What A Great Party!

What a great evening I had, and I hope everyone else did too.

Avatars came dropping in and out all during the evening and I even missed greeting some of them properly, which I beg their pardon for. There was simply too many to speak to and too much happening that my head was coming unhinged. So many hot men and beautiful women showing as much skin as they dared in the mixed company - and some a bit more than that...

Thank you to all those of you who could come and share this moment with me. To the one's who could not come, I hope to see you another time soon. All of you have my love!

I would like to especially thank my two amazing DJs, DJ sirhc DeSantis and DJ Jared Palianta, for their dedication and for the excellent entertainment they provided!

I was so busy all four hours that I - alas - did not have any opportunity to take pictures but will have to rely on the kindness of friends and other bloggers. (I will post the links as i see them)

My sweet friend and legal advisor Diana Gilderoy sent me a whole bunch of pictures, I am showing you a fraction of them here.

Link:

1. My Avatar's Name Is Apmel; "Housewarming after sad news" (The sad news was that immediately before the party started, Apmelito received news that his friend Sven Idyll, a Swedish SecondLife avatar and blogger, had been found dead at his home in first life.)
2. Ziggy On The Edge Of Second Life; Second Life: Party Party Everyday

P.S. Despite Guyke's, Lee's and my own efforts to show the most skin, I should think we can all agree that that contest was won hands down my Apmel's friend ush Underwood in her amazing "mankini" for women (pic on Apmels blog).

Here is the result of my tinting efforts by the way. I think it looks pretty good and when I got the gold shoelace on as a cockring it worked even better.

A Blogs Demise

It was not without some pleasure and great satisfaction that I late last night noticed that the Swedish virtual worlds blog Netlott, previously named Prim Team, declared that it was closing down after only 20 days (February 21 - March 11, 2012).

I have informed you about this blog earlier in my posts "Ich Bin Ein Prim Teamer" and Bukowski & Witches.

The blog started by declaring that the bloggers were a group of people with technical interests and that they together had amassed more than 25 years of experience in virtual worlds. They also declared that they were going to remain anonymous but gave no specific reason for this decision.

I am sure the blog would have been welcomed in the Swedish SecondLife community despite the fact that the bloggers wished to remain anonymous if the blog had settled for their proclaimed field of expertise, the technical aspects of virtual worlds. Such a blog written by people with keen insight and knowledge on the workings of the viewers and a willingness to share and educate the rest of us is sorely needed and would fill a vacuum.

However, the Prim Team and Netlott blog (Netlott is by the way a word play on the English word "net" and the Swedish word "nitlott" which means "drawing a blank"), instead chose to start delving in social issues and unearthing dirty linen and rusty battle axes from the close or distant past. This caused the Swedish community in SecondLife to erupt and the tentative armed peace that had been established over the past two-three months evaporated. Ghouls from the past that had relished in the previous unrest reappeared and the favorite object of hate was yet again reviled.

Once the blog started declaring who was not a member of the blogging team I declared myself to be one of them to see how they would handle that. This was never commented upon.

I am now completely certain that one of the team members is in fact "The avatar formerly known as Sven Idyll". I have come to this conclusion from the language used in some of the posts, some of the topics raised on the blog, a question directed at me by one of the anonymous bloggers which was exactly the same as one Sven Idyll previously had posed to me and now - finally - the way in which the blog was closed.

The blog was shutdown in exactly the same way as Sven Idyll´s previous three (3) blogs. with some choice words of recrimination, "no one understands me", "you have all misinterpreted me" and "you bore me" etc., and letting the blog stay online for a while after removing all the previous comments and assorted posts and not allowing any new comments.

I would be the first to welcome a new Swedish blog that focused on the technical aspects, but we do not need more trolls. We have enough of those already, thank you very much!

UPDATE (04:58 AM SLT): And now "The avatar formerly known as Sven Idyll" has read this post and has posted a not so subtle comeback at me. Hilarious! (No link to that waste of time will be supplied here, I am sure that others will be happy to help you.)

PROBABLY RELATED: My buddy NE0 Timeless over at Free Your Mind has found an interesting article from March 7, 2012, on a Swedish website that could have some connection to this matter. An IT-consultant of sorts is bashing SecondLife as a waste of time and claiming we now have drugs inworld, something called "Seclimine". 

Apparently it is something that messes with the shared inworld experience I gather, as he mentions something about a hazy viewer and sound distortions. I never heard about it though, but I am a sanctimonious prick so...

"Ich Bin Ein Prim Teamer"

The title of this post of course alludes to a famous speech given by the late U.S. President John F. Kennedy in Berlin, West Germany, on June 26, 1963,

On February 21, 2012, a new Swedish virtual worlds blog appeared. The blog, called Prim Team, was not really discovered by anyone before blogger Blanche Argus posted about it on her blog Blanche´s Arena on  February 28.

Little or nothing was known of the blogger/bloggers as they chose to remain anonymous, other than that they claim to be a group of people with technical interests "who together have more than 25 years of experience in virtual worlds". All might have run smoothly for them if they had not chosen to unearth and regurgitate the old Scandinavian civil war in SecondLife by four posts focusing on the old witch hunt theme again.

With those four posts Pandora´s box was opened and the scab was ripped off the old wounds which have seemed to be healing since summer. Their rehashing of history made it very interesting to know who was really behind the "insightful" blog.

For me knowing who wrote something is of interest in determining how much faith to put in what they write. Admittedly most of us in the SecondLife blogosphere go by our avatar names, all except my bosom buddy Apmel Goosson who is out there with his first life information also. But even if it is "only" avatar names that in itself is important information, because we know them as well or little as we know people in first life by their identities.

Three people came forward and declared emphatically they had nothing to do with the blog. These three were Blanche Argus, Gittrika Mint and Walentine.

In comments on the Prim Team blog and/or on other Swedish SecondLife blogs it has also become apparent that neither the mudslinger or her"cousins" are part of that particular team. The team behind the blog have also chosen to clearly state in a post that my buddy NEO Timeless is not part of the team.

I am rather sensitive to the use of language and after reading the blog for more than a week I ventured a qualified guess, by the language used in and the topics chosen for some of the posts, that one of the persons in the Prim Team is in fact Sven Idyll, latest known in the virtual world blogosphere for his blog Svens(k) Idyll (recently shut down).

Strangely this time the Prim Team chose to respond that "maybe he is or maybe he isn´t". Based on the fact that they have previously stated outright if someone wasn't a member of the team this answer - in my mind - is a confirmation though non-denial that Sven Idyll in fact is a member of the group.

In my response to this I decided to declare myself as part of that team. I still await their answer to that claim, which should be interesting however it turns out.

Oh and I should add that I have a growing suspicion about another member of the team. She is a highly intelligent woman, who has always been kind to me but is vehement in her dislike and disapproval of the so called "witch"

They should have discussed their policy on the anonymity issue better.

Last Names Are Coming Back

My blogger friend Sven Idyll over at Svens(k) Idyll just published the news that Rodvik Linden (in first life a.k.a. Rod Humble, CEO of Linden Lab makers of SecondLife) dropped a bomb today announcing that last names will be back in SecondLife hopefully by the end of January 2012. (source).

This news comes after an extremely long and powerful campaign by users that last names should be re-introduced.

Rodvik says, "Hopefully we will roll out what we are thinking early January latest. Identity is very important so as we touch it we need to make sure we are adding something great."


(P.S. It seems that Daniel Voyager also has the story, but I saw it first at Svens blogg.)

Sven Analyzes "the Threshold"

Swedish virtual worlds blogger Sven Idyll over at Svens(k) Idyll has been thinking over Philip Rosedale´s statement to the New York Times recently and come up with this interesting analysis (rough translation by me) in his post "It becomes impossible only when you know it is"

"Philip Rosedale made a statement recently about the threshold of Second Life being high, and to some extent it is true, but one thing is absolutely critical, the willingness to learn and explore. I have in the past month seen how quickly primary school pupils will take on such a thing as building in virtual worlds like Second Life and Open Sim. They do not think it is particularly difficult - if they have the interest they learn extremely fast. Learning how it works is not the hardest part for them but to learn to utilize the many options that are available is difficult. Children do not see so many obstacles, but they try - and often several times. Sometimes, the impossible happens.

Children have not acquired the limitations that we have as adults. We as adults mean something else with "impossible" than children do. Impossible for us older people is a pretty solid stop but for the young, it is a condition that exists until someone finds a way. A few adults manage to keep this desire to conquer the impossible and I would have liked to be one of those but I have put up too many stop signs and signs for both "one way traffic" and "forbidden passage" in my mind.

If you could make a wish for new feature or something else new in Second Life would it be something that has a counterpart in real world, or you could come up with something completely new - something that can only exist in the virtual world? Some children just spurt out such ideas. We are well accustomed to some of those things, being able to teleport, fly and change our avatar anyway we wish - or so we think.

We have a whole new world waiting for us where everything is possible, but we just copy things from real world into virtual reality. When will things start coming in the virtual worlds that we can copy over to the real world? Lack of imagination is in short supply in the virtual worlds!

We want to come to the virtual world because it is different but when we get there we immediately start converting it to a copy of the world we want to disconnect from.

In how many areas of your life are you free from rules and patterns and have a belief that there are no limitations? If you have that, can you describe that which has no borders and that cannot be captured by rules or exhibit patterns?

Second Life needs pure imagination to grow but to let go of the rational thoughts completely and let your imagination reign free is probably the hardest things to do."

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I must say I agree with Sven, if a total gaming idiot like myself - and a few other fools I know all to well - could learn to enjoy SecondLife and develop our skills inworld by ourselves and with the eager help of our friends I do not really see where the huge threshold problem is. There is nothing "impossible" with SecondLife!

Sven is also correct in my mind when he calls for even more imagination in virtual worlds.

Challenges should not be easy, but they must be fun and interesting and allow us to develop in our own pace. Only then will the curiosity and childlike creativity be awakened that makes life so fun sometimes.

Model: Millimina Salamander

I am still waiting in vain for my fashion statement "The Jesters Hat - only for the boldest among fashionistas" to be copied into first life.

Job Opportunity at Linden Lab

I read on GWNews today that there is a job opening at Linden Lab, creators of SecondLife. in San Francisco, California.

My first instinct was "Bock, you must send in an application whatever the job is!" but when I kept reading and hardly understood any of the requirements and responsibilities I decided that perhaps I shouldn't burden the Lab with my CV.

After all what use would the Lab have of my talents as a semi-charming European pseudo-nobelman with almost five years of virtual living experience and an ability to often change appearances but still always remain stunningly handsome, mostly humble, often patient and sometimes friendly.

Especially when the Lab is looking for someone with "strong, versatile computer science fundamentals who will become core contributors to refactoring, building, and designing new features of our server product. You will need strong skills in application and server-side development and experience with open-software and distributed software teams is a plus" and responsibilities that include "Refactor code written mostly in C/C++ with some C# and python". (Ughhh say what...?)

When I had - very reluctantly - disqualified myself as a candidate I thought of Mrs. Vampi Twine-DeSantis (the laird´s main tech support), Mr sirhc De Santis (cool cat and skilled techie) and Mr. Sven Idyll (technical wiseguy with a profound knowledge of the workings of virtual worlds). I would warmly recommend all three for the job to my friends at the Lab.

If you wish to read the full ad and perhaps apply for the job go to Craigslist Software Engineer at Linden Lab.

Bock Wins Again - Almost...

The laird celebrates the added funds

Today Swedish blogger Sven Idyll announced the winner of the contest that he has been running on his blog Sven´s(k) Idyll the last week.

The contest was to pick out the common denominator for ten videos presented one at a time.

Video 1 Fool´s Gold med Thin Lizzy. (The singer in the band was Phil (Philip) Lynnot, so we get PHILIP)
Video 2 Walk of Life med Dire Starits. (The singers name is Mark Knopfler, so we get MARK)
Video 3 Thats´s all You Need – The Faces. (Rod Stewart was part of the group during this time and he is the singer in the song. Rod´s real name is Roderish, so we get RODERICK)
Video 4 Online Venting – Rosedale. (Easy, we keep ROSEDALE)
Video 5 Dave Gahan – Kingdom. (Another easy one, we keep KINGDOM)
Video 6 Norah Jones – Humble me. (We keep HUMBLE)
Video 7 Outkast – B.O.B. (We keep BOB)
Video 8 Ulf Lundel – Kom in, Kom in. (We get KOMIN)
Video 9 Riverside – Second Life syndrome.( We keep SECOND LIFE)
Video 10 Ledtråd CEO – White magic. (CEO is the lead here)

We now have Philip, Mark, Roderick, Rosedale, Kingdom, Humble, Bob, Komin, Second Life and CEO, what do they have in common? Mix around a bit and you have four of the CEO´s in a company. The company's product is Second life.

LINDEN LAB is the common denominator and the correct answer.

Sven tells us no one managed to get the correct answer but that Bock McMillan (that's me!) after only six clues had been presented guessed on "Second Life" and is therefore awarded a consolation prize - or as he so kindly calls it encouragement prize - of 250 Lindens.

Rage Against Technology

I live with the not unreasonable expectation that every time I do a certain thing to a machine or with software programs I should and can expect the same results.

This expectation has more often than not been proven to be false, which absolutely stuns me every time. I think of myself as a human being with some emotional weaknesses but on the whole mostly rational. The fact that machines and software programs have the audacity to act up against me and take on a will of their own totally and completely pisses me off!

What has made the otherwise meek, happy-go-lucky and ever so humble Bock so angry you wonder? Well, this is what happened.

Yesterday I read about the new Linden Lab Beta Viewer 3.2 on Sven Idyll´s blog. He was very convincing so I uninstalled my Firestorm viewer, cleaned up my computer from anything SecondLife and downloaded and installed the new viewer.

I was totally enchanted by the exceptional usability of the new user interface and by the fact that my personal and group IM´s were vertically stacked (see picture).

It´s an awesome feature that prevents you from missing any IM´s and also keeps them collected in the same space instead of spreading out all over ones screen.

Well today I did the mistake of reading Sven Idylls blog again and seeing his praise for Starlight I decided to try that feature too. I shouldn't have done that! Because when I had installed the Starlight my vertically stacked IMs disappeared and seem to be lost forever.

In an effort to try to retrace my earlier steps I have uninstalled Starlight. uninstalled  Beta Viewer 3.2, cleaned up my computer completely from SecondLife, re-installed Firestorm and chosen the vertical tabs, uninstalled Firestorm, cleaned up my computer, re-installed Beta Viewer 3.2.

Nothing helps and my vertically stacked IM´s are gone and instead I end up with this (see picture).

Thinking about this I realize that I am mostly angry with myself. When the f**k will I learn not to mess with something that is good!

P.S. Finally I must emphasize that this was none of Sven´s doing he only got me excited when I read his blog. If I in any way have given you that impression I apologize to Sven Idyll!

I Think I Love it!

This is a photograph using "depth" instead of "color", cool huh?

After reading the Swedish blogger Sven Idyll´s posts about the new Beta Viewer 3.2. and seeing the short explanatory videos he has posted there Linden Labs new instruction videos for Viewer 3 I just couldn't contain myself and was eager to try out the new viewer.

I followed my own previously described routine about how to Install a Fresh Viewer and then downloaded the new one. I must say I fell for it immediately. You can move almost everything around anyway you want it to get the thingies exactly where you want them to be and with the shapes you desire.

Is it strange I love the guys and girls at Linden Lab as much as I do? These brilliant people have given me everything I can ask for in a viewer.

Love you guys, have a round of beer on me (but no more than 30 of you and you must include CEO Rodvik Linden/Rod Humble) and chairman of the Board Philip Linden. (Rodvik is almost catching up with my all time favorite CEO Philip with this stroke of genius.)

Sorry for being unfaithful to you guys there for a while, but I am back home in the fold with ya´ll now!

Complete List of Virtual World Blogs

Sven Idyll photographed by Sven Idyll

The Swedish blogger Sven Idyll has been working hard to make a complete list of links to blogs covering virtual worlds, although mostly SecondLife.

He has now collected a list with more than a hundred links to active blogs. The list is sorted with the latest updated on top. If a blog isn't updated in six months it will be removed.

Only a few of the links are for fashion or event blogs as Sven thinks these blogs - although they have great layouts are mainly for commercial reasons - and he wants to focus on the blogs covering living in virtual worlds or the technical aspects. He is however considering to maybe create a special collection of links to the fashion blogs in the future.

I have added a gadget in the right column with a direct link to the list, click the image "Virtual Links" and it will take you straight there.

Sven says he will gratefully accept any hints of blogs he may have missed, so if you don´t find your blog in the list tell him about it!

My own tips to Sven on missing links are
Gay-Worlds News (http://www.gay-worldsnews.com/),
The Bullring (http://torrospyker.blogspot.com/) and
Second Pride (http://www.secondpride.com/)

I Switched To The Firestorm Viewer

I have been reluctant to switch from the Phoenix viewer because it has worked wonderfully for me. I have very seldom experienced crashes and almost never felt any lag expect when that must be expected.

Well with all the talk about mesh coming and how important it was to get ready for that change I finally dared to take the big step, especially after watching Jessica Lyon video tutorial four (4) times about how to configure the Firestorm to look like viewer 1. I also remembered the praises for Firestorm by my friends Ziggy Starsmith, my regular tech-head Vampi Twine-DeSantis and Sven Idyll.

So far everything seems to be working as promised, and I have all my stuff back in their regular locations on my screen. Next thing will be to see how it works for me when I am doing my thing, but I´ll leave that for another day.

My Favorite Geek

Philip Rosedale, my favorite Chairman of the Board and computer geek, is seen here talking geek-talk and more with Kevin Rose. It´s a truly inspired and wonderful interview/conversation.

I understand all the words they utter but much of the technical dialog is totally wasted on me. I watch it because I love seeing the fascination in Philip´s face and for the non-tech talk of how it all started! Thats the creator of my dream-world!

This is reposted from Sven Idyll´s blog opensweden. I just had to have it myself!

(P.S. Did I ever tell y´all I love computer geeks? My Ars was one of them too!)

With the Dudes at The Marina

Yesterday my SecondLife started with a visit from Elorian Scarbridge and Butch Diavolo. They stopped by for a grand tour of Southern Charm. During the long tour we had a good conversation, it turn´s out that Butch actually knows almost everyone I am acquainted with in SecondLife.

Afterwards we continued on to Butch´s set at the wonderful new venue Chade Dagger has built on Hinterland. It´s called "The Marina"!

 

Chade Dagger

Sven Sharktooth

40-something

My co-blogger Sven Idyll over at opensweden. Leva i "kartong" is doing an interesting project on making an age-appropriate looking female avatar at 40-something.

My main complaints on Sven's attempts so far are
1. The avatars look way older than 40-something, in my mind they look more like 60-70.
2. Until his latest attempt published today he dressed them like 20-somethings and with the paraphernalia of that age group, like toe-rings
3. Aging doesn't necessarily mean you become "uglier", it just means you have to spend a bit more time in the morning and you have to do more regular up-keep and work harder for the results.

Here I would like to post some inspirational pictures for Sven with real life women in their 40´s.

A Whole Lotta Kissing!

The time for the 1st annual International Kiss-A-Swede Day in SecondLife finally was finally here.

Before it started I was wondering how the f**k I could come up with such a crazy idea, but that feeling passed once I had Millimina and Vampi at my side and we together waited for the kissers to start coming come to us.

Millimina and I before the party started (Photo courtesy of Millimina Salamander)

Kissable Vampi in a beautiful furry skin

 With an event like this there is no knowing who and how many will come, you just have to take it in your stride and go with the flow and most importantly just have fun!

People were coming and going all through the two hours, which is just as it should be on this kind of event, many I had missed seeing in a while showed up and some I thought might come didn't but thats to be expected also. Things happen in real life and in SecondLife, we just cannot be everywhere - and of course sometimes we don´t want to be at a particular place either.

The main thing is that those of us that were there had fun, and I myself for sure had an excellent time and kissed like crazy! There was only one dumbass loser who declined my kiss, it did not spoil my fun although I wondered about who shows up at a kissathon and refuses to kiss?

Anyway we were close to 25 avatars for about an hour and about 15 the rest of the time. I had an awesome time.

Thanks to everyone who came and special thanks to Vampi and Millimina for helping kiss a few!

Pictures from the event can also be seen on
Magasin Millimina,
Min avatar heter Apmel and
Blanche´s Arena

Now to my own kiss-fest pictures!

Kissing Carol

My boys Janttu and Guyke (Photo courtesy of Millimina Salamander)

Kissing Sven while Jon Rhiannyr dances

Me pouncing Carols hubby Timothy

Kissing sweet furry Zeba

Jon Rhiannyr pounces me after knowing me for less than 5 minutes

My bosom buddy sirhc, who was DJ-ing at another party at the same time

The wonderful Ziga and her Em - in amazing outfits as always

Not sure whom I am attacking on this picture, could be Sarco or Jeb  -  but it looks good...

Pounced by Jon again

Pounced by Blanche

Cuddling with Jon in the makeout room

Kissing Blanche again

Kissing Sven in the makeout room

Kissing Jon in the makeout room