The Tramp's Mind

Just Serious…

ralphschnook — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 21:04:23 +0000

My store is now open! ‘Just Serious…’ promotes it’s own sarcastic sincerity with blueish style. Right now the only items I have up for sale are dancefloors, but expect many updates within the next few weeks. Don’t forget, as I have promoted time and time again in my past builds, the underlying philosophy I go into Second Life with, get money get paid and have some fun.

The 'Not so Serious' Dancefloor Line

My first week on the big boy grid (and a few days extra)

ralphschnook — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 08:48:51 +0000

Overall my experience on what we referred to on the kidgrid as “the other side” has been pretty pleasant. I’ve been discovering lots of new places on a daily basis. A few that may want to be taken note are ‘The Vault’, a club that plays music from the 20′s, 30′s, 40′s, and 50′s, and IDIA Laboratories which hosts some great sim-size artwork. But enough with my in-blog advertisements, I managed to score (and by score I mean buy) some land in Somerset for a decent price. I intend on building and opening a store on that plot of land once I collect both the effort and the ideas to do such. But, until next time, the tramp signs out.

Last Days of the Teen Grid… for everyone.

ralphschnook — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 00:09:22 +0000

Howdy and hello. Teen Grid’s days are coming to a close later this year, and seeing as how I am going to transfer in a few weeks I thought I’d take some time to make a much needed update to the Tramp Blog. In the past I’ve bickered on and on about future prospects and solutions to save the main grid, mostly siding toward a merge, and now that something to that effect is actually going to take place I simply sit here in awe. I transfer in early October, and instead of seeing all of my younger friends funnel into what I often refer to as “the other side”, they will all come at once–glorious. This is a huge turning point in Second Life’s history, as it is the first time people under 18 can (legally) be in the same area as someone over the age of 18 without somewhere in the neighborhood of a billion background checks, teaching licenses, and swear-ins. Whatever the future holds for what will be known in the future as The Grid Formerly Known As The Teen Grid (TGFKATG) it will sure be different than the monotonous decline we’ve seen the once valiant Teen Grid undertake these past few years. So, instead of thinking of this year as the year the Teen Grid blew up, think of it as the year the Teen Grid transcended to another level.

If you have any fond memories of the Teen Grid or speculations of the future, please be sure to share them in a response!

Until next time,

-a tramp

Update

ralphschnook — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 15:32:39 +0000

It has occurred to me recently that I have no had the time to make a new post on the tramp blog in quite some time so I have made it my goal to post frequently, say, once a week on fridays. It has been a slow and uneventful time on Second Life recently for Mr. Schnook (yes, third person talk in TOTALLY in style right now) but that isn’t to say that I haven’t had any thoughts about future projects, Ro Ling is aging quite nicely, little followers but the build still looks good to me after all this time so I have decided to wait a few months before making an drastic changes to my little plot of land in Pinkwater. There’s a few different ideas I have been juggling around for the future of what is now Ro Ling, one would be a recreation or a larger version of Uruwashii Saten, one of my more successful projects to date, a recreation of the Imagine Cafe, the first plot of land that wasn’t a house that I owned back in the earlier part of 2006, or something entirely different.

I would love to see some comments about what YOU think the future of what is now Ro Ling should be, thank you, and stay golden! :-F

Why stay so long?

ralphschnook — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 11:35:15 +0000

Many people tend to look at my avatar’s profile and say “Whoa”, we all know I’ve been around since the primitive age of the Teen Grid, but why? I tend to ask myself this plenty of times, “Why am I still here?” because I tend to flip flop from ideas often, I don’t think I’ve made THAT much of an impact on a grand scale, and I tend to find myself doing little to nothing on Second Life thus I multitask.

Well I suppose the answer to this question would be that Second Life is now a part of me, it has become such a regular routine that I now cannot imagine a routine without Second Life. One may automatically go to the assumption that this is an addiction, however I would beg to differ because I know that I can quit Second Life any time that I choose, and I know many people who have in the past, but I choose not to. Perhaps it is just simply the idea of creating new things, giving myself projects, and developing in a way that past generations would not have dreamed of that excites me the most about Second Life when I log on, I often pick up new things and find out new ways to create things by partaking in events and actions on Second Life. And that is why I have decided to stay all this time.

Ro Ling – Teen Grid’s best trance techno club

ralphschnook — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 03:00:49 +0000

Ro Ling, my latest project, is now up and running at my land in Pinkwater at the southwest corner. You can get right to the dancfloor with this SLURL. http://slurl.com/secondlife/Pinkwater/42/52/1001

Enjoy! And be sure to trance it up!

The Grid Merge

ralphschnook — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 09:47:07 +0000

I know these posts are coming fast and hard and I’m fairly certain nobody has even glanced over my blog to this point, however I would like for somebody, whoever it may be to take a look at this to see how a 3-year going on 4-year Teen Second Life resident feels about the topic.

The idea of a grid merge is one that has been alive and stirring on the Teen Grid since the earlier part of 2008 with groups such as “The Grid Merge” which now sports (at the time of this post) a wealthy 604 members, which is a significant number when you consider the fact that the Teen Grid contains somewhere in the area of 200 simulators. Needless to say little has been done about the issue until 2009 came around with Philip Rosedale, founder of Linden Labs going out and saying that a merge is the best option. You can find this by navigating to the following link to find a Global Kids post on RezEd quoting Rosedale about the topic in January of this year. http://rezedhub.ning.com/forum/topics/philip-rosedale-teen-second

Of course with any major change in any technology, be it the telephone or our precious Second Life, there comes many ups and downs and controversy along the way but eventually something gets done and a majority of the people out there end up happy. So what are some of the upsides to this possible merging of the grids?

Improved and more regulated Teen Second Life economy
Teens would be able to meet up with transferred friends
Educators would be able to communicate with students more frequently (a majority of the regions on TSL are educational)
A merge would shy many copybotters on the Teen Grid from copybotting, the product would be available
Teens would have a much more vast area to explore than the 100 or so public sims on the Teen Grid
Children and parents would be able to talk to one another on the same grid

Okay, so there are many upsides and from my perspective I would definitely love to see a grid merge because, as I have said I have been a commonly active member of the Teen Second Life community for quite some time and still have a year and then some until I transfer and from what I have seen the Teen Grid has been at a decline since it has opened in 2005. Sure the building standards have increased but the amount of copybotters has risen tremendously since the technology has been discovered by Teen Second Life residents and needless to say not much growth has been occurring either. But enough of my opinion thrown into this post, it is time to talk about some of the downsides of this dynamic event.

Teenagers and adults in the same area could bring out some conflicting thoughts
Younger teenagers may feel left out in most scenarios
Sudden increase in price on everything for Teens may result in frustration
Adult content, if not moderated effectively or flagged in some way, could be a problem
Possible that merging the grids may not have too much of an educational impact

Most on Second Life, when tackling this subject, tend to gravitate toward not merging the grid, and in my opinion I believe this is from lack of actual experience. And coming from a three, almost four year veteran of the Teen Grid I can safely tell you that the situation on the grid is not improving. The isolated grid is not allowing teens to express their creativity more freely amongst themselves but rather limiting them on ideas and making them resort to things such as copybotting. The Teen Grid can no longer support it’s own weight, the community has just about given up on itself, which is why outside help is needed.

If you look at it in the following perspective it all makes a lot more sense. The Teen Grid works in cycles, the cycles come as follows. Every few months the Teen Grid tends to run into a dry streak, where it seems as though nothing new is coming and no new places are being opened. Then a few new designers come in and fix things up, usually become some of the biggest names on the grid that everybody knows, the help renew things. Then suddenly they disappear, these people transfer, they leave along with the skills they have taken the time on the TG to develop, thus making their magnum opus only available on the Main Grid of Second Life, and leaving Teen Grid residents at a point in time that was as if they never existed to begin with, with their skills no longer available on the grid.

Please leave a comment expressing your own opinion and be sure to use the poll, I would like to see what other people think about this and discuss the topic.

New thoughts

ralphschnook — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 23:21:13 +0000

So then, the tramp (myself) has been thinking much since the passing of Uruwashii Saten, about new ideas etc. A few have come to mind that I have decided not to publicly yell out, but I do believe they will all make the grid smile, while there still is a Teen Grid.

The Passing of Uruwashii Saten

ralphschnook — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 20:29:56 +0000

It has been about three months since I created the little tea house in Pinkwater and I have finally demolished it, it is archived if I ever wish to return to the build. This was all because of a stupid terraforming accident but I suppose it will give me, and those who commonly visit my land in Pinkwater a chance to be more creative and devise other plans. So with this new generation of the tramp’s land I say this, creativity will reign! And as for Uruwashii Saten, well it is now dust in the wind.

Priorities

ralphschnook — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 02:59:02 +0000

It seems as though I have so many goals and future accomplishments that I wish to achieve such as learning a new language, reading my summer reading novels for English class (for once), along with Second Life goals that it seems as though they’ve all been thrown in a dust pan and I’ve been staring at them all continually wishing I had worked toward at least one of them at the end of the day. I believe all of this will change with upcoming time, my friend Tony isn’t allowed to go out tomorrow so I will use that time to achieve some of these long put-off and important goals, perhaps this goal setting is a new step in the tramp’s life, one where I don’t dread goals and in the words of a totally stoned Rastafarian “don’t worry about a thing”. And who knows? I might eventually do something new with my land, eventually.

Blaaaaghhhh.