Another Missing Island

Jan is in London, John is in Italy, continues...

No, I don't plan to blog about my missing Second Life islands every time it happens '-) But this is interesting for one reason: I needed tech support. Wow, I can hear the screaming all the way over here. Yea, tech support.

Second Life was down for five hours yesterday for its usual Wednesday morning maintenance. When I could finally log back in I was puttering around my newer island when everything froze. I thought it was my internet connection so I logged out and back in again to be told my "region is unavailable" and was teleported to a region where everyone was speaking German '-) I teleported to my first island to discover that my new island was missing. This is the opposite situation from the other day when my other island was the one that was missing. So again I waited a few minutes for it to come back. It didn't. Then I read their blog and it said some regions were still offline but would be back shortly. That's fine except I noticed that when I viewed the "map" on Second Life it showed my island as there, not as offline. I suspected this was not part of their maintenance but was probably a server crash which I've heard happens.

I called their tech support number and after being on hold for 15 minutes got a recording asking me to leave a voice mail. Oh. My. God. They used to have fabulous in-world live support where you could instant message them and a volunteer got back to you, often in a matter of minutes. But that support system is gone. They have an email support system now which no one I know has ever gotten a response from. Sigh.

Then I remembered when I bought the islands that their "Your Island Is Ready!" email to me included a phone number for "concierge service" which is only for island owners. Hmmm. It was a U.S. number but I called it anyway. After being on hold very briefly, a live human being got on and asked if he could help me. When I explained my island was missing and I thought it was crashed rather than being one of the regions that was still offline he said he was happy to check on it. Happy to check on it! And indeed he discovered my island's server had crashed. He put in the command to restart the server and told me to give it about ten minutes and my island would be back.

And it was. Wow, a happy ending.

Meanwhile, back in Real Life, I am even sicker. The cold medication I got has had no effect so I'm going out to the store today to try something else. Plus I need dental floss yet again which is not an easy task.

One final word about my islands: yes, that is the Star Trek original series Enterprise NCC-1701 hovering in the distance. I am a shameless geek.

Comments

[Robert]

The first picture looks so sad, standing on the edge of half a bridge, with nowhere to go. I still can't get over that you're a Star Trek fan. You've lost all cool points.

[Jan Hanford]

A story for Robert:

Once upon a time... when I was single... ok, it was the late 80's.

I met a man who asked me to dinner at the most expensive restaurant in the city. He was an art dealer; intelligent, cultured, accomplished, wealthy, etc. He seemed like a nice guy. My friends were buzzing. My mother was delighted. He called me to schedule our dinner and asked what time he should pick me up. I said not until 8 because that was when Star Trek (The Next Generation) was over. He said, "Star Trek! Don't tell me you watch that crap!"

I hung up the phone.

[Esha]

My mother started out referring to it as "Star Drek"...but then she got hooked on it too.

[Robert]

LOL!

You know I'm just giving you a hard time, as always. But we find the right ones by walking away from the wrong ones, even for silly things like that. I have my shows too, and I know from experience that I wouldn't want to be with someone who'd sincerely laugh at my preferences. You earned your points back by standing up for your interest, if it makes a difference.

[Robert]

I do like the movies, btw. Just never could get into the shows. I was watching X-Files instead, when that came out. In the 80's I was watching cartoons. I still watch cartoons, but that's pretty much all I watched back then. I wasn't even a teenager yet.

[Jan Hanford]

Robert said: "But we find the right ones by walking away from the wrong ones, even for silly things like that."

Well, it's not a silly reason to me because the guy's reaction indicated not just a basic incompatibility but a complete lack of respect. His reaction to my enjoyment of Star Trek revealed a lot about him. I did not expect him to share my passion for Star Trek but his reaction told me that he certainly had expectations of who he wanted me to be and when I did not meet those expectations I would be insulted and bullied. I know that sounds like an overreaction to one little insult but I will just say that our subsequent conversations did not go well and my original instincts were confirmed.

You are right about walking away from the wrong one to find the right one. A couple years later I met John and on one of our first weekends together it was raining heavily. So we stayed in and watched 10 hours of Star Trek: The Next Generation. John still refers to it as one of his favorite weekends. '-)

Here's an interesting follow-up story about the guy I didn't go out with. A couple months after our cancelled date, I was in a restaurant having dinner with a friend. The guy walked in and sat at the bar. I had to pass him on my way to the bathroom so I stopped to say hello and we chatted pleasantly for about a minute. After dinner when my friend and I requested the bill the waitress said, "Oh, a gentleman at the bar already paid it."

[Martin]

Better get used to the German. A recent survey said that around 61% of all SL residents are Germans. Oh and about support they're introducing a new system now so if you're paying through the nose you can get stuff fixed. :-)

http://blog.secondlife.com/2007/05/17/coming-your-way-soon-the-second-life-support-portal/

[KFH]

I used to watch the X files religiously, but it wasn't as good as Star Trek. Star Trek, especially the 70's series, felt like my family.. I find huge comfort in watching that series for some reason. I loved reading this blog and the comments, very interesting! Jan u are an inspiration, I admire the way you articulate yourself and hope to one day have your strength... I think in life we have to really fight to stay happy, and I enjoy reading your positive blogs, they are quite refreshing :)))