Da remix takes the bangin' piano chords — inspired by classical tradition — and underpins them with head-nodding, ticking hip-hop beat. Sounds like KRT did some time-correction and groove adjustment to tighten up the sync. I <3 the part @ 0:35 in when a new bassline comes in and there's this wide-open starkness in the mid-frequencies, so much atmosphere + emotion. (Could soundtrack a surprisingly effective advert!) Lovely little touches keep things interesting as it progresses, like swirling pads that join in, and later, the reverse-cymbal-to-echo-delays @ 2:38. By the end fade-out, I'm wishing for more.

I mused to Kurt that maybe we should get a rapper on this. You can check out Kurt's music on MySpace and also his band, The Republicans.

Thanx Kurt!

One of my main irritations with sending snapshots in Second Life was having to manually input the same steps every time. It's just a few clicks, true, but that all adds up because I use this feature so much.

There is a better way! With macro software PhraseExpress (Windows-only), you can assign a keystroke to enter text and do other fanciness, reducing your "send a postcard" keystrokes to as few as 2. It took me some time to figure out, but oh glory, what cumulative trouble it's saving me — and hopefully you!

Instructions:

Download PhraseExpress (free for personal use) and install it.

Open Settings. You can do this by clicking PhraseExpress' icon in the taskbar and selecting "Settings".

In PhraseExpress, go to Tools menu > Settings.

Under General Features, enable "Expert mode".

On the Security Confirmation dialog, click Yes. A new tree of options will appear.

Go to Options > Expert Options > Paste method.

Select "Paste text using the Windows Clipboard". The reason why is because Second Life is poor at capturing all keystrokes at low framerates.

Optionally, you can click "Execute only in certain applications" and restrict the macro to secondlife.exe

Click OK.

In the main PhraseExpress window, click New Phrase. Give it a name (I called mine "Postcard DELUXE"), and in "Phrase content", enter:

{#CTRL -chars a}{#CTRL -chars c}{#CTRL #SHIFT -chars S}{#sleep 1500}{#TAB -count 2}{#ENTER}{#TAB -count 2}{#CTRL -chars v}{#CTRL {#TAB}}{#TAB -count 2}{#CTRL -chars a}{#CTRL -chars c}{#CTRL -chars w}{#TAB}{#CTRL -chars v}{#SHIFT {#TAB} -count 3}x@x.com{#TAB -count 5}

It's all entered keystrokes. Obviously, "CTRL" is the Ctrl key, "TAB" is Tab, and so on. A brief explanation of what it does:

1. Copies text in a target field. In this case, it's specifically designed to copy About Land's Name & Description, so you'll need to give About Land's Name field focus or it won't work.
2. Takes a snapshot, then prepares to send it as a postcard.
3. Closes the About Land window to reduce clutter.
4. Pastes the About Land name & description.
5. Actively selects the Send button so you can send your postcard by pressing Enter, or edit text further as desired.

You'll need to customize a couple things highlighted in red:

• {#sleep 1500} - 1.5 second delay (in milliseconds) which compensates for the time until the Snapshot Preview window appears. You may need to increase this on slower systems, and tune it so it works reliably yet isn't a terribly long delay. I'm still testing the optimal balance on my computer. To test, press Ctrl-Shift-S in SL (File menu > Take Snapshot) and time how long it takes for the Snapshot Preview window to appear. So if it takes a little under 3 seconds, set it to {#sleep 3000}. Note that high-res snapshots take longer, and if you vary resolutions, you may want this to account for the longest common case.
• x@x.com - Enter your desired email address here. You can send to multiple recipients separated by commas, e.g., "x@x.com, y@y.com" As mentioned in the SLBuzz article, I send to several social sites at once.

Now, setup a Hotkey. I like Ctrl-Shift-Alt-S because it's similar to the Take Snapshot shortcut, with an added Alt.

Click OK to save your newly-birthed macro, and log into Second Life.

Bring up the Snapshot Preview and make sure "Send via email" is selected beforehand because this macro is only for sending a postcard. You can click "Send via email" then close the window.

In Second Life, click on the land title or World menu > About Land to open the About Land window.

In the General tab, if its border isn't already highlighted to indicate focus, click in the Name field.

Now do the macro! As shown in the video above, if it's all setup correctly, it should quickly go to work before your eyes, letting your hands rest while it copies the place Name & Description into your postcard's Subject and Message.

If you prefer something simpler, try this macro:

{#CTRL #SHIFT -chars S}{#sleep 1500}{#TAB -count 2}{#ENTER}x@x.com{#TAB -count 2}

It can be used at anytime you'd press Ctrl-Shift-S, and goes beyond because it automatically travels to the Email Snapshot window and  pastes in the email addresses of your choice. It doesn't copy-and-paste a parcel's name & description, which may be preferable in some situations. I have both active with different keystrokes.

Notes:

• Why include parcel name & description in a postcard? Because it gives more context, and some social sites let you search them, making it easier to find your content later.
• It's a common convenient that Tab key moves forward through fields, but did you know that Ctrl-Tab moves you backwards through fields?
• I haven't found way to activate menu items without keystrokes with PhraseExpress yet, altho I know it's possible with other macro apps. This, for instance, would allow you to also automatically open About Land, shaving more steps.
• I'm aware this macro isn't that context-smart (since it'll break if "Send via email" isn't selected or if About Land's Name isn't the active text field) and can be refined further.
• The actual postcard I sent in the video can be seen here. Note how the text gets converted to native Flickr tags, making organization a snap. Thanx SLBuzz for the fab SL-to-Flickr crosspost!

If you have curiosities and/or improvements, let me know in the comments!

I've got just the thing, fast 'n' easy videos to teach you:

1. Free yourself from a trap - When in doubt, teleport away!
2. Give inventory through Instant Message sessions - Has the added benefit of letting you drag-and-drop multiple inventory items.
3. Inventory goes to Trash when you're Busy - No! It's not gone! Just… fish it out.
4. Land terraform strength - Gives you more control over shaping your terrain like clay.
5. Moderate group voice & text chat - Block troublemakers! Hold civilized discussions!
6. Move contents from one object to another - Workaround for a kinda clunky process.
7. Script editor featurettes - Multiple-line identing, dynamic help lookup, and more!
8. Sit down to stop being pushed - One of those "Second Life you must knows".
9. Turn off the typing animation - This used to be harder. Now, it's a simple Preferences option.

Remember!

• Be sure to visit our Knowledge Base for more learnage!
• Easy link to ALL the videos — share with friends: secondlife.com/video
• You can also subscribe to RSS feed (MP4 links are high-quality downloads) or browse in iTunes store

I love to hear from you, so if you have curiosities, send me a direct message.

• I scribed a post titled "GENDERBENDER OMG!" which is on Alphonsus Peck's blog, a topic — "Gender Identity in SL: Living your SL as the opposite gender" — which was suggested by his wife, Princess Ivory of Her Royal Highness
• I'll post a link to Katt's post, on "The power of llHttpRequest" suggested by Tiyuk Quellmalz's Second Life Adventures when that's up!

Enjoy!

Uccello Poultry - The Poultry Report

Thanx to Brandy Ramuson of Writing the Sonnet for suggesting this topic, "the ways the SL experience is affected by avatars connecting outside SL with sites like plurk and flickr"

Extending Your Virtual Life

For nearly two weeks I lived in a void, bereft of my trusty iMac, cut off from those I love in Second Life® (SL). Twice in that time I was able to access e-mail via the local library, but daily I cursed my mobile as it cannot access the 'net for e-mail, Twitter, or even text to e-mail. The experience made me think that if it weren't for those two visits to the library, i had no way to stay in contact with anyone I know in-world.

Clearly a second computer would be a solution, though the budget disagrees. An iPod Touch with Wi-Fi access to the 'net would work, but again the budget rears it's ugly head. With a nasty glare it also reminds me that I can't upgrade my mobile, either.

But let's say I did have another device, probably with too little "power" to access SL directly. Likely I could use an instant messaging service like Yahoo Messenger or MSN Messenger, both Instant Messaging programs you may have heard about. But everyone you want to communicate with needs to use the same service. Linden Labs® is devising it's own version called SLim, making it easy for residents to use IMs without an external service or the need to log into the virtual space to communicate with those in-world.

Whether it be SLim or another service, though, interaction still takes a step outside our virtual world and, like with in-world Voice, this makes me uncomfortable. Here's why: When residents use Voice, non-users such as my self are left out. Actually, I'm a limited user. In Real Life (iRL) I'm a mute. In-world Voice lets me hear others that use the feature but not respond except through chat. In my experience, Voice users gradually ignore chat and I eventually fall out of any conversation. I find much the same thing happens when I'm with a group of friends that all use MSN Messenger. We could be at a party or just hanging out and eventually the conversation drifts entirely into the other service. I wonder if SLim use will have the same results.

Maybe you can tell I don't find these external services terribly useful. I have a Twitter account but no one else that I know does. Makes me wonder about these stalkers people that 'follow' me. The people I follow on Plurk (account started 4 November) are at least familiar names, and I've actually spoken to one in-world. Not sure I know them well enough to actually want to 'follow' them in Plurk, but I'll try it for a while. Clearly I need to convince friends to use a service other than SL but so far I've had no luck.

Except for Flickr, but that's a bird from a different flock. The adage that a picture is worth a thousand words is proven via Flickr, seemingly the only (but not really the only) image sharing service. It is easy, fun, and free and is full of Second Life® users. I find it an easy way to keep track of friends I don't get to see often and for them to do the same, but it does require a bit of discipline. I'd have to look for when I last posted a picture to Flickr. I'm more likely to post a picture to my blog. EIther method is a cost effective means to share images (or video, with a service like YouTube). No need to spend L$10 for an upload then find a way to send it to several people. Just post it somewhere on the Interweb and send the URL to everyone that you think should see it.

Looking back it is clear to me that services such as Plurk or Flickr that work outside SL are both useful and useless, depending on who is using them. Of deeper meaning is that the actual use points to perceived limitations of SL

• Plurk HUD
• Ordinal Malaprop's Twitter HUD

Luna Jubilee - My Slife on the D List

Thanx to Teagan Blackthorne of SL Fashion Avengers for suggesting this topic, "A history of the birth and emergence of prim hair into Second Life as a thriving business and culture".

Just a few short months ago, I would nearly hold my breath upon logging into Secondlife (SL) waiting to see where my avatar's attached prims would be surprising not where I attached them last on avatar's body.  For some of the newer residences who don't know, there was a time period in SL, when you logged in or even teleported, all your prims would end up, well, in your rear-end.  Guess where your prim hair landed?! Yeah that was fun.  I guess it gave it new meaning to "trunk".

Being only 2 years old in SL, I call myself a veteran noob.  I find SL is a continual learning process and growth opportunity.  I have not yet, taken to creating, owning or operating a business on the grid.  I won't hide that fact that I was leery of this blog mix and match assignment for a couple of reasons.  One being that my assigned blog was this one, a widely read primary source of information for SL residents. Then upon seeing the assigned topic I think I may have blacked out.  Okay so it wasn't that bad but pretty close. I knew nothing, at the time, about the history of neither prim hair nor running a business that sells hair. I put my own twist on this challenge.

Taking the idea of SL being a great learning tool and social network, I reached out to the one who is noted to creating this influential product, Washu Zebrastripe, owner of Mirada and Hairspray. She walked me through this creation's birth, "The creation of hair started from a somewhat simple idea. While playing with the sliders one day, I got a bit tired of the simple hair styles we had. short, long, or square ponytails. I loved cartoons and wanted more options. SL lets you build to your imagination, so why should the hair be limited? I made a huge ponytail and I just loved it! I passed it to my friends and they also loved the idea." With some encouragement, today we share in this "simple" invention. As time went on for Washu, soon there was a consumable need for this product and other designers emerged.

In the early days, it was difficult to find all the designers. This helped launch the idea of Hair Fair, an annual gathering of many SL hair content creators. Each year residents are welcomed to explore the multiple sims to find their favorite designers and introduce themselves to new ones. A good portion of the proceeds are donated to Locks of Love. This year's donation was nearly $9,500USD.

I don't limit myself to a few wigs or a dozen but a few dozen many times over, as the picture proves. There is amazing talent on the grid in many forms, one of them being hair designers. It is an alive and forever advancing. If it's created, there is a consumer. I am just one of the many who shop in the various stores on a mission for the next popular hair style.

I would like to think the use of prim hair is one those fundamentals in most residences' inventory.  Thinking back on my first days roaming the grid, I want to say that quite possibly buying this item was my first "major purchase". "  Just like everyone else, we all were rezzed with system hair or "noob hair".  Of course, since my rezz day, the system hair has evolved to a very basic level, perhaps closely mirroring Washu's initial hair.

Why do I call it a fundamental, you may ask.  I believe prim hair is what shapes your avatar's overall look and defines your own personality.  Regardless of what you wear, hair is what makes the difference.  An ill-fitting wig can be detrimental. Oh the despair!  If I can offer some simple advice, please look carefully at the fit and style.  Pay attention to the size of your avatar's melon, aka head.  Review how your melon's size appears in the hairstyle.  If it appears to be zapped by a voodoo head shrinking doctor, please increase the size. On the flip, if your melon is massive, please deflate.  The average head size for fitting most hairstyles is about 55.  Then go ahead and tweak any prim, which can happen with various styles, to achieve the best fit.  If you have friends that walk the grid with hair issues, please do help them. Please do you part to help keep the grid beautiful.  Friends don't let friends use noob hair.

by deadoll

For example, when someone's vegging on the couch, the last thing they want is their brain to be wracked with how to change the channel. Little steps add up too: a click here and a push there quickly becomes a painful, overall drag once it's repeated often enough. I've found my mind winces in anticipatory pain anytime I'm not automating something that could, and should be.

I was happy to see the frank responses of being too lazy to use SLURLs. It can be hard for some to admit because you don't want to sound like a social slouch, but earnesty shows where your priorities lie and how you hope for a smoother path. Similar to how many great inventions were supposedly borne to reduce work. Why bother if you can avoid it altogether?

Books on the market emphasizing the lazy way to success are popular (just search Amazon). These texts often talk about how zoning out and being like a cat (which is to say, stretching out sleeping a lot) is fundamental to creativity and insight. There's an inherent danger of separating these messages from their contexts — e.g., if you get a great idea while power-napping, you'll likely need a great deal of energy to actually get it done — so blanket extremism isn't the way to go.

Speaking of blanket, I'm too lazy to write the rest

by tombola2004

And yes, there've been innovations, like Korg catering to the needs of laptop/mobile musicians with the nanoSERIES — of which I'll be getting the nanoKONTROL soon — but by far and large, the look and sound of the market hasn't jumped a great distance. Here are some examples to illustrate my point:

Breath control, where art thou?

In my old home studio, my Yamaha BC3 was one of my fave gadgets. In response to wind pressure, it output a MIDI data stream, ideal for simulating woodwinds. I got some brilliant flute performances out of it.

In 2008, breath controllers are harder to find! A risk you run with alternate input devices is that either certain companies patent the heck out of them — like Roland's D BEAM — or they don't reach a critical mass market, so they flounder as interesting "experiments", but experiments nonetheless.

Yeah, you can find various bits 'n' bobs on eBay, but this is far from newcomer-friendly. And in an era of USB convenience, the same MIDI Solution Breath Controller I saw years ago appears to have not changed, not in features nor price.

I'd like to see a total breath control package for under US$100. If that can't be arranged, there are creative alternatives: with so many plentiful headsets and mics, what about using your voice's amplitude to modulate another signal? (Not unlike a vocoder.) I haven't yet found a way to do this for realistic, as opposed to robotic, effects. Maybe it's out there and needs to be popularized so I can know.

Embarrassingly slow hardware rehashing

The major synth lines I'm seeing are either refreshes of previous years' — nothing surprising in itself. What makes marketing this easier is angling it as a return to vintage design, as Roland's JUNO-G none-so-subtly exclaims. What I inevitably notice for reasons of cost and backward compatibility is: previous years' soundsets are included while new ones are added on. That in itself ain't wrong, but check this out from the specs:

Wave Memory

64 M Bytes equivalent

64 megabytes? I saw that in synths half a decade ago. And what the heck does "equivalent" mean here? (Some engines use linear compression to further fold samples: say, 128 MB gets compressed into 64 MB of actual ROM.)

Long story short, this is primitive and puny, and a huge gap from how big computer-based soundsets are — a piano library can run in the multi-gigabytes! (Or be physically modelled, another synthesis technique which is complementary for breath control, and which I wish had more widespread acceptance.) There must be better ways to include big sound libraries on hardware synths. To its credit, even tho it doesn't support multisampling — which should be a more common standard — it does say:

External Storage Device

PC Card: 1 slot (supports SmartMedia and CompactFlash using a PC card adaptor)

But I'm surprised unlike digital cameras, more consumer synths aren't using Secure Digital, which is a far better deal than SmartMedia in terms of cost-per-megabyte.

Specs don't tell the full story and the actual sound is what's to be judged — so after I was at Guitar Center the other day (which has a great synth showroom), I'll agree the sounds are as sufficient as they were years ago, but not much that excites me in its expressivity.

By the way, I referred to a "huge gap" earlier: if you're really rich, an Open Lab OpenSynth will cost you more than a high-end computer — starting at US$3,699. Definitely a premium instrument for professionals, and priced far out of the hands of most enthusiasts.

Many hobbyists may not need such power, but I'm still sad we haven't come further. And I'm not singling out Roland: Yamaha, Korg, and even Kurzweil's workstation product lines haven't evolved much. Alesis is still selling its SR-16 drum machine which dates back to 1991 — I wonder if residual sales discourage the cost of product upgrades. At least Korg's been branching out with the aforementioned Nano, DS-10, Kaossilator, etc. But these are exceptions, not general expectations.

Stale styles

by Suzanna

I've listened to many hot trance singles of 2008 — and they sound effectively the same as hot trance singles of 1998. Similar melodies, chord progressions, and arpeggiation patterns create the false impression that one or a few people are producing a large portion of what we know as "trance music", or "McTrance" to the haters, and this is ridiculous. The same is true for trance's at-times stylistic opponent, drum 'n' bass. I'm not saying to ban staple ingredients like supersaws and Amen breaks, but to put them into new contexts.

Yes, fresh things are happening in their own scenes like dubstep. But where… is all the dubtrance?

In short, I'm hearing a lot that sounds like it was made by a small group of producers, which indicates a lack of unique voices. Too many Tiesto and Deadmau5 derivatives. Conversely, I'm not finding enough developments in promising styles that should have more movement.

Blame for this goes to no one in particular: it's like a lot of comfort zones have worn out their welcome. Here's a specific example: I really enjoy Hybrid, and can't fault their steady progress on combining orchestra + beats. But with their excellence, I'd expect to find more copycats. I'd really can't, and I think it's not just because they're exceptional: it's also really hard to master the "two worlds" of classical + electronic that's required! Finding someone who's skilled in both camps is undoubtedly rare. I've known numerous virtuoso breakbeat programmers and many talented classical soloists. But to get the two together (and overcome snobbery) is still an enormous challenge, let alone to find someone who can do both.

Thus, when it happens in a wonderful way, it really stands out.

Get me right: I don't mind tributes to classic rock 'n' roll. I'm not a hardass about stuff sounding "dated". But I do love hearing music that expresses an original earnesty that couldn't be mistaken for anyone else.

Also, a lot of tools have become largely democratized: there are far more VST effects & instruments than there are Photoshop plugins. But the skills to use them haven't necessarily increased in leaps 'n' bounds.

Perhaps I've become too critical, and need help opening up to new sounds — got recommendations? I don't buy much music at present, but had to give Trifonic (as featured on Hybrid's recent mix album) my attention after enthusiastically devouring their sound. Not only do they have their own special blend of rock, glitch, and snarling basslines — with vocals and melody! — brothers Brian and Lawrence Trifon also seem to be really nice guys (I emailed 'em once). They offer their album, Emergence, as a free download. And if you want to support them, you can pay up to the max. of US$20, which I did. Thank goodness for Creative Commons and an absence of DRM.

Music recommendation engines continue to disappoint me, but I shouldn't be that harsh. After so much looking, maybe the fact is, the music I'm really, really into just happens to be rare. Even though that's counterintuitive to its core elements: infectious melodies marry experimental techniques. And that's a personal preference, not a knock against whole scenes.

An absence of iconic leaders

by The700Level

The press creates heroes and tears them down — or neglects them. Perhaps after the heavily-marketed Stateside electronica wave in the late 90s, things just got too fragmented to easily pigeonhole. The public at large knows about Moby, but even his recent album was largely a return to his early sound, with no curveball surprises. The Prodigy's upcoming album, Invaders Must Die, was just announced, but even this is being announced as "old-school but cutting edge". At least Daft Punk is robot rocking on!

Newer names like Pendulum and Justice have a great sound and even greater videos, but I'd argue aren't as known on a name basis as the groups and individuals who led in 1997. Maybe, like A-list bloggers fading out, there's too much diversity to be dominant.

However, there's always opportunity to lead and make a difference. Much as how Jamie Olivier's gotten attention for his "Learn to cook and pass it on" mission, electronic music's many budding aspirants stand to learn from heroes who will enlighten them. Indeed, sites like AUDIOTUTS provide higher quality tutorials than I've ever seen before, but it's not clear how much they're doing to convert listeners into active participants of electronic music production. Some testimonials — true human stories — would help.

Again, get me right: the world doesn't just need superstars, but as music and celebrity have always been intertwined, a few iconic personalities can do a lot for popularizing what was fairly obscure and unappreciated, just like what Michio Kaku's doing for physics.

Your thoughts? And feelings?

I decided to pen the above after observing over several weeks, then gelling my impressions into something I could share. It's intended as a beam of hope, to show what's being forgotten. Loath of armchair activism that doesn't go further and time willing, if I do dive back into electronic music, you can bet I'll be hoping to contribute to what I've just said.

Remember that my point here isn't about a complete dearth of innovation. I'm not such a binary extremist. Infact, as I write this, I look tenderly at my M-Audio Torq Xponent, and find it fascinating how the traditional vinyl experience has evolved into a new analogue of digital, so to speak. I call out gems whenever I spot them, and urge for more.

If you're experienced in electronic music, how does the zeitgeist look to you? And if you're a newcomer, does it really matter as long as you're dancing and having a good time?

Download audio file (busta-veil.mp3)

I call it "Busta Veil", but since it combines "Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Can See" + "Veil Lifter", the cheeky bootleg name might as well be "Lift Your Veil Where My Eyes Can See".

For the (little) time that went into it for the cheer chucklery involved, it was definitely a shedload of fun. I sped up the composite mix a bit to 120 BPM, making Busta sound like an even faster rapper than he normally (and extraordinarily) is, and at the end before the fadeout, I used a combo delay-reverb effect to "gel" Busta's outro verse and give it a better-blendedexit.

One of my "rules of thumb" for a great mashup is: if you can train your mind to hear the mashup as if you never heard the works the parts come from, it should sound whole, as if it was its own original creation.