from an unknown stock broker today on ABC nightly news..

the APPLE Broadcasting Corp…. proven by the amount of ipad ouff pieces aired all month…

dont say you werent warned…;)

i guess you never really were a commerical designer before the computer. you have no history of tools beyond Apple Inc. and you just wont allow the “possiblity” that “progress ” isnt the defacto “outcome of process”.

an independent commecial industry never “had to worry about” staedler/letraset/bainbridge/magic marker/ etc moving on and leaving them with no “carreer” every 3-5 years… tool providers where PART of the economy- NOT the ENTIRE economy .

no fools ever gave them such “power” – until the religion of the mac…and those who couldnt really see what technology really is, not what some guru on a junket tells you what it is.

and yes its an old meme, but one you keep failing to grok. or worse- you actaully think youll be at the kings table for every meal….

well, looks like reuben maybe back, feeding at the kingdon. but dont kid yourself and ill post not to allow you to kid others, the system youre OK with… ISNT JUST.

and in the face of the obvious – much that you promote offers the blue pill that others /or yourself keep painting over red.

i guess that IS one sort of commercial “design thinking” — but not the type I find of any “progressive ” value… but as others note– i only live in the past…or so they are being told to think.

If you want to be a human generator in the ecosystem of Apple, you should do so knowing that Apple can move towards extracting more value and leave you behind as a disposable asset if it’s in their interests.

If you want to work on Android instead you can do so, but the rules are less visible and the value proposition might not suit your temperament or the end user market.

I suppose we can imagine a Marxist state in which each contributes according to their ability and is compensated according to their need, remove the ’state actors’ who have motivations that often differ from their constituencies, and live in libertarian bliss because the tools are ours and ours alone.

But there are efficiencies created by those ’state actors’ whether Linden Lab, Apple or Google which, while often mitigated by the down-sides, nonetheless create value.

I’m OK with capitalism. I’m OK with companies who treat consumers, creators or users as part of a value-generating system which can be tracked on P&L statements…and I’m OK with making my own decisions as to whether the value I personally extract is worth the price I pay in risk.

I’m also OK with Marxist ecosystems where appropriate, insofar as they often offer a response to too much aggregation of power….while also accepting that the flow of value is often invisible in those ecosystems, the tribal codes and rules aren’t always published, and power is aggregated in unseen places.

What I certainly agree with is that no one should imagine that any of these systems, platforms or ecosystems is perfect and they need tenacious commentators and thoughtful participants to shed light on the pros and cons, the traps and rewards, while acknowledging that there is progress and not perfection, and that stasis alone would be insufficient to the dynamic of the idea.

great…. reality 101. found.

Now HOW about just admiting that the constantly hacked at-remade- version updated “product-code on a disk” is the VALUE. And that all “us” human generators where just the parts of the money machine, that would be phased out, as soon as one could reach a “virtual consensus” to a buyer of such “green mists”. or vaporous systems…:)

oh wait? did i just let the secret sauce out?;)

OK, so what you’re saying is: apologies (for being snarky). But you’re still wrong. And not only wrong, but the idea of ‘culture’ isn’t “big enough”. So my thinking isn’t specious, it’s just too small.

HAHAHAHA.

Naw, I get it. But I really think you’re missing the larger point I’m making….forget the word culture entirely – what I’m referring to are the characteristics of virtual worlds and Second Life that bind it to a larger purpose or possibility, whether you call that culture, goal, vision or anything else….the affordances of avatar identity or 3D immersive spaces are commonalities between all of these things you call cultures.

Those affordances used to have a sense of priority against that larger design thinking/mission.

If I get rid of the word culture and say that the ‘design interfaces’ for Second Life (which provide an experience for individual user communities) maybe that’s language we can agree on – but what hasn’t become clear is whether those design interfaces are prioritizing merely shopping and the first hour, growth and economics, or some larger vision (which I choose to call culture, but which you might call ‘growth’ or ‘delight’ or ‘community’).

I use the word culture as short form to say that the Second Life I experienced as a user, accessing it through the interfaces I had, communicated to me certain things which I then shared with other users – rezzing a prim, the frustration of lag, the way that groups were organized, anonymity, prim hair.

Whether the “culture” thus presented was good or bad it was still a set of “things” which were shared and common among users.

But what are the shared and common things of the future, what are the priorities, and what are the common values or experiences that you think all Second Life users will share, regardless of what tribe or community they’re in, and what is the philosophical (or more pragmatically, what are the value-drivers) for those shared symbologies?

Anyways – I really need to drop the word culture, I guess. It’s overloaded with unintended meanings now, although I do feel it’s an important lens through which to view future development and evangelism.

In that sense, the idea that any grouping of humans might present as a monoculture is absurd, yes, whether that grouping is Second Life users, Linden Lab staffers or New Yorkers.

An economy based on nature.
An economy based on human virtualizations.
A economy based on machine virtualization

culture comes after economy…after transactions.

There IS a cultural meme runnning the SL experience as directed by people like you and LL… But its not the one the majority of SL users believe they want to be a part of once they experience it enough to truly get it.

And yes, Dusan, that Cultural meme gets reflected in all levels of “Interface” even if its those of seconf level value, like that designed for the humans in the system.;)