LL blog: Philips year end update & Emmy...

Interesting blog post from the govenator.
http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/01/09/year-end-updates-and-thanks-for-the-emmy/

In particular, I blinked a few times at him wondering what Starax's version of the Emmy would look like. I wouldn't want to be rude to Philip (really) but can't help wondering why he doesn't poke one of his people to restore Starax's account. Full disclosure is that I don't know that LW actually wants Starax restored but I find it a little hard to believe that he wouldn't like to have some of the stuff in Starax's inventory. I for one would like a wand, even if it has LW's name on it..

Also interesting is the mention that commercial/educational growth in SL seems to be going faster than the general public growth. I didn't expect this but do hope they're getting some good corporate cash out of it.

ObQuestion: anybody spot anything else overly interesting?

edit: for those who have no idea who Starax is/was: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUgGgTCbcgE .

I would advise editing your post. Publically announcing the name of a person's alt account is certainly questionable under TOS

Worst-kept secret EVER!! Well, now that his cat avatar is out of the bag anway..

/me sighs and edits the OP anyway.

This quote took my interest

"We will shift from our historical focus on relentless feature innovation to put making and keeping happy customers first on our list of priorities"

I've heard this too many times now and cannot take it seriously. All a load of old bollocks IMO.

well a exhibition of sculpture work by Starax and LW starts at rezzable soon (today?) so that's a big clue?

The Rezzable folks (www.rezzable.com) aren't really shy about naming names, are they?


I wonder how much Cory's departure was related to this..

I feel certain that Starax's new avatar already has full-permissions copies of all the Starax creations; he just chooses not to go back into the business of selling them, preferring to keep the Starax legend intact. Restoring the Starax account might return some purchased no-transfer things, but I doubt they are a major concern to him.

At the exhibition I believe some are for sale

He went public about the connection some months ago.

Also, at least fro a trusted source of mine, Starax dumped his inventory before closing that account. I would assume regardless, after more than a year, that all that old inventory is gone, gone, gone.

Mari

Thought I read somewhere that even his alt didn't have full-perms version of the Starax stuff. I'd be happy if that wasn't true, though.

edit: happy for him anyway.. not so much for me as it means I'm never gonna get a wand.

I guess I'm not as cynical as some - hearing Philip talk about putting a stable platform ahead of innovation is just what SL needs, in my opinion. Initiatives we are seeing also seem to bear out that this is the approach taken - my understanding of Havok 4 is that it is an effort to make things more stable. Other things are going on. With the exception of Windlight I can't think of any more new-fangled doodads that LL are working on. Some reports on WL seem to imply that it actually improves the performance, too.

I think that hearing that proclamation from the top, and seeing it backed up by activites from the LL crew is good.

... it just SEEMS like I am crashing and losing connections with the server more often....

I was very happy to see this "steady at the helm" message from the CEO. No new initiatives, emphasis on customers, continuing committment to the features they're already working on. Excellent - consistent focus is key to success as a startup - tho, with 7-8 years under its belt and near 300 employees, SL can I guess be granted status as a venture-funded business, no longer a startup.

I was further encouraged to see it clarified that the most successful corporate uses of SL is as a meeting/collab platform. It has a LOT to contribute to these sorts of intranet activities, and this dovetails well with the platform work LL is engaged in. I imagine IBM will be the first to host their own servers on SL's grid, and also the first to set up a private grid (if they haven't already). This I find very exciting!

The talk about continuous growth puzzles me. I would love to see some clarification about the steady decline in Active Residents (unique avatars who have logged in over the past 60 days): http://taterunino.net/statistical%20graphs.html

I would also love to see more statistics that attempt to meaningfully quantify the number of truly active residents, vs. bots or people who log in fewer than 5 times and are never seen again.

Nice video clip; cool builds.
And Starax was??? The guy who created them?

I think the rule of not naming names has to be read as "not naming names in a negative way"...

It is not against the TOS to point out someone's alt account name. This is not the Virtual Witness Protection Program.

Thanks for the fish.

Yes, Starax Statosky was the name of the avatar that made them. There's a bunch of his stuff at the blackwater sim, as well as pieces from other great artists. Also, look thru /327/0a/171033/2.html for a huge list of slurls, though a bunch are probably no longer valid..

I suspect you're right about the naming-names rule - I edited the OP more because I haven't heard his alt publicly say that he's Starax than because I think it's steps over the ToS rule.