Prokofy Neva

Answer to your question: "A second-hand emotion." It's all virtual, even if the people are real and do experience real feelings. But at the end, you can't take it with you. The number of people driving-SL-while-drunk is always high as some people think that they can cover up their alcoholism and drinking alone by talking to others in SL -- and generally being annoying and abusive and not even remembering it the next day. It's awful, and they should have AA chapters in SL.

I have never, ever found the skyboxes with bolted-in furniture to be very popular with tenants and that matters. All tenants want to remove or move things and while the Varonis skyboxes are a great start for some, and serve some niches, they are too dark and BDSM-y for most tastes. I agree with the other commenters that you should buy the skybox, then look for the furniture to fill it. And having bought 100s of adult beds in 20 years, I can tell you that none of them really work that well, that most people want their own special thing they get used to, and choosing them by how they look and not how the anims actually play out is a big mistake. So the new Miyabi skybox by dust bunny is my latest big enthusiasm, $1400, only 125 prims, two storey, and fabulous Japanese sensibility without the wasabi patterns in your face -- just simple wood beams and floors more like a Finnish or Quaker sort of experience. I would go to Black Sand for furniture. Also Bricolage which has nice sets and Naturi. People like myself put rentals together completely furnished but I find that the first thing tenants want to do is throw out all that painstakingly placed stuff you put out and have their own things around them, even if chairs from the Library.

They can speak for themselves and explicate their own story but I think it's not the worst thing for the first round. BTW they got their start with one of the early Linden "contests" which involved giving away an entire sim to a group which could justify a use for it. They hardly got any applicants because people weren't dummies -- they realized the set-up cost of the sims -- which then were much higher, like around $1000 -- were the least of the expenses as the *ongoing tier* -- which was higher then as well -- would be what would kill them. How could they sustain a payment every month of $300+? Few people had that to shell out on an early virtual world. The contest was handled by Haney Linden who then went on to be Pierre Omidyaar's program officer in his foundation. The community called Neufriestadt won the contest and put up an Alpine village with a socialist ideology behind it articulated extensively on the forums. At that time there were a few other similar groups, some around Caledon -- hence the name "Confederation" although by this time I think it's basically not so much a confederation of distinctly separate thriving groups but more a coalition of those who remain, on a few sims with stores and sailing. Again, such groups never think you understand them enough so let them explain themselves. I wouldn't have led that card if I were doing what is essentially a MEDIA CAMPAIGN to drive membership. Many users are Americans, like it or not, and they don't get socialism although they have it in some forms. I suppose we should be grateful that the Lindens didn't go Gorean on this round.

The CDS was founded by socialists who wound up in fact having to move to a more medieval smallholders/craftsmen kind of society which I think is more like the ancient veche system of Novgorod, let's say, than say, UK Labour Party type socialism. That's because they have to have merchants to rent parts of the land and then pay for it with selling content or activities or merely out of their own pocket. They don't really have the ability to "tax and spend" (although they can simulate this with having people donate to collective kitties). They don't "own their own simulators" -- they rent them the way all of us do our islands. They just mean that they agree *collectively* on what the community will do -- this or that building or activity or priority. Everyone who has been in SL for any length of time knows how hard it is to get groups of people to do things -- and pay equally for them -- in SL. Most projects are run by one very strong male persona with a subservient female or male helping him and then wider circles around them. They are run like fiefdoms or principalities or large Catholic families or whatever meme you want to use, but it's "Father Knows Best" and Mom is baking cookies and saying "Ward, speak to the boys..." That's because it's very hard to get things done in general in RL, let alone in virtuality, without a strong, determined personality to actually dig the soil and pay the tier and push the prims. Very few communities are collective in any way at all. They don't stand around collectively building and removing each other's prim as Soft Linden would dream of (and Philip back in the day). They commission builds. Or a sole builder makes something to spec. They don't have meetings and decide things democratically at all -- usually one person decides and the rest go along or don't. So in that sense the CDS is an interesting experiment if you have the stamina for such things. I have RL boards I am on or groups I support with RL functions that give me plenty of that "democratic centralism" and DSA experience without having to go into SL.

When I saw this video, I felt sorry for the Lindens -- they are stepping on the same rake again -- and yes, they tried this years ago, only in that age, while they had Desmond's Caledon, they had Cubey Terra's airport, where people could take airplane rides and collect some free flying vehicles, and several other oldbie venues (I believe "Riverwalk" with its art shows and fireworks) which are long dead now, after their managers first became Lindens (like Cubey), then sometimes died in RL or went on to other worlds beyond SL. The good news is that sensing what a conflict generator this caper is, the Lindens started off acknowledging that in principle "anyone" could apply to get a scarce, high profile exhibit spot on this newbie landing island and therefore potentially get traffic windfalls and sales, I might add -- that's why there can be a stampede to these things. I won't be applying because I no longer have a team at the venue I used to run (Memory Bazaar in Ross) -- with a builder, volunteers, interested store owners, etc. -- to greet and help newbies. I and a few store owners still do it occasionally now but since the Lindens turned off "set home to here" at many of the infohubs (a mysterious and destructive action), often they are AFK or just want to get the hell out of any sort of orientation trap and get to the clubs and shopping. And God bless 'em, that's what SL is for. I winced when I saw "Boystown," a venerable LGBT group which is decidedly NOT about taking boy children in RL or SL and "turning them gay," although I always thought it was unfortunate they chose for their name a vintage classic of old American movies feature Bing Crosby as a Catholic priest -- the RL Boystown was a place for runaway boys to go to for refuge during the Depression. The SL Boystown is indeed on adult sims but so what? The Lindens need to embrace the reality of their product since they readily sell these adult sims for adult activities. They could easily make G-M-A designations even for that welcome island but even that isn't necessary. People are grownups who come into SL, or should be, and they'll figure it out soon enough. I winced when I saw another child avatar avatar representing Bay City -- because when the media sees this without preparation, and feeding the usual prejudices and insanities -- they will come away and say "OMG child predators in virtual worlds my God hide the wife, hide the children, call the MAGA senators". I really wish the Lindens had put some more thought into the optics of a thing like this in THIS country at THIS time with THESE primaries going on. Of course, they live in California, which is a different country even than New York, let alone Texas. As for the Confederation of Democratic Simulators, or Confederation of Simulated Democracy ("democracy in one sim," as Trotsky might say) this needs the adjective "socialist" in front of it but in principle, sure, it's like an old European social democracy with some nice buildings and venues and maybe will appeal to aged members of the UK Labour Party or German SD, I don't know, you tell me. I go there for the stamps in the BBB game , and muse upon the days when Ulrika Zugzwang emulated the Russian Social Democrats and blew up her own created buildings rather than leave them to the community. You know, I'm too old. I remember too much. Amnesia would be a blessing in some ways. Then there's the no-show booths with the very hazy missions like "Non Profit Commons" which is supposed to bring together "all" NGOs but honestly, it's a specific type of NGO with lefty politics -- NGOs I myself would respect in RL -- but really aren't positioned to "serve the virtual masses" seeking info on how to turn their system bodies mesh. That was never their mission. I have to wonder why Corsica South Coast wasn't there at the very get-go as they represent a very sturdy set of people and activities, art shows, live music, clubs, interesting hang-outs and sights to see, etc. Hopefully they will come in to the next round. Why Club Furzona and not Luskwood is also a mystery but who knows, people are on different time zones, I don't know how much time went into this and maybe they weren't reached. Furries are a big part of SL -- some people from the outer world are already in furry conventions, that is legitimate. Mieville is another obvious group that should be included -- the Lindens have taken over their reduced number of sims now since the death of Perryn Peterson (in one of their rarely-bestowed "preservation" largesses, which has its pluses and minuses). They have more activities than any other group I know -- dances, readings, discussions, informal chats, libraries, merchants' events, themed occasions, etc. etc. It's very furry/tiny/LGBT friendly and Steampunk themed but loose enough so that norms like me are welcome. Of course most of the exhibits included here actually sell rentals or content and the Linden positioning helps that. Bay City is fantastically expensive, so I'm not sure why including that in the newbie pitch makes sense, not because newbies are poor -- they are six-figure computer professionals in some cases -- but because they don't readily drop their cash in the first few days and weeks. The Bay City activities themselves aren't frequent enough to allow for heavy newbie greeting but good luck, perhaps they'll retain some people. That is the goal. There is a large, vibrant Black museum/club/art gallery scene in SL (Motown is more of an outside corporate thing) which the Lindens should have included in the first round, they have a huge presence on YouTube which is enormously important in selling SL. LL might have better started with the top YouTubers around SL like Isabelle Charen and involved them to get visitors -- and that is still possible. I'll also speak a word in defense of Strawberry here, a person I didn't know personally when she was a resident and with whom I don't recall ever having any interaction with in SL. She is a solid character and a valid media presence who brings to her job the authenticity of having been on the ground in SL and who can establish rapport with the guests on the show which is very important -- for some people, Lindens are scary. She can also put at ease her own Lindens, which isn't trivial. Maybe she isn't Dick Cavett but then we aren't prime-time TV here in SL. It's fine for what it is. I don't get at all the claim that she is "dry" -- if anything, her sole fault is to be occasionally self-deprecating but she talks normally. I only have one big wish on her shows: for her to take that !@#@#$ annoying bobbing kittycat out of the view in front of her chairs -- it's not moving naturally like a KittyCat but wiggles only, old school. She needs to remove ALL distractions of that nature from the set, pronto. In fact if I were a Linden media manager right now, I'd delete or somehow bury the video produced from this gambit, get the cycle of the first round over as soon as possible so the eye does not linger on any bad optics around children or dull Alpine socialism or clunkety Steampunk (a niche topic for the world at large) and move as swiftly as possible to the broader selection with actual popular clubs and galleries and venues. Especially in time for Valentine's Day. Meanwhile, let us note the passing of the Great and the Good, the Nature Con, blessed with Linden Loving last year, which is completely MIA and whose main founder abandoned her entire land holdings and disappeared (I hope she's ok). Linden blessing doesn't pay the tier even with traffic windfalls; newbies don't spend money and are quick to move on to the next thing.

I think if it is just a non-paid raffle it won't be a problem, if there are such things. But the raffle boards I have and have seen on the MP have a payment mechanism. And what's the point if you don't have a payment, if you are trying to raise money for charity? I used to have land raffles and gatcha raffles as "something to do" and charged like $1 or $5 for the tickets merely as a slight offset. I think it will still be seen as gambling by the Lindens. And here's another point of information from my years of doing this: this is not how you raise money. It's just not. A direct donation mechanism for an explicit cause simply raises more cash in my view. For example for relief in Ukraine, Palestine, Haiti, etc. I have both a sign with a script containing a URL that leads people to a RL Internet site to donate in their currency directly -- really the most cost-effective way -- AND I also take Lindens in a donation jar and display how close I am to the goal where I can then myself donate US $25, let's say, to Doctors Without Borders, made up of dozens of small Lindens contributions. I just think that works better. But there's the cost of cashing out those Lindens and the accountability question in general and I just don't think it's efficient to use SL for fund-raising. I do anyway as a long and slow proposition -- it can take months to reach each US $25 check that I'd be sending in RL. The ACS Relay for Life has been honed for 15+ years at events like Fantasy Faire, which is managed by skilled people with RL non-profit management experience, who have worked for years to refine the vendors, the donation kiosks, auctions, accountability etc. needed for this effort. But many other casual things in SL are dubious. Is it fair that I get to write off the donation on my taxes, and all those people who donated 100L don't? OF COURSE it is because I absorbed the cost of tiering the view of the donation kiosks, the cashout fees, and the maintenance of the venues and records. They could always give directly to RL institutions.

Well, of course. We have thermoses and home-made stuff, too. Plus you don't HAVE to eat out, you can go for a walk and then eat at home. Some of the museums have times when you can come for free. Some have a suggested donation that everyone pays because it's expensive running museums, we don't have state socialism here as in Europe and that has its pluses and minuses, we have less taxation. The movies (especially if you add the popcorn) are ridiculous, and you have to put up with rats again now as well. Obviously you stay home and stream from Amazon Prime for $2.99 with those prices, and movie theaters are going to become extinct soon enough and they should turn them into homeless shelters. For young people, especially teenagers living in HUD housing with no resources, there is absolutely nothing to do here in my immediate neighbourhood of a 20-odd block radius except Italian ices in the summer and Father Jim's movie night at the church -- where he has strayed from the "holy" themes just to provide some civic service to the hordes of people wandering around with nothing to do, adding coffee and donuts as well, to keep them out of trouble. I mean, yes, if you walk out of our "food desert" of government housing where I live, where every little business has been destroyed by first Hurricane Sandy, then the other hurricanes, then COVID, then in some cases Black Lives Matters and anti-war demonstrations (where miscreants have broken windows and stolen stuff), it's bleak. You can support those causes as I do without taking away the livelihood of new immigrants. Second Life is drug- and disease-free and you don't have to worry about the unvaccinated and mask up as I do with an immune disease. Yes, there's something rather forlorn about having only virtual experiences and relationships but I have real ones too and frankly, they tend to cost so much what with travel and meals that I do less of them and I'm grateful for SL. Guess how our lovely town fathers wish to solve these problems -- they want to put in a tech center (that doesn't serve any youth, just big business) and a casino (!). There has never been a casino in midtown like that. The closest one is out in Queens. Casinos are mixed bags, of course. They bring in revenue but they drain poor people's pockets. Yep, a casino right smack in the middle of HUD housing, just the trick. Local elected are strenuously resisting with some civic groups.

Recently, a friend and I went to the cheapest diner in my RL neighbourhood and each paid US $30 plus for a simple breakfast and coffee. And that's before we even got to the movie ($17.50 each as seniors) or museum or anything, with $2.90 each way bus fare. Very easily a simple day with a friend in NYC turns into a splash-out of US $100. I don't have that in RL to spend. So SL for me, where I might spend that much in a month, but more likely half that, or US $50, is perfectly great entertainment and artistic outlet, and I have a business inworld to generate that income. People contrast Second Life with other online things, like MMORPGs or even an online news subscription. But the thing to contrast it with is real life.

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Interesting take. One thing I don't understand about SL these days (I'm old) is this insistence on dress codes. I go to some events where the invitations have elaborate dress codes either as to theme or as to degree of formality. I'm sorry, but if you want me at your ball, I may come in my 75L sweats because at least they're mesh; my tuxedo is old-school system paint-on. People are deadly serious about this stuff and while I have not witnessed anyone actually ejected for not being in a suit, there is this social ostracism involved.

I didn't realize you sold stuff. I'll have to look you up in the book.

I'd rather divide the forums into those who use their main avatar name on the forums, which is tied to their business and all their inworld activity, and those who use alts on the forums, and have hidden, mysterious mains engaged in who-knows-what. That's what I'd like to do. Happy to debate people when I know what their inworld business is and their public profile. For example I have many disagreements with Diablo Lioncourt, but he's a known quantity, with a public business engaged in public activity, so his remarks are tied to his business without fear or favour. I think everyone should be doing that on the forums. The Lindens aren't in a position to end this alt-o-rama; a keener sense of civic duty promoted by all could achieve this.

I have left groups she is in so I don't have to keep seeing that long name on the screen.

I don't want to violate the privacy of my tenants but let me say there are some real doozies in my groups.

Once at an event releasing Cory Doctorow's book inworld, I got into conversation with Philip Linden himself, and I said something about the limitations of the book device of that era. "Someone will make everything," said Philip confidently. Someone will make a better mousetrap. That's the mantra of the virtual world. Another time, I went to report on TechCrunch in NYC and I managed to catch up with Marissa Meyer, who was at Google back then. I noted that one of the popular apps at the fair had the ability to search inside the app for music *and it wasn't in Google*. I could see her brain whirring. "Someone will make something for it," she said, and of course today, no one remembers that app and Spotify is in Google. You can hum a tune to Google Assistant and she will find it for you. So if SL dies tomorrow, or if Amazon strangely forbids all adult content (how could they possibly do that, given all the web sites that run on their servers???), someone else will make a thing. "Someone will make everything."

I don't see why you can't return them if you actually see branches on your land, but maybe they are rooted in such a way that you can't, in which case you will have to file a ticket and wait...six months...nine months...until you finally go to a Concierge meeting and complain directly to a Linden.

I've got a 'Bama boat like this in SL.

Generally, I stay away from New Year's resolutions and I'm awfully late getting started (although if you go by the Russian Old New Year on the Gregorian calendar, I'm still fresh). But I thought of a great one and I simply must do this. With my inventory at 251,000, even if I spent every day on this, I'd have to go through 687 items a day for a year to make any progress. To be sure, there is low-hanging fruit like unpack and give scripts, those ridiculous doubled up names (why does that even still happen?!) and of course "object". I fear "object" because what if it's one of these ancient builds I commissioned from various builders now long gone from SL and I can't ever get that beam or door back? I suddenly realized the way to combat that problem is to do a search with "creator" on their names and pick out their "objects" and put them in a folder. After doing a few of those, I need to bite the bullet and delete everything named "objects". It's time. SL is almost 21 years old. But here's my idea: for every single thing I buy, whether at a store, event or a 50L Friday type of thing, I have to delete ten other items. That's harsh, but fair! Makes you stop buying stuff you don't really want, or, lets you buy that thing but forces you then to delete 10 other items. And honestly, sculpty trees and Christmas decor from 2006 can go unless it has some actual meaning or talent behind it. I don't promise I'm going to have the determination to hit "delete" on the "objects"....

It's true that everything seems to cost $10 now but you can't blame these services, they have to pay their bills. But I have to pay mine as well, so Flickr cancellation was low-hanging fruit for me -- I'm just a tourist snapping and posting unedited and unretouched photos and I'm never going to fuss with them, so it's not worth it. Yes, it would be nice to have better photos of my rentals but I do what I can and with the Premium Plus account the uploads are free, which is the main reason I get PP. OpenAI costs me something like US $2.00 a month to run 6 characters in SL at various venues who use chatGPT and talk to people in character. MidJourney is $10 per month and that's much more valuable to me than Flickr. I've debated whether to get the premium Twitter but it doesn't seem warranted for many reasons. My blog costs me like US $125 a year and even though I blog a lot less, I want to keep it and its archive and it's worth it to me. Etc. But more and more I have let things like Substack subscriptions or magazine subscriptions go.

There are so many I don't know where to start. Some five years ago, a new neighbour put up a giant photo-real wall that really blighted the view on two-three sims all around. He didn't have a build on the ground -- his main build was up in the sky. So it really didn't seem necessary to put up the ugly photo-wall, which always looks jarring in-world -- you can uncheck "avatars can see me" and be invisible on your land -- and in his case, this would be the rare times he would be on the ground. It was nuts. The owner of another rentals company, another long-time neighbour, and I all IM'd this character and asked him at least to make the photo-walls clear on our sides -- we would be looking at nothing then. Some people want the "sense of privacy" or enclosure such idiocies ensure, but of course if we were really keen to spy on this fellow, we could cam in through his wall lol. He was never there. Instead, he doubled down -- as such people often do -- and put up a giant, ugly picture of a disabled Black man leering into the camera. We AR'd it as racist and targeted behaviour such as to harass. Multiple times. The Lindens ignored us. The other company eventually abandoned their land and left, not only because they couldn't rent land near that idiot, of course. I put up one of Felix's giant stone/tree walls as a backdrop and put a skybox for rent there which hardly ever rented. The down side of that photo real monstrosity is that it rezes first when you came on the sim, leering up at you And there it will stay, ensuring that no one buys or rents any land around it for years, because spiteful little men like this never tire of the sense of power over other people they gain in a virtual world, clearly lacking in their real lives.

BTW, I think your purpose now, given what appears to be a "crashed" land market for you, is to bully and harass the competition on the forums, in tandem with tactics like aggressive returns and land-cutting and view-blighting inworld, safe in the knowledge that a) I won't AR you (I think it's tacky to AR people on the forums) and b) the mods will let you have your way, for reasons unknown. So I'm pretty much done with this conversation and if anyone wants to follow up inworld with discussion of the land business you can always IM me.

This is one of the best events in SL I've ever seen. A group of some 60 Japanese shrines, some permanent, some temporary, have gotten together to make unique stamps for each location which you can collect to display in books or on a board. Along the way you will some breathtakingly beautiful sights. Many of them also have free gifts or gifts for $10-100 which are beautiful. It closes January 15 so be quick! Goshuin Project

In the time this thread has run, I have sold 5 land parcels. I don't sell much land as I'm in the rentals not the sales business, but if land isn't renting, I sell it or sometimes abandon it rather than have it sit there or sell it for such a low price that it will be eaten by ad farmers. So I didn't have to pay much tier on them -- about 2 to 2.5 months. I had to lower the cost somewhat on some -- $5/me for waterfront seems awfully low -- but others sold for much more and I had a 4096 sell for $55000 that was double waterfront/roadside and a 1536 sell for $55,000 that was non-Blake but prime saleable land. No crashes for me, although I do think that overall, the market is down and the cashout is less. Accordingly, I continually downsize. I think yes, people spend more on their avatars than they do on rentals and flit around to clubs and various sims where you can even have sex out in the open or in cheap hotels or cabins. Or they rent for short periods. I think the Lindens charge the price that the need to charge to cover costs, as we all do in business. And as it is, they have a lot of free accounts -- the majority -- that are a load on the servers and not always a return to the economy or culture.

It makes no sense to rent Anshe land and re-rent it when you could get your own island and completely control it and not worry about that business suddenly leaving SL -- unlikely, but it does happen. If ACS charges so little that you in fact save the cost of your own start-up, they should review their pricing because they are merely foolishly enabling competitors on their own sims. Good 4096 is not subjective -- there are very basic metrics of FPS, view, waterfront or flat status, disposition of neighbours, etc. Nothing I've said is irrelevant as Mainland is not out of the scope, the issue is start-up costs and Mainland is simply cheaper across the board, despite the ultimate risks. I don't have hard-wired views. For example, if an annoying neighbour apparently trying to "make a point" returns every single prim of mine or my tenant's "just because he can," in the past I might return them back, put up ban lines, file ARs for harassment etc. Now I just abandon the land near that return-happy idiot. They can tier that land or worry that it gets cut up to ad farms rather than bother me. That's only one of a 100 ways I have changed my views since 2004.