The timing is likely right for Linden Lab to change direction: reports recently indicate Second Life is shedding users, with passive viewing becoming the dominant interaction method. Gaming industry notable Rob Humble, who previously worked with EA on the Sims franchise, took the reins at Linden Lab as CEO in 2011, however, and now the company is putting out mobile products that look vastly… → Read More
Does anybody go to Second Life anymore? It seems like a ghost town these days, although every now and then you hear rumblings of a quiet comeback for the proto-virtual world. Well, at the very least Second Life will be getting a second life at the movies. A documentary called Life 2.0 will be screened at the Sundance Film Festival.
Life 2.0 was produced by PalmStar Entertainment (which is… → Read More
Analyst firm Next Up Research has published an extensive report on Linden Lab, the San Francisco company behind virtual world Second Life. The research is based on aggregate data and is available on SharesPost, a site set up to trade shares of privately held companies (if you register, you can download the report for free from that page, or you can find other valuation reports on companies like … → Read More
Ah, Taser. The Monster Cable of personal defense. Although the word “taser” has become so common as to be an improper noun like frisbee, kleenex, or google, the company still vociferously defends its trademark. I guess you can’t really blame them there, but suing Linden Labs because some Second Life player made a BDSM suit with a “built-in crotch taser”? How petty. → Read More
Jesus, Mary, Joseph! We fleetingly mentioned those Tax Day Tea Parties yesterday, but this is too much. That’s right: Tea Parties in Second Life, the game that, um, is still popular? (Not a lot of buzz about it these days, I mean to say.) Anyway, here’s a few photos of the in-game protest about in-real-life issues. Because that’s how minds are changed, in online video games. Or don’t you remember… → Read More
From the frivolous lawsuit department: The folks behind Worlds.com are looking to sue the likes of World of Warcraft and Second Life for infringing on one of their longstanding patents that covers “virtual worlds” or somesuch. While that may seem pretty ludicrous, keep in mind that a similar lawsuits, against City of Heroes’ NCSoft, was filed in a plaintiff-friendly district in Texas. Best… → Read More
I’m totally OK with never trying this out in real life but some folks called VR WARE have created a way to add head gestures in Second Life by hijacking your camera and watching your facial expressions and eye movements. They’ve gotten it to recognize nods so far but can a wry smirk or a shoulder shrug be far behind? Truly, we are living in an age of miracles. via TC France → Read More
http://blip.tv/scripts/flash/showplayer.swf?enablejs=true&file=http%3A//blip.tv/rss/flash/1139135&feedurl=http%3A//techcrunch.blip.tv/rss/&autostart=false&brandname=TechCrunch&brandlink=http%3A//techcrunch.blip.tv/ Recently, there’s been a growing wave of startups and products appearing that are bringing 3-D virtual worlds to the browser. These include Vivaty… → Read More
Sibley Verbeck is moving past Second Life. The CEO of the Electric Sheep Company has made a lot of money creating virtual islands in Second Life for big brands such as CBS, Showtime, and Intel. But now he is ready to bring those virtual worlds to the Web in regular browsers. Today, he is releasing WebFlock, a Flash-based 3-D virtual world application he is offering as a hosted software service. → Read More
Virtual worlds like Second Life have a silo issue—they are virtual worlds unto themselves. Today, Linden Lab (which operates Second Life) and IBM announced that they have successfully bridged two virtual worlds, with avatars from Second Life successfully “teleporting” to an entirely different metaverse based on an OpenSim server. The two companies have been working together on the… → Read More
Move over Second Life. The 3D Web is starting to make inroads into the plain old browser. By “plain,” I mean only Internet Explorer on Windows machines—which for now is what you need to experience Vivaty Scenes. But at least it’s a start. (Firefox support on PCs is coming in a few weeks, but Mac support is being pushed off further). Vivaty Scenes is launching today in public… → Read More
EA-Land, the service previously known as The Sims Online will shut August 1, despite a much hyped revamp announced late February. The Sims Online was generally regarded to be a failure for EA, with the company unable to turn the success of The Sims franchise into an online hit. The service wasn’t helped by a complete lack of customizable features (outside of the usual Sims customization… → Read More
HiPiHi, China’s answer to Second Life has opened its doors to the public with a beta test that includes free features. We first wrote about HiPiHi in August 2007 when the company called for the establishment of virtual world standards and interoperability. German’s are famed for their ability to clone sites, but the Chinese aren’t far behind; HiPiHi looks and feels like Second… → Read More
In a truly amazing feat of computer mastery, Joshua Linden of Linden Labs managed to get Second Life to run on an Apple II. OK, so it’s not exactly running on the Apple II, it’s actually streaming a Windows desktop, but it is a pretty accurate representation of what it would be like to run Second Life on an Apple II. → Read More
I have a friend who’s obsessed with Second Life. She doesn’t play it much, but she’s in love with the idea. And she’s in the market for a new cellphone. Perhaps I shouldn’t tell her about this new Second Life client Samsung is planning on making available for some of its handsets. Is it a good idea? We don’t know. Is it a good idea my easily obsessed friends… → Read More
A potential market for AI in Second Life? Researchers at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have created at 4-year-old boy, Eddie, within Second Life. Eddie runs around and “has beliefs,” according to researchers. As Eddie operates entirely on formal logic and well-defined theorems, reasoning is not automatically fast, Bringsjord said, explaining the need for clever engineering and… → Read More
EA is relaunching The Sims Online as a free service with a new name and new features, including UGC, commerce and land ownership. EA-Land is the new, free Sims Online (TSO). The 12 different cities from TSO are being moved to EA-Land and the game area is being expanded to be “100 times bigger than the previous size of any city.” Existing TSO users will be able to purchase land in… → Read More
Linden Lab has announced that virtual banking within Second Life is to be banned effective January 22 after receiving multiple complaints by Second Life residents scammed by bank operators. Banking and associated services have become popular in Second Life over the last two years, with many offering ponzi style interest schemes that usually sounded too good to be true. Ginko Financial was the best… → Read More
The Electric Sheep Company, regarded by many to be the leading Second Life development company, has parted company with one third of its workforce (22 people). The Electric Sheep Company is best known recently for its work in creating the CSI:NY build in Second Life. The company offers its own Second Life browser “OnRez”, and provides services to companies looking to establish a… → Read More
Eastern European nation Estonia has opened an official embassy in Second Life. Estonia for those not aware of the country is a former Soviet Republic that this year is celebrating 90th anniversary of its initial independence, before it was invaded and occupied by the Soviet Union in 1940. It’s bordered by Russia to its East and Latvia to the South, and became a member of the European Union… → Read More
I had the opportunity today to catch up with Chris Collins, the “Technical Assistant to the CEO” at Linden Lab, the makers of Second Life. A Commerce graduate from the University of Western Australia he started in tech, then like many locals (Vibe Capital, Mig33) headed off overseas. After working on his own startup 3 years ago in the Valley he fell in love with Second Life and landed… → Read More
Linden Lab released the WindLight First Look Second Life client Wednesday, the first serious release of Second Life that incorporates the technology Linden Lab acquired when it took over Windward Mark Interactive in May. We noted at the time of the acquisition that the technology would bring “better clouds and wind” to Second Life, but this was in retrospect an understatement. Having… → Read More
Linden Lab’s Second Life has seen its fair share of controversies in the past; an FBI investigation led to a shut down of inworld casinos, some media reports suggested that Second Life may be being used as a training area for terrorists, and in July there was suggestion that Bestiality may be driven out of the metaverse by a crackdown under a new TOS that banned “Broadly… → Read More
Second Life is bracing itself for an influx of new members this coming week with the long awaited episode of CSI:NY does Second Life to be shown in the United States on Wednesday. The episode will see Mac Taylor (Gary Sinise) entering Second Life to pursue a killer who has killed a Second Life user in a case of virtual stalking gone too far. CSI:NY fans will be encouraged to join Second Life and… → Read More
We’ve been rather harsh in our coverage of Second Life in the past, the sad truth being that this year Second Life has provided a range of tabloid fodder that we’ve seen fit to print. Of late our coverage has started to change. The initial rush of “build it and they’ll come” corporatism has given way to something with more useful substance. Companies including IBM… → Read More
Having spent a few hours “playing” Second Life (research, mind you), I definitely noticed a disconnect between the hype and what I actually experienced. To boil it down to two words—it sucked. Now there’s a real-life study from the Yankee Group backing up my complaints. In a nutshell… • The average SL user only logs on for 12 minutes per month • Growth has… → Read More
The second session of the Metanomics Conference was held in Second Life today (see our previous coverage here) and I had the pleasure of attending. Guest speaker for today’s session was Sandra Kearney, IBM’s head of 3D Development. Kearney spoke from Sage Hall, Cornell in front of live audience, with a live stream being delivered to both Second Life and IBM’s Active Worlds chat… → Read More
Ohio based BidSL launched Friday with a product that offers eBay style auctions in Second Life BidSL allows any Second Life resident to put an item up for auction by renting an available auction device. The user can choose the number of days that the auction will run, and set a minimum bid as well. Items offered can be both virtual items (Second Life goods) or real world items. The cost of running… → Read More
Yahoo! News really needs to get the facts straight. It’s currently saying that the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra will be playing the first professional concert in Second Life. Hmm, that’s funny. This Google search shows that Duran Duran and Suzanne Vega have already performed in-game. Seems like a bunch of crap, unless you don’t consider Duran Duran “professional… → Read More
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