The Vagina Monologues are coming to Second Life!
For almost ten years V-Day has been working to stop violence against women and girls all over the world. V-Day’s model of ‘empowerment philanthropy’ has been a catalyst for activists, college students, anti-violence organizations and vagina warriors to transform their own communities in more than 112 countries worldwide.
The VDay group, under the leadership of ToryLynn Writer, and with assistance from members of SLiterary, Inksters, Act Up, and the Written Word, is producing Eve Ensler's "The Vagina Monologues" in Second Life. Created as a strong voice against female victimization and abuse, this Obie Award winning play has received world wide acclaim. It brings together women and girls (and the men who love them) to talk about the most sensitive parts of female anatomy in thoughtful and funny monologues and discussions.
Performances Feb 23 at 2:30PM and 7:00PM, Admission L$100, location TBA
This is a fundraiser for VDay 2008 Worldwide Campaign. We will also be setting out donation boxes - any donations are greatly appreciated and all will go to the VDay Campaign. More information is at http://www.vday.org
We need volunteers to help with publicity, security, SL sound tech, stage hands, stage managers, and scene voice directors.
Please join the VDay group, then see the notices section to get notecards for more information. Contact ToryLynn Writer, Calliope Delgado, Lauren Weyland or Ada Radius for more information.
ACTRESSES (must have female voice):
Auditions for actresses: Jan 5, 11:00 - 12:30
Join the VDay group and get audition pieces from the Notices tab
Actress callbacks: Jan 12 location TBA
Casting and distribute parts Jan 15
Actresses off-book: Feb 5
Rehearsals: Feb 5 - Feb 22
Producer: ToryLynn Writer
Director: Calliope Delgado
Specialized Omnigendered Spirit: Lauren Weyland
Administration: Ada Radius
Any of these avatars are available for interviews.
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Vagina Monologues in SL
City On The Edge of Forever 3
Time to make some predictions. The first one in the spirit of Mean Girls is that by the end of 2008 everyone will own two strip clubs, both will lose money.
The second one is serious: by the end of 2008, I will be out of escorting. One of my running themes has been how rl is coming to sl. This is underlined by a club I've been invited to audition for, it is owned by an rl porn star. The managers are all top talent, with good reputations in second life, and they know what they are doing. Other elements of this new club, which I don't know if I can mention the name of yet, point to success. They will offer premium cyber dancing and vox services. But what it also points to is the coming of rl to second life. Sooner or later, the IRS and others, especially in these "immigration" obsessed times, are going to require that rl businesses here declare where their employees are from, and all of the things that go with that, such as proof of eligibility to work, are going to come with that.
This means that sl escorting is going to divide into three parts: rl establishments, with rl verified people eventually having to pay rl rates, the really dark escorting which is outside of what rl establishments will touch, and the cheapest hobbyist rates. I'm not opposed to the evolution itself, even though it means the end of my time as an escort. That was always coming, I don't do sex work rl, and like any escorts on sl, and many people involved in the direct sex industry generally, my rl and my sl are not on speaking terms about this. Eventually for SL to grow people have to make enough money here to pay for the time invested, and the people who do, are going to have to be more integrated rl and sl.
One sign of this is that the number of escorts in second life is dropping. Not because heterogendered escorts are stopping, which was the chatter around voice, but because being a second life escort who charges even 500L :15 is becoming a more expensive proposition. The new club, as it should, requires photo real skins and other accessories. It also requires that you use sex parts from their partner, who is not xcite, which means even experienced escorts will have to pay 1000L or more just to be able to work there. The division between being able to do this, and not, is going to get wider. The days when escorting was a walk in way of earning 20K a week, are ending fast, except for people with real talent for escorting.
This has been noticed by places that sell ad signs, I see many many empty slots, where before I saw none, and the number of places that have large escort ad walls is dropping. This has not been bad for individual escorts already in the trade, because there is less competition, but it has been bad for clubs that focus on this as their model for creating revenue and traffic. It is only a matter of time before rl sex businesses come into sl, and learn to dominate the trade. One reason for this is the plummeting sales of DVDs. Before Virtual Sex as marginalia, now it is an area of potential growth, but the model that will make money is vox + virtual. I've been there for months now, and while cyber pays for pixels, it is vox that generates a strong hit of real money quickly.
Again, this was coming for some time, and the slow turning of old sl into new sl is something that observers have been watching. When it comes down to it, I am not an rl sex worker, and many others aren't either. That doesn't mean this will disappear, but it will be like Geisha in Japan, a connection to an older world which is a thin shell. SL sex isn't going to go away either, in fact the indirect sex industry should grow strongly. Selling sex beds does not cause problems with your rl. Using them for money does. This is not fair, but it is also Real Life.
The new club is more restrictive than most clubs, and has to be, it also pays lower cyber wages than I can make escorting. It pays much better vox rates. It also, as many have known for some time, will have its own regapi and people will be driven from the websites to Second Life. It's a combination that many have drooled over, but it takes money to play in that world.
But the bottom line is that within a year, even if you are working outside of one of the RL based clubs, being employed by one is going to be a sign that you are "real." With the huge number of people willing to post amateur porn on the web for low amounts of money, it is not hard to see that this will be the future of escorting in Second Life for "vanilla" sex.
The second layer of SL will be the BDSM and hard core sorts of escorting. These are activities that the rl sex businesses will want to avoid, especially scat, dolcett, pain and transformations. While eventually RL businesses will fill this niche, there is a great deal less drive to "realize" them and their participants. The participants care less that they are talking to a real barely legal hottie, and the reputation is something that rl businesses are going to be more careful about. But I get "farm cutties" emails into my spam folder, so even this will eventually be networked into the porn empires.
My own view of pornography is that like spirituality, it is best when left unorganized, but it never stays that way for very long. Playboy flopped, because it was not willing to, as Ten Book put it, "take the rectal temperature of Second Life." This new club is much closer to doing that, and offers an exclusivity and understanding of Second Life that Playboy did not. I have not seen the build yet, so I am not sure whether it will be as good, but we will see. So far they seem to know what they are doing and are making all the right moves by recruiting through the grape vine for the best.
The last layer will be cumslutting: the people with a whore fantasy and the men who want to play with them, hoping that the whore fantasy can be made real and in the flesh. About this I can't really comment, except to say that it will flood out, as it is flooding, the layer above it. Every freelancing club I work at has poacher waves now, and it is getting worse.
Like the end of gambling, this isn't good or bad in itself. Many people have gained a great deal by doing this, including people who are very important in second life. The sex trade has driven the platform, because it is people who have to see particular things who are willing to spend hours working through the intricacies of second life to get it. But that time is ending.
You'll still be able to haunt the corners of second life, and find cyber escorts who don't make this their real life, but increasingly the money will be from people who signed up with a credit card, and have particular fantasy expectations. One of those will be that he can prove himself the king of all cocksman to the girl he is talking to, get her rl phone number, and "make the meet." 50 year old married women need not apply.
If this is to be a net positive for Second Life prices need to drop for land and sims. That way with less pressure to earn, there is less reason to do anything it takes. The other is that work of other kinds needs to pay more. I think both will happen. The real problem in Second Life is scalability: with limits on grid growth, LL has to charge more per simulator and square meter. If Second Life could grow explosively, then it could become a commodity.
Right now the business model in sl is to find something people will do as a hobby, and make money form their hobby. The future in Second Life is to finally actually be a metaverse. Things done here have to ripple out into real life so that businesses see that spending a dollar here means saving or earning two dollars out there. As yet, this is hobbled by the poor connectivity of second life to the web. This is also a matter of cost: tier plus an outside web server is a great deal to pay for an ordinary person.
The other thing we are going to see a wave of is a more high powered version of "reap the newbies." The new search's basic problem is that it is a "pay for play" system, with classified ad revenue being more important than virtually anything else. I have visited several places that advertise heavily. Most are not good. One I went to sells no copy skins. No avatar in her right mind buys a no copy skin. Another, while it has high quality skins, sells them all in bundles at 4000L. A third has a restrictive license agreement, which is probably not enforceable, but to not have it enforced means not being quasi-anonymous by going to court to prove it. Those are the good ones, the bad ones sell lower quality skins at full prices. I can certainly understand someone buying Raspberry and Cow content: it's good. I cannot understand people paying 1700L for a Soul No Copy skin.
At the same time real content quality is going up. Sculptie shoes are nothing short of a revolution, and within many sections of sl, the old blingers that we all wore back in May, are just out. This is good. Really good. (clicks her shiny things heels together)
So what about me. In my time escorting I have learned more about human sexuality than I thought possible to learn. Within that time I've gotten established on second life. But the wave that was just a whisper in April when I started, is a growing moan on the winds, whose salt spray I can taste on my lips. The building, the novels, the other things, will have to sustain me, or Lillie will fade, and her player will go back to her Real Life, and look for the next wave to try and catch.
It's that simple: rl is coming to sl. That means RL money, but also RL identity for more and more people. Those established will be able to avoid some of this, because the cost for rl identity will not be attached to what they need, and having proven themselves in SL, they will be abl to make reputation here their calling card. But somethings are going to be out. Escorting as it was, is clearly one of them. At least I hope so. I'd much rather make money building my sculptures and other things, because in the end, that can be my RL. There would be no problem in my first life if I were Lillie Yifu, virtual artist.
What drives this is two essential points. The first is that our avatars are going to be more intimately ourselves. The second is that the advantages for begin established, particularly simply being first, are going to grow and accumulate, when even Stroker needs to have partners to sell sex parts, then you know that the walls to entry are going up, and the time of the maverick developer here is going to enter a new phase.
The second one is serious: by the end of 2008, I will be out of escorting. One of my running themes has been how rl is coming to sl. This is underlined by a club I've been invited to audition for, it is owned by an rl porn star. The managers are all top talent, with good reputations in second life, and they know what they are doing. Other elements of this new club, which I don't know if I can mention the name of yet, point to success. They will offer premium cyber dancing and vox services. But what it also points to is the coming of rl to second life. Sooner or later, the IRS and others, especially in these "immigration" obsessed times, are going to require that rl businesses here declare where their employees are from, and all of the things that go with that, such as proof of eligibility to work, are going to come with that.
This means that sl escorting is going to divide into three parts: rl establishments, with rl verified people eventually having to pay rl rates, the really dark escorting which is outside of what rl establishments will touch, and the cheapest hobbyist rates. I'm not opposed to the evolution itself, even though it means the end of my time as an escort. That was always coming, I don't do sex work rl, and like any escorts on sl, and many people involved in the direct sex industry generally, my rl and my sl are not on speaking terms about this. Eventually for SL to grow people have to make enough money here to pay for the time invested, and the people who do, are going to have to be more integrated rl and sl.
One sign of this is that the number of escorts in second life is dropping. Not because heterogendered escorts are stopping, which was the chatter around voice, but because being a second life escort who charges even 500L :15 is becoming a more expensive proposition. The new club, as it should, requires photo real skins and other accessories. It also requires that you use sex parts from their partner, who is not xcite, which means even experienced escorts will have to pay 1000L or more just to be able to work there. The division between being able to do this, and not, is going to get wider. The days when escorting was a walk in way of earning 20K a week, are ending fast, except for people with real talent for escorting.
This has been noticed by places that sell ad signs, I see many many empty slots, where before I saw none, and the number of places that have large escort ad walls is dropping. This has not been bad for individual escorts already in the trade, because there is less competition, but it has been bad for clubs that focus on this as their model for creating revenue and traffic. It is only a matter of time before rl sex businesses come into sl, and learn to dominate the trade. One reason for this is the plummeting sales of DVDs. Before Virtual Sex as marginalia, now it is an area of potential growth, but the model that will make money is vox + virtual. I've been there for months now, and while cyber pays for pixels, it is vox that generates a strong hit of real money quickly.
Again, this was coming for some time, and the slow turning of old sl into new sl is something that observers have been watching. When it comes down to it, I am not an rl sex worker, and many others aren't either. That doesn't mean this will disappear, but it will be like Geisha in Japan, a connection to an older world which is a thin shell. SL sex isn't going to go away either, in fact the indirect sex industry should grow strongly. Selling sex beds does not cause problems with your rl. Using them for money does. This is not fair, but it is also Real Life.
The new club is more restrictive than most clubs, and has to be, it also pays lower cyber wages than I can make escorting. It pays much better vox rates. It also, as many have known for some time, will have its own regapi and people will be driven from the websites to Second Life. It's a combination that many have drooled over, but it takes money to play in that world.
But the bottom line is that within a year, even if you are working outside of one of the RL based clubs, being employed by one is going to be a sign that you are "real." With the huge number of people willing to post amateur porn on the web for low amounts of money, it is not hard to see that this will be the future of escorting in Second Life for "vanilla" sex.
The second layer of SL will be the BDSM and hard core sorts of escorting. These are activities that the rl sex businesses will want to avoid, especially scat, dolcett, pain and transformations. While eventually RL businesses will fill this niche, there is a great deal less drive to "realize" them and their participants. The participants care less that they are talking to a real barely legal hottie, and the reputation is something that rl businesses are going to be more careful about. But I get "farm cutties" emails into my spam folder, so even this will eventually be networked into the porn empires.
My own view of pornography is that like spirituality, it is best when left unorganized, but it never stays that way for very long. Playboy flopped, because it was not willing to, as Ten Book put it, "take the rectal temperature of Second Life." This new club is much closer to doing that, and offers an exclusivity and understanding of Second Life that Playboy did not. I have not seen the build yet, so I am not sure whether it will be as good, but we will see. So far they seem to know what they are doing and are making all the right moves by recruiting through the grape vine for the best.
The last layer will be cumslutting: the people with a whore fantasy and the men who want to play with them, hoping that the whore fantasy can be made real and in the flesh. About this I can't really comment, except to say that it will flood out, as it is flooding, the layer above it. Every freelancing club I work at has poacher waves now, and it is getting worse.
Like the end of gambling, this isn't good or bad in itself. Many people have gained a great deal by doing this, including people who are very important in second life. The sex trade has driven the platform, because it is people who have to see particular things who are willing to spend hours working through the intricacies of second life to get it. But that time is ending.
You'll still be able to haunt the corners of second life, and find cyber escorts who don't make this their real life, but increasingly the money will be from people who signed up with a credit card, and have particular fantasy expectations. One of those will be that he can prove himself the king of all cocksman to the girl he is talking to, get her rl phone number, and "make the meet." 50 year old married women need not apply.
If this is to be a net positive for Second Life prices need to drop for land and sims. That way with less pressure to earn, there is less reason to do anything it takes. The other is that work of other kinds needs to pay more. I think both will happen. The real problem in Second Life is scalability: with limits on grid growth, LL has to charge more per simulator and square meter. If Second Life could grow explosively, then it could become a commodity.
Right now the business model in sl is to find something people will do as a hobby, and make money form their hobby. The future in Second Life is to finally actually be a metaverse. Things done here have to ripple out into real life so that businesses see that spending a dollar here means saving or earning two dollars out there. As yet, this is hobbled by the poor connectivity of second life to the web. This is also a matter of cost: tier plus an outside web server is a great deal to pay for an ordinary person.
The other thing we are going to see a wave of is a more high powered version of "reap the newbies." The new search's basic problem is that it is a "pay for play" system, with classified ad revenue being more important than virtually anything else. I have visited several places that advertise heavily. Most are not good. One I went to sells no copy skins. No avatar in her right mind buys a no copy skin. Another, while it has high quality skins, sells them all in bundles at 4000L. A third has a restrictive license agreement, which is probably not enforceable, but to not have it enforced means not being quasi-anonymous by going to court to prove it. Those are the good ones, the bad ones sell lower quality skins at full prices. I can certainly understand someone buying Raspberry and Cow content: it's good. I cannot understand people paying 1700L for a Soul No Copy skin.
At the same time real content quality is going up. Sculptie shoes are nothing short of a revolution, and within many sections of sl, the old blingers that we all wore back in May, are just out. This is good. Really good. (clicks her shiny things heels together)
So what about me. In my time escorting I have learned more about human sexuality than I thought possible to learn. Within that time I've gotten established on second life. But the wave that was just a whisper in April when I started, is a growing moan on the winds, whose salt spray I can taste on my lips. The building, the novels, the other things, will have to sustain me, or Lillie will fade, and her player will go back to her Real Life, and look for the next wave to try and catch.
It's that simple: rl is coming to sl. That means RL money, but also RL identity for more and more people. Those established will be able to avoid some of this, because the cost for rl identity will not be attached to what they need, and having proven themselves in SL, they will be abl to make reputation here their calling card. But somethings are going to be out. Escorting as it was, is clearly one of them. At least I hope so. I'd much rather make money building my sculptures and other things, because in the end, that can be my RL. There would be no problem in my first life if I were Lillie Yifu, virtual artist.
What drives this is two essential points. The first is that our avatars are going to be more intimately ourselves. The second is that the advantages for begin established, particularly simply being first, are going to grow and accumulate, when even Stroker needs to have partners to sell sex parts, then you know that the walls to entry are going up, and the time of the maverick developer here is going to enter a new phase.
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Second Live and Sex Slavery
I spent some time hanging out at my favorite place to laugh at people... the explodingly popular red light district. It is filled with the people who are the most pathetic on SL: people trying to use SL as a place to fulfill really stupid real life fantasies. One guy wanted an rl girl to be in his rl car as he crashed it. Another IM'ed me to work as a free hooker at a party he was charging for. An rl party.
One girl was begging to do anything at 100L. During an hour I saw only one hook up take place. And yet, the Red Light District is spawning its usual wave of whores who go to the rest of SL and wonder why everyone isn't charging 50L :15.
Let's add this up.
A full sex bed costs 25K Linden. At 200L an hour, that is 150 hours of whoring. At the rates I was seeing hook ups, that comes to umm... a year.
Let's talk about what it costs to be a beauty on SL.
Skin set: 4000L for RAC, Backstage or other top quality skin set.
Hair sets: 300L each, about 8 will do. 2400L
Shape: 500L, even if you later do your own.
Shoes: 300-400L per set, at least 5 sets. 1750L
Outfits, I own over 100. But let us pare that down to a mere 40 at 800L average apiece. 32K.
Tools and assorted other needful things come to about 2000L. AO's for example.
A 4000M plot is, at minimum mainland prices, 32K.
Assorted other furniture and dance balls runs another 5K.
Xcite parts run 3K for a full set.
Let's add this up. A top quality escort has a base cost of 110K. That is about 400USD. Tier runs at about 30USD a month for this, plus 8USD a month for membership if she does not belong to a land group. Buying island will come to a bit more, even without the membership.
To earn 100K base back at 100L, would mean 400 hours of escorting. If done 20 hours a week at the usual 2 to 1 rate I was seeing, that is two hours of standing around for 1 hour of work, that is 7 hours of escorting, which is 2800L a week. Since tier runs 10K a month for this, our hobbyist nets 1200L a month to pay back costs, or almost 2 years of escorting. But by then many of those items will be outdated and need to be replaced all over again. So , even if you are a whore nympho, there is no way to even break even at the escorting rates that the red light district supports. This presumes that our hobbyist has a full time rl job.
And yet the men there see me, and expect me to fall in with that price line, provide rl pictures, and do cam for free. And they complain about the newbie haired girls.
And yet this is exploding in terms of traffic.
What this tells me is that there is an undercurrent of violent hatred in our society, not just in the US. This is confirmed to me by how many people who say they want professional relationships act, with violent abusive insults being the order of the day in many quarters.
Second Life's economy is going to bifurcate. Hobbyists are going to be driven down to piracy wages. The only way to get quality content at those rates is to steal it. I should check if the pirated hair is still for sale. More over, there is a strange double standard. The people who built that sim sold it for 50000 USD. So LL is allowed to make money selling places for sex, that is rl money, enough to pay bills with. The sim builders are. The content providers are. And yet the women actually doing the service, charging? Outrage!
There is a word for people who are supposed to work for free while others profit. Slaves.
One girl was begging to do anything at 100L. During an hour I saw only one hook up take place. And yet, the Red Light District is spawning its usual wave of whores who go to the rest of SL and wonder why everyone isn't charging 50L :15.
Let's add this up.
A full sex bed costs 25K Linden. At 200L an hour, that is 150 hours of whoring. At the rates I was seeing hook ups, that comes to umm... a year.
Let's talk about what it costs to be a beauty on SL.
Skin set: 4000L for RAC, Backstage or other top quality skin set.
Hair sets: 300L each, about 8 will do. 2400L
Shape: 500L, even if you later do your own.
Shoes: 300-400L per set, at least 5 sets. 1750L
Outfits, I own over 100. But let us pare that down to a mere 40 at 800L average apiece. 32K.
Tools and assorted other needful things come to about 2000L. AO's for example.
A 4000M plot is, at minimum mainland prices, 32K.
Assorted other furniture and dance balls runs another 5K.
Xcite parts run 3K for a full set.
Let's add this up. A top quality escort has a base cost of 110K. That is about 400USD. Tier runs at about 30USD a month for this, plus 8USD a month for membership if she does not belong to a land group. Buying island will come to a bit more, even without the membership.
To earn 100K base back at 100L, would mean 400 hours of escorting. If done 20 hours a week at the usual 2 to 1 rate I was seeing, that is two hours of standing around for 1 hour of work, that is 7 hours of escorting, which is 2800L a week. Since tier runs 10K a month for this, our hobbyist nets 1200L a month to pay back costs, or almost 2 years of escorting. But by then many of those items will be outdated and need to be replaced all over again. So , even if you are a whore nympho, there is no way to even break even at the escorting rates that the red light district supports. This presumes that our hobbyist has a full time rl job.
And yet the men there see me, and expect me to fall in with that price line, provide rl pictures, and do cam for free. And they complain about the newbie haired girls.
And yet this is exploding in terms of traffic.
What this tells me is that there is an undercurrent of violent hatred in our society, not just in the US. This is confirmed to me by how many people who say they want professional relationships act, with violent abusive insults being the order of the day in many quarters.
Second Life's economy is going to bifurcate. Hobbyists are going to be driven down to piracy wages. The only way to get quality content at those rates is to steal it. I should check if the pirated hair is still for sale. More over, there is a strange double standard. The people who built that sim sold it for 50000 USD. So LL is allowed to make money selling places for sex, that is rl money, enough to pay bills with. The sim builders are. The content providers are. And yet the women actually doing the service, charging? Outrage!
There is a word for people who are supposed to work for free while others profit. Slaves.
Friday, December 21, 2007
WTO Rules that US Illegally blocked online gambling
Also gives an unusual form of compensation to Antigua.
Will online gambling return to SL? The answer lies not in government interference, since online gambling is allowed in the US, but in the credit card companies and in a VR company willing to deal with the problems that gambling creates, such as crooked machines.
Do I miss the gambling days? Yes. Am I glad gambling is gone from sl? Yes.
That's not a contradiction, it is the admission that we had a chance and let it slip through our fingers....
Will online gambling return to SL? The answer lies not in government interference, since online gambling is allowed in the US, but in the credit card companies and in a VR company willing to deal with the problems that gambling creates, such as crooked machines.
Do I miss the gambling days? Yes. Am I glad gambling is gone from sl? Yes.
That's not a contradiction, it is the admission that we had a chance and let it slip through our fingers....
The Naughty Nine
I am in a quiz mode today I guess. A friend admitted she wanted to have sl sex with me, and I thought, don't we all have our list? So why not put in a bit of order....
Name the avatar that you would most like to have sl sex with for.....
1. Their av.
2. Their mind.
3. Their poetic/mystical/creative spirit.
4. Their social success/success in sl.
5. Their libido, that is the thing they seem to want to do from how they talk and act.
6. Want to go against type for you. That is, if they are normally a top, you would want them to be your bottom, if they are straight and your same sl gender...
7. You would go against type for.
8. You would most want to do a nothing-but-sex week with, who you are not currently having sl sex with.
9. Threesome, which two. They don't have to be from the above list, but can be.
The tenth question:
"The forbidden," the one that, you'd like to publicly confess to, but the consequences would be toooooo awful. Examples would be your best friend's partner, a professional contact, someone you know rl who is here... Someone who you want, but have never been able to confess it too. Don't post... Just answer with whether they are online right at the moment that you post your answer.
Here is mine:
1. Dirk Talamasca
2. Jason Stardust or Vint Falken, depends on the day.
3. Voodoo Buwan
4. Hamlet Au.
5. TJj69 Benelli
6. Gwyneth Llewelyn. Sooo many ways: doesn't do sl sex, rl partnered, presents as straight.
7. Brandy Xeno.
8. (my forbidden, no question about it.)
9. Vint and TJ. Maybe Jason and TJ.
10. Yes.
And let's see, I am going to tag.......
Kitty, Veryon,Queen of Spain (our fingers are crossed...),Elusyve and Vint.
Veryon tagged Tiessa...
Vint tagged Evans, who talks about this isn't the way he likes to drive.
Soph gives us some hot hot hot answers...
Name the avatar that you would most like to have sl sex with for.....
1. Their av.
2. Their mind.
3. Their poetic/mystical/creative spirit.
4. Their social success/success in sl.
5. Their libido, that is the thing they seem to want to do from how they talk and act.
6. Want to go against type for you. That is, if they are normally a top, you would want them to be your bottom, if they are straight and your same sl gender...
7. You would go against type for.
8. You would most want to do a nothing-but-sex week with, who you are not currently having sl sex with.
9. Threesome, which two. They don't have to be from the above list, but can be.
The tenth question:
"The forbidden," the one that, you'd like to publicly confess to, but the consequences would be toooooo awful. Examples would be your best friend's partner, a professional contact, someone you know rl who is here... Someone who you want, but have never been able to confess it too. Don't post... Just answer with whether they are online right at the moment that you post your answer.
Here is mine:
1. Dirk Talamasca
2. Jason Stardust or Vint Falken, depends on the day.
3. Voodoo Buwan
4. Hamlet Au.
5. TJj69 Benelli
6. Gwyneth Llewelyn. Sooo many ways: doesn't do sl sex, rl partnered, presents as straight.
7. Brandy Xeno.
8. (my forbidden, no question about it.)
9. Vint and TJ. Maybe Jason and TJ.
10. Yes.
And let's see, I am going to tag.......
Kitty, Veryon,Queen of Spain (our fingers are crossed...),Elusyve and Vint.
Veryon tagged Tiessa...
Vint tagged Evans, who talks about this isn't the way he likes to drive.
Soph gives us some hot hot hot answers...
Cliquemetrics
Jelly Bean is so cute and nice. I on the other hand have claws. What defines a clique is not who you hang out with, but who you won't, don't and would nev-ver hang out with. Ex-clue-sivity is what is about, "X" the people who have not got a clue.
So I guess it is time to sharpen my claws a bit and write up my "clique post."
How to define your clique:
1. Name one rl individual who is otherwise popular, rich, famous, or some combination of the above, that every member of your clique will have unmitigated contempt for.
2. Name one rl individual that would make every member of your clique either wants to be like, or would buy a long distance plane ticket expressly to have sex with them. You know what I mean the "ohmygodhessooooogorgeus."
3. Name one slebrity that every member of your clique would like to grief.
4. Name one slebrity that every member of your clique would really like to be in the clique, but is not.
5. Name one place that all the women in your clique shop.
6. Name one place that all the men in your clique shop.
7. Name an sl place, that is otherwise well known that no one in your clique would be caught dead in, unless they were being paid money somehow to be there. Maybe not even then.
8. Name one common thing in sl that, in the view of your clique, all right thinking avatars hate. And if someone else likes it, it is an immediate "eeewwwwww...."
9. Name one non-clothing item that every member of your clique has *got* to have.
10. Name one land mark that your clique immediately hands out to newbies to help them out. (Read, make them more like your clique, which is, of course, the right way to be in sl....)
11. Name one well known sl website that every member of your clique reads or knows well. (Blog.secondlife.com, jira, new world notes, whatever it is... what does everyone assume everyone else knows.)
12. Name one well known sl webiste that everyone in your clique makes fun of. Or rather, which it is just de rigeur to make fun of.
13. Name the place that members of your clique go to pick up people for sl sex. If none, then fill in "whatever is at the top of orgy search."
14. Name the place that members of your clique go to meet wirps (with relationship potential).
15. On average how many sets of prim hair, prim shoes, outfits with prim attachments do the men in your clique have?
16. On average how many sets of prim hair, prim shoes, outfits with prim attachments do the women in your clique have?
17. Name one common sl type of avatar that is just right out. (Furry, sex bomb, hetero-gendered, newbie hair wearers, people who shop at a certain place... Who just would never be allowed in.)
18. How big is your clique?
19. Name one group that every member of your clique belongs to, if they have space for it.
20. What is the affectionate word your clique uses? (Hun, dear, hye yo, yo...)
21. What is cliquish for:
Hello
Goodbye.
It is Great!
It is Terrible!
I have to own that!
You spent Linden on that?
22. What are the regular gathering points and times for your clique?
23. What is the strongest insult your clique uses?
24. What question does everyone in your clique hate to be asked?
25. What is a question that everyone in your clique asks when meeting a new person?
26. What defines someone who needs to get a second life even more than they need to get a first one?
27. What activity could your clique just not live without?
28. How long, on average, have members of your clique been on.
29. What will members of your clique do for free that others might charge money for?
30. What will members of your clique charge money for, that many would do for free?
There, you now can define your clique.
So I guess it is time to sharpen my claws a bit and write up my "clique post."
How to define your clique:
1. Name one rl individual who is otherwise popular, rich, famous, or some combination of the above, that every member of your clique will have unmitigated contempt for.
2. Name one rl individual that would make every member of your clique either wants to be like, or would buy a long distance plane ticket expressly to have sex with them. You know what I mean the "ohmygodhessooooogorgeus."
3. Name one slebrity that every member of your clique would like to grief.
4. Name one slebrity that every member of your clique would really like to be in the clique, but is not.
5. Name one place that all the women in your clique shop.
6. Name one place that all the men in your clique shop.
7. Name an sl place, that is otherwise well known that no one in your clique would be caught dead in, unless they were being paid money somehow to be there. Maybe not even then.
8. Name one common thing in sl that, in the view of your clique, all right thinking avatars hate. And if someone else likes it, it is an immediate "eeewwwwww...."
9. Name one non-clothing item that every member of your clique has *got* to have.
10. Name one land mark that your clique immediately hands out to newbies to help them out. (Read, make them more like your clique, which is, of course, the right way to be in sl....)
11. Name one well known sl website that every member of your clique reads or knows well. (Blog.secondlife.com, jira, new world notes, whatever it is... what does everyone assume everyone else knows.)
12. Name one well known sl webiste that everyone in your clique makes fun of. Or rather, which it is just de rigeur to make fun of.
13. Name the place that members of your clique go to pick up people for sl sex. If none, then fill in "whatever is at the top of orgy search."
14. Name the place that members of your clique go to meet wirps (with relationship potential).
15. On average how many sets of prim hair, prim shoes, outfits with prim attachments do the men in your clique have?
16. On average how many sets of prim hair, prim shoes, outfits with prim attachments do the women in your clique have?
17. Name one common sl type of avatar that is just right out. (Furry, sex bomb, hetero-gendered, newbie hair wearers, people who shop at a certain place... Who just would never be allowed in.)
18. How big is your clique?
19. Name one group that every member of your clique belongs to, if they have space for it.
20. What is the affectionate word your clique uses? (Hun, dear, hye yo, yo...)
21. What is cliquish for:
Hello
Goodbye.
It is Great!
It is Terrible!
I have to own that!
You spent Linden on that?
22. What are the regular gathering points and times for your clique?
23. What is the strongest insult your clique uses?
24. What question does everyone in your clique hate to be asked?
25. What is a question that everyone in your clique asks when meeting a new person?
26. What defines someone who needs to get a second life even more than they need to get a first one?
27. What activity could your clique just not live without?
28. How long, on average, have members of your clique been on.
29. What will members of your clique do for free that others might charge money for?
30. What will members of your clique charge money for, that many would do for free?
There, you now can define your clique.
Raise the Group Limit
It has reached that point that political people call "capsize" or the "tipping point." It is that place where something which has been an issue for a long time suddenly is everywhere. What is it? The need for announcement groups: groups that don't have land or accounting but are ways of spreading notices and group chat. 25 Groups has long been too few. Many of us are up to 25 all the time. One major thing driving this is the part work nature of SL. Many of us work for three or four clients. That means belonging to between 1 and 3 groups per client. Many of us freelance at four clubs. That means belonging to a group a club. Many of us have land owning groups where several people gather to pay island fees or tier. Another two groups. Add it up and 15 of an avatars 25 groups are taken up with administrivia. Leaving only 10 for groups that are for networking and interests. Throw in the must belong to professional gorups, and many of us have... two or three slots to play with.
There are petitions, and there is Veryon's campaign to push a JIRA. There are a couple of different jira's already in fact.
This is one of those things which is directly affecting (note impact is not a verb) our ability to funciton. Communication is really broken here, and the 25 group limit is making it really brokener. I know people who are creating alt free accounts just to fill up on extra groups for announcments. So it isn't as if the 25 group limit is really saving anything at this point.
There are petitions, and there is Veryon's campaign to push a JIRA. There are a couple of different jira's already in fact.
This is one of those things which is directly affecting (note impact is not a verb) our ability to funciton. Communication is really broken here, and the 25 group limit is making it really brokener. I know people who are creating alt free accounts just to fill up on extra groups for announcments. So it isn't as if the 25 group limit is really saving anything at this point.
Thursday, December 20, 2007
"Flight"
The next interactive sculpture has been added to the Yedo garden: flight, which is based on powers of Pi. The interactivity comes from two parts. The closest avatar is keyed in as the direction of the axis, and the number determines the rate of spin.
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
rants and pants
A friend send me this link to a rant by an rl sex worker. I'm not going to comment on somethings, except to say that 500 USD would not get me to do what she does irl. The risks are too high. Far be it for me to call her stupid, she's making a lot more than I am.
But in one respect we are the same. Someone asked me why I keep escorting. It is simple: it is 80 to 120 USD a week, and at this point I don't have to work at it. One early week in sl, I was dancing or escorting for 70 hours. I cleared 21K between one thing and another. That's 300L an hour, or about $1.25. Last week I made about the same amount escorting. I put in less than 8 hours, or over 3K per hour on average of my time. That's 12 USD/hr. And yes I will be declaring both the income, and the expenses, on my taxes. It will about cancel out. That's money that almost happens. I would love to stop, but it is still more than legitimate people are willing to pay me much of the time for legitimate services. Say what you will about my clients, they pay here and now, and are never "well maybe you will make money from someone else some day." Even the worst of them understands my tier bill is not due someday.
The other part that struck me about the rant though was something that came up with an rl sex worker I've spoken to. Every escort has a thing that he or she is selling, and they want to do the minimum to get it. For this prostitute, and that is the correct word, she says it up front: she provides a hole to masturbate into. SL sex can be providing fodder for masturbation, but it can also be something that she does not provide what is called "the Girl Friend Experience" or GFE.
In SL, however, the GFE is exactly what escorts end up providing to regulars. It is precisely what they are missing in their lives, even if married, and precisely what they can get most effectively. They are not paying for sl sex so much as they are paying for the perfect girlfriend: someone who will not get too angry when they behave like a complete jerk, who is in the mood for whatever they are in the mood for, and who does not ask the prying questions that a girlfriend wanting fidelity will ask.
The specific turn that made me lose sympathy for her was the part where she ranted about how men asked her what got her off, and then how much of the rest of the rant was in fact a list of physical turn offs and demands. She in fact does have certain things that make her love a client, as a client, and thing that turn her off. Again, I can't call someone who is making much more than I am exactly stupid, but I can say that she lacks a finesse. Instead what I do, and what she should do, is to package up the things that make her job easier as "turn ons" and get the man to perfrom. Or she should figure out what is his big claim to sex god fame, and get him to do that. He will come faster and come back sooner.
But in the end I come back to the thing that this anonymous rl sex worker and I share: and that is that the economic priority for what the world is willing to pay a young woman for, is to be a warm orifice and target for abuse. It says something ugly about the world, and it is something that I have had confirmed in a professional context in second life rather recently. That thing is that as a society we have come to have a contempt for the law, for decency, for ourselves, and for everything that makes civilization worth having. I include myself, I've surrendered to this and pander to it, and I am sure I am racking up a karmic debt that will be ages to pay.
But here I am, and here it is, and there is nothing to change those facts. However, I must say, if I ever become that bitter, I'll stop, no matter how much I am being paid.
But in one respect we are the same. Someone asked me why I keep escorting. It is simple: it is 80 to 120 USD a week, and at this point I don't have to work at it. One early week in sl, I was dancing or escorting for 70 hours. I cleared 21K between one thing and another. That's 300L an hour, or about $1.25. Last week I made about the same amount escorting. I put in less than 8 hours, or over 3K per hour on average of my time. That's 12 USD/hr. And yes I will be declaring both the income, and the expenses, on my taxes. It will about cancel out. That's money that almost happens. I would love to stop, but it is still more than legitimate people are willing to pay me much of the time for legitimate services. Say what you will about my clients, they pay here and now, and are never "well maybe you will make money from someone else some day." Even the worst of them understands my tier bill is not due someday.
The other part that struck me about the rant though was something that came up with an rl sex worker I've spoken to. Every escort has a thing that he or she is selling, and they want to do the minimum to get it. For this prostitute, and that is the correct word, she says it up front: she provides a hole to masturbate into. SL sex can be providing fodder for masturbation, but it can also be something that she does not provide what is called "the Girl Friend Experience" or GFE.
In SL, however, the GFE is exactly what escorts end up providing to regulars. It is precisely what they are missing in their lives, even if married, and precisely what they can get most effectively. They are not paying for sl sex so much as they are paying for the perfect girlfriend: someone who will not get too angry when they behave like a complete jerk, who is in the mood for whatever they are in the mood for, and who does not ask the prying questions that a girlfriend wanting fidelity will ask.
The specific turn that made me lose sympathy for her was the part where she ranted about how men asked her what got her off, and then how much of the rest of the rant was in fact a list of physical turn offs and demands. She in fact does have certain things that make her love a client, as a client, and thing that turn her off. Again, I can't call someone who is making much more than I am exactly stupid, but I can say that she lacks a finesse. Instead what I do, and what she should do, is to package up the things that make her job easier as "turn ons" and get the man to perfrom. Or she should figure out what is his big claim to sex god fame, and get him to do that. He will come faster and come back sooner.
But in the end I come back to the thing that this anonymous rl sex worker and I share: and that is that the economic priority for what the world is willing to pay a young woman for, is to be a warm orifice and target for abuse. It says something ugly about the world, and it is something that I have had confirmed in a professional context in second life rather recently. That thing is that as a society we have come to have a contempt for the law, for decency, for ourselves, and for everything that makes civilization worth having. I include myself, I've surrendered to this and pander to it, and I am sure I am racking up a karmic debt that will be ages to pay.
But here I am, and here it is, and there is nothing to change those facts. However, I must say, if I ever become that bitter, I'll stop, no matter how much I am being paid.
To the people I miss
To Ten, who I hope will realize that her star has reached its bottom and is rising again.
To Bruthea. Words were said, but you may come back into my life as a friend on any day you choose.
To Lindarossa. My SL sister I miss our haunting the dustier corners of sl together.
To Killian, who is much too fine a man to be wasting his time or his words.
To Mystic. The nicest boss I have had on sl.
To the Sexcino wenches. Miss you all and every one.
To Serge. Who I don't entirely miss because I know he is going to be happier irl.
To Jaime. Who told me never to count on her. But I count on her being back some day.
To Veryon. Who is just never around when I am.
To others, for other reasons I dare not say.
To Bruthea. Words were said, but you may come back into my life as a friend on any day you choose.
To Lindarossa. My SL sister I miss our haunting the dustier corners of sl together.
To Killian, who is much too fine a man to be wasting his time or his words.
To Mystic. The nicest boss I have had on sl.
To the Sexcino wenches. Miss you all and every one.
To Serge. Who I don't entirely miss because I know he is going to be happier irl.
To Jaime. Who told me never to count on her. But I count on her being back some day.
To Veryon. Who is just never around when I am.
To others, for other reasons I dare not say.
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Golden Spirals Interactive Sculpture
Golden Spirals is now installed. It is based on the golden ratio, and it rotateas about an axis deteremined by the location of the nearest avatar, and at a rate determined by the number of avatars in the area.
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Kinetic Pagoda
Above is the new kinetic pagoda at the Yedo Basilica. It is an example of the poly dimensionality of Second Life, and a way of using this to show people rather than tell people about them. We aren't about 3D we are about PD.
The way the kinetic pagoda works is like this: an avatar touches the small round glass source. It scans to find where that avatar is, and the rate and velocity of the balls falling is determined by the distance from the source. The balls can roll down, pile up, or fly out in every direction depending on where the avatar moves as the kinetic sculpture runs.
In this way the avatar by moving in three dimensions over time, an interactive dimension, mixes the other dimensions and produces different results in the physics of second life.
Major gift of Modernists to LA Museum
New York Times Reports on works byKlee and Picasso beign given to the LA county museum.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
The Adult Entertainment Industry against its customers
An FT reading friend of mine forwarded this item to me...
Note some money shots: DVDs fell by 15% last year. That's sex DVDs. Note the industry does not blame the fact it charges high prices for yuch material... I wouldn't buy what they sell, it is just nasty, and I work in adult entertainment...
Note the other thing, the new business model isn't to pay performers, but to allow people to pirate and seek self-promotion. It's a battle I am familiar with, those who want to be paid for sex, versus those who want to be paid for offering access to someone else's sex for free. Including people who thought they were going to be paid for sex...
What i know is this.... the bills I have to pay keep going up, and the amount of money I am being offered to do things both rl and sl is staying the same. That means something has got to go, and for many people, that something is paying for entertainment. Good? I don't entirely think so. Inevitable given the ease of digital file sharing? Probably.
And if the sex business is having this problem, it must be everywhere...
Note some money shots: DVDs fell by 15% last year. That's sex DVDs. Note the industry does not blame the fact it charges high prices for yuch material... I wouldn't buy what they sell, it is just nasty, and I work in adult entertainment...
Note the other thing, the new business model isn't to pay performers, but to allow people to pirate and seek self-promotion. It's a battle I am familiar with, those who want to be paid for sex, versus those who want to be paid for offering access to someone else's sex for free. Including people who thought they were going to be paid for sex...
What i know is this.... the bills I have to pay keep going up, and the amount of money I am being offered to do things both rl and sl is staying the same. That means something has got to go, and for many people, that something is paying for entertainment. Good? I don't entirely think so. Inevitable given the ease of digital file sharing? Probably.
And if the sex business is having this problem, it must be everywhere...
Adult film industry enters copyright fight
By Joshua Chaffin in New York
Published: December 12 2007 00:18 | Last updated: December 12 2007 00:18
The adult entertainment industry has joined the battle between old and new media companies over copyright issues on the internet.
Vivid Video, one of the largest adult entertainment companies, on Tuesday filed suit against the Adult Entertainment Broadcast Network, accusing the company of allowing users to post Vivid’s copyrighted materials on its PornoTube website.
...
Both cases cut to the core of tensions between old and new media companies in an internet era in which users are able to post music, film and video – often not their own – on sites across the web.
Viacom, and now Vivid, contend that sites such as YouTube and PornoTube have built large audiences and sold advertising based on their material and are guilty of copyright infringement.
...
The suit comes at a time of turmoil for the adult industry. After a decade of steady double-digit growth, sales of DVDs – the industry’s biggest money-maker – fell 15 per cent in 2006 to $3.6bn, according to trade publication Adult Video News, leading to dramatic layoffs. Vivid and other companies have blamed the collapse on the widespread availability of free clips on the internet.
In addition to copyright infringement, Vivid also claims that AEBN has gained an unfair advantage because it does not follow regulations that force adult companies to verify the age of their performers.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Giggle
Doesn't seem like the were "ruined" or a "joke" last night. This is why Andy Goodwin's content free rant on Slate.com was annoying. It was clear they were going to play Stairway to Heaven and it was clear that it wasn't going to be the focus of the concert either, but instead the question of whether the band could put the energy and polish after two abortive attempts on stage, into a full set.
It seems from the people who cared about it that that happened.
What ruined Zepplin was the massive amounts of drugs and alcohol tha their drummer consumed leading to his death. Not a song, over indulgence. And as far as I can tell, over indulgence was part of their brand from the beginning. But then Andrew Goodwin wasn't about to let facts and basic methods of scholarship stand in the way of his self-promoting egotism.
It seems from the people who cared about it that that happened.
What ruined Zepplin was the massive amounts of drugs and alcohol tha their drummer consumed leading to his death. Not a song, over indulgence. And as far as I can tell, over indulgence was part of their brand from the beginning. But then Andrew Goodwin wasn't about to let facts and basic methods of scholarship stand in the way of his self-promoting egotism.
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Be his obsession, because it is only vanity.
They come to me you know. I mean your husbands. Especially if you and he are in your late 40's and early 50's. Haven't been having sex regularly for a while. Yes, he comes to me. He comes not for the sex itself, since we don't have physical sex. Perhaps he has his hopes, in fact I know he dreams of luring and seducing a beautiful young woman with promises of financial security. His hopes, in the general sense are not impossible, may december, or may late october, relationships are not unheard of.
Spare me the ev-bio theorizing about reproductive fitness. It certainly is a factor, but in truth it isn't for children either. That requires physical sex, or at least exchange of bodily fluids. And that doesn't happen either.
So why does he come to me? Other than he long ago found your touch cold and your nose turned away from him? Before sex comes mystery, intimacy and allure. Before sex comes the fit of people. Much of what goes on on second life is something more the pornography, and less than sex. It is most definitely cheating under just about any relevant definition of the word.
So what is it that he is paying for?
Obsession. There is, someplace in him, a raw nerve of vanity that you do not meet. Men are vain creatures. The ones who berate me for not sucking their virtual cock for free, as one arrogant old man did yesterday, want that vanity of being wanted for free. Vanity. He is here for his vanity.
And that is what you, the wife who is left alone at night, do not feed. You don't feed his sexual vanity. You don't feed his personal vanity. You are no longer the gem on his arm. He knows he isn't sleeping with you, so his masculine territorial vanity does not mean as much when you are out, because he is not yours and you are not his. Vanity. Vanity. Vanity.
And that is precisely what you have made it your task to humiliate. You can no longer tolerate his vanity, or his pride, or even a scrap of self-respect, and you carve him up. Yes, he is cheating on you, but he isn't. There must be a country song someplace that goes "I ain't a cheatin' cause were not havin' sex." (No that's not my joke, I am not sure if I wish it was...) It's playing on that little radio in the back of his mind. He's not unfaithful, because you aren't keeping the faith, and you have no faith in him. That's his tory, and he is sticking to it, any way.
I don't know first hand what it is to be disappointed in life, and I think that tempers the cruelty of my advice, because I am not sure I would do any better. However, I can only report on what I see first hand from the refugees of older loveless marriages, some close friends, many clients, and uncounted crates of them jerks I brush off as they attempt to engage in crude brow beating for sex. They call me a whore for not having sex for free, when I don't feed their vanity. They call you all sorts of things when you don't either.
My advice for some is to let go. There is no hope and had not been for a long time. But I think most women who are married to the men I see, want their husband's back. Men need three things I think, they are simple creatures. Money, esteem and sex. All of these play to the depths of their vanity. All of them say that they are better somehow than other men. They may have their fetishes: some want money, or the esteem of a very narrow group of people. But it is still vanity which makes them obsess.
Now I am the last person, avatar, or other self-identifying entity to say we are not vain to. But our vanity is different. Very likely you have carved up his self-image, precisely because your vanity has fallen, and he no longer feeds it. But let me be straight forward. You've become a double ledger accounting system. A calendar program that nags at regular intervals. And endless series of warnings and wearing wishes. He gets that at work. You talk of nothing that he is interested in, and don't move a finger to try. Maybe he is trash, and not worthy. But then, you should let go in that case, no?
There are time honored strategies for dealing with this situation. One of the cruelest, and oldest, is, of course, to feed your vanity by controlling his. This is a very self-conscious way of doing things, and it's trademark skill is to be the lady mistress of oral sex. For my generation oral sex, giving and receiving, is a normal part of relations between people. Oral sex on the first date does not mark anything as special, it just is. Controlling a man through the simple mechanism of controlling his release, and then having a flush faced vanity in it is a Glenn Close sort of smile to have, but works. He's not going to go to the computer to engage in banter with me, if you have drained him dry.
It doesn't make you a whore. The whore road is different, it involves giving in wholly to lusts and sexual fetishes, and opening your self, not merely using your mouth in exquisite ways, to whatever his wished needs are. You will see a great deal of BDSM here, one aspect of that is the strategy of simply giving in and being a cohort in sexual outlawry. It is growing both rl and sl, because the bonds that make traditional romantic marriage, or its nuclear suburban cousin any way, have frayed beyond the ability to take the stresses and pains that the world places on our self-esteem. That's the back drop you see, we treat people very badly in this world, and when they get off of work, they need a deeper and more potent form of ego enhancement than mere consumer ism offers to most.
The next solution, four if you are counting, is to become something else, namely, his courtesan. I am, often enough, a courtesan rather than whore or even prostitute. It is not just the virtual sex, but the whole shell which wraps it, the whole elegance and exhilaration of who I am in second life. You too can be this in second life, and in real life as well. Many, many, many women come here and make themselves into the creatures they wish they could be in real life, and create spaces which are beyond what their ordinary economic means could afford. For relatively modest prices a person can buy a low prim count sim and turn it into a glamorous estate. Play with your husband here, or in real life, and you will find that he will not be thinkin gof other women very much.
All of these roads have costs, I know this, but they are costs that are necessary. At a certain point a 50 year old man realizes the same thing 20 year old woman does: having something the opposite sex wants very badly. This is what tilts the playing field between men and women. A man in his thirties and a woman in her thirties are roughly equally desirable and have roughly a parity in the number of partners, by the late forties, it is completely the other way. Attrition has taken its toll on men, and now there are far more women who are desperate to settle down. One reason so many of the older men I meet believe there is free sex, is because the older women are far more willing to have virtual sex to get a chance at a longer term relationship than they would have been at say, 25. Many of these men respond to this by playing the field, and the internet makes that field much larger and easier to move around in.
So that is what I see looking down the long end of a Sexgen diamond sex bed. If you are an older woman, and you want the attention and fidelity of your older husband, then the road back into the central place in his life is through his vanity. There are many ways to do this, from a knowing manipulation of his sex organs directly, to a more indirect stroking of his ego by becoming the woman he imagines having on his arm. Second Life helps make that possible, and coming to play here, as a couple, is a very direct route to a kind of magnetic cache that couples create around them. But here or there, if you don't want him having virtual sex in my virtual bed, you must take it to become his obsession. He is obsessed by the thing that completes him, but that softness or grace or powerful mystique that he lacks. There is nothing wrong in being that, as I am, as the great loves in history have been.
There is no shame in being that living temple of Isis to which men's spirits seep in their waking dreams.
Spare me the ev-bio theorizing about reproductive fitness. It certainly is a factor, but in truth it isn't for children either. That requires physical sex, or at least exchange of bodily fluids. And that doesn't happen either.
So why does he come to me? Other than he long ago found your touch cold and your nose turned away from him? Before sex comes mystery, intimacy and allure. Before sex comes the fit of people. Much of what goes on on second life is something more the pornography, and less than sex. It is most definitely cheating under just about any relevant definition of the word.
So what is it that he is paying for?
Obsession. There is, someplace in him, a raw nerve of vanity that you do not meet. Men are vain creatures. The ones who berate me for not sucking their virtual cock for free, as one arrogant old man did yesterday, want that vanity of being wanted for free. Vanity. He is here for his vanity.
And that is what you, the wife who is left alone at night, do not feed. You don't feed his sexual vanity. You don't feed his personal vanity. You are no longer the gem on his arm. He knows he isn't sleeping with you, so his masculine territorial vanity does not mean as much when you are out, because he is not yours and you are not his. Vanity. Vanity. Vanity.
And that is precisely what you have made it your task to humiliate. You can no longer tolerate his vanity, or his pride, or even a scrap of self-respect, and you carve him up. Yes, he is cheating on you, but he isn't. There must be a country song someplace that goes "I ain't a cheatin' cause were not havin' sex." (No that's not my joke, I am not sure if I wish it was...) It's playing on that little radio in the back of his mind. He's not unfaithful, because you aren't keeping the faith, and you have no faith in him. That's his tory, and he is sticking to it, any way.
I don't know first hand what it is to be disappointed in life, and I think that tempers the cruelty of my advice, because I am not sure I would do any better. However, I can only report on what I see first hand from the refugees of older loveless marriages, some close friends, many clients, and uncounted crates of them jerks I brush off as they attempt to engage in crude brow beating for sex. They call me a whore for not having sex for free, when I don't feed their vanity. They call you all sorts of things when you don't either.
My advice for some is to let go. There is no hope and had not been for a long time. But I think most women who are married to the men I see, want their husband's back. Men need three things I think, they are simple creatures. Money, esteem and sex. All of these play to the depths of their vanity. All of them say that they are better somehow than other men. They may have their fetishes: some want money, or the esteem of a very narrow group of people. But it is still vanity which makes them obsess.
Now I am the last person, avatar, or other self-identifying entity to say we are not vain to. But our vanity is different. Very likely you have carved up his self-image, precisely because your vanity has fallen, and he no longer feeds it. But let me be straight forward. You've become a double ledger accounting system. A calendar program that nags at regular intervals. And endless series of warnings and wearing wishes. He gets that at work. You talk of nothing that he is interested in, and don't move a finger to try. Maybe he is trash, and not worthy. But then, you should let go in that case, no?
There are time honored strategies for dealing with this situation. One of the cruelest, and oldest, is, of course, to feed your vanity by controlling his. This is a very self-conscious way of doing things, and it's trademark skill is to be the lady mistress of oral sex. For my generation oral sex, giving and receiving, is a normal part of relations between people. Oral sex on the first date does not mark anything as special, it just is. Controlling a man through the simple mechanism of controlling his release, and then having a flush faced vanity in it is a Glenn Close sort of smile to have, but works. He's not going to go to the computer to engage in banter with me, if you have drained him dry.
It doesn't make you a whore. The whore road is different, it involves giving in wholly to lusts and sexual fetishes, and opening your self, not merely using your mouth in exquisite ways, to whatever his wished needs are. You will see a great deal of BDSM here, one aspect of that is the strategy of simply giving in and being a cohort in sexual outlawry. It is growing both rl and sl, because the bonds that make traditional romantic marriage, or its nuclear suburban cousin any way, have frayed beyond the ability to take the stresses and pains that the world places on our self-esteem. That's the back drop you see, we treat people very badly in this world, and when they get off of work, they need a deeper and more potent form of ego enhancement than mere consumer ism offers to most.
The next solution, four if you are counting, is to become something else, namely, his courtesan. I am, often enough, a courtesan rather than whore or even prostitute. It is not just the virtual sex, but the whole shell which wraps it, the whole elegance and exhilaration of who I am in second life. You too can be this in second life, and in real life as well. Many, many, many women come here and make themselves into the creatures they wish they could be in real life, and create spaces which are beyond what their ordinary economic means could afford. For relatively modest prices a person can buy a low prim count sim and turn it into a glamorous estate. Play with your husband here, or in real life, and you will find that he will not be thinkin gof other women very much.
All of these roads have costs, I know this, but they are costs that are necessary. At a certain point a 50 year old man realizes the same thing 20 year old woman does: having something the opposite sex wants very badly. This is what tilts the playing field between men and women. A man in his thirties and a woman in her thirties are roughly equally desirable and have roughly a parity in the number of partners, by the late forties, it is completely the other way. Attrition has taken its toll on men, and now there are far more women who are desperate to settle down. One reason so many of the older men I meet believe there is free sex, is because the older women are far more willing to have virtual sex to get a chance at a longer term relationship than they would have been at say, 25. Many of these men respond to this by playing the field, and the internet makes that field much larger and easier to move around in.
So that is what I see looking down the long end of a Sexgen diamond sex bed. If you are an older woman, and you want the attention and fidelity of your older husband, then the road back into the central place in his life is through his vanity. There are many ways to do this, from a knowing manipulation of his sex organs directly, to a more indirect stroking of his ego by becoming the woman he imagines having on his arm. Second Life helps make that possible, and coming to play here, as a couple, is a very direct route to a kind of magnetic cache that couples create around them. But here or there, if you don't want him having virtual sex in my virtual bed, you must take it to become his obsession. He is obsessed by the thing that completes him, but that softness or grace or powerful mystique that he lacks. There is nothing wrong in being that, as I am, as the great loves in history have been.
There is no shame in being that living temple of Isis to which men's spirits seep in their waking dreams.
Monday, December 10, 2007
Sunday, December 9, 2007
Chat me up: A short guide to scoring at phats.
A short primer to scoring at Phat Cats.
I love Phats, that is Phat Cat's Jazzy Lounge to the uninitiated, almost everyone who loves romance on Second Life does. It's an institution. There are other good ballrooms, but for that killer combination of shopping and dancing, Phats is still the tops. So if you were to meet me at Phats, and are looking not to pay for sex, then how should you do it? Lots of men want sex, and I think this is great, because sex is your best entertainment value. But many don't know the way to chat their way to the bedroom, and as a result, don't get there as much as they want. This seems to be true RL as well as SL.
First, there is no such thing as free sex. You pay in money, romance, time or selection. Many guys take some while to catch on to a simple fact: just propositioning every lady, woman or girl you run across is not really effective, and going to places where women are openly seeking just an act of virtual fornication right now, tends to be disappointing.
Spending some time on yourself helps, if you can't finish your avie, you probably can't finish me. But even in stock newbie, you can do well if you now how to move your fingers. The plan is simple, and the reason it works is because many men, especially men who have been in, are in, or are coming out of sexless relationships tend to develop the sense that there is a limited supply of female desire, and that they just have to check at the right time. Consequently they kick almost every one they meet to see if that is enough to start the motor. Bad strategy. Guys hope to get lucky, men get it.
When you go to Phats your first order of business is to get to the dance floor, without rushing there. Bumping and plowing into people is a good way to make a bad impression. Let yourself rez a bit, and also pop up the mini-map. See those green dots? Those green dots are other avatars, and you don't want to charge through them. This is a game, it is not Australian Rules Football.
When you get to the area outside of the dance floor, wait and look. You are hunting right? So look at the prey. Fine, you've seen… me. Whoever me is of course. Now don't just say "Hi, do you like SL sex?" That's a good way to find out how sharp a tongue I've got.
Instead chatting up involves kindling interest by talking about me, talking about you, and turning that into "us" and "we." You can do the you or me parts in either order.
Talking about me: don't deliver general compliments first. Save those for later. Instead compliment something specific: one of my interests, my dress if it is different, the way I am put together. We are all pretty here, but we all want to know that you've noticed something different. That this isn't just fishing in another pocket for a loose bit of change. A specific compliment should be open ended so as to encourage me to talk about my adventures in SL, or my frustrations. If adventures, respond with some of your own, or an offer to adventure with me. "You love the Botanical Gardens? You should show me your favorite spot." DOn't be put off if I say "sometime..." at first.
Talking about you: I want to know about two things more than anything else: your future and your feelings. This is because I want to know that "we" might have a future, lord is that powerful aphrodisiac, and I want to know about your ability to feel, because it is an indicator of your ability to feel for me. But just as when I flirt with you, I don't talk about your cock directly, but instead indirectly, when you flirt with me, don't emote too much, because it looks like an act or like it is about you.
Remember: open ended, invitation to talk about feelings and future.
One great line is to talk about a philosophy of life, in a sentence. "I wish people would open their eyes more to the small beauties in the world." Remember that one of the time honored roads in, is to get a conversation going about how other people don't get it. I like to complain, get it so that we are complaining about them, and suddenly the conversation is an us thing. And it can turn very spicy very quickly, because, guess what, I may have sex on my mind too, just gourmet sex, not McSex.
Us. That's what it has to get to. To get there, and the point where you are ready to leave Phats behind, you need to think of where to go next. If I am a newbie, then your favorite freebie place. Taking a girl to get the Mystitool is often a winner, because it is a must have that isn't all over the guide books. Or to use hair coupons. If I am mid-experienced, then a place that is like some of the things in my groups: "You love art? I have got to take you to Roma…" If I am experienced, then I've been down the chat up road before myself. Good signs of this are lots of groups, land owning, lots of picks, and well put together avatar. Best approach here? Ask me.
And then, and then, you are ready to move it to a smaller dance hall, to your place, or the place we've just both been talking about. That takes us beyond chatting up, and ready to getting down. It is about time to deliver that general hot compliment, about time to tell me how wonderful it was, about time to say something that, at least seems like, real emotional vulnerability. "Gasp!" you are thinking, do you mean a relationship? Not necessarily, just that the first orifice of mine you have got to get in, is my ears.
I love Phats, that is Phat Cat's Jazzy Lounge to the uninitiated, almost everyone who loves romance on Second Life does. It's an institution. There are other good ballrooms, but for that killer combination of shopping and dancing, Phats is still the tops. So if you were to meet me at Phats, and are looking not to pay for sex, then how should you do it? Lots of men want sex, and I think this is great, because sex is your best entertainment value. But many don't know the way to chat their way to the bedroom, and as a result, don't get there as much as they want. This seems to be true RL as well as SL.
First, there is no such thing as free sex. You pay in money, romance, time or selection. Many guys take some while to catch on to a simple fact: just propositioning every lady, woman or girl you run across is not really effective, and going to places where women are openly seeking just an act of virtual fornication right now, tends to be disappointing.
Spending some time on yourself helps, if you can't finish your avie, you probably can't finish me. But even in stock newbie, you can do well if you now how to move your fingers. The plan is simple, and the reason it works is because many men, especially men who have been in, are in, or are coming out of sexless relationships tend to develop the sense that there is a limited supply of female desire, and that they just have to check at the right time. Consequently they kick almost every one they meet to see if that is enough to start the motor. Bad strategy. Guys hope to get lucky, men get it.
When you go to Phats your first order of business is to get to the dance floor, without rushing there. Bumping and plowing into people is a good way to make a bad impression. Let yourself rez a bit, and also pop up the mini-map. See those green dots? Those green dots are other avatars, and you don't want to charge through them. This is a game, it is not Australian Rules Football.
When you get to the area outside of the dance floor, wait and look. You are hunting right? So look at the prey. Fine, you've seen… me. Whoever me is of course. Now don't just say "Hi, do you like SL sex?" That's a good way to find out how sharp a tongue I've got.
Instead chatting up involves kindling interest by talking about me, talking about you, and turning that into "us" and "we." You can do the you or me parts in either order.
Talking about me: don't deliver general compliments first. Save those for later. Instead compliment something specific: one of my interests, my dress if it is different, the way I am put together. We are all pretty here, but we all want to know that you've noticed something different. That this isn't just fishing in another pocket for a loose bit of change. A specific compliment should be open ended so as to encourage me to talk about my adventures in SL, or my frustrations. If adventures, respond with some of your own, or an offer to adventure with me. "You love the Botanical Gardens? You should show me your favorite spot." DOn't be put off if I say "sometime..." at first.
Talking about you: I want to know about two things more than anything else: your future and your feelings. This is because I want to know that "we" might have a future, lord is that powerful aphrodisiac, and I want to know about your ability to feel, because it is an indicator of your ability to feel for me. But just as when I flirt with you, I don't talk about your cock directly, but instead indirectly, when you flirt with me, don't emote too much, because it looks like an act or like it is about you.
Remember: open ended, invitation to talk about feelings and future.
One great line is to talk about a philosophy of life, in a sentence. "I wish people would open their eyes more to the small beauties in the world." Remember that one of the time honored roads in, is to get a conversation going about how other people don't get it. I like to complain, get it so that we are complaining about them, and suddenly the conversation is an us thing. And it can turn very spicy very quickly, because, guess what, I may have sex on my mind too, just gourmet sex, not McSex.
Us. That's what it has to get to. To get there, and the point where you are ready to leave Phats behind, you need to think of where to go next. If I am a newbie, then your favorite freebie place. Taking a girl to get the Mystitool is often a winner, because it is a must have that isn't all over the guide books. Or to use hair coupons. If I am mid-experienced, then a place that is like some of the things in my groups: "You love art? I have got to take you to Roma…" If I am experienced, then I've been down the chat up road before myself. Good signs of this are lots of groups, land owning, lots of picks, and well put together avatar. Best approach here? Ask me.
And then, and then, you are ready to move it to a smaller dance hall, to your place, or the place we've just both been talking about. That takes us beyond chatting up, and ready to getting down. It is about time to deliver that general hot compliment, about time to tell me how wonderful it was, about time to say something that, at least seems like, real emotional vulnerability. "Gasp!" you are thinking, do you mean a relationship? Not necessarily, just that the first orifice of mine you have got to get in, is my ears.
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Another night, another example of men behaving badly
[2:23] Shankar Destiny: Like your group - may I join?
[2:24] Lillie Yifu: Which group?
[2:26] Shankar Destiny: Second sex
[2:27] Lillie Yifu: It has reopened we were having a problem with a spammer
[2:27] Shankar Destiny: Got some time right now?
[2:28] Lillie Yifu: for?
[2:28] Shankar Destiny: For good second sex!
[2:28] Lillie Yifu: dear I am an escort
[2:29] Lillie Yifu: I don't run the group because I have problems finding sex partners
[2:29] Shankar Destiny: I don't either but it is late
[2:34] Lillie Yifu: so what are you asking for dear?
[2:36] Shankar Destiny: Some good sex
[2:36] Lillie Yifu: my rate is 750L :15
[2:37] Shankar Destiny: Sorry, i get plenty for free
[2:37] Lillie Yifu: I feel sorry for the girls if this is your approach
[2:38] Shankar Destiny: That's a strange idea
[2:38] Lillie Yifu: Dear don't open your mouth, youwill only stick your dick in it
[2:39] Lillie Yifu giggles
[2:39] Lillie Yifu rolls eyes in advance at the gem of witlessness that is coming
[2:39] Shankar Destiny: Wouldn't your prefer my dick in you!!!
[2:40] Lillie Yifu giggles
[2:40] Lillie Yifu: dear you are sooo lame
[2:40] Lillie Yifu: You really outght to read my blog
[2:40] Lillie Yifu: it's about all sorts of things, but how not to be a jerk is a favorite topic
[2:41] Lillie Yifu: and you eally need help in that department
[2:41] Lillie Yifu: so go back to bottom feeding dear
[2:41] Lillie Yifu: WHen I have sex with someone it is for money, or because I find something really compelling and wonderful about them
[2:41] Lillie Yifu: which does happen
[2:42] Shankar Destiny: I am not the one who gets off pretending to be fucked for money - have a good life
[2:42] Lillie Yifu: but not from people whose idea of a come back is "would't you rather I have my dick in you!!!"
[2:42] Lillie Yifu: Welcome to google Shankar
Well dear, now all of time and metaspace can see how lame you are. Insulting someone for getting paid for what you just asked them to do for free is... icky.
Beijos!
Yes I get this every single day. So do many girls. "Wanna fuck!" "How rude!" "You whore!" is a format, like "listen and repeat" in a language class...
Thursday, December 6, 2007
The New Island is delivered
Yedo Basilica will be open to tenants of the old NME properties by tomorrow, and to the public by Monday.
Beijos!
Beijos!
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Another rock critic who can't read.
Goodwin on Schlepway to Heaven
The offending passage:
First the two sections:
Not just believes, not just thinks, but is sure. And she has some proof of this: she's like many Princesses out here in rl who understands that the 'rents money gets you places that you should not be. What's better than shopping? Shopping with the boutique to yourself, of course. Goodwin obviously doesn't get this.
And here at the the end she is afflicted with the problem of the Midas touch: she is there, strutting in the finery bought, and wants to prove to everyone what the song makes clear is obvious once seen, that the stairway isn't going to be bought, even though she doesn't know it or learn it, the listeners of this song are supposed to. Remember she is sure that all that glitters is gold. Since she now glitters, she must, in her mind be gold. This, is not hard.
Second layer down is the call of the sonic artist against the visual: truth is heard, pipers call, the stairway lies on the whispering wind and so on, where as visual things are, consistently, false as symbols. It isn't really a great poem, but it is a great minstrel song, in that its symbolism is consistent, and it tells its tale fairly well. The critic clearly hates it, and hates melody, and the English language, clear thinking, Greek mythology, Christian symbolism. The shibboleth of pop orthodoxy in the Rolling Stone mode of having a Victorian attitude about the cannon of post-modern times, is, don't you think, a bit absurd? Even more dismal is that he is writing a book about Led Zepplin, and is an entrenched member of the ignorance industry. Sigh. And some people wonder why cultural studies gets such a bad name.
Well anyway, the lyrics aren't confused, though of course many confused people read them and write about them, from their own frame work. I'm not really fond of the song, even though I've been subjected to it numerous times, but it isn't that bad, and seems to be quite good in that it survives.
[Wikipedia tells me he is also a buffoon, getting his facts wrong.
He states that Stairway to Heaven is the only "hit" they had because they did not release singles. In fact Wikipedia tells me that
Whole Lotta Love hit #4 on the US charts and The Immigrant Song hit #16, while Black Dog hit #15. Those would also count as "hits" in the vernacular of pop music.]
So he can't read, and he can't count, hadn't heard of the internet where his facts can get checked and his source looked at and lies a lot. Maybe Andrew Goodwin is the perfect person to write about this band, he's dazed and confused and hasn't done anything new since a break up in 1980. Once upon a time someone would have needed to own a copy of the album to read the lyrics and the details on chart positions would have been a schlep to a book store or library. But those of us growing up now realize that this kind of grandiose lie based on proprietary information, isn't tenable. Any one can pull down the lyrics, any one can look up the chart positions. And just did.
The offending passage:
It also doesn't help that the lyrics appear to be an index of a confused mind. If, for instance, the lady at the beginning of the song is a fool (she believes, after all, that she can buy a stairway to heaven), then why at the end of this long and winding lyrical road is she shining white light and showing us how everything still turns to gold? Some critics have turned themselves inside out trying to prove that this must be a different lady. Cultural-studies theorists will see this is an "open" text. Industry bean counters will notice that its ambiguity is the key to its popularity.
First the two sections:
There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold
And she's buying a stairway to heaven
And when she gets there she knows if the stores are closed
With a word she can get what she came for
Not just believes, not just thinks, but is sure. And she has some proof of this: she's like many Princesses out here in rl who understands that the 'rents money gets you places that you should not be. What's better than shopping? Shopping with the boutique to yourself, of course. Goodwin obviously doesn't get this.
There walks a lady we all know
Who shines white light and wants to show
How everything still turns to gold
And if you listen very hard
And here at the the end she is afflicted with the problem of the Midas touch: she is there, strutting in the finery bought, and wants to prove to everyone what the song makes clear is obvious once seen, that the stairway isn't going to be bought, even though she doesn't know it or learn it, the listeners of this song are supposed to. Remember she is sure that all that glitters is gold. Since she now glitters, she must, in her mind be gold. This, is not hard.
Second layer down is the call of the sonic artist against the visual: truth is heard, pipers call, the stairway lies on the whispering wind and so on, where as visual things are, consistently, false as symbols. It isn't really a great poem, but it is a great minstrel song, in that its symbolism is consistent, and it tells its tale fairly well. The critic clearly hates it, and hates melody, and the English language, clear thinking, Greek mythology, Christian symbolism. The shibboleth of pop orthodoxy in the Rolling Stone mode of having a Victorian attitude about the cannon of post-modern times, is, don't you think, a bit absurd? Even more dismal is that he is writing a book about Led Zepplin, and is an entrenched member of the ignorance industry. Sigh. And some people wonder why cultural studies gets such a bad name.
Well anyway, the lyrics aren't confused, though of course many confused people read them and write about them, from their own frame work. I'm not really fond of the song, even though I've been subjected to it numerous times, but it isn't that bad, and seems to be quite good in that it survives.
[Wikipedia tells me he is also a buffoon, getting his facts wrong.
He states that Stairway to Heaven is the only "hit" they had because they did not release singles. In fact Wikipedia tells me that
Whole Lotta Love hit #4 on the US charts and The Immigrant Song hit #16, while Black Dog hit #15. Those would also count as "hits" in the vernacular of pop music.]
So he can't read, and he can't count, hadn't heard of the internet where his facts can get checked and his source looked at and lies a lot. Maybe Andrew Goodwin is the perfect person to write about this band, he's dazed and confused and hasn't done anything new since a break up in 1980. Once upon a time someone would have needed to own a copy of the album to read the lyrics and the details on chart positions would have been a schlep to a book store or library. But those of us growing up now realize that this kind of grandiose lie based on proprietary information, isn't tenable. Any one can pull down the lyrics, any one can look up the chart positions. And just did.
Lessons in dumping land
Land bots are not a bad thing, people, on the other hand, are dishonest and corrupt and Second Life's economy is filled with perverse incentives that heavily reward people who hold back progress. While Libertarianism is as close to a state religion as Second Life gets, it is, like all libertarians everywhere, actually anti-capital and pro-rent. People naturally gravitate towards religions that reward being first rather than smart, because, as SA is wont to point out "you can only think you are smarter than everyone else, but you can know if you are first." To which I can only add that some judicious pruning of people who were there before you helps a great deal too.
As I said, land bots are not bad, because they set the liquid price of land. That is the minimum that a parcel will go for. If you hold land, then land bots are the means by which liquidity is kept in the land market, a series of parcels are there to buy, and you can sell out in hours. This is a good thing. However, this is where the corrupt nature of people comes in. In market economics all information has to be distributed immediately through price. This is in the rules, and while I am not that smart, I can read my textbooks and regurgitate on command. Really, I'm good at this. I speak Standard Written English as my native, when I am not staring at my shoes in embarrassment. Then I speak mumble. In SL I speak with a heavy Typonese accent, as do many people.
Anyway, in SL this not the case with the land market. It would be far better if all land were sold at auction, rather than this strange guess based system, but that is the way it is.
What will happen if you put a parcel for sale at above dump price is that people will try and get you to sell below it. That is they are asking whether you want to donate to the cause of land griefing, or "are you a brain dead newbie to be reaped?" This is destructive to market forces, because they are, in essence, committing fraud, hoping you won't know.
Don't fall for it.
Never sell for what an ad sign says to sell for. Ever, it is always below dump price.
Listen to the market, not to the people trying to steal your money.
Often the people lying to you run the landbots. Which makes sense, they know how this works, and are more than willing to steal your money and not teach you the lesson. So here is the lesson that they don't want you to know: don't talk, dump.
So now you know: only trust their lindens. Only trust their lindens. Only trust their lindens. Because if the human is typing something, he or she is only doing it lie to you, that's the only thing that would motivate them to not just buy or not buy: the hope they can cheat you. But you can't cheat an honest avatar. So just be honest, and if you decide to dump (as we did sometime after putting the parcel for sale) don't try and get more than dump price, because no one in the land bot hoard will pay it. They sell prims basically, and they don't have time to evaluate parcels outside ones they know will never ever ever ever sell.
How do you figure the dump price? In SL the dump price is just slightly below the cheapest 512 mature mainland parcel available. Occasionally one land baron will buy a blocker and put it for sale well below this at an unacceptable price, and this will slow down land bots, which, remember are controlled by people who actually decide to buy or sell the land. This price in L/M is the what you should put the parcel for sale for. Parcels larger than 4096 tend not to sell.
Now here is where a bit of actual working capitalism comes into play. Landbots are capital, and maldistributed capital because ordinary users are intentionally blocked from using scripts to search for and buy land. This is, therefore, a government created restriction on free enterprise, and, just like all such restrictions, favors those who benefit from it, namely the ones who have libsl bots. It isn't fair, it isn't smart, and it is anti-capitalist but there are enough land bots out there that competition is starting to work. If a land baron offers below dump price, don't believe them, there are enough others who will buy that they have to pay the dump price. If that land baron does not like you, then some other will buy it.
That's the market, even as blocked by religion and corruption as it is, flowering through the cracks. Competition forces open doors, and prevents even cartels from exercising their power in an unlimited fashion. So now, some information has spread through the SL economy, so pass it on to everyone. So don't hate land bots, because they are actually capital doing its work. That work is both lowering base prices, creating more choices, and a floor for prices. Now that might not feel good when you have to dump, but realize that if you want to maximize profit on land, then you need to hold it and wait for someone who wants to do something that your parcel is good for, often that can be a long time, and tier makes that generally unproductive.
Don't sell below dump price. Land can literally evaporate. SA reports that one parcel sold before the dialog box closed. People will "offer" less than the dump price. No matter how desperate you are, never sell below dump price, because it will take longer to say "yes" and haggle with the fraudster who wants to steal your money, than it will to just set it at dump price and walk away.
This is why I think that land is going to stay around 8L/M. You see LL sells islands. The demand for mainland is mostly driven by speculators and new people. The speculators are paying lots of tier, and in fact holding prices down for everyone else, because if they weren't paying LL all that money to put up rotating for sale signs, then well, LL would raise its prices for the rest of us. Yes the speculators carve out a land tax for what they do, and they will try and rob you but, so long as you know what you are doing you will come out well enough.
SA says that the process you should follow runs like this:
First return all objects. You are going to dump, it might pass through many hands before morning. You have no idea if you will have access to the parcel. Return it all. But next time, give everyone a bit more notice. Sorry. The person who that is intended for knows who he is. Moving right along...
Next if group land, sell it to the owner of the group. Even if it is going to be divided, group payouts come days later. What is the point of dumping if you don't get paid right away?
To sell to yourself, first set user to yourself. First. First. First. Then set the price to 0L and then "keep ownership of the objects." Then buy. SA notes that you may have to play some games if your contribution to the group plus the land is more than your total tier. This because it is on the books twice: once as donated tier, once as the land itself. Just reduce your contribution to the group. This will give a warning, but if you buy it, it won't matter, because the group has a grace period to get the land and land credits back in balance. You will do that by buying the land.
Once this is done, you are ready to dump.
Next check the land search board. Select parcel greater than 512, mature, for sale, mainland. The top property on this will be the dump price. Take the area of that parcel and divide it by the price in Linden. Set your parcel about .1LM below this. That is subtract .1L/M from the dump parcel, and multiply by the size of your parcel.
Then type that price in.
No objects, so it doesn't matter, pick a box.
Then sell.
It might take a while for an odd parcel, but standard ones will evaporate.
You almost certainly won't make money this way, but at least you are getting the market dump price for your land.
The other lesson is the one I knew, but hoped could avoid. Mainland is a race to the bottom, and is barely worth the risk and time. Once you want to do something special, go in with others on an island, especially if you fit in with a user continent.
In our case we sold at around 7.9, which since much of the land was bought during the land collapse, is about what we got it for. (Average of 8.7L/M) Since we are moving to an island, and not paying tier any more, this was our best move, and we will be back with more land and more surprises as soon as we can be.
Thanks everyone, this means a great deal to me, and fortunately the ride isn't over yet.
As I said, land bots are not bad, because they set the liquid price of land. That is the minimum that a parcel will go for. If you hold land, then land bots are the means by which liquidity is kept in the land market, a series of parcels are there to buy, and you can sell out in hours. This is a good thing. However, this is where the corrupt nature of people comes in. In market economics all information has to be distributed immediately through price. This is in the rules, and while I am not that smart, I can read my textbooks and regurgitate on command. Really, I'm good at this. I speak Standard Written English as my native, when I am not staring at my shoes in embarrassment. Then I speak mumble. In SL I speak with a heavy Typonese accent, as do many people.
Anyway, in SL this not the case with the land market. It would be far better if all land were sold at auction, rather than this strange guess based system, but that is the way it is.
What will happen if you put a parcel for sale at above dump price is that people will try and get you to sell below it. That is they are asking whether you want to donate to the cause of land griefing, or "are you a brain dead newbie to be reaped?" This is destructive to market forces, because they are, in essence, committing fraud, hoping you won't know.
Don't fall for it.
Never sell for what an ad sign says to sell for. Ever, it is always below dump price.
Listen to the market, not to the people trying to steal your money.
Often the people lying to you run the landbots. Which makes sense, they know how this works, and are more than willing to steal your money and not teach you the lesson. So here is the lesson that they don't want you to know: don't talk, dump.
So now you know: only trust their lindens. Only trust their lindens. Only trust their lindens. Because if the human is typing something, he or she is only doing it lie to you, that's the only thing that would motivate them to not just buy or not buy: the hope they can cheat you. But you can't cheat an honest avatar. So just be honest, and if you decide to dump (as we did sometime after putting the parcel for sale) don't try and get more than dump price, because no one in the land bot hoard will pay it. They sell prims basically, and they don't have time to evaluate parcels outside ones they know will never ever ever ever sell.
How do you figure the dump price? In SL the dump price is just slightly below the cheapest 512 mature mainland parcel available. Occasionally one land baron will buy a blocker and put it for sale well below this at an unacceptable price, and this will slow down land bots, which, remember are controlled by people who actually decide to buy or sell the land. This price in L/M is the what you should put the parcel for sale for. Parcels larger than 4096 tend not to sell.
Now here is where a bit of actual working capitalism comes into play. Landbots are capital, and maldistributed capital because ordinary users are intentionally blocked from using scripts to search for and buy land. This is, therefore, a government created restriction on free enterprise, and, just like all such restrictions, favors those who benefit from it, namely the ones who have libsl bots. It isn't fair, it isn't smart, and it is anti-capitalist but there are enough land bots out there that competition is starting to work. If a land baron offers below dump price, don't believe them, there are enough others who will buy that they have to pay the dump price. If that land baron does not like you, then some other will buy it.
That's the market, even as blocked by religion and corruption as it is, flowering through the cracks. Competition forces open doors, and prevents even cartels from exercising their power in an unlimited fashion. So now, some information has spread through the SL economy, so pass it on to everyone. So don't hate land bots, because they are actually capital doing its work. That work is both lowering base prices, creating more choices, and a floor for prices. Now that might not feel good when you have to dump, but realize that if you want to maximize profit on land, then you need to hold it and wait for someone who wants to do something that your parcel is good for, often that can be a long time, and tier makes that generally unproductive.
Don't sell below dump price. Land can literally evaporate. SA reports that one parcel sold before the dialog box closed. People will "offer" less than the dump price. No matter how desperate you are, never sell below dump price, because it will take longer to say "yes" and haggle with the fraudster who wants to steal your money, than it will to just set it at dump price and walk away.
This is why I think that land is going to stay around 8L/M. You see LL sells islands. The demand for mainland is mostly driven by speculators and new people. The speculators are paying lots of tier, and in fact holding prices down for everyone else, because if they weren't paying LL all that money to put up rotating for sale signs, then well, LL would raise its prices for the rest of us. Yes the speculators carve out a land tax for what they do, and they will try and rob you but, so long as you know what you are doing you will come out well enough.
SA says that the process you should follow runs like this:
First return all objects. You are going to dump, it might pass through many hands before morning. You have no idea if you will have access to the parcel. Return it all. But next time, give everyone a bit more notice. Sorry. The person who that is intended for knows who he is. Moving right along...
Next if group land, sell it to the owner of the group. Even if it is going to be divided, group payouts come days later. What is the point of dumping if you don't get paid right away?
To sell to yourself, first set user to yourself. First. First. First. Then set the price to 0L and then "keep ownership of the objects." Then buy. SA notes that you may have to play some games if your contribution to the group plus the land is more than your total tier. This because it is on the books twice: once as donated tier, once as the land itself. Just reduce your contribution to the group. This will give a warning, but if you buy it, it won't matter, because the group has a grace period to get the land and land credits back in balance. You will do that by buying the land.
Once this is done, you are ready to dump.
Next check the land search board. Select parcel greater than 512, mature, for sale, mainland. The top property on this will be the dump price. Take the area of that parcel and divide it by the price in Linden. Set your parcel about .1LM below this. That is subtract .1L/M from the dump parcel, and multiply by the size of your parcel.
Then type that price in.
No objects, so it doesn't matter, pick a box.
Then sell.
It might take a while for an odd parcel, but standard ones will evaporate.
You almost certainly won't make money this way, but at least you are getting the market dump price for your land.
The other lesson is the one I knew, but hoped could avoid. Mainland is a race to the bottom, and is barely worth the risk and time. Once you want to do something special, go in with others on an island, especially if you fit in with a user continent.
In our case we sold at around 7.9, which since much of the land was bought during the land collapse, is about what we got it for. (Average of 8.7L/M) Since we are moving to an island, and not paying tier any more, this was our best move, and we will be back with more land and more surprises as soon as we can be.
Thanks everyone, this means a great deal to me, and fortunately the ride isn't over yet.
We dumped the land
... because we are buying an island. Yedo will be back when we have everything ready and working. I am doing the Raw file right now.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Free the Memphis 3
What's worse than the death penalty being stupid and ineffective?
Being crazy.
Shortly after three eight-year-old boys were found mutilated and murdered in West Memphis, Arkansas, local newspapers stated the killers had been caught. The police assured the public that the three teenagers in custody were definitely responsible for these horrible crimes. Evidence? The same police officers coerced an error-filled "confession" from Jessie Misskelley Jr., who is mentally handicapped. They subjected him to 12 hours of questioning without counsel or parental consent, audio-taping only two fragments totaling 46 minutes.
Jessie recanted it that evening, but it was too late— Misskelley, Jason Baldwin and Damien Echols were all arrested on June 3, 1993, and convicted of murder in early 1994. Although there was no physical evidence, murder weapon, motive, or connection to the victims, the prosecution pathetically resorted to presenting black hair and clothing, heavy metal t-shirts, and Stephen King novels as proof that the boys were sacrificed in a satanic cult ritual. Unfathomably, Echols was sentenced to death, Baldwin received life without parole, and Misskelley got life plus 40. For over 14 years, The West Memphis Three have been imprisoned for crimes they didn’t commit. Echols waits in solitary confinement for the lethal injection our tax dollars will pay for. They were all condemned by their poverty, incompetent defense, satanic panic and a rush to judgment.
Being crazy.
Shortly after three eight-year-old boys were found mutilated and murdered in West Memphis, Arkansas, local newspapers stated the killers had been caught. The police assured the public that the three teenagers in custody were definitely responsible for these horrible crimes. Evidence? The same police officers coerced an error-filled "confession" from Jessie Misskelley Jr., who is mentally handicapped. They subjected him to 12 hours of questioning without counsel or parental consent, audio-taping only two fragments totaling 46 minutes.
Jessie recanted it that evening, but it was too late— Misskelley, Jason Baldwin and Damien Echols were all arrested on June 3, 1993, and convicted of murder in early 1994. Although there was no physical evidence, murder weapon, motive, or connection to the victims, the prosecution pathetically resorted to presenting black hair and clothing, heavy metal t-shirts, and Stephen King novels as proof that the boys were sacrificed in a satanic cult ritual. Unfathomably, Echols was sentenced to death, Baldwin received life without parole, and Misskelley got life plus 40. For over 14 years, The West Memphis Three have been imprisoned for crimes they didn’t commit. Echols waits in solitary confinement for the lethal injection our tax dollars will pay for. They were all condemned by their poverty, incompetent defense, satanic panic and a rush to judgment.
Monday, December 3, 2007
Yedo Cecil Parcel for Sale
We are selling the land parcel in Cecil that is the current location of Yedo. The price is 275K Linden for 23824 square meters and 5452 prims. There are no ad farms in the sim, and it is low lag. If you want junk land, the pay junk prices. This is a wonderful price for good mainland... while it lasts. It's also less than what Anshe will sell it to you for if I dump it to the land bots...
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Eight Random Factlets
Kitty tags me
/me puts hand on hip.
I'm not doing 8 people. Not without being paid anyway...
Random Facts:
Here are the rules:
(1) Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
(2) People who are tagged need to write a post on their own blog (about their eight things) and post these rules.
(3) At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
(4) Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.
Ok, so facts... hmmm.
/me puts hand on hip.
I'm not doing 8 people. Not without being paid anyway...
Random Facts:
- WA Mozart is my favorite classical composer, John Coltrane my favorite jazz artists, Ella Fitzgerald my favorite jazz singer, Nirvana my favorite rock band and Cosmic Gate my favorite clubbing music. But I club goth. Go figure.
- Gold is my favorite color, especially for clothes.
- Pet language peeves: that/which, the m dash is not a punctuation mark, effect/affect, the lack of a you plural or third person neuter/indeterminate in English, and the use of the passive voice by anyone not wearing a collar. (And yes that last one is a giggle for me because I know it is in the passive voice... It's not my usual habit but I just got done working...)
- I've finished a novel this year. I didn't write fiction before that.
- I've done a Hillary Clinton avatar. I'm not particularly a supporter of hers.
- I'm a registered voter. And I vote.
- A Chorus Line is my favorite musical. And no I can't sing.
- I play bad rhythm guitar, but have met several well known guitarists. No I didn't do anything sexual with any of them.
Friday, November 30, 2007
Warning Danger! Broken as Designed!
REminder, keep video checked off in preferences in any sim that has a land owner you do not trust.
This is because llSetParcelMediaCommandList is not restricted to the parcel that it sits on, but can alter any av anywhere in the same sim.
This gets me back to one of my pet peeves: 16M parcels. There is no reason for them except land griefing, they are a security problem. LL should institute something rather simple on mainland: minimum parcel sizes. That way if people want to put up with the visual noise and security risk of 16M parcels, they can, and buy land for less because it will have a lower value.
LL claims this is not their fault, this is not true. Apple's Quicktime has a bug, but LL's video streaming system is Broken by Design and their land system is Intentionally a security risk. And they make money from this.
This is because llSetParcelMediaCommandList is not restricted to the parcel that it sits on, but can alter any av anywhere in the same sim.
This gets me back to one of my pet peeves: 16M parcels. There is no reason for them except land griefing, they are a security problem. LL should institute something rather simple on mainland: minimum parcel sizes. That way if people want to put up with the visual noise and security risk of 16M parcels, they can, and buy land for less because it will have a lower value.
LL claims this is not their fault, this is not true. Apple's Quicktime has a bug, but LL's video streaming system is Broken by Design and their land system is Intentionally a security risk. And they make money from this.
Fake Teenage Romance leads to murder.
Man kills another over fake teen romance.
Two people both pretended to be teenagers. Both were middle age. The man's wife caught him and revealed his identity to the woman, who was also faking it with her daughter's photographs. The man then killed a romantic rival, only to find out that the woman was not 18.
My, what interesting modern times we live in.
Two people both pretended to be teenagers. Both were middle age. The man's wife caught him and revealed his identity to the woman, who was also faking it with her daughter's photographs. The man then killed a romantic rival, only to find out that the woman was not 18.
My, what interesting modern times we live in.
New Clock at Yedo
We've installed an analog clock at Yedo. Of course writing the scripts is trivial, so long as the asset server isn't ahem having the hiccups. There are some surprises coming.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Una Ewing Update
Some time ago Una Ewing and I had harsh words over sex workers and modeling. Well, over the weekend she came to me and wanted to talk about patching things up and going forward. This, in a world where many people would rather dump their land at a loss and run, rather than be reasonable, is a major kudos thing. We had a really great chat about things, about the barriers to success, about the things we wanted to do. She's big into promoting new talent (more on this later), which you can see on her blog.
The heart of our discussion however, turned on avenues out for virtual sex work in second life. The source of the original span was when she put out a cattle call on a fashion show, and then snubbed coverage from this blog because it was, and is, a sex blog written by someone who was, and is, an escort on second life. It is still very much written from that point of view, because no matter what else I do here, it is that that opened the door for it. She was kind enough to invite me to speak today, and unfortunately rl work commitments held me in rl.
But the topic, and Una' commitment to offering exactly that: ways up and out. Is real. I think this place changes people, and their perceptions. You can't be on second life for this long, without coming to realize that young women coming into SL, who do not have a base of rl income to draw from, are drawn into escorting. If for no other reason than to raise enough funds to get the basics of beauty. Having seen that, and being a clear sighted and practical person, Una has decided to make it one of her priorities.
Coming to make peace alone is enough to set her apart. That takes courage, and grace, and those are always qualities to be applauded. But I've heard that talk is cheap, because supply greatly exceeds demand. Una is doing things and putting her weight behind giving women a way out of the esteem trap that is escorting for most of them. Yes a few of us do really well at it. Too well. (frumples lips. Sigh) But most don't, and even regular dancing can be a soul crushing experience and people come in and experience the corrosive misogyny that so much of the virtual sex industry on second life entails.
I can't tell you how grateful I am to Una for coming and talking. I know my original words were very harsh, because this is a harsh world we second live in. For that reason I am trying, though without as much success as I would like, to make my words of appreciation for what she is doing equally profound. The thing, I think, to do, is what I offered originally, and wanted to do genuinely: cover her shows from the point of view of those of us who use fashion as our working capital, and therefore have a different relationship with it than women who are consumers of fashion, or use it as an accessory to their business. We are numerous, and we are a large part of the demand for fashion. Our tastes and needs are reflected in a thousand ways in fashion. Many fashion houses advertise "escort" in their descriptions, even as they would not dare mention that actual escorts wear their fashions. Exceptions to this silence, like June Dion of Bare Rose Tokyo, generate a huge degree of loyalty from those inside the virtual sex trade.
I'm very glad, more than can easily be poured into meager writing, that Una has been clear eyed enough to realize that there is a need for fashion to both speak to the escorting community, and as importantly, maybe more, to offer a road up and out of that world for the many women who want to be treated with greater respect, and be more attached to making things of permanent value for second life.
Thank Una. Thank you in words as strong as my earlier ones were harsh.
Thank you.
The heart of our discussion however, turned on avenues out for virtual sex work in second life. The source of the original span was when she put out a cattle call on a fashion show, and then snubbed coverage from this blog because it was, and is, a sex blog written by someone who was, and is, an escort on second life. It is still very much written from that point of view, because no matter what else I do here, it is that that opened the door for it. She was kind enough to invite me to speak today, and unfortunately rl work commitments held me in rl.
But the topic, and Una' commitment to offering exactly that: ways up and out. Is real. I think this place changes people, and their perceptions. You can't be on second life for this long, without coming to realize that young women coming into SL, who do not have a base of rl income to draw from, are drawn into escorting. If for no other reason than to raise enough funds to get the basics of beauty. Having seen that, and being a clear sighted and practical person, Una has decided to make it one of her priorities.
Coming to make peace alone is enough to set her apart. That takes courage, and grace, and those are always qualities to be applauded. But I've heard that talk is cheap, because supply greatly exceeds demand. Una is doing things and putting her weight behind giving women a way out of the esteem trap that is escorting for most of them. Yes a few of us do really well at it. Too well. (frumples lips. Sigh) But most don't, and even regular dancing can be a soul crushing experience and people come in and experience the corrosive misogyny that so much of the virtual sex industry on second life entails.
I can't tell you how grateful I am to Una for coming and talking. I know my original words were very harsh, because this is a harsh world we second live in. For that reason I am trying, though without as much success as I would like, to make my words of appreciation for what she is doing equally profound. The thing, I think, to do, is what I offered originally, and wanted to do genuinely: cover her shows from the point of view of those of us who use fashion as our working capital, and therefore have a different relationship with it than women who are consumers of fashion, or use it as an accessory to their business. We are numerous, and we are a large part of the demand for fashion. Our tastes and needs are reflected in a thousand ways in fashion. Many fashion houses advertise "escort" in their descriptions, even as they would not dare mention that actual escorts wear their fashions. Exceptions to this silence, like June Dion of Bare Rose Tokyo, generate a huge degree of loyalty from those inside the virtual sex trade.
I'm very glad, more than can easily be poured into meager writing, that Una has been clear eyed enough to realize that there is a need for fashion to both speak to the escorting community, and as importantly, maybe more, to offer a road up and out of that world for the many women who want to be treated with greater respect, and be more attached to making things of permanent value for second life.
Thank Una. Thank you in words as strong as my earlier ones were harsh.
Thank you.
Monday, November 26, 2007
Thoughts in the flashes
Better broad belts, rope sandals, the need for a better catwalk animation, the utter must of a flexy that bounces up better and the ability ot have more control over the dress shape.
These things come through the talking head thing... there there are new worlds of style for sl.
10 Things I Hate About SL
1. Crashes. Of Course.
2. DP with heels. If I were in charge of programming in Second Life, this would be the top of the bug list.
3. Blue dialog boxes. Stack of ugly things in the corner interuptting everything. What would I do? I would have a window that has a "drawer" effect list of dialogs, small ones would have the yes no cancel options visible at a click or with check boxes to deal with several all at once, larger ones would, on mouse over, slide out, you could resize the space so that when you want very long dialog boxes would be visible. That or a wheel window would pop up with options or "more."
4. Pose balls. All right thinking avatars hate ball sprawl. What would I do? At the very least hide them. Better would be to make it so that more would position avatars above them, and appear as spots on the ground. I may do a demo of what I mean.
5. Lack of ability to create facial animations.
6. No joins on hands for our skeletons BVH files.
7. Slugly architecture. This is too big for a fix, but one major improvement would be to actually support huge prims. Another would be to have guides to better building published.
8. The Have/Have not economy. Too big for a single fix. But one large thing would be to make information easier to find. Traffic is a killer of information. It is meant to be. Get rid of it.
9. Ad farms. And all the things LL deliberately does to make them possible. Simple fix would be to zone mainland sims in advance by the minimum parcel that can be created and minimum width. Never create any more Governor Linden strips that create jagged edges whose sole use is for ad farm creation. That way, if people want to buy into ad farmy sims, and put up with the clutter, they can. Presumably at lower cost, since many will not want to be there. Right now everyone everywhere on mainland is always at the risk of slumification.
10. Its state religion.
2. DP with heels. If I were in charge of programming in Second Life, this would be the top of the bug list.
3. Blue dialog boxes. Stack of ugly things in the corner interuptting everything. What would I do? I would have a window that has a "drawer" effect list of dialogs, small ones would have the yes no cancel options visible at a click or with check boxes to deal with several all at once, larger ones would, on mouse over, slide out, you could resize the space so that when you want very long dialog boxes would be visible. That or a wheel window would pop up with options or "more."
4. Pose balls. All right thinking avatars hate ball sprawl. What would I do? At the very least hide them. Better would be to make it so that more would position avatars above them, and appear as spots on the ground. I may do a demo of what I mean.
5. Lack of ability to create facial animations.
6. No joins on hands for our skeletons BVH files.
7. Slugly architecture. This is too big for a fix, but one major improvement would be to actually support huge prims. Another would be to have guides to better building published.
8. The Have/Have not economy. Too big for a single fix. But one large thing would be to make information easier to find. Traffic is a killer of information. It is meant to be. Get rid of it.
9. Ad farms. And all the things LL deliberately does to make them possible. Simple fix would be to zone mainland sims in advance by the minimum parcel that can be created and minimum width. Never create any more Governor Linden strips that create jagged edges whose sole use is for ad farm creation. That way, if people want to buy into ad farmy sims, and put up with the clutter, they can. Presumably at lower cost, since many will not want to be there. Right now everyone everywhere on mainland is always at the risk of slumification.
10. Its state religion.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
We need more dresses like this
The balance of the shoulders against the handling if the waist are classic combined with this fabric weight and pattern. Whole ensemble on the perfect rl model....
Now look at this from sl... There is nothing here that can't be done in sl. Now why don't we have a hairstyle like that one? Why are there so many loop rez knock offs?
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
*snort giggle*
Tiessa gives us another not coffee safe link.
Meaning don't click on this link and take a sip of coffee while you wait for it to load...
Meaning don't click on this link and take a sip of coffee while you wait for it to load...
She Calls It The London:
Adult age play's real problem in Second Life
This summary is not available. Please
click here to view the post.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
The Swedish Chef Works for LL: Bork! Bork! Bork! Bork!
One of the three adjoining sims was offline, but the other two were not. I've been getting reports of crashes sims, of people in sims reported offline that are on line.
My advice.
Stay in bed.
And if you want to tp me in, my rate is very reasonable and I'm a great deal more fun than swearing at SL bugs.
Updated: the continent I am on just mega borked:
Rumor has it that there is a competition to see who can crash the most sims. I don't know if I should believe this.
She Calls It The London
She calls it the London because it's hers.
From up out of all of the aching years,
burned by memories of her arching fears.
Form up out of where her life began,
smuggled out of Pakistan,
sold to a twisted needy man,
to feed his ugly depredations,
fed to the lusts of many nations,
turned and tapered to shapes that adult lovers cannot know
a tiny vessel into which their sewage flowed.
To be that age and carry his seed inside,
to be at nine a hallowed concubine,
and then again, again at ten,
his pixie sparkly little bride.
And then escaped at twelve you see,
away from debauched fantasies,
and wandering streets like a Dickens urchin
stealing her food from shop stall merchants,
and caught one day her hand around an apple grasped.
Her wrist like bondage by his fingers clasped.
From out of this moment her expectations
where unhindered by ordinary hesitations,
but found, instead another path begun,
than left the other, older one.
Now she sits haughty, elbows like knees on the table,
a cigarette dangles, her neck is arched,
and wide dark eyes bore into me as I ask
how she now sets herself about the task
of courting men to pay for favors,
and all the debauchery in many flavors.
With an edge and air regal of one regaled,
she tells me of the city's darker tales.
Desire transformed be angry ego into rape,
while other weaker egos gape.
Of rooms of squirming bodies and shaken souls,
of masters slaves and their roles,
it leaves me reeling in the mind,
my pity eaten to a rind, and left
instead a cold wonder for this queen of night,
who treads soft footfalls beyond wrong and right,
to ease a sickness in its plight,
by catering to sweet neurotic flight.
Up and in to other lands,
taken and caressed by many hands,
to sleep upon the entire day,
it is wrong, but she knows no other way.
The smoke it plumes from her lips as she explains,
the daily agony and eternal pains.
The crooked path to self-redemption,
set forth on that darkened mountain path
was stolen by cruel intentions.
The white boa around her shoulders draped
was bought by the profits of many rapes.
But corroded away that innocence of dawn -
once taken it is forever gone -
is replaced by some strange self-possession,
which no mere physicality can exorcise.
I can see it, see it, see it in her eyes,
beyond her bluntness, and candid lies.
She calls it the London because it is hers,
and at its dark heart, her shiny mind and body
whirs.
At the heart of Second Life's direct sex industry is human need, human fantasy, and often, human carnage. Many of the people who are escorts are escorts because of dark fantasies of being abused and treated like garbage, of the people who have this fantasy, many, too many, are survivors, or victims, of childhood sexual trauma or emotional trauma. By no means all. But far far too many.
And in the community of second life, there are a small number of men who seek to exploit this. This is not only because those who do something out of need will do "anything with anyone for any amount of money," a phrase I heard from someone who is most decidedly not in this category, but whose description of the mindset is better than any phrase that I could coin, but also because it creates the expectation, the hope, of finding that diamond of sl escorting, the rl woman who wants to be treated like garbage rl. It is for her that more than a few men prowl are darker corners. The others, are merely the cost of searching for the her that they seek to own. The woman who will not only whore herself for linden virtually for them, though this is good, but the woman whose expression of these traits on Second Life is a cry to have them taken into real life. They look for the woman who will whore her real body for real money.
In my time on second life I have gotten offers to become an rl sex worker. I know escorts on second life who are rl sex workers, some trying to leave, others merely on hiatus or looking for ways of contacting additional clients through second life. It is a minority of the sisterhood, but not an inconsequential one. Similarly most of the men, even those seeking the most perverse of fantasies, are not interested in recruiting escorts for rl. More men want me to be a real life girlfriend, than be a real life call girl.
However, this rumbling undercurrent can intrude like a shock, when a conversation with a colleague turns to her experience of incest, when a client or potential client makes it clear that he isn't really interested in an sl escort, but only in the potential to take control of my rl.
The direct sex industry on second life is a fragile ecosystem. I am at pains to remind people that most of the sex that goes on in association with second life is not in the direct sex industry, but arises out of relationships. Escorting and orgy rooms are visible, because they have to be, they are not the middle range of expression of sexuality, nor the permanent one for most people. Thus it is not enough to "report" someone, because it is easy enough to slither away having been "mis read," and then to turn and reek revenge on the escort who was foolish enough to say anything.
This delicacy comes ut of the fundamental unfairness of the escorting reality. There is not enough work on second life for everyone who wants to work here. In fact, I would estimate that more than half of the active population of second life is here to learn this technology, and to build and grow with it, rather than to directly and immediately make money in second life. My own path is not abnormal: escort to get the basic capital and connections to try and spread wings and fly. Whether it works in my case I don't know. But if it does, I am not the first.
I publish this now as both a warning to those who work in the darker regions of the sl sex world, to be very careful about exposure of your rl, because the tactic is to get something which could be used to compromise your rl, and as a beginning of the exploration of how the aftershocks of rl trauma play themselves out in second life.
There are some stories, and it is time for me to tell some of them.
From up out of all of the aching years,
burned by memories of her arching fears.
Form up out of where her life began,
smuggled out of Pakistan,
sold to a twisted needy man,
to feed his ugly depredations,
fed to the lusts of many nations,
turned and tapered to shapes that adult lovers cannot know
a tiny vessel into which their sewage flowed.
To be that age and carry his seed inside,
to be at nine a hallowed concubine,
and then again, again at ten,
his pixie sparkly little bride.
And then escaped at twelve you see,
away from debauched fantasies,
and wandering streets like a Dickens urchin
stealing her food from shop stall merchants,
and caught one day her hand around an apple grasped.
Her wrist like bondage by his fingers clasped.
From out of this moment her expectations
where unhindered by ordinary hesitations,
but found, instead another path begun,
than left the other, older one.
Now she sits haughty, elbows like knees on the table,
a cigarette dangles, her neck is arched,
and wide dark eyes bore into me as I ask
how she now sets herself about the task
of courting men to pay for favors,
and all the debauchery in many flavors.
With an edge and air regal of one regaled,
she tells me of the city's darker tales.
Desire transformed be angry ego into rape,
while other weaker egos gape.
Of rooms of squirming bodies and shaken souls,
of masters slaves and their roles,
it leaves me reeling in the mind,
my pity eaten to a rind, and left
instead a cold wonder for this queen of night,
who treads soft footfalls beyond wrong and right,
to ease a sickness in its plight,
by catering to sweet neurotic flight.
Up and in to other lands,
taken and caressed by many hands,
to sleep upon the entire day,
it is wrong, but she knows no other way.
The smoke it plumes from her lips as she explains,
the daily agony and eternal pains.
The crooked path to self-redemption,
set forth on that darkened mountain path
was stolen by cruel intentions.
The white boa around her shoulders draped
was bought by the profits of many rapes.
But corroded away that innocence of dawn -
once taken it is forever gone -
is replaced by some strange self-possession,
which no mere physicality can exorcise.
I can see it, see it, see it in her eyes,
beyond her bluntness, and candid lies.
She calls it the London because it is hers,
and at its dark heart, her shiny mind and body
whirs.
At the heart of Second Life's direct sex industry is human need, human fantasy, and often, human carnage. Many of the people who are escorts are escorts because of dark fantasies of being abused and treated like garbage, of the people who have this fantasy, many, too many, are survivors, or victims, of childhood sexual trauma or emotional trauma. By no means all. But far far too many.
And in the community of second life, there are a small number of men who seek to exploit this. This is not only because those who do something out of need will do "anything with anyone for any amount of money," a phrase I heard from someone who is most decidedly not in this category, but whose description of the mindset is better than any phrase that I could coin, but also because it creates the expectation, the hope, of finding that diamond of sl escorting, the rl woman who wants to be treated like garbage rl. It is for her that more than a few men prowl are darker corners. The others, are merely the cost of searching for the her that they seek to own. The woman who will not only whore herself for linden virtually for them, though this is good, but the woman whose expression of these traits on Second Life is a cry to have them taken into real life. They look for the woman who will whore her real body for real money.
In my time on second life I have gotten offers to become an rl sex worker. I know escorts on second life who are rl sex workers, some trying to leave, others merely on hiatus or looking for ways of contacting additional clients through second life. It is a minority of the sisterhood, but not an inconsequential one. Similarly most of the men, even those seeking the most perverse of fantasies, are not interested in recruiting escorts for rl. More men want me to be a real life girlfriend, than be a real life call girl.
However, this rumbling undercurrent can intrude like a shock, when a conversation with a colleague turns to her experience of incest, when a client or potential client makes it clear that he isn't really interested in an sl escort, but only in the potential to take control of my rl.
The direct sex industry on second life is a fragile ecosystem. I am at pains to remind people that most of the sex that goes on in association with second life is not in the direct sex industry, but arises out of relationships. Escorting and orgy rooms are visible, because they have to be, they are not the middle range of expression of sexuality, nor the permanent one for most people. Thus it is not enough to "report" someone, because it is easy enough to slither away having been "mis read," and then to turn and reek revenge on the escort who was foolish enough to say anything.
This delicacy comes ut of the fundamental unfairness of the escorting reality. There is not enough work on second life for everyone who wants to work here. In fact, I would estimate that more than half of the active population of second life is here to learn this technology, and to build and grow with it, rather than to directly and immediately make money in second life. My own path is not abnormal: escort to get the basic capital and connections to try and spread wings and fly. Whether it works in my case I don't know. But if it does, I am not the first.
I publish this now as both a warning to those who work in the darker regions of the sl sex world, to be very careful about exposure of your rl, because the tactic is to get something which could be used to compromise your rl, and as a beginning of the exploration of how the aftershocks of rl trauma play themselves out in second life.
There are some stories, and it is time for me to tell some of them.
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