Will Sansar replace Second Life ?

[ChinRey]

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wherorangi wrote:

We SLers gave lots of reasons why we might not move and where we think his (Ebbe Linden) thinkings are/were wrong

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Yes indeed but when it comes to this specific idea - Sansar as the big unified virtual world of the future - it's one that Linden Lab seems to have given up long ago. Ebbe mentioned it briefly in a thread here two years or mroe ago, was immediately told why it couldn't happen and as far as I know it has never been mentioned by any Linden since then.

[wherorangi]

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Parhelion Palou wrote:

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BTW, Ebbe once expected the world/experience owners to provide their own registration systems. I don't know if it's still the expectation, but I can see why a company would want to do its own registration. World/experience owners will advertise their own worlds on their own websites. LL may provide a directory, but with Sansar they're getting out of the business of dealing with the end user.

 

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from what little has leaked about Sansar I think it goes:

LL maintains a central depository of accounts.  We get one master account which is identified by a email address (and RL dets for a L$/USD financial account on our master) This account is confidential to LL

we can buy stuff thru this account on a Sansar Marketplace exclusively owned and operated by LL. And buy and sell L$ on a Lindex exchange same as now

under our master account we can create as many profiles as we like. A projection is that we would in some cases create a profile for each of the gamified or roleplay experiences/worlds created on the Sansar platform

a projection is that a experience provider can thru their own website provide a skin signup page for new users (same as how the community gateways work/worked). The new user tho be signed up to the central LL account repository but spawned/landed on the experience in the first instance 

a projection is that LL would not do any governance of avatars on a experience. That be the responsibilty of the experience owner. A similarity is SL estate management. All welcome initially with experience/estate-wide bans as necessary. Or if chosen then a whitelist (like for schools etc). All banned unless by invite. Similar to SL closed groups

a question is: When a Profile is experience-banned then will this apply to the master account or just to the profile

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the big question for SL creators who make clothes, accessories, furniture, stuff, etc and sell thru the Sansar marketplace is: When bought what provisions will LL put in place for when the stuff is hosted on a experience providers own systems ?

or are RL online shopping rules going to apply on the Sansar Marketplace similar to other 3D object online shops

 +

ps

another projection is that our inventory would also be maintained centrally by LL. Where the issue with stuff comes, is when the experience sims are hosted by a experience provider independent of LL servers

 

      

 

[ChinRey]

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Qie Niangao wrote:

At least in theory one of those virtual worlds created inside Sansar could

be

Second Life, or close enough to draw over enough SLers that SL itself folds.

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Maybe some day in the future but Sansar would need a serious upgrade before that happens. 4x4 km - 256 sims - that's a lot but hardly enough to fit anything resembling the whole of Second Life. They'll have to find a way to make far bigger environments than that.

But even if the technical issues are solved, there's still the question of who's going to run such a thing inside Sansar. Linden Lab won't do it themselves, they've already made that absolutely clear. If somebody else wants to create this Big, Big World, the minimum requirements would be:

1. Exclusive rights to key parts of the software
2. Full control over and exclusive rights to the user database
3. Extensive control over and exclusive rights to the inworld valuta
4. Extensive control over and considerable exclusivity for content
5. No vendor lock-in

I can't see how Sansar can possibly meet any of these requirements and none of them are negotiable.

[wherorangi]

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ChinRey wrote:

4x4 km - 256 sims - that's a lot but hardly enough to fit anything resembling the whole of Second Life. They'll have to find a way to make far bigger environments than that

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4k x 4k is a single sim on a 32bit server (24bit fp math). A 64bit server could do 48bit fp math. 16k x 16k. With say 16 sims per server thats a pretty big experience on just one server box  

[ChinRey]

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wherorangi wrote:

4k x 4k is a single sim on a 32bit server (24bit fp math).

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Not sure what you mean but that's a bit beside the point.

4x4 km is the biggest possible simulator (or whatever they call it) in Sansar and it is not possible to connect them in a grid. Each "simulator" is an isolated island and the only way to get from one to another is by teleporting (or whatever they call it).

[Bitsy Buccaneer]

That's not what I meant at all, Parhelion.

Let me try this again.

I think at some point in the future tech will improve to the point where VR is no longer cutting edge and an open SL style environment is possible. Not going to argue about how far in the future, but given how fast related technologies have progressed I don't think it's remiss to for a company like Linden Lab to be moving in that direction.

I think Sansar is where they are learning how to do that. This doesn't negate Sansar being a stand alone project and it doesn't say anything specific about a future relationship between Sansar and SL.

But I do think SL will want to keep us sandboxers around so we can populate an open VR world. If they trash SL, they would have to start over with that.

So basically I think SL will be here until it becomes VR. At which point, Sansar may be whatever comes after whatever comes after VR. As Qie said, SL may become one of those worlds in Sansar, or perhaps several of them that we can travel between. That level of speculation is fun, but the real question is whether or not were going to get booted from SL, right? I don't think we are.

[wherorangi]

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ChinRey wrote:

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wherorangi wrote:

4k x 4k is a single sim on a 32bit server (24bit fp math).

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Not sure what you mean but that's a bit beside the point.

4x4 km is the biggest possible simulator (or whatever they call it) in Sansar and it is not possible to connect them in a grid. Each "simulator" is an isolated island and the only way to get from one to another is by teleporting (or whatever they call it).

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LL never said this. What they said was that a sim can be virtually unlimited in size

what technical discussion there was about the meaning of virtually unlimited, was about the hard constraints of floating point math on a computer

meaning that 32bit float (single precision) math can lose to much precision when the bounds get above 4k. Stuff doesnt get placed accurately in the space

64bit float (double precision) math can do 16k and be accurate

to get a idea of how far 16k is, then is about from the top of the Blake Sea to Pounce in the south

thats a big space for a single sim

 

 

[ChinRey]

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wherorangi wrote:

LL never said this

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Oh yes, they did. From Inara Pey's transcription of Lab Chat #2:

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Ebbe Linden and JY (Jo Yardley) said:

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but hopefully, the size of the regions themselves will alleviate the need for that sort of attempt at smooth region crossings. Regions crossings are just a really difficult problem to solve, so we’re going to sort-of stay away from that, at least for the foreseeable future.

JY: When you say multiple kilometres, are we talking one or twenty or ..?

Well, one is not multiple.

JY: That’s true. So we’re talking two square kilometres at least.

Or twice that … Part of it is what’s feasible with the maths for a coordinate system, but that’s sort-of the upper range where things start to get funky to deal with. but yeah, think in those terms.

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Come to think of it, twice as much as two square kilometers, that's actually 2x2 km, not 4x4.

 

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wherorangi wrote:

What they said was that a sim can be virtually unlimited in size

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Yes, they were talking abut that very early in the process but keep in mind that the plans have changed drastically throughout the development process. What LL believed they could achieve two years ago may not hold true today.

[wherorangi]

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ChinRey wrote:

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wherorangi wrote:

LL never said this

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Oh yes, they did. From Inara Pey's transcription of Lab Chat #2:

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Ebbe Linden and JY (Jo Yardley) said:

...

but hopefully, the size of the regions themselves will alleviate the need for that sort of attempt at smooth region crossings. Regions crossings are just a really difficult problem to solve, so we’re going to sort-of stay away from that, at least for the foreseeable future.

JY: When you say multiple kilometres, are we talking one or twenty or ..?

Well, one is not multiple.

JY: That’s true. So we’re talking two square kilometres at least.

Or twice that … Part of it is what’s feasible with the maths for a coordinate system, but that’s sort-of the upper range where things start to get funky to deal with. but yeah, think in those terms.

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Come to think of it, twice as much as two square kilometers, that's actually 2x2 km, not 4x4.

 

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wherorangi wrote:

What they said was that a sim can be virtually unlimited in size

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Yes, they were talking abut that very early in the process but keep in mind that the plans have changed drastically throughout the development process. What LL believed they could achieve two years ago may not hold true today.

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read it again, what Ebbe said

Jo asked: at least 2k ?

Ebbe said: or twice that. Depends on whats feasible with the maths for a coordinate system, but that’s sort-of the upper range where things start to get funky to deal with. but yeah, think in those terms.

+

and they do get funky above 4 x 4 on a 32bit system. And funky above 16 x 16 on a 64bit system

the question then is why would a engineering team be building a project like Sansar on a 32bit computer ?

 

 

 

[Phil Deakins]

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Qie Niangao wrote:

To me, the whole business model seems irrationally optimistic about how big the market will be for the making of virtual world entertainments and other "experiences".

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I sincerely hope that that is an over-pessimistic point of view, but I do think that you are right, although it would probably depend on how the the pricing structure works. For instance, if the pricing of a Sansar world (experience) can be the equivalent of an SL sim, though not with the same 256x256 limitation (I don't mean the actual price), and if the owner's possibilities in such a world are a great deal more than in an SL sim, then each world could be paid for according to size, from very small to very large, and be expandable. Then it could attract such people as the estate builders that we have now in SL.

 

 

[ChinRey]

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wherorangi wrote:

read it again, what Ebbe said

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/me reads it again.

Let me see, Jo asks if they're talking about two square kilometers and Ebbe replies "or twice that".

Oh well, only one way to find out.

[Qie Niangao]

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Phil Deakins wrote:

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Qie Niangao wrote:

To me, the whole business model seems irrationally optimistic about how big the market will be for the making of virtual world entertainments and other "experiences".

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I sincerely hope that that is an over-pessimistic point of view, but I do think that you are right, although it would probably depend on how the the pricing structure works. For instance, if the pricing of a Sansar world (experience) can be the equivalent of an SL sim, though not with the same 256x256 limitation (I don't mean the actual price), and if the owner's possibilities in such a world are a great deal more than in an SL sim, then each world could be paid for according to size, from very small to very large, and be expandable. Then it could attract such people as the estate builders that we have now in SL.

 

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Yeah, I may underestimate an important customer base. When I page through Inara Pey's blog, I'm forever amazed at the number of full-sim (or Homestead) installations that are privately funded exhibition spaces -- sort of 3D homepages on a much grander scale than the typical SL "home". So there are clearly more folks than I'd otherwise expect, wanting to "blog" with virtual world environments.

And, as I understand the model, it will be way less expensive to do that in Sansar (as long as there aren't all that many visitors?).

Re: other discussions about scalability of Sansar experiences: I think they've answered this a few times. They've simply given up on the technical challenge of seamless cross-shard transport (such as SL region crossings), but they do intend to support portals, and these could be among (some) experiences or also across parts of a geographically distributed experience. There's also a whole "instancing" model so huge numbers of folks can attend parallel instances of "Sansar Hair Fair" simultaneously (but can you teleport a friend to the same instance you're attending?) I'm also not sure if there are plans for viewing into (static?) geography beyond the avatar's current location, or if it's more similar to void-surrounded islands.

[sirhc DeSantis]

There is no Sansar continent as I am sure others have pointed out.

I would expect you of all people to know it is known as Sansara.

http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/Sansara

 

Unless some cryto communist scriptkiddy  fangurlz changed history. Of course.

 

[Theresa Tennyson]

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Qie Niangao wrote:

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Parhelion Palou wrote:

Sansar won't turn into a big open world. That's not what it's meant to be. As Ebbe said, LL wants to be the Wordpress of virtual worlds. They want to provide the infrastructure that companies (or individuals) can use to create their own virtual worlds. Those customers are unlikely to want to have their worlds mashed together. Think Google, Microsoft, and Facebook would like to have their websites merged into a single one?

BTW, Ebbe once expected the world/experience owners to provide their own registration systems. I don't know if it's still the expectation, but I can see why a company would want to do its own registration. World/experience owners will advertise their own worlds on their own websites. LL may provide a directory, but with Sansar they're getting out of the business of dealing with the end user.

 

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At least in theory one of those virtual worlds created inside Sansar could

be

Second Life, or close enough to draw over enough SLers that SL itself folds. Sansar won't have the technology capable of supporting SL as we know it for "many" years, if ever, but I suspect that is nonetheless LL's plan for a graceful shutdown of SL, someday.

Thing is, I don't expect Sansar to succeed. To me, the whole business model seems irrationally optimistic about how big the market will be for the making of virtual world entertainments and other "experiences". A "Wordpress" to support the creation of such things only makes sense if there's a truly huge demand to create the things it will support.

There are a lot of blog writers. Will virtual world experiences really be a comparably popular medium of expression, ever?

The LL folks are, basically, game developers, so it's natural that they should see the world populated by folks craving to develop games. They're encouraged in this faith by the game engines supplying somewhat similar functionality -- not competition

yet

, but if Sansar actually uncovers a real market, how long would the Lab's first-mover advantage last?

Also, the whole thing reminds me of one of LL's most spectacular public failures -- yes, even worse than the initial Viewer 2 launch: The government and enterprise marketing of SL. The idea was that those big players really wanted to use and control their own virtual world environments, and wanted LL to provision and administer the technology, with those enterprise-class customers supplying users and mediating sign-up. Turned out the market was tiny and easy enough to satisfy with a few decrepit OpenSim installations.

Granted, day one Sansar will support easy web sign-up and initial access, clearing one hurdle for experience-providers. Easy or not, though, I question whether this roll-your-own-experience market can be hyped into the size and exuberance needed to turn Sansar into a viable business.

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The historical analogy I see to this question would be for people in England around 1600 to ask, "Will North American replace England?"

The short answer is no, because North America isn't a thing equivalent to a country like England. If individuals from England started moving to North America in 1600 there experience would be something like:

"So this is the New W... BEAR!!!" *GRARnomnomnomSMACKnom* [that last part courtesy of the bear.]

However, the Court of England did sense that North America could be useful someday, so instead of immediately opening it up to settlers they issued charters to people they thought could build and maintain something viable and those charter holders took care of bear control, etc., meaning the average settler would have a fighting chance.

These chartered colonies weren't exact copies of England, mind you, nor were they all the same  - Virginia was quite different from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and Rhode Island and Providence Plantations was founded for people who wanted to get the heck away from the Massachusetts Bay Colony, which was in turn founded for people who wanted to get the heck away from England.

However, the English colonies eventually decided they had enough in common despite their differences to combine into an independent group that in some ways acted like a single entity and the rest is history.

Meanwhile, England didn't go away either.

I think that any successor of Second Life that comes from Sansar genetics will follow a similar path. Doubtless some of the first places created in Sansar will be by people with Second Life experience and many of the initial "settlers" will be from Second Life too. That doesn't mean that it's going to be exactly the same as Second Life, but there will probably be strong influences in places. I'm betting Linden Lab thinks this way too, but they don't want to talk about it too loudly. Early charter holders in the New Virtual World are probably already in the closed beta program.

I've seen some SL veterans talking about the possibility of getting involved with Sansar and saying things like, "I'll wait to see what the avatars are like." Right now, those aren't the people Linden Lab is looking for. At this point they're looking for the ones who are already thinking, "Okay, the avatar should be like this."

 

[wherorangi]

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ChinRey wrote:

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wherorangi wrote:

read it again, what Ebbe said

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/me reads it again.

Let me see, Jo asks if they're talking about two square kilometers and Ebbe replies "or twice that".

Oh well, only one way to find out.

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yes. Is easy enough to kinda miss what he was talking about in the rest of his answer when we not a techie

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the comment about virtually unlimited came from another Linden way down somewheres in one of threads on here

what they said was that a 3D space can be virtually unlimited. That is not so much the size of the space that affects a sim.

is the precision of the coordinate system used, and then how much stuff can be put into a sim using this coordinate system before the sim falls over, that is the main determinant

 

[ChinRey]

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wherorangi wrote:

yes. Is easy enough to kinda miss what he was talking about in the rest of his answer when we not a techie

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We'll still see

The business related factors are more than enough reason why it's unlikely there'll ever be a "Second Life within Sansar" anyway. You'd have to be clinically insane to try to create something like that on a platform you don't control yourself.

[Perrie Juran]

When Ebbe first announced Sansar he did indicate there were a lot of unknowns.

The one thing that was clear and is something that I think we'd all agree on, SL as a platform has some severe limitations and problems and no amount of patching is going to fix them.  Hence, something new, built from the ground up was and is needed. 

So I think when you boil down everything Ebbe originally said that was the sum and substance of it.

[wherorangi]

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ChinRey wrote:

The business related factors are more than enough reason why it's unlikely there'll ever be a "Second Life within Sansar" anyway. You'd have to be clinically insane to try to create something like that on a platform you don't control yourself.

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no more crazy than the Chung lands empire is, or any other of the big SL estates. Like Red Hearts or USS etc

[wherorangi]

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Perrie Juran wrote:

 

So I think when you boil down everything Ebbe originally said that was the sum and substance of it.

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yes pretty much

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i just repeat here what I have said before just in case really

i am not on Sansar invite list and I dont know anyone who is. I just go off what little LL have said and then I guess/speculate what else it might be. Is more about what I think might be a way to do it than anything else

so hopefully people who read my burbles kinda take this into consideration and not put to much into what I might say/guess/speculate/make stuff up about all this

 

 

[Amethyst Jetaime]

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wherorangi wrote:

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Perrie Juran wrote:

 

So I think when you boil down everything Ebbe originally said that was the sum and substance of it.

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yes pretty much

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i just repeat here what I have said before just in case really

i am not on Sansar invite list and I dont know anyone who is. I just go off what little LL have said and then I guess/speculate what else it might be. Is more about what I think might be a way to do it than anything else

so hopefully people who read my burbles kinda take this into consideration and not put to much into what I might say/guess/speculate/make stuff up about all this

 

 

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I think most everything that's been said about Sansar is pretty much just speculation at this point, other than maybe some of the things (durn little) that LL has lately said.

[ChinRey]

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wherorangi wrote:

no more crazy than the Chung lands empire is, or any other of the big SL estates. Like Red Hearts or USS etc

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Oh yes, far more crazy. You can't compare it at all!

 

The SL Land Barons could capitalize on the existing infrastructure in SL and they could build their businesses over time. In Sansar yuo'll have to go all in right from the start, you have to do everything yourself and them moment you show any sign of succeeding, there'll be a myriad of copycats trying to steal your idea.

That being said, insane business plans is hardly something new, and although the pioneer doesn't stand a chance, it's a good chance one of the inevitable copycats can succeed

[wherorangi]

Anshe Chung was in at the start of the SL land expansion and grew her empire from there

the Red Hearts didnt get started until after the land peak had passed, and grew their empire in a falling market

and then there are people at the next level down like Prokofy who got into it at the start as well. And then people like yourself who came into it later

and then there is those who got into creating for sale stuff at the start and are still going, and those who came later and are still going as well

and also lots who fell out along the way

for sure is not easy to do business in any environment, but some people do. They do their sums, and then apply themselves and do ok out of it

there will be people who will see Sansar in a similar light. They will do their sums and apply themselves and will do ok out of it

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just another comment about if I was the boss of Sansar

i wouldnt open the doors piecemeal. Not like how SL did it in the beginning, or how HiFi are doing it again. Cloud Party as well

i would want a substantial number of experiences and outfits premade, and have all the support systems in place before I even invited people into open public beta

the reason I wouldnt do it piecemeal is that I would need to wow! you (the users) right from the first day the doors open, or I am going get a great big meh!

the meh! will be bc there has been so much hype generated about 3D and goggles and VR and etc etc in the last few years, that if it doesnt wow! immediately then it will fail. Meh! and maybe oneday somehow it will be awesome, wont be good enough

another reason for this is that Sansar is not a startup. Unlike SL was, Cloud Party was and HiFi is

LL not being a startup will deserve every meh! they do get if they are under-prepared to wow! when they open the door to the public

 

[Vivienne Schell]

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THEGOATOFMENDES wrote:

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 It's just the way technology works. Things change, old tech becomes obsolete, ditch it and move on...

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Well, it´s not a matter of technology.  It´s a matter of human behavior. If it were a matter of technology, we´d all be dead or never born, cause HEY, we have the neutron bomb!

[Vivienne Schell]

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Qie Niangao wrote:

 Yeah, I may underestimate an important customer base. When I page through Inara Pey's blog, I'm forever amazed at the number of full-sim (or Homestead) installations that are privately funded exhibition spaces -- sort of 3D homepages on a much grander scale than the typical SL "home". So there are clearly more folks than I'd otherwise expect, wanting to "blog" with virtual world environments.

And, as I understand the model, it will be way less expensive to do that in Sansar (as long as there aren't all that many visitors?).

.....

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True. As true as the fact that there are millions of "private homepages" on the 2D web, which aren´t good for anything but some kind of representation of the owner´s ego and go pretty unnoticed by the general public. Still, I doubt that LL can offer something resource hungry as a 3D VR server for about 5 dollars a month. Question is if someone will pay more than that for such a private project (Remember that Open Sim - another "private exhibition platform" - has more sims as SL has now, but only cause it does not exceed the 5 dollars fee a month, usually).

Question is where LL will go to: EIther another high tech 3D sightseeing show for the dedicated few, another business focused 3D environment or another more Second Life like, "world"-like, social but G-rated environment, or another platform for game developers of any kind. Hard to tell. But none of these models has the potential to replace Second Life.

[Theresa Tennyson]

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Vivienne Schell wrote:

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Qie Niangao wrote:

 Yeah, I may underestimate an important customer base. When I page through Inara Pey's blog, I'm forever amazed at the number of full-sim (or Homestead) installations that are privately funded exhibition spaces -- sort of 3D homepages on a much grander scale than the typical SL "home". So there are clearly more folks than I'd otherwise expect, wanting to "blog" with virtual world environments.

And, as I understand the model, it will be way less expensive to do that in Sansar (as long as there aren't all that many visitors?).

.....

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True. As true as the fact that there are millions of "private homepages" on the 2D web, which aren´t good for anything but some kind of representation of the owner´s ego and go pretty unnoticed by the general public.

Still, I doubt tat LL can offer something resource hungry as a 3D VR server for about 5 dollars a month

. Question is if someone will pay more than that for such a private project (Remember that Open Sim - another "private representation platform - has more sims as SL has now - but only cause it does not exceed the 5 dolars a month usually).

 

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Sansar won't have fixed "servers" - they'll use on-demand virtual machines on the Amazon cloud system. The idea of the "server" is what makes Second Life unscalable. A stand-alone virtual home - even one that occupies kilometers of "space" - that's visitable by a limited number of people at a time will have very little fixed overhead.