http://groups.google.com/group/secondlifemerchanttimes
Not only will people link to your SL business from this blog, but the best entries will be featured here at SLMT!
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Post Your Own Business Listing on SLMT's Google Group!
http://groups.google.com/group/secondlifemerchanttimes
Not only will people link to your SL business from this blog, but the best entries will be featured here at SLMT!
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Bring your best Second Life items to BidSL... and bring more back!
BidSL is going to be big. That much I can tell from just a few minutes at its website and first in-world presence (more locations are coming soon)!
http://bidsl.com is where it all begins. Here, you are welcomed with a well-marked website offering: well-written in-world auctioning tutorials; BidSL's forum; helpful FAQs; links to in-world HQ; top auctioneers; franchise info; live auction info; BidSL Anywhere; and classifieds! The site is very easy to navigate but doesn't sacrifice depth in doing so.
Feel like fundraising? BidSL Anywhere lets you integrate its auctions into your party, event, conference, or other big SL to-do!
Crave the excitement and fast pace of auctions run by a live auctioneer? BidSL has some great news. In addition to the automated Second Life auctions running 24/7 at BidSL, live auctions are held on Saturday mornings (Second Life time). The live auctions are run by an auctioneer and feature high value and unique items. Everyone is invited to attend and to shout out bids! Just be sure to get there before the sim fills up!
BidSL is also working to encourage SL and RL items, businesses, services, and SL land for sale! Be sure to contact them if you have a suggestion or request for these live auctions, which take place in front of the in-world building in the billboard area.
Registered auction users can post classifieds for a fee on-site, and include a picture.
Again, the site is BidSL.com, and the company can be visited in-world at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Bonghwang/143/77/59/. See if you can find my auctions! Getting set up was really easy and this week it's super-affordable: I only paid L$7 for each weekly rental!
Plenty of interactivity however you reach BidSL.
Lots of room for buyers and plenty of opportunities for sellers!Monday, October 22, 2007
Happy SLloween From Second Life's Baddest Horror Store, Bleed Designs
From the moment heavy metal blasts you in the face and you appear in a portal filled with a circular haze of red light, you know you're in for a ghoulish experience at Bleed Designs.
A shower of blood screens the scream queens from the squeamish, and then you are in the moaning, groaning, clanking heart of Bleed.
A store so big textures took ten minutes to load in (though of course you can speed it up by walking around).Bleed is the largest store I have yet to review in SLMT. Inventory sprawls across the walls in several rows and displays, daring you not to find something to tickle your morbid fancy.
If you turn around the moment you pass through the doorway, you can see Bleed's selection of pillars, Gorean habitats, demon gates, blood fountains, spooky trees, newbie tools, and cutouts, complete with links to SLX and SLBoutique.com for people who like to browse online stores. A few Gothic club layouts and Bleed's famous HUD/Bloodstorms round out the morbid mix. A small niche on the entry wall features loads of Halloween sounds, and I took a chance on a slick-looking copiable store for 1024m plots (L$500) between the sounds area and some more appealingly gruesome wall art.
For people with a Resident Evil/biolab fetish, the left wall features sci-fi components, all under the name of "The Compound". A few curious-looking items, the "Ightant Lueurs", resemble bio-tanks often seen in the movies. Equipment like water filters, air pads, acid barrels, office chairs help round out the bio-horror motif. A copy/modify vesion of The Compound goes for L$20000, while the "Midway Package" version goes for L$13500.
The left doorway leads to a free-standing morgue building caked with gallons of dried blood. Inside this bare-floored building are vendors for the basic and deluxe Morgue Sets, as well as the individual components, such as Cold Storage Cadaver Units, Cadaver Tables (with pose and worklight!), Basic Embalming Tables, cabinets, and all the creepy extra little touches you expect from a forced trip to the morgue. Heart and muscle dissection charts, medical jars, fire alarm, Haylon Gas Jet (activates when you shout "OUTBREAK"), and Blood Bag Hangers, all fall under this latter category.
Back in the central area, a gift coffin kiosk stands alluringly in the center of the blood-spattered floor, offering coffins with credit from L$250 to L$10000. A second kiosk offers creepy teleport effects and sounds. Behind them stands rows dedicated to Bleed's prefabs, such as Necrotica Manor Series, Mythril Skybox, Creepies Diner, Chapel Chronos, Castle Bloodstone, and great utility builds like the 3-Floor Department Store (as cheerful as Silent Hill 3's) and the Gothic Vendor Stall. A wooden shelf nearby holds adornments like a Dragon Mirror, Ram's Head Crystal Ball, and Prince Consort Candle, items perfect for rounding out the lived (died?)-in sense of your own castle or crypt.To the right of the prefabs stand gruesomely effective sets such as The Brood Incarnation, Terror Wings, a haunted confessional booth (Dark Confessions), the Tormentia Table, a buzz saw called The Gutter, and an Aged Grandfather Clock. Of note is an especially promising-looking Home Position/Landing Point Portal Platform, with a walkway, glowing blue light, and long talons.
Nine thrones, from the new Metal and Flesh to the Hellshadow, next adorn the walls above classic horror art. To their right are more cool-to-haves like the Midland Park Bench, the spiked ball from Phantasm, the 2-prim following/greeting Eye, and Amorphous Metal Gravestone. Bleed's great particle equipment, from Reincarnation Vessels to Blood Rain to Cemetery Fog and Downpour, fleshes out this wall.
In the center are Bleed's crown jewels: Necropia, the 1671- or 2071-prim manor; The Unholy Cathedral; and variants of Necrotica Manor. Cleverly placed beneath it, like one of Joel Comm's Google ads, is a doorway leading to even more products. And straight ahead, each item set in a black-edged drop of crimson, lie the individually sold contents of the Creepies Diner, a horror masterpiece that comes in both a Basic (L$3000 [copy]/4500 [copy/mod]) and Full Extras (L$8000) version. Can't spring for a full horror diner but just have enough for one hellacool item, like the Bleeding Urinal, Vending Snack Machine of Death, or the fiendish Mirror Mirror? You can buy it here!
To the left lurk dozens of textures for the aspiring horror builder/machinima star. Between these and the Creepies items, Dismay Wilde has cemeteries: Rest Haven, Highfield, Resurrection, and All Saints. Miscellaneous extras include her Coffin and Gravestone Helper Kits. The opposite wall features DJ and stage equipment, including an impressive prefab club, complete with DJ booth, seating and tables. Sold separately, there are also eerily charming Podz speakers, pyrotechnics, blacklights, and a UFO DJ booth!
And on my way back out of the room, I happened upon a 200-prim gem of a bar, with kegs, cage, multi-directional seats, drink givers, and more. At L$750, that was less than L$4 a prim!
In leaving, I realized that the horror tradition is alive and well in SL, and there is nothing to worry about... only to fear. :D
Bleed Designs can be unearthed at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Lyashko/73/61/55.
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Groove Out, Man! Sign of the Quaternion
If you're the sort of person who enjoys a bus trip with a battered paperback and groovy tunes on your iPod, drinking coffee and playing Frisbee on the square, Victoria Wheeler's Sign of the Quaternion is for you. With a major in rotation and a minor in trippiness, Victoria's items either entertain eccentrically or edify the erudite. Many of her items, as her store name suggests, use rotation, and a few items feature her RL inspirations, from Marley to Munster, Brother Rawn to Great Grandpa John. And there enough freebies to turn a newbie into nouveau riche.
Sign of the Quaternion can be found at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Insula%20Inferi/197/176/33.
SIM OF THE MONTH!
Traci and I are working on a Sim of the Month award! We're looking for the best sims in Second Life.
However, since we're not sim owners (yet), we'd like to see what sim owners themselves take the most pride in, what their biggest challenges are, and so forth.
Just contact either of us -- Lionel Oliva or Traci Yiyuan -- in-world if you'd like to submit your sim for consideration or suggest criteria for choosing the best sim!
Monday, October 8, 2007
Builder of Dreams: Second Life's Insky Jedburgh
About a month ago this reporter decided it was time to create a special home in Second Life, one that would meet my somewhat unorthodox needs. A good friend who knows my need for exploring the weird and wonderful sims of SL led me to a special place and a custom castle manufacturer named Insky Jedburgh, the Builder of Dreams.
Insky built a place called Fizzdrake Castle, which I explored last summer. Although it's not a commercial sim, it's certainly worthy of its own writeup. When I knew that I needed a medieval build to fit into the covenant of the sim I’d picked out for my own land I looked up Mr. Jedburgh and found his sales lot at Twilight Gates.
Any SL Master Builder is going to excel at picking and placing textures, and Insky is no exception to this rule. Inside and out, the textures are marvelous… rich designs well matched and fitted to the structural look and feel of the builds.
Textures worthy of a master builder
To make matters even better, you’d expect to pay much more for such lovely designs. I found the prices to be a very pleasant surprise, considering the quality of the builds and the ease of the interface. There’s a huge selection on the lot as well, to make sure you get the perfect building for your perfect need. I even saw a complete “village kit” with multiple buildings to set up the centerpiece to your own medieval sim.
Hello Sailor.... : )
Topping things off is Mr. Jedsburgh’s courtesy and helpfulness. I asked for a few special favors and he was spot on in helping me out. I’ve found a few stuffy sim owners in my time, but Insky is top notch and friendly to boot. I felt like an important man had taken his time to help my SL experience be truly special.
In short, if your tastes (or land covenant) lead you to a medieval build, you can’t go wrong at Twilight Gates with one of Insky’s designs.
Saturday, October 6, 2007
Shopping Amidst the Ruins
After a few weeks off I returned to one of my greatest SL passions, exploring and writing about the gems you can find If you’re patient and persistent. I found a lovely sim on a post apocalyptic theme called Saijo.
Saijo is actually a group of sims built as a storybook/RP site, some of which areas are damage enabled. If I have to tell you what that means you might want to think twice about going there before you’ve visited a good weapons/shield store. Enough said?
Even the light beams are beautiful
The attention to detail in this sim is awesome. And yes, tucked here and there are shops featuring cyberpunk and excellent vehicles. I’m not going to tell you exactly where they are. The magic of this sim is in the search, and there are a million places to look. A great time on a dark evening when the wind is blowing outside and you feel the need to be in the dark.
Spin receives a new shipment of bugs from Linden Labs
I’ve been blessed by serendipity throughout my life. Today was no exception. I ran across the sim owner Spin Martin, and he suffered my endless questions about his beautiful build very gracefully.
Spin makes me feel right at home...
Spin tells me that a cast of regulars shows up to role play here, not during the normal prime time SL hours, and he’s working on staffing the sim with non-players and robots. During my first visit a drone robot came up and scanned me. It was a familiar feeling for a girl who dances on the stage from time to time.
Now which mutant skin goes with this hairdo?
Next time you want to feel the ache of civilization lost, open your favorite drink and come to Saijo. Settle in, wear your best grunge or cyberpunk, strap on your black widows and have a fun quest. I highly recommend this sim for an interesting night of shopping.
Thursday, October 4, 2007
Thank you Traci!
Fifty pounds of stuff in a five-pound bag: Second Life Merchant Times on the move, & collapsed posts
Hey all,
Looks like I'll finally getting rid of that albatross of a platform I have at the Second Life Merchant Times in Hawkins. Hopefully the layout inside my cool new store from Bleed Designs will be better-looking and you'll be able to see it soon.
Our vendor now gives out 80 -- count 'em, 80 -- freebies from Arcade Asylum. She's been kind enough to give them out through the Second Life Merchant Times with the agreement that they're not to be re-sold. So when you come by, please pick up an SLMT vendor if you would like to hand out some great freebies to your friends and customers! Our vendor is just 2 prims, but not only does it take people back to this page, but it also gives a "Friends of the Second Life Merchant Times" landmark box out to people. If you're good enough to put our 2-prim vendor on your land, we'll put your landmark in this box!
Some of you may be asking, "Why is that such a big deal?" I'll tell you. All of our vendors are updatable! That means when everyone else updates their vendors, they'll all start giving out your landmark every time someone clicks to visit http://slmt.blogspot.com/!
Just use the "SLMT In-World" link on the left to get your free updatable vendor with freebies!
COLLAPSIBLE POSTS UPDATE:
I've been wrangling with the site format for some time now, and trying to work in collapsible posts so that way people can see the most teasers on the front page.
It has been a nightmare. Put so much as one special bit of code in the regular section, and the whole thing goes haywire, reduces the print to 0px, and worse.
So, in order to allow the greatest number of pictures per post, to bring you the best visuals from SL, and to give you the best format for each blog entry, I am kicking collapsible posts out. I thank everyone who has read the blog no matter what the format, and would like you to know I will be tying pictures back in for maximum presentation.
Lionel Oliva
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