FLASH! $L Exchange Update

I'm not going to repeat what you can read elsewhere.  Please see Gwyneth Llewellyn's excellent post,
http://gwynethllewelyn.net/2013/05/17/financial-crisis-in-second-life-ended-linden-lab-launches-linden-dollar-authorized-reseller-program/

While you are there, follow the link to her much longer analysis piece, "How to Create Your Own Financial Crisis".

And, just to top things off, see her NON-financial piece on "There are No Humans in Second Life".

Great reading, great insights.

Keeping Your Feet on the Ground

It's pretty amazing when you think about it...everybody is always just the right height.  Yep, we all start at the top, and we stretch alllll the way down to the ground!  Sadly, this is not always the case in virtual worlds like Second Life.

Avatars floating several inches above the terrain, and others with their feet mired in concrete floors like Jimmy Hoffa are all too common.  Especially these days, and I'll try to explain why.

The main reason for these height-above-ground problems is those lovely sculpty and mesh shoes, complete with sculpty and mesh feet and alpha masks that hide the ugly "regular avatar" feet.

It's those alpha masks.  The maker of shoes generally works from her own avatar shape, and it's probably not the same as yours or mine.  She chooses the point at which the alpha mask leaves off, and your legs begin.  The shoes must be edited so that the top of the shoe correctly meets the (apparently) sawed off end of your leg.  Depending on how different your shape is from the creator's, this can leave your shoes seemingly several inches above the floor, or sunk several inches into the ground.

Until recently, to compensate for this problem there was a Z-axis avatar height adjustment in the Debug Settings.  Some viewers, like Firestorm, even put a handy adjustment control in Preferences, or on a special button. 

But, sad to say, one of the recent updates from Linden Lab removed this functionality.  However, they have provided a clumsy sort of work-around:  Go to Appearance/Edit Shape.  Look at the Body tab, and you will find a new slider control at the bottom, called "Hover".  This defaults to 50%, but can be adjusted to correct your height above ground.

There are three disadvantages to doing things this way.

1. You can't use the function with a No Modify shape
2. The increments are too large.  While 50% might have your feet in the ground, 51% has you floating above it.
3. You have to save your changes, creating a new version of your shape.

This last one can be dealt with, with some planning.  Create three versions of your shape, calling them (for example) "Lindalshape49", "Lindalshape50", and "Lindalshape51".  If you need to, you can create more, but I think you get the idea...a series of shapes, each with a slightly different Hover setting.  Then use the appropriate shape when you create a new Outfit, or when you change your shoes.

Third Party $L Exchanges Banned?

Today, Linden Lab made a change to its Terms of Service.

You can find the ToS here:  https://secondlife.com/corporate/tos.php?lang=en-US
The change is to Section 5, which deals with Linden Dollars ($L).  Specifically, Section 5.3 now reads,

5.3 There are other exchanges that are operated by third parties on which Linden dollars are exchanged.

Third party exchanges are not authorized by Linden Lab and Buying or Selling Linden dollars on third party exchanges are not authorized transactions. Third party exchanges are wholly distinct from both the LindeX exchange and Linden Lab and they have no affiliation with Linden Lab. We do not endorse or otherwise guarantee the legitimacy of the Linden dollar transfers offered on them, and we are not liable for purchases of such Linden dollars. Buying or Selling Linden dollars anywhere other than the LindeX is done so solely at your own risk. If you Buy Linden dollars that are traced to unauthorized credit card activity or other fraudulent activity, we will recoup these Linden dollars from your Account. The only authorized exchange is the LindeX.

Now, this wording is clearly distancing Linden Lab from the various third party $L exchange services.  They say that this is to better protect Second Life residents from fraud, and indeed there have been cases of fraud using the $L.  Up until now, LL provided their "Linden Lab Exchange Risk API", a software tool designed to reduce the chances of fraudulent activity, to legitimate third party exchanges.  However, the Second Life website has been updated to remove the references to the Exchange Risk API.

But, at least in the new ToS, LL does not prohibit using third party exchanges.  They merely say, "...done so solely at your own risk."  However, in a blog post on the Second Life website, http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Featured-News/Updated-Second-Life-Terms-of-Service/ba-p/1996185 , they say,

"... trading of Linden dollars (L$) on exchanges other than the LindeX, Second Life’s official L$ exchange, is not authorized or allowed." (italics mine).

In my view, this is not only to prevent fraud.  There are two additional reasons for LL to hog all of the $L exchange activity.

1. Fees.  LL collects fees when you buy or sell $L.  There is a problem with this thinking, though.  Most people who use the third party exchanges do so because they cannot use the Lindex, due to the fact that LL only accepts certain forms of payment (major credit cards, for example -- but not gift cards or debit cards.)  Also, many SL creators/merchants outside the US cannot use PayPal, and use the third party exchanges to cash out their in world earnings.  By cutting these people off from a way to buy and sell $L, LL is going to lose a significant part of its user base.
2. The US Treasury.  The government has begun to take a closer look at online currencies used in games, with a particular eye to them being used as tools for money laundering.  Despite the fact that LL uses legal mumbo-jumbo to say that the $L is not a currency, in the eyes of government regulators, if it quacks like a duck, it's a duck.  And Uncle Sam doesn't take kindly to private citizens issuing money.  So LL is likely taking steps to make the $L seem less like a freely traded currency by limiting it to the LL-controlled Lindex.  They are, by doing this, also separating themselves from any audits or actions that might be taken against these third party exchanges.

Most people haven't yet become aware of these deeper issues...the only thing that worries them is that they have to click that they have read and accepted the revised ToS on the login screen.  But I think this development could have far-reaching consequences for Second Life, its economy, and us users.

EDIT, May 8 2013:
Linden Lab sent an email to operators of third party exchanges, telling them to remove in world ATMs.  While there is still plenty of doubt about whether LL means that third party exchanges are simply "not accredited" or in any way associated with LL, or that they are not permitted, the Lab's actions in the matter so far speak louder than their contradictory words.

For more details on this, including what a number of third party exchanges have done in response to the new policy, see:  http://www.hypergridbusiness.com/2013/05/lindens-no-outside-currency-trading/

Lashing Out

 A lot of us have a love/hate relationship going with our eyelashes in Second Life.  I'll give you a Brief History of the Lash here, and then a very Happy Ending!

At first, eyelashes were simply painted on, as part of your skin.  They still are, and in fact this is the simplest, easiest way to do your lashes in SL.  It takes up no attachment points, needs no adjustment, and looks good from either far away or close up.  A lot of us choose to let things go with that and just get on with our SLives.

Then there are makeup tattoos.  Some of these feature additional lashes or eyeliner.  But they are still painted on the avatar...they have no depth.

Next, came the invention of prim eyelashes -- well, actually these came before makeup tattoos...but they are a step up in complexity.  These consist of four prims, one for each eye's upper and lower lashes, and they have an eyelash texture painted on, with an alpha channel to make the non-lash parts of the prim invisible.  These are nice, but they have to be tediously edited to fit the curve of your lash line.  They are usually quite inexpensive.  But they also have a serious drawback...they don't blink when your eyelids do.  They can look very lovely, but it would really be nice to be able to flutter one's eyelashes.  Finally, because of the alpha channel in their texturing, they can exhibit "alpha channel conflict" with other transparent textures, producing some odd-looking effects from time to time. 

A minor variation of the four-prim lashes are sculpty eyelashes.  Aside from more flexibility in designing the lash curve, I don't see much difference between the two types.

So, someone then invented all-prim eyelashes.  Each lash is constructed from an individual micro-prim.  One prim for each little hair!  Astonishingly, I have never had a fitting problem with these, which is just as well because editing that many tiny prims one at a time would drive me insane.  The primary outlet I've found for all-prim lashes is Kimber Carter's CCD.  These lashes look absolutely stunning close up, but can start to look spikey when viewed from more than a meter or two away.  And they have the same non-blinking nature as the older four-prim eyelashes.

But NOW....wow.  Today I ran across...drumroll please...MESH EYELASHES!  I found these at Gaeline Creations when I was there looking for AO poses. 

They come with a set of lashes, and several eyeliner tattoos.  They come with an adjustment HUD, too.  Normally, I like to edit my attachments myself, but in this case the HUD made it easy to make little micro-adjustments and get the lashes fitting perfectly.  They have an option for texturing the lashes in different colors too, and saving your favorites as presets.  This set of lashes is going to be my current "go-to" item for eye enhancement!

Mesh Lash HUD

But there is one last development...the Mesh Avatar Head.  I don't yet have one of these, but if you are a HUD type of girl, you might look into it.  Wear the mesh head, and adjust all your makeup choices by HUD.  In addition, the eyes have a slooow, sexy blink that looks very attractive.  You are, of course, limited to the choices in both the shape of your facial features and your makeups that are provided by the head's creator, and the facial features will not respond to the standard SL facial emotion triggers for smiling, laughing, etc.

Here are some examples of the different eyelash types.  As with all the pictures I publish, click on one to get a larger view, and a slideshow!

 

Plain Old Painted On Lashes

Four-prim Eyelashes

Sculpty Lashes

Micro-prim Individual Lashes (CCD)

Mesh Lashes - My New Fave!

Seek, And Ye Shall Find

Today’s post is about finding things.  More specifically, nearby things. 

Oh sure, you can just look around yourself and see things.  But sometimes, that’s not enough.  An object might be hidden inside a wall or under the ground.  Or maybe it is a griefing object and it has deliberately been made hard to spot by its creator.  Or it is a tiny prize object that’s part of a hunt.  At times like these, it’s good to know that there are special tools that make it easier to find stuff!

View Transparent Objects.  The keyboard shortcut to toggle this feature on and off is CTRL+ALT+T.  When enabled, objects that are partly or completely transparent will be shown in red.

Particle Visibility.  An object spewing out smoke or other particles may be hard to see through all the fog!  You can toggle particle visibility off and on with CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+=.  (Yes, the last character is an “equals” sign.)  You can also open Preferences (CTRL+P), click the Graphics tab, and move the Particles slider to 0.

Beacons.  You can cause objects that have certain selected properties to display a “beacon” highlighting them.  Go to World/Show More/Beacons.  You can select objects that are running scripts, or emitting sounds, or…   For added visibility, you can cause a bounding box to be displayed around the object.  Beacons can be especially useful for finding very small objects that you might otherwise overlook.

Object Owner List.  If you own land, you can use a feature of the About Land window to find things owned by a specific person.  Right click the ground, and choose About Land.  Then click the Objects tab, and hit the Refresh button just above the list window.  You’ll see a list containing the names of each person who has objects on your land.  Left clicking one of the names will cause those objects to be highlighted in yellow in world.  If the objects are not supposed to be there, you can Return them to their owner with a simple mouse click.

Area Search.  If you use the Firestorm viewer, this is a great feature for cheating in hunts.  Go to World/Area Search.   You can give the search window clues such as part of the object’s name, or its owner, or creator.  Then you can left click one of the search results, and you’ll see a beacon in world highlighting where that object is.  If you don’t see the beacon, it may be behind you.  Turn around until you can spot it.

Chatty Objects.  A lot of lost vehicles, pets, and griefing objects will send out chat messages, or send you a private IM.  These messages will include a set of object coordinates, such as “Object ‘ExDepart’ owned by Lindal Kidd, Masocado 56, 125, 4024 has offered you inventory.  Accept/Decline/Mute?”  To find the object that’s sending the message, go to the coordinates given in the message.  If no region name is given, it’s in the region you are in.  Your own current X.Y, and Z coordinates are shown in the information bar at the top of your screen.  Coordinates within a region can range from 0 to 255 for X and Y position, and 0 on up for Z position…but you won’t find objects above 4096 m altitude, so consider that a practical limit.  Zero coordinates are always in the southwest corner of a region.

Buried Objects.  If an object is buried inside another object, there are several ways to see it, and to get it out.  You can cam inside solid objects with a careful use of the Alt key, the left mouse button, and a sidewise sweep of the mouse to swing your camera “past” the exterior of a wall (see this earlier post on camming).  If your viewer supports derendering, you can cause the obstructing object to vanish.  You can also check “Build/Hide Selected” and then select the obstructing object.  It will vanish, allowing you to then select the buried item.  (It will vanish too, when you select it, but it will remain selected and you can drag it out from its hiding place.)

If an object is buried beneath the ground, you may be able to cam under the surface to find it, just as you did with the wall.  Or, you can turn on the Advanced menu (CTRL+ALT+D) and go to Advanced/Rendering Types.  Turn off “ground”.  Now you can see your buried treasure!  While you are there, experiment with turning the other rendering types off and on.  Selective rendering can be a very useful tool.

These tools should help you find missing, invading, or embarrassing objects much more easily.  Embarrassing?  Oh yes, it can happen.  One of my friends lost a chatty set of genitals underneath her living room floor!  Isn’t virtual reality strange and wonderful?

See you next time!

Land: Buying, Leasing, and Renting

It's Back to Basics time today!  And today's topic is one that has caused much confusion even among experienced Second Lifers, because the terms used are slippery, and it's very common for two people to be using the same word to describe different things.

Yes, dear readers, I'm going to talk about virtual land again.

In one sense, all of the land in Second Life is owned by Linden Lab (it's their servers, after all) and only rented by us Residents.  But in SL terms, we usually think of the land "owner" as the resident who pays Linden Lab a monthly fee for the land.

On the Mainland, this is pretty straightforward.  If you buy the land, then you pay LL tier on it.  You are the "owner" and only LL can kick you off your land.  You can also RENT land on the mainland, paying another resident, the landlord, a weekly or monthly fee in $L.  In this case, the landlord is the owner, and has the power to kick you off if you don't pay on time or otherwise are a nuisance.

But then we come to Private Estates.  The only true "owner" of a Private region on SL is the estate owner, who pays a monthly fee to LL.  That fee is $295 USD per month, or $125 USD for a Homestead region.  If you are not paying LL this fee, you are not the true owner, you are only "leasing" the land from the estate owner.

It may appear that you are the owner.  When you leased the land, the estate owner probably called the transaction a "purchase".  You may be listed as the owner in About Land.  You may have full land management abilities...terraforming, setting object entry and build permissions, allowing some avatars and excluding others.  But unless you own the entire region, and are paying LL directly, YOU DON'T OWN THE LAND.  The Estate Owner does.  If there is a dispute between you, or the estate owner goes out of business, or the region is sold to another estate owner, you could find yourself kicked off your land with no notice.

That's the risk when you lease a land parcel from a private estate owner, and it's why you should research the owner before getting land on an estate.  How long have they been in business?  How many regions do they own?  What's the occupancy rate?  What's their reputation with their tenants and former tenants?  How well do they communicate with you and answer your questions?

A good estate owner can (and should!) make your land-owning experience on their estate pleasant.  A good owner will respond quickly to resolve problems, whether it's poor region performance, a griefer attack, or a dispute with a neighbor.  Estate owners are, after all, in competition with each other and with LL for your virtual land dollar.  It's a highly competitive business, and poor ones don't stay in business very long.  And that is the upside to owning land on an estate...an owner who is more responsive to your needs than Linden Lab.

The same could be said of Mainland landlords.  They have somewhat less control over their land compared to a Private Estate owner (they cannot re-start regions, for example, and must ask LL to do it) but on the other hand, Mainland locations offer direct access to large, connected areas of land and sea to explore.  Some mainland landlords are not responsive to tenants, while others work to make your stay on their land an enjoyable one.

You can, in fact, actually buy a whole region from an estate owner and become the new estate owner.  This can save you a lot of money over buying a private region directly from LL ($1,000 USD setup fee).  An estate owner anxious to get out from under may sell you his region for $500, $200, or even less.  Be sure that you use the proper procedure for this type of transfer.  DO NOT pay the estate owner directly.  Once you have agreed on a price, you both submit support tickets to LL, and you send the money to LL, who acts as the "escrow agent".  When the transfer is complete, you get the region and LL sends the money to the seller.  ANY OTHER transaction with an estate owner is not a true purchase...it's a lease.

Class dismissed.

Second Life Turns 10!

It's hard to believe, but Second Life has been around for a decade now.  Each year, a special event commemorates Second Life's birthday.

For most of the past celebrations, Linden Lab has been in overall charge of the event.  However, last year when LL announced that they would not be providing special regions for birthday events and exhibits, and were leaving any celebrations up to the Residents...the Residents responded in their usual gung-ho fashion and put on what was undoubtedly the best Second Life Birthday exhibition ever.

This year, they're doing it again!  There will be 20 regions of SL10B (woohoo!), and the theme is (appropriately enough) "Looking Forward, Looking Back".

The organizers are putting in an unbelievable amount of time to get this put together.  And if you want to be a part of SL10B, you can!  They need exhibitors, performers, volunteer helpers of all sorts.  Check it out on the SL10B website, http://slcommunitycelebration.com/

Even if you don't get actively involved, do be sure to visit the event.  It'll be open from June 16-29 (SL's official birthday is June 23).  This is perhaps the biggest annual demonstration of just what Second Life's residents have done, can do, and look forward to doing in the future.  It's an incredibly moving experience to see what people can do when they really put their minds to it.  Don't miss it!