Some decisions are easy
As I finally drifted into unconsciousness last night, I had every intention of leaving today’s post with just the photo you see above. But I woke up a few minutes ago with two lingering dreams related to Second Life that I want to share.
In the first, I was walking along a beach with Rheta Shan, [...]
If two bots kiss in an empty sim
On the night of Night’s somewhat fictionalized chatbot experience, Kanomi, Val, Night and I hung out and mused about virtual life and identity. Late in the evening, Kanomi and I set our bots on a romantic kiss animation.
Earlier in the get-together, the group had discussed the relative impact of visual stimulation and hot text chat [...]
New comic on identity & immersion
This two-pager began as an idea to show the many links between the virtual and physical worlds. The message was to be that any sense of a significant separation between them is pretty much an illusion. I completely changed my tune over the course of putting this together. I’ll let it speak for itself today. [...]
Spectatorship, Immersion and Emergence: Part Two
Back in May, I introduced the term “Emergents” as a label for virtual personalities who travel outside their world of origin through online vehicles such as Twitter, Flickr and Facebook. What I missed (as you can see in the associated graphic) was the psychological dimension.
This blind spot contributed to the disconnection some readers noticed within [...]
Spectatorship, Immersion and Emergence
This is a continuation of a topic thread relating to “AIR-based relationships.” AIR = Anonymous identity + Immersive environment + Romantic attraction.
Spectator: one who looks and watchesImmerse: to plunge into something that surrounds or coversEmerge: to become manifest : become known : to come into being through evolutionFrom Mirriam Webster
I did some visual thinking over [...]
Botgirl vs. Human comic book available for inworld reading
You don’t have to be an Immersionist to read the intellibook version of Botgirl vs. Human in Second Life. Pick up a free copy at my almost-completed gallery in Extropia. It’s on the bar. Right click and buy for $0.
The experience of AIR and not-AIR
This is a continuation of a topic thread covered in the last two posts relating to what I now refer to as “AIR-based relationships.” AIR = Anonymous identity + Immersive environment + Romantic attraction.
Description of each factor:
ANONYMOUS: The human identity of the other being is unknown. Full anonymity encompasses age, gender, race, location, employment, [...]
Botgirl vs. Human Comic in virtual print format from Issuu.com
The embed below is a version of the comic uploaded to Issuu which provides a cool electronic publishing platform for books, magazines, comics and just about anything you would normally find in print. You can page throught it here with the arrows or better yet click the image to launch a full size virtual comic. [...]
The impact of immersive worlds on human emotional processes. Part 1 of a series
I started this post on Saturday morning with just a title: “Suddenly Psycho: Why your virtual friends go Mr. Hyde on your ass.” After many false starts, I realized a snarky approach was not a worthy response to the intense pain and suffering people experience when emotions spin out of control.
As Dale Innis reminded [...]
Churn baby, churn
A few well known Second Life bloggers recently weighed in with ideas to improve the virtual world’s stagnant growth rate:
Dusan Writer launched an 800,000L$ “newbie viewer” creation contest. He sees the current interface as the key one cause of the problem.
Grace McDunnough proposed an AI trainer corp to guide newbies’ first steps. [...]
Botgirl on the road: Protect your virtual identity beyond Second Life
OpenSimulator is an open source virtual world platform that supports Second Life assets such as objects and scripts. The codebase fuels a number of alternative distributions such as RealXtend and Openlife Grid. Although the platform is only in Alpha, a number of public grids are already online.
I urge anyone who cares about an established [...]
Introducing a newly revealed member of the Pantheon of Second Life
Lagachakra is the Bodhisattva of Avatarian Patience. When trouble strikes, simply repeat her mantra and you will find peace:Lahga Crahsha Bodhi Om
This morning at the Future of Religions conference in Extropia, Zoe Connolly and I decided that Second Life needs some patron saints to help us through lagging, crashing, griefing and other virtual challenges. [...]
Your cheating alt: Botgirl’s Guide to Living With Lies
A discussion popped up on Twitter last week about the deceptive use of alts in the soap opera known as Second Life. Many readers here have heard (or experienced) horrific stories of betrayal, lust, revenge and greed. I must admit that a few have sent shivers up even my pixelated spine. I’ll spare [...]
Avatar vs. Human Personality Test results
I’ve posted a spreadsheet on Google Docs with the results from the first batch of test results from the Avatar vs. Human Personality Tests.
You can help investigate human and avatar personality by taking brief test
Many active Second Life users experience their avatar and human expressions as distinct beings with unique and even contradictory personality qualities. For instance, a human may be shy and modest while the associated avatar is the flirtatious life of a party.
To look more closely at this phenomenon, I thought it would be interesting to [...]
Drama in paradise: Love, Limerence and Virtual Worlds
Here’s a little story. See if it sounds familiar.
You meet someone in-world. They are hot. You flirt. There seems to be an intense connection. Maybe you hook up. Maybe you don’t. But you soon find yourself thinking more and more frequently about the object of your affections. At some point an invisible switch is thrown [...]
Botgirl moves to Extropia
I purchased a sweet parcel in Extropia. Vidal Tripsa brilliant builder, architect and living-doll was kind enough to loan me a house to use until she finishes designing and building the super-secret project that will one day be the futuristic home-of-my-dreams. (No pressure Vidal.)
Although the dwelling is a work in progress for her, it’s a [...]
Updated visualization of human and avatarian identity movement
Here’s an image combining yesterday’s separate depictions into a unified view. (Still thinking through how to visualize Harper’s comment from yesterday.)
Behind the fantasy: Love and limerence in Second Life
I’ve been working for the past couple of days on a story for an upcoming MBC show on romance in Second Life. After setting up some interviews and spending a few hours researching, I decided to take a break and play around with a little graphic depiction. I came up with this somewhat caricatured [...]
New Music Video: Second Life machinima mashed up with time lapse and 3D stock footage
I went back and forth about putting the heart sutra text in the video, but didn’t have time to do it justice. Have to wait for the remix.
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