Gesture Zone: More Than Just A Store

by Kavella Maa | March 4, 2010 | One comment

The Gesture Zone sells… wait for it… gestures. But what are gestures, you may ask? Sit right back and I’ll tell you. Gestures are hot-key macros that cause your avatar to holler something putatively amusing while, possibly, perfoming some animation or other. If you’ve ever seen your Local Chat explode in asterisks and swirlies that interrupt any reasonable attempt at conversation while your speakers emit a truly atrocious and unintelligible chipmunk howl, that, my friends, is what Second Life calls a “gesture.”

OK, so, maybe I’m not the right person to explain the subject. I admit, I think they’re an abomination, individually and collectively. But maybe you like them. If so, you’ll want to go shopping at Gesture Zone, because they have a lot of them. Gestures based on movie stars’ catch phrases, on rock ‘n rollers’ songs and presentations, on cartoon characters’ and comedians’ punchlines, and so on and so forth.

There’s evidently a huge market for gestures. Gesture Zone is doing good business. I mean, they must. They can afford to pay the best camping rates I’ve seen recently (L$2 per 10 minutes, no daily limit) on three dance pads, two bar stools, two janitorial stations, and a bartender in a pear tree. All those Lindens gotta come from somewhere, right? Bets are on either the Homer Simpson or the Wang Chung gestures.

Gesture Zone contrives to be more than simply a store. Not only has it dance pads, 80s music, contests and a sploder ball, but it’s got a pretty little park outside with lots of pose balls for couples all over: candelit dinner up in the tree house, gazing into each other’s eyes over a picnic table, snuggling on the lawn swing, dancing on the top of a koi pool, etc. And in the category of “Um, sure, why not?” there’s a free shooting range, virtual gold area, and teleporter to bumper cars in a related skybox. Gesture Zone isn’t just a store; it’s a destination.

Speaking of pose balls: Why the crap does Second Life have to be so very heteronormative? Seriously: every couples’ pose ball I have ever seen consists of a blue one for the guy, clearly labeled as such, and a pink one for the gal, clearly labeled as such. “Kiss” and “Kiss her.” “Him” and “Her.” “Mal” and “Fem”. “Swing – M” and “Swing – F”. Really, it’s worse than simply presuming that every couple is a heterosexual couple. It’s effing traditional gender roles enshrined in Tender Romantic Animations. Seriously. If there is a more “active” participant in the sexual interaction, and a more “passive” one–like, say, when spooning, one avatar is on the outside encircling the other; or, while kissing, one avatar gets kissed and the other does the kissing–guess which one is labeled as “male.” Go ahead. You get two guesses and the first doesn’t count.

Look. Second Life, Linden Labs, this isn’t hard. You label the pose balls “Kiss” and “Be Kissed,” or “Spoon – inner” and “Spoon – outer”, or “Waltz – lead” and “Waltz – follow,” and don’t make any freaking assumptions about which gender identity does what! And you don’t color the pose balls blue and pink, FFS.

Actually, there’s a pose ball at Gesture Zone that’s even worse. Go inside the store, walk past the camping zone, and you’ll find a sort of waiting lounge area in front of a big corporate-looking desk. Like this:

The pose ball associated with that chair I’m in? It says “Man Sitting.” Because even though we’re a decade into the 21st century and we have fancy hi-tech virtual worlds to play in, we can’t have female high-powered corporate exec roles in our pixelated let’s pretend land. Especially not in an open-style legs-crossed position. No, that would fly in the face of God and Country! Now get in the kitchen, and bake me a pie, woman! And keep your knees together while you do it!

*sigh* At least the “Man Sitting” pose ball is pink.

Anyway, I don’t want to end this blog post by dumping on Second Life or Gesture Zone. Gesture Zone especially. The owner, Bree Toocool, is no absentee manager. She keeps changing the place around and soliciting feedback from her customers. She’s been editing the camping zone especially. As I wrote this post, she was conversing with a customer who complained that the dance pads and bar stools were susceptible to pushing (one person could push the other off). They discussed possibilities to fix that, and then she derezzed one of the dance pads and replaced it with the two janitorial duty camp stations, joking that “we’ll make you work for your money!” And when, last week, the dance pads stopped paying out like they should, she put up a big sign warning patrons of the malfunction. When she got them working again, she didn’t just take down the sign but sent out a Group Notice letting everyone know.

Oh, look, she’s just rezzed a big box that says “Camping Ladder.” I’m not entirely sure what comes out of the box; presumably it’s a ladder, and–ah. Yes. You stand on it and “clean windows.” Excellent.

My point being: With this kind of owner participation, Gesture Zone patrons are clearly in good hands. If you put a suggestion in the “Suggest Gestures you want!” box, you can be sure Bree will read it promptly. That there’s more than I can say about a lot of SL sims, folks.

Oh look, now she’s putting in a trivia ball…