Day: October 21, 2018

Second Life Steals, Deals, and Freebies: Free Kim Female Full-Body Avatar by Altamura!

Once again, Altamura has come out with a great deal on a full-body mesh avatar (both head and body in one package). This is a female mesh avatar called Kim, and you can pick one up for absolutely free at the UniHispana Crea Gateway Community sim (here’s the SLURL):

Altamura Kim freebie 2 21 Oct2018

Simply pay the vendor a Linden dollar and the Kim body is yours (your Linden dollar will be automatically refunded; you do not need to be a member of the Altamura group to take advantage of this deal).

Here’s what Kim looks like:

Kim Altamura 2 21 Oct 2018

Unfortunately, this is another one of the Altamura freebies which does not allow you to remove the head (in order to replace it with another mesh head). However, the included head really is quite lovely, don’t you think?

Kim Altamura 21 Oct 2018

Kim is a fully-adjustable Bento body which comes with a HUD which allows you a complete set of alpha selections to make just about any clothing fit well. I have found that clothing designed for the Maitreya Lara mesh avatar body tends to fit the Altamura female bodies very well, with a minimum of fuss (and more and more designers are now creating clothing specifically designed for Altamura mesh bodies).

Also, the Altamura female mesh bodies have Slink-compatible feet, so any shoe designed for Slink feet should work well (the female mesh body gift comes in three foot heights, selectable via the HUD: flat, medium, and high). The bodies have Bento hands, and (in a nice added touch) Altamura has included a hand AO which cycles through natural hand positions, which you can use with your regular (non-Bento) AO. There’s also a facial AO.

This avatar is wearing:

Mesh Head and Body: Kim by Altamura

Hair: The hairstyle is actually a freebie from your inventory, located in the folder Accessories/Hair Design Options (Colors & Styles)/Tapered Bob)

Eyes: Dream eyes in brown (a freebie from YS&YS at a recent shopping event)

Top and Skirt: Eleni tee and Caitlyn skirt, from the freebie capsule wardrobe by Baby Monkey available at The Free*Style store (for more information, please see this blogpost)

Flats: White flats by Garbaggio (part of the free sample pack for Slink feet; available on the SL Marketplace). The package includes flats, mid-height pumps, and full-height pumps, each with a HUD that lets you pick one of four different colours.

TOTAL COST FOR THIS AVATAR: FREE!

The Altamura Kim vendor is part of a special fund-raising event to fight cancer, which runs until November 1st, so you have until at least then to pick up this freebie. There are dozens of other vendors, some selling exclusive items. You can also make a donation (perhaps the Linden dollars you would have spent on a full-price mesh avatar head and body?) to the AECC: Asociación Española Contra el Cáncer.

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An Update: Leaving My Second Life Avatars to Other People Via My Will (and Why Cancer Is Still Part of My Life)

By the way, even though my recent cancer scare is over, I am still actively drawing up my list of acquaintances, friends and family to whom I will leave all my Second Life avatars in my will.

(If you have already responded, thank you! And I will be in touch with you before the end of October. So far I have had about a dozen people send me messages, by email or in-world.)

Here’s the alphabetical list for you to peruse. The following four avatars are already spoken for:

  • Nada Nix (my goth girl avatar) I have decided to leave to Jenn (a.k.a. Xiola Linden), the Community Manager for Second Life at Linden Lab.
  • Rose Queen (my Caledon/steampunk/Victorian older woman avatar) is going to Blush Bravin of the Second Life brand Blushed (a.k.a Debi Baskerville in SL and Sansar).
  • Scarborough Fair (my medieval roleplay avatar) I am leaving to Solas NaGealai, co-owner of Silvan Moon Designs in Second Life.
  • Vanity Fair (my fashionista avatar) I have decided to leave to Strawberry Singh. I know that she will take good care of her!

 

And, if you are hesitating because you don’t really know me, except through this blog, please don’t. I still need to find homes for most of these avatars before I shuffle off this mortal coil! Don’t get me wrong—I plan on living a long and healthy life, and reaching a ripe old age, but you never know what can happen! And I would hate to think that all my creative work will go into the pixel bin….

All I ask is that we have at least one good, long, in-depth conversation (via phone, chat, or IM). I simply want to know who you are (and what you plan to do with my avatar) before I leave you one of these avatars, on which I have spent a great deal of time, energy, and (in some cases) money.

And, if you don’t want me to publicize your name, I can certainly honour that request too; just let me know in advance. I’d much rather leave these lovingly-created and outfitted avatars to people who actually enjoy and appreciate Second Life, as opposed to people who never use SL. And I know from my blog statistics that I do get a lot of visitors from SL. Thank you for your consideration. Here’s my contact page.

By the way, cancer is still very much a part of my life. My best friend in real life recently underwent surgery for serious prostate cancer, and he has learned that this cancer has spread and that he will soon have to undergo testosterone suppression therapy and radiation treatment. I feel afraid, angry and sad, and I also feel guilty that I’m OK and he’s not. He was back in the hospital for a  couple of days due to blood clots in both his lungs after his surgery, but he is at home resting and recovering now. Please keep my friend John in your thoughts and prayers.

Relay in Life for Second Life now has a very special meaning for me. Please consider supporting this annual fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. You can also consider making a donation to the Canadian Cancer Society. Thank you!

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Aether City: A Brief Introduction

Well, whaddayaknow? I turned over a rock and discovered yet another blockchain-based virtual world!

Aether 21 Oct 2018.png

Aether City is a new virtual world (city, to be more accurate) that uses the Ethereum blockchain to register property ownership.

The only way to explore Aether City is via their web browser, which is currently rather limited in functionality. You can buy units or entire buildings, such as this central skyscraper whimsically named “A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace”:

Aether 2 21 Oct 2018.png

According to their website:

A unit is the smallest unit of property ownership in Aether. It is a property that is defined by its coordinates occupying an area of 10 m³. A unit is a part of a building and is adjacent to neighboring units. The owner of a unit determines its appearance, fills it with content, and has the ability to connect the unit to its own domain.

However, there doesn’t appear to be any way to actually build content within your units yet. All you can do is put in a link to the property’s domain page. Rather limited. (At least Decentraland already has a working command-line editor that allows builders to create and deploy test scenes.)

I bet that the team behind Aether City, Aether Labs in Waterloo, would just kill for the kind of media attention that Decentraland is getting. But sadly, it would appear that the project is moribund. There have been only two Medium posts about it (Feb. 4th and March 11th of this year), and not a word since. Their Discord has seen no discussion at all since May 11th, and their Telegram channel has seen absolutely zero chatter, with only a couple of company-posted pictures of their bland, rather uninspiring-looking city:

Telegram Aether 21 Oct 2018

Frankly, I’m not sure exactly why anybody would want to spend their hard-earned cryptocurrency on this. The Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace building is for sale for 10 Ethereum coins (approximately US$2,000) if you’re interested. I think I’ll pass.