Manic Liquor-Whats your poison?

Ripped-Off Noobs??

| Filed under: Bottom of the Barrel

Absinthe’s Thoughts:

Myself and Voddy were doing our usual rounds tonight by looking for new stores and we got an instant message from someone telling us to go check out a designer who claimed that she’s one of the top designers in SL, SexyEyes Valkyrie (owner of A Fantasy) apparently was renting some land or a small market stall from this person, and claimed she doesn’t have time to join the markets update group and on top of that claimed it was the marketplace owners job to notify her personally about any updates. I have been in Second Life long enough, and have rented stalls from marketplace owners enough times, that I know its your own responsibility to keep track of the updates of the sim or marketplace. So anyways, me and Voddy decided to go check out this pre-madonna’s store.

The name A Fantasy first rang a bell in my head because I think I remembered the name from when I was new to Second Life, so I thought, well if I remember the name then the stuff might be good. We walked in and the store is so enclosed it almost made me take a panic attack in Real Life because it was major claustrophobic. The design of the store wasn’t all that good, the layout flat out sucked, the ceiling was so low that it blocked your view of everything on the walls, although that may be a good thing cause the clothing is repulsive. Shes charging 600L for an outfit that looks like it was made from the Second Life default textures and no Photoshop work at all. I think her goal is to rip off noobs, cause that’s what its starting to seem like. But wait, if you walk around a bit you find that she may have something nice to buy, her necklaces look really good in the posters so I decided even after seeing the noob wall of clothing, that I would buy one, that was a waste of 150L. When you put the necklace on its an ugly prim that looks like cardboard around your neck and then the jewel on it is just a texture, there is no detail or prim work on it, its ugly! major false advertisement. The owner of the store has been in the grid since 2004, you think she would know what a Nano prim is, or by now a Sculptie prim. Maybe she’s just one of them people that refuses to get with the times. If this woman is a top designer in Second Life, then lots of people must be blind or stupid.

There is one thing that I will say I liked, and that’s the funny looking characters from a cartoon called Reboot. I think that maybe Ms.Valkyrie should stick to making gag items like this cause she definitely doesn’t have any other talent for creating things in Second Life. Noobs beware this store is trying to steal your money!!

Love

Absinthe

Vodka’s Thoughts:

Ab, I’m the one who screamed claustrophobia! Facing the store the hallway leading in is covered with posters and magazine stands. Walking in, the ceiling almost hit me in the head, and I’m short! I have a feeling, or at least hope, that noobs are NOT thinking her items are a great price. You can get more detailed and more original things elsewhere. I also bought a necklace and had to trash it. If i wanted a photo on a prim, I would have done it myself. I took the pink shoe photo because it shows where prims don’t line up, and how maybe Photoshop was used to try to hide the fact that the shoes were poorly made, but if that’s the case, it wasn’t done well.

I do give credit to the avatars in the shop, but did notice they were not made by her. While we were shopping, someone with her last name showed up. I figured there was a spy script in the store who heard us having a mental breakdown and they came to check it out, but when I cammed out, it was her partner, Lightwave Valkyrie, who actually makes the avatars. Now, of course I’m not sure if this is her, in male form, but by talent, I would think not.

I USED to buy her shoes in ‘06 when color change was the number one script and I could have one pair of shoes in all different colors, but after reading and hearing about this pre-madonna (perfect word for her outburst Ab) and going in to see that nothing was updated and the prices on the clothes were outrageous (notice the red gown…600L) I feel like I was scammed. Well, luckily I will never fall for it again, and hope no one else will! I do think that 99.99999% of this store (not including the avatars) should be set for free or demolished. I’d love to see her sales stats and buy everyone who likes her creations, a new monitor. Ab, I don’t think Noobs will be ripped off, but perhaps she’s mugging noobs for their clothes. Beware, bad designer, bad personality!

Voddy

Necklaces that look good in the ads, but like cardboard on!

Reboot characters.

Some ugly noob clothing.

More ugly noob clothing (Red dress bottom center is 600L) ew!

Some of her shoes, which are also over priced and ugly.

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When you can't create...

| Filed under: Bottom of the Barrel

Absinthe’s Thoughts:

In Second Life, there are many different types of businesses. The easiest type of business, and one could also say laziest, is being a reseller. Being a reseller is where you buy items from other creators in bulk and resell them at a higher price from either one location or various locations. Im not saying that this kind of business is bad, but in fact the way you go about it is what could make it a shady business. Ive never had a problem with resellers until today. I wandered into a store called TNY… at first glance I thought “ok a shoe creator who buys full permission sculptie shoe sets” then I walked further in the store and was shocked by what I saw… this reseller named Tango Bingyi is reselling clothing from Last Call, I’m not sure if any of you are old enough on the grid to remember what Last Call was, but the story in short is that Last Call was a popular store in Second Life. The designer was super talented in making clothes and paved the way for creators to start using attachments and sculpties in their creations. The store closed down due to a tragedy and one of the main creators of Last Call was killed in Real Life. Last Call was never a creator that allowed for reselling of their clothing, in-fact all of the stuff was no transfer right up until the end that the other creator made everything no copy and transfer. To me Tango has taken advantage of someones tragic death to make a profit, and on top of it he doesn’t even give credit to Last Call, he claims these creations as his own and has branded the clothing as TNY.

His store is all over the place, I was confused whether I was in a reseller store of a copybotter’s store. Some of his stuff is labeled as the original creator, where other items are labeled as TNY which its still obvious that he didn’t create these items. To top it all off nothing is consistent, he got different styles of clothing such as punk, classy, casual, and shoes, and furniture, and a giant cartoon turtle?.. did I just discover the first Second Life Wal-Mart?

I think this guy needs to come into his own and start to make his own stuff instead of buying everyone else’s and branding them TNY, or start giving the REAL creators credit. He has even gone so far as to steal an idea from one of the popular sky-boxes on the grid called New York Sky-box.. the sky-box has a window in it that when you look out seems like you are looking across the New York landscape. Tango has put this same idea at the front of his store. Just cause your name has New York in it doesn’t mean you have the right to take the New York Sky-box idea.Even his store name is unoriginal, Tango New York? Does he even live in New York or is he just ripping off the Maybelline New York makeup campaign. All I know is I wouldn’t spend a cent in this rip off store, and id advise the same for everyone else.

Below you will see pictures of the Last Call rip offs and the comparison of the New York Apartment and TNY’s store front.

Love

Absinthe

Vodka’s Thoughts:

Yet another cluster fudge of mess. Walking in you get shoes in your face like President Bush did. None of the shoes were innovative, so i passed them right by. The only creative thing about the shoes was one single ad up above the kiosk. Next, when I saw the Last Call outfits that I bought from Last Call itself (FOR WAY CHEAPER THAN HIS RIP OFF PRICE) I almost keeled over. I got so angry I told Ab I had to leave. In the distance I heard someone else complaining about his shoes. She said she spent L600 and nothing looked right. All I did was TP out. I’m glad items weren’t copybotted, but it’s a shame you put your name on someone else’s creations, considering the situation with Last Call, he should have done a memorial wall and shown the story WITH the creator’s partner’s permission. We were all heartbroken when the story of Last Call came out. The Last Call/Celestial/ETD sims closed down in memorial. Since then, I haven’t seen ONE thing that comes close to the quality of Last Call and Tango should be ashamed to put his name on their creations. They were not his, and I hope he is asked over and over to replicate it, because he can’t. Looking at his furniture store…I wonder what’s really his.

One store not to visit.

Bar closed on this one.

Voddy

One of the outfits from Last Call labeled TNY

Last Call Outfit # 2

Last Call Outfit # 3

Last Call Outfit # 4

Wall mixed with Last Call and other clothing.

TNY replica of New York sky-box window.

The real New York sky-box window.

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Pink Fuel

| Filed under: Middle Shelf

Absinthe’s Thoughts:

I was wandering around Second Life™ these first few hours in the day looking for some accessories to make my character look more unique and I came across a really cute and inventive store called Pink Fuel. The creator of the store is Mochi Milena. Her store itself is well designed with a eye catching colour scheme. when I walked in I immediately was drawn to the little stuffed animals that can be worn on all different attachments on your body. They are different then anything I have seen in the 3 years I have been part of this virtual world. Their uniqueness made me wanna buy them all, but I kept some lindens in my pocket and bought just one set. I also bought a bunny backpack (shown in picture below) and a pop-tart that attaches to my mouth, which makes my belly growl in Real Life. The store has numerous other odds and ends, such as cherries that hang from your mouth, a big sad but cute bunny that you can sit on, heart shaped glasses, leg warmers, eye patches, and a few other things. Once I was done buying the whole bottom floor I walked up and came across her skin line. I was hesitant at first because alot of skin designers spend more time photoshopping their ads and making the skins look amazing on the poster but when put on it looks like a totally different skin. Anyways, I tried on a demo and the face on the skin is really nicely done. The makeup is also unique like the rest of her creations, and it looks really good with my shape. I took some pictures of my favorite makeup, they are just demo’s right now because I cant decide which one I want, but you can still see the good craftsmanship.

I havnt spoken to Mochi yet, but from first impression of her store she seems like she has fun creating things here in Second Life™.

check out the pictures below!

Love

Absinthe

Vodka’s Thoughts:

I didn’t check out the skin, only saw photos from Ab’s post, but aside from that I think the number one product in her store is the backpack. It was the first thing that caught my eye as well. Though I fought back my urge to buy them, I did buy the cherries that hang out of your mouth. They come in 2 separate sets, one with skulls and one regular. 70L is what I paid, which is HALF of what I paid at The Golden Fleece (by the designer of LeLutka jewelry). I thought the animal attachments were really cute, but didn’t see anything super special or eye catching. The setup and colors were amazing. I love the pink she used.

Voddy