Mal’s Second Space

You probably know about my channels at Livestream (formerly Mogulus) and the attempt to aggregate metaverse video in a similar way to that with which my twitter feed collects and distributes links to blogs, articles and other text-based items. Sadly, it has suddenly become a victim of it’s own success.

I originally used the Mogulus service back in beta testing days when there were no restrictions and it seems we have been enjoying a period of grace ever since. Metaworld1 (Second World Monitor) has been showcasing the best of Second Life and other virtual platforms, Metaworld2 (Real Virtualities) has been running live shows from both inworld and out together with topical programme imports, whilst Metaworld3 is being built as a virtual news channel. So what’s gone wrong?

It’s a technical issue, but all three channels are owned by me and count as one account, where I have happily been broadcasting, uploading and importing within a 10gb per month limit for storage. I had assumed this "allowance" applied to new material on a per-month basis, to the point where our library ("On Demand") is now approaching 200gb in size.

Livestream have now informed me that 10gb is a constant - ie. a fixed storage limit that I "rent" each month with additional charges for extra space. To maintain this will now cost around $200 per month increasing by around $20 per month each month.

A similar problem applies to bandwidth. It seems we now have too many viewers! Especially those accessing the library rather than the live broadcasts.

So what does this mean?

Well, September 1st is the deadline. This means we have bare days to prune 90% of all the library content, including downloading copies through a very slow (no FTP) interface. In effect, it means the end of the library facility as an archive. Priority is being given to our original programming and the online content will be unlikely to contain anything more than one month old from now on.

We are now hunting for storage space where the video archive can be built as a separate entity. This is done for the love of it with no budget other than time, so the task is not easy. Nor is there any user interface that so far matches to simplicity provided by livestream. The irony is that all this happens when the prospect of getting flash inworld is finally on the horizon.

Meanwhile, keep an eye on our groups - "Metaworld Broadcasting" on Facebook and "MetaHub & Metaworld Broadcasting" on LinkedIn. 

Also join us for "Metaverse Week In Review" on Sunday at Noon SLT where will will obviously be discussing this further along with the latest news.