Havok 4

The end of the world must be near, or Hell just had some very unseasonable weather. Havok 4 cometh!

Flags!

If you haven't seen it yet, this is a delight. Ordinal offers us another alternative to Voice!

VAT and automated testing

Hot news right now is that LL is applying VAT to purchases from the EU. I wish they'd posted a notice about this in the official blog; there have been a lot of people wondering if this was a phishing scam. It isn't. LL does has an office in the UK now.

There's some attempt to create a bit of automated testing for LSL. There's currently several areas that aren't tested that would work in this context, so there's room for contributions.

Dreamtime

Ever want to touch the sky? Check these two articles.

I'll be the first one to admit that I'm mostly oblivious to clothes and fashion. I like what I like, and I don't care if that hideous affront to the eyes called legwarmers are "back" or not. But this place has some stunning outfits. I must go shopping.

Who needs a title anyway?

Not a lot to say. I did some vendor errands, uploaded another skin. I'm happy with the gray freebie one, I just need to remember to send it out. I keep forgetting how easy QAvimator is to use. I like the interface on the new ZHAO AO. My apologies to you all - I've been feeling not-social too often lately.

I made an animated bonito treat - after she's eaten all the bonito, my neighbor's cat rolls around on the ground where the flakes were - and that came out rather cute. I haven't done much with the built-in facial animations before this. I put it up for sale, but my email informs me that I forgot to use the proper group tag. :( I intend to fix that tonight.

I dropped a note to the MetaCard address for merchants. If you don't have a card account, and you click on the vendor, it pops up a dialog sending you to their website. *dry tone* This is not in a vendor's best interest. If someone's decided to buy something, the last thing I want is for them to be sent on an adventure across the internet. :P The appropriate place for linking to a website is the "We take Metacard" sign.

Neko spread and vendor interface thoughts.

Had some fun last night corrupting a friend. Well, not really. I'd gotten her thinking about making a neko avatar and she decided it was time to start shopping. She'd also never been to Free Dove, land of freebie clothes/hair/skins before.

I'm still thinking about how to best use the Metacard vendors. I don't like the interface; it is annoying to a shopper who isn't using their card. The first rule of any interface is "Don't get in the way!" So first check to see how the interface behaves with someone who doesn't have an account, then either I'll make a special "metacard" wall on the shop and talk with their tech people, or I'll like the interface a lot more than I do now.

Here's the interface I want to see.

Is the person the owner?
-YES: Enter admin mode.
-NO: Do they have an open line of credit? (not just whether they're registered!)
---YES: Offer to let them buy with the card.
---NO: Let them buy on touch, without the script's interference.
---If you don't get a response back within a reasonable time, assume NO.

EDIT: Okay, the interface is sounding like it works as I'd like for people without a MC account. This makes me happy. What made it messy was the fact I've got a merchant account - I didn't sign up for personal credit and I'm trying to find out how to tell their system to treat me like a non-MC avatar.

Metaplace

The areae people have finally started talking. Metaplace. They've got a mailing list.

Lions and Tigers and Cards Oh My

I haven't posted in far too long. Been messing with neko stuff, goofing off, shopping, and doing RL stuff.

I've got the new male neko skins up over at what I'm calling neon Neko. The striped and spotted ones are up for both genders in black and white, and the female tiger skins also have a gold and an orange version. Stuck in matching tails and ears. Had fun playing with the gimp to make a pic for the shop HUD for the place. Still deciding what I want to do with my older skins - I think I'll keep them as is, but I definitely want to do some siamese style ones with the new tricks I've learned. I've got some gray sample skins up as freebies, and I have to remember to mail copies to Smiley and the OpenSim crowd.

Been watching age verification slowly move onto the grid. Must remember to check with the lady who sells my adult products and find out how she's handling that.

The aditi (beta) grid has been popping up and down. Frustrating when you're doing texture work. Interested in getting status info on the beta grid?

There's someone at MetaCard who's setting up a Neko themed fair for the end of September. IM Minky Mousehold for more information. I've been curious about the card, so I signed up to be a merchant. If you're signing up as a merchant there doesn't seem to be any kind of check on the information you enter. I know this because I wasn't really born in 1917.

The client particle fixes I've been eagerly waiting for is starting to be added to the code! Having to restart my client to see particles has been a pain.

The Deer are Done! and creating urban blight

Note to self: Make sure you're fully awake BEFORE messing with Auto-return. Or any other object land permissions. Yes, I do know how to spout obscenities in more than one language, why do you ask?

The white tailed deer avatars are done and up for sale inworld and on SLX. I went with brown, black, and white. The texture on the brown came out wonderfully - I'm finally getting the hang of making things on the skin layer look like fur.

I had fun dressing up my little neko corner with some spraypaint. Looking for things to decorate it with, I found a wonderful place with a lot of run-down urban freebies. It isn't a look I usually try for, and I'm finding there's a lot to learn to do it well.

Laziness and a Todo list

I got the vendor errands done, and I'm trying a new and lazy tactic: listing one of a set on the online shopping services and including a slurl to my shop. Time will tell if it works. I may go back as I finish lines and include a picture of the entire set to entice people. I like the model; the skull attachment point is available for hair, the ears and tail are separate attachments and their root prims are a tiny orb so it'll be easy for people to add movement scripts. I originally made the white deer with albino pink eyes, but it looks like a demon-deer so I'm going to make them blue or gray instead.

TODO:

More Bambi work - Black and brown skins. The brown one will take a little longer, have to get the white pattern right. Then pics and vending prep. At least I'm getting faster at that part.

Free skins - pick and mod some for OpenSim/TG. I think I'll do something trademarkish on them, maybe a little scar on the bottom of the feet? Not sure yet. I know I want a pair of neko ones available, not sure what else yet.

New male neko skins - I'm having fun making skins, so why not?

Ansche-Mart

The freebie market has been getting steadily stronger the last year. It isn't surprising that someone wants to be the Walmart of SL (cheap goods at cheap prices.) Ansche is strong enough to make it happen.

It is happening. Arguing over whether it is fair is a waste of time. The current rules allow for it, and if Ansche doesn't do it someone else will. Use your time, words, and $L where they will be most effective.

Here's what I'm expecting to see with the introduction of a Walmart to SL.

• Goods offered by independent and small group creators will dramatically go up in quality. They need to differenciate themselves from Ansche-mart, and keep their $L per hour rate up. Niches, branding, and image will become very important.


• New advertising modes for these creators will appear. Fast. If you have an idea for a new advertising service, NOW is the time. Watch the channels Ansche-mart uses; that business model requires large numbers of purchases and that requires being seen and heard. She's already started this in Dreamland, remember the 16M ad plots on her sims?


• The newbie and casual creator end of the market will suffer. Newbies often make a handful of lindens by learning how to create and sell. They're new to it, so the goods they make are usually low quality and involve a high time investment. Cheap goods discourage people from learning to make their own, so long term there'll be a lower percentage of newbies who become high-quality creators.


• Assuming LL ever gets their billing problems fixed, there will be more people buying lindens. Newbies can't easily sell their creations, but they want $L, so they'll have to buy them. Meaning more money flowing thru the linden economy. Long term, this will be a good thing for everyone involved with the economy.


• Cheap and free goods will encourage people who are trying out SL to stay. Cheap goods encourage them to start buying items, getting people over the concept of buying virtual goods.

As an aside, I wonder if the reason furniture was released first is to encourage land buyers and renters? Most avatars have no land, and so no use for furniture. The goods are using animations from someone else so I wonder if there's no skilled animators on staff yet. Quality control is also an issue - the furniture line was first released with full perms accidently on those animations.

Gorgeous Nekos, HTML on a prim, and Looking for Logos

Vint's been getting a lot of enjoyment out of her new skin, and working with her has been a pleasure. Along with the new color-your-own stripe skins, I put up the first of a set of spotted ones last night. Yes, I ignored my list of things to do. *laughs* The newest neko stuff is on a board at the top of the tent in my main shop, and in the back room at Blacklight Club Supply (which is still being renovated.)

oooh.... Here's what's happening with HTML on a Prim! There's a google group for this project too - so please consider talking there instead of overwhelming the poor linden with emails. ;)

The Second Life Bloggers Group needs a logo! And there's a reward, so while your avatar's camping why not spend a little time with your favorite 2D graphics editor?

SLife's Little Details

Put up a handful of new striped neko skins up for sale. I've seen a lot of abandoned urban style building, so I started to rebuild Blacklight in that style. I added the beginnings of a neko shop there, offering the four new skins and a duct tape vest. I'll probably move the build up to 500M or so. There's some kind of stutter happening at the current height that I don't see at ground level, so I suspect it is related to the mysterious doings in my neighbor's tower. I need to finish up skinning for Bambi, and he'll be ready to go. I've been lax putting new things up on SLExchange because I need to update my boxes to the new ones.

TODO:
Offline
- Brown and maybe piebald skins for Bambi
- listings for new stuff on SLX,
- freebie skins
Online
- Update SLX boxes

Skins and Fireworks

Did some skin making this weekend. Learned some new things about working with alpha layers. I rewrote the section on skins in Avatar Toolbox so there's a much better discussion on how to shade and highlight them. I've got plans to make up a couple free ones on png files - OpenSim and the teen grid lack free neko skins.

Saw Marianne's last fireworks show of the summer. It was great! Quite a crowd too.

Finally got around to making a couple of overdue sales pics.