I just want to gleefully highlight this post on Kotaku that talks about how Second Life founder Philip Rosedale has stepped down, or changed roles, or whatever. Kudos to Kotaku for putting up an accurate depiction of a typical scene in second life (flying penises everywhere) rather than the typical corporate view that most news outlets show, the bland corporately attractive female avatar in front of buildings that the BBC story that Kotaku links to shows.

Whomever is in charge of the PR for Second Life deserves some kind of medal, and should probably move on to bigger and better things for a lot more money. They've turned what is essentially a venue for cybersex and furries (is that redundant) into the media darling for online social spaces. Now I have nothing against venues for cybersex, in theory. But with an Reuters bureau set up permanently on location in second life, and various corporate setting up highly publicized shops in the game, it gives the media impression that there is something happening in the game that is exciting and wonderful. That businesses need to be a part of (and pay lots of money for the privilege for). And the news coverage focuses on the financial and artistic achievements that the players of this game are able to achieve.

This is all kudos to Second Life PR. Well done sir or madam. I applaud your prowess. It just kinda feels deceptive if you've been to Second Life, and find out that it's a place where giant anthropomorphic foxes try to have sex with you, or you can be attacked by flying penises at any moment. I keep waiting for the mainstream media to become disenchanted with it. But it hasn't happened.

I think that the people in Linden Labs think that they have a Times Square on their hands. It's going to be a seedy place, but they can make it a landmark, and get enough people by any means necessary and once they have a critical mass they'll stomp on in Giuliani style and get rid of all the porn and uncomfortable expression of the modern human psyche and make it safe for the Lion King.

I suspect it's a lot more like Burning Man. If the place is cleaned up of all the weird and off putting elements, then there wouldn't be much left. Second Life is founded upon letting the audience determine what kind of attractions exist within the space. This kind of radical democracy doesn't lead to Broadway shows. It leads to naked people serving grilled cheese on a dance floor in the middle of the desert. Certainly a place worthy of covering in the news, certainly a place of great art. Just not a place everyone is going to feel comfortable being.

Burning Man seems to know their niche. While they keep growing they don't seem to have tamed down the event to please their corporate masters, though they have made a number of concessions due the increasing size of the event. Some may disagree with me. But Burning Man isn't going mainstream, mainstream may just be catching up with it.

So maybe that is the endgame for Second Life. Hang on with the shell game until it socially acceptable for people to be attacked by giant, flying, pink penises. What a world.

Animal crossing comic.

Saddest gaming comic ever.

Social Standing

The Orange Box - For Kids

High Tech House Search

So I'm moving soon. Mostly because my son will soon be in kindergarten and when I bought my house way back when he wasn't even a glimmer in my eye. So I wasn't paying attention to school districts in the frenzy of house buying at the hight of the internet bubble at the turn of the century. But now I care a lot, and it's the over riding factor.

But in those scant eight years (good lord is it that long???) technology has really advanced. Currently I've got a Google map that I'm cross referencing locations of houses with the good schools. Now this could be made slightly easier if the good school site had a publicly available map overlay site. I was about to say the same thing about Craig's List, but as part of my due diligence I did a search, and duh... already been done.

This is why one has a blog, to find out stuff you should have already known. And then to be redirected with other useful tips. So enough blogging, I've got to set up my little control room. Now here's hoping that soon my custom map would show up on my iPhone. Because that would be the best.

Again after taking a few minutes to ACTUALLY TEST IT, rather than just complaining I find that it ... kinda works. I can see the maps in the web browser, just not in the application. Which is good enough to take it out in the field, just not incredibly awesome. Here's hoping that Google updates the native app soon.

Samurai Champloo

So Adult Swim is broadcasting the first episode of Samurai Champloo again tonight. I like the anime a lot, but mostly I like this as an opening episode. It's an amazing way to begin a campaign. The main characters wander into town already secure in their skills, they seek out danger and cause themselves trouble, the plot throws a little trouble their way to get the protagonists together, but mainly it's the characters driving the action, rather than the action driving them. There are some great fights against the town guards, scions, assorted flunkies, some of which will come back to haunt them in later episodes, and even a fight against the other protagonists. But by the end of the episode they are all thrown together on their MacGuffin of a quest that keeps the disparate personalities together.

This would be a great way to start interactive fiction. Make the players feel like a bad ass by showing them that they are capable of taking on the structures of society and the world, especially if those structures turn out to be corrupt and evil. They players also get to test out each other's abilities by engaging each other in combat.

This would be how I would start my next campaign. I also like it as a guideline for starting a computer game. Get the players into the action, let themselves get into trouble, and once things couldn't get any worse, let them do the most awesome things to extract themselves out of the situation and get going on the main storyline. Rule of cool is a good way to plot out interactive fiction.

Gary Gygax RIP