Being enrolled in INF 315 for the second time in the past 2 years has been one of the most interesting and exciting experiences of my college education. This class has really opened my perspective of what I used to think of social networking and virtual worlds. Before I used to think that the internet was simply a tool we could use to make our lives a little bit more convenient, but after the submerging myself in the internet world I soon found out that the internet is in many different ways a way of life. People work and make a living by simply logging on to the internet. Other people buy and sell most of the products online. For most of us the internet is a social place where we can still a connection with our friends and relatives. It is also a useful tool for research. The use of the internet brings a world full of countless opportunities and there is still more to come. Taking this class really allowed me to notice the internet world that exist around me. Second Life was an unforgettable experience itself. Just like in the real world in second life you can pretty much do anything, host a business meeting for example. It is literally like a second life.

When this class first began, I did not see beyond the idea that Second Life was just a virtual game. I thought of it as just a hobby for those people who love to be on-line, but my perceptions were completely wrong. Looking back I realize that Second Life is more than a game or hobby to a lot of people. Second Life is a great opportunity for a lot of people. It is another world in which they can start their life all over. It gives people the ability to do things that they can not in the real world. I remember watching an ABC Prime-time special not too long ago on Second Life. It was about a couple whose husband was disabled and could not walk. Their hobby and passion was to dance together so through second life their hobby was kept alive. The couple loved to dance on SL , for them it gave them a great opportunity and a second chance to do what they loved to do. For the husband, SL gave him independence. He did not feel as if he needed anyone else to do things. He was up and walking doing whatever he pleased. Second life also gives people the ability to travel to different places and attend all sorts of events that they could not do in the real world. Everything is just a click away in SL. Moreover, SL is like a big money making business. It gives its inhabitants the ability to set up shops and sell whatever they like to make money. People therferore have their own on-line business set up through SL. Overall, the name Second Life is perfect for this vitrul world becuase after all it has the ability to provide its inhabitants with all the oppurtinites that the real world can offer!

My experience with Second Life has improved tremendously since the beginning of the semester. At first creating my avatar was extremely difficult. I struggled so much with making it look like me. I would become easily frustrated and irritated with second life at first because I had no experience. However as time progressed, I enjoyed spending more time on second life. Slowly I was able to manipulate my avatar and make it look just like me. I was able to create and buy clothing and shoes that looked just like the ones in the real world. I was able to manipulate a lot more things such as building my own condo and building a flag. In my own condo I was able to furnish and style it to my own taste. I was even able to upload real photos of my family and the pictures hanging from the walls in my Condo. My skills improved so much that with a group I was able to create a Laser Tag event that was open to all the inhabitants of Second Life. I was able to make the Laser Tag area as real as possible by creating many different objects that players could use to for protection. As I look back I realize that my skills have improved tremendously and that now I enjoy Second Life a lot more than I ever thought I would. Second Life is a world full of opportunities for those that can learn and are willing to take advantage of it.

Attending the car and bike show was really troublesome for me. I logged into Second Life from my apartment where I didn’t have that good of an internet connection. My laptop kept crashing but nonetheless I was able to see how the car show turned out. Another reason why my laptop kept crashing was because of the lag caused by the many people who attended the event. The overall event was just amazing and interesting and the DJ was pretty cool as well. I really liked the idea of cash prices for the best cars.

There were many people who participated in the car show and the cars and bikes shown were pretty bad ass. I really liked the choppers in particular. The car show seemed to be well organized especially because there was a lot of collaborative work and effort put into. The event was hosted at SLaytona owned by the Saints of Hell and DJ Fury played music to life up the event. I think the whole event was unique and way cooler than the rest of the other events. If you read one of my previous blogs I really wanted to do a car show for our event but as a group we agreed on the laser tag tournament.

After hosting our SL laser tag tournament I attended to the Off Constantly Art Show. The Art show was pretty cool and interesting and there were many interesting pieces that I really liked. There was about 20-30 people who attend and I think they all enjoyed it. From my perspective, the art show went pretty good, it showed overall good organization of the event and good team work amongst the group. One of my favorite pieces of art was actually donated by one of my INF classmates (mannit). The art piece showed the beautiful orange lit up UT tower and in the background an amazing lightening bolt coming down from a dark night sky. The art show seemed to be such a success that one of the visitors randomly asked me if I knew if any of the art pieces were sell. I told her that the people hosting the event were some of my classmates and that the art show was an assignments of an INF course at UT. According to the event coordinators, the art show could have turn out better than it did. They said a lot of the people that promised to donate art pieces backed out at the very last minute. Despite all this, they were still able to have a good turn out and a successful event. Overall, in my opinion I think that Second Life represents the real thing, when hosting an event in real life there’s no telling what the outcome of the event will be. There are so many ways in which an event can be a total success or a total failure. Therefore, I think that hosting an event on Second Life could serve as a pre-trail to a real life event. Doing this could be a very good way to pinpoint and indicate what problems you might run into when the real thing comes.

This past Friday November 30, my group and I hosted our final group event, which was a Second Life Laser Tag Tournament. Preparing for the event seemed to be pretty fun and simple. Building the arena was the most time consuming part of the entire event. Since the event dealt with avatars running up and down trying to shoot other avatars of the opposite team, we knew we had to build a space where people could run, hide and target their opponents. The trickiest part was to build obstacles that had ramps and stairs since the avatars weren’t able to fly. After finalizing the arena and a couple of run throughs the team and I were finally prepared for the big day. At first everything seemed to be running kind of slow but after a couple of minutes all hell broke lose. Avatar after avatar came running through the door anxious and ready to have a fun time playing SL laser tag. In the first couple of rounds my team and I were having a little trouble explaining the rules and handing out the equipment; we knew we had to improvise. Babalou the leader of the team proceeded outside of the building where he explain and handout notecards to all the incoming avatars. Imran, Mannit and me directed some the avatars who were having trouble loading the life and ammo status HUDS and guns. After the improvements every round ran pretty smoothly leading to a successful SL Laser Tag Tournament.

For our final group event of the semester we decided to host a Second Life Laser Tag Tournament. Our group consisted of 4 team members which were Babaluo, Imran, Mannit and Pablow (SL names). We decided to go with laser tag for two particular reason. First we wanted to host an event where everybody could just come together and have a great time in a friendly competition. You didn’t have to be part of a group or have any kind of experience. The event was also free of cost. The other reason was because we wanted our event to be exciting for us as well as for anybody who participated. We wanted an event that wouldn’t take too much of our times but at the same time we wanted an event that was worth while. Building the arena and trying out the laser tag was a whole lot fun in itself. All through out, the whole experience was fun and exciting.

We decided to divide the work into 3 main tasks assigned to different members amongst the group: Imran and Mannit took care of the exposure of the event; getting the word out there, Babaluo made sure that all the laser tag equipment ran smoothly for the big day. I was mainly responsible for building the arena; making sure the were spots were people could run, hide, and target their opponents. Soon the big day would arrive, the whole group was anxious to see the results of hard work and great effort.

In my perspective, I think this assignment may be more complex and might be more work than the previous team assignment but at the same time I also think that it will be much more fun and interesting. With the exceptions of a few minor glitches the last assignment was pretty successful. Like I’ve said before, because this class is exciting, interesting and overall a great learning experience, I think we could tackle this assignment without any problems. Although, I haven’t met with my group to discuss our group project, I have thought about some suggestions that I think would make a great final project. Since I am a huge football fan, I would definitely like for our group to organize a football game. We could divide the class into two groups and play a 2 min quarter game. If we weren’t able to pull of the class football game I would like to have a little car show instead. We hand the class a plain car to customize and then have a contest to see who has the better customized car. I can’t wait to discuss my ideas with my group.

Talking about the football game I came across a web blog were they were talking about football in second life. Here are the details:

It took place this week on Monday afternoon, apparently because of the Christmas schedule, but it looks like NBC, which has already held a couple of events in the virtual world of Second Life, is now trying out Sunday Night Football in the virtual world. The Christmas game between the Cowboys and the Eagles was not simulcast in SL but instead accompanied by a “guess the play” game (run from a heads-up display) that rewarded virtual armchair quarterbacks with prizes of Linden dollars at halftime and at the end of the game. The event, a beta test, according to the Electric Sheep Company (sponsors of this blog), was held at NBC’s virtual sports bar in the »Second City 3« sim, and was attended by about a dozen people, I’m told by one sports fan, who didn’t seem to mind watching the game on TV while they carried on in high Second Life style within the virtual world. No word yet on whether the event constituted a success for NBC, but I’m betting it worked well enough that we can look forward to more such Sunday night games in SL — which clearly has greater potential than the lame offerings that used to be known as “interactive television.”

The group tour assignment seemed to have been a total success not just for my group but for all groups that participated. We decided to do our tour of the NASA Institution, which was really exciting and interesting. Although our group consisted of only 3 people (Jason AKA EX Karhonahauf and Bernie AKA Dime) our tour went pretty smooth and was very informational. The minor problem that we ran into was the time limit. I remember the day of our tour, the whole group had just finally teleported and had barely settled down at the NASA Institution. Not that long after, I see a chat message from Joe that said, “OK, 5 minutes left, ” we were like “what!” So we kind of sped up the tour and everything fell according to plan.
My favorite tour besides ours was the NBA tour. It was pretty cool, especially if you’re a huge NBA fan. I was pretty amazed the you were able to play HORSE, which is one of my favorite basketball games. This is another great example of a real simulated world. Overall, all the tours were really fun, interesting and distinct in their own way. I guess the reason why this group assignment was a total success for the entire class is because it seems like the class as a whole is enjoying what we are doing. Everyone seems to be putting the effort that it requires to complete such a task like the group tours. This is exciting and fun and at the same time it is a great learning experience, we are doing things that other universities have never even heard of and those have heard of it, want to partake in such an interesting field; can’t wait til the next assignment.

Decorating my apt was really fun. I think its a great way of showing who you are; what you like and what your interests are. Its interesting to see the different ways my classmates can express themselves through the virtual world. I also was amazed of what second life has to offer. I mean you can do or make pretty much anything you can think of, which is pretty cool. I don’t recall whose apt it was but there was this one that I really liked. It had a bar and you could go and grab your very own drink. Everyone condo was cool in there own unique way. You can also tell who has spent more time than others by the way there apt looks like. Overall, setting up my condo was pretty cool, and I think this is just only one of the many things you can do in second life.When I first began decorating I noticed I wasn’t very good at it. It was taking me a while just to create and position a stupid picture on the wall, but after i spent time on it, I began to get the hang of it. I was doing things much better and faster. My biggest challenge in decorating my apt was organizing it. I think I might have reposition every single piece like twenty times in my apt just so that it wouldn’t look cluttered. Also you have to chose carefully of what or how you want your apt to look, it could get pretty pricey if you don’t like the way things look.

Just by looking at someones apt, you can tell a lot about that person. some people like to have all kinds of crazy stuff that you wouldn’t normally see in the real world. For example, I can’t remember his name, but I know he likes to surf. I can obviously tell because he has a picture of a surf board on his wall and his condo is filled with like 31/2 feet of water. Which is pretty cool, maybe he likes to surf inside his apt; I don’t know. Another person has a shit load of plants. I can tell this classmate likes nature and probably likes spending time outside a lot, just like me. He/she is probably very environmentally conscious and would never like to run out of oxygen in his/her apt, I don’t know.