I havent been around for a while…

I miss Bish so much! I have to say these last few months since LL closed us down, I have been very much in mourning, and driven by a horrible guilt loaded with shame for dropping so many wonderful friends by losing the resort like that.  I have finally made my peace with the loss though, but I still miss just dropping out of RL into paradise and living the dream that was Bishara, Majini, Bahati, Mandhari, Pepo and Wimbi Islands.

That said it was always the people who made Bish what it was, not even the waves, the environment or the sounds.  So I was overjoyed when I heard from a friend of mine that there has been some new sims with a similar feeling, full of echoes of the past, but soaked in a much brighter future!  So seeing how it has affected him so positively to be again in a sim where the old friends have all found a new home, I have decided to write a final post here to help you all find this new paradise. If you see any of the old team there, send them my fondest regards.  I still dream of my return, and as soon as my RL avatar’s ship finally comes in, I will be back and then I too will hope to call this new place my home!

My apologies to everyone!

It has been a real shock when I realized I missed the last email from Linden Labs stating that they are removing the sims from the grid, though not deleting them yet, until the final outstanding funds are paid.  I was not expecting this to happen until the end of January, but for reasons unknown, but understandable taken the time that has passed, the sims were removed.

Firstly about Linden Labs – they have been fantastic since I lost my job and we were left in what I would call dire need as a family.  After attempting to apply for over 131 jobs online and in person, I finally gave up and settled back in South Africa to find a lower paid job and help my new little family survive.  Sadly the country has exchange controls in place which make moving funds offshore (from South Africa to the US for example) almost impossible.  Though I have not had all the funds to pay, I would have been able to pay the bulk of the debts soon.  Lindens have been waiting for this to happen since August, but sadly we were always almost US$1,000 behind in payments and their patience understandably have finally run out.  That said, I wish to thank them all for their kindness since they are a business and not a charity, but still chose to work with VW and I to see what we can do to resolve this mess.

About Dumisani Ah – Dumi has not been inworld as I chose to remain offline until I could pay my debts. This way the sims had hope of being live for as long as possible and the debt outstanding only prevented my avatar from accessing SL in-world.  It was a hard hard hard thing to do since I had missed so much of what was happening, and more importantly missed my very best friends, you all in Bishara.  Dumi has a chance to still prevent the deletion of the sims if I can pay the outstanding within the next month.  For that to happen I need to close two very important deals and use the commissions from that to settle the debt to Linden Labs.  I am still positive this can happen, but I am not wanting to create any false hope, so watch this space and we see what can be done.

Bisharians – I have been honored to have met some of the most amazing friends in-world that I could ever wish to meet even in RL.  You are all simply fantastic and the support I had from you all to help me save the sims, and especially from VW and the clan, will never never be forgotten.  Thank you very very much!

Surfers – What can I say to describe the shame I feel for dropping you all so badly and losing you three fantastic surf spots!  I do not have the courage to face any of you really, but want to share with you all at least this that I tried everything I could to find the funds to pay LL the backlog.  Sadly the sims have never been profitable or at a breakeven point, even when VW and I tried adding all kinds of things to them.  So the backlog simply grew and grew, and as I usually subsidize that outstanding bit every month, the sims cost became impossible to cover.  Again, if I can change this I would, as you all deserve to have these places back again.

Landowners – Some of the most important people to me have been those of you who bought and own land in Bishara Resorts.  How do I apologize for disappointing you all?  I cannot really say anything to give you back what you have lost, and as I am totally unsure what happens to your land, can only say I hope that there is some compensation from LL.  Please know that I landed in this position only because I lost my job in May, and after many promises from my employer, the 3 month backlog in salaries too.  It is the harsh reality of the global economy these days that we are all at the mercy of investors, shareholders and bosses who wish to move their funds to safer havens and do so at a wim at times.  I apologize that this is so with me and that there has been no reprieve for Bishara due to my own financial situation.

VW and team – I cannot express the amazing sense of pride I feel to be called your friend!  You have been the most amazing in this whole sad episode in my life, and I cannot ever repay you for all the pain and frustrations you had to experience on my behalf, or for the warmth and kindness you showed to me.  Thank you, VW, specifically for the friendship we have, and to have honored us with your presence, willingness to help and the unselfish manner in which you managed Bishara in my absence.  Thank you each and everyone of you!

Group Liabilities

Aloha Bishara!
Let´s see if I can make this clear as we STILL have some members that do not understand……….
Until Dumi returns, the Bishara Group has no “owner”. That means that WE are responsible for group liabilities (30L per week for search inclusion). Now, both Dumi and I have said time and time again that if you are among the members (of 900) that have been charged 1L all you have to do is IM me and I will refund the 1L.

The simple solution is of course is for Dumi to allow group “officers” to pay liabilities (in the roles) but until he can log in and make the neccesary changes in the roles it´s up to “us” to scrape together the whopping 120L each month.

Again, if you have been charged for group liabilities but refuse to IM me for a refund and instead open group IM´s to complain about being charged 1L, yell about “poor management” and trash talk, well maybe it´s time you get some perspective.

If the thought of a 3% chance of being charged 1L each month (refundable) to help us maintain this group until Dumi returns is just to much for you to deal with then leave the group.

Think nothing of the 30.000 USD Dumi has paid on your behalf in the past 3 years nor the 1500 USD each month he pays to provide us with these great sims.

Mahalo,
/V

New surfboard designers – check out this fantastic Reaction competition!

http://surfwatch.blogspot.com/2008/09/board-design-contest-trawls-for-new.html

What a fantastic chance for someone to launch themselves in Second Life’s surf community and make some serious bucks too 🙂  Come on, Bisharians, let’s encourage everyone we know in our group and resort that designs well to try out for this competition that Reaction is offering.  it’s a fantastic idea and we should encourage it big time!

QUENCH Spotter wins SLSA JJ Lanes Shortboard Epic Surfing Competition at Morant Cays

Congratulations Q, you do us PROUD!!!

Bishara Group IM Chats

I have wanted to post this for ages, but never got the time.

When I created the Bish group it was for socializing and I wanted people to feel free to use it to ask questions, chat about Bish stuff, and generally have fun with one another.  It is after all a group chat tool.  Since we grew with some managers coming and fortunately going, many folks were flamed for simply chatting, saying ‘hi’ or asking a question on the group IM.  So I realized that we need to make a rule that works for everyone, so here it is.

The Bishara Group IM chat can be used for any Bishara group or member issues, single notices of social events on the Resort, announcements of marriage or even just for saying ‘hello’. 

The Bishara Group IM chat may not be used for advertising, for spamming folks with event announcements, or for flaming / griefing. Anyone caught doing any of this on a repeated basis will be ejected from the group.  Flaming someone or griefing someone through this group will get you a ban from the resort as well, as I do not stand for abuse or discrimination of any sort.

Why am I so tough about the last point? In the beginning of my life as a sim owner I was subjected to a well known avatar in SL’s racist remarks through an ongoing attack of such intensity that I felt I should leave SL completely. This person’s attack was because I tried to assist someone in the Concierge group with reporting griefers, and in those days a certain service for Sim owners was quite handy and I made the mistake of mentioning this service’s name.  That was the trigger for what became an attack on my culture and my person, and it left me shocked and disillusioned, as I had read this avatar’s blog regularly prior to this attack and had even agreed with some of the points he/she raised in some of the posts on that blog.  Having this happen to me stripped that admiration for he/she completely, and revealed to me the ugly side of Second Life, the fact that we do not really know the person behind the avatar.  The weirdest thing about this, is how the attack turned from an SL related issue to a RL related issue with the question ‘Are you Asian?’ only to be followed by ‘you’re African?’ – and then a tirade about how I am from a culture in which we are ‘psuedo nice’ people who are actually violent in nature, and so on and so on.

The funny part of that is that I am in fact European, though born in South Africa, as many of you know, but he/she took my SL name as his/her guide to who I am, and it sounded Asian / African I guess so I was open to attack and verbal abuse.  Those days reporting something like this in SL was almost unknown and I regret never doing so.  I remember in my shock I emailed Torley Linden about it and he was a great support to me.  However, the point was that as an European I for the first time felt what it must feel like for so many people around the world who are subjected to such treatment every day!  It cannot be tolerated and having matured in SL since that day, I don’t stand for it at all.

So, I don’t care who you are in SL or RL, if you flame or abuse someone, and a copy of the IM is sent to me in an abuse report or it is shown publicly in the Bish group IMs, you will be banned and I will report you to the Lindens as well, who I am glad to say look like they take such attacks more seriously these days.  VW Sands and the team in Bish are well capable of doing the same and are authorized to kick butt 😉  If you have experienced any such problems in Bish talk to them or me asap. We promise to be there for you!

To those who complain about IM chats ‘bothering’ you, just click on the little cross to the upper right hand side of the actual Bishara Group IM window.  That closes the group chat and ends any IM’s bothering you until you log on the next time.

New Mono fix rolling out this week!

Hiya Bisharians.  Hey, the Lindens are rolling out a new fix for a serious Mono glitch that caused scripts to crash completely (unrecoverable) suddenly and randomly.  A problem with C# too complex to explain here, but at least the more experienced coders / scripters in Second Life will be testing the fix to make sure it’s all sorted out for us.

This post is simply to warn everyone that the patch will be rolled out through the next few days so if anything strange happens just let VW Sands know and he should be able to sort out surfboards and waves that act weird in any way 🙂

New SLSA Directors in our midst :)

Congratulations to our very own VW Sands and of course the very delectable Tauri Tigerpaw for being elected to the SLSA board.  I for one know that you will both be a huge benefit to the whole surfing community and especially the association’s organization and competition. The very overworked Sally LaSalle will have some great help on hand.

My opinions, moans, and news, all on a nice new site :)

Hiya Bisharians, VW and I have both started writing personal blogs that some of you may enjoy reading.  Take a look at the menu on the right hand side of the Bish blog for our links.

Cheerio!

RL Sponsors

Having seen the initial success of the Surfline SL collaboration and PADI’s amazing work in SL, we are evaluating a similar partnership with ocean focused Real Life (RL) sponsors, either surfing product, windsurfing product, scuba product, fishing product or general ocean activities product suppliers that would be interested in sponsoring Bishara Resorts, and in return having the dominant product placements within our island group.  Furthermore, the sponsor would be able to place virtual versions of their real life products in Bishara and Second Life in general for showcasing / marketing as well as general purpose testing.  We are casting our lines out wide to find people who could help with high level introductions to companies that may fit this profile, and who would enhance the overall resort environment, look and enjoyment.  If you have anyone who could help sponsor or you believe your own company would be interested, please drop a notecard to VW Sands or Dumisani Ah at your earliest convenience.