The SL19B Sims Close to The Public

After being open for almost a month, the sims of the Second Life Birthday are now closed to regular visitors (baring a last minute glitch). While the last night the area is open usually is the scene of some impromptu music and dance parties, this time that wasn't the case. There were plenty of people checking out the "Shop and Hop" sims, but no DJs playing music that I could see.

For today and tomorrow is the "Takedown" or teardown when the exhibitors take down their builds. And then on Wednesday, only the Lindens and Moles will be able to access the sims as they close down, at least until next spring for the SL20B. 

Bixyl Shuftan
 

Early Showing of Project Sansar by Linden Lab This Friday

Linden Lab announced that they will be giving a "hands on preview" of their next generation virtual world this Friday. The news was given over a San Francisco events website.

This interactive virtual reality workshop will provide a hands-on preview of the new 3D virtual experience platform, code-named Project Sansar, being developed by Linden Lab, the makers of the popular virtual world Second Life. This new platform will enable people to virtually walk through 3D...

Hamlet Au of New World Notes commented, "Pretty strange to see this apparently open-to-the-public event promoted on a popular general interest SF event site when Project Sansar is supposed to be in closed Alpha with early users under heavy NDA. But there it is. So if you happen to be in San Francisco this Friday and can attend, please report your reactions ..."

But before anyone out there who hasn't heard this news before books a flight to California, Hamlet stated that the event is sold out. Curiously, Linden Lab's Peter Gray called it a "AIA event," which could mean the American Institute of Architects.

So on Friday evening, we should be getting a better look at Linden Lab's next generation virtual world.

*Update* In other Project Sansar news, Inara Pey posted on her blog that Linden Lab that one of the possible permanent names for the world being considered could be "Created Reality."  As she put it however, "while the name ... may doubtless describe the platform’s function in presenting spaces where people can create their own virtual realities, it does actually read rather, well, bland."

Reader Submitted: "What is Second Life?"

It wasn't that long ago in which Second Life got a good amount of coverage in the mainstream media, television and newspapers in addition to news websites. Today the coverage is more limited, and the reaction of many of those unfamiliar with it is that people go there just to act out their baser desires. Nydia Tungsten had a few things to say about this misconception, and above that answer the question: "What is Second Life?"

Read Nydia's article in Extra.

Team Firestorm Holds Public Meeting

By Bixyl Shuftan

On Saturday August 10 at Noon SL time, Jessica Lyon and others of Team Firestorm held a public meeting concerning developments with their viewer. Staff included, the meeting was attended by close to 80 residents. Jessica talked about the CHat User Interface or CHUI, and that putting it into the Firestorm Viewer was taking some work, "Linden Lab put a lot of stuff in" with code that conflicts some with Firestorm's own programing. Fixing it was proving to be something of a "nightmare" with "broken" codes.

Of Linden Lab's Project Sunshine, Jessica thought it was going smoother than she believed it would. She had earlier predicted that it would take three rollouts before the first part of it could get going, and the Lab had gotten it right on the first try. She told the audience Project Sunshine and it's server-side baking currently covered about 20% of the Grid.

Jessica and others in the staff, such as Tonya Souther, talked about other issues, such as the "chiclets," or mini pictures on the Linden and Firestorm viewers, Jessica commenting, "We've been trying to kill chiclets for ages." Whirly Fizzle stated in chat, "we have chiclets as optional for the next release." Of the next Firestorm update, Jessica promised it would be a major one.

For those who were more than a little critical of Team Firestorm's work, and it's discontinuing work on the old Phoenix Viewer, Jessica reminded that they were a group of volunteers working for free, and telling them what to do was a bit like "herding cats." This got some chuckles as Jessica'a avatar is a neck catgirl with ears and a tail, and teammate Tonya Souther a furry tigergirl. There were also reminders about filing JIRAs, "seriously, file a JIRA issue and explain as concisely as you can what the problem is and what you want to see changed and if we need more clarification, you'll be asked."

Someone also brought up the old Emerald Viewer, and there was a short explanation to newcomers that Jessica and others on Team Firestorm were once part of the team behind that old popular 3rd party viewer before some "drama" with Linden Lab, and they left to form Team Phoenix.

The Firestorm Viewer is the most popular among supported third party viewers. Except possibly for the old Phoenix Viewer which it developed but no longer supports, no other Second Life viewer is as popular.

The Phoenix blog is on http://www.firestormviewer.org/. Tonya Souther, who leads the Mac development team, has her own blog at: http://secondden.blogspot.com/.


Bixyl Shuftan