The Newser has just found out that the Rosehaven Estates will be closing later this year. The announcement was made first at an event, then officially on August 30 by Seleɳɑ Mσσɳcɧilɗ.
After nineteen wonderful years, I have made the difficult decision to
close Rosehaven. This was not an easy choice, but one that came after
much reflection and soul-searching. Some may try to place blame or point
to individuals, but the truth is simpler: for many years this decision
has weighed on my heart. With the loving support of those closest to me,
I have spent the last five years coming to terms with the fact that it
is time to simplify my life, follow my heart, and answer the siren call
of what lies beyond the horizon.
I am sorry that Awesomebreed didn't pay you for your code in the last year. You were paid prior that though so removing all your code even from pets and shutting down the pasture screws over customers who have been here for years more than it screws awesomebreed person who clearly doesn't care. I wish that person had never apparently bought ABC from I can't recall his name when they broke up.
Many of us have spent 1000's over the years and many hours breeding horses. Screwing over 100's of customers because the owner is a jerk, is not fair. Please out of decency leave us functioning pets and allow us to remove pets from pasture, please.
It was seven years ago tomorrow, Sunday April 26, 2015, that a bombshell was dropped: the SS Galaxy would be closing down. It was a shock to both fans of ships & boats and explorers alike. The announcement was made in the ship's group by it's managing director DBDigital Epsilon. The Galaxy wasn't just any ship, but a *massive* structure that was three sims long with two water sims in front and back. So it was probably the largest structure ever created in Second Life, and certainly the largest known. It was also one of the first places the Newser wrote about.
There was much to do aboard this huge vessel. One could rent a room there for a while. And once there, one could stop by the ballroom for music and dance. And as Gemma once wrote, "You will find a myriad of places to visit between shows in the Zodiac. Play a little miniature golf, skeet shoot, fishing, or play a little basketball. There is a gallery with a featured artist, many shops to visit, and much more to discover for your extended visit." It was a place one could have a virtual vacation on, or just drop by time to time for individual attractions. A video made by Nika Dreamscape would show much of the ship and it's activities.
So why did the ship close? An investigation revealed that the ship had recently been sabotaged in a severe griefing attack.
"We have had griefers before but not on this scale," one of the crew
told me, saying what happened was the culmination of a number of attacks
in recent days, tearing holes into the ship and mangling much of the
deck and walls. So DBDigital spent "hours" on the phone with Linden Lab,
only to be told he would be allowed one rollback for his sims, and then
no more. Not one a day. Not one a week. One rollback once, and then no
more, *ever.* And there was nothing they could really do to stop the
vandals from striking again. Feeling he could no longer safely offer the
cruise ship experience he had been giving, it was then DBDigital made
the decision to close the ship. After eight years of operation, the
great cruise ship would be having it's last call. For the remaining days
the ship was open, longtime fans, and new admirers alike dropped by to
enjoy it while they could, such as some impromptu fishing parties. Then
on May 3, the ship was closed.
So why did the Lab tell the Galaxy they would only allow one single rollback and then no more? There was no shortage of people saying the Lab just didn't care about it's residents. It was also suggested that this was the result of a "hands off" policy with minimal involvement. And there was the viewpoint it was customer service cut back to the point it was seldom available. But it was more than just the Lab. After all, the incident had happened because of vandalism by griefers. "Griefing is a big problem, not just in SL, but the uprise of 'active sociopathy for entertainment' on the Internet is becoming a larger issue. Especially in the last few years as it has gained its own sort of culture, justifications, and communities dedicated to it." "... that was years of people's work, and God knows how many thousands of dollars. And some people felt entitled to go and trash that."
But it eventually dawned on the Lab they really goofed up. Just two days after my commentary on the ship's closing, a group of Moles and Lindens created a preservation group. And five days after that, DBDigital announced the Galaxy would be reopening soon, but under the ownership of the Lab. That was the good news. The bad news, "Sadly being under Linden Lab’s flag also means that none of the previous management or crew will be aboard in any sort of capacity. I have also been told there will be no rentals or events. This means she will not quite be the Galaxy you know and love." A few months later in September, the ship reopened. The ship itself was preserved. But there would be no cabins available to rent for a time. There would be no schedule of parties in the ballroom. In a sense, it was a museum ship.
The closing of the SS Galaxy was one of several noted blunders and questionable moves by Linden Lab in 2015. But the Lab seemed to learn it's lesson. I never did hear of another place that shut down because the Lab told them no more rollbacks. As it turned out, there would be an occasional event at the Galaxy's ballroom, notably for the Relay. But for those who were fans of the ship in it's heyday, these would be just short reminders of what once was.
Things haven't been the best for the Genus Project store this year. Twice this year, someone hit them with DMCA takedown notices, the second just hours after the store reopened. Finally, after two months, the case has been resolved and the store is set to reopen today. So how was the suit pulled off and why did it take time to resolve? The owner of Genus would explain.
On Friday August 21, Yavanna Llanfair, the creator of the Yavascript pod travel system that covered most of the continents of the mainland, announced she would be "suspending all services" due partially to a 24 hour ban by Linden Lab she had traced to a pod glitch and partly due to the lingering effects of a Coronavirus infection. The service had been going since it's start exactly ten years earlier.
The result has been numerous statements of people expressing their sadness, and some people wondering why the lack of a response by Linden Lab to her ticket. On Saturday, Patch Linden would respond.
I am potentially as confused as everyone else. But then again I've
been out of town this week and I have some catching up to do. In any
case while standing in the house of mouse, this did make it to my
attention to look in to. While I'm digging in to find out what
happened there are a few things I can assure everyone of:
We've made no policy changes surrounding automated vehicles on the Mainland.
We like the Yavapods system
We use it in Bellisseria as the "engine" for the ferry boats, with Yavanna's permission of course
We keep having it back to SLB every year
These items do not seem like a recipe for a change in policy.
Hopefully things will unfold and we'll get to the bottom of this in a
positive manner. I can't really see any other way forward, and the team
and I have no reason to not support or help Yavanna.
Of her account being suspended for 24 hours and the lack of a response to the ticket she filed:
This is where part of my confusion is. The LDPW and the Moles do not
have a real ticket system. We sometimes receive JIRA's for issues, but
that's not really a ticket and the Moles are not reachable directly
through the support ticketing system. While I'm not here to dispute any
of this, there also seems to be some real confusion on what or how this
happened. If this took place in July, this is the first I'm becoming
aware of it. There is no "fight city hall" here, again, we have no
reason to do anything other than help with the system and the situation.
Ebbe Altberg/Ebbe Linden, the CEO of Linden Lab, would also have a comment. In response to a Tweet by Anne Brightstar, he responded, "No one is stopping them from running."
It should be noted not every single resident is speaking out in favor of the pod car travel system staying. Prokovy Neva would make a detailed post saying it was preferable that the system be closed down, on the grounds all the riderless pods going around were "endless spam," and when going about on roads as half-spheres, they looked like something from "outer space" that didn't fit in with most sims. But most everyone else on the official forums was speaking out in their favor.
Taking a look at the pod stations this weekend, many of the pod rezzers I checked were still up and running well. One would just click on the sign, jump on the pod (or boat at some stations), and click on the vehicle to get going. But this was not the case of every single one. A few at the Durango (154/188/118) station would vanish about a minute after running. Of the two stations at Bay City, they run differently than the others I found with the railcars and boat already there, and not moving until about a minute after the person or persons get on.
So as of Sunday, the pod tour system is still up and running. The problems are some of the routes are glitched, and of course there's the uncertainly of if the system will still be running. But Patch Linden's comments do hint at a solution soon that should put the minds of the pod car fans at ease. Asadora Summers, a moderator for the Pod Riders group, would say on Saturday, "Things are very much way better than they were yesterday morning ... just believe me that all things will go back to what we know." She would also thank fans for the well-wishes they'd sent Yavanna, and invite others to send her notecards so she could email her the messages. Also, there would be a "Second Life Pod Riders Group" set up on Discord where fans could share pictures and stories.
Stay tuned for more details
Addition: Earlier I reported one of the Bay City stations wasn't there and the other didn't work. Another look showed the first was there, the car and boat were just some distance from the LM, and the pods at both do work, they just need some time after the person hops on to get going.
Addition Part Two: I had an alt check a few more routes. While one did glitch soon after starting (probably a sim crossing), most were running fine, including one that glitched earlier.
The Newser was just tipped off to a sad announcement. After ten years of taking residents around the mainland, the Yavascript pods made by Yavanna Llanfair will be shut down after today. The reasons are a lack of communication with Linden Lab following a 24 hour ban, and her recovery from a Coronavirus infection that has had lingering effects on her body.
Dear pod riders,
Today is the 10th anniversary of the first road pod - "YavaScript Pod V5.0 (MCT)" - MCT standing for Monowai Constant Tour, which I put on the road in the morning of Saturday 21st August 2010. I have set that pod running again; it will run until it is swallowed by some random event (like a sim restart or a crash).
However, I am sorry to report that it is also the last day of the
pods as we know them today. I have made the decision to suspend all
services as of later today. The reason is as follows:
For the
entirety of the running of the pod service, I have said I will only run
the service where I considered I had the approval of the Lindens and the
community. Whilst there have always been a few who would criticise
(sometimes quite vocally), they have been a very small minority. And I
have always felt that the Lindens have tacitly approved of them, though
they would never say so directly. Certainly a number of moles have
expressed their approval, and to them I am very grateful.
On 27th July, my account was suspended for 24 hours because of a pod crash in Mieum (on the Wellington Road). At least, that is what I traced it to, because the Linden who suspended me would not tell me of the reason - merely that the object was returned to me. I explained that it is impossible to avoid crashes in all circumstances. I raised a ticket to the LDPW asking them to let me know if this meant my pods were no longer welcome on the roads. I said that I would take anything other than a positive to be a negative. My ticket was closed without comment.
It would have been a shame for the pods to have fallen short of their 10th anniversary, and so I have continued the service until today. And for now, I will merely suspend all operations by flicking a switch on my server. This means that the road pods will still rez, but de-rez shortly after (within 5 minutes). Pods will also still be available from the pod stations by clicking on the rezzer. But this is not a sustainable situation, as the vast majority of people come to know about the pods by seeing them pass on the road, so without that, the service is far less likely to be sustainable in the longer term.
I announced back in June that I was stepping back, due to a long Covid-19 recovery. That recovery is still not complete; whilst I have made progress, I still have some issues, mostly neurological. And stress is therefore something I have to avoid at all costs. Therefore I am not willing at present to fight anyone on this. Maybe one day I will. If the Lindens wish to get in contact to ensure me that the pods are welcome again, I will of course re-instate them. But I suspect that is not likely to happen.
I will continue to support pod owners who run their own systems.
Thankyou to each and every pod rider for coming along on the journey with me. It has been exciting and a lot of fun. It isn't necessarily over, but for now autonomous vehicles from the YavaScript stable will no longer be on the SecondLife mainland roads.
Thankyou, Yavanna Llanfair
For those wishing to check out the pods one last time, head to the main station at Durango (154/188/118). You can also join the Pod riders group (link here) for a list of her other stations.
Yavanna would list the following as her reason for coming up with the rides.
Why do I make these tours? Well, I believe that mainland should be enjoyed and appreciated. Yet there is so little on mainland as a whole which attracts people, simply because they don't know about it. Most people don't travel around and look to see what is there; they go from landmark to landmark in their inventory, without taking the time to look around them. But mainland has so much going for it; beautiful areas, historic locations, educational establishments, rail and sea transport, which most people probably don't know exist. Mainland should be alive, it should be a community. We should all care about it, and then maybe we would take more pride in it and in our buildings. The road network is extensive (though not always as complete as it might be). It is there for using, and should be used as a way to help fulfil this need.
Going about, there was a lot to see while taking a ride. It was an effortless way to cover a lot of ground and see how much was on the mainland. It is a service that will be missed.
Remember, after today, the pods will probably no longer work.
While the Second Life Birthday and the buyout of Linden Lab have been in the headlines, there have been other news stories that might have gotten more attention otherwise. Among the companies making use of Bento mesh is Genus, which has gotten attention for it's Bento heads. But a few months ago, they were hit with a DMCA takedown order, which shut them down for a while. Earlier this month, they reopened, only to be hit with a second takedown order in just a few hours.
When the news stories of people being told to stay at home started going around, social introverts whom felt happier online than engaging in plenty of public events could be forgiven for feeling a little smug. While extroverts would have to struggle to get used to the routine, people whom already spent a lot of time on the Internet and other places such as online gaming and virtual worlds, notably Second Life, seemingly wouldn't have to make any sacrifices.
But as it turns out, Internet introverts do have to give up something: the higher speeds they've been used to.
Articles, such as one in Fortune magazine, suggests that with more people using the Internet due to the people staying at home, the result is comparable to more traffic on a road leading to slowdowns. Several services such as Netflix and Youtube are reducing movie quality.
So what does this mean for Second Life? While periods of glitches and lag are nothing new to the virtual world, a number of my friends have told me it's been getting worse. While Sony made the decision to reduce downloading speed in response, Linden Lab is unlikely to mess with the quality of data transmission.
What can be done about all this lag? The best way is to go to one's Preferences and reduce quality, draw distance, or both. For those whom it's already low, they may have to avoid coming on peak times.
So it seems for now, we're having to deal with "Corona lag."
In what can only be described as a stunning development for artists and supporters of the arts in Second Life, the Linden Endowment for the Arts is set to close down on the last day of August.
The Committee of the Linden Endowment for the Arts regrets to inform residents of Second Life that the LEA regions will be closing at the end of August 2019.
In November 2018, the Committee decided that the best way forward was for the members to step down, and allow Linden Lab to revamp or re-organise the program, with new members if they wished. At that time, the bi-annual Land Grant (the AIR regions) were shuttered. A small number of the Committee stayed on to administer the Core regions until the remaining grant commitments ran their course. Those grants are now coming to an end, and therefore the LEA will be closed at the end of August 2019
The Linden Endowment for the Arts (LEA) was established to help create a center of arts activity in Second Life. It was founded in 2010 and launched its first events in 2011. For the last eight years, it has been a collaborative venture between Linden Lab and the arts community. Guided initially by a board of renowned Second Life artists and more latterly also bringing in people with a strong interest in promoting the Arts in Second Life, the LEA has been committed to providing access to engaging experiences in the arts for the Second Life community. Over the last eight years, through its exhibitions, programs, and events, the LEA has fostered awareness of artists’ contributions to our virtual world and encouraged others to get involved and be inspired.
It has long been divided into two parts; The Core Regions and the Artists in Resident Regions.
The LEA Land Grant (the AIR Regions) was a program to distribute 20 regions (LEA10 - LEA29) generously donated by Linden Lab. These regions were used to promote art and artistic endeavors in Second Life. Full regions of virtual land were made available to in-world artists through an application process. The AiR Land Grant was a 6 month grant.
The LEA Land Grant was shuttered by Linden Lab in January 2019 at the request of the LEA Committee, pending decisions on the future of the LEA.
The Core regions (LEA1- LEA9) hosted a variety of artistic events and installations for a three month period. The Core regions included a Welcome Area, a four region theatre, a sandbox for artists, and partial and full regions that could be used for the three month period, with a great emphasis on community art events.
This program will be closing at the end of August when all the regions will be shuttered by Linden Lab at the request of the Committee.
The Committee wishes to express its gratitude and deep respect for the artists of Second Life, whose work they have been privileged to support over the last eight years. We hope that in time Linden Lab will be able to create a new program that will continue their support of the arts in Second Life.
Any questions concerning the Linden Endowment for the Arts should be addressed to PatriciaAnne Daviau or JMB Balogh.
The Linden Endowment for the Arts Committee: PatriciaAnne Daviau, JMB Balogh, LaPiscean Liberty, Jayjay Zifanwe Advisors: The Dove Rhode and Corcosman Voom
Saffia Widdershins invited me to talk to her for a few minutes. She
stated Linden Lab had nothing to do with the LEA closing down. If
anything, they wanted it to keep going. But the LEA Committee "were
pretty much burned out." After inviting a number of people to join the
Committee, and being refused, they had decided to step down so a fresh
start could take place.
Saffia told me this wasn't
necessarily the end of the LEA. It could still be saved in some form,
"But the initiative needs to come from the arts community. They need to
pull together and create a workable proposal (or several proposals) for
the Lab."
Inara Pey had a number of things to say on her blog, "As was pointed out to me after I wrote the article on the 2018
restructuring announcement, running any organisation like the LEA is
going to be a thankless task; there is no remuneration for time given,
there is always going to be hostility over actions taken and the grants
awarded, and so on; it really can be a thankless task. ...
"However, there can be no doubting then when all is said and done, the
LEA did a tremendous amount of good for the artists who participated in
its programmes, offering many the means to express themselves and reach
audiences in a manner that might never otherwise been able to achieve.
"While the LEA many have had its warts and at times had to face undue
criticism, it has through its nine years of existence been a force for
good for those arts who have been able to make use of its facilities and
it has certainly helped enriched art within Second Life and allow many
to appreciate work and installations they might otherwise never get to
see. So, it’s not unfair to say its passing will be missed."
So will the LEA be saved, or will this chapter of the history of the arts in Second Life come to a close? Stay tuned for more details.
Yesterday on the blog for the Linden Endowment for the Arts, it was announced that on January 1, there would be a "hiatus for restructuring." LEA sims 11 to 29 would be temporarily shut down "to allow for a major restructuring."
Come January 1st 2019, the Linden Endowment for the Arts, known as the LEA, will be temporarily closing its Artists in Residence regions (LEA 10 - 29) to allow for a major restructuring.
Over the last seven years, these regions have been open for artists who apply to build their dreams, each for a six month grant. We have seen many great installations here - and some that have attracted controversy.
The nine Core regions (which include the Theatre, the Sandbox and Photohunt) will remain for the present, and short-term grants will still be available in these regions for community-inspired arts projects.
Discussions between the present Committee and Linden Lab about the future form of the LEA are ongoing, but it is anticipated that there will be a new organising committee when the AiR regions re-open.
The Linden Endowment for the Arts (LEA) was established to help create a center of arts activity in Second Life. It is a collaborative venture between Linden Lab and the arts community. Guided by a dedicated board of renowned Second Life artists, the LEA is committed to providing access to engaging experiences in the arts for the Second Life community. Through its exhibitions, programs, and events, the LEA fosters awareness of artists’ contributions to our virtual world and encourages others to get involved and be inspired. See more at: http://lea-sl.org/
Wednesday November 28 was the last day the Wildstar Massive Multiplayer Online game was up and running. In September, NCSoft made the decision to shut it down. The game had gotten attention for ir's cartoony look and being one of the small number of sci-fi MMOs taking place in space and an alien planet with most being on fantasy worlds. But it wasn't enough.
Why did Wildstar fail? Some people I talk to put the blame on NCSoft, which a few years ago had shut down the superhero MMO "City of Heroes" despite please from its fans, some vowing never to play another game from them. An article by MMOS World blamed mismanagement by it's developers Carbine Studios, lack of substantial content compared to other MMOs, lack of promotion and marketing, and more. In any event, the news was sad news for the games casual and core fans, hundreds of whom stuck around on the game for it's last few hours until the lights went out.
Longrem Smalls, one of my virtual neighbors on an extended hiatus from Second Life, had been a fan of the game, playing it for some time. He filmed his last few hours for a youtube.
I am deeply saddened to upload this video, a recording of the last
hurrah of Wildstar from my point of view. This was a very emotional
time for me, because Wildstar has given me some very fond memories.
This was the first MMO since Star Wars Galaxies where I was so
enthralled that I dove in deeply and actually tried to join the
community. I made a lot of new friends that I will take with me even
though the game itself is gone. We roleplayed together, we quested, we
dungeoned, we raided, we worked on housing and explored... Everything
about this game will be missed deeply, by myself and many others. I can
only hope that a similar game with deep lore, exciting combat, and
amazing housing will come out again.
Some technical details:
The Sunset party was held at Wigwalli Village in Whitevale so both the
Exiles and Dominion could be in one place. Attendance was over 450
players, nearing 500 at some points, and I know there were plenty who
wanted to attend but could not. The devs were having some zany fun,
turning us into rowsdowers, cupcakes, various NPCs from the game, and
even changing our sizes from ginormous to miniscule. This event also
pushed my computer pretty hard, dropping my FPS to single digits at
times, but it held up. Toward the end there are a few major lag spikes
on the server side, so the video will appear to glitch out and freeze
for up to half a minute, but it does come back, so please be patient.
And yes, there were also weird changes in the music being played, or
sound cutting out, just because there was so much going on.
This was recorded so that those who could not make it could at least get
a sense of closure and watch it when they get a chance, and has not
been edited in any way.
And so, the final sunset has fell on Wildstar, a unique MMO that no doubt will be missed.
Once again, there's a lot more news than there is time to go over it in detail. So here's more brief descriptions of several things that have been going on.
Is Animesh Update Causing Viewer Trouble? - Has your viewer been having problems lately? A couple people have come to me, saying they've been crashing a lot lately. My attention was directed to JIRA BUG-225584 done by the creator of the Black Dragon viewer, saying ever since the Animesh update to Second Life, his viewer has had "massive performance loss" with frame rate. The problem isn't limited to Black Dragon, but could hit any Second Life Viewer. Linden Lab is investigating the issue, and people with problems, are encouraged to discuss it on this thread in the official forums.
New Linden Realms - On the Linden Blog, there was an announcement that one of the older Linden games has been given a new twist. Linden Realms is now "Linden Realms: The Search For Magellan."
New Sunweaver Halloween Attractions - The Sunweaver community has two new Halloween-themed attractions. These are Shockwave's Haunted Maze at Sunweaver Eclipse (102/39/2201) and the Happy Vixen Haunted Manor.
Google Plus Shut Down After Data Breach Exposed - Google announced on Monday October 8 that it would be shutting down it's social network Google Plus. This announcement came shortly after a Wall Street Journal article that there had been a data leak affecting a half million users, and Google made the decision not to warn people fearing disclosure might mean bad press and possibly increased regulation as a result.
Dysphoria to Euphoria. The Newser was alerted to a sim that had been recreated by it's fans. Dysphoria was an Alice-in-Wonderland style sim that it's owner announced would be closing due to her changing real life. When an attempt to save it failed, fans made the decision to rebuild it, under the new name Euphoria.
The InWorldz grid is gone. On Friday afternoon, most of their residents found themselves no longer able to log in, and by Saturday morning the place had completely shut down. The closing has left many sad former users with a decision: where do I go now? From both InWorldz and Second Life residents, there have been a number of other questions such as "How could this happen?" "Will there be another InWorldz?" "Could this happen to Second Life?" Yours truly offers a few answers, or partial answers, based on my observations.
I was informed of the closing when I logged in yesterday. I normally get emails from InWorldz, but nope not on this. So I was surprised by Sam Leader in my inbox the minute I logged in and no one seemed to know a thing about when things were closing.
So everyone is scrounging to pull up stakes. Someone said it was a sudden eviction and the only ones who really knew about anything were the inner click and they didn't start spilling anything until a few days ago I guess everyone was in the same boat logged in usual time yesterday and slammed with closing announcements. Not nice.
There are a lot of disabled people and older people who play here. That sort of sudden "get out" message is hard for someone not in great health to stay up for two days straight and download 8 years of their life....type of thing.
Then you have the creators that took a chance here like Pulse skins, Twisted Thorn Textures, Katy's Creations, Seda's Creations, Seer's FP, and the rest. If they didn't keep .xml's on the hard drive then it is come in and delete their whole inventory so they do not get ripped off by the back up of servers. type of thing.
We all felt so safe here because of dcma's being taken serious....griefers were handled. How do we know they won't just take what we all leave to this new as their own property? This is teaching all of us how flimsy our hold is on our creations in truth. If some grid like Second Life closed, how do we prove the inventory and assets are not theirs? The best I can do personally is just let what I do not get out go and wish for the best....I will make more new things in the future....just sort of sad if I run across one of my builds in another grid by someone else. I had that happen in SL before. I didn't understand permissions when I started and had a whole set of clothing packs ended up in the free bie areas. It was sad all the hours I spent on them to have them show up given away for free by someone else. I learned (laughter).
This is teaching me also (grin), the do not sweat the small stuff and just have fun when I am in Virtual Worlds.
Zia Cruor (IW)/Zia Larnia (SL)
Zia Cruor of InWorldz is also Zia Larnia of Second Life, whom was the manager of the Grid Walkers Welcome Center in 2014.
Second Life has been under attack by trolls many times. But this time, hackers are the ones causing the trouble.
For the second day in a row, residents have had trouble getting inworld. People couldn't log in, or if they were already in, they'd be logged out. People had trouble bringing up the Second Life webpage as well as Marketplace. Yours truly couldn't get on until after 7PM SL time. Curiously, Firestorm was also described as being down. There was naturally speculation about the cause. One person wondered if one of the twelve employees Linden Lab recently let go had something to do with it. Others suspected a DDOS, or Distributed Denial of Service, attack.
Finally just after 11AM SL time, April Linden finally announced the cause, an unusually large DDOS, one that the Lab stated were "at a level that we rarely see."
As I’m sure most of y’all have noticed, Second Life has had a rough 24
hours. We’re experiencing outages unlike any in recent history, and I
wanted to take a moment and explain what’s going on.
The grid is currently undergoing a large DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service)
attack. Second Life being hit with a DDoS attack is pretty routine. It
happens quite a bit, and we’re good at handling it without a large
number of Residents noticing. However, the current DDoS attacks are at a
level that we rarely see, and are impacting the entire grid at once.
My team (the Second Life Operations Team) is working as hard as we can
to mitigate these attacks. We’ve had people working round-the-clock
since they started, and will continue to do so until they settle down.
(I had a very late night, myself!)
Second Life is not the only Internet service that’s been targeted
today. My sister and brother opsen at other companies across the country
are fighting the same battle we are. It’s been a rough few days on much of the Internet.
We’re really sorry that access to Second Life has been so sporadic over
the last day. Trying to combat these attacks has the full attention of
my team, and we’re working as hard as we can on it. We’ll keep posting
on the Second Life Status Blog as we have new updates.
As I am writing this, I've been hearing that various online retailers have also been hit with DDOS attacks. Although the Grid Status Report suggests there are still problems, some are telling me they can get on again. Hopefully the issue will be resolved quickly.
In a development that's clearly of interest to music lovers, youtube-mp3.org, once the top website for converting Youtube videos into MP3 files, was shut down earlier this month following an out of court settlement between the site's owner and the Recording Industry Association of America, or RIAA. The website www.youtube-mp3.org had been one of the most visited websites on the Internet according to an article in Torrent Freak magazine. But checking the location only shows a dead link, the site having been taken down.
About a year ago, Philip Matesanz of Germany and PMD Technologies UG, the owners of the website had been sued by a number of record companies, charging that the "Defendants are depriving Plaintiffs and their recording artists of the fruits of their labor," while raking in money from advertising. In the agreement between Matesanz and the companies, the domain had been handed over to RIAA and it's owner making a payment of an undisclosed cash settlement, the recording labels agreed to halt further prosecution, and the defendant accepts the blame of the charges against him.
While this is the end of www.youtube-mp3.org, these music companies feel the problem of "stream ripping" shouldn't have gotten so far to begin with, complaining that Youtube needs to take more responsibility in trying to stop them. As it turns out, Youtube did threaten legal action against the website, as well as the video downloader TubeNinja.
For those whom had been depending on youtube-mp3.org for their music, such as possibly some Second Life DJs, they will now have to find another way to get new music.
While there have been many colleges and universities which have had a presence in Second Life, perhaps the best known has been the University of Western Australia. Over the years since their begining in 2004, they have sponsored and held a number of art and video contests on their sims. But Jayjay Zifanwe and , the manager of the sims, had some bad news on Sunday September 11. Due to budget cutbacks, the number of sims held by the UWA will be "restructured" from five to only one.
UWA Virlantis will be taken over by Dr Phylis Johnson (Sonicity Fitzroy). The UWA, UWA Winthrop, and WASP Land, barring a last minute handover, will vanish on October 9. only the University of WA sim will remain, "Everything on All Sims will remain as is for the next 2 weeks... do come
back for a visit as many of the artworks going back 7 years are still
at various locations. Once those 2 weeks are up, our curator, Freewee
Ling will start to rationalise what is on the UWA sims, so that some
items from all sims are brought onto the one remaining sim."
Curator Freewee Ling had the following to say, "I am saddened by the restructuring that is happening at UWA and that the
university's presence in SL will be so drastically curtailed. JayJay
has done a remarkable job establishing the virtual campus, maintaining
the sims and, more significantly, building a worldwide reputation for
UWA's virtual presence. He has worked tirelessly to promote UWA in SL
for the last seven years. There is no one at UWA who didn't know about
it, and tours of the rl campus by everything from local school kids to
international delegations were routinely given a tour of the virtual
campus as well. Our reputation for inspiring the creation of literally
thousands of virtual artworks and machinima by hundreds of artists from
around the globe has helped to raise awareness of what creative people
in virtual worlds are capable of achieving. Our programs have served to
elevate and legitimize the work we do here. We had an inclusive open
entry policy that allowed newbies and veterans
to exhibit and compete on equal footing. I am very proud of all the work
you submitted to our programs. I will share more of my personal
thoughts in a separate post."
More details can be read in their blog post (here). Ironically enough, the exhibit mentioned in the post is "The Last Ocean," the theme being the death of a virtual world. You can check out the exhibit at UWA Winthrop (32/28/27).
Yours truly hasn't played the MMO World of Warcraft in a while. But while I was on, I'd heard people have mixed feelings over some changes, such as certain progression systems removed, the end of the three leveling trees, the simplifying of the pet care system, etc. Many felt World of Warcraft had lost something from it's older days. I'd heard of private servers in which players could go back and play the game as it was, but never checked them out. The big problem: they were technically illegal. Blizzard never authorized any, and each was subject to being shut down.
Nostalrius was one such server. A relatively new one, it quickly became one of the most popular. According to Kotaku, it had close to 800,000 registered users and about 150,000 active users, up from 5000 in May 2015. Unfortunately, it caught the attention of Blizzard, whom handed it's Internet hosting service a "cease and desist" order. The server's managers then reluctantly made the decision to shut it down, telling it's players the last day would be on Sunday April 10. In the final minutes, hundreds of players gathered in spots to say goodbye to one another and to wait out the end.
The server team also sent Blizzard a petition, for the company to bring back the World of Warcraft of old in "Legacy" servers, saying the sheer numbers of people whom were in Nostalrius was evidence of how many players were seeking it. "Do you think that a policy change can be made regarding legacy servers based on volunteers work, for very old no longer supported game expansion? Or do you think that legacy servers are doomed by definition since, in the end, it's hurting Blizzard trademark and communication more than anything else?"
It's been just several months since World of Warcraft's numbers had dropped to the point Blizzard would no longer publicly give out it's active user numbers. It could easily be argued that's a good reason for Blizzard to consider legacy servers.
Among other online newsletters, those at Joystiq.com, notably Massively and WoW Insider will be closing and soon be no more. After more than a decade of covering computers and computer gaming, including Second Life, these publications are shutting down. So why after a decade are these gaming news sites closing?
It was with sadness that over the weekend, White Vixen Enterprises made the decision to close one of Second Life's premier space clubs, Club Zero Gravity. The reasons were real-life finances.
All good things must come to an end, or at least a hiatus, and Club Zero Gravity is no exception. Since it was moved to Purrfection in July 2010 from the main Sunweaver Estates area , the "Party among the stars" has hosted hundreds of parties of many different themes. But due to real life finances, we can no longer keep the power running. So it's time to get ready for the final curtain call.
Thank you for your patronage.
"Don't cry because we are going, be happy because you were here."
Club Zero Gravity got it's start in the main area of the Sunweaver Estates, built by Shockwave Yareach and run under Spectra Ninetails, eventually it's first owners had to give up running the place. Ranchan Weidman then stepped in, giving the club it's noted space-station appearance, but in 2009 she too could no longer keep up the events and it closed. After several months, in July 2010 it reopened at it's current location in the Purrfection Estates. With only a slight modification from Ranchan's original design, Elphias Kojishi and Nydia Tungsten ran it for a time. Then Elphias had to drop out from helping to run it, and Bixyl Shuftan took over as manager. In June 2013, the club was closed for a few weeks for renovations to be reshaped into a slightly smaller club as people moved in from a residential sim that was closed due to loosing money.
The club has enjoyed events of many different themes from Halloween to Victorian to Steampunk to comedy to even the occasional adult theme (there were more wilder events when Nydia managed as she got her start as DJ "Naughty Nydia"). The final two events this week will be "Topless Tuesday" at Aug 12 6PM SLT, and the come-as-you-are "Last Call" on Thursday Aug 14 at 6PM.
Club Zero Gravity's sister club, the Happy Vixen, will not truly be closing, but is being relocated to the Sunny Beach sim in the Sunweaver Estates. It is expected that the Vinyl Museum, owned by Perri Prinz and RECoyote Mindes, will be taking the Tues/Thurs 6PM timeslot.
