Thinking of Gina

My friend Peter Stindberg, translator extraordinary, contacted me last week with an unusual situation. He had been affected by the all-too-often transitory nature of relationships in Second Life; his friend Gina Glimmer was no longer able to continue in our virtual world. 

This happens from time to time, sometimes when the avatar's owner passes on in real life. Often memorials are built, sometimes small and personal, at other times large and public, especially for those who were well known.

Peter has taken a different approach. There's no memorial. Instead he has made all of Gina's artwork (her former SL business) available to everyone at no charge in an effort to remember her. Peter hopes that people "maybe think of her when watching them". The artwork is available in her OnRez gallery or in-world at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Experience%20Italy%20W/179/30/29.

I never had the opportunity of meeting Gina, but after reading Peter's posts and looking at her artwork, I wish I had met her. 

Peter, it's working.

SLB or SLX? or SOR?

First of all, it's not SLB (SLBoutique) anymore. Their site was taken down a few weeks ago and was re-born as “Shop OnRez”. I am not sure I like the new name, but the new version seems to have a few interesting added features, such as bulk editing of entries.

But first, a bit of background. I had started selling particles on SLX (SL Exchange) long before I had any land or shops of my own. In fact, SLX sales funded the purchase of my first land in Lanestris. I've been quite happy with SLX, although the sales are significantly lower than from my in-world store.

Meanwhile, I also tried SLB. The management interface at first appears to be a lot slicker than SLX, but having used it to manage a large number of products, I'd have to say that the less-polished SLX was actually easier to use if you are a seller. Nevertheless, I set up a quantity of products on SLB and waited for sales. During the first month I made some sales, perhaps 25% of what I was receiving from SLX. However, after that sales dropped off to almost nothing – perhaps one sale every two months. Terrible!

I had almost given up hope on SLB, but with the introduction of Shop.OnRez.com, I thought I should give it another try. After spending several hours setting up all my products on SLB (Whoops! I mean Shop.OnRez, of course! Or should I call it “SOR”?) I was satisfied that I did all I could to properly use SOR.

Today, more than a month later, I signed into SOR and found to my surprise that I'd made 32 sales since I set up on the new SOR! I am liking this service more than the old one, at least for now. These sales are in fact somewhat larger than SLX during the same period. Good work, Sheep!