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Schrodinger's Gossip Girl: It's dead but it's still alive

Seraphina Brennan — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 10:00:00 EST

Filed under: Culture, Events, in-game, Launches, Second Life, Free-to-play, Casual, Virtual worlds, Massively Interviews

It's been a long run for the Gossip Girl simulation on Second Life, two years in the making actually, but all good things must come to an end. The well trafficked sims will be closing the doors tomorrow, as Warner Brothers and The CW discontinue their virtual marketing campaign for the show of the same name.

But that doesn't mean the Gossip Girl community is dying...

Fans of the simulation will be overjoyed to hear that the Gossip Girl community is transitioning to a new home thanks to the Metaverse Mod Squad, the builders and moderators of the original official sims. While the official sims, and the setting of the Upper East Side, will be retired on June 30th, the new doors will open on July 1st to large fanfare and a great number of festivities.

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Schrodinger's Gossip Girl: It's dead but it's still alive originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 30 Jun 2009 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Warner Brothers rejects non-English-speaking Gossip Girl fans

Tateru Nino — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 19:00:00 EST

Filed under: Culture, News items, Opinion, Second Life, Virtual worlds

Warner Brothers has a very successful setup in Second Life, centered around its popular Gossip Girl property. All isn't exactly rosy there, of late, as WB's actively moderated environment collides with Second Life's and Gossip Girl's rather broad popularity demographics.

Warner Brothers uses the Metaverse Mod Squad for active moderation of the Second Life presence. The question is, how do you moderate conversations in languages you don't understand? The answer, it seems, is that you don't. Visitors who communicate in languages other than English are warned to switch to English. Failure to comply sees the visitor ejected.

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Warner Brothers rejects non-English-speaking Gossip Girl fans originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 29 Jun 2009 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Metaverse Mod Squad raises over $200,000 from Angel Investors

Brenda Holloway — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 10:30:00 EST

Filed under: Events, real-world, Events, in-game, News items, Second Life, Machinima, Virtual worlds

Back in 1970, futurist Alvin Toffler coined the term "Future Shock", which is the personal perception of too much change in too short a time. While reading a press release for a virtual avatar staffing company, future shock hit this blogger upside the head like a ton of bricks. Thirty eight years after Toffler described the trouble people were having keeping pace with the ever-increasing rate of technological progress, a company has acquired $200,000 to populate virtual worlds with virtual people, living virtual lives.

The Metaverse Mod Squad, creators of avatars for projects like a series of machina "Gossip Girl" episodes, celebrated the closing of their $200K "angel" investment deal in their virtual offices, of course. Remember, every avatar with a job is one less avatar on the streets. By putting avatars to work as greeters, actors, friends for the friendless and so on, they are doing well, by doing good.

Metaverse Mod Squad raises over $200,000 from Angel Investors originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 19 Jun 2008 10:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Cinemassively: Iron Man in The Fall

Moo Money — Fri, 09 May 2008 12:30:00 EST

Filed under: Real life, Video, Contests, Second Life, Cinemassively, Machinima

Iron Man is kicking butt both in the theater and in the virtual world of Second Life. The ~~Warner Brothers~~ Reitz-Lang (Sorry, Jason!) machinima team in charge of the Gossip Girl set took some time out of their busy schedule to enter the Silverscreen Iron Man Fan-Art Contest. They chose a humorous and silly approach to the video, but all professional.

Everything about this video, including the lipsynching, the falling scene, and the way the bad guy was saved, makes us drool. We previously featured their initial effort in SL, UES Insider, but had some serious criticism about it, and they've improved 100%! We can't wait to see what kind of trouble Gossip Girl will write about next, and when it will premiere. Don't leave us hanging!

[Thanks, Jason!]

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

Cinemassively: Iron Man in The Fall originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 09 May 2008 12:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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GDC 08: Entertainment content convergence in online worlds

Barb Dybwad — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 08:30:00 EST

Filed under: Business models, Culture, Events, real-world, MMO industry, Club Penguin, Second Life, Webkinz, Virtual worlds, Massively Event Coverage, Gaia Online

We spent most of Monday ensconced in the GDC Worlds in Motion summit track, which made "standing room only" seem extremely spacious -- most of the sessions were packed to the gills and then some. It seems like more than a few industry types are interested in the intersections between gaming and virtual worlds. Case in point, the following session we've paraphrased (hopefully not too liberally!) from Reuben Steiger, CEO of Milllions of Us, a company that builds marketing campaigns and content for virtual worlds.

Reuben: Storytelling is the bedrock of human culture. (Looking at a slide with a real campfire on the left and a user-created campfire in Second Life on the right) -- users in virtual worlds are recreating this storytelling tradition. I'm going to make a contention: the internet has failed as a storytelling medium. Instead, the norm is bathroom humor and ridiculous jokes.

So virtual worlds: are they games or not? What defines a game -- linguists and semioticians get real worked up about it. The audience might say "virtual worlds are games without rules, competition, goals or fun." And it's hard to blame them. Extreme openness has defined virtual worlds, where fun can be in a way you define as opposed to what some game developer feels is fun. But the appeal of virtual worlds is that we can tell stories on a broader and less walled playing field.

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GDC 08: Entertainment content convergence in online worlds originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 19 Feb 2008 08:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Cinemassively: UES Insider - Noob to Knockout

Moo Money — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 12:30:00 EST

Filed under: Video, Second Life, Cinemassively, Machinima

Warner Brothers created a promotional Machinima showing the Metaverse Mod Squad making over a newbie in Second Life. It is narrated by Gossip Girl, the character in the TV show that anonymously blogs all the happenings in Manhattan's Upper East Side. She starts out by explaining that there was an asian-themed party for Blair Waldorf's 17th birthday. All of the familiar faces were there, but a mystery girl stood out in the crowd. They go on to show how she went from "noob to knockout."

The video, created by WB Worldwide TV Marketing - New Media, in conjunction with Reitz-Lange Productions, is a fun look at what goes on in the Gossip Girl sims. However, it could have been so much better had they not left the UI in the shots. You can clearly see chat going on in the bottom left corner. Another complaint is that the press release calls it an "animated video." This is supposedly the first in "The Upper East Side Insider" series, so hopefully next time they'll call it what it is; Machinima.

[Thanks, Stormy!]

Cinemassively: UES Insider - Noob to Knockout originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 15 Dec 2007 12:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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