VR Chat Security Update Results in Mass Protests by Playerbase

 
By Bixyl Shuftan

In the past few years, VR Chat has enjoyed an increase in numbers. They've gone from 9,100 active users in February 2018, when the Newser gave a review, to 42,500 in December 2021 (link). These are numbers that have made it a true rival to Second Life in contrast to the various Opensim worlds. The world has gotten both praise and condemnation. Early in its history, it was documented that several players came to the aid of another who suffered an epileptic seizure (article). More recently, there were allegations that younger teen users were being "groomed" into sexual acts (article). 

This week however came a move by the development team that resulted in both pushback from many users plus fewer people getting online in the world. 

On Monday July 25, the developers announced a security update (link), the largest change being the installation of "Easy Anti-Cheat." "If you’ve played Apex Legends, Fortnite, Gears of War, Elden Ring, or many more," they stated, "you’ve seen Easy Anti-Cheat (EAC). EAC is the industry-leading anti-cheat service. It’s lightweight, effective, and privacy-focused. In short, for any game or platform looking to prevent malicious users from breaking the rules, it’s a powerful solution."

The reason for this security update, they stated, was because of problems with modified viewers being used to grief other users, "“Modified clients” are a large problem for VRChat in a variety of ways. Malicious modified clients allow users to attack and harass others, causing a huge amount of moderation issues. Even seemingly non-malicious modifications complicate the support and development of VRChat, and make it impossible for VRChat creators to work within the expected, documented bounds of VRChat."

The problem is, EAC will not just block harmful mods, but ones useful to players. Some help in avatars being more interactive. Some help enhance the experience, such as VRC-CC which allows closed-captioning for deaf players so they can see movies inworld. 

https://twitter.com/TheFoxipso/status/1551640725455982593

Apparently, there's been an "unspoken culture," as Alexandra Hall of Kotaku describes, of mods being tolerated "unless they flaunted their upgrades or otherwise caught moderators’ attention." The result has been a "thriving underground mod scene" that allowed players to enjoy the game in ways not intended by the developers and for disabled players to get around the platforms shortcomings many say the developers were slow to adress. Some were also made to help protect players from malicious mods, "oftentimes unofficial mods have been the only means by which to access certain features, ranging from support for exotic hardware like advanced trackers and networked sex toys to addressing accessibility concerns like closed captioning and text-to-speech. Also popular were mods that tried to protect against malicious 'crasher' avatars, mods that helped to increase framerates in the notoriously sluggish, Unity-based game, and mods that allowed avatar searching, a basic-seeming feature that VRChat still lacks."

The development team acknowledges there is a problem, "we hear you and see you saying that many of the modified client features that are being lost due to this are extremely important to you, or in some cases allow you to use VRChat at all, when in regards to modifications that added accessibility features that VRChat currently lacks." But are going ahead with it, "we are going to be releasing this update, and we do not have plans or intent to revert or roll it back." 

The result has been numerous complaints, including many angry ones, from a number of VR Chat's users. The Steam page was full of recent negative reviews. "The latest update introduced Easy Anti-Cheat which has turned the game into garbage," wrote a Yifrick, "This was an amazing social game but now the developers have gone and ???? on it and everyone who loved this game by including this spyware under the pretence of making the game 'safer' for users, when it does absolutely no such thing, and actively harms the community." "Many hours i played and some years on it," wrote an Appie_Dude, " but when I heard of the new update, no (I) am done, am out. ... the devs won't listen to people and go for the money now. You ruined a game, goodluck." "You literally just destroyed your community who heavily relys on mods for quality of life improvements since you are so slow to do it yourself," wrote a Smackdatmoney, "What a actual shame that you continued and STILL went through with it anyways even after massive community backlash. ... you've just became another one of those companies who see their own community as 'idiots who dont know what their talking about'. ..."

In one review by a Soulful, "there's not a lot to be said here about the state of VRC. I've had issues for a while, game has serious optimization issues for folks who play through virtual desktop, has pretty much no graphical optimization implemented in any capacity, atop of compounding problems with lack of communication, community engagement, and a huge lack of understanding with their userbase's needs and wants. I lived with these issues, in hopes that these features would be implemented sometime, having relied on modding and even Steam's own built in VR stuff to help with these problems, which has been a godsend for those times when there's more than a handful of folks around ... For a long while the VRC team either would ignore a lot of these posts of critique and even real complaints of issues, or directly missing the point of something being brought up to begin with, it was nothing new, now though they're showing their ugly heads when it comes to something as big as adding an anti cheat. Normally I'd be for them implementing something into the game to help with dealing with malicious users doing things like code injecting or script kiddy nonsense to harass and disrupt other people. (But) to destroy something as big and as fundamental as the modding community, the Steam community, and even just plain ol Meta/Quest users on Virtual Desktop ... outright shutting down all sorts of background apps and taking snapshots of your PC if it even suspects even a little bit of something 'suspicious' or 'malicious', and is already VERY well known for not playing well with lots of 3rd party software used in day to day services, including VR services, and from the statements they've been handing out, and lots of the other things going on with VRC itself lately in terms of monetization, it's very clear where they lie in terms of the future of their platform. And it's not to be user friendly, not to be community friendly, and definitely not to be true to the spirit of a social platform to push any envelopes in the VR industry."

Someone named Keith complained the update didn't really stop malicious users, writing, "EAC was defeated in less than 2 hours after it hit the Beta Branch. This means that any malicious actor who wants to continue to use mods to cause problems can do so unimpeded. ... even if EAC was a perfect anticheat with no way around it? That wouldn't stop 99% of crashers, rippers, and account hijackers. The VAST majority of those people utilize completely vanilla clients because VRChat's code is just that insecure. ... at the end of the day EAC is a pure negative. There isn't a single pro about its presence in VRC. It will only make the crashing and other issues worse as it strips people of community made defenses, it takes away many accessibility features disabled folk relied on to be able to participate, and without the community driven QOL options many people use, VRChat just becomes an inferior platform compared to other options."

In the past few days, upset users have "review bombed" VRChat. Its recent reviews were ranked "Overwhelmingly Negative."

"Disabled players are feeling the brunt of this update the most," stated an article from Eurogamer that appeared in senegalbgs.org, "They say they are now stuck with a game they cannot play, with no guidance on when the game will be made accessible to them and no guaranteed way of making sure their needs are being listened to. ... this is a huge setback, particularly considering the work that is going into accessibility options in high-profile games . They say they now find themselves stuck in an ecosystem that has taken away the tools that allow them to join in without providing a sufficient alternative."

Not everyone is complaining. Talking to Marusame, who started out in Second Life, but appears much more often in VRChat now, he stated he didn't use mods, "Most people are just (complaining) because they can no longer use mods that give you power like flying around, crashing people, messing with things like turning off mirrors or making things move around or generally being a nuisance. ... though this doesnt get rid of crasher avatars. Imagine if in Second Life someone could whip out an avatar and crash a sim?" She also thought people had plenty of time to get ready, "I've known they was gonna do something like this for MONTHS. I've hanged out with some of the devs and one works on security. ... so for me, this change didnt do much other than lobbies are filled with less crashers now and they are more chill. (It) reminds me of the Second Life Windlight UI thing where everyone said they'd go to Opensim because of it, and a month later everyone came back."

So what to do? There are calls not to get on VRChat for a week so the drop in numbers will get the attention of the development team. There are also calls for those who signed up for VRChat Plus, a $9.95 USD a month subscription service to cancel. 

I had a few words with Johnny Vulpine, who was "a longtime SL user and also a VRC user." He recommended using a couple alternative clients to get onto VRChat, Neos and ChilloutVR, "If you are looking for something similar to VRC where you can hop in, throw on or upload an avatar and go socialize. ChilloutVR might be more your speed. Like VRC, it's easy to get in and just go. Content creation is done outside of the game and uploaded in. If you are looking for something more like SL but in VR, I think you will love Neos. Neos is a VR social app just like VRC and Chillout. But like SL, it has a full range of building tools in-game, you have an in-game inventory which already comes stocked with some basic things. Or you can upload content built outside the game. I will add that the learning curve for Neos can be a bit daunting. BUT you do not need to learn every aspect of building and content creation to enjoy the game. There are already TONS of avatars (many of the same ones used in VRC) that you can pickup and use for free."

Marusame was less enthusiastic about the alternative clients, saying ChilloutVR was harder to use, "the api is fried, also the sdk is janky was harder to upload an avatar than vrchat especially to get material toggles and has a harsher public avatar upload review process." But went on to say they are "doing a lot of hiring so maybe they actually want to do something. Neos VR I hear is more complicated and you can build in world, very Second Lifey experience. But development is dead at the moment with people leaving and infighting."

So what are Second Life users thinking of this development? There was one meme of two sailors getting disciplined by their captain. One was a VRChat user, complaining this was cruel and unusual punishment. The other was a 16 year veteran of Second Life, who was taking things in stride, and looking to the VRChat user and asking, "First time?"

Erron Kelly in Venturebeat would comment that there was something about VRChat that reminded him of the early "Wild West" days of the Internet, which while offering an unexplored frontier also had bad guys such as trolls using racist language, "VRChat taking steps to sanitize that stuff? In the long run it’s probably good for the software. But every time the Old West gets settled it’s a little sad. That’s just me being nostalgic about how I grew up. The people losing access to genuine quality-of-life mods? They’ve really got something to complain about."

Sources: Vice, PC Gamer, Venturebeat, Steam, Eurogamer/Sengal, Kotaku 

Bixyl Shuftan
 

More on Facebook And Meta And Virtual World Plans, Grumpity Linden's Interview

 
By Bixyl Shuftan

Late last month in late October, Mark Zuckerberg announced Facebook the company would be changing it's name to "Meta" to reflect it's plans to build a huge virtual world called the "Metaverse." Since then, there's been more than a few comments and developments.

As the term "Metaverse" was developed by Neal Stephenson in his cyberpunk novel "Snow Crash," he was interviewed about Facebook's move. "It’s flattering when readers take the work seriously enough to put their own time and money into bringing similar ideas to fruition," he remarked, "... science fiction writers have occasionally been given credit for inspiring real-life inventions, so this is not new and it’s not unique. I was aware of that fact thirty years ago when I wrote 'Snow Crash,' but I didn’t necessarily expect it to happen." He had never spoken to Zuckerberg, nor expected any kind of compensation, "In order to get compensation from FB or any other company I would need to sign some kind of deal in which I gave the company rights to some IP in exchange for payment."

As it turns out, Facebook may have a problem as another company filed first for rights for the name. Meta PC, which has been in business for a little more than a year, decided to officially apply for the name in August. The founders Joe Darger and Zack Shutt say they're willing to let Facebook have the name, but only if the larger company pays them 20 million. They also poked fun at Facebook by photoshopping a picture of Mark Zuckerberg holding one of their computers. Since neither company officially owns the name, Facebook may still be able to get it. But this oversight is resulting in a few chuckles. In the meantime, the result has been a great amount of free publicity for the smaller company, which saw it's social media followers increase by fifty times.

And what do the people at Linden Lab think of Facebook's move? Grumpity Linden, or Anya Kanevsky in real life, was interviewed by the French magazine Le Journal du Net (JDN). "It's interesting to see this interest in the metaverse from the Epic Games and Facebook announcements," Grumpity commented, " A metaverse is a collection of connected virtual worlds. In a sense, Second Life is a full-fledged metaverse. A living place in which, in the form of an avatar, you can stroll through shopping malls, go to the beach, visit art galleries, etc. Second Life also has its own economy and its own currency, the Linden Dollars."

She would go on to say that Zuckerburg and his people, "realized that the reputation Facebook has forged over time can be a barrier. This lack of confidence in the company exists and there will have to be a number of levers of confidence to allow those who wish to explore these virtual worlds. At Second Life, we ensure the privacy of our residents. For example, some assume their homosexuality in Second Life, but we know that some may live in areas of the world where their sexual orientation could lead them to prison. We are therefore extremely vigilant on this issue of data security. With the immense wealth of data in the hands of the digital giants, it will be necessary to ensure the protection of the privacy of the users of these virtual worlds."

Grumpity would remind that most content in Second Life, "was created by our residents and not by Linden Lab employees. We just play the role of facilitator. This represents our vision of the metaverse. I don't see how creating different games that would be connected to each other could be akin to the metaverse. In my eyes, this is content created by companies for users. For the metaverse to exist, it must be created and managed by the people who live there."

Sansar and it's option to wear VR helmets came up, "Many were not thrilled with the idea of ​​carrying these VR headsets that are quite heavy and require enough space at home to be able to use them. If virtual reality allows for an immersive and incomparable experience, we observed that few of our residents were ready to wear these helmets for more than thirty minutes. So we plan to keep trying new things around virtual reality, but VR isn't the only possible future for Second Life."

Grumpity would remind Linden Lab's virtual world was still making money, "In 2020, the creators of Second Life collected nearly $ 73 million. Many of them use the platform as a completely or have made it their main source of income." Although the Pandemic was ending, the people who signed on or returned were still logging on to Second Life, "even if they spend less time there."

The interview can still be read on the JDN website. As it's in French, English speakers may need to copy-paste in Google translate or have some other way of traslating it. Inara Pey would also write about it.

As time goes on, no doubt there will be more developments about Meta and it's plans to go into virtual worlds. Stay tuned for further details.

Sources: Axios, TMZ, IGN, JDN,

Bixyl Shuftan
 

Sansar Update: A New Direction, Torley, And Account Issues

The Newser hasn't written much about Sansar, the "next generation virtual world" since Linden Lab sold it to Wookey in March. For most Second Life users, only a handful such as Draxtor Despres expressed enthusiasm about it. So most reactions of it's sale were along the lines of "good riddance" and "why did it tale so long?" While many of it's personnel stayed with Linden Lab and went back to Second Life, some such as Torley Linden stayed and left the Lab. Torley is still with Sansar as it's Production Director. Another former Linden, Sheri Bryant, also stayed, continuing as it's General Manager.

Under Linden Lab, the original concept of Sansar appeared to be as Second Life's successor. But as it's development went on, the Lab began to realize most of it's residents would be reluctant to do more than casual visits. But it went on and to it's credit stuck with Sansar for some years, but didn't seem to have much of a plan other than "if you build it, they will come," and not many came. Exactly what Linden Lab could have done to make it work, and why it didn't do more has been debated numerous times. Perhaps it was simply beyond the Lab's ability to make Sansar thrive while operating Second Life.

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(Click here if the video does not play)

So how has Sansar been doing under Wookey? According to an article in New World Notes, lately it's been looking less like an open-ended virtual world where users can create their own experiences and more of a "virtual venue platform" for live events.

It's a smart move to target the live music/concert market in the COVID age. And I do like a lot of the functionality they are showing off in the video, especially avatar-to-avatar VR meet-and-greets for artists.

 Going to the website, https://www.sansar.com/ , there's a clear emphasis on live events, right down to the title: "Sansar - A New Live Events Destination." There's nothing on the front page about being able to make your own content or create your own place, just a link to the old atlas of user-generated places on the bottom.

This isn't necessarily a better approach as if a person has time to hang around once the event is over, unlike Second Life where someone with even a small amount of experience knows they can explore around. But it seems Wookey's Sansar has come to the conclusion this is their best course of action to get users, and money.

However, there is one customer service problem that former Newser writer Cyfir informed me about. From his point of view, it's "almost impossible" for Sansar users to erase their accounts, "I requested to be removed back in may out of concerns that the new company would not handle my personal information in the right way. And four months later, I get an email, which just happened to be during my three day vacation, requesting information and proof that I am part of the European Union (Cyfir is in the US) ... and they gave me three days to reply before closing the request."

And as Cyfir wasn't in a position to check his email until after his vacation, the company sent him another email saying "as we have not heard back from you, our support system has automatically marked your ticket as resolved." As Cyfir put it, "So if I still want to close my account, I would have to send another request, wait another four months, and all the while they still have my personal information and my account is still active on a platform I don't want to be on."

 Coming across this thread in the Sansar "Bug Reports" forum, there were others whom found themselves in similar positions, including when the world was owned by Linden Lab. While some tried to assure them it shouldn't be much trouble, the response was that deleting accounts was a lot more difficult than it ought to be, "I've not bothered to repeat the request because every answer has made it clear no one is interested in helping.  Not wanting an account here is not a protest,  its simply a matter or personal privacy-  which in this case is being handled poorly to say the least.  being able to delete an account should be a very basic function of the system.  what reason could there be to not allow it? Maybe to hold onto personal data that the person does not wish them to have- like name and e-mail." It seems those whom have yet to visit Sansar and are considering giving it a look may need to keep this in mind.

So under Wooley, Sansar has found itself a new direction with a few of Linden Lab's talent keeping it going, such as Torley. But it appears not unlike the "Hotel California," those trying to check out may find they can't truly leave.

Source: New World Notes, Modem World  , Ryan Schultz

Bixyl Shuftan

What Is Opensim And What Is A Hypergrid/Metaverse?

By Angel Fencer (Ender Leven)

As you all know Second Life is known for having multiple regions right? Well, what if instead of an region, it's an entire different server that's controlling the regions and login? This has been well-known in the MMORPG community as an Private Server.

This is exactly what Opensim enables users to do. But what if i can tell you there is more to it then just an alternative Second life experience, what if  tell you you can connect different grids (Second Life Private Servers) let me introduce you the Hypergrid and the Metaverse and its infinite grids.

Multi-Grid Users and Local Grid Users in OSGrid:

So what are the differences between Second life and Opensim?

There an few things diffrend about Opensim and Second life the main are:
Opensim grids are not owned by Linden Labs but by external companies/users.
Opensim has an Extension of LSL (Linden Scripting Language) scripting known as OSSL.
Second Life stuff is NOT exportable to Opensim (without using stuff which might get you banned in Second life).
Since Newer Viewers use Havok code that prohibits the usage of Opensim this means there missing features in the physics department.
Illegal and bad activities are covered by server owners, NOT Linden Labs.
God Mode and blue names are not restricted to Lindens only in Opensim.
Opensim region borders are buggier.
Nothing is goverened by Second Life’s EULA or guidelines as grid owners make there own rules.

Is Opensim illegal?

No Opensim uses old viewer versions governed under the GPL which doesn't prohibits connecting to external non second life services.

How do I join other grids

Be sure to download an viewer wich supports Opensim for example this Firestorm version (https://www.firestormviewer.org/os-operating-system/)

Showing how to enable other grids:

Install it and Enable other grids in the options

And your done for it go ahead go nuts and explore all the grids. I really recommend OSGrid it has no currency,is very active and the people are very polite in the main lobby LBSA.

What is your experiences in OSGrid?

I used to be on Second Life and figured out about OSGrid about an year ago (did join on another account but haven't played a lot) and instantly I fall in love with there building capabilities. I remember flying over some kind of dragon landscape (sadly removed) that isn't possible in Second Life because of its limited prim and region (actually not limited but its super expensive) count making it the perfect place to build the wildest things and with free upload and no currency (some regions do have them but its externally setup). You can bet your bum off you get a lot of freebees there. Just look at these jaw dropping max prim numbers for example.

Showing Primcount maxed out on Opensim:

God mode?! Blue Names?!

Yes you can become an Linden in your own grid and OSGrid sims.

Showing Names:

God Mod Enabled Message:

In god mode(On Opensim):
You can:
Bypass parcel,region and estate bans
Bypass parcel permissions
Edit any parcel
Force Ownership of objects,parcels and edit there settings
Mess people’s attachments up (grin)
Use extra commands (if setup in OSSL.ini!)
Bypass Damage in Non-Safe regions

With god names you can:

Get an Linden (Blue) name
Have something to brag about in your grid

FAQ:
Q: What is Havok and does it kill opensim
A: Its Linden Lab’s custom physics engine it does affect opensim but does not kill it
Q: What are the dangers of exploring grids in Opensim
A: Exploring unsafe grids may expose your IP and Mac address this however is not an issue people cannot really get much info and your quite safe if u stick with the grids Firestorm has build in!
Q: I see in those screenshots Manikineko Grid what is this?
A: An project i am working
Q: How in the name of Govendor Linden did u get 999999 Max Prims?!
A: Edit the Region.ini file add:
MaxPrims = 99999999
Restart your sim and There you go enough prims to waste your life building anything u ever dreamed
Q: Can I connect Second Life to opensim and/or export/import stuff between them
A: No you cannot connect them, yes you can “Rip” second life stuff and put it in Opensim altough you may get banned for using such applications or worse get an virus!

 Angel Fencer

News and Commentary: Sansar, One Year Later

By Bixyl Shuftan

It was a little more than a year ago that Linden Lab officially opened Sansar, it's "next-generation virtual world which had been in development for over three years, experienced a number of delays, and was the subject of no shortage of speculation by Second Life's residents. My initial impression was that while interesting it's best feature was it's, potential for improvement. Others had a firm thumbs down to the point it couldn't be mentioned in the Second Life Friends Facebook group.

Since then, there have been some improvements to Sansar. Last month, the Lab allowed content creators to sell custom avatars on Sansar's Marketplace. And less than two days later some appeared. As of the writing of this article, there were a total of 43 avatars either available for free or up for sale (some better than others). Among those you can get for free now is the "Draxacoon." The Lab also expanded the number of areas, or "experiences" that residents could have from three to twenty.

There are some visually stunning locations in Sansar. One of the more recent ones is the "Roddenberry Nexus," which according to Inara Pey was launched in August 1. Done by Linden Lab in cooperation with Roddenberry Entertainment, which is run by Eugene Roddenberry, the son of the man who created "Star Trek." Giving it a look, I found it offers more interactivity than previous Sansarbuilds I've seen with a lift that can move you between levels and buttons that when pressed will play recordings, such as one describing the transporter visual effects or the Star Trek Animated Series.

There was also another cooperative build done by the Lab with the help of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Among the most interesting stories I've seen was a video by Draxtor Despress, showing a number of people holding a "Hoverderby" game. These people weren't just looking at Sansar, but interacting.

But there's still plenty to complain about Sansar. Sansar is also a more restrictive place than Second Life. It was widely expected from the begining there would be more restrictions on adult content than Second Life. While I read somewhere at least one builder tinkered with such builds, the most recent set of content guidelines have pretty much stated "no nudity and sex."

Content featuring sexually explicit content and activities, such as pornography, sexual acts, nudity and sexual services, including solicitation and offers for such content, are prohibited.

The Lab does say, "However, in limited educational or scientific contexts, we may make exceptions to these policies in our sole discretion." One example might be the piece of nude artwork Ryan Schultz saw at the Smithsonian art exhibition. But this wasn't the only problem Schultz saw. Even mentioning the names "Sansar," Linden Lab," or "Second Life," on a build could get you in trouble.

Any content or Sansar store listings that contain any references to Linden Lab, Sansar, Second Life, or any other Linden Lab-related terminology that may imply a relationship with, sponsorship, endorsement, or employment by Linden Lab is prohibited. 

So even making a "Sansar" t-shirt would get you a takedown notice from the Lab. And it's not just inworld content as in January, Schultz was asked to remove some pictures, and there appeared to be a problem with the name he was using for his blog at the time, "Sansar Newsblog." Hassling a major source of news about a virtual world you want to get word out about, especially a friendly voice, (and a big source of information for this article) isn't exactly the best of business tactics. And then there's the following line.

Do not upload Content that promotes or could be construed as primarily intended to evade limitations on Prohibited Content.

This line of the Terms of Service certainly leaves a lot to interpretation. Considering the Lab's past behavior, some content creators might decide not to take chances with a certain idea and instead make and sell it on another virtual world. In addition to the lack of a fashion market, this is probably one reason why Sansar has attracted little attention from more than a few bloggers. Though Schultz would say this was a common case of most newer virtual worlds.

For those frustrated by the long time it can take details to rezz in Second Life sims, Sansar can be just as bad or even worse. And there are apparently some problems with buying Sansar dollars in bulk using the "bundle" option.

And of course, while Sansar looks good, it still lacks the interactivity of Second Life and OpsnSim worlds. As it's been stated before, it's like comparing a theme park to a residential area, a nice place to visit, but not one you can virtually live. The examples I've stated are Sansar at it's best. The majority of other "experiences" aren't as good.

For these reasons, the userbase of Sansar remains tiny compared to Second Life. In April, the Newser reported the next-generation virtual world was averaging less than fifty users a day. Schultz went further, saying that the average was never higher than twenty. In fact, the graph he gave showed it was sometimes less than ten per day. For now, it seems stuck at a tiny userbase.

So why has Linden Lab persisted in sticking with Sansar? The question has been raised on whether the Lab has a "cultural shift" away from it's established virtual world to this unpopular newcomer, numbers remained small. Yes, it's normal for a company to want to show off it's latest product. But why leave out it's tried and true moneymaker? Perhaps with the stories about cyber-affairs, incidents like the "flying penis attack" on live TV, being banned from the "Twitch" streaming service due to some of it's sims allowing explicit content, maybe the Lab is feeling it can't really mention Second Life much to a mainstream audience. Another possible reason, with the talk about "safe spaces" at colleges where controversial speech is prohibited, perhaps the Lab is wondering if the next generation is looking less for the ability to express oneself and more about security from what might offend them.

As for the possibility of Linden Lab closing down Second Life anything soon to force it's population to Sansar: not a chance. Near the start of it's development before it even had a name, Will Burns once commented if Linden Lab made such a move, about a third would move onto the new grid, a third to smaller virtual worlds, and a third would give up on virtual worlds altogether. Today, I'd have to say if Linden Lab made such a suicidal move, in my opinion less than five percent would be inclined to move on to Sansar as their primary virtual world. While Linden Lab might survive thanks to it's Blocksworld income, it would be a much smaller company. Of the rest of Second Life's residents, it's my guess about three-fifths would move on to the various smaller virtual worlds, perhaps some moving between two or three to continue to meet up with friends. And the rest would likely give up on anything more than a passing interest in virtual worlds. Even for those who moved, they would most likely not spend as much money. It's one thing to invest money in virtual land and property if you believe the grid will be around for years. But if you're not sure how things will be six months down the road, you may not be so eager to put down that money.

In any event, Sansar is very much a work in progress compared to Second Life, and even the more established Opensim worlds. It still needs at least a year, probably longer, before it can truly stand on it's own. For those who insist Linden Lab should get rid of it, such as one person I talked to who called it "the Edsel of virtual worlds," keep in mind the Edsel was in production for three years before it's makers finally gave up on it. Most likely, it will take longer than that before the Lab decides it's efforts are best spent elsewhere.

Sources: Ryan Schultz (formerly the Sansar Newsblog), Modem World, Sansar , Draxtor Despres, venturebeat.com  

Bixyl Shuftan

InWorldz's Rise and Decline

By Bixyl Shuftan

Four and a half years ago, the future of the InWorldz virtual looked bright. It was growing in terms of both active users and regions, notably a number of residents of Second Life whom were taking an increasing interest in this other grid which while the largest of the OpenSim worlds had remained a distant second place compared to the larger and more established virtual world. Today, InWorldz is facing the end. A statement made by it's owner Beth Reischl stated due to financial troubles, the virtual world's servers would be going down Friday July 27.

So what happened? While the relationship between Linden Lab and it's customers, the residents of Second Life, has always been a little problematic, about four and a half years ago it was worse. This was the "Rod Linden" period in which aside from responding to problems, the Lindens didn't talk much to the residents aside from the occasional statement. They made a number of clumsy moves, such as the 2013 Third-Party Currency Exchanger Ban that was lifted only when there were entire communities talking about leaving Second Life for other places. A few months later was the Content Creator Terms of Service controversy in which a poorly-written change to the Terms of Service in regards to the rights of content creators that with a public already wary of Linden Lab's moves, the result was some seeing the Lab as preparing to sell the content of it's users as it's own, possibly as part of an "exit strategy" of either closing down Second Life or transforming it into a much more tightly controlled place. It's hard to saw how many believed this, but the way Linden Lab had been acting, even those less prone to panic were thinking it could happen.

And so many residents of Second Life began taking a more serious look at the second-largest virtual world around: InWorldz. Tuna Oddfellow closed down his one of a kind performance in the more established virtual world and reopened it in the second-largest. I soon found the free Wingless avatars on InWorldz, then Luskwood was offering to give SL residents on IW a copy of the avatar they purchased on the larger virtual world. The Podex third-party currency exchanger set up shop in InWorldz. While there was already a Relay for Life in InWorldz, it became much larger, an InWorldz-Second Life Connection Center to aid SL residents new to the smaller grid sprang up, there was a meeting to discuss questions about InWorldz in Second Life, and more.

With all the attention on InWorldz, it was time for the Newser to make a small change. Where we once stuck such articles in "Extra," we created a new section, "Other Grids, MMOs, and Games." We would interview the founder of InWorldz. And then there were my virtual neighbors in the Sunweaver/Angel community. Nydia took an interest in the Connection Center, and when it's founder suddenly up and closed it she helped create a new one. The Sunweavers/Angels would also get a couple sims as a "life boat" for our community just in case Linden Lab really did shut down Second Life, still spending most of our time in the established virtual world, but getting to know the new one a little. With all this attention, InWorldz soon reached a total of 100,000 accounts, and it's fifth anniversary party was a happy occasion, that of a small but growing virtual world on the rise.

It's a good question of how things would have turned out for InWorldz had Linden Lab persisted in it's 2013 third-party currency exchanger ban, and if it's blunders in 2015 such as the closing of the SS Galaxy and the near-shutdown of the Grendel's Children mall had happened a year earlier. But even as the smaller virtual world was celebrating the promise of a brighter future, things were already turning around at Linden Lab. In January 2014, Rod Humble stepped down as CEO, and in February Ebbe Altberg took his place. Linden Lab under Altberg became more talkative to people, and among the first things he announced was that the controversial changes in the Terms of Service in regards to content creators would be undone. And in July they were changed to the satisfaction of most.

With the reasons InWorldz was getting more attention now relaxed, residents in Second Life became less inclined to hop over. The Relay for Life would continue to hold events there. But overall attention fell. With Linden Lab announcing the development of their next-generation virtual world Sansar, perhaps attention that would have otherwise been paid to InWorldz by residents of Second Life was focusing there. The Newser itself would continue to pay a little attention to InWorldz, but not as much. The numbers of active users would go up and down some, then in Spring 2015 start a decline that would continue. The number of sims would spike in mid-2015, then start to decline. The decline in sim numbers was slower than the numbers of active users, though. Then InWorldz found itself facing competition not just from Second Life, but another OpenSim world. Kitely grew rapidly in just a few years to become about half InWorldz size in the number of registered users. By 2015, the two grids were about equal, and in 2017 Kitely had become the largest of the OpenSim grids. Another grid, Avination, which was a competitor for the largest OpenSpace world in their early days, was the target of theft by criminals, and then hit by a "catastrophic" data failure that led to it going under in 2017.

InWorldz itself began making some moves that raised more than a few questions. This had begun early on when in August 2013 their General Discussion forums were closed, citing an increased activity of trolling and hateful posts that was taking time and effort to moderate them away from their activities in keeping up the grid. In April 2017, they announced they would no longer publish their statistics of how many regions or active users they had. And to a number, this was a signal the grid was in decline, and the owner wasn't sure how to stop it other than hide it. Reischl was distancing InWorldz from other OpenSim worlds, insisting it wasn't really one, "InWorldz has moved on from Opensim a long time ago," and seemed to be saying she was no longer publicizing the statistics because of an "us vs them" attitude there.

In January, Hypergrid Business published an article saying merchants in InWorldz were becoming concerned about the grid's future. "...we have seen a drastic decline in sales and residents," one merchant told Hypergrid, requesting anonymity saying he was concerned about possibly being banned. An "InWorldz Chamber of Commerce" had been set up in fall 2016 "To help promote in-world commercial activity, and to collectively advocate on behalf of their interests." But their director expressed disapointment in her meetings with Reischl, Hypergrid reporting, "She said it was not her job to keep merchants or residents in InWorldz." The article also stated, "Residents have also complained on social media that the founders haven’t been paying attention to their concerns. Of the top managers, owner Reischl moved to Panama and founder and CTO David Daeschler has mostly moved on to other projects." Another resident commented that early on, "one of the best things about IW was the fact that it was so easy to talk to the founders on the forum and they actually listened to us and gave us feedback it made IW feel like a community." But now it was looking more and more like how she saw Second Life at the time she joined InWorldz.

As of the writing of this article, Reischl has launched a Gofundme that was initially stated as having the goal of trying to save InWorldz. But then after most of the money needed to reach the goal was reached, the objective changed from trying to save the grid to packing up to move to another grid. The result has been confusion and some anger, and eventually comments on the Gofundme disabled. And then donations were no longer being accepted. One complication of getting the facts about the situation is that one major source of news about InWorldz, Hypergrid Business, is not particularly liked by the virtual world's owner, "InWorldz has repeatedly complained about unfavorable coverage"

Either way, things look poor for the future of InWorldz. If the grid is saved with the intention of keeping it up, the near-shutdown will make it a challenge to do so. If instead the place is closed with it's staff forming a new Grid, they will essentially be starting all over again, along with anyone who goes with them. Not everyone wants to start all over again, even if they could take most of their things with them. One recalls the virtual world "There" which reopened a couple years after it closed, but has been a tiny shadow of it's former self. Also, not all of the content creators are happy with the idea of their goods being moved to another grid without their consent, so there is the possibility of legal action.

Where InWordz's residents go from here, judging from the comments I've read at least some will be sticking around, either in InWorldz or whatever grid takes its place. But others have expressed that from their point of view, the place they have known is finished. Where they go from here is speculation. It's a fair guess some will head to Second Life, especially those with friends and other ties there. Others will move on to Kitely, the virtual world that overtook InWorldz to be the largest OpenSim world. Perhaps some will move onto smaller OS worlds, or start their own for themselves and close friends. Some will have lost heart in virtual worlds alltogether, either taking a break before going back, or for good. And those with a lot of friends who go different directions may likely end up splitting their time between where they go, whether Second Life, another virtual world, an MMO, etc.

As a resident of Second Life whose main interest in virtual worlds has always been here, to me InWorldz was a smaller cousin of the virtual world I knew. It was place with a less of the hustle and bustle of the more established virtual world. There was less of a variety of things to buy, but I eventually found an avatar I was happy with. And if somehow Second Life went away, InWorldz would be there as a place me and my friends could continue to meet up. Now, it is going away, at best becoming something smaller and different from what we have known. It is an irony that a few years ago, a number of us were thinking Second Life was about to close down and were seeing InWorldz as our next home. Now, we watch as instead for all of our problems we are still afloat, while the place we were considering moving to is sinking. While perhaps someday there may be another virtual world that will take the place of Second Life, InWorldz isn't it.

Sources: InWorldz, Hypergrid Business, Gofundme

Bixyl Shuftan

A Look at VR Chat

By Bixyl Shuftan

Several months ago, Linden Lab announced the release of it's "next generation virtual world" Sansar. Anticipated for two years, the reaction from most Second Life residents, who were presumably the far majority who explored it, was that it needed plenty of improvement and left it behind. There are other virtual worlds out there, such as InWorldz and High Fidelity. But these two have been around for some years and have yet to attract anywhere near the attention the largest virtual world has received. But are there any other new ones out there besides Linden Lab's new creation? The answer to that is yes. One other recent one is VR Chat.

VR Chat was created by Graham Gaylor and Jesse Joudrey, and was released via the Steam distribution service on Feb 1, 2017. But it's been in recent weeks the virtual world has taken off, an article in PC Games News in mid-January saying the client software had been downloaded over a million times in two weeks to 1.7 million. The reason for the attention the game has received is due to players broadcasting experiences over Youtube and Twitch. This includes recordings of the "Ugandan Knuckles" meme (some profanity in videos in link) that caught on to the point players found themselves followed by bands of badly-made avatars of the red "Sonic" character asking in African accents if they know "de wey." While the meme is considered lame by many (including yours truly), the publicity has gotten VR Chat the kind of publicity that has escaped most other virtual worlds other than Second Life.

To download VR Chat, head to it's page on Steam. The software is free. Clicking it on, you'll need to register an account. After your email address is added, and you agree to the terms of service, you should be ready to go in. Your first place will be a tutorial area to help you learn how to get about. For me, the most challenging part was just getting started, not being able to move from where I appeared. Then I realized that unlike Second Life, the movement keys are not the arrow buttons on the keyboard, but the WASD ones. You move your mouse to look around.

Another important button is the "Esc" key, which brings up a menu with 11 buttons and a sliding bar. You can adjust the bar for how loud you want to sound to others when you're speaking on your microphone. The two buttons I was using the most were "Worlds" which brings up lists of places you can travel to, and "Avatar" which allows you to change your appearance from a selection. Most of the choices in the Avatar section were varieties of normal human or robots, with a few others such as an elf, an orc, and what looked like a greenish anthro deer.

Unlike Sansar, you can actually grasp things. Just get your hand close enough, and press the left mouse button. You can hold an object for a while, and even hold and fire a pistol. I found throwing balls to be tricky, though. The only way I could throw something with some reliability was to swing the mouse upward and then let go, and the object would go some distance in the air. Different objects seem to have different weights as one "frisbee" would keep going up while a solid block only went up a few feet before falling back. You can also grab a pen and draw something. Unlike Second Life, you can't really add objects to your avatar indefinitely. If you want to hold anything else, you'll have to drop what you're holding.

After the tutorial area, your next location, and the one you'll appear when logging on the game is "The Hub." The place is divided into several areas. At "Featured Worlds," there are portals to several places. "New Worlds" has a few more of recently made locations. The "Help Area" has a number of signs with hints on getting about. The "Social Sculpture" is basically a blue square with several blocks which anyone can try to make something. There's also an avatar area with hints on how to change yours and a mirror to show you what you look like.

To travel to another place, you can use a portal if where you're already at has one to where you want to go. Otherwise, press the "Esc" key and select "Worlds" on the menu. You'll see several lists, which you can move about on using the arrow buttons. Once you select a world, you have the option of teleporting over, or you can create a temporary portal that those nearby such as friends can follow you over. Places can sometimes be small, such as a "Sword Art Online" one that turned out to be just a single room.

But most VR Chat worlds I saw were much bigger. One was a representation of Times Square, filled with parody ads and ads for locations. There was also a place that looked like an European village. Another place was made of floating islands in the sky. I also saw some gaming areas. One was a "Wild West" game between outlaws and sheriffs in which the latter would try to stop the former from taking the gold bars in various places back to their hideout with both shooting at one another. There was also a space-themed capture-the-flag. I also saw two maze games, one with simple walls, the other an underground cavern passages maze. There was also a small island done in the style of "Minecraft." I saw a listing to, but never visited, a "My Little Pony" area.

But the most common types of locations I saw advertised themselves as places to get avatars. Despite the "Ugandan Knuckles" fad, I never saw any of the deformed red Sonic avatars. In the several places I looked, amine girl and various cartoon avatars seem the most popular. But these aren't the only ones. A friend was able to appear in a "Windows 95" avatar. One time in "The Hub," I saw a guy that looked like a fish in a TV screen. To chose a look in one of the avatar places, click on it. But the look is temporary. After you log off, you'll go back to your old look. So if you want something other than the starting avatars, you will have to go back to the place after logging in.

Both worlds and avatars take programs outside VR Chat to make. Unity SDK can be used to create avatars and worlds. Avatars can also be created with Maya and Blender. Created worlds are private, limited to the creator and any friends he wishes to bring in, until the creator contacts VR Chat's team and requests that it be made open to all.

So far, meeting people there has been much like meeting people in a Second Life welcome area. Only instead of chat, it's all voice as there is currently no chat function. If you have a working microphone, press and hold "V" to talk. Besides a couple friends from Second Life whom helped show me around, different people reacted in different ways. One was helpful. One just wanted to curse at everyone else he saw. Most just went about their business or chatted with someone willing to talk. So far the only one who pulled that "Show me da wey," line was in a mummy avatar, not the deformed Sonic character. But you won't always run into someone, particularly during late night and early morning SL time.

Like Sansar, VR Chat is new, having been around only for a year. It's not as versatile as Second Life. And there's no economy, no trading or virtual currency. On the other hand, it's my personal observation it's more lively than Sansar. I remember reading that someone else who was both in Sansar and VR Chat stated Sansar felt more "managed." Hamlet Au (Wagner Au) was quoted in Motherboard as saying the focus Sansar had for high-quality images wasn't necessarily what was wanted, "Many also seem to be putting the cart before the horse. Carefully laying down an economic infrastructure when there’s hardly anyone there to use the economy. ... Most gamers don’t care about all that. They just want to jump in immediately, start playing around with the system, cause and enjoy chaos, and have fun with each other.”

Although VR Chat got plenty of attention due to a silly meme, it also made news when something serious happened. In one crowded room in which someone was recording, one player was witnessed having a seizure. Most stood around, not sure what to do, with one person telling others to back away to give the person room to recover and asking no flashing lights be used, and with one or two people clowning around like they didn't notice what was going on. Eventually the person recovered and logged off.

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(Click here if the video fails to play)

Personally, VR Chat seems to be better than Sansar, but it's no Second Life. It lacks the versatility of the more established virtual world. Right now, thanks to youtubers and a meme, it's riding a wave of popularity that has enabled to give it numbers that Sansar and others like High Fidelity wish for. But will the people stay once the novelty wears off? Second Life gained a community of dedicated users that stuck around once the media all but stopped talking about it. How VR Chat develops over time will help determine wether not people stay. Perhaps some of those there who start to tire of the memes but still have a taste for virtual worlds will head to the one that still has a sizeable following after almost fifteen years.

Wikipedia, PC Game News, Polygon, Motherboard, Rogue Shadow

Image Credit (bottom): Rakucia

Hat Tip: Skylark Lefavre, Rakucia

Bixyl Shuftan

More on Sansar

 By Bixyl Shuftan

On Monday July 31, Linden Lab finally opened it's new virtual world of Sansar. After visiting two of it's locations, my initial impression was the place had promise, but still needed a lot of work. Afterwards, I decided to look a little more for a better overall impression.

I would visit several more locations. One was highlighted in the Sansar Atlas: "Orgin Cinema 360." A second I had heard about in preview articles, "NASA  Apollo Museum" by LOOT Interactive. Two were from Maxwell Graf, "Respite" and "Rustica," the latter which was part of a preview video. Another was "Chess" by Lillani. Two more looked like places by less experienced builders, "Driveable UFO Bumper Cars" and the "Freebies Museum." And I decided to check the place done by SL video maker Draxtor Despress, "114 Harvest," and check Luskwood once again.

Of these four, the NASA  Apollo Museum I found to be the most impressive. There was a video screen with footage about the Apollo program, a display of a Saturn V rocket lying on the floor on it's side, and a display showing the path of the astronauts of the Apollo 11 mission took. For a someone interested in the space program, this would be very cool. Another detailed place was the "Orgin Cinema 360," which was described as a former arch-villain's lair now converted to more peaceful use. The center area was a 3-D panorama movie view, and stepping out, there was a detailed circular walkway. There was one moving object, a camera, that panned around. Below me were fans that whirled around.

They looked good. But as a Second Life resident, I couldn't help but notice what they didn't have. There was no interactivity. There were seats at the Orgin Cinema, but you could not sit down. You were limited to inside the movie area and the walkway, and that was it. While there were objects in the distance, you could not get to them. Orgin Cinema also took quite a bit of time to load, much more than a normal teleport in Second Life. And while the Apollo area looked great, unlike Second Life, you couldn't click on something for more information.

Maxwell Graf's "Respite" and "Rustica" had more room to walk around, and "Respite" had a very detailed,building, with a "rustic" look, the sound of a crackling fireplace. But you couldn't get up the stairs, and the sound of the fire was constant until you got some distance away from the dwelling, and then it was completely gone. I was about to walk around a while, but eventually I came to the end of the island. But once I got too far into the water, I "fell" down into some gray abyss. Rustica was a huge area of mountains and valleys. It looked less  like a detailed build and more about demonstrating how big an area in Sansar could get.

"Driveable UFO Bumper Cars" and "Chess" were small demonstations of what limited capacity for interactivity Sansar has at the moment. The first place was a gridlike driving area with several saucer shaped simple vehicles one could hop in by walking up to them, and pressing the "1" button. One could then "drive" the saucer by walking/pushing at it from the inside. I did notice it was possible to flip over the edge if you hit it hard enough, and pushing further, you would fall off into the abyss. After a few moments, you would respawn back to where you first appeared. With "Chess" it was possible to push against the pieces and move them. But when I tried to move one, I ended up moving a few, knocking over one. And there was no way to pick it back up.

Two places I haven't seeing on the Sansar viewer atlas after the first day were it's Luskwood area and "114 Harvest" by Draxtor Despres. I contacted Tengu Yamabushi in Second Life about the area that had seemed little more than a simple rocky savana. He told me Linden Lab had taken it down temporarily, "Seems you're not supposed to use a logo for the thumbnai. Who knew? ... Supposedly there's a policy, somewhere, that says the thumbnail has to be an in-experience screenshot, and no logos. Of course, not knowing that, I created a bog-standard-template world. And since it had no unique content, then, (I) just slapped a LW logo on it.  My bad."

And why couldn't I see it in the atlas if it was back up? Tengu told me about one big problem with the viewer atlas, "It's very easy to miss in the Atlas. There's new stuff accumulating in there and there seems no way to filter/search for anything." Still, he had been doing a little more work on the place, "We have a tree now! : It's not much of a tree, but it's a tree. It's a 'Charlie Brown Christmas' (style) 'Luskwood' tree." When I was able to take a look later, there was a larger tree with stone stairs leading to a platform on it.

Draxtor has emerged as a supporter of Sansar, helping Linden Lab with recent promition videos. So I was interested to see what his place was like. But I couldn't see "114 Harvest" on the viewer atlas. Then I saw on the Moni's World blog an address to the place. Taking a look at the Sansar website, there was a search bar on it's atlas that was missing in the viewer. So I was able to locate a location that I had heard the location of.

Checking "114 Harvest," I found myself in front of a house in the suburbs a car having the license place "DRAXTOR."  The front door was open, so I went in, and the only door inside open was the one to the basement which had a sign "First Lifers Keep Out." Downstairs was a couch in front of a TV playing one of his "Fluffee" videos from a few years ago, with a small radio room connecting. Back out of the house, I decided to look around, and fell through a hole of come kind, falling into the gray underneath. Down there was a rubber ball I could push around. The only form of interaction I had at the place.

In short, Sansar has a lot of potential, but there's not much to attract your run of the mill Second Life user. One big disadvantage is it's not that easy to hold events there. Tengu felt it's appeal would be limited among his fellow Luskwooders, "I'm not really sure how it will turn out.  We at Luskwood aren't really interested in 'experiences', we're first and foremost a community.  And I'm not sure how well the Sansar platform fits an online community. Two particulars: live music and collaborative builds, Primtionary, specifically. No way to do either right now in Sansar."

It should be noted Second Life was much different from how it is now to how it was on day one, or even how it was when it was a few years old from day one. It used to be everyone had to pay just to have an account or even to rezz a prim. Teleporting was once possible only through teleport hubs, and when you did it could be a mess with everything up your backside. It would be a long time before there was anything other than human avatars available. Second Life, while good, needed to be better. And eventually it was.

As for how many will use it? That's a question only time will answer. But when Second Life came around, there were only a handful of other virtual worlds that were unknown to most. Today, it's fair to say the majority with computers have at least heard of Second Life. So why aren't more using it? Perhaps it's bad publicity or it's not the kind of virtual experience they want, which Linden Lab seems to be thinking. Or maybe most computer users aren't that interested in virtual worlds that don't involve blowing something up.

So Sansar may just end up a much smaller alternative grid like InWorldz, with a few people and making it's owners a little money, but not much. Time will tell.

Sources: Moni's World 

Bixyl Shuftan