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Great news! I know that Mr. Masala has been a huge supporter of my creative endeavors, and I am excited about what sounds like a very exciting project. (Also nice to see elf representation on the board!)
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I am not even a land renter, but I have experimented with Val's system and it is great. I am an idiot elf and even I can use it!
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I hit "like" on your comment because I like your call for common sense, but I also have some issues with it. As usual when we get into a "We must protect the babies!" topic, common sense goes right out the window and Opensimword is not immune to that. Instead you end up with the extreme... a small minority of people going on some hypocritical "woke" campaign against child avitars in general, or entire regions targeted for vague and often unsubstantiated claims. Only recently i was at Lliba and was asked to leave or change my appearance because I looked "too young". My avi AND me are 5'6 and I had on an athena petite body and an outfit very similar to the image above. Long sleeves, long pants. Not even any pink clothing. I thought it was crazy, but I agreed to leave. So the idea the idea that we "are aware prior to making the visit" of what to expect is not exactly true when there are a lot of (often hypocritical) agendas at play. Maybe the OP is being a Karen or seeking attention, but to me THAT kind of situation is a problem.
Personally, I would like to throw out a challenge to everyone. Let's see if we can all go ONE WEEK without a single post regarding child avatars or the dreaded "ageplay" topic. I am betting hard money it can't be done. There are simply too many agendas at play.
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Personally, I would like to throw out a challenge to everyone. Let's see if we can all go ONE WEEK without a single post regarding child avatars or the dreaded "ageplay" topic. I am betting hard money it can't be done. There are simply too many agendas at play.
Though I can understand frustration if you no matter what the issues is was not able to gain the access or was denied access somewhere for any reason. However, I have not seen sodasullivan avatar, at this time or that i recal, nor know anything of any sort about you or your avatar nor do I have anything to do with the land you speak of. I think you went ,off in left field somewhere with your comments. Again, we all know what is what. Why are you still going on the subject? In order for that to work you would have to stop replying, not sure you can do that. Can you? Also, stop trying to milk people for money Sodasullivan.
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"Only recently i was at Lliba and was asked to leave or change my appearance because I looked "too young". My avi AND me are 5'6 and I had on an athena petite body and an outfit very similar to the image above. Long sleeves, long pants. Not even any pink clothing. I thought it was crazy, but I agreed to leave."
This. This so very much.
Many people claim that the only thing that could flag an avatar underage is an automated childgate configured to a minimum of 180cm or 6'. They claim that avatars would never be considered underage just by their looks. Until someone writes that exactly this has happened to their own avatar.
Even then, some either don't believe it, or they think their avatar, while not fully conforming to OpenSim standards, is safe. Until it surprisingly, unexpectedly happens to their very own avatar.
Those who still keep denying it, and I guess they're still the vast majority here, have female avatars that fully conform to the "professional San Fernando Valley porn star meets Kardashian family member, and the whole Hypergrid is Malibu or Ibiza in summer always and everywhere" standard. I guess they're staring at the above image in disbelief that it's even possible to build such an avatar, much less that someone has actually done it and, worse yet, sticks with it as a daily driver.
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This. This so very much.
Many people claim that the only thing that could flag an avatar underage is an automated childgate configured to a minimum of 180cm or 6'. They claim that avatars would never be considered underage just by their looks. Until someone writes that exactly this has happened to their own avatar.
Even then, some either don't believe it, or they think their avatar, while not fully conforming to OpenSim standards, is safe. Until it surprisingly, unexpectedly happens to their very own avatar.
Those who still keep denying it, and I guess they're still the vast majority here, have female avatars that fully conform to the "professional San Fernando Valley porn star meets Kardashian family member, and the whole Hypergrid is Malibu or Ibiza in summer always and everywhere" standard. I guess they're staring at the above image in disbelief that it's even possible to build such an avatar, much less that someone has actually done it and, worse yet, sticks with it as a daily driver.
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I think I might have been the one discussing PBR in Second Life. I think it is important to be clear about what we are talking about when we mention PBR. Physically Based Rendering (PBR) is not some new high-definition addition. It has been around since about 2013. It is largely "under the hood" and is likely present in either a graphic intense setting in Final Fantasy, or in a very minimalist setting in Minecraft. One of my favorite online games is "Kentucky Route Zero" which is a very minimalist 2D game that no one would ever mistake for being realistic. (Here is a screenshot: https://gyazo.com/eaf2d74e6281cb6e102d3bfd3271b721). Kentucky Route Zero uses PBR.
PBR is largely working "under the hood" and is simply telling light where it should go and how it should look. It allows you to do more with less. So instead of a Legacy Body with 6 billion triangles and vertices setting your GPU on fire, you can getas good a result or better with less and just some good texturing. Both SL and OS already offer specular mapping for textures. PBR is just the Peanut Butter to specular mapping's Jelly. It will not matter if you have a single prim block, or a detailed mesh house. Both will look better with a PBR engine rendering them.
I agree with you that the arguments that graphics in SL/OS are "poor" is not accurate. In fact, both offer some of the best graphics of any virtual world. It is the process of getting to that look that is an issue. It is much harder and much more taxing on your GPU than it needs to be.
PBR is not going to decide whether something is ultra realistic or not, it is just a standard process that delivers a better result to whatever you yourself choose to do with it.
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PBR is largely working "under the hood" and is simply telling light where it should go and how it should look. It allows you to do more with less. So instead of a Legacy Body with 6 billion triangles and vertices setting your GPU on fire, you can getas good a result or better with less and just some good texturing. Both SL and OS already offer specular mapping for textures. PBR is just the Peanut Butter to specular mapping's Jelly. It will not matter if you have a single prim block, or a detailed mesh house. Both will look better with a PBR engine rendering them.
I agree with you that the arguments that graphics in SL/OS are "poor" is not accurate. In fact, both offer some of the best graphics of any virtual world. It is the process of getting to that look that is an issue. It is much harder and much more taxing on your GPU than it needs to be.
PBR is not going to decide whether something is ultra realistic or not, it is just a standard process that delivers a better result to whatever you yourself choose to do with it.
Thank you for your explanation. I did read how Vulkan would allow much more for less in terms of hardware resources compared to OpenGL which has been seen as lacking for quite some time now. But your easy-to-understand explanation of what PBR is and does is most welcome.
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Indeed you are right, the issue is mainly of a software nature (rather than hardware), the "system" (so to speak) that we adopt in Opensim-based simulators, in Second Life, and in viewers more generally, to achieve good quality makes even very powerful computers "suffer".
Without going into excessive technical details, just consider that in Sansar, it offers (with VSync) 60 FPS even on dated computers with all graphics options set to maximum, including reflections (mirrors with real-time reflections and many other graphic beauties).
It's precisely the system as it's designed and implemented in these metaverses (and in video games), which manages to offer the maximum for the visual experience without overly burdening computer hardware.
This is because they preload the entire scenario which is then processed in a sort of "box", so they preload the map and even if you have to move to an adjacent simulator, the transition doesn't have the cross-sim and you still have to wait for the loading of the new map. Even the cache is managed differently.
Simply to notice the immense qualitative difference (also in physics), just enter Sansar where even not very recent computers with graphics set to maximum can manage the entire scenario and dynamics within it without lag or loading problems of textures or cloud avatars.
Try it out for yourselves.
The concept of the Metaverse is now focused on user experiences of this kind, Decentraland, The Sandbox, Minecraft, Sansar, and others are all decidedly more efficient and less "heavy" for computers.
SL/OS are much more complex starting from the viewers, and therefore much heavier, for this reason PBR, Mirrors, and much more will make many computers struggle.
Honestly, PBR is not of interest to me, much less functional mirrors in OS or SL, I actually think they are useless, they provide a very nice visual experience yes, but if SL doesn't change the way it manages this through the viewer just like Sansar and the others do, even recent computers will always struggle.
That's my opinion.
In particular, what impressed me positively about Sansar is the real-time reflection on a whiteboard in an Egyptian museum, and the fact that both a very performant computer and one from 10 years ago with a 5-year-old video card returned the exact same experience.
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Without going into excessive technical details, just consider that in Sansar, it offers (with VSync) 60 FPS even on dated computers with all graphics options set to maximum, including reflections (mirrors with real-time reflections and many other graphic beauties).
It's precisely the system as it's designed and implemented in these metaverses (and in video games), which manages to offer the maximum for the visual experience without overly burdening computer hardware.
This is because they preload the entire scenario which is then processed in a sort of "box", so they preload the map and even if you have to move to an adjacent simulator, the transition doesn't have the cross-sim and you still have to wait for the loading of the new map. Even the cache is managed differently.
Simply to notice the immense qualitative difference (also in physics), just enter Sansar where even not very recent computers with graphics set to maximum can manage the entire scenario and dynamics within it without lag or loading problems of textures or cloud avatars.
Try it out for yourselves.
The concept of the Metaverse is now focused on user experiences of this kind, Decentraland, The Sandbox, Minecraft, Sansar, and others are all decidedly more efficient and less "heavy" for computers.
SL/OS are much more complex starting from the viewers, and therefore much heavier, for this reason PBR, Mirrors, and much more will make many computers struggle.
Honestly, PBR is not of interest to me, much less functional mirrors in OS or SL, I actually think they are useless, they provide a very nice visual experience yes, but if SL doesn't change the way it manages this through the viewer just like Sansar and the others do, even recent computers will always struggle.
That's my opinion.
In particular, what impressed me positively about Sansar is the real-time reflection on a whiteboard in an Egyptian museum, and the fact that both a very performant computer and one from 10 years ago with a 5-year-old video card returned the exact same experience.
Yep, my 1050 loaded laptop works great in Sansar for sure. I also have an account in VRChat (PC only), and sine.space. All three of them work really well, thanks to everything being well optimized. I can run on low to mid settings on them and they all run smoothly... but because of that I typically run on high settings in those places, unless I'm in a crowded area.
But these places also suffer from slowdowns when they're crowded. People have reported that VRchat slows down with heavy crowds, and that's with users running in newer PC setups. I think it's slightly better with Sansar as far as handling crowds, I've been in some crowded spaces with my modest PC there and it hardly slows down for me. Of course I have to turn down graphics and switch off shadows... just like SL and OS.
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But these places also suffer from slowdowns when they're crowded. People have reported that VRchat slows down with heavy crowds, and that's with users running in newer PC setups. I think it's slightly better with Sansar as far as handling crowds, I've been in some crowded spaces with my modest PC there and it hardly slows down for me. Of course I have to turn down graphics and switch off shadows... just like SL and OS.
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*googles "duo pegging" and swallows my gum.
That is a LOT of animations I will likely never use, but the chaise looks SO great I have already found a home for it in the Park.
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That is a LOT of animations I will likely never use, but the chaise looks SO great I have already found a home for it in the Park.
Mhmmmm +400 animations, and we end up using the same 4 :P
To be honest though, if we only cared about that, I would have only 5, since animation engines tend to be sort of similar within brand from furniture to furniture (they maybe add a couple more, or re-position them). Buuuuuuutt :D
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To be honest though, if we only cared about that, I would have only 5, since animation engines tend to be sort of similar within brand from furniture to furniture (they maybe add a couple more, or re-position them). Buuuuuuutt :D
I just sort of meant.... well... I do good to manage to round up a twosome.. much less a threesome. But truly, it must be so time-consuming work. I admire your patience and attention to detail.
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I think this is the proper way to address this issue Safine. You are setting the rules YOU are comfortable with on YOUR region. I am fine having my region open to everyone as long as they agree to follow the rules. That is what works for me. I totally support your doing what works for you! That is as it should be. No campaigning or trickery against other regions. No crusading, just taking care of home. Just good common sense. I think this is the best way to deal with an issue that is not black and white as some try to make it.
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"No campaigning or trickery against other regions. " See..that's the problem right there. The organized harassment. This is the 2nd or 3rd time I've seen it on OSW since it opened ..and by 3 different groups, too! Mind you, that's only the campaigns them I'm aware of. It is *organized harassment* and not child avatars that makes opensim/the hypergrid toxic to such a degree that that I actively *discourage* people from coming out here (in stark contrast to 2015 and before when I was a opensim evangelist/apologist).
If there was a technical change that prevented child avatars from rendering, the dysfunctional jagoffs out here would find another reason and another method to harass people and regions they don't like. Maybe they'd fall back to sockpuppets and IM harassment (popular in 2018,2019), maybe they'd do something else.
My point being: it isn't child avatars that are the problem, it's the community and it's appetite for harassment. It is that the OSW/opensim community is so completely hostile/toxic and it has such a high tolerance for harassment -combined with an unwillingness to address harassment effectively.
From where I stand, kid avatars are simply the red flag de jour; but any issue would work. This community loves them some pitchforks and torches!
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If there was a technical change that prevented child avatars from rendering, the dysfunctional jagoffs out here would find another reason and another method to harass people and regions they don't like. Maybe they'd fall back to sockpuppets and IM harassment (popular in 2018,2019), maybe they'd do something else.
My point being: it isn't child avatars that are the problem, it's the community and it's appetite for harassment. It is that the OSW/opensim community is so completely hostile/toxic and it has such a high tolerance for harassment -combined with an unwillingness to address harassment effectively.
From where I stand, kid avatars are simply the red flag de jour; but any issue would work. This community loves them some pitchforks and torches!
good morning my friend, I am very sorry but you are mistaken about this being "organized harrassment." I dont know most of these people! I have a grid to run and trees to plant.....I do not spend my time trying to cause pain to others. I hope you have a very happy day!
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Good morning to you as well, I hope yours is going well.
I didn't mean to imply that *this specific post* was intended as part of the harassment campaign. As far as I know, you're only following the red flag du jour. That said, there has clearly been harassment against the #1 place region on OSW using Child Avatars as the justification. If there had not been child avatars, the issue would have been something else (it has been before) or someone would have taken child avatar alts in there to frame the owners (a trick we have seen played out here before, too).
My message was not aimed at your blog post, nor even at you. It was in reply to Soda's alluding to harassment campaigns and I was taking the opportunity to expand on that point.
The OSW audience is fond of eating itself from time to time (individuals change, but the harassment does not). OSW alternatives have come and gone but no one supports or uses them so honestly -the fault for opensim being so toxic, hostile and prone to harassment is with all of us to varying degrees.
So I wasn't mistaken. I was making a different point entirely...in response to something that Soda said.
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I didn't mean to imply that *this specific post* was intended as part of the harassment campaign. As far as I know, you're only following the red flag du jour. That said, there has clearly been harassment against the #1 place region on OSW using Child Avatars as the justification. If there had not been child avatars, the issue would have been something else (it has been before) or someone would have taken child avatar alts in there to frame the owners (a trick we have seen played out here before, too).
My message was not aimed at your blog post, nor even at you. It was in reply to Soda's alluding to harassment campaigns and I was taking the opportunity to expand on that point.
The OSW audience is fond of eating itself from time to time (individuals change, but the harassment does not). OSW alternatives have come and gone but no one supports or uses them so honestly -the fault for opensim being so toxic, hostile and prone to harassment is with all of us to varying degrees.
So I wasn't mistaken. I was making a different point entirely...in response to something that Soda said.
Your comments about OSW are very wise and true. In all honesty, OSW reflects the best and the worst of opensim. I cannot change Opensim or OSW, However, I can change Safine.....and how Safine reacts to certain things. That is something I work on every single day. Some days I do better than others ; ))) Huggs for my friend!
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What a beautiful comment! I may not agree with you on everything, but we definitely need more of you in the world! Huggs to you!
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*hugs* absolutely -and I support that. Like I just said to Arielle; I do not fault *anyone* for wanting to feel safe on their regions by not taking risks they're uncomfortable with. If you see having kid avatars as a potential legal liability you have every right to not allow them. We need to do what we can to feel safe in the places we run.
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"My point being: it isn't child avatars that are the problem, it's the community and it's appetite for harassment. It is that the OSW/opensim community is so completely hostile/toxic and it has such a high tolerance for harassment -combined with an unwillingness to address harassment effectively."
That's it exactly, and I keep having to tell people: OSW does not have moderation. OSW does not have "staff" in the traditional community staff sense. OSW's staff, AFAIK, is only Satyr. Satyr is only a tech admin and developer at which he admittedly excels. But he is not fit for moderation. He isn't interested in moderation either. He has stated several times that he wants us to deal with any kinds of trouble ourselves, and be it things that are clearly illegal. He has told me that he normally never bans anyone. As rarely as he's here, he never knows what's going on either, and he has never been in touch with the community. And he doesn't have time to moderate everything himself in real-time 24/7.
At the same time, he isn't even interested in establishing moderation at all. Neither does he implement moderation tools, nor does he appoint moderators, nor does he even define community rules as guides for moderation. This site has two rules for sims, both of which are frequently and blatantly broken with no repercussions whatsoever, and exactly zero rules for users.
In other words: On OSW, you can get away with everything. And I mean absolutely everything. AFAIR, OSW itself came under attack a while ago. Others would have called the authorities for investigations. Satyr simply restored the site and shrugged it off.
That's why it's so attractive to troublemakers. I dare say that not few people are only in OpenSim to cause trouble and harass others because it's so easy and with exactly zero consequences for themselves.
I mean, we, the community, can't do anything ourselves with no moderation tools to do it with. Ignoring doesn't work as has been demonstrated over and over again. The only countermeasure against troublemakers at our hands is retaliation, and that usually makes things only worse.
And I think I'm the only OSW user who has been here for several years while still only having one account.
"From where I stand, kid avatars are simply the red flag de jour; but any issue would work. This community loves them some pitchforks and torches!"
That, too. Only that most other issues lead to aggressive counter-attacks rather than attacks. I mean, it's hard to harass bot-using sim owners if there are always at least seven avatars on your own sim and always right after it has started, that number barely fluctuates up, and you claim it's regular visitor traffic. And you can't speak up against copybotting and content theft from SL if the only thing on your own avatar that's legal is the alpha'd-out system body. So you defend both tooth and nail instead with massive counter-attacks.
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That's it exactly, and I keep having to tell people: OSW does not have moderation. OSW does not have "staff" in the traditional community staff sense. OSW's staff, AFAIK, is only Satyr. Satyr is only a tech admin and developer at which he admittedly excels. But he is not fit for moderation. He isn't interested in moderation either. He has stated several times that he wants us to deal with any kinds of trouble ourselves, and be it things that are clearly illegal. He has told me that he normally never bans anyone. As rarely as he's here, he never knows what's going on either, and he has never been in touch with the community. And he doesn't have time to moderate everything himself in real-time 24/7.
At the same time, he isn't even interested in establishing moderation at all. Neither does he implement moderation tools, nor does he appoint moderators, nor does he even define community rules as guides for moderation. This site has two rules for sims, both of which are frequently and blatantly broken with no repercussions whatsoever, and exactly zero rules for users.
In other words: On OSW, you can get away with everything. And I mean absolutely everything. AFAIR, OSW itself came under attack a while ago. Others would have called the authorities for investigations. Satyr simply restored the site and shrugged it off.
That's why it's so attractive to troublemakers. I dare say that not few people are only in OpenSim to cause trouble and harass others because it's so easy and with exactly zero consequences for themselves.
I mean, we, the community, can't do anything ourselves with no moderation tools to do it with. Ignoring doesn't work as has been demonstrated over and over again. The only countermeasure against troublemakers at our hands is retaliation, and that usually makes things only worse.
And I think I'm the only OSW user who has been here for several years while still only having one account.
"From where I stand, kid avatars are simply the red flag de jour; but any issue would work. This community loves them some pitchforks and torches!"
That, too. Only that most other issues lead to aggressive counter-attacks rather than attacks. I mean, it's hard to harass bot-using sim owners if there are always at least seven avatars on your own sim and always right after it has started, that number barely fluctuates up, and you claim it's regular visitor traffic. And you can't speak up against copybotting and content theft from SL if the only thing on your own avatar that's legal is the alpha'd-out system body. So you defend both tooth and nail instead with massive counter-attacks.
"And I think I'm the only OSW user who has been here for several years while still only having one account."
Naw, I only have this "Arielle" account and it has been close to 10 years. I signed up within 12 hours of Satyr opening the site.
Like Harper says, it does seem like targeted harassment on child avatars because its been the main thrust of topics for a while now. I guess the community got tired of crying about the unlicensed content here but knowing forums and how they work in cycles about topics to complain about, I'm sure it will come back around :)
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Naw, I only have this "Arielle" account and it has been close to 10 years. I signed up within 12 hours of Satyr opening the site.
Like Harper says, it does seem like targeted harassment on child avatars because its been the main thrust of topics for a while now. I guess the community got tired of crying about the unlicensed content here but knowing forums and how they work in cycles about topics to complain about, I'm sure it will come back around :)
The solution would be to start an OSW alternative but when people do start one no one uses it -instead preferring to stay here. Several have been done, Kubwa (?) had one, unless I'm mistaken hyacinth has one at the moment, and there is also one at 8chan.moe that hasn't been updated for months and months. So whatever the reasons are for continuing to wallow in the filth here...it's a dynamic that I don't anticipate changing unless OSW shuts down or goes pay only or something.
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Thank goodness. I thought I was going to have to start a virtual 12-step program. Seriously though, these look beautiful. Thank you for the hard work you put into everything. If anyone has not shopped at Starchild yet, I highly recommend a visit.
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Yay for adding materials! I honestly do not understand why so many creators do not bother with this simple process. It is fairly easy to do and adds so much benefit. and if you have not been to Starchild's what are you waiting for? You would be hard pressed to find better quality furniture anywhere in OS.
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For a lot of years, FS's oxp didn't save or import materials...I'm going to guess that the copybot viewers didn't get them either. I've only noticed in the last 3 or so years that I no longer have to re-upload and re-texture materials into my builds after restoring them (things I build in SL, and then bring to OS). Before that, I would have to find and add my normal and specular maps manually.
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I think this is probably spot-on Harper. From the few I have spoken with the copybot viewer is not good at capturing the specular maps and even FS has trouble. Now with PBR lighting in SL, there will likely be an additional map in SL, not sure if or when that will ever happen in OS. Luckily, they have become pretty easy to duplicate. Both Photoshop and Gimp are very good at making them. There is even a free open source ap, "Materialize" that is specifically designed to make them. I have fooled with it a bit and it can handle pretty intricate textures well. (Not perfect, but well.)
https://boundingboxsoftware.com/materialize/
The maps can add a lot to larger objects like furniture and houses and rocks, so that is why it is such a treat to see that @Aurora has taken the time to add them.
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https://boundingboxsoftware.com/materialize/
The maps can add a lot to larger objects like furniture and houses and rocks, so that is why it is such a treat to see that @Aurora has taken the time to add them.
@HarperHeld yes...it is a pain... I am learning as I import stuff...didn't even know what bumpiness and shine did before! I think the WORST are some clothes from some brands...like TETRA... now THOSE are a nightmare...
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The lack of decent hair bases in OS is crazy. Should be fairly easy to do, but no one is doing. Guys get screwd so bad in OSgrid... and it shows. Have you tried the Silverfox store? They havea set of some newer male bases
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The lack of decent hair bases in OS is crazy. Should be fairly easy to do, but no one is doing. Guys get screwd so bad in OSgrid... and it shows. Have you ried the Silverfo store Jerra?
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Shogun is SO good! I can see how it would be inspiring. Thank you for sharing that link and good luck on those buildings!
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Thank you Soda! It has to do with cutting the roof to bring in parts, utilizing a script that reduces vertices something like that, Ferd explained it I have yet to dive in and try it I have been so busy with all the other fun details like clothes, shoes and landscaping lol
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A great resource for starting creators like myself with lots of "must have" scripts and textures organized in a way that is easy to navigate. Also great to see more textures with specular maps making it into OS!
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