Missed Opportunities With Alienware Competition

On June 20th Linden Lab blogged Celebrate SL10B With a Chance to Win a New Alienware 14 Laptop! “Awesome” was likely to have been the reaction of many, until they saw “Note: this contest is limited to Second Life users in the US” At this point the reaction of many was likely to have been “Boooooo!” I don’t have a problem with this, even though I can’t enter, the same as I don’t have a problem with the previous Amazon promotions I can’t participate in.

The competition runs until July 17th, so if you are a US resident and fancy entering, go here: http://www.alienwarearena.com/lan-give-a-way/second-life/ Read the rules carefully, if you’re from Rhode Island you’re out of luck!

I see promotions such as this as helping to promote Second Life outside of Second Life circles, and that’s a good thing. I will however say that I don’t think this competition is a great fit as part of the SL10B community celebrations, but that’s a minor quibble.

To get this into some sort of perspective, there are Alienware competitions that cover other countries, for example The Alienware Arena Weekly “Gamer’s Grab” Sweepstakes is open to: “legal residents of the United States, Canada (excluding Quebec), United Kingdom, France, Mexico, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore, that are 13 years of age or older and residents of Germany that are fifteen (15) years of age or older.”

A lot of excluded countries there, then there’s the 5v5 Heroes of Newerth Tournament – Europe which is open : “only to residents of Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Ireland, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom that are thirteen (13) years of age or older, residents of Spain that are fourteen (14) years of age or older and residents of Germany that are fifteen (15) years of age or older as of June 17, 2013”

So we can see that it’s not unusual for competitions and tournaments to be restricted. However where I feel opportunities have been missed here is that a platform such as Second Life has a wide range of ways to deliver content and prizes, and there are more creative ways to engage with a wider range of users.

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June 22, 2013

SL10B Should Be Extended

Sl10B is a big event, 22 sims worth to be precise. There’s so much to see and do, the agenda is:

June 16 Grand Opening

June 23 Official Birthday

June 23 Final day of performances

June 29 Sims close to the public

July 1 All builds to be dismantled – sims go offline

Now a really decent community birthday gift from Linden Lab would be to allow the exhibits to stay in place for a month or two, because that would give people plenty of time to get around. I don’t know exactly what the arrangement is between Linden Lab and the organisers but the community website tells us:

The SL10B Community Celebration is Second Life’s 10th anniversary resident-run gala celebration, and it happens from June 16 at noon slt to June 29. This year, we have 22 sims cram-packed with art, exhibitions, information, and events.

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June 21, 2013

SL10B – The Bear Necessities Part 1

In this little mini series I’m taking my SL10B Avatar on a brief tour of some SL10B sims and highlighting, albeit very briefly, some spots. This doesn’t mean I don’t like the spots I don’t highlight, it’s just that there’s not enough hours in the day to do full justice to the event. We’ll start with Second Life In Black & White, Journey by Bear Silvershade.

The notecard tells us: “In this exhibition, you will see the work of SL artist Bear Silvershade, with examples of early work not long after he first rezzed in 2010 through his growing fascination with monochrome in 2012 to his current, ongoing “Journey of the Lonely Man” series.”

SLURL: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/SL10B%20Dazzle/216/158/22

Marianne McCann chimes in with a couple of exhibits on my travels, one is still going strong, but the other is alas not, it is in memory of Greenies Home:

Greenies was once a must see sim, lots of impressive work there and a real fun place to visit.

SLURL: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/SL10B%20Dazzle/31/72/22

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June 18, 2013

Magellan Needs Help But Where On Earth Is Salazar Jack?

Magellan’s Grid Scavenger Hunt

Welcome, brave explorers and adventurers! Magellan Linden uncovered an evil scheme by the mad Doctor Talpa to build mind-controlling machines and take over the world. While Magellan builds a machine to counter this scheme, you are needed to gather materials and components — and to destroy every one of Talpa’s machines you find. Magellan has established workshops, a laboratory (even a bar) on the Isles of Ice; travel there to learn more, get equipped and start the hunt!

Visit in Second Life

Magellan Linden needs you! Well if you’re a Premium member he does anyway. Why does he need Premium members? I have no idea, but you can’t help if you’re not a Premium member, maybe Magellan is partying with basic accounts and hitting on girls, he has a reputation for booze and bawdiness. Wait a minute that would mean us Premium members doing all the work!

In the past Magellan used to write chronicles, but they ended around 2005. Magellan hasn’t been doing much since October 2008 when the infamous Nautilus City Investigation took place, you’ll find lots of links about the legend of Magellan Linden there. There you will also get some insight into the nature of Magellan Linden, as exemplified by one of the last known chat logs of the intrepid explorer:

Resident: Excuse me, but could I ask you please to move?

Resident: I mean, with that huge suit you’re wearing, it’s hard for people to walk around you in here.

Resident: Please?

Magellan: Hush, woman! I’m in three different IMs and they’re all more important than you.

Resident: But this is my art gallery. People are here for the opening party.

Magellan: Just tow it out to Weiland or Shenning. I’ll board it there, head south.

Resident: What?

Magellan: Damn it!

Resident: What did I do? Tow what?

Magellan: No, some arty-farty cow is making noise and confusing me.

Magellan: Damn it again!

Resident: Hey, wait, are you talking about me?

They gave Magellan a Mole Tank! I mean, letting Magellan loose in something like that!

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June 17, 2013

SL10B – The Shatoetry Project

You know how it goes, there’s a big event, you ramp up your graphics card settings, get ready for snapshots and watch in horror as you run out of texture memory, or the viewer crashes whilst playing about with windlight settings and then you forget all about the windlight setting you like. This is when you remind yourself that you’re living in denial about the capabilities of your graphics card and settle on looking at the parcel itself, which is what I did as I found myself at Crap Mariner’s SL10BCC Shatoetry Project.

The notecard informs us:

The Second Life SL10BCC Shatoetry Project

by Crap Mariner

(UPDATED June 9, 2013)

Shatoetry is a smartphone app that lets you create magnetic poetry with William Shatner’s voice.

“Second” and “Life” are available in the word packs, and that inspired this project.

I created a bunch of Shatisms about Second Life which explore the past, present, future, and quirks of this virtual world. Then, I embedded the sounds in this build.

When you arrive on the parcel you can listen to the Shatisms Crap has created, as well as user contributed ones. Details on how to add your own Shatism to the build are included in the notecard on the parcel, I’m not going to provide all the details here as that would not be fair on the exhibit, if this sounds interesting to you, go and visit the parcel:

SLURL: http://slurl.com/secondlife/SL10B%20Electrify/31/104/21

The build itself is nicely done and the Shatisms are very amusing as you hear William Shatner style speech with phrases associated with Second Life and virtual worlds.

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