Professions in SL

[Akane Nacht]

Cosplay store co-owner (it's still around) and around 2009 I spent several months as a dojo police (samurai swordfighting dojo. I kept griefers away). The latter was unpaid, I just enjoyed the power 😎

 

[Eddy Vortex]

14 hours ago, Rolig Loon said:

I tried my hand at creating clothing, back in the prim/flexi days. I had a shop that moved around two or three times and finally went to Marketplace about the time that mesh took over. None of that was commercially successful, but it was fun. During that same period I served as head reference librarian for the oldest library in SL. I had fun developing materials, including scripting a lot of educational displays and research tools, and I coordinated volunteer services. For most of my 15 years in SL, though, I have been a scripter. I've written scripts and collaborated with some of the major designers and builders in SL, but these days, I script largely for myself and do little commercial scripting.

What's the name of the library and is it still around?

[Jordyn McGregor]

Editor in Chief of two SL magazines.  I did it for 5 years.

[Conifer Dada]

I used to create things for myself and if I liked them I'd put them for sale on my land, in shops or on SL marketplace.  I tried my hand at making mesh things in Blender but I realised that it would need a huge investment of time and effort to become expert so I dropped by the wayside on that.  In the very early days I did a bit of land 'flipping' but only for the purpose of trading up until I got a 512m plot, which was the largest you could have tier-free at that time.  SL land was very expensive in those days compared to now, I'd say at least ten times as expensive.  Then came the great land price crash. 

Edited July 23, 2022 by Conifer Dada

[Maitimo]

I've been host and event/DJ manager at Chiaroscuro since the owner passed away in October, so that's 9 months. My only other previous job was a club dancer/stripper and that was years and years ago, I don't even remember how long I did it for, but I'd guess at somewhere between 6 and 12 months, until the region was closed down.  Both jobs are/were for tips only.

Good lord, organising DJs is hard work, especially when I need them to tell me what theme they're doing, six days before the event, so I can publish a poster for it.

Edited July 23, 2022 by Maitimo

[Rolig Loon]

9 hours ago, Eddy Vortex said:

What's the name of the library and is it still around?

Community Virtual Library (CVL), which once spanned 15 regions, downsized as educational discounts were removed in 2010. I have not worked with them since 2014, although I still attend occasional social events at their current home on Cookie. Some of my closest friends in SL today are people I met at CVL during my first weeks in 2007. Most are (or were) professional librarians in RL, determined to expand information science into virtual worlds. I credit them for giving me a home and purpose while I was finding my way in SL, and for giving me a much greater appreciation for libraries.

[Eddy Vortex]

10 hours ago, Rolig Loon said:

Community Virtual Library (CVL), which once spanned 15 regions, downsized as educational discounts were removed in 2010. I have not worked with them since 2014, although I still attend occasional social events at their current home on Cookie. Some of my closest friends in SL today are people I met at CVL during my first weeks in 2007. Most are (or were) professional librarians in RL, determined to expand information science into virtual worlds. I credit them for giving me a home and purpose while I was finding my way in SL, and for giving me a much greater appreciation for libraries.

Many thanks! I can't believe I haven't heard of this place in all my rezzed days.  I will definitely swing by and check them out.

Edited July 24, 2022 by Eddy Vortex

[Scylla Rhiadra]

4 hours ago, Rolig Loon said:

Community Virtual Library (CVL), which once spanned 15 regions, downsized as educational discounts were removed in 2010. I have not worked with them since 2014, although I still attend occasional social events at their current home on Cookie. Some of my closest friends in SL today are people I met at CVL during my first weeks in 2007. Most are (or were) professional librarians in RL, determined to expand information science into virtual worlds. I credit them for giving me a home and purpose while I was finding my way in SL, and for giving me a much greater appreciation for libraries.

I remember that. And JJ Drinkwater's one at Caledon.

At one point, SL was crammed to gills with libraries. One of the reasons I chose to open a "bookstore" rather than a library (my books were mostly L$1 each, as a token payment) was because I didn't want to seem to be pretending to be a librarian in a virtual world that was swarming with real ones.

I had a lovely friend whom I think you knew, Rolig -- Teachergirl Razor -- who also set up the libraries at Berlin and on my own SLLU sim. I knew her in RL: she was one of the people who brought me to SL in the first place. She retired about 5 years ago, and very sadly, died in January. I renamed the SLLU library after her.

[Rolig Loon]

34 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

I remember that. And JJ Drinkwater's one at Caledon.

At one point, SL was crammed to gills with libraries. One of the reasons I chose to open a "bookstore" rather than a library (my books were mostly L$1 each, as a token payment) was because I didn't want to seem to be pretending to be a librarian in a virtual world that was swarming with real ones.

I had a lovely friend whom I think you knew, Rolig -- Teachergirl Razor -- who also set up the libraries at Berlin and on my own SLLU sim. I knew her in RL: she was one of the people who brought me to SL in the first place. She retired about 5 years ago, and very sadly, died in January. I renamed the SLLU library after her.

Yes, and JJ is still around. In the years before 2010, there were enough libraries in SL (and they changed often enough) that we had to maintain a catalog in CVL to keep track of where they all were and who was in charge.  CVL itself was maintained by a series of grants from ALA and other organizations interested in exploring information science opportunities.  We had themed regions that offered gateways into different literary genres or historic periods. I managed Only Yesterday, which explored literature of the Depression era, for example.  When LL decided to remove subsidies for educational outfits and non-profits, grants -- which commonly expected some sort of in-kind match -- dried up. Teachergirl Razor participated in several of our projects, but was more committed to her own libraries. I remember scripting a few features for her. I lost track of her many years ago. I'm sorry to hear that she died.

Edited July 23, 2022 by Rolig Loon
typos. as always.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

22 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

Teachergirl Razor participated in several of our projects, but was more committed to her own libraries.

That doesn't surprise me -- she was very political, as well as very focused on her own interests. And although she taught LIS, she was in some ways more comfortable in media studies. She was certainly a mainstay for the SLLU.

23 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

Yes, and JJ is still around.

I'm very pleased to hear that! JJ was (maybe even still is?) on my friends list, but I doubt we spoke more than twice. Very helpful and friendly though!

25 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

When LL decided to remove subsidies for educational outfits and non-profits, grants -- which commonly expected some sort of in-kind match -- dried up.

I've often wondered if one could quantify the damage that inflicted, not just in terms of immediately lost revenue for educational / NPO regions, but in terms of recruitment and retention, not to mention what you might call cultural "legitimacy." From where I stood, although I didn't have any sort of "official" affiliation, it had an almost immediate, and very dramatically bad, impact.

[belindacarson]

31 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

That doesn't surprise me -- she was very political, as well as very focused on her own interests. And although she taught LIS, she was in some ways more comfortable in media studies. She was certainly a mainstay for the SLLU.

I'm very pleased to hear that! JJ was (maybe even still is?) on my friends list, but I doubt we spoke more than twice. Very helpful and friendly though!

I've often wondered if one could quantify the damage that inflicted, not just in terms of immediately lost revenue for educational / NPO regions, but in terms of recruitment and retention, not to mention what you might call cultural "legitimacy." From where I stood, although I didn't have any sort of "official" affiliation, it had an almost immediate, and very dramatically bad, impact.

professional forum troll isn't exactly a real profession................

[Rolig Loon]

3 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

3 hours ago, Rolig Loon said:

When LL decided to remove subsidies for educational outfits and non-profits, grants -- which commonly expected some sort of in-kind match -- dried up.

I've often wondered if one could quantify the damage that inflicted, not just in terms of immediately lost revenue for educational / NPO regions, but in terms of recruitment and retention, not to mention what you might call cultural "legitimacy." From where I stood, although I didn't have any sort of "official" affiliation, it had an almost immediate, and very dramatically bad, impact.

Whether it was a good or bad decision is certainly debatable, but it's impossible to resolve it for SL as a whole without stepping into the WayBack machine to ask LL what other issues they were trying to prioritize at the time. Not only did they remove the tier subsidy but they also eliminated the two staff positions that had been corporate liaison to education and non-profits. I can only assume that they were making hard decisions about how to deploy their resources.  I cannot fault them for doing what they thought was in their best corporate interest at the time.

The decision, however, did convince me that the premise that lured me to SL in the first place was false.  SL was not the next great virtual platform for higher education.  It is a good place for some kinds of individual (tutorial, adult education, extension...) instruction, but not classroom learning that depends on high-level cooperation at the institutional level. Even with resources and dedicated staff, that type of education is hard to pull off in a world like SL. The same is true for non-profits. Without support, it's essentially impossible.

Edited July 23, 2022 by Rolig Loon
typos. as always.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

3 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

Whether is was a good or bad decision is certainly debatable, but it's impossible to resolve it for SL as a whole without stepping into the WayBack machine to ask LL what other issues they were trying to prioritize at the time. Not only did they remove the tier subsidy but they also eliminated the two staff positions that had been corporate liaison to education and non-profits. I can only assume that they were making hard decisions about how to deploy their resources.  I cannot fault them for doing what they thought was in their best corporate interest at the time.

No, I'd agree that it would be unfair to "fault" them -- it was, as I recall, a time of radical and likely very necessary retrenchment.

I think I might argue that they found themselves in that situation to begin with in some measure because of poor decisions in the first place -- M's focus on business and "enterprise" versions of SL being maybe one?

But it was, it has to be said, terra incognita for everyone. There'd never been anything remotely like SL before, and even social media generally was still in its infancy and didn't provide a great deal in the way of example or guidance.

7 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

The decision, however, did convince me that the premise that lured me to SL in the first place was false.  SL was not the next great virtual platform for higher education.  It is a good place for some kinds of individual (tutorial, adult education, extension...) instruction, but not classroom learning that depends on high-level cooperation at the institutional level. Even with resources and dedicated staff, that type of education is hard to pull off in a world like SL. The same is true for non-profits. Without support, it's essentially impossible.

The lessons of the pandemic -- and I'm not even yet quite sure what those are -- do seem to me underline the difficulties inherent in almost any kind of "virtual" teaching, including Zoom. I was only really peripherally involved in teaching in SL -- I did a few guest "lectures" here or there -- but I was, like everyone else in the profession, full-on engaged with the move to online classrooms in 2020/21. It was, I think, not an encouraging experience for anyone I knew. And I've read nothing to suggest that anyone developed a good formula for it.

In terms of pedagogy (as opposed to the financial side of the equation), I don't know that we're much further ahead now in understanding how to make remote, online, and virtual leaning work well than we were in 2009.

[Persephone Emerald]

4 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

I remember that. And JJ Drinkwater's one at Caledon.

At one point, SL was crammed to gills with libraries. One of the reasons I chose to open a "bookstore" rather than a library (my books were mostly L$1 each, as a token payment) was because I didn't want to seem to be pretending to be a librarian in a virtual world that was swarming with real ones.

Fallen Gods used to have a very good esoteric library on an island. Most of the pagan groups with land have had one.

Transylvania had a decent vampire museum. There are still many wonderful art and history museums.

SL isn't just shopping, roleplay, and cartoon sex.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

13 minutes ago, Persephone Emerald said:

Fallen Gods used to have a very good esoteric library on an island. Most of the pagan groups with land have had one.

Transylvania had a decent vampire museum. There are still many wonderful art and history museums.

SL isn't just shopping, roleplay, and cartoon sex.

Absolutely. As you can see in my pic above, I'm still running a library/archive.

I've often thought, as a former maker of "books," that two things might be developed further (maybe using LSL?) to make reading and information retrieval exciting and functional in SL.

The first is HTML on a prim, which I've never seen used really well. (Other than for YouTube and such.)

And the second is HUD-based book systems, like the old Intellibooks. If these could be made more interactive, with dynamic page content, you could do some really cool things.

Edited July 23, 2022 by Scylla Rhiadra

[Lewis Luminos]

On 7/22/2022 at 5:26 AM, Ivy Mysterious said:

I know many of us either used to work within the Platform or still do so it's got me wondering:  What is your Longest standing Profession in Second life?

And if you have retired/ no longer do it, why? 

Mine will be down below! ❤️

I ran a jazz club for over 8 years. Eventually closed because of dwindling audience; I speciallised in Swing and as the swing revival in RL faded away, so did interest in SL. I could have diversified into other genres but I didn't really want to, so I brought an end to the events. The club itself is still there though. 

[Madelaine McMasters]

After teaching Anshe Chung everything she knows about building wealth in Second Life, I formed Woodbury University to destroy it. I also founded Bloodlines and the Emerald development team. I convinced Philip Rosedale to leave LL and Mark Kingdon to join it. ”Sansar” is Sanskrit for “Snugs”.

I can’t reveal what I’m working on now, but the future of SL depends on it.

Edited July 24, 2022 by Madelaine McMasters

[Love Zhaoying]

15 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

After teaching Anshe Chung everything she knows about building wealth in Second Life, I formed Woodbury University to destroy it. I also founded Bloodlines and the Emerald development team. I convinced Philip Rosedale to leave LL and Mark Kingdon to join it. ”Sansar” is Sanskrit for “Snugs”.

I can’t reveal what I’m working on now, but the future of SL depends on it.

I think you are doing yourself a disservice by leaving out that it was you, who advised Al Gore to take the initiative in the creation of the Internet. As I recall, you convinced Al using your trademark fast-paced banter, which of course the ALGORithm was named after.

[Vicious Hollow]

2 hours ago, Lewis Luminos said:

I ran a jazz club for over 8 years. Eventually closed because of dwindling audience; I speciallised in Swing and as the swing revival in RL faded away, so did interest in SL. I could have diversified into other genres but I didn't really want to, so I brought an end to the events. The club itself is still there though. 

Oh wow that's sad to hear, which I've said it before and say it again, that  to this day, it's still one of the best places I ever worked at and one of the classiest places I ever visited on the grid! 

As for mentioned work, I came on SL almost 12 years ago (rez day is in Sept.), about a week or two after that, I started dj'ing. 35+ clubs later, I'm still djing, though far from full time - at our family owned club. In that list of 35+ I've also been a co-owner (at a previous club and now) ,  and managed one club for around 5 years (while djing). Now, I'm primarily, just a quiet vehicle/aircraft/boat painter, who co-owns and runs 3 shops (1 main, 2 satellite) and have been doing that for the last 4 or 5 years (after retiring from a 25 year career of racing simulator work rl) .          

[Sprout Evergarden]

managed an estate and rentals for 5 years no interest in doing it again

[Katherine Heartsong]

Artist and art gallery owner.

My works are one only, I sell only the original, no one else in SL has the same work.

Stop by any time!

Edited July 24, 2022 by Katherine Heartsong

[Madelaine McMasters]

4 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

I think you are doing yourself a disservice by leaving out that it was you, who advised Al Gore to take the initiative in the creation of the Internet. As I recall, you convinced Al using your trademark fast-paced banter, which of course the ALGORithm was named after.

Shhhhhh!

I just fired Blake Lemoine for talking about that algorithm.

[Love Zhaoying]

17 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

Shhhhhh!

I just fired Blake Lemoine for talking about that algorithm.

Claiming that you were sentient was totally uncalled for. I'd have fired him too.