Caledon Oxbridge Q&A for 2013-12-15

15:00 Tali Rosca shouts We're starting the QA now. Today, we're at the skating rink at Caledon Oxbridge (127,104,27)
15:01 Larkylouz Hello, Professor Qyixote
15:01 Tali Rosca Welcome to. Feel free to enjoy the skating, but please hold back the huge snowball fight until after the QA.
15:02 Larkylouz Hi Calli. Hot cocoa in the hut. And skates.
15:02 Tali Rosca As usual, the deans of Oxbridge will answer questions about Oxbridge, Caledon and Second Life.
15:02 Tali Rosca We each have our area of expertise, which you can see here: http://www.caledonoxbridge.org/qna_index.php
15:02 Tali Rosca So, with the last people arriving, let us begin.
15:03 Tali Rosca Anybody care to open with the first question?
15:04 ℇmmɑ Ɱaybe (phillysmaybe) ..hmm maybe.. why outside?
15:05 Tali Rosca Well, we have the rink. I wanted to draw attention to it, and create a little variation.
15:05 ℇmmɑ Ɱaybe (phillysmaybe) ah ok :)
15:05 Larkylouz Ms. Maybe, there is hot cocoa in the shed. that's enough reason for me! ;^)
15:05 Tali Rosca No particular reason, really, except to highlight the winter season in Caledon.
15:06 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) *drinks non-alcoholic mulled wine*
15:06 CALEDON OXBRIDGE MUG whispers Yum! Chocolatey!
15:06 Phrynne *given the opportunity, skates while listening*
15:06 Tali Rosca No questions tonight?
15:06 Allison (allison2489) what are you guys doing for Christmas or Hanuka :)
15:07 Marion Questi We should point out that winter in Caledon is a relatively brief affair...
15:07 Marion Questi Not more than 7 or 8 weeks.
15:07 Caledon Ice Skates~Men Happy Holidays from the Caledon Oxbridge Gateway!
15:07 Tali Rosca I don't know if there are any official Christmas events in Caledon. Anybody know of some?
15:08 Phrynne There is the Carntaigh Caledon Christmas Ball, next weekend.
15:09 Phrynne other than that, I have not heard.
15:09 Tali Rosca Perhaps there is something on the Steamlands site calendar, but I must say I have not checked recently.
15:10 Ravelli Ormstein BBB at the 24th and several events at 25th and 26th
15:10 Ravelli Ormstein http://aetherchrononauts.org/
15:11 Tali Rosca Remember that the 24th is the day many non-English-speaking countries celebrate.
15:11 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) Yup
15:11 Tali Rosca Christmas Eve; not Christmas Day.
15:12 Caledon Ice Skates~Women Happy Holidays from the Caledon Oxbridge Gateway!
15:12 Tali Rosca (This announcement was brought to you by the Caledon Department of International Awareness)
15:13 Tali Rosca Any news we should address today?
15:14 Tali Rosca It has, to my knowledge, been a fairly quiet week.
15:14 Red Quixote china landed a rover on the moon :P
15:14 Allison (allison2489) O.O really
15:15 Tali Rosca *That*, however, is outside the Caledon jurisdiction.
15:15 Tali Rosca But yes, they did.
15:15 Larkylouz And we can't forget the NSA. Those skates are probably wired for sound.
15:15 James MacCloude (mac6572) well I tried every thing I know to do I can't find that lionsgate waypoint
15:15 Red Quixote hehe,.. it was the first news item I thought of
15:15 Tali Rosca Ah, the whole "Intelligence Agencies are listening where people are gathering"-scandal.
15:16 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) NSA is not the only one
15:16 Ravelli Ormstein well, if you google for "second life" and filter results of the last week, you will find articles regarding the NSA scandal and Second Life
15:16 Meora (menchor) get them to hire you and get paid to wander around SL
15:16 ℇmmɑ Ɱaybe (phillysmaybe) suddemly looks at her brand new coffeemug é_Ó
15:16 Red Quixote this is true
15:16 Martini Discovolante so i should not have my attack Ice Bear out?
15:16 Tali Rosca It did hit the news with surprising force.
15:17 James MacCloude (mac6572) i have a minigun if I need to defend the home front
15:17 Tali Rosca It ties in with the sheer magnitude of the surveillance, but I don't think it is particularly surprising that intelligence agencies listen in on a communications channel and community.
15:18 Ravelli Ormstein they make us of any way to get information
15:18 Red Quixote the same can be said of any 'soicial' network
15:18 James MacCloude (mac6572) hi Larky Allison
15:18 Tali Rosca In that sense, SL is just another social network.
15:18 Red Quixote *social
15:18 Meora (menchor) just use some key words they are looking for
15:19 Allison (allison2489) hi James
15:19 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) The lowest-level spies used to be those eavesdropping conversations in cafes and the like because that illustrated the popular opinion outside official proclamations. So this is sort of a modern version.
15:19 Ravelli Ormstein "gun bunnies"
15:19 Phrynne "alley cats"
15:19 Tali Rosca Indeed, the digital venues are where you can get the pulse of the public.
15:20 Tali Rosca "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious"
15:20 Caledon Ice Skates~Women Happy Holidays from the Caledon Oxbridge Gateway!
15:20 Caledon Ice Skates~Women Happy Holidays from the Caledon Oxbridge Gateway!
15:20 James MacCloude (mac6572) and they are headed by the president of morons annomus
15:21 Tali Rosca I think we are veering outside of Caledon and SL business now.
15:21 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) Very
15:21 Tali Rosca As for a quiet week, we're headed for even quieter, as the upcoming time is a "no change" window.
15:21 Tebby1988 Resident seems dazed & confused.
15:21 Tali Rosca LL will not do updates while most of the staff is away.
15:22 Martini Discovolante they will not fix anything either
15:22 Tebby1988 Resident is High as a kite. Just look at them.
15:22 Red Quixote so,.. maybe they won't 'break' anything else?
15:22 Tali Rosca Not apart from what amounts to "unscheduled maintenance".
15:22 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) There has been almost daily updates to the official viewer during the past week. So they may be trying to offload those before holidays.
15:22 Phrynne Is there 'traditionally' much griefing during this season?
15:23 Tali Rosca That's a good question, Phrynne. It's not something I have consciously noted and filed away for reference, but perhaps some of the older deans have a comment on that?
15:23 Ravelli Ormstein hm, i can't remember more trouble over the holidays than usual
15:23 Marion Questi I don't think there is a season for griefing....My impression is that attacks are mostly random
15:23 James MacCloude (mac6572) any one want a chair
15:23 Ravelli Ormstein at some times it gets pretty quiet then in SL
15:23 Meora (menchor) spring break
15:24 Phrynne it has seemed to me that it is when schools are on break, any time.
15:24 Phrynne but I wasn't in Caledon at this time last year.
15:24 Meora (menchor) is there a class in doing materials or part of a class?
15:25 Tali Rosca We don't have anything specifically dedicated to materials. Martini, does your Texture class touch on that?
15:26 Martini Discovolante no.
15:26 Martini Discovolante i need ot add a reference to whatever wiki page LL has provided.
15:26 Martini Discovolante i am not knowledgeable enough myself to add anythign xoconstructive to my class.
15:26 Tali Rosca Then I don't think we have anything currently.
15:27 Meora (menchor) thank you
15:27 Martini Discovolante and it is rather outside the scope of the Primer i offer.
15:27 Ravelli Ormstein there is a wiki page, but it is pretty technical, might be to difficult for non-techies
15:27 Martini Discovolante well i make these things available
15:27 Tali Rosca Materials are often associated with mesh, but strictly speaking, it is a texturing effect which can be used on any surface.
15:27 Martini Discovolante soem of my students are new to Textures, some are experiencedm and simply new to SL.
15:27 Tali Rosca But the normal maps are often generated in a 3D program, from a higher-detail model.
15:28 Tali Rosca So they fall somewhat in between.
15:28 Meora (menchor) you have to be able to run advanced lighting to see the effects
15:29 Tali Rosca That too.
15:29 Tali Rosca I have not seen any statistics on how many are running with that setting active.
15:29 Tali Rosca Has anybody heard anything about that?
15:29 Ravelli Ormstein we just could ask around in this small round here. who has Advanced Lightning active?
15:30 Meora (menchor) me
15:30 Tali Rosca Me
15:30 Gronk Seriman I do.
15:30 Phrynne me
15:30 Red Quixote not I
15:30 ℇmmɑ Ɱaybe (phillysmaybe) sometimes
15:30 Tali Rosca And who don't?
15:30 Marion Questi Not I. Not on my aging iMac.
15:30 Josain Zsun When I am taking snapshots & remember
15:31 Larkylouz Not I.
15:31 Tali Rosca So that sounds somewhat 50-50
15:31 Martini Discovolante i ramp up for photography, and make sure i do not need to move at all, and stay vanilla for day-to -day
15:31 Ravelli Ormstein yup
15:31 Phrynne I have used Materials settings on some hats; I have not had any comments on that yet.
15:31 Red Quixote I can do it,.. it just kills my framerate,.. I will be upgrading my card soon though
15:31 Callipygian Christensen I do
15:32 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) FPS drops to one figure when I try that. But not always.
15:32 Ravelli Ormstein well, 50-50 is a pretty positive tendency for this feature, its not that old. so in one year it might be 75-25 perhaps
15:32 Martini Discovolante i believe that settign is now Default.
15:32 Meora (menchor) also as people get newer machines
15:33 Martini Discovolante i had it on, and have just done a clean reintstall
15:33 Tali Rosca It depends on your graphics card. But I can imagine it being slightly optimistic about when to turn it on.
15:33 Tiny-Teddy 6 Unknown animation state 'Init'
15:33 Tiny-Teddy 6 Unknown animation state 'Init'
15:33 Red Quixote it's active by default now?, that might explain a resident's rendering issue earlier
15:33 Tali Rosca It does give some very nice screenshots, so it makes sense that LL would want SL to be seen that way.
15:33 Martini Discovolante the viewer tries to match teh machine you are on
15:34 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) Not a default in my viewer. That just updated itself after a crash.
15:34 Meora (menchor) you have to be above high on the graphics
15:34 Martini Discovolante perhaps it was because of the mammoth mac i run.
15:35 Phrynne I have Advanced Lighting Model on at mid-level graphics in the SL viewer.
15:36 Tali Rosca I don't know if we have anybody who feel confident enough about materials that we can draft him or her into giving a class about it.
15:36 Tali Rosca But it is definitely a good topic.
15:37 Tali Rosca The classes are heavily based on who volunteers to give one.
15:38 Tali Rosca That turned into a nice tangent. Any other questions?
15:38 Red Quixote there could also be a very limited number of students who would interested and have compatible hardware
15:39 Tali Rosca nods. "It is a highly specialized topic. The question is if it's too niché, or exactly something people would like to hear about because it can otherwise be hard to get into."
15:40 Larkylouz Perahps it is a class that could happen once a month, or once every two weeks?
15:40 Ravelli Ormstein sure
15:40 Red Quixote I say, let it develop
15:40 Sergei (tebby1988) does santa visit caledon oxbridge university
15:40 Sergei (tebby1988) ?
15:40 Marion Questi looks for his santa hat...
15:40 Tali Rosca I have never seen him, but perhaps we can get Desmond to dress up :-)
15:41 Meora (menchor) Ha ha ha hahahaaa
15:41 Ravelli Ormstein nobody knows, we have to wait and see, if he will come this year. some years back he was around, i got this scarf from him
15:41 Meora (menchor) Desmond Claus
15:41 James MacCloude (mac6572) welcome back Allison
15:42 Ravelli Ormstein ok, i have not seen him in persona, but i found the scarf hidden in a snow man as a gift
15:42 Marion Questi I have had a pile of coal left on my doorstep on Christmas Eve...:)
15:42 ℇmmɑ Ɱaybe (phillysmaybe) wonder if she'd dare to sit on his lap... o_0
15:42 Martini Discovolante HE has bvery little imagination and leaves the same gifts year after year
15:42 James MacCloude (mac6572) well if you need the coal
15:42 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) *has been Santa too many times to believe in him*
15:42 ℇmmɑ Ɱaybe (phillysmaybe) would make the coolest shapshot ever tho
15:43 Ravelli Ormstein Tali, perhaps if there is no question right now... are there any news from the TOS front?
15:44 Tali Rosca Yes and no.
15:44 Meora (menchor) they changed the bot rules
15:44 Tali Rosca There is no news from LL.
15:44 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) Bot rules?
15:45 Josain Zsun BOTS Rule dude! !
15:45 Tali Rosca The UCCSL group is deliberately going dormant over Christmas, but is starting to plan a coordinated effort come February.
15:45 Tali Rosca Details are still rather up in the air.
15:45 Tali Rosca I have missed the changes to the bot rules. What are those?
15:46 Meora (menchor) scripted agents an avatar controlled by a computer instead of a human running it
15:46 Marion Questi They have set some specific limits on messaging volumes from bots
15:46 Martini Discovolante http://wiki.secondlife.com/w/index.php?title=Linden_Lab_Official:Bot_policy&curid=93532&diff=1184982&oldid=1148292
15:46 Marion Questi It shouldn't affect us.
15:47 Tali Rosca Ah, I'll have to read up on that. Thanks for the heads-up.
15:47 Tali Rosca I hardly imagine it affects us, as Questi says, but we *do* have a bot, so we'd better keep up to date with any regulations.
15:48 James MacCloude (mac6572) I've heard of bots don't know yet how to use them
15:48 Tali Rosca -You may have met the Guardian up in the sandbox.
15:49 Tali Rosca Bots require a specific program to run; typically a non-visual client which only handles just the type of interaction needed for the bot to perform it's job; say, handling group invites.
15:49 Tali Rosca But seen from the server's side, they are just another avatar account.
15:50 James MacCloude (mac6572) Allison I like the sound you make when you teleport out
15:50 ℇmmɑ Ɱaybe (phillysmaybe) hmm, im off.. thanks and till next time
15:50 ℇmmɑ Ɱaybe (phillysmaybe) bbye
15:50 Ravelli Ormstein Ade Miss Maybe
15:51 James MacCloude (mac6572) and in
15:52 Tali Rosca As for the ToS, I imagine you meant the IP rights. LL has been completely quiet for quite a while. They answered one additional letter, essentially saying, "Be patient", but making no promises about if or when to make any changes, or if they would even ever mention it again.
15:53 Tali Rosca That was at the beginning of November, more or less. I can't remember the date off the top of my head.
15:54 Tali Rosca So we've had 2½ months of "we'll take a look at it", and 1½ month of "be patient".
15:54 Ravelli Ormstein yes, that was around the 10th November
15:54 Meora (menchor) it took them awhile on the deformer too
15:54 Callipygian Christensen That's pretty mormal for LL reaction times :)
15:54 Callipygian Christensen normal*
15:55 Tali Rosca In fairness, updating legal documents for a company *will* have a long turnaround time.
15:55 Josain Zsun As soon as they have archived all inventories and have a marketing plan, and their legal aide passes the BAR…
15:55 Tali Rosca But it would be nice to have *some* acknowledgment of their stance on it.
15:56 Tali Rosca Anyway, last chance for another question, before I pull out the snowballs.
15:57 Snow Ball Shooter Snow ball fight!
15:57 Tali Rosca QA is officially over when the first snowball hits Ravelli.
15:57 Ordinal Snowball Thrower v0.31 Enter mouselook and click left mouse button to throw a snowball.
15:57 Ordinal Snowball Thrower v0.31 Animations are on - /9808 anim to turn them off
15:57 Snowball Ravelli Ormstein has hit Tali Rosca with a snowball!
15:58 Tali Rosca ...or when he scampers away.
15:58 Tali Rosca Adjourned, people. See you again next week.
15:58 Marion Questi Good night everyone!
15:59 Ravelli Ormstein thanks for coming!
15:59 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) Bedtime for me, unfortunately.
15:59 Phrynne good night
15:59 Gronk Seriman Yaaay! Thank you, Deans!
15:59 Snowball Tali Rosca has hit Ravelli Ormstein with a snowball!
15:59 Ravelli Ormstein ouch!
15:59 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) Be seeing you
15:59 Tali Rosca I did tell you that :-P
15:59 Meora (menchor) just don't put a rock in the snowball
15:59 Callipygian Christensen throws it in a glass and adds syrup
15:59 Snowball Tali Rosca has hit Ravelli Ormstein with a snowball!
15:59 Elfbiter Skysmith (elfbiter) :-)
15:59 Callipygian Christensen slushie time!
16:00 Callipygian Christensen goodnight everyone..or morning or afternoon if it fits :)
16:00 Ravelli Ormstein i have to leave as well, bed is calling
16:01 Ravelli Ormstein good night everyone
16:01 Tali Rosca Hee, I liked the look of people crowding the ice and sitting around the fire.
16:01 Red Quixote good night Rav
16:01 Tali Rosca See you
16:01 Martini Discovolante night Ravelli
16:01 Red Quixote it was a nice change