

From Molyneux to a new view-- a functioning ecosystem in SL

In the beginning, Linden Lab created the heavens and the earth, but the sky was empty and the land was barren. The trees were green but did not grow, the sun and wind passed overhead but did not affect them.

Then Laukosargas Svarog came upon this and said, Come, let us make clouds so that they can be borne upon the wind. She did, and it was good. Then Laukosargas said, Let these clouds cast rain upon the ground, and where the land is marshy, let marshy flowers bloom, and where the land is open, let open flowers bloom. And let the sun shine upon these, and where the sun shines brightest, let them grow more, and where it shines least, let them lay fallow. This she also did, and it was good. Seeing this, Laukosargas said, Let bees fly amongst these flowers to pass their seed between each other, and thus be fruitful and multiply. Then she said, Let there be birds to feast upon the seeds, lest these flowers be too fruitful and multiplicitous. This she did as well, and it was likewise good.



Then her computer crashed. And that was not so good.

"My main machine has blown up!" Laukosargas announced shortly after giving me a tour of the miniature world she created. And since her replacement computer was too slow to meaningfully interact in Second Life, the goddess had to put her creation on pause for awhile.

The result of a year's work, Laukosargas Svarog's island of Svarga (direct portal here) is a fully-functioning ecosystem, adding life or something like it to the verdant-looking but arid pallette Linden Lab offers with its world. It begins with her artificial clouds, which are pushed along by Linden's internal wind system.

"If I was to turn off the clouds the whole system would die in about six hours," she tells me. "Turn off the bees and [the plants stop] growing, because nothing gets pollinated. And it's the transfer of pollen that signals the plants to drop seeds. The seeds blow in the wind, and if they land on good ground according to different rules for each species, they grow when they receive rain water from the clouds. It's all interdependent."

Looking more like an African princess than a deity, Laukosargas and one of her angels met me by a small campfire site in Svarga, and explained some of the inner workings of her world, and what drove her to create it.