New Users are the real Feted Inner Core

Cienna,

I don't know if you are alluding to me, but I assure you, I'm not the slightest bit jealous or envious of the technocrats or the scripterati or the other tekki wiki denizens who so jam the central core of the game at its fiery hub and prevent it from growing properly.

What I have described in my much ballyhooed and misrepresented FIC ideologies is in part satire but in part just a normal, garden-variety explanation of every mmorpeg game and every human institution.

I can't possibly be jealous of certain elements of the Nazi-like corporate society of architects, scripters, designers, and other content barons replete with various recycled cultural backwaters from the darkest pages of human history. It's not at all to my liking, and I shrink with horror at some of their manifestations. This is not where I want to be.

My "vision" might be utterly mediocre and mundate but it is more about openness and freedom and the right even to be not a perfect crystalline vision of electronic glory in this fascism. Little humble newbie starter houses and even RL replicas have a place in my take on what is possible just because I want people to be free, and not wait till they can draw like a science fiction magazine illustrator in PSP to make textures and prim-rustle like the SL magnificent.

The chief feature of the FIC is that it denies its very existence and appeals to the intellectual desires of persons like yourself to counter what is viewed as some kind of "conservative criticism" coming from someone like myself. Trust me, this lot is the most conservative thing on two legs out there. There is no revolution here. The revolution not only ate some of its children ("what about all the poor people with no talent", the revolution is being preserved in the most hideous way in the form of eternal unmoddifiable freebies -- those horrors dot the landscape today in the newest continent -- and in the long controlling compulsive reach of the "no transfer" and "kill copy" options of creators, coupled with the appalling disregard for basic property rights of landowners and groups.

If some of these people were nice to you, well, that's because some of them *are* nice and they've even been nice to me, even if I am a dick, and they have been helpful and courteous. But, they can bare their fangs when you challenge their sacred cows which usually revolve around the notion of "how you hurt SL" or "how you don't contribute to SL" as if this was a communist collective farm.

The phone company never asks me if I am "contributing to the telephone line community" and no other phone company patrons have ever entertained the notion of me "hurting the telephone line community". When will they get over themselves on teh Intarnut?



Wow. You know, sometimes I forget that even TSO wasn't as laggy as SL. I never saw WOW. And I'm thinking that at some point, we may hear the sound of SL going glub-glub-glub in the water as some other Next Big Thing comes along that combines TSO and SL. But until then, I feel about SL the way I feel about air and water. I breathe it, and I pay for it even if I have to. It's needed to live. I don't get sentimental about it

Just to be relevant to the threads turns, I have to say that just this moment it popped into my head about what a bust outer space exploration turned out to be. I remember when it dominated our existence, whether the Jetsons or the moon-walk. Then the teacher got burned out of the air before our eyes, and we gave up. There wasn't much left to explore 70,000 Leagues Under the Sea, either, and exploring the inner consciousness proved to be too hard and a bore...so this is where we ended up.

Every human being is interested in two kinds of worlds: the Primary, everyday world which he knows through his senses, and a Secondary world or worlds which he not only can create in his imagination, but which he cannot stop himself creating." W.H. Auden

I wasn't referring specifically to you, but if you self-identify.

There would be no 'issue' were it not for the insistance of some in making an issue of it, that's my opinion.

People naturally gravitate to collectives, naturally consolidate those collectives, naturally engage in exclusionary behavior to protect them, and naturally defend them from those who attack them.

That is as valid a reality for gamers as it is for chess club members, or furries, or political parties or pretty much any other social group in existence. As a matter of fact, it even applies to the terminally disillusioned or the perpetually disgruntled or the lethally class envious.

I read all this hyperbole and rhetoric about 'changing the world' and I wonder if anyone who wants to do so could bring themselves to take a moment and mediate on the following truth:

"People who change the world do so not by talking about how it should change, but by living as if they world they desire, exists."

I'd tell you who wrote that, but you wouldn't believe me.

At any rate -- I can safely say the current 'method' is ineffective and ultimately futile. I can say this because I have seen it fail in a variety of mediums over years.

I can say it because not only does it fail in those mediums, it is the conclusion of prominent sociologists and socio-psychologists. (Links and bibliography available upon sincere request via PM).

Finally, I can say it because there is absolutely no evidence such behavior EVER effects the change you claim to seek... indeed, one could make a pointed case that those who insist as you seem to are actively IMPEDING the very change they so stridently claim to desire.

So, you tell me, Prof -- at what point does someone who delights in challenging the establishment accept they have become part of the problem?

Or not... as your ability permits. -sly grin-

my guess is that prok actually lives up to that line... although he talks enough for 10 at the same time

that said, regarding your last post prok... well... it's just plain weird

Well, this theory, while sweet, would pretty much eliminate academia and theoretical discussion.

If you spent just half the energy taking the time to learn SL's tools as you spend ranting about the "technocrats or the scripterati or the other tekki wiki denizens" on the forum, you'd probably be quite skilled by now. You have the intelligence to write these overwrought tales of injustice and woe and yet seem to have yourself convinced that all these tekki wiki technocratic tools are beyond you. Much of your bluster in fact seems to be little more than an attempt to overcompensate... much in the way someone who can't read might say "Bah! Books are stupd. Who needs em! I have better things to do with my time!" You really should stop feeling sorry for yourself, give yourself some credit, and learn something. It would be good for you. You might even make yourself a "little humble newbie starter house" to be proud of. I guess maybe it's just easier to denegrate everyone with enough initiative to learn to do for themselves. If you learn things there's a danger that you'd have to stop feeling sorry for yourself.

*cracks his knuckles*

Well, I don't think I've ever solidly taken on Prok on the forums. I suppose now's a good a time as any to make it a first. *sigh* I realize, of course, this may be an excersize in futility.

1. By calling people "technocrats" or "scripterati", you are giving them nicknames that are directly implying superiority. "Technocrat" from "aristocrat" - or a ruling class, and "Scripterati" alluding to "illuminati" - supposedly people behind the scenes with lots of power. Now, you could have easily chosen words that did not raise up the folks you are referring to, but you didn't. That to me indicates you do have an element of envy and/or admiration. Ergo, you have contradicted yourself in this statement.

2. Saying that scripters and technical people stifle Second Life's growth is absurd. All content is player-created. Growth depends on content. Scripters and technical people are very adept people to create content. Therefore they are people very adept at providing a necessary condition for growth. You've contradicted yourself again.


You do have a point here. The concept of an FIC is exagerrated, indeed satired, but I agree that the more subtle tendency of human beings to develop a quasi-aristocracy exists. It's called "respect". I respect talented builders and scripters and other residents in SL, and I am more likely to reach for them on collaborations. I mean, it's basic math. If I want someone to build me a custom XYZ, I'm going to ask go to someone who has proven their talents.


Whoa, lot of stuff in there. Let me take this piece by piece:
"can't possibly" - One sign of faulty logic is when someone constantly states absolute truth or 100% certainty, especially regarding unquantifyable things like emotion. Prok, you could say, "I'm not jealous" or "It'd be very unlikely that I'd be jealous" but a statement like this smells to me like you're trying to convince yourself.

"nazi-like" - really, now? The nazi party took power by scapegoating and fear tactics, and their aims were purification and unbridled power. Even IF you successfully argued the last part - that the so-called "FIC" wanted unbridled power, and you threw out the whole "mass murdered people" thing, you miss 4 key pieces:
1. Organization. Nazis were a publicly organized party.
2. Scapegoating. I've never heard "Technocrats" and "Scripterati" blame anyone for failure of SL... the worst I've seen are jokes about hoochie hair.
3. Feat tactics. I've yet to hear any powerful player threatening anyone, unless you count triple neg rating! (OMG even the nazis wouldn't dare that!)
4. Purification. Is there a call to remove noobs? A call to remove untalented players? Quite the opposite. The well-to-do players love these people because they spend L$.

So I think your statement is not only warranted, but completely offensive. It was a baseless comparison to the most horrible group of people of the 20th century. You should be ashamed.

"corporate society" - corporatations open their businesses for public investment. Perhaps you meant "business society", instead? "capitalist society"?

"architects, scripters, designers, and other content barons replete with various recycled cultural backwaters from the darkest pages of human history"

Whoa, that's a doozy. Instead of speculating, I'll simply challenge you to produce examples of these "backwaters" from "the darkest pages of human history". I'm not even sure you're using "backwaters" correctly, but I sorta get your drift. But really, "darkest pages"? You do realize humans throughout history murder, rape, torture, and do other things which make this statement of your absolutely laughable?


Okay, boiled down, you disagree with the way things are done. You're entitled to your opinion. If you want to do something about it, I suggest following Chip's advice, and lead by example.


There's a ton of free textures, first of all. Second of all, most of the "elite" of SL were novices when they started. I am so frequently amazed at the great stuff new players make, and I think your perception of all noobs as unable to compete with veterans is off.


So basically you're saying the FIC is anyone who disagrees with you? Are people suddenly required to agree with everything you say?


I think the wonderful thing about revolution is how sublime and natural it is as it happens, and only as you really examine it do you see how spectacular it is.

At first glance, Second Life looks like a naturall evolution of MMOs and the Internet... what people make looks natural, like "duh, of course!" Then, when I step back and look, take some time out and see SL for what it is... I'm astounded.
- Amateurs with no professional game development / 3-D design / graphic design experience making great looking stuff.
- People from all around the world exchanging ideas in an environment far more meaningful than standard forums.
- The future of the Internet... the whole Internet ... where the user requests are heard by the developers and users are directly involved with the creation of the future of the world.


An absurd thread, at best.


I've found sims are like fine wine... they start off sour and get better with age.


Provide one reason why creators shouldn't be able to enforce their copyrights, eh?
Why is it the real world costs money but everything in SL is supposed to be free?


I agree this is a problem. I don't see how it relates to "FIC" players, though. The veterans are usually the ones being intruded on, not vice versa, eh?


Whoa, whoa... hold on... are the "FIC" a nazi fascist capitalist corporate state, or a communist one? These are polar opposites.


I fail to see how Second Life is like a phone company.


Hmm, TSO also didn't have:
- Player created content
- Streaming video and music
- Built-in Physics engine
- Avatars that weren't sprites
- Full 3-D environment
- Uploadable textures and sounds
- The goal of being anything more than a game

Apparently, all these things take 0 CPU time?


You just did.


A bust? Space exploration has led to countless spinoffs products (velcro, microwaves, satellites, communications, plastics, ceramics, rocketry, etc etc), better understanding of our own planet and how life may have evolved, and a continued interested in space sci-fi. (Star Wars is only the what... BIGGEST movie series EVER? Stargate is on the 9th season, Star Trek is on its 5th syndicated series and almost a dozen movies... etc) not to mention the fact that we just last year had the first private space flight.


nice quote.

Ah, that wasn't so bad. I dunno why everyone complains that Prok is such a thorn in the side. Prok seems harmless enough.

I read that... DAMN YOU Hiro ;0

Hiro, well put.
As for the quote at the end... I think I'll add it to my e-mail sig. ^.^

Oh dear. Are you on spring break or something Hiro???



There you go again. Hectoring, know-it-all, let-me-break-it-down-to-you and let-me-break-you-into-this-community.

Um, no. You don't get to do that.



No, I am satirizing them with deliberately silly names so that they can take themselves less seriously. Honestly, do you never watch Saturday Night Live? Have you never read Mad Magazine? Don't you ever see the cartoons in the New Yorker? So often I think the problem on these forums isn't just the lack of intelligence, but that people lack a basic cultural reference point.



People who place free items in the world you can't modify, and prevent you from giving your object to someone else or reselling it are controlling, clutching conservative obsessives, not growth-producers. This is just one of many features of the insular crowd who live so deep in illusion about their own superiority and "value" to society. Car repairmen suffer from these delusions as well. You can always walk.



I respect builders too. I hire them, and as they can tell you, I pay them very well to indicate what I view as their worth not only to me but to the SL public at large. Honestly, Hiro, you've probably never looked at a thing I've done in world so shut up. Meanwhile, I at least got your TV and put snapshots in it. Stop huffing and puffing about how grand SL builders are. Sheesh. In TSO I could drag a huge wall across the screen in one second flat. Here I have to like take a bus to New Jersey and change for Connecticut and "know somebody" just to link a goddamn prim. Get over your sense of specialness about these tools. They suck.



Not at all. I honestly don't have some kind of jealous seizure about people who can build. I myself have learned to build just enough for what I need, under duress, and it makes me proud. I'm a slow learner. But for the life of me, I don't understand why I have to cede pride of place and right of eminent domain to a bunch of CAD prim rustlers. I don't do this in RL, and I won't do it here. Society has to have all kinds. You need to be less filled with pride and arrogance about what you do, and have more humility not only about your customers, but about the grave limitations of your world. What's especially pernicious about Philip's little dollhouse world here is that he created this cumbersome awkward way to make stuff, that only some people could become adept at, and therefore created a class of cognoscenti who are terribly thrilled with themselves and insufferable. But...you didn't have to make things so hard, did you? And...in a few turns of the wheel, all this backend stuff now visible will be hidden away and the user interface will get tons easier and make all these arrogant honcho prim rustlers completely obsolete.



Well, people use the term "Nazi" far too loosely, I agree. What I mean is this zealousness and desire to control, this desire to "set me straight," "knock the stuffing out of me" and "make me do right" and "shut up". Isn't this world big enough so that you can always walk around the robots??? You're always behaving as if it is a tiny village in upstate New York where everybody went to school with everybody and slept with everybody. But it's so much bigger than that.



I can't think of anything better organized than the teki wiki. They all show up on the oil rig instantly and they all play their very scripted and rote parts to wreck havoc, be wacky, and impress Philip Linden. It's like a Kabuki theater, all under the deep illusion that it is spontaneous.



Oh, now there you really are off base. Come off your cloud there Hiro. Step outside and listen to the newbs and the midbs. Go and read the other threads


Go over to the classified sections and see all the really nasty threats people who have powerful connections make just against me, that they they "don't like the way I talk" about some big powerful macho dude, that they will "get me," that I am "a liar" etc. They constantly upbraid me and try to harm my business and my gameplay simply because I challenged a few fucktards. Huh? Couldn't they just play through?



All you have to do is read the threads about the new continent to see the pissing and moaning about these evil mediocrities who are going to blow precious Linden builds off lots and put up newbie crap -- and the desire to "leave sims pure" and free of builds of all those inefficent and exasperating humans. All the kvetching and kvelling about preserving the land from the idiots. I agree about the idiots. But it is that posture of horror and hatred that really gets my goat. They don't love them, they hate them, they resent them, they loathe them, and goddamn it, it shows, and when they act that way, it's no surprise people scorn them and ask very pointed questions about them.



No, I'm not ashamed, you should be ashamed at taking a normal, if overuged hyperpole that is used all the time in this game like "I don't like Nazi building commissions" or "I'm going to be like the Soup Nazi" and take it as something about the literal horrific Nazis of the real world. No way.



No, Hiro. Corporate or corporatist society is the fascist type of society (developed in some Russian fascistic and communist ideologies). Look it up on the Internet. This isn't "corporate" in the meaning of "businesses" but "bodies", not capitalism. It means that in such a society, the architects are in one box, performing one role, near the top. The scripters are in another box, performing a role in demand, in another. The artisans and designers form another corporatist bloc. This is an organizational description of a society based on the belief that society is made up of only very limited and rote roles and that such blocs or classes are inevitable and special and can't be crossed.





Yes. What I mean here is the prevalence in the game and the Internet of all kinds of conservative and historical ideologies of paganism, Wiccan, BDSM, and so on that celebrate suppression of human rights, women's rights, and dignity, and celebrate violence and slavery, in contrast to more modern movements of women's liberation and personal emancipation for the oppressed, such as slaves and minorities. This phenomena troubles me deeply because it is so widespread and popular. But honestly, I am definitely not interested in starting that debate in SL. People can have whatever lifestyle they want on the privacy of their lots or their sims and do what the hell they want without hearing from me. This is not TSO where there are children. I am just commenting on the profounding troubling issue -- which ought to be troubling to anybody who is thoughtful -- of so many human beings putting others in some kind of subordinate role to them on the Internet, and putting them through various paces, even painful ones. But, if you want to have this argument, I'm not available for it. Go over and read all the back pages of the Second Life Herald. I am merely explaining what I mean about the revisitation of the darkest pages of human history. It's my personal belief. I don't impose it on others. So please back off from your harassment of me for this personal belief, I will say in advance, because it will not be promoted or imposed on you.



I do, dumbass. That's all I can say, in the strongest, most offensive terms. Look at what I own, look at what I commission, look at what I do in the game for hours every day, and shut up.



I don't say that. Yeah there's that free stuff but I will tell you that I am getting goddamn sick of seeing the same old FIC prefabs on every square of every first land in the SL universe. Couldn't they issue some new models? It's appalling. Yeah, there are textures, but I am getting damn sick of seeing them everywhere, aren't you. And yes, newbs are often able to compete spectacularly with oldbies, God bless them, and you are pulling this "perception" of mine out of total thin air. What I mean is that the constant celebration of only the excellent architecture -- as much as I celebrate it myself -- means there is no space for tolerance of the mediocre and the bland in ways that people find happiness as they do in RL.



The chief feature of the FIC is that it denies its very existence and appeals to the intellectual desires of persons like yourself to counter what is viewed as some kind of "conservative criticism" coming from someone like myself.



*Rolls eyes*. These "amateurs" are in so many cases just kids who have evolved in the next generation of computer technicians and are good at PSP or CAD already as a natural byproduct of all their excessive video game playing. You're misunderstanding that very tiny percentage of the world's very spoiled population as some kind of huge international breakthrough for "amateurs". What arrant bullshit. Amateurs are people who can't even use computers. Or if they can, they never even right-click on "about land" to get what a prim is in this game. Do you realize there are hordes of people like that???

All this "hands across the sea" crap really goads me. It's a tiny, self-selected, very non-representative sector of any society. You just have no clue. I wonder if you have ever lived outside your own country in the US or Europe and seen just how DIFFERENT the rest of the world is.

And now, your glowing infomercial about the Future is Here...the Future is Now!!! Shoes for Industry! Shoes for Defense! Let the air out of your shoes, Hiro. When did the Lindens listen to the anquished urgent please of numerous players about the landscanners and the bouncer scripts? Please, spare me your drivel about listening to users. I'm entirely disabused of that notion now, every time I look at how Lindens parcel water in preparation for water-griefers. Feh.




Um we're not talking about copyrighted creations which people sell, Hiro? And put on non-mod to preserve their design? We respect that right in SL as in RL. We are not REPEAT NOT EVER talking about that category of object so PLEASE get over it? (Free items on no-mod, however, are a huge pain in the ass.)

We're talking about it being like THE REAL WORLD where you can take something you buy with your hard-earned money and GIVE IT AWAY OR RESELL IT. That's freedom. Go read the thread on second-hand items. I'm really out of breath on this one. You just don't get it. SO you will find that people like me end up leaving your world when another company figures out how to create freedom from such monstrous overreach on the Internet.


Um, no, Hiro, here's where you reveal yourself as a likely product of horridly inadequate American or European educational systems. Nazism and Communism are really very similar. There are entire libraries written about these similarities. They are NOT polar opposites in the slightest but have much in common, whether the extermination of groups of people in labor camps, or the appeal to utopian socialist ideas. Let's not have that debate here until you are done reading all the books on this subject to make you better informed.




*throws up hands*




Oh yeah? I put player content into TSO every night with my heart and soul. I made themed builds that were worlds, I made games, activities, dramas, stories, plays, as did many others. See, that's where your horridly restrictive technological hard science education really shows how threadbare it is. Those with a humanities or liberal arts education see the story, narrative, arts, sociology potential for these worlds and realize that content isn't just some kewl shiny spinning thing pushing my av around. So yeah, no built-in physics in TSO. But it had built-in tools to make group collaboration so much easier and more effective, with really lasting ties and loyal friends, in ways that SL utterly mitigates against. Will Wright truly succeeded in making a social game that could invent and sustain societies.

I don't care if my avatar was a "sprite" in TSO. There were democratic features to the TSO sim that you don't find in SL that helped erase these corporatist class differences.

TSO was more than a game for some. But I don't expect you to understand that because for you, it's only about high technology or not-as-good technology.

[wow did you know there IS a limit on posts of 20,000 characters???}

QUOTE]Quote:
I never saw WOW. And I'm thinking that at some point, we may hear the sound of SL going glub-glub-glub in the water as some other Next Big Thing comes along that combines TSO and SL. But until then, I feel about SL the way I feel about air and water. I breathe it, and I pay for it even if I have to. It's needed to live. I don't get sentimental about it

You just did. [/QUOTE]

No, I'm trying to say that you can be engrossed in a new world technology as you might breathe air, but you don't become sentimental about air. It's just air. There's more where that came from. Not the aptest metaphor. The intention is not to say "Without SL, I cannot live" but to try to give a sense of how widespread this technology will become in probably a relatively short time. so that just one company with it will not seem so special.



*rolls eyes 360 degrees in head*. Wait, you forget the ability to piss into a tube! That comes from space too, Hiro! Oh, you are ridiculous, just giving the usual tekki silly justifications for this monstrous excessive expenditure of the public's money for visiting some dull, cold airless rocks. I mean, really.



I don't watch it. It doesn't interest me. I used to watch "The Fugitive".




Why, thanks, Hiro, that's sweet. I'm not sweet like you are. I'm sour. So I fight back hard when someone takes out a huge bigass post like this against me. You have to realize that your worldview, dominated as it is by the typical modern technological education, is completely missing some of the basic building blocks that used to be part of Western civilization. And because of that, those of us who have been educated in other traditions are simply not willing to cede over to you all the tools and levers and controls of the New Age and the New World. Not on your life. Humility is endless. Acquire some.

Oh look, Mr. acrimony lecturing someone about humilty.

Oh my god, I'd never read all of that in a million years, Tolstoy

tl;dr

The proof is in the pudding. And I take offense to the "know-it-all" comment. There's no need for name calling.


Oh, I see that, prok. I understand the silly nature. My point was that you could have just as easily called them "technocraps" or "scriptologists" or something with a negative tone; in that I think the positive tone reflects you looking up to their ability.


I'm not sure what the heck you're really talking about. If I give someone a free DVD player, should a requirement be that the person be able to take it apart, reverse engineer it, and sell it on the market if they like?


And then in public you call them names by lumping them into a social corrupt elite?


I don't think I have, but I wasn't talking about your work. I wasn't trying to imply that you don't deserve respect if you've done good stuff; I apologize if it came off that way. I simply wanted to point out that your hyperbole of an aristocratic society in SL is really just builders respecting one another.


Okay, so you just stopped talking about how hire builders in SL, and now you say they suck? Another contradiction.

In TSO, the wall was made by an artist at or hired by Maxis. The wall looks identical to tens of thousands wall in TSO. There is no real variety or innovation.

If you're having problems linking prims, I would recommend a Building 101 class. Or, if you'd like, I'm sure you can ask for help on the Building forum and someone would be happy to help you. Or, you could ask Live Help, of which a great deal of veteran players have volunteered their time, and they could help you, too.

Or: right-click, select edit. Grab the axis you wish to move. Slide it to the destination. Release mouse. Optional: select "lock". Link? Shift-click two prims and hit control-L.


Fair enough. Building isn't for everyone, but I firmly believe everyone in SL has a talent they can develop - be it Photoshop, building, scripting, DJing, event hosting, or even land-developing. I think you should just do what you love in SL and someone will pay you for it. (Perhaps with a little advertising)


Did you miss my last post when I pointed out how most builders never touched CAD or 3-D Studio Max or any 3-D program before? There are classes and tools and people ready to help for anyone who wants to learn.

Further, I think your insistance that skilled, motivated people should not be rewarded for their efforts is, by definition, anti-capitalist. It's communist. It's right out of a Kurt Vonnegut book! Handicap the talented! Prok, do you have a secret desire to be the first Handicapper General?


Agreed, but all kinds should be encouraged to be educated to grasp opportunity and reach their full potential.


This is a whole nother issue, Prok. Where are these arrogant builders you speak of? The overwhelming majority (although I do have counter-examples) that I've dealt with have been open, warming, and helpful to me, even when I was just a noob. There are a number of threads in the forum history to the tune of "Post here to thank people who helped you when you were a noob".


I think here you simply lack the perspective of how 3-D design works. TSO is based on static content that is slapped on a grid at orthogonal directions. It's easier because there's a whole lot less variables. SL has to be a whole lot more accurate and flexible. The build tool is easier than most 3-D tools I've used, including Maya, 3-D Studio Max, Bryce, and AutoCAD. It's simply a matter of stuffing as many options are required to support a custom world into an interface.

And certainly if you have better suggestions to improve the interface, you're welcome to it.

I may add that 1.6's release added some nice tweaks to the interface.


I think people just don't like your hyperbole and lumping everyone into a us vs. them mentality. But, I agree that people probably are a little harsh on these forums. The proper thing to do is to dispute someone's views, not to dispute them.


LOL! Okay, you are right here; people are anxious to kiss up to Philip. Hell, I know I do it. I think it's more of being star-struck than any desire for power, though.


I am a midbee. I talk to newbs on a daily basis. I've been doing Live Help almost three months. I read lots of threads.


Prok, I agree that people are overly harsh about you. People forget that they are supposed to be trying to win you over to their viewpoint, not putting you down.

But you are frustrating, Prok. You surely understand that.


heh, haven't you realized that the Land & Economy forum is mostly B.S.?
Sure, I've seen some interesting discussions, but it's mostly for people who just seem to love economics to death.


Alright, fair enough. Just don't pull the nazi card on me and expect it to go unchecked.


Come, now. There are plenty of cross-skill workers in SL. It's just that many people have a nack for programming but not design, and vice versa. It also makes us interdependant.

Okay... so, coders are at an advantage. I admit it. It's the nature of the game, though. SL is code. Runners are at an advantage in a marathon, cooks in a kitchen. Web designers on the regular Internet. It's really the nature of the beast, though.


I'm not harassing you; you brought it up, I responded. That said, I do see the picture of what you're saying; I see peoples' Freudian ids running wild on the 'Net. Anonymity breeds it. I don't, however, think it's a condition you can label onto the SL "FIC", and if anything, these people with reputations are more responsible, and more genuine than the people who run around not worried about what they do.
...
It's still not the "darkest" pages of human history, but I realize your hystrionics is just a condition of how you speak, so I'll try and assume hyperbole from now on.


Real mature response. Not. Perhaps I was talking about your attitude, not your participation in game?


I disagree. I see a lot of newbie made builds. Bottom line, if you don't like an area, don't go there.. and as I also said, land improves in look with time.


Or, it doesn't exist as a formal body and this belief of yours is incorrect.


With all due respect, you're smoking CRACK. You have a total misconception of the average SL user. The overwhelming majority of younger players I find just want to hang out, and the overwhelming majority of these amateurs making great stuff are middle-aged folks who are discovering an awakening of talents that they never knew they had.


If you are implying that most of the world scorns the achievers, then I'm glad I live in the West. But, I don't think it is so. I've been to the poorest of areas in the world and what I notice is that no matter how little people have, they are proud of their own accomplishments. Peoples' drive to improve and create and be proud of what they build is irrepressable.


http://secondlife.com//land/index.php - a technological solution to land-scanners - LL implemented a player suggestion, and now the playing field is leveled to anyone who wants to have the information for available land. An RSS feed is forthcoming and I'm certain a script on how to use it will wind up in the forum.

As far as bouncer scripts, it's a tricky problem, but I can say from first hand experience that Lindens take resolving abuse of these scripts seriously.


?? lost me there.


First, please don't CAPS me. No need to raise your voice.
What about software licenses? Those are not for resale.
What about food? Food is consumable and not for resale.
What about liquor or guns or drugs or other regulated items? Not for resale.
Clearly, you can't make a blanket statement and say that everything in the real world is resellable.

The bottom line is that you don't HAVE to buy something if you don't like the permissions. I sell my stuff copy / no mod / no transfer so that if people lose / mess up the item, they have copies readily available. Literally, they are being charged money to pay for software rights to use virtual items I have created. I choose not to make that license resellable.


And you wonder why people don't like you? I have yet to call you a name. I'm not dignifying such an attack with a response.

Stick 'em up!

just kidding.


Again, when you stop personally attacking me, I'll dignify you with a response.


Prok, you claimed that TSO had a better framerate. i was giving you reasons why it does. Democracy tools don't factor into it. SL has way more options that take a lot of CPU power. Period.


Grossly inaccurate assumptions and a thinly veiled personal attack.


Wait, I think i get it. You're in love with an idea of what SL should be, without accepting it for what it is.


Okay, whatever. Next time you use anything plastic, reheat food in a microwave, enjoy flash-frozen food, talk on a cell phone, use any telecommunications device dependant on GPS, watch TV broadcast on satellite, hear a weather report depending on satellite pictures .. *trails off in a list of advances of science due to space technology*

Oh, yes, and then there's the computer, which got huge money poured into the technology to make it available on space flights. So as you're typing, you're paying homage to space flight.


You aren't everyone. A great deal of people do enjoy these series' and it inspires them. Having you as a sample size of 1 when we're talking about all of society is not a representative polling.


See, this is precisely your problem. My post isn't against you, Prok, it's against many of your ideas. If you lose the us vs. them mentality you may be able to see what I'm saying.


Such as what? I was a philosophy minor, an avid reader of many genres of literature, I loosely know a second language, and my grammar is impecable.


Wow. That one made me giggle.

haha, it's like Finnegan's Wake up in here

"Hmm, TSO also didn't have:
- Player created content
- Streaming video and music
- Built-in Physics engine
- Avatars that weren't sprites
- Full 3-D environment
- Uploadable textures and sounds
- The goal of being anything more than a game"

1. TSO players have long begged for the opportunity to create content, and were promised the ability to do so when the game first opened. However, they have created just about all the content possible and then some, with the tools they were given, if you consider content in terms of design and entertainment. (And put in their own streaming music.)

Avatars that weren't sprites? Not sure what you are talking about here. I'm glad my TSO avatars don't stand with their legs akimbo all the time.

"The goal of being anything more than a game" - this one speaks to the core of my major criticism of this game (I think; I'm still forming my opinions). You could also just as easily maintain that TSO has all the social and much of the creative of SL and also offers a game in addition. SL is not more than a game, but it is distinctly less than one.

2. You mention that the "what about poor people who have no talent" thread was absurd. To me, it spoke precisely and directly to what most limits the game, particularly from the point of view of a new player. There really should be more for a new player to do; more options for making money with certainty; and more ways that the new player can succeed, more built-in and obvious goals. I expect you and most of the people on these boards to disagree with me on that. And to call it envy, rather than the legitimate criticism it is.

3. The building tools DO suck, in many ways. The XYZ's of an item don't match up with other items in the world logically - they each seem to be inhabiting entirely different worlds - and I find myself often wishing just for a virtual ruler, if nothing else, both to measure things with and to line up various items. And a grid. I view the current system as a prototype, actually, of what it might actually become.

I don't think intelligence or talent is as requisite for using these tools as are the traits of patience and an ability to tolerate frustration. I admire less the use of the tools, per se, as I do the resultant design. Lots of people can make a beach chair. Only a few make a beach chair I admire.

coco

Y'all really really need to stop feeding this pair of trolls here.

Ah well. The first post to any self-professed savior is something I always design to see just how deluded they are as to their 'cause'. The reply comes in two ways -- either a much more reasonable post that is less 'messianic' and perhaps a tad sheepish for getting so wound up OR what I see here.

When I get the latter, I write off the author as too caught up in their own dramatics to ever deal with reality.

A pity really, because lurking under all that paranoia, wounded ego, and hyperbole is some intellect.

Oh well.

1 Word Prok/Hiro: Wow.

I did not know that. =P

Just about all the content possible and then some? Respectfully, I think you need to open your mind to possibilities.


TSO is what's called "isometric" which means the camera is locked at a specific angle and all characters and scenery are composed of a series of 2-D images. These images, played in sequence, simulates animations. Each image is called a "sprite".

In a true 3-D game, the character is modeled on a wire mesh of some sort and the whole environment can be explored from any angle.


Heh!


Do you work for Maxis? LOL

A game? No, Second Life is a world, or a platform, if I may call it that. There are dozens of games in SL - trivia, Tringo, RPGs, dogfighting, FPS, swordfighting, puzzles, contents, etc etc etc.

Seriously... I could list a bajillion things that you can do in SL and not in TSO, but... it's clear you just don't see it.


Besides build, chat, go to clubs, play one of dozens of games, script, explore, make art... etc ?


The game has a lifetime subscription fee of $10. TEN BUCKS! How much does TSO cost in the initial software plus monthly subscriptions?

Worst case, if you really can't make money, hunker down and spend some RL cash.
Or make some friends - most people in SL give stuff away to friends.

But really there's plenty of venues to make money. Just find something either no one else is doing, or do something better than everyone else.


Why? Why should everyone be led around like sheep? Second Life is not a game. The Internet doesn't have built-in and obvious goals, either.


For someone who expects Second Life to be a game, yes. But SL is not billed as a game.


Yeah, ain't it great that you're not locked in to an isometric cage?


Have you ever used the grid option?
Have you taken a basic / advanced building class?

I'm also happy about the improvements to the grid interface in 1.6... makes it even easier to use.


I don't see how you can say the tools are hard to use, and then say it doesn't require intelligence or talent. Regardless, I agree with you about the beach chair analogy. I also pose to you this: How many different beach chairs are there in TSO, mm?

He doesn't like you. NOBODY does.

All the Lindens love the residents of SL.

I know I'm a new Linden, but take my word on this. In my experience, the Lindens are honestly *fanatical* in their love of what all the residents are doing to make SL what it is today. Your creativity and dreams are driving SL.

When we say "this world is yours to create"...well, we truly mean it. If you have experience in other online "multiplayer worlds" you probably know how different other environments are in terms of supporting the creativity and dreams of the residents.

Truly, there is no "feted inner core." We are all in this together. Residents, making your dreams come true in a virtual world that holds no bounds to your creativity. And us Lindens, working as "groundskeepers" to help build and support the scaffolding upon which you will build your dreams.

OK...it may sound like I'm waxing poetic. But this comes from the heart.

Satirists generally have a sense of humour. When that's missing, it doesn't make any sense.

Oh, and by the way... New Yorker cartoons have never been funny.

You are SOOO my Linden alt!!! ^_^