A Bunny Licensed in 5 States, Linden G-Men, and M Linden's Supply 'N Demand Comedy Hour

You don't have to worry now that the Second Life Herald has deserted SL and gone over to cover robot tentacle sex in Google's Lively, because the Lindens' own web site has been revamped these days and is providing hours of fun-filled entertainment.

Start with the forums, which, after Prok's Law was put into effect in 2005, became a very lobotomized place, but has gradually picked up speed with a new crop of wags pushing the envelope.

A guy writes in he's suddenly got "a bunny licensed in five states" landing on his property. Seems he is possibly guilty of abusing the famous Playboy trademark, and he talks out of about 4 sides of his mouth trying to prove that he is merely living out his SL as a Playboy of the Western World, not violating the mark...

I swung by the officia,l licensed, sanctioned real-life Playboy sim that had 13,350 traffic on it and no bots or campers, and about 11 dancers, more males than females. It has a store with really realistic art...oh, actually in fact those are photos of real humans next to avatars. The jackets and bling and stuff seems very well put together and quite inexpensive, imagine, a Hugh Hefner style silk smoking jacket for only $75. It was just the thing to try to reassemble my broken life from the Sims Online...I spent some of my last hours on EA-Land in my lovely black smoking jacket from TSO...too bad the Playboy one doesn't come in different colours.

And a new Gor drama that promises to perk up the SL summer doldrums with word that Gor has gone nuclear. Read on.... Better start taking your iodine pills...

The forums list of bot places is very disappointing and sort of fails to make the point, but this blog with a guy's adventures bot-hunting is a total laff riot. It seems the bots are now in-breeding (*shudders*).

Sharp-eyed readers of the official Linden site will have noticed an interesting job offer...

...Account Manager -- Government.

Says the perky job description:

"The Second Life Grid is a platform for innovation that can be leveraged by many different organizations and businesses. Linden Lab's Proactive Initiatives team works to ensure the success of specific market segments using the Second Life Grid, such as academic institutions, healthcare organizations, government, and businesses. Through a combination of proactive outreach and handling incoming inquiries, the Proactive Initiatives team focuses on sharing strategies for success and best practices with these market segments. Linden Lab is currently looking for a new Proactive Initiatives team member to focus on government and military business inquirie".

Lest you think this is a lowly entry-level position one step up from liaision, looky here:

Responsibilities:

* Handling incoming inquiries from government and military organizations

* Proactive outreach into the government market segment

* Coordinating efforts with other Proactive Initiatives team members.

Qualifications/Experience:

* The candidate should live in or near the Washington DC area

* The candidate must possess a minimum of 5 years experience with government business practices and infrastructure.

* Experience in Second Life and the ability to address technical issues around the Second Life Grid are a bonus.

* The candidate must either have government security clearance or the ability to be cleared for government contracts/engagement - this will be seen as a bonus, as this position will require in-depth knowledge of clients' projects in order to fully assist them proactively.

This is hilarious. I've never heard of a private corporation advertising for someone to have a generic government security clearance. There's something strange or even inept about that. Government security clearance is given for specific positions within the government, and businesses or organizations that handle government contracts. You can't really advertise for some kind of "generic government security clearance" although the willingness to undergo such a clearance I suppose is something that could go in a job description. I'm sure this is something that know-it-alls on the forums and my blog comments could argue about forever.

But...I can read the code in the phrase "government business practices and infrastructure" -- that means the ability to answer those Request for Proposals to score some government grant money.

Of course, there's lots of quiet USG activity on the grid, mainly with things that are meant to appear non-threatening to the hardcore political left that is also floating around the grid and not bring them out to demonstrate -- stuff like NASA or CDC or FDA or education.

But since LL's foray on to the Hill with their gentle treatment from Rep. Ed Markey in a hearing about virtual worlds earlier this year, most likely the Lindens have an appetite for more -- and they want to be front and center when Obama comes to power, funded as he is significantly by Silicon Valley. If corporations slunk out of SL after failures, well, education and government grants that support it is the next refuge and cash cow.

And while you're browsing the job listings and wondering why the business manager job sounds so tekkie and not businessy, look at this job, based in Singapore -- where there may another under-the-radar LL presence developing.

Speaking of business, Hamlet nee Linden Au is running his third part of an interminable interview with M Linden, and confronts the new El President with a somewhat pointed question about the land glut (not TOO pointed as this is Hamlet after all, who remains embedded in the platform).

M provides another yuckyuck by telling us that land decisions are made on the concept of "supply and demand".

If you're looking for an excuse to crank up your outrage, note that after weeks and weeks and WEEEEEKS on the Showcase with Greenies, Rezzable is now hogging another Showcase slot with Black Swan, which is a for-pay venue costing $199 to see. I thought the whole idea of Showcase was to find things newbies could go to easily -- what newbie will already have cash like that, or want to spend that out of a stipend even if a premium?

I don't like Black Swan. I hate the lumpy sculpty macadam road, which is a real buzz kill. I hate that there isn't anything to do but gawk at stuff. There's a frightfully expensive piano for sale of $10,000, I don't think it even plays like the ones Sue Stonebender makes for a fraction of that price. My God, there's even a $6000 fetus for sale. What on earth would you do with a thing like that...Trying to take a picture of it, my computer blue-screened, gah...

M also claims that a survey of third-party developers found that "business is very good for them" (those for whom it wasn't good, left).

WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO SURVEY THE SECOND-PARTY INWORLD BUSINESSES, M LINDEN?!

Comments

[Cocoanut Koala]

1) "Proactive outreach into the government market segment"

OMG I can't WAIT till we have more government activity in, and hey, why not all OVER, Second Life?

I don't know about you, but for me, and I'm sure thousands of other marginal misfits, NOTHING SPELLS FUN LIKE GOVERNMENT!

And very little else is anywhere near that exciting! Maybe with any luck, we might even get the DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE! I'm practically breathless in giddy anticipation.

2) "and weeks and WEEEEEKS on the Showcase with Greenies, Rezzable is now hogging another Showcase slot with Black Swan, which is a for-pay venue costing $199 to see."

I believe I read where someone at Rezzable was perturbed that Black Swan wasn't on the Showcase.

I starting to think the Showcase was created for Rezzable; possibly at their behest, actually. Or maybe Rezzable has Linden alts in it.

At the least, I'm pretty sure that the people objecting to commercial enterprises being included on Showcase were blown off firmly and summarily precisely BECAUSE someone - like Rezzable - wanted commercial entities pimped on the Showcase.

We were talking to the wind, because the voices who really mattered had already spoken, behind the scenes. We wasted our time at those "discussion" meetings. They were strictly for the suckers. You could even tell that while you were AT the meetings. It had that flavor. A done deal, behind the scenes.

So now, against all reason, the Lindens literally subsidize their favorite businesses with free promotion and advertising, in a special new Search tab, at the expense of other businesses.

Guess Rezzables couldn't make it on their own, with selling avatars and stuff. And I suppose even the subsidizing wasn't enough, so now they have to charge, too.

So the Showcase is theirs for the taking. If they are unhappy that Black Swan isn't on there, well, then it will go on there.

Who cares. The Lindens will send the business to their favorites, over and above our objections. Me, I'm doing my part by never taking anyone to Greenies again!

Then again, I'm a very bad SL citizen. I should probably be doing much more to help the Rezzable people make more money.

I mean, they are more worthy and deserving than other businesses on SL, right? Or they wouldn't be getting the free promotion on Showcase.

And it's kind of sad, really, the way they can't make it on their own.

So, you know, maybe send them some money now and then.

Or better yet - just go ahead and Do What's Right, and send them all your SL profits directly. No SL profits? Then by damn, send them your real life tax rebate! Or SOMETHING. Cut that check now.

THEY need to take THEIR families out to dinner. Not you. Get with the program.

[Clubside Granville]

Hey coco, missed you at the TSO farewell conversation!

Prok, of all the yapping going on I'm still interested in what should be being discussed but isn't: the land supply. M *cough* may say supply and demand, but what about the current supply I demand be auctioned? At least a dozen purple reegions sit idly in the two most northern continents, created some time ago but not being auctioned. If they want to sit on their ass about creating new land, first let's clear out the current land. And as fra as not talking, I remind everyone of this post from July 17th: "After review, we have decided to remain as we have been, so we are not going to add any more Mainland whole regions for the next two weeks. We will review again on the 1st August and blog then to let you know if there is a change." I think August 1st has done come and gone, though who knows what new-agey calendar the Lindens have hanginf within "The Love Machine".

The Showcase is a horrible, horrible joke as I have mentioned before, as case of the Lindens deciding to game something only residents used to. Would this be a case of the Lindens GOMing Popular Places? See what I did there!? And I absolutely agree, no access-restricted (which includes pay to visit) parcel should ever appear in Showcase, but I guess it could be the beginning of a trend, a new FIC-level kick-back scheme! Just attach the appropriate slurping noise to the link. We have a winner!

[Cocoanut Koala]

I have been on vacation!

coco

[ichabod Antfarm]

Hi,

I was curious about Black Swan selling passes for access so I tp'ed there and managed to get in without paying a fee. I see in About Land that the price for a pass has been set to $100L but the box hasn't been checked off. Perhaps it was and they thought better of it? I wanted to verify this because I send new people there to show them what can be built in SL. However, I am not much of a fan either as I don't see what the point of it is beyond an exercise in technique.

Icha.

[Prokofy Neva]

You can land there, but to get past the landing area you have to buy a ring that enables you to pass through.

Clubside, I think you are pushing really parochial concerns here. I understand you want to buy a sim, but surely you can see with the huge land glut and gadzillion lots for sale that it's madness to keep pushing land on the auction.

Why don't you file a request with Concierge and ask them to put that one up in the queue? Perhaps that would make sense.

I've been trying to think through what it would mean to have "buy now" instead of auctions for new land, like ebay. Perhaps they should institute such a system. It would be great if it were scripted so that only the people on the sim where an old lot is recycled and reauctioned could have first crack at it, so that it didn't always go to land bots who merely jack it up in price. I'm all for middle men and arbitrage and liquidation. But this constant disruption of life on an individual sim is really a problem, where you cannot secure abandoned land and become thrown at the mercy of bots. I am trying to think through what the implications are for all this. I think it can only lead to stability and retention if people don't have to face frustration in buying lots on their sims or on demand. But of course it would very much change the feeling.

[ichabod Antfarm]

ahh, ok, I just TP'ed back and saw the authorization device they are charging 199 for. I don't know what it does because you can access the sim without it.

Icha

[economic mip]

Clubside thank you for reminding me about that August 1st deadline. I have seen that since the last announcement land prices appear to be going up. However what the numbers do not tell you is that best of luck selling land. I have seen that the actual price land sells at is about half the number Jack quoted or lower in some areas. So a lot of land is sitting for sale at prices people are not willing to pay. Sounds like the real world...

[Ann Otoole]

Prok you missed the L$50,000 ballerina statue at black Swan. When I saw that I laughed so hard i had to leave. There is nothing compelling about the sim whatsoever except the hype factor they managed to generate.

A company in Orlando pretty much has the VR world simulator business for the government wrapped up. They do a lot of urban warfare simulations. Those VRs are not subject to the security and performance issues SL has. I'm sure Lionel would not mind if the guv wanted to license his destructible stuff system if they wanted to build combat simulations in sl though. I guess if the guv wanted a cheap non secure VR then SL would be the way to go. But why? They could get all they need off the open source folks and not have to deal with SL/LL at all. Interesting.

[Clubside Granville]

I apologize Prok, because even if I am a child of the '70s I see myself as of the '80s, the Me Generation. Me me me. However, I'll try to keep my hijacking of this post to a minimum with a moistly unrelated follow-up to your comment.

What we really need is an undercover investigation into how the auctioning process works, as it makes no sense from an outsider's perspective. Why don't they have an eBay system in place, especiallyu now that there's an eBay logo on the Auction page? Why can't regular people auction off land through the system, setting a low market price that must be met like on eBay? Whyu can't they automatically detect Governor Linden reclaimed land and auto-push it onto the queue within in a week for a week long auction? Why should an already created region set for auction not enter the queue?

Anyway, I will take your suggestion and contact the concierge. I actually created a support ticked. The ticketing system even has auctions as one of the support types, asks you the Auction ID and everything. Of course after five days why should I have expected a reply? *snort* Did you notice the new home page at http://secondlife.com pushing the advantages of being a Premium? The bootom mentions extended support. Guess me an the Lindens have a different notion of the word "support".

Things were a lot easier when we could post to Ben Linden (was it Ben?) on the Land forum, he'd clean up those pesky Linden 16m2 right away and even tell you when plots marked for Auction were actually scheduled to enter the active queue. Why they weren't all automatically entered I never asked...

[Tammy Nowotny]

I am having trouble with the auction system.... since July 30 or so, when I submit a bid, it sez my "CustNo is Invalid."

I am just speculating, but I think the reason the Lindens don't automatically push land into the queue is because they don't want to put too much up at once. And they evidently give priority to abandoned properties in places where land sells quickly.... which is something you would need a human to figure out.

I hadn't heard about the issue of landowners charging for access to their sims until yesterday when it came up at both Beyer Sellers' and at Rissa Maidstone's shows. (Beyers had a show about Open Grid, and Rissa had a show about Texas State Technical College's new SL degree program.) The provision to charge for a pass to your land has been around from the beginning but the only places which actively used it till recently were sex playpens.

[Tammy Nowotny]

The security clearance requirement in the DC job listing is not all that unusual. Security clearances do start out as being part of a particular job, but they and and do go with the person when he or she leaves one job for a similar one.

[Prokofy Neva]

Tammy, there are many types of security clearances, and they go with government jobs. LL isn't the government. They don't have the government contract -- yet. They just ask for a generic thing that is very vague because they are signalling, basically -- we need somebody to get us government money and also serve as an informal lobbyist.

[Art Laxness]

Hi. The current re-hype for Black Swan is over an installation that myself and my RL brother Seifert Surface made for the sim. It's in the sky above Lightwave's stuff. Is it worth the entry fee? I have no idea. I find after making something I'm in no positiong to make any kind of critical judgement, but I think its pretty cool. Oh and there's lots of interaction so you don't have to just gawp.

[Prokofy Neva]

Art, I went to Black Swan before it was for-pay, and then recently. I didn't see anything up in the sky per se, unless you mean some flashing and dripping light or particles. I went on a ride on a black feather to some vendors. If there is "lots of interaction up in the sky" maybe they need a sign to explain it better, because I spend 30 minutes diving in the water, walking the path, trying to see if there was anything there and didn't see anything except these really obvious art cliches like the fetus from 2001 Space Odyssey and a ballerina and dramatic couples and bloody feathers -- the usual art stuff that has served as a cliche for man's struggle against the elements from time immemorial. Sign. I'm sure it's all terribly sad and important.

I hate like hell paying the $199 again to see this installation, but if you say it's cool, I guess I have to take your word for it.

[Ann Otoole]

Oh yea the one time i went and will ever go to Black Swan there was a teleport to a gallery sign. Teleport was broken because the slurl or landmark was bad. Very memorable. Paid to see a place built by people that can't build a teleport with a valid location.

[Martin Magpie]

Hey I enjoyed black swan very much. It's very artistic so right up my alley.

--the grid/land---

Lets talk about Zones shall we. What was it I said not so long ago? "Cleansing the grid" well there ya go. This is just their effort to make sl all pretty for the masses. Hello? The masses heard about your game either they went for it or they didn't. If they went for it LL already screwed them over and if they didn't; well they are probably playing in some other 3d world right now. I fully expect LL to announce some sort of government soon enough. I mean come on they must control ever aspect of our free time; right? Sorry a little bitter since the whole bay shitty thing went down. The fact that they keep up with the lip service doesn't help much either. I am still going strong in SL and again nothing has changed in my SL in the past 5 years. I am still building and still helping ppl. So what has LL done for me? Jack and Squat.

That's the thing though; they have done very little in 5 years. So no I do not expect a new bumper crop of newbies to show up any time soon. Bad news and bad press have taken well care of that.

LL needs to back the hell off and let ppl treat SL as anything they see fit; they need to allow the paying residents to change their minds every 20 min. if they desire to do so. All this hands on stuff is more than irritating; it's intrusive. The rules, the rules, the rules suck. They need to read their own TOS and stick to it before bringing more shit to the party if you ask me.

Other open source projects are working very hard to be online by the end of 2009 and now here is the kicker; they are already planning on underselling LL lol. WTG LL give em the code so they can put you out of business.

Alright I think I have said enough; if you can't follow along; tough. Read it, hear it.

Mar/Cat