Kopi Creations

See you at www.workingtribe.com

2007-08-22T15:32:00.000+08:00

This blog, kopicreations.blogspot.com, shall be halted as we moving to providing bigger services and design creations. I'll be continuing our articles and services on the parent website at www.workingtribe.com . :)

Please bear with us as we update and revamp www.workingtribe.com .

Halting of Online Gambling inworld triggers mass hysteria

2007-07-27T19:17:00.000+08:00

Following the decision to ban online gambling by Linden Lab, a friend in-world told me of wide spread demonstrations and protest. I went around casinos and banks to check out the seriousness of the situation and to take some shots of the demonstrations.

This sudden decision to apply ban to inworld gambling should be based on the US government's decision to restrict online gambling, hence triggering Linden's decision to impose a ban on the numerous casinos site that had sprouted out all over the world.

Casinos who were once experiencing high traffic and hit rates had by now become grounds for protest and demonstration gathering places. Casino owner hastily put up notices on ceasing and halting of operations. Overnight, these once value 3D assets became virtually worthless empty shells.

I had a chance to interview a casino owner on this issue. No doubt virtual commodities and assets are one of the profitable area in the virtual world, he feels that the economy in Secondlife is propelled by the online gambling and pornography industry. Hence the clamping down on one of such pillar will defintely affect the virtual economy. Well, for what I see in world, I can't help but to agree with him on the last statement. The virtual economy in SL is definetly powered by the 2 pillars that he mentioned.

With that in mind, I went off to my favorite virtual investment bank site, JT Financial, to have a glimpse of what is going on. Wow, by the time I got to the location, there were many avatars congregating around the bank lobby. The shot that I took only covers a small section of the crowd.

The owner of the virtual bank was there answering angry questions and trying to pacify the crowds. It seems that there was a mad rush by the crowd to withdraw money from the bank's ATM machines. While I was there I saw avatar teleporting and walking into the scene and headed towards the numerous ATM machines in the lobby. They were withdrawing their investment funds from the machines. I caught up with one such avatar who withdrew every linden dollar he had from his investment account. He was phobic that the virtual economy may crash pretty soon and was afraid that the virtual banks might be affected, and hence imposed some kind of restriction on withdrawal limits.

Personally I feel that Linden's decision to halted all inworld gambling may be a little too extreme as any such sudden decision will defintely affect other areas of the virtual economy. Although I am not a gambler, casinos in SL are some of the most innovative and interesting virtual places to visit. As in online gambling sites on the internet, casino owners and developers are pretty innovative in how they use the lsl scripting language, with account connection to servers out of the virtual world and simulation of slot machines, etc. The degree of innovation by these developers is simply amazing.

However from a much higher view point, I am quite impress with how the virtual economy had developed to. Over time, this virtual economy had began to mirror the real world economy in most aspect and industry, and how each industry becomes interrelated with each other.

One night in Bangkok makes the hard man humble

2007-06-24T18:18:00.000+08:00

So much for virtual sims in far away Austria.

Flying around and visiting other people's sims can be much fun, and I managed to find something closer to home, ... Bangkok!

The street texture is fantastic, the creator must had visited the old city, taking shots of Tuk-tuk taxis and the crowded and untidy city scape, with its massive amount of signboards and high flying, criss-crossing wire cables all over. Nothing bad about that, as this gives Bangkok that authetic genuine feel and smell of a old city. The characteristics that is unique to that city by the river.

Notice the textures for the streets are pretty well done, with the some of the buildings in Bangkok's Chinatown textured to simulate buildings of the distant past and some textured to simulate godowns and warehouses of the non so distant past. The creator throws in a mix of billboards with labels such as Ajisen and KFC. A distance down this street, the creator even simulates a broken telephone post, with the sparking electic shoot-out and the zipping sound.

Towards a corner of the sim, took some shots of the royal palace. The palace comes with the distinct multiple roof that ends in sharp pointer corner unique to Thai architectures.

The interior of the palace.

I can see patience in the creator as he or she tries to create this statue.

Overall, I'll give this sim a very high rating, as I feel that the look and feel of Bangkok is recreated in this sim. Very well done indeed.

Österreich! Austria Island

2007-06-05T23:43:00.000+08:00

Since my travel to Salzburg in the fall of 2005, I have such a pleasant impression of the country. Needless to say, I was quite delighted to visit the virtual Austria sim and took some photos of the places inworld.

Austria sim seems to be made up of several islands that are joined together. I didn't really visited the entire sim, and spent most of my time on the most eye catching island. Here we have the largest ferris wheel, that I had seen inside SL. The carriage are very well modelled and textured. This island contains some built-up with store fronts, and exhibition halls, a corporate like building and of course, what sim can be complete without an auditorium. The ferris wheel sits right in the middle, and provides a good and attractive landmark to whoever that flies near to this sim.

The outlook of the auditorium is very well designed. With the some of the sitting space half in the open and half inside the building. Err.. at least that is the feel I get when I sat inside. I like the architect's visualisation of the building. The colours of the building takes into consideration the colours of the Austrian national flag... and again, it seems like most building designers in SL incorporate the use of glass panels quite extensively in their design.

The entrance to the Auditorium.

With the holiday mood still in full swing, I did a search and found that there is a Salzburg sim as well. Ah! I'll cover that on another day then. The sound of music can wait a while...

Time to take a rest.

working... digging... building... texturing... scripting...

2007-06-05T12:18:00.000+08:00

Not much updates these days, since I spent quite a huge amount of time working in RL, and building inside SL. Project development is coming up to a most interesting peak... and I spent most of my non-working time inworld, creating contents for groups and organisations that are using the virtual world for branding, hubbing and product development. Cool... new concept new world, new frontier, just like when the internet had just started. Most organisations at that time, didn't really know what to do with the internet.

But precisely it is these few weeks of hectic work in RL, and then on returning home, the tight deadline work inworld (plus the assortment tasks of house chores), that impressed on me the interesting combination of working in a real world and at the same time, to inter-persed the free time in between the real world life and work with more communication, events and work in a totally virtual world. I feel like an expatriate, operating in a totally new environment, and offering my skillsets, creativity, advices, jokes, life, to other expatriates, in this new and strange land. Interesting. It does feels good to be a FT as well. LOL!

Well but work is work, I sneaked off once a while to look at interesting places and what others are building in their virtual islands, back gardens, and countyards. I'll cover these in the coming few posts.

Oh, I actually didn't noticed the comment in my previous post from Ms Ching-Yi Liao who is doing a course in Aston University in UK. She has a survey at http://my3q.com/home2/168/ilmiriam/1201.phtml .

If you have time to, and are a virtual world inhabitant, please visit her survey and help her out a bit.

Thanks. :)

Imperial Russian Power

2007-05-30T01:21:00.000+08:00

As I took a short break from my project and flew off to a island to take reference on their design, I accidentally stumbled on this half complete island by a Russian design firm that attempts to model and simulate Russia's old glorious past.

What glorious past can it be for an old imperial power like Russia if its ironclads aren't showcased? The creator attempts to model the ship Bapar, or is it Baprt (can't read the horizontally flipped R in Baprt). Anyway, I thought the modelling and texture wasn't really expertly done. But the final effect of putting everything together in scale, brings the ship up to a certain visually appealing state. The creator can enhanced it by adding lights and lots of signal flags to make more realistic.

And of course, since the Russian Navy is being modelled, how can one missed out the popular Russian sub-surface warriors.

Start of Project

2007-05-22T02:52:00.000+08:00

Yes, I am starting on Tropical's first, big time island project. No longer a small, 1 or 2 resident's house or club house, this project will be an island scale project for a local company's island in SL.

From concept to building, to refining, and in the latter part, scripting, the project shall span over a month, and should end sometime in mid of June. This also means that I shall temporary halt the renovation works at the Xin Pa Sat. Interestingly, it is also at this point in time that I have a couple of SL residents, enquiring on the possibility of holding stalls in Xin Pa Sat. Ha! The future seems great for that area.

Ah, as for the current project, I can't really elaborate on the building and the content as it is confidential to the company. But I do believe that this will be big and certainly will put in much effort to create a difference in this project, with respect to the other project I had taken, and also seen others built.

On Sculpture and Monuments

2007-05-15T02:35:00.000+08:00

There seems to be an increasing number of sculptures created in SL. With models that take on much more complex and demanding shapes and angles. This statue of a greek or roman or spartan soldier guards the front patio of an office building block. In fact, it seems to be facing (you can see from this camera angle) the main building in this sim.

Most of the sculptures are created with simple elongated, or deformed sphere objects. Some are twisted in a way so as to achieve a spiral kind of effect.

We are expanding and rebuilding!

2007-05-11T01:16:00.000+08:00

Yes! We are expanding! The trial run and test for the marketplace concept and the content creation concept is over. We are going full out into SL now.

Just bought a couple more plots to expand and increase our holdings. I'm currently working on a new design, as well as to hook up our SL simulation to our new backend support system. We will be bringing more feature into SL soon.

Memorial

2007-05-05T01:02:00.000+08:00

Capitol Hill Sim

2007-04-17T02:06:00.000+08:00

I am standing in the parliament area in the Capitol Hill sim. Very nicely done. The textures must had been taken from real life photographs. This simulation seems to take on the role of a museum, with text and sign posts distributed all over the place to describe the various areas within Capitol Hill.

Moving out of the building, the exterior is nicely done. With the builder leaving some parts empty to give it a natural look and shine. As you walk along the lush meadows, into the columns of trees, towards the coast,... one can't help but felt a sense of peace and serenity in the sim. The next time you visit the place, leave the pavement and walkways. Take a walk, explore the greeny. There are many easter eggs and historical monuments (I think so... should be historial pieces, anyway I know nothing about american history.) in the fields.

One Arm Bandit!

2007-04-15T23:47:00.000+08:00

It is really interesting to note the high volume of casinos and gambling establishment that set up shop in SL with each passing week. Some are probably company owned, with vast setup and elaborate decorations, while some others seems to be small time player, with specific focus on a narrow range of games.

I came across this one at a location that was sent to me by a SL friend in world. A small casino this is, probably over a land plot of 1024sqm. Despite its small size, and limited space for setting up gambling stations, the vast number of avatar present seems to imply a good traffic hit stat with respect to the land size.

I had a series run with the wall-mounted jackpots as was shown in the picture. Ahhh... no, I am not that rich, so I had to content myself with testing out the cheapest, and 2nd cheapest, machines (that is, the one at the bottom right corner and the bottom 2nd from the left corner). After a series of tries, I began to see a pattern forming... yes, a predictable series of patterns in the "random" results of that these virtual machines had conjured up.

Let me elaborate on the patterns that I picked up... take for instance the machine located at the bottom, 2nd from the left corner. The machine accepts L$20 dollars from the player with each push of the button.

With the first push of the button, the machine returns a result of L$20+$10, which means the player earns back the L$20 and gets an additional L$10. The 2nd push of the button will increase the winning streak further, and gives a result of L$20+L$20. Interesting... L$30 at the oush of 2 buttons!... the player should be completely psy-ed up at this stage for more. The 3rd push of the button starts chapter 1 of the real story... the result shows a L$0+L$10. The player effectively loses $10. The 4th push will show a L$0+L$0, the user loses his 20... the 5th and the 6th push will produce somewhat the same series of results, with the player losing L$10, L$5, respectively. There seems to be a slowdown in the lost of stake. The 7th and 8th round will start the winning streak again, effectively letting the player win back his losses right up till the point where the money in the inventory shows a "amount before you hit the button for the first time" - L$10. The next 10, 20, or even 100 times of button pressed will not bring any winning or losing, with the result always showing either a L$20+L$0, or L$10+L$10, or a L$0+L$20. Thus letting the player earn back the L$20 he/she pays into the machine for the press of the button each time.

Thus, the machine effectively wins a L$10 from the player.

I am able to replicate this same amount of pattern from the machine at the bottom left corner. I see the brillance in the creator of these jackpot machines, in that the creator is able to draw a L$10 from each player who happen to chance upon this jackpot station, and takes up the challenge with each of these machines. Say an average player were to try 3 of the machines, and given the sheer volume of unsuspecting avatars prowling around the casino floor everyday, I have this strange nudging feeling that the creator is obscenely rich by now.

So no matter if you are in RL or SL, the one arm bandit remains as it is... the one arm bandit.

Mercedes SL

2007-04-10T00:02:00.000+08:00

I had heard from my German friend that Mercedes is setting up a "branch office" in SL for advertising and marketing purposes, some time ago. But I have not had the time and opportunity to visit their island. Gradually, my curiosity died down and I had forgotten about paying them a visit.... until I came across a slick, gleaming, jet black C-Class, parked by the side of the road in Lion City, the Singapore sim. Goodness! It is beautifully done and simulated in SL.

With my curiosity regaining, I do a simple search and paid their island a visit. Wow... they seem to be promoting the C-Class. I tried my hand at test driving one through their winding circuit. The exterior and interior is beautifully done, but then again, the SL physics engine does has its limitations.

Ahhh! Don't think I will ever get the chance to drive a C-Class anytime soon in real life. Will probably settle for my virtual C-Class after I clear the current series of projects. I wonder do they come in bright red or yellow.

New Avatar

2007-04-05T23:51:00.000+08:00

I've finally manage to squeezed out some time from my real life work commitments, to create my new avatar. This is my second avatar, a male form with Asian looking features. Much more realistic than the previous avatar that is in the form of a slender female beauty.

Thanks to a fellow SL buddy of mine, I manage to get some Asian looking clothes from Bare Rose. Wow, they do have a HUGE collection over there at their island sim store. I highly recommend anybody who wants something exotic-ly Asian to search for their store in the search engine.

Ahhh! This feels better. We will have fun with this new avatar.

Creating Tropical

2007-03-27T16:11:00.000+08:00

Finally got a breather from work and activities to start creating my own office layout. Tropical occupies the end of the 1st storey of Xin Pa Sat. Fronted by a reception desk, the messenger system allows fellow avatars to reach me through email or stored instant messages when I am not in-world.

Our mission statement and portfolio is displayed on the wall behind.

Just a small meeting table and some chairs in the middle and we will be done.

Studio Hub.

2007-03-26T19:32:00.000+08:00

Yesh. The mall and swimming pool project is up and delivered. Great start for my online, virtual, reno cum design cum construction initiative. It is amazing how fast the world moves,... 3 years ago, who would have thought such possibilites are existed.

Anyway, on to the next project. This time it is a studio. Will release more details of it upon nearing completion of the project.

Cheers... more to come.

Tropical 1st Project : Watersoul Mall and Dance Club.

2007-03-21T22:08:00.001+08:00

I am proud to annouce that Tropical's 1st project, the Watersoul club, will be up and running soon. Built with fengshui and water flowing features, Watersoul is currently a 2 storey virtual club, residing on 2 512sqm virtual real estate, set in an fast developing area where hotels and commercial entities are currently taking shape.

The club is owned by a Singaporean SLifer, who wants to start his own happening club in SL. Flanked by large glass pieces and 2 streaks of huge curtains bearing the club's motif at the 1st storey entrance, this level will feature a mall whereby virtual merchandise shall be marketed and displayed. The merchadising theme leaning towards fashion, avatars, and body decorations. As in the pic, the entire rear wall is a water feature, with the water flowing down from the swimming pool on the 2nd storey. The water is directed under the glass flooring titles to the front portion of the building where it is filtered and treated before being recycled back into the pool.

The 2nd story of the club will be where all the actions will be. A huge glass pool, with a center dancing stage, will be the central attraction for the watersoul club. The water from the pool will allow club members to be animated with the swimming gesture, with generous poolside corners for couples who wants to nudge and huddle together.

An in-water bar area is built at the rear right corner of the pool. The area is designed for swimmers to sit in the pool, and sip on their favorite liqour and cocktails.

At present, the building project is almost completed and the 1st stage handover is in progress. With some additional touch-ups, Tropical will soon finish our maiden project.

More projects to come.

AE86 of Initial D

2007-03-18T20:57:00.000+08:00

I discovered a fleet of cars as I was wandering around in a public sandbox. On closer inspection, I discovered that somebody had accurately reproduced the Toyota AE86, in the livery of the famed Tofu shop delivery car, in the anime Initial D.

Beautifully done.

Unfortuanetly, I half-suspect that one can do serious drifting with this little baby. The physics model in SL is still not up to performance. Think I'll explore and try to create my own when I get a break from all these SL building projects.

Then again, a high fidelity one might forced the client to a crawl. Especially people like me who are playing from a laptop. Hmmm, maybe I'll use the 3rd principle simulations for some of the lower fidelity requirements project that I had done... some time ago.

Ah. The wonders of the virtual world never ceased.

Kopi SoundBox

2007-03-14T00:39:00.000+08:00

I have been looking to create a radio or music box object in SL for quite some time. Some object that can bring real world contents into the virtual world. Focusing my limited time on learning to create scripts to stream in music, I went on several trips to shops and places within the SL world and found out that you can't just play a music file through a script,... instead you gotta streamed it in from a websever.

Hmmm..... isn't that something like those radio stations online? Visual Radio from Nokia is following the same principal as well, just that it is through the wireless network.

I decide to try on building a Live station receiving unit by building on a few simple sample code stubs I got. Been researching and developing on to this for almost a week (going slowly. Got really limited amount of time.). Finally, I completed my own soundbox. I am able to stream live radio music live from the URLs found in shoutcast.com .

Have a look at my brand new system. I call it, the Kopi SoundBox Machine. Currently it picks up 6 stations, 3 in the US, one from Malaysia (I think so...), one from taiwan, and the last one from Japan. Unfortuately, the local radio stations seems to be pretty conservative, and hid their URL from public viewing. That's quite a shame, as an open concept might have triggered more local creativity into creating new platforms, that might reach out to an even wider range of audience. But well, this is still Singapore we are talking about.

I find the concept of internet radios to be really interesting. You can literaly hear the world, from just one point, in a virtual, and non-existing place. Interesting concept. What would the guy who invented radio (Bell is it? Or whoever he is...) thought about that.

With my curiosity still in full force, I proceeded to try the streaming on podcast this time. And who better than to try it on MrBrown's podcast, the MrBrownShow. At least, his podcast is open to the public. Well it really worked. With a simple modification of code, I am able to stream in a few of his latest podcasts, and cycle between them through the "touch" action... and of course since it is MrBrown, got to have the SoundBox in brown colour.

This development experience is really rewarding and I had drawn much basic knowledge on internet streaming through the research and development effort.

SL-URL for Xin Pa Sat

2007-03-08T21:20:00.000+08:00

Ah! I created my own SL-URL for Xin Pa Sat. Which respected site doesn't need a good URL, search tags, and description?

You can be teleported to Xin Pa Sat by clicking on the link below.
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Smoky/36/28/38/?x=320&y=200&title=Xin%20Pa%20Sat&msg=Virtual%20marketplace%20selling%20and%20linking%20stuff%20from%20the%20land%20of%20sg...

As like Google Earth's KML links, you will need your own Secondlife client to be teleported to that place. You can download your own client at www.secondlife.com , which is free.

Tropical the Virtual Company. A New Concept...

2007-03-06T00:50:00.000+08:00

With Xin Pa Sat's retrofitting almost done (actually behind schedule), I decided it is time to launch my own virtual company. Yes... I am going into business designing and building in-world contents and scripts for anybody who wants their own website, blogs, forums, organisation presence, 3D product simulation, virtual education zones, meeting rooms, built and simulated in the virtual world.

Tropical shall be a content creation, virtual construction and renovating firm with special focus on providing Asian Tropics designs.

Our office is located on the ground floor of Xin Pa Sat, at Smoky (24, 32).
IM me in-world (to Limkopi Davis), or sent me an email, should you want to find out more. Cheers!

SL Singapore 2nd Meeting

2007-02-22T01:04:00.000+08:00

Ah! I am not alone. Recently I found this group of Singaporeans in SL. Though limited in number, we met together and are quite successful in placing some local content and creation in-world. One good example is Nicky Ree's Pernakan Museum. It is simply fantastic. I wonder how long she took to construct the place.

I managed to attend the 2nd SL Singapore meeting, held on the 3rd night of the Year of the Golden Pig. In this meeting, we concluded that we will proceed to build up a Singapore Sim. An island will be purchased and then voluteer scripters and builders will start with the construction. We also decided that a coffeeshop (Ah! Kopi Tiam. This is a key corner stone of the Singaporean culture... where deals are formed and ideas are brainstormed, tutorials are copied, exams are prepared... The Kopi Tiams of Singapore!) will be the central focus point for the island sim. The design of the Kopitiam has to be as retro and traditional as possible.

Xin Pa Sat

2007-02-14T00:05:00.000+08:00

After months of weeks of hardwork and countless hours of design and thought through, I have finally built the Xin Pa Sat. Xin Pa Sat literaly means New Market. Created after the Lau Pa Sat (Old Market) in downtown Singapore, Xin Pa Sat aims to be the virtual cousin of the vibrant Lau Pa Sat. A new market place for virtual trading of virtual merchandise, and maybe real world merchandise.

There are 2 storeys to the market place, the upper storey is where I shall locate my smaller stores, while the bigger ones will take the lower storey. I shall do some gazebo and pavillions and landscape the garden. Maybe some water features will be good. A river that gives meaning to everything.

I had created some virtual merchandise for avatars who are suffering from phobias of WMD attack on their lands. A coastal search radar, complete with the optional bunker add-on, and Rapier surface to air missile firing unit. Currently both radar and Rapier models exist as static units. The Mark 2 version for the radar shall feature actual hostile avatar and object tracking, while the Rapier unit will actually fires its missile. Construction is still in progress. Will keep you updated soon...

At the same time, there is a food store for one to sample the local singaporean flavours. Of course food is what Singapore is famous about. Modelling food is interesting and pretty easy... that is, if one is able to get past the curious stares of hawkers and food center patrons, staring at you while you take shots of every plate of food you order with the mobile camera, for the textures to upload.

Yummy looking right? The chicken rice and Carrot cake are both from the famous Tiong Bahru market. Yes! The newly completed one.

SL Dublin

2007-01-30T21:11:00.000+08:00

Taking some time off from my latest building project on my land, I decided to wander around and look at other resident's sim. I found .... The Dublin SL Sim!

Boy! This is very well done! In fact, it is fantastic! Realistic rows of streets along a river, the scene looked exactly like out Clarke Quay. Nice! As my visit was late at night, the only store that seems to be open (Ah!... shouldn't stores in SL be opened 24/7???) is this Irish Pub. I went closer to have a look. It is fantastic! Wonderfully constructed! The bar counter and is pretty realistic and nicely stock with all series of liquour.

There is even regular performance and shows at this place! Yah liao loh (singaporean slang, literarly translated as you-win-already-then). No wonder the night crowds and choing-sters are so thick at this place. Certainly worth your teleport transportation time to visit this place.

Two thumbs up!

Advertising WorkingTribe

2006-09-04T23:27:00.000+08:00

I been trying to figure out what to built on my piece of seaview land for a few weeks now. I still cannot decide whether I will turn it into a fort of a residential home. Well instead of letting it rot for no good reason, I must as well put it to good use.

I decided to advertise for my website the WorkingTribe which I had setup and had not really advertise much on it due to terrible loads of commitment in my work life (How ironical, working life and working tribe).

True enough, after a few days, I got a strange amount of hits that I never got before. Ah, traffic from Secondlife! Yo! SEO craze fellows, turn your heads and look at the next generation of platforms that will bring traffic to your sites.

http://www.workingtribe.com/events/workingtribe-has-made-its-presence-in-secondlife

Smoky Estate

2006-08-27T23:19:00.000+08:00

With work coming to a slowdown (as usual for this time of the year), I can finally manage to squeeze some time to tend to my virtual properties. After an exhaustive round of search for virtual properties, I found this plot of 1024sqm near the sea selling for L$7000 plus. Quite reasonable price for a plot with a spectacular sea view. The place literally was baked in a hue of OpenGL golden orange colour during sunset. Beautiful. Though the place seems to be quiet at the moment. I don't see much avatar flying around this area.

Nevertheless, I had this strange hunch that this will be the server space where I will place my virtual foot down, plant my own flag, and build my own sim to introduce and spread my culture into this digital virtual work.

Gender in Virtual World

2006-08-25T22:43:00.000+08:00

A female avatar really work wonders. Fellow virtual resident seems to be more receptive and eager to listen up and help a female avatar rather than a male one, and of course, the worse will be a furries avatar.

Well up till now, I'm still pretty satisfied by the female skin that dressed up my avatar. I seem to dress her in clothes that my wife initially found to be rather skimpy, and on further thought, pretty ok, since she is just an avatar. A product of classes, methods, and callbacks.

With an avatar like her, I have no trouble getting all the help and answers I need, from passerbys and shop owners. Hmmm talk about gender rights and preferances. Seems to be pretty much alive in this world as well.

Maybe I should just postponed by plan to get a male skin to represent my avatar.

I shall be a property agent.

2006-07-14T01:13:00.000+08:00

I can't believe it. The property market in SL is really Hot, with the Capital on H.

With the sudden remarkably high profit earned from my first land sale, I proceed to buy another 512sqm plot for L$2000 plus (I can't remember the price). Intending to build a World War 2 U-boat on this piece of grassland (yes, sometimes I do made have weird dreams...), I started work on rezzing and constructing the conning tower of the U-Boat, following some of the samples found online.

L$10000 - L$2000 = L$8000

Again to satisfy my curiousity, I click on the "land offer for sale" radio button and put the price to L$10000. To my extreme shock and frustrating-ly happiness, I received an email telling me that the land was sold! i don't know what to say! My land plot was purchased by my neighbour actually, who seems to be triving and building the biggest child care center in SL.

And with the money in my avatar's pocket, I was able to repeat the same feat again. This time on a plot of 512sqm plot of sea (yes, I still dream of building my U-Boat). Again L$3500 sold for L$12000

L$12000 - L$3500 = L$8500

Looking at the above figures generated through these 3 land transactions, any sane, lower primary, kid, taking Maths as a subject, can guess that I am sufferring from a net profit boom instead of wasting my resources. If this can ever happen in RealLife...

SL is really fun... I am beginning to see the joy on Anshe's face when she opens her mailbox to clear logged IM messages every morning.

Virtual Property is Fun!

2006-05-16T00:42:00.000+08:00

Ho Sae lah! Some fellow bought my land from right under my nose. My building is gone! I didn't really linked it up and saved it! It was returned to me in bits and pieces... a pillar over here, a roof over there, etc. It is like somebody demolishing your prized possession and returning the bits and pieces to you in a plastic bag.

Earlier on, I had set the option to offer my land for sale. Fortunately, I had set a extra-ordinary crazy figure of L$10000. I had the conclusion that no sane avatar, and the human player behind the avatar, will ever get a piece of 512sqm virtual estate at that crazy price. To my horror and pleasant surprise, my new neighbour who is expanding his assets actually bought it!

L$10000 - L$512 = L$99488 !!!

Trading Virtual Real Estate is FUN! Simply satisfying and addictive, and without the risk of selling your real life house.

The Singapore Culture Center

2006-03-05T22:25:00.000+08:00

Things have really been busy for me. Work is trash, I have never seen an organisation moving so slowly, and a department that is so contented to lived in the clouds, and forgetting is original role in the organisation.

Arrrhhh! Work has kind of affected my life, not only that, my second life as well. Heheheh.
I took a few days of leave to rest at home.... and also to build my dream house on my still vacant plot of land. Benn getting lots of IM asking me on the selling price for my plot of land.

Well, after months of experimenting, I came out with an idea to build a Singapore Culture Center in the world of SL. Ah! That will be the first standing virtual-building-simulating-program or class, in Linden's data server, that represents something from my home country.

I decide to do something tropical, lots of open space so that the sea breeze can come in. With supporting stilts to give it a tropical kampong feel. Ah! I build an underground basement, and a revolving staircase from the ground level to the basement.

The main building consist of 2 levels, with a U staircase linking both levels.

With my culture center up... next step will be filling it up with the local goodies.

Interesting piece or real estate. I wonder how it will be worth in real life.

My First Land

2006-01-27T23:33:00.000+08:00

Finally.... I cracked! I can't resist the temptations anymore. I'm tempted to be all powerful again, to feel important , to feel belonged to, to come home from work to a place I call my own, ... and to say a big [YES!] should anybody ask me if I ever own a property...

I bought my First Land. Heheheh, a small plot of 512sqm piece in some far away island continent to the south of the 2 main continent. Ah! a small, rectangle-ish, plot of land, on top of the hill, overlooking the sea. Kind of deserted currently... that is, my neighbourhood. Full of shrubs and vegetation. To claim my land, I decided to plant some flowers and deposit a garden bench to mark my territory.

I will spent the next few weeks thinking of what to build on my little plot of space. Meanwhile, let's hope no one comes along and build some tower to obstruct my spectacular view of the sea...

Ah! Cheap lands plots for sale

2005-12-23T22:09:00.000+08:00

Reposting my article from 23/12/05. Blogger.com seems to had gone mad with the dates after I changed to the New Blogger.

Linden is encouraging folks in SL to own lands... the latest promotion craze sees land plots at WestHaven selling at a discounted rate of... I can't remember the price.... but definetly much cheaper than the first land prices.

What is interesting is that these lands come equipped with their own with low polygons (or prims, they called that in SL) houses. That means all you need to do is to shift in, choose a neighbourhood or land plot or low prims house that fancies your eyes, and simple change you membership plans and shift in to furnish your dwelling place in your second life.

Not bad. Pretty affordable for a private semi-detached house as compare to the fabulously ridiculous price here in Singapore.

Ah! This gets me really tempted to change my plans.

Should I?....

Moving around

2005-10-08T23:19:00.000+08:00

I am utterly fascinated by the creative world of SL. Linden Lab is kind of smart in the sense of letting the users and owners of land parcel create their own land. By providing a suite of tools for creating static contents, as well as a C++ like powerful scripting language, creation owners can create content, and bring them to life by scripting the creations behaviour. True enough, much like the real life world, different sorts of creations, buildings, facilities, objects, are created by the increasing number of land owners inworld. Moving around SL, one will wow with amazement at the handsome looking buildings with cultural architectural features, lifesize gaming arena, discos, amusement park, aerodomes, etc. Basically creations are limited only by the imagination of the owner of the land plots.

This moves Secondlife into a slightly different kind of of online adverture game. In fact, it does not qualify as the typical MMORG anymore, in the sense that it is fast becoming not a game, but a virtual metaverse whereby real life events and objects can be duplicated in this world. I've seen real life companies and societies setting up extensions, offices, and advertising outlets
in this world.

One day, I shall get a plot of land and setup my own establishment in this world, since it is cheaper, and much more feasibile than an online website. Arrhhh the smell of the future, Web3D.

Greetings Rinaz

2005-09-01T15:55:00.000+08:00

Ahh this is the 1st Singaporean I have met in SecondLife. Rinaz from Marina's Bloggariffic. Interesting girl, I had a brief chat with her and realised that she spent quite an amount of time in virtual worlds such as SecondLife, There, etc.

Nice to see a fellow countryman, or countrywoman, in SL.

Good to see you Rinaz

The Starting Place

2005-08-25T00:11:00.000+08:00

This is the starting place. Ah, or really the first place that I started after I clear tutorial island. The round thingy that I'm standing on is a teleporter. There are many such devices in SL. Basically, they cut traveling time but a great deal, as it enables the player to be wrapped to the nearest teleporter near the specified destination.

Oh, look the sun is rising. A new day is here.

This starting location resembles some sort of a central park. With a fountain right in the middle of four elongated pavillion like structure. Each of the pavillion containing notices and useful "click-me-for-more-info" tags to guide the player around, and to provide news, and more information of the key day to day tasks that the player will be encountering in the world.

In the "To Building Area" pavillion. I spotted multiple creations by the inhabitants of this world. Arrrhh! somebody actually created a Chinese dragon. Lucky it is static...

Sample chess setup at the Games Pavillion. Interesting samples. The powerful scripting tool of SL enables one to create logic and gameplay for creating your own gameplay.

Another great feature of the SL world is the environment around the avatar. I mean just look at the sky... as the time ticked by, you can see the sun setting and the sky changing its colour. Marvelous.

The horizon lights up and becomes brighter! Wow! Simply beautiful! The dynamic environment is well done. Sunset and Sunrises in SL offers the most beautiful picturescape if you want to take a snapshot.

Everywhere you go, you will notice that the terrain is not flat as a sheet of paper. Rather the terrain in SL world is undulating, with handsome textures that gives the overall scene a very realistic inworld feel.

The handy map that I carried along shows where I am. The terrain pieces around me, number of players within those areas, my grid location, etc, etc etc. Very well done!

Now in my next report, I shall take you to the "capital city" in SL. You can see on the map, the 4 squares on the left showing the buildup area of the city. (Errr.... at this point, I kind of forgotten the name of the city. )

In the beginning...

2005-08-24T23:02:00.000+08:00

Ah... virtual world. The concept of Web3D. When I came across Secondlife some weeks ago, saw some comments on it, I decided to sign up to be a resident in the virtual world.

I've been traveling around the world for quite a few months. Hmmm... to date, I have moved around quite a fair bit, been traveling around the landscape, riding bikes and boats, visiting inworld friends and making pacts and joining groups.

I've visited the inworld shops, bought clothings, funitures and even a huge anti-tank gun. Amazing creations by the resident in this virtual platform.

Visiting all those beautiful houses and shops in SL (SecondLife) makes me longing to start my own business. Options are plenty. I can start a reporting service... as a independent broadcast journalist in SL. Or a business owner. There are really many choices, and restrictions are few, quite unlike the real life.

Join me in this blog, as I present the events and beautiful creations and people from SL. :)