Second Life: Possible Leave

You have to come up with something unique, make something that no one else is making or make it better than anyone else does. If you plan to make a fortune making furniture or clothes, you need to take a long look at how many furniture makers and clothes makers there are.

But, you are actually restrained by the artist who created the scene. See, you can only interact with the art how the simulation has been programmed to allow you to interact with it. You don't have complete freedom - rather, you are like another actor in the scene, following within the confines of the script, and the artist is also much like the director of a play or a film. Drama is of course, also still art Performing arts, it is accurately named.

You don't have to have complete freedom to break the confines of the word art. You never have complete freedom ever. Everyone and everything around you in RL and in SL will always define what you do and can do. There is no way to break away from that, so by your definition, life is art, which.. is rather poetic and I believe it to be true in part.

However, we are going beyond just art once again. I'm not saying it isn't art. Just that it is *more* than art, and therefore has more possibilities, rules, effects, and various other words than 'just art'. A fountain is a fountain. But if that fountain become a waterfall that you can walk through to enter a cave it becomes more than a fountain while remaining a fountain. Noone will argue that its a fountain, but it could be argued that it is more than a fountain as well.

Trying to find words to express this is hard lol

"I have a friend named Art in Cleveland. A lot of people are taking his name in vain nowadays." -- Chad Mulligan

I think we lost the original thread somewhere.

As many posters said, a month is a fairly short time to expect to "get" SL. One of the things I like the most about the platform is the ability it gives you to form your own micro-community within a community. Buy some land, deed it to a group, invite some friends to join the group (and help pay for the land) and take it from there to see what happens.

In my opinion, some of the best places and businesses in SL come together this way: the ISM, Caledon, and so on. Give it a shot.

I have to jump in here with a bit of advice. In RL I am a cost accountant so you will know where I am coming from. I also have had my own accounting firm for many years and the first advice I give to anyone starting a business (art or otherwise): You will give 150% of yourself and your money for the first year. Then maybe, if you are very good, you will begin to make money and breathe a little in the second year. RL or SL it is still a business. Give yourself more time.

I also have been in SL for a little over a month and am beginning to start looking at 'what I am going to do' in this exciting new-for-me world! The possbilities are endless and the friendships I have made already are priceless.

Go to the Rezzable Hallucinogen sim and tell me this isn't a good environment for 3D artists.

Been there.

However, the COST of such a sim is a lot of money, for someone who is just making art. Most people can't afford it.

They can afford to do it on their own computer. Most game engines have a free editor, and mods are easy to do to realise quickly a 3d interactive visualisation, for a lot less money. I will repeat, the tradeoff is in being able to display the work. You have better opportunity to be an "art gallery" here.

I do see the Architecture Working Group as having a possible effect on lowering the cost of developing art in SL, witih the ability to host a domain locally on your computer. That will make it possible to really develop art in here economically.

On a side note, we're not quite there yet in regards to graphical quality, either. Getting there... looking forward to what happens.

So... what is meant by Possible Leave? You arn't planning on leaving? aside from the argument on 'what constitutes art', I hope you stick around long enough to find out what all the 'magic' of SL is all about. I am considered an artist by many, and I even consider myself an artist, but I am not going to discuss the fine line (or fine split hair) on where it stops becomming art... Stick around guy, we love discussing things to death in here!

I wouldn't call it an argument.. just a discussion =P

Ummm.... I called it a discussion twice, and an argument once.....so........am.....I......screwed......on......this.....one.......?

I am asking JUST for argument's sake...

ol I just wanted to be a tad argumentative XD

Interesting replies! Many of us who build towns/cites in Second Life are referred to as builders..on the other hand those who also do the same on other game engines are called level designers. Second Life to me fits more as an MMORPG...

Its all digitial art to me. Nothing more, you design, create and you have a virtual object. For visualizations SIMS for digital artists being able to host their own servers sounds very appeasing to me.

On the Unreal platform I would host my own server and sometimes lease a dedicated server and invite all my friends to come for chat, study, play, and study the visualizations. It was very affordable compared to SL.

Public Sandboxes has brought no peace in developing digital content. Griefers and bad lag has NOT given me a nice experience. I do now have a private parcel where I can work and the experience has been alot alot better than the SandBoxes...however, the problem still there....costly...high tiers.

No doubt about it, but I think Lindens made a BIG step in this idea and don't think this is the bomb. Its a fine step towards something else that's coming but SL may not be it.

SL, its really empty...no one is around and to be paying high tiers for empty parcels is idiotic nonsense.

No doubt about but again its a promising tech and is catching up with some nice visuals(WindLight) but my digital content will look alot better in UT3

To be competitive these days, its just like RL. you either have to be really GOOD at what you do, or you have to have good connections. Every now and then, someone shines and presents something that hasn't been done before, or shows a detail that takes things further than they had before.

Regarding the art, unfortunately many 3D professional artists, such as game designers, etc are either too busy to do much in SL, don't like the interface since they're used to pro interfaces such as Maya, or left because with a little hacking its easy to steal objects that are even marked as no-transfer. This leaves little instruction and incentive for newbies in here, and the learning curve is steep. It took me months to get realistic and emotionally-responsive design in SL down to second nature. And I must mention that I hold those who do mentor and educate in SL with very high respect.

Its expensive, but so were regular web sites when the WWW was a new phenomenon. i remember paying close to $250/month on an old web site in the early 90's. Now i pay about $200 a year for ridiculously large amounts of space and bandwidth. SL (metaverses in general) will be the same. We're at a half-step between 2 tech paradigms right now. Before any of us realize it, hosting a 3D metaverse will be as cheap as hosting a web site. Currently its either 2 or 4 sims per server (i forget), and each server is a massive machine that isnt cheap to buy. When someone buys a sim, theyre essentially buying into that machine more than anything else. As the machines get faster thanks to Moores law, hosting should get cheaper.

I have been in SL for over 18 months now and have read these post with great interest. Last May I started 'Barefoot Designs' and after the second month, my business has been paying my monthly tiers. Since I was a 'newbie' I have learned much and for me, all of this took time, and I am quite happy with the results. I did start small and worked my way up, learned a few hard lessons along the way. I think anyone who has the bucks in RL and starts out big, more then likely will have issues, and even get a bit over whelmed. I don't have the RL bucks to put into SL, so as long as my business covers the monthly tiers, I'll be a happy camper. In RL, I am involved with graphic design, web design and am now going into 3D modeling, learning Maya and 3D Max, so SL has been a very good platform to learn the basics and also to be creative. Long story short...take your time, one month simply isn't enough time to learn and absorb everything that goes on here in SL.

I have noticed that SL is empty. It used to be full. I have been in it for over a year.

Every place I go no one is there. I log on at 9pm SL time, which is my time. I suspect most people are in bed. What is it like during the day?

I used to dance at a club and the club is nearly empty now. I would not make any tips at this
point. I rather miss the dancing. I like people and the chanting and flirting.

I can not find anyone to talk to or make me their pet,my cow avatar!

Second Life needs better tools to help people connect with one another. Allowing better in and out of world communications and having browser based menus in world would be a huge step in the right direction. How much more comfortable would a new resident feel in world if they were presented with menus in a familiar interface, such as a browser? I've been pining for this for years, as it would allow many more people to provide tools to help us all connect with everything from random meetings to common interest groups.

I've never met anyone who's had to use a manual for a web browser; they are the most intuitive applications I've ever seen. With a browser, you have a pointer, and when you can click on something you want (nicely highlighted), the pointer becomes a finger. Easy, right? I've never understood reinventing the wheel with a different interface that doesn't conform to operating system standards. A lot of the SL interface is descended from 2003 - the last time there was a major overhaul - when SL was still being designed as a game instead of a platform / world. Many newer residents don't know this, but back then SL had a high score list, and the current interface was designed back when that was the thinking behind the UI.

Hopefully we'll see changes seen. We've seen rumbling that there are teams working on it for a while, but they seem to have intensified recently. A more usable, customizable interface and experience is the most important thing needed to keep SL's star from fading.

Regards,

-Flip

not sure where you're hanging, cassy. i've been in sl since april 06 and i see residents all the time. some of which i'd rather NOT see ... hehe.

things do change here fast as you know. so a hugely popular place can be a ghost town in a week.

One of the things i do to find people is play with the map from search listings...if i see an event, first i look on the large map to see if anyone is even there. Too many people = crazy lag tho, so i tend to look for places with 10-20 people. I am manager for Etopia Island and many times we can have 20 people there, but they may be in shops, in apts, on th beach, on the train, the mountaintop, etc. They are not always just sitting at the landing spot, tho sometimes we do all hang out there.

Also, I have several shops and biz's in SL. I put no money into SL other than my small 25USD for tier each month. My consulting work and shops have grown from my initial attempts to help people with various things and learning what people would pay for. I did not come in thinking i would sell a certain item or service. My advice would be to just hang out. I did not pay any L's for ANYTHING for about 3 months so i could learn how things worked and how i fit in. Gusher Im guessing your expectations coming in were pretty high and the return in one month has been minimal which is typical for SL. At one month i was still slamming into walls when i walked LOL.

In my time in SL, I have made some great friends, learned ALOT of skills, applied my RL experience, created an AWESOME av - hehe, had shops, become an integral part of a great and vibrant community on Etopia Island, developed a marketing consulting biz and also a great interior design biz because that is what people will pay for and what i can contribute. If you are still interested in SL at all, I would suggest you give it at least 6 months. I have been here since about June and have accomplished all of that really sinec Sept. Before that i was finding my way....

Also, please come visit us in Etopia. I would be happy to give you a tour to help you learn about our efforts to create a sustainable environment that fosters community. We have great people, great events, a great build and are much different than most of SL. And I know there are other places like this also once you explore more.

Just my two cents. jojo