Prof Outlaner responded with the following. "In the event of my election, I will name as Vice Mayor whichever candidate offers me the best bribe, then start watching my back. Better yet, I'll withdraw from the race and give all my votes to anyone who can offer an interesting enough bribe."

I offered to Novemeber already but I'll make the offer publicly: If someone from SLC feels their side has been presented unfairly AND is willing to both do an interview and have their product examined, I will be perfectly happy to present the article. I don't have any stake in either side being right. If you think Coke Supply is wrong, step up and provide proof.

Re@ Jessica You may notice in older video games, back before they had the status of Hollywood movies that modern firearms, while clearly identifiable, often used some variation of their well known name. For example the Desert Eagle was often referred to by its Israeli military designation (which eludes me at the moment)or as the Deagle or some other name that made it clear what it was without using the brand name. This was because those firearm manufacturers were not in a hurry to have digital representations identified with their producs without compensation. A friend who worked for a gaming company at the time explained it thusly - If you make a movie and buy a Desert Eagle or a licensed prop gun you have a right to photograph it and to call it what it is. This is because it IS a Desert Eagle. If, on the other hand, you make a perfect digital replica of a Desert Eagle, its still not a Desert Eagle. Its a digital model of a Desert Eagle that you made. So you can't say it IS a Desert Eagle unless the manufacturer allows you to. On the other hand, you can make it look a whole lot like one, which you couldn't do with a real firearm. So, based on that insider understanding (granted many years old now), the patent on the form of a motorcycle is not impinged on by a digital representation of the same apparent shape. This is because digital representations don't really have a shape. The sticky wicket is if you make a digital representation that appears to be a recognizable item AND use the Trademark names assosicated with said item. Of course these days its more likely that companies are lining up to pay for product placement rather than be paid for it in video games. *This advice is not intended as professional legal advice. If you have serious questions, consult a lawyer. Not intended to diagnose, treat or prevent any conditions. The FDA has not approved this advice or tested its effectiveness. Keep out of reach of children. Do not take internally.

Re: "And taking that to a higher level of referring to people by Second Life names within the same context does not call for distinguishing punctuation, but referring to them outside of SL does, Jessica Holyoke on a website like this, 'Jessica Holyoke' on a website like NPR." Yet we don't do the same for Miss Piggy, Optimus Prime or Sherlock Homes.

"Please let us know if you should find other similar issues on the site and we'll do our best to fix them." I ran this through Google translate using Corpspeak->English: "Please continue to function as an unpaid security consultant to our company."

I went to check this out for myself, good little cub reporter that I am. I figured I wasn't going to pass judgement without verifying a few details. By the pictures, I'm guessing that the bike shop is the big open garage looking place right at the landing point of the Saints of Hell sim. Your reporting is waaaaay off. There was NO sign to that effect there and certainly no bikes with stolen parts, or bikes of any kind for that matter. I asked a passing member about it as part of a longer conversation and he had this to say: [6:15] Magdalena Outlander nods. "Putting something in this big empty spot here?" [6:15] Amazing Diesel: yes I am sure that she has something in mind for it [6:15] Amazing Diesel: I believe a motorcycle vendor [6:15] Amazing Diesel: if i am not mistaken He was quite pleasant and a good host, ready with directions, event times and so forth. [sarcasm] So clearly, the only possible explanation is that you faked the whole thing.[/sarcasm] This forum does take bbcode tags, right?

I almost hate to waste a whole comment saying "agreed completely". My original rant kind of got away from me when I started writing it and wound up making a rather larger point than the initial focus.

If elected, I promise to provide full coverage of the innaugural gala security cam footage in the Naughty News. Which reminds me, I need to add some campaign posters suitable for enjoying in the privacy of your own home to the campaign kit available in my sign. Expect that tomorrow evening. Remember, a vote for the Outlandish Party is a vote for trasnparency in government and in government uniforms.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that a couple of factors contribute to the content of SL more than any other. All of this applies at the recreational level, of course. Serious business and/or academic use has both a different user base and a different economic model. The first is wish fulfillment. I'd say at first glance that 90% of SL avatars come in as the user's definition of physically perfect. That's probably the precise inverse of real life. Sims with strong sexual content will, likewise, cater most visibly to those things you can't get in real life. Even the bike designers featured elsewhere on Alphaville Herald are providing a wish fullfillment fantasy with their virtual replicas of massively expensive motorcycles. SL is seen as a safe, anonymous place to do things you couldn't do in real life. You can be a slave, hooker etc. without any of the real world fears of abuse, STD's etc. The second is the monetary incentive. Every sim, RP or otherwise has to generate its $300 a month just to stay open. That can come from sales in stores, rental of land, user donations or (and this is a big one) paid out of pocket by a person or group. So sims that focus on fantasy fulfillment have to cater to those fantasies that are worth actual money to people in order to generate their teir. Basic supply and demand dictates that the harder to find a given niche product is, the more a sim owner can charge for it. Similarly, more users support more sims of the same type of content at the same price. Also, the more hardcore a given interest, ie the more of one's life and identity definition it encompasses, the more willing a player will be to spend money on it. So taken as an average, Second Life looks a lot like people would imagine Hollywood to be. Everyone looks beautiful, has neat stuff, can have casual sex with two or three partners a day and generally live a simulated high life. Go to a big club any day of the week and you can see people trying to live up to their media defined idea of cool. Again at a first glance, places and items catering to that breed of cool probably occupy about as much in the way of SL resources as shows and movies selling the image do of mass media resources. Individually, sims tend to rise and fall with the fantasy they fulfill. There are fewer Femdom type places than male dominant/femals slave type places because the latter fantasy is more popular with people who log on. When it comes to Gor, don't discount the fact that this is a huge, largely underground niche community that has made SL its home. In the same way porn made the VHS work, Gor (and Steampunk) is probably responsible for keeping SL alive in its early days. It gave people an experience they couldn't get elsewhere and they were willing to invest their energy (money) to have it. I can see where, after years of being told women are supposed to be treated as both equal AND objects of sexual desire, a segment of the male population would be willing to pay for the ego boost of being the "stronger sex" again. Let's make no mistake here, at 300+ sims, Gor, not 70's fantasy artwork, does a lot to define the sexual mores of the SL RP community at large. Sl in some ways functions as a visible Collective Unconscious of Americans who can afford a computer and high speed Internet (75%+ of the user base at an eyeball). There is no nature, everything built was designed by a human hand to fill a percieved need in SL. Every avatar is a series of deliberate choices by the user about the image they wish to convey to the SL world. Caledon has been larger than the entire original SL grid for years now and spawned several other Steampunk communities. In some ways, this rise could be said to prefigure the growth of the Steampunk movement in the public consciousness. At the same time, most of the original cyberpunk sims have fallen by the wayside as that style has fallen from grace. Those are easier to notice because they're the kind of things people are willing to discuss in public. How many people at your office wish they were a character from the James Spader movie "Secretary"? Well, they're not as likely to discuss that for the asking. Do Gor, the prevalance of collars, the continued existence of brothels etc say something aobut our culture at large that people aren't willing to admit? I don't have the research to back it up, but the possibility is intriguing. Live from the grid, I'm Professor Outlandish.

The Outlandish Party has joined the running! Prof Outlandish with the help of CMNF Naughty News will be covering the campaign from the inside. Send your juicy campaign tidbits to Magdalena Outlander for inclusion in our hard, penetrating investigative coverage of the election.