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Virtual Snail Mail?


Orwar
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   In the 'real world', the practice of writing physical letters has universally declined, as the convenience of mobile telephones and instantaneous electronic mail has made it practically obsolete - not that it stops some people from still doing it simply because it is a fun and affectionate means of communication. Just like pre-packaged frozen dinners hasn't made home cooking obsolete! 

   But what about SL? 

   Certainly, it being a virtual letter, it doesn't have that handwritten personality, or the physical attributes of, well, a physical letter. But does it have any virtues that still gives it charm, or perhaps even convenience?

   There is one particular scenario in which I'll compose a notecard rather than send an IM: people I don't know whether they are online or available. Whether it's store owners, or people reaching out through the forums, a notecard is more likely to find its way than a stray IM is, and it doesn't necessarily prompt any urgency in the recipient to reply with any immediacy. Besides it feels as if it better accommodates a more formal approach, you can better format a notecard than you can an IM - if you need to write rather a few words to explain a problem, or if you wish to add reasoning or just simply strew in some politeness (or perhaps a vivid description of what an absolute rotter the recipient is?), notecards certainly allow for doing so more elegantly than a tightly crammed wall of text would.

   Besides, whilst looking back into a chat log can be nostalgic, one does rather tend to accumulate quite a heap of chat history, which prohibits any precise navigation, usually. And if your hard drive burns, that's all gone. Unless you back up your chat logs in a cloud storage or a save stick . . . The thought strikes me as quite weird, though. But, finding old notecards from family, friends, or partners in your inventory when you're having a half-ahemmed go at some spring cleaning your inventory (composing this very post may well be the result of an alarmingly expedient procrastinating diversion thereof!) - well, there you have a window back to Valentine's of twenty-nineteen, or a love letter someone wrote you in twenty-sixteen that you had completely forgotten about. Or just finding you had, for some reason, saved your SL Christmas card list from twenty-eighteen - who was on there? Or an invitation to your sisters' birthday festivities the other year, which brings back how you asked someone to dance and promptly nodded off.

   People still bring that up on occasion. Friends who've been around for a long time by now, some whom you speak to on a daily basis, others that you communicate with more rarely, will reach out to say 'Wow, I just happened upon the notecard you wrote me before we became friends!'. 

   When I began composing the post, I was just going to ask whether people used notecards to communicate in a social capacity. After having seen where things went though, I'd like to add a recommendation: do it.

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I can imagine this being popular in vintage communities and it does give a sense of old world mystique.

I guess it comes down to the reasons why you are writing to people and them to you as well.  If you meet up with people a lot then you will catch up via chat, IMs, etc. and so a "letter" as may not seem necessary unless you feel there is something important, private and/or personal to impart with a sense that it will be kept for posterity and nostalgia.

This is the main reason modern life has almost killed the art of letter writing, we are obviously much more connected than we used to be and that connection is almost always instant and can be one-to-one or many-to-many even when not in SL.  As a consequence I think there are large sections of society that have never really written letters to anyone and so it wouldn't seem a natural thing for them to do.

I suspect more notecards are shared with chat/IMs recorded from other people for the purposes of discussing their latest dramas than for anything other than support purposes.

For myself, notecards are usually sent for support purposes.  I don't usually send or receive any socially.  All my IMs go to my verified email and I appear to be one of the lucky accounts where that is very reliable and so people can pretty much always reach me that way.  So someone would have to want to send me something they think I would want to keep.
 

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I actually like the idea of using notecards as virtual letters a lot.

Even though you are more likely to communicate with those closest to you frequently, as the previous reply said, and therefore, through IMs, I think sending a notecard every now and then could be something special. For example, if you happen to be online when that close friend/partner/etc. isn't, you could send them a notecard with a message that you may not say as casually as you would in an IM. An example of this could be: Hi their name here, I know we've been friends for awhile but I really appreciate _____ and how supportive you are...

Letters often serve a more formal purpose, but I think they can also be used to share deeper sentiments with someone. 

Before this post, it had never crossed my mind to send someone a notecard letter, but this post has certainly planted the idea in my mind. 

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Being a bit of an old fashioned fella, I've always liked the personal side of sending a hand written letter or even just leaving a note. As it's been mentioned, it's an art that has sadly faded in RL. In SL however, I can say, at least around our home, it's alive and well.  My wife and I have known each other for over and around 5 years or so, and have been together for almost 3. Every day since we became "us", I've written her at least two notes a day - one in the morning, after I go through the normal morning routine and before logging off, and one in the evening before logging off for the night. I always write her even if we've been on for hours.

 

I once asked her to tell me if she  ever gets bored with them, since I have a tendency to be long winded, or to have the "old man in a row boat with one oar" syndrome (wandering around though eventually getting to port). She said that would never happen, because no one has ever taken the time to do something like that, and she loves each one of them.  The notes sometimes are full of this and that, ramblings of the day and whatnot, or but can be short, depending on the day itself, in the either case it's just my way of letting her know I was thinking about her, and always make that know that I was.  Even when my net's been down, I've sat here at my pc waiting for it to come up and written her on text file then as soon as I could log on, copied it to an NC and sent it her way. To date I think she has close to 2K of them, but again she loves to get them, and I always want her to know whether we've been on for hours or don't get to see each other that day, I was thinking about her. 🙂 

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Greetings Orwar,

Your post makes a great point. The note cards are really wonderful and when someone takes their time to send you one it is a treasure in my eyes. To add to your point I would really like to see greeting cards in Second Life that folks could see on their screen without having to rezz them (sometimes those things can be up to 50 li ). Speaking of greeting cards what happened to those Orwar ? I very much enjoy sending them in RL and in SL but rarely hear back from people......aaahhhh to be old fashioned.

Best Regards,

Josephine

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31 minutes ago, Josephine Carissa said:

To add to your point I would really like to see greeting cards in Second Life that folks could see on their screen without having to rezz them (sometimes those things can be up to 50 li ). Speaking of greeting cards what happened to those Orwar ?

   I do make those on occasion, primarily Christmas. It's pretty easy to set up:

  • Take a picture
  • Rez a prim cube
  • Put the texture on the prim (I usually make all other sides blank or transparent)
  • Form the prim cube into the right dimensions (to match the picture's aspect ratio on one side, and making it thinner along the other side)
  • Write a notecard
  • Put the notecard in the prim, along with an unpacking script (i.e. one that on touch sends the notecard inside, as opposed to the silly unpackers most stores use that'll send you the script itself along with all other contents of the box)
  • Take the prim into your inventory and rename it appropriately
  • Right-click the object and attach to HUD, and select where you want it to be (usually centre). Make sure that it is rotated the right way around and that the size is what you want it to be
  • Send it out to whoever you like!

   Such a greeting card could also be rezzed by the recipient, and has no more than 1 LI.

   You also could use a texture changing script to flip the prim card, having one side as the picture, and the other as the text side with the text on a texture as well. I've also made my own mesh cards of the sort you fold (although in my case it was entirely static). It was 0.5 LI and UV'd so that I could fit both the front and back on a single texture (which is easy enough considering everything was squares) - no idea if I still have it anywhere, or whether I made it before I switched computer .. 

   But yes, it absolutely can be done, and to at least some extent is used. Another alternative is to just include a texture in a notecard - if you allow copy and mod on the texture, the recipient can even frame it if they'd like to.

   And of course, don't forget to sign it!

   voluptatem et dolorem / pax et concordia / Árs Fridr / Respectfully / Regrettably / Resentfully / Reprehensibly / Resolutely / Relievedly / Repulsedly / Redundantly
   - Orwar Furlgrimr, esq, desk, etc.
   Friday the nineteenth of March
   anno diaboli MMXXI
   Lost at sea off the coast of Bellisseria 

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In my first year in SL I got involved with a guy that couldn't be inworld very often and even when he was inworld, it would often be at times when I wasn't inworld. Thus, before he logged off, if I had not been inworld during his time, he would send me a notecard.  He would talk a bit about the things he had done, ask me misc questions, maybe suggest places for me to visit, etc...  Similarly, if he had not been inworld while I was, then I would send him a notecard just before logging out.  It was actually a wonderful way to stay in touch and up to date on each other until we could both be inworld at the same time again.

I used to send notecards to people that were in violation of the Linden Homes covenant, but more often than not that would just result in someone blasting me an IM about minding my own business.  I don't even bother with that anymore.   If I feel something is violating the covenant, then I simply AR it and let LL decide.

Thus, these days the only notecards I create are when I need support on something.

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4 hours ago, Josephine Carissa said:

Greetings Orwar,

Your post makes a great point. The note cards are really wonderful and when someone takes their time to send you one it is a treasure in my eyes. To add to your point I would really like to see greeting cards in Second Life that folks could see on their screen without having to rezz them (sometimes those things can be up to 50 li ). Speaking of greeting cards what happened to those Orwar ? I very much enjoy sending them in RL and in SL but rarely hear back from people......aaahhhh to be old fashioned.

Best Regards,

Josephine

I used to make my Christmas cards in Gimp as 1024x512 or 512x1024 textures and then give them out that way.  No inworld rezzing and still has that keepsake feel but best of all no land impact unless the recipient wanted to put it onto something.

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4 hours ago, Orwar said:
  • Take a picture
  • Rez a prim cube
  • Put the texture on the prim (I usually make all other sides blank or transparent)

I was thinking that one could handwrite a letter, then take a picture of that and put the texture on a prim cube.

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47 minutes ago, Talligurl said:

I was thinking that one could handwrite a letter, then take a picture of that and put the texture on a prim cube.

   Well . . . I'd have to figure out whether the recipient is cursive-compatible first.

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On 3/19/2021 at 6:55 PM, Orwar said:

   I do make those on occasion, primarily Christmas.

   anno diaboli MMXXI
 

Madison and I make our own Christmas cards every year, just the same, as a texture on a prim with a notecard-giver. 

Also "anno diaboli" made me laugh. 

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  • 1 month later...
On 3/18/2021 at 12:51 PM, Vicious Hollow said:

I once asked her to tell me if she  ever gets bored with them, since I have a tendency to be long winded, or to have the "old man in a row boat with one oar" syndrome (wandering around though eventually getting to port). She said that would never happen, because no one has ever taken the time to do something like that, and she loves each one of them.  The notes sometimes are full of this and that, ramblings of the day and whatnot, or but can be short, depending on the day itself, in the either case it's just my way of letting her know I was thinking about her, and always make that know that I was.  Even when my net's been down, I've sat here at my pc waiting for it to come up and written her on text file then as soon as I could log on, copied it to an NC and sent it her way. To date I think she has close to 2K of them, but again she loves to get them, and I always want her to know whether we've been on for hours or don't get to see each other that day, I was thinking about her. 🙂 

How charming is THAT?  She can see that she is foremost in your thoughts when she receives your notes.  The fact that you share ramblings, not just romantic or naughty thoughts is really lovely.  Does she reciprocate with notes as well, at least sometimes?  I remember reading that Ronald Reagan wrote letters to his wife Nancy nearly everyday or sent her little silly doodles.  They remained in love until the end.  There is something to that, I think.   

Wishing you both all the very best. 🙂   

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1 hour ago, kari Velvetleaf said:

How charming is THAT?  She can see that she is foremost in your thoughts when she receives your notes.  The fact that you share ramblings, not just romantic or naughty thoughts is really lovely.  Does she reciprocate with notes as well, at least sometimes?  I remember reading that Ronald Reagan wrote letters to his wife Nancy nearly everyday or sent her little silly doodles.  They remained in love until the end.  There is something to that, I think.   

Wishing you both all the very best. 🙂   

Thanks 🙂 and yes there is something to that without doubt! 

She has replied before, usually by offline, on the rare times I wasn't on when she was. She always says she's no good with words, which I think the way she expresses herself is nothing shy of brilliant. I asked her again recently, if she was getting bored with the notes, and she said to me "Mr. Hollow, you worry too much!"...and saying again I can count on that never happening. 😁  

Edited by Vicious Hollow
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On 3/18/2021 at 6:53 AM, Orwar said:

When I began composing the post, I was just going to ask whether people used notecards to communicate in a social capacity. After having seen where things went though, I'd like to add a recommendation: do it.

People could put out mail boxes that would allow others to drop notecards in. They've been on the MP for years. Some are a bit fancier than others and you can restrict access but then you'd never get that really heart warming one from that secret admirer or the friendly drive by bomber that drops one off just to say hi! someone knows you're alive!

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1 minute ago, Silent Mistwalker said:

People could put out mail boxes that would allow others to drop notecards in. They've been on the MP for years. Some are a bit fancier than others and you can restrict access but then you'd never get that really heart warming one from that secret admirer or the friendly drive by bomber that drops one off just to say hi! someone knows you're alive!

   Yes, I've built myself mail boxes before. It's pretty easy, all you need is a script in a prim that allows people to drop notecards into it, then you can go and grab them! 

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4 minutes ago, Orwar said:

   Yes, I've built myself mail boxes before. It's pretty easy, all you need is a script in a prim that allows people to drop notecards into it, then you can go and grab them! 

I suggested MP for those who can't script, like me. lol

The Postman rides again!

Yes, I watched it again recently.  🤭

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1 hour ago, Silent Mistwalker said:

I suggested MP for those who can't script, like me. lol

   I saw something on the MP the other week that I thought curious .. Trash bins, that people can ride around and collect. Would be fun if someone built a Bellisseria post office to distribute mail or something! 

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1 hour ago, Orwar said:

   I saw something on the MP the other week that I thought curious .. Trash bins, that people can ride around and collect. Would be fun if someone built a Bellisseria post office to distribute mail or something! 

It wouldn't have to just be Bellisseria. It could include the whole grid.

Trash bins? (Second) Life is messy! Clean it up!

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