Second Life and larger stories

Aiji Ducatillon has published some comprehensive Conference notes from BlogHer07. Since many people were having trouble with sound levels his summary is useful until podcasts are made available.

Personally found the discussion about the news media in Second Life was the session my mind kept returning to throughout the day. Blogher editor Kim Pearson moderated a discussion between news reporters who reported from in world. The panel was made of SL News Network’s Cybergrrl Oh, Starr Sonic who is host of That S’Life and 57 Miles of Metaversed.com

I am new to this virtual world but if you see Second life, as a possible precursor to a 3D web you are immediately aware of this point in time. If you compare early web development and think in terms of Second Life being the equivalent of the early Mosaic browser how Second Life is reported by those in world as compared to the mainstream media becomes fascinating.

Anyone who has done any historical research will now what it is like to trawl through the newspapers of the day to see how an event was reported. As I was listening to discussion it occurred to me that these media reports from within second life will also become of historical interest. In the questions I had asked if the panelists saw themselves and capturing the early history of Second Life as it happened. Simply put some did, some didn’t. Some saw their role as important others saw it as very much a concern of the moment and that was it.

I was curious because so many documents associated with the early web simply do not exist any more. These daily reports bit by bit build up to form a history and they are part of the story of Second Life and perhaps part of a larger story yet to unfold. At the moment no one knows what the story is just as in the days of the early web no-one knew what the story would be.

All day my thoughts returned to how much of the activity in second life and other virtual worlds was being captured or not. There is the Second Life History Wiki but to my knowledge it is the only concerted effort to record the history of this particular virtual world. I would love to know it there are others.

Later:the Podcast of this session is now available from Metaversed

Blogher07 in Second Life

Last night primed on coffee I attended Blogher07 in Second Life. For all that there were some serious problems with sound at the start it was one of those evenings where you sit back and contemplate where this technology could go.

Since the time zones were working against me I caught the first session which was a panel discussion focussing on combining blogging and Second Life. The panellists Vint Falken , Queen Tureaud, TheDiva Rockin and Kos Farina creator of the second life blogHUD ranged over the topic teasng out some of the issues. The question of mixing ‘real’ life topics with second life topics made me reflect on what I was going to do with this blog.

I knew people kept separate blogs one for second life and the other for real life but since I see Second Life as another form of Social software – in other words not a game but a place to connect people that have common interests, I see no reason why the two areas of activity should be split. Some people like the freedom of remaining anonymous but personally since I am in there to see what artists, musicians, film makers, educators and other creative souls are doing I see no reason to not reveal who I am.

So far the experience of the conference has been fascinating and it’s been great to meet so many other bloggers! I will be in there again tonight listening to what people have to say.

For those who are time zone challenged like myself or if you simply can’t get there 57Miles will be podcasting the SL BlogHer Sessions Also the sessions can be found on SLCN.TV

I am going to Blogher!

This weekend there will be some late nights as I will be going to Blogher this year. Since I can’t attend in person I will be going virtually as Blogher07 is in Second Life

BlogHer in Second Life will offer the opportunity to experience the Chicago conference live on a virtual platform, complete with general sessions, audio feeds, and even a virtual cocktail party!

The virtual cocktail party has me worried as now I have to figure out what my avatar should wear! But, apart from that it looks to be interesting and a great opportunity to participate if geography defeats you.

Broadband speed in Australia is very very very slow…

I am always belly aching about broadband speed in Australia. Recently the OECD has released a 310-page report entitled OECD Communications Outlook 2007 (available as a PDF file)

Between the covers of this report there is some interesting comparisons of broadband access, speed and price. Not only is Australia is slow to take up broadband but when data was gathered in October 2006 for this report we had the second lowest download speed across the whole OECD! From my own personal experience I haven’t seen any improvement since October last year. I am sure price and speed have something to do with the take up rate of broadband as when you look at this graph you can see just how bad the service is in this country.

Thanks to SLOZ for bringing this report to my attention

NMC in Second Life

I am still exploring Second Life and still playing catch up as there are many educators and educational institutions in world already.

As I navigated the cycle of web reading/listening/viewing on the topic I encountered this Video which highlights the NMC Campus in world

NMC also has a blog