I’ve mentioned before how much I like the art of storytelling, I’ve also mentioned before how I’m surprised there’s not more storytelling in Second Life and how a virtual world is an environment that could allow for a feature rich interactive storytelling experience.
I haven’t changed my mind on any of the above but this evening I read an interesting post regarding storytelling in different virtual worlds : Why Kitely? What about Second Life? The post is from the Seanchai Library website.
First things first, Seanchai Library have been bringing stories to Second Life for over six years now, they are very much supporters of Second Life and aim to continue in Second Life. The post isn’t a bash Second Life post, it makes an interesting comparison between what can be done in Second Life v what can be done in Kitely and points out the cold, hard, financial realities.
The post talks about the possibilities of immersive storytelling and why Kitely may be a more attractive proposition for that sort of storytelling :
As we continue to explore creating increasingly immersive story experiences – an opportunity in what we do that several of us are very interested in – we run into immediate limits in Second Life. Those restrictions are, to be blunt, money and prims. A build like last year’s Dickens’ Project takes nearly 3800 prims (incomplete, by the way) and the space to manage them, none of which comes cheap in SL.
This is a reality that many a venture in Second Life has to face, be it storytelling, art, roleplaying, money and prims quickly become an issue. When you’re looking to tell an immersive story, it becomes more of a challenge. The room to expand and contract, to rebuild, to have space to manage the operation. Kitely offers a cheaper alternative. However that doesn’t always make Kitely the better option, it’s going to depend upon what you want to do.
The post compares the way different storytelling styles can work in both platforms :
Most of what we now produce in SL is fairly presentational: people sit in rows of seats inside of an environment and we stand (or sit) before them and present the literature. That is certainly one way of bringing stories to life, and one that we have been very successful with. But could there be another means of becoming transported into the story without shifting completely over to role play? Imagine you were wandering through the different environments visited by the Ghost of Christmas Past and Ebenezer Scrooge in Dickens’ A Christmas Carol while listening to the original text, presented live. Imagine exploring an ancient Irish tower house while listening to Gaelic folk tales. Imagine poking around 221B Baker Street while listening to a Sherlock Holmes adventure. As long as the environment engages you within voice range of the speaker, you can wander, explore, sit and experience the literature just as you do in a more traditional audience-performer setting.
The potential to get more immersive leans towards Kitely due to its lower costs, but traditional sit around the storyteller style storytelling can happily thrive in Second Life. Both are decent ways of telling stories.
Seanchai in Second Life is busy, very busy. They have many friends in Second Life and they have absolutely no intention of going away. However they do seem to be saying that their more immersive work is more likely to be found in Kitely, and for sensible reasons.
This is quite a happy compromise, they are using Second Life to tell stories in one format and they have potential for different formats in Kitely. This extends the reach of Seanchai by keeping doors open in more than one virtual world.
In the comments they do raise another further issue with Second Life, the dreaded TOS. They feel that it restricts their potential to work with real world organisations, indeed they feel that the door to working with real world organisations in Second Life is now firmly closed. I would imagine that real world organisations will be no happier about the concept of Linden Lab being able to exploit their work in any manner whatsoever than Second Life residents are.
Seanchai finish their post by pointing out that working in Second Life and Kitely can work well :
What we envision for the Seanchai Library in Kitely and in Second Life are two different things. They are experiences which, we feel, should compliment each other not duplicate. So unless the bottom falls out of Second Life (always possible, but not immediately likely) do not look for us to be leaving unless we find that our presence there no longer has validity or effectiveness. We invite you to consider joining us in Kitely to further explore and experiment with what is possible for the immersive presentation of live literature in a virtual setting. It is still all about the stories – how they inspire and inform our lives.
This is very encouraging, in some ways it works better for both platforms to offer different means of telling stories. I hope Seanchai continue for many more years on both platforms and they may even be able to boldly go where no storyteller has gone before … one day!
From the moment Kitely opened its doors to Hypergrid travelling it becomes one of the most promising commercial grids and for sure a mark on open sim.
I’m not a regular user of kitely, even if i do believe i was one of the 1st to have a world there, running since 2011, mainly cause as i can host my regions from my computer, i prefer to have my main open sim regions on Osgrid but with their marketplace, hypergrid now, Kitely is starting to be the anchor for open sim grids, some that Second Life could have been if they had a vision behind then just plain and easy profit.
Kitely is in a strong position but ZZ, OpenSim is good for interactive fiction full stop, I explored interactive fiction in hypergrid earlier in the year and enjoyed it a lot.
I agree Seanchai Library are doing a grand job of bringing their story telling venues to Kitely and, of course, there is also Nara Malone’s Writers Colony Grid (not Kitely) which offers plenty of support for writers keen to learn how they can best use Opensim virtual worlds. Interactive Fiction is a particular interest of the Writer’s colony and a number of writers have worked on venues for their stories which would probably be too expensive to do in Second Life as the Library folks have pointed out. None the less Nara encourages cross grid activities and the grid was recently visited by the Hypergrid Safari group that tour Opensim grids of interest and offer help and support for Second Lifers wishing to learn more about Hypergrid. The visit to the Writer’s Colony resulted in more than 30 avatars on the region with no noticeable lag at all which goes to show how far Opensim has come. I should also mention the Avatar Repertory Theater which has been very active in Second Life for a number of years and now plan to branch out to Opensim as well. Kitely is their choice too so all this shows that the open Metaverse has a lot to offer at very low cost, especially if you choose Kitely to handle your service. But you can do it even cheaper if you are willing to do the server side work.
Interesting conversation. I chose Opensim to build a grid for many of the reasons Seanchai did. I chose to run a grid because I didn’t want to put myself at the mercy of grid politics, changing pricing plans, or financial stability of a grid. TOS is also a consideration. Several of my builds are linked from inside published books. Contracts with my publisher would not allow me to place that content in SL under the current TOS. Above all we want a grid focused on the immersive story experience and interactive fiction. We’re working on a joint author/artist/musician project that will display a variety of transmedia and interactive tools for storytelling in virtual worlds. Talla Adam has an intriguing interactive story coming together in her regions in Kitely.
Yesterday’s Opensim Metaverse Tour included a visit to see Ruby O’Degee who has some 26 regions and describes her work as storybuilding. I couldn’t make that tour, but I’ll visit independently. It’s exciting to see virtual worlds develop as a story building/telling tool. We need a metaverse storytellers conference.
I also have worlds in SL and Kitely and in Nara’s Nook, and Inworldz. I will probably look at putting a place in OSGrid and, long term, may consider Metropolis as well. Right now, I am diversifying, trying out many venues for many purposes. Longterm, my plan will be to use Nara’s for one sort of work (creating illustrations) and some other open sim venue for workshops and readings, immersive events and performances of other types. All fall under my Freda’s Place Umbrella and all offer venues for literary activities of various types.
At this time, I maintain operations in SL (and Inworldz, another closed grid) for specific (and, I believe, temporary) reasons. Right now, SL is where the audience is. It is also where most folks’ inventory is, so it is much easier to get wardrobe, structures, and props for events. Yes, I do build, but I can’t do it all and need the support of a well-supplied market to do what I do. I believe that is growing in opensim and I will eventually be able leave sl (and other closed grids) behind.
SL’s TOS is a major driving force in my seeking venues outside SL. In SL, I no longer publish anything and only share my work in voice, never notecarded. I am uneasy when folks taking my workshops share their works on notecards in sl.
The other major factor in my seeking venues outside sl– money. Bottom line, in SL I cannot afford even one full sim. In Kitely, I currently get five sims for about 20 bucks a month and pay (maybe) 10 bucks a month for non-premium members of Kitely to visit my places. Right now, that’s the best deal on the hypergrid. I expect that to change, which is why I have lands elsewhere as well, lands that can be put to work if and when Kitely gets more expensive.
For most things, literary and artistic ventures especially, I think opensim will be the the best option down the road.
Besides, those Seanchai folx are just some of the nicest people around [and I like nice folx lots] ;’)
I started a story blog about my SL life four years ago as an outlet to write on another topic and in another style from my RL work. When RL changes allowed me more time to write and to play in virtual worlds, I expanded my horizons beyond SL but with no intention of excluding SL.
Now I’m in SL, Kitely and my own mini-grid Dankoville. Each serves my writing projects in its own way. However, my current lineup of “home” grids is a result of my personal circumstances, the directions of my character’s story and the way the grids I named are structured (and how they complement each other). I could easily have ended up on other grids had things worked out just a little differently – some of these things were within my control and some were beyond it… so I ended up ‘here.’
And ‘here’ is what works for me now. Next year or the year after, things could be different. It depends on my story and what various grids do and what other opportunities come up.
One unexpected opportunity that has happened on Dankoville is the very beginning of a little roleplay and writers community. Who knows where this might lead me?
Should time and circumstances allow, I can see myself expanding to other grids too – Metropolis, OSgrid, Craft World are at the top of the list of the places I would consider (for various reasons) but there are many options out there. We also have the recent news of LL’s “Next Life” and that could certainly play a role in my future virtual life as well.
My advice to fellow writers and to others who are thinking about expanding beyond SL, would be to take a serious look at Kitely, Metropolis, and OSgrid. They are three different types of grids and in my opinion offer the best options – it’s just a matter of what your particular needs are as to which one(s) is/are best for you.
And if those three don’t give you the chance to do something you can’t do in Second Life,
keep looking because there are many, many grids out there with good options to offer.
For various reasons, this is a really good time to be checking out your options.