Topic & thesis statements for short essay #1

Topic: Second Life business opportunities


Thesis Statement: Second Life has a thriving economy with business opportunities limited only by your imagination such as 3D animations, video production, and fashion designing.

Andy Explores Second Life.

What have I got myself into? I remember first hearing about second life last year in Las Vegas while I attended a conference for the National Association of Broadcasters. They showed us a short clip about a university that taught many of its classes in second life. I kind of chuckled at the time and thought to myself, “How can anyone learn without sitting through a traditional lecture”? I really thought it was going to be a passing fad that would never affect me. Well, here I am neck deep in an experience I shrugged off only a year ago. I have spent many hours over the past week trying to orient myself to second life. I can I can honestly say, it has been a humbling experience. I used to think I could pick up on and adapt to new experiences with ease, but second life has made me feel like an idiot. So please stick with me while I describe over the next few paragraphs, the details of my first exploration in second life.

The featured location I chose was the International Space Flight Museum. It was founded by Kent Lemieux. The space museum is dedicated to showcasing spaceflight. Including robotic exploration such as the space rovers we currently have on Mars. It is also dedicated to the history of rocket technology, manned space flight, and earth orbiting satellites. When I first arrived at the space museum I was in the middle of a large circle of flags representing the many countries involved with space exploration. Countries such as the United States, Germany, Japan, Russia, and Italy were all represented. There was an inscription written in stone by Kenstantin E. Triolkovsky that said, “Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot live in a cradle forever”. The most interesting object a came across was a space capsule that you could enter. I took a picture of what the capsule looked like inside. It was a very realistic simulation.

At Info Island I landed next to a white tree that had a large yellow rock sitting next to it. To my right, I could see a large platform with a podium in the middle of it so I walked closer to figure out what it was. It had a kiosk near the podium that I touched and it gave me some information about Info Island. As I started looking around I noticed a librarian assistant standing on the corner of a sidewalk. I approached her and she gave me a card which had a list of activities on it. I looked it over for a few minutes and the two that I found most interesting were, “Sense of Self in the 19th Century” and “Alanna’s Fireside Takes”. At this point I didn’t have another classmate with me but I went ahead and snapped a picture of myself with the assistant.

As I continued to explore Info Island I found myself in the International Plaza which is the gateway to international experiences in second life. I noticed that “Mebshowgirl” came online and I offered her a teleport to where I was at. She had already spent some time on Info Island, but was nice enough to help me explore the island. We walked around a little and came upon another avatar named NikNak Dagostino. He had the title “Ambassador” floating above his name. He was working on building something near the International Plaza but when we asked him what it was, he didn’t seem to want to answer. We asked him for some help learning about the International Plaza and he took us to the International Reference desk. It was a large open building with a librarian sitting at the desk. When I approached her there was a caption above her head that said she wasn’t talking today. We found another librarian who was having difficulty with her computer and wasn’t really able to assist much either.

During a second trip to Info Island I explored the Library Art Gallery. It is a non for profit gallery that exhibits artistic creations in second life. It was a partially open, two story building with numerous pictures hanging all over the walls. I took a picture of myself standing in front of a couple of the art pieces. When you touch the pictures, you get some information about who made it and any additional information that the creator decides to add. Apparently it isn’t a popular place on Info Island because I didn’t bump into anyone while I was in there.

From the Art Gallery I came upon the Genealogy Research Center. It is the home of the Genealogy Scribes Group. The building provides information on researching real life family histories. When I walked inside I immediately saw a large fireplace with a huge round rug in front of it. There was a couch and a couple of chairs for avatars to sit down and chat. As I continued to walk around I saw several banners that displayed information about how to track your family using online resources, calendars with events, and information about joining genealogy groups.

I also explored Peace Park. It is an area created for people to learn about different religions around the world. The entrance of the park had a large black metal gate with flowers growing on each side. I walked through the gate and came upon a fountain in the middle of the park. As I continued to walk through the park I found information cards that provided information on Hinduism, Judaism, and Christianity. There were other religions represented, but I was pressed for time and had to continue exploring other areas.

From Info Island, I started exploring a couple of other suggested locations in our assignment. Again, I met up with Mebshowgirl and we explored Beckenbach and Marni together. Beckenbach was founded by Chantel Bachman and is group owned. It is a place for Goth clothing and Punk gadgets. The area we landed in was a very dark place with purple carpet and lots of pictures of shoes and boots on the walls. There wasn’t much there that interested us so Showgirl and I snapped a couple of photos and moved on.

The next place we explored was Marni. The information at the top of the screen said it was Gary Hazlitt’s island but the information card on it said it was founded by JJason Jedburgh. It is described by him to be an "Idyllic Paradise". We landed in a large room with a big screen television in the middle. In front of the television was a large round Turkish carpet with pillows and candles on the floor. It looked like it might be the kind of place you may want to bring a date and relax. From the room we flew around and found a large open temple with music playing in it. I couldn’t find any information about it but I believe people would probably meditate there. We continued down towards the beach and found a large blanket with pillows, wine, and an umbrella. Again, it looked like a place you would want to bring a date and talk.

We then moved on to Themiskyra. Mebshowgirl found it first and teleported me there. Themiskyra is an Amazon city founded by Surina Skallagrimson. We arrived in a narrow rock hallway. Showgirl and I walked out of the hallway and through a large rock gate. There were signs on each side of the gate that said not to enter homes with closed doors without permission of the owner. After we walked through the rock gate we came across an open building that had a dancing broom sweeping the floor by itself. There was a large aquarium built into the floor with fish swimming around in it. Off in one corner was a large witch’s caldron brewing some kind of diabolical brew. There wasn’t much going on at Themiskyra, but I continued to walk around and came across some dancing Amazon women on the second floor of a building. I quickly wrapped up my tour of the region by flying around a little to get a bird’s eye view. After a little flight time, I decided to get started on writing my blog.

The exploration was a good experience for me. It forced me to use all of the important second life skills listed in our assignment. At first I was a little overwhelmed by the second life experience. I found myself spending too much time worrying about how I was going to navigate through second life and not enough time concentrating on my blog. I feel much more confident about my avatar’s abilities now and I am eager to find out if second life has any areas in my particular field of study.

Let me intoduce my second self

The appearance of my second life avatar is a work in progress. One of the things that I’m starting to notice in second life is that nobody is old. Why is that? Don’t people in second life age? In real life I’m forty three, fat, and losing my hair. The changes I made to my avatar were intended to make my second life avatar look a little like a young version of me. My lack of experience and skill in second life has kept me from bringing out the true Drew. Yes, I could have made him a little pudgier and sure I could have made him bald with fewer muscles, but what’s the fun in that? Everybody in second life seems to be so attractive.

I use the same avatar each time but the class may notice my avatar putting on some weight and losing his hair over the course of the semester as I struggle with reality and try to get a grip on my denial. I didn’t ask for any input on the look of my avatar. I already know what I look like and I really don’t need help with that. I also haven’t spent any money on my avatar’s looks, but I am considering joining a gym. That probably isn’t as funny as I think it is, because people may actually workout in second life. So, about that allowance you talked about Dr. Carter, when can I expect to see that? I need a good pair of black horn rimmed glasses, a buzz cut, and a new suit with a tie.

Initially I was very impressed with the way my avatar looked until I realized that every other guy in the class looked just like me. I put a few pounds on myself, changed my hair so that the color was close to my natural color and I found some different clothes to wear. I’m actually pretty pleased with the way my avatar looks right now, but I really do want to make him evolve so that he eventually starts look more like me.

I spent some time experimenting with sounds and gestures. I think the laugh is a little over the top, but I like it. My favorite gesture is the shoulder shrug. I have found that I don’t seem to use the gestures and sounds during my second life explorations because I’m usually just too busy concentrating on everything going on around me and trying to learn.

Oh yes, a final word of warning. I haven’t taken a shower yet in second life so I would probably steer clear of me until I figure out how to do that.

My first Blog entry

I have just completed creating my first personal blog. Hello to everyone in my Composition II class.