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BBC Program Broadcasts From Second Life

Posted by Zonk on from the live-from-nowhere dept.

Via GameSetWatch, the word that BBC program Newsnight recently broadcast live from the virtual world Second Life. The broadcast included a lead-in shot on a backdrop designed to emulate the real-life Newsnight set. From the article: "Because the virtual money inside Second Life is convertible to US dollars, and people who make things can keep the intellectual property, it is possible to run a real life business inside the game. I got in touch with Cory Edo - real name Sara Van Gorden - who runs a business in Second Life designing avatars - the idealised 3D personas that people use as their online identities."

25 comments

  1. not trying to troll, but... by aapold · · Score: 2, Informative

    how can a game with so few subscribers get this much coverage? It gets more articles than just about anything other than WOW, and even that is close.

    MMOGCHART.COM's most recent chart puts the subscriber base at 30,000. Second Life's own website claims 100,000, which at the time I write this (5:18 pm EST) claiming about 3700 online at this moment, which is about the number of players standing around in WOW's ironforge on a typical night on any given server. I tried second life during a trial period and the thing seemed more like still life than second life. I guess I'm asking a rhetorical question, it seems like someone would like to get more attention for it so it could do well, not necessarily anything sinister in that, but there just doesn't seem much interest here...

    --
    "Waste not one watt!" - CZ
    1. Re:not trying to troll, but... by Dave2+Wickham · · Score: 2, Informative

      Because SL is not really a game. There are no goals. It's not like MMORPGs like WoW or CoH - almost all of the content is user-created, and users just do what they want to. This concept is what interests people. They don't care that WoW has loads of players, and SL has a relatively small number, it's still just another MMORPG. SL is different.

      In terms of there being nobody active, that completely depends where you are. Sims (squares of the map, each ran by its own server) that are relatively new are likely to have nowhere near the population of more popular areas - after all, there is a huge amount of space for a relatively small number of "players".

      (Apologies for any difficulties in understanding this post, I am knackered.)

    2. Re:not trying to troll, but... by Gwala · · Score: 2, Informative

      It's grown 70,000 in the last 6 months. MMOCHART is out of date at the moment.

      --
      #!/bin/csh cat $0
    3. Re:not trying to troll, but... by Thing+1 · · Score: 1
      Sims (squares of the map, each ran by its own server) that are relatively new are likely to have nowhere near the population of more popular areas [...]

      Hey, thanks for that insight: "popular" and "population" have the same root! (I love language.)

      --
      I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
    4. Re:not trying to troll, but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      how can a game with so few subscribers get this much coverage? It gets more articles than just about anything other than WOW, and even that is close.
      Posting anonymously here because the real answer -sounds- like a troll, but isn't.

      Because Second Life is mostly about netsex, and furry sex. Seriously -- most MMORPG's don't have no-brainer mods to let your character look like something you drew, and most are goal oriented. SL has become more of the next gen for the MUCKs and TinyMUD social groups.

      (Do your worst, mods, but it's the truth.)
  2. Re:Saw this already... by vertinox · · Score: 1

    It's called "UO", "AC" and "EQ". How is this news?

    Can you create your own 3d models and upload them to the server?

    This game is quite different from all you mentioned. Its more like the ultimate sandbox.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Life

    --
    "I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
    -Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
  3. 3 questions by heavy+snowfall · · Score: 3, Interesting

    - What's the exchange rate?

    - Does the dev studio exhange this money for you or do you have to sell it ala WOW?

    - I guess you don't go around killing monsters that drop GP in this game.. right?

    1. Re:3 questions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Exchange rate is about $250 Lindens/ per $1 US dollar - usually by paypal or cc . it fluxuates based on who's selling - it's a market system for users maintained by Linden, but there's also a third-party system that Linden speaks good words of, linked from the main site, too. There are many games within games built by users ... they even have dev competitions devoted to such things - for the killing monsters and GP in this one, go to DarkLife, or look it up. There are others in the works, and a sports one, called Jetball - something akin to lacrosse and UT Bomber's Run, I believe ... There's many many more ...

    2. Re:3 questions by Dave2+Wickham · · Score: 1

      Buying/selling L$ is either through 3rd parties directly, or by using the LindeX, which is a sort of central marketplace provided by Linden Lab. The current exchange rate quoted to me is 1 USD = L$267.

      Money is earned or won; you can play in casinos, for example, or you can create content and sell copies of it. Content is created using an in-game model editor, and a scripting language called Linden Scripting Language (though they are moving to Mono; I'm not sure how this will affect it).

    3. Re:3 questions by patio11 · · Score: 1

      It should be mentioned that there are no foozles to kill to earn money, unless someone programs a section of The Grid to have money-dispensing foozles. Its real money you're playing with, so if you decide to buy a shirt for $.50 it actually cost somebody, somewhere fifty cents.

      --
      Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
    4. Re:3 questions by slashrogue · · Score: 1

      Originally players put together an exchange site, but now the company itself handles the money exchange. If you go to secondlife.com it looks like you have to log in to access that part of the site, so I don't know what the exchange rate is.

  4. Second Life by Digital+Vomit · · Score: 4, Funny
    I'd try out the game, but I fear I don't meet the minimum requirements.

    *rimshot*

    *chirp*

    *chirp*

    Get it? Second life? Get it? i.e. I don't have a life?

    *chirp*

    *chirp*

    Oh you can all go to hell!

    --
    Modern copyright is theft of culture from everyone and it retards the progress of the useful arts and sciences.
    1. Re:Second Life by mindaktiviti · · Score: 1

      I don't know what's more funny, the presentation of that joke, or the fact that I laughed at it in the first place.

  5. Portal by HTH+NE1 · · Score: 1

    Any updates from the Second Life newsdesk on Dave and The Hub?

    --
    Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
  6. Money by BlueFiberOptics · · Score: 1

    I'm under the impression that you cannot build a house, create objects, clothing without investing real money into the game. You have to pay Second Life money in order to upload TEXTURES. And a monthly fee if you want to own a house on land. Can someone explain why this is worth paying a monthly fee every month? Don't get me wrong, I think Second Life is an interesting concept.

    1. Re:Money by QuantumG · · Score: 1

      You can play the game without owning land. You can even make money. Why would you want to own land and pay a monthly fee for it then? For the same people want to own houses and pay rent/taxes on it: somewhere to put all your shit and entertain people.

      --
      How we know is more important than what we know.
    2. Re:Money by Gwala · · Score: 1

      The small upload charge (1/26th of a dollar per upload after exchange rate calculations) prevents the tragedy of the commons.

      There is 10 terabytes of content at the moment on the asset system, growing at 1.5% per day. Remove the charge and that verywell could speed up faster than the developers could ever hope to put up enough new storage units to compensate for.

      Upload fees are usually well within the free weekly stipend though; if you want to upload a lot, then yes, you probably will have to pay a little bit.

      --
      #!/bin/csh cat $0
    3. Re:Money by Geoffreyerffoeg · · Score: 1

      One good reason is that you can more easily sell stuff on your land than in malls (and I can't see how you'd sell services like arcades and stuff on someone else's land), and if you're any good and you're dedicated you can easily make enough much money back.

  7. Second Life still sorely lacks UI scripting by QuantumG · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Second Life is continually toted as a great platform for casual game developers to create interesting creations and, in fact, many games have been made in Second Life and the modelling and scripting available to every player is remarkably flexible. However, what is sorely lacking is the ability to script the UI aspects of a game. I read early last year that "viewer overlays" are currently under development, but to date there has been no progress. Without the ability to script the UI the kinds of games you can make in Second Life will remain limited to poor resolution puzzle games and gambling trivialities. With the ability to script the UI the possibilities suddenly become unlimited.

    Another limitation of the current system is the third party tools required to make animations. These tools are expensive and/or hard to use. Building an animation editor into the game would make player interactions so much richer and encourage the creation of games that can utilize such richness (like fighting games).

    --
    How we know is more important than what we know.
    1. Re:Second Life still sorely lacks UI scripting by eggstasy · · Score: 1

      This isn't true anymore, you can already build great UIs with the new HUD attachment point. You attach an object to "HUD" instead of your arm or leg, it's only visible to you. Guy I know is even building his own window manager.
      When were you last on? Animations abound everywhere, and if you think Poser's hard to figure out, maybe you should just hire someone. That's usually how things get done in SL - as a team. Great way to network.

    2. Re:Second Life still sorely lacks UI scripting by Reapy · · Score: 1

      Avi interaction still sucks. You have to both sit on the poseball, and then everybodies avatars have different arm lengths, body masses, heights, and whatever else. There is no way to make an animation match up consistatly with another. You can't even shake hands consistantly with another avi.

      On top of this, some of the dancing animations people have that use poseballs, still don't work that well due to lag. The animis just start at different times, or get loaded at different times, and there is no sync at all.

      The hud ui stuff is very slow and laggy. It is like having a prim shoved up in your face that only you can do. So you can only do the things you could do on the faces of blocks before.

      Overall, sl is pretty cool, but still has a long way to go. I think that if they focused on avi interaction, sl would grow leaps and bounds. It would bring in a lot more people who want to buy and exist in the world, who would support the people who want to build and sell, and it would just make the place a lot more interesting and varied.

      Still, as I said, sl is a cool model with lots of potential.

  8. The long view. by DaveKap · · Score: 1

    In the very very long run, Second Life is actually supposed to be the platform that extends, if not replaces, the current "world wide web" as we know it. Think "metaverse" ala Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash". It's what Activeworlds tried to do but didn't really pick up as much momentum. Of course, I mean "very very" emphatically since it's going to take a lot of work to get that far. However, anyone who has been around since the beta of Second Life (a little over 3 years ago) can attest to the incredible amount of growth, innovation, and evolution that has occured. Top it off with a company that runs itself like Google (only with less "take over the world" attitude) and it becomes obvious why the press coverage is so huge.