As the year in Second Life tumbles towards December 31, 2010, like a griefercube spinning and screaming towards the edge of the map, our thoughts naturally look ahead to what the metaverse will bring us in 2011. This year was, without a doubt, turbulent for this particular piccolo pixelated planet (sorry): massive layoffs at the Lab, fewer benefits for educational users, obvious deep flaws in the official viewer, a third-party viewer fooferah (AKA, “Emeraldgate”), and — on a personal note — the sale of my Bay City lands and my exit from that unique community. I think I can speak for other SLers when I say that I’d like 2011 to be the bearer of good tidings for weary avatars.
So for the year 2011, here are my predictions, and don’t hold me to any of this, because I’m full of crap. Mesh import will finally arrive… but only for authorized content creators. Mesh will mean scenery loads more slowly, but only if they’re used irresponsibly. And that means that it’s one tool that Linden Lab will never release to the general population. Expect drama.
A blazing-fast, web-based viewer will finally be available to trial accounts only. It takes a lot of server-side hardware to run a web-based browser, so I seriously doubt they could let everyone use it. For the rest of us, five frames per second.
New 3-D viewer support. In an effort to tap into the 3-D craze in movies and television, Second Life will offer a stereo-image viewer that works with 3-D capable graphics cards. A third-party viewer will emerge that offers the same thing, but for red-blue glasses or just crossing your eyes.
Large prims. FINALLY we will be able to edit prims to sizes greater than ten meters, making those old hacked megaprims by Gene Replacement obsolete.
Loss of physics. To save money, a cash-strapped Linden Lab will stop paying for a software license for the Havok 4 physics engine, and they will be forced to remove it from the product. Bouncing avatar parts, however, will receive the highest developer attention, and we will be sure to finally see this important feature in the official viewer. In 3-D.
Linden Lab will be acquired by a Facebook app developer. Second Life will become the next Farmville.
G-rated avatars. In an effort to make the world more suitable for the sudden influx of teens (Teen SL being shut down, of course), an underwear layer will be enforced. As the top clothing layer. Tighty-whities and t-shirts for all!
Censored open chat. All chat will be run against a blacklist of unacceptable words and phrases to ensure that nothing unpleasant is ever said out loud. Sorry, but adults must refrain from discussing adult topics openly. Swear words will be replaced with “HIPPOS!”
Enforced use of real names. At sign up, you will be required to provide proof of your identity, and your real name will be displayed above your avatar. The rest of your personal information will be stored securely in a database that will be accidentally sold to advertisers. Oops.
Gambling. We all cheered when region-choking casinos finally faded away and died. 2011 will not only bring them back, but this time they’ll come with Linden dollar incentives to the owners of the busiest casinos. Philip Linden’s slot machine is about to make a huge comeback. Dingdingdingdingdingdingding!
Linden Lab will be acquired by Digg. Users will suddenly no longer be allowed to upload, and Digg Life™ will allow sponsored content only. Expect lots of Flash ads in the viewer.
Advertising in the audio stream. This amazing revenue-generator adds audio advertising to the viewer. There is no volume slider.
Privatization of the mainland. As the population and revenue shrinks, it becomes unfeasible to keep so many mainland regions online, so the Lab will have to either shut them down and displace their residents or transfer ownership to private hands at a discount. Private landowners will be free to expel current residents and repurpose the regions as casinos.
Linden Lab will be acquired by Apple and rebranded iLife. You will be able to buy avatar clothing and gadgets at the App Store, but they’ll only work on one device.
Pay-per-use charges for connection. I really shouldn’t give the Lab ideas, should I?
That’s it for now. Honestly, I see a bright future ahead.
Cubey! Do NOT give these ideas to the Lab.
Mr. Mariner may have something to say about who is full of crap.
Anyway… you have some scary ideas. Knowing what a nutter old Rosedale is, is exactly what makes your ideas so scary. So i give you this: 2010 saw the return of Miss Laetizia Coronet to the grid after two years of absence.
So 2011 can only be better.
It took me a long time to overcome Sturgeon’s Law and rise from 90% to 100% crap, and even longer to admit it.
I salute you, Cubey-Not-Cubey!
-ls/cm
I’m fairly interested in how well Rod Humble will do as LL’s new CEO. He’s done some good work with the Sims 3.
Eeek! Let’s hope Humble never reads your blog!
You, sir, are a scary person :)
Cheers and happy 2011!
Hmm. Good idea. I’ll just forward a link to this post directly to him. I’ve got other great revenue-generating ideas too. How about a dollar per teleport, billed directly to your credit card? :D
oh hippos… The future is full of hippos! What the hippos!
(and now I feel bad for talking like that haha)
Happy new year :D
Watch your language, Miyoko. ;)
/me bursts out laughing! Nice.
(/)
^ ^
If SL goes teen in a big way, there goes SL into the trash heap. Teens, trained to expect AVATAR movie standards, will hee haw loudly at the crappy avatar shapes now running around. When bare behinds are square, so is the site.
The fact is that without extensive sexual interaction, SL would effectively close. Outside the sex places, SL is already a ghost town. Too late to sell SL aompany, almost too late to fix it, the SL leadership got an uphill drag now to get into the 21st Century human animations. Otherwise, SL will have new folks in the 3-months-and-out bag. Besides, who wants to go new into SL and be nastily attacked by the old hands… bye bye SL.
Adult-oriented locations account for a very small fraction of Second Life content, so I seriously doubt your assertions with that respect. If you spend most of your time only in adult-oriented sims, then you probably don’t get to see much else. I’d advise you to get out more, meet more people outside of Zindra. It sounds like you’re missing out on the best SL has to offer.