Virtual Goods Panel

Posted on September 28, 2009 by Apollo Manga
Metanomics virtual goods panel

Linden Lab CEO Philip Rosedale and Chief Product Officer Tom Hale were joined recently by Second Life residents Harper Beresford and JeanieSing Trilling in a mixed reality panel at the Virtual Goods Conference in San Jose, California. Hale and moderator Robert Bloomfield of Cornell University were in San Jose while Rosedale, Beresford, and Trilling were in Second Life at the Metanomics Main Stage. The event was telecast by TREET.TV and could be watched both in world and on the Web. Live chat allowed Web viewers to talk among themselves and to ask questions of the panelists.

Trilling, an animator and scripter in Second Life who taught herself LSL and had never done any programming before joining Second Life, is a music teacher living in a small Pennsylvania town, population 400, that’s an hour from the nearest shopping mall. She said that there are many rural people like her in Second Life, and that for them, a virtual world provides easy access to live concerts and a social life that wouldn’t be otherwise available. She said it’s particularly valuable to her because as a mother of a four year old, getting away isn’t always easy, and that the social aspects of Second Life are "wonderful".

Hale added that Second Life has been a boon for parents, who can now "step out" after the kids are in bed, without leaving the house.

When Bloomfield asked Linden whether the demographics of Second Life are what he was expecting when he created it, he replied that he had no expectations. He was simply doing what he enjoyed and seemed right. He said that there has been too much stereotyping of Second Life residents, and that the standard deviation is too broad to make generalizations about the typical Second Life resident. He did say that there is one common denominator: they have free time to spend.

The lawsuit that Stroker Serpentine filed against Linden Lab recently was doubtlessly on everyone’s mind, but was never mentioned, at least while I was able to hear (connection problems cause me to lose about a quarter of the hour long discussion). Tom Hale spoke of the inherent difficulty of balancing the goal of an open platform against the responsibility to protect intellectual property rights and proposed a registry of trusted sellers as a first step. Audio problems caused me to lose much of this very important discussion.

Hale also discussed how Linden Lab manages the value of the Linden, Second Life’s unit of currency exchange, to prevent excessive inflation or deflation, and mentioned that there are serious currency traders in Lindens, some of them surprisingly young. He also reminded people that when they buy or sell Lindens on the Lindex, Linden Lab is not doing the buying or selling. The Lindex is an exchange, like a stock or currency exchange, in which sellers and buyers agree upon a price.

According to the Treet.tv website, the video of the conference will be archived and available to viewing within 24 hours. You can get more information at the Treet.tv website, and you can get more information about the conference from the Second Life blog.


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A billion hours in Second Life

Posted on September 28, 2009 by Apollo Manga
Users have spent a billion hours in Second Life

Linden Lab announced in a press release last week that Second Life users have logged over a billion – that’s 1,000,000,000 – hours in world. That’s the equivalent of 114,000 years! Users came from over 200 countries – over sixty percent are outside the United States. User hours grew 33% in the 2nd quarter of 2009 over the year before, and users log on for a total of 40,000,000 hours every month.

Those aren’t the only mind-boggling numbers. Linden Lab also reported that transactions between users in Second Life now total over US$1,000,000,000 and that the Second Life economy grew 94% in one year from the 2nd quarter of 2008 to 2009. Transactions between users are now averaging US$50,000,000 per month, and that total user transactions should reach a half billion US dollars this year.

How much time do you typically spend in Second each time you log on? If you’re average, you spend an hour and forty minutes in world. If you’ve created anything in Second Life, you’ve contributed to the 270 terabytes of user-generated content, a number that is doubling every year. A terabyte is a million megabytes!

Can you guess how many words are typed in Second Life chat every day? If you guessed 600,000,000, you guessed right. How do people type 600,000,000 words per day? By typing 1,250 IMs per second.

Did you know that total land area in Second Life is now roughly equivalent to land area of the US state of Rhode Island? That’s what Linden Lab asserts. The total land area in Second Life is now two billion square meters.

You can read the full press release at lindenlab.com/pressroom/releases/22_09_09.


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Lawsuit against Second Life

Posted on September 28, 2009 by Apollo Manga
Second Life avatar Stroker Serpentine
Stroker Serpentine (Kevin Alderman)

Can a plumbing company CEO become a millionaire by selling sex toys in a virtual world? Yes, Kevin Alderman has and earlier this month his real world company Eros LLC, along with Shannon Grei, filed a class action lawsuit against Linden Lab, owner of Second Life.

Alderman, whose avatar name is Stroker Serpentine, sells sexual animations and related objects in Second Life under the trademarked brand name SexGen and are, he asserts, among the most popular in Second Life. Grei manufactures clothing in Second Life.

The lawsuit accuses Linden Lab not only of taking inadequate action against those who violate the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) by copying and reselling merchandise created and sold by others, even when it’s been trademarked or copyrighted, but of actually profiting from the infringements. The complaint alleges that although "Linden Lab may ban a Resident who is observed using CopyBot,… it will not ban a user for simply uploading or even selling copied content. In this case, Linden Lab’s enforcement is limited to that required by the "safe harbor" provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act", which requires filing a real-world lawsuit" and that few businesses in Second Life have the means to file such a lawsuit. The suit alleges that sometimes filing for DMCA protection within Second Life is actually counterproductive because the infringer will file a countersuit. Sometimes in fact, infringers will "threaten rights-holding merchants with the release of their protected assets for free if they file DMCA claims against their infringers."

Software such as CopyBot, BuilderBot, and CryoLife have been problems for merchants and artists in Second Life for some time. What are Linden Lab’s responsibilities, if any, in cracking down on them and protecting intellectual property rights of people who create merchandise and other objects in Second Life? The DMCA provides "safe harbor" status to service providers to protect them against the actions of their customers. Does "safe harbor" status apply to Linden Lab? And even if it does apply, is it adequate protection for those whose intellectual property rights have been infringed? The lawsuit complains that it is not sufficient, because it requires filing a real world lawsuit against the infringer.

Linden Lab has twenty days to respond. We can expect to know more in early October.

You can get more information about the lawsuit from The Alphaville Herald, Wired.com, and FindLaw.com. You can get information about a lawsuit that Kevin Alderman filed in 2007 against alleged infringers at Out-Law.com and you can read the full text of the current complaint against Linden Lab at The Alphaville Herald. As of this writing, Mr Alderman’s store in Second Life and his three websites are all offline, but his merchandise can found at kiosks in several locations in Second Life.


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Mixed Reality

Posted on September 28, 2009 by Apollo Manga
Ursula Le Guin appearing at a Second Life mixed reality event

An article on Friday by Des Moines Second Life Music Examiner Jen Harvey raises an important issue: the growing reality of mixed reality.

If you don’t know what mixed reality is, don’t feel badly. It’s going to be a huge factor in our lives in coming years, but so far few people know what it is, and even many of those who’ve experienced it don’t know what it’s called.

Mixed reality is what results when virtual worlds and the physical world is combined. One form it can take is an event like the one Jen Harvey writes about, where a musical performer plays in the physical world for an audience of humans while the performer’s avatar performs in a virtual world for an audience of avatars.

Another event is the one in the picture. In this March 2009 event, which you can read about here, famed author Ursula Le Guin was reading from her work at the Potlatch conference in Sunnyvale, California. Simultaneously in this mixed reality event, video of her reading was streamed into Second Life on two screens before a crowd of avatars. Avatars in Second Life were able to ask questions and Mrs. Le Guin answered them and was able to see the Second Life scene on a monitor in Sunnyvale.

The medium is only beginning to be explored. Some potential uses are for demonstrations at trade shows, classes with students who are both in the physical and a virtual world, and international appearances, such as when President Obama was recently beamed into Second Life from Ghana and was followed by a question between experts and an avatar audience. This writer wrote about the event in two articles, the speech and the interviews that followed.

Another example was Ray Kurzweil‘s appearance last month at the Second Life Community Convention in San Francisco. He wasn’t physically at the convention, but was in Second Life while convention goers in the St Francis Westin’s Grand Ballroom watched him on projection screens. This writer wrote about it here. In addition, many of the conference workshops were themselves mixed reality, with avatars in Second Life able to watch the San Francisco event and in some cases ask questions.

Mixed reality is still in its infancy. If you haven’t experienced it yet, you will. It’s coming and it’s going to be a huge factor in our lives.


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Using multiple Second Life viewers simultaneously – part 4

Posted on September 28, 2009 by Apollo Manga
Multiple avatars looking at multiple computers

In this picture, multiple avatars logged onto a single computer ponder the problem of using multiple avatars logged onto multiple computers. We discussed these options in Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of this series.. One thing we haven’t yet discussed is the most basic: why would anyone want to use several avatars simultaneously?

If you already know, you can stop reading here, but if you don’t, read on. This column is for you. The following are some situations in which this writer has found using multiple multiple avatars simultaneously to be essential:

Photography: Often when you do photography, you need subjects. If you need more than one avatar in your shot, you either need to round up other people’s avatars to be subjects, or log on simultaneously with different avatars. This is often easier than coordinating with several other people. It can also be a convenient way of getting pictures from different angles without continually changing your camera position.

Machinima: Just as with photography, when making a machinima, it can be easier to use one or more viewers for camera control, as well as for controlling multiple avatars.

Multiple events: Sometimes there are two events you need to be at simultaneously. By logging on simultaneously as two avatars, you can be at both events at the same time. This can be particularly useful when you want to record transcripts or take photographs at one event while being active at another event. It allows you, for example, to record and save to a file the transcript of one meeting while simultaneously taking active part in a different meeting somewhere else in Second Life.

Comparing viewers: If you want to compare features of various viewers, it’s easiest if you have them all open at the same time.

Building: It can be useful to have your Second Life camera trained on an object from several angles while building, and especially when aligning prims.

There are other uses as well; these are just the situations in which this writer has found multiple viewers to be extremely useful.

The other parts in this series are:
Part 1: Four ways of running multiple viewers and avatars simultaneously
Part 2: Videos and more details about running multiple viewers and avatars on a single computer
Part 3: Running multiple viewers and avatars on multiple computers with a KVM switch.


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Using multiple Second Life viewers simultaneously – part 3

Posted on September 28, 2009 by Apollo Manga
Using multiple Second Life viewers on multiple computers

In Part 1, we discussed using multiple computers to use multiple Second Life avatars and viewers simultaneously. It has the advantage of having a much lower impact on computer performance than using a single computer, but also has two major disadvantages:

1. Expense: If you’re not using laptops, you could have the additional expenses of buying additional monitors and keyboards (and additional speakers if the audio will be different in each viewer).

2. Logistics: Even if you don’t have to buy additional monitors and keyboards, running Second Life on multiple computers is still a logistical nightmare. Most people don’t have room on their desks for three or four laptops or monitors and keyboards, and switching between them can be a hassle.

There’s a solution: a KVM switch. This device allows you to control several computers simultaneously with a single keyboard and monitor. Some KVM switches also allow you to use a single set of speakers. With the KVm switch, your hands never need leave your keyboard. With a few keystrokes, control switches to another computer. It can work really well.

This writer uses an IOGEAR Four Port USB KVM Switch (model GCS634U). There are other companies making similar products. I haven’t tested them, so I can’t recommend one over the other, but the IOGEAR has worked well for me. Be sure to read reviews carefully before deciding which one to buy.

If running multiple viewers simultaneously isn’t affecting the performance of your computer, then there’s no point in using a multiple computer setup. But if you’re running more than two viewers simultaneously or if you’re doing something that’s resource-intensive, such as making a machinima, then using multiple computers with a KVM switch may work better for you.

The other parts in this series are:
Part 1: Four ways of running multiple viewers and avatars simultaneously
Part 2: Videos and more details about running multiple viewers and avatars on a single computer
Part 4: Why on earth (ok, virtual Earth!) would someone want to run multiple viewers and avatars simultaneously?

You can get information about where to download alternate Second Life viewers at wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Alternate_viewers#Third-party_Viewers.


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Using multiple Second Life viewers simultaneously – part 2

Posted on September 28, 2009 by Apollo Manga
Scene from Torley Linden video

In Part 1, you learned several ways to log several avatars onto Second Life simultaneously on a single computer. Now, in Part 2, you’ll learn how to set the target so you can run multiple instances of the viewer simultaneously, and you’ll see it demonstrated in two videos by Torley Linden, one for Windows and one for the Mac.  This picture is a scene from the Windows video.

To run several instances of the viewer simultaneously, you need to add "-multiple" to the target line. To do this, take the following steps:

1. Right click the shortcut on your desktop and left click "Properties"
2. Under the Shortcut tab, put your cursor on the "Target" line and use the right arrow key to move to the end of the line.
3.Add a space to the end of the line and then after the space, type "-multiple"

That’s it! With the current version of any of the viewers mentioned above, you’ll be able to log on as many avatars simultaneously as your computer supports.

There is one problem, however. The next time you install an updated version of the viewer, the shortcut will be replaced and you’ll have to add "-multiple" all over again. You can get around this by renaming the shortcut. This can be done either by right clicking the short cut and left clicking "Rename", or by opening the shortcut Properties tab as described above and typing a new name on the first line. For example, I’ve renamed my standard Second Life viewer shortcut to "Second Life – multiple". Doing it this way, you will be able to continue using the shortcut without changes after you install updated viewers.

One note: if you run multiple copies of the same viewer simultaneously, Voice will work only on the first one. Also remember that each copy uses system resources and will slow your computer.  Using several computers will usually result in better performance than using a single computer.

Here is the Windows video:

 

Torley Linden has also made a version telling how to run multiple instances of the viewer on a Mac:

The other parts in this series are:
Part 1: Four ways of running multiple viewers and avatars simultaneously
Part 3: Running multiple viewers and avatars on multiple computers with a KVM switch.
Part 4: Why on earth (ok, virtual Earth!) would someone want to run multiple viewers and avatars simultaneously?

You can get information about where to download alternate Second Life viewers at wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Alternate_viewers#Third-party_Viewers.


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Using multiple Second Life viewers simultaneously – part 1

Posted on September 17, 2009 by Apollo Manga
Five Second Life avatars logged onto a single computer

It’s common for Second Life members to have multiple avatars, but many don’t know that they can easily have several of their avatars logged on simultaneously. When you try to log on with a second avatar, you get an error message that Second Life is already running.

Nonetheless, it is possible. There are at least four ways for you to log on more than one avatar simultaneously. The picture is proof. These are five avatars logged on simulaneously on a single computer.  The Second Life version of Mexico’s Chichen Itza pyramid is behind them.

The following applies to Windows PCs. I haven’t tested any of this on Linux or Mac systems. If you’re a Mac user, read Part 2 of this series; it contains a video showing how to do it on a Mac. The four ways on a PC to log on multiple avatars are:

Multiple Computers: The obvious way is to use multiple computers. If you have a laptop and a desktop computer, you can have two avatars logged on simultaneously, one on the desktop and one on the laptop.  The big advantage to this method is performance.  Running several avatars on a single computer will impact its performance a lot more than running each avatar on a separate computer.

USB external hard drive: A less obvious way is to start a separate instance of Windows as a subprocess. You can do this using an external USB drive with Mojopac installed. It’s not an ideal solution because of the performance penalty of using USB, but it works. You can have Second Life installed on both the computer and on the Mojopac hard drive and log on two avatars simultaneously. I’ve done it and it works. There may be others ways to do it other than with MojoPac; MojoPac is the one I’ve used.

Multiple Viewers: Use multiple Second Life viewers. For example, in addition to the standard Second Life viewer, I have the Greenlife Emerald, Imprudence, Meerkat, RealXtend, and Snowglobe viewers installed on my computer. I can run all of them simultaneously, each with a different avatar log on (although I can’t run the Second Life and Snowglobe viewers simultaneously without taking the step mentioned in the next paragraph).

Multiple Instances of One Viewer: The multiple viewers method works but is not officially supported by Second Life. The officially approved – and the easiest – way is to add "-multiple" to the target line in the shortcut. It works with the standard Second Life viewer and with the Greenlife Emerald, Imprudence, Meerkat, RealXtend, and Snowglobe viewers (I haven’t yet tested it with other viewers).   You’ll learn how to do it in Part 2 of this series, where you’ll also be able to watch a video showing how.

This is the first of a  four part series; the other parts are:

This is the first of a  four part series; the other parts are:
Part 2: Videos and more details about running multiple viewers and avatars on a single computer
Part 3: Running multiple viewers and avatars on multiple computers with a KVM switch.
Part 4: Why on earth (ok, virtual Earth!) would someone want to run multiple viewers and avatars simultaneously?


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University of Texas’ major move into Second Life

Posted on September 16, 2009 by Apollo Manga
University of Texas

Colleges and universities are experimenting with ways to use Second Life to enhance their educational offerings and recently this column featured the program at Texas State Technical College that allows students to earn an AA degree with classes taken entirely in Second Life. Now the University of Texas has announced a worldwide first – the move of a state-wide university system into Second Life.

Current planning calls for all 16 University of Texas campuses to be represented in an archipelago of at least 49 islands in a one year experiment, the Virtual Learning Community Initiative (VLCI). The goals include creating a "virtual learning community of students, faculty, researchers and administrators," and transforming "the learning experiences and opportunities for individual undergraduate students." The University expects to allocate three islands per campus, and four islands for collaborative use.

Among the goals for the project are to enrich the learning experience while reducing brick-and-mortar costs, improving energy efficiency, and developing a model that will be useful for other state-wide systems. The University will be working closely with Linden Lab to develop the new program and to collect data on successful ways of using Second Life that will be shared with educators and similar systems, and has announced eleven objectives for measuring its success.

You can learn more about the University of Texas Virtual Learning Community Initiative at tuelearningcommunity.com/vlci.


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Debugging Second Life performance problems

Posted on September 15, 2009 by Apollo Manga

Your avatar tries to walk, but goes nowhere, then after finally making some progress suddenly gets whipped backward. If it continues happening, what should you do?

Problems like this are examples of lag, and can be caused by either the Second Life server, your network connection, your computer, or your Second Life Preference settings. This article will survey some basics of what you need to know to diagnose the problem, and will provide links to sources of more complete information.

Before getting into diagnosis tools and procedures, there are some basic questions to ask:

- Do you have a dial-up or satellite internet connection? If so, there may be little you can do to get satisfactory performance. Second Life requires a minimum of a dsl or cable internet connection.
– Does your computer meet minimum requirements to run Second Life? These vary depending on your hardware and operating system; you can look up minimum requirements for your system on the system requirements page. Bear in mind that you’ll require more than minimum requirements for a rich Second Life experience.
– Are you using a wired or wireless internet connection? Second Life allows but does not support wireless. In many or most cases a wireless connection may work satisfactorily, but if you’re having problems, first try connecting your computer to the internet with a wired connection before doing further diagnosis.

After you’ve eliminated those possible causes of your performance problems, you can move on to other possible causes. One key piece of information you’ll need is where you’re experiencing the problem and whether others are also experiencing it. Try teleporting to several unrelated sims. If you have the same problem in all sims, you can probably eliminate the server as a source of the problem. If no one else is experiencing the problem and you experience it in several different sims, then the problem is probably in your computer or your internet connection.

Second Life now has a handy tool for helping to isolate the cause of your problem. It’s the Lag Meter. You can open in by clicking the Help menu and selecting "Lag Meter". It’s shown in the picture above. All three buttons should be green. If any are orange or red, then there’s a problem, with red problems being the more serious.

Client button: "Client" refers to the Second Life software (the Second Life viewer) running on your computer. If the Client button is orange or red, it indicates a problem with your client, probably in your Second Life Preferences settings. Some settings to look at are your Graphics draw distance, putting a check mark next to "Avatar Imposters", turning off particles, and setting the Avatar Mesh slider to a lower setting. You can get more options in the links provided at the end of this article.

Network Button: This indicates a problem with your internet connection. Possible causes include your router, your ISP, your antivirus and firewall software, and other programs running while you’re in Second Life. If you’re having network problems, then clearing your Second Life cache may help. You can clear your cache by clicking Edit/Preferences/Network and then clicking the Clear Cache button.

Server Button: This indicates the problem may be on the Second Life server running the sim that you’re in. The problem is not necessarily the server itself. There may be too many scripts running, or too many avatars in or looking into the sim.

Here are some links for getting more information and for reporting problems:

Information about using the Lag Meter

If you’re technically minded, the Statistics Bar (you can select it from the View menu) can be very useful. Read about it here.

If you read these links and explore the Knowledge Base but can’t find an answer, you can get information about filing a trouble ticket or chatting with support. Note that only Premium and Concierge Second Life members can file trouble tickets. Basic members can learn what support services they qualify for here.

The following video will give you information about using the Lag Meter.

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