Ben Kessler's dashboard

thanks donza, we have a new version of the Launchpad coming 9/29... better organized, more stuff, etc. this is something we'll be continually refining... agree it would be nice to guide people into populated scenes and have more thumbnails per page. thanks!

Hi Chris! so exciting that your stuff is on its way. we will still be taking content submissions and showcasing stuff after 9/22, so please send it, we'd love to see it. thanks so much! let us know if you have any questions. – heidiperry, on September 22, 2008 03:27

Hi Heidi, Just a quick question with regards to content submission. I'm only just getting around to putting some stuff together today (which won't be finished for your 22/9 deadline). I'm in the UK anyway so not eligible for the competition (not fussed about that) but my question is will you still look through content and consider it if its sent to you after the end of the competition? Thanks! – Christopher J Burrows, on September 21, 2008 09:53

LOL ok I see the occupied scenes do rise to the top (not sure why I found someone listed on a page further back), Still would like to have the thumbnails smaller (1/4 the size or even smaller) so more scenes per page would show. I think at least 12 per page (even 25) would still be effective.

:~D

Just a couple of thoughts - could you please make the occupied scenes (esp public scenes) automatically sort to the front of the list on the first page? Right now you sometimes need to scroll through several pages of scenes to find one that has someone in it. If the occupied ones showed up first it would be much easier to find people online.

And also the thumbnails could easily be a whole lot smaller which would allow more scenes per page to be listed. Right now there are 12 pages with only 4 scenes per page - which takes WAY too long to look thru even with a fast computer.

:~D

Thanks for the insight - looking forward to seeing Vivaty bring 3D to mainstream!!

:)

Donza,

We are definitely moving in the direction of you being able to add content or edit whenever you want. Or as you call it, "making my worlds and connecting them to someone else's server." As Heidi has explained, we just don't have all the bits and pieces in place to do that yet. But that is the idea.

Regarding Vivaty being a "departure" I don't see it that way. Yes, the business strategy has changed-- we are not a tools provider in the way that the old Media Machines was-- but the end goal is the same: to make the Web an immersive place.

Thanks for your patience with us as we stumble through this. We will do our best to turn around improvements to Vivaty Create while balancing all the other things we are doing here like generally improving the user experience, supporting platforms like Firefox, integrating with social networks and more.

Cheers
+

Hi Tony,
Since you asked ... :)

I'd much prefer to continue the way that Atmo and Blaxxun worked and that means having my own content on my own web host and being able to add content or edit whenever I want. But I still want to have the same integration into your portals (Facebook, AIM, etc) and connectivity to your chat server as Vivaty has now. Basically it would look the same to the user it's just that I'd be hosting and maintaining it myself.

I do recognize that much autonomy might not be in line with what you have envisioned for Vivaty's future but "if I don't ask I don't get." And I do agree with GhettoVR in that Vivaty was such a huge departure from what we were all working on and expecting that it's taken a bit to get used to the idea. I think a lot of us who have been working with you for the past few years are still a bit confused about the sudden shift - I know I am.

Given my "druthers" I'd much prefer to continue making my worlds and connecting them to someone else's server but maybe those days are gone and having embedded "scenes" is how 3D will be seen in the future. If Adobe had stuck it out longer it could have done what you have done - instead they embedded in PDF's for god's sake - how incredibly stupid was that?? Certainly your pairing with Facebook and AIM is just plain brilliant. Bottom line is that all of us here want 3D to become known and used and I'm willing to go along with whatever it takes to achieve that goal.

But it would sure be nice to know what you guys are dreaming about - this little tidbit you gave us only makes us hungrier for the news. And the more we know of your dream the more we can help that dream come true.

In any case thanks so much for all your work and the opportunity to be a part of it,

:~D

Hey Donza,

Thanks for the kind words. And the feedback. Follow-up question: when you say that you want to "host your own sites" does that mean you want the 3D content to sit on a server of yours, or that you want your end users to go to your own home page? Even though they are subtly different it's an important technical distinction for us to understand

Yours virtually
+

Hey Tony
Thanks so much for the insight into the future. I would certainly prefer to host my own sites and still have the Facebook, AIM connectivity. You are always at the front of new good things on the web and I love being part of the process!

:~D

hi all,
I 've constructed an environment-room with furniture and images etc.. etc.. with vivaty studio and I don't know how to "place it out" on the Web & in Facebook to be My Scene.

If anyone knows how to do this, please let me know

thank you
Costas email: cdplus@upatras.gr

hi all,
I 've constructed an environment-room with furniture and images etc.. etc.. with vivaty studio and I don't know how to "place it out" on the Web & in Facebook to be My Scene.

If anyone knows how to do this, please let me know

thank you
Costas email: cdplus@upatras.gr

Sorry,...

I overreacted,...

Its just a real kick in the pants is all,..

Much Love for what your trying to do and I'm still voting for you.

'Lucid' of GhettoVR

Giving use any of the open ended features promised of the little spoken of 'Flux Worlds' beta that literally disappeared. Open ended, open source X3D standard technology for hosting virtual worlds, i.e.- what we've all been waiting for for years. Never further spoken of,... turned into a closed-ended, closed source 'Facebook' App?!?

'Flux Worlds' - Good name,. good idea,.. from a company I speak highly of, "Media Machines" and a developer I hold nothing but the highest respect for.

"Vivaty"- Took me multiple misspelling in order just to remember the name.
(In the end I just went to mediamachines.com(easy to remember) and used the link)

Did it just not work out?

Bigger than expected?

Will Vivaty ever reach for those same ideals?

Is this just a smaller start, a test in scalability?(Much like Google's 'Lively'.)

Those are the features desired,... the ghost features of the product that never made it past 'Press release',... "Flux Worlds"

When will we see a viable competitor to 'Second Life' if 'Flux Worlds' threw in the towel in the name of 'Social Networking' applications?

I guess the real questions are thus,
Will I the user ever be able to host my own server?
Will a non-social version of the Vivaty app ever arise?
Am I wrong in comparing "Vivaty" to "Flux Worlds" in the first place?

Paying $1000.00 for a Second Life server is a viable option if you have more dollars than sense. But what about the rest of us, those of us with the skills and the drive to develop new incredible and useful world but with a thorough distaste for the idea of paying for virtual 'real estate'? And with the added benefit of using REAL modeling tools and not the phantom versions SL provides us?

In other words SL still takes the cake,.. and after 4+ years of using that poorly designed piece of garbage the team had high hopes that "Media Machines" would blow them out of the water with the promise of open-ended X3D worlds.

I know that that is likely still the dream, I can keep on hoping anyway.

Either some suit with no knowledge of anything but 'Sales and Marketing' convinced you that Social Networking was 'the' viable angle or "Flux Worlds" simply presented to many technological challenges at this given stage in the its evolution to be able to make good on the claims of its original press release,...

the last word we the community ever got.

Sincerely,
The GhettoVR collective

PS-My apologies for the sharp tone. Given the recent addition of 'Vivaty' and 'Lively' to the realms of multi-user virtual worlds being a complete disappointment and the lose of the prized ideal that was "Flux Worlds" we cannot help but feel disheartened.

hi mutatron, yes, right now Vivaty works on Windows XP/Vista and IE 6, 7 and Firefox 3. We are also considering a Mac port sometime in the future, though i can't say exactly when.

Can't run Vivaty player on my Windows 2000 machine, even though Vivaty Studio works on it. So I guess this means you have no plans for a Macintosh or Linux version?

thanks, Earl. We're filing a bug on this. appreciate the find.

hi donza, yes, we agree. in a couple of weeks we'll have bookmark-able urls that go straight to the social scenes page in facebook. we're also launching something soon that gives you more guidance/context as to where you go -so it doesn't assume you want a personal scene first. thanks for the idea, we agree!

The new install appears to work fine in Firefox 3.0.1. The browser did crash within 20 minutes of loading the player but I can't blame you for that (yet!). When Firefox is restarted, it offers the option of "continuing the last session." Your player fails to establish a connection in that situation and offers a misleading message suggesting a port needs to be opened.

Is there a way that Vivaty could be set up so that you don't automatically junp into your own scene when you go to Vivaty? It takes a while to load and then if you want to go to the Social Scenes you have to wait before you can switch. It would be nice to have an entrance page where you could decide where to go first before it started loading a scene.