I've got a dream when the darkness is over, we'll be lyin' in the rays of the sun

I did not realize the Hill of Crosses existed in SL.


(Creative Commons license reserved to photographer Diego Delso. All rights reserved.)

The Hill of Crosses, or Kryžių kalnas, beyond the screen is in Šiauliai, wbich is in the upper part of Lithuania. No one seems to know for sure when it began to sprout crosses in profusion, but most sources agree it began sometime in the first few decades of the 1800s, after a few wars wherein the dead were buried where they fell, and not back home with their loved ones. Having no bodies to commemorate, they went to the hill and memorialized them there.

And the Lithuanian government was initally not pleased--especially during Soviet-occupied years. To the point, in fact, that the Soviet army bulldozed the hill, the site of the old Domantai Fort, three times--once in the 1940s, I believe, again in 1963, and once more in 1973.


(Creative Commons license reserved to photographer B. Villaiba, who snapped this image in 2016. All rights reserved.)

The people were undeterred. They raised the stakes--quite literally staking crosses deep into the hill, but also carting in statues of Jesus and the Virgin, hanging rosaries, holy medals, blessed scapulars and heavy crucifixes atop the crosses, the trees, the statues. It became as much an act of defiance, as it was worship.

And, as the Soviets discovered, nothing worked. The crosses kept coming back. And now, in these latter days, it has become a major Catholic pilgrimage site for eastern Europe, and there's more crosses and religious iconography than ever.


(Creative Commons license reserved to photographer Diego Delso. All rights reserved.)

There are many religious pilgrimages where the journey is the reward, or the power or peace of the place once it's reached. For Kryžių kalnas, any pilgrimage that ends there honors human will, as well as holy devotion. With its history, it is impossible to disconnect the two, and maybe that's as it should be. As Lithuania has survived terrible tragedies, so has this hill, the heart and soul of the faithful. It stands as a dual tribute to both: endurance and worship, defiance and deeply held beliefs. There's a power in that all its own.

In the meantime, worried about easy foods to eat, and make, prior to getting sick, or while sick? Honestly, this would've been better information a week back, before the stores were gutted by hoarders, but...At any rate, this is a surprisingly good list. It contains a few dishes that are nearly impossible to overcook, recommends flavor combinations, and two pretty stable, easy to store desserts--plus a fairly simple chicken soup. Nice.

the rain won't wash away the ashes underneath your nails

(Continued from part X.)

First, a note relevant to today.

Next, we're going back to the Information Privacy Principles (of California, at least). We'd covered 1 to 4; here's the next one.

5. Right to Know Principle

Individuals have the right to know what types of personal information we gather and use.

• We will tell you what types of personal information we gather and how we use the information.
• We will tell you what types of personal information we share with other organizations and the authority for sharing the information.
• We routinely inform the public about our information privacy policies and practices.
• We provide, upon request, information about our privacy policies and practices, including the names of staff responsible for overseeing our compliance.

What does this one mean?

Again, bad things for the JLU. They would need to be proactive about determining what information they need, and why they need it. They would need to have a policy announcement in place outlining the kinds of information they're keeping, how long they're keeping it, and where they're getting it. They would need to provide upon any request information about their information privacy policies, practices, up to and including naming names about who's on the team securing that personal information. Above all, they would have to be open and honest, two things I don't see them changing any time soon.

6. Right to Inspect & Correct Principle

Individuals have the right to inspect the personal information we maintain about them and to request that we correct errors.

• We have an accessible and simple inspection and correction process.
• We respond to your request within a reasonable time and at minimal or no cost to the individual.
• We correct the personal information when more accurate or complete facts are established.

What does this one mean?

For the JLU, it would mean keeping large sections of their wiki open to the public, even in unchangeable form. However, if they prevented changes to their information by the public, they would still have to set up and maintain policies by which individuals named in their documents could challenge that information. They would not charge for changing the information, and the information once changed should not be reverted.

7. Right to be Heard Principle

You have a right to be heard if you believe we failed to adhere to our Information Privacy Principles for Individuals.

• We have an accessible and simple complaint process.
• We investigate all complaints and respond promptly.
• We take corrective measures when appropriate.

What does this one mean?

As with the above, it would involve the JLU setting up an accessible and easy way for people to register complaint, or challenge both conclusions drawn and information posted. They would need to develop a secondary investigation team beyond that, to run down these complaints or requests for corrections, in order to insure that their information is fair, truthful, and accurate. This team would also have the power to make corrections to documents retained, in order to bring them more up to date with the shifts of personal information. Likely also, this team would be responsible for deletion of private materials when the time for their use had expired.

8. Commitment Principle

We periodically have outside privacy experts review our practices to ensure that we follow our Information Privacy Principles for Individuals.

What does this one mean? I think this would be the hardest of all for the JLU to follow. Allowing outsiders access to anything that isn't tightly controlled by their group seems to give them hives. But more importantly, it's a vital part of the process, a process that should have already been in place.

But, okay, those are the eight principles that California law considers official and binding. Why were there eleven principles mentioned in the comment thread? Well, there actually isn't anything that's glaringly out of place with the eleven mentioned in the thread; I'm thinking the list I found (specific to California law, not international) simply compacts things a bit.

What was the JLU's response to this list of principles? None that I can tell, or at least, none that made it through onto SLUniverse. But then, none of them strike me as being particularly devoted to transparency.

So here's my thinking, from this point forward.

Covering this controversy has eaten up eleven entries. That's not exactly huge, these days; the Escapist controversy had more entries, and covering the Zindra debacle took months. Still, it's a chunk of time, a chunk neither my readers nor I will get back.

So from here, any additional reading I do on the topic won't be posted on the blog. It's not going to be relevant, from this point; nothing I read will change any of the conclusions I've drawn.

For the JLU, if any of you wish to contact me, feel free; you can comment on any of the JLU-centric entries, you can drop me a notecard in world; hells, if you really feel compelled, scroll down on the sidebar; there's a way to contact me by email. Just don't expect me to chase any of you down. First, I already tried that (and failed) with Kalel; second, I really don't care. I'm not on your side.

What I would say, though, to wrap things up, is that if anyone in the JLU truly believes they are an honorable person, with personal integrity and clarity of vision, and you can believe that while still doing everything you can to break open private medical and therapeutic records, and do such a slipshod job of it that those you consider in the wrong are able to waltz in and grab things to flip up out of your control...well, you are invested in a great amount of personal delusion, because you are not honorable, you have no integrity, and you are in the wrong here. No one should have to worry that some random comment on a forum thread will be pulled out and lovingly slotted into a wiki as proof of some 'illegal' act. No one should have their place of work contacted, their college contacted, or their family and friends contacted and told to cut all ties as a matter of personal safety. That is cyberstalking at best; misdemeanor to a felony at worst.

And you should be ashamed for ever considering this was a heroic action to do. You're not heroes. Heroes would know better.

somewhere where it's not dark, dark, dark, dark

(Continued from part VII.)

Man, I have to find a good wrapping-up point, because I've been talking with friends, and their big conclusion is that this is all pretty meaningless. I'm letting personal feelings get in the way of accuracy (and okay, not for the first time), but more than that, what do I really care about all this? Privacy issues on the grid, sure. People getting lost in their roleplay, fine; it's not really my concern. I'm not affiliated with the JLU, I don't own a PhantomZone device, I don't call them when one of the sims in the estate I work for gets griefed, and I'm not a griefer.

So, seriously, why do I care? As one of them told me, these are the kinds of people that are why the mainstream smiles behind their hands about the internet. They give everyone who's reasonably sane a bad name. They're their own worst enemies, and their own behavior will take them down faster than anything I could possibly say.

While I'm struggling with this realization, more extracts. Starting here:

"The administrator can add anyone he wants to the user list. This allows people to have ban powers without having parcel powers."

Let me see if I understand this correctly. The reason people are given parcel powers (whether that's full controls including terraforming or simply the controls about that parcel, itself) is that they're invested--they're renting the parcel, they've bought the parcel, or they own the estate that that parcel is part of. This statement makes it sound as if the PhantomZone unit can help people who are not invested--who do not own a store on that parcel, rent on that parcel, or own that sim--the power to ban others.

Am I wrong?

Also this:

"Phantom Zone does not collect any data.
Phantom Zone Does Not Collect Any Data!
PHANTOM ZONE DOES NOT COLLECT ANY DATA!!!"

This is the first statement any member of the JLU has made that I wholly and completely disbelieve. There are many things that are up to interpretation, many things that may come down to distress and emotionalism getting in the way of understanding.

But this? No. Because if PhantomZone does not collect any data, ANY data at all, it cannot record and uphold bans. If it does not collect ANY data, it cannot share a global ban list with other networked security devices. If it does not collect any data, then everything previously stated on Krypton Radio's own PhantomZone page is inaccurate. Let me reference one section of that page specifically:

"The Phantom Zone uses flying probes called ‘prisms’ to patrol your land. These are temporary objects that efficiently roam your parcel, detecting and report any avatars that may need to be teleported to their home location and/or added to the parcel ban list. The entire volume of airspace over your parcel is patrolled, all the way up to the 4096m altitude limit. The prisms have been engineered to produce almost no lag and are extremely efficient."

That's gathering data, you idiot. You are LYING.

And this is pointed out later in the same thread:

"It's really, really clear from the words of KalEl that in fact he's all about collecting data. In fact in order for this system to work it HAS TO collect some data, as a technical matter. Otherwise (and Qie and Sione and all the IT professionals around here can correct me if Im wrong) it simple cannot FUNCTION as a linkable device from one node to another."

Exactly.

And this is relevant for all sorts of reasons. Namely, that yes, people who do not have owner controls for any given sim have ban rights if part of the PhantomZone system. Yeah, datamining or not (and remember, the JLU say they're not), THAT right there is wrong.

From Miss Dufaux:

Quote:
Rxx has a number of health issues, some severe enough to be eventually life threatening (read this as "thinks he has nothing to lose"). In specific, Rxx has epilepsy, a condition which severely limits one's lifespan in extreme cases. It is not known how severe Rxx's case is, but he was given a depressing long term prognosis by his doctor in spring of 2008.

"This is extremely upsetting to me. Regardless of his reputation and activities, it's just none of anyone's business what his health conditions are.

"Shame on you."

I agree. And this was what upset me in the first place--that they essentially cyberstalked a dying man, just to verify that he was, in fact, dying.

Let me be absolutely clear on this one: If I want RL medical information out on the Second Life grid, I will release it. While there are some incidents (I'm not that wary of revealing some RL information) I've mentioned on the blog, and in certain chats in SL, that could be collated by anyone who really obsessed on it enough, I have been the one who said that. That's my look-out.

I really, sincerely doubt that either the AIDS patient, or the person who has a debilitating epileptic condition, contacted the JLU in world and handed over their medical records. It's disturbing, angering and wrong that Kalel and presumedly others think it's no problem to collate and use this type of information, because it is, somehow, "protecting the grid". It's monstrous.

"It wasn't until I read the log entries prying into people's lives, and using their medical condition as some sort of information bargaining chip. You people (yes I said THAT) in the JLU while masquerading as fictional heroes have completely lost your moral compass and no longer see the difference between right and wrong, it's all a big game to you.

"But your pixellated fantasies have now twisted into RL stalking and intrusion. We're past the IP harvesting mentioned in the OP title, we're now talking about the bigger picture. What the JLU is doing stinks to high heaven, and I'm hoping at least one of the lurky loos from the JLU reading this thing has at least a whisper of morality left in their soul and blows the lid off this thing so it can end, soon."

Indeed.

And here's where the bottom dropped out again:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Velvet Bikcin
GLE, is this latest transcript accurate?

"Unfortunately, yes."

Really? Confirmation that the JLU routinely busts medical information for the sake of 'saving the grid from griefers'. Really?

Right, that's it, I've had it with the JLU now. There is no one who can now claim innocence, and no one who isn't tainted by this. If you're in the JLU past August 20, 2011--when this comment was posted--then you have no ethical leg to stand on. Not anymore.

More from that comment:

"When we were talking about collecting data, we were talking about collecting people's IP addresses. Of course the node is going to talk to the server and to other nodes, and it's going to have a bad guy list and a good guy list. But it doesn't collect IP addresses. Never has, never will."

No, see, YOU don't understand this. The folks commenting on the JLU were never talking just about collection of IP addresses--they were talking about the collection of IP addresses, personal RL medical information, real names, addresses, places of work, and suspected alts.

You know--data. To which you said PhantomZone collects no data and we all called you on it as the liar that you are. Now you're trying to hedge that you were just reaffirming that PZ didn't collect IP addresses.

One suspects you of having a working brain, GLE, but I'll still use small words: you know better than that.

From the original thread:

"Does anyone really mean to try to insinuate that a group supposedly dedicated to 'protecting' people really doesn't see that by providing a place where personally identifying information can be readily found, they are literally putting people who *were* safe in real life into real life actual danger?"

See, that's the thing. No one--who hasn't been stalked in real life--gets how scary it can be, how deeply it undermines confidence, how it increases stress, paranoia, worry, fear, and can result in exacerbating ongoing medical conditions (think heart problems from panic attacks, say), or plain out starting new ones. In fact, I'd be willing to go out on this limb and say that no one in the JLU even connects gathering all this information on 'griefers' and presumed other 'suspicious types' with stalking.

And really, to me, that's the scariest bit of all. That they think of as protecting the innocent fits with the legal definition of a cybercrime.

From another comment on the thread:

"There is a popular misconception that the term 'data mining' is somehow a bad thing."

There's more on that comment, but okay, let's break this down. Data mining--as a concept--involves collection of data from a variety of sources, compilation, redistribution, and analysis. Technically, data mining is neutral.

But how most people use--and understand--data mining is far simpler--the collection, collation, compilation, and analysis of data to determine things that single-stream sources would not reveal. Say, I get someone's name, but I don't know their ID number. Someone else finds that ID number, on an Ohio ID. Someone else discovers that someone's been married. Someone tracks down the wife's name on an ID from Nevada. Someone else discovers magazine subscriptions made out to the wife. One of those magazines is designed for parents of autistic children.

When all this information is collated and properly organized, we can know at least suspect that:

• Person A is married.
• Person A lived in Ohio before moving to Nevada.
• Person A has at least one autistic child.

And that is why people think data mining--in this sense--is a scary thing. Because what the JLU does with it is take avatar names and translate them through data mining (from what's suspected to be a variety of sources at this point) into concrete suspicions, or actual proof, regarding:

• their real names
• where they work
• where they live
• their marital or relationship status
• how many children they have
• what medical conditions they have
• who their family members are
• who their friends are

And the JLU is trying to maintain that they're the good guys. Riiiight.

Back to that one comment:

"Linden Lab seems to be listening to a mob of villagers with torches and pitchforks, metaphorically speaking. There are extensive threads on the official forums and on SL Universe, but they're the same sixty or so people posting over and over again, many of whom are alt abusers themselves."

I need a term defined. What's an "alt abuser"?

And one more extract:

"To put the flame war and ad hominem attacks in perspective, the Green Zone Users appear to be about 70% BDSM, about 4% age play, about 3-4% griefer alts, and about 5-6% business people or landholders. Somewhere between 10% or 20% are alts of other members, mostly belonging to just a half dozen people - mostly there just to 'stuff the ballot box'. For the most part these are people with something to hide, not political activists."

This goes directly back to that "doing perversion" comment quoted much earlier, I think. Let me test my understanding here.

To Kalel, these people are equal:

• griefers
• alts
• people exploring alternative sexualities
• ageplayers
• land owners
• business owners

and apparently all bad? Or am I wrong?

Miss McMillan voices a concern:

"See this was what i was talking about. What is going to happen is DC will come in to sl and remove all likeness to their heros.

"I DJ at a Heros club where the customers and staff dress as superheros DC ones and just dance and have fun. Also the owner of the club makes hero clothing"

And see, this is where the labyrinthine multitude of effects and interpretations from application of the DMCA just fly over the heads of most people (and really, I can't blame them, it's pretty dense legalese). But in brief, in simple terms: not only won't this happen, but it can't happen. Why? Because to file a DMCA cease and desist order, DC Comics has to name specific individuals--either by RL name, or--as has happened in the past with other companies--SL name. That takedown will be employed by the Lindens, and that person, and all associated content of DC's from that person, will be stripped from the grid.

DC Comics won't bar all DC content from Second Life, unless they feel like hiring 30,000 more paralegals and naming the entire grid in individual letters. And that purely won't happen.

From the Department of Irony:

[17:46] Kal-El (kalel.venkman): The flashy costumes and comic book personnae are a lot of fun - if it wasn't fun, we wouldn't do it. But they do more than that. These costumes are a part of our culture.
[17:46] Kal-El (kalel.venkman): They stand for something people want to believe in. They represent truth, and justice. We're more than people in brightly colored costumes. We're symbols of hope.
[17:46] Kal-El (kalel.venkman): And hope is what the people of Second Life need probably more than anything right now.
[17:47] Kal-El (kalel.venkman): Banded together, we can come to the aid of the good people of Second Life.
[17:47] Kal-El (kalel.venkman): We can earn the public trust, and come to their defense. but we can only do this if we demonstrate, time and time again, that we're on their side. And the only way to do that is to take the highest road we can.

So, that means you're going to stop the datamining and the doxing and take down PhantomZone? Great!

I guess it speaks something about a personal failure of utter cynicism that I'm even shocked by some of the things that are coming out. But yeah. Still shocked about things like this.

I guess, in the end, the things that are still bothering me are that people I don't know are going after people they don't know by accessing medical information. There are two types of people who should have access to medical information in my opinion:

• the individuals (and perhaps extended family directly in contact with them) themselves; and
• the doctors directly working with those individuals.

In my mind, no one else needs to know. Period. Including insurance companies, but I know, that's a fine line, managed HMOs being what they are.

But if you're some random wandering pretender-to-the-throne type, and you determine all on your own that Xavalenxia911 Resident is a threat to you, and you crack her files and discover she has any medical ailment...and you then post that information online anywhere...yeah. You've crossed a big line, right there. And that line is not going to change no matter how many posts you put up saying you're misunderstood and you regret doing the awful things you've done and you're not perfect, and all you're trying to do is protect people.

Screw you. YOU ARE IN THE WRONG.

More when I get back to it; for now, I'm leaving the keys, and going off, and looking at flowers or something, so I can convince myself the entire world doesn't need to burn just because people are stupid on the internet.

(Apropos of nothing in particular, and certainly nothing JLU-related, I am terribly, terribly amused by this. And I'm so with Moss on that--I doubt I'd buy twenty copies a month, but I would definitely make space in my budget for one copy a month, and possibly even subscribe formally and get it mailed to the house!)

leave you here wearing your wounds, waving your guns at somebody new

Seen at Raven's Heart Sculpts:

(from the shopping album)

For anyone who can't make it out, and doesn't want to click, it says

And thus was it so that in that time did come to pass all that had been predicted. And he that had predicted it did say unto the others 'I told you so' and yea were the others much [aggrieved] and struck him with sticks until he shut up.

That about sums it up.

[21:28] Your Friendly Internet Troll [Jakkar Carlos]: I HAVE ENCOUNTERED A HOMOPHOBIC!
[21:28] Emilly Orr: That's hardly surprising on SL.

But he posted a chat transcript.

[21:00] GlennM Foggarty: what a fag jakkar
[21:00] GlennM Foggarty: is that all u got?
[21:01] GlennM Foggarty: compensating for a small dick in life?
[21:01] GlennM Foggarty: come on omo bring it on
[21:02] GlennM Foggarty: still waiting for you to porve to me your a tough guy

Okay, let me stop here. Now, I know Jakkar. We have had our fights and disagreements, we don't always get along, and some of his hobbies, frankly, I just plainly don't understand.

But. Even if you're a homophobic moron, at the least step up and read a book now and again, okay? It's much harder for people to poke holes in your straw-man arguments on why "homos are bad, mmkay?" if you're actually literate, and present those arguments calmly, rationally, and above all, intelligently.

Exhibit A, GlennM. "is that all u got?" And yet he fully spells out--correctly!--'compensating' on the next line! But then, he falls over his own feet one line lower, when he forgets that "omo" has an "h" in it.

As it stands, if you'd expanded that out, Glenn, to full "omosexuality"? That would just mean you'd want to have sex with your shoulders, and that's not only ludicrous, but I believe it's biologically impossible, as well.

And the last line just makes me cringe--"porve"? "PORVE"? Seriously? And misspelling "your" is such a common error, it just makes you look dumb as a stick, Glenn.

A particularly thick stick.

But they went on.

[21:02] GlennM Foggarty: fucking ladyboy
[21:02] Hisoka (baccus.docherty): LoL what's there to prove? At least Jakkar knows which 'your' to use in a sentence.
[21:02] GlennM Foggarty: u stfu
[21:02] GlennM Foggarty: did i ask for your opinion
[21:02] GlennM Foggarty: i think not

Here's the thing. Before we get to the tear-down of why using five letters for a five word sentence is such a bad idea, you're saying this in OPEN CHAT, you idiot. This means your conversation is not private, is not simply between you and Jakkar, and that anyone can comment on the words coming out of your mouth. Or is that not simple enough for you to understand, Glenn?

Let me break it down for you: use full words. This make meaning clearer, everyone get words, everyone understand. Did that help?

Next, the whole point of communication is clarity. Occasional typos can be forgiven--in the heat of any given moment, everyone has misspelled words, me included. However, this is just textspeak pushed through the wall and out onto the wide sea of obscurity. Besides, "u stfu" won't impress anyone you happen to be arguing with, and I really think the whole point of that retort was to make Hisoka back off whimpering and cringing in terror from...

Wait.

*pauses*
*pulls up profile*

Oh, dear gods, you have zero excuse, Glenn. This is confirmation that you're this much of an idiot by choice. If your profile is to be believed, you:

• own your own business
• help budding models get gigs in modeling
• have traveled the world
• and have been in SL since 2007

So...what the hell is your problem? You've been exposed to other cultures, you've dealt with a wide variety of people, and these are supposedly good things. I guess traveling being a broadening experience kind of skipped past you, Glenn. You have NO excuse to be this lunk-headed.

[21:04] Hisoka (baccus.docherty): Nah, I was stating a fact. And I wasn't harassing anyone, I came here and was assaulted by your gay bashing foul mouth.

I am liking Hisoka a LOT.

[21:04] GlennM Foggarty: i dont like being harrassed by a faggot

Nobody likes being harassed by Jakkar, Glenn. It has nothing to do with whether or not he's gay.

[21:04] GlennM Foggarty: so again, why don't you stfu and get lost
[21:05] GlennM Foggarty: as for you jakkar you faggot, bring it on lady boy without a dick

I love this assumption that verbally emasculating someone with a choice phrase--even if, in this case, the choice phrase is on the moronic side--will result in nigh instant evaporation of the target of the phrase. And this rarely ever happens. Most of the time, you call someone gay--on or off the internet--and if they are, there's not a lot of wiggle room there. So to speak. The least challenging reply is "Yeah, so?"

But let's again break down the linguistics, here. Glenn is telling Jakkar that he's gay; follows that up with telling Jakkar that he's gay (thus being redundant as well as homophobic); then again informing him he looks like a girl (which, being a bish, is actually a compliment to Jakkar); then again stating that he looks so much like a girl he must be one...which circles back around to being gay in the first place.

It's as if men like this only have two places in their heads for people: "men" (including "other men") and chicks (which apparently include both gays and women alike). Pursuing this line of reasoning, then, if the whole point is to demean the gay male down to female status, and you are a heterosexual male, Glenn...then aren't you setting yourself up for a gay encounter? I mean, if you're telling gay men they're girls, and you like girls...sooner or later you're going to be sleeping with gay men. Because they're women to you.

Right?

The big problem I have with guys that seem to have their brains stuffed with hair, Glenn, is that you won't learn. It's not that you can't; education is out there, a thousand different libraries have books online, complete with research manuals, diagrams, architectural plans...With only a little bit of effort, you can take online courses in hundreds of jobs, training to be whatever you want to be. Local libraries will be happy to lend you books, DVDs, CDs, and some libraries now are even offering e-Reader programs, where for a nominal fee, you get your own e-Book reader that can access and download tons of books, from research texts to fiction, all at the touch of a button, or with only a few keystrokes.

Barring that, you've got all that Google can bring you--just type in a phrase, a word, even a single letter, and Google will fetch you literally hundreds of links on as many topics. Want to learn about plumbing? Google. Want to learn about theology? Google. Want to know what your town did back in 1945? Google. So much information can be found there, it's overwhelming.

And barring that, there are classes in SL, nearly every hour of every day. Building, making clothes, making accessories, business management, dancing, club ownership, retailing, runway walking; classes on correct historical deportment, classes on landscaping, classes on giving birth, classes on how to use all the features of whatever viewer you're on at the time. And that's not even touching the colleges and other educational institutions that are still in SL, who offer classes on the grid for actual college credit, on an amazing variety of topics.

You have all this wealth of knowledge, Glenn, and yet you choose to be dumber than mud. Why? Why would anyone want to be stupid by choice?

Must suck to be you, Glenn. Good luck with your little modeling thing.

so I took a chainsaw to my skull and extracted my brain out

The newest word from Google+ on pseudonymity: "We understand you want to lie to people. We're willing to look the other way for four days while you change your name. It's all cool, we're not evil!"

And I quote:

One of the things we strive for on Google+ is to make connecting with people on the web more like connecting with people in the real world. So as part of this effort, we've asked that those signing up for the service use the name they commonly go by in the real world.

In the past, when we found a profile that was not in line with our Names Policy (take a look: http://goo.gl/qh5V9 -- we've updated it with examples), we used to suspend the profile and then let the user appeal.

We’re listening, learning, and iterating to give our users the best experience possible. Starting today, if we find that your profile name does not adhere to our policy, we'll give you a 4 day grace period to fix your profile name before we take further action. During this period, you can continue to use Google+ as usual. We're hoping that most affected users will be able to quickly fix their profile name while continuing to enjoy all that Google+ has to offer.

Right. That was the death knell for me, because you know what? There are a lot of people who call me Emilly in the "real world", that is the name I commonly go by!

Jackhats.

So I'm looking into deleting my access to the service. And look what I found!

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https://plus.google.com/109179785755319022525/posts/YcvRKqJeiZi That. That right there. I have been Emilly Orr in Second Life and to many, MANY people who know me in real life for over five years. I have had a Gmail account for those five years and barring service outages, which you were ALWAYS proactive about informing us about, I have not had a problem with anything related to Gmail. And when Google+ came along, with GREAT trepidation--because I loathe Facebook with the fervor and intensity with which I despise Wal-Mart, and I despise Wal-Mart to a nigh psychotic degree--I signed up. One week later, rumors of account deletions surfaced, and I have been worried ever since. But thank you. You have made my decision easy. I need Gmail; I need Blogger; and I use Chrome as my main browser. I DON'T need Google+. And until you allow pseudonyms established in faith, as mine has been, to concur with names we're known by "in the real"--I'm not coming back. Whatever happened to 'Don't be evil', Google? Because this is a move that has cost you customers, cost you beta testers, cost you trust, and likely cost you funds. I'm extremely disappointed in you, and THAT is why I'm leaving.

I don't intend to return. It's done for me. They're not changing their minds, so hey, I don't need to be there, because they are NOT GETTING MY REAL NAME.

Which, half the time, is "Emilly" anyway, so what the hell, Google? When my WIFE calls me Emilly more often than she calls me by my given name, what does that tell you?

Oh, wait, it doesn't tell you anything, because you think you're in the right. Right. Good luck with that.

these tears can never dry, a judgement made can never bend

As we move deeper into June and the death of rashly-laid plans, I had plotted out a potential redux of the erstwhile business, along with a per-day inventory deletion strategy and a nebulous decision to start going to dances and social gatherings again. All that may or may not happen before the end of the year, but this month? Sadly, this month may not be the month for me to inject organization and a social/entrepreneurial reboot into things.

However, something's crawled across the dash that forces all that to the side as being absolutely immaterial. Today, I want to talk about injustice, plain and simple, and a way you can help to ease pain and suffering along the way.

Every year around this time, the folks behind Dare Designs throw a skating party for a cat. (I'm not kidding, it's what they do. His name is Rupert.) It's a chance to get together and party with friends and interesting passers-by, a chance to challenge the physics system in Second Life not to do baffling and lag-inducing things, and of course the chance for Axi Kurmin to strut her stuph as DJ Bronxelf--her first career in SL.

This year, however, things are a little different.

This year, they want to turn Rupert's birthday party into a fundraiser. And they want your help to do it.

Turns out that a band they favor, Lost Signal (the stage name of musician Charles Rehill), has some serious medical debt involved from the recent birth of their son, born six and a half weeks too soon. Unbeknownst to them, literally minutes after he was born, his section of their insurance lapsed.

Think of this for a moment. You were there as your wife gave birth early, and you're scared, sure, and you're afraid for her and your child, but you are humbly, deeply grateful that the system is in place to care for him until he's strong enough to care for himself. You have a home, you have a job, you are providing for your family and paying the sometimes outrageous insurance fees (in their case, close to a thousand a month to retain COBRA coverage) that entails...but it's okay, because you are covered, and what's more important, that precious small life is covered, and is allowed to grow, and to grow stronger.

Only later does the horror set in, that every rush of breath, every drip of saline, every warmed blanket, every coo of every nurse who checked his vitals and counted his toes and tucked him in and kept him safe and functioning...came at thousands of dollars per hour.

They were lied to, plain and simple. And they're trying to fight it. But in the meantime, they're staggering under this sudden, savage, and wholly unpardonable debt. This is not equivalent to the cost of a new luxury car, or four years of college, or even a starter house in a good neighborhood.

They're being asked to pay $225,000.00. As Axi said, that's not a typo. That's what their hospital expects them to pay, because their coverage was gone nearly from the moment he was born. A quarter of a million dollars...and there is no justice, none in any world, where that kind of financial demand is anything less than abusive extortion.

There's something so insanely frustrating to me that every time this country gets close to a rational health care system, everyone who's covered stands up and freaks out. People, we get it, you don't want your rates to go up, dear gods, no. But think this through--keep killing nationalized health care, and we continue to stagger under suicidally high bills. And there's no reason for this, just no reason at all. Worse are the morons who say there's no reason for nationally supported health care, and then cite increasingly stupid arguments in support of that untenable position.

What about the fact that healthier people live longer, and thus can work longer? What about the fact that sick people take more sick days and are less productive? What about the fact that sick people who know they can just go to their doctors will be more relaxed about their potential illness, and potentially heal from it faster and easier, than people who are desperate to avoid going to the emergency room one more time for everything from bronchitis to cancer, and thus get sicker before they're seen?

And this is a child...What was their alternative? Seriously, now. Should they have ever had to let the thought of letting Eric die cross their minds, simply because it would be less financially devastating? Should any parent ever have to think that? And let's be very clear, here--very few of anyone reading this, or even me writing it, knows the principals involved personally--but I know this, to the heart and bone of me: the single greatest cause of relationships imploding is financial. If Rehill and his wife make it to the other side intact, together, and still able to breathe, it will be a fucking miracle.

I want to see that happen. So yes--help if you can. As a fist raised against insurance lies; as a thread of support from one human to another; as Rehill's wife Kristine says, anything will help, even a single dollar. They're begging.

And I, who've never met them, who've never heard their music before today, I'm begging too. You'll notice the widget that ties directly in to their ChipIn account on the sidebar. Because this is the heart and soul of wrong, this is something that should band us together against all differences, this is a societal plea to make things better, since the people who should have done so to start with won't.

On June 15th, you can help them out in world, too. There'll be more details coming on the Dare Designs blog, I'm sure, closer to the day.

(Just from a musical standpoint, if you've never heard Lost signal, they're worth a listen for any fan of electronic music of any stripe. To me, they're similar in tone to VNV Nation. Compare Lost Signal's Frozen, for example, to Further from VNV, or to Regret from Assemblage 23--who, interestingly, was part of producing some of Lost Signal's work. Some have called Lost Signal's work "futurepop", but I don't think that's accurate. I don't know that I'd agree with "pop" as an appellation for any of it, because most of Rehill's work plays with themes of immobility and strain, pain and loss, worry and resignation--and always with that deep, moving electronic thrum driving the music forward. It's good dance music, it's good music to fuel contemplation, and it's even good to write blog entries to. As it happens.)

makin' your way in the world today takes everything you've got

From the amusingly named "Trollface" on City of Heroes (Villains side):

Me had it all.

Me was high-ranking 'Raknos guy. Stronger than everyone. Me started as simple Troll, but 'Raknos pulled me out of gutter because of Mu bloodline. Me rose in rank fast, and could take down anyone.

Me had it all.

But then Recluse got mad just because me beat up entire 'Raknos invasion force. (Me still say that Tarantula was lookin' at me funny.) So he had Scir... Sara... Swordy-Guy pull all Mu-gic out of me. Threw me off top of tower. Not fun.

But now me have new purpose. Me am put on cunning disguise and teach 'Raknos what it mean to be scared. And heroes, too, actually. And anyone else. Especially lippy Tarantulas.

Me am darkness.

Me am the night.

Me... am... TROLLFACE.

Well. Doesn't that just give you a happy mutant glow?

Oh, and his "cunning disguise"? A red mask.

A RED MASK. On a GREEN TROLL.

I love this guy.

So, we finally finished the BDSM hunt, and I'm not even up to going through all that we received, but we were stymied at one location. I couldn't get into one of the stores. So, the folks in our party who could port in, did so, and pulled all they could from the land group and the sim group.

Allie Munro, serenity Quar, Carra McKeenan, Talon Serenity, and Skar Scorpio own the land that Grumble's on. I mention this because I'm banned from the land Grumble's on. I can't find anything in Miss Quar's profile that pops as a connectible reason; neither Allie Munro or Skar Scorpio pop with any recognizeable "Em hate" groups. To be fair, none of the five seem to have any known links.

Other than all working at...oh, right. Grumble. This is because I didn't like that orange shirt.

IT WAS A TERRIBLE SHIRT. GET OVER IT. The rest of the stuph Grumble makes is good--not for me, but good. That orange shirt? Is a horror. It doesn't make it any less true to ban me, but feel free to keep me away from that orange shirt all you want.

We move on.

After that, we arrived in this huge store called XCLUSIVES ANIMATIONS. Like, sim-wide. And nothing is rezzing in. They have happy little section signs over various rooms, and we don't know where anything is. And it's not because things haven't rezzed in!

Handy little tip, large store owners: If you have a sign that says "FURNISHINGS", name the prim that. I am totally serious. You can even name it "XCLUSIVES ANIMATIONS FURNISHINGS" if you want to be pedantic (and if that's your store, and you're insane about the all-caps). But seriously--ALL THE SIGNS in this place? Are named "Object".

THIS WOULD SAVE EVERYONE a lot of time. Dead serious here.

(Also: If you have to call it "MASTER'S ALTAR OF SUBMISSION"...in all caps?

You're not a Master. You're a wannabe.)

Don't get me wrong, the Dead Man's Hand hunt has some nifty prizes. (It also has some that will leave you scratching your head and pondering how they got into the hunt in the first place.) And it's not even that I mind paying for a hunt HUD to get the prizes--I wouldn't be on the Royal Tea Party Hunt if I did.

No, what I mind is that they're asking us to find 52 cards. One suspects they're all individual, flat-textured cards, and that's just...odd in this day and age.

Never forget--the real world is always stranger than anything virtual. Hands down, no contest.

full of all my whispered words, her black hair

But the tug between open and closed systems, between hierarchy and bottom-up decision-making, between “platforms” and tools will continue.

Incredibly dense, but informative article on the difference between open and closed systems, transmedia, and augmented humanity. Well worth the time it will take to read (which is my way of saying yes, it's long.)

Next up, LoQ Hair:



Cafe Misto in Auburn. It's entirely sculpted, so there's nothing to move, and certain animations would drag the draped ponytail through the shoulder. Still, it's pretty enough.



Cafe Corretto in Light Red. I tried this in three different shades, and it didn't make any more sense in any of them. It's a lovely lace texture, but I just don't grasp the point of mask plus bunny ears plus shaved skull plus hair bun. This is the front, and..



This is the back. Now, maybe these are sculpts that are really slow to rez, but I just don't get it. Why the lace cap over the hair? Why the bunny ears on top of the lace? Why is the rest of the head shaved?



Hot Chocolate in Sienna. This is when I realized that the little bunny cap is some sort of...I don't know...reinforcement that it's a demo? Seriously, do people need that kind of special help? If the huge big white box over the head, and the monochromatic strands marked "DEMO" in large repeating letters don't give it away, the little lace bunny cap will? People are that dim?

And also, this is that 'punishment of one means punishment of all' thing in spades--or at least in lace bunny ears: frankly, I am not the problem on the grid where copying hair designs is concerned. But treating me as if I am--by either giving me ugly demos with face shields, lace masks, or all-over demo detailing so that it's hard to even make out the hair (or the skin, or the outfit, or the shoes)...it ruins the point of making demos available, and makes me never want to spend money in that store.

This hair? I won't be buying.



Turkish Coffee in Fiery Red. Never got the last bit to rez in, but at least there are no bunny ears.

Their booth is in Hair Fair 2.

"Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just stand there." ~Will Rogers

Never a bad thing to remember.

And, because I wanted to change:

Eyes: Miriel Standard eyes in Platinum (sadly, no longer available)
Skin: Nomine Virgin Valentine skin, in Red Rose 1 (I think this was from a special sale, but she might still have this skin in her Specialty Skins vendor)
Outfit: Pixeldolls Tilt dress in Noir (first sold in 2007; no longer sure if it's still offered for sale)

light a candle, lay flowers at the door

So, hunting about on the House & Garden hunt earlier, I ran across a Miss Sexxxual Delight. First off, if you have to stress the point that the "Delight" for which you're known is only horizontal? There is a problem, ladies and gentlemen.

But I pushed past that and read her bio:

Limits.. pretty simple..

Everything is pretty much negotiable.. send me any and all ideas . but Two non negotiables
1.) No OOC Drama.. If OOC turns into IC. I'm not gonna play like that.. I'll null and void the scene and then contact an admin..
2.) For anything you do I expect retailation or don't even bother wasting my time. Roleplay is about conflict! :)

I have an issue with this. Not the first one; eliminating mass drama in RP is always welcome! But the second.

RP is about conflict? Really? Plot devices are about conflict, nearly always. And plot can be--but not always. And secondly, think of how she's saying things to those who are trying to RP around her--no matter what I do, f'rinstance, be it handing her a daisy or shrieking at her whilst I run forward with an axe, there will be retaliation? For everything I do?

Gosh. I would not be looking forward to interacting with her. Period.

How'ver, onward we must go, because Fawkes has informed me he is going to train me how to use 2.1. Because I am, as he maintains, "using it wrong".

The first thing I notice when I log in that makes my blood boil: I was not in this outfit before. Nor was I in this skin, hair, eyes, or shoes. OR shape. This is bothersome in the extreme because I want to look how I want to look, damn it. Which should be how I looked when last on the grid, regardless of which client I'm using.

Strike one.

Fawkes says this is an issue with using multiple clients. He says there's nothing that can be done about it. There is also some confusion as to whether this has happened before--he says it has, with other third-party viewers; I say it hasn't, but in all fairness, I could be saying that simply because I want 2.0 to die instantaneously, preferably ablaze.

I could have a small problem with the 2.0 structure. This will likely not improve.

Secondly, he had me open inventory. Now, I have put significant time and effort into making my inventory line up how I want it to line up. I don't want system folders to the top by default; in fact, I don't want system folders to the top. Yet, there they are and there they stay; there seems to be no fix for this. In fact, all that careful work and time I put into ensuring I could find things quickly, easily, and with little muss or fuss--even considering my 72K+ inventory state at present--is now missing entirely. System folders are at the top, my folders are alphabetically beneath the trash folder, seventeen slots down.

Fawkes says I will need to get used to this. I grit my teeth and carefully do not scream.

Next up: I started speaking. And by that, I mean the little green lines flashing over my head, and my lips moving. So Fawkes talked me through how to disable that.

Then there was around half an hour of conversation while I got dressed. This was an ordeal. Not the conversation; the actual getting dressed part. Muscle memory, I am realizing, is something I've been relying on in SL. I know exactly how far down each folder is and exactly how many scrolls I have to go down before finding what I want, and where I find it. I keep reaching for the drop-down menu to close all inventory folders, and it's just not there anymore. Fawkes is right in this; it's like a whole new game, this browser.

And it's a game I don't particularly enjoy.

He talked me through making an outfit, and it does nicely save everything I was wearing, including eyes, skin, hair, shape, and bald cap--and it does save the prims. Of course, it also saves, under each chosen outfit, three separate categories: Clothing, Attachments, and Body Parts. To me, this seems more cumbersome, but to Fawkes, apparently, this makes perfect sense.

Then there was movement. I use camera controls. Yes, I know, I'm one of a vanishingly few people who still depends on camera controls; I like the tight control it gives me for photography, and it became easier just to leave it up all the time.

Fawkes had me take down the camera controls, and move as I'd move in virtually any other video game, using W, A, S and D keys. In 1.0 browsers, I had to disable the local chat bar. When explaining this to Fawkes, he seemed puzzled. "I don't use the local chat bar," he said.

I do. I use it all the time. But at least in 2.0, I don't have to sacrifice one for the other.

So, what are we at now, three strikes against, one point for? I think that's about close, anyway.

Then there's strafing. It sounds like an odd name for essentially hopping to the left or the right. In Team Fortress 2, for instance, A and D 'strafe' my character--hopping me to one side or another.

I told him that was why I don't use A and D to 'strafe', because if I want to move to the left, I want to MOVE TO THE LEFT, not hop for a bit and stop. Screw that; if I need to turn, I need to turn NOW, damn it, because I'm likely on fire or heavily wounded.

He explained how, in 2.1, I could click on my avatar and hold down the left mouse button, and that would move my character too; in fact, I could combine that with W, A, S, and D to move both my point of view and physically move me, as well.

Which, by the way, is the only thing in Second Life I've yet found that kicks up my nausea, graphics-wise--that sort of jittery camera motion is why I can't play games like Doom and Quake--it was slightly better in UnReal, and I even worked my way up to UnReal Tournament before I realized how crap I was at the game.

So that's a point against 2.1, or at least, my ability to handle rapid graphical shifts.

"The point is not to depend on the controls so much," he said. Why? I like the camera controls. I like the precision the camera controls offer me. He tells me SL is the only game that has a separate camera control menu.

I tell him that's part of what I liked about SL, when I discovered it.

Now, the keyboard version of the camera controls, he explains, might be easier for me to cope with, and it is, a bit, because it responds like the camera controls: hold down Alt, then use W, A, S and D to rotate around the focus point, and use E to tilt and C to pan (up and down, essentially). He says that it's just like using E and C to fly up and down.

"The hell you say," I tell him. "Page up to fly up, page down to fly down."

"E and C," he repeats. And F to turn off and on flight directly.

Huh. Now I have to relearn flying?

Okay, so I sort of have the hang of the basics, now, and I ask why I'm doing all this, if I can do all this in 1.0-structured clients. He says it's because nearly every game out there uses these controls, or at least an easily grasped local variant. My question is, if I can use what I learn in 2.0 to adapt to other games, then why am I in SL? If I hate their browser so much, why don't I just go off and play something else--where I can have this control set and like the game more?

Yeah, I have no idea either. But those are the basics. And I'll work on them. Gives me something to do, I suppose--beyond everything else.

"Now let's deal with some of the errors made by Zha in her blog," Fawkes says. Hmm.

We start with inventory. At the very bottom of the sidebar, the little white gear, opens a smaller sub-menu. The top of that menu says New inventory window. I pressed in, and three seconds later, I had a separate, independent inventory window. Well, good gods, why didn't they show me that in the first damned place? Why do I need the sidebar?!?

...Oh, because I can't MAKE THE DAMNED THING TRANSPARENT. Gods, I hate the programmers behind 2.0.

We moved on to Appearance editing. To get to the new Appearance menu simply, just right-click on your avatar and it opens up on the sidebar. You can then make changes "live", as t'were; in fact, as Fawkes pointed out, I can walk around, port, shop, talk to people, whatever--all while editing my shape, or my hair, or my eyes.

Here's my problem with this, but to be fair, this is my problem, because I have a five-year-old computer: with the Edit Shape window open, I can't move well. My movements--the world's movements--slow down terrifyingly. I had to take a lot of time to explain this to Fawkes, and the best way I found was--there were two of us, alone, in a sandbox, and movement was fine; I pull open the Editing Shape window, and suddenly, it's like we're at a heavily scripted club with sixty-five dancers and everything animated and tossing particles--I mean, an insane and sudden amount of lag from nowhere.

I do not like this, but I can't straight up say it's a flaw in 2.0, much as I want to.

There are some cool features in 2.0. Editing "live" does allow you to check out how a shape looks with your AO movements; this isn't a bad thing. There's also an onboard height meter that can be read in meters, or feet, to tell you how tall (or short) you are. The problem is it doesn't work currently. You have to multiply that number by 1.1 to get the accurate height in 2.0; it doesn't work yet.

We started pulling up profiles. I loathe the new structure but I did notice something profound is missing from my profile--the "My Notes" section. It's gone. "You never could edit that," Fawkes says. I beg to differ.

Notifications Fawkes says, is both right and wrong on Zha's blog. For one, there's no differentiation between IMs from a resident, group notices from that resident, and notecards sent from that resident. On the other hand, I tend to be extraordinarily anti-social in SL under 2.1, because I cannot, absolutely cannot stand the IM windows, the chat windows, and receiving notices. Pop-ups that I can't control drive me spare, and having the name of the person THEN whatever they're saying, two lines for EVERY single damn line of chat, makes me homicidal. So I tend to close everything as fast as it comes in and don't answer people because I will throw things at them and spray acid just for contacting me.

Fawkes did say I can change this behavior in 2.1, which is good, because it restores the two-goddamn-lines-every-single-two-goddamn-lines to one, and one not separated; this is guaranteed to reduce the amount of vitriol and hatred spewed at anyone who dares say "hello" of an evening.

I still hate that I can't make the window transparent. That deeply, deeply bugs me. I view it as a very personal intrusion into my life off the keys for every single big opaque block the viewer tosses onto my screen. It's annoying beyond reason.

Back to the popups for a moment...Fawkes calls these "toasts". I have no idea why except that's also what Second Life calls them. They bug the crap out of me.

Now, how I have been arranging SL chat and IM windows is to tear them off and move them to the upper left hand corner of the browser. Because in smarter structures--like 1.23--those windows transluce when anything else is clicked. This works for me.

Instead, I have a choice of not docking the windows--in which case, moving them up where I've been keeping them in 1.23 means I lose all sight of the sky with more than one conversation, or I can "dock" them. When I "dock" them, I lose the ground when they're active, and when I've clicked anything else, they disappear--or, at least, reduce to small tiny image sets on the lower right hand corner of the taskbar that are hard to read and annoying. Yay?

This is not a plus for me. (Apparently, those teensy little images are called "Chiclets". This is also not a plus for me.)

Another new thing--there is no "keep" anymore; there is "Show", "Discard" and "Block". Block most likely will block the item and mute the sender, but I'm not sure; "Discard" is self-explanatory, and "Show" means auto-accept and take me to that place in the inventory by opening the sidebar. More loss of screen acreage, yay...

I hate this browser. It is not getting better. I really, really, want to stab it with knives and dig a deep hole and toss it in and cover it in lye. None of these feelings are getting any less severe. Honestly, I'm scaring myself a little, here.

Sending objects remains basically the same, it's just the terms for them that altered. Also--an odd trick--if you right-click on an object, and click "Share", apparently you can share with anyone (within 130 meters), friends from your friends list, or searchable individuals--if they exist in world, they can be sent whatever you want to give out. I suppose this is a good thing, but I think there's far more potential for abuse.

I think part of the struggle, for me, with learning 2.0 is the atavistic phobic reaction from the first time I used 2.0--when all media was auto-on, and I suddenly had four inputs screaming for attention and I flatlined into dead emotional trauma. (Anyone out there who's OCD may understand this; for everyone else, all I can say is it's what I did then, and this memory just hasn't departed yet; I still remember shoving the headphones off my head, shaking in distress, tempted to turn the computer off and walk away entirely for the night without word to anyone. I didn't, but I was highly tempted.) But there's another part to this struggle, which is all bound up in how I behaved on IRC.

I developed, quite likely, a lot of bad habits on IRC. My main two were: I didn't want to talk with people I didn't know, which made me quite the hostile little ball of insanity on IRC, and two, if someone I didn't know DID talk to me, I gunned after them with the ferocity of a thousand razors. If spraying them with mace and chopping at them with a rusted hand-axe didn't drive them from me, I'd get mean. (Miss Sphynx can verify this; she was there on more than a few occasions.)

Now, when I hit SL, I was quite gregarious. (Oddly gregarious, and likely, that first year or so, more than was good for me, frankly.) I've never had that hostile I-hate-you-get-away-from-me-DIIIIE reaction...until 2.0

2.1 hasn't changed this. People IM me; I close the windows. Group chats open, I growl and close them. I get notices, my hands tighten into fists and I have to breathe and let the stress go.

I'm serious, it's a physical reaction, and I don't know why, but this must be what bigots feel like with the skin color they most despise; I mean, if I had the base code in front of me I would burn it without a second thought. It's intense.

All I know is, now I know how to do more things in SL, and this may influence things when I go back to 1.23; but I'm going to resent every single moment I lose to SL 2.1, until (and unless) it gets better.

And better for me means transparent windows; resizeable sidebars; smaller camera controls; and a folder architecture where system folders aren't automatically and always on top. Is this me being hidebound to the old structure? Likely. Am I going to change my opinion? Not likely.

But I will keep chipping away at it. It's important to Fawkes that I not hate this as much as I hate this, so I'll try. It's important to the Octoberville creators that by October 2011, if SL exists then, I have 2.1 fluency so I can go in and experience Octoberville-on-a-prim. And I do want to do that, if that's the only way I can hunt there October after next.

Still. It remains distressing, invasive, and annoying beyond all things. I don't like the structure. I don't think the improvements were necessary. And I wish they'd just taken some of what does work in 2.1 and applied it to 1.23 and everyone could be happy.

what good is this chanting? I don't even know what I'm reading!

Does Second Life have any lives left?

And we've heard this song and dance before, but I love the third comment down:

If Linden Lab didn’t care, they never would have put the modify/copy/trans permissions system into Second Life in the first place.

If Linden Lab didn’t care, they would have claimed ownership of all intellectual property created in Second Life. In fact, that’s how most game worlds work, and that’s how SL worked until Linden Lab changed their Terms of Service.

The people to complain about, to be mad at, are the people doing the intellectual property infringement. They’re the ones breaking the law.

Even if Linden Lab banned all third-party viewers and managed to keep them from connecting to the SL grid, people would still be able to copy SL content. People were copying SL content before third-party viewers existed.

Here’s what will happen: people will either figure out how to make a living in SL *despite* IP infringement, or they won’t. The ones that don’t will leave SL. The ones that do will stick around and thrive. The law of the jungle operates in SL as well.

Walmart didn’t quit because they couldn’t stop shoplifting. iTunes didn’t shut down because of Pirate Bay. Rolex is still in business despite the fact that you can get cheap imitations on the street. Best Buy still sells lots of DVDs. And SL will continue to exist, even though there are a few criminals running around.

Absolutely. Troy strikes again. But he's right, it's vital that creators learn this trick, and start employing it.

Yes, absolutely, go after infringers. Yes, absolutely, get the word out that copyright infringement is wrong. Yes, absolutely, take a strong stand against it and hold that strong stand.

But no, don't give up. No, don't stop creating. No, don't delete your work and go away. That's giving in, that's surrendering, that's admitting the thieves are better than we are, smarter, more adaptive. That's ridiculous.

Meanwhile, filmmaking has recently taken an ugly turn, namely the casting of Avatar: the Last Airbender. Let me preface this by saying I've never seen more than one, maybe two episodes of Airbender, but I know the concept, I know some of the plot. I missed was that it was a Western-produced animated series, not an Asian anime. It looks like anime.

But really, M. Night lost me completely as a fan with The Happening. To me, it's not a shock, it's just par for the course that he's done something as ridiculous as cast a nearly entirely wholly fair-skinned cast for an Asianesque fantasy universe. Why should this surprise me? He wanted me to be afraid of wind in the last film!

How'ver, Operation Squeegee--by the time this posts--will be open! There's a donation kiosk at my main store for them (making one on each side, now; Operation Squeegee's bucket and post, facing the multicolored ribbon that comprises the Virtual Haiti relief kiosk), and you can also go here to attend the main event.

What's the point, though? Right now SL is kind of glutted on charity events. We've even had an event where charity wasn't the point. RFL is still ongoing, the Virtual Haiti Relief effort is still going, so why another one?

Because--as with cancer, as with the total devastation of every form of Haiti's infrastructure--what's happening in the Gulf really is that tragic. Not only that, but it's a tragedy that could have been prevented with foresight. Like New Orleans.


(The Operation Squeegee event site.)

There are operations in process, moving (slowly) through the legislature, that will take profits directly from oil and gas royalty payments to use to clean up the Gulf. This is good. But that's later. The Gulf needs our help now.


(The Veritas houseboat. 53 floating prims.)

Scientists are telling us that children are at greatest risk for contamination from the Gulf disaster. Their systems stand to be irreparably harmed from contact with this much oil, and this toxic a chemical oil dispersant, threaded through the waves.


(Very fun beach ball.)

Two months after the disaster, things are worse than ever. Over seventy-six million gallons of oil have spilled out of Deepwater Horizon. They're telling us the worst is yet to come; we may never be able to stop what went wrong. We may have to live with this spreading devastation...forever.


(Blue Ocean dolly dress.)

There's oil rain falling in Louisiana now. It's also falling in Florida. Already, it's not bad enough that the oil's devastating the Gulf ecosystem; it's saturating the water now, which disperses into moisture that is then picked up, carried into clouds, and deposited miles away in the forms of lethal, contaminated, oil- and dispersant-rich rain, dew, mist and fog.


(Intense prim jellied eyes.)

The National Wildlife Federation is soliciting funds to help in any way they can, but in particular, part of their focus is on an endangered population of pelicans. And their efforts are being hampered in every way possible by BP directly, who is currently still spending their days claiming they're not to blame followed by making everyone they can find in the area sign non-disclosure agreements, or booking smallcrafts, helicopter and light aircraft flight/float times, to prevent scientists, technicians and reporters from actually moving over the area, to observe and/or take pictures.


(Picture pendant.)

It's staggering, and should it be BP's responsibility? Absolutely. But while they dither, we can't wait. It gets worse every single minute that goes by, and we must help. We can't afford to wait. No one can.


(Blue and black oil bikini.)

So this. So the Operation. Because the Gulf will die if we don't do something, and that doesn't mean just the pelicans, just the fish. That means everything. People, plants, animals, the land itself, contaminated for decades or centuries, the ocean a wasteland devoid of all life...if there's any way to stop that future from becoming reality, we have to try.

Contact the folks at Operation Squeegee for more information; as they said earlier, "Remember this is all to [benefit] a great cause - helping an ecosystem and all [its] residents recover from the Oil Spill Disaster. All funds collected go towards the National Wildlife Federation via Operation Squeegee."

This is another one where they're being absolutely transparent about where the money's going. Please give what you can and realize; the state you save, the country you save, may well be your own. We are a closed ecosystem; as we've learned with Chernobyl and Mount St. Helens, this will travel.

Give it time. The oil rain is coming. All of us have to do what we can to lessen the blow.

I mean cold, cold blood, running around inside our veins

[Late insert from the Editrix: one of the quoted participants in the Haven of Rogues/Haven of Mermaids discussion below has asked that her name be removed on the excerpted chat in this post; I have done so in compliance with her request.

[How'ver, I can't remove her name from Alexia Lennie's reply without killing her reply entirely, so at least that much of her identity must remain in this blog. That's not the frustrating bit, though.

[The reason this person asked me to remove her name is because Alexia Lennie was harassing her in SL. This is getting beyond ridiculous.]

===

This just in from Horrid Twine:

To My Lovely Friends, Colleagues, & Fellow Whales!

I have decided to pull entirely out of Second Life and instead move to InWorldz.
Every once in a while I leave and come back.
This time, unless something seriously changes at "The Lab", I will not be back.
Recent events have made me rethink being here.

And I find that InWorldz, though still small, is a medium that I can stand behind and be proud to do so.

So that is where Horribaubles and Pretty Squeezles will now be.

For those of you whom supported Zombiefest and the other assorted charities, I thank you.

In light of this, I am having a "closing" sale.

The closing sale is at her Starlust store--I think she's closed the others. Everything in her shop is L$100 until Saturday, at 8 am (she didn't mention her time zone, so I'd just think Saturday in general).

This leaves me asking a few questions that likely won't be answered:

1. Is Putrid Gloom leaving also? (That one, I think I'm asking Miss Putrid about, because I need to know if Show Me on the Doll is also leaving!)

2. InWorldz, near as I can tell, is using OpenSim architecture. Why go to Second Life Jr. if you're upset with Second Life? Sure, the management might be better, but seriously--the same damned coding issues we hate here? Are likely over there!

>3. What happens to the ZombiePopCarnival after Saturday?

If any of you need to contact me, you can find me @ horridtwine@gmail.com or on http://www.inworldz.com as Horrid Twine.

She will be missed, but if anyone wants to go over to inWorldz to say hi, feel free; she'll appreciate the support. Me, I adore her stuph, I do, but...I just can't register for a company who decided to end their corporate name in "Z". I just can't.

Other news: in the "Weekly Tempest", an in-world magazine for lovers of mer culture and fashion came this little tidbit:

HAVEN OF ROGUES/MERMAIDS RULE UPDATE

Griefers using child avatars have been creating problems for both 'Rouge' sims. These sims are adult, and thus, no child avatars are allowed.

They included a notecard listing--I thought--the exhaustive and heavy-handed covenant Matisse Vendetta developed on his land--which, again, is never mentioned to anyone on arrival, so the casual shopper or interested finned denizen has no clue they expect certain insane behaviors from the moment anyone enters either sim.

This was met with some startlement in the group of us that visited earlier this week:

[17:01] ******* ******: those assholes at haven of rogues
[17:01] Drakon Lameth: ?
[17:01] Jennifer Corbeau: ohhhh nuu
[17:01] ******* ******: have sent out info that we were griefing them
[17:01] Drakon Lameth: o.o
[17:01] ******* ******: to the mermaid weekly magazine

The Weekly Tempest mag, btw? Is not an in-house Haven of Rogues/Haven of Mermaids publications. It goes out to everyone who's bid in with a mermaid sim, or a mer fashion house, furnishings, or undersea plant life. In short, anyone who feels they have a tie to mer life, or wants to read more on it.

[17:01] Drakon Lameth shakes head
[17:01] ******* ******: HAVEN OF ROGUES/MERMAIDS RULE UPDATE

Griefers using child avatars have been creating problems for both 'Rouge' sims. These sims are adult, and thus, no child avatars are allowed.
[17:02] Emilly Orr: 0.0
[17:02] xvxRUBYxvx Praga: *blinks*
[17:02] xvxRUBYxvx Praga: Serenity is NOT a child avi
[17:02] ******* ******: and included a stupid notecard stating the rules
[17:02] Emilly Orr: THE HELL I AM A GRIEFER
[17:02] ******* ******: none of us were kid avies or griefers

Now, as I pointed out, Jakkar Carlos is heavily bish; so he looked young, but not CHILD young. And Saori wore a doll skin over her mer tail, so at best, she looked like a porcelain fantasy doll--again, not a child. I came as a small bunny, yes, but that bunny was short, not a babyfur, and Serenity was--Serenity! How does a six-foot white cat with tiny wings rate as a CHILD?!?

Apparently, on a mermaid sim, showing up in fur automatically labels one underage. The hell, people!

[17:02] Midori Yatsenko: where is this Mermaid Weekly Magazine?
[17:02] xvxRUBYxvx Praga: dear lord
[17:02] ******* ******: it doesnt name us but its talking about us
[17:04] xvxRUBYxvx Praga: if the sim is an adult sim...then they would be age verified to get on it
[17:04] ******* ******: after we were there
[17:04] xvxRUBYxvx Praga: *shakes head*
[17:04] ******* ******: and its not even adult, its just mature, so they are [lying]

So I gritted my teeth and pulled out the notecard they'd sent along. This is it:

NO CHILD AVATARS
Sunday, 13 Jun 2010 23:07:18 GMT
*******************************************
NEITHER OF THE HAVEN OF ROGUES REGIONS (that means
"Haven of Rogues" or "Haven of Mermaids) WILL ALLOW
CHILD AVATARS. None, period. There are bored folks
going around looking to create hate and discontent
by taking "child avatars" into mature and adult sims &
trying to start "crap." So! This fixes that potential for
"crap:" NO CHILD AVATARS. Get it? Got it? Good.
******************************************* M.V.


From Matisse Vendetta

....I am really starting to loathe that man.

1. We weren't bored, we were called there by friends

2. Our friends weren't bored, they were following advertisements that mentioned Lucky Chairs, groups they were in that mentioned changes in chair status, sales notices likely from your sim, Matisse--there could have been any number of legitimate reasons any one of us could have found your goddamned sim on our own! And this is what you tell people. This is what you think of potential customers in your sim, potential renters of your land. That we're griefers.

3. WE DID NOT SPREAD HATE. Honestly, where do you get this nonsense?

4. We did not "start crap". Some of us got there, ported by friends, and were immediately sent to the corner--and by that, I mean LITERALLY, sent to the CORNER COORDINATES of the sim into a SMALL CUBE OF STONE. This is not ejecting. This is not banning. If I were of less even temperment? I could AR your EMs for that!

But you are more than happy to live out the rest of your lives never seeing me again. TRUST me, I'm gone. Not one foot into anything you own; not one DIME spent on anything you've had a hand in making. I am DONE WITH THIS.

And I do believe that goes for Indigo Jashan and Alexia Lennie, as well. If that leaves me porting to mer places and having to check who made things, the full covenant of the land I'm on, who made the wall prims...so be it.

My gods, you're an idiot. Why on earth do you even have a shopping mall, open to the public, if you despise the public, Matisse?

I realize some questions have no answer, and less point, but it just galls me so. While I realize there is prejudice against non-humans (and in this case, non-mers), usually it's not so vibrantly painted, swollen with enraged revulsion, as this. We did nothing but come to investigate, to see if we wanted to come back later and shop.

Well, that answer's there at least--We don't want to. We never will.

feels like you made a mistake--you made somebody's heart break

I am surviving. Surviving with blistered skin and broken bones and nerve endings licked by fire...but alive. Survival is knowing the last breath seared the lungs, knowing the next one will, and breathing anyway. Survival is ash in the air and cinders underfoot and thirst never-ending.

Survival, sometimes, is being too stubborn to give up. To give in. To fall down and wait for the searing breaths to stop. If I am nothing else, I am at least that.



I have taken a wrong turn
when will I learn? When will I learn?
should I show them all my scars?
cherry-red, bleeding burn--

So many scars at this point, so much damage underneath them. Old burns, old breaks, old fractures...it's a miracle anyone doesn't walk across the landscape and not end up with shrapnel embedded in tender flesh, me included. Who knows what's lurking in the land, these days?



What any rational person would do...I am not doing. But I never said I was rational.

On the other side of the coin, this is not a rational place, even by my definitions. Things could go so very wrong...and we are not starting off balanced and level. There are pitfalls and tripwires and spike traps. I have carefully walked across the blackened earth to the cliff's edge, and it is crumbling.



Feels like you're making a mess
You're hell on wheels in a black dress
You drove me to the fire and left me there to burn
Every little thing you do is tragic
All my life before was magic
Beautiful girl
I can't breathe...

First it was certain topics under discussion, at certain times. Then it was certain feelings, pared out, planed smooth, examined under safe conditions.

Now it's down to breathing. Remembering to keep breathing. Keep breathing in spite of everything. I have no assurances and no control over anything else. Burnt air enters, toxic air leaves...okay. It will suffice for now.



I know that is in me to fail. Fail at small things, at large things, fail brilliantly, fail monumentally. Occasionally I fail in new and unexpected ways. It is in me to make mistakes and learn from them, and it is in me to make mistakes and make the same mistakes later, never having learned.

I want to learn from these mistakes. I want not to make them again.



We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

I am dwelling largely on the story of the little mermaid these days. Not the Disneyfied version, lovely though the songs are--but the original Danish fable, with the woman who yearned so deeply to travel beyond her sphere that she was willing to mute her songs and render every step on dry land an agonizing pain...just for the chance to take those steps.

Everyone concentrates on the sacrifice of the sea, but me, I'm wondering what would draw a woman to change her entire circumstance, just for a chance at something different. What was her life under the waves like?



for betty was born
to never say nay
but lucy could learn
and lily could pray
and fewer were shyer
than doll. doll

Consent and contradiction and glowing shards of what was, what might be...and what's the half-life of heartbreak? And why am I here again, and taking each moment day by day, anyway? It feels like playing chess in Chernyobl.



And what is the cost of all the fire, the end result of all the burning? If I must burn and burn again, let it matter. Let it crisp and sear and tear away what is unworthy. Let me harden to adamant and be strong enough not to burn again. If this is what it takes.

Hard surface, all the emotion of a star, reflecting all hope, deflecting all attempts...if this is what it takes, then let me be that. Gather my chains and remake my barricades, and be a closed capsule again, a walled city, overlooking the valley where the rivers dried to dust.

Let me be that. Not this.



love love love is everywhere
but not a drop for me to drink
tie me up and bind my feet
drop me in, and watch me sink

One step. And one step. If I have to break it down to centimeter progress, I will. I'll know what happens next when I get there.

I hope.



Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

Because staying here? Is not an option.



This is the way the world ends.
This is the way the world ends.
This is the way the world ends.
Not with a bang but a whimper.

I refuse. I will not be pushed. I will stand my ground until I am out of ground to stand on. Stubborn, so stubborn, but this has kept me alive more than once. And it may yet again.



In the meantime, I just have to keep things moving. Anything else hits the ground...there won't be ground left.

Home isn't home if I feel I can't go there. Safe places aren't safe if I don't feel safe in them. So I need to decide where my safe places are, and secure them. I need to decide where home is, and make it a home again.

And I will do this, through fire and flood, hail, devastation, and the vast and trackless wasteland of my heart, as many times as I have to do so.

Home is, after all, where the heart is.

Even if it's nailed to the wall.

(Lines quoted are taken from Locked Up by Ingrid Michaelson, Disease by Matchbox 20, T.S. Eliot's The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, ee cummings' a pretty a day, Ingrid Michaelson again, Alfred, Lord Tennyson's The Charge of the Light Brigade, and T.S. Eliot's The Hollow Men.

(Locations ranged from Fallen God's Dark Circus booth at Fantasy Faire 2010, the Chernyobl exhibition, the Junkyard, Tonktastic, the Stringer Mausoleum, the House of Munster and the Wastelands sim.)