Trouble With ABC Breedables

Breedable virtual pets have been a part of Second Life for most of it's history. And over time there have been a number of companies who have made them. But sometimes they run into trouble. One of the first to make it big was Ozimals. But in 2017, the company folded due to an internal dispute. Thankfully it's last act was to save the pet bunnies it's customers had. But those of another company may not be so fortunate. 

For some years, Awesome Breed Creations has been in the business of selling breedable horses and the feed for them, as well as medicine and accessories. People would breed them for desired traits, as well as auction them and hold races. But a few days ago came some trouble that may spell the end of the business. The person in charge of the scripts that brought the horses to life, Sentire Bravin, had resigned. 

I am writing to formally announce my resignation from my role as a software and content developer, effective immediately. This decision was not made lightly, and I deeply regret having to take this step.

I have the utmost respect and admiration for the staff and developers I’ve had the privilege of working alongside. Their dedication, talent, and passion for creating one of the finest breedable experiences in Second Life have been both inspiring and enriching. It has been an honor to collaborate with such a talented and exceptional team.

But, he stated he hadn't been paid in over a year. As a result, he was quitting, and had turned the scripts off.

As a result of the prolonged lack of payment, I have removed all of my code and data from ABC servers. Additionally, I have formally notified the owner of ABC to cease and desist from any unauthorized use of my code. I understand this will impact the functionality of ABC products, but this is a matter that Stephanie (the owner of ABC) must address. ...

Unfortunately, the results of the code and data removal was that the horses became frozen, the stats display above them showing red. They were now little more than props, static, not able to walk around, breed, be ridden, or anything else. Kitacelia, an ABC breeder for a number of years told me the "Pasture" where horses can be stored was inoperable and nothing could be taken back from there. The ABC website was also down. 

"I lost 1000's of dollars worth of pets," Kitacelia told me, "... not be able to turn on accessories/horns/wings on them or movement/sound ... I can't even get my remaining pets out of pasture ...  can't turn movement on or off or add accessories to the ones in inventory or inworld." Checking Penny Shuftan's horses in the Sunweaver community where the Newser office is, they were glitched as well.

Besides Sentire, there was also an announcement of two others on the team resigning, Saphear Saunders and Krystal Silverweb

After an incredible 10+ years as the artists behind Awesome Breed Creations, it’s with a heavy heart that we share the news of our departure from the development team. This decision has not been made lightly, but unfortunately, we’ve reached a point where it’s no longer financially sustainable for us to continue under the current circumstances.

Since August of this year, our development team has not been paid, and despite numerous attempts to contact Stephanie Merrienboer (the owner and CEO of ABC), we’ve been met with silence. We’ve received no explanation or reasoning as to why this has happened. We are aware that Stephanie has internet access and has been in touch with others, so there’s no reason why she couldn’t have spoken to us or even laid us off respectfully if the company was experiencing financial hardships (which, to our knowledge, it wasn’t). We’ve poured countless hours, effort, and love into ABC over the years, and we feel deeply disrespected to be treated in this manner. It isn’t right.

As a result, we’ve had to find other work and make the difficult decision to halt the development of any new horses or content for ABC.

Nikki Detritus, the Racing Commissioner, would also comment. 

I need you all to know that the RA and myself are all saddened by what has happened. I am still trying to hold out with some hope but that is hard to hold on to when you have no clue what has happened. None of us.. Not the RA, the VSRs, the auctioneers, the managers knew about this. The only ones who knew are obviously the ones not getting paid. BUT even THEY held on for so long because the loved ABC.  I know people are angry and emotions are high and rightly so.. But please lets stick together as family and treat each other nice as it is none of our faults and we are all sick over this. Jockeys and Owners.. I need you to know ONE thing..  I NEVER wanted to be the Commissioner.. I have worked as an RA member for close to 10 years now and I never wanted that position BUT I am so glad that I did take it. I learned a lot and I got to know all of you.  It was some of the BEST times of my SL life!  I care about each and everyone of you and will always cherish the memories of the great times!

While at the ABC store, I ran into a couple people, one who was quite upset, "I spent 30000 Linden ...  I had 150 horses cost me in food almost $ 150 a month. ... There are breeders who have 500 horses ... we have all been scammed!" He mentioned the Auction House had been closed for a month.

As of the writing of this article, there has been no comment from ABC's owner. What we do know is the horses are broken, and there are many upset and sad owners. 

Bixyl Shuftan

April Linden Leaves the Lab

 
Fans of April Linden, the self-described "Gridbun" of Linden Lab, are getting some sad news. On Friday November 5, she announced she was leaving.

Hello Residents!

Today is my last day at Linden Lab. I am gonna let this account go dormant after today. Watching y'all use the things we build in ways we didn't expect (or even know was possible!) has been an amazing joy the last eight years, and I am going to miss it. (heart)

My personal Twitter account is @bunnyhalberd , but I'm not a very exciting person to follow. I live in a small town in rural Washington and mostly just post about the silly things I build in my workshop because I figured they needed to exist.

Thank you for making the last eight years be a wonderful experience! I am very muchly going to miss being on the inside of this wonderful and crazy world that we all build together. (heart)

April's announcement got dozens of replies, including some from noted residents. Prokofy Neva, "Dear April, you left the virtual world a better place than you found it with your devoted work on the cloud migration and all that followed. Good luck on your future projects!" Daniel Voyager, "Thanks for all of your hard work to make Second Life a better place and keeping everyone updated when the grid had downtimes. Good luck for the future." Inara Pey, "Nooooo!! Say it's not true! We need Lindeny Gridbun! Seriously, am saddened to hear you are leaving LL, but wishing you all the very best for the future. Shall add your other account to my Following list!" Will Burns, "You will be missed... teh cute shall go on!" Luca, "April noo! =c will miss April, but best of luck with whatever April's going to do next x3" Caitlin Tobias, "Dear April, I wish you all the best and hope you’ll have fun on your new adventures!" Pantera Polnocy, "Thank you for being the awesome gridbun for all this time. ~"

April Linden joined the Lab in 2013, and became instantly known by her purple Luskwood bunny avatar. She would appear at numerous Bay City events, and others such as the Happy Vixen's Luskwood Tribute Party and just walking down the road at Second Life Birthday events. She eventually rose to the position of operations manager, and would take it upon herself to apologize to the residents when something went very wrong. With the move to "the Cloud," she would occasionally update the residents on the Lab's progress, and about a year ago announced all data from the sims had been transfered over.

In July 2019, April was interviewed along with Oz Linden. April revealed she had originally a regular resident who signed up in 2006, whom still came on using the accound and had a couple regions. She considered Second Life important as she came from a family where certain issues "were not to be discussed," and one could listen and talk about them here. Of maintaining the Grid, she called it a complex job with one "generation" of Lindens building on top of one another year after year, and sometimes the only way to fix things was to take the Grid offline, which she disliked, partially because it kept happening to her so much in her days as a regular resident.

On a more personal note, April Linden was spoken of fondly by some friends and neighbors of mine. She will be missed. 

Image credit: Inara Pey

Bixyl Shuftan
 

Peter Gray/Peter Linden Leaving Linden Labs, To Join Facebook

One of the more familiar Lindens to Second Life residents, Peter Linden, will soon be departing Linden Labs. Known as Peter Gray in real life, he was known as the Lab's public relations spokesman, officialy their Senior Director of Communications. But no longer.On Tuesday January 2, Hamlet Au and Inara Pey had received emails from Gray that he was leaving Linden Lab. His new place of employment: Facebook. He will be working at the communications team of Facebook AI Research

"After about a dozen years doing marcom in the virtual worlds/VR space (starting way back in '06 as part of Linden's external PR team), it's time for a new adventure, and I'm excited to be moving on to join Facebook's comms team for AI."

"I'm not sure if anyone else has been doing marcom in the virtual worlds / VR space longer, but 12 years is a pretty long time (in the tech world, at least). What's helped to keep it interesting, exciting, and rewarding all these years is also a big part of what made becoming a Linden appealing in the first place: the enormous range of stories to tell. I'm grateful to all the SL and Sansar users who are doing such interesting and creative things with our platforms, and in particular to those who have gone out of their way to share their stories over the years. "

Peter Linden had spent over eight years at Linden Lab, joining in 2009 and serving under four different CEOs and went through a number of turning points in the company's history such as when 30% of it's staff was laid off. His avatar has been seen in a number of events such as the Second Life Birthday and Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education.  It is not clear who will replace him.

As for Peter Gray's new job. it's likely to be an eventful one as last year, Facebook had to squash rumors that they had pulled the plug on an AI that had gotten "dangerously smart."

Sources: New World Notes, Modem World, Gizmodo 

Bixyl Shuftan

Ceasar Xigalia Announces His Resignation As CDS Chancellor

On Sunday October 19, on the discussion forum of the Confederation of Democratic Simulators, Ceasar Xigalia announced his resignation as Chancellor of the community. Ceasar described his term as following "an extended period where laws and democratic process had become secondary to those who wished to hold on to their positions of power at all cost." Among the issues of the election was land, whether to expand or keep the community the size it was. Ceasar described himself as being stymied in his efforts to add a sim to the community's estate. "The actions of certain members" he wrote, "made it undeniable" that his opposition "would use its powers for political gain and to protect its own interests."

"I can no longer in good conscience support a system that claims it follows democratic principles but is in fact simply a closed group role playing democracy amongst themselves rather than a real social experiment in virtual community development. The system is corrupt and seeks to consolidate power in an elite. I find this morally indefensible and therefore I refuse to continue to take further part and resign my position as Chancellor."

The Confederation of Democratic Simulators describes itself on it's webpage as "the oldest democracy in Second Life. Originally founded in 2004 as the City of Neualtenburg in the Anzere region, the Confederation of Democratic Simulators (C.D.S.) is now a five-region community operated by the citizens." The CDS recently celebrated it's tenth anniversary.

Breaking News: Rodvik Linden Leaves Second Life

After more than three years as CEO of Second Life, Rod Humble, known inworld as Rodvik Linden, has announced he will be leaving his position and departing Second Life. The date in which he left was sometime last week.

On Facebook, Rodvik wrote, “Its been a great 3 years! All my thanks to my colleagues at Linden Lab and our wonderful customers I wish you the very best for the future and continued success! I am starting-up a company to make Art, Entertainment and unusual things! More on that in a few weeks!”


Rodvik Linden is gone from the Linden Lab's staff page at http://lindenlab.com/about . It is not yet clear who will replace him.

It was announced on Dec 2010 that Rod Humble would be assuming the role of CEO of Second Life. He took the position a month later. At the time, he was known for being a success in the gaming industry, such as "The Sims."

Details are still comming in on this stunning news.

Image Credit: Marianne McCann