Pleasure and problems

This morning, Maggie and I stayed in bed chatting and cuddling, mostly about our future and our friends.

In the evening, Maggie was quite distressed, because some of the things she had made yesterday had lost textures, and she had crashed some 10 times before I came. She took me on a little tour to a place with some nice freebies, and then to a place with some freebie fun. It's nice to see that you once in a while find a place, in this case a kind of mall, where people don't follow the cookie cutter concept most places in Avination seems to follow, but dare do some crazy and fun stuff as well.

Things in Avination seems to be deteriorating on many levels at present. The technical problems are far worse than just a few weeks ago, without any apparent reason, and our home sim Sweet Hideout is still off-line, after almost 4 days now, without the slightest response from management or their team. I'm seriously pissed at their arrogance by now, but I will give them a little bit more time to fix it before taking any further actions.

Economy:
2011-07-04: -
Avination stats:
2011-07-05 04:16 UTC, 33,962 residents, 6,755 in 30d, 972 sims

Dancing and asset problems

This morning, I met Maggie and Lena at Lena's place, and the Maggie showed us the progress of the skybox home she's building for her and me. Eventually, Lena had to leave, and Maggie and I had to split up for real life soon after that as well.

In the evening, I met Maggie and Lena together again, when they were out looking for furniture. Maggie tried to show Lena her new gown, but the bottom part of it was corrupt, so it didn't show. After Lena had to leave, Maggie and I went dancing and listening to live performers in two different locations, one female country singer and one Elvis imitator. None of them were top notch, and both suffered severe technical problems, the first with a repeatedly crashing sim, and the other with a music stream that came and went repeatedly. Yep, Avination still has some things to fix.

During the second performance, Maggie got response from the gown creator, and we eventually left the performance to let the creator have a look at the gown problem. She couldn't do much though, but believed the texture was somehow messed up and submitted a support ticket about it.

Economy:
2011-06-24: outfit -C$150
Avination stats:
2011-06-25 04:15 UTC, 33,180 residents, 7,157 in 30d, 983 sims

Fooling around and discussing the future

Today, Maggie and I spent the morning cuddling in bed and chatting. In the evening, Maggie was with Lena when I came, showing her some of the recent additions on the island BDSM. Lena seemed to appreciate the news, and I finally got a chance to see her naughty seesaw in action. She and Maggie looked really sweet straddling it, slowly bobbing up and down on the large plugs she had attached under holes in the balance plank.

After Lena left, Maggie and I went to a closing sale from a creator leaving Avination. Sorry to say, but with the prices and qualities, even with the items on sale with 50% off, I'm not surprised they're closing down. They may have made OK a few months back, but today, they can hardly compete since you can easily find twice the quality for half the price in Avination. Basically, they're one of those mechants I use to say try and sell a L$200 suit for C$1200, just because it's in Avination, also called Merchantville.

I am developing my surveillance of Avination and the analyses of the results continuously. The results from the grid survey, when analysed a bit more in depth, was really not very positive. Basically, I fear that when some of the things there get known, which they will eventually, regardless of if I blow the whistle or not, Avination will have many serious issues with their paying customers, maybe enough to push them out of business. What Avination needs is either a management replacement for the grid owner Melanie, or her understanding it's not a viable business model to have customers pay for her and friends' private sandbox, without caring one bit about said customers' needs.

Economy:
2011-06-19: -
Avination stats:
2011-06-20 04:14 UTC, 32,776 residents, 7,405 in 30d, 1,003 sims

A huge lighthouse

To keep things simple with Maggie's helicopter circling the BDSM island, I built a tower in Doric style this morning, as a kind of "station" at altitude for it. In the afternoon, I modified it some, and added a large fire bowl on its top, making it kind of an ancient lighthouse. The view from there, as well as from the circling helicopters, is great, and I think that it can become a popular attraction on the island. I also cleaned up some in the dungeon, added the new dildo pole I finished yesterday to all the cells and the common dungeon area as well, and added image holders both to the tower and in the to-be art maze.

Later in the evening, Maggie brought me to a place selling houses, garden furniture and full set pools. She was much after the pool furniture, but was almost jumping up and down from wanting the pool itself. I have already been planning for a pool at the to-be club area, but these pools were large. However, if they're mod as it says, I should be able to fix both its size and its looks, to make it fit and blend in better in the environment. We will wait with buying until tomorrow though, to melt and ponder some on it.

Economy:
2011-06-18: uploads -C$550
Avination stats:
2011-06-19 04:14 UTC, 32,633 residents, 7,397 in 30d, 1,006 sims

Mini mall

Today, I worked mainly with the forum and the attached mini mall. There will be 3 proper shops to start with, one for me, one for Lena, who I hope I will manage to persuade start selling her creations, and possibly one for Maggie. I also added place for a number of ads or small vendors to the mall. I'm still not done with all the details, but the major layout is done at least.

This evening, Maggie and Lena had a long talk, and afterwards, Maggie and me went window shopping for some accessoirs to the island. We found quite a few pretty good things at decent prices by a new designer, and I'm pretty sure I will shop some there when I know better what I need exactly.

Economy:
2011-06-02: -
Avination stats:
2011-06-03 04:16 UTC, 30,648 residents, 7,635 in 30d, 1,034 sims

Taking care of friends

This morning, Maggie and I tried to set things up, so that we could let Lena come to our sim. Probably owing to lag of some form, it took time for the required setting changes to come through, but eventually we had it working, using Maggie's old avatar as a "crash test dummy".

Maggie met Lena this afternoon, and invited her to the island. It seems everything went well, and happily accepted Maggie's offer for her to have our island as a home. We both like Lena a lot, so we are happy for that. I hope I can manage to persuade her to start selling her creations as well, and having at least one shop for it on our island, since she's really a good designer.

In the evening, I added a few more information scrolls to the temple library at the island. Then Maggie dragged me off on a free money hunt on some island. After that we returned to our island and tried to set permissions right, to permit Lena to build, but not ordinary visitors and basic group members.It didn't work at all, but it may again have been because of lag. In the end, we gave up and went home to Sweet Hideout to bed, and I restarted both BDSM, Sweet Hideout and Sweet Retreat, hoping that would solve the permission issues on BDSM.

Economy:
2011-05-27: bird bath -C$200
Avination stats:
2011-05-28 04:18 UTC, 30,077 residents, 7,698 in 30d, 1,051 sims

Shopping decorations

In the morning, Maggie and I went to look for dolphins, since she very much wanted some of those around our island. We didn't find any we were really happy with, but she wound up with a swan and duck instead, and we know where we'll probably buy dolphins if we don't find anything better.

In the evening, I met Maggie and our friend Lena at the creator's expo, plus a German master and slave couple that seemed rather nice. After a few sim restarts and crashes, and some chat, Maggie and I went on to explore the expo area. They had some nice things there, and Maggie bought a bird bath which was very nicely designed. Time ran much too fast as usual though, so we broke off to go home and to bed, and hope to continue our exploration tomorrow.

Economy:
2011-05-26: clothes -C$50
Avination stats:
2011-05-27 04:18 UTC, 29,993 residents, 7,744 in 30d, 1,054 sims

Avination trouble and nice places

I was contacted by the Avination spokesperson Helen yesterday, regarding my postings on the Avination forum about the problems and decreasing usage in Avination at present. She said she and the Avination owner Melanie wanted to chat with me about some of my suggestions. It was OK with me, so we agreed on setting up a meeting this evening.

Helen never got in touch today, and in a way I'm not surprised. My trust in the Avination team isn't the best after their previous "accomplishments", so keeping appointments, or at least message to cancel them, is probably way beyond what can be expected from them. Also, I suppose 2-3 login outages during the day may have been enough to distract them. So, instead Maggie and me spent the evening at a beautiful Greek island, which the creators really had made something great with.

Economy:

2011-05-11: rent -C$480

2011-05-12: -

Avination stats:

2011-05-12 06:33 CET, 28,426 residents, 8,100 in 30d, 1,110 sims

2011-05-13 06:09 CET, 28,539 residents, 8,066 in 30d, 1,111 sims

Planning and shopping

Yesterday I sketched to Maggie how I wanted to proceed with an own sim in Avination, and after thinking about it, she was all for it. Before I came, she also met the girl that I've helped some with scripting, Lena, and they had a little chat. Maggie and me then spent the morning shopping clothes, dress shirts, ties and trousers for me, and a nice gown withh a bit extreme high heels for Maggie.

In the evening, we took a train ride talking some more, and then went hunting for a ballroom to show off Maggie's new gown in. There seemed to be non with anything scheduled though, and teleports kept failing, timing out or crashing. Maggie found a sim with a nice but raunchy clothes shop and some beautiful art though, so despite we missed our ballroom dancing, we still had a nice time together.

Economy:

2011-05-06: tip -C$100

Avination stats:

2011-05-07 10:15 CET, 27,854 residents, 8,224 in 30d, 1,116 sims

New toys and dancing

Yesterday, Maggie got a new toy from a girl I helped some with her LSL scripting, Lena. The toy was a RLV bracelet, permitting the wearer to be made helpless and toyed with. Even if there were a few things not working initially, we straightened them out, and Maggie said she was real happy that she could be restricted by me.

This morning, I found out that Xcite!, the creator of the most spread erotic interaction system in SL, had finally opened up in Avination as well. I have had creating a similar system specific for Avination my major pass time for about a month now, but now that Xcite! is here, I guess there's not much call for it any longer. It was a fun scripting exercise though, and I learned a lot from it, so the effort is on no way wasted.

In the evening, Maggie and I discussed some about our future and an own sim in Avination. We also checked up on some landmarks we got, and in the end, we danced the night away, in tux and gown, to a live performer at a ball room. Even if there were just some 10-11 people attending, that's still some 4% of the 260 logged in at that time. Not bad, and a nice finish of our evening.

Economy:

2011-05-04: sale +C$10, upload -C$10

2011-05-05: sale +C$10, upload -C$10

Avination stats:

2011-05-05 05:59 CET, 27,580 residents, 8,230 in 30d, 1,117 sims

2011-05-06 05:56 CET, 27,705 residents, 8,211 in 30d, 1,114 sims

Tired

I've been sleeping too little lately, and today I really felt off. I spent the morning talking with Maggie in bed, and in the evening we went to check out a new club where one of our friend work. We got some nice pictures of us cuddling on the beach there, but owing to an Avination bug, Maggie couldn't give me her pictures full perms, because they changed perms on the way from her inventory to mine. Tired as I am now, I can get damn frustrated on all those things that don't work as they're supposed to in Avination, even such small things.

Economy:

2011-05-02: -

Avination stats:

2011-05-03 06:10 CET, 27,336 residents, 8,270 in 30d, 1,115 sims

Lovely garden

This morning, Maggie was nervous about a real-life doctor's appointment, so we stayed cuddling and chatting in bed in Avination, which helped her relax some.

In the evening, Maggie found us a very nice garden double sim, with very many plants, buildings and fences for sale. I think we both got inspired, and discussed our own future sim quite a lot while we looked around. Many of the things we saw may rather become inspiration than something we really buy there, even if most of the prices were good as well. But we both enjoy to create, so even if it would be more cost efficient to buy, we may make our own versions just for the fun of it.

Economy:

2011-05-01: bath tub -C$50

Avination stats:

2011-05-02 06:15 CET, 27,227 residents, 8,317 in 30d, 1,107 sims

Voice chatting

This morning, Maggie and I met just briefly, and talked some about the problems she ran into with her RLV. Basically, she needs to restructure her entire inventory for it to work properly, and i know from Second Life how much she dislikes that.

I spent some of the day scripting some for the RLV functionality, trying to build a basic platform to make it simple to plug in new functions. The scripting in itself is rather simple, but I'm a bit unfamilliar with the syntax of RLV, and have lots to learn there.

In the evening, the entire Avination went down for almost an hour. Maggie and I went on Skype instead, and continued there after Avination was up again. It was a bit strange but nice feeling to be able to talk normally while we were looking around Avination. We bought a few simple and cheap but nice things, like a couple rocking chair and a couple bath tub, at a "medieval" shop, even if it was almost exclusively renaissance and rokoko rather than medieval.

Economy:

2011-04-30: skin, face, hair and complete avatar -C$328

Avination stats:

2011-05-01 09:25 CET, 27,106 residents, 8,317 in 30d, 1,111 sims

Appearence and RLV

Maggie and I spent this morning chasing shops. She looked for some nice dresses and lingerie, and then she found a new shop for male apparel, with shapes, skins, hairs and eyes. I have been looking for a good male skin for some time now, without much success. The skins in this new shop weren't 100% to my taste, but they were a lot better than the one I've been using before, and comparatively cheap, so I got one, and the shop owner who were there, was very helpful and even threw in hair and eyes for me, and eyes for Maggie as well, for free. I don't usually promote shops in this blog, but for this one, I'll make a well-deserved exception: Ernesto at Token City 178, 24, 24.

Later in the day, I ran into a girl who had some scripting problems. She was working on some RLV (Restrained Love Viewer, a system for people into dominant/submissive role-play, which permits others to take some control of your avatar) scripts, and I managed to help her out with it. She was very grateful, and gave me full perm versions of some simple scripts she made. I also helped her some with another, more advanced script, with menu control.

I never got around to scripting for RLV in Second Life, and not in Avination before neither. But now I discovered that it seems very simple, and later in the evening, when I met Maggie and told her, she wanted me to be able to lock my collar on her. I managed to modify one of the scripts I got from the girl so it worked with a decoration collar Maggie got from one of the shops in Sweet Hideout. She was very happy when I could lock it so she couldn't take it off, until she discovered the caveat that she needed to put in a lot of extra work in setting her inventory up so it worked when she was locked by RLV as well. She already have over 2000 items in her inventory, so she'll be busy for some time to come.

Economy:

2011-04-29: -

Avination stats:

2011-04-30 08:45 CET, 26,975 residents, 8,472 in 30d, 1,112 sims

Ballroom dancing

Maggie and I spent the morning just talking, like so often, but in the evening, we went ballroom dancing, me in my tuxedo, and she in a lovely gown. We tried two places, both empty except for us. One was really beautiful, but streamed a not very nice modern radiostation. The other was not as beautifully built, but had an amazing view out over some islands, and nice music. We danced and chatted about our plans to meet RL again later this year, before going back home and to bed, rather late.

Economy:

2011-04-28: -

Avination stats:

2011-04-29 05:55 CET, 26,871 residents, 8,545 in 30d, 1,113 sims

Places worth revisiting

This morning, Maggie and I re-visited the same place as we checked out the evening before, with a maze with Easter gifts in the center, and then we went to see an outdoor store selling rather simple but effectful waterfalls and other water things.

In the evening, we ended up at the same places, simply because I logged off there. But it was a beautiful place well worth visiting, and we also met one of the owners, a woman who was very nice and gave us some extra freebies. After that, we visited a couple of other sims, chasing a special shop that had been moved very recently. Maggie also handed me a freebie gift she found for me, and I paid for one of her purchases that was much for my sake. Finally, I set out a train on trad's railroad, and we took a calm private ride while discussing our future plans in Avination and some other things.

I've stopped setting out trains regularly on the railroad now, until I know if they add to the lag and problems in the sim. I submitted two support tickets about it, which may hopefully make it possible to pinpoint the causes of the sim problems, even if it's not the trains causing them. Crash stack traces from the scripts that I provided may give the Avination managers a hint of what's the root of the problem and how it could hopefully be solved.

Economy:

2011-04-23: donation? +C$20, concert donations -C$200

Avination stats:

2011-04-24 10:17 CET, 26,203 residents, 8,636 in 30d, 1,117 sims

Sim hopping and concert

This morning, Maggie and I met rather shortly, spending the time chatting about various things. In the evening, we went sim hopping, exploring some sims of interest. Unfortunately, she crashed a lot, but it at least helped some when she set down her graphics from high to medium. Later in the evening, we went to a concert, with a really good singer, singing lot of old goodies from Elvis, Gershwin, Louis Armstrong and others. After that we looked at a few more sims before going home and to bed.

Our friend and landlord trad is still missing, and has not been seen in Second Life neither. I'm really worried about what has happened to him now. I don't know when his next sim tier is due, but if he isn't there to pay it then, one day the sims will suddenly just go poof and disappear.

Economy:

2011-04-22: Zyngo +C$20

Avination stats:

2011-04-23 08:50 CET, 26,080 residents, 8,611 in 30d, 1,118 sims

Zyngo and sim roulette

This morning, Maggie and I spent in bed in Avination, chatting and snuggling some. In the evening, we first played some Zyngo and then played some sim roulette, jumping to more or less random sims. We found one strictly ordered German sim with casino, mall and houses for rent in very strict and perfect squares, one sim which seemed to be the playground under construction of some more or less crazy scripter, and of course a few casino sims, empty but surprisingly nicely designed. We finally got stuck talking about our real-life meeting and out friend trad, who hasn't logged in to neither Second Life nor Avination for a long time now, until it became so late we found it best to return home and go to bed.

During the day, I also submitted a couple of support tickets about the problem with the railroad. I think those may be symptoms of an underlying problem that could and should be solved, not just for the railroad's sake.

Economy:

2011-04-21: easter maze quiz +C$28, clothes -C$10

Avination stats:

2011-04-22 06:00 CET, 25,947 residents, 8,629 in 30d, 1,119 sims

Mazes and kink clubs

This morning, Maggie and I visited a maze full of Easter gifts, and managed to collect quite a few items and C$ in the trivia quiz inside the maze.

This evening, we visited a kink club, had a nice time using their dance balls, checked out their beach and gallery. We also met the owner, and Maggie invited one of our friends, Rosie, to join us chatting there for a while. On the way home, we visited Rosie's store, and bought some of her clothes creations, which were on sale for just C$10 each, which was a very good price.

Our friend trad is still missing, the trains were off-line this evening, so I reset them, and Sweet Hideout was lagged before we left for the kink club but better when we returned. I asked the owner of the kink club, whose sim is rather heavily loaded, how often he needs to restart it. He said once every 10-14 days, while Sweet Hideout needs restarting every second day or so, despite being much less loaded. Something obviously isn't right.

Economy:

2011-04-20: hair for Maggie -C$649

Avination stats:

2011-04-21 05:56 CET, 25,819 residents, 8,727 in 30d, 1,127 sims

New hair for Maggie

This morning, the trains on trad's railroad were still running, and Maggie and I spent the morning chatting. In the evening, the trains were again offline, so I set them out again. trad's neighbouring sim, Sweet Retreat didn't rezz and couldn't be teleported into, so I submitted a support ticket to have it restarted.

Maggie and I went to a kind of show case, and looked around. We found some good things, but most of them at prices that we both thought were too high for the quality offered. I gave Maggie money to buy a "fat pack" of hair in many different colors that she liked though. I looked for skins for myself, but found nothing to my liking, even if Maggie liked one of the skins I tried. She also found a very nice dress as a gift, but had a lot of problems crashing tonight. When we returned home, I crashed badly when trying to cross the sim border between Sweet Hideout and the restarted Sweet Retreat forth and back.

Economy:

2011-04-19: -

Avination stats:

2011-04-20 05:43 CET, 25,667 residents, 8,761 in 30d, 1,118 sims