Looking Ahead to 2015 in Second Life

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

Eleanor Roosevelt

  

Well, I’ve closed out 2014 in Second Life (SL) with my look back. 

It’s now time for me to look ahead into the New Year in SL and see what mischief I can get up to.  (Significant Other gently reminds me to keep all mischief out of Real Life (RL)!)

This is my one shot each year to think about what I want to accomplish inworld both in terms of work and the tone that I set in this blog.  (Believe it or not, there is always a plan.  Whether or not I stick to it is something else altogether.  Significant Other mumbles something about why can’t I just follow football like all the others.)

My intentions for this year are several.

First, I want to quit being an obituary for sims that are closing inworld.  Yes, I’ll still

mention them but I want to focus on the creativity and dynamism which is what SL is all about. 

Next, I want to step away from Linden Lab’s issues.  They’re not exactly listening to me.  Whatever is going to happen there will happen and I can’t prevent it.  I want to spend more time blogging about the worlds which comprise SL. 

Finally, I want to be more hopeful in my writing about SL in the New Year.  There is still so much I haven’t discovered and I want to bring as much of it back to my readers for as long as SL is around. 

Permit me to be more specific.

I’ll focus more on the inworld communities and the people who reside there.  Several readers have commented that they’d like to hear more about SL’s residents.  I’ll do my best here.  (Hey, if you don’t like it, tough!  These folks took the trouble to let me know what they’d like to see.  Send me your comments and I’ll do my best!)

I want to visit more new sims, meet new people, and have new experiences.  Then I want to want to write about all these and share them.  Several readers have admitted to living vicariously through my writings.  (This does add some pressure.)

There are a couple of series in my blog that I either began and haven’t returned to for a while or haven’t started at all.  I want to return to these.  Sex and the Single Avatar and Shoemaker’s Children are two examples.  There’s also a boat trip across the Grid with

several friends that I want to start and complete in 2015. 

I also have several outstanding stories that I need to complete as well as a SL user to be found somewhere in Antarctica. 

Overall, I want to be more hopeful, focus on the fun inworld, and avoid the Dark Side in SL.

From a technical perspective, I have several goals.

I plan to overhaul my blog’s form and function.  (I’m open to suggestions so please send them in.)

I’ll continue my experiments with social media as they seem to be bringing in new

friends and readers.

My use of pictures in the body of my story will continue as well as new ways to use them.  Once again, this was at the request of readers.

To wrap up my SL plans for 2015, I plan to have more fun and ignore the siren calls to the rocks of despair inworld.

Life’s too short!

So, to all, Happy New Year!

I hope to see many of you on the Grid in the New Year! 

As always, I’m grateful to all inworld for their kindness and time in stopping to talk with a stranger who was passing through their lives.         

My Twitter handle is @webspelunker.  Please feel free to follow me and I’d be happy to follow you.

I can be found on Google+ as webspelunker Ghostraven.

My flickr Photostream is located here.

On Skype I’m webspelunker Ghostraven.

I welcome feedback from readers, please either comment on my blog or e-mail me at webspelunker@gmail.com . 

          If you would like to read about my other adventures in Second Life please click here.

          Open roads and kind fires!

Whither Second Life Redux?

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

George Bernard Shaw

            A few months ago, I blogged about where Second Life (SL) and the challenges facing it.  My list included:

     
·    LL is not making investments in its technology and infrastructure to permit a scalable solution

·    New SL products don’t really cut it (I’ve been to Realms and am underwhelmed.  I haven’t been to Wilderness yet but first reports say I’m not missing much.)

·    RL technology is changing (e.g., iPhones and iPads) but SL is still trapped in desktops and laptops.  (Now, there’s a slogan for a mass movement, “Free SL!”) 

·    LL acquisitions are in businesses moving away from SL (i.e., Little TextPeople).

           

            As I wrap up this year, I want to talk about this a little more and its implications for the New Year. 

            Are we any better off in SL today than we were a year ago? Where are the new products for SL from Linden Lab (LL)?  OK, there’s mesh but that seems be causing some performance problems.  What prospects are there for new products?  The next Big Idea?  Or for that matter what’s LL’s strategic direction? 

            I know a little about strategic directions (OK, very little, but more than I do about working on my own makeover – that’ll be a future story.) What are SL’s business drivers?  What’re the baseline and the metrics to measure performance?  And I’m not talking about the sim rentals that LL churns out. 

            How about we move onto the three stables of any good business strategy, people, process, and technology? 

            Let’s start with people?  Anyone seen a Linden lately?  The ones that are around, how much would you like to bet most of them just do maintenance and not development?  (With sim rentals down, there may not be much cash left for that soon.)  Then there’s process.  Er, maybe someone could help me with this one.  I’m not familiar with any LL business processes for growing the business.  Finally, there’s our old friend, technology.  And I do mean old.  SL is running on an infrastructure that’s almost as old as Y2K.  (You remember Y2K, it came just after disco died.) Anyone heard of any new SL innovations lately?  Yes, there’s the already mentioned mesh but I’m not sure that fixes the root cause  problem.  (I’d love to hear from anyone with a contrarian opinion.) 

            So, I ask the question again, whither SL?  I’m still not sure.  But, next year, I’ll be starting a new series entitled Shoemakers’ Children in my blog.  I’m going to take indepth looks at some of the challenges facing SL today and see what solutions, if any, are out there.  I also plan to try and meet some Lindens either inworld or out and see if I can have a dialogue with them.  Let’s hear what they have to say. 

As always, I’m grateful to all for their kindness and time in stopping to talk with a stranger who was passing through their lives.

I welcome feedback from readers, please either comment on my blog or e-mail me at webspelunker@gmail.com . 

     If you would like to read about my other adventures in Second Life please click here.