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Beta Testers Needed

I’m in the need of several Beta Testers to test a building tool.  I’ll need testers that are familiar with SL building tools. able to drop objects into the inventory of other objects. willing to give quick, honest,  feedback. able to work with the product with little documentation to begin with. Ideally I would like around 10 or so testers [...]

Featured Post

Boxed Chess

Chindogu Happiness Industrial Concern happily presents its newest chess set. This beautifully sculpted box opens to reveal a working chess set.  The box and board with working lid weigh in at 6 prims while the stone carved pieces come in at one prim each (32 for those of you counting). The set would look perfect on [...]

Asides

• I typically sit at a computer for 8 or more hours every weekday.  As a computer consultant my job is to solve other people's problems, typically with better documentation, suggestions to business processes, and, most often, by writing new software.  I do it for a living because I like to eat and because, on a whole, the job is easy and the company I work for recognizes my hard work and rewards me appropriately with none of the 'be thankful you have a job' attitude I hear about from colleagues at other firms. I generally do not mind helping people with computer problems outside of work, but it is not something I want to do on a regular basis and I have to be motivated to do it.  Motivated by a kind word, or a sense that the person actually appreciates it.  If do not get that sort of appreciation the only other motivation I respond to is the type of motivation my job provides me and that is generally of a monetary sort that no one is going to give me otherwise. I have had multiple people over the last several weeks ask me for computer support and I have provided it (I'd say 'happily' but it was less and less so) and none of them have actually said 'Thank you'.  These have ranged from simple questions to people needing server support. I'm sorry if you ask me for help in the future as I am going to be reluctant to provide it, it's just not worth my time any more. #
• I'm wierd, but sometimes when I get a migraine (they happen less often now that I take daily medication) I can actually figure things out that have plagued me for months.  It generally works like this. I get the migraine. I try to sleep. My mind starts to race. Code starts forming in my mind. Stupid right?  Well in this case I had to put pen to paper (because the light from the monitor burned my brain) and the next morning, barring some basic trouble shooting, I had the basis for a product I had all but given up on months ago.  I can't wait to show it off. #
• So last night I spent a little time "Playing with Dolls" as a good friend of mine (not a SLer) calls it.  Basically this means simply flying around the grid and buying clothes and trying on new Neko ears, trying to find new places to hang out,  and that sort of thing.  I have to carve out my own Doll time, especially in times like this when I am working on projects that I do not feel like I can announce yet (maybe in a week or two?) but consume a lot of my SL time and I am busy in RL. Doll time is not time that I am always good at providing myself, but it is something I always miss.  This is the time that allows me to step back and go 'oh, right, this is why SL is so great and I stick with it', and it also reminds me that SL is, at its heart, a time to relax and decompress. #
• Four years ago today Alidar Moxie was born and became my main Avatar.  I say my main avatar because I rarely log in with my original account any more (Alidar Marten) despite the fact that I actually prefer her last name more to some degree (not enough to go through the trouble of buying her new wardrobe and so forth).  So why do I have more than one account at all?  Why are they so similarly named? I joined SL way back in 2003.  At that time I was still in school but thought SL would make a pleasant enough distraction.  In those days (you young whippersnappers) you bought land, paid a tax on your prims in world, and got a bonus on your allowance based on the amount of traffic your land got and your ratings and other factors.  Chances were you knew a good number of the people online at once and if someone was having a party you went because it was polite and because if they liked your clothes or something they would give you a positive ranking on something. I chose 'Alidar' mainly because I am Alidar on most everything else I do* and 'Marten' because it sounded like a real last name.  When I created the account I pretty much made up all of the other details on the account.  It strikes me as odd now that LL took my paypal account with these made up details, but I digress. I ultimately left SL because I could not cope with it and going to school and decided to put it on hold for a while. Fast forward a few years and a couple of degrees and I'm ready to play SL again, except for the fact that I cannot remember my password, at all.  I try resetting my password but cant remember any of those 'made up' details.  I e-mail LL and get no response after a day or so and I'm impatient, so, new account.  I again choose 'Alidar' because, 'I am Alidar on most everything else I do' and 'Moxie' because it started with an M (sort of pining after Marten) and away I went. A year or so later I upgraded to a premium account, go concierge service and IM'd a nice support lady who was patient with me and managed to unlock the account, but it had been long enough I even had a product on the market and didn't want to confuse things so I stuck with it. I've seen SL change quite a bit and it still amazes me with how far things have come (really? we have prim hair now? and sculpties?) I can't wait to see how things keep changing. The amount of stuff I have done in this world has also surprised me.  I've joined RP communities, left some.  Started sims, left them.  Started businesses, sold them.  Started other businesses, and am working on other projects that I can't wait to tell everyone about.  This, from someone who is a confirmed introvert. * This is true to the extent that in college someone else in RL had my same first name.  Once my friends found out I went by 'Alidar' or 'Ali' online I was almost never called by my RL first name again. #
• Just when I was getting going again LL changes the rules on me.  I've had numerous people ask me 'how do I get started selling things?' or 'how do I know if something to do well?' and chief among my recommendations was always 'put something up on XStreet' and when I decided to change gears myself and give up my land and figure out what to do, its exactly what I did myself.  I kept my premium account mainly so that I would always have my mainland account and keep my little Xstreet box and be able to throw stuff up on the website and see what stuck.  Seymour was a benefit of that and the in-world store is a result of me knowing what would sell here and there and what would not. The new rules that I am now going to be charged for just having items up on the site means that it will no longer be something I can use to get catalogs out to people or to distribute tools as I have in the past and makes a number of things much harder.  It also means I will have to re-think my strategy of what items get placed on XStreet (if any) and which become 'in store exclusives'. Frankly, this seems like a rather boneheaded move on LL's part, but one that seems to be following a trend of late.  "Hey, let's have some obscure office hours and then announce some stupid policy changes using those office hours as cover".  Brillant. I have half a mind to start a competing market place, it's winter and I have some time. #