Summer in the Northern hemisphere began with a lot of activities for the home and garden enthusiast in Second Life. I place its beginning at the H&G Expo 2013, as the year’s biggest fair, and more properly with June’s Arcade, FaMESHed, Collabor88, The Garden, Summerfest 2013, The Challenge, and several lesser happenings. It continues now with July’s The Home Show, a new round of FaMESHed and, in about a week, Collabor88 again. I might be missing a few extra events I haven’t heard of (yet), nor counting more frequent ones like Lazy Sundays and Fifty Lindens Fridays, all of which also contribute with furniture and outdoor wares to the grid.
Why do we need so many events of this kind? I don’t know. To cause shopping “outbreaks” and help the economy? I’ve heard store owners claim they do more sells in their stores with regular releases than what they earn from event sales; and it may be true since I think most people flood SL fairs to hang out with friends, window shopping, or just because. But if it were entirely true, why it is that so many designers only release new products during events lately or participate in several of them at once, to the point of not being able to meet the event’s deadline or not showing up at all in the end?
Is it to stimulate content creators’ productivity? I once thought so, but I don’t think they need events to be productive, none at all. When you have the “gift”, anything can trigger your inspiration, there’s no need to rely on external intervention, so that’s a very silly explanation.
To pretend SL is an active virtual environment and impress outsiders? I doubt it. That would be LL’s responsibility, not the user base’s, who are the ones organizing these bazaars all year round. The Lab tried that route a long time ago, with significant success, but it didn’t last long. It worked well during the boom years, and then it stopped. Now they advertise in Facebook and Amazon, but I have no idea how much they have accomplished with those campaigns.
To have something to do inworld? Well, at least this one might be true. One of the reasons SL is not attractive as an online “game” is because people are used to or prefer to have everything set up for them. That’s the case of pre-programmed (closed) worlds such as online or video games, for example, that only require of the user to calculate their responses in a certain manner at a certain point, then rinse and repeat. In SL you have to create your environment, and that’s not very appealing for most people it seems. Maybe they prefer a faster or easier time sink. After spending several months in SL clubbing or trying adult furniture in stores, they get bored and leave. It is because the investment in SL is bigger and costly in terms of time, sometimes money, and mental effort, in no particular order.
There are also events that have their origins in SL drama, and in that sense their purpose is to appease a portion of the population’s wrath (usually somebody’s friends) regarding the happenings –including organization– of another similar event they no longer wish to support for blatant reasons or hidden agendas, it makes no difference, or to fulfil somebody’s wishes, or egos, or points of view, or whatever.
The thing is that from my point of view there are too many events in SL’s little geeky village, and so many new items to choose from (at least more than my meagre economy can handle) that I could fill up to ten beach parcels, if I were to do so, without repeating a single summertime decoration. And that at least is good. But unfortunately I was barely able to finish a single one because my typist has been ill all month and is still counting the days before full recovery, sighs. That’s the sad part of life, I guess: no matter how well you treat yourself in order to be healthy, something’s gonna get in the way. If you thought RL was the world of humans and their creations, you’re utterly wrong: it’s really the domain of germs and diseases. Or it’s your body misbehaving, doing something that it wasn’t programmed to do naturally. Or worse: it’s both, and then you’re fucked. Sighs.
So I’ve been away from blogging for said reasons, just when I had so many things I actually wanted to blog and say; sighs again. It’s kind of ironic, because I’m known to unpredictably go on hiatus at random intervals throughout the year, especially when I lack at least one of two things, or both: some needed inspiration or time to put myself to work. This particular occasion was totally untimely and –of course– unwelcome. I even missed Second Life’s 10th anniversary and my sixth rezzday, as a matter of fact. Not that I planned anything special to commemorate either of the two because I never do, but at least a blog post was on schedule, as I’ve done in the past. Now I feel like the chance to say the things I was going to say is gone, and it’s not because SL has changed: it has not. It is me who has grown up a little bit from this last experience, and now I see things a little bit differently.
For example: In another time I would have dedicated a lengthy blog post to tell you in detail how disappointed I was about a recent land deal gone bad from day one for a small beach parcel in an estate somewhere on the grid that doesn’t deserve the promotion it would freely get with the mere mention of its name in this post. Today, I simply would wish them good luck for nothing, would remind them how good a client they have forever lost, and move on. To the readers, I’d advice you to trust your landbaron(ess) if you’ve been happy with the customer service you have received during your stay there. If you’re welcomed and well treated, think twice before moving somewhere else. It would be better to keep alive a place you trust, rather than to put your hopes in unknown hands. Land in SL is too expensive as to throw your money in the pockets of someone that is not willing to reciprocate your cash and your good will with the attention you, as a customer, surely expect and rightly deserve.
If you need land, these are the estates I recommend:
They may not be perfect (none is I think), but from my experience I consider them to be reliable; they never promise more than they are willing to provide immediately, and will try their best to please any request.