BIGPOND SECOND LIFE

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While Second Life can be simply amazing, that doesn't mean it's simple. In fact, there's so much you can do once you learn your way around...

So even if you've already decided to join, reading this page first will make your in-world experience much more satisfying from the start.

You'll find even more info on our Second Life FAQ page.

Landing in-world

Your Second Life experience is enjoyed via your avatar - a 'virtual you' that can look like almost anyone or anything you fancy. You can refine your avatar in-world, by creating or buying new shapes, skin, hair, tattoos, clothes...

First impressions.
When you first log-in with BigPond you'll rez (appear) on a BigPond orientation island. When you fly or teleport to The Pond after orientation, you'll find yourself in the nightclub/disco, cinema and business district. In the distance, you might be able to see the Harbour Bridge to one side and Uluru to the other.

Take the tour.
Nearby, you'll see a tour cart. Right click on it with your mouse, and choose Sit from the menu options. Your avatar will automatically take a seat in the cart and you'll be whisked around the highlights of our islands. You'll see how to scuba dive, sail, skate, go to the disco, see movie related content or visit our car racing track. It's a fast, free way to get a bird's eye view of The Pond.

Start exploring.
Use your cursor keys to move left, right, forward or backward; and the Page-up/Page-down keys to fly. When you meet another avatar, talk by typing into the Chat section at the bottom of your screen. When you're done typing, hit Return to 'speak' or they won't hear you.

Meet Very Mulberry.
Before long, you'll meet a young woman called Very Mulberry. She's the BigPond in-world mascot and manager. She can help show you around and settle you in. By registering for Second Life through BigPond, you agree to abide by Very's decisions.

Spread your wings.
There's no end of things to do in-world. Even the BigPond islands will keep you occupied with car races, games, chatting, shopping and more. But you can also take off to other lands to meet more people or attend special events. (Suzanne Vega performed live the other month!).

It's a wonderful world, so have a wonderful time. But please remember that anything you do off the BigPond islands might not count as unmetered usage.

You can build things with the software, then buy things, own things and sell things using Linden Dollars - the official online currency of Second Life (although it's worth noting that BigPond doesn't endorse the use of the Linden or warrant its continuing value as a currency).

Second Life unmetered

We're very excited to offer Second Life access as an unmetered channel for most BigPond Broadband Members.

Keeping your usage unmetered.
As an immersive 3D experience, Second Life creates masses of online data traffic. So having unmetered access to this phenomenon is a huge advantage for you.

Unmetered access only applies to the experience hosted via our servers. That basically means the fun you have on our islands (The Pond, Ponderosa, Billabong, Pondex, Pondessa, Ponderama, Ponden, Pondfield, Pondice, Pondillion and Pondshen) meeting people, playing games, watching videos, seeing car races and enjoying all our other events.

Getting the Second Life software

Second Life manages your avatar, movement, instant messaging, activities, possessions and so on through a special client application, which you need to download. The file is big - currently 30MB for PCs and 62MB for Macs - and there are frequent updates.

Downloads and updates
You can download the client as unmetered usage - but only from BigPond. There is an option to automatically download updates, or to accept update downloads. But these all come from the Linden Lab's server and are not unmetered.

Remember, you must always visit the BigPond pages and manually select the download for it to count as unmetered usage.

Getting in-world support

Conduct in-world
Even Second Life isn't a perfect world and, like anywhere else online, not everyone behaves appropriately all the time.

Second Life and Linden Lab have set up a system of laws and punishments. Very Mulberry can help settle some issues between BigPond users, and ban external users from the BigPond islands (at the discretion of BigPond).

But Second Life is a global phenomenon, run by an American company. So other issues on other islands, including inappropriate conduct or statements, have to be referred to Linden Lab.

Where to dig deeper

There's lots more that you can learn about and do with Second Life. There are online guides and even a 300 page official guide that you can buy.

There is more info on our Second Life FAQ page. And you can find answers to almost any question somewhere on the official Second Life website at secondlife.com

Any use of Linden Lab Web pages is metered and may affect your monthly BigPond data usage total.

And most importantly...

BigPond is hosting Second Life on an experimental basis. There’ll be problems that we never even anticipated, and we may not be able to fix them straight away. It’s a brave new world for us too. So please be patient, positive and optimistic - and enjoy yourself no matter what.

Want to know more?

Step in-world with BigPond