And I also agree that in some sense it doesn’t really matter. We oddballs have discovered and fallen in love with the general idea, and we’re not leaving (unless for something even awesomer). I hope LL doesn’t sterilize and ruin SL, but if they do there’s Blue Mars, there’s OpenSim, there’s whatever else comes next. It would be a little harder to move en masse from SL to some nice OpenSim grid than it was to move en masse from Twitter to Plurk but it would be doable if necessary.

And that said, I have a certain amount of faith that they won’t screw it up that way. They’re somewhat conflicted and inattentive and clueless at times, but I think they know where their differentiating UGC bread is buttered…

I’m not proposing that this is what Linden Lab should do or that they’ll achieve it. I’m very much a “on the one hand but on the other hand” kind of person - which means I’m terribly indecisive I suppose.

I believe the Lab is trying to be an alternate way to engage with content. I believe that they may very well be able to achieve developing a platform that is a parallel way to access content, built on the Net but independent from it.

Now, I don’t particularly think this is a great thing - if all we do is look at PowerPoints inside a virtual conference room then let’s just give up now. And surfing within a browser within a 3D world? Why not just, well, browse?

And clearly, as my last posts indicated, Linden Lab is trying to make a social media play, their new web site is all about ‘play’, engagement with other people, with a nod to content creation.

Finally - I’m with you on pitches to enterprise since that’s my work. What I’m waiting for is to bypass virtual meetings (which is a losing proposition frankly) and get into ‘deep collaboration’, innovation and unlocking creativity. And then, moving into data visualization and proper modalities for immersive training.

Finally, my point about humanizing is that they’ve gone too far - all of these PEOPLE doing boring things, and sitting around conference tables - it’s starting to look like Vivaty or Sony Home. In other words, the same as the rest. Which is hardly a competitive position.

I have reviewed a few RFP’s of late, asking for a virtual world build out. The overall theme is that companies are, no shocker here, looking to explore the opportunities for virtual classrooms and meeting spaces. While SL may be comparable to other VR offerings (yes, there are others) with regard to communication over voice and text, it falls way short of other platforms (such as OLIVE) with regard to native support of widely used business office document software, minimal firewall configurations, localized hosting, and a BIG one for business meetings, scheduling conference rooms and sending out notifications.

The humanizing of SL as you put it, in my opinion, only pushes it farther away from being a successful competitor to other VR platforms for business use or farther-fetched, replacing the current http://WWW. But I think LL sees a bigger reward coming from the world of immersive social interaction and game-like qualities rather than trying to replace the web’s fantastic ability to distribute information over thin clients, give content creators full control over their content, and run their choice of web server and content management system. SL as the new web paradigm, no thank you.

I wasn’t aware that Linden Lab was obligated to promote one particular idiosyncratic take on the aesthetics of Second Life over any other. Implying that they ought to by talk of “dirty little secrets” is only *tactically* different from some day old alt screaming about “serious business” and killing your chickens. It’s fascistic.

Verisimilitude isn’t the enemy of art; no, I have a far more likely candidate in mind.

I have to say….I show enterprise SL, and the Immersive Workspace meeting rooms, and the stage at Metanomics….and they’re GORGEOUS (of course!) but then I show them Eshi’s spider nest meeting room and they go WOW. So maybe all this packaging is just, hmmm, eye candy that preps them for the real meal.

@Tateru - you know, I really should be more careful with that term. What the Lab gave us was a general map of what they’re trying to do and how, some tools and tech that they may or may not launch…and that is NOT a road map. So I’m totally with you.

BTW - I’m willing to bet that mesh imports aren’t coming any time soon. “might be/some day/don’t know when if ever” is hardly a road map.

Media on a prim, I think they’ll do - it’s way too enterprise friendly.

And what is an ice cream headache? Is that Canadian for “brain freeze?”

But to the point that I most care about. Is Linden Lab moving far aawway from that which is Not Possible IRL? Hell yes. But guess what? What they do in that regard doesn’t matter anymore, because thousands of people in a lot of the right places DO care. Can you imagine Lewis PR calling up a media outlet to pitch NPIRL content? They wouldn’t know it if it hit them in the face, much less understand it enough to sell the concept. The dirty little secret is that most Lindens and their PR agency don’t grasp the Not Possible IRL aspect of Second Life.

For the most part, Lindens are not artists, nor do they understand art. The creative types have been shown the door. Today, LL is predominantly peopled with suits and geeks. But that’s okay! They will do their job and in doing so, enable us to do ours.