Slovenia and Si.moblie

Although I hadn't planned it this way, it looks like my blogging theme for the day seems to be Slovenia, and people and companies generally Slovene. To start, Iyan Writer, mentioned in my previous post, is Slovenian, although you'd be hard pressed to spot that he's not a native English speaker - or at least, writer. And now, while touring the Northern perimeter of the grid I stumbled across the Slovenia sim. In fact, there's a trio of sims, as we also have Slovenia Welcome and Corporate Island.

But first, a little about the country as it is in the atomic world. Slovenia is the Northernmost of the the republics to emerge from the breakup of the former Yugoslavia. It is also the most European, being a member of: The European Union; NATO and the Eurozone, as well as being a signatory to the Schengen ("open borders") Agreement. So a damned sight more integrated into Europe than my own country, then (damn 'em). It has a population of about 2million, of whom around a quarter of million live in the capital, Llubljana. Much to some people's surprise, you will see that their internet country identifier is "si" and not "sl" - which in fact belongs to Sierra Leone. I wonder if there is going to be a rush of new Sierra Leonian blogs and websites? Hmmm....

But back to Slovenia, the sim this time. Despite the name, this is actually the site for Vodafone's Slovenian subsidiary (or perhaps that should be 'partner'), Si.mobile. From what I can glean, the sim may have been around for quite some time. If so, I still think it needs some finishing. The basic structure of the island hangs off some sort of transport system (which did not appear to be running when I was there). A track loops around and across the island, with a number of stops offering different functions. The two that I particularly noted were The Lab and The Arena. The former, I gather, should allow you test out various aspects of the company's services - while the latter is simply a large dance arena. While not much of a dancer myself, I did like the textures in The Arena, perhaps because they broke away from the corporate colour scheme imposed on the rest of the island. It looks like there will be a big dance event here on 17th April (mid-day PDT/SLT). I was interested to see that the build has been done by a bunch of avatars with ACS as their surname - indicating Anshe Chung Studios.

The Welcome sim seemed empty - though I may not have been looking in the right place. I assume that this is an orientation sim. Corporation Island appears to be the work of FM Virtual, and features a skyscraping office block. On the ground floor you will find a large tourism advertisment and a teleport guide to the companies (supposedly) housed here. I say "supposedly" because it is such an impressive list that it seems unlikely they would all sign up for what is, after all, a tiny office area. Each company has a small office space, sufficient to host a meeting for, say, 10 people (I didn't count). The Kongresni Center offers more public meeting spaces, such as a cafe. There are also some buildings for rent.

Overall, despite reading that the Slovenia sim was complete, I get the impression that it is being revamped and augmented by the new Slovene sims. Anyway... as usual, here's a few traveller's snaps:

A Tale from Dreamland

Yesterday I wrote about the frustrations of dealing with Linden Lab when trying to pay for corporate land in Second Life. The timing turned out to be rather spooky. It was the end of the month, and therefore tier payment was due on my own plot of land in Second Life. And this, too, is turning into a bizarre and frustrating, almost Kafkaesque, experience. Let me explain...

Avid readers may recall that, owing to circumstances beyond my control, I had to move into new accommodation back in November. After carefully considering my various needs, I settled for buying (whatever that really means) a plot on Rhododendron Island, part of Anshe Chung's Dreamland estates. I had several reasons for opting for Anshe Chung, one of the most important of which was the apparent ease of payment - via a PayPal subscription.

What I did not know was that, a few weeks after I moved in, ACS would change their payment methods. Allegedly making the whole thing easier and more flexible, they cancelled my PayPal subscription (an action about which I had received no prior warning, and that put the screaming bejabers up me) and told me that henceforth I'd have to pay monthly at a pay station. Exactly how was this making it "easier" for me to pay? I cannot guarantee to be inworld at month-end, or indeed any other time. Surprisingly perhaps, I actually have many calls on my time - and finding the opportunity to get inworld is not always that easy. Well, anyhoo...

The 5k square metre plot that I have attracts a tier of 30 USD per month. So on 1st Jan I duly trotted along and paid my 30 bucks. At the end of January I went along again, and was surprised to find that I was about 300L$ in arrears. What? I paid the right sum - so how come I owe anything - even a relatively trivial amount? I am not master of my own destiny in this - if they so choose, ACS could blow away the content of New New Alville, regardless of the state of any billing query, if there is outstanding monies. For the sake of good customer relations, I would hope they wouldn't - but I did not want to take that risk, and duly paid the balance, following this with another 30 bucks, to cover February.

Now... part of the blurb I got from ACS back in December said they were withdrawing subscription payments. But if you follow the PayPal payment option from the inworld pay station you arrive at a web page that lets you do 2 things. First, you can pay any outstanding charges by a one-off payment (actually you can pay as much as you like - including the full month tier if you want). Second, you can set up a subscription. Yay!

So back at the end of January, not only did I pay the strange L$ amount and my February tier, I also set up a subscription to pay the 30 bucks. At the end of February, yesterday, the said sum was duly paid over and I got a nice statement from PayPal to that effect. Phew! The system works!

I was therefore somewhat disconcerted to get a message forwarded to my email account from ACS, telling me my tier had been charged for March (OK) and that I owed them 673 L$. What the hell is going on? What is this sum? Does it represent one day's tier and will go up in increments until my land is reclaimed and my inworld credit record is blasted to shit? Or is it some sort of balance left after subtracting 30 USD paid from a tier of... ummm... 30 USD due?

In the former case it would indicate that the subscription facility is not working - and they have 30 bucks of my money that is not being allocated against my tier. In the latter case, I am struggling to see the maths (I have a theory - but I will await an explanation first).

Once again, I have opted to pay the extra money rather than risk losing the parcel - and I have raised this as a support/billing query. But I really do not want to go through this shag'n'hassle every month. The subscription looks like a great method for circumventing this. If, as may be the case, there is a charge to go with this then it'd be nice to be told - and I can make the appropriate adjustment. Right now it feels like I'm making a number of smallish (but not insignificant) payments without any reason being offered as to what these adjustments might mean.

I wonder how this one will resolve itself?

Oh... I nearly forgot. You might think I should get a transaction history from ACS, then I would have a better idea of what was going on. Damn good idea - so I've asked for that. The pay station offers a "History" option that will email me with my transaction details. Unfortunately, this seems to be a non-automated option. I raised the request a few hours ago, but still nothing in my inbox. ho hum.

UPDATE 3rd March: I finally got a reply from ACS support. It seems that the difference is due to the PayPal charge - however, they are still not telling me what that charge is, so I can look at uplifting the subscription amount. The message also contains the comment: "We really expect your understanding and hope you could have nice time in dreamland." The first phrase, about "expecting my understanding", had me ready for some serious harrumphing... but on reading the whole sentence I can see it is a classic case of Denglish. Still... some indication of the actual amount would be appreciated.

Extropia Core Expands

Despite being a frequent absentee, I remain an avid fan of Sophrosyne's Salon at Extropia Core, and the eclectic gathering who converge there every Saturday for a talk or presentation from some luminary or another, followed by (or often interspersed with) a general chinwag. It's a fun event. The Extropia Core sim seems to change radically between each visit - but has now compounded this rate of change by adding another sim: Extropia.

Although the sim newly minted, the Extropia builders - Vidal Tripsa and Galatea Gynoid - have been beavering away to make it habitable. Parcels are available for rent here, however, before you rush into it, you might want to bear the following in mind: "We will REQUIRE two references from current citizens for all applications. The Board reserves the right to veto any application. To be added to the waiting list, IM Sophrosyne Stenvaag with the names of your references and the parcel size you would like." So that's a bit more stringent that Anshe Chung then.

I don't know what the sim will finally look like - maybe it will look like it does now. But since the group has opened it to wanderers and itinerant ramblers, I thought you might like to see it:

Al Moves House

I have been a bit quiet on the blogging front for a few days owing to a half-expected, but not too pleasant, piece of news that left me with some serious virtual house-hunting to do. For the last 8 months or so I have been renting a very nice, good-sized plot of land on the Intentional Growth sim, owned by a friend of mine. Unfortunately, for a variery of reasons she is having to effectively dispose of this quiet and tranquil island, and that means that I need to move on.

This has been a theoretical possibility for maybe a month - but last week it became a concrete fact. Now, I'm not really used to all this virtual land mullarkey, so I was at a bit of a loss to know what to do. I spoke to a few friends - issued an "all points bulletin" on Twitter, then started looking in earnest.

I had not appreciated just how complicated it can be to find the right deal. The "Land Sales" tab in the Second Life "Search" window provided me with hundreds of options. As I read through the lists I had to consider many criteria I had not really pondered before. Did I want themed? If so, what theme? Did I want lots of land but few prims? Or lots of prims on less land? Did I want pre-built or bare earth? Did I want to rent or buy? If I "bought" did I want the ability to re-sell later??

And for each interesting possibility, I had to teleport across to the land in question, see what the neighbourhood looked like and - most importantly - read and understand the covenant. For those who are unfamiliar with the concept, the covenant is provided by the landowner and basically tells you everything you can and can't do. Believe me, there can be huge differences between covenants - and this is often reflected in the price you pay.

So for example: Do you want to be able to build a skybox or platform? If so, are you happy with any altitude restrictions placed on you? Do you want to be able to terraform the land? Do you want to build a skyscraper? Or, indeed, have one on the plot next door to yours? Do you want to run scripted objects? If so, will they be sufficiently lightweight as to be permitted on the plot of land you are looking at? Sliding and rotating textures seem to be a particular bugbear - which is a pain for me, since I love 'em!

Then what about the purpose of the land? Do you want to run a business? If so, is it compatible with the covenant? Not a problem for me - but if you want a topless casino with camping chairs and money trees, then this could be a problem for you.

Negotiating this maze of possibilities while juggling the price and cost/square metre took me a few days. As with any commercial exercise, you are hoping to land The Perfect Deal, while suspecting that you could have done better. And the cost is another mini-minefield in itself. On the plus side, the many private land companies (like Anshe Chung) do not require you to hold a premium account - so that will save you 10USD a month. However, you should be aware that the price you pay comprises 2 elements: the "purchase price" and the tier (or monthly service charge/ground rent/whatever). Linden charge fixed amounts for these if you buy from them. However, each private vendor sets their own balance of the two. Some may opt for a low purchase price and a high tier per month, while for others it is the reverse. Even a single vendor may have multiple price bands depending on the type of land up for sale: low, normal or high prim, for example.

I know many of you live and breathe this stuff - but it was all new and a bit alien to me. It took me a few days before I finally found what (I think) I was after. It's a bit smaller than I had wanted, but it is a corner plot with sea on 2 sides, and waterways on the other 2; I can terraform it; the covenant is fair and sensible, but not too restrictive; the sim itself seems quiet and the price/tier is good value. (Or let me rephrase that: for buying something that does not really exist, it is good value!)

I am now moving in, having stripped out my old place. Here are a few pictures to remind me of where I'm moving from:


and where I'm moving to: