Paulius Designs Goes Hi-Tech!

(Click the picture for a larger view...and yes, that is me standing next to the ad)

(This will be of little interest to many of you, but quite frankly, I just need someone to gloat/brag to).

Until recently, my Second Life business was run using freebie hardware.

Here’s how it worked:

Essentially, I had a box. I put my clothing into this box along with a picture of each item. People would look at the box, click an arrow on it to scroll through the different items, and pay the box, which would give them their item and pay me.

Clunky, you could only see one item at a time, and it meant I had to wander around and update each of my three locations separately.

Today, I got the real shit.

Let me explain this thing…because I’m inexplicably proud of it.

Now, when you walk into my store, you see the equivalent of a gigantic plasma screen, showing up to 16 items at once, tiled on the screen. You click one, and in the blink of an eye, the item dills the whole screen. You can even click a button on the screen, and it’ll give you a notecard explaining the item.

Best thing?

Networked.

I have a server. I put my new items in it, and at the click of a mouse, every single one of my stores updates at the same time.

Actually, that’s the second best thing. With my old freebie vendor, the only way I could tell if anything had sold is by looking at my cash balance before I logged off, and seeing if it had increased when I logged back in. I could see that someone had bought something, but not where they got it, or what they'd actually bought.

The new vendor not only sends me an instant message, letting me know who bought something, where they bought it, and what they bought…I can also set it to send my an email with that same information.

There is one downside. It’s a minor, petty little thing…but just to take that big business, hi-tech sheen off the whole operation…where am I keeping my server?

In one of the secure server storage facilities dotted around Second Life? In a deep, bomb-proof cellar, beneath one of the malls my store is located in?

Nope.

It’s sitting on top of Sunny’s fridge, in her Second Life cottage.

Heheheheh…I’m big business now, but I’m still a cottage industy.