The Ephemeral Frontier

Thanks for letting me know. I can wait till he doe...

2011-09-07T09:36:31.007-07:00

Thanks for letting me know. I can wait till he does.

hello Anonymous, Sorry, I just now saw this messa...

2011-07-09T22:33:14.141-07:00

hello Anonymous,

Sorry, I just now saw this message from you. I went and checked Lock's shop in the OOC area of Deadwood and he still does not have the seven-and-a-half inch barrel version up for sale yet. I imagine it will be in the 1500 linden range as that is what his short-barreled model SAA's sell for.

Dear Dio, I was wondering what would the price be ...

2011-07-02T21:40:57.540-07:00

Dear Dio,
I was wondering what would the price be for the Colt Single Action Army with 7.5 in. Barrel? Please let me know when you find out.

Hey Lalo, The thing is, even when playing to the ...

2011-07-02T07:48:12.760-07:00

Hey Lalo,

The thing is, even when playing to the tourons, you can mix a bit of real history in with the entertainment, and when it works everybody learns something and has some fun. I've done a fair bit of "living history" and even in the most authentic of places and situations, there are always limits to what you can achieve authenticity-wise. (none of us at the 19th century site I worked at for a while actually died in childbirth or contracted cholera, for example).

But I think Aldo is right--it's not about making product, it's about fostering a process. And every now and then, you have these shining, epiphinal moments. But they usually come when you least expect it.

Yes, I hope you'll stop by. I heartily recommend a visit to Arundel Designs, Arundelain Dumart's quirky little store with its collection of bargain priced outfits. You can get a very courtly looking outfit (under names such as "Richard" or "Laclos") for 50 lindens, and it includes hat, hair, shoes and everything else you need or one of her sea captain outfits (not as utterly complete but still almost all there, I think) for only 50L.

.

I spent a couple of my formative years next door t...

2011-07-02T05:46:46.981-07:00

I spent a couple of my formative years next door to a well-known attempt to reconstruct 18th Century Virginia. Of course, there is a huge difference between authentic role-play and running an attraction for tourists, but it gave me a taste for that historical period. I am sorely tempted to seek out appropriate costume, and then visit Melioria.

Hey Rhia, Oh I think accuracy is a good goal, jus...

2011-07-01T09:22:50.442-07:00

Hey Rhia,

Oh I think accuracy is a good goal, just as long as you accept that what we are doing is based on what can be considered to be more or less historically plausible, rather than always shooting for what would have been historically typical (though a bit of the typical is fun as well).

And after all, it is about fun and learning, so a big part of what makes this cool is to go beyond level of the standard wikipedia piece and look for information that facilitates and supports interesting situations and scenarios and character development. And sometimes, it involves simply making up a really good story to explain something.

In fact, I think this sort of situation can actually facilitate rp interaction: you might have a scenario in which some english guy comes into the coffee house, sees some broads in there, gets all surprised as "we don't allow ladies in London coffee houses, blahblahblah" and then a big discussion with much Italian-style gesticulating ensues.

I think the infusion of accuracy and as much historical reality as possible adds new options--one of the ironies of a place like the original Alsium was that many of the folks going to play there were refugees from Gorean sims, who found the lockstep adherence to a fictional canon in those places much more restrictive than our efforts to base rp scenarios on actual ancient Roman history.

And as I said, in the case of the coffee houses, with a bit of research we found that there were plenty of examples of Italian coffee houses admitting women in the 18th century (I even put a picture on the wall that is a copy of an original 18th century painting of of a Venetian coffee house packed full o' dames). And in fact, it is turning out that 18th century Italy was a remarkable place in terms of women actively participating in academia, governance, literature and so on...

I usually find when someone says, "well, they never would have done this that or blahblahblah," it's usually because they have their own agenda that they want to support, based on their own need to control things or to reinforce their own personal prejudices (see "Gor" for examples).

Good luck with the sim - juggling all those moving...

2011-07-01T06:07:47.077-07:00

Good luck with the sim - juggling all those moving parts (to completely screw up a metaphor) can't be easy.

Complaining about the lack of historical accuracy in, say, having women in coffee shops, always strikes me as being a little obsessive about accuracy. It's tough enough to get people together for RP; having to go through other hoops to create interaction between the players, merely for the sake of accuracy, seems foolish.

Hi Miz D, thank you for stopping by to visit! I ...

2011-05-16T12:07:44.491-07:00

Hi Miz D,
thank you for stopping by to visit! I really enjoyed doing the talk at aether salon, and hell, I might even write something about the experience particularly if Sere starts badgering me to do so).

And thank you for the rez day wishes.

Hey Rhia, Thank you for the rez day wishes (belat...

2011-05-16T12:04:28.568-07:00

Hey Rhia,

Thank you for the rez day wishes (belated is cool with me--hell, more often than not, I completely forget about it too, until I happen to look at my profile sometime in July and go "shit, missed it again").

Anyhow, I understand the desire to lie down and "let the feeling pass." Sometimes "doing nothing" is the best answer to many situations. On the other hand, sometime if you feel the urge you might try finding someone to pair up with and work on a project together--sometimes pooling talents and ideas can be very productive. Like when Clay and I built a blacksmith's forge. It was mostly my ideas and his talents, but the process was fun, and the result was better than other options that were out there for sale.

Don't give up too readily, you may surprise yourself.

Thank you Sere, Yes, the builder who began the Al...

2011-05-16T11:58:51.325-07:00

Thank you Sere,

Yes, the builder who began the Alsium project made a great start to it, but then rl issues got in the way of subsequent phases. That said, the community was able to use what he and his team had started as foundation for some pretty cool collaborative work. And I think ultimately the strongest projects in Sl are the collaborative ones. Projects born of a "single vision" can be impressive and wondrous, but they often lack a certain depth and richness that usually requires a team effort to achieve.

It's like learning in SL--we tend to do better at it in a team environment because we encourage, inspire and motivate each other. I think building works the same way.

Hey Lalo--yeah, actually it's longer than 6 ye...

2011-05-16T11:47:44.307-07:00

Hey Lalo--yeah, actually it's longer than 6 years, as the Diogenes avatar started out as an alt. She ultimately replaced my main, which was created in 2004, but has long since been deleted.

Goddamn, times flies when you're having fun, doesn't it?

And yes, I am captivated by that sheer joy of getting a sense of accomplishment through building--and it's a sense that is based on doing something that does require some skill or at least some practice. There is a learning curve but it's not insurmountable., Learning to make decent crap in SL is kind of like getting through basic training. The people who designed it made it so that Basic is hard--and you feel like you have accomplished something when you get through it--but it's not so challenging that most people don't make it. I think the system that enables to be making junk in SL is very much like that.

The other thing I like is getting feedback...the responses we get to our creations can be rewarding and/or instructive.

I find the "rewarding" bits easier to swallow, but that doesn't mean I don't treasure the instructive ones as well.

Hi Fogwoman, Thank you for the rez-day wishes. A...

2011-05-16T11:32:06.766-07:00

Hi Fogwoman,

Thank you for the rez-day wishes. And yes, we probably should sacrifice some virgin prims to the flighty, feckless, gods on whom we rely. So what kind of things do you your gentleman like to create?

Dio

Happy rez day. I greatly enjoyed your presentatio...

2011-05-16T05:48:58.999-07:00

Happy rez day. I greatly enjoyed your presentation at Aether Salon.

Many happy returns (and builds.)

Happy (belated) rez day! I occasionally regret my...

2011-05-15T19:29:12.218-07:00

Happy (belated) rez day!

I occasionally regret my nearly complete inability to build. Then I lie down and the feeling passes. But I admire those who can do it, and I agree that it's one of the things that makes SL special.

Happy rez day, Dio! What splendid serendipity it ...

2011-05-15T09:07:08.094-07:00

Happy rez day, Dio! What splendid serendipity it is that the lapse of the original Alsium builder gave you the opportunity to bring your historical research to life through a build that all of us can enjoy. That's what SL should be about.

You've expressed exactly the joy of accomplish...

2011-05-15T05:47:22.929-07:00

You've expressed exactly the joy of accomplishment I gain from building... whether a reproduction of something from the physical world, or pure fancy.

And, happy rez day! I had no idea you'd amassed six years' experience on the Grid -- congratulations!

Great minds, I guess :) Husband and I were just di...

2011-05-15T02:42:02.677-07:00

Great minds, I guess :)
Husband and I were just discussing this very subject earlier, the joy for non-artists like us to log into SL and to be able to create amazing things. Just wishing that the creations were not so fragile and dependent upon seemingly capricious gods.
Happy rez day! Six years is a long time, glad you are still finding your bliss on this grid.

I am rather fond of The Age of Reason. Sad to say ...

2011-04-04T10:13:00.156-07:00

I am rather fond of The Age of Reason. Sad to say that to get it, we must escape into a virtual world.

Ah, well, as Jean Jacques Rousseau noted, "The world of reality has its limits; the world of imagination is boundless."

Have fun among the philosophes.

Hey HB, I'm glad you enjoy the metaphorical a...

2011-04-04T08:52:39.859-07:00

Hey HB,

I'm glad you enjoy the metaphorical and literary rambles. Some people probably sneer and say "why can't you commit to one thing and stick with it?" Well, I have been known to do that, but I guess I just suffer from some odd condition where I get the proverbial "itchy foot" after a spell, at the same time that I sincerely believe that you can't really write about life in these places unless you live there for a while.

And yes, it is an intriguing build in it's multi-layered beauty. You go up and down steps, hills, and ramps; you turn odd corners and go through alleys and find yourself wondering, "how do I get from here to there?" or "how did I get from there to here?"

I think you're going to see something similar when the new Alsium build is done.

Ooo, I love your 'new direction' posts and...

2011-04-04T02:14:16.916-07:00

Ooo, I love your 'new direction' posts and I'm looking forward to reading about not only your adventures, but also your musings on life & RP in this new (old) world :)

p.s. lovely photo, the second one - just lovely.

p.p.s. The first photo shows something we simply do not see enough of in SL - houses and buildings on different levels and at different angles

This: http://www.flickr.com/photos/26118380@N04/3767466254/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/bazilick/4372841550/

Compared to this: http://images.greenoptimistic.com/2010/10/toyota-smart-grid-project.jpg

Hey Iggy, I'm not entirely sure that money an...

2011-04-03T12:36:31.306-07:00

Hey Iggy,

I'm not entirely sure that money and deadlines are the determining factors, as there are plenty of casual blogistas who are as far off the mark as the paid hacks.

As my friends in the military history biz used to say "Any idiot can get a book published...and most of them do."

The same concept can be applied to blogging. Is being wrong a liability? I haven't seen any evidence to that effect.

Money and deadlines change everything bloggish, Di...

2011-04-01T05:01:34.101-07:00

Money and deadlines change everything bloggish, Dio.

You and I write for neither of those, so, in my case, when I'm being a dumbass, it's easy for me to eat the crow I get served.

When one makes a living or part of it as a "pundit," being misinformed or just plain old wrong is a career liability.

Hi Rhia, Yeah you're right, I misread who had...

2011-03-22T13:42:02.368-07:00

Hi Rhia,

Yeah you're right, I misread who had commented about butterflies and I have fixed that with the proper salutation on my reply.

That said, I appreciate your long and thoughtful response, and you make a really good point:

"It's always a mixed bag when bloggers - hell, anyone with a column - go out of their areas of expertise. Sometimes you get an interesting perspective; if the columnist knows a lot about subject X and applies that to subject Y, the result might be something that hadn't occurred to many readers."

I think that is a very important idea: that someone commenting from a different perspective can provide useful new ways of seeing things. It can also fall into the category that "every now and then, even a blind squirrel finds a nut."

But it can also just as easily end up being arrogant and insidious cocktwaddle (see "Glenn Beck").

As for the individual we are actually discussing here, that is the one point on which I am gonna have to respectfully disagree with you on.

I don't think SL was a core competency in this case--it was simply something which he focused on (for pay), and having the imprimatur of the Lab on his work gave it a veneer of percevied expertise. But the platform has really evovled in astonsihing ways since the days when he may (or may not) have been actively exploring and interacting directly with the user base.

He talked a lot with labsters, but hell, most of THEM had no real understanding of the actual user base or how our uses of the platoform were evolving, or if they did, they were embarrassed by it. The results of "your world, your imagination" baffled and perhaps even frightened them.

As for the "expert," you would have to be completely and woefully ignorant to make the kind of pronouncement that he did. Look at how learning, arts, content creation, and the development of shared narrative has evolved on the platform; look at things like the wildly popular new money-making social activities centered on breedables that have has sprung up from grass-roots sources; look at how different people select--or make--different tool sets to carry out the things that they want to do with the platform...not what the Lab thinks they should be doing with the platform.

It's not the user base that is afraid to change, it's the labsters and the pundits like the Hamster who are refusing to admit that that the user baser are bright, creative people with the will and the motivation to use the platform to accomplish things that the lab staff and the so called experts never conceived of.

You know, it's nice that the Lindens and the "experts" had plans or thought they knew what direction this all would take. But part of the deal with an experiment (and SL first and foremost has been and remains an experiment) is that you have to accept the fact that things most likely won't turn out the way you expect--then you have to try to understand what's going on and adapt to it. As my green machine friends say, "no plan survives intact following initial contact with the enemy."

Frankly the blogger in question does not seem to have made a real effort to keep up with what was really going on in the wilds of SL. He wasn't doing his homework.

Just calling yourself an expert doesn't make you one.

Hey Crap. Oh roadapples. You're not ignorant...

2011-03-22T13:11:17.700-07:00

Hey Crap.

Oh roadapples. You're not ignorant, you just have a unique niche that you choose to meander around in. Nothin' wrong with that. Bottom line that makes it work is that you don't pretend to know any more than what you do, and you go ahead and have fun with that.

Like grandma always said, "take what you do seriously, but yourself? meh, not so much...".

Hey HB, yeah, real subtle, I know...especially wh...

2011-03-22T13:04:16.109-07:00

Hey HB,

yeah, real subtle, I know...especially when I mentioned him by name in one of my comment responses. But hey, when you go into vaudeville, some nights they love ya, and some nights they're gonna throw tomatoes.