Drax Files radio show episode 4

Episode 4 of the Drax Files Radio Show with Jo Yardley is online.

We’re talking about Rod Humble leaving and talking to lots of people about their opinion on the current situation.

But of course we talk about other news stories;

You can listen to this episode by clicking here.

Enjoy and let us know what you think.

Another Oculus Rift user visits 1920s Berlin

Emily Kenney visited 1920s Berlin with her Oculus Rift and was kind enough to write me a report about her experiences.

If you have visited 1920s Berlin or the Oculus Rift Test area and want to write about it for my blog, let me know.

It would be much appreciated.

My name is Emily Kennedy. I started in second life in Feb. 2005, but I’ve taken frequent breaks from SL in that time. I had been away from SL for about a year and a half when I found out that the Ctrl Alt Studio Viewer had experimental Oculus Rift support.  This made me incredibly excited to go back to Second Life to try it.

 

For people who aren’t familiar with the oculus rift, it’s a virtual reality headset that’s still in development. The company has sold development kits to the public so developers can create games and applications for it.  It’s not a finished product, but it’s more than enough to show how much of a breakthrough this technology is in creating a virtual reality experience affordable to the general public.  The development kit has lower resolution than a computer monitor, and doesn’t have positional tracking, only rotational tracking, but these are issues that should be fixed when the consumer versional is eventually released.  

 

When I first heard about the Oculus Rift, I wanted to understand what it was like to actually use one. I went online, and tried to learn everything there was about it.  I watched as many youtube videos as I could, but sadly, most of the people who had one said “You have to try it to understand it.”  After I got my own rift, I found that all those hours of watching videos and reading articles really didn’t convey what it was like.  I tried to come up with a way to give a sense of what was different. If you imagine a pc monitor is a window, and you were able to reach into the monitor and pull out a game character, they might be about the size of a Barbie Doll. And the buildings and structures are the size of doll houses that would fit on your kitchen table.  They have to be smaller than real life, so you can see as much as possible on the limited screen area.  With the rift, everything is suddenly life sized.  If you’re next to a 30 foot tall building, you have to look up to see the top, just as you would in real life, and it towers over you. That sense of scale is something I never experienced with a monitor.

 

Another difference is the head tracking.  Imagine that you’re inside a small 4 walled building with just one window the size of a computer monitor, and you’re seated about 2 feet from it.  That window is all you know of world around you.  That’s what regular gaming is like.  Now imagine that all 4 walls and roof suddently vanish, and now you can see everything all around you, even what’s behind you by turning your head. That’s what it’s like to use the oculus rift.  You’re no longer trying to make sense of the world thorough a tiny window, but now you’re actually in the world.   When you get close as you can to a virtual wall using a monitor, your character might be right in front of it, but your real life body is still as far away from it as the monitor is. When wearing the rift, I got as close as I could to a wall, and it really felt like it was 5 inches away from my face, and covered my entire view. 

 

One of the most striking differences is the 3D effect.  The oculus rift gives each eye a slightly different view, and the brain uses those differences to calculate differences in 3D space. I’ve gone to 3D movies, and back in the 90’s I bought shutter glasses that connected to the PC that gave you a sense of 3D, but both of these methods made the screen dimmer.  The rift has the best 3D effect I’ve seen, without a loss of brightness.

 

All of these work together to give an incredible sense of immersion. 

 

Because the Ctrl Alt Studio Viewer can’t show all of the User Interface in oculus rift mode, I had to make sure my avatar was all set before I put on the Rift.  Like most SL avatars, I was much taller than the average real life person.  I was probably close to 7 feet tall.  One of the features of the 1920’s Berlin sim created by Jo Yardley is that everything sized to a real life scale.  I’m sure it took a lot of effort to do this, but it’s is one of the things that helps to create a great virtual reality experience. Before going to the 1920’s Berlin Sim test area, I adjusted my height and became 5’7″ plus a few inches from my heels. Now I was ready for the Rift!  I teleported to the sim, and found myself in another era. I saw a sign saying “Freebies” and some freebie boxes for period appropriate clothes and a few miscellaneous items. I was wearing a bright red modern dress that felt out of place, so I put on one of the free 1920’s dresses, and felt ready to explore.  I turned on the rift mode in the viewer, and then put on my rift.  Now I was looking at the world through my avatar’s eyes.  When I turned my head, my avatar turned her head in the exact same way. When I looked up at the ceiling in my apartment, I didn’t see my ceiling, but instead I saw the starry night sky above my avatar’s head.  When I looked down, I saw my avatar’s body wearing the 1920’s dress. From this point on, I’ll stop refering to my avatar, because the feeling of immersion was so great, it really felt like I was IN the virtual world, and not watching a picture of it on my monitor.

 

As I was walking along, I noticed a poster on the wall, but it wasn’t just a texture of a poster flat on the wall, but instead it was a poster that had thickness, and even more, the upper left corner looked like it had come loose, and had folded over part of the rest of the poster, causing some wrinkles. I had to move back and forth, looking closely. The thickness and attention to detail was something I probably would have missed normally, but now I was able to appricate it in a new way.   As I walked on, I saw an area that had snow. I had to stop, and felt my mouth open. It looked amazing, because the snow was falling in 3D.  Some looked like they were right in front of my face, others looked like they were further away, but they all felt like they were really there.  I then walked into a bar, and had the feeling of the doorway being a few inches above my head. I walked around trying to take in all the detail.  I saw a house of cards on one of the tables, and sat at the chair in front of it. I had a closer view of the cards, and it was marvelous seeing them in 3D right in front of me. Maybe in a few years, people might be able to put on haptic gloves, and be able to not only build virtual houses of cards by moving their real life hands, but maybe build anything they wanted to in second life.  I left the bar and hopped on the train that would take me from the berlin test area into the full 1920s Berlin Sim.

 

After I arrived in Berlin, I left the train station. I glanced up, and saw a large zepplin high in the sky. It was hard to tell how big it might be.  I then wandered into a blue telephone booth.  I really felt like I was in the enclosed space, but I didn’t feel uncomfortable, because I was able to see through all the glass panels.  I then wandered along the street and passed a few avatars that were roleplaying as inhabitants of the city, performing their job. I won’t say who I saw, so as to not spoil anything. If you come across any of them, be sure to read their profile, to read about their character. 

 

As I strolled along, I saw not too far in the distance, a huge zepplin hovering maybe 30 feet above a landing field.  I was in awe. The sense of scale was very strong at this distance. As I got closer, I could tell that the dirgible was perhaps the length of a football field. I had to turn my head from side to side to see it from end to end.  As I walked underneath it, it seemed as though each of the propellers was longer than my body was tall.  I was able to take a seat in the passenger compartment, and hoped that I would be able to take a ride around the city, but it didn’t appear to be the case.  I left the zepplin, and walked near a gyrocopter, with one of the vertical blades passing just a few inches above my head. I almost felt like ducking in real life to avoid it. That’s how real it seemed.  I went inside a clothing shop and ended up on the roof, where a hedge perhaps 3 feet tall ringed most of the rooftop.  The texture showed the leaves of a hedge, but the edges of the edge were flat, so unfortunately it had the appearance of a painting on a flat surface. This is another thing I would not have noticed without the Rift.   I stood at an area that didn’t have a hedge, and looked down.  It really felt as though I was standing on a ledge, with the street far below me. I  decided to jump, and felt a few butterflies in my stomach as I fell.  my dress flapped around me as I fell, and it added to the immersion.  Luckily, like Neo in the Matrix, I survided my fall off the building, and continued my stroll.  I saw some snowmen outside a theater and studied them for quite a while, trying to see how close I could get, marveling at how realistic the carrots for their noses looked. They really felt like if I got too close, they might poke me in the face.  

 

I spent more time exploring, but I think what I’ve written so far really gives a sense of what it’s like to explore an area with the rift.  I’m very glad that Berlin was made to a consistent real life scale, to really give the sense of immersion in a realistic space. I’m very excited about the future of virtual reality, and really excited about the future of Second Life, which I haven’t been for a while.  I hope that Linden Lab decides to embrace virtual reality, and makes adjustments in SL to make it the best possible experience. 

After her experience Emily wrote a handy blog guide with tips and advice for those who want to try the Oculus Rift in Second Life;

http://virtualemily.wordpress.com/2014/01/28/using-the-oculus-rift-in-second-life/

Rod has left the building

The leaving of Rod Humble as CEO of Linden Lab and commander in chief of our Second Life world, has caused quite a bit of surprise and excitement.

When Rod announced it to me a few days ago in a facebook message I was rather shocked and surprised, I didn’t see that coming.

Let me just make it clear that Rod and I are not close friends and that I am not really  a special privileged position.
We are Facebook friends but that is about it, we did not chat regularly and only met inworld once when he visited 1920s Berlin for the Drax files episode.
I was just bold and brazen enough to now and then bother him, asking him for a scoop for my blog, and to my surprise he didn’t mind and didn’t immediately mute me.
I guess I was just lucky asking him if he had any news for my blog just when he was about to tell everyone he was quitting LL.

Anyway, after I heard the news I wrote my blog post and soon It spread across the (virtual) world.

We don’t know why he left, I just asked him a few moments ago and he isn’t ready to talk about the subject in detail yet, so it will be probably another few weeks before we know more.

But now we are without CEO and where do we go next?

Lots of people are talking about what Rod managed to do during his time as CEO, where he succeeded or failed.
Opinions can be found on both extreme sides of the spectrum.
Some think Rod was the best thing since sliced bread, others feel he didn’t do a thing.

In the end it of course depends on your personal perspective, on the things that you find important.
For instance as a builder I’ve experienced huge improvements in the last 3 years, bigger prims, mesh, texture layers, speeding up rezzing of avatars, etc, etc.
To me personally, those things meant a lot and I felt that during Rod’s time more changed in SL than in the years before.
I am not in the position to be able to say if Rod was personally responsible for some of these improvements, but he was in charge and thus responsible.

Of course other things got worse or were not fixed at all.
The ToS debacle is still fresh in our minds and it took way too long for us to get fitted mesh clothes.

Anyway, now Rod is gone we have to start thinking about his replacement, even though we will have nothing to say about who our new “virtual king” will become.
Which is a bit of a shame, after all, we are a world of people and the next CEO will be in charge of our world.
We need elections!

One thing the farewell of Rod has shown is that Linden Lab still has a big problem communicating with its population.
Although I am of course happy that I got a ‘scoop’, this really should have been something we should have found out via a proper LL press announcement.
So that is one the next CEO really should sort out.
We know that it is not a good idea to try and communicate with all SL users at once, that a CEO that everyone can tweet or send a message is just asking for trouble.
But like many I feel that LL just isn’t very chatty.
Changes happen, like Rod stepping down, without us hearing about it.
If Rod had not told me and if his Facebook account had been set to private and if he had not also befriended a couple of other SL users, this news may still have been unknown!

Linden Lab needs someone who talks to us all, a lot.
A direct representative to the CEO or the CEO him/herself.
We want to know what is going on at LL, what are you working on, how far is the Oculus Rift project coming along, what happened when marketplace crashed, tell us about some sim the CEO visited and really liked, show us a new SL video we can share with our RL friends and, oh I don’t know, perhaps let us know WHEN THE CEO RESIGNS!?!

We should not be hearing something that important via someone who just happened to get a message on Facebook.

There are lots of things I could say about who should be the next CEO but I feel that the most important thing is that the new CEO understands Second Life.

I feel that a lot of previous CEO’s but also staff members at Linden Lab and even many of its users still don’t quite get Second Life or don’t see its full potential.
At the moment Second Life feels like a black and white TV with only one channel, the broadcasts are great and there is plenty to see… but nobody seems to realise yet that there are more channels… and that if you push the right button… we can even have broadcasts in colour!

The new CEO should spend a LOT of time in Second Life, travel all over the place, meet lots of people and see where things go wrong and where they go right.

Don’t just try it on your nice fast Linden Lab computer either, use a slightly older model as well and perhaps a slower connection.
Feel our frustrations!

But above all, understand what SL is and why it is surviving.
Because really, it shouldn’t have.
It is 10 years old, the graphics are behind on what we’re used to in regular games, there still is lots of lag, it has a terrible reputation and it hasn’t gotten any real publicity since the anniversary.
Its users find it too expensive, too laggy and pretty much every user can see 987231 things that need improving.
Yet most of us stay and love our Second Life’s.
Why is that?
The CEO NEEDS to figure that out.

Besides becoming a regular SL user who doesn’t just explore a bit but who rents a home, decorates it, goes to clubs, etc, the CEO should also get in touch with some of SL’s hardcore users.
Those people who own successful stores, own lots of land, manage role playing sims, are landlords, create amazing machinima, are brilliant builders, etc, etc.

But also add a noob, someone who joined just a week ago and who somehow has not ran away screaming yet.

Use them as consultants, let them tell and show you what needs to improve, what is important and what is so great about Second Life.
Let them make you fall in love with it, let them make you realise it is not just another game, let them make you enthusiastic so you can truly defend and promote it during your interviews.

I don’t care what you personally want to change in SL, or where your priorities are, I just want you to get it, to understand SL and us, its users.

We are not just people who play a game you’ll be in charge of, we are people who live in a world you are in charge of.
Treat us as citizens, not gamers.

Sponsoring a monument to victims of Nazism

In RL history plays an important part of my life, it is my job and I am very close to several people who lived trough the Second World War.

I am very happy that history and especially the war is also very important to many of the people involved in the 1920s Berlin Project, the sim I started almost 5 years ago.

It isn’t much of a surprise though as of course we are reminded of the dark years that followed the Weimar republic on almost a daily basis here in Second Life’s 1920s Berlin.

There is no escaping the political tension and the dark clouds on the horizon, even in this virtual world.

I am very proud that thanks to the people of this project and the many random visitors of 1920s Berlin, we collected enough money to sponsor a ‘Stolperstein’ monument, these are little monuments, the size of a cobblestone, to individual victims of Nazism.

You can find these stones in the pavements all over Europe.

We have put another donation meter at the entrance of our sim (click for slurl) and hope to collect enough money this year to sponsor 2 of these stones.

More about this on the 1920s Berlin blog here; http://1920sberlinproject.wordpress.com/2014/01/27/supporting-a-monument-to-victims-of-nazism/

This is the stone we supported last year, you can see it on the Rykestrasse 54 in RL Berlin.

Rod Humble leaves Linden Lab

In a personal message to me via facebook send a few minutes ago, Rod Humble told me that he has left Linden Lab as CEO last week.

The IM I received

He then announced it to friends, family and coworkers on his personal facebook page.

“Its been a great 3 years! All my thanks to my colleagues at Linden Lab and our wonderful customers I wish you the very best for the future and continued success! I am starting-up a company to make Art, Entertainment and unusual things! More on that in a few weeks!”

After 3 years of running Linden Lab and bringing a lot of improvements to Second Life he resigned and is going to start up his own company that will make art, entertainment and all sorts of wonderful stuff.

It is not yet clear who will replace him but I wish him lots of success with his new project.

This news comes as a bit of a surprise and shock and there is no official announcement yet.

Although Rod’s name has now officially been removed from the Linden Lab leadership page;

http://lindenlab.com/about

Linden Lab management and board, now without Rod’s name.

Rod and me chatting

Amazing video about past, present and future of Virtual Reality

It has been announced and discussed in the Drax Files Radio Hour with Jo Yardley and I am happy to say that this video is now online.

I hope you all go and watch it and share it with everyone you know, people who are not into VR or Second Life but also those who are, especially if they are Linden Lab employees, or if they work for Oculus Rift, Leap Motion, Virtuix Omni or any other kind of company involved in this type of business.
Many of these people need a little reminder regarding the full potential of Second Life, yes that includes some Linden Lab employees.
But the video will also remind them of how far we’ve come.

We have an amazing virtual world here and although many think we’re part of the past, I reckon we’ve only just begun.

This excellent video was made by Loki Eliot who is a well known creator in Second Life.

It shows us the past, present and future of Virtual Reality.

A lovely walk down memory lane that will make you get all excited (again) about what VR is all about and where it is going at the moment.

But as I said, it is also just an excellent documentary about VR in general.

More about the creator and his video here on Loki Eliot’s blog.

Draxtor presents Loki Eliot’s “The LOST Virtual World”
A collection of videos telling the story of a virtual world, how a community embraced it and the media forgot about it.
Behold: a mash-up of interviews and documentary clips from the last 20 years about the phenomenon of virtual reality, its trials, tribulations and media mis-interpretations, all feeding social and political agendas of various stripes, juxtaposed with excerpts of a popular fictional TV show about passengers stranded on a mysterious island [no NOT Giligan’s!] – 30+ minutes, edited by 3D artist Loki Eliot.
A wonderful look at all sides of the debate about reality, the future of the human race and how to proceed, sandwiched between wide-eyed cyber utopianism and dire warnings of the end of reality as we know it.
With its inclusion of recent interviews with Oculus Rift inventor Palmer Luckey and early idealistic statements by Second Life founder Philip Rosedale this clip-show gives a great overview of the current debate and may even enthuse some of VR’s disillusioned early adopters…
Clips used include statements by
Robin Harper
David Fleck
Rick Kim
Philip Rosedale
Palmer Luckey
Steve Ballmer
Andrew Keen
Louis CK
Rod Humble
Fran Seranade
and
various elected US congress persons
Clips from ABC’s “LOST” copyright ABC Television, used under fair use guidelines.

Drax Files Radio Show with Jo Yardley, episode 3: Esteban Winsmore invades!

The third episode of our podcast ‘The Drax Files Radio Show with Jo Yardley’ is NOW online!

It has lots of interesting subjects and also an interview with infamous griever Esteban Winsmore!

You can enjoy the show here;

http://draxfiles.com/2014/01/24/show3_esteban/

We also show a really great documentary made by Loki Eliot, more about that in my other blogpost that you can read by clicking here.

Drax files Radio show with Jo Yardley episode 2

Second episode of the VR and SL podcast ‘Drax files Radio show with Jo Yardley’ now online;
http://draxfiles.com/2014/01/17/show-2-the-legacy-of-osprey-therian/

New Second Life, virtual reality and metaverse podcast

First episode of new Second Life, virtual reality and metaverse podcast; The Drax Files radio hour [with Jo Yardley], is now online!

http://draxfiles.com/2014/01/10/show-1-oculus-nsa-fitted-mesh/

The Drax Files Radio Hour with Jo Yardley going live tomorrow!

Today we recorded the first episode of ‘The Drax Files Radio Hour with Jo Yardley’.

Draxtor Despres and I discussed some of the current news stories regarding Second Life and virtual reality in general, listen to a few items and interviews and generally chat about what’s going on in our online world.

We recorded the episode from a tiny attic in 1920s Berlin and had a good time.

Although we are very enthusiastic about our Second Lives, it won’t be an hour of us telling everyone how great SL is.

We will be critical as well and of course our guests won’t hide their opinions either.

But there is no denying that we are both excited about the potential virtual reality has.

Most importantly, we are “extreme users” of SL, Drax makes his machinima, I run a busy role playing community.

We both spend a lot of time inworld and have done so for a couple of years.

This will be a weekly show and we’re always looking for new guests.

So please let us know if you’re interested in chatting to us or if you think someone you know might be an interesting guest.

We’re looking for musicians, people who have only just started their Second Life, people who have been in SL since the dawn of time, movers, shakers, creators, etc.

The first episode will go live January 10th, 7am SLT.

There will be several ways to listen to it, you’ll find out more on the official Drax Files Radio Hour website;

http://draxfiles.com/

And our facebook page;

https://www.facebook.com/draxfilesradiohour

I hope you enjoy the show, let me know what you think!