Prokofy Neva

January 3

1 hour ago, Love Zhaoying said:

"Adults" are more set in their ways - and don't want to be told anything they disagree with. Yet, these same "adults" expect "children" to respect teachers, parents, elders, and experts.

You see a lot of that in these threads!

Example:

Them: "Wahh, PBR is going to sucketh greatly!"

Experts: "No, it will be fine." (Explains in great detail why.)

Them: "I don't believe you, because LL always fails!"

Experts: "Why are you here again?"

Me: I'm not an expert, but I'm sure it will be fine.

No, it's already been established in this thread (see above) that it does not work in the regular SL Viewer as imagined. Just because a small percent use this viewer for valid historical and current reasons doesn't mean the point is overridden.

I always marvel at the way people align themselves with the powers-that-be in SL in ways they never would in RL.

January 2

Just now, arton Rotaru said:

I get ya!
But it's actually not that hard to remove a PBR material as you know by now. In fact you can remove the materials easily.

And spreading fear and, uncertainty on an announcement of a new shiny is rather uncommon.

Nope. I am going to go on posting on social media and warning my tenants about this because it is NOT easy, NOT intuitive, and a general PITA.

If I DON'T do that, my customers will soon be saying YOUR LAND IS MAKING MY THING SHINY AND I CAN'T TAKE IT OFF *REFUND*

If more of you were in high-contact business with low-rent customers, you'd be less cocky and assured about all things LL.

Having a Marketplace page is not the same thing as being in business inworld although I do appreciate binoculars that are far less land impact than the one I've had for years and just deleted, let's hope I can resize it. (I don't care about Materials and most people don't.)

January 2

12 hours ago, Qie Niangao said:

One thing I noticed is that using the Materials in the Library folder directly from the Library folder (without making copies in "My Inventory") pops up the warning "We cannot display a preview of this material because it is no-copy, no-transfer, and/or no-modify." I understand what's happening there, but it's pretty confusing, and not something that happens with ol' timey Library textures.

I'm long, long used to that silliness in the library now and I push past it.

I'm actually glad things in the Library tend to be on no-transfer now.

For years and years, the Lindens put all the Library items not only on all perms, but on "share."

This created endless griefing vectors not only with Philip's party hat, making it appear that he had created a grief object; your own library object, left outdoors, could be swiped and it could be made to appear that YOU created a griefing object.

So it's good they closed off that loophole, I suppose, although it's too bad all the things in the library aren't on full mod, especially the avatars and clothing, which can be hideous otherwise.

January 2

6 hours ago, arton Rotaru said:

That's why we are here, helping. Answering questions, trying to explain things in layman terms. The wiki is useful at least for those who are going to make tutorials, videos etc. to have a reference guide to how things work. The wiki page is mostly filled by residents as well. It's certainly not complete, or a perfect guide on "how to's".

You could argue that all of that should have been in place perfectly fine (tutorials, guides etc.) before the viewer would have been released. But c'mon, that's not how things go and never will be. Expecting that is somewhat naive.

In the official viewer Blinn-Phong has been changed to "Textures" again, as in the old viewers. Some complained it should remain Blinn-Phong, because that would be the appropriate term.
But I can see why the Lab did change that back to "Textures". Having 2 new material terms in that release would be even more confusing to the regular resident.

All this are somewhat expected teething problems, though. They will go away soon.

Um, we're not talking about wiki-woos, we're talking about one line in a blog that says:

WARNING: TEST ON A PRIM FIRST AS YOU CANNOT REMOVE PBR TEXTURES EASILY ONCE APPLIED.

That's all. That.

January 2

6 hours ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

In fairness to Prok, the SL PBR wiki page is not exactly "user friendly," meaning that, you're right, it can't be easily distilled into a blog, but is also going to leave a lot of people's heads spinning. And it omits important things.

I was in the Phoenix-Firestorm test group chat last night; lots of people enthusing about how great PBR looked on their supersonic gaming computers, and one or two, including one creator, asking essentially the same question as Prok: how do you have both legacy textures and PBR on an object? I explained that you needed to add the legacy textures first. I doubt that any of them had read the wiki, but even if they had, it doesn't actually TELL you that.

What is required is something between a breezy "ISN'T PBR WONDERFUL?!!?!?!?" blog post, and the near techno-babble of the wiki: a simplified, step-by-step manual on how to actually do things using PBR and reflection probes. As Prok notes above, most residents don't know, and won't care, that legacy textures are now called "Blinn-Phong": they might well want to know how to texture a prim using both systems, and they're going to want that information in a form that doesn't assume a knowledge of the difference between "forward rendering" and whatever we're using now.

In fairness, the Black Forest supplied such a tutorial, touted by Lindens, but with its brutalist approach in the first graph, I gave it a pass.

January 2

6 hours ago, Love Zhaoying said:

Also in fairness, Prok said they never heard of Blinn-Phong. How could they miss all the Forum posts about BP lately? Who doesn't read all the Forum posts, every day??

I let weeks go by without reading your forums, dear.

I didn't "read down into" the one thread on PBR. There aren't "scads".

One can look up Blinn-Phong. I'm glad he/they are getting credit for his work.

Which is more than you can say for lots of things in SL.

Plus a lot of people who don't have much going on in their lives rn can get a certain frisson of superiority over others because they know this double-barreled exotic nerd term, right up there with Epstein-Barr and Anton-Babinski syndrome (quite common in SL).

January 2

7 hours ago, Arduenn Schwartzman said:

It's purely a viewer's shortcoming.

Blinn-Phong materials and PBR materials can be altered without the need for removing anything at any time. In the official viewer you can't do it in Edit (right now, that's definitely a problem), but with scripts you can and I'm pretty sure in future viewers you can do it in Edit too. (I'm pretty sure the good people at Firestorm are working on it already.)

Below, some proof. One and the same object as seen with a PBR viewer (left) and with Firestorm (right). Inside is a script that will toggle between a red and a green Blinn-Phong material when the object is touched.

So the official viewer of Second Life -- which I definitely prefer for many historical and practical current reasons -- does not work so well with LL's new shiny, PBR.

It works better on Firestorm, as many things do (starting with Search, which thank God, was rescued by Cinders back in the day on Firestorm).

And...It will work better if I add to the script load on my already heavily loaded Mainland regions.

OK, got it.

January 2

24 minutes ago, arton Rotaru said:

It's totally fine to dislike PBR. But apparently you dislike only the mechanisms of how to work with it.

"How do I remove a PBR material from an object?" as a thread title, would have done the trick for your case, though.

The PBR materials wiki page is still under construction. If there isn't a hint on how to remove PBR materials yet, there probably should be one added.

The process is the same as for removing a texture though, so that isn't really something new.

Being able to have 2 material types on a single face adds a layer of complexity, though. That's a given. An alternative would have been to have 2 different types of objects. PBR objects and Blinn-Phong objects. But then you wouldn't be able to add PBR materials to old content.

No, that wouldn't work because that isn't the point. I don't like something that is sprung on us and changes the nature of the elements of the world in irreversible ways -- and that is indeed the case.

I don't care about the wiki. The very first blog could have had a line or two with a warning about this.

It's NOT the same process as removing a texture because you CANNOT select it from inventory on the edit menu. You can ONLY select OTHER PBR textures.

You have to "just know" to click in the texture window and "just now" to select "none" to get the plywood.

I don't care about adding PBR to anything. That's what's hard for you to accept because you think everyone should be fanbois and get in line to be whupped by whatever is inflicted on us.

January 2

1 hour ago, Love Zhaoying said:

Let us know if you need us to fine a JIRA for you. Don't be shy!

ETA: I see Qie mentioned that Henri already did file a JIRA. Good luck with the "doesn't work for you" on using "None"! I bet someone figures it out and posts about it.

I don't need anyone to post a JIRA, that's not how you effect change in SL anyway.

Henri's JIRA isn't about my point, it doesn't matter.

As I noted above, using "blank" leaves it still with a ghoulish glow, and "none" works to restore the plywood original. And? It's beastly stuff and I have no more respect for it than I did starting out. I even bought a 25L texture of a volcano on the MP done in this "substance" and it looks like congealed blood.

I thought the point was to show actual inworld reflections like a RL mirror.

January 2

1 minute ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Yes.

It's not been well implemented, there isn't nearly enough guidance for those who are not techies, and there are bugs.

This is also LL we're talking about, right?

Yep. And that again is why Qie's answer was correct, and mine was not: it still has a "material" on it, albeit a "blank" one, if you choose blank.

And there you have proof of my status as a neophyte!

That's why it's not a texture.

That's why it's a substance.

It's like shellac, that you can't take off, not wallpaper, that you can.

January 2

4 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

I'm not sure I'm understanding what you're trying to do.

You can add the old legacy textures in the old way, BUT -- and this is the dumb part -- you have to add these BEFORE you add the PBR. Once you've added PBR, you can't go back and add, or edit, the old Blinn-Phong textures we used to use. You'd have to remove the PBR first (which is another reason Qie's solution is the correct one), add your legacy textures in the old way, and then add Materials afterwards.

Is the problem that you can't add legacy textures while the Materials are on it?

I appreciate that you're trying to be helpful -- I think -- but you also can't help being knowier-than-thou -- it's a common problem.

None of what you are saying is the point.

In fact, you reveal that my original post is spot on -- because

Once you've added PBR, you can't go back and add, or edit, the old Blinn-Phong textures we used to use

Of course, I've never heard of the term "Blinn-Phong" before now and I dare say most people haven't.

The problem is: you can't remove the textures if you can't override them "in the old way" and if clicking on "blank" turns them blank, but still that odd, ethereal glow of PBR (which I really don't like, I feel like it's "Tales of the Crypt").

You have to "just know" that you need to click "NONE" to get it "back to how it was".

I've made a point, the point is valid, and if you all need to keep man-splaining it and tech-splaining it, understood, but the point is: none of it is intuitive, you would have to come and ask on the forums and put up with knowier-than-though or actually vicious types to get answers -- or experiment by ruining a few things first, before you get it. None of this is necessary. If the Lindens and their fanbois weren't so hell bent on shoveling shiny at us to distract us from other failings -- literally! -- they would supply some basic prompts like this at the get-go.

January 2

8 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

I tried "blank" obviously, I'm not totally stupid.

And it didn't work.

So I have to figure out why now it isn't working for me.

So this is ridiculously and needlessly complex and again, no instructions were given with the blog, then Lindens advertised a tutorial on Twitter and elsewhere from a creator resident that started out with the snarky "Physically Based Rendering (PBR) is here. Long story short: you will be immersed in it whether you like it or not." -- that same instrumented nastiness was how mesh was introduced -- which doesn't guarantee it a read.

If you hit "Edit Selected" you will get a menu that only gives you all the PBR options and nothing else, like "base color" and "Metallic/roughness" etc.

That's why it seems like you can't change it.

So yes, you have to go back click in the window itself labelled "Material" to get the old option of "blank".

So you can change it out of "Gold" or "Copper" etc from the "Materials" file in the library to BLANK, BUT IT HAS A BLUE SHEEN BECAUSE IT HAS BEEN PBR-ized.

That is NOT "putting it back like it was".

Only "none" brings it back to the plywood that God intended.

January 2

23 minutes ago, Qie Niangao said:

Being unabashedly knowier than is fashionable: I think "None" actually removes the PBR Material (so you can go back to using the pre-PBR material textures, etc.) whereas "Blank" starts a fresh, unpopulated PBR Material.

This does seem less than intuitive. It's behind the "Choose from Inventory" option, which doesn't seem obvious to me as the way to remove the PBR Material and re-expose the underlying Blinn-Phong material maps. As I recall, Henri thought it broken enough to file a jira.

Possibly related: it's taking some practice to get familiar with "Material" as a real thing that combines the several maps and settings inside that "Editing Material" floater. I think it's probably a very useful layer of abstraction for reuse, sale, permissions, etc., but at the moment it's still kind of "in the way" of how I think about manipulating surfaces.

ETA: This came up in the "PBR Wow!" thread where Henri mentioned his jira and I posted a similar screenshot

I tried none, derp. Again, I have been around the block a few times. It didn't work. So as I said to Scylla, I have to figure out now why it "works on my machine" for you, but not me.

Yeah, I get it that Materials is a "real thing" -- I called it a "substance" because I have a major in Slavic Studies and a minor in Philosophy as it happens, not computer science.

"Choose from Inventory" will NOT show ANYTHING except OTHER PBR TEXTURES. That's what I explained. And slapping it on from inventory doesn't work.

All of this reminds me of how Aaron Gwyn noted that some men would rather tune an anvil to B than go to therapy.

January 2

46 minutes ago, Scylla Rhiadra said:

Well, I'm afraid I'm not a "knowier than thou" in this case -- I'm a neophyte who is very much struggling with all of this too.

HOWEVER

The answer to your problem is to open the texture tab, choose PBR Metallic Roughness, click on the texture box, and then choose "Blank" under the options.

This removes the materials.

I tried "blank" obviously, I'm not totally stupid.

And it didn't work.

So I have to figure out why now it isn't working for me.

January 2

I'm going to leave aside the question of "what the world looks like" and "the hit on performance you take if you set the dials to PBR" etc. etc. which is addressed in another thread.

Let's just look at the issue of what happens when you try to build with it as an ordinary bog-standard user using the inworld tools to make stuff, not someone schooled in Blender, etc.

There isn't a warning in the Lindens' first blog on this, so let me point out: be careful what you slap any PBR/Materials texture on *because you cannot take it off*.

That was not something I expected, leading me to conclude that PBR is not a modification, like a texture, but a substance -- like a Linden tree (one kind of thing in SL) or a prim (another kind of thing) or a sculpty or mesh (still other kinds of things, or substances, if you will).

If you test a prim with the items in the Materials folder added to the Library, you can toggle out of them -- but you can't put ANOTHER texture to overlay it -- or go back to what you had in the first place. It's locked. It literally won't budge.

You are now stuck with a PBR-ized thing, which is like something vulcanized in a microwave or otherwise changed so that you "can't put it back the way it was."

There are always knowier-than-thou types who come along at this juncture and say butbutbut -- except go and try it, and you'll see what I mean.

You cannot overlay another texture -- not only can you not select it from inventory from the edit menu on that unfortunate object -- even if you go to a texture in inventory another way and try to slap it on, you can't. Again it's locked, for some technical reason.

I noticed on the MP, there are few creators -- not of the best known ones -- offering PBR textures, and those that are, are true unknowns not even bothering to put up pictures of their wares. The more scrupulous among them are adding warnings to their TOS such as "PBR is new and may bug out."

Indeed.

I also noticed that the first version of this "phenomenon" just labelled the edit menu toggle "Materials" -- now in the latest version it is changed to "PBR Metallic Roughness," such as to suggest a kind of super bump map (which I guess is what it is?)

So...I'm not sure I'm going to put anything made with this out for a freebie or sale because I like to put things on mod for people (mercifully) and this would violate my code and also be sure to lead people IMing with annoyed questions "how come I can't re-texture your thing?"

I realize this violates a sacred religious code -- criticizing a new Linden shiny -- and one (as mesh was in its day), shoveled at us with some venom and malice by some -- "take that, get used to it or else!" but still it has to be said.

I doubt this feature can be changed but there at least could be warnings before somebody ruins their rare gatcha or house they spent days getting "just so".

January 2

So if I understand correctly, if the web site currently says NONE AVAILABLE, there is no point in flying around and looking for an empty one to put in a ticket, correct?

In other words, the web site would show AVAILABLE if any empty ones were available to select and ask for via ticket.

So then either we wait for someone to get tired of theirs and release it, or until January 8 when they may or may not make new ones?

January 2

I think many readers have been able to answer for themselves here the question "Is SL more toxic than other games?" and as a bonus, can now answer the question, "Is the SL forums more toxic than other game forums?"

January 1

4 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

It is nothing more then a reinterpretation of the maxim's to "know thyself" and how the "unexamined life is not worth living" which predate pop psychology by a few thousand years. It is also based somewhat on the idea that insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result.

Trying to use one time victimization events as a basis for not having to look at habitual victimization scenerios is a weak argument and it surprises me to see you attempt it.

The business man who continually suffers from losses which others do not or the man or woman who continually gets into abusive relationships would do well to ask themselves what it is that attracts those sort of things if they wish it to stop. You can only blame others for one's bad luck for so long before it starts becoming obvious that maybe there is something I do or be that brings this on myself.

No, like I said, it's rewarmed 1970s pop psych.

Knowing yourself is a noble and valid exercise -- it doesn't involve validating griefers who commit crimes, which you seem to want it to do.

It's not insane to live your Second Life using the available land tools and hope for harmony and happiness. The good news, most people are decent, and most of the time, you do not have adverse results by leaving groups open to join without fuss and leaving land to rez on immediately without waiting for an absentee landlord to show up. Most of the time. Imagine that. I don't think I should warp my SL around the tiny percent of miscreants and change my use of the affordances of SL; the Lindens should instead ban obvious recidivists so it sticks and stop listening to word salad.

No, no, no. No woman deserves to be beaten by her partner, end of story. You don't say "was it your short skirt?" or "was it your pushy attitude?" Because beating is wrong. She doesn't "bring it on herself" -- the abusive man is wrong, full stop.

These are basics, and it truly is a shame that Internet-bred youth have a different notion of all this, in part based on magical thinking.

January 1

1 hour ago, Luna Bliss said:

You might like to visit my installation where I have a card "Why Twelve-Step Programs Doesn't Work".

Basically, it's about infantilization.

December 31, 2023

12 minutes ago, Persephone Emerald said:

You're stretching what Arielle said to include a bunch of things she didn't say. I agree that the "Everything happens for a reason" idea can be widely overused to blame victims for things that happened to them, but in this case she specifically asked if there might be a reason you attracted griefers who would go so far out of their way as to call your RL home.

Maybe it's just the price of doing business in SL when some people are bound to be jerks?

Go back and read what I just wrote. It applies. In spades.

I don't accept the thesis that "there could be a reason..."

I COMPLETELY reject that thesis because it is a criminal thesis. It means that outlaws get to mete out "justice" to people they think "deserve it."

There is nothing that anyone does anywhere -- their lifestyle, their beliefs, their blogs, their business in SL -- NOTHING in RL or SL that "deserves" griefing or "attracts it" in some way -- which is always and everywhere blaming the victim.

I reject the concept of "blaming the victim."

I reject the idea that someone should examine their conscience or reflect on their behaviour to see how they may have "attracted griefing" because griefing is wrong, and nothing anyone does anywhere should attract it -- because it is wrong, and unlawful.

This seems to be hard for you to grasp, and that's a big problem in SL.

Taylor Lorenz doesn't deserve to be ridiculed and hounded and misrepresented because she has an immune disease and doesn't choose to have a party at her house in the holiday. She's an outspoken public figure but there is no need for her to reflect what she might have done or said to "attract the hate" because...the haters are wrong to start with.

If someone shoots at an intruder in a safe zone and griefs them back, that may be another story.

But just because someone is an outspoken public figure -- that's what you mean, isn't it -- doesn't mean they "attract griefing" -- and by implication then must shut up, stand down, "not feed the trolls" and blah blah blah.

Again, I reject all of those theses as utterly unsound.

Some GOP Congressman in Upstate New York who I wouldn't vote for and don't agree with does not "deserve" to be swatted. Swatting is wrong. Swatting can cost lives. He gets to be an unmolested public figure if people voted for him.

December 31, 2023

On 12/29/2023 at 5:07 PM, Arielle Popstar said:

Sure but it should lead me to ask myself what it is about me that attracts people like that.

No, it doesn't, because that is some warmed-over 1960s or 1970s pop psych paperback thesis which has no validity.

Worse, it's truly a ghastly thesis for society, because it means that little children playing in their schoolyard who now have no legs after a Russian bombing "deserved it" because of some conflict about which they could understand nothing. That little children in their cribs in Gaza bombed by Israel "had it coming" because of something their rulers did.

It's about as far away as you can get from any notion of civil society and the rule of law -- and just law in a liberal democratic society.

It leads to "might makes right," because at any time, a vicious griefer, like a terrorist, can say they were "smashing capitalism," or "evil land barons exploit the people" and should have their sim crashed. Or whatever.

In fact, this is the key to understanding the griefers' success in society -- that people like you enable them, by thinking that the targets somehow "attract it" or "deserve it" by either "bad karma" or unspecified "bad deeds" -- even if the punishment isn't commensurate with the alleged crime.

Thanks for illustrating this principle so nicely. It explains a lot.

That you get a bunch of yahoos on the forums to nod and smirk and likey-like means nothing because this principle is NOT one you actually ever want applied to you.

Let's say you put out 500 prims in a 70 prim rental, deliberately. The landlord returns all the prims and evicts you. Did you have this coming? What about you made this happen? Were your actions in fact to blame, not "something about you"? Was the landlord fair? Did he have a rule like this? Etc.

When you get in a car accident in RL, or even you just lose your expensive virtual car in a crash in SL, you don't say to yourself, "I shouldn't have put out those 500 prims."

December 29, 2023

3 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

Good for her, not so much for your sake as hers in that she cleared up her conscience rather than sear it or have to drown it with alcohol or drugs. Those methods are more common unfortunately but I feel that is because too many are not aware of the ramifications when one sells out to their own toxicity.

Reminds me of an incident a number of years ago when I used to operate a business where extending casual credit to a customer was a standard procedure so that when a guy asked if he could have a burger and drink until payday, I readily agreed in spite of his many assurances of his honesty and intent to pay, realizing from experience that the more one is trying to convince me, the less likely I will ever see the monies. Sure enough I didn't see him again for a number of months until one day I saw him come out of the employee entrance and literally slink by my mobile shop with eyes cast down and body angled away in hopes I wouldn't spot him. At that moment the realization struck that this was a man who had literally traded in his self worth and respect for a $5 meal. I had already forgave him and let the amount go but still felt sad for him, realizing he just didn't know how much that burger and drink had really cost him.

Let me suggest that four years of crashing my sims and driving my paying tenants away, and hounding me in SL and RL, would be a value greater than $7000L, so I'm all for any kind of compensation.

"Forgive your enemies and do good to those who hate you" -- if only it worked in SL like it works in RL!

December 29, 2023

14 hours ago, Gabriele Graves said:

I posed the question on another topic about whether Second Life is meaningful anymore, especially as social media is often most people's Second Life.
Obviously a name change isn't on the cards but as a hypothetical exercise it would be interesting to see what people come up with.

This is the topic to unleash your naming creativity. No idea is too daft.

I would call it

NO PAYMENT INFO ON FILE

BORN 2007

December 29, 2023

10 hours ago, Myth Valeska said:

The beauty of SL is that peace is but a TP or mute away lol. Drama and toxicity can be found in every corner of the internet as many have already said. I personally don't participate in it and go to my happy place and decorate my house!

Yes, I would often go to my happy place, called "my real-life apartment in the real world," whereupon griefers from SL would call my RL phone and play the Soviet National Anthem in the middle of the night, scaring my RL children. Sure.

December 29, 2023

8 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

After thinking about it a couple days and looking back over the last few decades, I'm realizing that the short answer is being open to acknowledging, accepting, forgiving and making amends for one's own toxicities in what ever form they take, that one loses the insecurity and feelings of unworthiness that some of us are prone to.

The techniques for doing all that may differ but those are in my own opinion and experience the principles needed to be worked towards.

Had a gal fly up and hand me $7000L in her account to make amends for her griefing me with a gang of losers for years.

That's the sort of reparations we must all encourage. I got a mesh body, mesh head, and bought some original art works.

In general, I don't think griefers reform, however. They just grow older and write thinky faux scholarly papers about "transgressive behaviour," "altnerative communicative strategies," and "signifying otherness" in virtual worlds.

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