Stuff

Well, there's been a number of things I missed this week and no doubt some of you have too. So, instead of tearing my hair out at IBM, I thought I would take a break and do a little Round-Up Of Stuff.

The biggest piece of news this week was the attack on InWorldz by some fool who thinks it's clever to break stuff. Miso has voiced my opinions on the saga here.. saying."... hey botnet feebs: attacking Inworldz is like running over a kitten in a Cadillac; no skillz need apply. You want me to admire yer dastardly ch0pz? Hack mil.net or something really hard. Until then, yer small potatos. Any monkey or toddler can break a thing."

...and, like her, I think it is InWorldz who come out of the crap smelling of roses. I was able to get news of the repair job on Twitter as well as the forum, unlike the Boys who tell you what has happened after it's been fixed. Interestingly enough, or, maybe obviously, people who were inconvenienced were patient and understanding... again....it's about customer support...(last post)...

....which leads me on to the new reduced service that LL (who is not in any financial trouble) has decided would be good for their business. You can read about it here..... and cry...

On the lists of everyones top 200 things "What I Would Most Like the Lab to Do Next" I would bet good money that no-one has thought like the Boys. The Next Offering...is.... a newsletter.... cringe...
Sandbox, it is to be called, and let's hope I am the first, not the last, to mention cat litter in the same sentence.
I could say a lot more about this, but I am trying, very hard, not to be 'down' on it before it comes out....tho....the idea that the Boys can do blogging better than the extremely good bloggers out there already seems extremely unlikely.... I would prefer if they did Support rather than Spin....

Accentuate the positive, soror!!...ahhh...OK...

Chantal has some great news... Peter Greenaway seems to be getting more and more involved with Machinima and is to be a judge in the upcoming competition. This sort of support from a credible film-maker is a real boost for the art.

..and.. Playlen Fairchild had an interview last night which I unfortunately missed...hasn't been fully blogged yet, unfortunately...and, it struck me that some may not have seen The Funniest Thing to have come out of SL, namely her machinima ...if you've seen it before...it will brighten up your Saturday, if not......




well...have a great weekend...I'll go back to tearing my hair out...


:))

Customer service and JIRA.

Ravin Draconia needs thanking for taking the time to list the frustrating steps it takes to propose a new feature, or, in her case return to the viewer a lost feature, lost when the new 2.0 viewer was intoduced as a far inferior product to the previous one.

She details her steps here.

I am still unable, and will be for eternity I think, to log on to the forums with Safari as very few browsers are compatible.

The list of things wrong with the forum is detailed by Ravin in her JIRA ...here.. she has listed 20 items which should be fixed.

I can recommend that you take a little time to vote for this JIRA, you have to sign on first ...why would they make it simple??

Now, the whole JIRA system stinks in my opinion.

Any reasonable sized business has a support system. This normally involves sending an email to support @xxx.yyy .. In normal companies, there is then a person, an employee who files, defines, analyses the complaint or issue to make sure it arrives on the right desk of the right person.

This is not rocket science, this is good business practice.

Linden Lab, however, have decided that it is you or I who should do all the work, and, it is a lot of work, so that they don't have to employ so many people on customer service.

Running the JIRA gauntlet is, of course, enough to put most people off. It took me two years to get it together.

This is not, by any calculation, a successful outcome for the Boys. They do NOT gain by having fewer complaints, ideas and suggestions.

Feedback is an ASSET, not a pain in the neck, and making it easy to get feedback should be a priority for any company selling a service.

Philip can stand on any platform and smoothly reassure The Naive that this is a new era, where the Lab is really listening, interested in community.....etc ad nauseum...if JIRA is still a nightmare, if posting comments on the Forum is impossible without downloading a few browsers to see which one works, if SnowStorm is a lie.... well...he is a fool.

...and we are fools to believe anything we get told.

The current formula for success is....PR = SPIN = LIES, and that's a formula that will bury Second Life.

Sort it out Boys!!

:))

Boobs Fall-Out

Well, Emeraldgate has not gone away, the Boys are thinking of welcoming the Viewer back into the fold under certain conditions. In the name of transparency these conditions were secret....then, the Boys changed their minds, and decided Emerald could tell us about the list..... who cares...I've personally passed thro disinterest into comatose...

Of course, if you can't log in.... then this whole thing may be more important... "In the coming days, some of the older versions of Emerald Viewer may be blocked from logging in at our request, this however will not happen until updated versions are made available on our website." ...so keep up, you Emerald users with the latest....

Boobs, however, are a different matter for many. Wizard Gynoid, who's name figures large reporting the whole debacle, was the Tweeter who came up with this bomb shell. Apparently the Boob Dude, the sole boob coder in Emerald, has left before finishing the job, leaving the project for boobs, hanging..... so those who adopted Emerald for the flexi mammaries may feel 'screwed by Boob Dude.'

Emergence, a new viewer has, well,...emerged as having most of the features Emerald has, but Imprudence seems to be gaining respect.... meanwhile, we are all looking forward to adopting Annoyance, the new V.2.987654132. from the Boys.




Finally, I have been given the keys to the sim at IBM ( C) which I will be transforming into something or another for your delectation ...the working title is, currently, Tree of Trees, now that Glyph has left the (IBM) building...

I'm all set to get my hands dirty and my brain fried...

:)))

RL stuff ... a bit of my life

This is Little Cat and he/she is not very well, so a client of mine asked if I would house and cat sit for 10 days while they are in Cambodia, visiting Ankor Wat...


















The place is a wildlife haven, deer, badgers, fox, moles all helping to keep me busy...

....unfortunately the broadband connection here is totally crap, so if I stand about like a moron for the next few days, it isn't cos my brain is fried, it's because I am totally lagged...

...just 8 more days and I'll be back to normal.

:)))

soror Nishi at UWA.

For those of you that missed my opening at UWA (SLURL) on Sunday....a few snaps...










Great fun was had by all, and I really loved the following song which Eifachfilm Vacirca, the DJ, played ...(the whole set was good)...




Nothing more to say....hehehhehe

:)))

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..


:))

Thoth Jantzen .... a visual extravaganza ....and a garden

Thoth Jantzen...well.... it's a must see.

Thoth has basically stretched the SL medium to the limit. Music and visuals, textures all meshed into an experience you couldn't have in RL.

He has this to say about it...
"“Enjoy the experience! When you arrive, click the "play" button in your media controller, and explore - that's it! We do suggest first trying out the seating pads in the entry area (make sure your media's working, then point and click to get on, then hit ESC two times. When you're done, just click 'stand up' to get off) but there's no real path you must follow - just go where you like! We do suggest you take your time and look around - there's a LOT to see and experience - but you can do it at your own pace in whatever order you wish. And, of course, you're always welcome to return! To enter the main build, just point and click on the portal pool in the centre of the entry area. The name of this build derives from what you get when 'complexity' emerges from 'simplicity' -- I hope its obvious!”

The SLURL is here.

Another preview you might enjoy is this one....I have been asked not to post photos and....I didn't install Viewer 2.0 (recommended for the site) before I went...

The press release is huge so I won't post it all here...
"LPDT2 is the Second Life incarnation of Roy Ascott’s groundbreaking new media art work La Plissure du Texte (“The Pleating of the Text”), created in 1983 and shown in Paris at the Musée de l’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris during that same year.

"LPDT2 will be projected into Real Life in Seoul, Korea during the INDAF new media art festival held at Tomorrow City, Songdo, Incheon, throughout September 2010. The project will also be open to visitors in Second Life during this month, starting from September 1st.
Roy Ascott's project has been co-authored in Second Life by Selavy Oh (programming and architecture), MosMax Hax, aka. Max Moswitzer (architecture and terrain) and Alpha Auer, aka. Elif Ayiter (avatar design). Further associates are Frigg Ragu, aka. Heidi Dahlsveen (avatar animations) and i-DAT from the University of Plymouth, UK (Real Life SMS input). Special thanks go to the University of Applied Fine Arts, Vienna, who have made the project come to life through the provision of their Second Life island for the duration of the show."

The SLURL is here...


I popped over to see a garden planted by one of my customers, as I sometimes do..






...and was very pleasantly surprised. Immm Back is the lady with green fingers who obviously possesses a considerable landscaping skill. Her post-nuclear "Wasteland" is well thought out, planted and has a number of dwellings from containers to shacks.

The lovely Siouxsie Seoung explained that the sim was far from private but home to a community called The Puppettes and they welcomed visitors. SLURL is here.

A huge space craft hovered over the sim..





....containing a mall....I was pressed for time so didn't explore....should go back.

and....I ended the day with some friends Wizzy and Juanita. Turquoise, Astra and Miso also popped in...on soror Nishi Island (InWorldz) where I have used a few more prims...



My show today at UWA is worth a visit too, of course, I am showing most of the pieces I entered to the Imagine Competition over the last 11 months set in a sort of bay.... my dragon is there too....SLURL...

See ya there

:)))