{"id":5071,"date":"2015-06-22T22:59:57","date_gmt":"2015-06-22T21:59:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sl.governormarley.com\/?p=5071"},"modified":"2015-06-22T22:59:57","modified_gmt":"2015-06-22T21:59:57","slug":"oz-linden-talks-second-life-at-sl12b","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sl.governormarley.com\/?p=5071","title":{"rendered":"Oz Linden Talks Second Life At SL12B"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Oz<\/a><\/p>\n

Oz Linden talked to Jessica Lyon of Firestorm Viewer<\/a> fame and Saffia Widdershins, of Prim Perfect<\/a> fame at SL12B this evening. Now if you want the full skinny on the lowdown, you’ll have to wait for Prim Perfect to upload the video, which should not be too far in the future. However, if you want to read some frantically scribbled notes, that may contain inaccuracies, carry on reading here.<\/p>\n

Oz discussed current issues, past issues and future issues in what was an extremely engaging interview.<\/p>\n

I crashed a few times whilst taking my notes, but I’ll try not to start any blasphemous rumours. However crashing is a good place to start as that was part of the discussion. Oz explained how in the past he had worked for products where a 1% crash rate was considered pretty bad, however the crash rate for Second Life is higher than that and the panel agreed that Second Life users seem to accept these crash rates.<\/p>\n

However Oz went to great lengths to point out that Linden Lab do not accept that crash rates should be as high as they are and they have been working on improvements and continue to work on improvements.<\/p>\n

One point that Second Life users should bear in mind is that some viewer side crashes are out of the control of Linden Lab, for example, when someone has a graphics card that suffers from a memory leak. This is an issue that the people who create the drivers need to fix, and that’s not within Linden Lab’s remit.<\/p>\n

The wide range of hardware that Second Life residents use is of course problematic when it comes to bug fixing, but Oz gave a tip on how to improve one’s Second Life experience, it’s a tip that I heard many many moons ago in relation to Microsoft Windows. Whereas a funky new graphics card can improve your experience in Second Life, a cheaper option may well be to increase your RAM.<\/p>\n

Oz also discussed how new features in Second Life are received by the community, some people love them, some people hate them, some people are indifferent. However, Oz pointed out that whether people are criticising or praising a new feature, the level of intensity shows that people really care about Second Life. There was also a discussion of how some features introduced by Linden Lab won’t be appreciated by everyone because they simply don’t have the hardware to take advantage of them. A glaring example here is of course materials, whereby if you can’t see the new texture types, then you won’t see the enhanced texture on your screen. The beauty of this though is that people will still see textures as they’ve always seen them.<\/p>\n

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Oz also discussed how working with the community has been beneficial and gave an example of a recent survey on Inventory loss. The feedback from Second Life residents helped Linden Lab identify some issues that they could see would reduce the chance of inventory loss, they also got a boost from an unexpected source when a Linden Lab developer suffered inventory loss!<\/p>\n

What about the future you may be wondering? Well one thing is for sure, Linden Lab do not sound like they are treading water when it comes to Second Life and Oz teased the audience by suggesting that they have some new features in the pipeline for Second Life that we would genuinely not believe they would ever do. I’m not sure about this, some of us have very vivid imaginations, but it sounds exciting! We won’t see these features in the next few weeks but there is testing going on. Oz refused to give us any clues as to what these features are.<\/p>\n

\"Oz<\/a><\/p>\n

Oz was more forthcoming in other areas, Linden Lab are still working on improvements to Windlight and Oz suggested that parcel Windlight may arrive. However they have to be careful as to how it’s implemented and there may be a minimum parcel size requirement.<\/p>\n

Linden Lab are very excited about developments such as Oculus Rift and we should see further development of these technologies from a Second Life perspective.<\/p>\n

What of Project Sansar, Linden Lab’s nextgen virtual world? Oz couldn’t reveal too much, largely because he is so committed to Second Life that he does not pay full attention to all of the Project Sansar developments. Oz’s enthusiasm for Second Life really shone through in this interview and he admitted that he really wouldn’t want to do anything else right now. Oz believes he will be working on Second Life for quite a few years to come and that this is a job that he gets a lot of job satisfaction from.<\/p>\n

One reason for Oz’s expectation is almost certainly because he knows what Linden Lab are developing for Second Life. However another reason was touched upon, and it’s a reason I have cited for Second Life’s longevity likely being greater than people predict, Second Life is where the people are and that’s a really great advantage over other offerings.<\/p>\n

Oz left the meeting after admitting that he had to go and play in a pool league, a real pool league that is, so he’s someone who is familiar with all the angles \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n

There was a hell of a lot more in the interview than I’ve covered here and I really would suggest watching the video in full when you get a chance, or looking for a transcript, it’s around an hour long but well worth your time.<\/p>\n

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