Virtual Secrets

[Love Zhaoying]

10 hours ago, Rowan Amore said:

Here's the list.  What bothered me even more than the comments about the 100s of sex places I go and with a male avatar (since I guess I'm really a man) is that they spelled my name wrong!  But, the other spelling mistakes did make me LOL.

..when you go to 100 sex sims looking for "come backs" on the menu..

ETA: Is meaning for "Silverback Gorilla"?

Edited August 15, 2022 by Love Zhaoying

[Gabriele Graves]

5 hours ago, Rowan Amore said:

Here's the list.  What bothered me even more than the comments about the 100s of sex places I go and with a male avatar (since I guess I'm really a man) is that they spelled my name wrong!  But, the other spelling mistakes did make me LOL.

Woah!  That someone really ought to use lamp oil for lighting lamps instead of getting high.

[Love Zhaoying]

Having reviewed the threads, I now remember old posts about "Virtual Secrets". 

It seems to me, that the one post Rowan shared could have been made by any 'he-man woman hater" on the Forum with poor grammar and spelling, as is the norm. 

But then again: "I saw you / your alt at 100 sex sims" (just like people calling you out in RL for going to a bar "every day"): "That's interesting, so you must have been at 100 sex sims 'too'?"

[Rat Luv]

Roman Amore sounds like a '60s playboy secret agent 🤵

[colleen Criss]

There is a ton of posters over there unhappy about their lives is all I can gather.

[Love Zhaoying]

1 hour ago, Rat Luv said:

Roman Amore sounds like a '60s playboy secret agent 🤵

Bond Chick!

[Blaise Glendevon]

11 hours ago, Pixie Kobichenko said:

In the same gossip vein there used to be “shopping cart disco”  & “the whisperer”.  Both of those have gone extinct.  
 

Virtual Secrets is the spawn of Shopping Cart Disco. Nobody read any of the other features, so they just whittled down to what was Second Life Secrets but was re-named Virtual Secrets at about the same time that Second Life Universe (the forum) re-named to VirtualVerseOne. Not that those sites are related, but Second Life started enforcing some point of trademark that lead sites named Second Life [thing] to swap branding. 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

14 hours ago, Prokofy Neva said:

Your memory is very selective.

The Alphaville Herald began with the Sims Online in about 2000 and switched over to Second Life in about 2004 when a group of us migrated from TSO to SL. Urizenus Sklar, a professor of linguistics in RL, was the founder, but there were other editors, including Pixeleen Mistral, who in real life invented Gopher and worked on Croquet, and Mark Wallace, a writer and early journalist of the Metaverse. 

Of course it was independent, and dependent not only on Sklar -- although it's a curious notion of yours that if one publisher decides to sponsor a newspaper, that newspaper now isn't "independent" -- when of course it is, and it is the plurality of such independent media outlets that makes up a free press. Certainly it's independent from the "state," in this case a game company and a virtual world company. It's more than fine. 

The Herald broke many important stories, for example I recall one I wrote that CNET covered which was about Philip calling in the FBI finally to investigate recurring crashes of the entire grid, when SL would be down for days.

If it adapted the persona of a tabloid and covered picaresque figures like BigJohn Slade, that added to its charm. The comments were the main place outside of these forums to discuss the burning issues of SL. Sklar (Peter Ludlow) wrote a whole book about the Herald, which I myself find tendentious, but I appreciate its role.

We have no intelligentsia like that in SL now. None. At one time, these figures, who were tied into a network of professors and journalists outside of SL who covered games and worlds critically, formed a very important body of thinkers. We have nothing like that now. Thinkers like Matthew Ball dismiss SL utterly, and get it wrong utterly. I'm reading his book now; he has the temerity to say that no university was ever in a virtual world when we have had HUNDREDS of educators, including the Ivy League schools, and have quite a few today, even after the high water point when schools got non-profit discounts (I believe this has now been restored).

 

Full points, I suppose, for tolerance and forbearance, given how you were harassed by these people and their associates.

But that's sort of the point I'm making. Yes, the Herald did break some actual news, and sometimes even noteworthy news. Hell, they gave really full coverage of a protest picket I led at a r*pe sim once, and even published in full a statement I made on it afterwards. (I also got an invite from Morpork to pose for Post 6, but that was mainly in the hope that it would shut me up, I think.)

But where they didn't have actual news to cover, they either dredged up utter garbage, or they made the news happen by setting their dogs on someone. How many stories did they get out of griefing you? How often did you get dragged into a story merely because hating on you went over well with their readership?

Yep, I know all about Ludlow, McCahill, and Wallace. We can cavil about how "independent" they were (were you not alarmed when Wallace was hired by LL? I sure as hell was). But, again, "independent" or not, the Herald was an unethical pseudo-academic experiment in hactivism, with all of SL as its petri dish. Its approach to "news" was actually a rather interesting foreshadowing, I think, of the kinds of strategies employed now in social media to feed disinformation and stoke outrage. And no, pioneering in that is not a "good" or "laudable" thing.

God help anyone sifting through the sludge in the Herald for any sign of this "intelligentsia." There's no point in arguing this with you: I'll just direct anyone who is curious to visit the site themselves and make up their own minds about whether or not it constituted "critical thinking" and incisive virtual world journalism.

I'm pretty sure they won't make it half way through the cutting-edge article on "The Fattest Guy in SL" before closing the window.

[Dafadilia Wayfarer]

I checked it out once and walked away sadly losing brain cells that day I can never get back.

On a serious note though, I find the site vile. Making up mindless gossip about others says more about the posters than the people they are trying to tear down.

 

[Janet Voxel]

There was a time there were a few gossip sites out there and they were at least discussion worthy gossip sometimes. Now it's the only one that's left. It really has nothing to do with gossip anymore and more like a sounding board for personal attacks.

It's basically what happens when you take shouting into a void, a WWE Royal Rumble and a mosh pit and make it SL related.

Meh

[Seicher Rae]

Well, one positive... if the stuff from over there keeps people with that mentality over there, at least they are not over here. Maybe.

[Amina Sopwith]

49 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

 

Hell, they gave really full coverage of a protest picket I led at a r*pe sim once, and even published in full a statement I made on it afterwards. (I also got an invite from Morpork to pose for Post 6, but that was mainly in the hope that it would shut me up, I think.)

🤣🤣🤣

Had these halfwits ever met you?

That's one of the funniest things I've ever read. That's like Goreans thinking I'll shut up if I could just get a date with John Nobhead.

(I might, to be fair, but only if I could clandestinely have at his roast tarsk with the Senokot.)

[Scylla Rhiadra]

15 minutes ago, Amina Sopwith said:

🤣🤣🤣

Had these halfwits ever met you?

That's one of the funniest things I've ever read. That's like Goreans thinking I'll shut up if I could just get a date with John Nobhead.

(I might, to be fair, but only if I could clandestinely have at his roast tarsk with the Senokot.)

Well, good question. I mean they should have known me well enough to understand that I was not going to pose for them. I was certainly eloquent enough on my feelings about Post 6.

But it is interesting that Timothy apparently thought that a (public) offering of a spread there (so to speak) would be something I'd consider. It suggests that maybe he either wasn't really getting it, or that he suspected my motives, and thought I was really either just jealous, or craving attention. Either way, he certainly wasn't taking my criticisms seriously.

I should say that I made it clear enough, I think, that my objections to Post 6 were not prudish. I'd have been fine with it, including the nudity, had they chosen people with actual accomplishments beyond an ability to max out shape sliders, or who had things to say. I do nudes and semi-nudes myself on Flickr: the issue, as I'm sure I don't need to say to you, wasn't nudity, but rather the context and how it was served up.

I should also say that on at least one occasion I got rather mean about one of their models, who really presented herself as the ultimate inflatable and brainless large-breasted boopsie. I don't know if she was really as clueless and empty-headed as she sounded, or if it was role play, but I should have been a great deal more gentle and less satirical than I was. I'm not very proud of how I managed that. Sometimes walking the line between making a point, and scoring points, can be difficult to negotiate, and I've got it wrong on more than one occasion.

Edited August 15, 2022 by Scylla Rhiadra

[Prokofy Neva]

1 hour ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Full points, I suppose, for tolerance and forbearance, given how you were harassed by these people and their associates.

But that's sort of the point I'm making. Yes, the Herald did break some actual news, and sometimes even noteworthy news. Hell, they gave really full coverage of a protest picket I led at a r*pe sim once, and even published in full a statement I made on it afterwards. (I also got an invite from Morpork to pose for Post 6, but that was mainly in the hope that it would shut me up, I think.)

But where they didn't have actual news to cover, they either dredged up utter garbage, or they made the news happen by setting their dogs on someone. How many stories did they get out of griefing you? How often did you get dragged into a story merely because hating on you went over well with their readership?

Yep, I know all about Ludlow, McCahill, and Wallace. We can cavil about how "independent" they were (were you not alarmed when Wallace was hired by LL? I sure as hell was). But, again, "independent" or not, the Herald was an unethical pseudo-academic experiment in hactivism, with all of SL as its petri dish. Its approach to "news" was actually a rather interesting foreshadowing, I think, of the kinds of strategies employed now in social media to feed disinformation and stoke outrage. And no, pioneering in that is not a "good" or "laudable" thing.

God help anyone sifting through the sludge in the Herald for any sign of this "intelligentsia." There's no point in arguing this with you: I'll just direct anyone who is curious to visit the site themselves and make up their own minds about whether or not it constituted "critical thinking" and incisive virtual world journalism.

I'm pretty sure they won't make it half way through the cutting-edge article on "The Fattest Guy in SL" before closing the window.

I was more alarmed by Wallace being hired by Electric Sheep Company, which at one point created a world-wide search of everything (enabled by the Lindens' "show in search" right on the object menu) that gutted privacy not to mention enabled Copybot. PS he was also involved in a failed app project with a former Linden that is part of the whole gorgeous mosaic of Silicon Valley history.

If you look at the total Herald history over time, you will find the stories about me were not so great in number and the stories *by* me are more important. 

So many things bother you which in fact are the normal features of tabloid press -- "to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable."

The Herald was vital to reporting about the Linden betrayal of the GOM and the Linden in the IRC channel plotting against me and many more subjects. The took a critical eye not just to the Lindens but big club and real estate owners. It's about keeping feet to the fire. It's all there was. There is nothing like that now.

There is a vast wasteland now of witless fashion blogging and sycophantic inworld reporting. The only respectable outlet is SL Newser but they are more like a shopper or parish bulletin.

I don't remember "the Fattest Guy," but hey, you have to sell newspapers. 

[Lindal Kidd]

16 hours ago, Prokofy Neva said:

We have no intelligentsia like that in SL now. None. At one time, these figures, who were tied into a network of professors and journalists outside of SL who covered games and worlds critically, formed a very important body of thinkers.

It's "professors and journalists" like these that give intelligentsia a bad name. In fact, anyone who considers themself, or is considered by others, to be a member of the "intelligentsia" probably IS a professor or journalist like these.

I hope I never am counted among them.

 

Edited August 15, 2022 by Lindal Kidd

[Robin Kiyori]

Ah Vs , a hive of low effort gossip that just boils down to throwing random slurs around, people even the rest of that site doesn't  care about. More slurs  x store is a scam!  Yz,Z and A are pedos [shows a photo of of a adult twink] And maybe just maybe. An actually funny meme.

It's  really not worth the energy.

[Bree Giffen]

So I googled around and found what this thread was about. It's not worth the effort to even read anything there. 

[Rat Luv]

2 hours ago, Amina Sopwith said:

🤣🤣🤣

Had these halfwits ever met you?

That's one of the funniest things I've ever read. That's like Goreans thinking I'll shut up if I could just get a date with John Nobhead.

(I might, to be fair, but only if I could clandestinely have at his roast tarsk with the Senokot.)

Who's John Nobhead? 

We had a chat recently in another thread but can't remember which one now  about that old Channel 4 documentary about the SL Gor master who tries to start a cult in RL...do you remember it? 

[Paul Hexem]

21 hours ago, Rowan Amore said:

Here's the list.  What bothered me even more than the comments about the 100s of sex places I go and with a male avatar (since I guess I'm really a man) is that they spelled my name wrong!  But, the other spelling mistakes did make me LOL.

Nobody ever makes up any crazy drama about me, they just ban me. Where's the fun in that?

[Dragon Mommy]

I always feel like it's either frequented by a social group I don't know who all post about each other or it's just screaming into the void and nobody knows anyone posted. 

[Rat Luv]

29 minutes ago, Paul Hexem said:

Nobody ever makes up any crazy drama about me, they just ban me. Where's the fun in that?

 Shh...no Moles allowed...but...I heard Paul Hexem is rezzing prim cubes at 2000 metres in sandboxes and selling them to noobs as luxury homes! 😮  

[Scylla Rhiadra]

28 minutes ago, Dragon Mommy said:

I always feel like it's either frequented by a social group I don't know who all post about each other or it's just screaming into the void and nobody knows anyone posted. 

I've never appeared in it (that I know of anyway), and the only person I directly know of who has been attacked there is Roman, but I know friends who have friends who've been pilloried there. On that basis, I don't think it's a single social group -- rather a particular kind of group that uses it.

I think it's actually pretty popular and gets a lot of hits.

Which, yes, is frightening.

[Akane Nacht]

2 hours ago, Rat Luv said:

 Shh...no Moles allowed...but...I heard Paul Hexem is rezzing prim cubes at 2000 metres in sandboxes and selling them to noobs as luxury homes! 😮  

Hmmm I wonder if anyone has created a random scandal generator... 🤔 

[Prokofy Neva]

7 hours ago, Lindal Kidd said:

It's "professors and journalists" like these that give intelligentsia a bad name. In fact, anyone who considers themself, or is considered by others, to be a member of the "intelligentsia" probably IS a professor or journalist like these.

I hope I never am counted among them.

 

Well, I don't think there's any danger of that.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

47 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

Well, I don't think there's any danger of that.

That's pretty uncalled for.