Booby Prize Islands:Pay Prize Pyle too much for the privilege of overpaying him every month.

We sell islands at 28K per month with no up front fee. Prize Pyle sells islands at 47000K, and then charges 29000 a month. That's what we charge people who rent from us. With no up front fees. What do you get for you 19000L? Some palm trees, I think a couple of boats. Maybe. A terraform with lots of flashing. Free? He's charging you 17K more than just moving into an island, not just from us, but from several other land vendors.

Most people aren't selling value added islands... they are just charging for them.

Aurora Primealus

As with nature, sometimes it is the oddities which are the most telling.

Care for a swim?

Thanks Dizzy

I just wanted to thank Dizzy again for letting me help out on the message in a bottle project. It's his baby, I just added some bubbles.

But then, a party is better with bubbly.

New Price List for Buying Openspace Sims from Neo-Modern Entertainment

Reading OS sim prices, it seems we've precipitated a price war. That's good, because it means people will be paying lower prices for open space sims no matter where they buy. There are also value added os sims, and people should be willing to pay more if they are getting exactly what they want. But if you want a sim to do whatever you want to with it, then price is your most important measure.

How to read this table: The first column is the monthly tier. The second column is the set up cost you must pay to get that tier.

This means to buy and take possession of the island you have to pay the move in cost, which is the total of the set up costs and the first month's tier.

When comparing prices, remember there are slightly more than 4 weeks per month, so multiply a weekly rate by 4.3 to get the equivalent monthly rate.




Tier  +  Set up  =  Move in   Notes
27250              
26500     15000     41500     Name the sim
26000     20000     46000
25500     25000     50500
25000     30000     55000     Choose the place.
24000     35000     59500     Price reduction!
24000     40000     64000     Price promise
23500     45000     68500
23000     50000     73000
22500     55000     77500
22000     60000     82000
21500     65000     86500
21000     70000     91000


All come with Estate Owner rights. Generally we can deliver a new island within 1 hour, depending on LL's land store.

SL5Banned Party

I helped Dizzy a bit with his message in a bottle installation. I didn't do much, threw some scripts together. I did a great deal, but it would have gotten us b-aaaned from SL5B if we had done the really edgy version. So this Friday I'm going to hold an SL5Banned party, feature the bottle that SL won't allow you to crawl into, with the really fun effects that go with it. Come as your favorite banned group from SL5B. Your exposed nipples get you in the door with no cover charge.


So stay tuned for the place and time.

Arden Bricklin: liar, cheat, and drama queen

"People make decisions every day."

I made a bad one in listening to Arden Bricklin. She lied to me repeatedly, and tried the weasel trick of saying that she liked me, and she would "refer business." I don't want her business, or her friends.

She was late on rent. She said it was "a communication error." I argued with my partner not to evict when they were 24 hours late. The next day they paid, but only after being prodded. Then today, 24 hours later, they up and left and demanded a refund on the week. I gave it to them.

Then they hard the nerve to insult my business partner. If she is bad mouthing my firends to me, I can't trust anything she says about what she will say afterwards. She said we had a great deal so she would refer. Well that's in the numbers. We do try and offer the lowest prices that we can. When people get into trouble and have to leave, we make arrangements. But Arden made one weasel after another, and being in the real estate business, she should know that people who are late on their rent, who run out in the middle and demand a refund when nothing was mentioned in the contract, and who try and bad mouth partners to each other, isn't welcome. She's renting from a friend now, I think that's probably the right choice for her, because she didn't treat my friendship with any respect.


She kept going on about how she has a great reputation in Second Life. I don't know her other business dealings, and she could have a wonderful reputation.

But what I know is that she treated me unfairly, and made veiled threats that if I did not tolerate it she would bad mouth me. Well, that's the nature of SL. I am loathe to write about people coming and going, escorting or renting it is the same. People get into bad situations, people have to make choices.

Arden made the choice to be a bitch to me, and that is what I have to say.

I'm really sorry for this post, I kept ignoring the warning signs. Don't be late on your rent, don't use your position to threaten me, don't bad mouth my friends, don't say how you like me, and then after I argued for you to my partners, dump an agreement.

Yedo Yoshiwara for rent

Good Location next to the Basilica, water on two sides.

7250L/wk.

Moulin Rouge

Grey figures on landing, odd angles on sight.
White letters on listening, odd exchanges of night.
Green numbers still holding, even in the light,
pastel glow from the orbs, even if not bright.
Colored painted lady I, a dream to catch the wandering eye.
Fashioned fashion after a fashion, a figure that figures.
The words bled together long ago, and now the movements do so.

Gathering Literary Men in My Official Residence On a Rainy Day

Outside are banners, displayed in state; Inside floats incense, quietly our own.
Wind and showers, come in from the sea, Cooling pavilion, above the famed lake,
and drive away, the feverish heat. From where guests gather, eminent they all,
Although I am shamed, at my high position, while the people lead, their unhappy lives,
let us banish care, with good intentions, being only friends, enjoying this nature.
We have dissatisfy, without fish or meant, there is here plenty, of vegetables and fruit.
We bow and then take, take our cups of wine, our focus is on the poems.
The mind exalts, the body light, feels to float upon the wind.
Suzhou is the center of letters, from which it wins its fame.
Does it not show that the great land, is of better things than wealth?

After Wei Yingwu

The original is, of course, far better in fact than what I can write in my dreams:


兵衛森畫戟， 宴寢凝清香。
海上風雨至， 逍遙池閣涼。
煩痾近消散， 嘉賓復滿堂。
自慚居處崇， 未睹斯民康。
理會是非遣， 性達形跡忘。
鮮肥屬時禁， 蔬果幸見嘗。
俯飲一杯酒， 仰聆金玉章。
神歡體自輕， 意欲淩風翔。
吳中盛文史， 群彥今汪洋。
方知大蕃地， 豈曰財賦強？

It is part of the famed collection of 300 Tang Poems. About which a friend inquired to me recently.

Adding Wildfire Walcott

She's very smart and has lots of great advice on her blog.

A quick trip down land price lane

I wanted to know what other people are charging, so I did a search of land prices. Now I can't know the private deals that people may offer. Some land sellers offer more in the way of terraforming and building than we do. But that's something you should decide based on a clear look at the prices, whether what they offer is enough "extra" for you.

Let's start with the first one on search:

NOW OFFERING ESTATE MANAGING RIGHTS FULL CONTROL OF THE SIM. Open Space SIM 65536 SQM, with 3750 Prims, Just 50,000L$ to own and 28,600L$ MONTHLY tier. Terraform and Texture this land however you want. Free Financing.

The two numbers that matter are your "move in price," which is what it takes to take control of the sim, that's up front charges plus the first month's rent, and your tier after that. So move in price of 78600 with a tier of 28600.

From us you can get a move in price of 77500, and your tier would be 22500. That's a difference of 6100L a month. So that you can pay for someone else's financing. I don't know how you earn your money on sl, but for an escort, that's a lot of cyber blow jobs.

Aloha? Won't even tell you their prices.

Whisper Sands? Better Service? They don't even tell you their prices. How can it be "better service" when you have to take your time to go to their island to find out what the base price is. We tell you what our rental fee for an island is in the search. In the name even: 7250L week, no other fees.

Land Store? Won't tell you their prices either. Now think about it, if they have a sim doing nothing but being a billboard, that means you are paying for it, because it has to come out of someone's pocket. We don't have billboard sims. If a sim is advertised, it is because it is for rent.

Prize Sands. Says "first month free." There's no such thing. There is move in cost, and tier. That tells you what the sim costs you. So I had to wander over to their website...

Low Prim Sim 65536 sqm, 3750 prims 59999L 108.61 USD (28999L) 59999L

Is their price line. So let's see, move in price of 59500 means from us a tier of 24500L. That means you are paying prize islands 4499L a month more. For? I think those 9's and !'s must cost something. And don't be fooled by "Estate Owner Rights," anyone can do that and it currently doesn't cost anything from LL. So why are you paying 4499L a month more, every month? Well that website and the advertisements have to come from some place, and that someplace is you. And by the way, if you are paying 180.61 for that many linden, you are overpaying, you can get them by ordering a couple of days in advance for $106 by placing a limit by at 275L for $1. The way to do this is setting your Linden Exchange settings to advance, and instead of doing a market order, do a limit by. Type in how many Linden you want, and what you want to pay per linden, though 275 is the cheapest that it will ever be. The advantages of having an rl finance guy as one of the partners, he figures these things out. You can do the same thing in reverse with selling your Linden, where 264L is the cheapest it is going to get. And no, you can't buy at 275 and sell at 264 and make much of a profit. That's why they have currency trading limits.

They don't tell you those things, we do. They can say integrity and service, but we just saved you some money. They think about themselves, we think about you.

Bell Estate is the only one that comes close. Move in of 60K. We beat them by 500L per monht. Or 6000L a year. That's significant.

But if Bell is offering a reasonable price, then Ocean Estate 5 is trying to rob you blind:

100L is for reservation. Buy this whole sim for 85500L (about $295 USD) and pay 28500L ($99 USD) tier for a 4 weeks period. Im me if you have question. No covenant.

Let's add that up. Move in of 85500L, I am assuming that comes with the first month's tier. Let me see, what about a move in cost of 82K, that is 3500L less, and a tier of 22K? That's 6500L less. Or a total of almost 75K less in a year. I'd have had to cyber escorted for 250 hours to amke up the difference. The only word for that price, is screwed. A lot of screwing.

ZweiteWelt? 29,999L. That's a thousand Linden a month more than what we charge. Now they are German speaking, and that may be what you need. But they have an awful lot of empty sims, that's going to cost you.

Hawaii? 16 USD Dollars a month more than we charge.

Windlight? Restrictive covenant and 14USD a month more. And people are going to be boating across your land.

CES Openspace? 9,000L a month more.

So the end of the quick trip shows that there are a few vendors with reasonable prices, and many with very unreasonable prices. Since who you rent from is important, you should check the people with reasonable prices, and see who you want to do business with. The only people in Second Life in a hurry to get you to spend money.... are afraid you will find a better deal. Take your time, your land agent is someone you will do business with a great deal. But you should think about something.

The websites I visited talked about "other people's" prices... and didn't mention Yedo. There's a reason for that, our prices are alot lower. So if who you do business with matters, are you going to start with a vendor who tells you to buy linden the wrong way, charges you more, and won't go through and comparison shop with you and tell you how things work? It's not a good basis to start out from.

But remember, the bottom line is move in price, and tier. They can say "first month free," or not, but it still comes down to the same thing. And whoever you buy from, that is buy not rent, ask for estate owner privileges. They can do that. We do that.

Here is our price list. to get the move in price, add the cost and one month's rent. In each case you will find for the same move in cost, we have lower tier than the competitors who are advertising. Not some vague "others," but naming names and quoting prices from search and their web sites.

Yedo Ebisu for Rent

yedo Ebisu for rent. 7250L/wk.


Our current price list for buying or renting is here. You will find we have the most reasonable prices at every price point. And don't listen to vendors that make a big deal about making you the "estate owner," for people who buy, we can do that for you as well.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

I feel like I live in an era that was born old, and will vanish from the earth in infancy. It seems almost as if the story of the baby boom makes more sense if played in reverse: growing up in the shadow of nuclear war, rebelling for democracy and peace and a new world in youth, and then a march behind their elders into a kind of adolescent consumption.

It is truly, born under unusual circumstances. What ruin will they leave for us. They will leave so much ruin I cannot even begin to describe it. These are haunting notes, and even this trailer implies what I think to be true, that over and over again, when faced with a rift between sensation and emotion, that all they can do, is move on.

Half of Second Life, or more, I think, seems to be wrapped in reactionary thoughts and attitudes, fighting battles that I do not understand, speaking a code that I cannot break, and a language which is not written down in any book. Instead, they seem to be passing backwards to a moment where their morality does not apply, freed from rules that they never believed in, but were instead merely forced to obey, there seems to be a rift that either wants to not believe that there was ever any purpose for the rules at all, or that they can be imposed by bombast.

I do not believe either of these things, but I cannot yet say with precision and rigor what I see. If only trying to look forward, and not back, did not hurt so, and strain the mind's eye. If only it did not lead to such places of dark despair. Perhaps I am not meant or made for this stretching of the imagination.

But I know that it must happen, some how, and by the hand of someone.

More Solutions in Progressive Architecture

This is textured badly, I admit. It is a core and floor twirl, with the 20x20x60 as the twirl, the 30x30x30 as the sleeve for the twirl, and a 90x90x90 dimpled and hollowed to .35 as the floor.

Information Week on Eshi's struggles to stay in the US

Eshi and rl, as covered by Information Week.

A Second Life artist who goes by the name "Eshi Otawara" faces real-life deportation due to the so-called "widow's penalty" in immigration law.

The artist, whose real-life name is Irena Morris, is a Croatian immigrant who lives in Florida. Her American husband died suddenly, when they'd been married less than two years, while her application for residency was in progress. According to U.S. immigration law, the application is automatically rejected once the American spouse dies. Morris received formal notification from U.S. immigration authorities last week that her application was terminated, and she's ready to be deported from the U.S. at any moment.

This is absurd. Widows? Why?

"Dishonorable Passions":Anal Sex and the Law

Salon.com reviews William N. Eskridge Jr.'s work on anti-Sodomy laws in the United States.

Interestingly he argues that the creation of homosexuality as a category is rather late in American enforcement.

The reviewer asks who the other is, well all he needs to do is come to second life and see the next frontier of other.

Intergrid JIRA

With the first log into an open sim from an LL agent domain, Aditi, not Agni, the reality of an open metaverse gets closer. However one aspect of contention is how the IP of creators will be respected. One step we need then is to allow creators to set the permissions for objects to other grids. The default would be only in the grid the object was created in, but to allow objects to move across grids with the intentions of the creator and copyright owner attached, some work needs to be done.

Saijanai Kuhn has proposed a first step on the Jira, that would allow this to be stored. We also need a set of permissions to be saved, and displayed, that would tell people what they are buying. But more on that later. Right now, we need this JIRA voted up so that it can be shown to be an issue of importance.

Cuomo Gets Providers to Restrict Child Porn Access

Landmark agreement.

New Concept Tower

This new concept tower is based on the work of the first one, however it solves the walkable twirl with huge prims problems. The advantage of using twirls, that is boxes and cylinders with rotation at beginning and end, rather than torii and their cousins, is that a twirl is exactly at the stated height. A 40x40x40 cube is 40 meters tall, rather than some fraction of this which has a bit of round off error. This means they can be stacked more easily to any desired height without gaps or adjustments or pixel lines.



This gives a second option, in addition to "core and floor" architecture, for tall walkable buildings, and provides another example of huge prims opening up the possibilities for second life architecture, since 10x10 twirls are not really walkable, but larger ones are.

Located here for as long as it is installed.