The celebration of Second Life’s 6th year has begun and I’m happy to say that the Studio Wikitecture group has an excellent build featured in the sims. Using the wiki-tree the group came together and collaborated on the final design that you can visit here: Studio Wikitecture @ SL6B

Do swing by and check it out! The tree is there with all of the iterations of this project. There’s also kiosks that display info on other Studio Wikitecture projects.

That was it for me today.  Had to split early so I missed the last couple of sessions.  I came back in time to have a beer, watch some Rock Band and listen in on the acoustic jam and then we got kicked out.  Hopefully the camp returns to BarCamp in the fall.

That’s right.  A presentation on presentations.  Right about now is when I kick myself for never, ever writing down the presenters name.  What kind of notes do I take?  Srsly.  This was a great talk on the basics of talking at a group of people.  And…GASP…he used no slides!  Which was awesome because the absolute reliance on OO.o/PowerPoint/Keynote/whatever slides that happens (not necessarily at BarCamp but EVERYWHERE) kind of drives me crazy.  Most presentations could be handed out and lose the speaker and you would get more out of it.  But I’m ranting…

Other things I jotted down:

Human to human communication

Make sure there’s 3 clear points

How not to say um, if you think of saying um, inhale (this works!)

A fun session on the history of the Aibo and a little overview of the existing Aibo community despite the fact that Sony discontinued the product.

Aibo’s come apart! They were originally envisioned to have modular parts

Aibo memory sticks are really hard to find (pink sticks which differ from traditional storage memory sticks)

Resources:

tekkotsu.org

aibopet.com

bbs.aibosite.com

iRobot makes a platform called Create (non-vaccuum roomba) which allows you to hack away at it and create other robots.  So, if you want to build your robot army, start with something like this.

Presented by Jonathan Strauss, UnClasses.org

Was setup to facilitate teaching/learning connections.  Everyone has something to teach and this provides a place to publicize and build a group of students.  Referred to as “Casual Learning” (or Casual Teaching I suppose)

Casual learning – everyone has something to teach

Unclasses.org will setup classes by metro area. You setup a class and then host it (in real life).  You can schedule a class and leave info as TBD to see if you have interest before committing a location.

Anyone can teach or learn

Instant knowledge share?

A cool presentation that generated a lot of discussion about Alternate Reality Games.  Discussed using them as marketing tools and talked about the challenges and nuances of running an intricate “game” without shattering the alternate reality or endangering the participants.

-websites used as mystery to drive discussion for traditional media

-Interesting discussion on setting up alternate realities, the boundaries you hit, the wildcards (users trying to break the game) and rewarding users just enough to keep them interested.

BarCampLA 7 has come and gone and I’m going to post my quick notes from the sessions.  They’re not at all in-depth enough to make you feel like you were there but they’re enough to help me remember what I attempted to learn.  Maybe you should come to the next one if my notes aren’t good enough for you.

Terribly sorry about the abrupt stop in the journey across the world.  I’ve recently upgraded both my machines to Ubuntu 9.04 and, it turns out, AMD has decided that their driver that is compatible with this latest Ubuntu is not so compatible with my no deprecated ATI cards.  It’s a perfect storm of frustration leaving me without decent 3D support and thus really shitty looking SL.  I’m holding out for a patch to the previous driver that will rectify all of this. 

Until then…I apologize.

Apologies for my extended break.  Let’s just pretend a curled up under a prim tree somewhere and fell asleep.  My journey resumes…

The railway continues into Calleta and there’s an immediate payoff as a large rail yard full of a collection of train models,  that I imagine most enthusiasts would love, unfolds before me.  There’s quite a variety and the setting is nearly perfect for them all.  Beyond the railyard lie some clues as to what this sim really is. 

I find a collection of posters and helpful object willing to get me started with the Second Life Hobos.  I’ve heard of the hobo subculture but I’ve never encountered anyone who’s a part of it.  I endeavor to hang around here a bit and meet one. Further down the rails I stumble into what seems to be a hobo camp! 

Continue reading »

Whilst on my break from walking I wanted to post this article from New World Notes only because I think it’s rather important.  Important because a lot of folks still don’t grasp VW’s and some refuse to.  This is an application that will make almost anyone take a second to consider the newish technology we all enjoy daily. 

I hope this gets out to the mainstream media as easily as stories of sex/adultery in SL do.