All My Dankos (with Historic Photo)

“This Hypergrid thing is great, especially when you have accounts on multiple grids. Over the weekend, I friended myself.”

– Danko Whitfield, virtual comedian

Ever since I did my first hyperjump in April I’ve been wondering, what if I jumped to a world where I already had an account…could I use a second viewer and log in THAT Danko and have two Dankos from two different grids looking each other in the eye?

I didn’t see why I couldn’t. But I haven’t fired up two viewers at once in a long time. And when I did it was to login Danko and an Alt at the same time, using two SL official viewers. And my computer didn’t like that. And there wasn’t much use for it anyway. Some people have a use for logging in their main and an alt at the same time. But you can’t log in two of the same account, wasn’t possible in SL. Something about the space-time continuum. But what about in OpenSim with this hyperjump feature?

I asked around. Nobody I asked knew but they thought it could be done though they had never tried it. I also assumed it could be done but left it there because I really didn’t have a reason to do it other than to do it just for the sake of doing it.

Recently I mentioned in an article here that a friend had recommended Hippo Viewer as a nice light viewer that, among other things, was good for logging on an alt when your main av was already on. Hmmm, I thought when I read that recommendation. I was also thinking the “lightness” of Hippo might make it good to hyperjump with, though I had never heard anyone make that argument.

Last week I spent a lot of time on OSgrid working on a new project. I’ve had an account there since 2010 but only would use it to visit some friends so there was absolutely nothing in my inventory. I was using a default or starter av from 2010. Now that I’m there a lot, of course, I thought about upgrading the avatar. But OSgrid has no currency and the freebie shops offer the same avatars I see – and have – in OpenSim elsewhere. Not exactly inspiring.

A friend said, “Why don’t you go over to Neuland grid. They have some different starter avatars.” Hmmm.

So I did a hyperjump from OSgrid to Neuland to check it out. Of course, unless you’re hyperjumping regularly, it’s not as simple as that. I had to go through the, now how do I do this again? And what’s the HG address for Neuland? That last question took some investigating. Why don’t all HG-enabled grids put the address on the front page of their website? Now that I think of it, a lot of them don’t even put the login uri on their front page. What’s up with that?

Fifteen minutes later, when I got to the freebie area in Neuland, the selection wasn’t very exciting but I did see a couple of male avatars I was not familiar with. So I “bought” a few things for free and went back to OSgrid. But my inventory was all messed up and I couldn’t access anything in it, not my new items from Neuland, not the few older things I had. Nothing is ever easy in virtual worlds.

Now what? Is it even worth trying to figure this out? Or will I just go to a lot of trouble to come up with a new look that isn’t really any better than the look my OSgrid av already had?

So I decided to find out if it was worth spending any more time on this, I created an account on Neuland. I had that new Danko pick up the same body parts and clothes as the Danko from OSgrid and I started mixing and matching. I came up with a look that wasn’t great by any means but it was better than my older OSgrid av.

It did cross my mind to bring Danko from OSgrid back to Neuland so Danko from Neuland could give him the stuff or have Danko from Neuland go to OSgrid to make a delivery – but the essential parts were no transfer.

Then I thought, hey, I’m this close to having two Danko Whitfields in the same sim at the same time. Let’s do it.

A little while later, I had Danko from OSgrid online, I forget which viewer he was using, probably Firestorm, maybe Imprudence. Since he had already made a successful jump to Neuland, why reinvent the wheel? I sent him to Neuland. Then I fired up Hippo for Danko from Neuland to go inworld.

Ta-da! There they were. Danko from Neuland standing there, all new and proud. Danko from OSgrid with his face partially rezzed and sort of looking like Frankenstein while the rest of his body and clothes were the purest white….as in lack of texture. Some photo that’s going to make.

I logged OSgrid Danko out, then in. Same difference. Ah yes, this is why I hadn’t done this before, because I knew it would be one big pain in the ass.

I tried a few more tricks but nothing worked, OSgrid Danko was still whiter than a ghost with a Frankenstein face. I took a photo anyway, just for posterity’s sake.

And then I friended myself. In public. 🙂

What I wish I’d thought of was to try a group invite. Next time.

And then OSgrid Danko went home…where he immediately rezzed fully. Of course.

Well, /me smiles, I still have two Dankos online at once. /me chuckles. So I get the HG-address for OSgrid and I send Neuland Danko over to OSgrid.

It worked!

There they both are, fully rezzed, standing in Danko from Neuland’s office – No! – Danko from OSgrid’s office…his office…their office…my office…our office. (Pick the one you like, dear reader, I am too confused to choose.)

Well, now a proper – and Historic! – photograph could be made. The backdrop? Of course!!!!

It took a little doing – how could it not! – but I lined them up in front of a photograph that was hanging on the wall….

The Danko on the left, the one who looks stunned by the entire proceedings, is Danko Whitfield of Neuland. The Danko on the right, the one who looks like he’s been smoking too much hash, is Danko Whitfield of OSgrid. Behind them, looking down on them – literally and figuratively – from the photograph is Danko Whitfield of Second Life, who is thinking: “You guys are never going to look as good as me!”

That Danko on the right is from 2010 and looks it. The Danko on the left is looking about as good as an average OpenSim avatar can look today when it belongs to someone who doesn’t know how to make anything and who thinks Blender is something that can be used to make a nice juice drink.

So Danko on the right is going to go through with his plan to adopt the look of Danko on the left. In fact, he has. I worked out that inventory problem and made the change. (The next day I opened an account on still another grid and found that same skin and made a Danko there that looks like the one on the left. Different haircut but otherwise, pretty much the same.

So now I have this new Danko look for OpenSim worlds that are HG-enabled and I’m going to send some other Dankos to Neuland to adopt it…if I get around to it and it’s not too much trouble at the time, it ain’t that great. Meanwhile, in many other worlds – not HG-enabled – I have the Danko look that I use from mixing and matching Linda Kellie items. A lot of my Dankos look like this…

Then there are closed grids where Danko looks like whatever I could find to work with. And there’s InWorldz where Danko has been able to purchase a much better look, a bit too young for my tastes, but he’s looking good at least.

And I impatiently await the opening of Kitely Market with the hope that really good designers of skins and eyes and hair and clothes, etc. from Second Life turn up. Or brand new but really good designers debut – wouldn’t that be nice. Followed by the HG-enabling of Kitely so all – or many – of my Dankos can shop there.

Note to designers: Kitely has this new Export feature. Please – use it wisely. Please create and price appropriately nice things that we can buy in Kitely and take to our grids around the Metaverse. Just think of the market-size you will have!

As all of this takes place, the dashing and dapper Danko Whitfield of Second Life, looks on from the bar at his Storytellers Pub in Winterfell Laudanum, puffs on his cigar and considers his place as an icon to lesser-looking Dankos around the worlds.

“The poor bastards,” he says with a smile.