Diamonds

Diamonds are forever! Is it James Bond – the agent 007? No, it is only my association that appeared after some newspaper article in the last days. There is hungriness for diamonds. Demand is increasing mainly in such countries like India and China. The mining is decreasing due to the political reasons. War and violence do not allow to work at the deposits in countries like e.g. Angola or The Democratic Republic Congo. On the other hand, the jewelry companies like Tiffany & Co. and LVHM Möet Hennessy Louis Vuiton chafe their hands. And prize is increasing and increasing. And what about you? Do you have any gift for your partner? Nothing is better than true diamonds. It is the best investment. After all, the diamond is common carbon, but in the most beautiful modification itself.

However, nothing is like roses. Opposite is truth. The prize can go down. Surely, there are the synthetic diamonds. Their production rapidly increases since 1955. At that time, General Electric (GE) invented a technique to produce the artificial diamonds. By the way, GE only as the company that is part of the most famous world stock index – “Dow-Jones-Industrial-Average” (DJIA). In fact, DJIA is not really the index. It is “average”. Originally, the rate of 12 American stocks was simply divided by 12. Today, DJIA covers 30 stocks and divisor is very complicated due to increase/decrease of company capital, new stock titles, etc. But the whole world orientates to DJIA.

And what about the stock exchange? I don not know.

And what about the Second Life? So, I know that. Visit luxury shop Diamonds Fashion at Diamonds sim.

Decadence

I was at party in CCaS club, Slovakia, at some party on Sunday. The party was name “Hairstyle Party”. So, I tried to search through my inventory to find some hair other than I usually wear. I remembered that I had ones packed in the inventory. They were from PXD Toxic brand name. So, I flew to a sandbox at Bohemia and they were unpacked in a moment. One needed also some suitable clothes. However, I was some bad combination of hairs and clothes. Further, I wear a tattoo on my upper body and I have also several jewelers. So finally, the leather trousers and the excellent leather shoes were the winners. I looked for also some accessory and by mistake I wore a fan! Later, there was toxic Lemon in the club and he told me that I looked “decadent”. So, I had this creation on me for the whole evening. Next day, it occurred to that I would make some pictures of me. I was done it! Look the pictures below!

Inspiration 2

So in the last days, I have browsed through the Internet and have found several Second Life movies that were very inspired. The first one is inspired by classic poetry – the poem “The Stolen Child” by William Butler Yeats. He was Irishman, but he wrote in English.

There are a lot of beautiful and fantastic places in SL. On of them is on the second video. I think that I have introduced it here.

The guardian angels are mysterious creatures that exist not only in actual world, but also in SL. They are equally beautiful as terrifying. Does one of them look so?

Rhythm – vibrations – sounds – voices – dance. All that is in the last video named “Two Planets”. I recommend you to see all in HQ.

(Zdroje: Vimeo, YouTube)

The Stolen Child from Lainy Voom on Vimeo.

Follow the Lad from Carla Broek on Vimeo.

Inspiration

Today I would like to present three movies that I have found in Internet.

The SpaceJunky group certainly is not unknown for many of us. They had their show in Tornado Club recently and singer Shakti Cianci gave an interview for magazine Globe – Globe is in-world magazine published in Czech and Slovak community. The song “I Am” is dedicated to a diversity.

The title of the second movie “For You” suggests that it is about love. Love is powerful sorceress, both among people and angels and each other too.

The last movie is really masterpiece. It was inspired by short stories of Edgar Allan Poe and it is made in new Second Life dynamic environment.

So, enjoy!

Press Enter to “Say“

I have borrowed the title of today’s contribution from paper title of J. de Winter a S. Vie (1.). I am scientist in RL, therefore, I have interested if there was some research studies about Second Life. Surprisingly, I have found several interesting papers, see list at the end.

These papers have interesting topics. At the first time, it is an education and a teaching in general (1.-3.). The next paper analyzes so-called “traffic” in Second Life (4.). I have learned there about that, how Second Life has architecture, what sim is, what kind of relation exists between sims and regions, which types of servers exist in SL, and finally, what it happens by resident login. Since SL is mostly about graphics, than it cannot miss the paper that focused on creation of 3D fractals in SL (5.). The last two papers (6.,7.) are from medicine area – about a virtual physician practice and about autism people in SL.

The first paper is very interesting, so I would like to present here some interesting remarks.

“Although the meanings of game (ludus) and play (paidea) overlap in meaningful ways – both are governed by strict rules – games area a type of play that end with victory or defeat, gain or loss.

Although Second Life is not a game – it does not have defined ends that determine victory or defeat – it still retains many of the same educational benefits as computer games that aks participants to complete goals.”

It is exactly this what I promote in SL for long time. YES, SL IS NOT A GAME.

And who are avatars living in SL world?

“They represent our deepest wishes, aspirations, virtues, and, yes, vices. Nothing is more authentic.

… avatars both reflect and deviate from players’ offline identities, …”

I also agree with it. Paper’s authors published also some list of questions that an instructor should present to his/her students. I think that these question are interesting also for everybody. Here they are:

• How does your avatar look and dress? Did you pay for extra features or for branded clothes? Why did you decide to create the “look” that you did?
  
• What gender and sexual orientation is your avatar and how does your gender and orientation affect your interactions within Second Life?
  
• What systems limit your actions, movements, thoughts, and expressions? What have you wanted to do or convey in Second Life but could not?
  
• What is the relationship between what you want to say and the technologies that allow you to “speak” in the game environment? How does typing or using voice-enabled capabilities make communication easier or difficult and why?
  
• What labor did you have to engage in to play in the environment as you wanted to? Did you purchase items with Linden dollars or script any of your own objects for use in Second Life?
  
• Have you done anything that you think is transgressive—against the norm? Have you engaged in “griefing,” deliberately aggressive or provocative activities, or harassment in Second Life and why? Have you ever been harassed there and what was your response?
  
• What parallels do you see in your everyday life—your “first life”—to Second Life? How does the character you play in Second Life reflect or not reflect your personal subjectivities?

Some answers could be simple, by others one has to think about them. So finally, I note two remarks without my comment

„Most of the legal values that Americans depend on in the real world – private property, representational democracy, law and penal codes – can’t be taken for granted in these online worlds.

Spaces like Second Life are not innocent, neutral tools.”

The following pictures maybe are not related to the theme, but this sim – Lighthouse Point – is dynamic in some parts. I recommend you to fly there.

References

1. J. de Winter, S. Vie: Press Ester to “Say”: Using Second Life to teach critical media literacy. Computers and Compositions 25, 2008, 313. (doi:10.1016/j.compcom.2008.04.003)
   
2. A. De Lucia, R. Francese, I. Passero, G. Tortora: Development and evaluation of a virtual campus in Second Life: The case of SecondDMI. Computers & Educations 52, 2009, 233. (doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2008.08.001)
   
3. L. Jarmon, T. Traphagan, M. Mayrath, A. Trivedi: Virtual world teaching, experiential learning, and assessment: An interdisciplinary communication course in Second Life. Computers and Compositions 25, 2008, 313. (doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2009.01.010)
   
4. R. Atnonello, S. Fernandes, J. Moreira, P. Cunha, C. Kamienski, D. Sadok: Traffic analysis and synthetic models of second life. Multimedia Systems 15, 2009, 33. (doi:10.1007/s00530-008-0125-1)
   
5. P. Bourke: Evaluating Second Life for the collaborative exploration of 3D fractals. Computers & Graphics 33, 2009, 113. (doi:10.1016/j.cag.2008.08.004)
   
6. K. Jähn: Die Virtuelle Arztpraxis: Perepktiven für webbasierte Gesundheitskommunikation durch „Second Life“? Public Health Forum 16, 2008, 6.e1. (doi:10.1016/j.phf.2008.07.004)
   
7. P. Fusar-Poli, M. Cortesi, S. Borgwardt, P. Politi: Second Life virtual world: A heaven for autistic people? Medical Hypotheses 71, 2008, 980. (doi:10.1016/j.2008.07.024)
   

Lost

There is a silent railway station sometime between hour of dog and hour of wolf. I am shivering and my pen is not writing. All the people are sleeping, only I and the birds are awaking. There are far sounds, maybe the cars or something like this. Just a liner train has passed. My cigarette has gone out. Now, some locomotive has blown itself. It is 1:45 AM and I am somewhere where I should not be. The writing is running on the paper. I cannot imagine anything. Maybe I have no any inspiration. I am thinking about something what I did not do it. Vainly. Again the locomotive has blown itself. I am still waking. Dark is already changing into light. The birds have felt silent. Only dogs are barking.

Is it Second Life or Real Life?

Closing

Saturday, May 2, was nice day for me too. There was nice weather in RL and I looked forward to nice meeting in SL. It was closing of some exhibition of snapshots of photographer Michal Prihoda and pictures from Iaoness Aichi. There were people in great numbers ass you can see on pictures below. The exhibition was placed in Nova Straaf Gallery at Deck 3 of SS Galaxy ship. This ship is really amazing and I have explored it yet. Maybe next time I will write something about it.

Fanda Ryba gave an opening speech and it was excellent. He mentioned Bwindi Orphans project and thanked all people that organized this exhibition including ship staff. After moving into the gallery, everybody could see presented works. Actually, I have mention that it was last possibility to see these things, because it is organized other exhibition every month there. After a deal with staff, you can find small pink pig there to donate some amount of lindens to building a new school in Uganda.

After that, I moved to La Fabrique café and listened jazz, blues and soul. Unfortunately, RL time passes same speed as in RL. Time to go.

SLurls: SS Galaxy, La Fabrique

Parties

There are no enough parties. Therefore, I looked forward to last April day. It is known as a “day of witches burning” in my country. It is very old feast day, when people get together and kindle bonfires mostly on hills or mountains. The spring coming is celebrated, even if this year winter passes directly into summer. Sometimes it is called as Walpurgis Night or according to Celtic feast as Beltaine, Beltine or Beltane, respectively.

SL Residents also celebrated this night in many places and in many forms. I looked forward to the night also. I wanted to fly to a sabbath of witches and wizards in CCaS club at Slovakia. However, fate struck. Exactly to say, nature used its big power. The place near to railway was struck by lightning and together with other two elements – heavy rain and air – the transportation was completely broken in many directions both from and to Brno city, where I work.

However, I made up for it next day on May 1. The party invitations were coming one at a time. In other words, I was just at four parties! Somewhere I stood long time and elsewhere short time. Simply, I hurried to social ball in concert park at our sim Bohemia. Nice ambiance, music and nice dressed people, this all filled my imagine about nice evening.

And dance whirl, excitement, passion and desire burned around me.