Exploring Second Life

Bucknell Students: Arianne Flemming

Jake MeyerWill Sipf

St. Johns Students: Liz D’Orazi

Danny Kurabieski

What was your experience as a new comer to SL?

• Introduction to in-world life through tutorials was a smooth transition

• Some points where in-world interaction was not user friendly

• After becoming accustomed to the mobility of your character and communication with other people, in-world life becomes almost effortless

What helped and hindered your progress on a learning curve?

• In-world tutorials offer a great deal of information as you get started, such as learning how to fly and learning how to communicate with other avatars

• Many websites outside of Second Life that offer information about in-world life

• Self exploration and socializing are two of the best ways to become acquainted with in-world life

How effective is SL as a platform for

online community, culture and commerce? • Online Community:

• Meet people from all over the world

• Make friends with people from other cities, states and nations

• Accomplish tasks through the use of SL, such as the project we are working on now

How effective is SL as a platform for online community, culture and commerce?

• Culture:

• Expression of self in any form you choose

• Mold your character to reflect your own self image or take on a different persona if you choose to do so

• You can even create a culture in some sense, by building new locations that can develop into a specific clique in SL, that has a culture of its own

How effective is SL as a platform for online community, culture and commerce

?• Commerce:

• SL provides users with a whole new world of E-commerce

• Owning businesses, property, and providing services are all available to users in Second Life

Working in a Virtual Team

• Assigning roles is key- allocation of roles, power point editor etc.

• Frequent communication is very important is clarifying the tasks

• Group meetings and instant messages are more effective than emails- due to lag time on replies

Ex: Initial lack of response to email limited my ability to participate- response came 2 days later

• Date: Tue, 27 Nov 2007 22:35:57 -0500 [11/27/07 22:35:57 EST] From: avf002@bucknell.edu To: "Mr. Daniel M Kurabieski" <daniel.kurabieski03@stjohns.edu> Cc: Elizabeth A D' Orazi <elizabeth.dorazi03@stjohns.edu>, jmeyer@bucknell.edu, whs024@bucknell.edu Subject: Re: Our Sl presentation Headers: Show All Headers Hi again everyone,

In regards to my last email does anyone know how to fix the problem when it says login packet never received by login server? This I why I can't get online...I've tried everything...if this keeps happening will someone email me after the meeting on Emeegtee and let me know what was discussed? Thanks again-ARIANNE

• Group members responded to email and eventually gave good suggestions and suggested courses of action

• It takes copious amounts of time to fully understand how to navigate and ‘live’ in Second life

• Everyone in the team is at different skill levels in terms ability of use of Second Life- limitations of knowledge

Working with our SL Team

What was it like to work on a cyber team?

• Group members are able to get to know each other without actually meeting in person

• Each team member is able to visualize what the other members look like based on how they design their avatar

• Able to view assignment in SL as a group in order to delegate roles and discuss questions/topics

• Ability to multi-task while in SL

Effective uses of SL

West Greenwich Village- Manages to re-imagine Greenwich village without feeling like a cheap copy. The plethora of stores and attention to detail (everything from posting the correct street sign to funky galleries) makes one feel as if they were actually there.

-The slight deviations from reality are what make it interesting to people who’ve been to New York in real life. There are new shops and galleries. Plus, one can’t actually fly through Bleeker Street.

- Second Life is most effective when it blends reality and imagination. Greenwich village gives the user an ideal opportunity to do that.

Beowulf This location is extremely interesting because of

the level of interactivity. -One can assume a Beowulf avatar-Explore a perfect recreation of the Beowulf set.

All freeThis plays on the “magic” of literature of

movies. - One’s ability to cross into what was

previously imagined provides considerable user interest.

Fashion Mall• Manages to be interestingly uninteresting

• Instead of riffing upon the reality of a fashion mall in the same manner that Greenwich Village does, the Fashion Mall is too perfect of a re-creation. As a result it is boring for the exact same reasons that malls are boring• Too much commercialism• No interaction between people• Lacks genuine artistry in the displays.

• This is fascinating because begs the question “what exactly are we looking for in a Second Life setting”• The answer appears to be a slightly tweaked facsimile of

reality. Strange enough to make one feel that a shopping mall is interesting, but true enough to form for one to realize it’s a shopping mall.

What Settings Work and Why• Overall, it seems that the true intrigue of

Second life settings can be found in its ability to make everything seem new.• Every shop, no matter how mundane, has

the potential for interest. This new format of interaction and experience enables one to enjoy old things in an entirely new light

• This is why Greenwich Village was such

a success. It varied from reality enough to feel new.

• The Fashion Mall failed for exactly the same reason. It couldn’t provide a fresh imagining.

• Beowulf was able to provide another point of interaction with literature and was therefore valuable. It was actually a re-imagining of a director’s imagining of an author’s creation. The mirror within a mirror effect is enough to hold one’s attention.