I was telling a bunch of non-Comm friends about the wonders of SLeuth, and they were stunned to find out that the whole class was working toward a single group grade. I really hadn't thought about that being an unusual format, but I suppose it is to an extent. Unusually awesome, that is. I really enjoyed working as a big team toward an ultimate goal - the successful establishment of SLeuth - and I think that the format made the project consistently engaging, exciting, educational, and enlightening, from start to finish.

In my esteem, the project made for a successful class because it was fun and gave us all a sense of the import of what we were doing for SLeuth. We had to learn new things and stretch our limits, and the motivation was not based on a grade but on our responsibility to the project.

I was dubious and--I won't lie--a bit put-out when I was placed on the building team, but when I was offered an out I stuck by the build team (or Unicorn Posse) because it was unpopular, and I'm really glad I did. I learned so much about building and decorating, form and function. I feel proud of the Posse. Proud as peacocks.

I came into the class with some acquaintance with chat rooms (from back when chat rooms were a thing), a little knowledge about online virtual worlds (countless hours logged in Ultima Online), an idea of the every-day practical applications of the internet (uh...many hundreds of dollars in DVDs purchased on Amazon, for instance). But I feel that I'm coming out of this class with an understanding of Web3D, an amalgamation of all of these facets of the internet - literally the web in 3D - still in its infancy. Second Life is a starter crib for such an infant, and I'm really glad I at least know who that baby is.

This project has been a roller coaster of good times.

As a member of the build team, I found our overall goals to be about as difficult as I anticipated, but in different ways. For example, one of our long days I set a task for myself: to make a large magnifying glass for our lobby. Within about forty-five minutes not only was I satisfied with my creation, but I had also adapted the magnifying glass into a hand-held version and distributed this new marketing tool to about half the class. The process was much smoother than I thought! Then I spent the next two hours turning over chairs in our virtual classroom. The things that I anticipated going smoothly often proved to be the real challenges.

As far as marketing is concerned, I feel like we've got some great ideas in the works, considering our small to non-existent budget. Ingenuity and some elbow grease has gone a long way for us, and we're still in the midst of the experience. Also, despite the discovery of services similar to our own, we're going strong. I think the services we've found are pretty small-time or in only adjacent markets. I think we still have the SecondLife matchmaking market lying more or less prostrate at our feet, and I'm excited about the rest of our plan.

Using Pat's Personalized Google idea (thanks, Pat!) I have all my news and links at one centralized location. This means that I will not only be able to easily access all this information from anywhere on campus, but it has been helpful to me since coming home.

On my Google Home page, I have several feeds, including news, weather, my Google calendar, how to of the day, and interesting photos of the day. Very helpful! More relevantly, I have feeds from Second Life Insider, the Official Linden Blog, the Reuters SL feed and the Second Life Herald. I have found Second Life Stats particularly addictive.

I also made a tab called "My Links" which has links to all the appropriate pages, which I have labled adorably with memorable link names.

Title: "Marketing Under the Radar"

Article Author: Deborah Branson

Full citation: Deborah Branson (2004). "Marketing under the radar," Corpwatch, December 22, 2004.

Summary by: Valeah Beckwith

Key concepts, terms and buzzwords:

- advertising
- stealth marketing
- guerilla marketing
- grassroots advertising
- word of mouth

Summary:

Despite its length, this article packs in a lot of discussion on stealth advertising strategies, their effectiveness, their potential dangers and their application, as well as the theory - and morality - behind them. Stealth marketing, sometimes referred to as "guerilla" marketing, for those who are not aware, is basically advertising where one does not expect it.

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Title: "Changing Realities: User Creation, Communication, and Innovation in Virtual Worlds"

Article Author: Cory Ondrejka

Full citation: Cory Ondrejka (2005). "Changing realities: User creation, communication, and innovation in virtual worlds." January 19, 2005. Distributed by Social Science Research Network.

Summary by: Valeah Beckwith

Key concepts, terms and buzzwords:

- MMORPGs
- virtual reality
- virtual property rights
- decentralization

Summary:

Ondrejka's article addresses the issues behind building and creation in digital worlds, and specifically in Second Life. The article begins with a discussion of the components of digital worlds, MMORPGS, the web, virtual reality and decentralized avatar worlds. A virtual world such as Second Life is an amalgamation of all of these. The assumption here is that understanding the makeup of this phenomenon will lead to a deeper understanding of - and ability to capitalize on - the promise of digital worlds themselves.

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Title: "Coercion: Why We Listen to What 'They' Say: Advertising"

Article Author: Douglas Rushkoff

Full citation: Douglas Rushkoff (1999). "Advertising." Excerpt from Coercion: why we listen to what 'they' say. pp. 162-192.

Summary by: Valeah Beckwith

Key concepts, terms and buzzwords:

- branding
- demographics
- psychographics
- ad deconstruction

Summary:

This article provides a look at the history of advertising. Specifically, the author looks at the 20th century, during which the field of advertising was effectively initiated, and developed into the business we know today.

( Read more... )

Web 3D is okay in my book. Some of my classmates, and I as well, have expressed some concerns about the workings of Second Life. I agree that the interface is somewhat counter-intuitive, and the graphics are impractical. But I still think that using Second Life feels real, to some extent. Nearly the whole class has begun referring to our avatars as "I" or "me." In a recent class discussion, I pointed out that we were referring to virtual property as "physical space," notably in differentiation from a 2D website. So I think we can all agree that Second Life as a world, even with its limited and crude graphics, has made something of an impression on us.

From now on I will operate on the assumption of a theoretical no-holds-barred, entirely accurate, lag-free, lifelike, real time virtual world. This may or may not be in the cards for the next few years as far as technology is concerned. I think that overcoming the time inefficiency and to a much lesser extent the still-primitive feel of the graphics are the two main obstacles right now in the popular acceptance of the medium.

I enjoy the potential visual aspects of Web 3D. Being able to create a virtual self that exactly resembles the user would make for much more convenient clothes shopping. It wouldn't replace something like shoe shopping for me (which is too bad since I'm not a big fan of shoe shopping), where the physical component of the experience is so great an imperative. I don't shop for shoes online currently, and no level of graphical realism is going to change that. We've used the video rental example in class, and here I also feel like the quality of the graphics would not make a difference, and in this case (as well as other tasks that can be performed physically or virtually) I don't see much of a difference between Web 3D and Web 2D.

My main concern with Web 3D is the lack of anonymity. The internet in its current form allows for wide exploration with no implied persona, whereas Web 3D (or, I should say, Second Life) requires an avatar. This limits the user to either forfeiting his or her anonymity, or creating a level of falsity in his or her online alter-ego. Neither of these appeal to me, and I feel the issue would create a large barrier in the transition or integration of Web 3D.

So in conclusion, barring the issue of anonymity vs. created persona and the fact that right now, in practice, shopping on Amazon.com is a lot quicker than doing any old thing in Second Life, I would approve of Web 3D as a theoretical alternative for Web 2D. But not for real life.

Okay, I tried to find a Significant Other on MySpace, but to no avail!

The first step of my research was to look at a few MySpace profiles to help me create a convincing fake persona in the form of Evey, who can be found under the user name "sl4l." Evey searched for other users who were interested in Second Life, and messaged five candidates (users who identified themselves as straight males or bi/gay females) asking them if they'd like to have a virtual rendezvous in Second Life.

I can see my mistake now, because I do have four pages of friends requests and five messages from people I don't know. MySpace is swarming with people shooting messages into the dark like I did, and of course users will ignore these impersonal messages (mine mostly read along the lines of "Hey! Want to meet up on Second Life? Message me back!"). All the same, I think the MySpace interests search could be a valuable tool for detecting clientele from without SL, but only if we can either reach out to users in a more personal fashion or get the interested users to contact us.

I didn't have much luck searching for SLers on Facebook because I couldn't figure out how to search interests for users outside my networks.

Oh nuts, I meant to say that we should capitalize on the opening in the Harry Potter market. I mean, "Magic Alley" closing? Harry Potter fans (which, throw a stone, right?) are an under-tapped resource in Second Life right now! Ch-ching!