racisim in Second Life

today while camping, I received the following message:

sheitanor Aichi: Ce soir valerie fais un exposer sur la supériorité de la race blanche ..... pour les curieux ca se passe ici http://slurl.com/secondlife/Adrift/21/129/35

(tonght valerie will do an exposition on the superiority of the white race... for the ones curious, th address is http://slurl.com/secondlife/Adrift/21/129/35)

I went there and the place is call "La France aux Francais" - France for the French, there were a bunch of people who have already gathered in protest, several admins were there as well. Voice chat was also going on but malbeureusement je comprend pas trop.

in the picture you see two things, first the sign of dumping nazi in the trash, second the group, france en couleur ( france in color). I think this event is a reminder that second life is not just a game, there is a person behind every avatar and there is little room for insult and hatred even in the virtual sphere.

Second Life Server Issue

(almost empty dancepad area after server failure)

HippiePay is one of the most visited spots in SL. Since joining SL, I have twice exeprienced what looks to be either an attack on the island or a server failure:

symptom:

• everyone on dancing pads or other kinds of poseballs suddenly get ejected from the system ( i.e. signed out)


• if you are one of the first to realize and sign back in, there is no one there


• then you discover the system has retained memory of everyone's earning - the money is there with no owner to claim it!


• if you sit on any of those poseballs you get money, you also commit what it called "ball-hopping, some people were confused while others are intentionally taking the chance to profit


• hippiepay (or anywhere else) bans you

I was almost banned the first time this happened ( I was signed out and then I didn't know what's going on), I managed to argue this through with a "helper" and get my earnings back. This second time I saw hippiepay helpers cruising the island catching people "ball hopping" and sitting to collect the money themselves ( persumably to prevent others from doing so and to hand over the money later).

No one has been willing to tell me what issue this server is experiencing, perhaps as a commercial hub they fear the publicity will decrease the value of their land.

HippiePay never compensates those whose money got erased from such accidents, even though I would persume that the system would have a record of who is on which pose ball, at least for a short period of time. (evidence is if you get up and try to get back on the same pose ball it tells you to change to another one)

it would be interesting to know whether the different land owners in SL shares a server provided by LindenLab or have one of their own.

Game Enviroment in Second Life

So last night I stunbled upon an Egypt game sim, "Era of the Gods" in which you can be captured, sold, mutilated.... ( bloody) the instructions say yell " don't do XX to me" in group chat if the captor tries to force it on you. Or you can get an observer tag and watch. No, I didn't see the battle, there was basically no one there last night.

today I am in Rome

interviewing the princess of sparta revealed the following: your avatar does not die in a game, or hurt in any other way, however you wear a HUD, head up display that tells you how much energy, stamina, life you have left, etc. Interestingly, you can be at any place in SL that enables scripting and play the game! You can come back to life just as in any other game. Here it is illustated on the picture i took of the arena by the yellow light beams to the left ( kind of hard to see).

So what is interesting is the fact the fighting is not actually done by stringing together a number of gestures because gladiators and other combating characters have to be able to respond to changing situations. I have yet to discover how it actually works.

another SL source

Here's a FAQ on wiki that's worth looking at, it answers some basic question and also some more advanced stuff like how to build things

https://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Help:Second_Life_FAQ#How_do_I_detach_something_from_my_head_.3F_.28or_other_body_part.29

some facts about second life

• in terms of fonts and languages, whatever Windows takes SL will probably recognize
• your inventory is the depository of everything, from note cards you get from people, objects to landmarks that gives you a shortcut to where you want to go. it also contains your clothing and everything else you've acquired.
• for clothing, click "search" and then "places", type Freebie and a bunch of places will pop up, Freebie beach is a good place to get started, it also has skins but unfortunately if you change your skin you won't quite look like yourself. Money Island and Money Tree Island are two more places where you can earn money and get some free stuff. Just click teleport under the picture of the place you selected to go there.
• you can also buy things in SL, right click on the object and select pay, your balance is on the top right hand corner. You can camp or fill out surveys to earn money. Surveys pay way more but they are a pain. Either ways you are interacting with an object (a poseball or a ATM object) to get started. For camping the best place is Woodstock Island but you have to join the group Hippie Free Spirit first, it has a slightly cumbersome procedure, if you need help, write me a reply. :)
• WORD OF CAUTION: SL is virtual, but it does have real world characteristics, hence you will see pornography and other R rated places. Teleport can always get you away from something that makes you feel uncomfortable.
• To set a landmark, simply click "world" - "create landmark here", or you can also say "set home here".

That's all I have for now!

Me

This is me in Second Life. :)

Finally figured out how to use the camera to take a nicer picture of myself.

Landmarks of interesting places to come.

i got a scottie! :D

so after days of camping, I finally saved up $500L for a doggy, he is a cute black scottie who follows me around and I haven't thought of a name for him yet

for this class, I am studying his scripts, including how to program him to do different things :D so far I have succeeded in making him walk closer to me and in a more natural manner (not rotating around me as was the default)

more reports later, but here's his picture right after I got him from D&D dogs