Second Life Leaks Into Real Life
by Pixeleen Mistral on 11/08/07 at 6:41 pm
PNs protest Furries – Furries break PN’s signs – Los Angeles FOX 11 News Investigates LULZ and internet hate machine
by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk
PNs protest furry yiffing at Anthrocon 2007
Signs of trouble continue to mount, as scientists and engineers struggle to keep real life – or RL – functioning, despite an obviously overburdened infrastructure and insufficient assets and servers. The cause of the problems appear to be Second Life and the Internet – where dangerous memes are nurtured, then grow and mutate. These memes seek hosts so that they can reproduce and so eventually jump the inter-species barrier between fictional characters in games, and real life people – much like bird flu.
Chilling examples of this dangerous pattern of mutated memes modifying RL are apparent in a series of YouTube videos that Herald researchers investigated today. White male afro clad protesters at the Anthrocon 2007 furry convention earlier this summer bear a striking resemblance to the PN group found in SL, and they voice a common message to the fur community: “yiff in hell, furfag”.
The same anti-fur sentiment from Anthrocon is apparent in this Second Life video covering PN raids on June 22. Here a specialized weapon is used to crash a sim. For those with a taste for griefing, the virtual realm would seem to be safer than RL, since large guys in fur suits are not physically present to threaten their tormentors as was the case at Anthrocon 2007.
suits, afros, and anti-fur sentiments span worlds
FOX News Uncovers Internet hate machine
But griefing is not limited to Second Life, as this report by Los Angeles FOX 11 News illustrates. We particularly enjoyed seeing a truck unrelated to the story being blown up several times in the report as a “demonstration”. Is it possible that the FOX news people have seen too many video games, and are suffering from suffering from an inter-world meme infection?
anonymous target MySpace and treat the internet like a video game
Who are these guys?
For those wondering at the motivations of the anonymous in both RL and SL, this video may shed some light. In it, several contestants in the stupdenous ironic badass race in SL use Ventrillo voicechat to coordinate raids, and indulge in the sort of lulz that Fox news has been investigating.
And so the griefing and meme reproduction continues, in our world and the next. With the Lindens either helpless – or unmotivated – to prevent this sort of emergent resident behavior, we have one question – was this the sort of thing that Philip Linden dreamed of when he was a kid?
Witness X
Aug 11th, 2007
Goes to reaffirm what’s been said PN /b/tards Chans Woodbury/b/tards are a cult. Hopefully this more media outlets will start showing what vile the Chans are doing and help educate people about them, and then law enforcement will finally catch up and start putting away these Chan Cult members.
Hopefully the time of Anonymous is finally starting to see their end.
Anonymous
Aug 11th, 2007
MOOTY=ANGEL FLUFFY!
N3X15
Aug 11th, 2007
Except it wasn’t us at Anthrocon.
GJ doing your research.
Witness X
Aug 11th, 2007
“Except it wasn’t us at Anthrocon.
GJ doing your research.”
Doesn’t matter, you Anon types are all the same. You use the same memes you are lumped with them. The PN and the Chans are linked, no matter how much you deny it the evidence is all there. When one Anon does something it represents all of you since all of you always fall under the “legion” banner.
bootyRus
Aug 11th, 2007
“Hopefully this more media outlets will start showing what vile the Chans are doing and help educate people about them”
I had constant lulz fits at watching that silly Fox “documentary”. All it shows is how retards get butthurt.
“law enforcement will finally catch up and start putting away these Chan Cult members.”
Yay! We’ll all get v& !!
Law enforcement has crime to take care of. Unlike to pimpled geeks who can’t find a girlfriend, to them the internet isn’t serious business.
The internet’s good for lulz and porn, for everything else, there is: get outside and do something with your life.
urizenus
Aug 11th, 2007
bootyRus,
being a pimpled geek after lulz does not protect you from having the feds kick down your door and throw you in jail for a few years. Paranoia about kids with 1337 h4x0r powers has jailed nicer people than the chan boyz. Just ask Phiber Optik.
I’m not threatening. I’m saying be cautious, because just because you don’t take shit seriously doesn’t mean that there aren’t law enforcement people who want to win an election by prosecuting evil “hackers”. And while you know and I know that there isn’t a hacker in the bunch, will a jury know that? Answer: no.
Dire Allen
Aug 11th, 2007
You know I am going to play devil’s advocate here. Who’s more at fault here? A bunch of Anonymous goofing around with a Computer 3D Physics Program (because come on, it’s not a game right?). Or the people responsible for creating, and maintaining the program?
I’m going to say Linden Labs. Why? Because for a number of years now, they’ve known about these easily executed exploits and have done nothing to fix them.
When Microsoft discovers an exploit, they eventually put out patches to fix and hopefully prevent future exploits. Why hasn’t Linden Labs done the same? And don’t tell me they can’t, because that’s fucking bullshit. If Valve Software can do it, so can Linden Labs. Remember, Second Life is Serious Business, right?
All I am saying is, if you leave your front door open, you’re bound to have visitors. I don’t feel sorry for any one in those videos, nor the company responsible for Second Life. They allow this to happen to them. And why? Because despite what you may think of them, the PN is keeping SL in the public internet’s eye. Without these attacks, what left does SL have? Sex clubs and furries?
Hazim Gazov
Aug 11th, 2007
urizenus, I’ve been doing this for 10+ years, I don’t think the FBI is going to bitch at you for freezing servers and showing furries pictures of severed dicks.
Jim Schack
Aug 12th, 2007
>Why? Because for a number of years now, they’ve known about these easily executed exploits and have done nothing to fix them.
Yea, it gets pretty difficult to stop griefing when LL just leaves the back door wide open. Granted they have been slowly (and i do mean SLOWLY) been implementing protection. Email verification for new accounts, black listing scripts, …etc.
Could they do more? Yes.
But on the same token, i think the whole drive and push in SL is creativity and we should be doing a lot more on the user side to fight it. If LL falls short of the help we need, we shouldn’t be bitching and crying. We should be implementing technologies to combat while we wait for them to realize the threat.
Sure this exposure could help SL but it can also hurt it. Take in the case where John Edwards came in and really make other political candidates second guess SL. So it’s a mixed bag.
Witness X
Aug 12th, 2007
“urizenus, I’ve been doing this for 10+ years, I don’t think the FBI is going to bitch at you for freezing servers and showing furries pictures of severed dicks.”
When law enforcement finally catches up with the digital age as things move more and more into the interwebs, you’ll be faces alot for what you and your fellow Anons do. It’s just that they’re trying to catch up and are at a loss as what to do since they’ve been sitting on their asses. You all have just been taking advantage of the fact that law enforcement has been on big donut break since the internet came around. Enjoy your fun while you can.
Artemis Fate
Aug 12th, 2007
I liked how the Fox report intercut sections of it with an exploding van. That’s classic terror-reporting there, Fox. I’d say I was surprised they did it, but Fox even did a report about the “All your base” fad (like 6 months after it died no less), so there’s no question that they scrap the bottom of the barrel a lot.
I can’t believe PN showed up to an Anthrocon, that’s kinda sad.
NobodyImportant
Aug 12th, 2007
Artemis:
Some misguided failures from 7chan showed up to Anthrocon.
N3X15 posted the video link on the news section for the rest of the PN to see, and there were many comments of “fail raid is fail” and other such ridicule.
There were also stories at the time going around about those people accepting umbrellas from furries, which heightened the “fail” comments.
urizenus
Aug 12th, 2007
Hazim, the FBI may or may not care about frozen servers, but it’s civilian leadership may decide that busting the heads of snotty script kiddies is a good way to score some votes. If you don’t remember the 80s crackdowns on “hackers” like Phiber Optik you should do a little research. Julian Dibbell had a nice piece called “Phiber Optik Goes Directly to Jail”. Or before that remember when they threw Captain Crunch in jail for phone phreaking or something? The authorities wouldn’t even give him access to a phone because they said he could start World War III from a pay phone. There is also a good book by Josh Quitner on the raids on MOD — feds in full body armour busting in doors during breakfast.
If you think Prok is paranoid let me assure you that the general population is twice as paranoid about any combination of kids+technology.
I’m not saying that is right, I’m just saying this: Hubris puts you in jail.
spankee
Aug 12th, 2007
Take a look at the chans (especially 7chan). It’s hysterical how they intermix cries of “fag!” and “furfag!” along with anime pictures of girls with penises the size of Volkswagens.
Who’s sexually misguided?
Someone in a costume, or someone who gets off on hermaphrodite freaks of nature?
h34rtburn
Aug 12th, 2007
This is a matter of Subculture vs Counterculture.
Furries, as they are, are a subculture by definition. What they are a branch of is up to individual debate.
Those that conduct raids need to be looked at as an internet counterculture, not a subculture. They maintain their own guidelines of conduct.
Hunter Thompson’s book on Hells Angels describes the Motorcyclist gang as modern gunslingers, mutants of society and outside everything so much that their actions are alien to those not involved in their Ethics and technologies.
I think the same can be said for these “Hackers on Steroids”.
I believe many “subcultures” on the internet bring this upon themselves.
Perhaps Angry That Raids Instigated Off of Their Internet Culture would Nullify any Intelligent, Genuine, Realisitc Arguments, Said Furry groups Underestimate Clearly the Kinetic nature of the “raiders”, and their ability to blend into anonymity. You Are Hated for being different online, and that is a sad fact of the internet.
I don’t think anyone is innocent.The laser dots are on all their foreheads, and it is serious business to not take any threat from any group seriously. Learning, Understanding and Leniency will save this and other situations.
h34rtburn
Anonymous
Aug 13th, 2007
The Fur con raiders were indeed PN, head figures of it even. The reason the raid failed is cause only three dared showing up.
Of course denying them being PN means not having to admit their raid failed. they don’t like admitting failure; proven by the fact that they call particle spamming a furry club 2 minutes before being b& a success and ‘epic win’.
And yes, the umbrella was given to them by a furry.
PS, great reporting, but late… this happened weeks ago.
Alazarin
Aug 13th, 2007
Well, well, well the opening of the first video clip definitely shows up PN as a brain-dead greifer group. It features an attack of theirs on the Merry Prankster’s base at Basilisk in Second Life. I know it as I built it for them. Sadly for PN, the owners and regulars of The Merry Pranksters are all humans and a very nice crowd of laid-back ‘Dead-Heads’. The only fur (OK, I’m a scaley for the pedants amongst folks here) involved with The Merry Pranksters was myself, the builder. I get along wonderfully with everyone at The Merry Pranksters and vice versa. In spite of their name the Merry Pranksters are not a greifer group….. they take their name from Ken Kesey’s ‘mob’ of anarchic acid-heads back in the 1960′s.
Alazarin
Aug 13th, 2007
Eh… I goofed. It’s the second video clip, ‘Operation Heartburn’ the features the outdoor woodland club I built for The Merry Pranksters at Basilisk. If that’s the PN’s idea of ‘WIN’ they have shown themselves to be nothing more than cheap schoolyard bullies and thugs.
Alazarin
Aug 13th, 2007
Heartburn, you flatter yourself by attempting to drape your infantile PN, /b/ groups as counter-culture. What constructive memes / visions do your championed groups propose as an alternative to that which they seek to destroy?
In spite of the freewheeling anarchic ‘hipster’ facade of your raiding groups they are little more than a front for hyper-conservative racist and bigot values. No different from the KKK lynch mobs or ‘gay bashers’. Shame on the lot of you. Go to re-education camp for a long time.
Anonymous
Aug 13th, 2007
Alazarin, you have a Myspace. That fact says everything that I would need to know about you. Yiff in hell.
RedZergling
Aug 14th, 2007
The anthrocon raiders were not PN. The umbrellas were bought by Kazuiami (a friend of one of the raiders). Uncle Kage (the convention head) purposely mislead everyone into thinking they were protesting the black people of the convention and ultimately the police told them to leave. h34rtburn you failed so hard in your coverage that there’s a decent chance you’ll develop cancer from it. I happen to know 2 of the raiders personally. It was a mock-protest. This means it was a joke (see the great habbo raid of july 12). A real protest would of had many more people and have been hostile towards the furries. This entire thing has been a joke and the very fact that everyone took it so seriously accomplishes what they set out to do in the first place.
Anonymous
Aug 23rd, 2007
Stupid furries, the FBI does not exist to protect your feelings. And Furfags are the cult; come on, you practice totemism and spiritual possession by animals and probably other stuff we haven’t found out about yet.
ananomyous
Feb 23rd, 2009
As a Christian, I hate seeing these people so wrapped up in these disgusting fantasies of “yiff.” gross.
BirchCOM
Aug 15th, 2010
Dammit! It was a fucking set up… man why don’t people actually grow some fucking balls and lynch these sickos? Child molesting faggots and furries go hand in hand right?