Why Doors On Hinges?

If we can have scripts that allow us to change properties of prims on doors, why do we make them so complicated by having them rotate, which involves rotating the prim and fixing that it moves ever so slightly over each time? Why not simply make a script that makes the door change texture from a door to alpha, and change properties from solid to phantom? Then people walk in and the door goes back to normal on a timer. Would someone who has free time (I can't WAIT to have some) get on that please?

Museum of the Real

A while ago, as I was building a replica of an Asian-inspired house, I was listening to Under the Radar (I think it was Episode #1) and Radar's conversation with Crap Mariner. Crap talked about his struggle to understand those who, when faced with the ability to create the incredible, choose to recreate the Real. And I thought, "Yeah man, WTF is up with THAT!" Then searched for the exact texture for a rice paper door I saw in a book.

So I'm still reading "The Emerging Geographies of Virtual Worlds" and Taylor talks about the desire to capture that which seems to be disappearing and allow others to experience it; or to create a space that one cannot be exposed to in the Real unless one is of a certain socio-economic background. He calls it the "Museum of the Real (Taylor, 1997, pg. 185)." So I think that's the answer. There is a desire to protect that which we lose or have what we can't in ROL (Rest of Life); yet, I'd much rather have an Asian style house that listens for the command, "Autobots! Transform!" and turns into a robot. *grin*

Modern Day Shamanism

While reading "The Emerging Geographies of Virtual Worlds" the author invoked the feeling that virtual worlds create a shamanistic quality by flying over virtual geographies (Taylor, 1997 pg. 185). That got me thinking about furries and their desire to transform themselves into wolves, tigers, etc. That's another example of the desire for a shaman like experience. Then I got thinking about how children are entertained by anthropomorphic characters: Mickey Mouse, Thundercats (Hooooo!), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and the list goes on and on. Even literature and religion use these to explain morales: Animal Farm, Jataka Tales, Aesop's Fables.

So what does it say about our culture, when we use anthropomorphic characters to entertain and teach morale issues, then expect people once they come of a certain age to "grow up?" I don't know the answer, but it gives me pause before I start getting pissed about stuff like this [NSFW](which still freaks me out, but I don't HATE on em now).

Challenges for Managers in Text-based Interactions

Even when using avatars, text-based interactions can be difficult. One often feels they need to be more and more precise with their words, which can filter out important emotive content that would have been expressed with body language or vocal quality. So what are managers to do?

Well, I think that managers can learn a "right-brain" approach to this issue from the spirit of narrative medicine. The literature has shown that as students become more scientific in their approach to medicine, their empathy decreases. The idea is that using a patient's story can get analytical information from a patient that may not be produced using only traditional methods of inquiry. How does this relate to managing in synthetic worlds?

Managers should not only communicate hard facts, but also stories to paint a picture of what success means to the team, how one's actions relate to the whole, and the ideal situation to strive for. Stories coupled with hard facts can relate a richer message in text-based interactions. Of course, you could just switch to voice if that's available. LOL! ;-)

Linden Fears in 2008 (Nazi Style)

"A bunch of pirates have reverse engineered the server code. It runs better than our code. :-O"

 

Architectural Inspiration

Second Life Architects have plenty of in-world inspiration, but they may find new inspiration by watching T.E.D. talks on the subject. T.E.D. :

"... stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds. Since then its scope has become ever broader."

I've found their talks to be inspiring. Click around and enjoy.

My Tiny Life (FREE)!

This is an important book that covers every level of virtual interaction: sociology, geography, law, gender, economics, history, sex, and virtual life in general. The reason why I value this is because of something Ezra Pound said about good literature being News that stays news. Even though this is talking about a text-based virtual space, it still applies now with 3D synthetic environments. AND IT'S FREE!! Julian Dibbell talks about how it came to be free, but not Creative Common. Which reminds me, I need to add a CC license to this place. /me adds it to his list of to-dos.

Architects Weigh In on Import and Export Issues

The architect's dilemma's are many. Over at The Arch, one issue is being put to the community in order to garner support towards advocating for importing and exporting information in and out of Second Life:

"Having had a number of conversations over the year with people about this, I can say with confidence, that SL’s lack of portability is the number one hurdle for our demographic and the main reason why many people never come back. Although speculation, I would imagine this is a major hurdle for other groups as well."

If you find this to be important to you as well, read the article and way in on the discussion.

Lainy Voom's New Movie "The Dumb Man"

Oh my god, this is JUST beautiful:


The Dumb Man from Lainy Voom on Vimeo.

Virtual Training

The military has been training soldiers using synthetic environments, which I think business should take notice. The literature on virtual work (i.e. using email, chat, wikis, blogs, etc) show that the first thing a virtual group should have is training together. Start training your virtual workers in synthetic environments to give people a sense of esprit de corps, facilitate trust, and to understand their 'real world' reactions:

"Face-to-face communication is usually the benchmark for what communication should be. 'Why do we want to train people using a virtual environment?' generals ask me. The reasons are this: You can record the environment. You can elevate the levels of stress and moderate the other variables. You can record and play it back to see the human performance in real-time. You can use that as a talking point to illustrate later all these training objectives that are tied to non-kinetic engagements and objectives. The tools we provide help them train faster."

I wish I could have said it better. :-)

So it begins..

This angel has been wandering confused and amazed at all he sees in Second Life for over two years. Architects, who fashion objects from primitive shapes, and Enchanters, who breathe life into these objects, have inspired this angel to search for understanding and skill with these arts.

The hope is that through learning I will provide meaning for my wandering existence. Having been cast here in the virtual firmament with no understanding of where I am or why I'm here, I'm anxious to understand the mysteries that my rezzing has wrought.