Well, not all of you, of course, but rather that part of you that is so cynical and negative (I know: redundant terms there.) Second Life is such a wonderful wonderland upon first entry, but gradually dulls and seems to grow darker with time, the way brass will dull and tarnish without a constant polishing.

Zara Mistwallow has a great post on her blog regarding how we just don’t really talk to each other anymore, how we’ve become indolent in our little virtual worlds inside the big virtual world as far as our social attitudes go.

Side note: nope, not trying to use overly-fancy words. But rather trying to avoid the trap Tateru Nino writes twice about in her blog, a traps I myself fall into quite frequently, with regard to using the proper word to obtain the “right shade” of meaning in my writing.

It’s no secret that our little wonderland is full of wonder… and ‘deviance’ all over the place. Much of which is really only perception and the actual ‘deviant’ activity never really occurs at all. For example, I am currently entertained through role play in the “Barbary Coast Project”, which if you look-up the real history of it can be rather ‘off-putting’ to ‘sensible’ people. The way I see it: did Schindler’s List offend you? The Color Purple? the mini-series Roots? It’s about experiencing history and, well, having something a bit more exciting than “Mother Goose” stories to role play.

This is one of the reason the Gor role playing theme is so popular and often some might say “thrilling” at times. It’s why the “slave” meme is so ridiculously prevailent on the SL grid. And not only in the Gor role-playing sims, but all over the place in every imaginable and conceivable theme, such as the Furry “culture”.

I’ve even run seen listed in search results Furry BDSM and Gorean-themed sims. How, whatever turns your crank, drive-on and have your fun, it’s your sandbox.

So this morning I am working on updating scripts in my products and an IM comes through on the “Barbary Coast Project” group chat. A simple, straight-=forward question:

My first thought is: thank you for checking. really, it’s is wise and kind of you to do so rather than just popping-in and running around as though nothing is amiss. In the end I was able to give this lady-furry some ideas on how to find what she was looking for.

But my first reply to the group channel was as such:

The reply from the one asking the question was an expected “no need for a smatass answer”.

And she was right in every way.

I have a rather abrasive sense of humor. Most people I know in SL and possibly first life either love me or hate me. Likely more the latter – until they get to know me. But either way, my comment was uncalled-for, even though I was genuinely going for humor.

Which brings me to the way we all are becoming less friendly as we weather our Second Lives. Hence, the comments Zara made on her blog. We communicate with strangers far less than before, and we tend to take comments in a negative way automatically, rather than first assuming it was meant in jest (though my comment definitely appeared to be a snarky one, I’ll admit.)

So, like the beautiful, shiny brass railings you might find at movie cinemas, fancy banks and barber shops, perhaps the Second Life exerience begins to tarnish with age and we are simply procrastinating the effort to break-out the Brasso and soft linnen to polish it up?

art: “Gifts 4 Heartbeat“; “Chainsaws & Jelly“

This is how I view the Second Life grid. Okay, not really, but a way to describe how I view the grid – with regard to the bigger picture.

I have been complaining (to myself and to you, through this blog) about how the grid becomes increasingly diluted and more uninteresting by the day. This has been on my mind for the last year or so, but considerably entering my thought more profoundly in the last few months.

When I first entered the grid in 2006, it was a wonderful new world. Certainly just the newness of it to me was exciting and it was a joy to explore and see things, being built by the other “residents” made it even more interesting. It was easy to find fascinating things to see and do, easy to find and meet new people, make new friends, socialize.

There was one mainland, then two and a smattering of privately maintained simulators (a.k.a. ‘sims’ or ‘private islands”/Estates (though an estate can contain multiple sims)) and though there was a massive number of things to see and places to go, in comparison to today the entire grid was minuscule.

Now think of the virtual land in SL as water and the people on the grid as a grain of sugar each and the activities (meeting people, seeing awesome things, doing things, etc.) as the ‘taste’ of sugar-in-water.

Second Life has become incredibly diluted.

And this is the problem.

The grid is becoming so heavy with land and virtual space that it will slowly break-apart and float away. In 2006 it was a teaspoon of sugar in a thimble, then a shot-glass, in 2007 with virtual land appearing everywhere, the grid turned into a tumbler, then into a drinking-glass, and the grid grows still.

That’s good for Linden Lab as every square meter of all this virtual land is potential legal tender income. However, the sugar becomes increasingly diluted. Add to that the new continent of Ursula/Zindra and the compelled move to it from all other points on the grid by all “adult” (formerly “Mature”) rated activity.

Not only is another continent created, but in order to fill it, existing continents are drained and emptied. This creates a vast deficit in the ‘people-to-space’ ratio. Add to this, at least 30% and possibly as much or more than 50% of all agents (avatars) on the grid at any one time are automated robots (bots) or inactive “campers” or both and suddenly the concurrency number looks incredibly inflated with “air”.

There is an insufficient number of often niggardly people to fill-out the virtual space, causing them to be spread far too ‘thin’ across the the Linden world. Too many bots, too many campers and too many alternate accounts means the deficit is considerably larger that what might appear at first blush.

However, Second Life is a social platform. It’s useless to be in-world unless you actually have something to do, and 95% of all of that will include your being with other people and it is becoming increasingly harder to find them.

Linden Lab now corrals all those partaking in what is likely the most popular activities across the grid, what some might term “adult deviancy”, into a single new continent. The up-side to this is that it brings all the people scattered all over the vast, gigantic grid into a more confined space.

Whether this is the intended side-effect of this move or not by Linden Lab, it is among the ‘pluses’. I like the idea of segregating this content and activity. However, Linden Lab still has a long way to go as far as how the grid itself works. Too many ‘threaten’ (most are just hot-air) to leave the SL grid for an alternative because of the copybot issues, ripping-viewers, and even the new Adult-segregation policies.

And the new adult filtering doesn’t even work very well. If you know how to fly in no-fly land, then you know how to defeat the ‘adult-rated access’ restrictions whether your are a verified adult or not, the same technique to fly in no-fly land apparently also turns-on the “adult” search results option.

As I was contemplating how to approach this blog article (thinking on it for the last month or so), Kirsten Winkler made a blog post of her own expressing her view regarding the state of Second Life where she concludes:

[T]he problems SL has are not related to bad graphics, bad usability or connection problems. The problem is the athmosphere [sic] and there [Linden Lab] did everything wrong it could possibly do. Maybe they over estimated the creativity of the community or the fact that humans still act like humans no matter if they are online or in the real world.

I am not so great a writer or orator. I ramble-on as is evident in this and most of my other posts. So, when someone else says what I am thinking in a far more eloquent and meaningful pithy way, I would rather quote them on the subject. For instance, what I have often tried to describe over the last year or more and in this specific post is this, as conveyed by Kirsten:

[Linden Lab relies] on the community, no borders, too big.

Second Life is based on the idea that the community will build the
world. That is not a bad idea in itself but the problem is that
everyone wants to be his own boss. So instead of working together and
building one giant world people buy thousands of little islands to
become “king” there.

Therefore the world is constantly growing leaving the handful of people back in more and more space.

Basically, Second Life becomes less and less ‘sweet’ by the day. How long before it goes from sweetness to ‘bitter’, as no doubt it already has for many people?

Kirsten’s full commentary here: Some thoughts on Second Life | Kirsten Winkler
art via RoofTopKitchen

A gun is just a tool. A means to an end. The fact is if someone is intent on the end and one means is removed, for example the gun, they will find another means to that same end. Thus, in this context the gun is no more dangerous than a steak-knife, a hammer or even a fist-size rock.

Fortunately, Linden Lab always errs on the side of caution. Yes, even an “under-age” abuse report causing an immediate ban is erring on the side of caution. Granted, there should be some kind of “flag” in the system that once the accused verifies themselves, all subsequent ‘under-age’ A.R.’s are automatically moot and tossed aside. Hopefully Linden Lab will get to working on a feature such as this. But I digress.

I am going to tell you a tale of two… er, tales. However, the two thus will merge into the point that the Neillife viewer can be detected on the grid (albeit in an inconvenient and rather sloppy way that still leaves some doubt.) I discovered this through a rather frustrating process, accidentally – and through continuing tests, is an accurate method of “detection”.

However, speaking to one of the development team for the GreenLife Emerald viewer proper early this morning, I now have an understanding of why this happens and how the Neillife viewer is being “detected”, thus it is an unfortunately trivial effort to “fix” the viewer.

Also please note: most of this is written before I spoke with the member of the Emerald developer team (early this morning) and so I want to be clear: because I now know the Emerald viewer proper does include the creator tools I speak-of in the Neallife viewer, (but wasn’t aware because I’m on an older version,) there is no reason or purpose for using the Neillife viewer except for thieving. Most of this post is written before I was made aware of the newer Emerald features.

It gives me pause as to whether I should make my findings public or not, as the author of the Neillife viewer will know instantly what to change to cause this ‘detection’ to fail. But I’ve decided it is better to simply tell-all because the benefit to you, dear reader at large is the greater and better of the consequence, even if only temporary.

I won’t force you to read my entire diatribe (some would think I’m that evil, but I am in a good mood with news that Emerald proper will be all I need, so here is the answer): Place any physics-based vehicle… sailboat, motorcycle, car, whatever and try to drive it. If it refuses to budge and just won’t go, it is extremely likely someone on your simulator is using, (not necessarily abusing,) the Neillife viewer. I explain how I found this below.

The problem, I fear, is that you might instantly accuse someone of abusing the abilities of the Neil viewer to steal content from you or others when they may not be doing that at all. I know, I know: that viewer is eeeeveeeellll. Well, not really. The human being using it might be evil. But they also could be someone like myself who simply enjoys the abilities of this viewer as it relates to the ease and reliability of backing-up my own creations to my own computer for safe-keeping and archiving.

But I’m one of the honest ones (and too much to risk by being dishonest as well.) Unfortunately the viewer makes it far too easy to steal other content right off other avatars – literally the shirt off your back. This is enough to turn most honest people dishonest if even only for a fleeting moment. That is why this viewer should not get mass distribution – but it will become distributed – it’s just way too easy to find. Until development stops and the grid technology changes enough to break it, it always will be here. So get used to it.

Added: I won’t redact the above because it adds context to the rest of my story and my own mindset when I wrote it. But I will say that the ‘need’ for Neillife as I describe it as a creator’s tool is now moot as I was just this morning enlightened about the current version of Emerald proper. Thus, there is no “need” for Neillife whatsoever by any ethical person. When inquiring about these creator tools being implemented into Emerald, I am told it’s already there. /me groans… (face-palms himself.) Please keep this paragraph in mind as you read-on.

Part one: I have recently downloaded every ‘alternate’ grid viewer I could find for the purpose of finding the “better viewer” as it relates to performance-to-features ratio and posted my findings previously (I won’t bother to link as it’s mostly out-of-date by now.) This includes Kirsten’s, Greenlife Emerald, Cool Viewer, Meerkat, and a bunch of others, including those from Linden Lab. I have more than a half-dozen grid viewers on my system and I haven’t bothered “uninstalling” them. I decide to cruise the grid alternating between Snowglobe and the GreenLife Emerald for the last couple months.

Now with the current hysterical paranoia spreading through the SLogosphere like a plague about the “new copybot viewers’, I decided (after yawning and rolling my eyes) to research these for the purpose of blog-fodder.

Among those I have played with is the Neillife viewer and I must admit the “tools” to “rip” content are a stunning Godsend with regard to being a creator and being able to easily and conveniently backup my own creations – all of them to my local hard disk and also reliably restore them to the grid when desired or needed (I have problems getting Meerkat to restore reliably). Yes, I said stunning.

Added: reminder that as of this morning I am now enlightened that the current version of Emerald proper has this – so Neillife will be chucked as soon as I get home. Yes. Really. Not worth the risk of some false abuse report if I were to accidentally fire it up. Accidentally? Yes, please indulge me here.

Thus, knowing that Linden Lab does not drop the hammer on people based on the software they are using, but rather on the activity they are engaging in, I decided to also leave it on my hard disk drive with the intent to spend a few hours one weekend backing-up all my stuff. However, as an all-time-use viewer, it has some quirks that annoy me and the performance isn’t what I have become accustomed to with Snowglobe and Emerald proper.

Why am I referring to GreenLife Emerald as “proper”?

When I first downloaded the Neil viewer and fired it up, there was something wrong. The desktop shortcut I created kept opening the Emerald viewer instead. So I went directly to the .EXE file and still the Emerald viewer came-up. I whacked that folder from my computer and re-downloaded. But the same thing kept happening. I finally decided screw-it and logged into the grid.

After sim-hopping for a half-hour or so whatever wasn’t right was really bothering me, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Then it hit me: there is an additional menu in the menu-bar called Neillife…something. Then the epiphany and light-bulbs went-off like camera flash units.

I was actually using the Neillife viewer, but in every single way it was the Emerald viewer, except for the one extra menu. It’s a ‘hacked’ version of the Emerald proper.

I won’t go into detail, but needless to say after experimenting on my (Group-manager bot) alt account, I have discovered what this thing is capable of. As a creator with regard to my own creations: I was stunned and thrilled at the same time. However, in a moral and ethical sense – (20-years in the military can do that to you) – I also was taken aback at how this thing can so easily be abused to steal content.

Since I am so well established in SL, lots of real money invested, a highly successful business and respected as a creator (even if not on a personal level – LOL) – I decided this is great tool but should only be used when the tools are desired. It’s way too much risk to go around using this thing all the time, no matter how much Linden Lab errs on the “safe side”. So thus I tucked it away and went back to my alternating use of Snowglobe and Emerald proper.

Shifting gears now…

Three years on the grid has rubbed the shininess of it down to a dull drab. I am not one for poseball-bumping and “clubs” just don’t do it for me as I keep music streams and voice turned-off because I don’t want to waste the bandwidth. So I run around to role-playing sims which offer a bit more variety in activities.

Tried the fantasy thing – you know: medieval with fae and dragons and goblins and all that…shiny wore down eventually. Did the Gorean thing off-and-on and most recently for a full continuous year. But again, drama of it has worn me down. The Kingdom-of-Sand sim is exciting, but it’s all World-of-Warcraft-like. Role-play is practically non-existent, though you simply must visit the sim for the build alone: it is awe-striking.(Adult-rated SLURL)

The grid goes dim and dull for me. First life becomes busier and I find I am spending less and less time in-world. I might even just fade-away quietly and no one would be the wiser. (I mention this so you know why I have become complacent in keeping my viewers up-to-date – SL has become seriously ho-hum for me – so no reason to update viewers every month.)

Then I discover a newer role-play sim called the “Barbary Coast – Port of Korat” (yes, that Barbary Coast, as in real world history – hence: seriously adult-themes if you choose to check-it-out (Adult-rated SLURL), and if you are inclined to “Kingdom-of-Sand meets Gor” – it’s a must-visit.)

Something interesting for me again, so I sign-up to be a pirate. Yes, one of those pirates, as in 16th to 17th century historical earth pirate. I do some shopping to gear-up. You know, the whole cliche pirate outfit and accoutrements, but, I also need a pirate ship. One I can actually drive around. yes, I know: “landlubber, it’s called sail about”. I’ve known SL sailing is among the most popular activities on the grid, but I have never done it myself.

The grid is exciting for me again!

I go shopping for a pirate ship and find awesome builds from TSS (have a look here at XSL) created by Martina Lewsey . These are beautiful builds and I have a hard time deciding on which ship or boat to go with! (The captain of the Lady Washington told me she is a “boat” for having only two masts and tall-ships must have three or more to be considered a “ship” – there’s some useless information for you.)

Picture: the Lady Washington, an historical tall-boat based in Washington State that is a kick-ass ride.

So I eagerly un-box my new TSS Shebec boat (two masts, woot!) and plop her into the nearest Linden sea. Raise them sails and brace myself for an exciting new SL experience. And… away we go!

Away!

…Go…

GO, dammit!

The damned thing won’t budge.

I double-check all the notecards, reread everything, do the trouble-shooting, blah, blah. Those goddamned Lindens went and changed the simulator server code and broke something, dammit!

So I send an offline IM to Martina.

Martina is gracious, kind and incredibly accommodating, teleports me to her and we spend a couple hours trouble-shooting. This time is involves her rezzing her own copies of different ships, even a land trike – the vehicles aren’t working. Nothing is moving. We sim-hop to other places on the grid. All broken. Other sailing buddies of Martina’s show-up to help-out… they aren’t moving either. Linden Lab must have done something big to beak all these vehicle scripts. Ships and vehicles from other creators are tried – all broken.

I am in SL three years. I’m patient. I can wait until the problem is solved, no big deal. Martina and friends continue as I logout to first life work. Then there’s an offline from Martina – which was peculiar. She said that after I left and they continued to trouble-shoot… everything started working again.

This is what I call a “whoa!” moment.

I was quickly able to reason that my viewer was causing the problem. But when did Emerald ever start doing this? How bizarre is this? Well, I haven’t sailed before – so I guess sailing will have to be done in Snowglobe. But it still doesn’t make sense. What about everyone else who sails?

I get home, check my system… the mess of viewers scattered on my hard disk, all the shortcuts (aliases) on the desktop… then it hit me: there are two icons that look identical: the GreenLife Emerald proper and the Neillife.

I fire-up the Emerald proper and plunk my boat into the water… and she is quickly under way and I am enjoying it with a serious sh*t-eating grin. Yes, SL is exciting again!

So I force myself to stop sailing, fire-up the Neillife and plop another pirate boat, weigh anchor and raise sails and… plonk. Turns out I was in the Neillife viewer during all the hullabaloo and didn’t even realize it.

I confirm that the Neillife viewer “breaks” the sim’s physical vehicle attributes in the Havok engine as it pertains to vehicle movement scripts – everything else works fine.

I have continued discussions with Martina (wonderfully sweet lady, by the way – go buy all her stuff, right now,) and asked her if she could find a way to convert or adapt her sailboat scripts into some kind of “detector” that would indicate when this was happening, thus indicate if someone on the sim is using this viewer.

She believes she could, but (we both agree) it is such a simple “fix” to the viewer that as soon as the author gets wind of this, it will likely be “corrected”. Even so, most who use it might be like me: complacent in maintaining the latest updates, thus continuing to use the older version that will cause this issue.

Unfortunately it might be kind of an inconvenience to “check” for this on your sim.

But if you drop a physics-based vehicle and it doesn’t budge when you try to drive it: chances are ridiculously high that someone on the sim is using the Neillife viewer. It doesn’t mean they are abusing it per-se, but they are using it.

So, if you are one of those paranoid types and get overly suspicious as you watch people on your sim like a hawk while they meander about, drop your tricycle and try going for a spin. If the squeaky wheels turn regardless if you can pull ‘wheelies’ or not, the coast is all clear.

Otherwise, hit the eject-all, ban-hammer switch, restart the sim and run quickly to your medicine cabinet to get a double-dose of that Pepto-Bismol stuff.

How long will this “test” keep working? Probably not long as I’m sure the Neillife author will “fix” his viewer. But for now, for today, it’s a little something you can count-on.

And as a footnote, I (along with all ethical people) utterly cheer Linden Lab on for their sting-operation regarding confirmed abusers of the Neillife viewer!

art: Pytnik; Deby Dixon

And – isn’t it radically ironic that Second Life residents will blast Linden Lab for acting to enforce their own Intellectual Property Rights (made to be BAD GUYS), but yet blast Linden Lab and shout shrill diatribe when their own (Residents) Intellectual Property Rights are offended – i.e. “copybot” (GOOD GUYS)? Cake + Eat = Sour-taste.

[Update: and I just read this at Not Possible In RL blog: "Animators in Second Life strive so hard to emulate the graceful movements of real professional dancers through precision motion capture, but the animation I adore and would miss the most is my trans/copy SkybornFly. I know I've had it since January 2008 because I remember handing out copies of it like there was no tomorrow at Komuso Tokugawa and MoShang Zhao's fabulous realtime jam and prototype event..." - uh... WTF? (emphasis mine) - and she didn't even know who the creator was until now. Complain about copybot or "theft"in general lately? I mean - if you didn't know who the creator was, how could you know if the license allowed you to throw it around so willy-nilly? (If it's a custom animation made for you - then clarify - but you say you've never heard of him... things that make you go 'hmmm'.)  (Source)] [Edit: I want to clarify that I am not accusing Ms. Tizzy of anything. Comments below explain why I am using this.]

(Back to regularly-scheduled diatribe):
If you’ve read Hamlet”s post about Linden Lab Incident Reports at New World Notes and all the comments to it, you don’t need to read any further here. I read all those comments and it seems everything relating to “breaking the rules” on the Second Life grid always causes the ‘copybot’ theme to rear it’s head.

The current shrill paranoia is with regard to the new open source free viewers in the wild that allow the user to copy prims (rezzed and worn by others) and textures (layered and baked) with only a few clicks. The panic seems to be reaching a fever-pitch…if you follow blogs about Second Life that is… and as I’ve spoken about in the last couple posts I made here.

My comment there at NWN was more directed to all those other commenters rather than the original article, and I got a bit verbose as I often do. After posting I looked at it and felt it was a bit long and decided I’d just repeat it here because I make a few more points that speak to what I was trying to say on my last post and I want to have my comments “archived” here at Common Sensible.

In my reply I directly answer a couple other commenters, but also largely toward one particular comment, so I will quote them in truncated form here before I dump my own rhetoric onto the page for your ridicule.

Ann’s [Otool] cryolife detector is a great tool, but increasingly, I am seeing people who are undoubtedly using “that” viewer to hide their client version. This typically shows itself by coming up with a “?” in the radar on Emerald (unless they have decided to clone a different viewer).

I stood next to a friend’s store last night changing the texture on a statue to stop someone from copying it, this person had hair on that they had created themselves the previous day – was named “hair – Liz” in their own language. In the end they either managed to copy the statue while I was changing the texture on it every time they changed it back (it’s like two clicks to copy a linkset), and they went, or I stopped them and they gave up.

My friend AR’ed, but what will be done? We have no proof apart from the hair and what they were doing.

- snip-

Ann is right .. I believe the vast majority of theft is personal use – you cannot file a DMCA for that.

So what happens when you know something is being copied, or you are 99.9% certain? You have no proof. There is nothing physical to be seen, unless you manage to find it inworld [sic] after the event – and that’s not really likely is it?

There’s no safeguard, no comeback, and soon no point in making content.

- snip -

Posted by: Toxic Menges | Thursday, October 01, 2009 at 04:48 AM
[at New World Notes]

In my reply, I speak directly to the claim that viewers that appear with a question mark in the Emerald (or Kirstens, et al) radar. This commenter proclaims any viewer that cannot be identified in the built-in Emerald radar is one of “those” viewers (that allow “ripping” of prims and textures.) And by the way “99.9% sure” is not “sure” – there is still doubt. This is why the Abuse Report will go nowhere, as it should go nowhere.

Guess what, even the Linden Lab official viewer and Snowglobe appear as a question mark (?) in the Emerald viewer. So I suppose if I use Snowglobe and create and wear hair that I happen to call “Hair – Torley” that I am evil because I’m a copybot-ripper? Sheesh. Why would I call my hair that? How about “Hair” so the name is easy to search for in inventory and how about “Torley” to name the “style”?

There also was some comment by someone else about how these other viewers, such as “Cryolife” are “unauthorized” viewers. There is no “unauthorized” viewer. Using it to actually break Intellectual Property rights is a violation of TOS and CS, but using the viewer itself is not an offense. No more an offense than owning a gun and never using it in the act of a crime. For those in the United Sates, research the Sony versus Universal Studios “Betamax” suit.

To summarize: Universal Studios basically argued that the Betamax Video Cassette recorder could be used to “copybot” movies (shock! ZOMG!). However, the Supreme Court eventually found that the device facilitated substantial useful purpose more than the potential abusive purpose and thus, video-tape has changed the way we all enjoy our private entertainment and edification studies.

The issue at hand isn’t the existence of these “ripping” viewers, it’s how they are used. The sheer panic, paranoia and hysteria surrounding what they can and might, maybe, possibly be used to do. If there is an earthquake on the other side of the world, will you lose sleep in a panic-induced worry a tidal wave will wipe-out your beach-house? That’s more or less what people are doing. Concern, yes. But outright nail-biting worry?

Thus, those in panic mode need to really get a grip on reality and seek a return to a little healthy balance between their first and “second” lives before they blow a gasket over the status of ‘toys’. Thus, my comment at New World Notes (with additional commentary and repeated here for my own archival purposes):

**********

Wow.

Just… wow.

First, there is no “unauthorized” viewer. Yes, even “cryolife” is “authorized” on the grid. Is that good or bad? You decide. As you think on it, think about the freedom of speech argument (those of you in the U.S. anyway). [In hindsight, the argument for the second amendment of the United States Constitution - “The right to bear arms” would have made a better example here —Ari]

As for copyright violation: personal theft is not a copyright violation. The simple transfer of a product from one person to another does not violate copyright (regardless if it is paid for or not, authorized or not) – else we all are in violation based on everything we own in Second or First Life. [My argument here is that it does not become a copyright violation until to begin to distribute to the public at large. Even if you give to friends and known acquaintances it falls under fair use. So, “personal use” in my point means literally. —Ari]

I agree most “ripping” of content is likely personal use. Most people are basically honest (I know it’s not a black and white issue – so I mean to say they lean heavily toward honesty and more away from dishonesty) and wouldn’t try to resell these things they’ve “shop-lifted”. [Digital Rights Management is meant to keep honest people honest and most people are honest. In the case of ‘ripping’ in SL, I believe most people are honest enough that they might go dishonest just enough to steal a copy of something for themselves, but not dishonest enough to redistribute it. —Ari]

Then there are the idiots who do ‘rip’ content and turn around and resell it. [Which I believe to be a water-drop in a five-gallon drum among all those who do steal content, and they being a water-drop in a lake as compared to the entire population of Second Life. However, the squeakiest wheels always make the biggest waves and get the most attention. The shrill minority as far as I’m concerned. —Ari]

Either way, I genuinely believe the “problem” of ripping is a minuscule amount as compared to the grid “population” as a whole with regard to the ratio of ‘honest’ people versus ‘dishonest’ people (shop-lifters) and only a tiny fraction of those ‘shop-lifters’ are actually crude enough to try to resell the content. Litterally an eyedropper drop of water into a lake. It is the most vocal who are violated that make the ‘news’.

This doesn’t mean it’s nothing to be concerned with. I just believe there is too much hype and hysteria going on. [Frankly it seems to be turning shrill. The law suit by Stoker Serpentine isn’t helping as many people are using that as a catalyst for uneducated, sloppy and loose argument and reason to turn paranoid over it all. The law suit has nothing at all to do with copybot or ‘ripping’. It has to do with Linden Lab’s ability or choice in acting upon a DMCA report, and their alleged complacency in ‘knowing “illegal” activity persists on the grid” and not doing anything proactive about it. This lawsuit will fail as Linden Lab to my knowledge and understanding based on all I have researched is doing everything by the letter of the law. So Stroker should be suing the U.S. Congress. Ari]

As for the comment above about how a viewer shows-up as a question mark (?) in the radar of Emerald (and other grid viewers with this capability): this does not mean it is a ‘naughty’ viewer. I use Emerald myself – however I have particular features turned off and I am often asked why my viewer shows as a ?. So does Meerkat and I believe the Imprudence and so on. A viewer that does not report what it is does not a “ripping” viewer make. [It’s true, if one actually reads the detailed documentation of the Emerald viewer, there is a portion that explains if you do not have certain “protections” turned on, your Emerald viewer will not report itself to other Emerald viewers as an Emerald viewer. Also, see my comment above about the Official Linden Lab and Snowglobe viewers. —Ari]

The problem here is that there are too many loose assumptions being thrown about. Guilty until proven innocent? That seems to be the case here. [Imagine yourself using the Snowglobe viewer, wearing hair you have created that you’ve chosen to name as described above, and going into “Edit” mode to discover the creator of a wonderful statue you might be interested in purchasing. Suddenly - you are ejected and banned because you are assumed to be ripping the statue. Pathetic. —Ari]

As for creators who decide to stop creating because of the very existence of these things: that’s your choice. Then they ‘win’. Perhaps you should focus on actually trying to enjoy SL. Build for yourself – for fun, rather than trying to take it all so seriously as though it were a life or death struggle. [Problem: you are taking your “Second” life way too seriously. You need to get a “Real” life and refocus your priorities in a bad way. —Ari]

Some of you might blow a gasket if you aren’t careful with all this paranoia. Second Life is an entertainment MMO and platform. I remember back in 2006 the shrill shouts to Linden Lab demanding a means to “back-up” prim creations because of the ridiculous instability of the grid at the time. [Edit: I just remembered... take a WILD EFFING GUESS as to what the creators of the original copybot said they were trying to do!]

So now that capability is here, but because (like Video Tape) it can be *misused by some* it is suddenly the evil incarnate. I suppose we all want our cake and to eat it, too.  [The old “be careful what you wish for as you might just get it” scenario. Look at what the U.S. Government looks like right now for example. —Ari]

Please understand my comment here is not to make light of the situation. But rather to attempt to put things into a more realistic perspective. [Read: don’t put more effort into worrying about what happens on the grid than you do in worrying what happens in your real life. It just isn’t that important. —Ari]

The example of the person wearing a hair prim that *appeared* to be a “rip” (How do you know they didn’t actually create it – did you ask them?) and attempt to copy a statue while you worked on it… as to the hair: so what? [(snark-on) Oh, but even though this person really did create their hair and named it as I exampled above and were just checking creator on the statue, you were sure enough to actually file an Abuse Report (and likely banned them)? Wow. Just effing wow. ( /snark-off) —Ari]

That is not a lost sale because that person is too cheap to buy anyway. They would never have been a customer to begin with. As for the alleged theft of the statue… how do you know they stole it? Did they rez a copy of the statue right before your eyes? [Read: Even if that person was ripping your stature and that hair - they are too cheap to have purchased anyway. So it really isn’t a lost sale. Rather just another copy on the grid, that’s all. get a clue. Just like Adobe proclaims a bazillion dollars in lost sales because most Second Life creators who whine about copybot and I.P. rights are using pirated copies they haven’t paid for - they never would have purchased anyway - they would find an alternative - so it’s not really a lost sale. Talk about bullshit-spin.—Ari]

If not then you are the evil incarnate because you are now paranoid, presuming everyone in sight to be a thief. Guilty until proven innocent by virtue of suspicion alone. I am not saying you are wrong or right. [Note the “snark” tag above. —Ari]

I am saying that you are losing sleep over something that firstly nothing can be done about by you, me, anyone else, even Linden Lab. And secondly, something that is meaningless in practicality and the larger scope of things. [Larger scope: real life concerns. —Ari]

I am not defending people who do this stuff. I am saying we all need to get our priorities in order rather than running around with pitchforks and torches in our hands looking for any excuse to use them. [Most, if not all these paranoid people are now on witch-hunts and will be convinced that copybotters are constantly in their midst, without actually making a genuine effort to find out, first, because it’s easier to just A.R. and ban people than it is to file a real DMCA the way the law requires. And then they will wonder why no one comes to buy from them any more, and presume it’s because of copybot, rather than a sucky ‘economy’ is the cause and so they will A.R. and ban more people and the spiral downward begins and speeds-up as they go. Then they blame Linden Lab for not doing what Linden Lab is even capable of - for their spectacular crash into the ground—Ari]

You can earn yourselves ulcers over the wrong reasons. As for copyright and Intellectual property rights, if you are serious about your creations in Second Life that you lose sleep over the fear that someone *might* come along and steal a copy, then register it, perhaps even file a patent? [Wrong reasons: over anything Second Life rather than first life. —Ari]

If your creations are that important to you then a federal registration is the appropriate way to handle it. I will not call Second Life a “game” as I know better. But at the same time if so much of your real life concerns and fears are based on the grid and what goes on there, perhaps a reevaluation of your life priorities are in order? [You have no say and no proof that your creations are actually yours until you register them. Until then, it’s your word against anyone else, unless you can actually convince Linden Lab to dig through system logs to prove otherwise. Oh, but that requires an actual lawsuit that is likely un-winnable, doesn’t it? —Ari]

I have been copybotted last year. I agree it is infuriating. It is flustering and I will not deny the anger that bubbles-up from it. But at the same time, I know the majority of people on the grid, those people who never even see these blogs, the ones who run around Zindra with prim-genitals all day look upon the Second Life grid as a *game*, and entertainment, a diversion and cannot be counted-on to consider taking anything on the grid, including creations seriously at all. [You and I might not call it a game. But we are only 1 in 10,000 of people who do think-of, look-upon and call Second Life a game. —Ari]

This is why it is a “losing battle”. I agree awareness is important. But anything beyond that, especially the high blood-pressure that arises from just the very thought of all this stuff is a reason to reevaluate the value and worth of the Second Life grid as a whole with respect to rest of your life and exactly how it fits-in and what priority you are giving to it. [Meaning if you are so paranoid about anything copybot, you actually think your creations are worth the effort to copy (most aren’t - including my own), and you need to get your priorities straight. Not to mention your hyping about how wonderful the Open Simulator (OpenSim) project is - just wait until you start creating things there.—Ari]

So my advice is: Breathe. Nice and slow, in through the nose, out through the mouth. Now close your eyes and go “mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm” and a soft, low tone. [Think: Ghandi. —Ari]

Source: New World Notes

art: Anna Eppel

Copybot has been around since 2006. And now, there are grid viewers with the same capability built-in and there are those who are going absolutely nuts with paranoia. At large are Cryolife, Thuglyfe, Streetlife, Neillife, please Get-a-life.

Sure, I could easily link to each and every one of those I’ve just listed. But then I’d get flamed for “accessibility to the masses” and all that nonsense. In truth they are quite easy to find and all are free (so if you pay for any of these, you are a lot more gullible than you should be.) As for the “copybot capability” of these grid viewers, why is no one screaming in shrill tones about Meerkat viewer – actually highlighted on New World Notes – among the most-read blogs about Second Life?

The fact of the matter is this stuff (ripping textures and prims) is not stoppable and there is nothing Linden Lab or you can do about it because it happens after the scene is downloaded to the local computer. Think of the technology as a “cache sifter and extractor” because that’s basically what it’s doing (for descriptive purposes anyway.) If you can see it or hear it, you can steal it. So why is everyone so paranoid about this stuff?

The answer is simple: people are taking Second Life and their “work” in it far too seriously.

I have a real and genuine proposition for you…

I want you to work for me.

No, really. Work for me – here, in real life. No worries about grid stability or your internet connection dying out on you or any of those other things. I want to hire you to landscape my home in first life (a.k.a. “real” life) and I will pay you to do it. In fact, the best part is that you have full reign, you can be as creative as you want. Do anything and everything. Whatever your heart desires, there is absolutely no limits whatsoever.

You also can sell anything and everything you create for my garden. I won’t interfere in any way, shape or form. I want you to have as much fun as you can with it and maybe even make additional money on-top of what I pay you! I swear to you it’s a dream-come-true!

Set your own hours, be your own boss and do anything and everything you want.

However, there are a couple of caveats:

First, you must agree to the contract between us. Well, it’s really more of an agreement that you will obey my rules while on my property. You must be nice to everyone who comes by, specifically, other guests to my property.

Oh, and though you can do anything your heart desires with no limits whatsoever, you must pay me rent to use the land in my property – you choose the section and size and I’ll adjust the rent appropriately. Whatever you do in that space is all you – go for it and have a ball!

Oh, and if you do make some amazing statues or grow stunning flowers and sell them to other people, I want a cut. And by the way, you must provide your own tools, whether you buy them from someone else or create them yourself, all you get is an empty, plain chunk of ground.

I forgot to mention that because of decency laws in my neighborhood, if you intend to allow nudity or any ‘naughty-naughty-wink-wink’ kind of stuff, you’ll have to choose a chunk of my land that’s in the back-yard. You know, behind the house so people on the street won’t be offended.

Oh, and did I mention that all transactions will be handled with Monopoly money? This is better because I can easily print my own whenever I need it and they are easy to trade. You know, like a token. And because it kind of resembles money it makes for a good enumeration to account for your earnings. Oh, and I do mean all transactions. So if you sell your hard work, the buyer must obtain Monopoly money from me so they can buy from you.

Oh, but have no fear! You can make a real life living working for me! I swear it! If you make really really pretty flowers and garden decorations a lot of people will want to buy them! You’ll make more Monopoly money than you can imagine. really! No shit! Unfortunately some folks might steal some of your flowers, but don;t worry about that. I’ll let you advertise your stuff in my searchable newsletter. Those thieves wouldn’t have purchased your stuff anyway.

But back to what I was saying… Whenever you want, I’ll actually trade you your Monopoly money for real life legal tender money. Seriously, it’s a great deal! You can make your living by working for me.

All you have to do to get started is agree to my rules and then come to my house.

I know, I know, the rules are all there to protect me and all of them more or less work against you, but hey – it’s my house, right? You are the guest who comes to visit and work.

Oh, and I know that I exchange the Monopoly money for real money, but I should point out that part in my rules about that… just ignore it. It doesn’t mean anything, really. I mean, I’m exchanging Monopoly money for real money right now, aren’t I?

Remove that part of my rules? Why, whatever do you mean?

Oh, I’ll do it eventually. You know, when ever I get around to it. It’s kinda low on the priority list right now. But it’s okay, just ignore it because I’m not enforcing it at all for the time being. Which part of my rules am I talking about? Haven’t you read and understood my rules before you started working for me?

Why parts 1.4 and 1.5 of course:

1.4 ARI BLACKTHORNE REAL LIFE “currency” is a limited license right available for purchase or free distribution at ARI BLACKTHORNE’s discretion, and is not redeemable for monetary value from ARI BLACKTHORNE.

You acknowledge that the Service presently includes a component of in-world fictional currency (“Currency” or “BLACKTHORNE Dollars” or “B$” or “BS” or “BULLSHIT” or “BULLSHIT SYSTEM“), which constitutes a limited license right to use a feature of HIS product when, as, and if allowed by ARI BLACKTHORNE. ARI BLACKTHORNE may charge fees for the right to use BULLSHIT Dollars, or may distribute BULLSHIT Dollars without charge, in HIS sole discretion. Regardless of terminology used, BULLSHIT Dollars represent a limited license right governed solely under the terms of this Agreement, and are not redeemable for any sum of money or monetary value from ARI BLACKTHORNE at any time. You agree that ARI BLACKTHORNE has the absolute right to manage, regulate, control, modify and/or eliminate such Currency as HE sees fit in HIS sole discretion, in any general or specific case, and that ARI BLACKTHORNE will have no liability to you based on HIS exercise of such right.

1.5 ARI BLACKTHORNE offers an exchange, called F-YOU-X, for the trading of BULLSHIT Dollars, which uses the terms “buy” and “sell” to indicate the transfer of license rights to use BULLSHIT Dollars. Use and regulation of F-YOU-X is at ARI BLACKTHORNE’s sole discretion.

We’ll skip the details here for brevity. But suffice it to say that you are allowed to trade my Monopoly money from one person to another, but there is no guarantee whatsoever that I will give you any real life legal tender in exchange for it.

Oh, here’s another important part of chapter 1.5:

You agree and acknowledge that ARI BLACKTHORNE may deny any sell order or buy order individually or with respect to general volume or price limitations set by ARI BLACKTHORNE for any reason. ARI BLACKTHORNE may limit sellers or buyers to any group of users at any time. ARI BLACKTHORNE may halt, suspend, discontinue, or reverse any Currency Exchange transaction (whether proposed, pending or past) in cases of actual or suspected fraud, violations of other laws or regulations, or deliberate disruptions to or interference with the Service.

There. Understand it now? Oh, I won’t bother to pay your taxes for you either. So you’d better stay on top of that or the bad guys might slap you with some serious shi…er… stuff.

But please, don’t let this stop you!

I mean, even though you have absolutely zero rights at all whatsoever morally, contractually or even legally and are at my complete mercy in all things, don’t you think this is a great opportunity to make a lot of money – and even stake your very livlihood and living on it?!!

C’mon! It’s a perfect business plan! Why, any bank in the world would be fools not to back you up!

I mean sheesh… if you don’t think it’s such a great deal you could always go off and look at the competition.

I hear Linden Lab has a damned similar offer , you know. But their rules are worse, because it’s a computer game, not real life like the offer I’m making to you. And besides, you are at the mercy of your ISP and your very computer not crashing and dying on you and your electrical power going out and a whole host of other stuff completely out of your control.

No one in their right effing mind would dare think to actually try to make a living in that Second Life place with that Linden Lab terms of service. That person would well do better having a gaping hole drilled into their head.

I mean, Second Life is just for fun, right? I mean, because people do actually know better than to feel entitled there, right?

art: Rose (Dinarzad); JCLPAT; Bob (Break.Things)

There is big news making the rounds in the SLogosphere this week about an effort (boycott) regarding content theft in Second Life. The effort is called “Step UP! For Content Creators”. Many bloggers have called it many things. Many others, including Gwyneth Llewelyn calls it what it is and should be: an awareness effort. But I think it actually goes too far.

The untiring Gwen Carillon, one of the best jewelry creators in Second Life, and the long-time president of the Content Creators Association, a [sic] SL organisation “to support, inform and assist creators in protection of original content and other content related issues”, has launched a new project: Step UP! for Content Creators, a new way to raise awareness for content creation theft in Second Life.

[From Gwyn’s Home » Blog Archive » Step UP! for Content Creation Theft Awareness]

Fair enough. However, there is a problem. A big one, too. Gwyneth also writes:

Gwen, perhaps unlike many others, is a firm believer in a positive approach to the whole issue, that is, to find solutions to problems and get people to spread the word about what can be done.

Gwyneth’s emphasis, not mine. But also the very emphasis I would have made myself. You see, there is no solution. At least none that I can think of in knowing what I know about how computers and networking works (I have first life I.T. experience.)

There is the issue of “copybot” we all have heard about before. Frankly I am tiring of… well some might call it a ‘discussion’. I consider it all more of a one-sided paranoia diatribe. I don’t mean this in an offensive way to any who speak of it. I am only saying it’s a futile worry. “Copybot technology” is here and it is here to stay.

Period.

Gwyneth briefly and accurately covers the history of copybot and what it is from first inception and public knowledge in 2006 through now:

Enter Fall ‘09. Content pirates now aggregate around illegally tweaked copies of the Second Life viewer, and a soon-to-be-released version of one of these viewers will feature an easy, user-friendly way to copy basically everything you see in your line of sight[.]

The bold emphasis is mine and brings home my entire point. The RIAA and MPAA are going ape-shit in panic mode trying to inject Digital Rights Management (DRM) in order to prevent the “theft” of their respective works. However, in so doing they are punishing you, dear honest consumer – the majority, in order to do nothing more than slow-down the minority. A ratio, by the way, that is ridiculously out-of-whack.

One in a million motorcycle riders kill themselves so the rest are forced to wear helmets. Music and Movie files are easily copied by the tiniest fraction of consumers and the rest are forced to deal with DRM that doesn’t work and causes far more problems than it fixes.

The simple matter of fact is: if you can hear it, you can copy it and steal it. If you can see it, you can copy it and steal it. As for copybot: it works the exact same way. If you can see it, you can steal it. it always has been this way on the internet.

Every web page you view must be copied (albeit temporarily) to your local computer before it can be displayed on your screen, including every single element. All of it, except for Flash – which loads completely into memory (and is why it is a horrible, resource-intensive bloatware behemoth I personally block in my web browser.) These temporary files on your local hard disk drive used to actually display the information. It is what is called “cache“.

If you siphon through your internet cache files you can copy every movie, sound file, photograph and everything else you’ve seen or heard while on the internet browsing the world-wide web. The web site has absolutely zero-control over what you can or cannot do with that stuff.

Second Life works much the same way. The difference is the cache is not so easily browsable – unless you have a software tool to decipher it for you.

Hence: copybot.

Copybot will grab this stuff and reassemble it back into the grid for you. But only the stuff you can see – thus why copybot cannot copy scripts and animations and any contents inside prims – such as what is inside resale vendors.

So with all this the way it is, my question to Gwyneth, and you and everyone else… and Gwen Carillon, is this: Why are you punishing Linden Lab by boycotting the upload of images or whatever else you have planned and are asking others to participate in?

I mean, what would you have Linden Lab do specifically? Surely Linden Lab can placate we creators by adding more permissions restrictions or whatever else, but then we will chastise Linden Lab for not going far enough.

Linen Lab is between a rock and a hard place because they cannot win in this situation. They are damned if they do and damned if they don’t. Content creators will never be satisfied with anything Linden Lab does, short of eliminating the problem, which is utterly impossible to do.

Linden Lab has no more control than you do with regard to your content being plagiarized (not stolen – you are not deprived in any way.) Oh, and to proclaim that you are losing sales? Get real, will you?

Like Microsoft and Adobe and so many other software companies who proclaim “lost sales” due to piracy, you are not losing any sales. The simple fact is those pirates never would have purchased what they have “stolen” to begin with. They would have simply found a less expensive, other alternative. Thus it is not a “lost sale” – because no “sale” would have occurred otherwise.

Second Life also is massive. Subtract the camping-bots, subtract the campers, subtract the alt accounts, and finally subtract all those with entitlement attitudes (the “I deserve it for free because the world revolves around me and owes me everything for nothing” crowd) and there are at least a good 100 people or more on the grid who will buy your stuff.

Your business is down and sluggish because of the economy, not because you’ve been “copybotted’. Most who “copybot” I suspect do so just for themselves. A smaller fraction will actually be stupid enough to try to resell what they plagiarize.

Linden Lab does provide a way for you to file a take-down notice. It is not easy or lightening fast. But this also prevents false initial reports. Yes, the problem is (and Linden Lab will matter-of-factly indicate to you) the one you report against will simply file a counter-claim to have the stuff replaced. A no-win scenario? Blame the idiots known as the Congress of the United Sates.

Sure, Linden Lab could make filing take-downs easier, but then the flood-gates for false initial DMCA reports will open. Besides, the problem isn’t with Linden Lab in this regard, it’s with the law. The way Linden lab handles DMCA notices is in accordance with the way the law is written. The boneheaded idiots in Washington bending over to placate the RIAA and MPAA and those guys have created a nightmare law and it should be challenged in the Supreme court based on it’s very Constitutionality. But that’s expensive and takes years.

The awareness aspect of this effort is something I agree with. However, even awareness would only matter to a fraction of the grid. The fact is no one really cares about the things we would hope they care about. The majority don’t care about quality of your creations. They don’t care that it took you a lot of work and hours and hours of prim manipulation, scripting, and texture generation. They don’t care that you rely on those sales to pay your tier fees. (if you rely on anything in SL for first life – you are a fool.)

They really don’t care if you are here tomorrow or not. That, dear friend is the majority attitude on the grid. Copybot and entitlement attitudes were given their birth at the onset of the open-sourcing of the Linden Lab grid viewer. The cat already is out of the bag and there’s no setting him back in.

I am most happy that Linden Dollars are tracked and transactions occur only through the server, because if anyone got their hands on that code, woe-be-the-grid.

I don’t mind people who debate, argue, shout, even become passionately vitriolic about something. But it’s all cry-baby whining unless you provide an alternative solution to what you are crying about along with your crying – then it’s not crying, it’s debating.

[Edit: The question has not come up, but it occurred to me that I must mention that Gwyneth does, in fact mention her idea of a solution - which I applaud - regardless how feasible it is or isn't. —Ari]

Since the copying of prims and skin and clothing textures and basically your complete avatar and what you wear, along with anything rezzed on the grid is 100% out of Linden Lab’s control, what exactly would you have Linden Lab do to placate you at all?

My own solution is to simply shrug and continue on with as minimal stress and worry about it all as possible. As for the “Step UP! For Content Creators effort”? I think it’s based on the right idea: awareness. But to punish Linden Lab (or anyone else for that matter) by attempting to “hurt them” through boycotting uploads is a bit over-the-top and based on emotion, not logic.

I know, I know – the idea is to send a strong message to Linden Lab itself. Trust me, I have it on good authority Linden Lab is well aware of our plight. However, there are many reasons, many of which we are not privy to where Linden Lab must move forward carefully. And some of those reasons are entirely out of their control.

It’s okay to “think with your heart” – but sometimes it is simply healthier to think with your head instead.

What is your solution to the problem?

art: Kevin Lim (Inju); Reachneville; FamilyGuyFan221

It’s just another way of saying they can beat you up, hate you, make you miserable – but in the end, they can’t take away your principals. And so, I now hereby open myself up to whatever flaming, trolling, vitriolic hatred might come my way when I make my genuine opinion here known to the world.

Not a secret, but never before openly and loudly shouted out to the Second Life enthusiast world. So, please allow me a moment to get my helmet and flame-retardant armor on and buckle my seatbelt, ‘cause here we go…

First, I’ll repeat a comment to an article I wrote and my reply. The article, in-short, can be summarized as ‘worrying about copybot and its derivatives is a waste of time‘. It is simply a sample of a discussion that was posted at Shopping Cart Disco (source).

In the source and my post was this statement:

Informant: And it’s completely safe, you can trust me on that, but yes they were all originally derived from the same people in the same place, most creators were underaged boys and made hacked viewers to sell to normal Second Life users, or so they could steal content for themselves.

To which, someone named “hiyas’ commented to my post about it with:

If i understand, Kids aren’t allowed on Second Life. I’ve Ar’d people after i’ve found out that they’re kids

This is true. This is how it always has been – especially since back when I first entered second Life back in 2006. And from then (and before) all the way through now, this ‘argument’ has been made over and over and over again.

News flash: The dead horse has been beaten to death.

I responded to “Hiyas” with this:

Unfortunately, Linden Lab allows the teen grid to wither away and rot. And along with free “basic” accounts and virtually no checks and balances whatsoever, Linden Lab has allowed a serious proliferation of underagers to enter the grid. The Second Life grid is infected with the, ([sic]: them)

Even though the population has been shouting to Linden lab [sic] to fix the problem, they never raised so much as a finger.

Now they are trying to fix the problem. The only way possible is the move the city walls inward – into the middle of the city in order to keep the unwanted out of the inner sanctum – rather than the city itself.

So now – you should be able to say ZINDRA is for adults. The rest is more or less hush-hush, wink-wink wide open.

I forgot that my comments and replies to them via Disqus (which I love, by the way and wish every blogger would use it) is set-up to also post a notice to my Twitter feed (along with notices when I update this and my other blog.)

I was surprised to see a tweet from someone (I assume) at Linden Lab in the feed called “TeenGridNews”. The tweet said:

That’s teens for you. <_<

I must humorously agree. I am not sure if the reply was in response to the reply I made on my own blog or to the comment first quoted above. But that’s neither here nor there. I rarely use Twitter directly. I use it as a notification system for those who prefer to follow me there rather than directly at my Tumblr blog – so my tweets are automated.

However, I manually sent this tweet to TeenGridNews on Twitter… (allow me to tighten my seatbelt right now)”

@teengridnews – I open myself to serious flaming here when I say *I SUPPORT* Opening the grid to teens – I hope ZINDRA allows it eventually.

There it is. I am now officially standing on the south-side of that great dividing intellectual fence, accompanied by very few against the vast majority of Second Life users. (Allow me to lower the face visor on my helmet before you start flinging the icky, nasty, stinky organic waste at me, please.)

Linden Lab is asked often about the whole Zindra plan. They are asked and it is often assumed, presumed and accused that Linden Lab’s primary plan for moving all “adult” content into that ‘inner sanctum’ behind tall walls called Zindra (Zindra is the Linden word for “Kremlin”, folks — okay, okay, just kidding!)

Linden Lab’s response is and always has been (I paraphrase, but it always comes out to) “We have no plans at this time to merge the Teen Grid with the Main Grid.”

I believe them. I also believe Linden Lab when they say the Zindra ‘segregation’ project (my words) is not designed or planned to the end of merging these grids. I believe it is simply to better organize the genre of content on the grid.

Any reasonable person with minimal common sense would agree even adults can be offended, even shocked (and often just plain tired of) the premise of much of the “adult” content and activities that go on across the grid. These are genuinely sensible people. It just gets ‘wearing-down’ seeing it all over the place after a while – and it is often in vendor displays, where those vendors are in the markets you almost always land in practically everywhere you go – the same markets that are necessary to help the parcel owners cover their tier fees..

Want to visit a role play sim? Teleport, land, rez, stare a large vendor screen with a picture of some giant sex toy staring you in the face. Sure, we just shrug it off and go looking for the entrance into the sim proper. But don’t you get tired of seeing all that stuff all the time when you aren’t even looking for it?

Let’s face it, teens are here already. Let them be for crying out loud. The only reason “underagers” are ‘forbidden’ from the ‘main grid’ is so you and I and everyone else can be allowed to play by our own nastiest, most deviant, shocking dirty little fantasies.

Linden Lab allows this. It is not a right, but a privilege. This of course brings legal ramifications into the mix with regard to access to that naughty content by legal minors. Linden Lab wants Second Life to be open – open access to all, regardless of race, religion, skin color, creed, sexual orientation and… if they can find a way …age.

I say go for it.

Not quite yet, of course. But once the content segregation is properly completed and the grid is ‘cleaned-up’ — go for it. Allow the teens into the main and kill the teen grid, which languishes like some lost, forgotten gulag.

I figure since the grid is being ‘cleaned-up’ (I mean this in a good way: the segregation of content genres) in order to make it easier to run into “adult” content only when you explicitly choose and intend to find it, then why not allow the teens in? There really is no reason not to.

So to be clear: I am not advocating opening the main grid to teens…yet. I agree, adults need to know they are surrounded by other adults. And they will, when on Zindra. As for the rest of the grid, why would it matter?

I believe the is the end to which Linden Lab is working and I support it. Uncle Philip has already stated that changes are coming and they will be uncomfortable changes, perhaps even ‘painful’ changes. But change happens. I believe allowing teens into the main eventually will be one of those “changes”.

“We have no plans at this time to merge the teen grid with the main grid”. No plans at this time. True – the plan is for a later time – after the grid has been cleaned-up. Merge the teen grid with the main grid. True – allow teens in and kill the teen grid.

The point being is that it is not a question of if, but when this will happen. And I stand on the side of the teens with regard to this scenario – provided the time is right and the grid made appropriate for it.

/me now pulls the splash cover over my entire body in preparation for the onslaught of whatever may be thrown in his direction.

art: GaBbu & Oleh; Ben SanJose; Jack and Laurie (DBCoop77)

First Life company makes a move not only from one office to the other, but from one city to another. The good news is that my morning and evening commutes are considerably less stressful (from an average 30-minutes on a good day down to 11 minutes every day.)

Unfortunately the move itself was and still is a real pain in the ass. And back. And legs, and feet and arms and… well, if you’ve ever moved house, you know what I’m speaking of. Now multiply that a hundred times to get the impression of moving a business.

Any way, I expect to be back by this weekend, and to continue my regularly scheduled rhetoric at Common Sensible and my riff-raff-rantings on Blackthorne inSL.

I figure if you haven’t left me over my nonsense already, and haven’t left me over my absence by now, you need some real forensic psychiatric help. But I, at least, should explain that my absence is only temporary.

/me thinks he’ll take the long weekend opportunity to chill out and just eat a lot of WATERMELON. (Nod to our awesomely wild what-ever-he’s-havin’-I_wants-some cheerful friend.)

And @Hamlet: What wee spoke-of, I’m on it hard this weekend.  :)

**********

Dear Second Life Resident,

You have a parcel or classified ad listing that appears to contain adult content, but is not located on an Adult region. On September 15th, the Adult Content Policy transition period will end. After the 15th, adult content may only be advertised if it is located on Adult regions.

On September 17th, we will be turning off auto-renew for any classified or parcel listings that are advertising adult content on PG or Mature regions. This means that these listings will expire from Search. To avoid having auto-renew turned off, please make sure your listings are in accord with the Adult Content Policy. Here’s how:

1. If you would like to advertise adult-themed content, then please relocate to an Adult region.
2. If you would like to remain on a PG or Mature region, you must remove adult-themed content from your parcel, parcel description and classified ads.

Below you’ll find detailed instructions as well as the full text and SLurl of your current listing(s). Please note that, if you choose to advertise adult content on non-adult regions in the future, your listings will not show up in all searches but will still incur full listing fees.

Moving to an Adult region
Please visit the Knowledge Base for tips for moving to an Adult region or flagging your region as Adult. Adult parcels are available at auction on Zindra, or can be found for sale in world.

Staying in a PG or Mature region
For Parcel Descriptions: Please remove adult-themed content from your parcel. Then, update your parcel description to reflect the PG or Mature theme of the parcel.

1. Go to your parcel and open About Land by clicking World –> About Land.
2. Update the title and description to remove adult themes.
3. On About Land, go to Options and verify that the Show In Search category is not set to Adult.

For Classifieds: Update your classified description to reflect the PG or Mature theme of the location or service.

1. Go to your classifieds through Edit –> Profile –> Classified.
2. Update the title and description to remove adult themes.

Thank you,
Linden Lab Customer Support

Your affected listings include:

Parcel: ::City of Laura:: and the Meadowlands http://slurl.com/secondlife/Meadowlands/128/128/0 Gorean Authentic Charter Member. Roleplay and market, based on the book Captive of Gor by John Norman, as authentic as SL will allow. BtB Slave Submissive Kajira Master Dominant Collar Silks Panther Capture Combat Warrior

**********

So it’s official. Classified listings, parcel descriptions and, I suspect, profile “picks” will now officially be filtered to hide “Adult Only-Rated words”.

Please see above, where it explicitly states “Your affected listings include” – read that for me. Read it again, aloud this time. I now ask you, one and all: who in their right mind can point to any reasonable person who can find a single “adult-rated” word in that entire listing?

Is the word “Gorean”? How can that be an adult-rated word? It’s the name of a fictional culture based on a science fiction novel for crying out loud. Perhaps the word is “Captive”? All you artiste’s better not hold captive audiences, unless you change the rating of your venue for certain.

Ahah! Perhaps it is the word “slave”? I hope no one intends to have a museum dedicated to the “Underground Railroad” on PG-rated land. Or perhaps it’s the word “submissive”? Or “Master” or “Dominant” … or… “silks?

What I am getting at here is that this listing is not being filtered for what it says. It is not being filtered for the idea it attempts to project (Gorean-themed role-play).

But rather, it filters based on what you think it is saying (which is still nothing.)

The Linden Lab indexing computer is now the thought-police.

The blogoshpere is flooded with opinions and apparent excitement that Blue Mars is finally going into public beta. I’m on the beta list and have run around the place for a time (Look for Ari Blackthorne on Blue Mars – except you’ll have a hard time finding me – see below).

I came.

I saw.

I left.

Gwyneth Llewelyn wrote a wonderful piece, probably the most accurate on the subject thus far. But most of what I’m seeing appears to be the drooling excitement that an alternative to Second Life is finally at-hand. Ummm — no.

As Gwyneth mentions, the developers of Blue Mars are really targeting content creators right now. And, as a content creator myself, I can relate to the excitement this brings. However, as I step back and look at the larger picture, I see problems.

Big ones.

Before I jump up onto my soapbox, allow me to be absolutely clear:

• Yes. I know Blue Mars is in beta right now and much of what I speak of will be changed; fixed; tweaked; made “better”.
• Yes. I know that comparing Blue Mars to Second Life really isn’t very fair – they are two completely different beasts. However, the developer admits Second Life is a model with heavy influence. But much of that influence has yet to be seen. Perhaps later when the platform matures more.
• I want to be clear that my comparison isn’t with the software, the world, the animation, the builds, the… anything. My comparison is with regard to my user experience.
• No. I am not dissing on, slamming, or in any way attempting to put a negative spin on anything Blue Mars or Second Life or their respective creators or even those who’ve blogged about them.
• This is not a review of Blue Mars. It is simply a reflection on my initial experience.

The first issue I have with Blue Mars, (Mars for short; “BM” sounds too much like “Bowel Movement” to me – sorry for that mental picture,) is with the marketing and how they describe the system requirements. It is unethically misleading to say Blue Mars will run on Microsoft Windows and “Macintosh with bootcamp installed”.

Okay, ummm… sorry. But that’s a flat-out lie, the way I see it. The system requirements for Operating System is MS Windows, full stop. A Macintosh with bootcamp installed only means there is a DOS partition. Mac users still must spend $250 or more for a copy of….

Wait for it….

Wait for it…

Microsoft Windows to install onto that bootcamp partition! I will not hold my breath on ever seeing an OS-X native version of Blue Mars any time soon. I’ll explain later. Meaning that the first statement (‘requires MS Windows’) is still the case. I believe it’s their way of saying “screw you Macintosh. You want-in? Then run MS Windows!” – but in a covert, underhanded way.

The next stunner is the sheer size of the download. It is a 1.3 GB – (GIGA-BYTE!!!) beast. Yes I have broadband. Yes I have enough bandwidth allotment to download it, though I know there are those with tighter bandwidth caps than I have.

Okay, so the download is massive (read: bloated). It’s because most, if not all the content I will see in-world is included in that download. This provides for a ‘better’ user experience by allowing the entire world (“city” – or “sim” in SL terms, albeit much larger each) without any ‘rezzing’ issues.

Why is this a problem (in my own perspective, remember)? Because it’s a lot of wasted stuff. I will not see it all. I am downloading a lot of content I will never see or use. Or, if I do see it all so easily, I suspect the world will become redundant and boring rather quickly. America Online was sued (and lost) over the downloading of extraneous content – because it is wasted and simply sucks-up resources (file size-bloat; bandwidth to download it, etc.)

In this case, all that extraneous content is being force-fed to me in the guise of a bloated initial download.

The first cringing, tooth-grinding, hair-standing on the back of my neck moment occurred when I went to install the viewer. I was told I must install Adobe Flash Active-X.

I won’t bore you with a long-winded rant about Flash or anything Adobe for that matter. But I will briefly say why I personally don’t like it. First, Flash is bloated. It used to be lean and mean. Now it’s bloatware, poorly-written and sucks-up a lot of computing resources. Adobe is trying hard to make Flash all things to all people for all purposes.

This makes poorly-written software into bloatware. The majority of every single thing I see in Flash format is advertising. Which is annoying. Standard advertising using regular image formats are fine.

The only other thing I see Flash used for is video. Which is a bastardization of the video-viewing experience. The Quality to file size to resource consumption ratio is abysmal. It’s one of the reasons why YouTube now offers viewing via standard H.264 and foregoing Flash altogether (though you have to manually set your preferences to fore-go Flash.)

The only other reason to use Flash is web-application, most often games. And there is your answer. Eventually, I’m sure, they will make the viewer embeddable into a web page – because it’s Flash. It even looks like a Flash The reason I won’t hold my breath for an OS-X (Macintosh for all you Windows-heads out there) native version is the Active-X aspect.

Most web developers whose circles I find myself in do not like Active-X because it is too limiting (platform-wise). They don’t despise it, but rather it’s just that anything created with Active-X can only be run on MS Windows (and for a time Internet Explorer-only.)

I don’t usually like Active-X tools installed on my machine, but I’ll go with it if there is not other way or alternative. So the Blue Mars view is based on Active-X and Adobe Flash.

I thought it odd that after installing the Active-X Flash tools, the ‘installer’ became an “assembler’. At the end of it I received a message that the “Setup” has been successfully “assembled”.

Only after launching the viewer did I realize “setup” means the avatar set-up. Moving through this process was pretty simple and straight forward. The interface was smooth and slick. In fact, it had a very “Flash”-like feel to it (go figure.)

Once ‘in-world’ I discovered I was at a “home” screen. Apparently the permanent starting ‘location’ for everyone. I kept waiting for the floor to rez. it never did. It took me a while to realize there is no floor. The swooshing water fly-over was the intended design. My, my, my all those times of teleporting into a new sim in SL and waiting for the floor to rez had caught me in the habit of waiting… for the floor to rez. (/me laughs.)

To keep my rhetoric short, I’ll just bullet my main first impressions here – and remember, this is beta software so all this will likely change for the better:

• Feels like a FLash-based, enbedded web game. Like those the little kiddies like to frequent, albeit with far better-looking art.
• Even though all the content is already on my hard disk drive, entering a city (sim) still draws piece-by-piece the way Second Life does (building the scene), though more quickly. Perhaps twice to four-times faster (yes, that’s it – I expected almost instantaneous drawing because the content is already on my hard disk. But, it’s “Flash” /me groans.)
• I have a nagging feeling the majority of the content included in that bloated download is completely wasted. I don’t see it and I’m not so sure I could find it if I wanted to. I much prefer the à la carte way Second Life (or any other virtual world) serves the content to me as I need to see it in a predictive way, rather than the pig-in-a-poke method (providing everything whether you need it or not, want it or not is what I really mean. “Pig in a poke” is just a fun term that comes close.) :P
• Movement is elementary – by left-clicking. Everything. Left-click the side of a building and you will (try) to go there. I found it rather juvenile-feeling and limiting.
• Right-click to interact with anything and everything. This was a bit awkward, though not an uncommon interface paradigm. I just haven’t used it recently. But it also means everything must be done via a context menu.
• Who is who? No names on anyone. Everyone is anonymous. As I have mentioned above: I am Ari Blackthorne on Blue Mars, but you’d never know it unless you found me and I told you. Even right-clicking on an avatar (which can be a little tricky to do correctly) doesn’t show their name. I know: it’s beta software, this will be corrected in time.
• On the right-click paradigm – it also is how you move your camera – move your mouse while right-clicking and the camera moves around. However you leave your camera is how you remain, even when you begin to move around. The camera remains fixed according to the world, not your avatar. Again, not an uncommon paradigm.
• There does not seem to be any easy way to zoom the camera in and out to change your field of view. For instance, there was a large billboard sign at the home location. I found it difficult to read. I had to walk to the correct position in order to see it clearly. Then it began spinning. (/me rolls eyes)
• “Eye candy” (the actual look of the place) is okay. It looks good, but for some reason I had the impression of a Hollywood movie set: pretty textures on cardboard. The quality of the art in Blue Mars is marginally better than Second Life. But the look of the place isn’t the draw, it will be the social aspect. The look of the environment only adds atmosphere, so the actual quality (as long as it’s not garish) doesn’t matter as much. We all know Second Life has more garish environments than not. But that doesn’t stop people from congregating in those places.

In short, Blue Mars is a good place to explore. Unfortunately, there isn’t much in there yet to make exploring a compelling option. An empty city is just that. In short, it’s still an empty suit.

Am I impressed with what I saw? No. Now, I don’t mean to say it’s bad. It’s not. Actually it has huge potential, but it’s nothing like Second Life. Not in terms of the viewer (/me shivers at the requirement for Adobe Flash,) not in terms of the interface and how it operates, not in the ‘look’ of the art (environment), and certainly not in the interaction.

As Gwyneth mentioned (paraphrased), it is indeed “Second Life circa 2003″ in terms of where it is now with features and function, it has a long way to go. Unfortunately, with a minimum requirement of a video card with 512MB of RAM, 4GB of hard disk space and so on, the target audience will be the ‘technologically leading-edge’ crowd.

Well, people like the ones who frequent Second Life. Except those people in Second Life like Second Life on so many different levels they aren’t even aware of yet. Until they experiment with other worlds like Blue Mars.

In short, I think a lot of the hoopla in the SLogosphere, the excitement being expressed and all that stuff, though certainly justified, is a bit over-the-top from where I sit as Mars is a bit underwhelming at this particular point in time in my perspective. Will that improve? Most certainly. So for now, Blue Mars, to me, is just a blue moon .

I came.

I saw.

I wasn’t impressed.

Rather, I was amused and bemused.

But I haven’t uninstalled it yet. And that’s a damned good sign.

art: Aberrant Corpses