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Friday, November 03, 2006
Monday, October 16, 2006
A possible answer to the infamous question, "What is SecondLife?":
2nd life is like The Matrix. It's a reflection of real life, but without the limitations of real life. You can defy gravity and create things at will. In addition, you can utilize the advatage of a computerized world. For example, one person creted a "universal translator" on it. You set it to the language you want to traslate to, and everything that is said to you in that language is sent to Altavista's BabelFish site, run through the translator into your language, and appears on your screen in the game within seconds in your language, and everything you say is automatically translated to the other language, too. You can hold a concert for friends across the world by streaming in audio. Anyone in the world can come just by sitting down to a computer and turning on 2nd Life. These are just a VERY small peak into what 2nd Life can do. Professors are actually holding college courses in 2nd Life, utilizing the fact that anyone from anywhere can get to it, and using the ability to manipulate the in-world to help illustrate their points.
Need a purpose? A "gaming" aspect to your online time? Users have created their own games in-world that you can go to and do, too. And that's the thing. Users create them, they don't need a corporation to support them, so new and inventive ideas are everywhere. Any creative outlet you can think of is all housed in one world, faciliated by the tools that Second Life provides, and the fact that anyone can come to what you put up, instantly, from anywhere in the real world, just by sitting down to a computer.
Source: an anonymous reply to a story that appeared on Slashdot on October 15, 2006.
2nd life is like The Matrix. It's a reflection of real life, but without the limitations of real life. You can defy gravity and create things at will. In addition, you can utilize the advatage of a computerized world. For example, one person creted a "universal translator" on it. You set it to the language you want to traslate to, and everything that is said to you in that language is sent to Altavista's BabelFish site, run through the translator into your language, and appears on your screen in the game within seconds in your language, and everything you say is automatically translated to the other language, too. You can hold a concert for friends across the world by streaming in audio. Anyone in the world can come just by sitting down to a computer and turning on 2nd Life. These are just a VERY small peak into what 2nd Life can do. Professors are actually holding college courses in 2nd Life, utilizing the fact that anyone from anywhere can get to it, and using the ability to manipulate the in-world to help illustrate their points.
Need a purpose? A "gaming" aspect to your online time? Users have created their own games in-world that you can go to and do, too. And that's the thing. Users create them, they don't need a corporation to support them, so new and inventive ideas are everywhere. Any creative outlet you can think of is all housed in one world, faciliated by the tools that Second Life provides, and the fact that anyone can come to what you put up, instantly, from anywhere in the real world, just by sitting down to a computer.
Source: an anonymous reply to a story that appeared on Slashdot on October 15, 2006.
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
All You Wanted to Know About Prims and Didn't Ask
Part of living and working in SL includes understanding your surroundings and what is actually in front of you as you walk through a forest or though a busy club.
Understanding some basics will not only help you see your world in a new way, but also may inspire you to add your own contribution too.
There are four basic elements in SL: land, water, sky...and everything else. This post is about the 'everything else' part, but I'll explain the other three things first.
Land, water, and sky are all basic elements of the SL world. Every bit of land you walk on or fly over is owned by someone. The owner might be Governor Linden who owns almost all non-resident-owned land. Governor Linden owned land is usually reserved for roads, large areas of water (also known as void regions), new land not yet for sale, and resident-abandoned land.
The sky is visible everywhere and provides residents with daylight and moonlight (stars too). A day in SL lasts 4 hours - three hours of daylight and one hour of darkness per four hour period. You can fly up into the sky. If you have help, you can fly very high (millions of meters) but you can only build/live at 768m and lower.
Water comes in two forms: Linden water and other water. Linden water is as close to real water as you can get in SL. It moves just like real water, and gets dark as you deeper under the water. You can just walk right into the water - or fly around if you like. You'll notice that it is darker than it would be at the surface. You can buy attachments that detect Linden water and help you swim or scuba dive to add some more realism.
The last basic element, before 'everything else' is Land.
The smallest single plot of land possible in SL is 4m x 4m (or 16 square meters) and the largest possible single plot of land is 256m x 256m (or 65,536 square meters). The largest plot of land is often referred to as a sim (short for simulator) and each sim has its own name. Individual plots of land have their own names too and people refer to their land as the name of their plot followed by the sim name (and sometimes followed by numbers which represent coordinates within the sim).
Land governs a variety of things in SL including security (you can be banned or ejected from a certain lots/parcels of land), music and video (even though you may have seen radios and TVs/theaters in SL - these are actually supported by the land itself), capacity (only a certain number of people can be in a region at a given time), and of course, the capability to build and leave builds in place (also referred to rezzing and leaving builds rezzed).
Functions like security, music, and video work for all land, regardless of size. The amount land someone owns within a given sim determines how much can be built on the land - the more land you have within a single sim, the more you can build within that sim.
So, how does SL know how much you build? That is where Prims, short for primitives, come into play.
One prim is a single 3-D shape - a square, cylinder, sphere, torus, etc. Everyone has the ability to rez (create) prims. You can manipulate and combine prims to make things like tables, chairs, buildings, trees, and everything else that is not land, water, or sky.
Something that uses a lot of prims is said to be "prim-heavy" or "primy", and things that look good and use very few prims are referred to as "low-prim".
Depending on the skill of the person that makes something, a particular 'thing' (chair, house, bed, etc) can use a large number of small number of prims.
Land in SL supports a certain number of prims. A typical first-land plot of 512 square meters supports 117 prims. A tiny 16 square meter plot supports 3 prims, and an entire sim (65,536 square meters) supports 15,000 prims.
When you rez (place) something on the ground, SL determines if you are allowed to place that item. If the land does not belong to you, the owner may grant permission to build there as is done in sandboxes. If SL determines that there are enough available prims on the land, SL allows your item to appear. If there are not enough prims available then you'll see a message telling you that the 'parcel is full'.
You can see how many prims something uses by doing the following:
< coming soon >
In my earlier post (where I describe how to make money in SL), I discussed land in terms of the purchase price and monthly fee (tier). The more land you own, the more tier you pay per month (up to US$195/month for a sim). But the more land you own, the more you can build.
When you rent land, an apartment, a condo, or a place in the sky in SL the owner, manager, or landlord will tell you how many prims you are allowed to use. It is important that you abide by the prim limits and you should ask if you need more prims or are not sure how many you are using.
Keep track of the number of prims you are using by adding the number of prims each item uses and then totaling the numbers.
If you own the land, or the land is deeded to your group, you can check how many prims you are using by right-clicking the ground, select the About Land option, and then click the Objects tab.
I hope this information helps you, as always I appreciate your constructive feedback!
Understanding some basics will not only help you see your world in a new way, but also may inspire you to add your own contribution too.
There are four basic elements in SL: land, water, sky...and everything else. This post is about the 'everything else' part, but I'll explain the other three things first.
Land, water, and sky are all basic elements of the SL world. Every bit of land you walk on or fly over is owned by someone. The owner might be Governor Linden who owns almost all non-resident-owned land. Governor Linden owned land is usually reserved for roads, large areas of water (also known as void regions), new land not yet for sale, and resident-abandoned land.
The sky is visible everywhere and provides residents with daylight and moonlight (stars too). A day in SL lasts 4 hours - three hours of daylight and one hour of darkness per four hour period. You can fly up into the sky. If you have help, you can fly very high (millions of meters) but you can only build/live at 768m and lower.
Water comes in two forms: Linden water and other water. Linden water is as close to real water as you can get in SL. It moves just like real water, and gets dark as you deeper under the water. You can just walk right into the water - or fly around if you like. You'll notice that it is darker than it would be at the surface. You can buy attachments that detect Linden water and help you swim or scuba dive to add some more realism.
The last basic element, before 'everything else' is Land.
The smallest single plot of land possible in SL is 4m x 4m (or 16 square meters) and the largest possible single plot of land is 256m x 256m (or 65,536 square meters). The largest plot of land is often referred to as a sim (short for simulator) and each sim has its own name. Individual plots of land have their own names too and people refer to their land as the name of their plot followed by the sim name (and sometimes followed by numbers which represent coordinates within the sim).
Land governs a variety of things in SL including security (you can be banned or ejected from a certain lots/parcels of land), music and video (even though you may have seen radios and TVs/theaters in SL - these are actually supported by the land itself), capacity (only a certain number of people can be in a region at a given time), and of course, the capability to build and leave builds in place (also referred to rezzing and leaving builds rezzed).
Functions like security, music, and video work for all land, regardless of size. The amount land someone owns within a given sim determines how much can be built on the land - the more land you have within a single sim, the more you can build within that sim.
So, how does SL know how much you build? That is where Prims, short for primitives, come into play.
One prim is a single 3-D shape - a square, cylinder, sphere, torus, etc. Everyone has the ability to rez (create) prims. You can manipulate and combine prims to make things like tables, chairs, buildings, trees, and everything else that is not land, water, or sky.
Something that uses a lot of prims is said to be "prim-heavy" or "primy", and things that look good and use very few prims are referred to as "low-prim".
Depending on the skill of the person that makes something, a particular 'thing' (chair, house, bed, etc) can use a large number of small number of prims.
Land in SL supports a certain number of prims. A typical first-land plot of 512 square meters supports 117 prims. A tiny 16 square meter plot supports 3 prims, and an entire sim (65,536 square meters) supports 15,000 prims.
When you rez (place) something on the ground, SL determines if you are allowed to place that item. If the land does not belong to you, the owner may grant permission to build there as is done in sandboxes. If SL determines that there are enough available prims on the land, SL allows your item to appear. If there are not enough prims available then you'll see a message telling you that the 'parcel is full'.
You can see how many prims something uses by doing the following:
In my earlier post (where I describe how to make money in SL), I discussed land in terms of the purchase price and monthly fee (tier). The more land you own, the more tier you pay per month (up to US$195/month for a sim). But the more land you own, the more you can build.
When you rent land, an apartment, a condo, or a place in the sky in SL the owner, manager, or landlord will tell you how many prims you are allowed to use. It is important that you abide by the prim limits and you should ask if you need more prims or are not sure how many you are using.
Keep track of the number of prims you are using by adding the number of prims each item uses and then totaling the numbers.
If you own the land, or the land is deeded to your group, you can check how many prims you are using by right-clicking the ground, select the About Land option, and then click the Objects tab.
I hope this information helps you, as always I appreciate your constructive feedback!
Grid Attacks and Approaches to Cope
Yesterday (September 18, 2006) the SL grid was attacked three different times by self-replicating objects.
A self-replicating object is a prim (or a linked group of prims) that contain scripts that are designed to make copies of the object. Often, these objects move around the grid by themselves (using physical movement to avoid being disabled when crossing no-script areas) and replicate at a certain interval to aviod detection for as long as possible.
This type of attack strains the SL systems since it results in a large number of objects throughout the grid, each running their own scripts and moving throughout (if they are using physical movement). I saw about 160 of these objects on one of my plots of land -- many others were reporting many more.
LL has coped with this problem in the past by disabling new logins and then attempting to remove the offending objects. At times, they have had to take down SL for hours while they work to clean up the mess.
Recently LL has been handling grid-wide attacks by disabling all scripts in SL -- this is a great idea.
Although vendors, teleporters, games, camping chairs, doors, and a range of other things stop working you can at least build, socialize, terraform your land or just get organized.
Sure it's a headache, but it beats being logged out and unable to login for a long time.
A self-replicating object is a prim (or a linked group of prims) that contain scripts that are designed to make copies of the object. Often, these objects move around the grid by themselves (using physical movement to avoid being disabled when crossing no-script areas) and replicate at a certain interval to aviod detection for as long as possible.
This type of attack strains the SL systems since it results in a large number of objects throughout the grid, each running their own scripts and moving throughout (if they are using physical movement). I saw about 160 of these objects on one of my plots of land -- many others were reporting many more.
LL has coped with this problem in the past by disabling new logins and then attempting to remove the offending objects. At times, they have had to take down SL for hours while they work to clean up the mess.
Recently LL has been handling grid-wide attacks by disabling all scripts in SL -- this is a great idea.
Although vendors, teleporters, games, camping chairs, doors, and a range of other things stop working you can at least build, socialize, terraform your land or just get organized.
Sure it's a headache, but it beats being logged out and unable to login for a long time.
Monday, September 18, 2006
Ok...so how do I get money? A Fast Guide to Getting Money in SL
One of my SL businesses includes renting inexpensive condos - I get a lot of new citizens because the condos are cheap and offer lots of features that most other places are only dreaming about now (like auto-configuring locking doors, flexible prim limits, and a few innovative goodies that I'll keep to myself for now).
The question that most people ask me (and I am sure you have heard it too) is, "How do I earn money?". This is a complete guide to making money in SL:
There are eight parts in this guide:
You don't have to have money to enjoy SL - there are a lot of high quality freebies available. Shop around, visit freebie places each week - things often get added or removed. Visit popular malls and clubs - they often give things away. I recently got a free tux - it very high quality but was free for only one day as a promotion.
You can even 'live' in SL for free - I came across a mansion that is free to use. The owner furnished the mansion beautifully and includes several private rooms. You cannot add your own furniture, but then you don't need it anyway.
If you want to build, visit one of the many sandboxes. If you are tired of the more crowded sandboxes, visit the less popular ones - they are often empty.
Are you making something and want to texture it, but don't have L$10 to upload? No problem - you have a lot of textures in your inventory that you can use. Need some more? Visit the freebie places - there are a lot of high-quality free (as in L$0) textures available now (visit the Bazzar - a Linden location with free (L$0) stuff including textures).
Have something to sell? There are free places for that too. Just spend some time using Find in-world or check the SL forums. The time-investment you make there pays off quickly.
Can't find any empty sandboxes or a free place to live? Ask a landowner - you might be surprised how helpful people in SL can be! Be polite, explain what you want to do, and maybe you'll come across someone with some spare land (even if it is only temporary).
Money that Grows on Trees
In SL, money does grow on trees! If you are less than 30 days old, use the Find button and search for 'Money Tree' - or visit places like The Shelter and get a current listing of Money Tree Locations.
The generosity of other SL residents makes Money Trees possible. Everything from the actual Money Trees to the land they are on and the money they grow is made possible by other SL residents! If you see the owner nearby, or see someone donating to a tree, take a moment and say "Thank you".
Working for a Second Living
Many SL-ers have a day job (a job in RL [real life]) and really don't want to work in SL. Some of us like to work in SL since it is part of their Second Lives. So, how do you find work?
Answer these questions first:
The question that most people ask me (and I am sure you have heard it too) is, "How do I earn money?". This is a complete guide to making money in SL:
There are eight parts in this guide:
- Here's the Good News - You don't Need Money to Enjoy SL
- The Fastest Way to Get Money
- Money that Grows on Trees
- Working for a Second Living
- Getting Paid and Reinvesting or Cashing-out
- Making enough money to buy land
- Making enough money to pay tier
- Making enough money to enjoy it
You don't have to have money to enjoy SL - there are a lot of high quality freebies available. Shop around, visit freebie places each week - things often get added or removed. Visit popular malls and clubs - they often give things away. I recently got a free tux - it very high quality but was free for only one day as a promotion.
You can even 'live' in SL for free - I came across a mansion that is free to use. The owner furnished the mansion beautifully and includes several private rooms. You cannot add your own furniture, but then you don't need it anyway.
If you want to build, visit one of the many sandboxes. If you are tired of the more crowded sandboxes, visit the less popular ones - they are often empty.
Are you making something and want to texture it, but don't have L$10 to upload? No problem - you have a lot of textures in your inventory that you can use. Need some more? Visit the freebie places - there are a lot of high-quality free (as in L$0) textures available now (visit the Bazzar - a Linden location with free (L$0) stuff including textures).
Have something to sell? There are free places for that too. Just spend some time using Find in-world or check the SL forums. The time-investment you make there pays off quickly.
Can't find any empty sandboxes or a free place to live? Ask a landowner - you might be surprised how helpful people in SL can be! Be polite, explain what you want to do, and maybe you'll come across someone with some spare land (even if it is only temporary).
Money that Grows on Trees
In SL, money does grow on trees! If you are less than 30 days old, use the Find button and search for 'Money Tree' - or visit places like The Shelter and get a current listing of Money Tree Locations.
The generosity of other SL residents makes Money Trees possible. Everything from the actual Money Trees to the land they are on and the money they grow is made possible by other SL residents! If you see the owner nearby, or see someone donating to a tree, take a moment and say "Thank you".
Working for a Second Living
Many SL-ers have a day job (a job in RL [real life]) and really don't want to work in SL. Some of us like to work in SL since it is part of their Second Lives. So, how do you find work?
Answer these questions first:
- Do you login to SL regularly? Can you be available at certain times?
- How many hours do you spend in SL per day and week?
- What are your RL skills? (writing, marketing, socializing, shopping (yes, people have personal shoppers), programming, graphics artist or wanna be artist, RL artist, role player, etc)
- Do you understand terms like IM, "rez", TP and other assorted SL idioms?
Looking for a Job
Once you have answered the questions in the previous section try the following:
- Check the employment section of the official forums.
- Ask owners or managers in places that you at which like to frequently hang out (be polite and not too pushy).
- Consider hosting events, organizing parties, weddings, or other places where your skills can be of value.
- Ask friends and other acquaintances if they know of anyone that is hiring.
- Update your profile - add a brief listing of skills and the fact that you are looking for work. You'll be surprised how many leads that brings in.
If you plan to work in a service-oriented field, customize yourself, and borrow L$10 from someone, and add a snapshot of your avatar to your profile.
Making your own Job
Of the people that earn money in SL, many are self-employed or occasionally sell things or services on their own.
The great thing about SL is that you real life skills make a difference. Enjoy providing top-notch service? Do you like to make things? Have a good eye for interior decorating? Garden design? Can you establish and use a network of friends and associates to help others? Do you enjoy writing?
There are a lot of businesses you can try. Don't let the fact that your business might already have a few instances in SL already stop you. Take a look at the huge number of clubs in SL - new clubs pop up every day - they don't seem to be de-motivated by the sheer numbers of competing clubs!
There are a number of ways to get started that don't necessarily involve investment beyond time and your skills. Look around, be social and you'll be surprised (remember to be polite and not too pushy - business and land owners are usually very busy).
Making enough money to buy land
I have heard of people doing this, but have yet to personally come across someone that registered six months ago as a basic member, and made enough to own land.
The reason I say six months is that older citizens may have had better opportunities though stipends and other incentives to accomplish this. SL is a different place now, and selling killer products or services (those that have a very high demand) is much more difficult than it once was.
There are people that make a fair bit of money in SL; however, they have either had excellent insight into consumer demand or may have invested their own money in SL to start out and are recovering their startup costs. These aren't the only possibilities, just the most likely ones.
One of the complicating factors with land is that, up until recently, you had to be a premium member to own land. With recent changes, you can now buy land on private islands (that is another discussion) without being a premium member. More about this in the next section.
Getting Paid and Reinvesting or Cashing-out
If you sell things (objects), set them for sale and you'll accumulate L$ in your account.
If you sell a service, people usually pay you directly based on your terms. Remember that any agreement between you and the person receiving the service is your agreement - LL won't help in any disputes, so be fair but cautious.
Once you have enough L$ and you could re-invest by buying things or land, or you can cash out.
If you don't want to buy anything in-world, you can cash out -- convert your L$ into real money.
Visit https://secondlife.com/currency/, read the information, click Sell L$ (if you qualify) and enter how many L$ you want to sell. As with everything else, do your homework and learn about trading L$ and you could make some more US$ for your L$ (hint: visit https://secondlife.com/account/currency_settings.php).
Making enough money to pay tier
All land owners, regardless of whether you buy/own mainland land or private estate land
must pay a 'tax' on land - the tax is called tier. Tier is the fee that Linden Lab charges to maintain our virtual world. All land owners pay tier.
If anyone offers you tier-free land, it is a scam - everyone pays tier in one way or another.
Tier changes based on how much land you own, and making enough to cover your land purchase price and then the monthly tier can be challenging (unless you come up with a killer product or service).
Don't let this stop you though!
Making enough money to enjoy it
You could enjoy SL and your business so much that the money is actually a bonus! Cash out whatever you can and pay what you need to since SL and your business are fulfilling enough.
This is a great way to go if you can afford it or if you can wait a while for returns on your investment. Enough said.
Well, that is my brief guide to making money in SL. Next post will be about: Living in SL.
Sunday, September 17, 2006
Laggy? Update your graphic card drivers
Lag in SL is not as simple as it may seem at first.
I have met people in-world that have their draw distance set at 512m (that's 2 sims!) on the mainlnad and complain that they can barely move.
Since there is a lot of 'stuff' on the mainland reduce your draw distance as much as you can (CTRL + P, select the Graphics Tab). I usually have my draw distance at 96, and sometimes 64 is really busy places.
Also, ensure that you have the latest drivers for your graphics card! SL imporved a huge amount for me -- so much that I enabled all kinds of cool features including rippling water - SL looks better than it ever has :)
I have met people in-world that have their draw distance set at 512m (that's 2 sims!) on the mainlnad and complain that they can barely move.
Since there is a lot of 'stuff' on the mainland reduce your draw distance as much as you can (CTRL + P, select the Graphics Tab). I usually have my draw distance at 96, and sometimes 64 is really busy places.
Also, ensure that you have the latest drivers for your graphics card! SL imporved a huge amount for me -- so much that I enabled all kinds of cool features including rippling water - SL looks better than it ever has :)
Friday, September 15, 2006
Calm down...it's only a Forum
Since the forum closures I have been hanging out at slhomepage.com and forums.secondcitizen.com - they have been a termendous help in weaning off the SL forums :)
I found and corrected some bugs in my LeaseDirector system. Remember, kids, code paths do make a difference - test all of them before deploying your solution to more than 30 rental boxes (a developer/programmer will understand this). I have been a RL professional developer for more than 15 years and an enterprise architect for 7 years...sooo....I should have known better.
I hope my land in Barbados sells soon (teleport there now...and click Buy Land) *grin*. Nice marketing, eh?
This should be an interesting, post-update weekend.
I found and corrected some bugs in my LeaseDirector system. Remember, kids, code paths do make a difference - test all of them before deploying your solution to more than 30 rental boxes (a developer/programmer will understand this). I have been a RL professional developer for more than 15 years and an enterprise architect for 7 years...sooo....I should have known better.
I hope my land in Barbados sells soon (teleport there now...and click Buy Land) *grin*. Nice marketing, eh?
This should be an interesting, post-update weekend.
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Taking Stock
It's easy to loose sight of the bigger picture in light of the current issues SecondLife is facing: security breach, forced password resets, and now a bumpy update to 1.12.5.
The fact is that we SL citizens are very fortunate. We have a world that is free of barriers to entry: we don't have to pay anything to access SL, SL is the complete deal - no feature-limited demos, getting SL up and running is fast (a quick 25Mb download and simple install), and registration is quick and easy.
Once in the world, every single resident starts with equal abilities -- everyone can modify their appearance as thy like, change all of their clothes, create things, write scripts, and of course interact.
Our abilities are limited only by how much effort we are willing to put into ourselves or our creations. There are no reviews, upload fees are minimal, and we can do business with others from the moment we first rez.
We want to enjoy SL in whatever way is meaningful to each individual. Businesses want to succeed, and there is a large base of consumers that want to help make great SL businesses successful since they often enhance the SL experience.
LL, I believe, wants to be successful too - a lot of passionate people want to make SL an even better place for more people. Accepting change is part of our second lives, and sometimes the transition from where we are now to where we want to be can be hard - but SL gets better each time we emerge from one of the many transitions.
Take a step back and enjoy the freedom to be who you want to be, among friends, in great surroundings, in a freely accessible world.
The fact is that we SL citizens are very fortunate. We have a world that is free of barriers to entry: we don't have to pay anything to access SL, SL is the complete deal - no feature-limited demos, getting SL up and running is fast (a quick 25Mb download and simple install), and registration is quick and easy.
Once in the world, every single resident starts with equal abilities -- everyone can modify their appearance as thy like, change all of their clothes, create things, write scripts, and of course interact.
Our abilities are limited only by how much effort we are willing to put into ourselves or our creations. There are no reviews, upload fees are minimal, and we can do business with others from the moment we first rez.
We want to enjoy SL in whatever way is meaningful to each individual. Businesses want to succeed, and there is a large base of consumers that want to help make great SL businesses successful since they often enhance the SL experience.
LL, I believe, wants to be successful too - a lot of passionate people want to make SL an even better place for more people. Accepting change is part of our second lives, and sometimes the transition from where we are now to where we want to be can be hard - but SL gets better each time we emerge from one of the many transitions.
Take a step back and enjoy the freedom to be who you want to be, among friends, in great surroundings, in a freely accessible world.
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
Business Impact of the Forced Password Reset
Looks like it started on September 8 and has taken a few days to surface. Heavenly Condos is normally 75% occupied.
Most guests at Heavenly Condos are long term (staying at Heavenly Condos for at least one month). The record, by the way, is five months - currently held by a guest that is still with me.
Today occupancy dropped to 60% and is likely drop further. Several leases expired today. Most guests pay just before lease expiration instead risking the wait to the last minute since Heavenly Condos are a great place to call home and get occupied quickly.
Likely, my guests are not able to recover their passwords or, worse, may have decided that SL is too risky for them.
Having just completed another investment in Digital Nirvana - landscaping, building, etc. I need to keep occupancy rates high, so available condos are ready to rent.
If you are a long term guest at Heavenly Condos and are not able to find an available condo when you do login, please contact me and I'll setup another condo for you.
Most guests at Heavenly Condos are long term (staying at Heavenly Condos for at least one month). The record, by the way, is five months - currently held by a guest that is still with me.
Today occupancy dropped to 60% and is likely drop further. Several leases expired today. Most guests pay just before lease expiration instead risking the wait to the last minute since Heavenly Condos are a great place to call home and get occupied quickly.
Likely, my guests are not able to recover their passwords or, worse, may have decided that SL is too risky for them.
Having just completed another investment in Digital Nirvana - landscaping, building, etc. I need to keep occupancy rates high, so available condos are ready to rent.
If you are a long term guest at Heavenly Condos and are not able to find an available condo when you do login, please contact me and I'll setup another condo for you.
Sunday, September 10, 2006
LeaseDirector
LeaseDirector is the culmination of my efforts during the past several months: a completely integrated leasing system.
LeaseDirector's features include:
* Accurate
* Low lag
* Supports partial payments when lease is active
* Supports multiple managers (owner plus many managers)
* Allows lease to be initiated or extended on behalf of a leasor
* Allows early termination with a fee
* Customizes door locks, teleporters
* Updates 'Availability Board'
I am using the full system at Digital Nirvana's Heavenly Condos, which are 85% occupied at the moment.
When someone leases a condo, the lease system gives the leasor a notecard that includes all kinds of helpful information in addition to the rules (someone can request the notecard simply by touching the lease box). The system also updates the condo's locking door by adding the leasor as an administrator of the door (the leasor can add and remove their own guests at that point), and it updates the 'Availability Board' that is in the rental office. The Availability Board shows what condos are available for lease to make it easier for someone to find one to make their home.
My approach to design encapsulates functionality in things that look like they should do a specific job. I don't join the functionality of a teleporter and rental system like the Lestats Rental system does. As a result, the Availability Board indicates the status of each unit (rented or available) and potential leasors must use the teleporter to go to an available condo.
A lease has three key events: start, end, and extend. The LeaseDirector system notifies owners and managers when each of these events occurs. The leasor's experience is a little different - LeaseDirector sends reminders to the leasor at 3 days, 1 day, and 1 hour before the lease expires.
The customizable locking door is activated on lease start and is reset on lease expiration.
The teleporter - about 2% of Cubey Terra's Mark III teleporter and 98% mine - is secure in that the leasor can allow only their guests to teleport to their condo. The teleporter works just like the customizable locking door, in terms of setup and reset.
The final cool feature is for owners and managers. A manager can start, extend, and terminate a lease on behalf of a leasor without having to pay the system. Managers can access the teleporters and locking doors, regardless of their lock or security settings - making management a lot easier.
I am presently working on correcting some small issues, but this system has helped Lillia and I a great deal. Our leasors are happier since setup is immediate, and leasors can help themselves, payments are a breeze now and we have time to do other things (other than locking and unlocking doors).
The system also gives us a competitive edge since we are secure from the moment the lease starts and all customizations are free, of course. You have to wait or pay for extra features, or even both, at many other places. Other places often require a minimum commitment of a month or more to gain access to security features.
Some other great features are already in use now too - features that set us apart from many other condo and apartment rentals. Heavenly Condos is already far ahead of the competition - this just makes the gap larger and provides even more value to my guests :)
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