The Charm of Draconia

 This, of course, is the season of getting stuff. But for those few who already have stuff and would like to get enchanted rather than stocked up, Opensim offers many opportunities in tune with the natural world. Generally nature with a Northern bias, since so many of us live up here, these months are the cold bit of the year.

Winter stirs all the fearful instincts innate in humans. It's the death of the year, of the productive cycle, and our ancestors were full of doubts. Will the sun return, will the food supply last, will the cold or sickness defeat the group; this is the stuff of legends. On the other hand, the changing landscape offers a paradox. In place of the dominant sun, other lights take over, and we see the world in a different way, or perhaps, we see another world that coexists with the bold daylight landscape, one that becomes visible only when the sun is in nadir. Then, we have time to reflect that there is more to this existence than meets the day-to-day eye.

Bink Draconia is one of the best artists working in Opensim and her regions on Pangea are beautiful, thoughtful, ingenious, and atmospheric to a point where you feel charmed when, in the shared environment (the mist is essential) you go for a wander...or do I mean wonder... around  Stella Polaris. 

The wedding zone, Stella Polaris

It's pure wonderland. In part it is a party destination, with a wedding area shown here, and a dance floor with a chessboard theme, and other tableaux gemming the woodland, under starlight. But that's only one aspect of it, the social side. 

Beyond that it's a wistful, misty forest where the ground sparkles with eerie lights in the air and water, and the meadowland is just a little underwater, enough to create that liminal sensation, between day and night, dry land and swamp, the spooky and the sweetly sentimental, with places for a romantic tete a tete or a solitary saunter.

Winterfair is Coming

Pirate and shipwright extraordinaire Trouble Ahead together with One Andonly and Cata Raven, the owners of Catronian Archipelago, have organized another event for the merchants of Kitely this winter. The address is as usual at the end of the post. Bear in mind, you can't just jump direct to the fair, you have to go through the Catronian Archipelago landing point, and it's on Kitely so as you well know, if nobody's on the sim, it'll take a sec until the region comes online.

Popping over ahead of the opening day which is 14 December, it was great to observe that the skybox with this event on it is already looking super seasonal. It's a positively chilly townscape with lots of snow and frozen (and skatable) canals, and of course a schooner. 

You may remember we voyaged here on Safari  back in May 2024. So many islands and sail related adventures to be had with this predominantly roleplaying group!

As regards Winterfair, you'll encounter quite a lot of brands and names you'll have heard of if you browse the Kitely website; most of the stalls push you onto Kitely Market rather than have buyable boxes, and that probably makes things easier for the vendors. 

To make the event even more festive, like the Christmas Market over on Bloonmoonpackgrid, there is even a prize for the best build to be announced during the opening party with DJ Melanie Auxifur.

Too Right

We all know that two wrongs don't make a right, but did you know that many rights make a wrong - when the 'rights' are well crafted art installations, and the 'wrong' is , well, The Wrong Biennial... but let's get Kimm Starr to explain what's going on, she's one of the curators of a fabulous art exhibition on Kitely.

Kimm Starr: The Wrong Biennale is a bi-annual show seen by millions of people worldwide. This edition of The Wrong is about AI and the artists' use of it in their work. Seems like an obvious choice for them to make, since AI is coming at us 90 miles an hour. We saw it as an opportunity to show the world that what we create in OpenSim is not only art, but an art medium in its own right. We made a pavilion called "Synthetic Dreams" which consists of two parts. One half is a dedicated website and the other half is an in-world gallery. The show opened on November 1st, 2025.

Thirza Ember: Tell us how you came to choose to do the show on Kitely.

AMV Six

Cataplexia Numbers: Hi Thirza! Welcome to the AMV Birthday region... this is Cafe Espresso and Town Meeting Stage. 

The grid's 6th birthday celebration is on December 6 and the fun starts at 6am SLT, you can find all the details on the AMV website front page. The region has various stages and meeting areas.

Cataplexia Numbers:This is where we will do Taffy's inauguration as mayor, and Desy's retirement, then on to the living stage. 

The Region address is (yes, you know before I say it) at the end of the post. If you're admiring the lovely setup on this region, it was made by Ted Junior and Chris McCracken. Both have made many fine regions in Opensim, for example, you may have seen Ted's build Creative Landform, a sort of tour of beautiful places around the world, and Chris is known for builds like Raceway Island, an automotive paradise. After the Mayoral ceremony from 9 to 10am Grid time, the Birthday bash will continue with three hours of music with  Clan Escotia, Cataplexia, and Icky Thump.

Thirza Ember: Do you remember what sims you first had on the grid when it opened back 6 years ago? are any of those originals intact?

Cataplexia Numbers: Yes. Cliff started out with two, there was not much on them. When I came I brought a dozen VARs I had on OS Grid...  Indigo, Wintervale (now Winterfest), Summervale, Koryphon to name a few ...

Thirza Ember: It is quite a leap of faith to pass your regions on to a person with a new grid - what was special about Cliff that made you sure you were doing the right thing?

Cataplexia.Numbers: Well I had met Cliff back in InWorldz. I had a very busy life there, I was the InWorldz events coordinator, and I had many clubs, and a school of enlightenment. Cliff and I were next door neighbors. I have known him 11 years now.  Its never been hard for me to trust Cliff, he's been so genuine with me since day one

Cat and Cliff

Cataplexia Numbers: When we got married on OSgrid, AMV was called V World... it was not really public yet, was just a few weeks old, and so we literally began it together.

Thirza Ember: you went from one of the shortest grid names to one of the longest!!

Clifford Hanger: yup

Cataplexia Numbers: we just changed the name because I had spend many years building that brand.

Inside one of the oldest buildings on sim Manipura

Cat and Cliff showed me one of those very early regions, still online, though in part, of course, rebuilt over the years. There's still a bit of the original construction, a prim building where they do the belly dancing. The vast ground floor space is dark and ornate like an ancient temple. Above, under the roof, is a densely decorated ballroom where Clan Escotia has been known to do a set in the past.

Thirza Ember: How many people joined you when you started? or was the idea just to have a place of your own.

Cataplexia Numbers: my renters mostly. I had 3 regions of rentals there for free, 66 renters - Marune Estates - so some came for the ride. Others just found the place and liked it, others still came from other places i lived, like InWorldz.

Clifford Hanger: they came from everywhere

Thirza Ember: your regions are very colorful and imaginative, I bet that drew them here... and so Cliff, when did you think, "this is really going to be something, it has taken off" ?

Clifford Hanger: yesterday lol ...no, seriously, it was during our 2nd year. At one point we couldn't create regions fast enough.

Thirza Ember: and did you learn from the mistakes you may have seen on other grids?

Clifford Hanger: on how not to do it yes... we wanted to be visible, we wanted lots of space, no residents next to each other.

 From one of the oldest sims on the grid, we moved over to a region that exemplifies today's Alternate Metaverse Grid, in the eyes of its owners. Metasea is a huge 12x12 VAR which is principally water, with lots of room for sailing, fishing and other water sports, as well as camping. The great indoors, indoors.

Cataplexia and Cliff are an affectionate team

Thirza Ember: Cliff, if you could give your younger self a bit of advice about getting the grid going, what would it be?

Clifford Hanger: automate things if you can! Also - When you start out with a grid of your own, you think you can borrow bits from other grids you've been involved with. But in reality every grid is different they all have their own special needs, so you have to make your setup fit our unique set of circumstances. On the whole, "Don't Panic!" would be my best advice. 

The AMV landing point sim contains information for finding your way around the grid.

Clifford Hanger: Be transparent with your residents when things go wrong, they will be patient, they know that sometimes things break... and cultivate good relationships with your service providers and tech people. For example,  the one time we were hacked, we were back up after five hours.  Another time the main grid server died on a Saturday afternoon. Thanks to the good business relationships and contacts we had developed, we were able to get someone to build an identical server, and in just four hours all was back up.

With affection, teamwork, and commitment to each other and to their residents, it's no wonder that AMV grid has grown and matured over the past six years. Here's wishing them many more to come.

HG Address: alternatemetaverse.com:8002:AMV Birthday

Luna

The last words Luna Lunaria wrote to me were: 'Yes, it's for the community'. 

She was a delicate, almost fairylike apparition with long flowing hair, the longest and whitest hair in the Metaverse, with that gentle swirling movement that stood out in any group photo or video. And there are so many of those group shots. 

Ataraxia, Craft-world grid

Here she is perfectly perched, with Cherry Manga, on one of the roman wall paintings on Ataraxia region on Craft, a place of calm and serenity. 

To lose a friend like Luna, for the Opensim community to lose such a significant contributor and supporter of all we do, is a terrible blow, but of course nothing to compare to the sadness and devastation of the real life family that is coping with this sudden bereavement. Our hearts go out to them, with tears in our eyes.

Phigitting at the MdM

 Light and compact, brightly colored, with three prongs in play, and never still for a moment... the buzzword 'phygital' put fidget spinners into my mind ...oh, the naughties! 'Phygital' is a portmanteau term used to describe, until someone thinks of a less clunky term (and please do!), the fusing of activities going on at the same time in the physical world and on digital platforms. 

Come to think of it though, the Museo del Metaverso is compact, brightly colored, with three prongs in play - it's active in Craft grid in Opensim, and Spatial, a corporate-facing immersive VR platform, and in Second Life. 

Judging by the past year's activities at the Museo del Metaverso, called MdM for short, its founder Rosanna Galvani has been spinning up a huge success story with art shows, workshops, exhibitions, presentations, and conversations that bring together the realities in a masterclass of organization and commitment to education and art. 

Seen here at the Museo, dressed in dark business slacks with her signature top hat, Rosanna cuts a typically modern Italian figure of elegance with a touch of whimsicality that lifts the mood. The HG Address of the MdM is of course at the end of the post, where it belongs.

Rosanna Galvani

Rosanna Galvani: 2025 was both a fruitful and transitional year for us. My vision for virtual worlds is that they should be more than just a "niche" space but that they should take on greater cultural density: artists, curatorial projects, transmedia collaborations—all of this is growing. Over the past year, the Museo del Metaverso has become more 'phygital' with a range of voices and languages and different events. These include digital clothing, 3D installations, and live discussions between participants in real and virtual worlds.

Where Eagles Dare

 Our second stop on this final Safari of the season was on Kitely, to see a build by Karima Hoisan and Dale Innes. A few problems, because Kitely blocks a whole lot of the smaller grids, which is a shame. It's also a shame that Karima's regions are some of the few on Kitely that are readily accessible to hypergrid art-lovers and explorers, but we make the most of the Hoisan-Innes generosity, talent, and style.

Karima Hoisan and Dale Innis

Star Ravenhurst: Hi Karima and Dale. Finally rezzed
James Atlloud: Hello
Karima Hoisan: Welcome to The Mountain, please take a nc, it has LMs of some places here

The group gradually arriving on Kitely

Thirza Ember: Karima we just need time to arrive and rez, we are not all here yet, and one or two of us are never all there... like myself
James Atlloud: some are signing the Kitely waiver... lol
Karima Hoisan: ohh boy haha
Dale Innis: haha no rush
Star Ravenhurst: I often have to go to the Welcome Center first on Kitely. Then I can go to where I want to go
Nara Nook: Neo tried welcome, think he is trying a different avatar on another grid now
Thirza Ember: on Kitely, it's a pain in the butt... if there is nobody on the sim, then you have to begin on Welcome, but if there are people on the region and the sim is spooled up, you can jump direct
Star Ravenhurst: There have been a few issues getting here lately
Nara Nook: Neo made it
Neo Nook: Weird, looks like Kitely does not like my home grid
Dale Innis: Glad you made it!
Star Ravenhurst: YAY!