Another One Bites the Dust: Virtual MTV closes

There.com’s sister 3DVW Virtual MTV is closing its doors. Here’s a portion of the note posted at There:

Members,

As some of you might have heard, MTV is planning to shut down “vmtv.com”, originally known as “Virtual Laguna Beach”, later this month. We at Makena will be sorry to see it go, as its environments based on hit shows like Laguna Beach and The Hills were a new experience for us, and an exciting learning process for Makena and the VMTV community. As you can imagine, it would be inappropriate for me to comment on why they decided to shut it down, or what their future plans are.

However, as you all know, a virtual community is far more than the environment. In fact, it’s a small part of what makes it a community. Even though the environments are gone as we knew them, we know that the VMTV community will still be there, and many of them might visit us in There.com. As with any visitor from any virtual world, I know that the There community will welcome them and do their very best to make them feel at home.

As you know, VMTV was based off the same software as There.com, but it had a “simplified” UI and lacked a lot of There’s coolest features (Hoverpacks, ‘hugs, and real estate, to name a few), so a lot of the members might have questions and need a little help here and there. I know you’ll all be more than willing to help them out and introduce them to everything from CC Metro to our huge catalog of developer items.

So let’s dust off the Welcome mats and warm up those volcano fizzes! Company’s a comin!

Michael Wilson
CEO, Makena Technologies

Viacom, once a major supporter of these worlds, who also sponsored the now goneThe L Word Islands in Second Life, and the vSide clone Virtual Lower East Side, seems to be pulling out of the 3D virtual world business all together.

This is no doubt part of the major cutbacks being made at Viacom, which isn’t making as much money in TV ad revenue as they once did.

Update: From the vmtv.com forums:

Dear vMTV member,

In August of 2006 MTV launched its own virtual world where you could watch our shows and live the MTV life, virtually. You’ve sent us your comments and we listened. We’re excited to let you know that you can now check out a new and improved version of Virtual MTV at virtual.mtv.com! This new ALPHA version is browser-based and allows you to create an avatar, get your own crib, explore virtual worlds and play games.

Here’s how it’s going to work: On February 19, 2009, vMTV (www.vmtv.com) will officially close and the new virtual world experience will begin. You will be able to link your new virtual account with your old one and convert your MTV$ to our new virtual currency, MTV Coin, at a 1:1 exchange rate (e.g., 1 MTV$ will convert to 1 MTV Coin). Be sure to link your accounts by February 18th or your existing MTV$ will not be eligible for conversion for use in the new Virtual MTV.

To convert your MTV$ amount to MTV Coin, you first have to sign up for MTV.com and then link your existing avatar to that account (it helps if the email you use for vMTV is the same). If at any point you have trouble linking your account, please email us at virtualmtv@mtv.com. For terms and conditions of the use of MTV Coin in Virtual MTV please see our Virtual Reality Additional Terms for MTV.com http://www.mtv.com/sitewide/mtvinfo/virtual_terms.pdf

Thanks for playing and we hope to see you in our new world – we built it with you in mind!

Thanks and enjoy,
MTV Staff

So that’s that. Another one bites the dust.

Winter Solstice in the Metaverse

Twas the Day of Solstice and all through the net

Snow Colored Pixels on MMOGs they did set

Old Ascalon Covered in Wintry Delight

Inspired many to engage in a snowball fight

Then skating in SL at the Winterfest Inn

An axel, a flip, and even a spin

Then on to the ski lift, a ride to the top

For Heroes and Villains ski down the big drop

Lets do it again! Once is never enough!

But this time we’ll skinny ski in the buff

Laguna Beach winter looks more like Australia

But Christmas in There, hey what can I tell ya?

For Winter Solstice comes a visit from Santa

Who warms me up with a Flaming Banana

The daytime is short and so is this verse

Happy Holidays to all in the 3D Metaverse!

Water Water Everywhere in Laguna Beach

Once upon a time There had water but only the best computers could render it so they dropped it.

Now with the MTV hosted Virtual Laguna Beach starting, they decided to bring it back. The ground under the water is no longer blue, but sandy and the texture of the water is similar to water used in the hot tubs. More interestingly the water subtlely moves up and down giving a weak impression of waves against the shore.

One of the cool effects of glass blue oceans in There though is the buggy effect. On water in There, TUV’s reach speeds of 280 kmh without turbo.

Unfortunately, my experiments in VLB show that the TUV has a cruising speed of 180 kmh on the new water. To do the experiments I hacked in a copy of the GPS compass of there as it has a decent speedometer.

Here is hoping this speed change does not happen when water reaches There (and accourding to the head of There Inc. it soon will), as it will peeve a lot of people off including myself. Slamming buggys into the shoreline while going top speed is a hilariously fun activity in There.

Virtual Laguna Beach

The makers of There have teamed up with MTV to create a new independent 3D world called Virtual Laguna Beach. http://www.vlb.there.com/ or http://lagunabeach.mtv.com

For all intents and purposes, this is just another incarnation of There, complete with shopping, spas, hoverboards, buggys, chatting, etc. just with a california theme instead of an aztec/hawaiian theme. The avatars have changed a little, but the spas have all the same controls, so you can keep the same look if you want.

One feature VLB has that There does not: Streaming Video. I guess if you are going to partner with MTV, you better have streaming video capabilities.

Currently VLB does not have voice chat, but you know it will be coming soon. The program is in “Alpha” testing right now, though it looks pretty damn finished already.

UPDATE: I tried to be ArianeB, but it said the name was taken, which tells me that you have to use names not taken in There. Actually the rule is that if you were a submitted/accepted designer in There, then you cant use the name in VLA, which makes sense since there can only be one KittenKat or Phedre, etc.

Also VLA is actually based on that Kalifornia island, though you can’t get to it from There. Proof: http://www.so-there.net/attachment.php?attachmentid=1951&d=1154879569