Tag: 3D

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.

More online communities 2

I’m very interested in learning new languages and practicising the ones I already know (to some extent). Over the years I’ve been a member of a couple of different ones. The one I’ve liked best is LiveMocha. It works like this: if you’re studying a language, you can get help from native speakers. Or you can help someone studying your language. Many people ask me for help with Swedish language exercises and once someone even asked me for help with one in French. It wasn’t hard, fortunately, something like what I did when I first began to study French at the age of 13.

Since I’m a major booklover, I’ve joined three (four if you count a Swedish one) book sites.

LibraryThing
GoodReads
Shelfari

You can post all your books (or as in my case, the titles I can remember – long story), read reviews or post reviews. There are more features but those are the ones I’ve used. You can post a LibraryThing author tag cloud in the sidebar of your WordPress blog or in some other places too, if you want them to show up on your blog. There are other widgets that you can post too.

Second Life is a community, but it’s a bit different from many others. It’s in 3D. You get an avatar (not quite like in the movie) that can move around and interact with other avatars. You can customize that avatar pretty much any way you like, add virtual pets, change hairdos and go on shopping sprees with it. If you’re interested in building/creating things in a 3D environment, you can, but you’ll need to pay a little to upload your ‘textures’. You can ‘buy’ or rent ‘land’ and all kinds of things. And you can chat. Voicechat or text chat, whatever you like.

I’m not entirely happy about SL. You hardly ever run into so many nutcases as you do there. Some can be very annoying. Many people have ‘sexual’ relations in there. Cartoon sex. Pretend sex. LOL. (I didn’t make this up, but it’s too funny not to share it: Second Life – where men are men, and so are the women, and the children are FBI.)  It’s also very much about money, though you can experience SL without paying for anything other than your computer, software and internet connection. There are an almost limilless number of ‘sims’ – regions – that can be beautiful and intricate and fascinating. And you can go ‘shopping’ in huge stores. Strangely enough, it’s very relaxing. I’m not really into shopping in real life, but in SL I love to browse those stores, even though most of the clothes in there are slutty, to put it bluntly. My sister and I have had to learn to design our own, but that’s another story.

There are real businesses in SL and some universities teach courses in the 3D environment, so it’s not all ‘fake’. I’ve heard companies have staff meetings in SL and I know real famous singers have concerts there. The trouble is I always get to hear about it too late. Apparently, you can also ‘watch tv/movies’ too, but I’ve never tried that. You can also display your photos or art work. It’s a bit difficult to learn to move around in there, but I’m living proof you can learn how to do it. I even made a good friend in there, which was totally unexpected.

Second Life – a Language School?

It’s kind of funny. I’ve been a member of a number of different language sites and I still use one regularly. Many different people contact me, wanting to ‘learn’ Swedish, without taking any classes. Some just want to practice their English. No one stays in touch for long. I can’t say I’ve had much use for the exchange.

Strangely enough, in the relatively short time I’ve been in Second Life, I’ve already felt that I can express myself more freely, especially in French and Spanish. Not as much in Italian and German, but at least there’s some improvement.

I don’t have that many close friends in SL, but that doesn’t really matter. The constantly new people who want advice or help or – in some cases- who want to help me, will ask or tell me things in their languages. I need to find the right words or expressions quickly, almost as if I was in France or Spain or wherever it is.

Sure I need to let go of my demands for perfection. My sentences tend to be simple and basic, as I used to express myself in the years before I first went to school (when it comes to Swedish) or the first years of learning English (roughly ten to thirteen).

That’s not really a problem. I can make myself understood and my brief acquaintances appreciate the fact that I respond in their languages. It might be hard to believe, but there are some ‘residents’ of SL who aren’t fluent in English.

This even made me want to learn Portuguese too. Several times I’ve been unable to chat with the Brazilians who get in touch, hoping I’m a Portuguese speaker too. Who knows, some of those people might be really nice.

So, now I can add another advantage to being in SL. In a way, it’s a pretty good language school. If this is making you a bit curious, why don’t you drop in? There’s just one thing – you’ll need a quite modern and strong computer. Other than that, it’s not difficult. Besides, if you’re not that good at for instance English, there will most likely be people from your country in world already. Search for groups for people from your country or people speaking your language and join them. From the start, you’ll have some people to talk to.

My Second Report from 3D Land

At the moment, I’m trying to make enough money to upgrade. That means I’m not doing anything but camp. I chase around all of Second Life, looking for good camping places. Sometimes you need to watch your avatar all the time, so it won’t become inactive and get logged out. Of course, I have managed to ear quite a bit of money in a relatively short time.

Since I don’t have that much else to do right now, I might as well keep at it. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Second Life – SL – perhaps I should explain that the money in there – Linden dollars – are actually transferrable to a PayPal account. In some countries you can also transfer the money to your bank account. That might be possible here too, before long.

Something else – a Linden dollar isn’t worth much more than a cent or two. It takes a long time to save up for something in real life. I donated my savings to an animal shelter a while back. Since I know the two people who run it, I know that the money goes to a worthy cause. Many other animal shelters worldwide, will accept PayPal. You could donate to other causes as well. In any case, it’s been hard to buy something, like books.

Either way I like the idea of being able to donate money, even though I’m unemployed and can’t really donate ‘real’ money. That’s why I’ll probably keep doing this, as soon as I manage to save up a reasonable sum of money. Even though I would love to buy more books.

Another thing – sometimes I wonder if I’m not going around in circies. I want to make money so I can upgrade – so I can make more money. Isn’t that a bit weird? What little else I do inside SL I can easily do using a free, basic account. Here I am running the rat race, so I can run some more rat race. Something is a bit off in this reasoning, but like I said before, I don’t have anything better to do, so for the time being, I’m going to keep doing it.

Excuse, now I need to go and keep an eye on my avatar, so she won’t get up and stops making money, or maybe, worst of all, will be logged out.

Adventures in 3D land

Ok. I’ll admit it. That title – I just made it up because it looks cool. So far I haven’t had any adventures of any kind in 3D land. Not that I want to. That kind of adventure.

Let’s start at the beginning. Last summer I let myself be talked into joining Second Life. My sister was already hooked and she thought I’d like it too. In a way, I did. It’s a fantastic 3D environment. Better than any other attempt I’ve seen in the nine years I’ve been online. What’s missing is some content.

I’m not Bob the Builder. I’m not there to look for sexual contacts either. What else is there? Well, according to my sister, who is the only one I know in there, you can chat. Socialize. Like in any other social networking community. There are even groups, for people with all kinds of interests.

So I joined them. There were actually groups for most of the things I’m interested in. Unfortunately, that didn’t help at all. They seem too haphazard and vague for me. Or maybe it’s just that it’s hard to fit in. The people in those groups are presumably already friends. Maybe it’s my shy Scandinavian temperament. Who knows? In any case it didn’t help.

Supposedly, there are also all kinds of ‘real life’ events too. Concerts. Pub performances. Even online courses or lectures arranged by respectable universities. Lately, Sweden, yeah, that’s right, my country, has started a cultural embassy inside the virtual community.

So far though, I haven’t found my place in there.

What I have done, which I’ve enjoyed enormously, is create my avatar. It’s more fun than you might think. Certainly more fun than I expected. In real life I’m nobody’s fashion freak. In Second Life makeovers are a breeze. You just go shopping for new hair, new clothes, even new skins and shapes.

Shopping… Well, as you know there are women who love shopping then there are others who don’t. I belong in the latter category. Unless you let me loose in a bookstore with lots of spending money, shopping simply doesn’t appeal to me. I guess I’m too much of a tomboy at heart. Tech stuff is nice too, if even more expensive. Other than that, I just can’t stand shopping sprees.

In Second Life it’s just so much easier and practical. Unfortunately, it’s just as expensive and being the cheap weirdo that I am, I absolutely refuse to ‘buy’ Lindens – the currency, not the founders… Not sure if those are for sale… LOL.

That brings me to the most typical aspect of Second Life. Money. Business. People actually run businessed in there. Make believe businesses, selling make believe stuff. Believe it or not, someone’s actually become a real life millionaire selling (or rather speculating in) land.

I’ve been forced to learn new ways of making money. Being who I am, I absolutely refuse to join the sex industry. When it comes to sex, I’d rather buy than sell. Just kidding. About the buying part, not about the selling part. That’s my final word. Fortunately, there are a few more ways of making money.

So now I’ve become a professional dancer. LOL. No, not quite, but I do ‘camp’ for Lindens. Most addicts (did I say addicts? Slip of the tongue). Most residents frown on that, but camping is available and so I camp to make money. I sit in a chair or I dance. As simple as that. Of course you don’t make much and there are many pitfalls and hangups. You can get logged out. Some camping providers (is that the word, SL:ers?) kick you out on purpose so you have to pay a little fee to start over again. If you’re not careful you end up losing money instead of making it.

Anyway, let’s say I have a little hard earned cash. I head for the luxurious stores. In Second Life shopping really is a pleasure. You can walk around those endless halls, gazing at the merchandise hanging on the walls. Once you’ve found what you’re looking for (and being me, I’m extremely picky) you click on the item you’ve chosen and voilà ! You’ve bought it.

One of the worst aspects of Second Life is that it can be extremely sexist. I’m not going to get into the more ‘adult’ examples of this. Suffice it to say that the female apparel is slutty. There’s no other word for it. You’re expected parade your poor avatar around half-naked. Not me. Not this girl.

There. Enough for now. This is the end of my (possibly first) report from 3D land.