Pixel Scoop

Well, I’ve seen it all now! I was perusing SLExchange™ miscellaneous category to see if I could find something I probably don’t need to buy and allow to rot in my inventory for the rest of eternity, when I came across a rather interesting item! ‘Cyber Sex Flashcards for him,’ to be precise! And no, it really isn’t a joke. For L$500 this creator promises to really boost your cyber sex life through a series of cards with… well what exactly? I couldn’t quite bring myself to buy them even for the purpose of reviewing but if their advertising is anything to go off, then apparently you absolutely need these so that women won’t gossip with their friends about your bad pixel performances! In fact, allow me to share their item description with you (I’m sure they won’t mind the free advertising).

“These cards were made in an effort to assist you in impressing your partner with your cyber moves to the point where she will want you again, and again! We realize that even bad typing can result in not so hot cyber sex so these cards may just be a “tool” to enable you to say what your really want to do, but perhaps can’t type it out without spelling errors! Or, if you are more physical in real life and not used to having to put your actions into words, these cards will help you in that area as well. Our goal is that eventually, you will no longer need the Cyber Flash Cards, or that you may only have to refer back to them from time to time.
Being a good cyber lover, will keep you in demand and the ladies will be sure to tell their friends you are the best lover they ever had!”

The description is accompanied by three images informing us that “Real men do ask for directions, and that “Girls tell eachother everything. Don’t let her tell her friends that you suck at cyber.”

Wow, what an interesting way to advertise. Essentially informing all men that they clearly are not real men, will be mocked for the rest of their lives tirelessly and will never get any Second Life™ loving again…unless they buy these cards! But the creator has the last laugh judging by the number of ratings received! Now, I hold my hands up and admit that I have personally stood within chat range of newbies cybering, in that age of innocence when they don’t realise that people listen to public chat and cyber in the public channel, and I have read and chuckled to myself. The majority of times it consists of a series of, “Mmmmm,” “Goooooooooooood,” “Yeeeeeeeeah,” (before she types “BRB” and disappears for all eternity). So granted, perhaps pumping a little imagination (no pun intended) into the population’s cybering habits isn’t a bad thing. But surely if these cards really are THAT elaborate and girls really do tell each other absolutely everything, someone is going to get sussed out. Take the following example:

Girl 1: Oh wow, you’ll never guess what I did last night.

Girl2: Gee. Please tell me. I am almost wetting my pants in anticipation of the story you’re going to tell.

Girl 1: Well I cybered Dave the Avatar again!

Girl2: Really? But I thought he sucked at cybering. That’s what you said when you told me everything last week. You said he was the worst pixel sex you’ve ever had, ever, ever, ever and you said he blatantly got his whatsit from a freebie store and that it looked a little bit diseased and like it might fall off. And you said all he did was say ‘Mmmmm’ the whole time and that he had a tattoo of a Swastika on his back that was all a bit freaky.

Girl1: Oh but never mind that. I don’t mind his Nazi tendencies and diseased body parts anymore, because he got good at cybering, so nothing else in the world matters anymore. I mean, it’s fair to say even though he tells me he is a hot twenty one year old from New Zealand (whose pictures by the way, look exactly like Brad Pitt’s. He’s even been in the same films as Brad Pitt, judging by his pics), he could be a half dead 89 year old cross dresser from Saturn, but even that doesn’t matter. Because he got good at cybering.

Girl2: Wow, that’s so strange because my boyfriend, Dick the Avatar got better at cybering too.

Girl1: Well I bet he isn’t as good as Dave. Dave told me that he was going to run his fingers gently over my skin while whispering into my ear how much he loved me in seventeen different languages and then….

Girl2: What? But that’s what Dick said to me!

And there you have it. Sussed. And surely when these guy’s girlfriends realise they’re copying and pasting their heat of the moment words directly from widely distributed flash cards, won’t that ruin the moment? And won’t people get a little bit suspect when their partners who normally misspell four letter words start constructing grammatically perfect complex love lines without a single spelling mistake?

I rest my case. And just for amusement’s sake, if you think your “Mmmmms,” and “Aaaahs,” will make you a mockery among all female avies, then maybe try a move comical approach! http://www.teamwarfare.com/forums/showthread.asp?forumid=9&threadid=52065&page=1

Everyone, oh everyone, posts lyrics in blogs these days it seems. I am beginning to feel a little left out. So here. You might say I made some minor adjustments to a certain Gloria Gaynor classic (I Will Survive). Then again, you might say I just raped it. Either way, here you go:

Our Pixel Lives

When I first rezzed to life,
I was petrified,
Kept thinking I would never walk
No matter how I tried.

But then I spent so many hours
Clicking everything in sight,
Found teleporting,
And then I soon discovered flight.

Now look at me,
Flying so fast,
With my prim hair at my crotch
And my shoes up my ass.

I wish I’d worn a pair of shades,
Really need the help to see,
Cos there’s a blinged up gangster coming
And his bling is blinding me.

Go on now go. Hit teleport,
Just turn around now,
Cos I can’t stand your bling no more!
Weren’t you the one who tried to spam me in that group,
Before I found you and I added you to mute!
Oh here we go,
It’s so noisy!
There’s fifteen waterfalls and fires
And a dolphin-chimpanzee.
I’m so sick and tired of this,
I mean ‘I’m sick to death of DIS’
Our pixel lives,
Our pixel lives!

Well, if ever I have encountered something to make me laugh, it’s pixel police. I was minding my own business today, mooching around a few stores, as you do, when someone started spamming the public chat channel. Yes, it’s annoying. The same shouting from the same avatar requesting that everyone within his 100m earshot does something along the lines of (how can I put this politely?) getting a bit jiggy with their own Mothers. Nice. Oh well, not the end of the world. He wasn’t the brightest bulb in the box and was simply just shouting from his own name. God bless ‘mute’. One moment to silence the little avatard and peace was mine again. No problem. Nobody died. No orphans starved. The world did not end. But it seems this shouting was hideous and heinous enough in its criminal nature to summon…wait for it…. a pixel cop! In he bounded in his virtual bullet proof vest (because obviously, without one, if someone shot him in game, he would surely die!) to make everything alright again.

“Breach of the peace, man.” he shouted. This was enough to make me unmute the spammer simply to enjoy watching the SL™ Superman himself attempt to save the day and protect our avatars from the highly dangerous public chat. It seems, however, that the spammer was very keen that someone should definitely have sex with a parent, as his requests persisted, filling up my screen. I didn’t mind. They were interrupted by the occasional “Stop that right now,” from Superman, whose patience was reaching its end. “Don’t make me shoot,” the cop continued. Now this, I had to see. And sure enough, he brandished his somewhat oversized machine gun (compensating for something maybe?) and started shooting. Unfortunately for him, his gun let him down (wonder how many times that’s happened to him) owing to a no script/no build in place on the parcel we were on! He soon teleported away. I remuted the spammer and normality ensued.

My question is this. Why? Why oh why do people find it so utterly necessary to make complete asses of themselves by bounding around with prim badges and freebie guns, hats that don’t fit them properly and “FBI” vests declaring to us mere virtual civilians that everything will be ok because they’re here to protect us? Ok, roleplay is one thing and in my looking through policing groups it seems there are some who specifically roleplay. Then there are others who seem to have some sort of delusional philosophy in place whereby they really do believe they’re saving the grid from… erm, well from bad stuff, I guess. One group claims, in its charter, that its purpose is to “protect sl and make our world a safer place.” Others offer a free uniform and training when you join. Oh goody. Because I’ve always wanted to spend my time being told how to look and act like a bit of a pillock by someone who has clearly already mastered the art. I think I will pass up on that one. Looking through profiles, some of the ‘police officers’ themselves offer virtual protection. Just IM them, apparently, and you become under their protection. Wow. As tempting as it is though, I think I can just about handle spamming of the public chat channel and the occasional avatar who, shock, horror, bumps into me! The bruises, I’ve discovered, go away pretty quickly. And failing that, a new copy of my skin should do it.

Perhaps these people think they’re the only ones with access to the “Abuse Report” function. Perhaps they believe that if they wear a virtual cop uniform, everyone will do exactly as they say. Maybe their uniforms are magic and that upon sight, all the griefing avies will disintegrate into nothing. Maybe they think that if Linden Labs™ sees all the good work they’re doing, running up and down the metaverse shouting at people and threatening to arrest them, they’ll get a job! Who knows! One thing I wonder though, how on Earth do these people think they can arrest someone. “Sir, you’re under arrest…. Oh damn. He teleported away.” Hmmm. Something to ponder.

Please find below an up to date blog containing details of the Asshat Server Issues that have once again blighted SL™ this weekend.

[RESOLVED 10:00 PM PDT] Ok, ok. Really this time guys, really it is all fixed. I promise you there’ll be no more problems for at least the next ten minutes! Ok, I’m off for a break.

[UPDATE 8:38 PM PDT] We are still trying to nail down the problem. That Henry. What an ass.

[REOPENED 6:25 PM PDT] We are currently experiencing some Asshat Server Issues and investigating the cause. Again! Updates will be posted here when we have further information. Thank you for your patience (they make me say that, despite the fact that the 150 comments already received on this post tell us all patience has well and truly expired).

[RESOLVED 5:00PM PDT] Ok, everything should be back to normal now! Not that normal is good, right now, but whatever. Deal with it.

[UPDATE 4:00PM PDT] Erm, anyone wanna play backgammon?

[UPDATE 3:25PM PDT] We’ve sent someone over to look at Henry. We’ll let you know how he’s doing as soon as we can be bothered.

[UPDATE 2:40PM PDT] Ok, we’ve found a piece of equipment we can blame for these problems. So until we actually find out and solve what is wrong (some time after our tea break, dinner break, general doing nothing break and six month vacation) we’ll blame this piece of equiment. Let’s call it Henry.
[2:14PM PDT] We are investigating intermittent database and asshat server issues. This means you can’t login, rezz anything, pay for anything, give anything to anyone, view anyone’s profiles, search for anything, fly, teleport, move, breathe…not to worry though, as these are of course only luxury functions anyway and we here at Lazy Labs believe that even without these functions, SL is enjoyable enough to still charge $9.95 a month for. We’ll update you with more bad news as we see fit.

Cove Islands Real Estate recently held a little caption competition, providing the residents with an image and giving them a few days to caption it for us, with tier as a prize! Winning caption accompanies the image here. Thanks to Yuna Blessed for a great caption! It made us chuckle. More random piccies and witty captions to follow Eventually.

Now, we all know how admirable, respected and generally amazing ‘gangsta’ avies are. It really does take a certain amount of confidence (or delusion) to wander around the metaverse dressed like something out of a really bad rap video. And because, of course, we all so badly want to be just like these people, I headed off to gangsta venues to study this species of avatar! With my new found knowledge and understanding of these ‘gangstaz’ and ‘sistahz’ I was then successfully able to recreate their look and attitude without spending a single Linden! Here, I share the joy!

The Look

Through studying and observation, I was able to identify 5 key requirements for men.

1. BLING. Unless you are wearing enough freebie bling to cause long term vision problems for anyone within a 15 mile radius, you simply won’t fit in. Bling can take the form of anything really. Watches (because of course looking at the clock built into the SL™ viewer is evidently just not gangsta), knuckle dusters, belts… but the preferred bling seems to be giant gold or silver necklaces with $ signs on them. Wow. The epitome of all that is manly, tough and just plain cool. I was going to ask if, being from the UK, I ought to find one with a £ sign on. But decided against communicating with this unpredictable species. Other admired accessories took the form of belts with ‘playa’ or something similar written across them.

2. DUFFEL BAG. Most male avies will be aware, I’m sure, that within the appearance editing options, hidden amongst the love handles and flat butt sliders, is an option to adjust your package! The scale on the sliders goes up from the aptly named ‘coin purse’ right the way up to a ‘duffel bag’. Well, you want to be gangsta, you need the duffel bag. It appears that unless you look as though you’re carrying around at least ten tonnes of pure man meat within your underwear, you’re just not gangsta enough.

3. FACE COVERAGE. A bandana or doo-rag and something tied around your mouth is of course a complete necessity. One has to be unidentifiable in the police line ups of course. So you really need to make it look as though you’re either just returning from a bank robbery or just about to go out and pop a cap in someone’s ass. (Sorry, that should be ‘azz’. My spelling is terrible.)

4. PYJAMA PANTS. It is absolutely necessary that any pants you wear in public must resemble PJs (overly baggy, crotch hanging to the floor). This is just a rule. Apparently, we do not question why.

5. OVERSIZED SHOES. If your footwear is not a similar size to a canoe, then you are clearly just not gangsta. Normal sized shoes? What are you? A little bitch? Get real mo’ fo’. If you can’t fit 3 grown men into each shoe, then you’re gonna end up with a cap in your ass. Apparently.

The rules for female avies were much simpler. Very few clothes, LOTS of bling and a backside that is 100 on the butt slider. Yes, if your butt doesn’t resemble 2 small planets in a pair of pants, you’re no ‘sistah’.

So, with the clothes all taken care of, an AO that makes you walk like John Wayne desperate for the toilet and a certain amount of insanity to make you believe this looks good, you’re almost gangsta. Of course, before you can even think of using the sacred term for yourself, you’ll have to acquire a weapon (in case it should become necessary at any point to pop a cap in some bitch’s ass). Again, as with all the clothing, it can all be acquired FREE! WOOT!

The Lingo

Even if you look right, I can’t help but think that you’d be sussed out right away if you went into a gangsta club and spoke, well, properly. There is the entire abuse of the English language thing going on and if you’re going to be able to pull of gangsta, you’re going to need to learn it. A few key rules:

1. All words ending in –er now in –a. E.g ‘gangsta,’ ‘motha,’ ‘brotha.’ –ER is the enemy.

2. Equally as discriminated against seems to be the letter S. Ass appears to be spelt ‘azz,’ and plurals all end in –Z too it seems.

3. A number of ‘th’ words alter their spelling in gangsta. The = da, them = dem, that = dat.

4. The verb ‘to be’ in the present tense exists only in the third person singular form – ‘is’. I is, you is, we is, they is….

In addition to the basic rules outlined above, as with any language, there are a number of words that follow no rules! Examples include:

-Girl = gurl

-Boy = boi

-Sister – sistah

-Bitch – bytch

In translating from English to Gangsta it is important to remember the key points. Example translations:

“Well hello there. That’s a lovely necklace you’re wearing,” becomes “Sup bitch. Dat bling is da shit.”

“That boy over there really did annoy me. I’m going to have to resolve this!” becomes “Dat boi der, ima pop a cap in his azz.”

“They are such cowards,” becomes “Dey is bytchez.”

And so there you have it. How to be gangsta without spending a linden. Want to replicate this look? No, I thought not. Good choice. But just in case you find yourself incredibly intoxicated one night or want to attend a ‘gangsta’ night, all clothing and accessories I found came from Freebie Store http://slurl.com/secondlife/Chromex/208/182/24

Thanks to Jenee Marten for the photography, as a result of which she is now mentally scarred for life.