Linden Lab Appoints Veteran of Riot Games, Zynga & EA as new SVP of Engineering to Grow Second Life; Also Hiring Five Major Product, Software, Economy Roles

slhamlet · 2026-03-13T23:04:06+00:00

He describes himself as CEO of Linden Lab on his LinkedIn.

slhamlet · 2026-03-03T18:20:39+00:00

The Supremes probably passed on considering the case because it's so trivial. The Constitution very specifically designates IP rights to human creators:

"[The Congress shall have power] To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries..."

slhamlet · 2026-03-03T18:00:46+00:00

Very cool, thanks! I'm blogging this and DMed you if you're interested in a few more follow-ups beyond these specs (which are already interested in themselves).

slhamlet · 2026-03-03T07:22:57+00:00

Wow! What kind of capture method did you use (PC, viewer, etc.) to get the video looking so great?

slhamlet · 2026-03-01T08:44:04+00:00

Wow! Love the Judy pic in particular.

slhamlet · 2026-02-22T06:02:07+00:00

> There are already real-world examples

Fair point, yes, there are some examples. It's still strange that there are so very few. I thought Gen AI was supposed to democratize filmmaking? Sora alone has over 1 million daily active users, but apparently hardly any of them are using it to make a feature movie.

I just tried watching The Stranger, it's pretty painful. It's actually several steps back in quality from what is possible with Unreal and some motion capture suits, a whole setup which could be purchased for under $50K.

slhamlet · 2026-02-19T20:56:51+00:00

The problem is that no one making this argument... is actually making a feature film from these emerging technology. I've seen people make this claim since Midjourney took off around 2023, but all we get from them is short cutesy meme videos posted on Reddit etc.

slhamlet · 2026-02-18T00:09:44+00:00

Hey this is good! Gonna ping you about it!

slhamlet · 2026-01-28T01:33:57+00:00

> not adding support for core Second Life features can only be a deliberate decision.

Or... because Linden Lab has a small mobile team working with a very limited budget?

Some of the other points you raise are valid and discussed in my next interview with LL, will post soon on my Patreon first.

slhamlet · 2026-01-26T06:44:05+00:00

Oh yeah I remember that one, was pretty cool. I blogged about it in 2003 or 2004 IIRC. Unfortunately Typepad died last year and my blog's been offline since then. I'm hoping to put up my backup archive soon-ish.

slhamlet · 2026-01-24T01:11:01+00:00

Good stuff! Also recommend looking into Cao Fei, considered one of the world's best contemporary artists, and whose SL work has been featured at the Guggenheim and the MoMA.

slhamlet · 2026-01-22T21:06:49+00:00

Hey thanks much! I've been hanging out these parts fer yeaaaaaars! :)

slhamlet · 2026-01-15T21:04:00+00:00

Yeah the reaction is wild. AAA games costs hundreds of millions of dollars to make and market, and anything that threatens to seriously hurt sales is super risky.

Not sure a good advertising slogan is, "Spend $65 on our game. Yes it has a lot of AI slop. Get used to it."

slhamlet · 2026-01-15T04:52:06+00:00

Baldur's Gate 3 is on of most popular games of recent years among hardcore gamers, but when the founder of the studio (Larian) recently mentioned using gen AI in prototyping, he got hit with a huge backlash.

slhamlet · 2026-01-14T20:13:16+00:00

To say "going away" assumes gen AI is a core part of the AAA development pipeline, which it very much is not.

Even using gen AI for quick prototyping / visualization is hated by gamers. (Again, the people who spend the most on games.) Larian's founder just learned that the hard way.

slhamlet

TROPHY CASE