Everything is Borked ™

Most of you know this already.

If you have purchased something and haven't gotten it due to the borkedness™ please send another note card. You aren't the only one who is losing inventory, not getting delivered items, etc etc.

At this point, I believe to be caught up on all customer issues. So if you're expecting something and haven't gotten it, give me a holler and let me know. I'll need all the usual information again, transaction number, date, item, destination.

Please note! If the destination is Haedon Quine send the note card to her. I cannot verify purchases that went to her, and vice versa. Please contact whichever of us is listed as the destination on your transaction information. That will expedite things for you.

Customer issues aside, I have a confession. I've had zero desire to create anything for a while. I've played with the Eloh skins, and have some that you might actually be seeing sometime soon. I've spent months trying to figure out sculpties and how to make something that wasn't a phallic stand-in. I think, maybe, finally, I've got it figured out to a large degree, and I picked up some sculpt maps on SLX (who knew branches made good hair?) which also helps supplement my less than fabulous sculptistry.

I know most of you are aware of the IP rights campaign.



The content theft has really been a wet blanket to my creativity. It's really hard to want to create something when the fear of it being stolen is ever-looming. And honestly it's taken me this long to come to grips with it. Just when I think I'm okay, someone else close to me has something copied and I take a few steps back. It's really discouraging and sometimes down right depressing.

And this post has now been sitting unpublished a few days (so I'm likely behind again, lol!) because I found one of my styles stolen again. It's been duplicated and mirrored. So far I've only been able to find pictures on ads for said hair, the hair itself doesn't appear to be in the boxes. Which is strange, and maybe someone else got to them first and has filed a DMCA for their own style resulting in removal of all of them at that location. I don't know. But I've spent a fair amount of time trying to track it down so I can file DMCAs.

See what I mean? Just when you start to think "Okay, I can do this," and reach down to grab your bootstraps, someone kicks you in the behind and shoves you face first in the mud.

Anyway, I'm hopefully back to the grindstone now. I just wanted to let you guys know I hadn't been eaten by the asset server, too.

Happy St. Patrick's Day Weekend!

Feelin' lucky?

There are greens and green tips packs of hair in the lucky chairs for the weekend. They will be there through Monday.

There are LOTS of different styles in there, and some for the men too!

Tag I'm It!

Ryker tagged me, and I'm just now getting to it. Cause honestly I had to wait for a book to end up on my desk that wasn't a board book. So, here we go.

The Book Meme

1. Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

The Tao of Equus

'The only way you'll be able to wake up from your own nightmare is if you start paying attention to all your feelins, in the present. In fact, I'm going to step off my soapbox now, and ask Noche to help you work on it.'
Because Joy was in such a dissociative state, I decided to let her simply groom the bay horse, hoping he still might help her gain a better understanding of how she lost contact with herself when she felt threatened.

And I'm tagging:

Arabeth Laval
Ciera Bergman
Sachi Vixen
Annyka Beckers
Shelly Toonie

I'm a donut too!

I saw this over on Berry's Blog and couldn't resist.

Krispy Kremes. Lord, had I known when they went public with their stock, I'd seriously have gotten like 100 shares. Anyway, here's my donutality. Strangely enough, it's also pretty much the only kind of donut I ever eat.

You Are a Glazed Donut

Okay, you know that you're plain - and you're cool with that. You prefer not to let anything distract from your sweetness. Your appeal is understated yet universal. Everyone digs you. And in a pinch, you'll probably get eaten.

What Donut Are You?

Ooo the drama!

Anyone who knows me knows that I avoid drama at all costs. Anyone who really knows me knows that I have no qualms about standing up and saying what I feel the need to say. This is one of those rare times that the two overlap. It bugs me to no end when someone feels the need to speak on my behalf because they don't think I'm capable of doing it for myself.

So lest anyone think for a second that may be true and I don't have the balls to state my own feelings, here are some of my thoughts on a a recently "hot" post to hit the fashion feed. I'd rather my own words be read than implied by someone else.

Truth said...

"P.S Haedon and Lily I have your back on this issue as you guys are some of the quiet ones and I dont mind being the loud mouth cock on this issue ;)"

I saw the comment that was made about Calla on Sofia's blog. It wasn't actually in her original post, but in a comment she made to someone else's comment about her original blog post. (Five times removed and someone is their own grandpa's mother's dog's uncle.)

She said:

Sofia Gray said...

I would agree with you Chardonnay, however Truth (as well as Frangipani, and Calla) is/are a store(s) that build the majority of his collection by knocking off ETD styles. (Actually, Calla has a lot of original stuff, but lately it seems like they are desperately grasping by copying ETD styles...[cut]...

Did it bother me to be accused of being a "store(s) that build[s] the majority" of our collection "by knocking off ETD styles" and by "desperately grasping by copying ETD styles"? You bet your ass it did.

When I read it, I was pissed. Mostly it hurt my feelings, because I work hard at what I do and put a lot of time, effort and thought into the products I make and will not release something that I don't feel 100% confident in the quality of. But after that because I know it's not true and was such a broad generalization and blanket statement. So my pissiness lasted a minute or three until I realized she was stating her opinion, and even if the rest of the grid thinks I copy ETD's styles, so what? I know the truth. I'm the one who has to live with myself. I'm the one who has to look in the mirror every day. I'm the one who sleeps comfortably at night (assuming my kids let me). I'm the one who has customers that adore the styles I've made who own both Calla and ETD styles and don't think they are at all alike.

I know I haven't copied Elika's styles (or anyone else's for that matter). I'm the one who sooo wanted to go and buy up half of her store when she had that 25L sale and didn't feel that I could, because of potential broad generalizations by people who don't know what they're talking about. I guess I'd rather "avoid the appearance of evil" and miss out on great hair than put myself in a position that may look suspect. I'm honestly sick of that whole mentality of hair makers not being able to own something another hair maker made because of "so and so copied so and so, and look they bought this, and look what they just made that looks just like that" but that's an entirely different rant.

We're all entitled to our opinions. We're all entitled to express them however we see fit. In the grand scheme of things, one person's comment about what they think I do doesn't really carry a lot of weight with me. So much so that I didn't feel it warranted a response. She has her opinion, I've got mine, and readers as well as customers have theirs, too.

I quit caring what people thought of me after I made it out of high school alive; which was a long time ago. I enjoy what I do. I enjoy my customers. If I make something you like, that's fabulous! If you don't like it, that's okay too. What a boring place the world would be if we all liked the same things.

I was offended, momentarily, by a blanket statement that was unwarranted and I feel (oooo look, my opinion!) undeserved by someone that I'm not sure even owns any styles I've made. She has the right to express that opinion (whether she owns anything I've made or not) just as I've the right to be upset by it, get over it and let it go. The world turns. We all make choices. We can choose to let things like that upset us, or we can choose to take it with a grain of salt and move on.

Keep doing what you love, whether it be making hair, or stating your opinions about things, or sitting around with your thumb up your ass and watching it all happen.

Really, in six months, will any of this matter?

Sofia, I may not agree with everything you write. I may not appreciate what you said about Calla, and therefore about me specifically and one of the most important people in my life (Haedon, just so there's no confusion by anyone). However, I do respect your opinion as being your own, and your right to voice your thoughts and feelings without being hammered into changing them to suit someone else, and I have no right to ask or expect you to do differently. Lord knows I don't cave to what someone else feels I "should" do.

I'll keep making hair you don't have to like, you keep making statements I don't have to like, and somewhere along the way people are going to agree with one or both or neither of us.

That, to me, is the beauty of creation, whether in words, or prims, or any other medium.

To our customers who continue to show faith in us and continue to send kind words at the times we need them most, thank you for standing by us and enriching our lives, both first and second. To those of you who aren't our customers, I only ask that you evaluate our work first-hand and form your own opinions.

Signed,
A tired Lily whose mother-in-law is in town staying with her and thus feels the need to rant endlessly.

We need your voice!

Please, if you haven't yet, go here:

https://jira.secondlife.com/browse/SVC-676

And VOTE! Make your voice heard! The votes are only at 600 this morning. Haedon sent out a notice to our group, which consists of nearly 3000 users. There are lots more who aren't in our group, so that number should be considerably higher than 600! The jira always runs slow (at least for me anyway) so be patient. If everyone hits the page at once, it's going to be even slower. Please, please make it a priority to go and vote on this issue!

The process is extremely easy, and here's what you should see:



Now you need to login to the jira with your Second Life username and password. This is a Linden Labs site, so your information is safe. It's no different than logging into the SL website.



Once you're logged in, on the left hand side of the page you will see this:



This is where you click Vote for it. The page will reload, and you get this:



Content theft effects all of us. In this situation skins are being mentioned specifically, but there is so much theft grid-wide. This impacts the creators the hardest, and first. When our work is taken out from under us, and given for free or next to nothing, we're 1) losing sales and 2) forced to lower our prices to get sales back that *should* have been ours in the first place.

I read a blog entry by dandellion Kimban this morning, and would like to quote parts of it here. Her original post was regarding free skins, but it so applies to this situation of all content being stolen. I found it a really thought provoking article if you have the time to read it. (emphasis added is mine)

"On the other side, there is just one item that keeps its price stable: land. And may I say, compared to anything else, land is too fucking expensive. And, it is very important, land tier is paid in US$, not in lindens. Even if you are living on an estate and pay your landlord/lady in lindens, they pay US$ to Linden Lab. All of a sudden, we are not talking microcurrency linden peanuts, we are talking hard green cash recognizable in any bank on planet Earth. What does that mean?

That means that content creators are working for third world wages while land barons are doing serious biz here. And, mind yu, making skins, hairs, scripts and all the rest of lovely things we use takes a bit more knowledge, skills, creativity and time than buying an island, placing prefab houses and renting all that. All of a sudden there is an ethical problem of giving those skins for free! Dropping prices is not a good idea anymore. Dropping prices is taking money from content creators. And content creators need money. They need to be payed for their work and they need to cover their expenses. They need to pay for the land their shop is on. And that price won't drop with everything else."

Those two paragraphs tell more than anyone could explain in a whole dissertation. When we lose sales because we've lost the content that we spent time, effort, heartache, and money to create, we lose the ability to pay for the land we sit on. If we can't afford our rent, or our tier, they kick us out. We can't keep an island for free, believe it or not! (The Lindens frown on that for some reason.) If we can't pay the rent, they're going to kick us out to find someone who can.

This effects every single person on the grid. When the content creators are not protected, when we can't make enough sales to cover our business expenses, there's not going to be anything for the rest of the grid to buy. Which effects the economy. Which effects Linden Labs. Which means they're not making money to cover their business expenses (servers are expensive!) and will either sell out, or close down.

This is not a minor situation! As Ming-Ming would say: "This is sewious!"

Here is a poignant video from Minnu that sums it up nicely.

And if you've gotten this far, for the love of all that is created on the grid, go VOTE already!!!

My Skins for Another Fundraiser!

This is one of the most amazing contributions to the grid. Eloh's done an incredibly generous thing by giving the community the .psd files for these skins. I've learned so much over the last few weeks that I've been playing with them. I have a completely new appreciation for those people who make skins. This is not an easy thing!

Here are my donations for the Another Fundraiser. All proceeds from this fundraiser are going to Unicef.

I did three different makeups, in three skintones. Here are some close ups of the faces.







And here's a full ad so you know what you're looking for when you get there.



There are so many skins! I've seen a few blogged that are absolutely incredible, and I'm sure that's just scratching the surface. There are over 100 skins, and they are all 50L$ each. Yes. Five. Zero. Fifty!!! It's for a good cause so please be generous with your L$.

I can't begin to say how much I've learned, and how much I've enjoyed being a part of this effort. I'd like to personally thank Sasy Scarborough for undertaking the organization of this huge effort. She's had skins and ad textures and note cards and questions and who knows what else thrown her way from so many people, and has done a fabulous job putting this together.

I hope to see y'all this weekend, 'cause I am so going to be there grabbing some of these fabulous works of art!

We're in a book!

Calla has been listed in the Second Life for Dummies book as the number 2 place to get hair! We are so honored to have been included.

Haedon received the following message:

[4:42] Typewriter Tackleberry: Just a note to let you know, Sarah "Intellagirl" Robbins and I mentioned your shop in Second Life For Dummies. Thanks for bringing quality to Second Life.

I didn't know anything about it and didn't get a message from them. I'm so far behind in keeping up with the blogs that it'll be next year before I have any idea what's going on.

She goes to look, and then messages me (cause that's what we do) and I go look.

While we honestly, truly appreciate it, and are honored to have been included, there's a very huge printing error.

HAEDON WAS LEFT OUT!!!

That's like the yin without the yang, or the peanut butter without jelly, or the coffee without peppermint! It's the Lily without the Hae! You just can't!

We also got credit for Eolande's Accessories.

I've taken the liberty of making a few corrections.






Woot! That's better.

Really sincere thanks to Mr Tackleberry and Ms Robbins for all of the effort that went into this publication, it seems to be a great guide. (<3 Amazon search inside.) We're proud that Calla was chosen.

And much congratulations go out to everyone else who was included in this book! It's so exciting to see so many fabulous creators receive mention!

/me is a total geek and ordered her copy today.

New Group Option for Calla Update Group!

We've been awfully quiet lately and I'm starting to feel guilty. So here I am! There is stuff going on behind the scenes at Calla. We are here, I promise. We're just knee deep in gift certificates. (We were previously up to our eyeballs, so this is an improvement!)

One of the things we're working on, and I am quite excited about this, is a new group alternative!

Please let me be clear: THIS DOES, NOT NOR WILL IT EVER, REPLACE OUR IN-WORLD GROUP!

We love our group, and have some of the best girls (and some guys) ever. We really enjoy the chats which usually spiral out of control into a completely hysterical laugh fest. So, if you enjoy the craziness that is our group never fear, group chat is not going anywhere!

But if you're like the rest of us and shuffle groups around to get notices and info and goodies, or you just don't want the chatter, we're hoping this helps!

We're trying something a little different than the Subscribe-o-Matic. This doesn't make you find a terminal, but rather it's a HUD that you can attach anywhere. It looks like this:



The "Subscribe" and "Unsubscribe" buttons do just that. If you subscribe, it will send you the group notice as an IM. If you unsubscribe the only time it will talk to you is when you attach it.

The big button in the middle will have different functions, but basically you click it and get something! That's the one that will give you whatever group gifts, notecards, LM's, blog links, etc that we send out.

We will be asking for your feedback, though. We want to make sure it works as well for you, and for us as we think it will.

You can pick one up in the lobby of our main store. Just find the HUD in the lobby near the entrance (I promise to make it big enough to see) and buy it for L$0. We will also be sending one out via our group notices, so you can get it there, too.

Happy Birthday Haedon!

Today is Haedon's RL birthday! But don't tell her I told you. Like I told our group, she loves to get note cards. Read her profile! She asks for them! Please send her lots of birthday wishes via note card. Those fill her inventory up pretty fast. Plus with the capped IM situation, she'll be sure to get your messages if you do a note card.

And now I get to gush for a minute. Hae, you're the most awesome person I know. You're my best friend in the whole world and I'm so, so glad I have you in my life. You're the one person I know is going to be there no matter what, and that is priceless. This day is a celebration of you, and you so deserve it. I hope you have a hundred more, 'cause I'm gonna need you at least that long (you know, until I figure out the whole flexi match up thing). I am so blessed by our friendship and I love you so much. Happy birthday!

If I could, I'd make sure you had doritos and coffee in bed served by a naked butler every morning. (You know the ones.) Since those butlers are over in England someplace...



Don't worry, it was really good.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! <3!

IM IN UR BLAWG TELLIN UR OTHER PEEPZ!

Merry Christmas!

I just wanted to wish you all a wonderful Christmas. May the coming year bring you joy and happiness, and all the things you hold most dear.

I'll refrain from getting too sappy...Santa still has stockings to fill and cookies to eat. I'm glad to have so many fabulous people in my life. You each bring your own magic to my days, and I wouldn't trade that for anything. I hope that I'm able to return that gift to you.

Gifts, Holiday Hunt and Ltd Edition Colors!

There are lots of exciting things at Calla this weekend! There is a Holiday Hunt going on. Hidden in the store and around the island are 25 gift boxes. Yes, I know the ones we did last year were tiny and you all got eye strain. This year, Haedon took mercy on you and made them bigger. There are men's as well as women's gifts! Find the boxes and buy them for L$0!

Under the Christmas tree in the lobby are two boxes. They are wrapped in the Calla logo wrapping paper. One has green ribbons and one has umm...shoot I forgot, I think white ribbon. (Maybe red. I'm not logged in or I'd double check.) There are Holiday Edition Mega Packs of Pine and Larch. They are both shown below!



There are also 19 other styles available in the limited Holidays Packs. These will only be available for sale through Christmas Day.





And finally, a special present for our group members. Need a kiss? Be sure to grab this. If you didn't get the notice, check the group information for 12-21.



Happy Holidays, and a very Merry Christmas from both of us!

Much love,
The Calla Girls

New Shapes!

Each shape is shown with 10 different skins, as well as the Free skin that is included. There is also a note card with each shape that contains all the skin information for the skins shown, as well as landmarks to each store.

Demos are available in store. We are also offering two versions, a copy/mod/no trans as well as a no copy/no mod/trans.

Clicky pictures for a better look!

Have you got the time?

New jewelries @ Calla. Pocket Watch necklaces! They are transfer only, so you can gift them if you'd like. At the bottom of the display is a red gift box that you can take, and pack them into so you can give it to someone in a pretty box. Or put it under the tree!
(Or keep it for yourself whoo hoo!!)

Gift Certificates 50% Off!

From now until December 25th, you can get Calla Gift Certificates for half price! You will see displays through the store. All certificate amounts are included as well as a special 2000L Certificate!

Four More @ Calla

Hiya peoples. Four more new releases at Calla. Here's some pictures! I hope you like them. Available at Calla's Main Store (you know... when the grids up and all)














And just cause I really liked it when I was messing around, I decided the mistletoe would have a special two-tone pack. There's 10 colours in there!:

Four New to finish up the weekend!

Brand new, and in the lobby at Calla!



Chestnut Tree - In trying to come up with some holiday flowers, I kept singing "Chestnuts roasting by an open fire..." and this became Chestnut Tree. It's the perfect look for bundling up in a blanket with a good book (or a good man if you find one) by a fire while the snow falls outside. Color change hair clip, and flexi pieces!



Christmas Rose - This is a flower that only blooms this time of year. It doesn't look much like a rose, but rather this pretty little flower that comes with the style as an optional chin attachment. The flower is not color change. This hair is really cute, and has a little bit of subtle flexi movement.



Lavender - It's not a seasonal flower, but it's been giving me an ulcer for weeks, so here it is. I keep thinking it needs different bangs, but then I keep liking these. Maybe it's one of those either you love it or you don't ones. Who knows. Anyway, there it is.



Poinsettia - Last but not least, this comes with the poinsettia flower you see in the back as an optional chin attachment. It is not color change, because poinsettia's are pretty much red. I actually made the petal and leaf textures the color you see, so it is not really colorable. This is perfect for the holidays. It goes fabulous with a sweater and jeans, or with an elegant gown. The movement makes it great for dancing or ice skating. I've put a bug in Eolande's ear (not that it took very much) to make something for it to wear in place of the poinsettia after the holidays, but it also looks good without the flower!

Hae's Eight..

Ok so, I didn't wanna do this. But for some strange reason I started to feel guilty about it. I was tagged by Marleen, and Truth... I think that's it. I hope that's it anyway. So here goes:

The rules are:
1. Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged need to write a post on their own blog (about their eight things) and post these rules.
3. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
4. Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them they are tagged, and to read your blog.


1. When I was in Kindergarten, our class got a brand new piano. During nap time I chose to sleep under it with my cousin who was in the same class. She dared me to carve my name into one of the legs with a paper clip. I did. My whole name, first and last. When I was done, she got up and told on me.

2. I'm an insomniac.. But when I finally do sleep, I can sleep anywhere. Through anything. It's just the falling asleep part I can't get down.

3. I have 1g plugs in my earlobes. Some people don't know what those are, so here's a helpful picture of someone with them. Mine are smaller than that though, as I tried to stay on the girly side rather than the gross side. I like to stick pens through them and jiggle them around while I fill out forms at the doctors office.

4. I can juggle up to 6 objects at once, but nothing bigger than an orange.

5. I can't do basic math without counting on my fingers. I can do multiplication, and division and fractions ffs.. But ask me what 8 + 7 is and you'll see my fingers wiggle.

6. I write erotic short stories.

7. I like traffic. But only when I'm alone in my car. It gives me time to relax and sing as loud as I want to.

8. One of my 8 facts.. is a lie.

I'm going to tag.. the entire Calla Update Group! Cause I can :D If you don't have a blog, feel free to do it in the comments to this post.
~Hae

Randomness

I must confess. I did my best to ignore all the tagging going on and wasn't going to participate. Then I kept reading all these things about people that I know, or admired, or hadn't really heard of before, and I've really enjoyed getting to know a little more about the people behind the names. To all of you who really didn't want to but did anyway, thanks.

I've had a few rough RL days this week. I was going through the feeds and saw this from GirlWonder Speaks. I absolutely loved the video and it really touched me.

Yesterday morning I logged in and decided to do a little wandering around to grab some of the awesome goodies everyone's giving away and on my list of places to go was Reaction. So I TP'd over and was bombarded by hug pop ups! Not one to turn down a hug, I said yes. I was still rezzing and was being hugged by people I didn't even see! I only went to get a freebie from under the tree (which I completely forgot about) and ended up making several friends. That group of people can't possibly have any idea how much their hugs meant to me. I asked for a sign after a while and headed back to Calla to maybe share some of the love. If just a hug could help me after the last few days I'd had, I was sure going to pass it along to someone else!

Rad and the rest of the folks who'd been over at Reaction came to Calla, signs in hand and we all stood around and tried to hug. I was really, really surprised by the number of people who said no. After a few, it was pretty depressing. My chat looked something like this:

Kitten has declined your hug.
britany has declined your hug.
Zazza has declined your hug.
Lola has declined your hug.
Ayano has declined your hug.
Libertine has declined your hug.
relea has declined your hug.
Shangreloo has declined your hug.
dani has declined your hug.
Lynd has declined your hug.
Valle has declined your hug.
Lang3 has declined your hug.
nadia has declined your hug.
Enchanteddreams has declined your hug.
Hayato has declined your hug.
Ahdri has declined your hug.
Lorelei has declined your hug.
Foxie has declined your hug.

I was quite relieved that 2 of the 3 of the Callatropians to come through did hug me.

But overall, it was a very different experience than what I'd had over at Reaction. It took me an hour and a half to get a dozen hugs at Calla. I even put out a big sign that opens the video url and passes a "FREE HUGS" sign.

I gotta say, I'm a little disappointed. I totally understand rejecting a kiss, or something of that nature. But a hug? Come on people!

I encourage you, if you see someone with a free hug sign, give them a yes. Stop by Calla and get a free sign of your own. If you see someone that just looks like they might need a hug, offer one. Sometimes, a little thing like a virtual hug can make a really big difference in someone's day.

Tagged dang it

I always sucked at running. I've been tagged by Nef and Nicky.

Rules:
(1) Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
(2) People who are tagged need to write a post on their own blog (about their eight things) and post these rules.
(3) At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.(4) Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them they're tagged, and to read your blog.

1. I feel guilty drinking coffee but I do it and love it anyway.

2. I have a horse in my backyard.

3. I hate summer.

4. I didn't graduate high school because I failed AP Govt.

5. I don't like Coke or Pepsi, and yes I can tell the difference.

6. I have six kids, two of which were born at home without medical assistance, on purpose.

7. I can't eat anything that looks like it may have been alive at some point.

8. I miss being able to chew gum.

And in the spirit of giving others this fabulous pleasure, I'm tagging:

Eolande
Soda Domela
Betty Barracuda
Janie Marlowe
Nyte
Ariel Black
Arabeth
Julia Soothsayer