In his first life, Yadni Monde is a night clerk in a hotel in a secluded corner of France, but in his Second Life ™ he is the baddest architect on the grid. With an imagination fueled by a massive library of classical and fantasy architecture and copious amounts of ganga, he doesn’t just build buildings, but astounding, richly textured dreamscapes – and in some cases, nightmarescapes. Today we bring you the first of a 4 part interview with Yadni, in this installment touching on his history in SL and how the Linden’s recent purging of 6 month old ratings screw the true builders and favor the club owners like Jenna Fairplay that build giant fugly boxes. InYadni’s words, the ratings have become “crappy shit for dancing whores.’ Sacre bleu!
One of Yadni's latest builds -- the entire Bedford Simulator
Urizenus Sklar: Yadni, when did you first come to Second Life?
YadNi Monde: i joined SL on the 30 of March 04
Urizenus Sklar: did you play other mmorpgs before that?
YadNi Monde: i am not online since very long, i tried A Tale In The Desert, where i had only in mind to build, already, which i did, btw, i created a Colossus Statue of Pharaoh
YadNi Monde: then i migrated to there where i was the Permazoners Leader for a while and i had this Gnome Hill on NAda Island, you can still see the pic from time to time on the There.com Site
Urizenus Sklar: did you start building right away when you came to sl?
YadNi Monde: when i first arrived to SL, my first idea was to understand how it worked , so i wandered all the world in search of my first freebies to edit them and KNOW =D
Urizenus Sklar: for how long did you wander?
YadNi Monde: heheh, i guess after three days, when i got my very first land, i had to settle a bit
Urizenus Sklar: is that when you started the junkyard?
YadNi Monde: yes, at that time, no place was having such an organization, and when i came to organize all that stuff, i thought other people might like to have clean folders as i had now, so i created my first boxes and opened very fast
Urizenus Sklar: you mean you made boxes with folders of freebee objects?
YadNi Monde: yes boxes, all with contents arranged by theme, for example, a box of vehicles, another with clothes, and so on, that sell contents and give a clean folder to the buyer, with NO EFFORT for him =D
Urizenus Sklar: and you sold these boxes or gave them away
YadNi Monde: decided to sell them a linden each, to cover the land fees, the time spent organising and hunting freebies all over the world, and eventually to have a chance to expand the junkyard to more than the basic 512 plot
Urizenus Sklar: When did you start your famous builds in second life?
YadNi Monde: i think it was around 15 days after i joined, when i made my very first Avatar, the Earth Dragon =D that was a real HIT =D
Urizenus Sklar: can I see it?
YadNi Monde: of course
YadNi Monde: My Very First Av =D
Urizenus Sklar: wow
YadNi Monde: then i declined it to fire dragon and water dragon, which is even more impressive
Urizenus Sklar: I know you live in France, but do you have a background in the arts?
YadNi Monde: yes i am an ex arts student, i am a stone sculptor, a drawer and a calligrapher for the most important things, i also have a very good knowledge base in computer graphics
Urizenus Sklar: Is that what you do for a job in your first life?
YadNi Monde: alas not, i am just a simple night receptionnist in a little hotel lost somewhere in a remote area in france, i tried, but dunno, bad luck prolly =D
Urizenus Sklar: That sounds rather romantic in a way.
Urizenus Sklar: Is the hotel in a nice part of France?
YadNi Monde: hehe hmmwell a bit frustrating too, but at least i m still free to do what i want with my arts
YadNi Monde: but yes it s in a nice part on summer =D for the rest, a bit rainy =D
Urizenus Sklar: Think of the expressionist painters...
YadNi Monde: poor guys never could feed themselves with their passion
YadNi Monde: waste
Urizenus Sklar: but anyway... back to your SL...
YadNi Monde: heheh kk
YadNi Monde: =D
Urizenus Sklar: when did you make your fist architectural build
YadNi Monde: hmmmm i guess it was for a contest at Edifice Rex Club by Lumiere Noir, i had made a gazebo and received an award for encouraging me to keep up, kinda fourth Prize, i still have it i am proud of that one =D
Urizenus Sklar: and that encouraged you to keep building?
YadNi Monde: oh i didn’t need that to encourage me but let s say it motivated me even more =D
Urizenus Sklar: so what was your next build
YadNi Monde: my next was a Castle for a Friend of mine here, Solace, want a pic or two?
Urizenus Sklar: you bet!
YadNi Monde: here s a little folder
Urizenus Sklar: ty
Urizenus Sklar: Question: where do you get your ideas for your builds?
YadNi Monde: heheh, in my very sick mind =D
Urizenus Sklar: lol, that always helps
YadNi Monde: lol
Urizenus Sklar: does "joint time" help too?
YadNi Monde: hmm i think i can say it does, for me at least, i can better concentrate, and with the appropriate music i simply feel free and begin to go wild, and build ... =D
Urizenus Sklar: do you get influence by pictures of ancient builds or pics from fantasy like Tolkein?
YadNi Monde: i have a very important library of my own with tons of books each one on another subject, can be furnitures from 1900s, medieval architecture, melee weapons, whatever is richly illustrated and detailed has to come to my home =D it s my real food i guess,
YadNi Monde: without em i d be empty and with no culture
YadNi Monde: 37 years feeding from all i can SEE
Urizenus Sklar: so these books, and a little herb, are your inspiration?
YadNi Monde: my personnal inspiration comes from beyond, those are helpers
Urizenus Sklar: from beyond?
YadNi Monde: they are my fuel
YadNi Monde: i see what I’ll build before to build it, in my head, behind my eyes, i know the mood it will have and i just have to drop it here
Urizenus Sklar: but do the ideas come from a spiritual dimension?
YadNi Monde: hmm frankly i don’t think so, they just come from my deep, i don’t see anything spiritual there i guess
YadNi Monde: more like if i had many worlds in me, just waiting to be showed
Urizenus Sklar: What about the textures? where do you find them and what inspires you to use the ones you do?
YadNi Monde: textures are generally given to me, or i can also get some on the web, or even create mine if none is good enuf for the purpose
YadNi Monde: depends
YadNi Monde: and then it s all a matter of the mood i want to translate
YadNi Monde: transmit
YadNi Monde: whatever =D
Urizenus Sklar: do you picture the textures in your head with the build, or do the textures come later
YadNi Monde: i know before to build if i have the good textures in my inventory or not, i know from the beginning the mood i want so i know what textures will fit it
Urizenus Sklar: we should probably turn now to the question of the new ratings system and the fact that they removed ratings from more than 6 months ago. You have views about this, yes?
YadNi Monde: well, just more room for clubbers =C damn it, clubbers in the builders leader boards that just KILLS me
YadNi Monde: shit licking pays, finally
YadNi Monde: i have already said my opinion in a latest thread in the forums and i m not afraid to make myself enemies here
Urizenus Sklar: Well why do you think the Lindens did this?
YadNi Monde: i guess they want the noobs to have a chance to reach the boards in the long term but, here s my question, how did I do then to reach place SECOND ? i began as a noob too, i took hundreds hours to build, i won my place the hard way
Urizenus Sklar: It is distressing that club owners like Big John Jade and Jenna Fairplay can erect a giant box and reach the leader boards of the build category.
YadNi Monde: rofl that makes me laugh out LOUD, but hah, after all, if some like that ...... *evily grins*
YadNi Monde: on the other hand they were giving a lot of money, there is a real effort so i guess it’s not that bad
Urizenus Sklar: but that just means they bought their way to the top of the leader boards
YadNi Monde: yes, you are right
Urizenus Sklar: What do you think the Lindens should do? Go back to the old policy?
YadNi Monde: i think to the point we are now, it would be simpler to just STOP the boards completely, it does not mean anything anymore, it is just crappy shit for dancing whores
Urizenus Sklar: so at this point the ratings only matter to dancing whores?
Urizenus Sklar: like Jenna Fairplay?
YadNi Monde: well if you see any other builder than me in the building leader boards, i have to change my glasses ....
Urizenus Sklar: Well, do you consider Big John Jade a dancing whore?
YadNi Monde: what else can he do ?? just remind me ?
Urizenus Sklar: he can build big boxes and manipulate newbies into being cyberho's for him
Urizenus Sklar: that's something.
YadNi Monde: that answers your question i guess
Urizenus Sklar: yah, I guess.
Urizenus Sklar: In the next two interviews we will cover Good Yadni, Bad Yadni, and Mystical Yadni, but those are about the three islands you build in simcast. What is your next project?
YadNi Monde: SciFi =D hard core dark cyberpunk SciFi =D
Urizenus Sklar: ooooh, where are you going to build? and do you have a sponsor?
YadNi Monde: cant answer the first yet, and yes we have a sponsor, were a little group of greatly motivated and skilled persons
Urizenus Sklar: does the group have a name?
YadNi Monde: YadNi s Crazy Techs Research Group
Urizenus Sklar: sweet
YadNi Monde: =D
Urizenus Sklar: well we better go to our meeting
Urizenus Sklar: 1 down, 3 interviews to go!
YadNi Monde: thanks to you, it was a pleasure
YadNi Monde: and bye bye reader, seeya next time =D
Internet buddhist sand art experiment, that's my view of this.
Posted by: cow_2001 | February 23, 2005 at 04:55 PM
Yadni...A legend in his own mind :P
Posted by: Me | February 24, 2005 at 01:50 PM
Seriously overrated. His builds aint nothing special at all, however wonderful he thinks he is.
Posted by: Pfft | March 07, 2005 at 07:02 AM
This guy sucks, you call THAT a good build? Its pathetic, I outdid him in 2 months of SL. You wanna interview some real builders, look for shop builders in big time places like C-tech, Crystal Studios, or any other big time shop. Heck, I have been a pro builder in SL for 2 years, check out my stuff, my Av is named TheEmperorsFinest Supermarine. I have some stuff done that will change your mind about great builders of sl.
Posted by: TheEmperorsFinest Supermarine | February 07, 2008 at 06:05 PM