At The SLB: Shinning Stars Hunt Prize Number Three

 

 

For those who didn't get the third and final prize of the SL23B's Shinning Stars Hunt, here it is.

 

SL23B - Star Hunt Prize Kiosk - v1.0: Congratulations, you are a super Hollywood Stars collector and have collected 100 stars, here is your tier 3 prize.

 

And the prize is, a hot dog "boopie," one named "Frank" appropriately enough.  He mumbles and snickers, and when touched (and sometimes when not) squirts mustard ketchup into the air. 

 

And so that was the prize that went to the wieners.

 

Bixyl Shuftan 

 

And The Winner Is ...

 

 At 9AM SL time today, the twenty-three winners of Linden Lab's Golden Ticket Giveaway were on stage at the Orpheum Theater. In the middle were twenty three boxes, with twenty-two containing 10,000 Linden dollar prizes, and one that had a million Linden dollar prize. About 180 residents crowded themselves in with many more watching via the Youtube feed. 

 

One by one, starting with the winners of the earliest tickets, the contestants, most of whom who got up and walked to the show host, Ninja, on stage, a few having to remain seated due to lag, chose one of the boxes. They all gave a small shower of sparks, and the host would say they were 10k prizes. Finally with nine boxes left, Carmelle James (Missnicety1 Resident), chose box 19. And this would be the one that would win one million Linden dollars. 

 

Carmelle had remained in her seat and messaged her choice to Brett Linden who messaged the show host, so it's likely she had to deal with lag worse than most others. I didn't notice any further response from her, and only got up from her chair some time after the event ended. 

 

One of the 22 secondary winners did respond. Se7en Zen had chosen to donate her 10,000 Linden dollar prize to the Relay for Life's Second Life Cheerleading Squad. "RFL is an important cause, and it's a privilege to be able to support it," she would tell me."

 

At the end, Ninja had a special announcement.  Linden Lab was matching the grand prize with giving another one million Linden dollars to four charities: Virtual Ability, Team Fox (diabetes research), Spoonful of Sugar (Doctors Without Borders), and the Relay for Life in Second Life. 

 

"That 250k donation pledge from the Lindens was an exciting announcement," Se7en added, "I want to add that the cheer community in SL supports RFL with our whole hearts. This is  cause that touches us all, and RFL is a way to share hope."

While this would be the last official event of the SL23B, the Birthday goes on Sunday July 19, to Midnight SL time. 

 

Bixyl Shuftan 

 

EOTB: "SL23B Golden Ticket Giveaway Finale - Watch It Live!"

 

After a few weeks of anticipation, we get to see who wins the big prize of the Golden Ticket Giveaway. On Friday July 17, at the Orpheum Theater, there will be a special event at 9AM SL time in which the 23 Golden Ticket winners will appear, with one getting the million Linden dollar prize.

 

 The entry period for the SL23B Golden Ticket Giveaway has now closed, and the grand finale is just days away!

The twenty-three finalists are confirmed and will take the stage to choose from 23 Golden Prize Boxes, each containing a Linden Dollar reward. Only one box holds the grand prize of L$1,000,000.

The live finale event takes place on Friday, July 17th at 9am PT, where winners will make their selections in front of a live audience.

 

The three suggested SURLs are:

https://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/SLB%20Celebrate/25/24/22
https://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/SLB%20Astonish/26/251/29
https://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/SLB%20Amaze/251/27/28

 

 

You can also see the event on Youtube.

 

To read more, check the Linden blog entry here. 

 

Bixyl Shuftan 

 

Winner of Final Linden Home Poll Announced: Tiki/Water Theme

 

Last Monday, August 5, Patch Linden announced in the Second Life forums the winner of the last Linden Home Poll. It was the Tiki/Water Theme, with Alpine Style Theme (Snow) as the runner up. 

The winner:  Tiki/Water Theme
Runner up:  Alpine Style Theme (Snow)

Owing to our offsite training, the team has fallen somewhat behind and is now focused on catching up. We have yet to determine which theme will be in line with Premium or Premium+, but we expect to make this decision promptly. 

Thank you to everyone who participated in the poll and helped decide the upcoming themes for Linden Homes!

The first of the three polls was announced on July 1, of which Tiki/Water and Alpine style were just two of 33 themes listed. The winner was supposed to have been announced a week earlier, on Monday July 28, but was delayed without comment for seven days. 

There was no comment about when the new theme will be available.

Bixyl Shuftan

VWBPE Announces Delightful Doowangle (Barbara Truman) Has Died

Barbara Truman, 1962-2021

It is with great sadness we inform our community that one of our own Thinkerer Award recipients, Dr. Barbara Truman (sl: Delightful Doowangle), has passed.

Barbara was a campus activist who became a virtual world champion. She dreamt of being a virtual world architect to create the future while empowering others to do the same, especially for accelerating and incubating R&D to improve quality of life.

Barbara had over 20 years of experience in US higher education as an educator, scholar, administrator, and researcher. 

In these roles, she participated in national and state associations, presented on critical educational topics, and published articles related to teaching and learning with mediated technology.

Barbara’s doctoral research, conducted in virtual worlds, explored why vesting in immersive, virtual communities using embodied avatars matters.

Since February 24, 2006, Barbara was active as an advocate and connectivist who built bridges for virtual world communities and championed learning in virtual worlds.

She donated her time to over a dozen virtual world groups, organizations, and conferences to strengthen virtual world education.

Her doctoral research, exploring why vesting in virtual communities matters, anchored her transdisciplinarity research with the MIT Presencing Institute, advancing our understanding of embodiment as virtual physioception and virtual-intersubjective presencing.

Barbara received the Thinkerer Award in 2019 for her outstanding dedication and leadership in education. We are so fortunate to have been able to recognize her and her efforts.

If you would like to offer a tribute in memory of Barbara or send condolences to the family you can follow this link https://www.acommunityfuneralhome.com/obi.../Barbara-Truman/

From VWBPE Facebook Page 
 

And It's ... Trump

Last night was certainly a nail-biter of a Presidential election, the winner not being decided until close to Midnight SL time (3AM EST). But with four states yet to be decided at the writing of this brief, the Electoral College total is 278 to 218 in favor of the Republican Party's nomine Donald Trump. This was something as a surprise as while the polls were a statistical dead head, most showed Clinton slightly ahead. But once again, Trump surprised friend and opponent alike and got a slight lead in the popular and Electoral vote.

At certain places in Second Life, such as the Bay City Clinton HQ and the Trump Pub (pictured above), people gathered to discuss the election and await the results. Over group chats, such as that of my home community the Sunweavers, there was quite a bit of chatter, some cheering, some despairing, and some simply watching the whole thing with fascination. Over my Facebook feed, there were a number of cheers from supporters and many seemingly almost in tears or in rage. Not that many had neutral comments about Trump's victory.

I'll have more to say later. But for now, time for a little rest.

Correction: As the votes came in, Clinton eventually got the lead in the popular vote. But winning the popular vote doesn't get a candidate the Presidency.

Bixyl Shuftan

New Chancellor In The CDS

A picture of the celebration for the winners of the recent election in the Confederation of Democratic Simulators. Last Saturday on May 24, Cleopatra Xigalia contacted me to say Ceasar Xigalia had won the Chancellorship. He had outperformed the other candidate, Patroklus Murakami, 34 to 31  (details in CDS forum).

There was also a referendum on whether or not to purchase a new sim, which passed.

Jobias Barthelmess Announced as Winner of Steelhead Elections

It was last week on August 6 in which the Steampunk community of Steelhead held their mayoral elections. Yesterday at the Steelhead town hall, interim mayor Jimmy Branagh announced the results. Three candidates had run for the office, TotalLunar Eclipse the incumbent, and two challengers, Willow Leafstorm and Jobias Barthelmess. Jobias, whom was involved in an attempted shooting of Steelhead's Sheriff Fuzzball Ortega, was a much criticized candidate at public meetings. Even he himself during the debate admitted he wasn't the most popular of those running.

So imagine the surprise when it was announced at the August 13th town hall meeting that Jobias had won the elections! Timmy, who gave the announcement, was described as worried, "he sounded odd." This led to a lengthy debate among the people at the meeting, and whether or not the votes should be screened for accounts less than a couple weeks old.

Lunar reminded the crowd that while Jobias has been accused of many plots, he had never been convicted of them. When talk turned to tarring and feathering him, Lunar tried to calm them down, "Killing or maiming him would earn you jail time, there is still a law here." He asked that if people insisted on plotting that he be left out of it.

Speaking to Lunar after the meeting, he commented of the results, "I am quite frankly shocked. I have served under another mayor before I will try and keep neutral on my feelings." Willow, who was also there, had this to say, "Yes, I have a statement. There is no way that man, Jobless Brothelmess is taking office on my watch. He is a scoundrel and a criminal. My duty is to protect Steelhead."

As of now, there is no official statement from Jobias. Details are still coming in about this upset election in Steelhead.

(Editor's note: the election results are part of a community roleplay, so expect more twists and turns)

Bixyl Shuftan