linden

On the Virtual Worlds Podcast this week we mentioned the rolling restart that updated a part of the Linden Scripting Language, the code that makes much of Second Life work. The update removed a feature, or fixed a bug, depending on your perspective. Chaos broke out accross the grid.

Lear Cale was building a ferris wheel whose occupants started spinning in their seats. Homer Horwitz had a series of multi-pose chairs that now had avatars embedded in the arm rests. Nack Barnes had an entire product line that couldn't be released, and a bar that nobody could sit in anymore. Charltina Christensen was planning a giant event across two sims (a wedding) when suddenly every single bit of furniture broke. A massive amount of content was ruined, and businesses were in jeopardy.

I contacted Soft Linden, the technician responsible for resolving the issue, to find out more. They declined to comment, and I was referred to the company JIRA; a central database for bug fix and new feature requests. The bug fix request to put things back the way they were is still there, and tells quite the story. Officially closed now, it garnered 93 votes and over 50 comments from desperate business owners pleading Linden Lab to roll back the clock. Dellybean North wrote: "Please, PLEASE restore this! You've just torpedoed a 20000L product my partner and I released a couple of weeks ago!"

While Soft Linden gave frequent updates on the progress of this fix in the comments, and was hailed by all those I interviewed for their speedy and attentive service on the issue, there was some confusion over why this was done in the first place. We know that the adjustment was to prevent sim crashes, but many felt that the particular method used was unnecessarily abrupt. This could have been done in a way that didn't disrupt content, and some who caught wind of the change ahead of time tried to warn the responsible Linden to no avail.

Instead, they debated whether the technique of placing an avatar in a specific position using this function was a "hack" or a "feature". Both Soft and Qarl Linden (who later joined the debate, although what part he played in the issue remains uncertain) assert that the use of this function in this way was a hack, while others felt that any use of a completely undocumented function could be thought of that way.

Of course, some questioned whether or not the Lindens should really be debating any of this at all. "The problem here is, that Qarl and Soft actually have the nerve to argue if this was a hack or not after there are dozens of content creators complaining that this breaks about 80% of all high quality furniture at the moment," stated Juliet Ceres in her comment.

Ultimately the issue can be blamed on a lack of communication on the impact of planned changes. The consequences were lost profit for many business owners, and an uphill battle to restore consumer confidence. Ilana Debevec lost three days of business while the problem was being worked on, and Rifkin Habsburg's new game that had just launched saw a sudden halt in sales that is only now beginning to recover. Events like these reinforce that nothing is certain when working in a beta environment like Second Life. As Ilana put it in later interview: "You can take every precaution and test you want when devloping a product, but you can't predict when you're gonna get SLcrewed."

In an open meeting with Second Life residents, Linden Lab CEO Philip Rosedale revealed that the company may institute a performance based ranking system on non-Linden made registration portals. A month or so back, Linden, makers of Second Life, announced that they would be outsourcing the registration and orientation process to outside companies with the goal of creating a better first experience for new residents and increasing retention rates. Since then, new projects have been going online and Linden have been rotating traffic to them.

Interestingly, Rosedale says that the initial results indicate that the resident run islands out perform Linden Lab's. When questioned about the future of traffic distribution amongst competing projects he said that the company were considering an Adwords style ranking system where those that scored well on such variables as new resident retention, and number of successful registrations would rank higher, and consequently receive a larger share of traffic. The goal of course is to improve the overall experieence, and get more new residents into the system faster -- keeping them there is a major concern, as many newcomers to Second Life do not stay for long.

The transcripts of the meeting were recorded by Prokofy Neva. I was not able to attend, but made for good reading and provides some interesting insight into how Linden plans to handle the new new user experience over time.

Linden Lab, makers of 3D virtual world Second Life, are to aquire Windward Mark Interactive, a 3D visuals company specializing in natural light effects. Windward's main products include Windlight, a lighting technology that simulates more natural light patterns in 3D environments, and Nimble, which simulates photo realistic 3D clouds.

Financial details of the deal were not disclosed according to the Boston Globe, but Windmark president Asi Lang says that the team is already working on Second Life, and that residents should see a "major improvement in visual quality" within several weeks.

Windmark will join Linden Lab's Cambridge facility by the end of the year.

Two respected, reliable and independent sources have told me today that Linden Lab are asking companies with "Linden", "SL" or "Second Life" in their company names to change them. It's not clear whether this is just one group being asked, or whether it will go grid-wide, but it certainly seems to be happening, and if confirmed, will become a major point of contention in coming weeks. Many, many companies have those trademarks in their names.

As residents continue to stamp their feet about persistent problems with the Second Life grid, Project Open Letter, a public whine fest of tearful demands not only gains momentum with bloggers and press, but will now get a public response from Linden Lab, makers of the besieged virtual world. Look for Linden to either grovel, fawn or play the "this post is so long you'll never read it game" in official response later in the week...

In Sunday's Metaversed Podcast I dismissed Project Open Letter, a complaint from long time Second Life residents about persistent problems such as inventory loss in Linden Lab's virtual worlds as just a "gripe fest". It seems that despite that, the move to pressure Linden into action is gaining steam as more and more residents sign the petition and major news outlets cover the story. See CNet and Reuters amongst the large, and growing list of Second Life bloggers.

I still think it's whiney, but im impressed with the traction it's getting, and I do sympathize, at least a little, with the cause.

A friendly nod and a wave toward Eloise Pasteur writing for SLI for spotting this tidbit of media stupidity. The short story is that Linden Lab, makers of Selcond Life have struck a deal with an outfit called AMPP media and soon to be Google owned DoubleClick to provide billboard and video advertising inworld.

Id be hard pushed to find a more useless way for companies to spend their money. Really, if you want to reach Second Lifers you're going to have to do a whole lot better than putting traditional interruption, broadcast advertising in front of them while they're busy getting on with stuff. Sheesh..

Tell me I'm wrong....

Got thousands of virtual items in your Second Life inventory? Scripts, HUDs, houses...? How would you feel if you logged in and found you'd lost the lot? Well, that's what's happened to a whole bunch of folks over the last few days, and understandably they're not happy about it.

Linden Lab, the company behind the growing success story of Second Life have Aknowleged the issue and are taking steps to address the problem. If you're missing iventory, do check out their post as it contains important information on how to regain your lost items.

In Second Life, Avatars, the virtual characters that represent normal folks from all over the world can carry all types of inventory collected, bought and bartered for in the Metaverse. Linden has been having a great deal of database trouble recently, and this is almost certainly the cause of inventory loss among many residents. With over five and a half million registered users, of which just over one and half million have logged in in the last sixty days, its little wonder they're feeling the strain.

Ever wonder what it would be like to have the same kind of god like powers Linden Lab employee's have in Second Life? Well, Inigo Chamberlin was recently, and presumably accidentally given just that: In Accidental God Mode - An Easter Surprise at the SL Herald, he recounts the experience of being given Linden powers, and later, in LL Mysteries Revealed By Accidental God Mode, there's much speculation, accompanied by great screen grabs to be had by all. Time to break out the tin foil hats methinks.

It's a bit of an odd story really. For $100 up front, and $50 a year you'll be able (finally) to own your own first and last name. No word as to what happens if someone else already grabs your name of course, I assume you'd have to tweak it a bit, but that's definately an assumption. The Second Life Insider blog cites the same AP story but seems to either have more information, or have made a mistake, as the author, Akela Talamaska seems to think they'll be milking. .er, i mean charging... residents per month for the privilege of a name change?

Currently, you can get a custom last name if you apply to Linden directly. It costs $1000 and $500 a year, but the account has to be fresh, and Linden will only do this at their discretion. I inquired about this and ended up speaking to Glenn Linden who gave me the info, but simply just couldn't justify the cost for the sake of vanity :)

Oh well, Im growing into 57 Miles, so no worries.

It looks like Linden Lab, the folks behind the 3D virtual world of Second Life have outgrown their small biz back office setup and partnered with Netsuite to provide financial and business management software more fitting for a company who's "residents" exchanged over $5M in January alone. They'll also be putting in a spiffy new CRM module. For the obligatory canned quotes, boring hyperbole and mind numbingly banal corporate drivel spewed from a marketing department that epitomizes the phrase "doesn't get it" see here.

It seems Linden, creaters of Second Life are struggling to keep up with the demand for land, but are taking steps to address the issue that's causing sharp increases in auction prices on new land:

January was another record month for Second Life in many ways. The size of the world, as measured by the virtual square kilometers of simulation, expanded 23% over December to 361 square kilometers. In fact, continued brisk sales have left us with roughly a two-week backlog for new Island order delivery. (Thanks to everyone for their patience on this.) The backlog has also affected our ability to expand the mainland sufficiently to meet. demand. As a result, the average price for mainland auctions is up higher than I think anyone would like to see it. Over the next several weeks, we hope to rectify both situations with a greater volume of server delivery from our supplier. With a recent release of more than 40 regions of mainland, the addition of a new mainland continent & and doubling of the daily release of new mainland regions I would hope that we will satisfy the seemingly insatiable demand and stabilize the mainland auction market to a more sustainable price.

The economy in general seems to be thriving, with user to use transactions up 37% on December, though actual sales of $L down.