Along Second Lifelines

It's Creepy at Haunted Caverns

It's Creepy at Haunted Caverns, originally uploaded by susanreynolds.

Ewww.

Liquid Heat does not just make interesting islands with lava and rock - although they do that too - they also make disturbing Halloween adventure spots

Standing in the opening of the cave and seeing these spiders scurrying around in an ominous green glow was just just creepy.

You can take a ride in the mining cart through the Haunted Caverns covering 1/4 of the sim. But the spiders still creeped me out the most.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Liquid%20Heat%20Beauty/149/150/31

Columbus Day Artwork at Commonwealth Island

Columbus Day Artwork at Commonwealth Island, originally uploaded by susanreynolds.

This piece of artwork was one of the first things that caught my eye when I visited a Columbus Day exhibit that Parhelion Palou, an associate from NonProfit commons told me about.

It was put together by Nany Kayo of Virtual Native Lands and focuses on the Taino people who - the note said "discovered Columbus."

What does that mean? You'll have to find out by dropping by and reading all about it.

Also see some lovely art pieces in an unusual open air gallery format on a lovely tropical beach with lovely waves and a surprise or two.

 

Most of the exhibit is around the landmark link to Commonwealth Island, and if you walk to your right down the beach toward the sunken ship you'll see artwork on your right, along the tree line

Weekend Wanderings: Places to Visit in Second Life

Things to See - Places to Be:

• Governor Linden Palace - open to wander & GREAT place to take photos & learn to walk around, maybe bump into Lindens (employees of Linden labs which operates Second Life are assigned the last name Linden)

• Dog park  - I kid you not - go see and watch the dogs interact with you and each other. Pet them and see what they do.

• Caledon: vast complex of Victorian and steampunk themed islands with shops, streets, sights to take in, readings in their libraries, performances at their theatres and more

• Ancient Roma

• Riverwalk and cliff house Arts

• Greenies Home  You get a totally different take on things when you are tiny and everything else is big, Give yourself lots of time to discover and just take photos, see things from a different perspective and have fun.

• Mexico Archaeological site. Looking around and experience the impressive structures and landscape

• Feel like a treat? You will not believe these virtual 'edibles'

• Lost Gardens of Apollo

• The Botanical Gargdens of Sl

• Paris 1900 - Wonderful if you go when it's not crowded and laggy - I fell off the Eiffel tower here and lived to tell the tale

Regular People in Community: Where Being is the Point

"It's a gigantic, user-driven, massively-multiplayer 3d virtual world. It's never going to be as simple as a 2-slot toaster."

Second Life is a lot more fun than making toast though. It's a place where regular people gather in community where just the "being" is the point.

No dragons to slay in a challenge for rank. No fair maidens to rescue. . .  unless you want to dream one up or engage someone to play the part  And that's because although there is no quests, no points nor any prizes built in, you CAN create anything in Second Life.

Maidens, word games, walking fish, space ships, fountains, and your dream house.

My thing is attending educational or networking events like the one pictured at NonProfit Commons with Anika Pastorelli, DonPaul Cale, Saitek Landar and others.

Even simple things like decorating homes or planting gardens are among some of my favorite virtual activities.

Others friends would prefer to change hair color twelve times in an hour and that's fun too. Why not after all. I don't chose to add wings or fins to explore new ways to express my personality but it's all there available to us.

Others who use the Second Life platform:

• tour Dell and other islands
• raise funds for their favorite charity
• attend a support group
• take a ride in a virtual gondola
• make a living from creating content for other users to buy 
• dance while listening to music while chatting with people from around the world
• drive race cars
• listen to a live music performance

It's all possible. I've even got a toaster in second life. A designer created that content and I bought it.

So that makes Second Life's appeal about creativity and ingenuity and a small business economy. It's about a community. It's about learning.

It's about life, but on another level.

BlogHud Makes Blog Updates Easy

The Blog Hud lets us send timestamped and location-linked postcard images directly to our blogs, like this one sent last year. "Getting away from it all in Second LIfe" or What Susan does when she morphs into Tynan Clary.   

Technology. Amazing!

posted by Tynan Clary  using a blogHUD : [blogHUD permalink]

Sculptural Surprises

Teeg's Sculptural Design, originally uploaded by susanreynolds.

One of the most interesting things about Second Life is that every time I log in I am able to have a different experience.And that's doubly true because my next door neighbor builds . .  and I never know what she's going to build.

Where I use Second Life as a way to attend meetings I could not get to otherwise, to interact with a wide variety of people and to just zone out sitting next to a virtual duck pond, my neighbor Teeg creates And does so on a massive scale.

Yesterday I had two meetings both help entirely within Second Life and then I crashed out, which is fairly unusual for me lately with the improvements in my computer and Second Life's servers. When I signed back in later I looked at the plot of land next to mine to find this very tall very blue floral sculptural piece on Teeg's lawn.

It got me thinking of what it would look like when it's completed and the possibilities of what one could do with it in combination with a fountain or subtle lighting or softening landscape.

The charm of sculpture in Second Life is although it is created by manipulating basic geometric shapes (prims which is short for primitive shapes like cubes, cones etc) and visible on your screen, it's also possible to get a 3D view by moving - walking or flying or just moving your camera - around the creation and getting a 360 degree view.

This makes Second Life a wonderful place to experience wonderful artistic creations, from the most primitive beginner level to the most sophisticated interactive pieces done by those who have mastered scripting and advanced textures.

And the imaginative leap Second Life allows us is that we can place a piece of sculpture next to a waterfall, or float it on a cloud, to give us a totally unique experience not possible in the physical world. No rust, corrosion or danger from the elements ensues and we can move it with a mouse click.

Voila.

Now the question is - where will this creation end up next - and in what form?

M Linden (Mark Kingdon ) and Lon Sands (Safko) talk about Second Life

M Linden and Lon Safko, originally uploaded by susanreynolds.

I got the opportunity to sit in on an interesting podcast recording setting from today, with the Social Media Bible Interview with Mark Kingdon (M Linden), the CEO of Linden Labs, creator of Second Life.

The location in the Social Media Bible Garden Pinastri (159, 203, 20).was a great place to ask hang out and ask questions of Mark and chat with Lon along with a bevy of invited guests.

Thanks to Francine Hardaway for hooking me up with Lon. I wish I saw Francine more often in Second Life but I know that she knows its potential!

Social Media Podcast website

Sun Shines on Puzzles in Second Life

Sun's Solaris Campus in Second Life is an experimental learning environment and community created by Sun Learning Service to make learning about Solaris immersive, easy, and fun plus it's being talked up by Dana in Geeksville who says:

Second Life (SL) is easy to misunderstand, and many people have the wrong idea that it is some kind of game environment, or a place where people just chat and act silly.

On the contrary, Second Life has many places of learning from Science Friday, to Buddhist meditations, to technical seminars. Many corporations are set up in SL now to teach consumers about their business, do business online, and to have a virtual space where employees can have meetings.

  . . .Sun is opening Sun Solaris Campus this month for developers. Don't think traditional campus - think a fun, unique and community-oriented virtual campus. At this inworld campus, you'll be able to talk with experts, listen to informative chats about Solaris, and network with other developers

Try to solve all pieces of a puzzle for real life prizes, meet Sun-certified Solaris 10 instructor Stephen Mohr (Sidifen Yiyuan) and learn all about Solaris plus join in the Solaris scavenger hunt on October 10, 2008 right after the instructor-led session with Sun-certified instructors at 9:30AM Pacific time /12:30 PM Eastern time.

Other live events including Office Hours by Sun employees are viewable from the Solaris Campus in Second Life as well as via this Solaris Campus Google Calendar.

Second Life URL (SLURL) to the Solaris Campus:http://slurl.com/secondlife/Sun%20Microsystems%201/32/231/22