A Town Built on Water

Flying around Venice I was able to see a city so magnificent. A city built on water and is able to sustain itself for so many decades. Like Paris, Venice is a city of love and wonder. While I was able to already experience a gondola ride, thanks to the Venetian in Las Vegas, I now have a virtual experience where it all began.

One of the Seven Wonders

With a quick search and an even faster teleport, I was staring at one of the seven wonders in the world...the great pyramids of Egypt. I was walking across sand and exploring the land I have never seen before. Glancing up in "aw" to the pyramids that slaves once built, or in this case, computer graphics.

Athens

Visiting Athens I got to explore where the once mighty Greek gods once walked and ruled over the mortals. And took witness to where the first olympics took place. I got to experience some of the buildings, some now not in their finest conditions. Again, it was nice being able to take the virtual tour, but hope that someday I will witness with my own eyes.

Dubai

Dubai, one of the seven emirates and most popular of the United Arab Emirates. Home of the man-made islands, the palm island and the world island. Is one of the most beautiful places on earth. One of which I hope to visit in my lifetime. It was cool getting the chance to take a virtual tour of the place and experience some of the architecture. Thanks to Second Life, I was able to explore the world's only seven star hotel, the Burj al-Arab.

A Time Of Shakespeare

Watching the introduction videos I saw a world I didn't even think one could visit. I traveled to the time of Romeo and Juliet and where a Shakespeare fell in love...Renaissance Island. I toured the stage where once the Queen came to visit and be entertained with the work of William Shakespeare. It was definitely a sight I thought I would not see and explore in my lifetime.

Neverland

Because this is a fictional world I thought it would be nice to go to a fictional place. I have traveled to Neverland, the place in which Peter Pan takes place. It basically just consists of the pirate ship, the large crocodile clock, and then a bunch of buildings that had nothing to do with Peter Pan. I tried to captain the ship away from the island but I was not able to steer the ship. This place also shows another side of Second life and highlights one of its many advantages. This is like one video game that has many different fictional places. This is not something that I could find in a video game.

Statue of Liberty

The Statue of Liberty and New York City were much like a few of the other cities in Second Life, there is just the main skyscraper and then a few other smaller buildings most of which are not interactive. One new thing that I found in New York was the ability to drive motor cycles. The streets were short and I wasnt able to go too fast but riding on the motor cycle was pretty fun. I crashed into plenty of other cars and motor cycles but nothing ever happened, I just bounced off everything. An improvement that they could make to Second Life would be to show the effects of a crash or of your avatar falling from a high place.

St. Louis

The MLB all-star game took place this week in St. Louis and because of this I decided to go see the Gateway Arch. Surrounding the arch is a few buildings, but nothing substantial or interactive. However, the arch itself was very helpful with not only information on the arch but of all of St. Louis. You enter the Archway through the bottom of the structure, just like real life. From there a computer is available to find facts about the structure and the city. You can also go up to a small room in the middle of the top of the arch and over look the city.

Land of Lincoln

When looking for the White House I found the land of Lincoln which shows the educational side of Second Life. This place could be used if someone needed to know a lot about Lincoln for a project. The small peice of land is completely dedicated to him and shows you a lot about him and his history. On the main part of the land the White House and Lincoln memorial are facing each other and in the middle of the two is a small garden filled with other educational information about Lincoln. Both the White House and the Lincoln memorial are almost perfect replicas of the real life buildings. Every detail is accounted for, which is what is truly impressive about Second Life, many of the replicas in this "Second World" look exactly like the real life thing.

Hawaii

I went to, Oahu, a beach in Hawaii and it looked great in even in a simulated world. The small resort was filled with plenty of other people and offered plenty of activities to the tourists. An official Hawaiian Lei could be yours for just $50, a Hawaiian wedding was also available, as were tattoos, surf boards, and apartments to rent. The island also had a few bars to sit down and talk to people and boats and jet skis for rent.There were torches lit and palm trees swaying in the breeze everywhere you look and plenty of people populated the resort. I've never been to Hawaii, but it looked exactly how I envisioned it. There was even an island of volcanos just off of the shore. The beach was incredibly detailed, the water was glistening, people were sun bathing, waves could be seen although not too realistic and there was even a lifeguard tower.

In World vs. Real World

(Jeff, Paul, and Steve)

The social structure in Second Life is similar to that of the real world. You will find people who are helpful and enjoy communicating while also running across people who are not so helpful. There is a higher level of self expression that in part is provided by the anonymity of not using your real name and being able to create an avatar of your choosing.

Our meeting in Second Life took place on the Dell Island. We picked the placed based on the facts it was easy to find (search: Dell) and not populated. The chat experience was basically the same as our weekly Wiggio chats but with a graphical background. The interface in not as intuitive or simple to navigate as Wiggio's.

Second Life can provide a classroom settings for student and instructors from around the world to meet. These classroom are only limited by the imagination of the teachers. If you are taking a chemistry class, it could be held in a virtual lab allowing for experiments without costly materials or potential hazards. The sense of a community is heightened by Second Life's social networking tools which allow for a comfortable setting to exchange ideas.

There is still much that needs to be improved in Second Life. The interface is not intuitive and at times can be cumbersome. The script language to create objects takes some serious time to master. New tools are need to augment the creation process. Technology needs to catch-up with Second Life and virtual worlds in general. Unfortunately there are high technical requirements. As technology continues to evolve and become smaller and faster Second Life will be able to run smoothly on newer smaller devices. Hopefully we will soon see smaller and faster graphic chips with faster wireless connections.

Empire State Building

I visited the Empire State Building. It wasn't the real city but just the big building and a small town underneath. The building was huge. It took me a while just to get my camera up to the top to take a picture. The small town below has an art gallery and some apartments that you can supposedly rent. When I strolled through town, I didn't come across any people. It was a small island with a huge skyscraper in the middle. It was a pretty cool place.

Australia

I visited Australia today. Its a pretty nice place. I saw a huge whale swimming in the ocean. I jumped in to see if it would react to me but it just kept swimming back and forth totally disregarding me. There are many art exhibitions going on in there. It was pretty cool to look at. Australia has a lot of different things to do and sights to see. It was the coolest place i visited so far.

New Zealand

I packed up my bags and set a course for New Zealand. The trip there wasn't half bad. When i got there, i found that there was one main building surrounded by a couple mountains. The rest was water. When i went inside the big building, i found out that it was a bunch of small shops. In the center was a dance floor. The place was deserted, and i was disappointed in the lack of sheep.

Big Ben

I traveled to foggy old London town today. It was a really huge city and i got lost on multiple occasions. Trying to find the elusive Big Ben clock tower turned out to be a hefty chore. I found a couple of people dancing at the club and big red double decker buses driving around the city. I tried to get on it but it wouldn't let me. The city had many cool looking buildings. I even managed to find a cemetery memorial type place.

Africa

I visited the African wilderness today. I saw many types of animals including giraffes, hippos, buffalo, deer, and mules. They didn't seem to be moving at all. Although I didn't get mauled by any lions, I did get the chance to look at different pictures of various other animals. Virtual Africa is a pretty wet place. There are rivers everywhere and it was even raining in one of the parts. There was a welcome center there but the place was pretty much deserted.

Eiffel Tower

A quick search and teleport took me to Paris and the Eiffel Tower (secondlife://Paris Eiffel /9/193/23). I had fun exploring the area. Found the Layachi Gallery (shown in the picture) which contained some nice artwork. Walked over to the Liberta Stage and found a nice tribute to Michael Jackson. The people where nice area and very helpful in pointing out landmarks and places to see. The high graphical nature of the place did slow things down and I had to wait for screen redraws. Overall a nice place to visit and take in the sites. You can contact me in Second Life at: Phightin4anAPaul Stromfield

Great Wall of China

I've always been fascinated by the Great Wall of China, so off I went in Second Life to check it out (secondlife://Mao /133/13/24). Overall I was not very impressed, the wall while looking nice was really lacking any information. I was hoping to find signs with info on The Great Wall of China as you walked along the wall. There were only a few people there and they were not in a talkative mood. In the picture, I found a nice place to sit and enjoy the scenery.

Japan Tempura Island

Since I doubt I will ever travel to Japan, I thought I would checkout Tempura Island, Japan (secondlife://tempura island 207/45/37). A visually stunning world with some of the most ornate artwork I've seen so far. While it is a visual treat to explore, it is a massive load on my system and video card. I needed to drop the graphic setting down to even be able to move around. I find this to be one of the most frustrating things about Second Life, the very high graphic requirements. I'm running on a i7 computer with a high-end gaming card over a FiOS network connection and still need to turn the setting down. I feel it lessens the visual experience of Second Life. It was interesting to see people chatting in different languages. the picture is of me relaxing on a giant couch looking at a pair of deer.

Dr. Who in Second Life

Being a big Dr. Who fan, I thought I would checkout the Dr. Who site in Second Life (secondlife://Katrina 28/250/28). As you can see from the picture above I meet two people at The Stolen Moment Bar. They thought it was great I was taking a picture of them for a class. We had a nice discussion on the new Star Trek movie and they gave me a few tips on Second Life. They were using voice chat while I typed. The mixed form of communication worked with no problems. I thought it was nice of them to warm me about some of the not so nice elements in Second Life as well. Overall a very nice setup with photos from the series and a store to buy in-game Dr. Who items. I even picked up a free sonic screwdriver.

Dell Giant Computer

I remember reading something a while back about Dell having a presence in Second Life, so decided to start there (secondlife://Dell Island 4/3/139). The Island looks great with plenty of stores to visit and art on the walls. I was about to pick up a free tree courtesy of Dell. The Dell Island (actually group of islands) location is abandoned. One island you can teleport to is the Dell Giant Computer (secondlife://Dell Island 2/245/207) where you can walk around inside a computer (picture on the right). It was interesting walking through fans and flying around the video card.