Monthly Archives: May 2014

200,000 views….thank you!

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Public domain image, royalty free stock photo from www.public-domain-image.com

 

We’ve just passed the 200,000 views mark, in around two and a half years of SLN existing.

Considering it’s a niche lifestyle blog related to a niche online game, it’s hard to fathom that a blog that began getting 5 or 10 views a week in its earliest days has, in recent months, averaged around 10,000 views a month!

Clearly these aren’t Gangnam Style youtube style figures, but if you’d said to me two and a half years ago that we’d have viewing figures of 20,000 I’d have been shocked and thrilled.

We can’t do it without you, the readers. I, and the rest of the staff, would like to thank each and every one of you for your continued support and just say that we’re committed to bringing you the best naturist news from around the SL grid in the future. It’s not a numbers game. We strive to bring you the best writing, photos and news related to the naturist lifestyle within Second Life.

We’ve achieved almost global coverage in that time. Iran, China and central Africa are the only locations on earth that there hasn’t been some sort or SLN presence.

My grateful thanks to all of you.

 

Ella.

Scout Willis and her topless protest against Instagram

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I don’t have time for social media. By that, of course, I mean I don’t have an appetite for it, not a lack of minutes.

I don’t do Facebook (and in fact actively loathe it), and I don’t do Twitter or Instagram or any of those other ones. One, because I don’t trust them in terms of data privacy concerns (there’s no such thing as a free lunch, remember?) and two, Facebook in particular is an example of no moral compass being applied. No? Some time back FB was permitting videos of beheadings, but refusing to permit nudity of any description, including breastfeeding photos. Now, I don’t know what your definition of ‘harmful content’ is, but in mine I think it’s more harmful that children, young adults, the over-sensitive and vulnerable can readily view graphic violence while a very natural part of the post-childbirth months is banned.

Don’t imagine I’m preaching a case for nudity here. I’m not clamouring for the opportunity to be faced with breasts every time I might open up Facebook. I understand why they might not wish to open up a legal can of worms by all manner of ‘revenge’ photos being uploaded to it. I quite understand that may be the thinking and policy. But do I want to entrust my data with someone who can’t differentiate between the morality of video beheadings and a proud mother feeding her new-born child?

And so I steer clear of them all, primarily on the ‘data privacy’ issue, as I say. Bare boobs are essentially neither here nor there. Besides, does anyone really want to know I’m having spinach for dinner? I don’t think that qualifies as ‘news’ even from interesting people.

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Scout Willis, daughter of Demi Moore and Bruce Willis, decided this week to protest against Instagram’s bar on nipples by taking to Twitter (I think I’ve got that the right way around…all of these social media outlets blur into one big mess of narcissism after a while) and wandering around the Lower East Side topless. ‘Legal in New York, but not on Instagram’, she said. Which is a silly state of affairs when you think about it.

Of course, the protest is, in itself, a bit silly, all a bit ‘First World problems’, aka ‘White Whine‘. If she’d been protesting about the oppression of women in other locations around the world, using the obvious magnet of bare boobs to draw in an audience to highlight rape, female genital mutilation, starvation or something else….fair enough. But to be protesting against, well, the well established policies of a social media outlet -however silly those policies may be- is silly in itself.

Ella.

 

 

The Citroen H Van and French chic

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In the town near where I live, there’s a very nice guy who has set up a mobile cafe from a van like this…a Citroen H van, apparently. I had to look that up, as I didn’t know the name, but it has been something that has been lodged in my head as being as quintessentially French as croissants or brie. In my mid teens, I was something of a Francophile, reading Sartre and hoovering up 1960s films by the nouvelle vague directors, films which almost invariably included a van like this. It all seemed so chic, so Parisian.

Later, I’d get to experience Paris first hand, and sit in Left Bank cafes still reading Sartre, drinking wine and, for a short time, smoking Gauloises or Gitanes cigarettes.

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I’ve visited Paris so many times now I’ve lost count, as well as visiting other parts of the country both as a ‘textile’ tourist and naturist holiday maker. J’adore France…as they say.

When I cycle into town I now invariably buy a cup of coffee from the man with the H van because of the van! It just summons up something familiar and warming, for me.

Imagine my delight, then, when Diane came back from a photoshoot that included photos of an SL H van . Excited? Yes, I am.

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Incidentally, the name of the town on the side of it, Frontignan, is a real world place that I’ve been to! It’s just along the coast from Cap D’Agde, and I’ve also stayed at a campsite called Camping le Sérignan-Plage Nature, visiting Frontignan on both occasions I’ve stayed nearby. So by some weird SL synchronicity, it’s perhaps appropriate that Diane, by chance, just happened to have undertaken the shoot that she did.

Ella

 

 

Lupe’s: an update after the publication of the Issuu Guide.

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As is often our practice, I’d sent out message to Lupe in advance of us publishing the Issuu Guide you can find here.

As is also often the practice, Lupe’s commitment to real life ™ meant that he didn’t get back to me in time, and thus his own comments weren’t included in that Guide. However, I’ve now received a note from him and I’m happy to provide an update on all-things-Lupian, if I can phrase it thus.

As many of you will know, there’s a membership fee applicable at Lupe’s, and it’s only there, Lupe says, is ‘to defer the constant attacks from griefers and spoilers’. I understand exactly. We’ve all experience them, particularly within naturist settings in SL. Thankfully, this isn’t an issue in RL naturism!

Lupe continues, ‘We have always endeavored to make the sims as naturalist as possible’, and there can’t be any of us who don’t marvel at the views and vistas it offers. With regard to the membership scheme, Lupe says that ‘does not seem to have deterred anyone joining and does help the peaceful ambience thats members always comment on.’

I asked Lupe about his plans for the future. ‘We operate regular open days at Lupes and (sister sim) Sweet Rhapsody is permanently free to all for the moment. So if you want a naturalistically beautiful sim and some peace then take at look at ours. Sweet Rhapsody is more than worth a visit – we have regular comps and events at both sims.’

 

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So there’s the very latest from Lupe’s. Be sure to drop by and have a look around this gloriously wild, natural haven of peace and tranquility.

 

Ella

Naked Catwalk (2 of 2)

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Following on from Naked Catwalk Part 1, I turned my attention to the use of nudity as part of fashion (it seems that it’s currently ‘in’).

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My research showed, however, that there isn’t much in the way of sexual equality on the catwalk. I could only find one example of male nudity (clearly taken at the same show as the one in which Sophia Cahill appeared naked and pregnant)

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So to redress the balance, a little, and virtually, I asked Diane if she could at least have a male model striding his way up and down the catwalk. 🙂

Barbara

Naked Catwalk (1 of 2)

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Forgive me for not being ‘up to date’, but I wasn’t aware of this story until last week, when I happened to find a copy of the paper, eighteen months old now, yellowed and dirty, lining a box in which I’d stored some things in my greenhouse. Naturally I was intrigued, so a little internet reading, a call to Diana to find a model, and a week or so later, here we are!

Nudity, it seems, is now part of ‘fashion’. We do keep telling you, your birthday suit the best fitting, most enduring suit you’ll ever own! One that will never go out of fashion (as a trawl through the annals of Art History will prove).

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Yes, it’s a lovely young woman called Sophia Cahill,  a model and former Miss Wales, treading the catwalk while heavily pregnant. And gorgeous she looks too.

The internet is terrific, with the capability to read several different perspectives with the benefit of eighteen months distance, and thus read those supportive of her appearance, and some against it, largely miaowing, claws drawn ‘feminists’ who write in a poisonous manner for many of the UK’s newspapers.

My mind turned to how we might replicate this in Second Life, and so Diane rounded up a model who was willing to be photographed ‘pregnant’ (there’s no virtual pregnancy or Mama Allpa hud thing going on here, the model simply adjusted her figure to suit…in case you were wondering).

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As with Sophia Cahill, our model has chosen to model a hat.

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It must be said that long after any dresses that were worn at the show are forgotten (or more accurately, fallen out of fashion) Sophia’s beautiful appearance on the catwalk, normalising nudity, normalising pregnancy, normalising naked pregnancy, will be remembered.

Barbara

‘Never run in the rain with your socks on’

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I was out and about doing photo shoots for SLN over the weekend, and chanced upon the H220 sim, a dark, rainy location ideal for photography.

‘Never run in the rain with your socks on’, as the sim builders say of it. If that’s not a challenge, I don’t know what is.

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The photo hasn’t been re-touched. This is the default light setting at H220, and it’s all rather dramatic, foreboding and atmospheric. I love it!

Diana.

 

(Ella adds: This post was in my inbox this morning, and seems entirely appropriate for today, a British Bank Holiday. Yes, it’s raining where I am. That’s not to criticise. I’ve already been out in a soft drizzle this morning, and it was perfect for talking a leisurely walk through the park with only the odd, hardy dog-walker and jogger around).

Harry’s Gallery: an update

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I’ve persuaded Harry to not do a ‘grand opening’ of his gallery until next weekend, for the simple reason that I’ve talked him into doing a ‘catalogue’ of the various photos on display there. You can still visit it in the meantime, but in keeping with real life, a catalogue of the pictures displayed might be a useful addition, probably available through our new favourite toy, Issuu.

I’m pleased to say that the guides have taken off like a rocket! 🙂

It rather appears that the vast majority of visitors have clicked through to view the guides, judging by the stats I can see, so thanks for your support.

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Ella

 

 

Naturist Evening Wear

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From time to time I see items of clothing that readily lend themselves to the naturist lifestyle. Lady naturists do love to dress up in the evening (I must be an exception, regarding a skirt and tank as more than adequate clothing for going to a restaurant) to the point where you imagine they’ll have packed more clothing than a lady going on a conventional textile holiday will have done!

Blue Couture is currently offering a lace dress. Now, in its planned version, there’s an under-slip that hides everything, but I immediately saw the potential in taking off the alpha layer and under-petticoat to produce a racier version. I can readily imagine the ladies of Cap D’Agde going out for dinner dressed thus.

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The black lingerie is from my inventory and not part of the set. I’ve added them to produce a more modest, but still ‘racy’ look to the dress.

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Once the lingerie was removed, the lace dress itself proves itself to be rather more revealing. Incidentally, the lace had the odd effect of making my…er..’lady garden’ seem as though it wasn’t there, despite it being worn. 

So there you have it! If any of you SL lady naturists are going out for dinner or dancing in something a bit daring, then this dress may well be for you! It’s at Blue Couture and is a L$0 group gift (there’s no group joining fee).

Ella.

 

Harry’s Gallery at Nude Haven

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Hi! I’ve opened a small gallery at Nude Haven, which will hopefully fill up with downloadable images over the weekend. I’ve been planning to open a gallery for some time now, and the opportunity to do it on an urban, naturist sim was one that was too good to pass up.harry studio2_001b

I hope to have the permissions set so that visitors can ‘buy’ (i.e. L$0) anything they like. Items that can be bought will be on the walls, with other photographs on easels around the gallery. Essentially, if it’s on an easel, but you’d like it as something to hang on your apartment wall…ask! 🙂

I’m still working at it, and it’s going to take me most of Sunday to ‘crack’ how to do it all correctly (never having built anything before), but I hope to have it filled up by tomorrow night (at least to my prim limit! 🙂 ).

Please! Stop by! The plan is to run it for a month, and probably rotate the photographs from time to time. Free they may be, but prints are usually done in ‘limited runs’, so once it’s gone, it’s gone! Not even fistfuls of Linden dollars will bring them back once I change them. So please bookmark the gallery and keep checking back.

Thanks for your support.

Harry