Stories from Second Life: DB Bailey’s LOCUS

It is interesting to note that here is pinpointed ONE builder (in more in a "contemporary" style), when there actually are THOUSANDS of talented architects and builders in SL. I don't want to speak "against" this artist, and will avoid any judgement here. But there are plenty of very interesting builds, which are not "researches" or "innovations", but actual forms of art, often much ellaborated in both their purpose, concept, realization and finishing. Let us quote here some examples:
-the "Svarga" sim (endangered)
-the pagan temple in the "Madrigal" sim
-the elven castle in "ElvenGlen" and many builds around
-the awesome dragon cathedral in "Cathedral", and other large builds arround
-the space museum in "Spaceport alpha"
-In "Spaceport Bravo" the full scale replica of the huge NASA's VAB, so large that clouds can appear inside, in RL and in SL as well
-the replica of the Köln Cathedral in "Koelner dom"
-The IBM sims
-and probably thousands others...

These builds were made by artists who went into all the steps of building: creating a design for a purpose, making of it a plan, designing the parts depending on the constrains* of SL, selecting or drawing textures, checking useability with users, etc.

But on the very first, these persons had a purpose: to build something which was to serve a group, a community, and which was to fulfil a function. For instance the pagan temple in Madrigal has a symbolic square plan matching with the four elements, directions, etc. It was adapted for its use (meditative gatherings) and purposely degraded or old looking textures were used, for instance irregular or broken ground tiles instead of the standard "spanish tiles" provided in the basic SL library. On the countrary the dragon cathedral uses stones looking as if they remained intact through millenia. The elven castle is vast, but elegant, light and clear. The NASA builds are just attempts to reproduce an awesome enough reality, while the IBM builds are modern shapes symbolically sheltering large spans of their campus. At least the IBM builders were able to do modern things while escaping the common short comings of this style...

In none of this building you will find hanging or uncompleted shapes. The reason is very probably that it just looks ugly and unfinished, anyway unfit for any purpose or function. Just good for "contemporary" "art". Well, thanks you to tell us that "contemporary" "art" has entered SL...

So there are more than one builder in SL, and in more they are diverse, talented, awesome and accomplished.

*note: as I build myself, I noted that the SL building system is very constraining, especially against large or curved shapes. The few possibilities allowed are the responsible of this common "SL style" which signs for SL as surely as steel and concrete sign for "modern" towns.

Agreed, and thanks to all who are posting links to their great builds.

However, if Santa Claus walks up to me and my friend on a street corner and hands her a gift and me nothing, I don't object to his gift-giving! I think this Stories from SL blog series is great. It cheers me to see members of LL loving the worlds the residents create, and threads like this offer me ways to continue to explore, beyond the single site reviewed.

*I enter the skyscraper at ground level and look around, mystified, at the blank interior. The walls are glass with an oddly textured scaffolding of support, but otherwise featureless. I step on a grid on the floor, and it begins to rise, then slowly tilts like a leaf in a breeze. I watch, bemused, as my avatar takes a couple of steps forward, then hesitates, then another. When he stands at the edge of the grid, I tap to bring him back to the middle, and the tipping lessens ... I play with it, noting other grids drifting by ... it comes to rest high amongst a forest of baby hands. I step out onto a mezzanine to investigate them, then notice ramps going up ... when I emerge at the top of this tower, alone, I gaze into the center of a forest of similar towers of different heights, to see a very slowly roiling cloud of orange and white -- is it moving, or not? The soundscape, a peaceful low almost tidal swelling and ebbing, calms me as I watch the whale clouds wallow in their skyscraper home.*
.

I have to agree. I rather go to a region that is easy to navigate with agrid of roads signs lights buildings and all the like. If its familiar to me, it is more likely i will find what im looking for and it will be more pleasing to the eye then the random garbage you might find on mainland. This is probaly why we have moles rebuilding the infrastructure of mainland to make it not only more pleasing, but also more navigatable.

I suppose that would be one of the challenges for those wanting to make Reality-Free sorts of builds that Residents will want to visit more than once---to wow viewers with their imagination, while making entry into and passage through the build seem intuitive and understandable.

(Good point about the Roads, too.)

Coonspiracy has roads, they just happen to be half a mile in the air.

Why is this thread considered as "sticky"?
It's not that vital, or important, it's a normal talk thread as the other non sticky threads.

Google as I may, I cannot find this quote from the fusty architecture critic, surely uttered upon encountering his first cantilevered mass.

It bears noting that the wonderful music in our now-venerable FlowerBall build that currently has a home at LOCUS was composed and performed by AldoManutio Abruzzo. Why, that big ole ball would be -nothing- without the soundtrack! Well, it'd be something, but not nearly as interesting.




Nika, the tipping motion of those transport prims was the creation of my work partner Desdemona Enfield. She ended up having to reduce that motion, because people were finding it too hard to navigate. Jumping from one transport prim to another triggers the musical notes which Dizzy Banjo composed for us -- his creation of a sonic environment for that space was masterful.
If one jumps onto enough of those platforms, something special happens. Try it!

Seems reasonable to me.

(((But just as a general comment on all sims, most people will be grateful if they can easily find roads or other navigation aids (through signage or whatever).)))

Translation, please

reading the posts above, I find a common need for some "navigability" of the lands, and for this people usually refer to roads.

Indeed we often have in mainland adjacent parcels where people build each their thing, without considering the neighbouring (this is not a reproach: the people in mainland are the poor in SL, unable to affort a full sim, and they are imposed with plots touching each other without land management). This results into the usual mainland "mess" and ugliness, and also difficulty to navigate (no passageway) and even to take bearings.

However in the organized lands I quote above, there are usually no roads (do you imagine roads in an Elf land?) but nearby alway some passage way function. That could be footpaths, waterway (the whole elven lands have a river and ocean system, when we can sail everywhere (it was also possible to join neighbouring lands, before some open sims were lost). But such kind of organization is highly depending on the group theme. For instace Caledon has a "realistic" well defined road and railway system intersecting at right angle. Sci lands and IBM campuses usually don't have ways, but there is kinda land management always ensuring enough space between builds to navigate without problem. Some estates (I don't rememner the name) rent islands, and it is still possible to navigate from one island to another by sea, even if a renter makes a whole sim private.


anyway navigation in a land is not alway the primary function. When a sim is divided between several private dream lands, people teleport into their plot, and no matter if there is no roads between them. In well managed lands, this don't result in a mess, because well managed lands have a theme, or a covenant, imposing a given style, or with rules such as having a coherent and smooth transition from a plot to another (terraforming, random tree hedges...). This is technically the same individual plots systems as into the mainland, but the feel is completelly different, as of a coherent set, where navigation is anyway easy and pleasant. even if there are no passage ways of any kind.

True, the lack of "zoning" can be a real challenge when it comes to a planned build such as The Riverwalk. However, a lot of the fun my partner and I experienced in the early days of The Riverwalk originated with the challenge of accumulating the parcels of land, or making allowances for really ugly/inappropriate builds while waiting for the parcels to come available for purchase. A private island (had such been available in 2004) would not have been anywhere as entertaining, and the 2 of us would likely have abandoned SL long ago.

In my many years of SL experience, I have seen many wonderful builds - often approaching masterpiece status - disappear. They did not fade away due to a lack of roads or access, or the unchecked builds allowed by a lack of zoning. No, many disappeared simply because LL stopped caring about the Mainland (and their customers as a whole).



Just an FYI - some of the people in SL, being customers of SL long before private islands were even a dream at LL, actually CHOOSE to be on the Mainland. Those of us - old enough to remember when 3000 people online at once crashed the servers - have for years heard the broken/unfulfilled/never intended promises of LL in regards to what is now known as the Mainland; fixes for sim crossings, better griefer controls, regular increases in prim allowance, etc. etc.), - all forgotten by LL once private islands became the primary revenue stream. Paying FULL TIER for Mainland property makes us neither poor nor unable to afford a full sim (since many, many Mainlanders do have full sims). Staying on the Mainland, building on land that essentially cannot be modified, is a choice a lot of people in SL made long ago, with the hope that the community that was SL may someday again be realized.

Before you generalize that people on the Mainland are too poor to afford a full sim, actually visit the Mainland. You will be pleasantly surprised.

I HAVE a plot in mainland, which is only my free tier of premium membership. This is not a choice of me, it is because I am unemployed in RL, my income is only half the the poverty level. I however do the personnal sacrifice of paying a premium membership to be of some help and value for others in SL. So having a plot in mainland is not a choice, it is the ONLY possibility I have for some independence of action in SL (holding meetings). And yet I had to report an abandoned casino hanging over my land... just to find it replaced by a dark tower, but I can no more complain as the owner is free to do so.

What is important to understand is that there is in Second Life an IMPLICIT ROLEPLAY of land speculation and people with uncompatible projects being put to hamper each other. Griefers left free and residents having to defend themselves are just a part of this implicit roleplay, which "philosophical" tenet is that egocentric freedom always passes over respecting our mates in SL. In fact there is NO NEED and NO POINT to force people to be besides each others and hampering each others.

This said, I agree that we must not generalize, and there are great things in the mainland, for those who love the roleplay of imitating RL, its buildings, and also its constrains and fights. You enjoyed the gameplay of fighting for land, but for the large majority of SL users this game is just a pain, a spoling of their enjoyment. They enjoy THEIR ROLEPLAY, whatever it is. Why do you imagine that, after the repression of open spaces, I observed a drastic lowering of frequentation in several very different places? It is because most people come into SL to be happy, and precisely ESCAPE the constrains of RL and the pointless roleplay of social fight and competition. Why to go virtual if we have to bear the same pains as in RL? It is much better to have a walk in the forest or do a party with our neighbours.

Ok, if I had to manage SL, I would not suppress mainland. But I would ensure that only those who like it are in mainland, by allowing all the others to have a fitting place in SL, without having to bear this unpleasant/unwanted roleplay. There are two solutions for this:
-having a zoning regulation per style or way of life, like the land barons do
-making sim prices proportional to the server load (number of prims and characters allowed). This would allow for cheap first prices, and everybody having his own dreamland, even simple. This would attract people into SL. By the way such a policy would also increase income for Linden Labs, when the foolish open spaces policy actually reduced it (4400 sims lost in Nov, Dec, Jan overcompensate the increase of income from these sims)


This discussion being slipping off the topic of this thread, I invite to further continue it at http://www.shedrupling.org/art/big3D/manifeste.php where posts will not be erased after one month. If you contribute, remember this and make your point first, in a way that the reader will not need to refer to this forum.