Torley, We Hardly Knew Yeh

I've come to look forward to Torley's video tutorials. They've helped me with permissions settings on objects and land, shown me some clever little building tips and useful apps.

He sometimes makes things look too easy; when I installed an offline app to make sculpties, all I could do was stare at it.

Still, if it weren't for Torley, I wouldn't have snazzy big screens on my Juliet property featuring a movie clip, rock video, ancient commercial, or whatever I feel like featuring for a week or two. At this writing it's a rarely seen DEVO rockvideo, and it looks amazing against the holodeck grid. I can smile at the bits that reveal he's as Canadian as M&M Apple Pie. I was THE key rep for a Canadian website's support team for several years, eventually moving up to team lead and teaching all I knew about pronouncing and spelling and writing dates like a Canadian to a fledgling group, who would take over what one person had done. Anyway I can appreciate his attempts :)

But I digress...

Yes, Torley has lit my way through my emigration into Second Life. From what I see in the official forums, he was very dedicated as a Second Life resident, who joined them to moderate the boards. Don't know when his job changed and he devoted more of his SL job time to videos and blogs, but it seems clear that SL felt they needed an optimistic icon to represent them amid the throng, and Torley was it. He is Second Life's celebrity among its population. Oh the pressure...

...So when did he last post on the boards? All that talk about how involved he was with events and happenings in SL, and now he scurries like a clam when sighted. Hm. That doesn't sound right.

Have you ever been to his property in the Linden Village area? That sensory overload of magenta and green you can see from the map? Some pretty awesome stuff there, and a piano in the magenta green water you could play.

Well, you can't see it anymore. It looks as though he's left Linden Village for a bigger space. He now has an island to himself not far from other Linden islands (i-worlds, land concierge offices, and those gaggle of orientation and help islands allegedly invisible to residents on the map).

A lot of magenta and green, his latest tutorial viewable almost everywhere, examples of stuff, personal effects, giant eggs and chick chicks, the piano in an inlet. I guess with all he's offered there are a lot of examples.

The disturbing part is the big face. He has his own RL visage prominently displayed. It's kinda scary. It seems like 10m or a megaprim. I cant imagine an identifiable Linden using a megaprim, so let's assume it might be 10 high. That's a really poignant statement beside the avoiding the common folk.

Torley no longer behaves like a friend of the people off camera, and no longer lives among us in Second Life with the Lindens. He is now in his own world, possibly underground and out of sight. If it weren't for the giant self portrait, I think I would feel bad for him and his unanticipated fame, but it brings another image to mind which isn't as prone to my sympathy.

Still, it is rather sad that someone who devotes so much time in helping us become a part of Second Life society seems so alienated from it.