[1]
After months of getting to grips with SL and learning the ropes our time to shine was finally here. The class had been divided into three groups to work on a project under the theme of “web 2.0”, since October. Each group had 10 minutes each to present. (Although I think the groups went a little over this)
One of the requirements of our presentation was to advertise it in order to get more guests. We first off set up an event on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/events/504076326293430/ (Last accessed December 26th 2012) and started inviting people. I also invited people I had met on my travels in Second Life and messaged a few others who weren’t online often, to come. I was in and out of Second Life that day and so it seemed were a lot of the other students, most likely running through their presentations. Our presentations were held at The Amphitheatre in Dublin virtually Live. By 8pm there was a good turnout, including guest judges Elfay Pinkdot and Sitearm Madonna.
Our group was second to present. The name we went with for out presentation was “Where’s Your Identity, Please?” Box designed each of us our own badges to wear for the evening, containing our names and ages. We decided on the theme of identity as it seemed very fitting for the Sl module. We each took a different aspect of online identity. Dudley talked about social communities and box discussed the difference between real life and second life. She compared places she had gone in real life to the online version of it in second life. Thomas discussed online education, to aid his presentation he used a slide show and had conducted some interviews. I finished our presentation by discussing online businesses and how they portray themselves online. I used examples of a few businesses that use the web to their benefit by doing competitions via Facebook, twitter etc; and how this has resulted in more business and customers for them. I ended out presentation by talking about the necessity to manage any online identity.
Overall it went very well. I was quite apprehensive beforehand, that the slideshow would freeze or my internet connection would go but luckily all went to plan. After all of the presentations were done we were each asked individual questions about how we found various aspects of the course. It was a somewhat cathartic exercise; all of the pressure and stress that had been building up to the presentation evaporated once our group was done and talking about our SL experience and hearing everybody else’s was a nice end to put on the module.
[1] http://roflrazzi.cheezburger.com. Submitted by unknown. Retrieved December 26th 2012.
'Virtual Environments: Is one life enough?' 
A nice summary!
hi, i just found this blog, and found it interesting. i’m interested to know if you have continued to play sl after your project ended? was also wondering how caught up you got in the social play of the game while doing the project and what your final thoughts were.
Thanks Dudley! Hi Sue, thank you. Yes I have been in Sl a small bit since but I have been quite since the module ended, so not as much as I would like. When I get some free time I plan to try get onto it regularly enough. A bit yes, its hard not to because there is so much interaction with your class mates and people you encounter. It’s easy to get lost in the game and spend hours on it without realising. There were times I would go on SL before class and go to a place with music and i would happily have stayed there for longer had I not have had class.
Since our theme was on identity, it made me think more critically about SL and our my avatar. What she was representing, why etc. But I was kind of thinking about that from the beginning.
If you haven’t tried Sl before I would recommend it. Hope that helps!