Hey everyone,
You probably noticed a little redesign going on. This is in anticipation of welcoming our first sponsor for the site, and organizing what we're doing here just a little better.,
There's lots of work left to do on the colums you see on the right, so do forgive me if things get switched around just a little over the next day or two.
Do let me know what you think...
I just don't know what to do with myself without internet!
Im back though, did you miss me?
Hey everyone. We interrupt you're regularly scheduled, relatively professional virtual worlds news coverage to state the patently obvious: Nick is working on the site design, live...
:)
I fiigured it would never get done otherwise. Please bear with me, and feel free to report problems or suggestions as we progress! Im working off of the Drupal Themes page here, and updating via my Twitter page...
Sorry for the shoddy service...
Veejay kindly recorded transcripts of the talks that IBM, SUN and Intel gave at our recent Geek Meet. They're here for any that want them on Google Docs:
Thanks for coming everyone!
Wow, glad its not just me then... that's been doing my head in for 1/2hr now..
But I can't login! Arrrrrrrghghghghghg......
Oh well, guess i'll gry again in 30mins, maybe it's just everybody trying to login at once..
For your delight and amusement I've posted a bunch of pictures just shot at the Coca Cola Virtual Thirst press briefing for the design competition they're holding that I wrote about earlier today. You can see the two seperate galleries: Celebs, for hotties and notties amongst those in attendance, and virtual thirst, where i've snapped a couple of stage just for show...
Remember, if you want to post photos, or blog, or both, at Metaversed, you can. It's easy to do and lots of fun.
Ok, so there's not a ton of discussion going on just yet, but it IS starting to roll, and for the age of this site we're not doing badly. So with that in mind, I've made some adjustments to how discussions can be tracked at Metaversed.
See the Discussions Page (top right of all pages) and notice the tabs at the top. Now you can track news, blogs, images or everything at once!
Hopefully this will help members find conversations, stories and opinions they're interested in faster, and promote more discussion in general.
It's been a busy weekend with kids, lawn mowers, stray dogs and tractors (dont ask..), but I've managed to add some much needed functionality to Metaversed for members. If you're not a member, join now, it's free and you'll be able to see the stuff I'm talking about..
Remember that we opened up Metaversed only last week for member blogs? Well, this Sunday, Im pleased to announce the first improvements to that small offering. Now if you want to blog, photo blog, promote your SL business or just create a central page full of your SL related details, you can.
You can see my profile page as an example. Here's what's been added this weekend:
If you're logged in, hit the post something link on the right. You'll see that as well as "blog entry", you now have "image". This, as you might imagine, lets you upload an image! It automatically creates thumbnails, and sizes the image to 500px max wide (about the widest it can go before wrecking the page on a 1024x768 resolution).
Those images can be tagged, and the result is the creation of image galleries like this. Once in the system, using the Rich Text editing detailed below, you can easily add images to blog posts by right clicking them and copying their location.
In the not too distant future, I have plans to add Flickr integration and allow members to post pictures to Metaversed directly from Second Life. That last point isn't trivial though, so give me a little time on that one :)
Don't know HTML? No problem, now you don't have to. When you go to submit a blog post, or add text to an image, or even comment or edit your profile page, you'll now see that hopefully familiar row of text editing controls above the form. These buttons will hope those not comfortable with writing raw code insert links, bullted and numbered lists, change the text and background colors, insert emoticons and more.
If like me you prefer the more hardcore "plain ol' text box" you can easily disable rich text editing by default in your profile. Just it the "my account" link on the right, and then edit your profile settings. Incidentally, this is where you can fill in your bio, website and Avatar pic - once you start filling out your profile, and adding blog and image content, that page becomes a lot more useful... You can also change a whole bunch of other stuff there so it's worth exploring a bit.
You'll see from my profile that now your images will also show up on your profile page (the last 6) alongside your last 5 blog posts.
In the future, i'd like members to be able to add their own CSS to this page to control the look and feel totally.
If you have problems, find bugs or just have a comment on the new features, do drop your thoughts into the comment box below, i'd love to hear from you..
Ok, so this morning Im messing around with various image options. We need to be able to easily add images right?
Keen eyed regulars may have spotted the new discussions link at the top of the page - I didn't put that on until now because there really weren't any and as RedKitten just mentioned if the place feels empty, you're not inclined to be there right?
Well that list isn't looking too bad at the moment, and it's a great way to keep up with ongoing conversations so if you've not seen it, go take a look!
It's been a long day. I've spent most of it tearing what little hair I have out trying to track down a particularly elusive bug, but Im pleased to say that finally, blogging and custom profile pages for members are now in open beta!
Im far from done, but unless I get some folks in here kicking the tires early, it just makes creating the Metaversed site that much harder, so your attention, and time are very much appreciated.
Lemme tell you what's going on then...
Now when you register at Metaversed.com you'll get instant access to the both a personal profile page, and your own blog.
These are fairly simple at present. Room for a pic of your Avatar, your main or alternate url (ie if you have a blog, MySpace/Facebook page or forum profile), a bio where you can pretty much put anything, including links to other sites, lists of items you sell, details about your SL business or anything you like.. and an automated list of links for your current posts at Metaversed.
The profile pages will work well for folks wanting to promote a SL business, or just give a web based version of the kind of details you might provide in your SL profile. Im working on making them CSS customizable, but for now they're fairly rigid.
You can see mine here: http://metaversed.com/57
Oh, did I mention you get a neat url like that?
To get yours, just register, follow the instructions to activate your account and then edit your account. You'll find the interesting bits under the "about me" link near the top of the page :)
If you dont have a blog for your business, or to jot down notes about your travels and doings in the Metaverse then this is for you! Metaversed blogs are extremely simple, you just fill in a title and the text, and hit publish.
If you want to use your blog to promote your business, or announce new products, go right ahead. We'll put the best ones on the homepage, which means they go out in the main RSS feed!
And you can follow, and get an aggregate feed of all blogs at http://metaversed.com/blogs
Blog URLs look like this: http://metaversed.com/57-miles/blog
It's early days yet, but worth grabbing your /my-name URL here at Metaversed, and definately a good time to let your opinions and thoughts be known on the general topic of this sites development. Nothing at all is set in stone, what feedback I get, I'll value, and use.
I'd LOVE to get some feedback, dont be afraid to tell me it's a shit idea if that's how you feel, I wont mind. Just go ahead and drop your thoughts in the box below, I'd love to hear from you...
