Emerald Death or Murder............?

Now, everyone loves a conspiracy theory...... so here goes...

Watching Poirot, rather than a reality show with Stupid People, has shown me that after a murder the person with the motive is the person who did it......even if it looks like suicide...

So... let’s look at the facts my little garlic eating friends...

1) ”Don't waste everyones time suggesting that we throw away Viewer 2, or that we revert the UI to Viewer 1. It is absolutely not going to happen, and any suggestion to that effect will be ignored.” [Oz Linden.]. 

2) Dusan Writer had the view that a lot of new stuff planned for SL is dependent on the adoption of viewer 2.0, in an earlier post he says..
“Because the new Viewer was the spring board for a whole bunch of other things:
-The integration of Web-based content into the world, through Grid-wide access to Second Life Shared Media

- The integration of Second Life with more open systems for things like groups and identity. The side panel on the new viewer would allow both context-specific help and search and the pulling in of Web-based content and was clearly a precursor to ways in which they might handle social connections, groups and, ugh, search
- A widgetized viewer: M often talked about how eventually the viewer could open up something like an iPhone marketplace. Imagine being able to choose what widgets you want to have in your viewer. No more HUDs, with the ability to “run” things in-world with plug-and-play tools embedded directly into the viewer, downloaded from an extended Second Life Marketplace.

- Increased numbers of users attracted to Second Life because of an improved usability experience.

- With the above in place, a new content ecosystem and the launch of mesh imports. With content creators now able to import mesh, create widgets for the viewer, and maximize use of Shared Media, there would be a whole new range of content that could be created and sold.

- And finally, with the new ecosystem, and the ‘pushing’ of some of the content to the Web (the Marketplace, group and event notice systems, etc.) you’d be able to push THAT content out to the wider Web."

3).... tonight we hear...”Those final two requirements that were given to us by LL, was to have a release out by Friday September the 3rd that would not support emkdu or llkdu even if one of the files was present, and that Lonely Bluebird, Skills Hak and Discrete Dreamscape be removed from the project. The alternative was that LL would block the viewer from access to the SecondLife Grid." ...from Jessica Lyons

Theory...so... let’s assume that the Boys are not a bunch of blithering idiots, but shrewd entrepreneurs. Maeve Eiren reminded me a while back that entrepreneurs are like silent and stealthy predators, not risk-takers like people assume, and, seeing how many Dot.Com whizz kids have come and gone, the Boys were pretty good at what they do, having survived for so long.

...If 50% of the SL regulars are/were on Emerald, then Emerald could be a thorn in the side for the Boys...
...so...(dramatic and eerie music...) did they do the dirty by turning a development team into Us and Them by demanding half of em should get the sack??

Divide and conquer...oldest play in the game...

Will the Boys be drinking champagne tonight? I can't see them crying into their beer (excuse me for mixing my drinks metaphors...)

...probably not guilty.......but a bit of fun, well, not for the deceased...

:))

Emeraldgate continues

The ongoing saga of the Emerald teams disagreements continue with news that Fractured Crystal (Display Names.. eat your heart out) has resigned and handed the reins to Arabella (who is also resigning) and if it continues it'll be only ex-Lindens left running the show...

As @Toxicmenges tweeted with great foresight yesterday...."Stick another Ex Linden in the microwave, should be defrosted by the time the next Emerald Drama breaks next week."

Other news is concerning InWorldz.... time to buy that sim.

As of 1st September set up fees will be charged for the island set up, 75$ on top of your first months tier....so...get one now... I did, as you know..and it's the best virtual money I ever spent (apart from some great hair...)...

They have made great strides when it comes to stability and I would think their sudden remarkable growth will need a bit of a serious financial backup... all well deserved.... 11300 users, and 427 sims.. .thats up from 10k and 333 sims just 11 days ago..... can't be bothered to get the calculator out...but thats growth LL would kill for.

As to their credibility...I did write an "in-depth" post a while back for those that missed it.

Keep rocking the boat you guys and girls..


:))

UWA, Glyph and other bloggy stuff.

Well, popped over to UWA to see Wizzy’s new sculpture, which is well up to her normal standard....and loved Nish Mip’s Umbrellas, below, and ....








I’m always a sucker for this type of thing by Ginger Lorakeet, (tho I missed FreeWee’s humour)... and Samara Borkatron's presentation of Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken" moved me more than I expected...

Sharni Azalee, inspired by Avatar, in her piece I See You, has a strong, emotional side which talks of identity in a more subtle way than Cat's....but they are related pieces, I think...

Cat Boccaccio's piece, Identity Crisis, is very striking, and slightly mesmerising.


Loads of other good things there....too many to mention...



Then last night I had to visit Glyph’s new installation at IBM (IBM exhibit C (14,124,23) which was very worth seeing...

....lots to see at ground level.....hidden stuff etc....then above this he has bacteria who have avis.... well...as far as I understand...single cell organisms are monitored in RL and their movements shown on SL prims (shaped like cells).....

To put it more adequately....
”This isn't just a simple RL/SL communication project it is literally real life mediated and projected into a new virtual existence. Somewhere in the bowels of Perth in the Studio of Electronic Arts at Curtin University, WA, Australia there is a lonely petri dish sitting on a bench. Inside this petri dish is a colony of Protozoa. Their movement is captured through video microscopy and then converted into a real time data stream and sent to SL.

Julian's part in the collaboration is the physical world part, that is, to capture the data and stream it into sl where I pick it up and transform it into a SL existence. He collects his cultures from local Perth ecosystems and isolates particular microcommunities in these samples, then tracks their movement and reproduction through digital microscopy, converting the data into a set of coordinates and id numbers.

I met Julian at the inaugural Australian Centre of Virtual Art LAB (http://www.acva.net.au/) where I had been discussing possibilities for transforming data between worlds. Julian works with mixed reality data transfer systems, using real biological data to create bridged mixed reality environments. With a few stops and starts the collaboration on the Cells project went from there.”

Lots of arty types were there and lots of arty friends... a generally very amusing bunch.

Meanwhile..... Emerald_Viewer_1.23.5.1635.exe has been released by Modular systems...... which I havent tried yet, but Wizzy said the alpha fix was noticeably better.... will wait for further enlightened comments....

I am currently watching the French Open and Chelsea Flower Show this week so my interests are somewhat varied....expect no great SL presence, tho some new trees are in the offing....

Oh, and my show at IBM will now be in September...also on IBM C like Glyph and Miso...

My Virtual Treeline book is in the post....exciting...can’t wait...

:))