Author: Alan Kiesler

Well, its finally occuring.

My time in Second Life is scarce enough as it is, and the experience I’m having today has gone down a lot in the past year.

So, its time to vote with my feet for awhile.

Numbakulla will hopefully be handed off to someone else to help supply the tier, or otherwise sold in some fashion. My only other obligation is a rental (Tavarua), and so I will close the Money Tree and drop to a Basic account afterwards. I will continue to have a presence in the #secondlife EFNet channel, since I’ve spent so much time working on getting the link as it is, and I can monitor the further progress of SL.

What next then? I have two other choices to start with: There, and H’uru / New Age building. Both require the same basic set of skills in building, so it can go either way. Perhaps also looking into writing a bit more, or fiddling with Linux or Solaris 10. I’ve got lots to occupy me.

Just not in Second Life anymore. Too bad really, I had hopes for it…

–Alan

There has been a debate rumbling in several SL forum threads, regarding a string of large ‘Impeach Bush’ sighs on the smallest land parcels available (16 m2). It’s finally brought the attention of the [New World Notes][NWN] weblog (sidebar), which had succeeded in getting a discussion with the owner of these parcels.

The discussion does not surprise me much, but I want to bring up two different responses to this. Note that I’ve been silent on the matter until now, since my time in SL is sparce due to Real Life issues and the very real problems I’ve had with the 1.7.x release series. Plus, I no longer ‘live’ on the mainland and have not for nearly 2/3rds my SL ‘life.’

OK, first, the (somewhat non-political) SL side of my response:

– These are objects that in most cases are hanging out of their parcel lines, in come cases by a lot. This is infringing on other people’s ability to build in their own plots and should, out of courtesy at least, be shrunk to fit. If they want something larger, then perhaps send it 250 meters up and cross your fingers that it don’t get autoreturned.

– Some parts of this owner’s tactic borders a bit on the griefing side, but is still leagal by the TOS. Should this change? Perhaps, but what would we change that with? We have to be careful what we wish for in terms of changes to the system; It may be best to revamp how land sales are done, but at what cost? A reasoned discussion should still insue now matter how inflamed it may get; The [telehub/point-to-point][TH-nwn] discussion is a good example of how we should try and go about it.

– [rant] Things like this make me more assured that I did the right thing at the right time by fleeing the mainland back in Jan ’05. Apparently I saw the writing on the wall well before I realized it. Perhaps Gwyn is right (see the telehub link).[/rant]

Right, now on to the meat of this land owner’s campaign: Should Bush really be impeached? Warning, hugely subjective – and possibly inflaming (even for Republicans) – opinion follows…

Well, I still feel that what’s occuring in Iraq was a good thing; What happened may not bear fruit until after the US ‘midterm’ elections, but you will see Iraq becoming a much better neighbor, and – perhaps in a great turnaround – a great ally of the US, on their own two feet, and proud.

However, I think Bush went about it the wrong way, and may have in fact done things a bit underhanded – or at least not be clear enough about those intentions to the US public.

Everyone kept hearing about the WMDs from the media, we’ve all heard about that debacle. But didn’t he also want the Iraqis to live in a better world, to finish – once and for all – a war that really was not over (only a cease-fire was signed, not a surrender!) and lift its citizens to a better life without Saddam, and get a better economy there and thereby help *everyone* in the world. Is that not a good thing to try and strive for? So why was this not brought to the fore? Why were the WMDs brought front and center? All that did was shun our biggest supporters, and put the whole thing on the wrong foot before the first missle was fired.

So, should he be impeached? Perhaps. At the very least, the whole thing should be investigated (and keep the damn media out of it during the investigation, because they could very well have been part of the problem!). If, after such a search, it becomes apparent to the group doing the investigation that it would be a good idea to impeach, then I may in good concience be able to support it.

Even from this old Republican, and Bush supporter…

–Alan

[NWN]: http://secondlife.blogs.com/nwn/2005/12/impeachable_off.html
[TH-nwn]: http://secondlife.blogs.com/nwn/2005/12/point_to_point_.html

As just mentioned, the site is back up.  Thx. *bow*

Unfortunately, since then I had gotten my own space.  It targets all the meta-worlds, not just SL, so I cannot justify placing all that here. ;)

I am in progess of moving the old articles here over to that, since I’ve gotten quite used to WordPress.  However I’ll leave this open and post now and then with links back to my home space when SL is discussed.

Current projects (watch the above space or here):

– SL/There objective comparison, and recommendations based on user type (in particular the Uru community).