The assets of Teleplace are being liquidated after the business-oriented 3D virtual meeting place hit a financial singularity which prevents the venture's continued operation, according to a mailing sent to potential creditors - including the Alphaville Herald's own part time typist/technical advisor Mark McCahill. 

Mr. McCahill provided the Herald with copies of the liquidation notification but pointed out that the Teleplace software was recently open sourced as Open QWAQ, so the software will live on indefinitely -- despite the apparent demise of Teleplace, Inc.

seeking a more fluid situation

While opponents of open source may be dismayed at this development, software immortality is good news for the members of the Turing Church Online. The group had been holding their transhumanist services at a virtual venue hosted by Teleplace, but have now moved to another hosting service running the Open QWAQ software. Is it any wonder Second Life conspiracy theorists fear a  transhumanist tropism for open source systems?

Unfortunately, the Teleplace and transhumanist news cut short the Herald staffs' well-earned break from the virtual world news beat. After dusting the cobwebs off our virtual printing press and consulting the staff directory,  I was able to arrange a meeting with Mr. McCahill at the fashionable Martinis and Power - an after work club favored by Herald reporters despite having almost nothing in common with Philip Rosedale's new Coffee and Power work club.

Pixeleen Mistral: Hi Mark! Sorry to interrupt your vacation but what's this about Teleplace being shut down?  
Mark McCahill: Way back in the day - back when QWAQ was just getting started - I spent a couple days talking with them and they put me in their rolodex. Eventually QWAQ turned into Teleplace, and the rolodex must have made it through the transition. Now it looks like they are notifying everyone who might possibly be a creditor, and so a couple weeks ago, I got this notice. It sure looks like they are selling everything off. Here are the papers - what does it look like to you?

calling all creditors

Pixeleen Mistral: Hmmm. Looks like game over. That's a shame. Were you surprised to see Teleplace go into liquidation?
Mark McCahill: Not exactly. I knew something was up when Teleplace open sourced their code after a long run as a proprietary branch of the Open Croquet project.

It breaks down like this. David Smith and Andreas Raab worked on the Open Croquet project. They are some of the best software engineers I have ever seen - so they have really great tech - but its not just about the tech. David and Andreas went on to form QWAQ after funding for Open Cobalt got tight, which happened once Carly Fiorina left HP and Mark Hurd took over and started cost-cutting. At that point Alan Kay's research group was wound down, so David and Andreas needed to find a new home for their work. In the end, the people at the universities kept working on Croquet and David and Andreas formed a startup based on the Croquet code. That was the genesis of QWAQ, and eventually QWAQ changed its name to Teleplace.

But the business-oriented virtual meeting place market is really crowded, so a shakeout was inevitable. Look at what happened to Linden Lab - they took a huge hit and laid off 30% of their staff after Mark Kingdon pursued the business meeting place biz. So when the Teleplace code was open sourced, it seemed to be a sign that a change in direction was coming. It was ironic that the code was released under the GPL, but I imagine it was the best they could do.

Pixeleen Mistral: How was releasing the code under the GPL license ironic?
Mark McCahill: Teleplace is based on Open Croquet, and Open Croquet was released under the MIT license. This means that you could do pretty much anything with derivative works, including take them closed source and proprietary. GPL is different - and viral. GPL says that all derivative works have to remain open source. That is a big turn-off for companies that want to sell proprietary systems. Now, if I'm at a university working on a research project like Croquet, I want the widest possible impact for that research, so I prefer the MIT license. On the other hand, I imagine the only way the Teleplace guys could convince their board to release the code was under GPL, because the board was probably worried someone else might take the code and compete with them - so they wanted to see any changes made to the code. Unfortunately, this fragments the open source development community.

Pixeleen Mistral: How so?
Mark McCahill: We can't add any of the Teleplace code to MIT-licensed projects like Open Croquet or Open Cobalt without those projects getting infected with a GPL license, and we don't want a GPL license. So we have to be very careful to keep Teleplace code out of Open Cobalt. There is a way around this mess, which would be for the rights holders of the Teleplace code to dual-license it.

Pixeleen Mistral: what do you mean by dual license?
Mark McCahill: Make it available under both the MIT and GPL license and allow people to choose the license that suits their needs. I imagine that they will be selling the rights to the Teleplace code as part of the liquidation of assets. I wonder who will end up with the rights? Maybe they will also release it under an MIT license. 

Pixeleen Mistral: Where do you see the virtual meeting space for business software going next?
Mark McCahill: Onto mobile devices like the iPad and Android tablets. WebEx works really well on an iPad and I see a ton of tablets going out to corporate salespeople. To get anywhere in the corporate market, a 3D meeting space will need to be better than WebEx or Google+ video hangouts and work on tablets - and also do something WebEx and Google+ doesn't do.

Looking at the way the virtual meeting place market has played out you can see why Linden Lab bailed on marketing Second Life for business meetings. But as you keep reminding me, there is money in the babyfur and My LIttle Pony/Brony markets - and not much competition, so Second Life for fancy dress party socializing still makes sense.

Pixeleen Mistral: Never underestimate the power of cute, at least outside a business context.
Mark McCahill: If anyone would know, it's you Pix.

I was a relatively early Google+ user and spent the last few weeks adding friends to Google+ circles. In doing this I implicitly promoted Google's seriously over-hyped circle-centric Facebook clone by sending invitations to friends. This was probably a mistake - but I was curious to see if Google's algorithm-driven data mining culture could cope with running an MMO -- and an online culture that embraces the meta-game of duel-to-the-death by abuse report.

get suspended on Google+ -  lose access to GMail

For those with certain tastes, Google's new game is appealing if you don't mind risking the loss of your identity, e-mail and social graph as part of the gameplay. I'm sure the griefers and vigilantes will have a great time playing. How well this will work for serious business is another story.

After the Google Lively fiasco, I had little confidence Google would get social right - despite promises to be less evil than Facebook. Now that I have personally experienced Google's rough justice - my Gmail and Google+ accounts have been suspended and I am blocked from downloading a copy of my Google+ friends - I am pretty sure that a rousing game of hunt-the-fake account will help make up for the lack of familiar Facebook favorites like Farmville, particularly for those who enjoy a full-contact cross platform MMO.

It appears Google's Data Liberation Front  goes missing just when you most need it most. The screenshot below shows several successful exports of my Google+ contacts - but that ended today.

Data Liberation Front can no longer locate my contacts

kiss your contacts list goodbye: no data liberation once you have been suspended

Unfortunately for Google's ambitions in the social space, the death to fake people game may alienate exactly those real people that Google so desperately needs to succeed against mighty Mark Zuckerberg's privacy loss desensitization operation. How can you be sure who is real online?

The fake people game began in earnest with a Google engineer reportedly suggesting abuse report vigilante action against suspected enemies of the real people in Google+. A wave of account suspension followed.

Andrew Bunner call for vigilante action against fake people - is Mr. Bunner for real?

But does Google have the staff to carefully review the disputed G+ account suspensions? What will stop troublemakers from filing mass frivolous abuse reports against the sort of game god-fearing real people that Google seems to be courting?

For those who have not yet played, my experience may help you decide if you are interested in risking your mail, identity and social graph by playing the Google+ MMO.

This morning I woke to find my Gmail account locked due to  unspecified "suspicious activity" on the account. When I logged in this afternoon I found my Google+ profile was suspended,  presumably because I have been accused of being a "fake person" and/or some civic minded vigilantes are working their way through Google+ reporting accounts they hope to see banned. I noticed that my old friend Kalel Venkman of the Justice League Unlimited still has a working Google+ profile - presumably because his profile picture looks like superman and he is one of the good guys.

Kalel Venkman - a real person or flagrant Google+ community standards violator?

I was able to re-establish control of my mail after visiting the Gmail web site and entering a verification code sent to my cell phone. On Google+, the best I could do was ask that my suspension be reviewed - but there was no place to explain why Google might deem my account real enough to retain. I imagine there are some seriously overworked game moderators stuck in a basement somewhere in the Googleplex trying to decide what to do with a flood of disputed suspension - a flood which is likely to grow as more players join the game.

The parallels between Google+ and sort of game god "justice" seen in Second Life are uncanny. In most MMOs, players can loose their assets at the whim of the platform moderators. In the social space, the most valuable asset imaginable is your contacts list, and I find that  I'm now blocked from downloading my formerly thriving social network - despite Google promises of Data Libertation.

Two days ago I had about 120 friends in my G+ circles and was in about 180 other people's circles. Today I can't see anyone who has me in their circle and my friends list is less than half the size it was previously. Does this mean that half of Google+ accounts are really the sort fake people that we are all meant to report to the authorities?

I can see why Google says G+ is not ready for business - imagine the chaos when the anonymous hacktivists decide to mass report G+  account of an organization that drank the "Don't Be Evil" Koolaide and placed an all-in bet on the Google cloud. The sort of federated social network suggested by Open BuddyCloud and Diaspora just keeps looking better and better.

The Twinity virtual world newsletter and web site are now playing the cybersex card hard – a turnabout after several years of relatively tame promotional efforts. Is this a cry of desperation for population – or a keen understanding the core audience?

Whatever the motivation, Metaversum begins by stroking the libidios of amorously inclined avatars with a suggested visit to "Flo’s Winter Love Shop" for some romantic couple animations. I’m sure that there are those that will enjoy this, although the animation pictured appears to be a Dracula-like character choking a white haired woman – perhaps a leftover from Halloween?

  Twinity newsletter: get laid and check out th

After setting the mood, the next stop is the less than coy "Get Laid shop"  to pick up the new sex animations and beds now available in the Twinity virtual world. Unfortunately there are no illustrations of the Get Laid shop animations in the newsletter or web site, so how Dracula and his special friend get their freak on in Twinity is left to the imagination.

Twinity website: join us for toon cybersex!

It is too early to know if Twinity’s latest promotion will succeed, but one can easily imagine Linden Lab keeping a close eye on this approach – although it seems unlikely that the Lab would promote Stroker Serpentine’s wares directly.

Twinity avatars after a round of cyber?

By Journey Yellowlist, Herald Religion Pew Desk 

Even as His Holiness Pope Benedict launched a frontal assault against media in general and virtual worlds in particular, the Church has rolled out its own competitor to soon to collapse once-heralded Second Life. 

Ex Cathedra^tm will soon launch using a dedicated client bearing the imprimatur  of Rome, with immersive simulations that include an interactive pilgrimage to medieval Canterbury, a dramatic game recreating Apostolic succession, real-time exegesis of ancient religious texts-on-a-prim, a vampire-hunt with “The Holy Inquisition 2.0” team of superheroes, and a humorous casual game for young men about the perils of altar-boy duties, “Who Dropped the Body of Christ?” 

Catholic gamers are delighted that the Vatican will finally enter the 21^st century. 

“Dude, The Church has totally been like this really boring wine-and-cracker party that went on for like 2000 years,” said StXavrRulz, a respondent at the Holy Father’s blog, Nihil Obstat. “But being able 2 stake fag vampires and burn heretics at the stake completely rocks. ROCK ON Benny ROCK ON.” 

Conclave of Developers To Do God’s Work 

The Vatican has been quick to avoid the sorts of mistakes common at Linden Lab. 

“From the start we intend to avoid doctrinal errors that, sadly, have led so many souls astray,” said His Eminence  Bonaventure Ignatius Loyola Jeanbaptiste, Cardinal of the server-farm inside the Vatican. “We have constant supervision now of all coding and hardware acquisition, and we hold our team to the highest possible standards.” 

The Cardinal is said to be a leading candidate to become the next Holy Father. He has been instrumental in several technology initiatives for the Vatican, notably increased security measures to protect The Church’s priceless treasures and key prelates.  The Cardinal oversaw the purchase of several hundred Leopard III tanks and Eurofighter aircraft, a move that caused protests outside St. Peters by mobs of antiwar protestors. To quell the riots and “restore peace,” the Cardinal dispersed the crowd using the Pope’s personal bodyguard of fifty 800-series Swissguard2000 ^tm defensebots. Cardinal Jeanbaptiste personally designed these robots. 

While His Eminence’s tactics may seem reactionary, his technical skills are impeccable. In leading development of the Ex Cathedra team, the Cardinal has made several noteworthy changes from the competition. All avatars will have their owners’ real names, “in order to avoid occasion for sin in this sacred space,” The Cardinal added.  “Though in a moment of vanity, I made my own avatar to look a bit like His Eminence Jean du Plessis de Richelieu.” 

“In fact, mine is the first virtual cardinalitial diocese.” He eyed the rows of hardware with pride. “There are thousands of souls in these boxes already. With my brothers in the faith we will maintain excellent stability and reliable service on our grid.” 

Coders and customer-support clergy who prove poor at their jobs will be transferred by the College of Cardinals to remote parishes. 

“Or we’ll sell them to the godless Turk to be his galley slaves,” Cardinal Jeanbaptiste said, with a wink. “Just kidding.” 

All third-party viewers have been branded, in advance, as malefactus for Catholic gamers, known in Ex Cathedra as “brothers and sisters.”  Those found using TPVs will be subject to excommunication. All non-Catholics are blocked from the virtual world, though potential converts may use a secondary grid, Purgatorio, until certified as ready for conversion. 

“We want to give those bound for perdition a taste of what awaits them unless they convert. Though they will not feel the torments of hell itself, their avatars will not be glamorous, their activities banal, and the setting and company will test even the strongest of errant wills.” 

a view inside the Purgatorio grid

User-generated content will be permitted in Ex Cathedra, but most will be subject to review by a panel of Bishops and theologians.  Some unrestricted content will be allowed: cakes for church bake-sales, tracts against birth control and masturbation, baptismal fonts for parish churches, yard-sticks for nuns in Parochial School region, and implements of torture for the adults-only Torquemada sims. 

Unholy Fail: Heretics Stumble in Attempt to Match Rome 

Even before Benedict sat in the chair of St. Peter, plans were afoot for Catholic dominance of the gaming industry. John Paul II was particularly fond of St. Mario^tm, an early PC game that he had planned to offer as an MMO teaching youth virtue and manual dexterity. 

Had the pontiff lived longer, this project may have come out of beta into full release. Instead, after his death, the short-lived and unpopular Torments of the Martyrs^tm was released and quickly sank. Reviewers noted that the choice of soundtrack-hymns alienated many young gamers and modern Catholic parents were offended by images of disembowelment, flaying, boiling in oil, cutting off of noses and ears, all accompanied by violent lyrics that boomed from their children’s speakers: 

O sacred head, surrounded 
by crown of piercing thorn! 
O bleeding head, so wounded, 
reviled and put to scorn! 

infallible beta-tester prefers Ex Cathedra^tm 

Progress has continued unabated since that early gaff, and today the Holy See appears to be far ahead of The Archbishop of Canterbury, whose Anglican Life^tm virtual world was derived from an early version of Ex Cathedra released during a ecumenical thaw. 

The stability of Anglican Life has been derided by some tech writers; pro-Catholic griefers recently attacked several regions, leaving the tags “Rome pwns CoE!” and “Henry8 burnz in Hell!” on the side of virtual Westminster Abbey, while a Sunday service at the virtual York Minster was interrupted by a particle attack featuring thousands of images of Queen Elizabeth I kneeling, in Gorean slavegirl attire, before Philip II of Spain. 

“We deny these childish acts,” Cardinal Jeanbaptiste insisted. “If, however, some overly-zealous member of the One True Faith^tm were culpable, desecration of once-Catholic, now heretical, virtual buildings would only merit a few years in Purgatory. Yet I think it more likely that the LutherSim codeset favored by Protestant virtual-world builders permitted the defacement of the English heretics’ places of worship. With such variation, all sorts of error creeps into the purity of what began as the One True Code^tm.” 

Whatever the faults of Anglican Life, it’s undeniable that other branches of the LutherSimulator client-and-server software are not only less stable than the Vatican’s platform but also grid owners running this software show no sign of reaching common standards.  

A recent conclave of LutherSim developers broke down into ever-smaller factions, each with its “divinely approved” version of the source code.  All of them united, however, to denounce the Roman Catholic software. 

“That’s Open-Source theology for you,” Cardinal Jeanbaptise lamented, rolling his eyes heavenward. 

Dark Powers Exploit Early Flaw in Code 

His Eminence was less sanguine about a flaw that emerged during the closed-beta tests of the new world.  Upon login for nearly a week, clergy found their Ex Cathedra avatars wearing altar-boy uniforms while trapped in the locked vestry of a church and unable to log off. The avatars were carnally violated by “Father Agrippa,” a malevolent figure whose face resembled an amalgam of many priests accused in recent sex scandals. 

“This was the work of the Evil One and his minions,” Cardinal Jeanbaptiste noted, dryly. “We found a security hole in the login protocols, left by one of our brothers who had not yet taken his vows. He has been disciplined, though the fault lies with his listening to GWAR during an all-night coding session and we blame them for this possession by Satan.”  

After the incident all servers were sprinkled with holy water, and one unrepentant CPU was buried with a titanium stake through its hard drive. Coding then resumed. 

Corporate Sponsorship  

Interest in Ex Cathedra has been intense, with some companies already announcing plans. Among these efforts will be a Red Papal Bull^tm in-world quest to see which sinners can be rounded up and brought before the Inquisition.

Microsoft’s Stained-Glass Windows^tm marketplace will also open to provide virtual goods and services to brothers and sisters in Ex Cathedra.  

Not to be outdone by the private sector, the Jesuits and Benedictines have formed in-world orders with intensive requirements for full group membership. For a weekly contribution, members of the public may join the orders as laity. 

In other corporate news, The Church has denied that HP agreed to change its brand-name to “Heavenly Powers” or “Holy Pontiff,” in exchange to exclusive contracts for the entire Vatican server-farm and upgrades to the 800-series defensebots. 

“That claim is false,” Cardinal Jeanbaptise confirmed. “The 1000-series Swiss Guards are being tested and produced with the assistance of several German firms. We’ll introduce them soon to the lapsed faithful in Europe before a full global deployment on The Holy Father’s next tour.” 

The Vatican also reaffirmed that no Linux clients of any sort will be released for Ex Cathedra. As Cardinal Jeanbaptise put it “we do not accept this Unitarian-Universalist OS as legitimate for the salvation of souls.  Steve Jobs and Steve Balmer, however, would have made excellent medieval cardinals, so we have embraced both Windows and the Mac OS. God’s will be done. See you in-world.” 

World of Warcraft is a subscription model, similar to SL’s premium membership.  People sign up for automatic billing and tend to forget its there.  Allods has an item shop but the game developers provided players with opportunities to avoid using it, which players tend to do, even when it makes no economic sense.

One of the items you can get is a bigger deposit box for banking the weapons, armor and other items you accumulate in the game.  This box costs approximately $10 US.  You can pay the $10 or you can perform a Wandering Alchemist quest.  The Wandering Alchemist quest is; a player must find the Wandering Alchemist, a non player character or NPC, in order to obtain a potion.  The potion has 14 constituent parts.  Each time the alchemist is found, one part, at random, will be given to the player.  The Alchemist can be found in ten different locations.  Each time the Alchemist is found, only one player may interact with the Alchemist.  After a player talks to the Alchemist, the Alchemist disappears for four minutes to reappear at one of the ten locations at random.  After receiving the 14 parts, the player must find the Alchemist again and give him the parts to make the potion.  Then you must take the potion to another NPC in order to get the deposit box.  Or you can pay $10 US. 

The interesting part is that based on the chat, and people looking to form parties to make the quest shorter, players choose the quest frequently, even though at a minimum, with no other players interfering, being able to travel to the correct location where he appears next, and the parts being given in the correct number and order, this quest will take at least an hour.  Which means players are willing to give up well over an hour of their time either running around or waiting in order to avoid paying $10.  In the meantime, the game is still running and the company needs to keep the servers going. 

Without money coming in somehow, servers do not run.  And if a player is willing to put up with the Wandering Alchemist, game developers need to come up with new ways for payment in order for games to run. 

According to CNN’s report, the mother told the court, "When she cried, I cuddled her, but I noticed she was getting thinner," and added that she had not learned about baby care at the hospital nor had she read any books on the subject. Clearly children should come with better documentation – but perhaps online gameplay could make learning more fun and help replace the missing childcare manuals. Might Facebook come to the rescue?

It was unclear if the grieving mother had played any of the Facebook childcare games which feature an endless supply of virtual babies that can tolerate intermittent care – but one might imagine how mandating an online diaper change every few days would to be good training for real life.

However, all is not lost – the couple is expecting another child, which could provide them with a second chance to level up – despite the prosecution’s request for 5 year jail terms. Asking for mercy, the couple’s attorney, Kim Dong-young of the Korean Legal Aid Corp. said "They regret it, but Ms. Kim is pregnant, please consider this." and added "They were addicted to Internet gaming; they put their baby to sleep and came home early in the morning". The father of the unborn child seems determined to do better and said, "There will be no second mistake."

by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk

there gone

The PG-oriented virtual world There.com is to be closed March 9, a victim of hard economic times, according to There CEO Michael Wilson’s announcement. An FAQ at the site states that the company is buying back  virtual currency from players with a "Therebucks buyback" program for those who purchased Therebucks in the last month and for developers who made Therebucks by selling developer items. Therebucks collected from Sparkles, Tips, or give trades from other members are not eligible – so virtual escorts and other personal service industry workers appear to be out of luck.

did There.com’s paintballer moderation policies hurt the game?

The FAQ hints at significant levels of player dissatisfaction with hard-to-control end-game emergent behavior. Player profiles have been disabled, and the FAQ explains, "So many members were using profiles to post pornographic links and images out C/S staff couldn’t keep up. We’ve temporarily disabled profiles until we can catch up and find a better solution."

Unfortunately, disabled player profiles make it difficult for in-game groups to coordinate moves to other virtual worlds. A source in Second Life informed the Herald that Therians in Second Life are considering organizing an event at Starlust for There refugees. Given the demographics of There, the Teen Grid is likely to see more refugees than the main grid.

According to our source, speculation among There players is that some of There.com’s financial woes may have been due to sponsors pulling out after a recently public incident with a player named Brad Mitchell who was permabanned from There.com, but ended up in the news after a cross country rendezvous with a 16 year old girl he met on the Internet.

Brad Mitchell griefing in There.com

the internet can be dangerous

by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk

Last night I ran into poopmaster Oh – an ex-Second Lifer who now spends quality time in EVEOnline. While poopmaster Oh waited for EVEoffline to become EVEonline again – the game had crashed – we discussed the relative merits of the worlds, the charm of spaceships and spacebux, and the impact of the fearsome Something Awful Goonswarm faction.

poopmaster Oh stops by Hyperborea sim

Pixeleen Mistral: great name!
poopmaster Oh: you dont remember?
poopmaster Oh: yea its great

Pixeleen Mistral: I meet a lot of avs in this business
poopmaster Oh: I am a reporter, or was a reporter for SecondLifeHarold.com
poopmaster Oh: damn domain expired on me

Pixeleen Mistral: the SecondLifeHarold.com was short lived
poopmaster Oh: 2 years
poopmaster Oh: very short yea
poopmaster Oh: time flies so fast in here

Pixeleen Mistral: so maybe you should write for the real Herald
poopmaster Oh: i found a new game last year and hardly ever come in here anymore

Pixeleen Mistral: what game is it?
poopmaster Oh: been playin EvEOnline.com

Pixeleen Mistral: Walker Spaight likes that a lot
poopmaster Oh: internet spaceships

Pixeleen Mistral: and spacebux!
Pixeleen Mistral: I wish LL had real spaceships and spacebux
poopmaster Oh: yea the sims r way way way too small
poopmaster Oh: you can fly around a bit but you just hit the walls
poopmaster Oh: it really is amazing how 2 cents worth of internetspace ship can get your heart beating so fast

Pixeleen Mistral: well – it might crash!
poopmaster Oh: it did crash
poopmaster Oh: thats why i came here

Pixeleen Mistral: to catch your breath?
poopmaster Oh: the whole game crashed

Pixeleen Mistral oh noes 

Pixeleen Mistral: so would you advice SL players to try EVEonline?
poopmaster Oh: i have been thinkin about doin a 'event' to do that
poopmaster Oh: its not the most easy game to learn
poopmaster Oh: http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3088/2335016192_6003c39c4c.jpg

Pixeleen Mistral: if SL players want to meet you in EVEonline – how would they contact you?
poopmaster Oh: i should/could make a channel
poopmaster Oh: someone did make a channel called 'Second EVE' for SL players who also play eve to hang out
poopmaster Oh: ive never seen anyone in it tho

Pixeleen Mistral: so what did you think about the goonswarm guys?
poopmaster Oh: They are a large a powerful alliance
poopmaster Oh: From the something awful forums
poopmaster Oh: I don't play the same game they do

Pixeleen Mistral: yeah – and they took out the most powerful EVEonline alliance
poopmaster Oh: the universe is very large
poopmaster Oh: yea they have taken over large amounts of space in the south
poopmaster Oh: the most valuable space

Pixeleen Mistral: can anyone stop them?
poopmaster Oh: but they have recently added changes to the game (dec 1) to make resources more even
poopmaster Oh: They play in 0.0 space mostly and gank hi sec miners, neither of those two worlds do i enter

Pixeleen Mistral: so what is your game there?
poopmaster Oh: I am a low sec pirate and i play in faction war

Pixeleen Mistral: sounds fun
poopmaster Oh: PvP is allways fun
poopmaster Oh: when i was in the northern collition (mostly harmless) i did fight the goons a few times they can bring some big numbers

Pixeleen Mistral: I think it is a bad sign the goons mostly ignore SL now
poopmaster Oh: in EVE its a numbers game, the more ppl you bring the better you can kill, a gang of 10 ppl cant win vs 100, if we bring 150 they bring 300
poopmaster Oh: its about how many friends you have in 0.0
poopmaster Oh: or slaves
poopmaster Oh: in lowsec is less large gang more solo and small gang

Pixeleen Mistral: you seem to like it though
poopmaster Oh: yea its addictive
poopmaster Oh: it can make a very strong emotional response
poopmaster Oh: like sl

Pixeleen Mistral: does it have cyber like SL does?
poopmaster Oh: no
poopmaster Oh: there is no 'body' or out of ship avatar
poopmaster Oh: you can dock up and change ships but you can not walk around stations
poopmaster Oh: yet
poopmaster Oh: they been sayin they will add it for years

And with that, the other-worldly visitor disappeared. It was reassuring to learn that there is still a place for small gangs with internet spaceships despite the best efforts of the large factions – but how many other Second Lifers have moved on?

The Princess of Yaximixche is embarking on an ambitious tour of virtual worlds beyond Second Life from December through February 2010. The tour marks Her Royal Highness's first major public appearances since failing gravely ill during the summer of 2009, according to the Royal Press office.

Over the next ninety days, Her Royal Highness will visit 9 Virtual Worlds focused on content creation and other sectors, including stops in Twinity, Blue Mars, HiPiHi, i-Citizen, ActiveWorlds, VastPark, Mycosm, Multiverse and Opensim grids.

Is the Princess hedging her bets on Second Life? 

The Princess of Yaximixche´s Royal Standard

Long time observers of the Palace of Yaximixche suggest Her Royal Highness may be considering expanding her empire, and point out that in 2008 the Princess opened The Palace of Gukumatz to the public in Google’s Lively virtual world. However, when tentacle porn proved to be less of an attraction than hoped by the Google panopticon ad agency benevolent free service provider, Lively was terminated – a natural disaster that destroyed The Palace of Gukumatz.

In any case, the new media savvy Princess seems willing to adapt and move on, and is now providing minute by minute updates on the HRH Princess Yaximixche twitter channel. A facebook page also compliments the royal website.

by Pixeleen Mistral, International Affairs desk

The Korea Herald reports that Linden Lab has abandoned its Korean localized web site and viewer after allowing its contract with Barunson Games Corp. to lapse. Barunson Games had been contracted to operate Second Life's Korean service in October 2007, but apparently found selling life in the metaverse difficult.

A gloomy picture is painted by Korea Herald writer Choi He-suk, who points out the limited appeal of open environments populated with anonymous strangers and lag, saying, "Second Life appears to have failed to adapt to the characteristics of the local market. According to industry officials, Korean users tend to prefer moreclosed environments where they can interact with people they alreadyknow or relatively small groups of people, and are used to fast-pacedonline games."

We can certainly understand the desire for minimal lag and less than glacial rez times when grid hopping, but these problems seem unlikely to improve anytime soon.

On a happier note, now that the Lab has redirected the Korean Second Life web site http://kr.secondlife.com/ to the english language site, think of all the fun our friends in Korea will have practicing their english skills. Let us hope the appeal of this sort of informal foreign language class does not wane over time.

With the Lindens working to increase profitability by any means necessary, readers may wonder if the Lab will cut it's losses in other marginal markets in preparation for some sort of investor cashout event.

More worrying is the possibility that Korea's failure to appreciate the charms of the Second Life walled garden of cyber delights is a warning that Second Life cannot compete in what is believed to be one of the most wired and game/MMO crazed countries on the planet. Could this be why Philip Linden jumped ship?