Pick and Choose

It's time for you to give back!
Please help us with a new project, Safari Suggestions. The idea is to give every hypergridder the chance to name five memorable places in open sim, and share their thoughts and Landmarks with others. This is not a popularity contest, but more a chance for you to let us know a bit more about you and your tastes.

You can suggest your own sim, or not, there's no rule against self promotion. Don't feel you have to put the five most 'important' places, or limit yourself to Safari destinations. Maybe you like art, or education sims, perhaps let people know about some good free shopping regions, or tell them about community or music events. It's up to you.
It's harder than it sounds! Can't remember the name of a place we saw while on Safari? 

Looking back through this blog may jog your memory, or the Safari Archive inside the clubhouse may also help.
Once you've chosen five places, what next? 

Safari crosses over

            Institutions. We all love them, and most of us belong in one. This week three SL/opensim crossovers were our destinations, each one an epic in its own way. First up,  Seanchai Library which this month celebrates seven years since it was founded in Second Life. That's a big deal when you think of all the performances that this group has put on, and all the money they have collected for charity too. We met on sim Inis Arcain in Kitely to hear the short story 'The Bard' performed by Caledonia Skytower. This is a tale of druids and warriors and ancient angst, and one of the most memorable menacing laughs in the metaverse.

          Caledonia set things up so we could hear her via streaming anywhere on the sim, making it possible to go wandering around the build without missing any of the story, also making it easier on those of us who find that Voice does not work well when

Fun with the Frenchies

          What keeps a grid alive? A sense of place, a sense of purpose. That is the secret behind Francogrid's longevity. The grid is founded on good old French ideals like Liberty and Fraternity, and they mean it. Freedom is paramount on the grid. A free exchange of knowledge. Creativity given the freedom to grow. And free space. The grid has an impressive history of sims donated to creative people. Freedom too from the humdrum cookie cutter architecture of the past.

Accueil, Francogrid's welcome area, with TP parlor. Build by DJ Phil and Cherry Manga

The English language is, obviously, a crushing force for communication in the metaverse. In Francogrid, just about everyone makes an effort to speak English if they meet a non-francophone, however, this grid does a little bit to push back and remind us all that there are other languages out there. 

Taarna Welles

             Our final  stop on this week's trip was to a fashion designer with her own grid. From Indigo to Bubblesz, Taarna Welles' little grid. Taarna chatted in voice as Mal Burns asked her a number of questions on behalf of the group. 

Taarna explained that her grid began just a couple of years ago. She had been active on a number of grids, including OSgrid and Metropolis, before she started Bubblesz with her husband. She has been making sculpty objects for years, and with the advent of mesh she's been busy making even more stuff, notably the BEST footwear in opensim. 

Blue Safari

There are two kinds of people in this world, those who do, and those who don't.

          This week Safari began with music and a big ole crash. Wolem Wobbit played the blues for us on the dance floor on hgsafari sim. Wolem is working on a great performance sim on Metropolis grid, called Chicago Blues. 

Go visit if you get a chance, you'll like it.

It took a while for stream to kick in. Wolem did back flips while we waited. I was thinking of all the signage I should have put up to make it easier for people to understand where we are and where we're going, but let's face it, nobody actually reads anything. 

Safari gets corny

This last week of February is, has been and, perhaps, will forever more, be Cornflakes Week in OpenSim. It's a celebration that transcends the rivalries of individual grids, that doesn't require any special outfit or costume, loosely based on the memory of Cornflakes Woodcock's zany, gaudy art, but not limited by his freebies. Anyone can do anything, as Virtual Christine pointed out, no-one's in charge! The week long celebration was publicized in facebook and in G+ and for a first year, seems to have been a modest success. It owes nothing to real life or second life traditions, it is wholly ours, and perhaps as time goes by it will be embraced by all those who love silliness and the mad variety and independence of OpenSim.

Franzi, Nara, Wizard, Mal and Apmel Fransson await the arrival of the latecomers

We celebrated with a few stops this week, picking up birdy nam nam shoulder pets, or

Goodbye to Gatsby

"In two weeks it'll be the longest day in the year." 

She looked at us all radiantly.

"Do you always watch for the longest day of the year and then miss it? 

I always watch for the longest day in the year and then miss it."

"We ought to plan something," yawned Miss Baker.

                                                                                 The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

It's easy to miss things in OpenSim; we are all so busy making, inventing and scratching our heads as the platform throws up some new curve ball that takes away an hour or two we might otherwise have spent  relaxing. 

But some things should not be missed, and this is one of them: The Great Gatsby build, part of EXPLORESeanchai on Kitely. After a month or more of performances and guided tours, the build will be closing, with a party on the last day of this month, Sunday 28 February, some time after 2 pm Pacific. Here's the address:
Hypergrid URI    grid.kitely.com:8002:EXPLORESeanchai  

East Egg and West Egg have been coming alive in this very special way throughout the past few weeks as the Seanchai has presented readings of the novel in weekly episodes with performances by both Caledonia and the great Corwyn Allen. The readings