In Part 1 a cat got skinned, several patents were filed, and the grandmother of the 3D web talked about how you can copyright your work for only 35.- $. I continue my notes here where I last left off, and will see if we ever can find out who “they” are and if other pressing questions may get answered right after this lady had some pepper.

(CC-by Suicide Girls)

Tessa wants to use the time it takes someone to write their question again to talk about something else, this time about how SpotOn3D is giving to the community. She mentions double dutch delivery and something called Hot Swap (phon.). How this is helping the community remains her secret.

She also mentions how SpotOn spent “almost 20.000 $” on getting the word out on OpenSim through their platform. She mentions the shows they’re hosting there, and how they had the owners of the biggest other grids on GridWrap, and that she applauded every one of them and did that in support of their grids. Says she feels it’s important to have a choice, and mentions SL had a foothold on “this technology until they open-sourced the client”. It’s not clear how any of that has anything to do with OpenSim, but she says she believes their efforts are benefitting the whole OpenSim community.

She says she realizes they’re “one of the better-funded platforms out there and therefor we have a bit more muscle to throw around when it comes to marketing”. This makes me wonder why they’re not more successful at it.

She says they openly promote other grids for people to go to, which is so open I must’ve missed it. Again wraps this up as “helping the OpenSim community”, and mentions it is highly offensive to her when it’s said they’re not giving back and are a monopoly. I don’t know who said they’re a monopoly, as this is clearly far from the truth, but it certainly looks like they would like to be one, despite all of their claims to the contrary, as all their inventions, and business strategies (double dutch, patents, key accounts, etc.) are of a centralizing, lock-in nature. They just work when it’s SpotOn controlling them.

She states that everyone on their team is working 12 to 16 hours a day “trying to get the word out, not only about our platform, but about OpenSim”. This sounds like an overstatement, but again, if it’s true, they’re not very effective at it. “If we weren’t proud of being an OpenSim platform, we would not even mention the name to every chance we get.” – That’s strange, because the “name” is not mentioned at all on SpotOn’s website and hardly ever on their blog.

Someone else on voice says they have a question. Either this is a late visitor, or the person typing just learned how to speak. The question turns out to be more of a supportive statement that “if there is pre-existing art, there is a legal mechanism there to sort those issues out”. I think Tessa says the person speaking is some admin of the SpotOn team, and states that “this whole thing proves that the patent process does work”. How it proves that remains a mystery. She states they didn’t have to say that the system is patent pending, and they were “trying to be very transparent, as we always have”. This makes me wonder why this kind of transparency was not seen with their previous pantents (as Stevan said earlier, they had four more already filed) and also, why this transparency stops halfway through by saying they’ve applied for a patent without telling exactly what it is for.

She states they “wanted  people to, say, wave a flag, like they have” which “could’ve done more (…) a little bit more constructively”, but still leaves me wondering why now, after all the flag waving has occurred, they aren’t happy about it. Also, Tessa doesn’t want to be Darth Vader, and somehow seems to think that to be reassuring.

Repeats how nobody came to talk to them, which, now that it has been mentioned so many times, really makes me want to know what she means by that. Do I have to drive to… wherever it is she’s living and knock on her door? Do we all need to sign up for SpotOn3D and find her in-world somewhere? Why is stating your opinion in blog posts, comments, tweets, etc. not talk? Or rather, if it is talk, then why is this not acceptable talk for Tessa; something she could reply to.

I’m afraid I won’t find answers here, because she goes on to state that the biggest problem she “always had with OpenSim is mass assumptions about motivations, about reasons-why and how and when and everything, and immediately assuming the very very worst.” Now I find it hard to think of anything good to assume about filing patents on tiny software innovations, and Tessa doesn’t come up with anything good either, and instead reminds us that she’s a “16 year veteran of this stuff”, and if anybody’s part of this community it’s her. I’m not sure what community we’re talking about now, but I don’t think it’s OpenSim anymore.

She continues to give her references as being “here” since the start of 3D and working in all 3D venues (out of which she names a few that are perfectly unknown to me, but then, I’m not a veteran). Someone makes a joke I didn’t get, and Tessa says she’s not mean, but very direct, then asks the person typing if they wanted to say something, because she sees them typing a lot. Her rants seem to create some time-space-continuum.

Silence.

Stevan lost his hair, has a wardrobe malfunction, then flies.

Tessa resumes her rant, reminds people of their, now, over 20.000 $ spendings on TV-Shows, advertisements, sponsoring musicians, promotion of events, calculates the cost of a show, and says it’s all trying to get people to “cross that line, to go from SL to an OpenSim grid, and experience it, and understand that it’s not evil or bad, make sure they understand they’re not disloyal” and thinks that’s made a lot of headway. I think it has not.

For some reason she comes back to “this exploit in the client”, whatever it is (I really would love to know that) and that they haven’t closed it off, but would have to. It sounds like this is dire news, but I fail to grasp the gravity of it all, probably because I have no clue what she’s talking about.

She states they are not sure how they will implement the use of the plugin, are still talking about it and are open for suggestions, but have to use it “as a way to help our company grow”, whatever that may mean, because “that’s what it’s there for”. People need to understand that it’s a business and there are bills to pay. It’s not clear why people need to understand that, but I get the feeling she thinks that a world without SpotOn3D would be at a terrible loss.

Tessa comes up with the odd tale of having asked once a person about what they think it would cost to run the SpotOn3D grid, which gives her an opportunity to calculate their running costs, and to point out that nobody on their team is paid even decent wages, because (!) they are all dedicated to the goal of a 3D web and encourages people to do the math. (The math, by the way, is a wage of 833 $ per employee per month, if all of the 300.000 $ funding was spent on wages.) At this point it’s not clear if she even understood the 2D web. Or the term “web”. Or how to treat employees.

She likes to point out that they’re not trying to be Second Life, or Inworldz, or Avianation (sic), or ReactionGrid, but have a goal that is really different from anybody else, which is why nobody ever asked them for their code, because they are trying to set the standards to make a production-level grid functionable for business and education, and users, and recreation. Yes, that sounds really different from everyone else, especially Second Life.

Tessa continues to compare SpotOn3D to Second Life which really is some way to go. At this point, I’d like to compare OpenSim-Creations.com to the Second Life Marketplace. I mean, both are on a website, right?

During this tirade it becomes clear that all the Evil™ is in Second Life (datamining, abuse, inhuman behaviour), which leads her to a moment of zen, where she realizes that “the real truth is, we are a cannibal to ourselves. That every time we do a misdeed it does cut into us a little bit.” Something to take away there. Also, Second Life is not a game, even though it kinda is.

Luckily person typing seems to finally have finished their job and say that “I think the attitude of the community is that they’re worried that in the future your patent will stop them from developing their grids in the way they want.” Tessa agrees, but says they’re not out to actually stop people. Maybe we can hold her to that statement one day.

She goes back (again) to talk about how Double Dutch Delivery is really there to help “these other grids who are starving for content and cannot get going without it” and to give creators a wider customer base. I don’t think this is getting any more true, no matter how much she repeats it.

We go back to our moment of zen, where we realize the non-gameyness of Second Life and how we can’t “divorce” ourselves from ourselves. People give out signals. Real feelings and real lies clash, and there is a car wreck. Something like that.

Second Life and OpenSim and virtual worlds need new users, because 600.000 is not a lot. Six. Hundred. Thousand. Vladiwostok. Rotterdam. Glasgow. Baltimore. Not a lot. So naturally, SpotOn3D can help expand that. And everybody will benefit from that.

Some people repeat her statements.

Then we get this gem (timestamp 53:00): “We were the most creative because it was being funded between 2006 and 2008 in Second Life, and I know this because I worked with corporations and educations, by no means I don’t think we can point to them and say they’re greedy people, because they educate us, and they have to have beaucoup of real people, blood, flesh, talent to do that and it’s always going to be the most expensive thing you ever pay for in a company is the humans, who actually make it happen, but without it, what have you got, you know?” No. I don’t know. If anyone can explain that to me, I’d be so oblieged.

The technology has the potential to create a global degree, where people can go to any university and pick out a course, which is one of Tessa’s hopes, and she sounds almost moved to tears when she says that.

Again, she talks about all the things they do for the community: Free uploads. Giving free content, islands and pay to community leaders who bring their community to SpotOn3D. And a pony. (Joking, there’s no pony.) And she doesn’t understand the ill will, and if people really knew them as a company, ever watched a Grid Wrap, or the work they did with musicians, would change their mind.

Tessa says she wouldn’t dare to criticize Kitely for their business practice, community or technology if she never experienced it for herself or talked to Ilan Tochner. Personally, I have stepped into SpotOn3D to experience it, and have talked to Tessa, so I guess that makes my criticism okay in her book. I don’t know about Ilan, though.

Someone says in all ages community is needed as well. Tessa says that’s true, because teens will lead us into the future. She mentions her 17-year old who has seen his mother “in virtual” all his life. So we have to hand the technology over to the kids, otherwise it will die with us. It’s not clear what this has to do with patents, other than the patents will kill this technology faster than a 17 year old can get it handed over to.

Someone states that, “from a neutral point of view, the one and only thing they are complaining is the patent, and they” (probably the critics) “would applaud the rest of your work.” This throws Tessa off the trip she’s been on, and so Stevan, who only seems to wake at the word “patent”, chimes in to say that “we haven’t filed nearly as many patents as Linden Labs” and seems to not understand why people are opposed to SpotOn3D instead of Linden Labs. Right now, I’m quite tired of explaining that, and will leave him in his confusion.

Silence. Tessa is off her space drug. Stevan went back to sleep.

Timestamp 1:00:00 To be continued…