In Memoriam Ebbe Altberg

Yesterday we got the sad news that Ebbe Altberg, a.k.a. Ebbe Linden, had passed away the day before. 

My thoughts and condolences first go to Ebbe's family, friends, and coworkers at Linden Lab in their loss, but also to all residents of SecondLife. 

Ebbe was a game-changer for Secondlife when he came to us as the new CEO of Linden Lab in 2014, especially when it concerns the relationship between the Lindens and us residents. 

Inara Pey has expressed my feelings eloquently and much better than anything I can achieve so I refer you to her blogpost; Living in a Modem World, In Memorian: Ebbe Altberg.

Inara Pey - Meet the Lindens

Second Life’s 17^th birthday starts on Friday, June 19^the, with a preview for members of the SL17B group on Thursday, June 18th. (...) The celebration will have a series of Meet the Lindens sessions featuring individuals and teams from the Lab discussing their work and Second Life.

Read all about it at Living In A Modem World: Meet the Lindens (URL).

Linden Lab Keeps Promise

I love Linden Lab, they always keep their promises, at least since Ebbe Linden has been at the helm!

Yesterday Linden Lab announced on the SecondLife Community blog (url) that last names, by popular demand, are now back again after being gone since 2010.

Those Premium Members who wish to change any part of their names, both first and last, can do so for a fee of $39,99. Residents will be able to choose from a rotating list of available last names, which will be on display on your SecondLife account page under "Change Name".

SecondLife Turns 15, Let's Celebrate!

SecondLife was launched on June 23rd, 2003 when the adorable Philip Linden, our divine creator, first set foot in this world where Kahvy Smith only existed as an atom that would develop into the first dinosaur. Apmel Goosson wasn't far behind (just a fem nanoseconds) but still came in as first runner-up.

So this year it is celebrating its fifteenth anniversary. Wouldya believe it? It looks so old and mature...

Our darling Ebbe Linden and the Linden Lab har promised that there will be a yearlong celebration. Read all about the improvements at the SecondLife Community blog (url), which include lower mainland costs, the return of last names, improved performance and migration to the Cloud and much much more.

Happy 15th birthday SecondLife!

My Ebbe Loved My Tweet

This is big enough to temporarily break the "no more blogging"-rule. Ebbe Altberg, a.k.a. Ebbe Linden, CEO of Linden Lab, the creators of our beloved SecondLife, today absolutely loved my tweet below. I am ecstatic!

@ebbealtberg (of @LindenLab) called to say that I was PROBABLY going to be named “#SecondLife Avatar of the Year,”, but I would have to agree to an interview and a major photo shoot. I said probably is no good and took a pass. Thanks anyway!

— Bock McMillan™ (@BockMcMillan) November 25, 2017

A Message From Our Dear Ebbe

I hope you all got this wonderful email from our darling Ebbe Linden.

Ebbe Altberg, aka Ebbe Linden, sexy as hell in scruff

Dear Second Life Residents,

It’s been an exciting summer at Linden Lab. Second Life celebrated its 14th anniversary, and shortly thereafter we also opened Sansar's creator beta to the world. In addition, we are 

thrilled to announce a set of investments into Second Life and its communities that will include enhancements to our engineering support, customer support, billing systems and upgrades, and customer acquisition outreach. In all, we’ve budgeted many millions (USD, not L$...) in the coming year to make SL even better, and we’ll keep everyone up to date on improvements as they roll out (or sooner).

This summer’s milestones have given us all another opportunity to reflect on just how strong the Second Life community is, what an incredible history SL has had so far, and what an amazing future lies ahead for the virtual world and its Residents.

For more than 14 years, you’ve created memorable experiences, diverse communities, close relationships, thriving economies, engaging art, exciting events, and amazing creations of all kinds. You’ve made the world, and we’re proud to provide the platform and tools that help you to do so. We at Linden continue to be impressed by what we witness from Residents every day, and we want you to know that we share that commitment to and love for Second Life.

Here are a few of the things you can look forward to soon:

• We are hard at work upgrading all of the SL infrastructure and moving it to the cloud, which will bring a wealth of opportunities to Residents near and far, and allow us, among many other things, to make SL more performant for Residents across the world from us. It may also allow us to introduce new products with more flexible pricing. 
• We’re working on several features to increase the value of Premium subscriptions. Most recently we gave Premium members priority access to near-full events, and shortly, we’ll be ready to unveil another bit of exciting news for subscribers. 
• We're building out a series of great extensions to Windlight (code name: EEP!), which will give value, flexibility, and new marketability to land, and will make Windlight settings tradeable assets. 
• We have an extension to the animation system in the works (code name: Animesh) that will allow non-avatar objects to use more powerful and efficient skeletal animations the way avatars can today, and even more changes planned for creators and merchants later in the year. 
• We’ve also got new experiences and events coming. An exciting new grid-wide gaming experience is coming soon! The team can’t wait to share the details with you in just a few days. Also in the works for this fall is an updated Halloween Haunted Tour, with new spooktacular events to celebrate. Not to mention, we’re turning 15 next year - SL15B, baby! That’s an incredible milestone and we are looking forward to collaborating with you to produce an amazing celebration. 

Long live Second Life and long live the creative process in the amazing worlds that you've trail-blazed! Thank you for filling SL with your creations and communities all of these past 14+ years, and here’s to many, many more together.

Best,

Ebbe Linden, CEO & the Second Life Team

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Well, what can one say after that breathtaking declaration of love, other than "We love you right back, Ebbe baby, and the SecondLife Team too!💗💗💗"

I hope you all noticed the remark about "amazing creations of all kinds", which we all know must certainly include my fashion-forward and spectacular "The Jester's Hat"! Nothing else comes to mind really so it must be Linden-lingo for Bock's creation.

It is also good to know that the Lab is going to keep on investing in, working with and improving SecondLife despite the doomsday prophets who for a long time have been crowing about how the Lab will lose all interest in SecondLife once Sansar is launched.

Linden Lab: "Love Is Love, Is Love, Is Love"

Yesterday I got a heads-up from my dear old friend Ebbe, to keep an eye open for some exciting new developments that would be launched today. And my is it a whopper!

In an exciting and thrilling announcement today on the official SecondLife blog we can read that Linden Lab has - finally - decided to depart from it's Judeo-Christian roots and accept all love for what it is and allow residents who choose to do so to formalize it by entering into recorded partnerships.

Hitherto it has only been possible to partner with one other resident, regardless of gender, from this day onward we will be able to enter into multiple partnerships.

However, there are two restrictions

1. No more than ten residents can be in one partnership at this time (the numbers may - or may not - be amended in the future to a larger or a smaller number.)
2. If a resident is already in a partnership the presumptive new partnership must  also be accepted by all the previous partners on both sides for the partnership to be recorded and official.

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It really was high time for Linden Lab to allow poly-amorous relationships in SecondLife. We all know of existing love triangles or even menage-a-quatre, cinc, six, sept, huit, neuf and dix.

Ever since I read the news I have been thinking of if and with whom I would want to extend my marriage with. I will keep you updated on my thoughts on this.

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Update April 2nd, 2017
This was my attempt at being funny on April Fools Day. 

Hip Hip Hooray, It's My 10th Rezday Today!

How time flies! It amazes me to think that today I am celebrating my tenth anniversary in our wonderful world of SecondLife.

Bock 2017 by Richard De Grataine Suoh

It's been a wonderful and amazing journey and I wouldn't wish to be without it. In those days we were born ugly and we stayed ugly. We duckwalked and had our clothes plastered to our bodies. Some days we would crash 45-50 times a day and still we would soldier on through those bad days and log right back in again. After each teleport you had to check yourself, so that you hadn't ended up with your shoe sunk into your ass or your hair stuck to your groin.

But we sure did have fun, even when we and watched the number of logged in residents getting close to first 5,000 holding our breath and waiting for SecondLife to crash. Then that number rose to 10,000, 20,000 until we no longer thought about it.

Bock 2007 by Bock McMillan

Life improved gradually - and at times very fast - but most of the time there was some improvement that gave us all hope and energy. Well except for under the reign of M Linden, those years were a total waste and we were all rather despondent until Philip Linden took the reins again. At the moment we are experiencing another golden age with great improvements under the benevolent rule of Ebbe Linden.

I am going to stick around for a couple of years more to see where this whole exciting adventure ends. It's going to be a thrill!

Honorary Citizenship Bestowed

2016

I will not miss you, 2016, you were a horrendous and worthless year with only a few redeeming qualities. 

I will not delve into all shit you caused, but I will drop a few names. Donald J. Trump, Vladimir "Little Father" Putin, Bashar Al-Assad, Julian Assange and, last but not least, Aleppo.

Among the few redeeming factors were Tomais, Dej, JJ, Pook, Kevin (previously known as Knox) and the Smith Boys, Kahvy and Garrett. I must also add Ebbe Linden and Bento and the welcome extra prims.

Let us all hope - and join forces - to fight for a better 2017!

Dem Bones, Dem Bones!

In the 3rd year of the almighty, wonderful and charming Ebbe Altberg (a k a Ebbe Linden), CEO of Linden Lab, the creative gods at the lab have - in close cooperation and collaboration with SecondLife content creators - achieved the revolutionary Bento Skeleton.

Both Linden Lab and Firestorm have now released viewers that are Bento compatible.

Bento is an extension of the SecondLife avatar skeleton whereby we get dozens of new bones to support rigging and animation and new attachment points.

The new skeleton, which is compatible with existing avatars, rigging and animation, gives creators the power to build more sophisticated avatars than ever before. The skeleton extensions include:

• 11 extra limb bones for wings, additional arms, or extra legs.
• 6 tail bones
• 30 bones in the hands (all 10 fingers!)
• 30 bones for facial expressions
• 2 other new bones in the head for animating ears or antennae
• 13 new attachment points associated with the new bones

What all this means is simply that our wonderful SecondLife content creators have gotten more and better tools to make things look, move and appear better and a greater range of customization to your own preferences and individuality. 

A Match Made In the SL-Heavens

Oh my, have I got news for you all! It is so exciting I can hardly contain myself, filled with jubilation and excitement as I am.

At the editorial meeting today I met with The Much Honored Bock McMillan, laird of Southern Charm etc, etc, at his mansion (a.k.a. "Gossip Central" due to the always well informed laird's highly dependable sources).

The laird had a particular bit of thrilling information to impart today, "directly from the two involved horses mouths" as he chose to phrase it.

Please sit down and breathe deeply three times before reading any further. This blog cannot be held accountable for any damages you may incur while reading this post!

OK, here goes!

His lairdship informed us that my Philip (a.k.a. Philip Linden in SecondLife or Philip Rosedale in first life) and my Ebbe (a.k.a. Ebbe Linden in SecondLife and Ebbe Altberg in first life) are romantically involved. So what we all thought was merely a bromance between our wonderful dreamer/creator and the best damned C.E.O. of Linden Labs we've ever had has evolved into a deep love between the two.

The guys have decided to move in together with both of their first life families as well. For that purpose a large mansion (sixteen bedrooms with ensuite baths) has been bought outside San Francisco for them and their families.

It is reported that both the wives and the families on either side get along famously with each other and are all for this somewhat unusual arrangement.

This is a marvelous - albeit unforeseen - development for SecondLife and all it's residents. Let us rejoice with the happy couple and their families!

The 1920's Berlin Project - 6th Anniversary

Frau Jo Yardley is inviting us all to help celebrate the 6th anniversary of one of the best known and longest lasting projects in SecondLife, The 1920's Berlin Project.

I for one will drop by during the coming week and check it out again. I have been there before a few times and have always enjoyed the friendly atmosphere.

Besides, who knows whom you may stumble across when visiting and enjoying yourself there. It is well known that the venerable Frau Yardley has the attention of Ebbe Linden and probably lots of other important people and residents too. 

Frau Yardley's dedication and hard work on this project should be an inspiration to us all on what can be - and has been - done in our wonderful world.

On May the 30th 2009 I opened the door to a little very basic, noob build bar and let the public in for the first time. The 1920's Berlin Project was born!

Only 3 months after joining Second Life, barely understanding how to glue prims together, I had started something that would soon grow into a vibrant active community of wonderful people.

And there is more to come… But first we need to celebrate the 6th (!) anniversary of our little neighborhood and we’re doing this by organizing 6 days of fun events and inviting everyone to come visit.

You can find 1920's Berlin by clicking this link: Berlin (SLurl) 

We look forward to seeing lots of familiar but also new faces visiting us.
Prosit!
Jo Yardley

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Schedule of events:

Friday, May 29
All day: Open Door Day

On this day everyone is welcome to visit our sim and take a good look around and see more of the sim than you’re usually allowed to see. Several of our tenants will also the doors to their private apartments and an ‘Open House’ sign will show you where you can enter and explore how the people in the city live. 

The regular 1920's dress code is in place but being allowed to have a peek inside normally private residences is a lot of fun.

2:00 PM SLT – Party Dinner & Tango evening at the Hotel Adlon

Saturday, May 30
01:00 PM SLT – Kids’ Pogo Stick race with prizes!
02:00 PM SLT – 6th Anniversary Dance at the Pariser Platz (At the foot of the Brandenburger Tor) with a show by Fräulein Sonatta Morales and with DJ Myron Byron

Sunday, May 31
11:00 AM SLT – Tea Dance at the Hotel Adlon
01:00 PM SLT – Unveiling of the Community Quilt at the Library
02:00 PM SLT – Opening of the Biergarten!

Monday, June 1
02:00 PM SLT – Open Stage at the Biergarten. Simply show up and be brave enough to step up and share your (PG) talent!

Tuesday, June 2
2:00 PM SLT – Miss Berlin pageant! Who will be Miss Berlin 1929? Unmarried ladies can sign up by contacting Fräulein Adele Kling.

Wednesday, June 3
All day: Relaxed Rules Day. On this day we forget the 1920's Dress code for 24 hours and welcome all kinds of avatars. So if you are interested in visiting our sim but were not keen on wearing 1920's clothes or just don’t feel comfortable with a human avatar, this is your chance to walk around without our cops coming running after you.

But be warned! We also allow our tenants to ignore all the other rules of the sim and this usually means they will go a little nuts…

More information and up to date news can be found on our Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/265276560117/events/

#LindenLover Forever

Thank you @ebbealtberg & @LindenLab for doing the right thing for Avacar #gayfunworld. #LindenLover forever! pic.twitter.com/s07yBEGRV4
— Bock McMillan (@BockMcMillan) April 11, 2015

Award Acceptances on Twitter

@BockMcMillan Thank you!
— Ebbe Altberg (@ebbealtberg) March 7, 2015

@BockMcMillan Oh wow, thank you. :-)
— The Firestorm Viewer (@PhoenixViewerSL) March 7, 2015

Close to Home

Ever since I was reached by the news about Avacar Bluestar's passing I have, privately, been hoping that he and his partner Rico had been more prudent than my Ars and I were.

It is after all so extremely easy to take precautions to help your partner in SecondLife in case something unforeseen should happen, even if one is young and in good health. Unfortunately we seem all to be living in a dream that nothing bad will ever happen or that there is no tomorrow and thereby leave our loved ones future in the - less than certain - good will of our inheritors in first life.

As the passing of Avacar hit very close to home for me and have brought all the uneasy memories from almost five years ago to life again, I have not been able to bring myself to contact Rico directly. Even if I am now very happy again and very much in love with my new partner Tomais, the memories of those awful hours, days, weeks, months and years after Ars death are with me still. In particular the period when I was afraid of losing the home we had over  period of more than two years built together on the Southern Charm sim.

Ars had just died and I was grieving deeply for him and less than two weeks afterwards I was struck with the realization that the sim was solely in Ars' name (to avoid EU VAT) and I did not know what to do to get the sim transferred to me. I was afraid to lose it all and with it all the memories of Ars.

I blogged about it - of course - as that was my way of venting and letting off steam. These are the links to my posts as the events unfolded. (If and when you read them, please try to remember I was not completely sane at the time and more self-involved than ever before or after.)

1. Trying to deal with reality - March 26th
2. Trying to deal with reality II (updated) - March 20th
3. Trying to deal with reality III (glimpse of hope) - April 2nd
4. Trying to deal with reality IV - April 13th
5. Trying to deal with reality V (The conclusion) - April 19th

I will never forget the kindness of Belinda Linden and a few others at Linden Lab when they guided me through the process, however I do believe think it would have gotten the happy ending it did had it not been for the kindness and compassion of the Wilson family.
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I can wholeheartedly sympathize with the agony that Rico is going through at this time. The sims mean nothing to Avacar's first life family - except possibly a hateful reminder of the true nature of their son - while it to Rico is a living memory of the work the two of them did for many years to build a meeting place for the LGBT community in SecondLife.

Please @ebbealtberg, @LindenLab try to find a way to #DotheRightThingforAvacar and transfer the GFW-sims to Rico. pic.twitter.com/WFy7zoi4Qj
— Bock McMillan (@BockMcMillan) January 16, 2015

#DoTheRightThingforAvacar

Yesterday I was contacted by Rico Bluestar, who wanted to know how the situation concerning the transfer of Southern Charm sim had been solved when my husband Ars Northmead passed away on March 12, 2010. Ars was in first life also known as Joseph Douglas "Doug" Wilson Jr.

Although Linden Lab were compassionate and as helpful as they reasonably could be throughout the process, I could only tell him that I was fortunate that Doug' first life family were understanding and loving enough to help me in that situation.

Doug's father, who was the executor of Doug's estate, presented the proper documentation to Linden Lab showing his status as father and executor, and also wrote a letter to Linden Lab in which he asked them to transfer Southern Charm to me. That saved the situation for me.

I am forever grateful to the Wilson family, and especially Mr. Wilson himself, for the love, support and assistance they showed me - a complete stranger (although Doug had mentioned me to them several times it seems) - in this difficult situation.

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Rico Bluestar was the partner of Avacar Bluestar for close to three year up until Avacar passed away on November 14, 2014. Together the two owned, operated and worked hard to build Gay Fun World (GFW) as a place for gay residents to go to for fun and shopping.

Rico is not as fortunate as I was. It seems that Avacar's first life family are Southern Baptist and all of them - with the exception of a one of Avacar's sisters - absolutely abhor and detest Avacar's "lifestyle choice" (i.e. that he was gay and admitted it). They want all evidence of Avacar's homosexuality obliterated and disolved and will therefor not cooperate to have the sims transferred to Rico Bluestar.

I think that is wrong, it is in fact an outrage!

I would like all of my family and friends - straight or gay - to join me in telling Ebbe Altberg, the CEO of Linden Lab, and Linden Lab itself that it is time for them to take a stand against homophobia, to make an exception and to transfer the GFW sims to Rico.

If you have a Twitter account please retweet my tweet and ask your friends to do so too. If you don't have a Twitter account, get one and do the same thing. Gawd this is the 21st century people, get with the program!

@ebbealtberg & @LindenLab, #DoTheRightThingforAvacar and put an end to #homophobia. Transfer the GFW sims to Rico! pic.twitter.com/WYipgApNVq
— Bock McMillan (@BockMcMillan) January 15, 2015

The Laird's New Year Address - 2014

Friends, residents of SecondLife, countrymen in the Commonwealth of Southern Enchantment and residents in regions under Our protection,

As tradition bids We address you on this last day of the year. In a few hours the bells will toll and 2014 will end. The new year 2015 will be here. Of this we can be certain, and we look forward to it in hope and anticipation, but we cannot predict what it will bring us.

When We look back at the past year in first life and SecondLife it is - as always - with mixed feelings. Many things have moved forward and been improved but others are still the same or even worse.

From a strictly personal perspective the year 2014 will forever in Our heart be remembered as "Primus annus Thomaidis" (The first year of Tomais). Our royal consort's  love, patience, humor and thoughtfulness has been a great support for Us throughout the past year. His presence in Our life is a source of unceasing joy for which We will always be amazed and grateful.

For SecondLifer's in general and for SecondLife itself, We believe that 2014 will be remembered as the year when Ebbe Linden (in first life a.k.a. Ebbe Altberg) came to the salvation of us residents. Since Ebbe assumed the reigns of Linden Lab many advantageous changes in policies and practices have been made. We can - hopefully - look forward to many more years with Ebbe.

In Our first life We despair at the sight of such dictators as Vladimir "Little Father" Putin and the massmurderer Bashar al-Assad, not to mention others, with the help of their henchmen still in control of their respective countries to the detriment and misfortune of their countrymen.

However, we mustn't be discouraged, there is a New Year ahead with infinite possibilities and much hope of change. If we all, like the Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, resolve to work together to make our worlds into better places we can surely accomplish many improvements.

We wish you all a fabulous, fantastic and fruitful new year! Be happy, be safe and be forever vigilant against the powers of evil until the day you die of old age with a smile on your wrinkled face!

The #icebucketchallenge

Petr Vanbeeck-Hastings challenged Tomais and me in the ALS #icebucketchallenge. So this is the picture Tomais made of us today.

We challenge Ebbe Altberg, WayneNZ and Holter Rez. The three of you have 24 hours to complete the challenge!

Don't forget to visit the ALS website to learn more about the disease What is ALS? And while you are there please consider making a donation!
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And here is my tweet on the same subject!

@Petr_V challenged @TomaisAshdene and me #icebucketchallenge. We challenge @ebbealtberg, WayneNZ and Holter Rez. pic.twitter.com/QoVIBDfTWx
— Bock McMillan (@BockMcMillan) August 23, 2014

Our Darlings

Lindens... pic.twitter.com/pPutWimkKh
— Ebbe Altberg (@ebbealtberg) July 24, 2014

Ebbe Linden, in first life known as Ebbe Altberg, yesterday tweeted this picture of our wonderful friends at Linden Lab, Makers of SecondLife.