Wanna Be A Second Life Resident?

Here are my Tips for Wannabe Residents:

Creating/Choosing your name

- Take your time when you choose your name. Create a cool name combination, if possible a very unique one, since your avatar might perhaps develop an interesting life later on. Now if you later regret your name choice, sorry for you.

Speak your name out loud, to test acoustically, if the first name matches with the last (that's how picky I am). Remember -- you can not change your name anymore, once it's done! You will have to start all over again with a new account and you can't transfer most of the items in your inventory to your other avatar, cuz most items are not transferable.

If none of the available last names on the Second Life website appeal to you, go to SL Name-Watch to be able to choose from all the available names. Available last names are mainly scattered on different communities, for registration.

- When creating your first name, please write the first letter in capital, since we all went to school and that's one of the first things that we have learned ---> names start with capital letters and that is how you write them too!

- You might want to consider creating a unisex name, so you can change your gender any time you want to, or if you aren't sure yet if you want to create a female or male avatar.

- Avoid creating your first name in an AOL IM/Chat type, like combined with numbers e.g. sexyfucker123 or with special characters ##++deekhead%§" or something like tHiS. People tend to not take you serious, cuz your name will look like it was made in a rush, just to have quick seXXorz or griefing or scamming activities. Some people will also misjudge you as either being illiterate, a 12 year old kid, or a teenie (though I know lots of teens who are better).

You can say what you want, but that is the first impression you will make. Imagine if your boss in RL will write his name like that, plus his name not capitalized, I wonder if you will still respect him or take him serious as a business person. Me personally, I do have prejudices about those people. Call me "shallow" or a "snob" if you want to, but that's just the way it is.

Once you "rezz" (as in appear or your image has fully downloaded) for the first time in world and you find yourself at a welcome area,

DO NOT:

• Accept anything that a random stranger gives you
  
• Accept a bite offer from retarded vampires
  
• Accept group invites out of no where
• Accept friendship request from people you haven't even talked a single word with
• Click "yes" if something wants to animate you

Pop-up menus in blue will often appear on your screen, especially if you are new. Read everything first before you click on it. Learn to DECLINE everything first, before you get used with the user interface and navigation. Everything will seem to be very confusing and overwhelming at first, so you won't have the ability yet, to get a full overview in what you are actually accepting. So it's best to "decline".

Scammers and griefers mostly hangout at welcome areas or info hubs, cuz their special targets are newbies, so be careful.

Optimizing Your Avatar/Avatar Make-Over

Once you managed to get a decent name and finished the whole registration process, you are now ready to customize your avatar or "avie" as we say it in SL language. You will have some random default avatars in your inventory, under library, to choose from, aside from the choices during registration on the SL website.

Now if you don't want to look like a typical noob, that will somehow attract griefers to send you thousands of miles up in the sky by orbitting you, avoid all those random freebie places, that you will find, using the search option in world (sounds logical doesn't it?). And why? Because all you will get there are mainly crap items, from BIAB (business in a box) sources, ripped or stolen contents.

Remember, you don't need to spend any single cent in SL, and you can still look good (or avoid looking like a noob), wearing freebies (free items) from well-known designers. You just need to know where to find them.

Follow these tips:

- Join the groups of high quality designers. They mostly give out high quality items free, to their members.

- If your avatar customization is quite urgent, go to The Gnubie Store. You can get free items, from well-known designers there.

- Go to high quality designers' stores and check if they got freebies available to everybody or especially for residents under 30 days.

- Browse XStreet SL for freebies. You can sign-in with your SL avatar name and password. Shopping at XStreet SL is more comfortable, than teleporting all over SL. You can search and browse the items faster. Search for items that costs zero L$ at XSL, there are tons of them there. Then all you need to do, is to send it to your avatar in world. Remember my tips regarding unpacking boxes (see term "rezz").

- Join hunts. Many big time designers join hunts to promote their products. All you need to do is to find those hidden items. Now where and when a hunt is, I have no idea. It's best to read SL fashion blogs, to find out about them.

- Avoid bling. Period. Why? Just avoid it.

Now if you are willing to spend cash in SL for your avatar customization, I'd say that you will need approximately 10.000 L$ (around 40 US$) for an absolutely stunning avatar. I can drop you landmarks for great shopping places, or check out my list of "where I shop" at the very bottom of this post.

Second Life Residents' Common Terms (No chronological order)

Here are some common SL terms that residents use, so you can understand, when they try to tell you something:

Rezz, rezzing or rez - is when an image appears in world, thus being downloaded by the client. For example, to rezz an item/object from your inventory, you need to drag it out of your inventory and rezz it on the floor, like a box, house, table etc.

Take note: you can only "rez" items that appear as a box icon in your inventory. But to be able to do this, the land you are on, has to have "build" enabled. You can see it on your User Interface, at the very top (e.g. if there's a small box icon there, that means that you can not build, thus rezz an object on that land).

Many newbies make the mistake of wearing the box, instead of the intended item, which might look very entertaining to experienced residents, but it's very upsetting for the new resident. The box, which is the package of the item, must be rezzed first (drag it from your inventory to the floor, on "build" enabled land), right click it, then choose "open" from the pie menu.

The content will now load (see the tiny icons loading in the "contents" window). Once it's done, you can click "copy items to inventory". Now click the "recent items" tab in your inventory, find the folder and you can now wear the items, using right click and "wear".

TP - shortcut for teleport, like if someone will say, I will TP you or please TP me.

LM - shortcut for landmark. You need a landmark of a location to be able to teleport there or you can also enter the coordinates in the map field, which is more complicated. If you are at a place that you really like, you can create a landmark by going to the menu ---> world ---> create landmark, so you can go back there again next time. You can also rename the landmark, so it's easier for you to find it in your inventory later.

Remember SL is a huuuge place! You can also mark the place by putting it in your "picks" under your profile. Just stand at the location, go to your profile, by right clicking on yourself and choosing profile under the pie menu. Then under the "Picks" tab, click "new" et voila! Your favorite spot is now marked in your profile.

Please also be aware, that everybody can check out your profile, so if you happen to like a penis club or whatever suspicious activities are goin' on at that certain place, I suggest that you rather create a landmark, than putting it in your picks. Feel free to add my store and lounge to your profile picks, if you happen to go there.

IM - private chat. This is the one you're suppose to use, if you are having a pixel bumping session or seXXXorz in SL. Don't expose those using the open chat, since not everyone will be amused about your dirty talks. Warning! Explicit words are not allowed on a "PG" land!

Be careful also not to get confused, when many people are messaging you per IM at the same time and talking to you per open chat. IM is private and you definitely don't want to answer somebody else, while meaning to send it to another avie. Happened to me many times already.

SLT - Second Life time, that's the time on the right hand side on the top of your screen. Events, such as parties, live concerts etc. are always announced referring to SL time, to avoid confusion.

Rezzday - is a resident's or avatar's birthday. You can see a resident's birthday, when you check out their profile.

Noob, Noobie, Newbie, New Resident - that's you.

Notecard - is a writing pad you can create in your inventory, rename, then pass on to someone, by dragging it to their profile. Most designers or sellers, insist for a notecard instead of IM, when you have certain inquiries about their product.

Client/Viewer - is the program/software you are using to run Second Life. There are different versions available, also customizations by other residents. The official viewer is available on the SL website, under downloads. There are also beta or first look versions such as Snowglobe, that can be downloaded from the SL website.

UI - shortcut for User Interface

Pose balls - are balls scattered all over the grid, which you can right click and sit, to activate, also used for pixel bumping. These balls have scripts and animations in it. So when you sit on one, it will animate your avatar. If you see pairs of pose balls that are mostly in pink and blue, those are for couples. Both have to right click and sit on those balls, to activate the animation.

HUD - is the abbreviation for Heads Up Display. A gadget that you can wear, which is composed of different menus for setting up, adjusting or activating certain objects. It can be a weapon, a dance gadget, a tool etc.

AO - is the shortcut for "animation overrider". A gadget that you can wear, to eliminate all the stupid noobie movements, by replacing it with more stupid movements. Well it depends on which animations you loaded your AO with.

My tip is not to buy complete AO sets, but rather just get a free ZHAO HUD and load it with your chosen animations. If you see some female avies looking like they need to pee, or doing poses like a dork, then they are using an AO.

RP - is the shortcut for role play. Many avatars are constantly in their role play characters, like slaves, tinies, furries, vampires, trees, mermaids etc. Hardcore role players go to role play sims with special themes.

When going to those sims, you have to obey and respect their rules, which are automatically distributed as a notecard, as soon as you enter the area. Many avatars speak in a third perspective using the "/me" command before the main sentence when typing in the chatbox to create a story line type of atmosphere, e.g. I can type "fuck you" in the chatbar and it will appear like this:

CanTell Mizser: fuck you

If I want it to be more dramatic, I can type /me shouts "fuck you!", spits on his face and angrily leaves the room, slamming the door behind her; and it will show up like this:

CanTell Mizser shouts "fuck you!", spits on his face and angrily leaves the room, slamming the door behind her.

It is not allowed to use the open chat for "regular" conversations, when visiting role play areas. It is heavily demanded to emphasize it with ((OOC)) (means out of character) before the text, so people know, it's not a part of the role play chat.

SIM - shortcut for sim node or sim host, is the physical server machine which simulates one or more regions (see Wiki). A region is like a country in real life.

Lindens - there are two definitions. First, a Linden is a Second Life employee or someone who officially belongs to Lindenlab. All people who officially belong to Lindenlab, carry the last name "Linden".

Now since SL is mostly an RP world, some disguised as an "SL Police", "SL Agent", Fireman, Superman or whatever might approach you, to scare you off, by threatening to arrest you. Don't be scared, since they are all wannabes. Only real SL employees with the last name "Linden", have special Superman powers.

Second, residents also call the Second Life currency "lindens", which is the shortcut for Linden Dollars. Which means, you can not buy and sell a Linden, but you can buy and sell Linden Dollars.

LL - is the shortcut for Lindenlab.

RL - is the shortcut for real life or FL as in first life. Take note that it's best not to give out personal infos at all to anyone. You can stay completely anonymous in SL. It is also against SL TOS (terms of service) to give out personal infos about other people, if you happen to know them.

Skin - is the most important part of your avatar, which will give it the certain personality, that you are trying to achieve. Remember to always try out the demos first, before you buy them. Also, it is very important to have a matching shape for the skin. No matter how great the skin is, it will still look horrible, if the shape is not well made (see shape).

Shape - is another important part of your avatar. This is the 3D mesh that holds the skin. Avatars wearing the same identical skin, may completely differ from each other, when using different shapes. You can create your own shape if you have a good eye for aesthetic or knowledge about the human body proportions. Otherwise, you might end up like this:

Or like this:

Or maybe like this:

Or perhaps like these:

Or this:

Hau! Wanna see my weener?!

If you are not yet very confident in making your own shape (unfortunately, too many people are, which ends up like the above examples), get one at C-Stylez Boutique (if you are a female avie) or if you are male, ask a male avatar where he got his shape, in case you see one, wearing a shape that you like.

Where I shop (some of the stores, since I can't remember all)

Skins (Check out C-Stylez Boutique for the matching female shape):

• Celestial Studios
  
• Laqroki
  
• Belleza
• Damiani
• Naughty Designs
• Abyss
• Mai
• Pixel Deep

Apparel (Including shoes):

• Coco
• Ce Cubic
• Maitreya
• Laqroki
• Armidi
• HOC
• Akeyo
• Soreal
• Fnky
• Grueling
• Draw Machine
• J's
• SLink
• Tesla
• Shiny Things
• LeeZu Baxter
• Enkythings
• De La
• Ivalde (vintage clothing)
• Ingenue (vintage clothing)
• Icing (vintage clothing)
• RFyre (gothic clothing)
• Nona Hedges (gowns and formal)
• Tres Beau (gowns and formal)
• Nicki Ree (gowns and formal)
• Shai dela Croix
• Barerose Tokyo
  
• Cupcake Region (lots of cool designers located there)
  
• Le Look Region (lots of cool designers located there)
• Albero Region (lots of cool designers located there)

Hair:

• Hairspray Region (lots of hair designers located there)
• Waka & Yuki
• Maitreya
• Armidi
• Red Queen
• 69
• Amrita
• Carlucci
• DejaVu
• Mirai
• Bijou

You can also read SL fashion blogs (just google them), to be updated about latest releases of many SL Designers.

I hope my tips were a bit helpful to you. If you decide to sign-in and explore Second Life, look-up my SL name (CanTell Mizser) using the in world search. Holla at me if you need help and I will try to help you as much as I can, when I'm in world. Enjoy exploring!

Yours
Can'Tell

OMG! Virtual Weeners!!

So I just found these funny shots while browsing my SL picture folders and I thought of posting them, especially for people who have no clue what all this sexXorz stuff in SL is all about. I once caught these avatars in action while shopping and teleporting around.
I landed at a place accidentally, when I was looking for a certain hair store. And since I always have my mini-map open, I saw a bunch of green dots, but the store was empty, so I started to cam around, hmm, no one there. So I cammed down... nobody there either, and then I cammed up...whoa! There they were, 200m up in the sky! I didn't even have to fly up.

So I just stayed on the ground and observed what all these avatars were doing, cuz I thought they were bots. I started to lmao really hard when I saw these:

An example of a horny avatar, waiting for the chance to pixel bump a female looking avatar. For your information, most female avatars, if not all, that go to these places, are men in real life, so I always use the term "female avatar" or "female looking avatars".

He found one of the hookers, now he's begging for some sexxies.

Typical SL perv just hopped on a ball, waiting for someone to join him. Isn't that sad? lol!

Most avatars that hang out at those sex places are fugly, like this example. No one seems to want to fuck her, so she just fell asleep lol!

This guy seems to be having a lot of pain, judging his facial expression.

So I cammed closer to see what's goin' on and...

Hah! No wonder he's having a lot of pain! I can imagine, having your dick stuck inside your body must be very painful!

A female avie seems to enjoy watching him.

If you are wondering why her shoes are sort of flashing, it's called bling - the most hated feature in SL. So if you ever decide to create an account in SL, don't ever ever wear bling, or people will shoot you.

A tranny, like many guys' darkest secret fantasy, hidden beneath the dept of their souls lol!

Some guys just hang out there and have a casual chit chat with amazones... with their dick hangin' out. Meaning literally "hang out" lol! Imagine if they did that in real life.

Why are all their goddamn balls always hangin' out their pants like that?

Now this example is just pure nightmare. I think he's so horny, he thought of fucking the chair instead. If one would have a nightmare that involves a naked guy, he would probably look like this one *shudder*

Now he decided to do it all by himself, since no one wants to join him. Isn't that sad? I mean you go to a virtual world to get laid, cuz you nobody wants to fuck you in RL, but then nobody wants to screw you virtually either! lol!

A close up of his weener. Wow! I bet ladies get turned on by this sight LMAO!

Another newb who dropped by for a quick sexxies. What's up with those horrible looking penises? Where did they get them?

Finally, a female avie was willing to get pixel screwed. Wow! Such a fugly avie with the inventory skin. She doesn't even have nipples or a coochie lol! Now please explain to me, who in the hell would wank to such a cartoon? Or even get a hard on? Those people who get off, watching this fugly ass characters, seriously need to see a doctor. Go watch a decent porn instead damn it!

Those are just a few examples of the SL sex scene. There are definitely better ones, with good looking avatars and animations. But c'mon now, it's still cartoon no matter how good those avies might look. SL veterans or sexperts, mostly use the private chat for wank sessions. So it's basically the same as using any instant messenger or cyber chatrooms.

Watching avatars pixel bump in SL is just funny as hell, since the animations, no matter how good they are, run in loops, so they all look like robots with a defective chip. It's also because the very few facial emotes look really fake and rather comical. Imagine a person having sex, with an empty look on his face and no emotion at all, well that's how avatars look like in SL, when they are having sexxies.

Oh yeah, I also tried all of those, when I was new in SL (as posted on my Diary about my early SL adventures) and the strange thing was, they thought I was a guy in real life! Now ain't that funny? lol!

Woohooo! Another Avatar!!

I recently created a new avatar, well I do it now and then for a change, cuz it's quite exciting to start all over again. You know like, get a cool name, create a story plot (since my alts are RP avies and they live a life of their own) and then go shopping for all the great stuff.

Well this is how I first looked like when I rezzed at the start location:


I'm the one in a "girl next door" look, wearing a stunning polka dot I-wouldn't-wear-it-for-an-hour-even-if-you-pay-me-hundreds-of-Ls dress. Notice the other avatar staring at me, probably wondering if I am really a total noob or someone's alt or just simply out of my mind. Also notice the stupid grin on my face, which I couldn't change yet at that very moment.

Unfortunately, a slut default avatar still isn't available in the inventory. I wonder why, considering that, it is the most popular and favorite look in SL.

While going through the default selection of avatars in my inventory, I discovered this gem:


Now this classic avatar is the famous "Ruth". Female avatars used to look like this, every time SL had its borky days. Some male avatars also turned to this ruthed figur, which was surprising at times. I was so glad that Ruth returned to our inventories, ya know, for sentimental value. She was gone for a while, since we all now turn to clouds, during SL borky times.

With this new avatar, I wanted to create a vintage style avatar, more like 40's - 50's era, cuz I thought it's kinda cool. After going through so many stores, in search for the most important body part, which is the skin (not genitals hmkay?), I finally decided on one of the best skin that's out there, but not telling you which one, cuz I keep my skin info topsecret he he... I'm pretty sure though, that skin fanatics can easily recognize a skin, from a well-known skinner.

For example, most if not all, hookers, sluts, strippers, escorts, fuck-me-now avies, somehow always wear Redgrave skins. I also noticed that most fugly female avies, with distorted shapes and weird outfits also wear mostly the same Redgrave skin (Hana?) and to make it even worse, they throw on some Stiletto Moody shoes with the feet skin color not properly matched. Kinda like bimbos in real life lol! I wonder why they do that? Neither me nor any of my alts own a Redgrave skin or Stiletto Moody shoes.

My reason for not buying a Redgrave skin is that, not one skin type appealed to me in any way, especially when I saw the butt shading --- I just don't like it. Don't get me wrong, my avie doesn't intend to get naked, so it's probably not important, but I sure blog about fashion now and then, so wearing lingerie with that butt, wouldn't be attractive to me at all. Gladly, I don't own and wear one of those, then suddenly encounter all those fugly avies wearing the same one, when I go shopping.

Now the reason I don't own any Stiletto Moody shoes is first of all, they don't provide a demo, secondly, they are just too exaggeratedly expensive (not willing to pay that price, though I can afford), third, there are better ones out there with more reasonable prices, fourth, most of those fugly bimbos wear them.

Searching for apparel and hair wasn't really that difficult, since I'm already familiar with most stores, with the best high quality items. So this is how she finally looked like after a couple of hours:

Isn't she gorgeous?

Isn't she lovely? Like a classic hollywood diva.

I know she's not wank material, but wait till you see her pin-up shots later, when I get the chance. I'll probably inflate her boobies a little bit more for the shots.
But lo and behold! She lives another life (not a third life dumb ass!) -- she's a vampire!! And this is how she looks like, when she goes out hunting to quench her thirst:

Isn't she stunning?

I discovered this gothic skin accidentally and I'm really loving it. I went to so many skin stores, trying to find a gothic skin I like, but most gothic skins are so paper white with zombie like make-ups. I wanted the skin to be very pale, but not white, with a rather strong make-up, but yet attractive face. A vampire has to be beautiful you know.

Of course the body shape plays a crucial role, when creating an avatar (get a C-Stylez body shape now!). That's why not everyone can create a gorgeous avatar, even if they use the same skins I'm using --- trust me. This skin from a not yet so well-known skinner, has beautiful body shadings, which is a great plus in my book.

Most gothic skins are so pale, you hardly recognize the body shadings, and the nipples are mostly also very pale (which I despise). I was really lucky to find this skin, since it's also not very dissimilar to the non-gothic skin I wear for this avatar. I'll post more fugly avies next time, since I found random shots recently, so you can understand what I mean. In the meantime.... blood! Gimme blood! Aaaaarghh!!


Vintage Avatar:
Outfits - Icing
Shoes - N-Core
Hair - Ingenue
Eyes - Adam&Eve

Gothic Avatar:
Outfit - Barerose Tokyo
Shoes - N-Core
Hair - Redqueen
Eyes - C-Stylez by CanTell Mizser
Fangs - Wilted Rose
Manicure - I&K