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Category
Art and Exploration
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09.06.08
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08.23.08The Social Life of Avatars: 30 Days in Active WorldsBy way of Digital Urban a chapter by Dr. Andrew Hudson Smith on 30 days in a Active World tracing the evolution of a virtual community, condom machines and, well, a ghostly abandoned sim with a lot of spare prims lying around. Worth a read however, described as:"a project aimed at documenting the development of a virtual environment from the beginning to end, the point where a plot of virgin land would develop into a community with a urban layout. In a sense the project was similar to an early days 'Big Brother' in that the community was watched and logged 24 ...
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08.15.08The Avatar AfterlifeThe Long Now Foundation posts speculation that our avatars will soon be programmed with our online preferences, leading to an afterlife for our digital personas: The software used to track the online behavior of users, within in particular system (virtual worlds or social networks) could be modified to track the entirety of their online behavior, over a longer space of time – say thirty years. At the end of this period the data could be used to program an avatar. This avatar would inhabit a virtual world or worlds and be programmed with all the users personal data, preferences and potential ...
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07.21.08Young Second Life Filmmaker Profiled at TNWAriella Furman is a young filmmaker who works exclusively in Second Life. Earning upwards of $2,000 US dollars per month, her story was recently featured on the TechNewsWorld Web site. It is nice to see positive coverage of the use of machinima in Second Life. The article describes in detail how Furman, a recent college graduate, goes about creating a film in SL - in this case, her client is IBM - using a virtual producer and how she directs the avatars. She has worked for Electric Sheep and Popcha working for IBM, Nestle, and other clients. Furman's final cut can be ...
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07.03.08IMVU Founder Cary Rosenzweig on Avatar-CentricityIMVU recently opened itself up to the general public after registering 20 million users to its 3D virtual platform. Worlds in Motion had a chance to interview founder Cary Rosenzweig about the public launch, and he throws around some pretty impressive figures: 20 million users, 2 million items created, and over 100,000 content creators, of whom "dozens have quit their day jobs by developing items for sale in the IMVU catalog." He speaks to the idea that within IMVU, users are the main content makers and as with SL, are the ones that drive the experience. But what gives IMVU its competitive ...
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06.30.08Call for Papers on VW CultureThe Journal of Virtual Worlds Research is asking for contributions to its forthcoming issue dedicated to culture in virtual worlds. The editors of this issue, Mark Bell and Mia Consalvo, are looking for articles from 'academic researchers and practitioners' that explore the culture and experience of VWs. Here is a list of topics, culled from their site, that the editors are looking to explore in this issue: • Definitions of Virtual Cultures • Ethnographies of Virtual Worlds • Social mechanics and networking in Virtual worlds • Historical development of Virtual Worlds • Identity • Differing goals of play versus non-play centric spaces • Emergent practices, player-generated content, activities • ...
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06.28.08Film made in SL to raise money for cancer researchA partnership of two people well-versed in the world of digital media has come together to make a short film for the American Cancer Society. Falco Tomsen, who regularly makes SL videos for clients, and Ridha, a Tunisian-based musician familiar to users of SL, combined their talents to make the film. It will be screened on June 29 and will help to raise money and awareness of the Cancer Society's research center in Atlanta, GA. The film follows a young woman's fight with cancer. A 3D set was built in SL to represent an oncology center, and the collaboration turned out to ...
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06.19.08NY Times Rave: Arias with a TwistFront of the arts in today's Times, a rave of "Arias with a Twist", proving perhaps that reality can still be as entertaining as virtuality. And I wonder, if this review can appear in the Times, and if people can put this sort of content *gasp* on a stage without being shut down, then why is the adults-only Second Life World acting more like it's Disney's Main Street when in fact it's probably a lot closer to Broadway. Have a read....actually, it somewhat sounds like the NPIRL Garden: (Scenes) include Mr. Arias tumbling through space and landing in a glorious Edenic rain ...
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06.15.08Remedy Exploration, and an Invitation to Artists and BuildersI don't often talk about the stuff I do in Second Life - it's not much really, made some houses when I first started that still seem to sell, am working on a sim that integrates a Web-based narrative engine with in-world objects, and other odds and ends. I suppose I'm better at thinking up stuff than doing it, and I'm more like to be staring at prims than rezzing them these days. But part of what interests me is simply exploration. And as part of this, I set up a sim called Remedy Exploration. I think of it as an ...
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06.03.08Rosedale to speak at Tech Virtual Workshop in San JosePhilip Rosedale will deliver a keynote at the Summit on Digital Democracy in Exhibit Design, hosted by the Tech Virtual Museum Workshop in San Jose on June 4th. The Tech Virtual Museum is a place where folks are building art exhibit prototypes. The goal is to build a working example of an exhibit or museum space in Second Life before actually constructing it in real life. It is a great example of online collaboration covered under the Creative Commons Attribution license. Hopefully, a majority of the kinks of exhibit-building can be worked out beforehand, and a whole slew of real-life headaches ...
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