Farewell to the Princeton Installations

Due to the openspace sim pricing change, Princeton University will be letting go of their four OSs that were home to some of the most interesting art installations on the grid and destinations unto themselves. The very act of their creating such places for us to enjoy showed the university's understanding of SL as a medium of incredible expression. It's quite a loss, but as I have said before in previous posts, our world is an ephemeral one with persons and places we care about being liable to disappear at any moment. But, as I told a fellow visitor to one of the installations, "A venue may disappear, but an artist goes on to create anyway..."

AM Radio's "The Quiet" "DynaFleur" by Douglas Story, Desdemona Enfield, Dizzy Banjo & Poid MahovlichPoid Mahovlich's "Triptych" (this and the following photo)
"Liquid Light" by Juria YoshikawaI realized I don't have a good picture for Scope Cleaver, AldoManutio Abruzzo and Poid Mahovlich's "Ludovico's Lament". It was a beautiful installation as well. Support your SL artists now, while you can, as you never know if putting off a visit to see their work might be too late.

The Grand Tour

Although I get around the Grid, you know that my home base is in the historic sims of SL. In light of the whole OS hoopla, a lot of them were seriously affected by it and so this weekend I spent a lot of time participating in the Grand Tour. Organized by Fogwoman Gray of Caledon and with organizers at the participating sims, balls and dances were held the entire weekend going from location to location. Congrats to them on a job well done. Participating sims were Colonia Nova, Orcadia, New Toulouse, Victoriana, Neufriedstadt, Winterfell, Caledon, New Babbage, Steeltopia, Al Andalus, Isles of Fatima, Wunderbar, Antiquity and Steelhead. If you have never visited these place, go...the time is now.

If you want to read my posts about my bouncing from place to place you can read them HERE.

Butterflies and Storms

So I am sitting here at my home, having read the latest Linden openspace announcement earlier. It is very important that you read the Knowledge Base info accompanying it as that is more detailed...In a nutshell, they are creating a pricing tier system that splits OS sims into "openspace" and "Homesteads". OS sims are to be light-use, 750 prims, with a cap of 10 AVs. Owners can put in for their OS sims to be Homesteads for light commercial and residential use, 3750 prims and a 20 AV cap. For both, script usage restrictions are as of yet TBD. Thing is with Homesteads is that the pricing goes from $75USD to $95 as of Jan 5, but as of July 9, it'll go up to $125--the price originally proposed in the last posting that set off the furor. Owners also have the option of exchanging openspaces for full regions as well, an option being entertained by some communities.

My home here "might" upgrade to Homestead, we'll see, but what does this mean for communities like the sailing community and themed ones like Caledon? They can't hold larger community-based events such as dances or balls or regattas or races. Even the train that runs through most of Caledon would be affected due to its scripts. I still wonder what the longer-term effect of this will be across the Grid. Are we to be happy with this? Is this really okay? I don't know...take this and add to the fact that M Linden's declared premium members like me (yeah, I know, I keep considering a downgrade) as "immaterial" and this steampunk kitty's still feeling a little leery right now...