An explanation

It wasn't just your product that was whimsical and wonderful, but the stories behind them. You achieved on the Grid what few could. But I understand burnout and disillusionment. Stepping back can be a good thing. Wiping the slate clean is an act that in and of itself can get the juices flowing once more.
All the best to you in any endeavor that lies ahead, whether it be on or off the Grid.

Skusting Dagger
(and Dickens the kitten, too)

Never have I seen a reaction of the Caledon community, across four years, as strong as this one.

Caledon without Ordinal is... unthinkable. We are lessened, and greatly so.

It's as simple as that.

* * * * *

As painful as this is, it's very important that *we* aren't self indulgent ~ if this is what's right for Ordinal, if this is what Ordinal wants... we have to respect it.

And I for one shall make damn sure that there will be an easy return, pleasant and fun and without stress, if such a thing is possible.

Desmond Shang, Guvnah
Independent State of Caledon

Well, of course I have to say that, like all the others here, I'm sad to see you go.

But it's not about us-- it's about you. You're absolutely right to leave if you're not having fun anymore. And for what it's worth, your stuff has made me smile more than once. You've got a wonderful sense of inspired whimsy.

Wherever you should land, keep that whimsy and keep having fun.

Everything is impermanent — people come and go, and we ought to enjoy their presence as much as possible while they are around, and derive pleasure from it! That's what I (hopefully) did while you were eagerly active in Second Life, as a person, a programmer, and a major blogger and opinion-maker. I always liked your consistent literary style, which I found amusing, but also admired the incredible time and patience that you took to make it always so consistent.

Obviously I'm incredibly sorry to see you go, or at least, drastically limit your activities in Second Life. I can even understand your reasons for doing so. It would be very hard — and possibly unfair! — for me to criticise what you felt to be the "last drop" that spilled the glass of water, so to speak.

Nevertheless, I will just add a small comment: circumstances change, and nothing remains forever — it's thus foolish to cling to something, wishing it not to change, because that's simply impossible. Every good thing will come to an end — it might take a day, a week, a year, or a whole lifetime, but, ultimately, good things will go away. The good news, however, is that bad things will also go away; nothing bad lasts forever, either. It's by understanding the changing conditions — good or bad — that we suddenly realise that it's pointless to suffer because things are not any longer like we wished them to be. We suffer because our expectations are not fulfilled (in this case, the expectation that things will remain always in the same state).

What I've learned is that Second Life, like anything else in the universe, is constantly changing, and "fighting" that change, or "abandoning" a changing SL, just leads to frustration and sorrow. Sometimes to anger, too — I remember being furious at Linden Lab for all sorts of stupid things that they've changed, creating pain for tens of thousands, just to revert their decisions, but too late to make any difference for those that left in disgust.

But at the end of the day, I had to be honest about my own feelings. Why should I be angry or frustrated at things that are beyond my control? Why should I fight change with all my heart and will, if change will happen nevertheless, no matter what I do? Why should I cling to my own expectations on what SL is supposed to be, since what SL becomes is outside my abilities to change or manipulate? Worse than that: even if it were in my power to "keep things as they are" — freeze SL in place, so to speak — my own expectations also change over time, since I change too! So a "frozen SL" in, say, 2004, would not make me happy in 2010, since I'm a different person today, with different expectations.

Is this just an excuse — a delusion, if you wish — to keep me accepting everything that LL throws at us, and cross my arms, sigh, and let it go? No, not exactly. I can still complain and voice my opinion loudly. However, when the change comes, in spite of all my efforts to resist it, I have no other option but to let go my anger, sorrow, and frustration, because it's simply foolishness to believe I have the power to prevent change from happening.

The important thing I always keep in mind is that even a change for the bad will also be temporary. At some point in the future, it'll pass away too. By not getting frustrated when that change for the bad comes, I patiently wait until it goes away, and see a change for the good that will eventually come, too.

Obviously I cannot claim that others are able to be as patient as I am :) That's specially true when some sudden change for the bad seems to become everlasting (even if it won't be), or at least take way too long to pass. You might remember how many months it took until XStreetSL started to accept only avatar logins (e.g. XStreetSL starting to use LL's internal OpenID authentication system). We're still waiting to be able to have access to our L$ account inside XStreetSL. But ultimately this will happen; and the same will happen with Avatars United as well. Why LL didn't spend some time before announcing the acquisition, I have no idea; then again, they behaved the same way with XStreetSL, so they're at least consistent in their incompetence. Script permission errors? Well, they happen once in a while, and they get fixed with a subsequent release, to be broken again on the next one, and so forth. For someone who has been such an old resident of Second Life, you should be more than used to the ever-changing nature of the grid's stability: rock-hard one day, totally out of control the next day.

And with the upcoming SL 2.0 Viewer, and the introduction of more things like clickable-HTML-with-Flash-on-a-HUD, meshes, multiple avatar layers, and so forth, you can imagine the degree of confusion that will follow... the next months will be insane. But... when was that different? Surely you remember, in the past few years, how some things broke SL so completely for weeks and months? You should remember how we had to wait for Havok 4 for almost 4 years... and bug fixing, on average, takes 18 months or so, except for the insanely critical ones (since it's LL that defines that level of "criticality" it means we have little influence of what gets fixed and what doesn't!). So you, like everybody else, ought to be used to it by now.

So I just wished you took a serious look at what motivated you to remain in SL for so long. It definitely wasn't the "past stability". Nor was it "reasonable decisions made in the past" (my memory shows me that there were very, very few decisions made in the last 6 years that were universally acclaimed as "good"). There is no mythical "time in the past where everything was golden and radiant" with milk and honey streaming down hills. Instead, there were some moments, scattered along the years, where things did, for a while, remain stable according to our expectations long enough for us to enjoy them. Those moments were always short, even if "short", for some, might have meant "a few years". So I'm quite sure it was not because of those "islands of stability" and "reason" that you remained in SL for so long. There were definitely stronger motivations.

The recent changes in policy (and technology) might just be aggravating and increasing instability (both social and technological), but, well, how are they different than what happened in the past? I think that when you realise that there is not much difference from the recent changes to any others in the past (some which have been way more serious in the change they created!) that I hope you'll still feel motivated to log in again and come back to ever-changing Second Life.

In the mean time, I wish you all the best luck.

I miss you, Ordinal.

This is so pertinent to me, I never knew you but knew you were old school SL good people, a founder, and i remember you at some of the old Babbage Town Hall meetings Shaun chaired, I also enjoyed looking at some of your "founding" Flicker pics greatly.

You always seemed a maverick to me, one of those people that underpins the skewyness of the grid, and *needs* to, really thinking outside the box but 99% of the time. I remember once looking at your blog when you were experimenting with a bridge made from 100% physical prims, and how disasterous/hilarious, in an anarchic manner SL so often lacks, the results were.

But oddly enough, earlier tonight I opened the oldest notecard in my inventory, from one of the first sims i plopped down in the best part of 3 years ago now:

"Skeeball -- Instructions
-=-=-=-=--=-=-=-=-=-

It's the arcade classic, now brought to SL! Here's how to play...

(edit!)

...Uses physics code from Ordinal Malaprop's Paper Airplane Thrower."

SL is shot through with you like words through a stick of rock (you might have to look that up), a vacuum will be left, and those of us who crave the taste of true originality, well we abhor such vacuums.

Nevertheless, good luck and every happiness in all your endeavours =)

I'm sorry I never had the chance to meet you in person. The narrative made your whimsy all the more charming, and the technical excellence inspiring. I hope we'll see you again someday; until then, fare well where you fare.

Dame Ordinal, you have been an inspiration. Thank you for all your ideas and works, especially the .22 Target Rifle.

All the very best.