SL9B Main Stage

SL9B Main Stage, originally uploaded by Winter Jefferson.

Beautiful picture of the beautiful Lotus Stage at SL9B!

Dreddful

Judgment is coming!

So after having seen the Judge Dredd trailer released this week, I realised that there hadn't been a Dredd outfit made for tinies. So today I fixed that! This is the culmination of a day's work. I'll have it boxed up and on sale over the course of the following week, all being well. 

Might even throw it our for Tiny Swagtastic Weekend as an introductory offer!

A few more pictures from a quick wander around the amazing INSILICO are here.

Birthday Bashing

Here's Serendipity Haven rightly pointing out that the Lindens really weren't needed when it came to putting together SL9B!

Shroom With A View

SL9B has begun!

Yes, despite Linden Lab's attempt to ensure another one of its big community events didn't happen, the residents have successfully risen to the challenge and have made this year's event their own; in truth, the Lab suggested a 'community' theme should be handled by the community, so less attempted sabotage by the Lindens and more just general laziness on their part.

The annual birthday celebration kicked off at 11am SLT yesterday (Monday), and after Saffia's impassioned opening speech, the tinies were representin' in force with at least a dozen riverdancers making a whole lotta noise!

Our plot is on Jamboree, one of 20 sims given over to this year's event, and in some cases with up to 36 plots on each sim, that's a whole lot of exploring to be done! In keeping with the feel of Raglan as a whole, the Shire SL9B plot is made up of overgrown natural elements - primarily three giant mushrooms, upon which we (myself, Etheria Parrott and Panacea Pangaea) have put out different creative elements from the community. I won't give too much away in that hope that you, reader, get the opportunity to go and visit the plot and play around at it!

The info hut and the community picture display.

The mushroom-head picnic tables.

On the smallest shroom sits three picnic tables (with waffles), where we invite tinies to gather and chat; a ladder above that is our Poetry Slam shroom, where a small circle of mushrooms each hold a poem written by a different member of our community; and an Anywhere Door journey above that is our sundial of events.

The Poetry Slam shroom circle: when clicked, a shroom reads the poem contained within it.

As I said in my previous blog entry, it felt imperative to me that as many tinies from Raglan contributed to the build as we could involve. Although we were limited by the small amount of people who were allowed access to the sims in the building stage, we put out a plea to the group to contribute pictures, poems and free gifts, and it didn't go unheard - we were sent dozens of pictures and a good number of poems.

The Event Sundial: when touched, the dial turns to a specific month with details about that months event.

We've already had a number of other SL9B participants come around and compliment us on our build, which is incredibly kind and generous, especially for a build that developed organically - my only idea when we got our plot was 'it should be on platforms'. I love seeing builds you can interact with and explore, and given that each plot covers a relatively small ground area, the best way to develop that interaction was to go high.

I'm exceptionally pleased with how the build has turned out, and that really is a testament to the community; my own contribution to the development of the build was very minimal - I rezzed a couple of things, sent out a couple of notices asking for stuff - so it really has been the generosity of others that has injected the plot with life. It's fun, colourful, cute and different - exactly how life as a tiny can be! Visit it at this SLURL!

Polly Ellsmere (left) and Bree Himmel explore the plot.

I should really start thinking about SL10B. Or would it be SLXB?

Growing Shrooms

Hello reader! Apologies for my distinct lack of updates on the Second Life front of late - truth be told, it's simply because of my complete lack of activity in-world. My time spent in SL has greatly diminished of late, not through a lack of interest, but simply because RL demands it.

That being said, someone reminded me a couple of weeks ago that it was SLxB time again and inquired as to whether the Shire would be having a presence there again. Seeing that the theme of this year's SL9B event is 'community', I felt it was imperative that we would; after all, it has been said a number of times in the past that the Shire community is one of the strongest and largest on the Grid.

So I'm here at Jamboree, slowly putting the plot build together with the help of my trusted friends Etheria Parrott and Panacea Pangaea, who between them could build, texture and code almost anything. The above picture is just a teaser of what our plot consist of, but I think it fits perfectly with the natural feel of our home sims and offers a good general picture of what our community has to offer all year round. It's an incredibly difficult thing to bottle, as by its very nature 'community' is only really defined by the people who take part in the events, but I'm trying to involve as many tinies as I can by asking for snapshots of tiny life. We'll have a method of hearing poems written by Copper Mistral's Poetry Slam group too.

And as an amazing unplanned bonus, our plot neighbours the plot for in-world percussion group DRUM!

SL9B opens to the general populace on June 18th. More information can be found on the official blog.

Kickin' It

A few weeks ago, Zayn Till (he of the ownership of the Shires) and Wynx Whiplash (she of the creator of the tiny avatars) launched a Kickstarter campaign to help fund their efforts to try and transpose the characters of Second Life into a first-world Raglan Shire project, and with a week to go, not only have supporters helped them reach their target amount of $8,500, they've taken it past $10,000!

This is a great result for the Jazz Paws team, and I truly hope their efforts pay off, as their vision far exceeds the desire to see these characters in a media away from a digital one. I hope they both utilise the talents of Shire residents at some point too! The community didn't get to where it was simply of the position of prims, but the people behind the avatars!

Goodbye Tiggs!

Tiggs Linden by Marianne McCann

Some slightly sad news to report: Tiggs Linden, one of the very few (if not only) full-time tiny Lindens is to leave Linden Lab on March 9th.

Tiggs has been working out of the Boston office of the Lab for a number of years but has decided that now is the time to move on to pastures new. "This was my choice. I still believe in Second Life and I think it is a viable, healthy place to be," Tiggs told the Friends of Raglan Shire group. He's off to work for Turbine, developers of some other popular MMO games including Lord Of The Rings Online.

Tiggs will undoubtedly be sorely missed by many around the Grid, but by none more so than those in the Friends of Raglan Shire group. As part of that group, Tiggs would often allow residents to throw questions his way about how things worked (or didn't) or why things happened (or didn't) and would very happily and succinctly answer and offer explanations. It was great to see a Linden interacting first-hand with residents, many of whom had probably never heard from a Linden before, let alone have seen or stood alongside one of them at the many Raglan events that Tiggs would come alone to see.

Tiggs has promised to stay in Second Life though - "I'm just leaving the Lab, not Second Life" - and stay as a tiny too. He also suggested (tongue-in-cheek) that he may teach a class or two at Raglan U, the Shire's in-world learning facility. From FoRS group chat:

[12:51] Toady Nakamura: and imagine the scripting classes you could teach at Raglan U
[12:51] Tiggs Linden: i do know a tad about scripting
[12:51] Morton Wheels: cool :-)
[12:51] mouseplay Resident: loll scripting classses?
[12:51] Toady Nakamura: I knows
[12:51] One Rhiadra: ooo scriptings
[12:52] Morganne Darkstone: oooo...wuld love t'learn lots about scripting...
[12:52] Tiggs Linden: "how to bring a region down"

Thanks for being such a wonderful source of help and support, Tiggs and we all wish you well in Middle-Earth!