Five Quick Tips to Enhance Your Second-Life Experience

The following is a transcript of "Traveling Avatar's Quick and Dirty Tips for a Richer Life," a podcast from QuickAndDirtyTips.com. The audio program is available via RSS feed here and at TheStreet.com's podcast home page.

Will Ross here. Welcome to The Traveling Avatar's Quick and Dirty tips for a Better Second Life. On this show we discuss tips and tricks for the game Second Life, created by Linden Labs.

Photos: Make the Prim a Light Source

One: When creating pictures for your Second Life home using snapshots, consider turning the prim into a light source to make the image look better. To do this open the edit menu and go to the "Features" tab, then check "Light" to make the prim a light source. I usually set the intensity to around 0.7 because it gives the colors nice pop without whiting out the image. (Imagine a television with the brightness or contrast set too high.) This will eliminate dull, hard-to-see pictures, and give them a pretty cool glow, too.

Photos: Change Permissions to Prevent Meddling

Two: When sending photos by texture that are intended for the recipient only, change the texture permissions to no transfer, no copy, no modify to make sure your image doesn't get passed around. There are rarely good reasons to copy, transfer, or modify a personal photo. And before you send that texture, take a listen to my episode on safety, and use good common sense. Once it leaves your computer it's gone forever, and textures can be places out in the open, on billboards, and in profiles for all the world to see. There are some things you don't want to become famous for.