I can almost hear the crackling pops as new virtual worlds suddenly appear in the static void of cyberspace. The megastar Second Life™ has a little competition; perhaps one day soon one of these new virtual worlds will entice Second Lifers to switch allegiances? Kzero recently provided some insights into the behavior of users in the post ‘Running the numbers: vSide’
It helps to follow the innovators, you can observe their mistakes and problems, and build something that improves upon their initial idea. ‘Followers’ frequently end up with a superior product, and the innovator finds themselves getting left behind, financially unable to justify investment in improvements. On the other hand, many followers are not necessarily improving upon the original vision of a product; they are just jumping on board the ‘band wagon’. But then, perhaps the fact there is a ‘band wagon’ means that a concept (in this case the concept of virtual worlds) has reached mainstream acceptance?
Looking through Truthseeker Young’s ‘threads’
The chuntering stage
When the first passenger train, the ‘Rocket’, was introduced to the public, sensationalists speculated that people would faint due to the high speeds the train could achieve compared to horses. There is always a sizable swathe of humanity that becomes very anxious when faced with innovative ideas and inventions. For example: planes were met with ‘If God had meant man to fly he would have given us wings.’ ‘Television will turn us into zombies’ or ‘Mobile phones will give everyone brain tumors’ etc.
Virtual worlds are in the midst of navigating their way through this chuntering stage as those who say ‘I just don’t get it’ are convinced that virtual world travelers are forgoing ‘real life’ for synthetic existence. Virtual worlds are gradually being recognized as a form of communications that can network us with others and information data. The Internet was created to share knowledge, and we are social animals who want to discuss what interests us. Hence the evolution of Web 2.0, with its social networking tools, enabling us to share conversations about quantum physics or Paris Hilton (or both at the same time if we are so inclined!)
The problem today is that there is so much information ‘out there’ we can easily begin to feel disconnected, even alienated. The more we conduct our business (both commercial and personal) in virtual space, the more abstract our work becomes. It feels harder to relate the different experiences of the concrete world with the synthetic world. But this is where the potential of 3D worlds lies. These synthetic worlds use the metaphor of the concrete world, and this metaphor can potentially help us relate to masses of information. That is, if we move into a 3D virtual space we can place ourselves within relationships to information and data (and each other). We can represent ideas in 3D creating an immersive virtual mind map.
I am taking classes at a university that recently published its class schedule purely online. Classes are now tucked away in a system of drop down menus and filters that sift through the classes for me. Seems a shame though! I miss reading what other departments are offering and feel caught in a linear ‘outline’ logic system that disconnects me from the bigger picture.
Entrance to the blue orb by Kolar Fall
Imagining 3D catalog / galleries
Now, imagine putting the catalog in a 3D environment. Each department would represent itself three dimensionally, could be a building, object or symbol, and the same for classes. I could wander into each department and explore its programs. For instance, I could walk into the business school and see what they are offering (prerequisites would float like balloons above the particular class). If I want to know more I can click on a class for an information note card. To sign up I click on an enroll button that takes me through to a registration page.
Imagine visiting other universities in the virtual world and taking a look at their catalogs in exhibition areas, or galleries. Class catalogs are a form of education, in and of themselves, as they introduce us to other disciplines and educational possibilities. A problem with academic institutions is that they constantly refine themselves into ever tighter discipline areas that fail to relate to each other. Ideas become vacuum packed and creativity decreases as the cross fertilization of ideas becomes increasingly difficult. Online class catalogs run the risk of extending this compartmentalization.
Inside the purple orb: Jopsy Pendragon’s ‘Seraphim Monument’
Information disconnect
We are putting more and more information online while simultaneously struggling to integrate and relate to this same information! When information loses its ‘tangibility’ (e.g, the paper based catalog) by becoming virtual, we feel we have symbolically lost something. However, we can come full circle and make the virtual information symbolically tangible by being able to directly relate to it within the 3D metaphor of the virtual world. With the financial pressures being placed upon businesses, non profits and academia more information is going to be published virtually. The sense of disconnect will increase with this remote placing of data. Virtual worlds have the potential to help us resolve this ‘lost in space’ experience of information anomie.
Inside the yellow orb: The Chakra Symphony by Brigitte Kungler
The next phase of virtual world development may well begin to provide us with this virtual 3D mind mapping environment, helping the data of our concrete worlds relate more naturally with the abstract data of cyberspace…
Communication technologies have been created to help us overcome the physical separation of distance. The measure of the success of these technologies revolves around how much we can create a sense of immediacy, and closeness to each other (despite the miles between us). If we can understand just what makes up social presence then we can deepen our understanding of ourselves, our minds and each other. I define social presence as ‘how much we experience others as breathing, thoughtful, emotional beings with whom we might share some degree of empathy’. (There are far more intellectual definitions of Social Presence Theory, I have simply created my own definition to reflect those aspects of SPT that interest me personally as a virtual world traveller.)
Detail of light sculpture by elros Tuominen
The illusion of compressed distance does not necessarily equate with a comfortable sensation. I am thinking of a friend who described using voice in Second Life to chat to the avatar of someone who lived in another country. She said she felt as though the person behind the avatar was in the same room, and it was scary because she had no idea who the other person was in reality.
Perhaps, today’s sophisticated technologies sometimes feel too real and immediate? Heightened reality is not necessarily what we want in our communications nor does it automatically provide strong social presence. Seeing and hearing each other does not immediately produce mutual understanding, as we all know from face to face situations! It may even be the case that we desire a little distance from each other’s physical, and social presence, to experience each other’s essential self or ‘essence’? That is, we want to get past the distractions of real world, skin deep, appearances to reach each other’s (more genuine?) inner self. As it is, we can determine our appearance as avatars in virtual worlds, then adjust them to represent selected aspects of ourselves. We seek different levels of reality for different situations, and avatars perhaps become an emotional expression of self? Maybe this is the reason why people have more than one avatar? Each avatar reflects different dimensions of our personality and can be selected for different situations? (A rubric cube of selves?)
Ivory Tower Library of Primitives (textures display detail)
When business people are wheeling and dealing they tend to trust conservative clothing and want to glimpse the whites of each others eyes. (As though that conveys a more honest interaction?) But what’s this? Businesses are making use of Second Life as a communication platform to use for virtual meetings. How do they dress their avatars I wonder? (Do they have the added pressure of being ‘known’ in the real world and so will they be judged by their avatar’s appearance in the virtual world?)
There was an interesting discussion recently on SLED’s listserv about how avatars should dress to be taken seriously by those who are ignorant of virtual worlds. One idea put forward was that (when introducing Second Life to *Sluggles) people could dress their avatars in something akin to interview suits for such occasions! Others felt this was not the solution, as avatars are a form of self expression and people should stay true to themselves! This conversation thread was the result of the funny (but could have been much funnier) sketch about Second Life users on the Jon Stewart Daily Show.
Appearance in the virtual world is becoming more significant as the numbers of avatars increase. (And don’t forget the ‘augmentalist v immersonalist’ debate!) Our avatars are unique communication devices in and of themselves. They are created by us in Second Life (and other virtual worlds) and acquire unique features turning them into a digitalized, yet strangely emotional, fingerprints of ourselves as we sit at our keyboards.
Neko avatar with butterfly wings and leopard skin spots in the grid!
At the same time as having their appearance constructed by us, our avatars become the medium of communication once we are inside our selected virtual world. Here we are, now able to mine down through layers of communication tools to end up with these personalized ‘speakers’. (The layers: personal computer via a modem; connects to a server; that runs a program; within which we create an individualized communication tool called an avatar; who can communicate with other avatars!) We talk about getting new skins for software applications, this metaphor of ‘skins’ comes full circle when we acquire virtual skins for avatars. The avatar becomes a personalized software device or communication application. Add into this picture the knowledge that, at this very moment, developers are creating ‘doors’ in virtual worlds which will enable us to walk from one virtual world into another using our personal avatars!
Maybe the next step will be to create avatar building software that has an embedded ‘degrees of reality’ dial in the preferences section? Then, according to our personal comfort levels, and different virtual environmental situations, we can adjust our avatar for any and every occasion in the metaverse!
Sluggles: Cyberloom’s description that borrows from J.K. Rowling’s ‘muggles’ to describe people who are ignorant or skeptical of how Second Life can be used as a communication platform.
Traveling through Sound Art created by Edo Autopoiesis. Location Harmonia
Second Life™ is a giant collaborative exercise where creative people make everything in the synthetic world. A great part of the magic is seeing all these different imaginative manifestations co-existing side by side. Lesser mortals, like myself, are tourists in Second Life; we travel around exploring, we are an audience that interacts with the creations around us. We are not passively sitting watching (as we would be in front of a television) instead we are moving through and are able to become part of the scene we see.
Listening to ‘Sound Art’ described by Edo Autopoiesis’ as ‘A sound installation resonating with Second Life wind’. Visit Edo’s (real name Edo Paulus) website to hear for yourself.
I may not be able to write computer scripts, design islands and houses but I can photograph what I find with my virtual camera. I can capture images of what I see in my computer monitor, and I can compose freely from what I see; and create my own visual relationship with the artificial space. I can’t do that when I watch a movie as my view of the scene is (by necessity) decided for me by the director. But in Second Life I feel I am photographing my imagination meshed in with the imagination of others around me.
Trickster avatar created by Max Hatfield swanning around Sound Art windmills.
I once spent weeks writing a paper about imagination and I got completely stuck trying to understand how I could see things in my mind’s eye. What was my mind’s eye? Where was it? How can I see images when I close my eyes? Where are those pictures lurking in my mind? It was not a productive line of thinking and I wrote some embarrassing rubbish for my paper! There is, I discovered a need to ‘walk upon the water’ sometimes. Don’t look too closely or you will sink, eyes up, look around and keep on going! Let imagination roll around, avoid constraining it with too much reason!
The Trickster again.
Second Life is shared imagination; it is a land where imaginative people share their far-fetched imaginations; and it is a random world of the possible, the improbable and the utterly impractical. The only difference between the virtual world and the real world, is that we know the virtual world is a metaphor.
‘Robots and Donuts’ is an exhibition of paintings by the artist Eric Joyner. This show, promoting his book of the same name, is on display at the Museum of Robots in Second Life. If you (like me) have always liked those archetypal robot figures of the 1950s and 1960s you will enjoy seeing this work.
Malfunction Bay
Eric Joyner’s robots have an endearingly mournful air. It is hard for a robot to smile and this exhibition shows how care worn a robot can be. Clearly they have many concerns, issues with anger management (see above) and feelings of despondency. I can understand this, not because I am a robot, or am I? (See Botgirl Lives for more on such musings). I was thinking more about a friend who came from a family of four boys. Their father loved clockwork, battery operated, and remote control toy robots giving each boy a number of robots to play with. One day the four boys were angry with their father, and made their entire robot collection walk the plank out of their bedroom window. They even managed to set some on fire before they took their walk into electromagnetic infinity. Eric Joyner’s robots know about these things, you can see it in their eyes.
In the background is the painting ‘The Usual Suspects’. In the foreground you can see Cyberloom (dressed up in her robotic party frock) spending rather too long chatting to two swivel chairs believing them to be distant relatives.
‘The Fog of War’ depicts a battle with 300 foot high donuts, the dreaded arch enemy of Joyner’s robots. Following my visit to the ‘Robots and Donuts’ exhibition I was intrigued to see this report on the BBC . This news segment shows the US military testing out a robotic suit, they have already spent “tens of millions of dollars on development…” For a moment I had a vision of America declaring war on giant donuts. Some health experts might even agree that the real ‘axis of evil’ is the American diet? I then began speculating on how big a donut we could make in reality? Say we took one busy Dunkin Donut shop and poured a week’s worth of batter into a giant deep fat fryer, how big would the donut be?
‘Weary Traveler’ depicts a beautiful scene with its glimpse into the virtual world of Joyner’s imagination. We see a robot napping close to the edge of a cliff… and realise we are the robots.
‘Mystical Serenity a romantic isle’ is the perfect location to experiment with the Second Life 1.20.0 platform update. This romantic and peaceful island has lots of water, big skies and beautiful trees.
I took these first 1.20.0 photographs using advanced settings in the environmental editor (under World in the top menu bar).
Advanced sky settings set to ‘Blue Midday’ and water set to ‘glassy’ producing a soft pastels look.
‘Fine Day’ with ‘distance’ and clouds adjusted for compositional effect
‘Fine Day’ once again. You can move the sun in an arc across the sky and watch the changes in lighting and shadow. It looks pretty amazing, like watching time lapse photography speeded up.
Pirate ship in the distance and ‘Foggy’ setting.
‘Mystical Serenity’ has nooks and cranies galore to explore, the picture above gives a glimpse of a small sandy beach with a treasure chest and camp fire. There are many surprises on the island, but I won’t give them away!
Cyberloom with baby dragons, this picture was taken using the previous viewer and now seems less 3D when compared to the pictures taken using the new viewer.
The updated viewer takes a while to get used to. It gives a huge range of choices for how your virtual world can appear. We may soon see an explosion of gaudy images emerging from Second Life! The pictures above are from my first experience with the viewer. The next thing is to find a good reason to render a ‘Valdez’ oil slick or ‘Second Plague’ water effect!
Some will feel overwhelmed by the range of choices now available, but they can always leave their settings on default, and avoid the learning curve. The biggest concern is the demand on computer resources, but if I understand correctly you can open preferences, and move all your graphics sliders down low (if your system is having problems). I suspect many people are going to be updating video cards and some may be buying new computers to handle the updated graphics demands.
Take a look at the Torley Linden YouTube tutorial (below) on setting graphic preferences if you want to know more.
May you find ‘Mystical Serenity’ with advanced settings! Oh… by the way this island looks gorgeous on any setting but its a great place to hang out and practice with your viewer!
Cyberloom has recently met a number of educators who express anxiety about the World Wide Web with its social networking sites and virtual worlds. They are particularly concerned by the stories they have heard about Second Life. This platform has many parallels with the early days of the internet, and like the internet is often portrayed as a haven of sex and debauchery. (At the very least, virtual worlds are seen as distractions taking students away from their studies.) There is no smoke without fire, but perhaps it is also the sign of a viable new communication system when the sex industry runs in to exploit it? And another indicator is when educators run in to exploit the same medium for educational purposes?
The history of Distance Education is a history of communication technology and as Michael Moore and Greg Kearsley say in their book Distance Education: A Systems View (2005) the Internet and World Wide Web provide Fifth Generation Distance Education. Moore and Kearsley suggest Correspondence Courses made up the First Generation, radio and television the Second; Open Universities the Third; and teleconferencing the Fourth Generation. I am sure I am not alone in thinking that Web 2.0 with podcasting, social networking, virtual worlds and virtual classrooms are Sixth Generation Distance Education? There are already a number of educational institutions working within Second Life and that number is steadily increasing. Take a look at Institutions and Organizations in Second Life to see a list of educational establishments and organizations already exploring this platform.
Now, by venturing into Second Life and returning with photographs for my blog I am participating in a long tradition of education through photography. Victorians took photographs of distant lands, science and nature then presented their images to genteel society as an early form of ‘edu-tainment’.
Cyberloom sitting on a coffee molecule at sunrise. (Location: Science Education Island Second Nature)
Perhaps my pictures and blog will help shift some preconceived notions? Hum… so does that mean Cyberloom could possibly be a form of edu-tainment for genteel bloggers? No… the truth is this genteel blog is edu-tainment for Cyberloom.
Trying out a dance pole in deep sea diving gear. Very aerobic exercise! (This place was a ruin before I started dancing I promise!) Location: Mystical Serenity a Romantic Isle
Relaxing on a surf board… paddling homewards. The weight of my diving gear is sinking the board… will Cyberloom survive?
Blued Food’s ‘genetica’ on show at Quadrapop Tree until April 14th
Memes propagate themselves and can move through a “culture” in a manner similar to the behavior of a virus. As a unit of cultural evolution, a meme in some ways resembles a gene. Richard Dawkins, in his book, The Selfish Gene, recounts how and why he coined the term meme to describe how one might extend Darwinian principles to explain the spread of ideas and cultural phenomena. Wikipedia
Cyberloom was asked to participate in a meme game by Sofian, editor in chief of Second Life At Hand.
Book meme 5:5:5 + poem
My instructions The meme to disseminate:
You take the fifth book (from the left or the right) on the fifth shelf (from top or from bottom) of your bookcase (if less than 5 shelves you go and buy a decent bookcase) and you find the fifth line of the fifth page from which you take the fifth word, that’s all.
In a second step you arrange the letters of this word vertically, so as each letter is the first letter of a verse, and you build a poem, an aphorism, whatever you like referring to Second Life.
Here is my first try with “The Usborne Book of World History” where I find at page 5 and line 5: “milk, wool and animals for carrying loads.”
The fifth word is “for” therefore my result is as follows:
Frightened of the griefers I often stay at home but sometimes
Overcoming my fear I dare to go shopping and buy
Ridiculous outfits that will stack in my inventory.
My contribution to this internet meme game of Web 2.0
The fifth book on my fifth shelf is ‘Eats, Shoots & Leaves’ by Lynne Truss. The fifth line on page 5 says: “Blair was stood” (instead of “standing”) we suck our…” Obviously not a complete sentence; however, it gives me ‘of’ to write as two lines of poetry… Well, I am not a poet and feel the need to camouflage my poor poetry by turning my lines into photo captions.
Orange bat clothes complete with wings, horns and hair
Fashion victim yet again! (blushing synthetically while you stare!)
Now I am meant to identify five others to play this game but I will confess something here. You know all the chain emails that make their way around the internet? The ones that say pass this email on to ten other people and you will receive $10,000 in the mail? Or, pass on this message and something really good will happen to you in three days time if you send this email to 16 others… Well, I am the one who breaks the chain. Sorry about that.
The idea of the meme is fascinating all the same. I recommend a visit to The Daily Meme, an evolving internet meme archive, with an incredible range of memes squirreled away for rainy day reading. After discovering the Daily Meme I began delving further into Google search, and found a surprising array of web sites devoted to the meme and memetics. To learn more explore the following sites: fusionanomaly and Meme Central.
Postscript
Having made my modest meme donation I see that Second Life At Hand wrote on April 1st:
Alors voila, j’ai décidé que j’allais arrêter ce blog, le fermer définitivement, en plus ça tombe plutôt bien avec les nouvelles restrictions™ que je suis bien incapable de circonvenir ou de respecter, avec tous les Second Life et Linden Lab dont j’ai truffé mes articles, comme autant de mines anti-personnel prêtes à me sauter à la figure à la moindre occasion…
Adieu monde cruel, tu ne me manqueras pas, j’ai ma pelouse à tondre et mes rosiers à tailler…
Crescent Moon Gallery currently has an exhibition of the work of Mr Light Waves / Starax Statosky the virtual world artist and sculptor. I went to visit with my virtual camera and recorded these pictures for Cyberloom.
Dragon by Starax Statosky
Ghostly Eagle by Light Waves
Lion by Light Waves
Touched by Starax Statosky
Goliath by Starax Statosky
Kong by Starax Statosky
Dialogue box for 3D building.
Alchemy?
As far as I understand it all the above sculptures were created using one of these dialogue boxes and all these creations only exist in the virtual world.
Rumsey Maps is a brilliant demonstration of how virtual and real worlds can intersect (or, as in this case overlay each other) to create something educationally richer than either world could provide independently.
Looking out from ‘Clouds Rest’ above Yosemite Valley (topographical map created in 1883).
David Rumsey’s Maps Island opened at the beginning of this year and I encourage you to visit NOT POSSIBLE IRL by Bettina Tizzy for an in-depth explanation of David Rumsey’s work (plus links to a slew of blogs who talk about this sim).
Closeup view of World Globe (1790) and Celestial Globe (1792)
David Rumsey set out to share his antique map collection by using the latest technologies to present them to the widest possible audience. There is an excellent video (about 30 minutes long) shown at his virtual museum in Second Life and on his website David Rumsey Map Collection. You can marvel at the work of creative cartographers and compare antique maps with their modern day counterparts (be prepared to be amazed). This web site is rich and multi layered and also provides what may be the classiest sign up point available for registering to enter Second Life.
An avatar seated upon an orrery inside the world globe
What is so special about maps? For one thing they hold a lot of information yet they can also be framed and displayed like works of art on the wall. Old maps are like old photographs recording the past yet adding another dimension to the present with insights into lost places and ancient memories. They hint at possibilities, unsolved mysteries even hidden treasures; showing us landscapes that existed before motorways hacked through hills and valleys to link up our sprawling car parks.
Virtual map reading wearing an explorer’s hat
Walking across the map of Yosemite Valley converted into a contoured landscape reminded me of making my way through snow (as it was white and dirty gray like real snow) and I was sinking into it. The difference of course is that names are not written across hills and valleys in our physical world, though there are times when this would be useful!
Cyberloom making her way along a river in Yosemite Valley
Crossing a landscape created from a map within a virtual world is thought provoking to say the least. For a start where is this virtual world located? In servers in California? In the 0,1’s of computer coding? In our imagination? Yet, we use maps in Second Life all the time to see if anyone is around, to find SLurls, so get a feel for our ‘location’ in relation to the virtual environment. We can visit in-world planetariums and fly amongst the stars and planets of outer space. And now, we can hike across old maps and stick a push pin into a world chart indicating our real world location.
A truly immersive experience… Cyberloom sinks up to her virtual hat in a virtual river
We have an instinctive need to locate ourselves. We want to identify our personal longitude and latitude in relation to whatever reality we find ourselves in. We take emotional and physical bearings and orientate ourselves to the people and objects that surround us. Part of the success of virtual worlds is due to their ability to provide a ‘place’ for us to position self and thoughts within abstract dimensions. Part of the success of maps is their ability to provide a ‘place’ for us to locate our physical self in relation to time and the landscape around us. And part of the success of Rumsey Maps Island is that it places us inside a metaphor with an x, y, z axial relationship to real experience.
