Second Life – Page 58

July 9, 2015

Notification Project Viewer May Save You Time

I have had to go to some very dark corners of Second Life to create this blog post, very dark, the lengths I go to in order to get the right shots!

In a virtual world far far away, Aki Shichiroji pointed out that notifications in Second Life were untidy and not well organised, especially for people who receive a lot of notifications. I can’t quote Aki directly because the original Jira post has now gone dark. This is because the issue has been resolved in many ways.

How has the issue been resolved, I hear you ask, well Linden Lab yesterday announced, New Project Viewer: Get Your Notifications Sorted :

The Notifications Project Viewer is an improvement for sorting your notifications. This new feature is based on your feedback: a notifications floater with four tabs sorting your incoming notifications into System, Transactions, Invitations, and Groups and allowing better interaction with them as well. Those who deal with high volumes of money transactions, group notices, group invites, or inventory transfers now have a better way to review their messages and identify which notices need immediate attention.

I’ll try and explain what is changing, with some screenshots.

So on logging in, after clicking the chat bubble which alerted me that I had notifications I see the above. Now I can see that I have four tabs, one for System messages, one for Transactions, one for Invitations and one for Group notices. At a glance I can see I have one System message and 25 Group notices. Now I have a choice here on which notices I consider to be the most important. A merchant may want to pay more attention to any transactions first, whilst someone awaiting a group invitation may want to look at that first.

The messages default to collapsed, to expand them, you just click the downward arrow :

Now I can see the full message, in this case, that I’ve received too many notifications and my instant messages were capped.

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July 7, 2015July 8, 2015

Where Second Life Leads, VR Looks Set To Follow With Charitable Giving

In another “Second Life, yes it’s still around” post I’m taking a look at areas where Virtual Reality is likely to follow Second Life’s lead, in particular charities, nonprofits and social causes.

Earlier today I was reading an article by Erin Blakemore on Smithsonian.com, Virtual Reality Could Be the Next Big Thing in Charitable Giving :

Sometimes, all it takes to inspire more charitable giving is a visit to a place or person in need. But not every situation or location is accessible to the average donor. That could be changing, writes NPR’s Linda Poon, thanks to virtual reality experiences designed to increase empathy and charitable giving.

The linked article by NPR’s Linda Poon is well worth a read too. Virtual Reality may well be able to take people to places and scenes that will increase their empathy to charitable causes, but the concept of charitable causes being able to extend their reach via Virtual Worlds has long been a practice in Second Life and other similar virtual worlds.

Erin Blakemore’s article acknowledges this and points to the Nonprofit Commons, which has a presence in Second Life. The Nonprofit Commons explains a bit about itself on their website :

Nonprofit Commons was designed to lower the barriers of access to Second Life, to create a community of practice for nonprofits to explore and learn about the virtual world, and to investigate the many ways in which nonprofits might utilize this unique environment. Through this community, we provide free office space to qualifying groups, meet and network, create a cooperative learning environment and foster outreach, education, fund-raising, all in a virtual space. Our focus is on providing an accessible entry-point to Second Life and on creating a community of nonprofit organizations (NPOs) for effective collaboration and support. We believe that Second Life is a wonderful place not just to entertain, but also to educate, inspire, and work together to assist our fellow avatars (and the humans behind them). You do not have to be a resident of the Nonprofit Commons to get involved with our community. We welcome all who wish to join us as partners, collaborators or supporters.

The Nonprofit Commons are under the leadership of TechSoup and rely on the help of volunteers to aid their good causes.

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July 7, 2015July 8, 2015

Second Life Wedding Picture Used For Motherboard Transhumanist Article

The time has come for a couple of “Second Life, yes it’s still around” blog posts. The reason for this is that despite people sounding surprised that Second Life is still around, the platform still gets cited directly and indirectly in many articles.

The above picture by Alex Bristol appeared on my Twitter stream today. The image appeared because Chuck Baggett was pointing out that the image was being used in a post about human marriage. However there’s a bit of a twist regarding the article, it’s actually a transhumanist article. Transhumanism is a train of thought devoted to improving the human condition via technology. There’s a lot more to it than that, but it delves into areas that many find troubling.

Now ideas that many find troubling are not a bad thing. We need to discuss the way technology impacts upon our lives. I personally find it interesting, but at times it does appear to be way too sci-fi for my liking. However that’s the point of the discussion.

So back to Chuck Baggett’s tweet.

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July 4, 2015July 8, 2015

What Second Life Means To Me Video Project Hits The 30 Entry Mark

Back on June 16th Xiola Linden posted a blog entry, The “What Second Life Means to Me” Video Share Project :

We’ve been having a lot of fun with no end in sight to the good times – but you can’t turn 12 without a little pride and reflection. Second Life has been going strong for a dozen wonderful years and there’s a ton of things happening to celebrate. You’ll see more to come here in the Featured News Blog – but we wanted to stop and ask – “What is the meaning of Second Life?” To you – that is! This question may sound daunting – but the truth is, tapping into what makes “SL” so special to us as individuals and communities is a really amazing exercise in retrospection and self-discovery. This is your world – so what does it mean to you?

Whether you just got started, have been onboard for the full dozen years, or fall somewhere in between – we’d love to see a glimpse of your story in the “What Second Life Means to Me” video project.

Since then people have been creating short videos and I have noticed that the playlist on YouTube has now hit the 30 mark. There are a variety of styles applied, some people share more of their real self than others, some are shot entirely inworld, some have no voice. This mix is what makes this project so interesting.

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