We Are One - are you in?

            You may know that most grids like to celebrate their anniversary, and you also know that lots of grids don't stick around very long. So for an opensim grid to be celebrating seven years of existence is really something!
        Craft, the 'Friendly Grid', has its 7th anniversary coming up at the end of January.

        Every year, they hold a building competition. Perhaps in past years, you've attended the anniversary party, even admired the winning entries to the building competition. The first prize is a free region for a year.  Second place gets a 10k prim region for a year... which to my mind is just as good.
       Wowee, you may say, lucky Craftians... but did you realize that anyone from any grid can take part, and win that prize?
        Yes, you too can compete in the Craft competition!    

Another Arty Safari

Three artists, three countries, three genres, three grids this week.
The theme this week, the interplay between real and virtual worlds when it comes to art. Obviously, it's all art. But working in virtual worlds can be a great stepping stone to begin or re-ignite an artistic career. It can inspire your creativity,  suggest new ways to express yourself,  give you the courage to put your work on display, and help you find fans and clients. HG Addresses as usual at the end of the post. Landmarks are available at our clubhouses on OSGrid and Francogrid for the next few days also.
Our first stop, A'Shaala on Francogrid, home of Talie Tramont also known as Talie Tramontane. An art school graduate based in France, Talie is best known for her photography, which you can find on Deviantart, as well as on this lovely region.

Thirza Ember: everyone has the Lms?
Malon Wyngard: got all
Thirza Ember: her computer broke suddenly yesterday, she was fixing up many winter things for us to do but... boom - no computer
Cherry Manga: She has computer issues so she leaves us on her region, she can't imagine what a safari can do when alone!
Sunbeam Magic: Does it snow in France?
Cherry Manga: here, it's fog and fog and fog since 3 weeks
Spike Sol: liegt überall schnee im Moment.. nur draussen nicht
Dabici Straulino: na hier her haben wir ca 50cm Schnee - Quebec
       .... as you can see we're a very international bunch.

Fully Loaded

            Billy Bradshaw asked if we could do a quick Load Test on TGrid before we headed to our first official destination this week.

             If you've been doing anything more than sitting at home alone dropping cubes off towers or checking the hiccup time you get when you cross a sim boundary, you will know what a horrendous condition intergrid communications has reached. For many months now, sending offline IMs to people on other grids - which used to work just fine - fails more often than it works. When this started, it took me a few days to notice that the 'User not online. Message saved' message was actually saying 'Unable to send instant message. User is not logged in.' which caused some really amusing headaches. But of course, now we have all learned that to be sure your reply gets through, you must actually go to the other person's grid to send it. 

Safari Goes Pear Shaped

 Words Matter.
          George jinxed us. Or maybe it was the fruit. Or the sudden decision to get out some NPC line dancers.
Thirza Ember: Hello all and welcome to the Safari. Two destinations this week, first grid EVER and then on to Kitely. You should know that grid-jumping directly to the EVER grid welcome sim, Gutenberg, is a problem. For some time now, it's not been working right. I have given an alternate LM that always works, it takes you to a different part of the grid, and from there you can get to Gutenberg.. and then to theater... so multiple jumps....Aime, can you confirm for me that the direct jump to Gutenberg region doesn't work?  
Aime Socrates: OK
~momentary silence and distinct lack of teleport particles ~
Aime Socrates: no, cannot go there directly, you are right thirza, we must use the alternative lm.
Lucy Afarensis: We have already started ?
Aime Socrates: yes Lucy..we started the party before safari..you know why ? its a dangerous safari...
Thirza Ember: you can tp out of the grid, but to get in, you have to do contortions - multiple tps
Lucy.Afarensis: oh dear
Aime Socrates: some will not come back

Lucy Afarensis: shudder... Thirza, You have a pear on your head ?

Safari Goes House to House

        Three destinations, and all the Hypergrid Addresses at the end of the post, the first house of this week's trip around the magnificent metaverse was a lighthouse. 

          It represents a point of reference, of illumination, and security, while hinting at the feelings of loneliness  and isolation that can afflict all of us, any of us, at different times in our lives. Leighton Marjoram is here to help, specifically people dealing with gender issues, and where they fit in to the spectrum of attraction and identity.

La Dolce Safari

          On the day after the night before in the US election, the special Italian Night Safari was a much needed moment of  restful, intelligent fun in the company of a borderless band of creators and thinkers. 

          We meet on Francogrid. Some Safaris have last minute changes, or there is a special gift for the group, so it's worth taking the time to join us here, rather than going straight to the first destination. 
          Also, the LMs for each Safari remain in the LM giver for about a week, in case you want to get them on a later date. And as usual the HG Addresses will be at the end of this post.

Safari Fiction

This week, the Safari trip had a single destination, to the literary grid Nara's Nook, celebrating three years of writerly pixels. 

Nara's Nook is the brainchild of Nara Malone, and styles itself as a colony for people who would like to explore their literary creativity online. Whether you're an author in need of moral support, or trying to revive a stalled novel-in-the-works, or looking for inspiration to come up with a new storyline, or curious about using new 3D methods to convey your narrative, Nara's Nook can help. Here's the Nara's Nook website.
       Scroll to the end of the post for them list of the places visited this week.

Safari Takes a Cure

          The adventure begins each week with a gathering on Francogrid, sitting around on the deck outside the clubhouse. Some strange reason, in all four incarnations of the clubhouse, the group always seems to prefer to be outside. Perhaps it's the adventurous spirit of those brave souls who show up each week to boldly go. 

Aime Socrates, Pathfinder Lester and Snowbody Cortes, waiting for the fun to begin

It's almost Halloween and so that means it's time to go spookily into that dark night... courtesy of the gang over on Kroatan Grid.   The exact HG Address you will find, of course, at the end of this post.       

OSCC Safari!

On Sunday, 11 December we will be holding a special OSCC Safari.

The event will start at 11am Pacific Time - one hour earlier than our usual time.
The starting point will be on OSCC Grid, at the Safari Expo,
here's the hg address  cc.opensimulator.org:8002:expo zone 2
As usual there will be 3 destinations, each lasting about an hour.
But this time, there's a new twist... to cope with the large number of visitors, we will be running two different trails at the same time.


Safari Trail A and Safari Trail B will both include places of artistic, educational, and practical interest and the two groups will meet up at the end in a very entertaining place!

Being on a Sunday, we hope that many who can't attend the regular Wednesday events will be able to come along and sample the simple pleasure of grid-jumping.
So please, mark the day on your calendar, and invite your friends.

If you have experience at grid-jumping, especially in a group, we can use your help as tour guides!
Send an IM to Thirza Ember in OSGrid, or email me at thirza.in.sl@gmail.com to get more information.

Freebies!

A few new items at the HG Safari Market, next to the Clubhouse on Francogrid, that may interest you.

Sunshine Szavanna has donated a lovely delicate nosering, and there's also a mesh witches hat that may fill your seasonal needs. Neevo Geesink, after our recent Safari visit, very kindly sent us this Teleport device, which you can program to fit your needs.

Safari goes to Generositania

Generositania isn't a real place... it's loads of places, where the spirit of generosity is the fundamental working principle. Here are three fun places in opensim, with an emphasis on altruism, that you should definitely go and see. 
HG Addresses at the end of the post as usual. First stop, the Dune Project on Metropolis.
Neovo Geesink: Welcome at Dune-1
Wizardoz Chrome (it>en): Like film Dune? ... or ...
Truelie Telling: there is no resemblance to the world of the film Dune, or the books
Neovo Geesink: I don't know why they are Called Dune. Lena Vanilli is the "boss" and has made this Project of 5 4x4 var regions possible.
James AtLLOUD something gigantic just rezzed in my camera view.

Chat !

A little bit of HG help from opensimworld.com
It happens every week, on Safari..

The group meets at the clubhouse, at 12 noon Pacific time 9pm CET.
Everyone grabs the Notecard with the landmarks and details about the trip, and at the appointed time, we all set off...

...well, most of us do. But glitches happen.
Maybe your avie freezes.
Maybe you get stuck in tp limbo, neither here nor there, and have to log out.

Perhaps you click on the wrong landmark, or can't find the notecard.
Maybe you're waiting at the Clubhouse on Teravus Plaza, OSGrid, not realizing that our main meeting point these days is on Francogrid! (There's a portal)

The Teravus Plaza clubhouse

Maybe your clothes fail to rez, so you rush home to fix the problem, and when you come back the group is gone.

Or, you show up late, and it's hard to figure out where people have gone.

Of course, you can just go fishing, like Aime Socrates. But if not, what can you do?

The obvious solution is to have a way to communicate with the group outside the Viewer. That way, even if you get logged out, or are on a region that refuses to let you send IMs to people on other grids, you can still find out where we all are.

There are lots of different ways to chat outside the Viewer. Skype, Facebook, G+ hangouts, even Twitter come to mind.
The problem with all of these is that there is no consensus among OpenSim people about which is good to use. Some people find certain websites difficult to use while they have their Viewer open. Some people don't like one or more of these chat providers, other people like them, but use an account name they don't want to share inworld.

The solution may be at hand. Satyr Gator has just introduced a Chat feature on his website OpenSimWorld.com. It is still in Beta, so we will be testing its robustness!
OpenSimWorld is free, and you do not have to have a region to be part of the website.
There is an HG Safari group in OpenSimWorld, which you can join also.
The chat feature on this site is not for the exclusive use of HG Safari, and we'll be using it mostly as an SOS resource. Both people who are hypergridding pros, and those new to HG are encouraged to join soon, so we can see how useful this will be when the hg gremlins make life hard for us!

Safari goes Past, Present, and Future

           Virtual worlds are ephemeral, we all know that, a hiccup on a server and all your stuff can be gone. Of course, a housefire can do the same thing in the real world, but it's a lot easier to lose, or lose touch with, things and people dear to us in our online existence.
HG ADDRESSES AT THE END OF THE POST

Tina Bey

           Tina Bey posted this video on Facebook recently,  telling the story of Arcauana, her region (hosted by the great Ken Savage) on OSGrid. How could we resist?

        In a lot of sci-fi films, we are presented with a universe full of different life forms all living together in (dis)harmony. Now, imagine if all the life forms in the the universe of sci-fi films were able to interact? The characters from Star Wars, Star Gate, Star Trek, and more. This is Tina Bey's premise. It is also an exploration in lighting and audio effects, so be sure to turn on Sound and read the instructions on windlight, for the best effect.

Safari Tours Turin and Counts its Blessings

This week the Safari experienced a symphony of building- a concert of creativity! HG Addresses at the end of the post.

          First stop was on OSGrid, the region called Torino Italy, with our hosts Alfiere Rossini, Lucy Rosadisharon, and Giuliano Carminucci. People hypergridded in from at least nine different grids to be part of the fun, and learn a little about Alfiere's build.
Thirza Ember: we need to study piemontese for our first stop tonight
George Equus: Hope  chat will be in English  :)  No parlare Italiano buono  :)

Safari heads for the Fests!

Mal Burns: reminder - AvatarFest starts this Friday and all weekend - http://avatarfest.net:6000         

      Shock horror - turns out Oktoberfest actually begins in September!
     This is one of the many things we learned on this week's Safari. We were invited by NextLife grid to come and see their fabulous Fairground and dancing region, where much of the Germanophile and germanophone opensim community are gathering during the two week festival. 

Graham Mills' Age of Steam

   Our final destination this week was on Kitely,  with Graham Mills, a talented builder, educator, and story-teller. Named, Age of Steam, the build celebrates the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway Company  

Graham Mills: this is a recreation of the world's first railway station 
Don Smith: Nicely done Graham, i was here recently, loved it

Graham.Mills: opened in 1830 and closed in 1836 because it was too small, all before photography, so just paintings and sketches to go from. The opening day was 15th Sept, there were 750 guests, amazingly complex to organise; the army must have helped, Wellington was guest of honour, he was Prime Minister at the time and rather unpopular he got a particularly rough time at the other end of the line, Manchester, 30 miles away, a lot of folk didn't want the railways either as they thought it would ruin the nvironment and put poeople out of a job, which was true in part.
Serene Jewell: Darn railway/automobile/internet/cellphones.... 
 Praline B: wow this build is awesome and all in prims
Graham Mills: normally 4 horse-drawn omnibusses would bring 1st class passengers here, you had to book the day before, on the opening ceremony they came in their own carriages -- there was a one-way system outside. The railway carriages were incredibly tightly packed, 26 was a typical number
Serene.Jewell: Pretty crowded

Graham Mills: most were 4-5 coaches on opening day, yellow were first class, blue second class
Serene Jewell: Let the random sitting on things begin!
Graham.Mills: all sorts of ways to make second class passengers miserable, not least Embers from the firebox, lol many complaints of damage to clothing at the front is a pilot wagon, this was used for brakes
Thirza Ember: some scary umbrella accidents too i bet
Serene Jewell: Lots of stepping on dresses I'm sure.
Graham Mills: the dresses were huge in those days major issues getting into carriages, but folk were used to stagecoaches,  so nobody thought proper platforms necessary. This is the first ever railway shed and incidentally platform, although it was poorly designed as the pillars sometimes meant you couldn't open the doors
Serene Jewell: I need a ticket!
Kurtis Anatine: That will be 1 shilling please
Graham Mills: this was the train used by the Duke, the VIPs and the Directors of the company, it started in the tunnel and they pushed it out -- nice theatrical effect, gasps from the audience, three bands are playing, the Duke arrives. Thousands of people around cheering. He waves to everyone. He's dressed in black but has a sensible thick cloak on (the King had just died)... Notice anything?
Graham Mills: No engines!! They made the tunnel too small!

snowbody Cortes: wow!
Thirza Ember: that is hilarious
Praline B: yes lol
Graham Mills: but there was a slope anyway so they couldn't use engines (which liked it flat) so they ran the carriages down by gravity and up by rope or donkeys, so to get started the staff would push the train - technical, eh?

          We walked through the dark tunnel to the next station Edge Hill, which is where they coupled trains, the dark interior made us al think about how much soot people must have breathed in back then.
Kurtis Anatine: this is where coal lung came from right?
Serene Jewell: What are the barrels for?
Kurtis Anatine: i think its for water isnt it?
Graham Mills: This is where they coupled up the locomotives, the barrels are for water -- to make the steam - easy to forget they needed water, but they were on the outside of town - no mains water, so they pumped their own. The arch above me has stationary engines, one in each tower; they powered the rope for hauling the trains, and pumped the water, the arch was a signature build, but cleverly hid all the techie stuff :)
Serene Jewell: People are ingenious.
Praline B: coming from indian architecture?
Graham Mills: yes -- asian, unusual as most was neo-classical, ie Greek
Praline B: ok ;)

Thirza Ember: people must have thought they were living at the end of one age and the beginning of another.. like the Moon landing... life would never be the same
Graham Mills:it was a momentous step -- travel had never been so fast they moved vast quantities of coal, and fresh food; cities and factories became possible, one end of the country was soon connected to the other - railwaymania began
Serene Jewell: So many people that had only known there one small area would be changed by traveling on railways.
Praline B: yes, a real step , revolution, how exciting it was at this time!
Thirza Ember: what got you interested in this station and event?
Graham.Mills: um, I work on Crown Street. Never knew it had such a pivotal role. Decided it was a good subject for a build,  it's a public park now, so i can do mixed reality.
Praline B: Really interesting build Graham, I very glad to revisit this part of the steam history! This build is really realistic,
Serene.Jewell: So, someday people can take their iphone and see what the park used to look like by viewing your recreation, Graham.
Graham.Mills: yes, Serene, it's easy enough to capture panoramas already, RL to Opensim to AR To RL, that's the idea, connect ppl to their heritage, release an OAR, let them work with it.
Praline B: that works fine Graham ;))
snowbody Cortes: super
Graham Mills: trying to get cultural and historical organisations interested at city level, some progress - I would, of course, like to get the trains running, maybe next 15th Sept
Thirza Ember: that would be wonderful also, but they tell a story here in the statio that is very interesting
 snowbody Cortes: it seems all alive

Graham Mills: well, as you may know, the opening ceremony was a disaster after the triumphal departure - the local Member of Parliament was killed, run over by a loco, so a very gloomy return!
Serene Jewell: Saving the gruesome bit for last, Graham? :-)
Graham Mills: very hostile crowd at Manchester- Hasty return - engine failures, engines in the wrong place, 3 engines ended up pulling 24 carriages -- very slowly, but the next day they ran an excursion and the day after that opened for business and never looked back!

HG Address: grid.kitely.com:8002:age of steam

SafariMania

          So, this season of the Safari, we are going to be promoting builds with some kind of - let's not call it educational benefit, that sounds too dry, but the idea is that we all come away from our tour feeling like we now know something we didn't know before. First up, Anachronia sim on the German language grid, Dorena's World.
          HG Addresses at the end of the post, as usual.

          Dorena and Anachron, the grid-mama and grid-papa were there, along with other residents like Uwe Furst, Lureen Persephone, and the lovely builder and creator Klarabella Karamell, an authentic opensim heroine. We first sat down which really helped with the lag that comes when a region is bombarded with a dozen or more avatars arriving from multiple grids.

Gor and More

This week two destinations, both fun and at the same time quite serious, in that they deeply connect with the real world beliefs, creativity, and endeavors of their creators. HG Addresses as usual at the end of the post.

          Despite some craziness in hypergridding which slowed down our arrival on Destination one, Counter-Earth grid, pretty soon about 15 of us were at the arrival area at Sardar Mountain, which in the books is a marketplace where it seems anything can happen, from the dangerous to the delightful. There are community evenings on Counter-Earth Grid, at 8pm Pacific Time, and there are organized games of Gorean soccer, and they are working on getting combat events - the arena is ready, just some scripting left to do. For those in the Antipodes, you may like to join the New Zealand cohort on this grid, so there's something for everyone.
If you visit the grid, be sure to leave some feedback on the OpenSimWorld page

Back on Safari

Sound artist Morlita Quan, check out her music here

... And we're back.
The first Safari of the new season was a celebration of creativity, style, sensuality and above all the free open source ideals of Francogrid, and the wider hyperverse of OpenSim.

Fest'Avi is always about the body beautiful. It is about creativity and a practical need for more original avatars for people to use and share. Anyone can contribute an avie, and this year there are about 19 different models, some very human-like, some romantic, some very unusual.
Here are the avie makers this year: Sunbeam Magic,  Archael Magic, Canonboymaty Duffield, Zany Foxtrot, Serene Jewell, Praline B, Shannan Albright, Meilo Minotaur and of course Cherry Manga, whose artistic imagination and passion are the fabric upon which these avatars are displayed.

Sun Sets on Safari

Thai Low: allora abbiamo resistito al terrore delle griglie: HG Safari!

           Just for a few weeks, the Safari will be taking a break. This was our 110th consecutive week jumping from grid to grid, and it's time to take a moment, hose out the clubhouse, reorganize the landmark giver, purge the cache, and have a bit of a rest.