(Almost) Forgotten Story: Linden Lab Accused of Using AI For Ads In Early 2025

 

Well, this news story could be called "better late than never."  

 

 In late February 2025, it was revealed on the SL forums that Linden Lab was using AI to make an ad. The reaction from the poster, "It looks like a bad ad for an AI chatbot app. SL has fantastic creators and content, why use AI generated video?" What followed were posts by upset and confused people, "Why would the Lab do this?  This isn't representative of SL AT ALL.  New users gonna log in with a default Ruth & duck walk & log right back out cause that video is bait & switch."especially since Linden Lab could, and was, doing proposed ads done entirely within Second Life. 

 

 Hamlet Au ended up talking to Linden Lab head Brad Oberwager. Oberwager responded that the intention was to use AI only for testing ads, and expressed surprised that they'd somehow leaked out and were seen by the residents. Hamlet would guess the Lab never asked residents for help thinking it would take too long to get permissions. 

 

Some people in the forums reacted with skepticism, "Good grief. Tell me you don't know how A/B testing works without telling me you don't know how A/B testing works, especially with FB ads." "They have no idea what the coffee they make tastes like. They will fail to find the magic bullet because they refuse to really taste the coffee." "As a marketer in RL I am sitting here shaking my head." But others were more hopeful, "Going by the article of Hamlet, it seems they did understand the mistake they made and hopefully will be correcting it." Later comments were a discussion about what kind of advertising might work. But there didn't seem to be any general agreement. 

 

Oberwager would admit of the controversy, "I f**ked this one up," and say to any residents reading, "Send me videos. Look at these bad ads [we made], and make them better."

 

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On a personal note, sorry for missing this story. Thankfully it doesn't happen often. 

 

Bixyl Shuftan

Bits of SL Life And Times

 

As I wrote earlier, yours truly can be very busy in real life sometimes. So sometimes there's very little time to write. And so things I would like to put my pen down to get postponed, sometimes again and again. So here's a few things that I couldn't find the time to write down earlier, such as cool Halloween looks, an alt experience, and a wrestling match.

 

Read, and see, the tales and pictures in People.

 

From Fairelands Chat: The Late Passenger

 

It has been weeks since the mysts reclaimed the Fairelands. We have found a new passenger lost in the  aether. After taking her aboard, We got her steeled and comfortable. "I missed the Faire, I tried but it was too late."  The poor dear is on the verge of tears. 

 

I sit with her "You may have missed the Faire, however not the FaireLanders. Come here, there are wonderful places and events that we shall travel to. The people are still here and you will meet them."I look at the bundled girl and smile. "Care for a waffle?" She looks around and sees the waffle tree and giggles. 

 

Fantasy Faire Radio still plays from the ship's radio. "Is that the sound of the f-Fairelands?" I nod. "It's beautiful....." We set sail to meet other Fairelanders and an event so the young one can see that Hope does live. People do care. She is  not alone. 

Pookie Wolfsong (Helixer Resident)

Patch Linden's "Better Late Than Never" Christmas Picture

 

 

 Yesterday on Flickr, Patch Linden posted this "Another Better Late Than Never" picture, "Happy belated Holidays and New Year to everyone! This concludes my catching up from being MIA!"

Hat Tip: Dreamer Pixelmaid

More News Later

 Yours truly has been busy, and wasn't able to finish writing something before the need for sleep took over (or maybe was busy to the point he couldn't start). We'll have something up once there's been a chance to rest.
  

More News Later

 

Yes, there is a LOT more going on with the Relay and the SLB than I've been writing. But yesterday was a busy day, and yours truly needs to rest up before writing more. Sorry about the wait.

Bixyl Shuftan

News Later Today

It's been a busy day, and yours truly needs to rest up before working on the paper. Sorry about the inconvenience.

Bixyl Shuftan

Cartoon of the Day: Late Cupid

Taken at HV Community. Sorry it took a little longer for the "grey matter" to come up with a joke for the winged white mouse.

By Bixyl Shuftan

Stormy Weather

Things were quite breezy in parts of the United States yesterday. And yours truly had his power knocked out for about eight hours. Because of this, some articles will be running late.

Sorry about the trouble.

Better Late Than Never

Quite a bit has happened in recent days, such as Rod Humble's resignation and the head of the UCCSL's conclusion about Linden Lab and the ToS controversy.  Regrettably, this meant a few noteworthy events weren't mentioned. Still deserving of mention, here they are.

Wounded Warrior Benefit Raises Close to 120,000 Lindens

On January 26, the monthly Wounded Warrior fundraiser took place at Veterans Isle. From 5PM SL time to a bit after 9PM SL time (Midnight EST), four musicians performed live in front of the crowd. Besides Frets Nirvana who organized the event, there was PonDman Haalan, Ganjo Mokeev, and the popular Mankind Tracer. When the last singer was finished, they had raised about 115,000 Lindens. But the donations kept coming. About a half hour later, the total had gone up to a few shy short of 120,000.


We raised 115k Linden at last nights Wounded Warriors Benefit. That means we will be sending a little over $400 to Wounded Warriors for the month of January 2014. Thank you to all who supported and to the great performers. Pondman Haalan, ( Alton Rex), Ganjo Mokeev and Mankind Tracer ( Seth Regan). You were fantastic. ...  Remember, this need does not get smaller. It only gets bigger. Count the blessings that so many have sacrificed to allow us to have. Thank you all for supporting.


Veterans Isle holds Wounded Warrior benefits by Frets Nirvana on the last Sunday of every month.

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ROMA Celebrates Paganalia

While the Steamlands were having their Winter Games on the weekend of January 25 and 26, the ROMA area was having its Paganalia festival. Things started off on Saturday with a roleplay ritual for Ceres, the Roman goddess of agriculture, and Tellus, or "Mother Earth" to the Romans. The ceremony was done in Latin with an English translation. The two other events that day were fishing and a crocodile race. Sunday would see a recreated ancient Egyptian ritual, then the Grand Feast which offered lots of food and dance.

The final event was the "Legio XIII Death-match," in which ROMA's legionnaire's fought one another with sword and shield in one on one elimination combat with the winners of the first round taking on one another in the second, and so on. The match was held on a bridge over spikes. If a player fell, he or she was out. The semifinals had one close match with each legionnaire's combat meter close to one another as damaging blows were felt. The result was both players knocking each other out: a rare occurrence in ROMA's legionnaire fights. The winner was Tarvos Cilvrnigvs (Tarvos Resident), whom walked away with a 1000 Linden prize.

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The Drax Files Radio Hour (With Jo Yardley)

Following the first episode of Draxtor Despres' radio show, the program continued to be broadcasted every Friday morning in Second Life, with the episodes available for later listening on the show's webpage. Yours truly planned to listen to each one before writing about it, but time constraints left that a nonoption.

Episode 2 discussed the legacy of the late entertainer Osprey Therian whom passed away recently. Other topics included the Redzone controversy, NSA snooping, net neutrality, and Philip Rosedale's High Fidelity.

Episode 3 featured an interview with Esteban Winsmore. discussing a documentary about virtual reality by Loki Eliot, and a Google Glass user getting arrested.

Episode 4 discussed the resignation of Rod Humble, and the impending shutdown of Cloud Party.

Sorry these stories didn't get attention until now, but better late than never,

Bixyl Shuftan