New World Notes

Real People of the Metaverse, 2010 Edition: Fashion Designers, Fire Dancers, and More

Here's one last look at some of the Second Life Residents profiled in New World Notes last year, people featured here because they're interesting, but as a nice side effect, utterly demolish the tired stereotypes of who participates in virtual worlds, and why. (Click to enlarge if you're so inclined.)

Clockwise from top left, they are:

• Ana Alves (Irah Anatine in SL), a Portuguese metaverse developer who managed Second Life projects for members of the European Union parliament and even traveled to Iraq to speak about SL to Iranian refugees in that country.
• Laika Saintlouis and Stella Semaphore, a Second Life fashion blogger and designer who are a real life couple and exude big city ironic hipster-tude in both worlds.
• Martina Karapetrić & Morana Saračević (Vitabela Dubrovna & Precious Restless in SL), real life twins and fashion designers who own a boutique in Zagreb, and sell virtual versions of their designs in SL.
• Kudzumai Kinomis, a new media student in Europe who joined Second Life to write a report on it, but stayed to, well, become a furry horse girl.
• Gillian Tunney (Delaney Whippet in SL), an artist and web developer who creates content in SL and dances with real fire.
• Aston Leisen, a new media professor living near Shanghai who created the acclaimed China sim in SL, uses Second Life as a teaching tool, but worries that his government may one day shut Chinese access to the metaverse. (Hence the anonymous photo.)

My Top 10 Favorite New World Notes Posts for 2010

Here's my personal favorite posts for New World Notes last year, several by guest and contributing writers. Also see my Social Times post from July, "How to Save Second Life in Seven Easy Steps", including the suggestion, Hire a Game Industry VP With Design Background, which I'm happy to see has been fulfilled by the hiring of EA executive Rod Humble. Here's my ten 2010 NWN keepers, roughly in chronological order:

• IMVU Advertises With Avatar Like Avatar From Avatar on Article About Second Life Advertising With Avatar Like Avatar From Avatar - Oh I love recursiveness.
• Jesse Schell, Get Real: Accessibility, Not Reality, Is the Big Force Driving Games and Virtual Worlds Today - Commentary on a widely seen talk which has helped drive the "Gamification" craze.
• Machinima is the Only Real World Application of Second Life To Gain a Mass Market (& For Now, the Only One that Will) - With a special appearance by McLovin'!
• What Rebecca Learned By Being a Second Life Man - A gender role reversal leads to surprising insights.

Six more after the break!

2010's Most Noteworthy News Posts From New World Notes

Now that I've mentioned the most popular posts from last year, here's what I think are the most newsworthy posts from New World Notes of 2010 -- stories that can or will shape the future development of Second Life, Blue Mars, and metaverse/virtual world technology in general (roughly arranged in chronological order):

• Second Life Machinima Simulates Video Game for Scene in Hollywood Movie Role Models
• Los Angeles Architect Uses Second Life to Develop Multi-Million Dollar, Mixed Used Shopping Mall Project in Egypt
• Avian Fever: Virtual Chickens (Briefly) Added 60K Paying Users To Second Life's Economy!
• Real Business Meetings in 3D Virtual Worlds Won't Go Mainstream For Many Years, Platform Evangelist Predicts
• Second Life's New Term of Service Grants General License to Machinima and Screenshot Creators; EFF Lawyer Approves
• In Development: Software for Integrating Motion Capture Suit With Second Life For Full Body Interactivity
• Second Life Machinima Used to Demonstrate California High Speed Rail Proposal -- And SL Machinima as a Cost-Effective Tool for Real World Work
• Linden Lab Finally Issues Statement on Emerald -- Which Now Reportedly Accounts for Nearly HALF SL's User Hour
• John Hurliman on Intel's OpenSim Breakthrough: Yes We Can Get 100s of Avatars in One Region, Yes It'll Be Part of OpenSim's Public Codebase
• Minecraft Passes World of Worldcraft on Google Trends!
• Now Showing Cloud-Rendered Blue Mars Running on a Mac, Macbook Air, Old Laptop, iPad, and iPhone!
• Presenting KataSpace, an Open Source, WebGL-Based Virtual World From Linden/Stanford Alum Henrik Bennetsen
• Presenting Canvas: Ex-Linden Lab Manager Launches Web-Based, Unity-Powered Viewer for Second Life & OpenSim
• Motus, a 3D Motion Controller for Games/Virtual Worlds That Could Revolutionize Machinima and Other Applications
• Second Life Launches Beta Web Browser Access Test Using Gaikai Cloud-Based Streaming
• EFF Says Supreme Court Ruling on Videogame Violence May Affect Virtual Worlds Accessible to Minors
• Bunneh v. Horsie: Linden Lab Partner Ozimals Embroiled in Totally Adorable Virtual Animal Copyright Suit
• Embracing Second Life as a Game Platform, Linden Lab Selects EA Exec & Game Developer Rod Humble as New CEO
• 3D World Breakthrough: Warcraft Played With Kinect Using Open Source Software Available to All!

Did I miss any?

2010's Top 10 Most Popular New World Notes Posts

Happy 2011, readers! To get started with this New Year, here's a look at the very most popular posts from 2010, with several noteworthy news items and amazing content, these 10 alone totaling up to well over 150K pageviews. Thanks to the StumbleUpon community (which in aggregate has fairly quirky taste), there's several oddball hits in this list. Counting down from number 10:

10 - Breaking News: Sources Say Linden Lab Executive Changes Involving Mark Kingdon and Philip Rosedale Coming Soon UPDATED: Confirmed, Kingdon Out, Philip Rosedale Back as "Interim" CEO (June '10)

9 - Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Establishes Licensing Agreement with Frank Lloyd Wright Virtual Museum in Second Life. Ironically, the Wright foundation suspended this license last month for reasons both sides dispute.

8 - As It Turns Out, Second Life Does Inception Better Than Inception Does Inception. Do not underestimate the power of an 8 foot furry penis (apparently.)

7 - Man Makes 8 Mile Minecart Rail in Minecraft & Beautiful Timelapse Machinima to Show It Off (October '10) Follow-up Minecraft machinima here.

6 - Breaking News: Blue Mars Launching Cloud-Based Option (April '10). This story, and the huge reception to it, is among the main reasons I became a consultant to Avatar Reality, the company behind Blue Mars. Which meant helping introduce the cloud trial demo video in November:

5 - Husband and Wife Researchers Create System That Sends Real Hugs Through a Virtual World.

Final four after the break!

New World Notes' Top 10 Second Life Machinima of 2010

Here's my personal top ten favorite Second Life machinima of 2010, videos with innovative visual effects, bravura editing, beautiful cinematography, great storytelling, and sometimes, all four, counting down from the top:

10 - BobE Schism's "Hanging Out to Dry", with surreal and witty use of Second Life props and effects matched to cool music:

9 - Lainy Voom's "Dagon", a magnificent Second Life machinima based on H.P. Lovecraft's short story:

8 - Toxic Menges' "Little Red Riding Hood", kung fu edition:

7 - Akira Balog's story of an android at the end of the world:

6 - Bryn Oh's music video for a Moby track, "Stay With Me":

5 - Lyric Lundquist's "trix", brilliant merging of deeply personal real world video with SL machinima:

 

Final top four for 2010 after the break: