Tammy's Jazz Club in The Metaverse Tribune

My latest review of Tammy's Jazz Club has just been published in The Metaverse Tribune. Tammy's is my current favorite hang out, even when it is empty. When I'm working on an article in-world, I like to park myself by a bar where there is music and then use IM to gather my data. If need be, I'll TP the interviewee over for a face-to-face meeting but for most of the time, it's sufficient to sit and chat.

I sometimes refer to myself as a journalist, sometimes as a writer, but I actually think I prefer to be a hack. And by "hack," I prefer the modern, self-deprecating definition typified by the "hacks" and "hackettes" of Private Eye, one of my favorite rags.

There's a certain romance in propping up a bar with a whiskey in hand. I've even toyed with the idea of wearing a trilby with a "press" card stuck in the band. But it's remained at the toying phase.

So take a look at the article and maybe even take a trip to Tammy's. Hey, you might even find me there and you can buy me a drink.

Hottest Male Avatar 2008 Contest Flawed: I'm Not There!

Hamlet Au's New World Notes is host to the Hottest Male Avatar 2008 contest, overseen by Iris Ophelia, some other Second Life person who has clearly never met me. The list is notable in that it misses out an obvious candidate, one who is intelligent, witty, devastatingly SL-handsome, and outstandingly humble. In fact, modesty is probably one of my most redeeming characteristics.

Like anyone else in SL, my striking looks are based on my having flawless skin (I bought it), a well-proportioned body (my friend designed it), and a great wardrobe (I bought that too). In fact, by not dieting, not working out, not avoiding to much alcohol, and not exposing my genitalia in public, I think I've managed to do OK so far.

I could, of course, pretend to be like everyone else who is not on the list and take some mythical moral high ground and say that none of this matters, and that being "hot" in Second Life is simply a matter of buying the right pixels. But I won't. I'll pout and stamp my well-proportioned avatarian feet and whine that I was never given the chance because I don't know anyone who was involved in the selection process.

But I refuse to be downhearted because I know my ego is easily large enough to get past the rejection, especially since I know that I am pretty wonderful (and modest). I shall simply go on the hunt for a new skin, have my body once again meddled with to attain the desired proportions, and spend more money on enhancing my already ridiculously large (for a guy) wardrobe.

I'll also shamelessly use my upcoming new media venture to promote myself mercilessly. After all, the only brand I have to offer is Sigmund Leominster, and like all brands, I won't stop until it becomes a household name.

Rebranding of SL on SL Redux

A couple of months back, I set up a new blog on WordPress called SL on SL Redux. This was to be a more or less carbon copy of SL on SL but using the WordPress platform, which appears to get hit more times by search engines.

I have now renamed it to SL on VL - Sigmund Leominster on Virtual Life. The content will now shift away from just Second Life but to other virtual life offerings. This will include virtual worlds, social networks, MMOGs, MMORPGs, and any other events that affect how people interact in the entire virtual universe.

SL on SL will continue to be my Second Life blog of choice but SL on VL will become much broader in its coverage. The point is to extend the Sigmund Leominster brand into more areas of the infosphere. I suspect it will have shorter commentaries and wider appeal.

We shall see.

Church Firebombing in Second Life

The Second Life Herald has run my latest piece on a firebombing in a church. Pastor Samuele Shepherd's Overcomers church was disrupted by griefers last Sunday (November 30th) with the interesting names Ex Laks and Rotten Core. The story generated lots of comments that are worth reading.

The SL Enquirer also posted copy on the same story - and in exactly the same words! Either Pastor Shepherd gave both the Herald and the Enquirer the same copy or the Enquirer ripped off the story. Although the latter might be the more dramatic option, it seems unlikely because it was only the comments from Shepherd that were the same. The Enquirer didn't publish any comments from Core or Laks, which suggests the copy was simply the same notecard.

Anyhow, life goes on. I'm working on a couple of new avenues for further promoting the Sigmund Leominster brand inside Second Life - and beyond. No names, no pack drill just yet but the New Year should see some interesting changes.

The Militarization of the Second Life Community

The Second Life Herald has a whole strand of coverage dedicated to Second Life wars. I'm not a war correspondent myself so I have to admit to being completely ignorant of the machinations surrounding the activities of the Alliance Navy, the Vanguard Militia, the Sovereign Regime, the Merczateers, Uncle Tom Cobley and all.

However, there may be the opportunity for these happy bands to go up against real life opponents now that both the US Air Force and US Army have established beachheads in the virtual world. According to Virtual World News, the Air Force's MyBase sim is open for customers at http://slurl.com/secondlife/MyBase/174/136/28. The official Air Force release says that, "With more than 15 million accounts worldwide registered in Second Life, Air Force officials hope MyBase will attract men and women interested in learning more about the Air Force, said Col. John Thompson, the AETC Future Learning Division chief. The site also provides links for enlistment and commissioning information and how to contact the nearest Air Force recruiter."

The release goes on to say that, "One possible long-term use for this technology is to open a private site in a three-dimensional world, yet to be determined, where active-duty Airmen can attend virtual training and are tracked to receive course credit. Offering virtual-based training could offset the cost of travel to training sites around the world which often includes lodging and other expenses."

Meanwhile, the US Army hopes to complete two new islands within the next 45 days. According to General William S. Wallace; commander of the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC), there will be opportunities for "virtual experiences like jumping out of airplanes, and rappelling off of towers and using a weapon, to see if we can get some kind of recruiting benefit out of this social networking."

Presumably they can also link in with the new Nurse Training initiative offered by Glasgow Caledonian University, Scotland, so they can experience trauma treatment.

Linden Lab Appoints Ex-Pixar Exec

As part of its strategy to beef up its executive team, Linden Lab has appointed Howard Look as Senior Vice President of Customer Applications. Look's recent CV includes his previous job as VP of software at Pixar, preceded by a stint as VP for Applications and User Experience at TiVo Inc. He was also the director of Applied Engineering at Silicon Graphics.

In the official Second Life blog on December 2nd, 2008, the company say that, "He’ll be responsible for leading the engineering team responsible for the customer-facing part of the Second Life experience. Throughout 2009, Howard will be working with T Linden (Tom Hale, Chief Product Officer) and our product, design teams and engineering teams to reshape the Second Life viewer into a simple and intuitive interface."

This represents yet another significant hire since May 2008 when Mark Kingdon became CEO, along with Frank Ambrose as Senior Vice President of Global Technology in August, and Tom Hale in November. Despite the doomsayers continuing to predict the closure of Linden Lab, these recent changes are more indicative of a company focusing on keeping the doors open.

More on Impending Doom - or The End of the World is (Still) Nigh

Once of the quirky things about End Times movements (those people who prophesy the End of the World) is that when the appointed date comes and goes, they find perfectly warped reasons to explain why they were simultaneously right and wrong. The commonest one is, "Hallelujah, our prayers have saved us and God has given us another chance"

There are similar groups in Second Life. Not a day goes by without someone, somewhere, predicting with certainty that all is lost and Second Life losers are about to be forced to get real lives. Some of these folks seem to also take perverse pleasure in wanting this to happen, not caring one whit about the thousands of people who genuinely would be hurt. Don't believe me? Well, check out this link to an article on how Lively residents have been fighting to keep their virtual world online. These are not whackos, weirdos, losers, or sad people, just regular folks who enjoy the camaraderie of an online existence - no stranger than folks who enjoy long chats with AIM, long hours with World of Warcraft, or cold nights outside watching supposed adult males running around with a squashed leather ball, running from one side of a field to another just to put it down.

However, it seems I am not the only one who isn't preaching the mantra of "Second Life is Dead." Chris Gaylord of the Christian Science Monitor takes a more even-handed perspective in the article, When is an online fad over? One of the more positive quotes is "But at least Linden Lab has a clear and functioning business model – something Google couldn't lasso with its free Lively world (on which it will pull the plug at the end of the year) and something the new online darling, Twitter, is struggling to capture."

Kudos to Chris for reading more than just "it's all over" into that one article on Reuters departure.