Friday, December 8, 2006

Booting McCall (I of III)


Written 7 December, 2006

On Behavior, Part I of III

Booting McCall


In my month as a landowner, I’ve banned only one person from my land: McCall Ryder.

He’s not such a bad guy, just clueless.

I met McCall at a concert—live streaming audio—and later showed him my new property, an island—most of one, anyway—with a live volcano. He seemed nice enough, although I was certain that in his mind we would soon be partnered.

The next day was one of those spontaneous SL happenings. I was on the island, and friends, including McCall, were IMing. When they did, I would teleport them to the property. Soon there were five or six of us.

As my land was undeveloped, and as the owner, Knight Something-Or-Other of the adjoining lot had been missing in action for several weeks, and as Knight’s property was set up as a beach playground, we naturally wound up there, lying in lounge chairs or standing around the fire, listening to it crackle. Before long, my equally new neighbor, Artik Crimson joined us. Artik, with his wife, Keri, owned the southern flank of the mountain.

We were talking about this and that, having a good time, when I spotted Carcinia Polano, complete with clipboard, standing by the water.

That clipboard is everpresent with Carcinia. She’s all business. Indeed, SL is her livelihood. She works for Ansche Chung Studios, which owns the Dreamland Forsaken sim, where I live. She’s the Dreamland point person.

I was sure we were busted, but Carcinia wasn’t there to shoo us away. She had been trying to get in touch with Knight, who had neglected to set up tier fees and who wasn’t returning IMs. She wanted to tell him face-to-face he was in danger of losing his land. She had noticed our presence and dropped in in hopes of finding the owner or at least one of his friends. And now she was here, she told me, the land was in serious violation of the covenant.

I asked Carcinia if she would show me the violations, as I did not want to make any of my own, and she did. Artik came along as she showed me how Knight had blocked a waterway, denying his neighbors access to the ocean. And—

Enter McCall.

My friends had remained respectfully silent as Artik and I talked with Carcinia. But now McCall was jumping in, interrupting, saying he wanted to buy the land and put up a high-rise hotel, blathering on.

“WTF is this?” Artik IMed me.

“A friend, I’m embarrassed to say,” I shot back.

“McCall,” I said in chat.

He kept on with his pitch. Carcinia was studiously ignoring him.

“He can’t do that!” Artik Imed. “It’s in violation of the covenant. Why is he doing this?”

“I don’t know,” I IMed back.

“I don’t know him that well,” I added lamely.

“McCall!” This in chat. "Stop."

And finally, and I’m sure I yelled it, “McCall, please!”

And that’s how McCall came to be banned from my land.


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Photo: Cheyenne with Wireframe turned on.

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