Realrestraint brand - what is it?

No, no... I didn't imply that love ruled submission out, far from it. The two are independent but one doesn't contradict the other. For instance one can be submitted to another without necessarily loving them, perhaps even hating them. On the other hand, you can love without submitting. My cats for instance, do love me. They are not submitting to me in the least though. lol.

Scylla : Interesting links there, thanks !

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Jackie: Go ahead and explore those options (the slave contract thing, the prison sentence) if they sound as if they would be interesting or fun to you. In my own experience, while such roleplay can be fun for an hour or an evening, it is NOT what D/s is about. It's only the shallow surface (especially in a world where all restraint is consensual from moment to moment). The trappings, not the substance.

I'd be interested in Brenda's take on this, since we both seem to be explorers.

My way of thinking is that in RL, you have D/s, and SM.

My way of thinking is the scope of what BDSM means to me. I don't mean to imply it should mean that to you.

So, my way of thinking. D/s is the aspect of power exchange. Power exchanged freely. It's the mind. The body is one tool amongst many to access the mind, to shape it.

SM is the toys. The endorphins, the pain and pleasure. The joy of bondage, of feeling helpless and being tortured or torturing. The focus is hedonistic.

We (or perhaps just I) exist on the continuum between these two extremes.

In SL, BDSM very much entirely in one's mind. Short of self abuse, of course. It has always been theater of the mind, because the body is inaccessible to the partner. So for me, it has always been all D/s, and no SM.

RLV, on the other hand, has changed that. It hasn't created something new, but it's definitely improved it. While not SM, it isn't entirely D/s either. It's an analog to RL SM, I think. Given it's popularity, it clearly fills a need. It is a strong tool for "casual play" or more, but it's about helping to play out a scene. It's not necessarily about the strong D/s connection between a dominant and a submissive, but it can be.

I think that the people who object to RLV or look down on those who do enjoy it live their SL (and perhaps RL life) heavily on the D/s side of the fence, while just about everyone else from the SM side to the "best of both worlds" camp can appreciate its inherent value.

Not necessarily. While I do have some Sensations specific arousal and other commands, there is nothing stating that you have to use the arousal functions or any of that. I didn't go with Xcite as a developer simply because of some issues I had with a bug that - well, we just didn't get along all that well, and it took me a month to get a fix. I don't have time to wait that long for a bug fix and I'm not big on attitude either. Xcite is a great line of products, and their support is good for customers, but because at the time I was an unknown developer, I was treated as second rate. --shrug---

That said - the plugin I have now for remote control will drop into ANY sensations item that takes sensations plugins. So you could, for example, get the sensations "hair" scripts, drop those in your hair and drop my plugin into that and use it just for the plugin.

I will also be making other plugins that work without sensations, I just haven't had time. I do have a free LBOM Developer's kit though on Xstreet. Now is not a particularly good time to start playing with that though as I'm in the process now of adding a ton more features to it, so the core scripts will change. They should be backwards compatible, but anything you develop now will take a considerable amount of extra work to update to take advantage of the newest features. Once I get the 1.5 version of the free core system out - I will look into making something that works without sensations. (This whole project is really only a few months old).

(As for your parts - I have a set of scripts - available for free, wherever Lustbaby has out her "wings" - somewhere in the mall, lol) that you can drop into an excite item (if it's moddable) and it will make it sensations compatible - meaning that it will send arousal and all of that. My plugin wouldn't work in that, but... if you do get some sensations stuff and don't want to give up your tail and stuff - there is that option. -- that's another reason I went with sensations - you can make XCite stuff Sensations compatible because Amethyst put in hooks. You cannot make sensations stuff work with the XCite HUD because they only want it to work with their stuff and their "approved" builders).

Anyway - I'm rambling - stay tuned. Once I get this next release out of Beta, there will be a remote control script that will work without sensations. Drop it into a prim and click the prim and you'll get a menu.



For Jackie:
Have you tried any of the submissive style hypnosis programs on our machines? One of the cool things with the hypnosis is that it allows you to explore some of the feelings and emotions involved - without necessarily having to submit to anyone (though they also work great in making the RP aspects in SL "feel" more real when you are exploring them). But if you are just looking to explore some of the feelings before you decide if you want to do some RP with it - it might be a way to go. We have tons of sessions (with several available for free on the various machines scattered around our sim) and both Hypnodolls and Hypnotic Magic make hypnosis machines that have sessions available with the same kind of theme.

Hypnosis definitely isn't a substitute for the real thing, but it can be an excellent tool when it comes to opening up the imagination and helping you to visualize what it might feel like if it were to be actually happening to you. So it might be worth checking out. IM me in world if you want me to show you some of the stuff we have. You can probably spend a half hour to an hour a day for a week or two without spending a dime. And after that, you can still do it without spending a dime, but at that point, it's usually when people want to start thinking about whether they want one of their own or to buy a session or two that are new and more advanced that they can load into our demo machines, etc.

I sent you a notecard in world. Talk with you later.

Lin, you know me well enough to know how willing I am to jump into things with both feet. I guess I feel that if I know I can stop it or it's for a short period then I'm not making the commitment that is required to understand it. I may get cold feet (as you well know), but right now that's how I'm looking at it. Thank you, as always.

Yes, I'd like Brenda's comments too.

Thanks Jackie! I did pop inworld long enough to get the card. And yes, I will be in touch. In the meantime, take care.

I've never ventured into that realm, it doesn't interest me. I have no opinion on it otherwise.

You can explore it deeper in RP as well. I've had several long going RP relationships. Whenever we would meet, we would pick up right where we left off, but we still had the benefit of knowing we could each end it at any given time, without any hard feelings. Out of that, something more substantial can develop if you wish. It's not for everyone, but it was a great way for me to become involved at a more comfortable pace.

That's not what I meant, exactly. I meant, "what's your take on the whole D/s - BDSM - rp - relationship thing/universe/experience?"

OH. Like I said before, whatever you get out of it is what's right. If it's just a kinky thrill, naughty roleplay, or a personal experience, it only matters to those involved.

For me, it can be all of those, depending on the situation, and people involved.

I found the jail rp to be mostly extremely boring, a lot of sitting alone in a cell. When there were guards around then it would get very intense, never really knowing what you might be subjected to. Also, I found that when I finished, it took me a few days to readjust to not being in the cell and subject to the whims of the guards.