some destination listings for a few of my favorite places on the grid:

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Digital Art – Cammino e Vivo Capovolto

Cammino e Vivo Capovolto is a creative place dedicated to 3D art and photography by Mistero Hifeng.

Visit in Second Life

 

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Virtual Black History Museum

The Virtual Black History Museum invites everyone to explore the timeline of African-American history from the heartaches to the victories in a park-like and welcoming environment.

Visit in Second Life

 

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Missing Melody

Missing Melody stuck in nostalgia. Breathing a dream. A cool wind strolls between the trees and leaves dance with the salty water’s waves. Photographer and Blogger friendly with a romantic touch. Everyone is welcome. Add your images to their Flickr group: flickr.com/groups/ohdeercafe

Visit in Second Life

 

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Chouchou

Japanese music group Chouchou bring their creativity to Second Life in several photogenic and atmospheric regions, including “Memento Mori,” “Islamey” and “The Babel.”

Visit in Second Life

 

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Tralala’s Diner @ Pine Lake

Tralala’s Diner @ Pine Lake is post-apocalyptic living at its finest. Explore this photogenic region filled with rooftop slums and scavenged ruins. Strap yer boots on tight…you might be a’ight

Visit in Second Life

 

Have a fun week and remember, stay safe, stay home, stay virtual!

From all us us at Zoha Islands And Fruits Islands/Eden

Safe Mode: Your Windows 10 Bomb Shelter

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Safe Mode has been an important troubleshooting tool for Windows since the operating system’s debut. With Windows 10, Safe Mode got a major upgrade, with new features that make it more powerful than ever. Read on to learn about them and new ways to access Safe Mode in Win 10…

  
 

New Features of Windows 10 Safe Mode

When you have a problem with Windows, starting up your computer in Safe Mode can help you get back to good. You might want to print a copy of this article and stick it in your “computer emergency” folder, just in case you encounter a “blue screen of death” or other startup problem.

Safe Mode loads Windows with the bare amount of components necessary, with or without network (Internet) access. I read somewhere that Safe Mode is like a bomb shelter when Windows explodes. That may not be a perfect analogy, but this bare-bones Windows configuration makes troubleshooting simpler. You can tweak your auto-start programs one by one until something triggers the problem you’re having. You can also run a virus scan, access System Restore and other repair options in Safe Mode.

Since the invention of the stone tablet, Safe Mode has been invoked by restarting your system and holding down the F8 key until the Windows recovery menu appears. However… this is not how you access Safe Mode in Windows 10. For the first time, you can switch to Safe Mode while you are in Windows! Here are two ways to invoke Safe Mode:

Windows 10 Safe Mode

Method 1: From the Start menu

  • From the Start menu, choose Settings.
  • Click on “Update and Security”
  • Select “Recovery” from the left-hand column, then click on Restart Now.
  • Wait a bit until the menu appears
  • Click on Troubleshoot, then Advanced Options, then Startup Settings
  • Click on Restart

Method 2: From the Sign-In screen:

  • Restart your PC.
  • When the Sign-In screen appears, select the Power icon and click on Restart.
  • When the “Startup Settings” menu appears:
  • Click on Troubleshoot, then Advanced Options, then Startup Settings
  • Click on Restart

In either Method 1 or 2, when the system restarts, you will see a menu of options; you can choose to start Safe Mode without networking, or start Safe Mode with networking. If you anticipate needing the Internet while in Safe Mode, choose the latter option.

Since the “press F8 while the computer is starting” trick no longer works, and both of the above methods require that Windows be at least partially up and running, you might be wondering how to get into Safe Mode when you can’t boot up at all. I’ve not personally experienced this, but Microsoft says that if Windows tries to start and is unsuccessful twice, it will automatically start in Windows Recovery mode. From there, you select Troubleshoot, and follow the steps outlined above.

For completeness, I should mention that there is a way to restore the “legacy” F8 method of entering into Safe Mode during the startup process. It requires just a bit of minor geekery. First, you must open a Command Prompt window in administrator mode. To do so, type cmd in the Windows search box, right-click the top result, and select Run as administrator. Click Yes to allow the app to make changes to your device. Next, type (or copy/paste) the following command and press Enter.

bcdedit /set {default} bootmenupolicy legacy

Close the command prompt window. You can now enter Safe Mode by pressing F8 when restarting Windows 10.

 

Once you’re in Safe Mode, you can run your anti-virus program, try System Restore to roll back recent system changes, or uninstall recently added software. If a printer, scanner or other device isn’t working correctly, you can visit the manufacturer’s website and download a new driver for it.

New Features on the Startup Settings Menu

Note that the Startup Settings Menu includes options never seen before in Windows (see image above).

Disable Driver signature enforcement: Windows 10 normally requires digitally signed driver software that has been tested and certified to work with Windows 10. But you may need to load an uncertified driver to get your old printer or other peripheral device working. This option disables driver signature checks so you can load the old driver and see if it is causing your problem.

Disable early launch anti-malware protection: Anti-malware software includes components that load early in the startup process to guard against suspicious activity of software that loads later. Sometimes anti-malware software blocks the loading of other software when it shouldn’t, which can cause problems. This option lets you disable these early-loading components to see if they are causing your problem. Your anti-malware software will load completely later in the startup process.

Disable automatic restart after failure: As mentioned above, this kicks in if Windows thinks it failed to start successfully twice in a row. You wouldn’t want to change this option unless Windows gets confused and mistakenly thinks something went wrong during startup.

I am pleased to see options 7 and 8. I am not so pleased to see the new, somewhat tedious process of invoking Safe Mode. It would have been even better if the folks in Redmond had not hidden the “F8 during startup” option, and added these new ways to access Safe Mode. But overall, I give the new Safe Mode and Startup Settings a thumbs-up.

Have A Great Week From All Of Us At Zoha Islands Fruit Islands/Eden