Op/Ed: The 10 Worst SL Train Wrecks – So Far
by Alphaville Herald on 19/10/07 at 8:49 am
by Casey Jones, railroad expert
10. Any announcement by Robin Linden on a Friday
Announce the bad news then head for the hills – the classic Linden strategy. Robin depends on the idea that any resistance is futile since most residents don’t have a week to fight against Lunatic Lab’s latest moves, and at least half the residents are probably ill-informed, so the other half can spend their time arguing with them. While the SL residents spend most of their time backbiting, Robin has proved herself to be a master at putting the worst possible spin on whatever bad news the Lab has cooked up. This makes us wonder – is Robin Linden really a griefer at heart?
9. SL Next Top Model
This competition has been a long standing joke in the Second Life fashion world. Several months ago we watched the stolen idea war between Jada Hoyer and BooBooKitty Haight, Then there is a minor issue – Miss Hoyer never received written permission from Bankable Productions to reproduce the contest in Second Life – but with the amount of press Jada insists on receiving in-world, she might soon find a big, fat, life-sized lawsuit on her hands. But look on the bright side: if you suck up to Jada right you might win the competition! Next Top Model, please!
8. The Rag SL
A small unknown blog popped up a few months ago and seems to have a penchant for calling out people for their indiscretions – and doing that with a bite of humour. Only problem is they seem bent on publishing full chat logs – could this be their undoing? Oh wait – we do that here at the Herald too. Oops! Recent Rag SL complaints include the Face of Style contest and the Minnu Skins vs. Suite 17 debacle.
7. Woodbury University Closing
Good job there Lindens! While Provokey Evah “hits back hard” when asking the Linden game gods to keep their fingers off the scales of justice, that hobgoblin of small minds – consistency – is not a problem when P. Evah’s has unilaterally convicted virtual miscreants. Whenever the ever omniscient one has determined guilt – it is time to ban the whole lot of ‘em – and take their land too. But what on earth was the Lab thinking? With all the pushing they do to get educational backing, they choose to shut down an edu-Sim? Sad, really.
6. Second Citizen
A forum unto its own, this place gladly welcomed the jaded and slightly -or completely- insane to become regular posters in its largely unmonitored posting fury. The only downfall is the threat of legal action finally got the best of the moderator and he shut it down. Drama whores of Second Citizen then migrated to SL Universe. Second Citizen ranks #6 because they managed the longest running, slow motion train wreck in the metaverse.
5. GBUofSL
This is an older blog from last year, but it still deserves to be on this list. The blog was ran by a couple of alts who had a penchant for attacking Six Kennedy in particular. Some rumoured that the alts were actually Ginny Talmasca and one of her (his?) cronies, but there are also rumours that this blog was run by Colleen Desmoulins and has a very strong connection to the Brutal Honesty blog.
4. Brutal Honesty
This blog took less than a month to skyrocket to C-list fame in Second Life by blindly attacking anyone that moved the wrong way. They claim to be brutally honest, but unfortunately, all they tend to do is come across as cruel. Their gaggle of drama-hungry comments only increases their breakneck speed towards the wreck. Is it wrong to hope they actually reach the destination? Probably – but it feels so good.
3. Second Thoughts
In the midst of mountains of self indulgent, faux-intelligent conceit and way too many words, this particular blog does its best to tackle the “controversial” topics. Unfortunately, the articles tend to come off as poorly researched at best and there are astounding amounts of recycled prose. Good thing that this means you can skip reading the bulk of the blog. The obsessively repetitive approach here relies on making completely blind claims in the hope that someone, anyone, will get offended and provide a good nugget of real news to write about. Most commenters only hang around to laugh and poke at the author with sticks – and not because she’s funny. Rest assured, we’d never do anything like that here at the Herald.
2. 12Avatars
Aside from the blogs, this particular contest was a trainwreck in itself. Advertising twelve spots for any resident-elected avatars, the number of possible winners was slowly whittled away as we found out exactly who Monkeyface had chosen for his own – and those included Bianca Darling and Callie Cline, both which arrived in the helicopter on the night of the opening. At the time we were all left in the dark as to exactly why. There were also “real life models” (re: bimbos) added into the mix, the profiles of which never mentioned whether or not they were Second Life residents. Wasn’t the contest supposed to be for Second Lifers? We won’t even touch the original concept of the thing, which was a popularity contest. Barf.
1. VAT Tax “Surprise!”
Oh, what a grand thing – Europeans woke up one fine morning to the VAT Tax slapping them in the face with its penis which was 17 to 24% larger than they expected. This particular episode will go down as Robin Linden’s best resident griefing ever – until next friday.
mabb dilweg
Oct 21st, 2007
Prok: “Yes, the trainwreck of the year really is the Herald.”
I totally agree Prok. I used to enjoy reading the SLH a year ago when I first encountered Second Life. In particular, I remember a very amusing piece on some US politician appearing in SL – it was satire. Intelligent, but with a point to make. Pixeleen wrote that piece, and there were many articles by others that I found intelligent or witty but most of all, worth reading, even when I totally disagreed with the authors!
Now it’s just a bitch-fest written mostly by people who don’t have the courage to come out and spray their crap under any kind of traceable identity.
Walker, Uri, I do hope you’re deeply ashamed of what this blog has become in your absence…
Alec Caprilli
Oct 21st, 2007
Good Bad Ugly of SL was indeed ran by Ginny Talamasca and Mya Heaney.
When the water got too hot they got out.
Pansies.
Anonymous
Oct 21st, 2007
You forgot these:
Ginko financial
SL4B
Secondlife itself, but the latter isnt qualifiable because it’s a trainwreck in motion.
The 'Nother Anon
Oct 22nd, 2007
Sorry, Alec & multiple anons (ie. Colleen Desmoulins?), GBU was definitely written by Colleen. She admitted it to more than one person and on at least one blog. She’s also been known to regret that fact and is somewhat famous for blaming it on anyone under the sun, anonymously, whenever she can troll a thread that has remotely anything to do with drama or fashion. GET OVER IT ALREADY!
Yawn
Oct 22nd, 2007
GBU was run by CD, but she was not alone in the running of it, ever notice how the only post to praise anyone on that blog, was praising a certain big designer? Fishy much?
It was run by a group of people, all of whom used to be close in friendship, and I would say that was CD, GT and MH. People aren’t always who they seem to be, and I for one would be extremely careful around a particular “big designer” and s/he would just as easily stab you in the back as love you to your face.
DaveOner
Oct 22nd, 2007
Accusation: “…In the midst of mountains of self indulgent, faux-intelligent conceit and way too many words…and there are astounding amounts of recycled prose…”
Response: “What a fucktard”
You guys don’t seem to understand the timing of comedic genius. This is a gold mine of humorous sarcasm and irony! Not only does her first comment mock the use of “too many words” and “faux-intelligence” by being a retarded 3 word comeback, it also emulates the “recycled prose” factor by using a played out term among internet nerds: “fucktard”!
I think Prock is misunderstood in the same way Andy Kaufman was misunderstood for the majority of his career. She manages to stay polarizing and completely in character at all times without accidentally making a valid point or otherwise a cohesive thought! So much discipline is required to appear undisciplined and oblivious to rationality. I wonder how much of that spills into her real life?
Either way this stuff is classic, guys!
Vote for Prock…for…something ’08!
Prokstar
Oct 22nd, 2007
Prokstar (with apologies to Nickleback)
———————————————-
I’m through with toein’ the line
at blogs I’ll never write on
It’s like the people I’ve been baitin’
Shat on my virtual lawn.
Second life hasn’t turned out
Quite the way I want it to be.
(Well tell me what you want)
I want a big glass house
where I can scream my fibs,
And an ego big enough to piss off the whole grid,
And a frothing potty-mouth, large enough
For ten plus me.
(Yeah, so what you need?)
I need a brand new blog, where I’ve got no limits,
And little black tux, with a loser in it.
Gonna start my own fan club,
Cause nobody but Koala likes me.
(Been there, done that)
I need a new website; I’ll be a lesser fucktard,
Get a star on Nick’s “Metaversed” boulevard,
Somewhere between Onder and
you, Nick, is fine for me.
(So how you gonna do it?)
I’m gonna trade my pride for a tiny bit of fame,
I’ll even bend my gender and change my name.
‘Cause we all just wanna be big Prokstars and
Live in big glass houses, pretend we’re all Czars.
The text comes easy and the lulz come cheap
We’ll all stay angry ’cause we just won’t think.
And we’ll all hang out at my nutty blog,
(Where I’ve banned near everybody, so forgive the fog.)
Every good ass kisser’s,
Gonna wind up there,
Every chubby dickless wonder,
With weird bleach blonde hair.
And well…
Hey, hey, I wanna be a prokstar
Hey, hey, I wanna be a prokstar
I wanna be great like Stalin, without the hassles,
Hire eight sock puppets who can kiss my asshole.
Post a couple walls a day
So you can milk my lulz for free.
(I’ll have a side of bullshit.)
Gonna dress my ass,
With no sense of fashion,
Got a package and a t-shirt,
now see my male “passion?”
Gonna hang out with Nick Wilson,
since he’ll stroke my giant ego for me.
(So how you gonna do it?)
I’m gonna trade my pride
for a tiny bit of fame,
I’ll even bend my gender
and change my name.
‘Cause we all just wanna be big Prokstars and
Live in big glass houses, pretend we’re all Czars.
The text comes easy and the lulz come cheap
We’ll all stay angry ’cause we just won’t think.
And we’ll all hang out at my nutty blog,
(Where I’ve banned near everybody, so forgive the fog.)
Every good ass kisser’s,
Gonna wind up there,
Every chubby dickless wonder,
With weird bleach blonde hair.
And we’ll all hide out at my private sim.
With the latest Enemies List
(of SL’s who’s who).
I’ll bitch and moan and whine,
though I never smile,
Everybody’s got my avatar,
set on their lulz-dial, well
Hey, hey, I wanna be a Prokstar.
I’m gonna sing the songs
That my foil-hat tells me
will be big ‘ol hits,
(well at least with newbies).
Get my copy-paste fat-fingers writing all my posts
Repeat ‘em every week, ’cause I’m just dumb as toast.
‘Cause we all just wanna be big Prokstars and
Live in big glass houses, pretend we’re all Czars.
The text comes easy and the lulz come cheap
We’ll all stay angry ’cause we just won’t think.
And we’ll all hang out at my nutty blog,
(Where I’ve banned near everybody, so forgive the fog.)
Every good ass kisser’s,
Gonna wind up there,
Every chubby dickless wonder,
With weird bleach blonde hair.
And we’ll all hide out at my private sim.
With the latest Enemies List
(of SL’s who’s who).
I’ll bitch and moan and whine,
though I never smile,
Everybody’s got my avatar,
set on their lulz-dial, well
Hey, hey, I wanna be a Prokstar.
Hey, hey, I wanna be a Prokstar.
Hey, hey, I wanna be a Prokstar.
rofl
Oct 23rd, 2007
that is fucking hilarious
Jellin Pico
Oct 29th, 2007
Quote: 6. Second Citizen
A forum unto its own, this place gladly welcomed the jaded and slightly -or completely- insane to become regular posters in its largely unmonitored posting fury. The only downfall is the threat of legal action finally got the best of the moderator and he shut it down. Drama whores of Second Citizen then migrated to SL Universe. Second Citizen ranks #6 because they managed the longest running, slow motion train wreck in the metaverse.
Prok? Is that you?