Virtual poetry reading

Last night, my sister, my mum and I went to a virtual poetry reading. The guy that was reading, his and works of others, is the multi talented Russell Taylor Ashby – Russell Eponym in Second Life and other virtual worlds. He’s a poet, artist and musician with a beautiful voice. Perhaps I wasn’t as happy about his selection of poetry as I am with his music, but it was still a very nice experience.

A story from my childhood

When I was a child and my sister was going to start school, she got a school bag which was red and very pretty. I was really envious. I wanted one just the same. Even though I wasn’t starting school that year, my parents bought one for me too. It was blue, not red, but to me it was just as pretty.

Then finally, when it was time for my first day in school, I was very proud of my lovely blue bag. Time had gone by and the pretty blue bag wasn’t ‘trendy’ anymore. My classmates noticed and started teasing me for having such an unfashionable bag.

If this had happened when I was a little older or something similar had happened today, I would have been sad, but tried not to let on. Back then though, life hadn’t hurt me as it has now, so I replied, quite calmly:

“You don’t like my bag? I do.”

My mean classmates lost their stride and never mentioned my bag again. I loved it just as much even though my classmates probably didn’t. Probably, I say. I’m guessing they didn’t care about the bag. They probably just wanted to be mean, but that didn’t work.

I’m seeing a connection between this little story and the so called ‘funny’ stories about Apple products, hinting that Apple users are idiots. So I say, just like I did then:

“You don’t like my pretty new iPhone 6+? I do.”

Headache

headache

Today it’s especially hard to ignore the real me. I prefer, as some of you may know, the virtual me. I couldn’t go to work today, because of a terrible headache. It might be due to stress, my potential high blood pressure or the new medication I’m starting to take. Either way, it’s tiresome. :(

Organizing an Emergency Preparedness Bag for your Dog

An Emergency Preparedness Bag, also known as a Bug-Out Bag, is a type of designated container that you have filled with whatever you’ll need to be able to survive for a 48 to72 hour period; what you’ll need if you have to “bug out” in a moment’s notice. It’s important to have a kit ready for each human member of your household, but if you find yourself facing a disaster like a flood, fire or tornado and you need to make a run for it, you’ll want to have a bag ready so your dog can escape with you as well.

Read more here.

Can your avatar enter into an agreement with someone?

Some time ago, when I was still unemployed, I tried to keep busy taking small assignments like creating websites. One time I got a bigger job to make some templates for an organization. Some of the templates were for Word. Being an Apple fangirl, I don’t care much for Microsoft. I love Pages and when I need a simple word processor I have a couple of free office suites I can use.

I wasn’t going to pay for the whole Office package so I downloaded the trial version. It was for 30 days and that would be enough for the job. I finished the job and got paid for it. A while after I started to get strange withdrawals from my PayPal account. The company that took my money was Microsoft. I tried to contact PayPal, but they just told me to contact Microsoft. It was out of their hands since I had “signed an agreement” with the company.

I didn’t have any contact information with this branch of Microsoft, since I had never signed anything. I had even stopped using the trial after I had finished the job. Still the withdrawals from my account continued. One day, a VAT invoice came in my mail. Not in my email inbox, but in paper form. The name of the one that had entered into the agreement with Microsoft was one of my Second Life avatars. This avatar, no matter how real I sometime feel that she is, is not a real person. Microsoft obviously thinks she is, but I’m sure no law would support that belief.

With that paper, scanned and emailed, to PayPal, I thought I would have a chance to stop the payments. They got back to me pretty fast. Their reply was strange. Although, they still claimed that everything was right and that we had an agreement, they would be kind enough to pay back the money that was withdrawn from my account. They did, not all, but some of it, so I stopped arguing with them.

I am just wondering what will happen next time my avatar wants to buy something, perhaps something even more expensive, will I be able to stop it? It’s obviously legal to enter inte agreements with digital personas without the owner’s knowledge about it. Or perhaps it’s just Microsoft that claims that right.

Following the Fair path

As a potential phone buyer, you’re never short of negative articles about the iPhone. Apple is a company that people in general love to hate. Even though I’m sure many of the articles are true, I’m just as sure that the articles could just as well have been about other phones. After all, most phones, regardless of brands, are made in the same factories.

And until now, you haven’t been able to buy a phone that doesn’t come with many negative issues regarding how it’s produced, the material used and how the workers are treated. No phone owner (until now) has had a completely clear conscience. It doesn’t matter if you’re using iOS or Android. The producers are using the same materials, the same suppliers and are treating their workers the same.

Since it hasn’t been possible to buy a fair phone, I’ve used iPhones (and a HTC) because it came down to two choices. Either living off grid with no phone or using “the best one” available. I have to admit, I love iPhones (and HTCs 😉 ). So until now, I’ve had a HTC Desire C and an iPhone 4s and I’ve been really happy with them. There’s just been one problem – a big one. I didn’t like how they were produced.

So my latest phone is a Fairphone, this wonderful little gadget that “has everything” you can wish for. The company is treating the workers better than any other phone company. The materials used for producing it are the best available for the environment. I’m starting to get used to the Android OS. It’s actually pretty cool. Of course I still miss my iPhone and the iOS. There are still things I can’t do with my Fairphone, but what I can do is pretty awesome. The best thing about it (apart from the obvious) is that because of the dual sim, I can actually manage with only one phone.

Many thanks to the Fairphone team for helping me keep my conscience clear and still get some of the “good stuff” in life.