To celebrate its first anniversary later on this month, the Croatian-language Kroatan Grid is holding a photo contest themed “my crazy virtual life.” The deadline for submissions is Monday, May 15, and the winning photos will be featured at the grid’s first anniversary party on Saturday, May 27. “Prizes are virtual, like aRead More →
Island Oasis postponed its sixth anniversary, celebration, originally scheduled for March 1, after grid grid founder and COO Nicole Dreyer suffered a heart attack. Dreyer, also known as Sugar Paolino in-world, was rushed to the hospital and was treated successfully. “She is fairing well and recovering,” a grid spokesperson told HypergridRead More →
All active grids with infringing content have addressed the problem, according to VirTec owner Virtouse Lilienthal, one of the affected content creators. VirTec makes a multi-grid OpenSim vending system which has machines that report back to a central server. As a result, Lilienthal was able to discover that the machines were poppingRead More →
If you want to rent land, or sell other products or services, you need a landing page. A landing page is a page that converts someone who is vaguely interested in what you are offering into an actual customer. The effectiveness of your landing page is known as the conversionRead More →
The Kitely Market has passed the $100,000 sales milestone, the grid announced last week. The Kitely Market, which now delivers to 174 different OpenSim grids, is the leading online marketplace for OpenSim content. It accepts payment in both the in-world currency, Kitely Credits, and through PayPal. Merchants who sell via PayPal canRead More →
VisionZ HG Magazine will be celebrating its second anniversary on March 15 from 1 to 3 p.m. Pacific time on the 3rd Life Grid. “Our focus is on all things happening in the Hyperverse, those spaces connected via the hypergrid protocol,” said editor Sunbeam Magic. The event will feature a live performance byRead More →
Active user numbers on the OpenSim hypergrid  crossed the 80 percent share mark this month, reaching a new record high, while the hypergrid share of land area reached 95 percent, another new record high. The hypergrid gained 1,781 new active users to reach a new high of 30,655, or 81Read More →
The annual No Borders Festival, which was previously known as ROBstock Festival, will take place on Saturday, February 11 and Sunday, February  12 from 8 a.m to 8 p.m Pacific time on 3rd Rock Grid to raise money in support of the Doctors Without Borders medical charity. The name was changed toRead More →
The total amount of money spent on purchases over the VirTec OpenSim vending machines network nearly doubled last year, increasing by 92 percent from $4,206 in 2015 to $8,080 in 2016, the company reported. Meanwhile, the total number of transaction increased nearly three-fold. In 2015, the company’s first year offering the OpenSim vending service,Read More →
I am passionate about OpenSim and making OpenSim more accessible to people unfamiliar with the OpenSim platform. New people, like myself a few years back, need places to get things for their avatar and their region and this is my contribution. I visited a variety of places on the hypergridRead More →
Dear OpenSim Viewer Developer: A new trend in learning management systems  could be a vehicle for expanding educator use of the OpenSimulator platform. More specifically, one of the newer learning management systems – Canvas – includes an external app integration feature that allows faculty and institutions to easily integrate bothRead More →
ZanGrid went live with the Gloebit virtual currency on Monday as the platform gets ready to start approving merchant cashouts. The currency can also already be used on Mobius Grid. Users can use a single virtual wallet to shop on any Gloebit-supported grid, and, when the grids allow, take the purchasesRead More →
$6 for three years of protection against lawsuits from US creators — for any grid, anywhere in the world helps protect against take-downs by hosting companies and domain registrars helps keep creators from going to social media and blogs to get attention for problems The US Copyright office has madeRead More →
OutWorldz has released a beta version of the DreamWorld OpenSim installer for home-based mini-grids which now offers users a free subdomain for their grid, such as anygrid.outworldz.net. Previously, users had the option of registering their own domain name with a commercial registrar or using a free external DNS service like No-IP, DuckDNS, andRead More →
In response to yesterday’s post about the changing editorial direction at Hypergrid Business — and free ads — I’ve been flooded with requests for advertisements. And I want to run the ads. Really, I do. Promoting OpenSim to the 100,000-plus site visitors who might not have heard of OpenSim beforeRead More →
The world seems to have hit a tipping point when it comes to immersive environments, and the pace of change is exploding. These changes have been dramatically reflected in the readership of this site over the past couple of months. My life is about to change dramatically as well. SoRead More →
Grid owners, content creators, and other members of the OpenSim community are working to solve a serious case of alleged content theft that surfaced recently on the Alife Virtual grid and may involve several other grids and 62 allegedly stolen OARs, or region backup files. On Thursday, Genesis Metaverse CFO JanetRead More →
OutWorldz founder Fred Beckhusen has purchased the Hyperica OpenSim directory from Hypergrid Business. He will continue to maintain the current website, add more content, and add more functionality, as well as the in-world hyperport, and the in-viewer destination guide. The Hyperica website had nearly 20,000 unique visitors over the courseRead More →
AviWorldz has officially joined the big grid migration of 2017, becoming the latest in a string of grids to switch to DigiWorldz hosting. DigiWorldz is mostly known as a popular commercial OpenSim grid, but the company also provides hosting for other grids. This means that would-be grid owners can focusRead More →
Firestorm is the preferred viewer for OpenSim users, based on a survey of Hypergrid Business readers. Nearly 53 percent of respondents chose Firestorm as their favorite, followed by 26 percent for Singularity and 7 percent for Alchemy. Firestorm was also the viewer that most people had tried. According to the survey,Read More →
It didn’t take long at all. It was less than three weeks ago that Alexsandro Pomposelli announced that AviWorlds was back up and running — from his garage. The much-troubled grid is now down again as a result of a power surge, he told Hypergrid Business. “My anti-power surge didRead More →
It has often been the so-called vice industries that have driven forward new technologies. This will also be the case with virtual reality, where we are already seeing it shaking up the gambling sector. Sectors such as gambling were among the first business use cases for the internet, and tendRead More →
myVR, a social virtual reality platform from the folks at myWebRoom, has opened the platform to allow brands and marketers create and publish in-app branded experiences. For instance, companies can place branded videos and images on virtual televisions accessible by other users in the virtual rooms, game developers can availRead More →
Viar.Live allows users to upload and share 360 degree photos, create virtual reality tours from the uploaded 360 degree photos, embed virtual reality content on websites, and distribute the content across desktops, iOS and Android mobile platforms. It supports Google Cardboard Camera and iPhone Pano so anyone whose phone supportsRead More →
One of the devices that generates the greatest interest among the tech community at the moment is Microsoft HoloLens. By revolutionizing the way we perceive reality-altering solutions, the technology that stands behind HoloLens is as fascinating as it is complex. In simple terms, it can be described as the mergingRead More →
Public OpenSim grids gained land area, registered users, and active users this month, with active users reaching a new all-time high. Grids reported a net increase of 638 active users, for a new total of 36,330 actives, despite the end of the OpenSimulator Community Conference. That event accounted for a one-time additionRead More →
Last year was a mixed year for OpenSim grids. Active users were up, but the increase was much lower than in the previous year. The increase in registered users was also smaller, but this was mostly due to a multi-month outage on Avination, which is still down. Land area actually shrank thisRead More →
Genesis Metaverse, a company which previously ran its own grid and also provided hosting to other grids, has left the hosting business and is now using DigiWorldz to handle its hosting and OpenSim management. The company was formed after last summer’s disastrous flameout of the AviWorlds grid and its associatedRead More →
My role in my school district, involves working directly with classroom teachers in kindergarten through 12th grade to help them create effective learning experiences with technology. Recently, I’ve become a fan of what virtual reality brings to the classroom. I came across CoSpaces through Twitter at the start of this school yearRead More →
The OpenSim Embassy has a grand opening tomorrow, January 11, on the Second Life grid. Performers at tomorrow’s event, which starts at 11 a.m. Pacific, include the ChangHigh Sisters Fireshow of Light, Life and Love, SingerGirl XOXOXO, Amazon Ballet, DJ Pilou, and TatianaCoin. It will be held in the OpenSim EmbassyRead More →
The Canadian Sun, an in-world magazine on the Great Canadian Grid, is sponsoring a St. Patrick’s Day parade on Friday, March 17. Participants are starting to build floats now, but there is still room for interested groups to sign up. Organizers are also looking for performers, and there will beRead More →
OpenSim users can buy legal mesh bodies for their avatars — and the news has helped keep noted designer Linda Kellie from leaving. “Jessica Random and I sat down the other day and made a pro and con list,” she wrote in a post yesterday. “And in the end one ofRead More →
Updated: January 19, 2018 Virtual reality is still in its very very very early stages. The headsets are bulky or uncomfortable, the interfaces aren’t really there yet, there isn’t that much content, and the experiences can sometimes give you motion sickness. But you need to try it anyway, and haveRead More →
The AviWorlds grid is back up and running, grid owner Alexsandro Pomposelli told Hypergrid Business today. This is now officially the grid’s tenth incarnation, not counting the times it was down due to server problems or other temporary issues. The grid’s loginURI and hypergrid address is login.aviworlds.com:8002 and OpenSim users who wishRead More →
The Baller Nation and Kea Nation grids have both moved to DigiWorldz. The two were previously the marquee customers of Genesis MetaVerse, which, like DigiWorldz, both runs its own grid and also offers hosting services for other grids. Genesis MetaVerse was one of the two hosting companies that emerged lastRead More →
Kitely has added a complete classifieds system to enable users to buy classified ads using Kitely Credits, as well as new search tabs in the viewer to allow people to search for avatars, OpenSim groups, parcels, events and added classifieds. To access the new “People,” “Places,” “Events,” and “Classifieds” search tabs,Read More →
Genesis Metaverse has been attacked and some systems have been damaged, but the grid has been able to recover much of its data. To help protect against future attacks, the grid has also switched server companies, upgraded its hardware, added more backups and is taking other precautionary measure as well.Read More →
Press release: vTime Now the Most Widely Available VR Social Network with Launch on Google Daydream Liverpool, UK –  vTime, the VR Sociable Network, today becomes the most widely-available VR social network in the world as it launches for Google Daydream. Used by people in 195 countries, vTime is theRead More →
For the past few years, the Hyperica grid and website has been a directory of hypergrid destinations for OpenSim users. Nearly 40,000 people have visited the site over the past two years, with more than 330,000 page views total. Those are decent numbers for OpenSim, but are tiny compared toRead More →
More than 70 virtual and argumented reality companies will showcase their products, innovations and demos at CES 2017, starting this Thursday in Las Vegas. The full list of those exhibiting in the gaming and virtual reality category can be found here and include new virtual reality headsets, 3D cameras, motion and eyeRead More →
The Virtual Reality Festival will be holding its Extreme Virtual Reality Challenge event in Las Vegas starting next Thursday, January 5, but you still three days to vote for your favorite virtual reality movies, video games, and ads. And even if you don’t vote, this is a great time to catch up onRead More →
It seems that everyone has been getting virtual reality for Christmas — and posting the reaction videos on YouTube: And on Twitter… Holiday 2016 VR Reactions Here at Hypergrid Business, we normally get between 3,000 and 4,000 people a day looking for Google Cardboard QR Codes — on Sunday, thatRead More →
At a time when grid outages and scandals are in the news (okay, just the one grid, but they do create a lot of news) it’s nice to see a grid do something positive. On Tuesday, I saw this post from DigiWorldz show up in my social media, which leadsRead More →
I’ve been doing the stats report every month — without a break — since mid-2009. With nearly 300 active grids, many of which don’t have standard stats pages, the amount of work going into this has become unmanageable. It eats up parts of several days of my time, contacting everyone,Read More →
Christmas and winter themed events, virtual tours, skating, creative contests, parties, and dances have already hit the ground running in various grids. A number of grids are also offering you to hunt and win cash and other gifts, or buy lands at cheaper prices. Many will also be hosting newRead More →
This past year has been a troubling one for OpenSim, with slowing growth rates and increasing concerns that OpenSim will be sidelined by advances in virtual reality platforms. Active users numbers went up, but at a slower rate than in any of the previous years, and a steep decline fromRead More →
An industry group and individual vendors are working to fix the problem of incompatibility across multiple virtual reality content hosting, distribution and advertising platforms. Currently, advertisers, publishers and brands often have to create native applications for each of the platforms to distribute and monetize content to as large audience asRead More →
The public OpenSim grids reached a new high of active users, 35,692, an increase of more than 2,000 since this time last month. The 2016 OpenSim Community Conference was responsible for about a quarter of the increase, but many other grids also saw gains. The total number of registered usersRead More →
If you missed the panels from last weekend’s OpenSim Community Conference, you can now catch up with some of them on YouTube. OpenSimulator Core Developer Panel A discussion of key issues facing OpenSim developers, with Avacon founder Joyce Bettencourt, OpenSimulator core developer Robert Adams, core developer Michael Cerquoni, OpenSim core developer andRead More →
Kitely Market sales have increased significantly over the past year, Kitely CEO Ilan Tochner told Hypergrid Business. The market now delivers licensed OpenSim content to 162 grids, with 16,364 product variations grouped under 8,551 listings. Of the variations, 11,394 are sold with the export permission, meaning that they can beRead More →