M is for Myg

Report from the Fight for Topgol.

Some things make SL suck. You know what they are, right? Let’s talk about how the place looks to newcomers on the mainland:

A Vision of Hell, originally uploaded by Khamudy Mannonen.

I’ve been writing about what Second Life is good for. I’ve been doing that because I really believe in Second Life as a platform for people, digital or otherwise, to get shit done. I was compelled to write that series because there are actually quite a few problems in Second Life that make it suck, and as is the mainstream media’s way, these are the issues that get the bulk of the attention. While I sincerely hate to do more calling attention to Second Life’s quirks and, er “growth opportunities,” in the name of helping things improve for all of us for the long term, I gotta.

Today we’re talking about land developers.

Alex and I own a nice chunk of a mainland sim called Topgol, which happens to be the home of -=CLOCKWORK=- Go on and visit – we’ve worked really hard on it. So have Sable, Romana and Martin. We’ve created a nice, grungy urban theme. It’s not like mainland sims you often see – like the one pictured above. It’s got a look, a feel, a community.

So when our new blingin’ neighbors came in and put up a shitty ad cube in the middle of town, we didn’t like it. I posted about it here. In addition to the ugly ass ad cube, there’s also the matter of their club and mall being extremely ugly. Their property, in the middle of the sim, seriously degrades the overall look of Topgol – but you know what? I didn’t even complain about that because there were buildings and streets and I thought, well, I’ve seen worse.

In any case, my neighbors were offended by the post. I think they felt, oh I don’t know, a little threatened. They took down the cube, put up huge walls, and then banned me and Alex from their land. Martin Squeegee, another land developer who actually works to preserve the theme, approached them to get them to take the walls down. After like, sheesh, two hours of talking to them they took down all of the walls except the one bordering our property, which they designed to look like this:

(That’s me with my irate neighbors as they are scripting the wall to move and induce seizures I guess…)

Now, I had put a wall up too. I figured if I was banned from their land, no way did they get a road into Mainline. But I textured my wall with brick so it’d look like Romana’s loft – you know, not hideous and antagonistic. When they went INSANE and started building 50m high walls everywhere, I took it down.

They told me if I didn’t take down my post, they wouldn’t take down the wall. They felt that since they took down the ad cube, I should take down my post. I explained, oh no no no. That’s not how it works. If they work with the community, I’d be happy to post something about that and it would portray them more positively. But if they continued to act like giant babies, well, I’d likely be writing about that instead.

Today I went in and the wall was down, and an apartment building was up. And over it, a nice huge fat spinning ad cube. So here’s the rub.

In the rare instances when strangers gather around a common purpose like building a sim within a theme, that’s something worth respecting and preserving. It is an ideal of community and cooperation that shows the world what’s possible when human beings respect one another and work together.

Technically my neighbors can build anything they want. As they said, “This is mainland. If you want community you have to go to a private sim.”

But I think we’ve proven that you can have community on a Mainland sim. Hell, even the casino looked like it belonged, and you know how pissed off I was with the lag. But they bought in Topgol because they loved what we’d done and they didn’t destroy the look of it.

As Richard Palace, the land owner here (my neighbors are tenants) suggested I do in his comment on said post, I contacted him. His solution was for me to take down my post.

I figured the best way to respond was this.

Dear Richard Palace and all mainland land developers:

When you allow ugly shit to populate the mainland, you lower the quality of Second Life for all of us. Your income is intimately linked to how well Second Life attracts and retains new people. One of the most common criticisms of Second Life is the poor quality of how it looks. You are largely to blame for this.

If you keep developing mainland into digital ghettos, you will continue to be at odds with the greater good of Second Life and its residents. And if you come do it in Topgol where there is an established community, I will take the piss out of you every chance I get. It’s all I can do in the fight for a Second Life that isn’t pathetic and abused for the gain of a few thoughtless individuals.

I’m not for a lot of regulating. I wouldn’t advocate Linden Lab set covenants, etc. I just ask people not to be dumb asses. I know with a particular type of money grubber, that’s too much to ask. But then expect verbal beatings. Repeatedly.

And one last thing. Linden’s latest policy on ad farms should put these types on alert. It doesn’t apply to my neighbors, but it does imply that they are not real happy about those big spinning ad cubes fucking up the scenery. THAT’S BECAUSE AD CUBES SUCK – AND SO DO THE LOSERS WHO USE THEM.

And that’s round three, folks. Stay tuned…

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 16th, 2008 at 12:25 am and is filed under Fight for Topgol, Second Life, Things that make SL suck.