Bitsy Buccaneer

I like the way Carmsie Melodie phrased it (or whoever she got it from for the sign): "The only real things in Second Life are our feelings, so please take care of each other." There is just so much truth in it. The pixels are just pixels, but the rest - the care and effort and emotion, that's what's real and what makes this mad place so very special.

OK, I misunderstood your 2) above then.

Has the Omega system been set up for Ruth 2? I think Ruth 2 uses the standard system UVs so it should be possible. That would be the way to get a purchased skin onto Ruth 2, but only for Omega-compatible skins and only if the Omega system creator has set one up for Ruth 2.

I don't know about that. I think it's more that the complainers are the vocal ones and the rest of us get on with it more quietly or just ask questions. As for your examples, those of us with a strong kinesthetic approach to learning would surprise you with what we can do and how we go about it. There's always a subtle tactile element to my public speaking and overt ones in my preparation and most definitely in my learning how to do it. Audio learning as the sole way of acquiring manual skills is a red herring. But some will learn better with a verbal description to accompany their physical efforts and some will learn better from reading first or seeing it done. You always have to do it yourself in the end though. But all I'm really asking is to just be a bit more careful with how you word things. Given how difficult many people are inclined to make things for themselves, why throw even more obstacles in their way like demeaning a format you find problematic? It might be part of the solution for someone else.

Some people do alright with reselling gachas. It's a risk though and probably takes a good understanding of the gacha resale market to succeed in. But yes, sales here are primarily by creators rather than retailers. Most of us get into it because we just like making things or we can't find what we want, so we learn to do it ourselves. Collaborative building used to be the mainstay of SL, people contributing their different skills and ideas to bring a project together. Nowadays, more of the work is done in external programs like Blender or GIMP but there's still an ecosystem of full perm components you can draw on to help. That can be very satisfying, a lot of fun to play with and much more manageable to learn. Since you want to promote others and be part of a team, have you thought about becoming a customer service representative or other type of assistant with a brand you love? It might be a better fit with your current skill set and you'd probably learn a lot about running a shop in SL.

Part of the trick of working with LODs is figuring out what you can get rid of without having a significant visual impact. Your basic structure (8 rectangles + 8 rectangles = 16 rectangles = 32 tris/triangles) is friendly to holding itself from a distance. That's an excellent starting point. Are you interested in expanding your Blender skills to learn how to remove bits? Ditching the rounded trim pieces will save lots of tris, so that would be a good place to start on making your own custom LODS. The vertical and much of the horizontal trim could be simulated through an additional texture which has both trim and siding. From the pictures, I don't see why you couldn't learn how to make the octagon roof in Blender (though not the weather vane). It would be tricky to make the shape in prims but you could do it in about five steps in Blender, from the top of your tower. Also, crumple to nothing is a cheat but sometimes it's a useful cheat if the object doesn't need to be in a long range view (i.e. from a distance, it would just look like a normal Continental roof line). Just some thoughts. It might seem daunting, but I think you're probably closer to being able to do this than you realise. You understand spatial relations very well and that will give you a big advantage.

Can you see how different this is from what you wrote earlier? Really horrible format. Horde of people who are convinced. If you didn't mean to make it sound like you're looking down on use, why choose those words? There are other ways to make the point which are more readily understandable, like you'd prefer it if there were more searchable documents and that you find videos too time-consuming and frustrating. If it's related to your preferences and your experiences, it comes across as just that and much less judgemental. When it's phrased more clearly, new approaches become easier to see, like pairing a written summary of steps with a video. Would it be worth asking some of the better Avastar video makers to do that? Or maybe someone else who wants to help but doesn't have the depth of knowledge to write a tutorial from scratch could offer? I agree that the whole system could use some improvement. Shall we try to brainstorm on how?

And for those of us who don't have access to a live teacher for one reason or another, and certainly not one we can ring up at a moment's notice, or can't manage a full class because of health, work, family or other reasons? In person teaching has its place. It's a fantastic resource when it's available. Well organised and presented videos have their place, including the capacity to repeat sections and revisit it whenever you want. Written forms have their place too. Isn't it great we have so many different forms to draw on? Then each person can seek out what's going to be most useful for their individual and particular needs in that moment. There is no need to say things like "video is a really horrible format for self learning" or make snide comments about those of us for whom they've proven to be the most suitable format available.

Thanks for the optimism JessycaJayne, but I haven't managed to even get a place in Belli yet or find a way to become part of the community. The question for me is how much more energy to expend on trying. With every new thing popping up, there's just less need for another one and more competition for people's time. I'm not very good at any of that so it's probably best to just accept that the time when my idea might have been viable has already passed. But I do wish everyone well in their endeavours. You're all building something really wonderful here.

Do you mean as a creator of individual items or as someone putting together a sim? I'm not sure there's an answer to this question if it's the former. The individual items I have difficulties with are things many people enjoy. Many effects in SL tend towards sounds or visuals repeating on a short loop. The longer the loop and the more variation the better for me, also lower volumes. Setting default volumes lower could be something creators could do, then owners can increase it if they want to rather than just going with it loud because that's the way it was made. I just keep sound off as a matter of course though, because SL sounds tend to give me a slow build up that's not really noticeable until it's too late. Some patterns have elements within them (like stripes, checks or spirals) which increase the rate of visual repeat even when the texture is moving slowly. A spiral-type pattern is harder for me than an irregular one. Spiral water ripples are where I run into it most often. But many will enjoy the hypnotic quality of the water ripple spiraling around and those patterns tend to work better for some builds. If it's on the level of a sim/region/parcel, then it's quantity as well as speed. How much of the screen is moving? Is there anywhere safe to put the camera and still be engaged with what's going on? Lights in a corner are easier to cope with than a flashing animated dance floor. Does it really need to be moving? If it's contributing to a club atmosphere, then it probably does, those are difficult to impossible places for us in RL anyway. If it's a sign in a store and the owner thinks it's a way of getting more attention, then there are safer ways of doing that. Have you looked inworld for any groups to ask in? Or maybe a disability awareness sim? I'd be interested to know how others with related issues negotiate SL and what gives them difficulty. This discussion has been really helpful for me. I've been working on things to make a sort of psychedelic hippy environment, so playing with the brain visually has been part of that. If they go public (though it's looking less and less likely that it will), then I'll build in ways to caution and inform those who are photo sensitive and also separate levels of intensity.

This looks great. There really isn't much need for my hippy hangout place, is there? It's hard to give up a dream but there isn't any point in continuing. Well done on this and all of the other wonderful places in Belli. Have a fantastic time.

Neither vendors/franchises nor gacha resale really work with promo events or definitely not with 1L1H. With gachas, you have to buy the items individually at a certain cost (and with no guarantee of which one you'll get). Sell them for less than the pull price at the machine and you'll lose money. With vendors/franchises, all you get are the vendors themselves and all the risk and expenditure of trying to sell from them. You pay for the land to rez them on and get 20%-45% of any sales. The rest goes to the creator. The vendors are scripted so you can't change the price. If the franchise has a promotion, it probably won't be suitable for your own event. It will be whatever the franchise decides to do. 1L1H requires you to have the right and ability to sell an unlimited number of copies of an item for 1 linden, essentially giving it away and hoping for volume sales or people making additional purchases. It's for things you make yourself. It won't work for either franchises or gachas. The things you can buy full perm typically have restrictions on how you can sell them. Selling "as is" is always forbidden, you have to add to it in some way - they're components for building and creation, not stand alone items. Some FP creators have a minimum price or restrictions on how their components can be used in promotions and gifts. Too many people giving away or selling similar items for next to nothing undermines the ability of others to sell. 1L1H only makes sense after you've built up a large selection of your own items. Start with that. Franchises may seem like a way to fill up a mall and generate more sales, but they're not. You still have to do all the promotion work, you're constrained in how you can do that, and many shoppers will be turned off when they see yet another franchise. You'll be better off joining with others, where everyone is promoting the area and hopefully bringing in customers who'll look around a bit.

I've found videos easier to learn from when the keystrokes are recorded and displayed. The teacher doesn't need to spell out every hotkey combination and if it's from a menu I can see how to access that menu straightaway. With written tutorials, there was always a time, several usually, when I'd have to stop to look up one of the more basic elements I hadn't yet learned or couldn't recall exactly enough. Maybe that's easy for you or you didn't have to, but it would throw me off track for the one I was working on and hampered my progress. Also, video tutorials are often project orientated and some of us do better with that. Amongst the disorganised, person talking to himself while he putters along videos, there are many which are well-organised, complete and easy to follow. Finding a series and teacher whose approach works for me (BornCG) helped immensely. Now that I'm further along, looking up specific bits in written form will often suffice. In theory that's quicker. In practice though, it usually takes me a few tries to figure out the right wording for the search and I end up spending at least as much time in the search as I would watching through part of a good video. Given the different ways people have of learning (like the visual, audio, kinesthetic model), any one way just isn't going to suit everyone. Please don't disparage those of us who need different approaches than yours. Our needs and ways of doing things are just as legitimate as yours.

Just to check, are you saving the snapshot inworld and then downloading it from SL to your computer or are you saving directly to hard drive when you take the picture?

Genuine and sincere question here: If a particular person's words bother you so much, why not simply ignore them in the forums and block them inworld? Are you hoping they'll post something you like eventually? It just seems like the simplest and most practical solution.

Thanks for the kind thoughts. The downside of waiting is that the more of Bellisseria there is, the harder it will be for a new community place to get noticed. When I first started trying, people were enthusiastically posting about the cafes and other places residents had made to share with the community. That's fallen off already and the "look what I found" posts are about the Moles' wonderful efforts. What will it be like in a year? I simply don't have the stamina or energy to do much to promote a place so I was counting on getting some of the Belli exploration effect to help. Meanwhile more infrastructure for things to do is being built, which is great for Bellisseria but does mean less attention to go around for everything else. If it's two years, then I'll have to pay the increased rate to continue with the alt's premium in addition to the increased price for the two prems I use for my shop. All of that will be harder to justify with my limited income. Basically, when I made the alt premium to try for a Belli house, it was affordable and making a community space that would be used by others seemed feasible. The longer it takes to get there, the harder it will be and eventually it will cost more too. As for right now, it's become like the rest of my life, with the limitations imposed by chronic ill health keeping me on the sidelines, observing others enjoying life and me exhausting myself trying to join in. I had thought it was something I could do, but it's become just another thing for me to fail at. For the sake of my health, I have to put a time limit on how long I'll continue to waste precious energy on it. I do wish everyone else well and hope you all find lovely homes to build your dreams in.

I have plans for a Grayson. If I can't get something when the hoped for large trailer release happens, then for the sake of my crappy health I'll have to accept that this dream of being a small part of the Belli community is really just a nightmare that needs to end. I'll try to adapt all of the wacky ideas and things I've been working on in anticipation to one of the Meadowbrook houses instead. It will end up more an experiential art space to visit than a trippy hippy hang-out for the community to explore and have fun in, but it's better than letting it all go to waste. Everyone here will be invited to check it out for a month and then I'll try to figure out what to do with the majority of two years premium I foolishly got on an alt for Bellisseria. It will be in a Grayson because of its special place in our hearts.

Land owned by a group gets an extra 10% free too.

That would work for my idea just fine. I'd be happy with just about anything.

There's a lot of SL that's safe enough, so I think the more appropriate place for a warning would be tied to specific builds. That's hard to do though given the infrastructure and TPing to get around. I think I'd like for there to be a culture of providing warnings or information about what's ahead primarily because it would encourage broader awareness amongst the general population, but it would probably backfire and become the new script/arc policing. I'm just so used to dealing with it I don't think to mention it to others, though it usually comes up eventually with close friends. For me, the most important accomodation I need is somewhere safe on the screen to divert my camera to. It gives me time to fumble for the ctrl-shift Home and sometimes it's enough to let me stay a while.

I have photosensitive seizure activity too. It's one of the reasons why I tend to travel with my graphics turned all the way down and then adjust them gradually to determine safety. I keep particles off and avoid places known to be difficult. This keeps the triggers at a low enough intensity for me that I get build-up rather than a seizure, which gives me time to get away from it. If there's somewhere with flashing lights that I really want to be, I find a place to park my camera (the roof is often good) which keeps the moving lights off my screen. It's a way of being there for the company without putting my safety at too much risk. Something like screen flicker means SL is more tiring for me than many other computer activities (and computer is worse than non-screen of course). It means I have to watch myself, limit my time inworld and not allow myself to over do. Having to be careful all the time is wearing too, but my SL friends are the ones who've stuck by me through my illness and deterioration so I'm not going to let them go until I have to. It would be lovely if more venue-owners were aware of our needs and took them into account but of course it's never going to happen. It's not like they'll miss us or anything. Those of us who have these difficulties just have to find ways to keep ourselves safe and manage risk.

I doubt it. My information is over 25 years out of date, but way back when I did some work for a friend who was writing software to do automatic checks on copyright infringements. My job was to do manual searches to generate data to compare the automated processes to so we could see how much they missed. It's easy to get the software to find some, it's tricky to get it to find all. The automation and processing power behind it are ridiculously better now, but so is the size of the internet and the amount of data it has to trawl. That their searches found some but not all is absolutely no guarantee of anything.

Congratulations Shield and everyone else. Enjoy.

Could it be "Savage"? Any other words with Harley Davison connections there?

Missed again. Of course.