EOTB: Embedded Youtube Videos Not Working

 

On Wednesday November 19, Linden Lab addressed a certain issue it the official Second Life blog:Youtube videos embedded inworld had stopped working. 

 

Many of you have recently noticed that YouTube videos embedded directly in Second Life no longer play. Here’s what’s going on, why it’s happening, and how you can keep sharing video experiences in-world.
First, let’s clear the air: this change is not caused by Second Life.

YouTube has begun more strictly enforcing the policy around video playback inside embedded browsers. These policy and technical restrictions affect any platform trying to use embeds stripped from the iframe, not just Second Life. As a result, YouTube.com embeds often refuse to load or play inside parcel media and shared media surfaces.

Our underlying media system has not changed. What has changed is how YouTube allows its content to be displayed. 

 

The embeds are breaking because Youtube has tightened various restrictions, so that the inworld media panels' inworld browser can no longer meet their requirements. So the videos are blocked.  

 

What to do? Linden Lab stated they are "exploring ways to improve overall media playback resiliency." But for now, they suggest either using Vimeo platform videos, as it is "currently the most seamless drop-in replacement for in-world video playback," or using a self-hosted webpage with an iFrame, "Many residents already use this approach for theaters, classrooms, and event venues."

For the blog post in full, Click Here. 
 

Bixyl Shuftan 

 

Second Life Land Area Rises to 25,555 Sims, Private Sim Sales Stopped Temporarily

 

When Linden Lab announced last May that they were could no longer guarantee a new sim to everyone who wanted to buy one, it was obvious the amount of private land areas was going up. It was just a question of how much. On January 3, Tyche Shepherd announced just how much it had. The total number of sims had increased from 24,740 to 25,555, an increase of 3.3%. For private sims, the rate of growth was a little short of twice that. They grew in number from 16,105 to 17,024, an increase of 919 or 5.7%.

Checking Tyche's chart, April and May saw huge increases in private sims compared to typical changes, with 176 in the week of April 19, 192 in the week of April 26, a huge growth of 352 on the week of May 3, and 268 on the week of May 17. But this period also saw the greatest drop, a decline of 179 on the week of May 10. These huge numbers were likely why Linden Lab made their announcement saying they couldn't guarantee a new sim for everyone. From the week of November 15 to the week of December 6, there was another period of growth averaging 80 a week. This followed the Lab's announcement that they had more sims available for sale, though still in limited numbers. But in late December, the Lab put further purchases of private sims on hold, at least for now, due to maintenance of it's land store. So the number of sims dropped in the last week.

So what will happen in 2021? Presumably once the bugs are worked out with Linden Lab's move to Amazon Cloud servers and anyone can get a private sim when they want, their numbers will continue to grow. But if glitches cause them to keep new land purchases limited, the increase will be small.

Source: Tyche Shepherd

Hat tip: Daniel Voyager 

Bixyl Shuftan

Responding to Readers: Why Is Second Life Banned on Twitch

One of our readers, followed by a few others, posed a question on Facebook recently: "Why is Second Life Banned From Twitch?" For those who don't know, Twitch is a streaming service aimed at gamers. But not everything can be streamed on there, as one New World Notes reader commented in a letter she shared in which Twitch temporarily banned her for streaming Second Life. Taking a look at the Kotaku article cited by our reader, and the list given by Twitch itself, Second Life finds itself among some rather odd company with games such as "Battle Raper" and "The Guy Game," which involve lots of sex, violence, or both.

So why is Second Life on this list? Sadly, it has to do with the griefers and trolls.

Most every experienced Second Life user is familiar with griefers harassing people and trying to shock people with adult content, such as the obscene particle attacks that yours truly has witnessed at a few sandboxes. Unfortunately, not content just to troll people, sometimes the griefers post their dirty deeds on youtube. Plus there have been a few instances of live recording being interrupted by such griefings, the most known example being the "flying penis barrage" that happened when CNET tried to interview Anshe Chung, the noted Second Life Land baroness. So despite everything else that had, and has, been going on here from charities, to Dungeons and Dragons style roleplaying, to education classes, what Second Life is best known for to many who have yet to set foot inside and know about the virtual world only through what they've heard now and then through social media is that people use the place for "strange and weird porn."

Twitch would not respond when New World Notes tried to contact them, though Hamlet Au commented that they had a former employee of Linden Lab among their staff shot down arguments that Twitch was operating solely through bias, saying despite places being designated as G-rated, violent and pornographic content can potentially appear anytime and anywhere, "no matter what the region rating." But critics of the ban who are familiar with MMO survival gaming can always point to Rust, in which players start out nude, male characters with their genitalia exposed, and the game is not banned from Twitch.

Fortunately there are other options for streaming. Ciaran Laval pointed out one named "Hitbox," which did respond to questions about allowing content from Second Life, "We are more than happy to allow broadcasters to stream Second Life on hitbox granted they are responsible about the content being presented to the viewers. We don’t tolerate our broadcasters to present mature, sexual content that isn’t the intention of the game. ... we are okay with broadcasters streaming Second Life as long as it’s done responsibly."

But for the use of the more popular Twitch, the issue seems not up for discussion, which is a shame. Just as there's more to Amsterdam than it's red light district, there's a lot more to Second Life than just the shenanigans of a handful of trolls and griefers.

Sources: Twitch, Kotaku, New World Notes, Warcry, Ciaran Laval,  

Bixyl Shuftan