News and Commentary: Sansar Update: Plans For Release Date, Minimum Requirements, Allegation of Content Theft

By Bixyl Shuftan

A few developments about Sansar have come up in recent days. One is an answer from it's developers via Twitter when asked about when it would be ready for release. The answer was, "Plan is this summer, specific date (to be announced)." This is a little different from when in interview last month Ebbe Linden stated they would release Sansar this Summer. Now, they say their plan is to release it this Summer, but can't give a specific date. Another sign that the development of Sansar is seeing more difficulties than anticipated.

Another development was when the developers, also on Twitter, answered a question about Sansar's requirements. What the minimum requirements were, they stated they couldn't say what they would be, but "current recommendation is aligned to Oculus/Vive specs."

Taking a look at oculus.com, there was the following minimum specs:

Graphics Card    NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti / AMD Radeon RX 470 or greater
Alternative Graphics Card    NVIDIA GTX 960 4GB / AMD Radeon R9 290 or greater
CPU    Intel i3-6100 / AMD FX4350 or greater
Memory    8GB+ RAM
Video Output    Compatible HDMI 1.3 video output
USB Ports    1x USB 3.0 port, plus 2x USB 2.0 ports
OS    Windows 8.1 or newer

On vive.com, these were the minimum specs posted:

Processor: Intel™ Core™ i5-4590 or AMD FX™ 8350, equivalent or better
Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce™ GTX 1060 or AMD Radeon™ RX 480, equivalent or better.
Memory: 4 GB RAM or more
Video output: 1x HDMI 1.4 port, or DisplayPort 1.2 or newer
USB: 1x USB 2.0 port or newer
Operating system: Windows™ 7 SP1, Windows™ 8.1 or later or Windows™ 10

Hamlet Au, who also wrote about the recommendations, summed it up by saying "so basically, if you're not a hardcore PC gamer already, you're probably not ready to jump into Sansar when it Alpha launches ..." In the comments following the article, Ckara Seller commented, "when I did a quick check on upgrading prices to meet specs on Occulus and Vive I was coming up with numbers ranging from $2500 to $5000 depending on how much you need and want. I'd say that most people will need a new system if they are going to meet specs for processor alone. There's the cost of the VR equipment, a powerful graphics card, power supply and the required USB ports. It makes no sense to spend a hefty minimum to upgrade to minimum when you know it's inevitable that minimum will be a dinosaur within months. So my amateur take is that you will need to spend a few thousand to get what you need to carry you for awhile. It's going to hurt your wallet like a bad trip to the dentist. Calling for financial pain is where Sansar is going to begin their introduction to new customers. ... I think this message is so untimely and they all know it. ...."

It's looking less and less like Sansar will be the highly successful product Linden Lab hoped it would be.

Also in the comments was what might be the first accusation of content theft in Sansar. Someone found what he identified as a BonHuit cottage from M and M Creations. If the name seems familiar to longtime Newser readers, it should. M&M Creations, owned by Marcthur and 10 Goosson, was one of the main longtime sponsors of Second Life Newspaper, the predecessor newsletter of the Second Life Newser and has bought some advertising time in the past. In the past, they had an inworld mall and at one time offered building lessons. Sadly real-life troubles have caused them to scale back on their activities. But they do offer some great products.

I messaged Marcthur, and eventually got an answer. The owner of the cottage did buy it from him, and does have permission to use it in Sansar. So apparently there was no content theft after all. This is a reminder though that Linden Lab will need to police it's new grind for real cases of stealing.

Sources: New World Notes, vive.com, oculus.com

Bixyl Shuftan

Sansar Update: Video, Images, Details on Sansar Dollar, Fees, Release Date After March

By Bixyl Shuftan

A couple days ago on January 4, Linden Lab released some details on Sansar. One was a video, Sansar Creation Preview, featuring Loz Hyde, noted for being the man behind Meshworks and has worked on motion pictures such as "Terminator Salvation" and "Guardians of the Galaxy" (2014 interview by Draxtor Despress).



Details about Sansar's virtual currency, the Sansar Dollar, were also made public when "Road to VR" magazine talked to "a representative of Linden Lab." The Sansar Dollar will be made available at the rate of 100 per US Dollar or one cent apiece.

The exchange rate between USD and Sansar dollars will be floating and will vary according to supply and demand. The rate will not necessarily be equal to the exchange rate between USD and Linden dollars in Second Life (which is also floating). To begin with, the exchange rate is about USD1 to S$100.

Second Life users will not be able to directly exchange Linden Dollars for Sansar Dollars, at least "for now." The Linden Dollars would have to be sold on the Lindex for real world currency (in which Linden Lab takes a cut), and then the user used the money to buy Sansar dollars. The representative did say that they "have not yet determined the rate of commission" they will be taking from Sansar users selling it's virtual currency for real world money.

On Upload VR, it was mentioned that as of December 2016, there were 700 content creators in Sansar, and Linden Lab was planning on giving more an early start before the official release. In an interview with Tom's Hardware, the number given was "roughly 500, maybe 600."

 In an interview with Venturebeat, Ebbe Altberg revealed Linden Lab will be charging both transaction fees for purchases in Sansar and "hosting fees" for virtual land, “We want it to be low enough that it does not add unnecessary friction to the economy ... But we do want to get a piece of the GDP and then make the hosting fees for Sansar as low as possible. We charged quite a bit for the hosting fees in Second Life and didn’t have a consumption tax to take part of the GDP. So now we will balance the hosting fees and the consumption fees in the economy.”

At one point in the Tom's Hardware interview, Altberg commented, "we continue to add more creators .... And we will continue to do this throughout the first quarter." Later on, the interviewer asked, "So, you’re running the private creator preview for Sansar for the next quarter or so?" Altberg answered, "Yeah. We’re trying to be data driven in the process as opposed to date driven. I wouldn't say we have all kinds of luxuries and that we’re taking our sweet time, but we want to make sure that it's incredibly great by the time any user can get access."

So it seems instead of the announced release date of January 2017, this month, it looks like Sansar will not be available until at least April, possibly longer.

Sources: New World Notes, Modem World,

Bixyl Shuftan

SL 2.0 To Be Out As Beta 2015, Completed 2016

A release date has finally been given for the next generation virtual world Ebbe Linden announced Linden Lab was working on. In  an interview with Roberto Baldwin of "The Next Web," Ebbe gave the release date of the beta as "expected to be launched in 2015 with the final version sometime in 2016. He told the internet magazine they would be hiring forty to fifty more people for its development.

Ebbe told Baldwin that this new virtual world will offer new and better toold for content creators, and everything that makes Second Life attractive for it's residents will be available in its successor. So why not just keep on updating Second Life? Ebbe's answer was, "We're not going to constrain ourselves with backwards compatibility."

Baldwin also talked about Oculus Rift and development for interaction with Second Life.

Source: The Next Web

Hat Tip: Jo Yardley