Enemies Known

Everybody keeps watching Linden Lab over the years to see whether they will get bought out by some bigger media company, and they forget to watch to see what they themselves acquire -- or just take (like the did with GOM). Of course, that includes Windlight, and didn't they buy or get a stake in some customer service thing? (Or was that just a rental lol). Now they've bought Avatars United, something that nobody ever went to, even before it was one of those Yogi Berra places like it is now where "nobody ever goes there, it's too crowded". Of course, some people will go there just to chat with Lindens who are in a suddenly socialable mode and easier to find on there, unlike SL, where they alphabets have made themselves impossible to search for -- deliberately.

When I was a child, we lived in a series of dumps in a small upstate town, the kind of wooden homes build in the 19th century that were originally for the wealthy of their day, complete with carriage steps and stables, and then became known 50 years after their prime as "multifamily dwellings," which was a way of saying "they got all chopped up and rented out". We would live in funny arrangements with two or three other families, say, we would have half of a downstairs and one upstairs room, which would be shared with people also on that second floor in two rooms across the hall, where they put lockable doors. Today, all the multis have been kicked out and they've been refurbished for a new generation of wealthy 100 years later, but back then, they were dumpy, with sagging porches and stairs, high ceilings in rooms that never got warm, peeling linoleum. Even so, we loved them precisely because they were dumpy, but interesting, with dumbwaiters, strange earthen basements, barns with odd implements, bannisters to slide down, and witch's tower.

When we had to move into a shiny new split level suburban house like a 1,000  other houses in a treeless tract, it was supposed to be "better," but it was depressing and we didn't like it. Nothing for the kids to do, except go down in the ill-named "family room" and watch TV.

That's how it feels being driven over to Avatars United, a site run by Enemies Unknown, which I had never heard of. I'm not very "social" to be honest despite having lots of "friends". I went over there, just to see if it had anything -- it doesn't.

Appallingly, as Ordinal has pointed out, this antidote to the Facebook-uniting features that M Linden wants to push obviously accepts avatars -- you suspect this is the ghetto where the people who refuse to out their RL name will have to go -- doesn't have verifiability for the avatars. There are already three Prokofy Nevas, only one of which is me -- and one of which is the known enemy type who wrote "communists" blah blah and the other was Ordinal testing what she could do with the system -- which was make any name, including Linden names, to spoof anyone. Is there a Spartacus Linden? You know, there could be, there are Lindens springing up everywhere like kudzu now.

That's just inexcusable. It might dampen membership velocity, which is all these suits care about, but having a kiosk you touch inworld for verifying identity would make it grief-free on that score. Instead, the owners -- and their new Linden overlords -- have outrageously said that they figure the fake IDs will simply be driven away. That's retarded, because on Twitter, there are still people friending the fake Prokofy as there are on Facebook and never realizing (the Prokofy on FB is not me but Woodbury griefing).

Returning to my metaphor of the old Victorian houses and the new bland suburbia -- AU is supposed to have "APIs" and "widgeteers" are supposed to love this. So far, the APIs consist of...a shoutbox. Like writing on a wall. And a feed reader, which is mildly helpful because it is a reader you can make free of Torley HUD Madness and those hideously ugly avatars that Puma Jie keeps putting up trying to be cool and insisting that by making girls with heavy eyebrows and big indentations under the noses and thick glasses that they are being cutting edge and realistic (instead, they just look retarded).

I really am getting sick of the fashion feed, and I actually go to virtualworlds.alltop.com more these days, but that doesn't quite do it because the items in that feed aren't all of interest. I like Planet.worldofsl.com but I can't take the Torlification and the ugly girls (has no one ever heard of beauty? BTW the other one with the really ugly fashion models is Arabella Steadham. I characterized them as hideous even before realizing they were hers -- she is banned from my land for being an Emerald and Woodbury troll and even doing rent-griefing. Arabella has these slutty, drugged out door-knob dumb looking avatars with very widespaced eyes, slathered on eyemakeup and pouty lips. There was one on for a time wearing various ugly bad Russian imitations that were unlike even any Russian tablecloth or upholstery I knew, as dresses, and a version of that model still on with the spaced-out eyes and aggressive drunken stupid face. Why can't people admire and post *beauty*? Have they no sense of what beauty is?! Inworld, you have to put up a well with so many overly painted, pneumatic-breasted female avatars now with their asses showing through jeans, and skins that have strange white streaks on them, that are probably supposed to look shiny on some computers but just look like they got up from a bukkake club.

Ugh. It's nice to get AWAY from that feed, and for that AU is good in that you can customize it -- of course you could do that on Google too.

There is something called "Wikitar" (sigh) that enables you to...uh...post a Youtube. Whoot! But I tried for 20 minutes to get the damn text box working and gave up. Wouldn't it have been better for LL to buy Koinup? At least there, you can put up screenshots and stories with captions much more easily.

I wonder if I will wind up using Avatar if it has a capacity to post screenshots from inworld to the site (I don't see that it does). But I like Posterous because in addition to my blog, it has a separate page where people can post comments. The only thing wrong with Posterous is the way it combines with Typepad not to make a nice readable caption, requiring separate manual editing.

I find that I'm not just that interested in friending and chatting bunches of avatar outside the context of a world where we can make and share content and activities. It's like the AOL chatroom or the Yahoo chat functions which have zero interest for me, and which I keep shut off on Yahoo and which I never join on Gtalk/gmail. Never make a gmail, you will never face the pressure to "g-chat".

Avatars become more stupid the farther away you take them from home, which is a virtual world.

All of this stuff is said to be helping the Lindens with sign-ups or with "becoming more like the web" or social control (and there's a lot of cynicism and anger being expressed to the odious Wallace Linden for pretending that he was sounding out opinion and didn't know anything was planned -- and then being called out for in fact softening everyone up a week before this Avatar United rollout happened).

But Crap Mariner mentioned another concept to me that I had forgotten: scaling.

As you know, the Lindens favourite thing to say to whatever anybody wants is: "it doesn't scale".

And of course, Second Life itself may not scale, despite bringing on all these people from AOL and such to help.

If you look at all the Linden decision making in the last year in terms of the stark awareness they may have reached that the world doesn't scale, it makes more sense:

o buy XStreet, because you can get rid of inworld stores -- they don't scale, too much land, too many avatars, too much bling

o start Linden Homes, to make very predictable spaces with very set types of textures, prims, etc. to endlessly replicate easily -- because mainland where people do their own thing doesn't scale, governance and server wise

o make Zindra, so that the job of perusal of adult content and keeping out child pornography becomes easier to do in the sense that people are supposed to self-select here, as perusing the entire world doesn't scale

o get rid of the freebies on Xstreet, to reduce content, because inventories aren't scaling

o glut the land market, to discourage anyone but end users from buying land, as island and mainland landbarons can't scale -- they buy too many servers and dilute the population on them

o buy a social-networking site, as groups and IMs aren't scaling in SL.

And so on. Eventually, we may find that owning land is something that will be only available for the super rich and connected -- everyone else will be driven into their stock Holodecks, with changing scenery that they use while online, but which disintegrates when they go offline, to free up space for the next people.

In There.com, one way your home/land works is you carry it around like a snail as inventory and then put it in a "drop zone" when you are ready to sit and hang out with friends.

Obviously, dedicated servers kept always on 24/7 is a luxury of server space, electricity, cooling, etc. that *does not scale*. It used to be that people really thought you can always add one more; maybe the Lindens "now know" that they can't.

Comments

[AnnOtooleInSL]

So the tradition of creating spectacles of stupidity and griefing to cause a mob demand for ending anonymity on the blog didn't work out so M bought an entire web site to extend the griefing out onto the web and hired the PN Herald's leadership to run the war on existing residents eh?

Makes sense.

Wikitar and other widgets don't save edits btw. And groups is your only shot at an ad for now. But accepting invites to other groups shoves your group off the screen so we are left with only our own groups lmao.

Oh and I am so looking forward to granting "Enemies Unknown" access to Secondlife.com and their garage coders making little widgets will get auth on the entire web site by account.

Durrrr

[Lizzie Lexington]

Um, so are you now a mirror site for WTFug? Why the fixation on avatar appearance? Sheesh!

[Puma]

LOL. I'm sorry you dislike my shapes. I like my eyebrows... to each their own <3 I wear glasses in RL too! As for the indentations... it's my graphics card ;x

[Prokofy Neva]

Because I'm tired of deliberate, catty, louche, faux-arch-ironic but retarded ugliness? I'm just *tired* of it. It's dishonest.

Wearing glasses is not the issue. It's deliberately making avatars to be somehow "normal and real lifelike" but with a deliberate catty hatred of them.

I'll bet some of you are men in RL.

[Brinda Allen]

Prok...RE: our brief chat last eve in-world...
Every now and then I guess I make the right decision {for me}. Yes I see no need for me to *commune* with other avatars outside Secindlife.

The scaling thing...the thots are scary 'cause they sound like a plausible reason for what's happened these last couple years.

I don't remember who originated the statement that SL is an experiment run by the Lab and we're just invited lab rats.
you kno...I guess lab rat is OK..'cept for the "X" amount of thousands of dollars I pay for my entertainment {and the lab experiment.
And....
"Enemies Unknown"
My god couldn't someone have forseen the subtle issues generated by a name like that! Sure, I really want to join something named Enemies Unknown!....are they kidding me?

[melponeme_k]

I don't plan on joining AU anymore than I do FB. My avi is a vehicle I use in-world to explore what other people create. I post pictures of it on my flickr and an obscure website. Thats it, nothing else is needed.

As far as avatar styles go, it goes through a lot of changes. We have the super tall fashion models on one end, the Japanese Kawaii girls on the other. In between there are these harlot types with greasy skin and then "realistic" ones. The problem I have with all of them is that they are all geared, to most extent, to the male gaze. When I first came into the SL grid, I was surprised to see women turning themselves into caricatures of photoshopped models. And I was curious to know what would we choose to look like if that had not been the case. I'll never know. And now I no longer think about it.

Now the fact that men are perpetuating these stereotypes and portraying themselves as understanding the female condition (through female avatars) pisses me off. But I'm not going to get into it.

As far as land goes. Yes, I think you are right that only the very wealthy hobbyists will be able to afford their own land. SL will raise tier rates. So that the small homesteaders drop out and will have to make do with Linden Homes.

On a stray note, I noticed that some of my scripted items are acting wonky. I think the grid is already throttling them. That means I have a lot of items in my inventory that will be dead in the water and worthless. Oh well.

[Lizzie Lexington]

@Prok - if I were a man in RL I would be a fabulous, stunning gay man a la Elton John! Listen I have respect for you as a writer and an activist in SL. Not all of us want to do that though. Some of us want to play barbies. Some of us want to create a character who may wear crazy glasses, jellies and SL "couture" with cowboy boots. Who is being harmed by this? Why not have respect for what some of us want out of our SL, like some of us do in regards to yours.

[Lizzie Lexington]

And for the record I am not in AU as of yet - I have enough social networking in my life and not sure if I need anymore.

[Prokofy Neva]

I don't understand your point Lizzie. People can do what they want. I do get to criticize it, however. In what way have I claimed that people can't where crazy glasses and cowboy boots? I haven't.

What I *will* do is criticize the ugly avatars that Puma Jie (What is juma pie, anyway?) and Arabella Steadham inflict on us day after day. They are ugly. They are deliberately made ugly as some kind of "fashion statement". It's a fashion statement with an undertow. They get to do this, and I can shield my eyes, but I can also criticize it as basically something wrong. It is not beautiful. It is not creating beauty. It is making a stance that says, "I will deliberately make these ugly women and pretend that I'm fighting for the rights of ugly women, but what I'm really doing in a subtle way is mocking them and hating them."

That's my take-home. Your mileage may vary. They get to make their avatars and sell them. I wonder how many people here have bought skins of avatars with wide-spaced eyes and greasy makeup, or glasses and freckles and snub noses. I see this on *fashion blogs*. I don't see it in world except on Toast and Ingrid who have always been pioneers in 'the rights of the ugly avatar' to be fashionable -- but of course they do this with a huge sardonic tongue in cheek.

[Radio Signals]

So images of beautiful women are objectifying and hateful. And images of ugly women are mocking and hateful. I know, let's cover all women up in black cloth so we'll never have to look at them again!

OH WAIT THAT'S HATEFUL.

What about images of women for women doing the things that these women like to do? That's what I think most of the SL fashion scene is, and I like it!

I know Puma personally and she is really not a very hateful person, especially not to women. (and I am a woman). She's not even hating on you, Prok. Give her a break, for real.

[Lizzie Lexington]

Everything that Radio says plus my own... Puma has a vision for her avatar that may not meet your standard of beauty, Prok. And I assure she is not "making a fashion statement", she is simply being Puma - a charming, sweet person and who btw is very kind to many people. And your words have hurt her and I don't like it one bit.

And Arabella is also a friend of mine and personally I love her avatar. She is also a kind, intelligent and a fierce human being. I have turned to her in the past for guidance and advice and I think she is simply wonderful. This personal attack of her is uncalled for completely.

I argue you are not criticizing but attacking people for their vision of second life. Frankly now I am classifying your blog among the likes of WTFug and Fashion Police. The End.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

"The problem I have with all of them is that they are all geared, to most extent, to the male gaze. When I first came into the SL grid, I was surprised to see women turning themselves into caricatures of photoshopped models."

This is too true, sadly. And the knee-jerk response -- that all giant-breasted, barely-clad women in SL must be men in RL -- doesn't do anything like justice to the problem. Too often, women want to look this way because they have been conditioned to believe that this is how they should want to look. And, in fact, I've heard women say that they were only "noticed" socially once they increased their breast size.

It's sad sad sad that SL, that should be an ideal means of challenging these kinds of stereotypes, is probably cementing them even more firmly in place.

[Prokofy Neva]

It's not about my standard of beauty. It's about what is beautiful universally. And it's about not doing the same thing over and over again, which is what these fashion blogs do. Formulaic. Ad nauseum.

What I don't like about the ugly avatar movement is that the people doing it think they are more-PC-than-thou by making "realistic" avatars, but in fact, they aren't really realistic. They are a kind of caricature. They are *skillful* but...there's something about them that is disturbing. It's like we *have* to have ugly avatars. I just never people actually chose those skins. I guess it's like a lot of fashion -- it's for the fashion mags, and ordinary people only select elements of them, or none of it at all. It's a strange cultural affectation.

Puma might be very charming and sweet and all the rest, and she's a skilled artist. I'm expressing my opinion. I'm tired of the diet of Juma Pie. Every single day in the feed. Endlessly. With the same type of avatar deliberately not-pretty. Where I'm *supposed* to say "I appreciate that this avatar is more realistic and not objectified beauty". Except, after while I have to say: but...it's still not beautiful. it still doesn't have soul.

I realize my expression my singular opinion can be hurtful and even incite anger. Then I can only say: then if you love what you do, if you can stand by it, then tell me to go fuck myself and just do your thing. But perhaps you might think: am I in a rut? Is this really my best? Is this in fact beautiful?

Arabella is a creep. Her avatars are aggressively ugly and greasy. Very unlike Puma Jie, who isn't aggressive and is more skilled.

I'm just expressing my opinion about what I'm sick and tired of, and how I feel railroaded into accepting a PC notion I don't wish to accept. I wish to say these avatars are not beautiful. I bet I'm not alone in that feeling. I believe in beauty as an abstract, higher notion. It doesn't have to be the beauty of the typical male definition or anything like that.

I don't know WTFug and Fashion Police but I do know this: every time one of those People magazines or whatever put up pictures and tell you what's "hot" and what's "not" and what was an awful dress at the Grammy Awards or whatever, and what was beautiful, I totally disagree. Totally.

[Az Afterthought]

I would argue that the AU acquisition wasn't motivated by scalability - but rather a need for SL to support relationships other than ones that are started with 'CAN I BE YOUR FRIEND?' Seriously, who's ever said that IRL after a business meeting? However, I would say that it's a bad and needlessly complex solution (I wrote a blog post about it here - http://a-res.info/?p=212 ).

About your feed problem, have you tried a web based feed reader service? I swear by Google Reader for following blogs, just add all the feeds you want to follow, and it just keeps a long list of links all up-to-date in an inbox-like interface.

[Prokofy Neva]

Um, yeah. I do know how to use the Internet. Google feed reader is for the birds. Even Scoble says that. It creates feed bankruptcy. You end up with a huge pile of feeds you never read and they sit there.

I've made my Google page put the feeds that are absolutely vital for work into the panels itself on the viewer, and that works, but I haven't taken the time to make an SL viewer. Having to log in and out of two Google accounts which I already do is a chore -- that would make three. I'm not motivated enough to have a Google feed reader just for Prokofy when I have...Twitter. Which does that better, really.

[melponeme_k]

Where Warcraft goes the others follow.

http://www.wow.com/2010/02/01/blizzard-launches-facebook-armory-app/

Thankfully I don't have an FB. But the moment Blizzard starts pushing to publish info about all my game alts connected to my real info is the moment I delete the account.