Category Archives: Second Life

Second Life – A flawed masterpiece.

Posted by on January 15, 2012 No comments

For the last couple of years, I’ve been involved in the virtual world of Second Life. For the most part, this has been a rewarding experience. Although I have over time become more aware of some of the flaws. It’s been a disheartening thing, seeing a platform that I believe has real potential being held back by these flaws. Happily, the creators of Second Life under the guidance of Rod Humble are working to make the technology more accessible and easier to use, which is excellent news, and have plans to drive the world forward.

I see Second Life being used by numerous artists and other creatives. People the world over are able to tour art galleries and view works of sculpture. Further to this, Second Life makes art exhibits happen that are just not possible anywhere else. Concerts can be held and DJs can play virtual sets. I’ve listened to artists from across the world performing live from their own homes, so I know first hand that there is a live music scene in Second Life. All of this is available to you, as long as you have an internet connection. Remote location, or physical disability need present no obstacle to fulfilling Second Life.

Of course, my more usual field of comment is agnosticism, religion and spirituality. This area is most certainly catered for in Second Life. In my early days, I found a region called “Bodhi” which was well constructed and hid snippets of Dharma in gems around the landscape. Bodhi is now gone, to the best of my knowledge, but there are plenty of other places. The Skeptical Buddhists Sangha and Kannonji are just two such places with discussion and talks. Consulting the inworld search yields many more.  The odds are, if you enter your faith or lack thereof into Second Life search, it will be there.

In addition to this, there are many centres of learning, not just focussing on inworld skills but things of use outside of Second Life. You can also find support groups inworld for any number of things, and I find myself reflecting that if Second Life saves even one person through these groups. Or when it enables people to grow and reach nearer their potential through these classes, then it’s all been well worth it

Virtual Remembrance Day

Posted by on November 13, 2011 No comments

virtual-cenotaphIn both the real world and the virtual world, it’s time for remembrance.  We enjoy a lot of freedoms in our lives, freedoms which were won at an awful price. Remembrance Sunday is the day where we stop to honour those who fell so that we can be free.

Of course, that’s as true of our freedoms in the virtual world as well as in the physical world and it crossed my mind to see if this was remembered there.  I was pleasantly surprised to find that it is and Second Life has a virtual Cenotaph.

When I visited it was quiet, but I could tell there had been visitors.  At this time of year, land permissions are relaxed there so you can lay a wreath there (the dispenser is by the entrance) while you stop to reflect.  If you have Second Life installed on your computer, you can find it here.

Norway, virtual remembrance

Posted by on July 31, 2011 3 comments

I tend to steer clear of commenting on world events if I can.  It can be hard to find anything to say that already hasn’t been said a hundred times.  In some cases, such as the recent awful events in Norway, it can be hard to know what to say at all.  Words just don’t seem to be enough, which is a strange position for a blogger to be in but there you are.  In this case, it’s so very hard to even know where to begin.

People grieve and remember and build memorials in our own ways, in my opinion, the memorials in the virtual are every bit as touching as those in the real world.  I’ve observed this in a previous post about the Second Life memorial to Salem.  Today I’ll return to the world of Second Life and look around a sim called Norge, or “Second Norway”, where I had found out that there was a memorial to the victims of the massacre.

Norway-02I, or rather my avatar, appeared by a waterfront.  It’s a tidy and very pleasantly presented area, with a small park, a café and a few shops; to name but a small number of the things that were there.  I took a moment to orient myself and looked out across the virtual harbour, thinking that this must have taken a lot of planningNorway-01 and effort to design so well.  There were a few other avatars around, I immediately noted a small group by the waterside, but consulting my mini map I saw others dotted around the sim.  My trip was slightly complicated by the fact that the memorial wasn’t signposted, but this meant that I had the pleasure of exploring the sim a little to find what I wanted.

So, I wandered a little, admiring this very nicely put together sim and taking in the sights, not all of which are as obvious as you might think.  But then that is the beauty of exploring Second Life, unlike MMOs Norway-03things aren’t always made so obvious; there are no “way points”.  As I explored, my path eventually took me uphill, towards a beautifully built church.  I went inside and discovered the memorial in the middle of the church, a collection of small objects bearing messages from people across the world.  I sat for a few minutes to read them and I once again realised how much a virtual world can bring us together, especially at times like these.  I’ve seen Second Life bring together communities from across the Norway-04world and crystallise them around a common interest or purpose.  Admittedly, in this case grief and remembrance, but the effect here was powerful and provided as touching a display as any in the real world.

On reflection, in spite of all the hurt that the gunman wrought in Norway, I feel that seeing this display of the goodness in humanity shows that there is hope for us yet.

A Moment of Pause

Posted by on April 27, 2011 No comments

I was in Second Life the other evening when I came across an entry in the destination guide;  a small memorial to those who died, falsely accused of withcraft, in the town of Salem.   I must admit to having found the time to pause there and reflect as I read the names on the stone plaques around the central square.  This small area is part of a much larger pagan themed sim, click on any of the thumbnails here to get a screenshot of the memorial area itself.  If you have a Second Life client installed, you can click the following link to teleport directly there: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Primrose/170/218/88

salem-01For those who don’t know, Salem is a town in the US state of Massachusetts, whose name was given to an infamous series of Witchcraft trials in 1692 and 1693.  The trials didn’t just take place in Salem, but the two best known trials did.

26 people were tried for witchcraft and executed in these two trials alone and considering some of the “proofs” of being a witch, they really didn’t stand a chance.  Consider that simply expressing doubts about the trials was enough to put you in danger!

Salem is infamous, but it’s by no means the only place that witch trial happened.  Europe had it’s own infamy and here in the UK,salem-02 we didn’t escape.  Many people died at the hands of Witch Hunters and the Pendle Witch Trials[1] in 1612 are part of English history.  In truth nobody knows the exact death toll, but it is certainly horrific.

As I intimated above, the witch craze was international and in Europe the Catholic Church produced the “Malleus Maleficarum” or “The Hammer of Witches”, which basically said that if you were accused then you were a witch and detailed many torture methods. There was no right of the defendant, no opportunity to confront accusers and torture was considered an “infallible method” of determining guilt. [2]  The whole thing was a scam and innocent people were framed left right and centre, often people would name others just to get the torturers to stop.  When being hanged, one English witch hunter salem-03confessed to having sent over 220 women to their deaths![3]  In one small town in Germany there were 24 public burnings with an average of 4-6 victims each in one year. [4]

For me, seeing a place such as this was a stark reminder of why we must rally to fight superstition and ignorance, it was these things that were the breeding grounds that this horror arose from.   This is why scientific education and the promotion of critical thought and the teaching of the scientific method itself are so important.

—

References

1 – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pendle_witches

Source – “The Demon Haunted World” – Carl Sagan – ISBN 0-7472-5156-8

2 – page 113.

3 – page 114.

4 – page 116.

Second Life and Reaching Out

Posted by on November 10, 2010 No comments

I’m not too sure about the title of this one, but I really can’t think of a better one.

On Sunday evening, I was at a Buddhist Dharma talk at the Kannoji Sim in Second Life.  The speaker was a Zen monk, and our subject was virtual worlds and the Sangha.  It’s an interesting subject and it allows me to touch on something that I have been saying privately for some time.  I really do believe that Second Life has a great deal to offer people who want to reach out and investigate things before approaching them in the physical world.

Attending a virtual Buddhist meeting, as I did, is a perfect example.  I’ve been attending these meetings for some time now and have participated in more than one such group in Second Life, I have to say it has been a rewarding experience.  These groups give you a way to easily connect with like minded individuals from across the globe and can lead towards taking the steps toward such groups in the real world.

It could be said that you can do this via forums and IRC, but I believe that the extra capabilities of the Second Life platform add a great deal to this experience and strengthen it beyond the other mediums.  The talk was given using voice, and at one point over 20 avatars were present, in addition to text chat and a voice connection the speaker could have used slides on an inworld board or could have used inworld video if required.

I have seen the use of inworld slides and video and they are every bit as effective as in the real world, the 3d world of Second Life adds something to their use that I don’t get from Youtube, Flickr or other software.

It does sometimes seem, what with one issue or another, that Second Life isn’t worth the effort or is going downhill.  I beg to differ, Second Life allows these things to be done comparatively safely and with minimal cost and effort.  For those of us who are housebound, or simply without enough time to make a real world trip, I think that groups like this in Second Life do plenty of good and make Second Life and other such systems (e.g. OpenSim) well worth the time and effort.

A headset that reads your brainwaves

Posted by on July 23, 2010 No comments

I happened across this video, courtesy of TED.  It’s a headset that work by reading your brainwaves and at this stage looks like an idea that is coming along very, very nicely.

I’ll only say that I would love one of these for Second Life, but I imagine it’s a few years off a consumer release as yet!

The is the full video and comment page at TED.

Second Life, a Difficult Platform.

Posted by on July 21, 2010 8 comments

I tweeted earlier today that Tameside Council in the UK is closing their Second Life island.   I can understand this, especially given the dire state of our public finances.  When you consider the reality, SL is probably not the most effective way for a regional council to talk to its citizens.

This brings me to a point I’ve been pondering, it’s not just councils.  Why do real life (RL) companies often fail in Second Life ( SL)?

Firstly, I think that a company can fail by not becoming part of the community.  SL is not something that can be run in the same way as a corporate website, it requires an engagement with the community, especially if you plan on running a successful business presence.

Secondly, the kinds of products that are successful in SL are not the same as in RL.  Yes, Coca Cola and various other companies jumped inworld.  But let’s be honest, anybody who wants to drink Coke probably already does.  If they don’t then a virtual world is possibly not going to convince them.  A car company can offer virtual, drivable versions of its products, which may help RL sales, but whether it will be worth the trouble is questionable at best.  IBM seem to be doing quite well in there, but then they are a different kind of company to Coca Cola or a large auto maker.

Thirdly, there are a lot of residents who can and will be very well positioned to compete with RL companies.  These residents already have their own established brands, do the job at least as well and tick the community box already.

As a closing remark, I will observe that the companies that prosper bring something to the mix.  SL is not just a billboard, not a static website.  It’s a dynamic and vibrant virtual ecosystem and economy, thinking you can just walk in and posture is (in this writer’s view) a guaranteed recipe for failure.