The World According to Jennyfur

I came back from lunch to find out that a friend of ours Maddie Blaustein (aka Kendra Bancroft in Second Life) passed away last week.  We met through Second Life a long time ago in a far off galaxy and met in the real world at the first Second Life Convention in 2005. Theres so much I could say about her. She was one of the most fearless kick ass people I have ever had the pleasure to meet. I’m not sure what happened. The only reports I’ve seen are that she passed away in her sleep after a brief illness. She was a voice actress for several anime series, most notably she was the voice of Meowth in Pokemon. She will be missed.

I’m quickly approaching the one year anniversary of my “hiatus” from Second Life and virtual worlds in general. I never really intended for it to go on so long. I thought that I’d be back in the swing of things after a few months. I guess I was more burnt out than I thought I was…. I was very angry and bitter at the time that I left in my usual path of scorched earth and prims. Its hard to even say why.  There were so many reasons  most of which are now irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. Second Life was a big part of my real and virtual life for many years with both extremely positive and extremely negative connotations. Needless to say, that while, I’ve turned the corner after being burnt out on Second Life, that I’m having a bit of trouble resuming any interest in SL or logging in with any frequency. A lot has changed in Second Life over the past year or so. I’m actually more interested in Open Sim these days than in Second Life proper given the myriad of Linden Lab’s asshattery.

It has come to my attention that some of my clothing designs or rather the texture used to create them, have been negatively affected by the release of Windlight. I am sure that I am not alone in sharing this bit of woe. All of my designs were created long before Windlight was even in beta or even public knowledge. Due to the lighting restrictions of the time, most designers had to painstaking add in our own shadows and highlights to bring the fabrics and designs to life. Now that Windlight has been released, it is affecting items with dramatic shading and highlighting.

I don’t think this affects every item I have made. At some point in time I will need to do some inspection to see what is affected and what is fine. Unfortunately, I cannot go back and edit most of these pre-existing items without having to redesign the affected items from scratch. I spent some time last night searching for my source files and especially Photoshop Documents etc. I seem to be missing files from my hard drive. One item was brought to my attention, so I searched my design files for it and the Targa file was missing as was the Photoshop Document. The only remnants of the item was the product design for the box. I’m hoping these files got misplaced somewhere and not accidentally deleted during one of my hard drive cleanses.

All Deadly Nightshade customer service concerns will be handled by FlipperPA Peregrine during my extended absence from Second Life. I apologize for not doing this sooner and for making light of the situation. Mea culpa!

Flipper will handle failed inventory transactions, refunds and other miscellaneous issues. Because he is not a fashion designer, no modifications will be made to existing items.

If you had a customer service issue previously ignored by yours truly please contact FlipperPA Peregrine and give a detail explanation of the problem and inventory items concerned. Since he is not familiar with my entire collection, please give specific item names i.e. (Deadly NIghtshade) Crimson Contact Lenses as opposed to Red contact lenses. This will make it much easier for him to ameliorate the situation.

Please note: all items in the Deadly Nightshade corset sets are sold separately. Yes, the corset is pictured on the three separate skirts available, but that is primarily because the pictures would have looked stupid without them. Also, the corsets were a reissue from an original design made in 2005.

All items should be Mod/Copy No Transfer. Not all are, especially if they are older. If this is a major concern for you please contact us.

We will not provide customer service for free items.

Please also realize that FlipperPA Peregrine doesn’t log in as much as he used to, but please be patient as it can take up to a week for issues to be resolved.

Thanks,

Jennyfur

Sometimes it pays to be snarky and mildly offending… at least I don’t have to change my blog title in light of “Fake World” makers Linden Lab’s new mandate reported by Tateru Nino of Massively regarding usuage of Second Life names and logos in conjunction with third party products and websites.

Flip/Tim and I have been entrepreneurs in Second Life for the better part of the past four years, in which the use of “Second Life”, “Linden”, “SL” etc. as part of a business name or url has been widely accepted and endorsed by Linden Lab. This is evident in the numerous Second Life related websites that have cropped up over this time.

I believe the process for naming the Second Life Community Convention and for using the SL name and logo within our own only involved an email expressing permission, a direction to download said logos from the website and eventually this was put into writing in mid-2007 as part of the formal contract between the convention and Linden Lab.

Beyond the SLCC, Flip/Tim has worked extensively on SLBoutique (now OnRez), SLTrivia and SLPTO. The later two I suppose fall into the trouble zone and will need some appropriate attention whether it is filing for use of the url or changing the name entirely. I know that we are not alone in our contempt for this new decision.

Granted some of the language is vague with no indication of how strict or lax the enforcement will be. The change seems sudden and on the heals of the recent announcement that Philip Rosedale will step down as Linden Lab’s CEO, one can easily wager to guess what may be next coming down the virtual pipelines.

For now, I view this action as a slap in the face to all of the enterprising individuals who helped to build Second Life into what it is today. Linden Lab developed the product and platform, but without the countless enterprising residents engaged in forging the vision for virtual worlds far and wide since late 2002… Second Life never have grown to its current size and popularity.

Read more about changes to trademarks and Linden Lab:

Second Life Corporate FAQ regarding Trademark Use

Second Life Brand Center

Linden Lab Asserts Control of Name and Image @ Massively.com

The metaverse is a buzz this afternoon as the news broke across Reuters that Linden Lab CEO Philip Rosedale is stepping down. Rosedale assume the role of Chairman of the Board, replacing Mitch Kapor. Kapor will still remain on the Linden Lab board.

The news has been reverberating across numerous Second Life related blogs and forums and twitter to name a few. Some regard the change with welcome arms citing many issues with Linden Lab’s management style in the face of a downturn of press and numerous issues with the grid. Others fear that this may be a red flag signally financial duress for Second Life makers Linden Lab. Some are speculating that perhaps, Linden Lab will soon be bought out by another company.

Every now and then I still get asked when I am taking a long term hiatus from Second Life? what I am doing? will I ever be back? why I left? and so on and so forth. The easy answer was that I just burnt out on Second Life and needed a break after having spent the majority of the past four years in the spot light for one reason or another. It is sad for me to admit, but co-founding and running the Second Life Community Convention from 2005-2007  is one of my biggest regrets. If I could turn back time, I would never have gotten involved with it. That is not to speak negatively of those who have been and still are involved with the convention. In a lot of ways the negatives vastly outweighed the positives of that experience. I’m not overly bitter about it, just reviewing it with my usual pragmatic criticism. If I can’t learn something from these experiences, they end up being kind of pointless.

One of the reasons I left Second Life last summer was that I realized that I was too deeply emotionally invested in all things Second Life. A lot of things effected me much more than they should have or than I ever wanted them too. Since July or August, I’ve gotten really into playing World of Warcraft and it has helped me in so many ways to detach emotionally from gaming and/or virtual environments. I enjoy playing World of Warcraft, but stay drama free on all fronts. I’m not emotionally invested in the people in my guilds or anyone else around me (well accept for the few RL friends of mine who also play WoW). Playing WoW is something that I enjoy doing, but it is not all encompassing the way Second Life was for so many years.

Now, I am starting to try and figure out how I can approach Second Life in the way that I have approached World of Warcraft. I do want to get back into Second Life again at some point in time. I just need enough time to let the past be buried and to not be emotionally attached to any aspect of it. I’ve considered retiring Jennyfur Peregrine or at least not using it as a primary account when I return. I’m not sure whether or not I want to get back into content creation or if I want to explore something new. I’ve considered doing something with the music scene in Second Life, well not the existent one, but bringing more bands into virtual worlds. as I continue my explorations of music and new media.

I’ve been keeping up with all that has been going on and am interested to see how web on a prim, mono integration and Havok 4 affect the Second Life client. I’ve also been keeping my eye on the Open Sim project and all that.

After having many of my objects effected by some price change bug when I moved my store from Indigo to Deadly Nightshade Design Studio in Olive, as I was repricing items I decided it was time for a sale. Most items have been marked down to the $100L to $250L range aside from some Collections, which are higher in price. I am still adjusting my prices at other locations so please bear with me. All items in vendors and on Onrez.com are correct in price.

I’ve updated the list of places in Second Life where you can purchase Deadly Nightshade clothing by Jennyfur Peregrine:

Deadly Nightshade Design Studio in Olive

Deadly Nightshade @ Transylvania

Deadly Nightshade @ Nomine

Deadly Nightshade @ Amsterdam

Deadly Nightshade @ Phobos Design in Chaos

Deadly Nightshade @ Promenade Mall

Deadly Nightshade @ No Mercy

Deady Nightshade @ Shop.Onrez.com