SL celebrities?

Aww I missed my typo, was I Desmond Shag or Desmond Chung? I get those a lot

There *is* something to celebrity here, but it's very, very little. The most I get is people recognising me from the SL official handbook, or forums or something. "Hey, you are in my book!" "Yes that's me! Hi." "Hi! ... .... ..." "Nice to meet ya. Welcome to the grid." "Can I be your friend?" "Sure."

Then you either never hear from them again (most common) or they invite you to poker parties or their club or whatever... but I can't ever go because I've got five concurrent IM's about land, and two people waiting for me to deed a parcel. I'm no fun, simply not enough time.

The flipside is real life. In certain circles, such as engineers or internet business people, Second Life is pretty well known and just about everyone has, or has had, an account. So they may have heard of your internet self. "You!? You are Desmond Shang in Second Life? ..." "Yeah... that's me alright." "But you are dressed like a surfer!" "Well it's not like I'm going to catch waves with a top hat and a pocketwatch..." "You... regularly go outside!?" "Surprisingly, yes. Want to go? You can borrow my board half the time, it's all dinged and I don't care." "I can't, I've got a Warcraft raid early this afternoon, so the Europeans can make it." "Right."

Honestly anyone could get well known. If you post in the forums a lot, you are well known. All there is to it. It's everything to do with being chatty - *no* other skill required. Though chatty people make cool stuff too sometimes! You don't even have to be nice, or talented - just yappy! Occasionally there is a famous designer, but by virtue of that they are usually... designing more stuff, not hanging out being diva's.

Besides, in a list of life accomplishments, who *really* wants to be well known on the internet? At best you could maybe rub shoulders with Gary Brolsma, Chris Crocker, the Star Wars Kid and the dancing baby. Obscurity never looked so good.


Edit: we are *all* designed for greatness FD! You too. Just takes a lot of people telling us otherwise that brings us down.

I was walking past an ad farm once and Umnik Hax was standing admiring the view!

Does that count?

Aww, thankoo!

F’r me, it’s like this:

Lumiere Noir, Jopsy Pendragon, an Robin Sojourner for their tutorial works

Philip Linden, for which we can blame it all on.

Torley and Ravenelle, for lots of reasons

Many other Lindens, if only because of their involvement with the world as a whole

Phaylen Fairchild, for her work with Divas, amongst other things

Flea Bussy, the brains that brought Grendel’s Children to be

Robbie Dingo, machinima arteur

Starax Stakowski/Light Waves, the “Michelangelo” of SL

Prokofy Neva, Love ‘em or hate ‘em, he’s got relevance

Steller Sunshine, the first resident

More than this, though, this is a world where anyone can be a “celebrity.” Great builders and designers can be idolized. Those who make are can be admired. Those who speak out and lead can be followed. Anyone can achieve their 15 cycles of fame.

This is exactly how i feel.

There lot be said about being obscure, anonymous, unpaid Artist I guess
versus successful business owner that can't get seconds rest to just
reflect on one's pixelated navel.
I don't know if I could deal with constant instant messages.
I have hard time if more two or three regular people are messaging
me all day long who are friends when I am trying to work on things, play
or host a pizza game.
I am just not very good at multi-tasking, I either can create or hang out
I can't do both as well as you seem to do plus hold down a successful business too.
I would love more money for things, I am very poor but I am wealthy where it matters
I got good friends, with lots of time to reflect on my own pixelated navel which I keep meaning to learn how to draw better, people are nice to me 80 percent of the time and I get to create
things that I like, I get to improve every day regardless if it 4 hour work day or 70 hour
work week to get it right and the process of creating is whole lot more valuable then
being well known, getting lots of $, instant messages, popularity or being a "FIC" if
they actually exist.

The FIC do not exist, and we never have.

There's about 5 different definitions of FIC. Some by definition don't exist, some couldn't exist, some MUST exist. None of them really match the definition of a "celebrity" though, although there's strong overlap.

I wonder about that I remember the road crew was first in hiring process and
I thought wow what cool job, I wonder if I am good enough to have my doodles
as part of public works project and one of my friends discouraged me said
I only be hired if I was like a friend or part of like recognized group from the Lindens i.e
the FIC group.
I didn't think I was "good" enough so I never applied. I figured it was job for the
secretive order of FIC or something.

That's exactly what you'd say if they DID exist!!

/me proves the existance of FIC, with Des as their PR guy.

edit: oh.. And Jurin Juran and Chip should go on the list.

So.. for the ignorant and def not FIC- what is FIC?

Feted inner core, they get all the exclusive face time, secret business dealings
and Linden PR to promote their business, news time to promote successful designers
or business and spokespeople in resident class that LL uses to make SL look good.

Feted Inner Core. It's a term first coined by Prokofy Neva that's evolved and mutated a lot since it was first used.

In original usage, it meant the tendency for older, or more established residents, to band together and favor each other, and insodoing to slow down improvements to the world - not least, by bypassing the world's limitations for themselves via favor (rather than using their power and influence to canvas for the limitation to be removed for everyone).

Now, in that sense, I'd personally believe it would be nearly impossible for it NOT to exist because, well, that's how people are. If you're Famous Builder and you can use your contacts and reputation to get the ability to build on high-traffic islands without needing to pay tier, then you probably aren't going to be picketing the Lindens' Office Hours to demand lower tier fees. In fact, the only people doing that will be the Not Very Famous Builders, and the only response to the picket will need to be "if you were better you'd be famous, and then you could build for free like that guy". Whereas, the argument went, if (say) Starax had threatened to take down all his builds unless tier fees were lowered, there'd be a much greater chance that they would be. And, further, the argument goes, ultimately this is bad for the grid because it creates a society where "success" means not having to follow the rules (ie, pay tier - earned in-world or otherwise), which in turn can lead to a society where the rules are far too oppressive and stay that way, because the people with the influence to change them are exempt from them.

However, it then got mutated and bent out of shape until it became commonly used just as a joke, a nonexistant Illuminati-style conspiracy determined to rule Second Life.

You can see the very first thread that used the term here: /120/d9/31559/1.html .

...and everybody except Prokofy Neva is a member.

Actually its kinda funny how many of the older residents that y'all list as celebrities have been my friends list for years. Back when I started some of them were already important movers and shakers, but many were not yet. They are all just plain good folks. Part of a SL that was a bit closer knit and kinder to each other and new people than it is now.

I figured FIC had to do with special group of residents that got more jobs, more money, more face time, more influence, being sanction as legit Linden dollar trader or being able to
do certain technologies connected or sold through SL with special promotional status because they are buddies with right Lindens or something...
Darkness I keep hearing how friendly things were back then but it wasn't my
experience.
It was confusing ghost town for me back then remained so until I left in 2004
and returned as FD still sometimes is.
My first guy is from January 23, 2003 and I never met anyone for years in SL
and was bit lost.
I think I saw one person in 2003 to 2004 and it was on orientation island.

The FIC theory is about nothing more than denegrating and disparaging other people's accomplishments. Ironically, the person who coined the term is probably better known now than most of the people he's spent his SL career denegrating. I'm sure he'd attribute his own success to nothing but the sweat of his brow, but everyone else's he attributes to some kind of repressive old boy network that spends all its time trying to stifle everyone else. Of course his own success puts the lie to such paranoid idiocy, but don't expect him to ever put two and two together and see four.

I still find a lot of close-knit and kind people out there. Unfortunately, they're not typically found at the infohubs, where all the new folks are. In fact, th' infohubs as they are can be pretty icky.

As to FIC? Meh. People like to assume there are grand conspiracies.

Well- first I heard of it -

Know what does give me that ooh! feeling? Meeting and old resident. Not cause they're "special" but just cause they have been here forever.

I sort of expect them to know stuff- and some do. Others never caught the build bug or they went away and just came back and me as a relative noob know more- disconcerting that- Still is a cool feeling when I come upon an "Ancient" (You have to say it like that too, with hushed tones of reverence.)

Wherever people are close-knit and kind, there is FIC - by the original definition. They are one and the same. The conspiracy theory came later.

I don't about my alt Dagon Grimm he is older then dirt, doesn't do much, I just
kept him around cause he was my first Alt, he never accomplished much except
be grumpy old fart with pointed elf ears and doesn't shave or pay much attention
to his appearance and other then being over 5 years old, he is total newbie

FD I had a totally different experience back when I was new. I got to meet alot of really talented oldbies and learn from them. They were always willing to answer a question or help with an odd issue. Now I am not going to say I liked every oldbie I ever met. There are even some on peoples lists I flat out don't like. Thats human nature though no one gets along with everyone.

One that most don't think of as a celebrity is Toy Lafollett. It was her work near 5 years ago that really pioneers the concept of prim water, waves and waterfalls. I learned a TON from her and remain a friend to this day.

I never met Toy but I have heard of her. Prim water has been something
that fascinated me.
Yeah when I was first Dagon I had land but I didn't know even how to travel.
I sort wonder around tiny bit but I couldn't figure out even how to get home when I got one here after I left TSO beta. I was so lost in SL for like year
back then never could figure out what to do, was really out of it, ill, I hadn't even figured out if I said I was lost and confused in forum maybe I could have gotten help back until FD joined in in 2006.
I think I briefly visited forum once in 2003 to ask about Blender, which still years later only thing I know how to do hit the exit button. Yet I didn't think of saying hey I am lost on grid can't find my way back home in forums or ask how to build or use my 2d texture making skills in SL. LOL
And then when when SL went public the prim tax I just sort of left discouraged because
I just had no clue to do anything or figure out things.

Greater minds than you and I have crumbled under Blender's user interface.
I am fairly convinced that Blender is, in fact, a two-dimensional view of one of the Lovecraftian Elder Gods.

I came to these forums pretty new, and so I knew nothing of who the movers and shakers in SL really were, or who had accomplished what. I didn't even know there was much to accomplish. I got to know several people here as friends without realizing who they were. Every once in a while, I still see something amazing and do a double take when i see whose work it is. Like, "OMG - YOU did THAT!? Weren't you and I just making fart jokes in group chat!? How can you be famous!? Crap. Now I have to respect you"

It turns out that people are just people, no matter what they have accomplished. That's not to make light of people's accomplishments at all. It's more an issue of celebrities being created in the minds of people who don't know the celebrities and somehow build them up to a different status than the celebrities would see for themselves.

I'm glad I met the people I did before I knew who they were. I've got some good friends and have had some great laughs, and I would hate to think I would have missed out on those because I was afraid to approach someone.

*giggles* ^_^