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I just came back from James Cameron's 3D movie Avatar which was a really great experience. For almost 3 hours, I just forgot the time, my mind was not anymore in cold snowy Paris, but in Pandora, where you could see the slow move of Jake Sully to his long tall blue semi-lion man avatar. I wish I could also have jump into that jungle and fly on those strange birds.

Great 3D movie with hundreds of people stuck on their chair and applauses at the end. Sophisticated media, simple message and the idea that soon, someday close to us, our Second Life will also be as real as the world of Pandora for Jake. I know for some this may sound as a nightmare, but for some of us, - and I belong-, this will be a small revolution....

How did we arrive in Second Life ? What was the main reason . How did we end up to incarnate our avatar, what was the drive, when was the exact moment ?

For some, it might be easy to say, but others more shy or modest, it would be more difficult to explain. For some coming from video game univers, it was a natural prolongation. For others, manipulating the keyboard took a month before they could get handle movements properly.

Reasons to get and to stay into Second Life  are all individual choices. Maybe SL was an answer to loneliness, tough and modern, maybe just an inside solitude that nothing could kill before. Maybe it was a way to keep active, brain & engine. Maybe it was an overdose of television, bars and light relationships. Maybe it was sickness, handicap, difficulty to move but will to share and socialize. Or unemployement,  or opportunities. Or maybe just curiosity, fantasy, creativity. And maybe for some, it was a little bit of everything.

Whatever was the reason to get in, there was an instant, short, fleeting, an immaterial flash, where we and our avatar became the same person. The avatar was not anymore a puppet on the screen, but the person behind it, mind, soul and body. We even did not realize it, we were just in the mental flow, no more idea of time and space, just inside this 3D world that was so hard to leave.

This is called immersion, brain immersion, and that makes all the difference.
Because when the avatar becomes a part of us, and that we can evoluate in a 3D environment,  then all the doors open to leave a stream of emotion going from inside the screen to outside the screen. That helps us to get interested by others, their culture, their mood, their life. That is why we can spend hours building a house or decorate it. That is how we can make real friends and relationships. That is also how we can learn more easily, or share a conference together, or understand concepts better.  

When emotionnal doors are open, what happens to our avatar also affects us. It can be good, like a friend of mine who suddenly discovered she had no more vertigo in her real life after using parachutes a few times in Second Life. It can also be sad, like when suddenly you learn that someone you used to talk to everyday, had a mortal accident in a trip on the Himalaya Mountains.


Yes, our avatar changes us, that is a fact. 

People who never were in virtual worlds can laugh about avatars and maybe they do it because they dont get it. They understand you need a pen to write, or a screen to watch a movie.
But they dont get the idea, you may need an avatar to enter in another dimension, and eventually spend the vacations you can't afford in real, go to bars, laugh and dance, meet people, share time and mental energy with them, architect a palace you would never be able to afford, become the Madonna of the international virtual stage from you small village in Arkansas. But apart from the fun, your avatar in a 3D world, is a way to feel the abstract space, to see yourself in an environment that flat design or internet lists & catalogs are unable to provide.  For business people, an avatar will allow you to travel during the same day in many regions of the world, hold meetings and media conferences, exhibit your goods and products, recruit specialists, visit prototypes...

Your avatar is all about putting your dream in action, and at the end, you never know how this action will impact your person in the physical world.

People do not understand it mostly because they are afraid of it. Afraid that you would lose all contact with your reality. It is a risk for some, but for how long ? As Jake Sully, you do not feed your body with pixels...

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Except if you have been sick and away from any traditionnal or new medias the last 2 month, or out on another planet, you certainly have heard about UN Copenhagen Summit on Climatic Changes which is being held until Dec 18th.

There are many ways to participate to this conference, if you are not invited at the Summit ! You can of course do it the traditionnal way, which means waiting for hearing the news on TV. But if you want to be more active and get the feeling to participate, you can either share and interact on the website OneClimate which distribute a live stream from Copenhagen 24/7 thru Justin TV, either join the Virtual Expo in Second Life at OneClimate Island where you will get to participate to real conferences and meet interesting people who have been using Second Life and virtual worlds as a platform to prove their concept for a greener world. That is one of the most interesting aspect of virtual worlds and this is the best moment to get the idea !

This means you'll have the opportunity to ask questions of the policymakers and campaigners shaping the most important climate negotiations of our time.  You can also watch films & get information, based on the five elements, covering the Arctic, rainforests, wind turbines & typhoons, volcanoes, peak oil, virtual allotments and Australian wetlands.  

You'll find all details of the program and places in SL here.

If you have any questions about this great event and want to relay or know more, you can contact Paolo Rousselot in SL aka Peter Lundquist.

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Zwei Putzfrauen im Bürogebäude. Sagt die eine: "Ich mache jetzt Diät".
Darauf die andere: "Gut, dann mache ich die Fenster".

Warum müssen wir über so etwas lachen (komm, gib es zu, du hast wenigstens geschmunzelt)? Keine Ahnung, und im Grunde auch völlig unwichtig, ich benutze das Stilmittel des Witzes nur als Einstieg in diesen Beitrag.

Aber mal ehrlich, das Jahr neigt sich dem Ende und spätestens nach Sylvester sind sie wieder da, all die guten Vorsätze. Immer gerne genommen, der Vorsatz, im neuen Jahr abzuspecken. Deutlich abzuspecken, versteht sich. Und endlich kann ich diesen Blog einmal dazu benutzen, wirklich hilfreich zur Seite zu stehen. Mit meinen beiden Tipps. Tipp 1: 15 Kilo abnehmen in 5 Minuten – die Bein-ab-Diät!! Funktioniert immer und dauert vor allem nicht so lange. (Übrigens: Vorsicht, funktioniert genau zweimal, dann ist Schluss mit dieser Art von Diät!)

Auf Tipp 2 bin ich gerade eben gestoßen: Abnehmen in Second Life. Was?! Ist der jetzt total irre geworden? Ist er nicht. Kürzlich hat in unserer virtuellen Lieblingswelt Kaliforniens beliebtestes Fitnesstudio eröffnet: Club One. Auf einer kompletten Insel kann der gemeine Resident Sport treiben, relaxen, Pfunde verlieren und was weiß ich noch alles. Dass das kein Gag ist und man es in Kalifornien offensichtlich verdammt ernst meint damit, sieht man nicht zuletzt daran, dass Club One jetzt ganz aktuell ein spezielles Programm aufgesetzt hat, für das der elitäre Club Leute sucht, die mitmachen. Und zwar in Second Life ... also virtuell. Genauer gesagt, Fitness OS (Ohne Schwitzen).

Ok, wenn wir uns alle wieder beruhigt und hingesetzt haben, dann lasst mich erklären, warum das tatsächlich funktionieren kann: Wer schon mal eine Diät gemacht hat (und wer hat das nicht, außer mir?), der weiß, dass die meisten Diäten an sich selbst scheitern, sprich an den Leuten, die sie machen. Der biologische Prozess des Abnehmens ist nicht das Problem, das Problem ist die Frustration, die Motivation, kurz: die Emotion. Und genau da setzt dieses virtuelle Pfunde-verlieren an. In angenehmer Umgebung treibt man Sport, schwitzt, saunt, schwimmt und dieses virtuelle Verhalten überträgt sich sozusagen automatisch auf das Verhalten im realen Leben. Wer einmal virtuell 2 km am Morgen durch das eiskalte Schwimmbecken gekrault ist, dem sollten lächerliche 200 m Freistil im Schwimmbad um die Ecke keine mentalen Probleme mehr bereiten. Na, das denk ich doch auch.

Wer's immer noch nicht glaubt, der schaue hier:



Anmeldungen übrigens direkt in Second Life. Das wollte ich nur noch erwähnen. Nur für den Fall, versteht sich ...

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What is the common point between Second Life 2008 and Second Life 2009 ? Or let's figure the question as one of those wine lovers friends, and since we are almost at the end of the year, can we assert the Second Life 2009 vintage is one that will show a definite break between the old Second Life and something that we do not know yet but which is on the way.

So much changes everyday announced on the Second Life blog, new website, adult policy, new policy for the newcomers, new premium accounts, new rules for merchants, new enterprise program, new viewer in perspective and so much more is showing a deep change and it is hard to believe Linden Lab is not onboard to announce some main change.

I am not reading the cards but I really would like to be in one of that movie where you could read the newspaper of december 2010, then come back and use that news to achieve the best position for the future.

Today I was having a closer look to Blue Mars strategy with content partners, reading about the lauching of NearLondon , listening to people talking about Eve, downloading pdf about web.Alive and finally ended by watching James Cameron talking about his movie Avatar which I am looking forward to see next wednesday with my nephews !

I celebrated my 3rd rezz day a few days ago. At the time I entered SL, blogging was the hot thing. My Space was this music thing, Facebook was a joke, microblogging was not even existing, Apple was talking about the iPod Phone and Second Life was wowwww. So much is going on with web 2.0 and time passing, we dont realize how we have ingest that change, how all that has changed us, but also shaped a whole generation coming in the ring and for whom Second Life looks not so wowwwwww.

I love Second Life and the way we were. I am working as an evangelist for 3 years, and integrated it in my personal and professionnal life but let's face it. Change we need & change the community needs to accept.

I remember Philip Rosedale in Chicago saying " we know virtual worlds are here to stay and grow. We just don't know if Second Life will be the one..." and disappear in the boiling flow of technology as Netscape did in its time. And because I want Second Life "to be the one" (dont know why really, but this is how it is), I think we all should work to accept and manage this change and the opportunities it offers each of us.

More than this, I think nothing will really change for those who dont want to change. Second Life is just opening to other users, other needs and wishes, other type of consumers, and why would it not ? Why would we want to keep the old Second Life the way it was like a jealous lover who would ask you not to ever change ! And for this move, all of those changes make sense :
- a new viewer to simplify the first hour experience for those who are not video game oriented
- a new premium account with land and basic house to enhance that experience
- a new enterprise product to feet corporate needs
- an adult policy to run away from usual scandals that pollute the image of the world
- a change of Xstreet to enhance the shopping experience and maybe avoid crazy dumping
- Second Life Answers with Resident Help Network like the aardvark model
- an energetic solutions providers program to chart quality and extend "a B2B sales force" (affiliation program ?)
- a reorganization of the P.R. program to reinstall the real image of SL

I am sure I forget a lot of announces but what I feel for sure is that the change behind all this is leading to a swift in the economic model. More income, sure, but also more money to finance more technology and therefore more services.

More technology also means different versions of the viewer and maybe a lite SL browser based, real time, acting as a twitter inworld. Means also integration of 3D meshes, and interoperability with other social medias.

And to get back to the image of Second Life, this change would take us to a really new Second Life, a Second Life 2.0 that would certainly needs a change of name. Is a suffix enough to identify what is your Second Life, entertainment, enterprise or education ? Or is Second Life already a brand of the past that needs a total fixing with a new name ? Is Second Life ready for a change of name ? What do You think ?

My opinion is that name must be relevant to the user you are talking to, and I am sceptical on the fact that a radical change of name would carry the idea of a total new change without losing the benefits of 6 years experience and work. Except if SL would be totally integrate by a larger company, what is the point ? A suffix would be a good start so each consumer will associate it to its own interest. The first talks we had with corporates mentionning a new product called Second Life Enterprise are showing us a slight change of attitude and a positive concern.

Whatever will be chosen, wherever leads those changes, we may all agree Second Life has definitely opened the way and changed the life of millions of people all over the world, introducing the era of 3D web real time... Let's continue, let it be the one, let's move on and share !


"Life 2.0" documentary teaser from Jason Spingarn-Koff on Vimeo.
This feature length documentary follows a group of people whose lives are dramatically transformed by a virtual world, Second Life - reshaping relationships, identities, and ultimately the very notion of reality.
Premiering at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival

Related articles by Zemanta

• Linden Lab to raise Xstreet fees, loses vendors, products (massively.com)
• Exclusive interview with Linden Lab CEO Mark Kingdon (massively.com)
• Linden Lab to alter third-party Second Life viewer policies (massively.com)
• Second Life is Still Around but Media is Less Interested (shoppingblog.com)
• Second Life Economy Healthier Than First Life (manolith.com)
• Second Life Takes Virtual Goods Corporate (marketingvox.com)
• Virtual world workers need avatar dress code policy (blogherald.com)
• Dusan Writer Blog
  

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Image via WikipediaBack from a few days in Rouen, the old capital of Normandy, where I was in charged to train the creative team of a multimedia agency which main signature is something equivalent to "Materialize Virtual". Nothing about 3D but just the plain idea that web is a virtual experience...

Confronting ideas and working on website ergonomy, I suddenly realized the gap which existed between "talking about virtuality" and "living the virtuality".

Maybe, as I developed it in an early post about immersive internet, it is still the use of the word "virtual" that is still frightening people and corporates, maybe it is the close proximity with video games, forcing some to add "serious" to limit the analogy... Maybe also, corporates just do not understand the substantive savings and the qualitative added value they can get from adopting those new collaborative practises.

Actually my deep thought at this point is that there is no difference between real and virtual, virtual is just another side of the reality... or let's say a tool, very practical to be in real time in different places at the same time. What is the problem with that, the oldest dream of mankind, why should it raise so many questions, except those that I would describe as philosophical, and which are the most important : who am I, what is the meaning of my life, what do I want to do with my life....

The famous "Cogito, ergo sum" from our national René Descartes, persists in the dematerialized reality as it in the physical one... I am a thing who thinks, or let's say a thinking reality... And I am tempted to go further here, asserting that without his social attributes, manking gives itself a larger freedom of being, behavioring, and exchange knowledge with more authenticity.

Maybe that can be frightening, and especially in France, my country, where the sacralization of education is also about how you say it and what you wear...

The last conference I gave could have been made totally into a virtual environment. A training of 3 hours a day during a week, at the MakeMyWorlds Training Center would have cost less than half of the price of the budget that was used to invite me there - which was a pleasure nevertheless - But in those times of economic crisis, swine flue & green logic, that is a real point to think about each time you would organise an event.

Just a short calculation to give you an idea :

Budget 1 : 10 000 to 15000 euros (depending on the type of executives)

• 3 days conference
  
• Train, taxis and other transportation
  
• Hotel for 3 nights
• 21 restaurants & various reception fees
  
• Salaries of 6 persons non operationnal during 3 days

Budget 2 : 5000 euros

• 5 x 2.30 hours per days conference at MakeMyWorlds Training Center (including basic pre-training of Second Life, documentation, installation)
• Salaries of 6 persons during 12h30 which is very different since collaborators are just non operationnal a third of the day interrupting another way with the daily flow. The other important thing is that the 5 sessions can be organised twice a week so the pedagogical process is much deeper and efficient.
  

Above the knowledge those people acquired in the training, you must add some special value directly created from the experience in virtual environments. A group of 6 persons meeting in 5 sessions, develops special bonds sharing a learning experience in an unknow territory ... to make it short and create a physical sensation, it is a bit like those team building sessions where you stimulate a selling force by walking bare foot on hot coals ... just less traumatising and dangerous !!

So the budget for this training would have cost to this company , less than 50% of its price in reality, and would surely have brought at least the same effect, and eventually more in a longtime run... since those 6 people would also have developed a special skill to meet in virtual environments ... skill that they could use in the future for internal meetings from home or external meetings out of the city.

Some nice savings that corporates can reinvest into more trainings to allow people to extend and enlarge the field of their knowledge and access to R&D, or redistribute it in better wages, or offer workers cultural and social events, very real, to stimulate creativity and create a real enterprise culture. From a diner-concert or theater, to a ClubMed week end, opportunities are endless... What about creating philosophic coffee shop next to the cafeteria...

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Kein Grund zur Panik! Ganz ruhig bleiben. Es kann Ihnen nichts passieren. Natürlich nur insofern Sie das Haus nicht verlassen, öffentlichen Versammlungen fernbleiben, nicht in den Urlaub fahren und mit niemandem reden – oder nur mit Ihrer Familie, die mit Ihnen im Bunker lebt.

Mittlerweile glaube ich ja an gar nichts mehr, vor allem nicht an das was ich lese. Zu oft werde ich überrascht. Beispiel? Gerne. Nehmen wir die Weltwirtschaftskrise. Noch bevor sie uns alle dahingerafft hat, ist sie auch schon wieder im Orkus des Unwiederbringlichen verschwunden, die Gute. Natürlich erst, nachdem die Blüte unserer Wirtschaft (ich meine Unternehmen) dieses kurzweilige Phänomen ausreichend zum Anlass zu nehmen konnte, im großen Stil Arbeitsplätze abzubauen. Das versteht doch jeder!

Eigentlich hat die Weltwirtschaftskrise auch ihre guten Seiten, denn am Ende bleibt dem Normalo-Bürger (arbeitslos oder nicht) so wenig Kohle, dass er an Urlaub gar nicht zu denken braucht. Wie gut, denn dann kann er sich in der Fremde auch nicht anstecken. Und null Reisekosten, sozusagen.

Das gilt natürlich NICHT für Unternehmen. Denn für die gehören Reisekosten ja zum festen Posten einer jeden Budgetplanung. Klingt nach Einsparpotential – und siehe, genauso ist es. Und was hilft da beim Sparen: richtig – virtuelle Welten wie Second Life! Denn SL ist nicht nur von der Schweinegrippen-Epidemie weitestgehend verschont geblieben, sondern bietet Unternehmen überdies eine ganze Reihe von Möglichkeiten, virtuell zu meeten. Und davon wird immer mehr Gebrauch gemacht. Wie z. B. IBM. Virtuelle Messen, Kundenmeetings, Mitarbeiterversammlungen, Online-Präsentationen – das alles geht jetzt in einem Rutsch. Und kostet so gut wie nix. Aber das beste ist: Keiner pennt mehr ein in so einem Meeting.

Denn Jetlag gibts auch nicht mehr! Na dann ...

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Needed a nice break from Second Life this week end to enjoy my real nephews, and socialize with my natural environment ! Fall is nice in Paris those days and walking makes your ideas clear and fluid. It is important, when you spend a lot of time inworld, to create those breaks that make you see your old second life as a newbee. I can't believe I will enter into my 4th year of SL in a few weeks...

Ending my week end with a great movie (Le Concert from Radu MIHAILEANU) shared with some friends in a comfortable movie theater, I was remembering of a live performance I enjoyed at Natt Jazz Club sometimes ago, and wondering if it would be the same kind of emotion to share this movie with my SL friends from all over the world, in a great decor like the one of the incredible Rose Theater. That is maybe why so many people are using TV screens in SL...



Last week I spent quite a bit of time updating my social online networks thru facebook, linkedin and twitter... Those followings are a few articles I run thru on the way. Glad to see that aside from usual critics and complaints, and far from the medias affects, there are still a lot of people and organisations who are experimenting and working to make the best out of SL and virtual environments.

What happened to Second Life? I was not too sure when this was written when I read it... Look as an old vision of SL, which is very different from what I can see. Apparently there was an interview given by M Linden and the BBC journalist wrote it yesterday... But she does not seem to have really taken the time to explore Second Life 2009....

How Virtual Worlds Mimic the Politics of the Real World
Interesting thoughts & questions about governance in MMO and democracy in virtual worlds...

Business Process Modelling in Second Life
"Our scope was to explore how Web 2.0 techniques, social networking tools and virtual world environments can be used to support the collaborative design of business process models."

The U.S. Army Embarks on Virtual Worlds for Amputees
"Pixels and Policy looks at the growing trend in developing an amputee-friendly Metaverse, and the role new "accessible worlds" will play in improving the lives of amputees."

Wiki Tree Goes Open Source
"So we’re liberating the Wiki Tree software. We’re releasing all the code, both in-world and server-side under the Berkeley Software Distribution license."

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• Wikitree (deangroom.wordpress.com)
• The Linden Prize goes to ... Studio Wikitecture and Virtual Ability (blogs.secondlife.com)

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