Natural Born Kiavik

UPDATE!

2010-05-14T04:11:00.004+02:00

KIA-ORA!

Just for the few of you who have been wondering where and how I am...

Everything is ok with me, after a 38 hours long teleport I 've finally landed here in BananaLand and I am having a great time! Unfortunately I haven't been able to log into SL so far, so I guess Midd must be having the longest sleep he's ever had in ages.

So here's a quick report about my past days and weeks:

1. The love of my life is the best girl on Earth, and I am lucky to have found her.
2. Life on the southern hemisphere is cool, and I 'm thinking of having a swim in the pacific ocean and pretend it's summer anyway.
3. I 'm finding it very easy to cook italian food in a foreign land. Banana says I am good at it, but she is obviously biased.
4. Even if I am half the world away from home, it just feels like I 've always lived here. Nothing has changed since I left 8 months ago, and this is simply the best place in the world!
5. Born and raised in Soccer Land, I will try to learn something more about this painful recreational activity they call rugby and maybe even get to play it, once I am sure I am covered by health insurance.
6. Cricket, NO WAY!
7. I am happy.

To all of you dear friends, a warm ciao from Midd.
Hope to be able to talk to you soon!

April 13th, 2007.

2010-04-13T11:20:00.010+02:00

(2007 pic of Me and Banana in our very Noob days)

" Hey Banana. Do you know that if you dig a big hole in the ground where you are in NZ, and walk thru the core of the Earth, you 'll end up just here in my lounge in Italy?It's called antipodes."

If you consider this a good pickup line, then you will probably like me as a person. .

But to be my partner for 3 years? I dunno. Ask Banana.

I love you baby. Ti amo tanto. Happy 3rd Anniversary!

Speech by ReadSpeaker

Translator anyone?

2010-04-13T10:36:00.003+02:00

Well this is funny. I dunno when and why I happened to get myself a "Ferd's google translator", but I checked and I have one in my inventory. I never used it. Oh maybe I have, since the name of my avatar is on their website,with roughly all the names of the people who have received one as well. It gives the date of purchase and the coords too. I wonder if the translator itself has some sort of tracker script in it, I am not enough a techie to investigate but that's what my first thought was about it.
Is this against the ToS? I think yes. If every store owner did the same, we would have our avatar's name scattered everywhere on google search, a very pleasant thing for those who are concerned about their privacy in SL.

SL mobile hunt.

2010-04-06T23:51:00.001+02:00

Ok, ok, I know nothing about marketing. But this HAS GOT to mean something anyway..
According to my Google Analytics I 've received 243 visits in 5 months from people who googled 'Second Life Mobile' and they all found out that there isn't a mobile application yet. (erm, there is a SL-lite chat-based App for Iphoners but it's semi-official and doesn't work well).

So, dear Lindens, when am I going to give these guys some good news?
I am waiting...:)

I want FreeTube back!

2010-04-02T10:55:00.002+02:00

So it isn't a joke. No april fools day. Second Life 2.0 is now the official viewer, and no one likes it. I liked the new user interface a lot, except for the few bugs which have been resolved with the following updates. But I agree with those who miss the old layout of profiles, I am a profile sneaker and it's kinda shocking to have them sliding from the right of the screen, and get to read them as if they were a newspaper article. GRR!

Anyway, we still got viewer 1.23.5 to use but...for how long? this morning I got a message on the startup screen saying that installing NOW the 2.0 will not overwrite the old one, and I believe this is the first time this happens. Freedom of choice, but again for how long?

For sure there's one thing we are all sad about.

Since the first release of SL 2.0, we 've lost FreeTube. Some say it's just a coincidence, some say it's not, fact is this wonderful machine is not working anymore. Thanks a lot Soy Nakamori, it's been good till it lasted. Now we can play Youtube videos on a prim, but there is no frigging way to hide the Youtube interface and it won't look like a normal TV set for sure.

On the other hand, Facebook runs just smooth on a SL prim. Lol isn't that just masochistic?

**HUGS** to all!

Twisted tribute!

2010-03-31T22:57:00.001+02:00

Sad day today as the 1-month-long Twisted Hunt comes to an end at midnight.
To be honest, I haven't hunted at all, but it's been fun to wake up early (GMT+1) and log into SL for the usual daily dose of Twisted Hunt Group Chat. For those of you who have no idea what that means, just imagine yourself having your morning coffee with sleepy eyes and then get to read all sorts of swearing/bad words/yellings/F-words/P-words/A-words and so on including all possible twisted ideas that might come into the minds of the devoted Twisted Hunters while they incessantly ask for hints to the group moderators. It's an extreme experience (hmm, lol), but so funny you all should try it. You have a few hours left to complete the hunt, only 103 (or more I can't remember) boxes to find at 103 different stores, so good luck and be quick!

As a tribute to the Twisted Hunt, I thought I could go spend some of my hardly earnt L$ and buy samples of the average kind of kinky clothes/items for sale at most of the stores involved in the Hunt, just to make a funny book of photos of Midd in all his BDSM-RP-BONDAGE glory.

So I hope you like my Twisted avatar:).
(I don't, but the suffocating-venom-mask I bought is definitely blog-worthy, lol)

And yes I know the shoes aren't twisted at all. They just add to the fun!

Ciao:)

Challenge for your eyes.

2010-03-12T10:19:00.002+01:00

Pay a little attention to the two cars in the picture. (you can enlarge it all by clicking on it) One of the two is the actual picture of the RL car, the other one is..a fake. Fake as in 'pixelled fake'!
So, can you tell me which is which?

mhhmmm....hard to pick the right one I know.
A little hint: the pixelled car lacks the steering wheel and has some weird red coloured interiors. Easier now? yeah, but still incredible, it looks a lot better than the real one.

It's been made by my friend Gianfranco Foxclaw using a pretty expensive 3D modeling software called 3D Studio Max. He HAD to give me the 'missing steering wheel' hint to help me realise it REALLY was fake. He said he got tired of working on it, and he didn't want to spend more time on building the wheel and finding good textures for the seats, lol. I reckon it looks perfect anyway.
So this is just to show you a glimpse of what the future holds for us SecondLifers. The future is...mesh imports! even if it is still not clear whether the official Second Life 2.0 release will include a full mesh import functionality or not, the legend says it will allow some basic transfer beetween actual RL 3D software and the SL viewer build functions. It really is an old legend, lol, as NWN mentioned it quite a long while ago. In short, you build objects offline, the way you want and HOW you want, then click on the import button and..there you go, you have the object rezzing on your land in SL. There's rumours saying only premium accounts will be allowed the privilege, and this badly affects my enthusiasm about it(i am never ever gonna go premium) . Plus, I am not sure how much of the accuracy given by the professional made 3D object will be effectively noticeable once the transfer to SL is complete, but for sure it 's gonna look a lot better than this:

only downside...LAG! I am not an expert but Gianfranco says that driving a high-def thing like that in SL will keep you stuck in first gear with the engine going full revs, lol.

In order to know more I sent Midd directly to 955 Battery Street, San Francisco CA, but Philip Rosedale wouldn't let him in 'cause he is age verified under a fake RL name and LL headquarters are rated as adult...very adult, lol.

Special credits go to Banana Vella for helping me with this pic. ILU baby. (GIMP is a biatch!!!)

oh, and feel free to IM Gianfranco Foxclaw for custom textures and/or custom builds. He speaks some english, but I 'll be happy to help with the translation(free of charge, lol) in case it's needed.

Ciao!

Random Spam!

2010-03-06T18:20:00.014+01:00

Erm since it's my blog I think I am free to spam and advertise as much as I want on here.
But there's a reason behind this, this is just to say thanks to some people I am proud to call friends. It serves also as an apology to them, for all the times I haven't answered their IM's in the past weeks when they were just showing how much they cared. So i hope you STILL care, guys. (lol)

Spam number 1:

www.thenestoftheraven.webs.com

this is the cool (and very well designed) website of dear RohanaRaven. It's about animations. I blogged about her store recently, but she 's added some more cool stuff there and you need to go check it out again!

Spam number 2:

there's a lady who has just started making her own skyboxes. I am not sure she 'll appreciate me mentioning her 'hobby', but this is just to remind her that she should SRSLY start a business and sell loads of them. This is the skybox she made for me, and her name is Sammi Ninetails. Im her for info about prices!

Spam number 3:

Golden Water Med.
Pay a visit to this sim created by my friend Spilo. It has a disco, a bar, a beach, house rentals and a shopping mall with all kinds of clothes for you shopping addicts. And may I say, it's very gaylesbobisex friendly. Yay!
Plus, there's a place up in the sky there (very very UP) I call home.

Spam number 4:
Erm, nothing to spam about her. Jenni, where are you? (lol)

Ciao to all:)

Introducing my new friend, Mr Last!

2010-02-27T22:01:00.001+01:00

I am trying to get used to viewer 2.0 ....
I kinda have to, as something tells me it's definitely going to be THE VIEWER in a couple of months or less. So I 'd better stick to it and...practise.

But one weird thing happened since I last used 1.23 (or whatever the previous one is).
I now have a new friend, I can't remember when we met, how I added him and where.
His first name is....First, and his last name is Last. Thats original, no doubt. Have a look:

Funny thing is..this guy (I suppose he is a HE) keeps logging in and off, and then off again and then relogs a dozen times each hour, so I guess he is probably sticking to the old viewer and its crashes..

poor guy.

who's the poor guy? ME!! I can't fix this bug, I don't know how. 2.0 doesn't recognize who's coming online among my friends list, and calls them all Mr. First Last. WTF??? are you serious? what am i gonna do now? is it just me or just the italian version?? HELP!

Anyway. There's one more thing I noticed on viewer 2.0 ... but this has nothing to do with the Lindens really.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the italian language, it's just I missed Banana's third rezday. Well she missed it too, lol.
So baby, have a wonderful day-after-ur-third-rezday and let's make all our dreams come true, if possible, lol.

bye:)

RezDay 3.0 and...WTF??

2010-02-25T14:03:00.003+01:00

I believe one of the most unused features of the SL viewer must be the ‘notes’ page in an avatar’s profile. I have never had a reason to use it, at least for its intended purpose, and I know most of my friends don’t even know it’s there. They are so used to consider the first life page as the ‘last one’ to read, and why would we put notes in there when we have lots of other ways to remember things about someone? I ‘ve heard of people keeping their passwords there, or chatlogs, lol. But to be honest, quite some time ago I decided that my own avatar’s notes page would become the ideal place to just store my secret six numbers…02/24/07. Yeps that’s my rezday. Not Midd’s, but Kiavik’s, my first avi. 3 years old in SL, and I can’t really say my life hasn’t changed. What if I had never read that magazine article about the new virtual world. What if I had given up playing sl after the first (very) boring week?. Would I be a different person now? 3 years aren’t enough yet to make a final statement about it, but I think it’s just me not being able to judge. Considering the recent developments in my first life I can surely say I have been living in the first row seat of a superfast rollercoaster for 3 years with no interruption. How can someone judge if it’s good for your health? For sure the excitement makes people feel alive. Headaches too, but they’re painful, sometimes a lot painful. Anyway, as the years go by I am less and less inclined to care about the ‘timestamps’, as in weeks,months, years and even days if you ‘re using Emerald (argh I think I already forgot about my 1000^th day! Lol). No timestamps, SL is just a little part of me, sometimes a major source for happiness, sometimes just a pastime. The goal is to make yourself capable of balancing the highs and lows. Get me? (I know most of you agree)

Talking about highs and lows. Linden labs has provided us all with a new viewer, just to give me a boost of optimism as I cross the line into the fourth year. I know everyone is talking about it, and there isn’t much I can add really. Probably there’s just one thing no one has noticed yet, and this is the capability of the SL 2.0 viewer to be run even on poorer machines (poor as in hardware-poor, lol). The viewer seems to be lighter in RAM usage, and 128 Graphics dedicated megas are still enough to be part of the game, I admit it’s a bit of trouble (/me adds ‘when the heck are you gonna buy yourself a new lappy?’ in the notes page) but still, it’s nice of Linden Labs to keep us all together, noobs and oldies regardless of the hardware specs we got. Considering how long it takes to load a Facebook page with all the plugins enabled on a Mozilla Firefox web browser, the new web-oriented layout of SL 2.0 makes things look even easier despite being a 3D world. So kudos to LL. I have been using it only for a half hour, and it was plenty of time to get used to the new features and to find my way in the different positioning of the pre-existing ones. It looks cool. Omg, have they kept the notes page in the profile’s popups? Lol. Haven’t checked that yet.

Moving to a more…personal tone. Here’s a picture I need to show..(shall I say UPON REQUEST?*winks*)

We stepped off the rollercoaster for a while, took some time to sit on a rocking chair and she kissed me on my nose. How sweet. (the RL equivalent of the above actions required a bit of a flying around the world and also a bit of driving along the Italian magnificent coastline, lol)

To all my friends who have been there for me in the past month…thanks a lot guys. I have been in silent mode lately, I will get back to normal soon, and I hope you understand. Please DO understand, lol.

Now, the WTF in the name of the post refers to this:

While in the midst of writing this post I got the news from Banana about her account being suspended. This IS NOT COOL, Lindens. You ‘re stepping on your own feet. Surely it won’t be a biggie, knowing the person you’re dealing with, she ‘ll be able to kick some ass and get things sorted easily.

But, hey. NOT COOL AT ALL.

CIAO to all.

Check this out!

2010-02-04T10:57:00.008+01:00

My dear long time friend and wannabe sister Rohanaraven Zerbino has just started her new business in SL. After quite a few years of building anything that can be built she kinda wanted to try her skills at animations...and her new store is just fantastic!
just go and see for yourself.

Animations are very cheap, and they're transfer only or full mod. But you can also upgrade the transfer ones to full mod. Just IM Rohana for more info.
Here 's a nice one;)

And if you upgrade to full perm, you 'll get a builders' package with a help pose included, so that you can set up the assets easily (i dunno what this means, but i suppose any builder will know, lol)

Get your ass there now!

ciao.

Love and expectations

2010-01-26T11:17:00.001+01:00

omg i so NOT wanted to do this, but here is my say about the latest events. I 'll try to keep it simple and easy, and I hope it can be of help for anyone who happens to read this.

Here in Second Life we get stuck in all the wonderful and unexpected things that come our way. It really is fun, joy and entertainment. Sometimes it can be tricky, because the boundaries between who you are and "who you want to be" can be easily lost, and it's sad to realise you've ended up out of bounds when it's too late. It can even get WORSE, when among the unexpected things SL has brought to you, there is that crazy little thing called LOVE (excuse the quote).

In case you fall in love with someone, feel free to enjoy it at the fullest. Hop on the poseballs, dance or just hug, find the places you love the most and hang out. Emotions will run fast, while everything around freezes and the pixelled world feels so real that you just want to fly to San Francisco and go shake hands with Philip Rosedale.
THEN, if after a while you feel like pixels aren't enough anymore and start consideridering an eventual RL development to your perfect, wonderful romance, you 'd better start unfreezing the atomic world around you and well ponder the concept that all you 're doing is..going back to the place where it all started.

Your REAL LIFE.

Most importantly, you need to consider how much of that pixel-boosted excitement and joy you are able to transpose into your flesh and bones, your everyday needs and your habits. Being in front of a computer screen is just a RL habit, but then, it's all we do when living our full Second Life.

And even MORE important at that stage is...to stop for a moment and be really, really honest with yourself. Inside the computer screen you 've found everything you need. Mainly love, which can lead to EXPECTATIONS. (In this case it did. )

Love can grow fast, expectations can grow just as fast as love. Look inside yourself and recognise the role that expectations played in your commitment to the person involved. If it's love playing the biggest part, then be ready to firmly believe in love, and keep the expectations on hold for a while. Short or long while, it shouldn't matter. In case it's the expectations playing the main role, then think twice about making the big move. Expectations can come true, they can change, they can fade. In any case, in the end you 're left with nothing more to look forward to, because that's exactly the moment when you realise that love wasn't the main reason that pushed you into such an adventure. All of sudden you would start to look differently at things, and find yourself committed to a person you hardly know for real, a person who hasn't given you any of those things you were expecting to receive, and maybe you even let some unjustified resentment grow and eventually influence your words and actions towards him.

And probably hurt him, too. Especially if that person had put love in First Place, and...his expectations weren't even close to First Place - to what he had been dreaming about all his life.

The Beta Grid and time travelling.

2010-01-09T17:40:00.001+01:00

I know most of you know what the beta grid is, but since I only found out about it a short while ago, I thought it could be useful to post a short 'how to' get inside this kinda 'hidden grid' also known as preview grid. The reason for this alternative Second Life (I 'd call it third life) is...testing. Linden Lab tests almost everything there and so can you.

To log into the beta grid, just launch SL normally, and then press CTRL-SHIFT-G. You will get a different login menu, that will look like this:

Each of those names in the dropdown menu represent a different grid, but only 2 of them are actually public access. The Agni grid is... Second Life main grid. Aditi grid is the beta. Choose Aditi and login!
Oooops...having troubles loggin in?? Erm, there is something more that you should now. The beta grid status is not up to date. The servers aren't 'refreshed' often so all your present-time data may not be available, such as your...password for example. So if you change your password frequently, you may have to try to remember all of the past ones and try them one at a time until you finally get the one you were using at the time of the last beta grid update.

So...let's say you made it into Beta..

For sure the first thing you notice is...that you 're awesomely RICH!! (oh well, some of you may think of 14,384 L$ as being poor, lol)

The red upper tab is just there to remind you that you are using beta, and the money balance is just...for you to spend the way you want! Unfortunately, there aren't many ways to spend money because there is nothing you can buy...no shops, no malls, nothing. But yes, you can upload EVERYTHING you want for testing purposes and 14K L$ sound like heaven to me. Poses, animations, prims, sounds, textures, and whatever else.Considering that if you're working with sculpties they may require quite a number of sculpty maps uploads before reaching perfection, in the end you can save some good money by doing it on beta. You can work on them, then save them onto your hard drive (all except prims, obviously) so that once you 've finished, you only actually pay the amount necessary to bring your completed items inside the main grid. Isn't it just COOL??

But anyway, if you think it's worth to wander around Beta, just expect to find yourself...BACK IN THE PAST...lol. As I mentioned above, everything on Beta is frozen to some point in the past, so it can be kinda funny to have a look at what you were like back then. Here is me!

GAWD, that is so....tall and skinny! And my good old favorite tux too!!!
Unfortunately, your inventory will look old too, not as old as your avatar, but kinda, so don't you worry if you 're missing some of your recently purchased stuff, they 'll still be there once you log back into the main grid.
If you are a profile sneaker, then click on all of your friends list to remind yourself of the good old times...it may bring back good memories and probably give you an idea of how far back in time you are..Mine looked like this...

Ehm...what do you mean 30 years old?? argh now THAT is a long while ago, lol.
As for your friends list, you may find names of people you 've deleted/forgotten by now, but no worries, they won't show online unless they deliberately decide to log into Beta too..;)
Now let's have a look at the world map..some say Second Life is a small world, so what about Beta grid..is it smaller than small?

This is all you can see by completely zooming out. There's a welcome area and a few sandboxes...and can you count the green dots?? I only managed to count 20 of them, so...small world, a few guys in there and no LAG! So small that I randon TP'ed somewhere and bumped into a friend...

The pic is intentionally taken from a wide angle so that you won't notice her being bald and half naked while working on bed pose animations..lol. she didn't expect me to bug her there too and kinda freaked out at my sight, so I escaped quick before being badly told off.

Okay, what's next? I went to the other neighbouring sandbox and there were no signs of life, except this big sign of warning:

OK, no weapons, but please tell me, even if I carried one, what am I supposed to shoot at??

Maybe this guy knows more...he is a living weapon, or maybe just a transformer, I dunno..

so, no shootings, but WHERE IS THE SEXXXX? no sex at all, weird eh?

and where is the FUN?? I 'll tell you where the fun is..

TOTALLY UNCONTROLLED GRIEFING!!! Omg I couldn't remember the last time I saw the old sim-wide particle shower trick...it used to be a superMario jumping and bumping on you from all sides...now it's just some RL pics of an unlucky (and unaware, I suppose)nerdy looking lady who got caught while in a bad mood..lol

And in case you 're just as naive as someone I know, feel free to accept a random 'ANIMATE YOUR AVATAR' offer to just find out that...

you 're getting owned....omg funny...sad....CRAP. Thanks a lot Estella Starostin, I hope I made your day on the Beta grid, and yes, I most definitely think you're a male in RL, lol.

So to sum things up...Beta grid is useful for a lot of things, mostly for builders and developers.
But in case you haven't got the chance to experience zero lag in SL, its worth a try. It's a very pleasant feeling.
Or, if you 're somehow interested in the feeling of time travelling (lol) that's just what you might be looking for.
Or, if you just need to hang-out/party with a few close friends and no one else around in a huge and empty full sim, just get them all inside Beta grid and have fun!!

Ciao to all :)

Builders,textures and the dishwasher approach.

2010-01-06T18:33:00.003+01:00

I haven't had much time to write on here lately, mostly because I am becoming very busy with building something in SL..plus I resumed teaching after the Christmas break and despite loving it, it just makes me want to jump in bed right after the bell rings. Oh well, my night owl days are over....kinda over, lol.

My passion for building is growing anyway, and I can't stop dreaming of building whatever comes in my mind when I wake up in the morning. This attitude doesn't match well with my renowned 'dishwasher approach' in anything I do. I am sure some of you know what I am talking about, that is....I hate instruction manuals. When it comes to learn how to make the new dishwasher work for the first time, I prefer just to press the 'ON' button and wait for something/anything to happen, rather than go sit in the lounge and read the 234 pages instruction manual, safety precautions included. So, same for building in Second Life. I have been given hint notecards, shortcuts manuals, starter's guides from my builder friends but never read any. It's crazy, I know. I just click on the build button and start learning by experience.
Plus, lately I have been focusing on just ONE project, and of course it's the hardest one to achieve.

So hard that I want to complete it as soon as possible, lol. I know I can make it all by myself, as one of the few things I don't lack is optimism. But after the initial boost of confidence, I have come to the conclusion that I need at least a little help in dealing with the textures I need. Building is fun, no matter what you do. You make things right, and you 're happy. You screw everything up, and you 're happy anyway, 'cause at least it gives you a smile and after all, you can't screw things up twice in a row (or can I? lol).
But textures, TEXTURES are BITCHES!! Textures don't forgive. No second chance, nothing left to do when you 've uploaded the wrong one than spend another half hour searching for the good one, hoping it will be THE good one. You have no time to look at how beautiful your linked prims are, when you're rushed to make them appear as something more than a few wooden cubes glued together in such an unpredictable shape.
So, I thought maybe I could get professional help..lol. Time to pay for your dreams, Midd. I contacted some famous builders/custom texture designers, helped by the endless patience of my dear friend Rohana, and it's not making things easier at all.
As Rohana said, being a talented builder herself, "In Second Life there is no worst bitch than a builder, me included". I didn't give it much credit at first, but now I think

I should, lol. What's wrong with you guys?? This is just simply wearing me out. All of them, and I say ALL of them, have put me through the same tiring process of a corporate job interview. And no, I didn't play the part of the interviewer.

So here's a short explanation of what I need to be done. I will put it here, so next time I can redirect you guys here, instead of spending another couple of hours in lagging IM windows. :

1) Yes, I DO need custom textures. Custom made, for me means, made appositely for me, from scratch. Custom made, for me, means that you have to launch you photoshoppy thingee and hit "Create New File". New file, blank sheet of paper, and start working on it.

2) Yes, I will provide you with RL pictures explaining precisely what I'd like the final result to be. But I don't want you to use those same pictures to actually create the texture. I can do that myself with Microsoft Paint, it wouldn't even need Photoshop. You look at the picture I give to you, and then start drawing the texture the best you can, to make it look as real as possible. You think you can do it? Then, do it. You can't do it? Then tell me.

3)Yes, I know such a thing requires a lot of work. Yes I know it's a hard work. Yes I know it's not quite like the simplest thing you 've ever made in your career. But please, tell me how much it will cost. I am not asking the precise amount, I just want to have an indication.

4)No, I won't place a big order at first. I want to know the average cost per 'unit'. As in, one texture costs....and then make the count myself. You don't need to know how big my Sim is, you don't need to know how many textures I need, you don't need to ask ME how much I would spend for it. I want you to make a first (paid)work sample so that I can judge and eventually consider if you are worth my trust for the remaining parts of the job.

5) Yes, I agree you may need some time to think about it. But If you call yourself a custom texture maker, I guess you know that people come to you when they have no other option left, and that they have already spent a while searching for "normal" textures. So please, think about it, but think quick.

6)Yes, I know you are obviously busy right at this moment. You are building half a dozen other sims, you deal with Im hell as well, but please make some sense of what you're saying. I am the one asking, I am the customer, so please reduce your 'diva' attitude to the first couple of minutes in the convo and then go straight to the point..."WILL YOU FRIGGIN DO THE JOB FOR ME OR WHAT?????"

7) Yes I know my profile shows 'No payment info on file". This is none of your business. It's mine. Just please tell me how much you cost, do a good job and you'll get the money. The end, lol.

oh, please tell me guys, am I asking for too much?? ;)

Happy 2010 !!!!!

2010-01-01T02:02:00.002+01:00

Happy new year to everyone, and may all your wishes and dreams come true.
I think 2010 will be a good one. I just love the way it sounds.

Ciao!

88 MPH and going...

2009-12-27T02:24:00.005+01:00

I thought I 'd give you a quick preview of my latest building obsession...

I wanted to wait until it's entirely finished, but I couldn't resist.

Damn clock tower...

LINDEN LAB is... NUTS!

2009-12-25T19:51:00.003+01:00

Two days of RL Christmas shopping can be tiring. Gifts and groceries, traffic jams (lag), crowded stores, and no teleports. But there can be always something that puts a smile on my face, and hey, I swear I didn't edit this picture....

SECOND LIFE® AND LINDEN LAB® ARE REGISTERED TRADEMARKS OF LINDEN RESEARCH, INC. NO INFRINGEMENT IS INTENDED.

Linden Labs, thanks for the peanuts too!

And Merry Christmas to everyone!

GO FUG YOURSELF!

2009-12-22T13:59:00.004+01:00

Lovely night the other day. Not only it was a special *day* for me, but also I went to the Moonlight University Christmas Party, and I had lots of fun.
My aim was also to show off the lovely hat that Banana had just given to me as a b-day present, and I thought I would look cool dancing the chicken dance with such a lovely garment keeping my bald head warm in a open-air disco a thousand feet high in the SLsky.

But as often happens during parties, one of the guys went wild a little and showed off his hilarious Mickey Mouse pants on stage..

And it became...contagious..
The ensemble hat/mickeymousepants/greysocks/trekkingshoes did look perfect on me, don't you think?

And here is the 'rear end' view :)

So contagious that the entire teachers' committee in Mickey Mouse pants decided to give a warm Christmas salute from the stage..

aaaaaaaaaaand just one of us kept them on even for the staff official picture!
(okay there is also one of us wearing a M.J. avatar so they wouldn't put the blame on me only)

OMG someone fugged me here too

But I just couldn't resist. As the party finished, I had to go visit my friend Bunni and show her how cool my after-party look was and we captured the moment..

And, omg, here I am today working on my new creation with good Mickey giving me building hints. (Poor Banana was hiding in fashionista-shame behind her posestands but as the French say when it comes to haute couture...c'è la vie! lol)

That's all folks!

The man and the BUILD button...

2009-12-20T00:50:00.002+01:00

Once upon a time there was a man. Somehow this man got bored one day and decided to do something new..something he had never tried before!

He just hit the BUILD button, lol. And he built, built and built.

And dont'know why, it all started with food....

Then the man had his little spiritual moment and decided to make it a church....

And THEN, he tried his skills at german-italian medieval architecture...but with bad results (damn textures!!!!)

btw did you know that building 64 octagons in a row will make you worry about prim limit, even if the prim limit is 3k???

Anyway, he got bored with architecture too and decided to expand his interests in air transport..

yes, it really is THAT HUGE, it really is THAT YELLOW, and yes, it DOES FLY!

But somehow he decided to get back to his old passion, car racing..
the guys at the racetrack told him it was the wrong way though.

So maybe he could try...SCULPTIES? He did try.
Sitting on a mushroom and winking at someone....

But in the end, he decided to go for the masterpiece..

Hmm, ok i have been told it just look like a wedding cake. But I guess i couldn't avoid that since it actually looks like a wedding cake in RL...(waves at John Key and some kiwis and Bananas..)

This is it for now. The man is now lost learning sculpty paint but will come back from the future someday..

Happy building everyone! (in case you're trying, lol)

Why is my SL so messed up?

2009-12-18T11:19:00.005+01:00

Hello everyone, I somehow managed to remember my blogger password today and promised some friends I would post a very PARTICULAR picture they have taken a while ago..

So here we are...

There isn't really anything to comment about, when you 're trying on some Gorean scribe clothes and being beaten to death by some ladies you thought were good friends...(and they said they were trying to cheer me up!)

Blogpost on my building adventures is coming, so stay tuned, lol.

ciao:)

QUICK UPDATE!!

2009-11-24T11:47:00.001+01:00

Hello everyone, remember me? I thought I'd give you a quick update about my wanderings in RL and SL.
In RL, I am a little overstressed by many things, but fortunately things look like they're improving a little,mostly because I am a great, smart and wonderful man...(insert laugh here).
SL has been a good escape for me anyway, mainly because of my IM window, as everytime I login there's always that bunch of lovely people (old and new friends) who entertain me with their wit and caring...and when there was really really NOTHING to talk about, I 've been developing my newly discovered passion for building silly things in Second Life. I am still wanting to post pictures of my personal view on architecture and engineering (hey, I am not serious, lol) but somehow I lack the courage..even if it's just for a laugh ;). And well, I've been told that when you feel a lack of courage in anything you do, that's just the right moment to do it....:)

Btw, there is something really funny I did yesterday, and I thought it was worth some pics..I played a little with the edit appearance button, and since this happens very RARELY (lol), I thought I could do something meaningful with it. Erm, 'meaningful' means I added some good fresh meat on Midd's belly and hips, trying to make his shape look as identical as possible to my RL shape, and see what could come out of it. Here are the results!
(dont laugh at the pose, I know it's still a female one, lol)

As you can see, I couldn't do anything to minimize the pectorals and the famous 'six-pack', as it is included as a gift from the creator of my shape, but the overall figure resembles my RL body pretty well. Of course I had to work on proportions, 'cause no way I am that tall in RL (2.18 metres vs 1.80 and definitely happy about it, lol). Didn't want to work on the length of Midd's legs, 'cause it always gives me troubles when changing jeans and they never fit perfectly with the clothes I use for the upper body. Here's the equivalent of Midd in RL...:)

The blurry overzoomed pic is good enough to hide my face but not good enough to hide the ducks I was playing with..LOL. Now let's move to the butt pics:

Weird it looks like I was posing FOR THE DUCKS this time in RL...

From behind, the addition is more visible, and but still pretty proportionate with the size of Midd's butt. (I wish I could say the same about my RL butt, sighs, lol)

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the experiment. I have, lol.
And in case you see Midd chasing ducks inworld, remember it's not him...it's me!

Quick notice!

2009-11-10T11:01:00.003+01:00

Due to some RL issues that will keep me away from the computer (not 'completely away' but kind of, lol) I will take a hiatus from blogging. I probably will come back sooner or later and in the meantime, I wish my 15 affectionate readers a good time in SL and lots of fun.

A special mention goes to my lovely friends Rohana, Bunni and Jenni, whose great minds and sensitiveness I value like gold, and whose words I treasure among the most special gifts I could receive from this crazy world named Second Life.

Banana is the only one who won't miss my writings, 'cause she will keep reading them in some sort of form anyway, lol.

See you all soon guys!

I will be teaching in SL anyway, so any offer for help is appreciated :P

/ME GOT BOOBIES....

2009-11-08T12:32:00.001+01:00

Erm....well not really, just thought I had to share this amazing work by my friend Paolo. It took him more than a week to make it, and he is giving it for free to all his friends. If I had made such a wonderful thing, I 'd have sold it for a trillion L$!

I guess this is the only time you will see me as a transvestite, even if it's a robot-woman from the movie Metropolis (1927). Here is the original picture:

Btw the movie tells the story of a scientist who is dumped by his girlfriend, and decides to build himself a perfect woman instead. He eventually ends up being sexually attracted by the robot...Erm, do you see any connection with Second Life?

/me feels a need to hurry and delete his female alt account...LOL

The voice of Nutella.

2009-11-06T21:19:00.007+01:00

I thought I could spend some words on the Artists Voice "strike" going on these days.
I agree with the idea, I mean it's for a good reason. Content theft is a problem that must be solved in ANY way by Linden Labs. But I doubt this 2-days strike can be effective afterall. It would be effective if we really could stop all money transactions, so causing a little damage to LL and let them know how much the community cares to avoid creations being copied and resold for nothing. Unfortunately this won't ever happen, as it is quite impossible to spread such a message to the majority of SLers and convince them to listen to the call. Plus, the protest was meant to be extended to the blogosphere, as in....no shop, no blogging. I wonder what effect can this have on the overall result, being the blogosphere just a small part of the entire SL community and definitely not the leading one- I am implying that most SLers don't and won't ever know what this Artist voice thing is!

Anyway, I haven't shopped these days. LOL

Fortunately, I have been busy building and it stopped me from blogging. (Means, I wouldn't have blogged anyway)

But now I have to upload textures, and this requires money transactions. How do I do?
Can I wait a little more and then upload all the textures I need? After all, I am just delaying my money transaction, that will happen anyway. What do I do?

I know what I can do. It's in this picture:

God bless Nutella. I am jumping from the keyboard into the jar head-first. It's worth it, believe me!!
/me passes the spoon to the artist

Ciao:)

Looking back at the past...

2009-11-05T01:25:00.006+01:00

Some say it's not good to look at the past...and I agree. But hey, I do it a lot! Unfortunately, I have a great memory. And this time, I really had to go back at Nebula and see what it looks like now. Look at this!

Some of you already know the story, but in case you don't know what I am talking about, you can read more here and here.
The fugly building on the bordering land made Banana move out, because she thought it wasn't nice to build a wall or a mountain range to hide it from sight. And that is just what the landlord is doing now! AHAH I can't stop laughing.

The mountain is quite big for a such a little strip of land. Couldn't they just tell the nice dark lady to move out as well?
Ah, life. First or Second, it's a hard one. ;)

Ciao:)

CLASSIFIED AD! (2)

2009-11-03T22:03:00.000+01:00

/me is looking for any american/canadian/english/irish/welsh/scottish/aussie/kiwi/south-african (from the North Pole?It's ok as long as you are a native english speaker) fellow Slers who want to join my classes for some simple conversation (voice would be perfect, local chat is ok) with italian students of the English language.

It's a lot of fun, I can assure ya. :)
Post a comment in here and we can talk about it inworld.

TY!

Mid-exploring....(!)

2009-11-03T01:26:00.002+01:00

(premise : this whole post is a joke, so don't take it seriously. It's just the result of a day-off work, a better desktop computer, an NVIDIA graphics card, a zero-lag sim and my very-second attempt ever at building ANYTHING with a meaning in SL)

Oh I so wanted to go explore today. Looks like everyone goes exploring these days, so I had to try myself. So, today's place is called MCOTW, which I believe stands for "Middleton's Corner of The World". It 's not on the Showcase, as it's pretty new on the grid and needs a little fixing to be done before it can be opened to the crowds. But I managed to get thru a lot of security, passport control and finally flew over a deserted land, until I spotted it on the ground...

As you can see, it really is a corner, so kudos to 'whoever' chose its name, 'cause it's pretty realistic.
Soon after landing there, I noticed the cool map on the floor. I know it's inspired by David Rumsey Maps but I definitely love the texture in this case, as I am a big fan of Google Earth.
Plus, I really can't say where that place on the map is, but it looks somehow familiar so thumbs up!

Now, this place is not really big, but still provides some good spots where you can sit and admire the sunset....(obviously, being it a corner you can't expect the mountain to rez on the edge of a Sim)

or, facing east, a spectacular view of the sun slowly rising above the sea...

There's a cool chopper bike you can ride, but you have to like its colour though...pink is not for everyone...

But what I found really interesting is this WELL BUILT store called 'Bomba Delight', right in the corner of the corner. No one there, so I ate 5 or 6 of those yummi thingees called Bombas (aka Krapfen in the original German), for free. They didn't explode in my stomach, but I am sure I 'll have troubles sleeping tonight.

Darn, I do love exploring now. But I think it can be little tiring though, considering that this place was only 10 X 10 meters and it has taken me a lot of patience and time to go thru all its amenities.

SLURL will be relased soon, but you can IM me for a guided tour. And you all guys, have a nice time inworld!

Mutual exchange.

2009-10-31T18:31:00.009+01:00

I have to admit, I love to google 'Banana's Hubby'. It's nice to know there are people who read my posts and even set them as preferites. But I didn't expect to find my name on here..

English Banana Bubble WHAT? LOL. This lady runs a website for cool banana recipes and I don't know how he decided to add my 'she is not the reason why i teach english in SL' blogpost on his suggested readings:

what can i say, my dear reader. I 've found your website interesting too, especially this particular recipe.

Chocolate PEANUT BUTTER banana muffin...MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!

/me drowns in peanut butter.

note: i added halloween and pumpkin in the tag words below for mere traffic increasing purposes. Pardon me. ;)

I love pillows....

2009-10-31T09:31:00.002+01:00

Sitting on Banana's boobies. Now that's kinky! and no, i wasnt staring at her butt in the pic

POTASSIUM LOVE

2009-10-30T19:27:00.006+01:00

AWW sad day today for my Nana. A fugly BDSM dungeon built by her neighbour made her ponder closing the store at Nebula..
Plus, it seems the effects of global warming are becoming a problem in SL too...so there she is contemplating a half-watered Potassium still in its astounding beauty.

Time to pack up.....but she decided to demolish instead...

and look what we have NOW! the one and only fly/sail-thru store in SL!

Come down here for a visit..sale ends in 24 hours..

CIAO!

Another thoughtful post from the SL blog!

2009-10-30T09:28:00.005+01:00

WHY SHOPPING!
(link)

AHAH this girl, Zhanka really loves to get into trouble! Good luck!

" Why people (you) buy things in Second Life? Is it profitable in Second Life virtual environment?"

LMAO!

IT'S NOT JUST A POINT OF VIEW.

2009-10-29T21:52:00.003+01:00

Among all the possible kinds of RolePlay in Second Life, you can also get the chance to join a Mafia community. There are lots of groups, Sims, and even stores dedicated to the recreation of some kind of "mafia atmosphere", for the full enjoyment of roleplay action and the celebration of badly generalized values such as Respect and Brotherhood. Add some beautiful 30's style clothing and sims, and the trick is done. I typed 'mafia' in the Secondlife.com search and here are the results (note: mature and adult content not included) :

436 groups.
Now, Mafia is still a huge problem in Italy. It' s something we aren't definitely proud of, and despite Italy ranks as the 5th biggest national community in SL, only a few d****e bags among us happen to join certain of those groups. I am aware the term "mafia" has been anglicized and has a broader range of meanings in popular american culture, but still, an average of more than 300 people are murdered every year and 40,000 families are affected by "that word" in my country and there is no way any of us would even dare to recreate this atmosphere in a virtual world. Popular TV shows such as "The Sopranos" have never been aired on TV here, and it is a criminal offense to publicly emphasize any mafia-related phenomenon.
Being the internet a relatively new world, I think it's our duty to keep it clean and accessible for all possible users. I know Facebook has deleted all its mafia-related groups, but I am sad to hear that among the addictive Facebook games such as Farmville, Pirates and CafèWorld, now there is also Mafia Wars.

Second Life contents are entirely user created, but I guess the Lindens must have some kind of control over certain 'politically uncorrect' behavior. Just out of curiosity, I thought of other shameful words in worldwide culture and typed them into the SecondLife.com search :

As you can see, no matches found for KU KLUX KLAN...

And 15 matches found for NAZI, just because of the various ANTI-NAZI groups.

and obviously no matches found for 'al qaeda'...

So, shall I just be glad that one of the darker stains on my country's worldwide reputation isn't considered off limits by Linden Labs, or is this worth some more thinking to Mr Philip Rosedale? I 'd like to know your opinions about it.

Peace :)

Moon&Josh, Thank you!

2009-10-29T10:04:00.007+01:00

Oh, yes. Whatever our background is, we are in SL for one main purpose. To avoid being forced to live a first life all day long, and this implies we get rid of all the stress, problems, pay the rent, and we don't even have to drive to work, 'cause we can fly there. If married, we can also pretend not to have a wife/husband to care for. In brief, we are free.

But there's a couple I know, who doesn't agree at all. In fact, despite knowing that ending up being unhappily married/partnered in RL is the number one reason for the success of Second Life(/me was in the group), they decided to get married in SL, in a wonderful, perfect ceremony. My admiration goes to them, and my thanks too, because I really enjoyed being there to witness the start of their new life together.

*sorry, crappy pic, but lag was bad and my laptop couldn't handle to rez the whole chapel at once, lol

Moon and Josh, you guys were able to bring tears to my eyes yesterday.
May your love grow bigger and bigger everyday, and you be happy for the rest of time!

Tanti auguri di cuore!!

CLASSIFIED AD!

2009-10-28T20:20:00.003+01:00

For you M.

2009-10-26T23:19:00.004+01:00

Wow, Second Life.

When you think you ‘ve been thru all kinds of emotions, events, when you think you are experienced enough to handle whatever may come your way..you find out that this electronic thingee you’re typing onto and those copper wires on the floor are always there ready to surprise you, or shock you for some reason.

I was busy commenting on London’s post about RL identity tonight, when I logged on SL and found a few offline IM’s.

(Avatar name is altered, *no translation* needed for the Italian viewer interface )

-- Registrazione degli Instant Messages abilitata --

[13:55] Mandy McCallen: You were nice to me, for that i will always remember you

[13:56] Mandy McCallen: Now I have to leave, you are all in my prayers

[13:56] Mandy McCallen è Offline

This woman I met by chance at some friends’ place, and after a short conversation she offered to help me with my teaching activity in SL, providing my boring and monotonous dissertations on grammar with some pleasant Irish accent/native English pronunciation exercises. I appreciated her spontaneous effort at helping me (she refused to get paid for it), and noticed it was beginning to become very important to her. I could tell by the tone of her voice, and by some other conversations we have had during the few days of our friendship. She shared some sad details of her RL, and how much SL provided an escape to all the S**T she is going through at the moment. I can undoubtedly say….SL was just making her life a happy one.

Now she is gone, and for ever.

Damn SL, we will never be good enough. ‘Cause there is no way ANYTHING like this can happen in my RL, and I wasn’t prepared for it.

Just in SL, damn SL.

OUT OF CONTEXT. (Valentino)

2009-10-25T19:23:00.005+01:00

YES I KNOW! SL is SL, RL is RL.
But I just couldn't resist.
Congratulations Valentino, you are the greatest of all ;)

@ Quaintly...that skyscraper should remind you of something! ;)

Thinking about a new skin..

2009-10-23T01:50:00.005+02:00

I have mentioned in my previous posts my dissatisfaction with the standards of the graphics in SL. I am not a computer nerd, so I am not enough qualified to judge, and I know that it's just my opinion, as most people I know are quite happy with things they see on their screens.
But I believe that the quality of the SL environment depends a lot on the creators, they way they imagine things and the way they build them. As for avatars, I don't think there's much they can do, I mean... a good skin is a good skin, a bad skin is a bad skin, but they look just the same to me, lol. I accepted my skin and shape for what they are, and all the times I have thought of changing it into something similar to the way I look in RL, I gave up 'cause judging by the previous results shown to me, it wasn't even worth trying. Anyway, hope is never a bad thing and, even if I am not sure yet, I think i 've just met the right guy these days. I can't call him a friend yet, but he's been the only SL builder/creator who hasn't gone mad at me for interrupting him while working on a creation.For this, I consider him one of a kind, lol, and definitely a nice guy. We chatted a bit and I forgave his one-hand typing of course, 'cause his other hand seemed to be very busy...I started to admire his skills and asked him to show me some of his previous works..which were amazing. I dared to ask for a custom job, and he basically made it in a flash ! I have a fetish for high-tech electronics in RL, and asked him to build an exact replica of my mobile phone just to see how far his skills -and SL graphics- could go. I allowed him a couple of days....It took him just 15 minutes. He said it's not perfect, and that he would make a better one in a hour time or so. I can see why it's not perfect, but just 15 minutes to see my RL phone rez in SL are well worth my appreciation. So here it is..

So I thought I could show him this picture...and ask for his opinion about it.

Hmm, he thinks he can do a better job than that. So shall I trust him and get me a new skin? Problem is, I have to take a perfect picture of my RL face, and if it's the way he described, it's going to take me hours. It's all a matter of getting the right light on my cheeks, so that every wrinkle on my face can become a pixelled line, lol. I 'll think about it, actually it's a week I am thinking about it. Once it's done, and if I like it, I guess I 'll just pay more attention to people complaining about my appearance, 'cause I won't be able to blame SL graphics anymore...or will I?

ciao:)

Quintessential surprise:)

2009-10-21T13:04:00.000+02:00

I knew my attempt at modeling on female poses would have scared someone. But in SL as in RL, the world is made of the weak and the brave. Among the brave, there is Quaintly, who not only appears not to have thrown her laptop out of the window after seeing my "tap my butt" pictures, but she 's just rezzed a male pose stand on the sandbox/platform that Banana built for her a few days ago (it's not that Banana isn't brave enough, she has just lost hope with time. Understandable).
Shall I take it as just kindness from Quaintly, or is this an encouragement to make me hit the 'snapshot' button again and again??
Since I am pretty good at making fun of myself, but I am definitely bad at taking myself too seriously, I will postpone the new modeling session for now. But I will do it, and blog it too! No worries if I am on your blogroll/feed, I will make it clear from the title that it's about me modeling again, so that you can choose wether to take the risk or not, lol :P

Thanks a lot Quaintly :)

THE BERLIN WALL.

2009-10-20T22:53:00.007+02:00

It's kinda crazy what's going on at Nebula. Banana's store has been there for ages, in a little corner of the SIM and with much of the surrounding area being empty all the time. It's a week now that a new neighbor has bought a huge section of it and has rezzed a big black building just on the opposite corner. It's so huge and black that you can actually see it from wherever you are at Potassium, and it isn't really a nice sight. Plus, the outside "garden", bordering Banana's property is full of crappy grass and some kind of tall purple flowers worth the most abandoned war cemetery in Greenland(omg has there ever been a war in Greenland?). Banana was left with no other choice than try to decorate the strip of grass on her side with some cute mushrooms and a pond, right after a first attempt at raising a little hill in between the sections so that the monster could be at least partially hidden. She has posted about it, and even felt a little guilty about the terraforming she had made at first. But surprise surprise....the neighbour built some ugly walls on the border, which accomplish the hard task to be even uglier than the black building itself. Now what could Nana do? She raised the hills again, so that the grey would disappear from sight, at least the side facing Potassium. You may think...ALL SET, grey wall on their side, green hill on our side. Fair enough.

Hmm, no, have a look at this!

I wonder what kind of pot this woman smokes. What's the point in making the wall taller again? Do we have to raise the hills again? Is this going to be a battle for the tallest avatar-made structure in Second Life? What's the fun in crashing my bike on a grey wall? Make it blue, red, yellowish at least!!

I walked to the black building (she made it a no fly zone) and wanted to check the view from there, looking towards Potassium. Here it is.

Don't you think that is just too "KEWL"???? I 'd really love to hang out at a place like that. Really as in...really really really.

What to do now....I don't know. I hope Banana gets things sorted. I hate grey, Berlin wall grey.

Not for the faint of heart!!

2009-10-20T11:07:00.005+02:00

Thanks to Banana and her neverending blogroll I literally bumped into this Flickr post.
I recommend reading it, though it's a bit harsh, and definitely her (Nicole's) own point of view. But I agree on some points, as I have always felt sad looking at people who lose the balance between they RL ego and the reflection of it into the metaverse. Too bad this person, Nicole, appears to have left Second Life, because no loss of balance can't be recovered with time. Take a deep breath, and read:

What SL should look like

I had a long conversation with probably one of the only people in my life who's ever been honest to me.He helped me see something, that I did not want to see. I. Hate. Avatars. This is what SL should look like. We should not know that there is land. We should not know that there are skies, or stars.Fly up a few thousand meters. Do this: Advanced - Turn Off Skies. He reminded me: "Even the stars are fake" SL should look like infinite space. The problem with SL, is that, it is fundamentally broken. We still know that we have avatars. We still know that there is land below us. We still know that there are avatars all over the grid. SL is too internalized. We all keep looking inward. There is no way to escape it. Take an honest moment with yourself and ask yourself. Why are you really here? You can not escape the fact that. You're just hiding. It does not matter what you are "doing" there. You are still there for what? Your OWN reasons. YOURSELF. Reconnect with yourself. STOP PROJECTING YOURSELF onto a you that will never be. Stop using your fucking sliders. Stop using your fucking clothing inventory. Stop taking picture after picture, of your "hot" little avatar. Face it. It's not you. Your pictures are lovely, I'm sure you like to look at yourself, just, STOP IT. IT IS NOT GOOD FOR YOU. I will not be using my avatar anymore. If you do see me, I will be my light ball, and that is all. I am not going to pose for you. I am not going to pretend to be something I am not. I will speak to you as myself. I am not some cartoon character in your imaginary little world filling some role that you've imagined me to be. I am not saying SL is entirely useless. I am just saying that SL has made you all sick. Whether you realize it yet or not. This is true. I for one am not going to imprison myself in avatar. SL should look like this. Infinite space. It should expand peoples minds and stimulate creation in a void of space. Ask yourself... why do people keep buying land, clothing, hair. Why do you keep trying to fill your life with fake "real life" items? What purpose does it serve? Is it comforting to have something you can't have in Real Life? Think of it this way. YOU DON'T and WON'T ever really have it. You are paying other people to lie to you.

Truth.

I speak it.

Don't like.

Don't comment.

Thanks for listening

-Nicole

Actually, I am pretty sure she will come back into SL.
Nicole, if you 're ever gonna read this, send me an IM!!

FINALLY something thoughtful from the SL blog.

2009-10-20T01:14:00.003+02:00

"Caution : Secondlife can activate basic neurological processes and may cause synaptic connections to be made triggering emotional responses that could lead to paradigmatic shifts in cognition which affect the quality and direction of future life decisions."

BS or truth? I don't care.
Yes, I do love your comment, Ripped Winkler. Even though you posted it just to cut and paste the URL of your Xstreet account, it just made me stop for a second in a kinda speechless mood :)

SLebrities!

2009-10-19T23:33:00.001+02:00

Celebrities, yeah.
I have always thought Second Life to be too much an "easy" world for anyone to define themselves as Slebrities. I mean, no matter how popular and productive you can be as an avatar, it doesn't take much effort to become well known and respected in a little village of 400 thousands active users worldwide. Moreover, the common definition of celebrity in RL is of someone who is popular, and exclusively in the media, for the most various reasons, even if the reasons themselves aren't really praiseworthy. So, since I can't really find any representation of the "media effect" in Second Life, (hmmm, gawd, how crazy would it be to have a SL TV in world??) then what is it that makes a celebrity out of a pixelled avatar?
I guess it's a matter of money again, or at least in part. I won't name any of them, but there is a little bunch of guys in here that is actually capable of earning REAL money, even if the legend says only 49 people worldwide (Linden Labs not included) earn enough to fully sustain their real lives. I can't anyway define them as celebrities, i'd rather think they 're just..very smart guys in the virtual sex/porn industry(lol), and a few ones in the fashion business.
Then, there 's the much wider community of avatars who THINK they are Slebrities. "A year in SL equals to 7 years in RL", as the saying goes. 100% true, though I haven't bought Banana a present for our 14th wedding anniversary yet. Fact is, emotions run fast in here, and so does self-esteem. From noob to entrepreneur, from camper to landowner, from ruth to supermodel, from nerd to trend-setter, the target is at anyone's reach. All you have to do is get a hundred dollars charged on your VISA. Lacking traffic? Some 50 more dollars spent in advertising will do the trick, for a month or so. But hey, nothing compares to becoming a celebrity!

I 've been lucky enough to witness some of these guys while stressfully dealing with their change of SL-status.
No more 'how are you?' IM's 'cause they were often in busy mode.
No more 'Let's go for a ride' IM's 'cause they were frantically going through the list of possible managers to hire.
No more rezzing helicopters on their land 'cause it could offend the patrons.

But the point of no return is...when you open their profiles and the guy who once was a..

"friendly easygoing man who enjoys SL and all it has to offer! Send me an IM if you like"

becomes a...

OF COURSE you 're a PROUD owner and of OF COURSE your IM's get capped!!!
But please tell me why you can't just check them in your friggin' email.

Pathetic.

Peace.

*someone please stop me from uploading SL profiles on my blog or i 'll get sued one day or another.

JUST FOR FUN...

2009-10-18T22:58:00.000+02:00

HMM Pretty cool pictures at her store... and a skilled model too...

Wonders how she can make it...there must be a pose stand somewhere near and I am gonna find it for gawd's sake!

Done. What I thought were huge light bulbs hovering in the sky...Idjit me!

OK ladies, stand back and enjoy! My turn now ;)

erm, ok first try was good, don't you think? Female poses make the bald man look so kewl...

Second try, even better. I think i am enjoying this..hmm...too much.

Ooopss! I think I went a little bit too far..the last one reminds me of Tony Manero but I can't be that low on testosterone.

Back on track, italian avatar. If you haven't learnt fashion in Milan, you won't learn it in Second Life anyway. And all of you reading this, please JUST KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT OK?? ;)

TOP TEN REASONS TO LOVE A BANANA.

2009-10-17T19:29:00.001+02:00

No pun intended. She is just my Banana.

Number 10. 'Cause she can feel really disappointed when her new neighbor puts a yucky black castle-thing right in front of her pretty store and all you want to do is to bomb it straight away.

9. 'Cause instead of bursting into tears, she then decides to make it up by adorning her pretty little land with some funny colored mushrooms and a small pond just on the border of the property.

8. 'Cause there is no better place where she could start whispering sweet little nothings in my ears...

7. ...or start jumping on the mushrooms as if they were a trampoline!

6. 'Cause no matter what she is busy with, she always finds the time to build Quaintly a custom sandbox...

5. And then allowing me to go mushroom hunting on my pink chopper!

4. 'Cause despite knowing that women drivers rhymes with women riders, she wants to give it a try herself..(look at the passenger's frightened face)

3. Cause she is the only one capable of jumping the hills like that..

2. And 'cause when it comes to riding a bike, she doesn't mind violating the sacred steps of a french church...

1. Most of all, the number 1 reason to love a Banana is...'cause after a tiring day like that, she won't just say good night and log off. There is always time for a last dance, until the morning comes.

'Cause morning will come.
I love you baby, ti amo tanto.

50 most annoying things..

2009-10-17T19:04:00.005+02:00

about the internet.
I thought i'd share this list of thing people hate the most about the web, from the Daily Telegraph.

I totally agree with number 2. Joining charities online is the best way to go to bed thinking you 've done something good. But nothing 's going to happen overnight anyway.

Number 4....argh yes i DO wanna kill the inventor of Captcha!!

Number 5.... social media guru's...who are they???

Number 11...youtube speech bubbles..I LURVE THEM!

Number 35..compulsory fields on forms..GRRRR!

Number 50..I think Chris Crooker is a genius.

Weird, the list doesn't mention Second Life. Is it good or bad? I 'd rather choose to be on a 'hate' list than being completely forgotten. But that's just me...;)

LOL, Emerald.

2009-10-15T00:46:00.003+02:00

Just found this funny discussion on the Second Life blog about the Emerald Viewer. Funny because they are debating about the legality of the viewer, in particular about a special feature of Emerald that would make it easier to steal/copy items. Funny because the Emerald viewer is mentioned on the Second Life wiki. And i guess ANYTHING from the Second Life wiki should be legal...LOL. But then you read this warning message there...

"Warning: Third-party viewers are not associated with Linden Lab and are governed by their own respective licenses. Linden Lab is not responsible for any desired or undesired results in association with those viewers."

Is this just.....total confusion??? I dunno. I 'll keep using Emerald very often. Until the day I learn how to copybot. Promise.

Mid-Fashionistaholic!

2009-10-14T10:31:00.012+02:00

Thanks to the Emerald SL viewer, I now know that i am 801 days old.It's not that i couldn't do the count myself, and of course the day-count isn't the reason why I recommend you download Emerald. It has many advantages you can find out yourself, but the best thing for me is that Emerald is, strangely enough, lighter than the default viewer, and allows my old&crappy laptop to run 2 SL windows at the same time with just 2 gigs of RAM and a couple of other applications in the background.

Anyway, back to the 801 days I spent in here, I thought I could do some more counting. Easy counting. Measuring the time in days, I tried to figure out how many days I have worn the same pieces of clothing! I know, it looks like an impossible thing to do for most Slers, but me being a special case, I just changed my clothes depending on the events that occurred from time to time, so that now i can summarize it, with these amazing end results:

Number 1 : an amazing total of 160 days. It's the Frank's place jazz suit, that i wore during my workdays there as a host. It came with multiple jackets and ties, so that i could vary my looks if *only* i wanted, lol.

Number 2 : 100 days. Jeans and polo t-shirt from AITUI, a gift from a crazy bunch of guys then known as 'the family', after a one month long fight to make me change my clothes.

Number 3 : some unbelievable 300 days ca. Nice jeans, shirt, tie and vest. Gift from Banana, and then she kindly threatened to unpartner me if I hadn't worn it. Ask her for a LM if you like them, lol.

Number 4 and 5 : These cool shirt, jacket and jumper (the white one gives me the penguin look i know) I have been wearing the last 30 days, just to feel the thrill of it.

Now, I never believed in Karma, but I guess I really should start to. Such a lazy shopper I am, 3 days ago I randomly joined the Bitch Tail Midnight Mania board, just to help increase the number of participants to 500, the minimum requested by the organizers.
Woke up the following day, with a flashy 500 L$ bonus credit card in my pixelled wallet:

OPPS! Did I just write 500L$? hmm, yeah,that was the supposed amount. But have a closer look at the amount on the credit card..don't you think 3 zero's after a 5 are better than just 2??
Thanks a lot, Bitch Tail. And many more thanks to your sales manager, I just hope you don't fire him 'cause mistakes sometimes happen for a good reason. ME!!!

In the end, i walked home with 5 new outfits and a dozen of custom motorbikes, the pink one being my favourite...

Have a nice time in SL you all :)

She is not the reason why I teach english.#2

2009-10-13T00:13:00.011+02:00

I really don't like to repeat myself but since one of my previous posts got some blog-wide attention , I thought I could write a quickie and add some more words of wisdom from a girl who knows how to put a mark on a man's soul. Dedicated to all non-native english speakers and to all native english speakers who have misspelt a word at least once in their lives.

and i checked her paid-ads page too, unfortunately she doesn't appear to support any campaign for the extermination of slow typers. And lastly, I am not a fuginista but, you reckon her double nipslip in the picture is intentional?

;)

How many people know about your Second Life?

2009-10-11T05:57:00.007+02:00

RL and SL. SL and RL. Are these just acronyms we use to read on profiles or have they some more profound meanings?

Okay, I am not going to bore you with the over-discussed topics of how much Second Life has enriched your real lives, or how much of your real lives should be shared inside your second ones. I bet there are hundreds of blogposts about this. Because it seems we talk about it a lot. We talk about our real lives in Second Life, always, even when we don't want to share a single thing. If we don't share any details, it doesn't mean we aren't giving any, because no matter what, we are telling people that we tend not to mix RL and SL for some unknown reason concerning our RL. It is always the first life merging into the metaverse. It's NEVER, or almost never, the metaverse merging in our First life.

Let's be honest.

How many of us are open to the world about SL? How many of us use to decline a night out with real friends, by honestly saying "Sorry mate, i have a bunch of avatars waiting for me inworld"? How many of us have told our families, colleagues, cousins, aunts and uncles that we spend a third of our daytime watching pixels dance on a poseball? How many of us have the guts to admit having found love(even the true one), friendship, or just meaningless fun inside some servers down there in San Francisco? Have you ever figured why no matter how much effort we make in hiding our real lives in SL, it will never compare to the effort we make in hiding SL from RL?
And if the answer is..."just a few of us", then why? If Linden Labs' invention is so precious to us, why do we need to hide it from the 'atomic' world?
I can only guess some of the answers, and of course people come to SL for the most various reasons so that it's impossible to even get a kinda comprehensive idea after all. But I am pretty sure the majority of us think that the outside world just can't understand.

No, they won't understand. Because Second life is best (if not only) understood when you are living it. If you are in it, and happen to like it very much, thats when the world starts refusing to understand and you think you'd better keep your mouth shut with everyone.

Lacking in Potassium me too.

2009-10-10T09:23:00.007+02:00

When complaining to me about lack of visits to Potassium, I threw it right back at Banana for not posting about it enough.

So true. No wonder she married me - I am a smart man.

Photo courtesy of Banana Vella ® Blogspot

This is Potassium. It has clothes. Cheap, cool and casual. Visit.

She is not the reason why I teach english in SL :)

2009-10-09T21:17:00.010+02:00

One interesting thing in becoming a blogger after 2 whole years of a Second Life, is that you can think and re-think the past, allowing good and bad memories to come back into your mind. Only difference, now you have THE way to let them out and share them to the world. Today is a bad memory's day, lol. I remember bumping into this unbelievably self-centered-wannabe-diva and overpixellated-avatar while hanging out at some super popular club, and this was looong time ago. I was just waiting for my special one(*no need to mention her name, lol*) to log in and have our daily 10 minutes romantic dance, but i couldnt avoid to notice Sensua. Erm, no, not because of her looks.
Not because of her sexy AO.
Not because of her charming bling.
Not because of her smart chat lines and tempting gestures. >Since she seems to dislike updating her profile(oh, what a turn off!), I can show it to you exactly how it read more than a year ago:)
Now you tell me what kind of woman can have such a Second life profile page.

Now, methinks..what's the best in Second Life? Being fluent in English? Oh come on, it can't be much of a problem in here. We got real time translators, we got schools, and you could also fall in love with a nice guy from a foreign land, and decide to speak his language instead. You just don't know how fascinating it could be.

So i decided to move on to her Interests' page, hoping to be delighted by her wit again.

Oh, you want to be free. How original and real.
Oh, you 're sarcastic, i think i know that by now. And you can be mean to men!
Oh, you speak English....HEY WAIT A MOMENT!! WTF?? what's the problem with you!!! Again, you can be that mean to foreigners, milady..GRR. I will excuse you only if you can prove you were Borat's girlfriend before he made the movie.

And now very intrigued to have a look at your first life..

COOL!! what can i say , Sensua. Voltaire gave you a good advice, for sure you 've accomplished the first part, but it's a long way for the second!!!

I thought I'd give it a try...

2009-10-09T00:18:00.001+02:00

and I did good!!!!!

I thought my avi would look hot in a uniform..but that's not the point.
I managed to accomplish my first undercover mission..and the guy is in jail!

Now, if you happen to know who the guy is...you know what i am talking about.
In case you DON'T know who the guy is....DON'T ASK!!!!

cheers.

Dress Code

2009-10-08T21:06:00.003+02:00

Funny aye.
I thought it was just me complaining about dress code violation during formal/semi-formal events. Instead, just today Gartner inc. the "world's leading information technology research and advisory company" (as they call themselves) has released an interesting report concerning RL enterprises who want to establish their offices inside virtual worlds. The reference to Second Life is pretty obvious but what's funny really is...they state that by 2013 there will be a huge increase in the number of business companies involved and that, in order to achieve better results, 70% of those enterprises will require their virtual employees to adhere to a very formal dress code, avoiding any type of clothing that can do harm to their respectable RL lookalikes.
2013? I know that the major companies who first came into SL as an experiment have escaped almost immediately the metaverse, due to the absolutely uneffective feedback and ridicolous increase in popularity. And the cause for this definitely wasn't the way their employees looked like. Plus, SL stats are falling down to the lowest in the last 3 years and it is very rare to hear of a major business company entering SL lately. So i am sorry Gartner inc., I am not going to spend 95USD and download the full report from your website 'cause you may just be ...totally wrong IMO :)

ciao:)

Even the Army goes to University!

2009-10-08T00:54:00.007+02:00

No need for words really... have you ever seen troops at school? This is what they'd look like!

Hmm some guys in my students' group really needed to make it a funny class..

And no I am not in jail at the moment....but that was their intention..

why is it so difficult to behave in SL??

btw if you look carefully at the pics all names are hidden except one;)

CALLING MY LAWYER NOW!

2009-10-07T12:11:00.005+02:00

Lazy morning, one of those you spend re-reading your posts and thinking how you could be so silly to write about silly things.
Ops, here 's another. WTF does this mean?

Copyright (c) 2009 Natural Born Kiavik. All rights reserved. Design by Free CSS Templates Bloggerized by TeknoMobi Supported by Orcun .

Does this mean i have a copyright? Does this mean i can sue people who cut&paste from my blog(i wish they did, lol)? Is this just for me or is it for anyone who happens to join a free blogger account? Does this mean that CSS, TeknoMobi and Orcun are my business partners and why havent they called me yet? Does this mean i am just too lazy to read the Blogger T.o.S. and find out by myself?

Well, in the end, who cares? It's just so nice to see that (c) in between brackets.

back to real life now. :(

NO SCRIPT SANDBOXES

2009-10-06T13:32:00.010+02:00

WHY ARE MOST SANDBOXES NO SCRIPT??

PREMISE: all i can do in Second Life is...chat, make friends, talk on voice, teach and translate. Some say the best thing i can do in here is just to be a PAIN IN THE ASS, but I prefer not to overestimate myself. Anyway I 've never used the right click button much, except for when i need to 'SIT' or open a profile. Isn't that sad? Believe me, I felt a lot sadder when i tried to build a red mailbox and ended up naming it 'red hammer' because a hammer is what it looked like in the end.

Being a SLtech-noob isn't really bad anyway. You can always use it as an excuse, when friends are building for you and need some help. Advice: at least don't stand in their way when they're camming close to a tiny object,as they can get really angry at times.

Now, unfortunately i have to learn how to right click more often. My new job requires some SLtech knowledge and i have to admit, even if teaching is basically done on voice, a few tricks can be helpful and can save me a lot of time.
So, I asked my friend Josh (a teacher of scripting) a little help for the setup of a Notecard Giver, which is useful when you have a class of 20 in front of you and need to pass a notecard to all of them one by one. I allowed myself a half hour to understand(lol) how it worked, and thanks to Josh and his patience i managed to put all the little bits together and in the right place. I can't explain how I felt, but I am pretty sure Leonardo da Vinci must have felt the same after the completion of his beloved Mona Lisa. Except I don't think painting a masterpiece can be THAT BORING.
But then.. Josh had to go.. and i was left all alone to practice with my new right-click thingee. I was at some friends' place and i didn't want to do any damage to their nice land so i decided to move to a sandbox. Chose the last one on the list, 'cause less the lag, better the experience. YAY! it was absolutely empty and all for me. Rezzed the thing, right clicked and then...

"JOSH??? where are you? why isn't the thing working NOW???".

Josh was gone and I couldn't find any help anywhere in my friend's list. Typical of me, when i think I know enough, that's when i have to start reading the book all over again. Except for this time. I realised it wasn't me at all. The friggin' sandbox was NO SCRIPT! i mean, NO SCRIPT! And WTF is a SCRIPT?? okay, a script is a THING written in a LANGUAGE that allows some objects to do what they're supposed to do. In my case, give out notecards. So i tried another sandbox, and then another. And then another. All were no script! As far as i know a sandbox has got to be a place for builders and a place for whoever wants to try new stuff they 're building. Script are a big part of it. Houses have sliding doors and windows, Tv sets and showers and bath tubs. They all have scripts. Now WHY? Why most sandboxes are NO SCRIPT? Sadly enough, Second Life is full of grievers, and sandboxes are a griever's paradise. It's easy there to use scripts the wrong way and there isn't any security, so people get often shot in the head by a russian automatic rifle while they 're trying to make those 4 walls match the size of the roof. Optimistic as always, i found a script-enabled sandbox, but i ended up being hit by huge bullets shaped as SuperMario. I liked SuperLuigi more but i didnt manage to send an IM to the guy and complain.Okay the point is: builders have their land, and they build there in peace. But what about all the wanderers in Second Life? Do we always need to OWN/RENT land to have full permits in SL? How can i practice my building now that i have a growing passion for it? (lol)
I think i 'll find a solution but all the newcomers in SL won't find it easy to learn how to 'right click'.

Peace:)

A few words on... Love.

2009-10-04T12:33:00.004+02:00

At first Love is infatuation. Love is curiosity and exploring, Love is when you wake up and smile for no reason.

Then it becomes butterflies in your stomach, then it becomes the need to give everything you got because you know you will have it back someday. Even if you think you're hopeless.

Then, Love is..walking hand in hand, spending hours just staring at each other in the rain.

Then, Love is when you can't stand being half the world away and decide to make a video of 2 avatars in a virtual world, no matter if it's the most childish thing you 've done since your high school years.

Then Love is...sharing the same thoughts, dreaming the same dreams, working together to make them come true.

Then Love is.. accepting the differences, adjust to them, managing to fill the gaps with all what you heart suggests.

Then Love becomes Perfection, and soon after that it becomes Respect.

Respect is that thing that manages to get you through the worst in life, and makes you feel content when, once you 're grey and old, you' re both sitting by the fireplace, watching your grandchildren play hide and seek. Respect is never granted.

But since Perfection doesn't belong to mankind and Respect is hard to earn..Love is also made of mistakes and apologies.

Mistakes happen all the time, apologies don't. Mistakes hurt, apologies sometimes hurt more.

Especially when you think they aren't really needed, but your wounded heart says you have to ask for them.

SWINE FEVER ALERT

2009-10-03T19:51:00.002+02:00

NO COMMENT.
Or maybe yes. EUWWW!!!

(and yes that guy wearing donkey ears is me)

LOL!

2009-10-03T19:40:00.002+02:00

have a look at the Second Life Blog!

I never knew the difference between "Payment info on file" and "Payment info used". That's funny!

RL Locations.

2009-10-03T11:17:00.010+02:00

Due to my recent involvement with Moonlight University, I have met more italians in SL in the last week than in the past 2 years and a half-and-a-bit. Being able to escape my RL location has always been one of the reasons I love Second Life above all. But i was checking one of my student's profile last wednesday and I got suddenly intrigued by one of the places listed in her pics page. It happens to be a particular location (a beach) in my RL city, and I so wanted to go have a look at the place! Lesson ended and I hit the TP button...here's what i saw:

Now, this is the actual place:

Erm, it doesn't matter if some of you think the pixelled beach looks better than the real one, lol. But i mean...WTF? Is it right to name places in SL after actual RL places and then not even bother to make them look at LEAST somehow similar to reality?
Apart from the palm trees and the black lamps on the seafront walk, nothing looks quite right, really(you might want to click on the RL pic to enlarge it and see what i am talking about). And no, i didn't expect to find the horrible TV antenna in the background but geez, I often used to go check places in the grid just to see what they could look like in RL and this one place here definitely doesn't do a favour to my beloved RL location. GRR!

Instead, here is a good example. The place is Milano Vera in SL compared to actual Milan:

Funny to notice that even the CLOUDS look just the same, lol ;)
And no matter if the guys at Milano Vera decided to build the disco right in the middle of the square, actually i think it would be a great idea to have a disco there in RL too, lol.

I think i 'll go explore places these days, beginning from those places I have already visited in RL(it's a long list), and if i find something funny there i will post it straight away.

Ciao!!!

"Jinius" Jenni Movies :))

2009-10-03T00:06:00.006+02:00

This is what friends are for...

Jenni is a very special one. She really knows how to have fun in SL and never get bored. She 's been everything and anything, an entrepreneuse, a shopping-addict, a builder, a dating service manager, and ultimately a spiritual minister too...LOL (winks). Most of all she is a true friend, who always shows me her affection no matter what she is busy with in SL. This is Her last invention:

HOW COOL IS THAT??? Well she has tried to explain how she makes it...she gets RL movies and then uploads them into her cinema thingee, dunno if there's any copyright infringment there, 'cause you can call it 'private viewing in a virtual world' and the trick is done. The resolution was kinda like HD really and it impressed me quite a lot. Definitely the best video player i have ever seen.

LOL yeah that pale round skin and that red head are jenni and I watching movies!

there's even a friendly but scary giant spider giving us shivers in the dark...called Blinky:)

Now what? I just have to convince her to upload the Back to the Future Trilogy. Wonder what a DeLorean's flames look like on a virtual screen!

Ciao!

NO PAYMENT INFO ON FILE.

2009-10-02T22:01:00.004+02:00

Yep that's just what my profile says. No payment info on file. SO WHAT???

i was hanging out with 2 friends of mine the other day, and dunno why we ended up talking about money in SL. I was the only one there with no payment info,and we started a kinda funny-serious discussion about it, lol. They explained why they needed to put RL money in a virtual world, and in short it was all a matter of 'getting things the fast way' instead of earning money by working in SL. I made a quick check on my friends' list in the meanwhile, and apparently there 's just a bunch of people there (5 out of 79)who bear my same label on their profile. When i started SL I promised myself i 'd never use RL money for it, and no, it wasnt because of fears of gambling addiction. I wanted to keep it as a game, and when i play games i do not usually use money. Plus i have no reason to spend money in SL, really. I rarely go shopping, I do not have tiers to pay, I do not own land, and when i used to have a house i was able to earn my little treasure inworld and be a good saver, lol. Now i have 2 jobs in SL and a little monthly income, which goes mostly into Banana's account 'cause i haven't found a valid reason to spend it yet.
I remember the day my balance went up to 10.000L$, all amazingly earned inworld, and then asking myself "WTF now?", lol.
But well, I find it a lil' annoying to be discriminated because of my payment info status! Most SL clubs (SweetHearts started first, lol) require payment info on file for job applicants, as a manager once explained "it is just meant to verify the degree of SL commitment of a possible working partner". The tons of new and different SL viewers being released these months feature special add-ons such as 'show payment info as tag', as if women need to know about your "SL shopping commitment" before even Iming you for a dance. And last, even among friends, you get to know new people and these guys happen to be avid profile readers who can't wait to hit the shout button like this : "Hey mate how can you manage to live here with no money??"
No money my ass!! How weird, Second Life allows us to do a hundred things we wouldn't commonly do in RL, yet some of the best and most annoying RL clichès show up to remind you that artificial intelligence hasn't been invented yet:))
But well, in the end kudos to Linden Labs. They did their job well, 'cause they knew there were going to be guys who 'd exchange at least 10USD into L$ just to get that shameful tag off their profiles for good.
Do the count, 10 USD x 8 million users...NOT ME!!!!

CONFESSIONS of a wannabe BLOGGER Part 2.

2009-10-02T12:07:00.003+02:00

OMG OMG! I entered the blogosphere 2 weeks ago and it's been a blast!I managed to keep a good pace, like 2 posts/day but..erm yesterday was the first day i didnt really have anything to post about in here. Gawd is this normal? i am asking you, experienced bloggers - has this ever happened to you too? What do you usually do when you have ran out of interesting things to share? Am i the only one who can blog about nothing? (lol)

I guess I haven't been in SL enough these days to be able to blog about something, nice or bad. Even though my friends at Moonlight University are expecting a big post about my first days of work there...

So what am I doing here? I know what I am doing here, I 'll blog about blogs! The blogger community is big and diverse, but I can surely say all bloggers have something in common...and this thing I call the 'IKNOWITALL' syndrome. I know this is not going to increase my already a-little-more-than-zero popularity (despite being helped by Sweethearts Jazz) but I definitely find it easy to detect in each blog I read, that little sense of superiority residing in every respectable blogger's soul.
It doesn't surprise me, after all. To be able to blog, means to be able to have a view on life, first or second. Consequently, each of us guys develops a point of view, and also develops some good criticism with a need to share it. So it's nice to read away, and everything is cool, everything is what it has to be, everything shines in that little spot of their Second Life... then all of a sudden the mishap happens. For some mysterious reason there is always something that wrecks the moment: a guy is annoying them all on local chat, some guy's translator causes major sim-wide lag and freezes everyone around, or simply some builder's skills weren't that good when he decided to upload sucky textures for that wall bordering the property. I dare you guys, find a blog that doesnt feature the 'iknowitall' syndrome. Ah maybe this is just my 'iknowitall' moment right now, so no exceptions...

Anyway (!) if it is so, it has to be so. For life can be sometimes boring, and we all need a boost of self-confidence by making a fool of someone else, even if it is just for a few minutes. Or a few lines.

So this is all for now, early morning post, and what could you expect more?
See you all later:)

AJAXLIFE....GOOD NEWS!

2009-10-02T08:17:00.002+02:00

Sometimes it's good to be wrong. Many thanks to Quaintly Tuqiri for letting me know that Ajaxlife is back and working!

And yes, everyone can post a comment on my blog, just click on the heading of each post. The post-a-comment window will show up immediately. (but please be nice to me)
:)

Ajaxlife....BAD NEWS!

2009-10-01T11:48:00.002+02:00

AjaxLife. Browser based Second Life client, created by Katharine Berry. On Sept 8th 2009, Katherine posted on her blog: "AjaxLife is currently down, due to being banned by Linden Lab. I will re-enable it when I have figured out why."

No more ajaxlife guys!

BANNED FROM SWEETHEARTS :)

2009-09-30T11:49:00.009+02:00

OK!! I said OK!!! I have been a dick.

As any respectful blogger would do, i am trying to find ways to promote(promote/advertise, there 's a difference IMO) my blog lately. And one of these ways is the most common of all....wearing a Flip Title inworld. I chose it red, showing the URL of N.B.K. and it looked funny! :)
I TP'ed myself to places, just random ones and people seemed to be nice to me everywhere. I know some Sims do not allow flip titles but i don't know why (or i know why?lol) I then decided to hit the TP button to SWEETHEARTS. Landed there, said hi, and got ejected in 3 minutes, without any warning. I TP'ed back there and Imed the hostess, Blossom Morgath, just to make sure it was an ejection for advertising. She apologised for not being able to warn me in time, and said it had been a decision of the owner, Sir Dilbert Dilweg. I removed the flip title immediately, had a friendly chat with Blossom and everything seemed to be alright for the following half hour.
On the following day, Banana invited me for a dance and I suggested...SWEETHEARTS!(not that we go there much anyway, lol) Roughly 24 hours after wearing a flip title for approx 3 minutes there, i found myself on the BAN list. How cool is that?
So this is the IM convo with Blossom Morgath, who is also co-manager there and a very nice person:

2:34] Banana's Hubby : hi Blossom, any idea why i got banned?
[2:35] Banana's Hubby : i removed the flip title as soon as i realised it wasnt allowed:)
[2:35] Blossom Morgath: hey honey... I've got no idea... I didn't know you were...
[2:35] Blossom Morgath: yes I know you removed it... and you were able to come back...
[2:35] Banana's Hubby : yes and i stayed at SH for a half hour
[2:36] Banana's Hubby : today i found out i am banned. lol
[2:36] Blossom Morgath: yes...
[2:36] Blossom Morgath: you will need to ask the owners - Dilbert Dilweg or Charity Colville
[2:36] Banana's Hubby : i have Imed him but he hasnt replied despite showing online
[2:37] Banana's Hubby : i dunno really cos he didnt ban me yesterday
[2:37] Banana's Hubby : he banned me today. lol
[2:37] Blossom Morgath: oh it's pointless sending an IM... you need to send him a notecard honey
[2:38] Banana's Hubby : okay i will. But in case i mention your name, will you confirm that i removed the flip title right after our talk?
[2:38] Blossom Morgath: yes honey, I will
[2:38] Banana's Hubby : okay:)
[2:39] Blossom Morgath: I hope you get it sorted
[2:40] Banana's Hubby : erm its weird cos he didnt give me any warning before ejection and before the ban. i only talked to you because I Imed you. and i removed it straight away

Well, dear Sir and Mister Dilbert Dilweg. Thank you anyway because now i know just another way to increase traffic on my blog. Since it seems it's very easy to get banned from your fine place, i guess there must be hundreds of poor fellows gridwide and worldwide like me who are googling 'BANNED FROM SWEETHEARTS" at any moment.

So i think it's just a matter of choosing the right key words for today:))

Second Life Mobile. Update!

2009-09-30T10:43:00.005+02:00

Again for all of you SL addicts who wish to play SL while on the move, here is an update.
In a previous post i mentioned the Vollee mobile SL client, which is currently down. No news from Vollee yet, so i thought i would give everybody a quick hint.
For all Iphone users, you can access SL (just local chat, IM's, TP's) on the already well known ajaxlife.net website. It works pretty well on Iphones and the touch screen is perfect for it.
For all of you who do not own an Iphone, there is a chance for you too. Of course you need a high end device anyway, Symbian or Windows mobile OS's (Nokia, Samsung, Sony-Ericsson, HTC, etc.) and all you need to do is download(free) and install the SKYFIRE web browser from www.skyfire.com/. Once you 've managed to make it work on your phone, just go to ajaxlife and access SL. It is a little slower and laggier than the iphone experience, but still worth a try. All other default mobile browser do not support the flash animations used on ajaxlife, so Skyfire is the one and only. You can just use it for emergencies (lol), or just to send a quick hug to your special ones inworld (btw, Skyfire is one of the best mobile browsers on the market).
For all of you who just own a java enabled device...i am sorry but there isn't anything ready for you at the moment.

Anyway, I wonder why Linden Labs has developed the SLim viewer (lighter SL viewer with no graphics support, just chat and IM) for normal PC's, and yet there is no agreement with ANY mobile software developer for an official mobile SL viewer.

/me thinks... It's all about the Moola!!!

Ciao everyone!

TSUNAMI in the pacific ocean

2009-09-30T00:41:00.004+02:00

Just heard about the heartquake near the pacific islands of Samoa.

Everything seems to be ok but my all prayers are for you Samoans, Aussies and Kiwis.

HOT SEE THRU.

2009-09-29T11:16:00.006+02:00

Have you ever wondered what's inside your avatar's head? Do we all have virtual brains in here? Will our avatars get their own Artificial Intelligence one day and steal our accounts? Will they wander by themselves in orgy rooms while we are working RL?

I guess here is the answer for now.

Amazingly enough, avatars have no brains.
OR WAS IT JUST MINE????

Well my dear Philip Linden, if this is the message, i got it.

The not-so-live Concert

2009-09-28T21:52:00.016+02:00

I got a group notice.

It said 'The Doors LIVE concert tonight at bla bla bla..'

I couldn't wait to go there!

Went there, stage was perfect, lights were on, people were screaming already.

THEN the music started.

And it was a CD. One of those i bought back in my high school years.I thought it was just an intro to the actual live show. It wasn't. I know some say Jim is still alive, but that was just a crappy CD while the notice said 'LIVE CONCERT'

I had to IM the band manager:

Banana's Hubby: "hello, is this a live concert or are you just playing a CD tonight?"

A. Destiny: "lol no CD, we are a LIVE tribute band!!!!"

Banana's Hubby: "HMM, i mean, is anyone going to perform live tonight?I have this CD here i can play it whenever i want and stream it just like you 're doing now.Is this a cover band?"

A. Destiny: "We have the best original live concert files, you won't find these in music stores"

Banana's Hubby: "hmm not sure about that.."

A. Destiny: "gee, thanks, lol"

Banana's Hubby: "don't worry i thought this was a live cover band"
Banana's Hubby: "now i know it's not:)"
Banana's Hubby: "Nice avatars tho"

A. Destiny: "So what are you saying? the REAL Doors aren't good enough? lol"

Banana's Hubby: "LOL!!! C'mon you know what i mean, i can play this same song everyday on my stereo. Live music is what i expected, but i talked to the owner here, i misunderstood the group notice.."

A. Destiny: "enjoy, we have a following of 5000, no worries, they seem very happy with our shows this is more than just playing a cd and btw its not tunes from a cd, i have live soundboard files"

Banana's Hubby: "WADEVAAAAA!!!"

I am sure i heard some guys in the audience say "wow his voice is so similar to the real Jim!!! Awesome!!" Well,I didn't want to ruin their day.

And BTW, the SLM MUSIC TRIBUTE BAND group has 323 members,but probably 5000 group notices..:(

Peace!

Welcome back Nub!

2009-09-27T20:51:00.003+02:00

My long time (2 years) aussie friend Kanubie popped up today after a long break from SL...She is one of the best people I 've ever met and a true kind hearted person. She 's saved me from quitting SL countless times and i have saved her from Slingo induced RL bankruptcy some other countless times. What more can you expect from a friend? It's great to have you back Nub! :))

And this is where we met tonight. Slingooooo!!!!

QUICK PRIVATE MESSAGE:)

2009-09-26T23:59:00.002+02:00

i am sorry J.A.F.A.'s are bad cooks, baby. We 'll have the best ones on *THAT* day:)

SL Adult Content Policy

2009-09-26T09:48:00.004+02:00

The Adult Content Policy is now officially operative after months of studies, research, blogposts, surveys and.. lots of advertising. *winks*
It is meant to make Second Life a safer place for teens and kids.

But i am age verified with an absolutely fake RL name and an absolutely fake driving licence number. I didnt even care about modifying data from a real driving licence, i just put the first 10 or 11 numbers that i could think of.

Well done Linden Labs!

BTW, i am 31.

ROLEPLAY. Man vs Gor.

2009-09-25T13:34:00.047+02:00

RolePlay and Second Life. For a large majority of SLers these 2 things are strongly linked to each other or better, they just mean the same thing. I have met avatars whose Second Life is a 24/7 roleplay area as they spam local chat with the third person "/me" thingee, which after a while annoys me 'cause i feel like i have to do the same but i can't, lol. Anyway, I have never been a fan of common RolePlay games in RL, therefore i kept my pixelled butt away from RP areas in SL and whenever anyone asked me to join, i explained i couldnt see myself acting like i am somebody else, 'cause i am too proud of who i am...and that's when they started to make fun of me..lol. Anyway i enjoy to always learn everything about anything and what i find a little weird is..RP communities aren't really open to people who want just to learn more out of curiosity, it's more like a "you're IN or OUT" thing and it's very easy to be ejected without a warning as soon as they realise you aren't "IN" at all. As an example, i am definitely against slavery in RL so it's kinda intriguing to know how a Dom/Sub-Master/Slave relationship can be enacted in a virtual world of the 21nd century, and where the entertainment lies in that(since sex doesn't appear to be the main point, lol). In the end I have been told "You just can't understand" when the only reason I was there was TO understand. Or worse, I get to face the most common question of all: " Why do you need a Second Life if you just want to be yourself in here?". Ah well, too tired to go undust my books of sociology, mate.

But now i have found a way to know more, as one of my dearest friends has joined a Gorean roleplay community a while ago. She accepted to show me how things work down there and here is what happened...:)
(i won't mention the name of the Sim and the Gorean community, and to be honest i don't even know if the guys there know i was about to blog them, so SHUSH!)

This is the place and as you can see, it is very well built and definitely a pleasant land to explore.
(this is also when i got told off for saying "hi all", as visitors arent allowed to speak if not in ((brackets))

Then, i decided to have a walk around the place, and this is what i found...fishes again, but this time they were dead and ready to be eaten.
(this is also when i got told off for speaking to a slave, as slaves aren't allowed to start a random conversation at anytime. Btw it wasnt my fault 'cause she IMed me first.)

The walk continued and I cammed around a bit. This is when i finally realised what a slave is supposed to do when you (the master) are meditating:

Then, I got all excited because... i was just about to witness a collaring! Thats me trying to hide behind the wall in my 21st century clothes, and my friend Yesi keeping an eye on me.
(this is when i got told off for taking pictures. Cameras didn't exist in the Land of Gor, plus mine must have been a really noisy one)

Here is the slave, being prepared for the collaring..and he was actually screaming and begging to be set free.(couldn't help it,had to jump in the middle of the scene with no fear of being decapitated)

And this is it, the slave is finally collared and part of the World of Gor. He will do his best to serve the community and to please his Master. YAY! (and, thanks to the faulty animation i didn't even have to Gimp the slave's intimate parts, lol)

In the end, it all really seemed very theatrical, with lots of pauses and the longest chat lines i 've ever seen in SL. But well, Gorean definitely is a must-do for whoever enjoys history and a bit of sadism added. Thanks a lot Yesi for allowing me in the land.

As for me, i don't want to be a slave. And I don't want to be a master.
Anything else involving peanut butter, I AM IN!!!!

Effectiveness of Google Analytics

2009-09-25T01:12:00.004+02:00

I definitely am a geography nerd. In fact, the only reason why i would really like to buy me a new and more powerful laptop is...to get the chance to run Second Life and Google Earth there in the background as well. (OK OK for all of you guys whose machines are already capable of something like that, congrats!)

No wonder why i am loving using Google Analytics to look at the world map and see where all the visitors of my blog come from. But hey, is Analytics really 100% reliable? I did some research and the answer is no. There 's a lot of easy ways to avoid being tracked on the web, and most of them are just one click away from you. Most recent web browsers have options for private navigation, denying access to any kind of cookie ever on the net. Mozilla Firefox in particular has a bunch of add-ons that really can assure you the most anonymous browsing experience ever, lol. The "Ghostery" application for Mozilla detects all possible trackers and even lets you choose which one to allow and which one not to allow. "Ghostery" really changes the way you look at things in here. I mean, you think you 're in your room alone and then you find out you 're not, as a bunch of fellows you would never go out for tea with is already tracking you for the oddest reasons ever.
Of course, major companies using Analytics have big numbers and anonymous users are just a small percentage in the overall stats. But here in the blogosphere...things can become tricky ;)

Anyway, have fun you all!!

MOONLIGHT University

2009-09-25T00:43:00.007+02:00

These guys are supposed to be my bosses/colleagues. Instead they are just some amazing guys who have welcomed me into their staff today...and i couldn't hope for better guys!!

Thanks a lot for the fun,

JOSH and MOON LORENA and MARCUS

...and me:)

Italian/English Lessons start next tuesday, IM Moonlight Hirvi for info.

See you inworld!

What I want?

2009-09-24T01:13:00.013+02:00

My inventory is a mess. I have 3,875 items there, but i usually use less than 20 of them. I think i have never ever created a folder by myself, and whenever i need something unusual, i don't even try scrolling down. I just try to remember what the thing is called and I allow myself 3 attempts to try and type the right name in search. Of course, when it comes to notecards and they are all named 'new note', search is useless and i can do nothing but open ALL of them one by one. How annoying. Except, tonight I managed to open the right one at the right moment:)

Banana: If we can't meet and i can't have you here, in my real life

Banana's Hubby: yes?

Banana: it doesn't mean i don't want you at all.

Banana's Hubby: so what should i do? Tell me.

Banana: I don't have all the answers.

Banana's Hubby: hey

Banana: I wish i did

Banana's Hubby: you have just said, it doesn't mean you don't want me at all..WHAT should i do then??

Banana: I think you need to listen to your heart.

Banana's Hubby: I am listening to my heart now, but i can't come there where you are in RL.

Banana: What does your heart want.

Banana: I mean, really, really, WANT.

Now, this girl really has to have some hypnotising power. Don't you think?

Genderless love

2009-09-24T00:35:00.003+02:00

Back in one of my previous posts, i have shown some pics of me trying different kinds of hair, and because of the weird combination of my skin/eye colour (or just because of my hard bald head) all the different versions of haired me were a little funny and worth a laugh. When commenting the absolutely un-natural blonde me, i wrote "and this is the hilarious and gay me.."

I have been told by friends that maybe referring to that look as "gay" could be slightly offensive to the gay community in SL...but it wasn't my intention to offend anyone.

So, now let's all read these few lines:

"Sweet, you are my life, my love and my everything. Looking into your eyes is magic and makes all the reasons we shouldn't be together fall away. When i am with you there is nothing else.
all my love,
T."

This is a notecard i was asked to translate into spanish long time ago, and it had been written by a man to a man.

God bless genderless love:)

Back to the old habits...

2009-09-24T00:00:00.004+02:00

As i said in my earlier posts (maybe the very first) one of the major reasons that pushed me into joining SL is language teaching. I have been teaching Italian (my native language) to english native speakers for a long period of time, joined language learning groups, private lessons and all. I even challenged myself in teaching Italian to Banana, so that you know how brave a man can be in life. She appreciated my intentions.

But now after a while being just a translator for Babel Translations in SL, i am back and behind a virtual desk again! I will be teaching Italian for native english speakers and English for italian native speakers at Moonlight University, starting next week.

Anyone interested please IM Moonlight Hirvi for further information:) See you there!

Who'd tell..

2009-09-22T21:39:00.010+02:00

I was trying to blog the other day and as i logged on SL i got one of those random TP's from a friend, you know one of those people you add by chance and then stay on your friends list for ages, even if you don't talk much to each other for months. Okay, in this particular case it wasn't months, it was...a year and a half!! :)
And this girl also happens to be the closest (in terms of RL distance) person i have ever met in SL, so i accepted the TP just to see what it feels like to write a few chat lines in local RL slang.
Of course random TP's have a reason, and the reason this time was the promotion of a new italian SIM dedicated to fashion and general entertainment.
Ah, fashion. Catwalks. Models. Cotton, wool and bikinis. High heels and pret a porter. Since Banana decided to become a designer in SL, i admit i have developed a growing interest in SL clothes. Most of all i admire now the skilled creators in SL as i am now aware of the hard work required to make such beautiful items shine in the numerous stores Banana has taken me to.
But still, i thought it would take a lot more than a random TP to make me attend a fashion show in SL. Like, half a dozen pills of Prozac or a six-pack of the best chinese beer ever imported in Sri Lanka. But Princess (my friend) welcomed me just so nicely that i decided to give it a try. Surprise surprise, it has been one of the funniest evenings in ages!! There was a speaker on voice who described the dresses as the models crowded the catwalk one after another, and i felt a little out of place, sitting in the middle of experienced designers who kept commenting as if they were the real D&G at an informal meeting with Donatella Versace.

Arrow indicates the bald head:)

the show was extremely pleasant and absolutely lagless, the models were skilled and experienced and even a fashion-noob like me enjoyed the sight of the cool dresses presented by designer MEB. The staff was friendly and warm and the speaker on voice contributed to the show in a significant and funny way. The name of the Sim is ESSENZA ITALIA and english speakers are welcome.

Oh, i 'll be waiting for the next show, Princess. No chinese beer needed!
(ciao!)

CONFESSIONS of a wannabe BLOGGER.

2009-09-22T12:43:00.006+02:00

Hi everybody. Blogging is fun.WHY??

because....

When you start blogging, you think you need to spend more time in SL and find more and more interesting things to blog about.

Then , while inworld you find your usual friends and they are all happy to chat to you for a while, and of course you can't deny none of them your appreciation.

But, you got some news to spread around and then you start cuttin&pastin the link to your blog to all of them, hoping they'd be proud of you.

Then you find a cool place and try to take a pic, but while you 're saving the snapshot those same friends are IMing you about places you should go give a check.

Then you realise your avatar was blinking and the snapshot isn't worth 10 Lindens but you have already paid for the upload.

People start sending you the links to THEIR blogs and you have to read them to meet their expectations, as they have met yours. Your IM hell becomes LINK hell.

Then you choose to blog later and talk to you friends instead, so that after they all log out, you will peacefully hit the 'Edit post' button.

When you click on the 'Edit post' button, it is probably...

TOO LATE, YOU HAVE 9 MOZILLA FIREFOX TABS OPEN, INCLUDING A PORN WEBSITE THAT CAME OUT OF NOWHERE, YOUR 2006 GRAPHICS CARD STARTS CALLING YOU NAMES, YOUR AVATAR IS STUCK FLYING IN A GREY SKY BUT THE MINIMAP SHOWS YOU RE NOT EVEN MOVING,AND THE ONLY SIGN TELLING THAT YOU HAVEN'T CRASHED YET IS....

a blue SL notice that reads like this

" You have paid 10L$ to upload"

OF course, you go to bed thinking that if you had kept using a Mac, none of this would have happened.

Peace.

Friends

2009-09-21T21:40:00.003+02:00

I guess it's time for a special post...
the wonders of SL have been able to keep me interested enough in the metaverse, but many times i have been tempted to give it up for some reasons. Now if i am still here it's because of the people i have met through the years, some true friends i cannot do without.
i have many friends inworld, some are just cool avatars i chat to from time to time, some are true souls that have touched my heart in many ways and have placed their special mark on my bald head long time ago.
Now that i am receiving their support and love in this new adventure of mine, i thought i owe them a few(!) lines and thank them for all what they do for me everyday.
Thank you Jenni, Bunni,Rae, Ro and Cope. Love you just as much as you love me! (so you 'd better keep it strong, lol)

quick check

2009-09-21T02:44:00.001+02:00

if you can read this, means i can blog from my mobile phone. ah, god bless nokia. ciao!

Anyone's looking for hair?

2009-09-21T00:18:00.007+02:00

Ok my avatar is bald. There is a reason for it, and i am not sure i want to share it. Let's say my first avatar couldnt find a way to get out of the noob look on day1, so he got a little nervous and ripped his hair off. Then the legend went on to the next avatar and here i am, bald head in SL..funny thing i noticed, whenever sharing some RL info with close friends and maybe even blessing them with my RL pic (lol), is that most of them think being bald in SL necessarily means you re bald in RL too..how funny is that? Makes me wonder, probably no matter how crazy your avatar looks (not my case), avatar are perceived as a possible anticipation of what you may look in RL.
Anyway, i decided to try some hair today, just for fun, and this what came out of it:
(i am not sharing the names of the stores i 've been too, because the end results are embarassing!!)

this is the 'Chandler from friends' look, lol

this is a tribute to Michael Jackson's wig

this is the newborn Elvis...

and this is the hilarious blonde and gay me..

Last one is the rastaman!!

It's clearly not my fault.
I was born to stay bald in SL.

SL mobile.

2009-09-20T11:20:00.003+02:00

One possible solution for the lack of body exercise while playing Second Life would be... a mobile SL viewer! Okay, okay i know for all of you SL addicts this would just worsen your addiction while allowing you a short walk in the park in the evening, just like those you used to have before downloading the SL client on your computers. Well, a little more than a year ago, this wasn't just a dream, it was a dream come true..have a look!(video is in spanish but..well no words needed really)

this was called 'Vollee SL client' for java, symbian mobile handsets and it worked in a very simple way. Vollee servers in California ran a normal SL viewer just for you, while sending the video streaming of your avatar's adventures right on your (expensive) mobile phone, via a high-speed 3G wireless connection. As you can see, the metaverse could fit a 3 inch screen in an acceptable way. The viewer only lacked the 'build' feature of normal SL, as for the rest....IM, local chat and TP's it all came easy to do just in the palm of your hand. Unfortunately, Vollee filed for bankruptcy after a few months, and despite Linden Labs were supporting the release of the mobile client, it all puffed away at some point and no further news/updates were made public since then. (and this all happened a few days before i bought myself a symbian mobile, lol)

Pretty impressive? Yes definitely. Also considering the system requirements needed to run the normal desktop version of SL, and the frustrating crashes/faults/lag experiences we all go thru every now and then.
I ll keep an eye on Vollee, or better on its former CEO who is now currently working for a new software house in that wonderful place called Silicon Valley.
Byess!

Funny but...scary.

2009-09-19T21:13:00.002+02:00

i remember quite a while ago a cool french video about RL people acting like SL avatars in everyday RL situations. It was real fun to watch them speak and type in real, fly around office rooms leaning on a wheelchair, and pointing at things they wanted to right-click and buy. But now there 's this video on youtube, and it is a kind of reverse enactment of the previous one. Think about it, guys, whenever SL-riding a bike or SL-deer hunting, this is all the range of movements you are allowed in RL. And it all happens inside that same square meter spot.

Profiles and fishes...

2009-09-19T19:42:00.007+02:00

Okay okay, talking about profiles, here is a bit of mine:
(note the inverted comas as i quote myself)

"Ah,dont ever take me scuba diving in SL.I did it once, and all i was supposed to do was to look at super fake roadsigns that were meant to be wild fishes in the indian ocean!"

I know it is quite rude to write smthing like that, but really the graphics capabilities of the numerous SL Viewers released in the years have never satisfied my expectations. I know we are talking about an ultra-nnovative online 3D environment, and that requires ultra-tera-giga-bytes capable servers to work, but hell, despite my best efforts in setting my laptop to the highest rendering option and drowning my avatar in huge lag, the best feeling i have got so far has been the one you 'd get living in a low budget japanese cartoon from the 80's.And i have tried better desktop PC's too, though my eyes were never amazed. Oh, now i remember. There was a place i used to go long ago, just to enjoy the sights, that place was Svarga,and had nothing to do with the rest of SL. Simply amazing light effects..but now it is gone.
I have read blogs and various websites on the topic, and many other agree. Linden Labs itself is well aware of the problem, since other virtual worlds are appearing on the market and all of them feature better graphics but less building/creating/interacting possibilities.

Anyway, i updated my profile long time ago, so thanks to my friend Bunni, this is the view i had today, and it is about fishes....

I have to say, since my last underwater experience, things have improved a lot. But still not enough. Maybe i 'll accept an invite to scuba dive now, just to see what it looks like now and maybe delete my lines on my profile..

Here is another example of close-to-reality textures for a tree. Or better, it is just the best tree i have seen so far:

Oh well, that bald head is ME:)

Byess to all:)

And this one...

2009-09-19T17:42:00.002+02:00

this happens to be one of the best profiles instead. It comes from a very very close friend of mine, have a look:

How you know you've met Mr Seducer Bot:
-He wants to go pose ball shopping on your first date
-He looks "longingly into your eyes, his lips touching yours, on the way to capturing your soul" while IMing a blonde or three dancing behind you
-When you IM asking what he's doing, his reply -- trying to get out of a tight spot

Remember, it's easier to throw the undesirables overboard before you get them in the boat.

well done my friend. Of course you were the blonde dancing behind him ;)
HUGZZ!

Day 2. SL profiles.

2009-09-19T13:47:00.013+02:00

Okay i made it past day 1, and here i am again :)
SL is a big place and there are endless possibilities to make what you want of it, but well it all starts from your chat lines. No matter what your interests are, you can't make your second dreams come true when you re not a good chatter nowadays. Same rules apply to RL, i know, but SL has something more...and these are profiles. Oh, how wonderful RL would be if only we could click on someone's shoulder (not mentioning TAGS) and see what they are like, the places they love the most and the experiences they have been through so far. Well, profiles are important. I know some guys who don't really care about them, and leave them blank, very alt like. I know guys who update them every day and they are never satisfied. I know guys who ask for professional help when writing/updating them because they think a good profile makes it easier to impress people around. As for me, i always used my profile to give basic information about me, my Second Life and a bit of my RL too. Of course i tried to add some funny comments in it, just to get some compliments around the grid and give people a reason more to IM me straight away.
But well, profiles can be tricky. Sometimes choosing for the simplest lines is never good enough, and when you think you have finally made it, there is no space left in the profile window to finish the last smart sentence that had just come to your mind. What then? Is there a way to bypass the problem, maybe with a lot less effort and a lot less waste of precious time? YES there is. QUOTES! What is a quote? A quote is a way to express yourself using someone else's words, and that is a contradiction in itself because if it wasn't you, it will never be you anyway. But hey what a relief...google 'oscar wilde', cut and paste and there you are looking smart and well educated in the metaverse.
Anyway, having been an Apple Machinstosh user for ages (no right click button), just switched to Microsoft the last two years, that 'open profile' section in the pie menu has given me much more enjoyment than the 'inspect' one.
Here are some examples:

(This is a list of the 10 funniest profiles i have opened, and i say funniest in the very general meaning of the word, please if you think your profile is listed below don't be offended, as i am just one in the crowd)

Number 10 :
Hello everyone, this is ME.

Number 9 :
Friendly guy, but please RL is RL, SL is SL. RL = Loading
(ok not funny at all but always worth a laugh)

Number 8 :
Feel free to IM me anytime, as i don't bite:)
(Ohhh ladies, guys want to be bitten)

Number 7 :
...why swell'st thou then ?One short sleep past, we wake eternally,..
(Quote from the very past)

Number 6 :
You never know what you do until you try
(thanks man, at least you tried first)

Number 5 :
Second Life is what happens while you 're busy making RL plans
(i don't think John Lennon would appreciate)

Number 4 :
Live your life, live your dreams!!
(someone find me a smart comment for this one)

Number 3 :
Life is short, Break the rules, Forgive quickly, Kiss slowly, Love truly, Laugh uncontrollably, And never regret anything that made you smile
(gawd this is the one i find truely annoying)

Number 2 :
you think you're sneaky don't you? Well, I have a little buzzer that goes off every time my profile is opened...so you're busted!
(/me got shivers)

Number 1 :
To avoid the usual chat, let me say this:
1. Hi back :)
2. Fine thanks and you?
3. I am 23.
4. Lebanon.
5. Nope.
6. Yes, four kids.
7. Maybe?

And the VERY VERY number 1 funniest profile is......

what can i say? the owner of this profile is a well respected, strong lady and she 'd be able to kick my ass in a flash if she only wanted. So if you 're ever reading this, please know that i have learnt how to talk to you...
(and kudos to me for uploading my very first pic on blogger)
Okay this is all for now, Byesss ALL!

YEAH! Baby woke up!

2009-09-18T22:42:00.005+02:00

Banana is awake and just had the news..she has to read my blog when she wakes up..call it karma, call it love..
Now, Banana and I aren't just an SL couple. We have never been that. Hmm now i know why SL-bloggers start to blog at an early stage, because it is easier to share the events as soon as they happen. New discoveries, new feelings. I have a whole 2 years and a half to share!And it is all my past, my present and my future too, so i 'd better find an easy way out now, lol. All i can say, Banana and I are each other's life. And ironically enough, we have just spent the best times of our RL lives, after meeting in RL 2 months ago. So where to begin? Second Life is a second life, and i am in the middle of making a First Life out of it. Okay, cool down Kiavik, cool down. You will find the way to explain things one at a time. But not now, your noob smell hasn't gone away yet :)

OH, i almost forgot....
even though fashion isn't really my fav thing in SL, this is a cool store to visit:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Nebula/222/240/23

It's Potassium!

Talking about first posts...

2009-09-18T21:04:00.003+02:00

eheh i am enjoying it...

Reading everyone's first posts is fun:) i wish SL noobs could share their first impressions about SL, the same way i can do it here on Blogger...who knows maybe it is a good idea *points at Mr Linden*
Btw i have just realised how anonymous i am being right now..i am just Banana's hubby right now, and my blog's name doesnt help much in revealing who i am in SL.
Well, Kiavik was me. It came natural (lol) to mention poor Kiavik Slade., he has been the first 'me' in SL. Short life he had, but a full one. He has been a noob, then a fool, then a tourist guide in the old Parioli Sim. God bless Parioli! It doesnt exist anymore, but it was worth a visit back then. Oh what a pleasure it was, in a crowd of italian avatars, to find those few brave foreigners wanting to expereince Italy in SL. And more, being one of the few italians capable of a few sentences in english, it just made me feel like a national hero to be able to walk people around and explain the sights there! Kiavik was a great guy. Incapable of escaping his noob looks, but great at spotting the right avatar at the right moment, he has lived it all.
This was long long time ago. Kiavik, i am proud of you, and that is why you are here now. Never forgotten, LOL.
(baby, wake up)

OH WELL....

2009-09-18T20:35:00.003+02:00

ah, funny. Just completed my first post and i wanted to have a look at my baby's first post...actually i 'd like to have a look at EVERYONE'S first posts now...and here's what she wrote:
"Ok. This is me.
I dont profess to be a fantastic writer, nor particularly knowledgable about fashion. But I, just like a ton of other SLrs, love to try new things, wear what I like, be who I wanna be, and enjoy hanging out in the metaverse.
I don't have a point to my blog (as yet.. maybe one day), and I'm prolly not going to be all that regular. But I promise, if I have something to share, I will share it.
That is, if anyone reads this. Otherwise, I'll just be talking to myself. Ahhhh... whats new.
One person i know that will read this is my hubby. Thats cause he luffs me."

So, as you can see, we are soulmates.
And as all good soulmates do, she has got to help me find a good layout for this blog, and she has to teach me how to change the settings and stuff, etc. She has been of help so far in SL, i know she will be of help here on Blogger. Plus, as soon as she wakes up, she sure will want to save her reputation...lol.
DANG i suck at I.T. !!!! Wake up wake up baby come help me :))
"

Hello everyone.

2009-09-18T18:18:00.001+02:00

Hi everyone, this is my blog. hmm well it is hard to call it a blog, it is just my very first line of the very first post, and i really don't know where this thing is going to take me.
I have been living a Second Life in the past two years and i have never paid attention to the SL blog community, then my partner started one and i realised once more how cool, smart she is. I know her pretty well (lol) but still, reading her blogposts makes me so proud of her and still wanting to discover more about her soul and personality. Hmm i have to say, her blogging seems like an endless flow of ideas, and i am blessed i can wake up everyday and have a look at what she 's just written. Erm, yes i wake up and she goes to bed, time zones that is..but God bless Second Life, for allowing two soulmates to meet. We live so far from each other in RL, and probably (well, definitely) we would never have met without those geniuses at Linden Labs..

This is weird..for some reason i consider myself a noob in sl, and for some reason i AM a noob in sl. But now i am twice a noob here..this blog thing scares me a little!
As a non native english speaker, i wondered which language could be the best for it. Then i realised i have never read a SL related blog in my native language, plus, the main reason (and only reader for now) for this blog is my partner, and i want her to understand what i say on here, so this is it. English. Good luck to me!

Now, what is the reason for a blog? Is it just a way to let the stress out of our bodies? Is it useful in some way? I have no special reason, really. Most SL blogs have a predominant recurrent topic, and that makes it easier to write them, to read them and to become blog addicts after a week. Given the random nature of my blog, I ll just let words flow out of my mind and let theme form the shape they want.

Now, my Second Life. What a ride! Having been an internet- skeptic most of my life,years ago i could never imagine myself leading a virtual life inside a 14 inches LCD computer screen. The magic of Real Life, is that it is just like a box of chocolates, and you never know what you are going to get. Judging by what i got, I can only be glad about that day i read about SL on a popular italian magazine..Internet noob, web-chat noob, and a little BIG interest in foreign languages..i threw myself into the GAME. Because it seemed like a game, it looked like a game. By the time i found out there weren't points to gain, goals to score and soldiers to shoot, instead of giving it up and have a laugh, i saw myself stuck in a chat with people from around the world and enjoying it more than any other thing a computer can do. Oh well, i was so confused at that time...but all of us wish we could turn the time back to our noob's days and get those weird feelings of the very 'first time', right?
Oops, talking about 'first times', this is my first time as a blogger...lol It feels nice, it feels good.
In short, my Second Life has been the one of a complete wanderer for the first 2 months, random chatting and random pranks grid wide. a few friends that never went through the phase of 'who the hell is this guy i am talking to' but still addictive friendships. Then, erm...women! Yeah when I thought i had known enough about them in RL, there came another challenge for me...and what a challenge. I admit, it was hard to adjust myself to the situation of having to seem a cool and smart guy, while not being even sure it was a girl (as in RL gender) i was talking to!! Damn it was hard. Fortunately enough, i have been able to sort things out with one particular avatar, and this particular avatar is the sole owner of my heart since then. For the rest, i have tried to be myself in the metaverse, really trying to mirror my real life (habits included, i only wish i could eat and smoke in SL as i do in RL). So i have been a language teacher, host at Frank's Place, a TV show host (not that i work as that in RL, but there is a lot of vanity somewhere in me) and now that i have reduced my SL time a lot i am a translator for the best translation service company in SL. It is a cool job, since it is what i most love doing, and since i get the chance to read about some of the new SL-creations quite in advance before they are released in the grid. Oh and it is quite remunerative too, lol. Of course, this is just a short description of 2 years and a half in SL, but more will come in the next posts.

HMM i guess it is too much writing for today.
I don't know who i have been writing to.
All i know is, this is for you, Banana, mio amore.