Ineffable Mote

Often when I log into SL I'll just sit and park to multi-task or afk through the day, returning and glancing in now and then, I wouldn't call that an addiction but I'm aware that it ends up being an energy vampire, even just in the most mundane literal sense of the term. Internet forums tend to be a lot like that and always have been...a lot of lack of understanding and people coming from places of fear, healthy exchanges and introspections are an important part of lives too (and I'll posit that as the real secret, or at least a doorway to it, while I'm here).

It goes both ways, I think a lot depends on momentum too. I could say more but not sure how to express it clearly without veering into religious issues which I won't here, other than to say there are wheels of rebirth and even aside from that believe it or not change gets forced from wherever (via any number of places).

Part of me wants to point out that there aren't enough mirrors in the world for some people, but otoh I've long ago realized that some people/things in these lives are more here for the purpose of demonstration anyways.

Gorging is gorging. But I'll add that the only thing more certain than death and taxes is change.

Habits could probably be qualified as games too...the mention of Camus above reminded me of Berne's Games People Play (more psychology writings, and a little knowledge is a dangerous thing etc)

As an ex smoker (last century) I always called that a habit too, pack a day for nearly a decade. And it was a habit, even though it wasn't. Sometimes the word intoxicant fits better than drug. It's all a lot of semantics (with the game vs sandbox argument, as well). Games/platforms have addicting mechanisms intentionally built in to varying degrees, much like SL does, not just with loot boxes and such but leaving games open-ended I'd think(things like sims and stardew, maximizing the replay value). I'd say this was generally lesser known and understood 25 years ago, while far from unknown, but fbook especially was/is so atrocious that it forced it all out into the open. Industries have this all down to a science, more than just observations. And with light, that can be helpful and an irritant both, depending on quality and quantity. Where quantities get to be an issue it tends to be more obvious, less so with quality. More generally speaking, seeing the world through both/and sometimes makes stronger framing than either/or (the world we live in is both binary and not binary? I guess ditto with dualism)

Not sure if this is intended for too serious a discussion but I figure it's one worth having so I'll take the bait anyways Considering social media is pretty well documented as being addictive, so much of it by design, and then Second Life being so immersive, and the shopping being addicting(with or without gachas), and music can get to be addictive too(not to single out trance music, and melomania I think it's more traditionally called), and OCPD (Obsessive Compulsive Photography Disorder) is some kind of thing too, and one could go on, without ever mentioning adult content, but I can see how SL's kind of at least a quadruple whammy for a lot of people. Though I'm not sure it qualifies as a real secret or is even all that surprising. I'm wondering if this was some new documentary that's out, or maybe just a youtube thing? late editing to add in here: addictions and habits can be hard to kick and not just replace with one or another as typically with these things there are underlying issues involved..unresolved issues and/or unmet needs and often from a young age. and not to open those cans of worms here either but this is what actual counseling and therapy is for, from someone with genuine credentials maybe even a license, which very well rules out SL for that these days with really exceedingly rare exceptions.

There would need to be more interest in the metaverse to start with, it just ain't there. With SL it seems to be just the one main target market now. I was thinking new technology that would offer something of substance, and maybe offer more fertile ground. I don't think AI is it , either. 25 years is a pretty good run.

Tilia was newer with more potential, and can expand and grow. Second Life can't, but it's still somebody's cash cow(and not the customers). It amounted to a nice(and viable) balance, but adjustments will necessarily get made, as they have been all along, from day 0. The new metaverse craze isn't going along as it was hoped for and hyped. The wheel(or madhouse) will keep spinning another two to four years, unlikely more at least without some pretty major changes in what it has to offer(and not more shine). Nearly all we get to see are usual hysterics from angry and delusional people on a platform, and whose investments in this thing aren't primarily measured in dollars.

In what language does thunes mean thorn? or does it? I'm curious about what the name thunes means, as I find etymology fascinating. I take it it means money in french, seems fitting but uninteresting really

As far as I know Linden Lab doesn't officially have a CEO either and hasn't since previous one's illness/passing. Quite possibly this is all a pretty good business arrangement for both. Interesting changes either way, and LL has long been in need of some. (but I realize chicken littles will do their thing, why wouldn't they)

Taking the paragraph as a whole, it seems like a redeeming quality from here. This sounds like a good shake-up is here too, presuming it's something so far unannounced [bold emphasis not mine, for sake of clarity]

20% = 1 in 5, and as far as assertions go that's beyond spurious, as are related claims being made. Even were it including edge-casers, grid wide that'd still probably be less than 5 in 100.

I'm not sure if he's being sarcastic or not, but I'll just add here that locking people up should be less about punishment and/or vengeance, more about separating people turned dangerously unhealthy threats from society. Part of me wants to point out in this thread that LL needs to change their corporate culture in some ways, but so much has been normalized in RL cultures that I don't think it'd do SL much(if any) good at this point. It's all kind of Lose-Lose, sans kind of. And SL being such an old platform, saner long term strategies to deal with adult content(employees/alts and userbase alike) seem a bit pointless as well.

It's less that it's loaded, and more that it's been maldefined, and that much is intentional, consciously or otherwise. That Kipling was coming from a place of better faith shined through in his works and observations, but it sure doesn't here, it's something else (SL as whole, I'd say. I could point out that as bodies of water, ponds tend to fare better than seas in this virtual world)