Chaser Zaks

A thing I have been seeing for quite a while now is the question of "Is Second Life dying?", or statements that outright state it is. I am a researcher into a lot of Second Life related things. Be it from studying the protocol to better document it, to archiving historical content, to looking deeper into the Grid status to see what is normally unseen. Today, I bring my research to the public for a informative look into the question "Is Second Life dying?". I'm going to divide this research into three key parts: Concurrent residents Region/Grid growth New resident sign-up rate My poor understanding economy Summary 1. Concurrent residents Firstly, the statement that Second Life doesn't have as many people as it used to. After scraping historical data from web.archive.org, as well as my personal database: Apr 2007 19,005 Apr 2008 34,685 Mar 2009 68,710 Jul 2010 42,990 Aug 2011 33,628 May 2012 36,854 Aug 2013 32,974 May 2014 38,056 May 2015 39,336 Jul 2016 39,031 Jul 2017 31,930 Nov 2018 45,301 Mar 2019 44,854 Jan 2020 34,133 Feb 2020 50,936 Just yesterday we had 50,936(Feb 2020) concurrent residents! Within the past year, the max concurrent residents we have seen is 54,336, which is nearly comparable to March 2009's 68,700 residents. This isn't counting individual logins, which is likely a lot higher. I say we have had around the same amount of people as we have always had. NOTE: Data from <2017 are before I was recording it myself, and was gathered from web.archive.org. As such, this isn't the peak data, but data gathered from when their web crawlers ran. Second Life sees less people during EU/Asia hours, and more people during American hours. 2. Region/Grid growth Now let's take a look at the Grid, which I think serves as a great look into the health of Second Life. The grid is indeed growing, which I feel means resident's are trusting in Second Life enough to invest into private regions. This means the region appearance to disappearance ratio is in favour of appearance. Don't just take my word for it, here is a (big and poorly made(I am a computer scientist, not layout artist)) gif of the public region zone of the grid(You can even see the addition of Bellisseria!): Full images are here (CAUTION: These images are 2048x2048 in size): https://agni.softhyena.com/static/agni-2020-03-01.png https://agni.softhyena.com/static/agni-2018-09-07.png https://agni.softhyena.com/static/agni-2018-09-07-to-2020-03-01.gif Color key: Region Restricted Available Bordered Cart Bulk Reservation Missing Data Please note this data is gathered using a very rudimentary and unintended way. Color key may be incorrect for some or a lot of regions. (EG: Regions showing as cart entries, or missing data appearing in some grid tiles). A region doesn't guarantee it to be online, it simply means "A region exists here and hasn't been deleted"(Deleted meaning, someone stopped paying for it and LL has no reason to keep it around in the dataserver). Typically they exist and are set to be online, but some regions(EG: Ajax Arena) are set to not come online. This also shows regions that are not publicly accessible. This also only has from 0, 0 to 2048, 2048 in region coordinates(The grid is 65535 by 65535 in region coordinates!), which appears to be the area of the grid that is used. Unless LL is willing to give me a copy of the data, researching past there will take a whole day of data mining and strain on the servers. 3. New resident sign-up rate As for new resident sign-up rate. It is still quite high! Just within the past 24 hours of making this post, the average sign-ups per hour is 544 (Rounded). While yes, some of these are probably bots, I still see tons of people in new resident landing spots who actually go through the tutorial instead of teleporting out, which tells me there is still a lot of interest in Second Life! My reasoning behind this is: New residents will actually go through the tutorial, where as people registering alts or bots will simply teleport out to skip the tutorial. 4. My poor understanding economy Finally, I would go into economy, but I am not a economist, I am a computer scientist. I don't have enough knowledge on economy to make a decision on whether or not Second Life's economy is doing good. With that said, read the next line under the assumption I have no clue what I am talking about. If I had to take a guess, I'd say MAYBE it could be doing better. I've seen L$ to USD ratio going up, but I've also seen times where it goes down. I'd suspect the economy will correct it's self and prices for stuff will go up in L$, but will remain the same for USD. 5. In summary Second Life most isn't dead, and it most certainly isn't dying. If anything, I'd say it is thriving. We are seeing new regions and residents, as well as plentiful concurrent users. I hope this clears any concerns that "Second Life is dying". It may not have as much media coverage as it did back during the times of IBM, CNET, The Office, or CSI, but the resident base is still here and is growing. Footnotes All my statistics are publicly available. If someone wishes to have a copy of this, please let me know in-world and I'll give you a copy of the raw data. As for those asking why I obsess over data collection, autism/aspergers lol. You can view my recorded/public statistics at https://agni.softhyena.com/stats. View the page source for API information. Region statistics is very very big, and because of this, it will kill my measly 100KiB/s upload rate. Please ask for a link and I'll give it to you. The data, while gathered by me for research purposes, is copyright to Linden Lab. Please properly attribute them when using it.

Oh no! Someone bumped my avatar, what ever shall I do!? Oh, I know, I'll do nothing because it is just light illuminating pixels that are determined by mathematical equations used to determine vertex positions which are simulated by physic. I never understood getting upset over getting bumped. I get bumped all the time.

There are no ways to do this via scripted means, nor can this be done via RLV, which leaves the following possibilities: It is a maliciously crafted gesture. Gestures can have delays set for a very long time, so even after using it when it appears legit, it does a different action. Additionally, they can be bound to hotkeys. My recommendation for this is to check gestures. This is the likely culprit. They are using a.. well let's say untrustworthy viewer. Some viewers that do things they shouldn't come with backdoors and other trickery that allow their designers to take control of avatars. Ensure that the viewer your friend is using is a real viewer from the official source such as Firestorm, black dragon, alchemy, and of course the official viewer. The least likely scenario is your friend is "goofing" around and doing it. I'm not accusing them of this, but this is a possibility as I have seen people fake unsolvable issues before.

I'm just going to say this: please just drop it. I didn't want to start a argument over stuff, this is a unpopular opinions thread, not a argument thread. Please don't make me the reason this thread gets locked. I know this sounds like a minimod response but I can't help but feel responsible for causing the argument and I don't want to cause issues on the forum.

I moderate regions, so I don't use the mini-map specifically, but rather the radar/people tab thing, which does have the radar in it. This is how I keep my viewer windows laid out: I have a button to specifically open these windows and put them at said positions. It is a very bad piece of code that I am ashamed of, but it works and that all that matters.

I'm really active in SL. As in I stay logged in 24/7. Proof: you can send me a IM any time and I will receive it.† † TERMS AND CONDITIONS APPLY. MESSAGE AND DATA RATES MAY APPLY. PLEASE CHECK WITH YOUR CARRIER FOR ANY CHARGES THAT MAY BE ASSESSED. NOT AVAILABLE IN ALL REGIONS. OFFER NOT VALID WHEN MY INTERNET IS DOWN, DURING ROLLING RESTARTS, REGION CRASHES, OR GRIEFER ATTACKS.

A asset server. It goes down and everything breaks. (In this picture, I modified the viewer to display the MISSING IMAGE when assets don't load so it is less ambiguous. I also faked a downed asset server.)

Probably unpopular opinion: I think LL should ban political threads from general, as in amending the rules to say "No politic centered threads". Not politics entirely, just political threads. Specifically just General because Events/Looking for/etc could be used to find people with like minded opinions, which I think is perfectly fine. General threads regarding it tends to just invite fighting/bickering. They always just seem to divide the community IMO, and I don't want to see the community divided.

Yes, concurrent count, i don't have access to how many unique logins per day.

Yes it should say January, lmao. I have no idea why I put June.

Despite popular belief, SL has maintained a steady userbase. I keep track of SL's user numbers: Apr 2007: 19,005 Apr 2008: 34,685 Mar 2009: 68,710 Jul 2010: 42,990 Aug 2011: 33,628 May 2012: 36,854 Aug 2013: 32,974 May 2014: 38,056 May 2015: 39,336 Jul 2016: 39,031 Jul 2017: 31,930 Nov 2018: 45,301 March 2019: 44,854 January 2020: 34,133 It really depends on what time you look at the online user count, but I can say with honesty, I do not believe SL has a declining userbase. You will typically see more people online on Friday nights, Saturdays, and Sundays, or before/after work hours in U.S. time. I've also observed higher user activity on major holidays and during summer(HMMMM...). Anyway, userbase tends to stay above 30k and below 55k. Lowest I have seen was 16 users because LL restricted the grid to Lindens only when there was a major issue back on 2019-05-14.

I like these colours personally: Note the last colour isn't full black, it is rgb(1,1,11). A wise person once said never go full black, add a little blue to the black to make it look more natural.

Is today the day this thread finally gets locked? More at 11.

People are free to play bloodlines, and I am free to ban it's use from places I own. Bloodlines has no intent on working with people to help prevent it's use in places it is unwelcome, so I have no intent on working with it by allowing it period. If they change their attitude on allowing detection, monitoring, and regulation, (I. E. A global llRegionSay channel that emits data regarding bites and usage) I reserve all rights to ban it just as I ban griefing defense huds.

Seeing as how this thread is still going, I'll drop a few more opinions in here. To be blunt, both sides are biased and have formed their own echo chambers and refuse to listen to each other, resulting in no middle ground(I.E. my way or no way). If you think your side hasn't done this, you are part of the problem. I rarely see anyone who is willing to actually discuss politics with the opposite side, hear each other out, and look for a middle ground, because both sides are too eager(I.E. too lazy to actually discuss and wants to win) to godwin and claim the other side is a nazi or a communist. I'd say a good portion of this thread is a example of this. I've seen views from both sides and both sides are ready to call each other names instead of constructively criticizing the views. Problem is people forget what true nazism is. You take one side, claim it is right without question, and remove the others or doubters. In this case it has reached a more digital approach, where if someone has the "wrong opinion"(both sides are guilty of this), mob mentality takes place and forces corporations to take action, often resulting in someone's livelihood being taken away faster than thanos snapping his fingers. This also results in them getting more extreme views and having hard time finding a job unless they can find a job with extreme views. We are getting into a very, very dark place with politics and I hope more people can realize this before it is too late(if we haven't already crossed that line). Both sides are focused on "us vs them" instead of "everyone" lately. Even I am guilty of this and I try to stay centrist and see both sides of the argument. I'd be lying if I didn't have my own biases, I try to put them aside when deciding stuff but sometimes they get the better of me. But centrists are hated by both sides because they support some views that the opposing side has, so ignore my words I guess lmao.

Yes and no. The only way to get a resident's IP address is to utilize media(parcel music/media or media on a prim), even then it requires the target to enable it, and whos to say others wont enable it as well? Most cases these days will probably be over MOAP, in such cases you'll get one request for each person who clicks the media(emphasis on clicks, the target would have to click the MOAP, and there is no guarantee others wont click it as well), and then it isn't really possible to narrow down what IP goes to which resident. If they attach it as a hud that'd be a different story. Simply don't attach random huds(or random attachments in general, that's bad practice), and if it uses media on a prim, make sure you trust the creator. Parcel media is a bit different, as you can set individual URLs for each resident. However this requires parcel permissions, and most reputable places will not attempt to ever do this. So lets say someone does get your IP address, what can they do with it? Right now my IP is 67.140.131.201, so we will use it. They can use GeoIP which isn't accurate. GeoIP says I am in "Clarkson, Kentucky, United States", which is incorrect, I am in Elizabethtown Kentucky. So good job they narrowed me down to 10,000+ houses. What are they going to do, visit each one of them? They can launch a "denial of service" attack on me, emphasis on how this would be a DoS not a DDoS. Most people who get IP addresses like this are script kiddies and think they are clever to "ping dos" someone, which will impact a internet connection no worse than watching a 240p video on YouTube. Also this is a violation of U.S. Federal law under the computer misuse act(I think thats the specific law, I forget which). They can flaunt it around and say "HEY CHASER'S IP IS 67.140.131.201", but now they violated the Terms of Service and you can report them for disclosure. What they can't do with it: Hack your Second Life account. Not only is this always false, but you can report them for this threat. Send you malware. While mostly true(No one is going to pay loads of money to some deep web site for a zero day to hack you), this is also a violation of the terms of service, report them for this. Plus modern firewalls and anti-viruses will prevent this, and assuming you forwarded your ports, otherwise your modem will just see all the traffic and reject it. Find your real location. Geo IP isn't accurate, and they can narrow it down to or near your city, but not your address. Locate your alts. Unless they manage to get you to fall for the same thing on all your alts in a short time period(your IP address can change if the modem restarts or your ISP unleases the IP), locating alts isn't possible with just one IP. Also people share IPs so there is false positives(see redzone's history for more information on this). Methods that can't get your IP address: Voice - some people think voice is medium to get IP addresses, but voice is mixed on vivox's servers, no one but vivox sees your IP address, and everyone listening only sees vivox's IP address. Clicking a object - unless it is MOAP, there is no way to see the user's IP via LSL. Second Life - unless you are a Linden, you can't see someone's IP address. Nor will a Linden "friend" reveal this to another resident. Not only will that violate their privacy policy, but the Linden would be fired on the spot. What can be done to combat this?: Don't play suspicious media. If someone is wearing MOAP, it probably isn't a good idea to play it. Make sure your modem is reasonably secure, it shouldn't show the control panel to random IP addresses, and you should change the default admin password. Reboot your modem. Hardly anyone has a static IP for residential subscriptions, so rebooting your modem can make all their hard work go to waste as you now have a new IP address.

It'll just be another Minecraft or Roblox. Sure you can build and customize stuff, but no where to the extent you can in second life. I can make maps and customize my character in team fortress 2, does that mean tf2 is coming after SL? All I can see is fortnite world ending up like this: Screaming and swearing kids everywhere. Only slight amusement out of this is you may occasionally hear "WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY?" from their mom over their open mic. More griefing than there is in Minecraft. Fortnite is built to be combat, hense everything is designed to be destructible. If you have played Minecraft, you know people like to set your house on fire. Customization is limited to tinting. Content freedom isn't as free as SL for various reasons. "Scripting" will take the habbo hotel approach of stuff wiring tiles together. This isn't another second life. It hardly classifies as a metaverse. I guarantee you there will be many servers running instead of one world running. I'd argue VRChat is more of a threat to SL, but again, it is very limited, content creation must be done externally in the unity editor, stricter policies, etc. HiFi and Sansar(not as much due to content restrictions) are the only ones that really come close to being a threat to SL but they don't have the user base to do so.

My parents seem to like it, but I'm not really a fan of kfc. Not really a fan of chicken unless it's been ground up into a paste and glued back together. I like chicken patties, nuggets, and buffalo wings tho.

I much prefer text over voice, but don't mind using voice. Reason I like text over voice is because: I can easily go back and see what was said. I have a speech impediment, specifically a lisp, which I am somewhat self-conscious about. I also have autism which makes me unable to speak properly, I often pause mid-sentence as my voice gets ahead of my thought process. No worries of voice cutting out, which I notice happens a lot(both on SL and on other platforms). Reasons I like voice over text: It is faster than typing. I can sit back and relax. I can get up and go across the room while still being connected(wireless headphones!) I can multi-task using voice activity. There are benefits to using voice especially in meetings, as it enforces a bit of turn taking, where as text, people will type over each other and often push other's questions out of the way. Though safe hubs have shown me people really don't care about turn taking and will talk over each other regardless. As for voice verification, I find it a bit silly but also having it's meaning. I have no problem telling people I am male in real life when I have a female/herm avatar. If people judge me for it so be it, my RL profile tab will always contain the truth whether people like it or not. It's my Second Life, I'll enjoy it as I please. Though I can understand why people do want voice verification, as some.. untrustworthy people will lie and pretend to be female. At least with being male I can say I am male and people will believe me!

Hello! The Lindens will only lock your display name only under specific conditions, such as inappropriate or offensive display names, or impersonation. If your account gets suspended, you will receive a email from Linden Lab regarding the suspension. No matter how good of a friend someone is with a Linden, they will never act on behalf of residents. Typically those who state they are friends with a Linden are trying to manipulate you into doing something. Those who actually are friends with Lindens will keep it more on the down low and not mention it. Judging by what you stated and how your display name got locked, it is likely the resident reported you for impersonation. In situations like this where you had no intent on impersonating someone, it is best to contact support and explain the situation, they are very reasonable and understanding.

I'll say this, I have seen people on both sides of the political spectrum on Second Life, from nicest to the more extreme. Political opinions are like butt holes, everyone has one and they all stink. However it is important to note, no matter what political opinion someone has, Linden Lab does not endorse or support said opinion. Just because one person is spewing hate, does not mean that Linden Lab supports that. Linden Lab has no control over what users say, but they can punish them afterwards. Controlling what users say would result in censorship/filters which would be very harmful to the virtual world. From what I have seen, Linden Lab likes to take a very neutral/centristic point of view when handling abuse reports and allowing residents to have a freedom of speech and opinion. However they don't support hate speech, it is important to understand what hate speech constitutes as according to Linden Lab. To do this, we have to look at the Community Standards. In specific, we will look at the "Intolerance" section(This section may change at a later date, please refer to the Community Standards for the most up to date version). My interpretation of this means: You can have what ever opinions you want, be popular or unpopular. However said opinions may not be used to attack or belittle groups. For example, "I think <x group> is going too far with their politics" can be OK, but "Eradicate all <x group>" is not OK. Of course context really does matter in this situation and it is a very touchy situation because some stuff can be seen as offensive to others, while not offensive to others. The Content Guidelines has additional information which basically says the same thing but worded to legally cover content seen in world. Additionally, Linden Lab could have taken action, but you just don't see it. Linden Lab treats privacy really seriously, so if someone got warned, you won't be informed. Only the person who has been warned will know and it is up to said user to disclose if they were warned.

Hey it's a discount, I'll take it.

To answer the original question, the 1:3 square layout isn't uncommon in SL. I've seen it plenty of times and there is a rational reason for it too. The landing spot has plenty of space for crucial information and advertisements, while leaving a majority of the land space for shops and vendors. If you hop around various clubs, I guarantee you that you will find something with the same, if not similar layout. Heck, Linden Lab once did the bridged entry way at the Second Life Birthday event once before. The best solution in this scenario is if you want to truly be unique, you'll need to do a lot of blueprinting and revise the design multiple times. The more complex the design, the more chance of someone not having done it before.

A bit late to this discussion, but after reading some of the replies, I'll leave this to say: I am a male, I haven't had any issues with feeling unwelcome(because of my gender, I DO feel unwelcome because of social anxiety that everyone hates me lmao). While I do have a big variety of avatars which all have different genders depending on who I wish to be today, I've not felt unwelcome when using my male avatars. Granted I tend to get "hit on" more when using my female or female-ish avatars if that is what you are wanting as in "feeling more welcome", but that's not to say I've been hit on when using my male avatars either, but in general, with my male avatars I tend to get more "Hey whats up?", rather than "Hey wanna bang?" which I see with my female avatars. As for lack of clothing for males, I suck at clothing in general, which is why I REJECT CLOTHING ALL TOGETHER. IT IS EVIL AND I CANNOT FIGURE OUT FASHION (fur helps in this situation though). I've done lots of searching on the MP, trying to find something simple, not overly complex, etc, and I see the following for males(both avatars and outfits): Beefy mc buff Thug Extra beefy "Mess with my family and I'll mess with you IRL" And I have seen the following for females: Full perm retexture #5719473 Skimpy BIG BOOTY "I'm a drama queen" As such, I think the MP is diluted with a bunch of the same thing over and over again for both genders. I just want normal every day clothing for people who are not "BEEF MC BEEF" or "guys my thighs are 1 mile wide", or people who look like copy/pastes. I'm not buff IRL, nor am I fat IRL, I am slightly overweight but only slightly. I want outfits I would wear IRL that are not full perm retexture and have modify permissions so I don't have to deal with stupid scripts that are unneeded. NOW I KNOW THIS IS GOING TO BE HEAVILY CONTROVERSIAL, but I don't like the club scene. There is a bazillion of them and we need something more original because clubs, in my opinion, tend to devolve into the following categories: Everyone thinks everyone wants to bang them and as result, their response to someone striking up a conversation is: "Not interested." Everyone is talking with their friends in IMs and local chat isn't inviting. The DJ finds a few tracks off youtube and plays them like a playlist. Someone gets upset that someone else is there and drama erupts. What needs to be done here is create something original, some hangout that provides amusement and entertainment that isn't the same club scenarios repeated forever. This is why I much prefer hangout sandboxes over clubs. People are goofing off and having a fun time, and you bump into people and stuff isn't being taken too seriously. I know there is a place on the destination guide that does a hangout/games thing, and it seems more welcoming than a club would be. Then again, this is all being said where I am scared to talk to anyone in fear of judgement. What I feel may be either slightly or very different from anyone else, but personally I haven't had any issues aside from the masters of drama.