As we previously predicted, the Second Life 2.0 viewer is going live today, meeting the originally slated release target of Q1 2010, if only by a few hours. The 2.0 viewer has been in public beta since 23 February.

In addition to the new viewer, its rearranged user-interface, slate color scheme and slick Shared Media implementation, today sees the launch of two new Orientation experiences and a selection of new starter avatars to select from (we wonder if any of them are blue).

Continue reading Second Life 2.0 goes live today

Second Life 2.0 goes live today originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 31 Mar 2010 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Over about the last 60-90 minutes, Tom Hale's been delivering a keynote at the SL Pro! conference held in Second Life. There are multiple hefty announcements from Linden Lab involved, and some of that should be reaching the official Second Life blogs as you read this.

Golly, what do we have among all of this? We've got the Second Life 2.0 viewer public beta, which should be available right now. We've got the new third-party viewer registry and third-party policies being announced today; We've got changes in the names of content-ratings. We've got the official release of open source viewer Snowglobe and the announcement of Snowglobe 2; and all capped off with a slew of supporting FAQs, guides, video tutorials, wiki pages and what-have-you!

Continue reading A red-letter day for Second Life, Second Life 2.0 viewer and more

A red-letter day for Second Life, Second Life 2.0 viewer and more originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 23 Feb 2010 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Registrations are presently open for SL Pro! a two day conference being run by Linden Lab for 'serious' professional Second Life content-creators to take place in late February this year, in Second Life itself, with a bit of help from NMC (the New Media Consortium).

Unfortunately, it's a conference with more than one track, where the two tracks generally have a fair bit of overlap, so that's a bit of an issue. The two tracks are building and scripting, each with eight sessions.

Continue reading Registrations open for SL Pro! conference, February

Registrations open for SL Pro! conference, February originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 23 Jan 2010 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Generally, operators of MMOGs and virtual environments don't show their numbers unless they feel they've got something to crow about, and Linden Lab's crowing today, releasing a selection of figures that give you an idea of the scale of Second Life.

Approximately 1,250 text-based messages are sent every second in Second Life. That's 108 million messages per day and more than 600 million words are typed on an average day. That's a whole of messages for any architecture, quite honestly.

Continue reading Linden Lab says Second Life huge, shows numbers

Linden Lab says Second Life huge, shows numbers originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 22 Sep 2009 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

It seems these days that you can't have a Linden Lab employee give a speech to Second Life users without some included warning label of rough times ahead for them. It's almost relentlessly axiomatic nowadays.

At this year's Second Life Community Convention, Rosedale gently urged users and Lindens to support some necessary changes to come: "Try to work with us. Let go a bit." Ironically, he has encapsulated the same core message that Second Life users have been trying to get Linden Lab to hear for the last several years.

Continue reading Philip Rosedale: "Try to work with us. Let go a bit"

Philip Rosedale: "Try to work with us. Let go a bit" originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 17 Aug 2009 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Linden Lab's Tom Hale has published the Quarterly report for Second Life for Q2 2009: "Economy grows 94% year to year, hits new all time high in Q2; World expands and voice usage hits all time high; Bot policy affects user hours and logins"

We beg to differ in some key respects. From the figures presented, we see quite a different picture (go on, tell us you're astonished by that). Allow us to touch on a few of the high points as we walk through the report, and we'll lay it out for you.

Continue reading Linden Lab publishes Second Life second quarter metrics

Linden Lab publishes Second Life second quarter metrics originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 13 Aug 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Back in September, when we first noticed the hiring of Tom Hale (T Linden) as Linden Lab's new Chief Product Officer, we had a little difficulty envisioning quite what Hale's role would even be, given that Linden Lab and Second Life was very platform-oriented and had very little product-focus. Apparently, adding that focus as an extra consideration throughout the business seems to be the thing.

Initially, we were more or less expecting Hale to be more focused on, well, the sort of thing that Rivers Run Red's Immersive Workspaces is providing. Perhaps there's some of that in there too. Right now, Hale's looking at Second Life premium accounts and stipends and how they can be improved; a topic which has been much on the Lab's mind of late.

Continue reading Tom Hale talks Second Life premium accounts

Tom Hale talks Second Life premium accounts originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 21 Nov 2008 21:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.