"What is the place of the embodied human agent in the virtual world?"

That's the questions Featherstone and Burrows try to answer in the book "CYBERSPACE/CYBERBODIES/CYBERPUNK: CULTURES OF TECHNOLOGICAL EMBODIMENT." A review of the book is at EBSCOhost. What interests me is that they though that synthetic worlds "[have] the potential for intellectual disembodiment and transcendence of flesh and bone (Gerhard et al, 2004)." What amazes me most is that the book was written in 1995! *shakes his head*

Gerhard, M., Moore, D., & Hobbs, D. (2004, October). Embodiment and copresence in collaborative interfaces. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 61(4), 453-480.

Escape Pod Episode

I just finished listening to a great Escape Pod podcast about the Hugo award nominee. I HIGHLY recommend you give it a listen.

The Blue Book: A Consumer Guide to Virtual Worlds Is Now Available Free from the Association of Virtual Worlds

The Association of Virtual Worlds has just released its new title The Blue Book: A Consumer Guide to Virtual Worlds listing over 250 virtual worlds and is pleased to offer it free to anyone who is interested in the rapidly growing field of virtual worlds.http://www.associationofvirtualworlds.com/publishing.htm

SL Book Fair

A friend of mine would like help getting the word out about this event. If you have a blog, please post or link to this one. Thanks.

SL Book Fair 2008
25-27 April
Book Island and Publishing Island

SLURLS FOR EVENT AREAS:
Book Island Stage - SLGuides, Virtual Learning Centre - http://slurl.com/secondlife/Book%20Island/190/217/36
Cartland Court Stage - Rez Magazine - http://slurl.com/secondlife/Book%20Island/126/146/36
Beach Area - Third Life Books - http://slurl.com/secondlife/Book%20Island/196/33/24
Publishing Island Stage - SL-Newspaper.com - http://slurl.com/secondlife/Publishing%20Island/18/84/36
SLGuides, Virtual Learning Centre - http://slurl.com/secondlife/Publishing%20Island/182/114/29


EVENT SCHEDULE:

Friday 25th

2pm Opening Ceremony (Cartland Court)
3pm Marylmagner Munz reading from The Big Secret by Mary Magner (Beach Area)
3pm Threik Wilkinson reading from The Courage of Intimacy by Keith Ainsworth (Open Books)
3pm Kabbalah Today - live Kabbalah concert and Q&A session (Publishing Island stage)
4pm tbc.
5pm Madddyyy Schnook - Building for Beginners (Slguides Virtual Learning Centre)
5pm-7pm - DJs Shannah Halberd and Rat Halberd from Simkast (Cartland Court)
7pm Poetry and prose readings from INKsters and ANON magazine (Publishing Island stage)

Saturday 26th

6am discussion: Death Penalty, Right or Wrong? Selina Greene (Beach Area)
7am tbc
8am Nebbisk Oh - 'Fictionary' game where you make up definitions to fool your opponents. (Beach Area)
9am Madddyyy Schnook - Marketing and Sales in virtual worlds (Book Island stage)
10am Babu Writer - Amazon and POD - what's going on? (Publishing Island stage)
10am Selina Greene - the RL Book publishing process - talk and Q&A (Book Island stage)
11am Cricket Gears - How Art and Music Can Change the World (Cartland Court stage)
12pm Trinity Dechou, Voodoo Buwan - Rez Magazine debate on inworld Publishing (Cartland Court stage)
1pm Noble Charron - Characterization - the Soul of the Story - Lecture and Q&A by bestselling author, Michael A Stackpole (Beach Area)
2pm Elan Neruda - Paying the Bills While Paying Your Dues: a partially practical guide to writing genre fiction for a living (Publishing Island stage)
2pm-4pm Miriam Antonelli DJ (Cartland Court)
3pm Madddyyy Schnook - Building for Beginners (SLGuides)
4pm Diana Allandale - Promoting Yourself, from and Author's POV, workshop with author Diana Hunter (Beach Area)
5pm Wilbur Rich - reading

Sunday 27th

6am discussion: What's SLove got to do with it? RL/SL relationship pleasures and pitfalls. Selina Greene (Beach Area)
7am DJ Doubledown Tandino spins his signature blend of nujazz and house in a live turntable mix (Cartland Court)
8am discussion - What makes a book a cult book, rather than just a good book? Selina Greene (Beach Area)
9am Jilly Kidd hosts readings from writers in the Written Word group (beach area)
10am Sean Voss - Author Sean Percival, The Second Life In-World Travel Guide talk, Q&A (Book Island stage)
10am Madddyyy Schbook - Building for Beginners (SLGuides)
11am Simeon Beresford - Literary quiz (Book Island stage)
12pm Poetry and prose readings from INKsters and ANON magazine (Publishing Island stage)
1pm Kitumscheid Writer - the publishing process for illustrated books, based on experiences from her book, Pirate's Alphabet (Publishing Island stage)
1pm-3pm - DJ Ravishal Bentham from Kona Radio (Cartland Court)
3pm - Diana Allandale - The Ins and Outs of Writing Erotica workshop with author, Diana Hunter (Beach Area)
4pm Arton Tripsa - The Writing Life: The Creation Of A Novel, a talk/Q&A with Jane Watson, author of the Hindustan Contessa (Book Island stage)
5pm Closing ceremony and afterparty (Cartland Court)

Sick

I've been sick for about a week. Just as I started this post, Crap Mariner tweeted about the "Creeping Crude." Seems like an appropriate description.

Stuff From My SL Inventory

The Red Stick International Animation Festival is a RL convention for animation business and acts to provide animators, directors, students, artists, designers, writers and educators with a forum in which they can share their knowledge and skills and promote the art of animation

http://redstickfestival.org/

Free School

So I've been Rest of Lifeing a lot lately - medical issues, blah blah blah. Anyway, I got this notecard and thought I'd share:

1. Organizing without organizations

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lgeYWY09LE8

Author Clay Shirky on his book "Here comes everybody: the power of organizing without organizations": (video about 45 minutes; a short intro to the book is available at Apr 3rd entries for The Colbert Report's page at comedycentral.com)

2. Ubiquitous freeschooling

http://www.schoolofeverything.com/

Exactly what it sounds like. A social networåking-based, rl-focused freeschool for everything.

A short intro to School of Everything is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pd4TMZIGTlw

Synthetic Worlds and Collaboration

Terra Nova asks some interesting question: "What is the added value of a virtual synthetic world like Second Life? And where will this lead in 2008?

"Terra Nova: Collaboration in the Virtual World

Sunday Afternoon Matinee

Some videos I'm watching this afternoon:

Torley's Tip on Particles


Two Machinama





R. Kelly's "The Storm is Over Now" (Wishful thinking).


And Ask Ninja!

Beautiful Just Beautiful

Bjork Video

Second Life Struggles with Direction

The rumor in the SL grapevine is that the recent changes (trademark policy, CEO, and Cory Ondrejka quitting) are preparation for going public. Also, that an internal struggle  regarding whether they should use open standards or closed might be the impetus for these changes as well. The Economist has a great article that should help them realize the need for open standards: Internet communities | Break down these walls | Economist.com

Avatar or God?

I love this quote from » Avatar Is Not A God - Living in the Metaverse

"Having an avatar doesn't make a human god nor goddess. Having an avatar is an opportunity to be in the digital environment, to manifest in a form different than the native one. As gods give life to their creations, our humans give life, imagination and feelings to us, the avatars. Praised they be :)"

Read Me if You Want To Start a Business

I really enjoy reading Arminas's posts because he writes about busniess AND particle effects - my two favorite things in SL. Here are two posts he wrote on running a club in Second Life:
Second Effects: The Economics of Second Life Clubs, Part 1
Second Effects: The Economics of Second Life Clubs, Part 2

I think it's a great read if you want to understand how to think about running business in SL.

Podcast on Virtual Money

Here's a intersting podcast on virtual money - have a listen while you walk in the nice weather this weekend (or I hope it's nice weather where you are): The Daily PWN » Blog Archive » The Daily PWN 42: Game Money PWNS USD

Gender and Second Life

Xirconnia Morphett is working on research regarding gender and virtual worlds. It's interesting so far, but she/he could use some assistance on her/his wiki:

2007 Second Life Conference Presentation
Presentation Transcript
My Days as a Dude

Check it out!

First Interdisciplinary Research Workshop on Free Culture

CALL FOR PAPERS

"The First Interdisciplinary Research Workshop on Free Culture presents a unique opportunity for scholars with various backgrounds, whose work contributes to the promotion or study of an emerging Free Culture, to present their research work to a multidisciplinary audience of academic peers and practitioners. It will be held in conjunction with the fourth iSummit, one of the largest annual events for the Free Culture and related movements. Our aim is to provide a platform for scholars to communicate their findings to an audience that extends beyond individual disciplines because we believe that the wider participation in the creative process (and consequently in the formation and dissemination of our modern culture) enabled by new Internet technologies, innovative legal solutions and new business models, are far-reaching and therefore deserve to be examined through the lens of multidisciplinary inquiry."

http://www.icommons.org/isummit08/commons-research/