One of my students wants to create a version of the Family Feud television game show on our student-run television station. He needs to gather up data to make the questions for the first episode.
If you have a minute - could you take the survey?
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.asp?u=591502025808
Thanks.
Sunday, April 16, 2006
One of my student's is doing an independent study of television viewing habits. She has a short (2 minutes approximately) survey online. It would help her out if a wider variety of people took the survey. Please giver her two minutes and take the survey.
The URL is http://vista-survey.com/survey/v1/survey.dsb?ID=7787779685
Thanks!
Kim
The URL is http://vista-survey.com/survey/v1/survey.dsb?ID=7787779685
Thanks!
Kim
Friday, April 07, 2006
I think the students have finally gotten comfortable enough in SL to do some interesting projects. They started out with observations of their own reactions to time in the world. Those were good papers for the most part. Their second project (due Monday) had htem analyzing content around the game - forum posts, blogs, websites, things for sale on SLexchange. They seem really excited about all the conversations. They seem fascinated by all the people who spend a lot of time and money and energy in the world - the designers, the people debating whether players should keep getting allowances from LL, why people build things in the sky. They seem excited about doing interviews int he world - that's their third people. We practiced IM'ing and saving chat histories today. And went tothe welcome center to talk to noobies to ask them some questions just for practice. Lots of chatter in the room about what folks were typing to them. Still some folks wandering around off task. But most people were getting things done. I'm pretty happy about the game for class right now.
Friday, March 24, 2006
at GDC
The folks from Linden labs had a session about giving the users creative control and ownership. Cory Linden did the talk. He pointed out how many SL-ers create stuff and write scripts - even tho the script language was very difficult to use.
I really liked when he described how a user figured out how to make a kite - and the developers had to go ask the user how they did it.
Philip Rosedale - head of LL - had one of hte keynotes on Monday. It's gotta be a scray position right now - do away with subscription revenues, give away basic accounts and hope people convert to property owning accounts that cost money each month. I think he said they take a little cut out of the linden buck exchnages.
And - in the other MOnday keynote - Jesper Juul talked about goal less games - Ithink SL might fall into that category. They hav eto have lots of things and lots of actions - the user creates those "nouns" and "verbs" anyway they want. and the more combinations that are possible the better. I need to read his book Half-Real
He pointed out that GTA and The sSims have some things in common - including that both are playable as goal-less games - you can just wander around GTA - practicing your bike skills, driving to see scenery - with no penalty. You sort of make your own goals. He talked about how he wanted his Sims avatar to eat a lot - but instead the kitchen caught on fire and his avatar went kind of crazy so that the doctor came. He "failed" nominally since the avie didn't eat as much as he wanted, but the failure was interesting. A lot to think about in his speech.
then - as my students tell me - it's weird to try to define games - they just are and ya know them. Maybe that's true. Gonna make for an interseting final exam question.
I really liked when he described how a user figured out how to make a kite - and the developers had to go ask the user how they did it.
Philip Rosedale - head of LL - had one of hte keynotes on Monday. It's gotta be a scray position right now - do away with subscription revenues, give away basic accounts and hope people convert to property owning accounts that cost money each month. I think he said they take a little cut out of the linden buck exchnages.
And - in the other MOnday keynote - Jesper Juul talked about goal less games - Ithink SL might fall into that category. They hav eto have lots of things and lots of actions - the user creates those "nouns" and "verbs" anyway they want. and the more combinations that are possible the better. I need to read his book Half-Real
He pointed out that GTA and The sSims have some things in common - including that both are playable as goal-less games - you can just wander around GTA - practicing your bike skills, driving to see scenery - with no penalty. You sort of make your own goals. He talked about how he wanted his Sims avatar to eat a lot - but instead the kitchen caught on fire and his avatar went kind of crazy so that the doctor came. He "failed" nominally since the avie didn't eat as much as he wanted, but the failure was interesting. A lot to think about in his speech.
then - as my students tell me - it's weird to try to define games - they just are and ya know them. Maybe that's true. Gonna make for an interseting final exam question.
press coverage
There's a story about SL in Wired magazine - actually about the Second Life Herald - a "newspaper" that covers SecondLife and other MMORPGs. The writer is sort of an embedded journalist. He covers the good, the bad, and the very pretty (check out the Post 6 Grrls)
URL http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.04/second.html
The herald is a good source of news and would be good to analyze over time.
URL http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.04/second.html
The herald is a good source of news and would be good to analyze over time.
Friday, March 17, 2006
avatars
the avatar dressing and modifying - seems to be an important part of the game for the students.
Yet - some are finding that they want their avatar to look like them as much as possible. That was their first assignment and they didn't like it at hte time. Now they have total freedom with how they look. They tried out different hair and skin color and clothes and shapes - it was overwhelming for some of them with all the choices. Then they're slowly going back to the original look.
I wonder how true that is overall. If the people flying around in Jedi soldier uniforms or pikachu costumes are relatively new and over time they slowly change back to normal too.
And then do people stop playing? Once the character is "normal looking" - is the excitement of the game over?
That's the question for the rest of the semester...
Yet - some are finding that they want their avatar to look like them as much as possible. That was their first assignment and they didn't like it at hte time. Now they have total freedom with how they look. They tried out different hair and skin color and clothes and shapes - it was overwhelming for some of them with all the choices. Then they're slowly going back to the original look.
I wonder how true that is overall. If the people flying around in Jedi soldier uniforms or pikachu costumes are relatively new and over time they slowly change back to normal too.
And then do people stop playing? Once the character is "normal looking" - is the excitement of the game over?
That's the question for the rest of the semester...
Friday, March 10, 2006
arggh - slow hardware
I know how some of the students have been feeling - they have slow comptuers or slow connections.
And now so do I. My laptop died so I had to fall back on my desktop machine - which is about 5 years old. It's a G4 but i'm seriously lackng RAM and processor speed. SL starts but - oh my goodness it is slow - gray rectangles everywhere, avatar won't move. Man it is irritating.
Especially when I really wanted to kill some time playing the game, looking for Robert Scoble's volcano and softwre company, and the peach computer store.
Oh well - guess I"ll do more homework. I wonder if the students ever say that!
And now so do I. My laptop died so I had to fall back on my desktop machine - which is about 5 years old. It's a G4 but i'm seriously lackng RAM and processor speed. SL starts but - oh my goodness it is slow - gray rectangles everywhere, avatar won't move. Man it is irritating.
Especially when I really wanted to kill some time playing the game, looking for Robert Scoble's volcano and softwre company, and the peach computer store.
Oh well - guess I"ll do more homework. I wonder if the students ever say that!
Sunday, March 05, 2006
Observation Papers
My students wrote their first papers about SL - based on tehir own personal observations. We'd been reading personal ethnographies and they were supposed to write in that style. Most did a great job.
We're all wondering why people spend so much time building houses and neighborhoods and yet most areas of the world are so incredibly empty. One person commented that early members had to pay to join and so SL might have attracted people who wanted to build. They also noticed that people have different views of what SL actually is - a sandbox to build and create, sex, gambling, chat.
We ran into some technology problems - slow connection speeds in the dorms and apartments, slow wireless connection in the lab; the frequent updates meant I had to tke the lab over for an hour several times to load all the machines; avatars reverting to default modes; and the strange fact (g) that students don't want to read the notecard instructions sprinkled liberally around the world but rather want to just do (and want things to just be transparent and obvious - a want that I think might make the game a bit less fun).
And we're having an ongoing discussion about whether it's a game or not. One take is that it isn't. ANother that it provides space for people to play games. It's a discussion we'll be having hte rest of hte semester - it will probably be a question on our midterm and final to give them an opportunity to apply what they're reading about definitions of games.
We're all wondering why people spend so much time building houses and neighborhoods and yet most areas of the world are so incredibly empty. One person commented that early members had to pay to join and so SL might have attracted people who wanted to build. They also noticed that people have different views of what SL actually is - a sandbox to build and create, sex, gambling, chat.
We ran into some technology problems - slow connection speeds in the dorms and apartments, slow wireless connection in the lab; the frequent updates meant I had to tke the lab over for an hour several times to load all the machines; avatars reverting to default modes; and the strange fact (g) that students don't want to read the notecard instructions sprinkled liberally around the world but rather want to just do (and want things to just be transparent and obvious - a want that I think might make the game a bit less fun).
And we're having an ongoing discussion about whether it's a game or not. One take is that it isn't. ANother that it provides space for people to play games. It's a discussion we'll be having hte rest of hte semester - it will probably be a question on our midterm and final to give them an opportunity to apply what they're reading about definitions of games.
Friday, February 24, 2006
I added a dashboard widget from Google that supposedly lets me post right from my desktop - this could be cool.
Monday we're going to go play games in the world. The students have an observation paper due Friday - their observations of their time in SL.
The biggest problems so far - hardware, hardware, and hardware. Some kids don't have the newest machines. Some have slow internet connections. And our labs - with faster connections and needed drivers - aren't open that much. Annoying. And we discovered that our wireless network is too slow to run the game. That kills that plan for hte future.
Monday we're going to go play games in the world. The students have an observation paper due Friday - their observations of their time in SL.
The biggest problems so far - hardware, hardware, and hardware. Some kids don't have the newest machines. Some have slow internet connections. And our labs - with faster connections and needed drivers - aren't open that much. Annoying. And we discovered that our wireless network is too slow to run the game. That kills that plan for hte future.
Monday, February 13, 2006
Can ya sell drugs in SecondLife?
That's what a student asked today in class? After they'd discussed briefly one students idea to become a prostitute to make Linden bucks. Another student lost all his money at blackjack and another played Slingo for 3 hours. Going to be a fun semester.
next time we play - we go to the museums and library - gotta show off the cultural side of the game.
next time we play - we go to the museums and library - gotta show off the cultural side of the game.
Saturday, February 11, 2006
ok - now i know what they mean by herding cats
you remember that commercial a bunch of years ago for EDS (Ross Perot, Superbowl - - -but I digress) about cowboys rounding up a herd of cats - house cats, not big ol' jungle cats. The cats were all over the place.
Or there's the phrase nailing jello to a wall
In other words - things that are just not easy to organize or accomplish
That's how i feel after a week of tring to get a group of students started with SecondLife. They are all eager to get started - how do i do this or that, look at that guy - where did he get that cool shirt. And so on. In a lab where it took us about 30 minutes out of a 50 minute period to download hte software the first day! In a PC lab when I have experience using hte game on a mac - i forget about right clicking stuff.
But i think we're over the hump. They are playing with their avatars - all named for the most part something-or-other Fluffy. They are learning how to teleport and fly. We went to the junkyard to look for free stuff. I gave people some of the free stuff I had - wings and clothes and sparklie bits. Good chat comment - I get college credit for playing video games - how cool is that.
Next week we can actually do something I think - that will get them going on what they need for their research papers (which they don't know about yet.) We're moving beyond playing a game to studying playing a game. Hopefully it will stay as much fun. ANd the SL servers will stay up. ANd there won't be a new version ever 30 minutes.
Keep your fingers crossed - we're going in!
Or there's the phrase nailing jello to a wall
In other words - things that are just not easy to organize or accomplish
That's how i feel after a week of tring to get a group of students started with SecondLife. They are all eager to get started - how do i do this or that, look at that guy - where did he get that cool shirt. And so on. In a lab where it took us about 30 minutes out of a 50 minute period to download hte software the first day! In a PC lab when I have experience using hte game on a mac - i forget about right clicking stuff.
But i think we're over the hump. They are playing with their avatars - all named for the most part something-or-other Fluffy. They are learning how to teleport and fly. We went to the junkyard to look for free stuff. I gave people some of the free stuff I had - wings and clothes and sparklie bits. Good chat comment - I get college credit for playing video games - how cool is that.
Next week we can actually do something I think - that will get them going on what they need for their research papers (which they don't know about yet.) We're moving beyond playing a game to studying playing a game. Hopefully it will stay as much fun. ANd the SL servers will stay up. ANd there won't be a new version ever 30 minutes.
Keep your fingers crossed - we're going in!
Saturday, December 31, 2005
a site with a word game
secondlife://Sutherland/187/145
free now - but will cost money in the future
a word game - combo of scrabble and boggle - fun - but hard to play only because i couldn't figure out where to stand so the letters were clear and that weird name above my head didn't cover the letters up
(notice - if you have second life loaded, you can put a link on a wepage to a site in second life)
free now - but will cost money in the future
a word game - combo of scrabble and boggle - fun - but hard to play only because i couldn't figure out where to stand so the letters were clear and that weird name above my head didn't cover the letters up
(notice - if you have second life loaded, you can put a link on a wepage to a site in second life)
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Games
We study games in class - second life is a virtual world which i'm goiign to call a game until we have the big class discussion on what is a game.
Anyway - we need some games to play.
I think we will play hide and go seek. And tag. Maybe in the sandbox - then there's be other people who might play with us and things to hide behind. And as my studnets got more confident - they could quickly build something to hide behind
There is supposedly a game-within-the-game called DarkLife. It's a MMORP. that could be interesting
Anyway - we need some games to play.
I think we will play hide and go seek. And tag. Maybe in the sandbox - then there's be other people who might play with us and things to hide behind. And as my studnets got more confident - they could quickly build something to hide behind
There is supposedly a game-within-the-game called DarkLife. It's a MMORP. that could be interesting
A class we can attend
Bob Bunderland (SL name) has a weekday class for SL newcomers. It is very cool. It's a question and answer session. Bob has a shoutcast server so he streams his audio of the course. the students type in questions and comments and he gives answers, suggestions, tips. He walked us thru creating a default avatar and then gave us some costumes so we could play with them without losing whatever we were wearing originally. I learned that one avatar can give another avatra something by dragging it onto them. That will come in handy in class. And you can ecome someone's friend (makes IM easier) by right clicking on tehir avatar and doing the make friend option. I have to figure out the whole notecard/greeting thing. I got some good newbie tutorials too.
This is a picture of the class - they have a great amphitheatre for their class. And it is available for anyone to use. We could have a speaker there - and put it on the event calendar for SL to attract other people.
And then - there are signs to click that teleport you to a pool area and in the evenings (aboout 8 our time) they ahve a pool party with a dance machine and piped in music and free swim suits. and free beer too - but not during class time.
Turns out there are classes on building too and animation. That would be good for students after class activities are over if they want to stay in the world. Those classes would also be a good way to meet people who are after a different experience in the world - and would give my students a chance to see more of the SL culture.
A cool thing I found
There are some museums in SecondLife - here's one under construction about space exploration. Could be pretty cool.
It would be fun to help develop the content - write info cards for exhibits, program some music for background while exploring. that kind of stuff.
Monday, December 19, 2005
Some More Ideas for Class
I think we'll start by making our avatars look as much like our real world selves as possible - we might as well look familiar while everything else is new.
We have to go thru all the steps in the orientation island because ya earn Linden bucks - but only the first time you go thru
We have to go to some events - there's one that happens pretty frequently for new residents - that should be cool. I found some spaces where hopefully we can have a class meeting online - there's one in the building for hte educators in SL group. ANd one cool one that of course I forgot to bookmark. So guess I"ll have to go find it again The spaces have seating predefined -very cool. Otherwise we will have to just stand around.
We have to have a class in the sandbox - build stuff, play with textures, talk with people, check out the avatars
Same with the welcome center - lots of people just hang there talking
Then - we have to experience SL as something other than ourselves - if i can figure out how to save the first look. I would like to see people become the opposite gender - but becoming an animal might be interesting too.
Then we have to take a "grand tour" - here are some places to visit mentioned in the second life forums - places with things to explore, potential for in world games and role playing, interesting scenery, interesting malls, etc. - maybe we each take a place and write a travel brochure style description on the blog as a way to help others see what the world is about/what's possible. Or we each look at 3 or 4 places and try to come up with some commonalities and description of what SL really is/SL culture - here's the list of places so far:
Nexus Prime - like the world in Stephenson's Snow Crash - very modern and cyber-techy
Devils Moon - another cyber-techy city
Midnight City - a big city themed area - like NYC
Akasha Village - underground area to explore, a cemetary
Amsterdam - like the real city
Vail Art Museum - an art museum - this could be neat - I'd like to see a video wall with videos from park students - imagine iCTV promos running
Island of Dragon moon - has dragons!!! and a cave with cave paintings and lots of places to explore
Anango Island - supposed to be danger
Isle of Bliss
Disco Inferno - 70s themed disco
Nerd Emporium - low prim furniture
Serenite
skydiving in Abbotts
Rizal - has Linden made games including laser tag
Parrot Islan - has jetskis
Big Easy
Blarney Stone
The Forest of Kahruvel (space ball)
YadNi's
Mars Japanese Gardens
Clementina Park
The Scurvy Pier
Ambertown
Pop's Roadhouse
Megabux Games Rides Fun (182,37,123)
Lost Gardens of Slosser
RIverwalk
Telador Island - a recreation of hte land from the game Myst
Eldamar - an elven island
Lauk's Nest - has ruins of a Mayan temple to explore
Miyajima - a japanese themed sim
Taco - cartoony colors
Castle at Verloren
transylvania nation/vampire empire - vampire land
ALchera Winter Wonderland - has ice skating
Silver Island has a race track for cars called hte Silver City Motorsports COmplex
Tompson - quiet, place to sit and think
Portage - ditto - just pretty scenery - quiet
Chaos - has underground tunnels - lots of streat noise
and since we're media people - we need to seqarch out the media in the world - the infohubs, movie screens, radio, there's supposedly a newspaper (maybe slboutique.com is sort of that newspaper)- i wonder if this is something we could get involved in - making media available to places to improve dwell - we get artieK to DJ, how about some instructional podcasts, interviews with residents, machinima travelogues (i like that idea).
so how do these things fit in with qualitative research - part of that research is understanding culture - and part is understanding the different between observation and participant observation, part is interacting with people for interviews and such - and one of hte things I want peole to learn/get better at is writing in lots of different styles - for academic journal articles, for newspaper stories and for online venues - - so i think these things still fit - - and if one of our goals is to figure out what is or isn't a game - then playing more indepth in SL might help us make that definition
We have to go thru all the steps in the orientation island because ya earn Linden bucks - but only the first time you go thru
We have to go to some events - there's one that happens pretty frequently for new residents - that should be cool. I found some spaces where hopefully we can have a class meeting online - there's one in the building for hte educators in SL group. ANd one cool one that of course I forgot to bookmark. So guess I"ll have to go find it again
We have to have a class in the sandbox - build stuff, play with textures, talk with people, check out the avatars
Same with the welcome center - lots of people just hang there talking
Then - we have to experience SL as something other than ourselves - if i can figure out how to save the first look. I would like to see people become the opposite gender - but becoming an animal might be interesting too.
Then we have to take a "grand tour" - here are some places to visit mentioned in the second life forums - places with things to explore, potential for in world games and role playing, interesting scenery, interesting malls, etc. - maybe we each take a place and write a travel brochure style description on the blog as a way to help others see what the world is about/what's possible. Or we each look at 3 or 4 places and try to come up with some commonalities and description of what SL really is/SL culture - here's the list of places so far:
Nexus Prime - like the world in Stephenson's Snow Crash - very modern and cyber-techy
Devils Moon - another cyber-techy city
Midnight City - a big city themed area - like NYC
Akasha Village - underground area to explore, a cemetary
Amsterdam - like the real city
Vail Art Museum - an art museum - this could be neat - I'd like to see a video wall with videos from park students - imagine iCTV promos running
Island of Dragon moon - has dragons!!! and a cave with cave paintings and lots of places to explore
Anango Island - supposed to be danger
Isle of Bliss
Disco Inferno - 70s themed disco
Nerd Emporium - low prim furniture
Serenite
skydiving in Abbotts
Rizal - has Linden made games including laser tag
Parrot Islan - has jetskis
Big Easy
Blarney Stone
The Forest of Kahruvel (space ball)
YadNi's
Mars Japanese Gardens
Clementina Park
The Scurvy Pier
Ambertown
Pop's Roadhouse
Megabux Games Rides Fun (182,37,123)
Lost Gardens of Slosser
RIverwalk
Telador Island - a recreation of hte land from the game Myst
Eldamar - an elven island
Lauk's Nest - has ruins of a Mayan temple to explore
Miyajima - a japanese themed sim
Taco - cartoony colors
Castle at Verloren
transylvania nation/vampire empire - vampire land
ALchera Winter Wonderland - has ice skating
Silver Island has a race track for cars called hte Silver City Motorsports COmplex
Tompson - quiet, place to sit and think
Portage - ditto - just pretty scenery - quiet
Chaos - has underground tunnels - lots of streat noise
and since we're media people - we need to seqarch out the media in the world - the infohubs, movie screens, radio, there's supposedly a newspaper (maybe slboutique.com is sort of that newspaper)- i wonder if this is something we could get involved in - making media available to places to improve dwell - we get artieK to DJ, how about some instructional podcasts, interviews with residents, machinima travelogues (i like that idea).
so how do these things fit in with qualitative research - part of that research is understanding culture - and part is understanding the different between observation and participant observation, part is interacting with people for interviews and such - and one of hte things I want peole to learn/get better at is writing in lots of different styles - for academic journal articles, for newspaper stories and for online venues - - so i think these things still fit - - and if one of our goals is to figure out what is or isn't a game - then playing more indepth in SL might help us make that definition
Friday, December 16, 2005
Some photos
Interesting - SL has daytime and night time. I wonder if there are different things going on in the dark as opposed to in the light. Now - get your minds out of the gutter. I'm not talking about that kind of stuff. I'm thinking about things like dinner and walks on the beach in the moonlight, and dress up dances.
Friday, December 09, 2005
Winter/Holiday Themed scenes
I saw a post on another blog about all the themed areas dressed up for christmas/the holidays. So i checked them out tonight. There are some incredibly talented people in SL. Makes me want to start learning how to build and animate. That's one of hte things I want to do over winter break from school.
WTF???
Ok - I'm cruising around, looking at SL christmas decorations (pics in future post)
and then i decide to look at popular places - went to IceDragon's Playpen
they have these dance pads - they animate your character for ya and you dance, and dance, and dance
and get paid - $3L per 10 minutes.
I can't figure out what the deal is - it's not like a party, people aren't talking.
Then i remembered sites with big "dwell" get money - so they have these dance pads to help you earn a little and they earn more
Odd - there's a character there dancing who's been there more than an hour dancing - he's made about $20L. I'm going to dance my 10 minutes to get $3L just to see what it's like
You can go off and leave your character tho and they keep dancing so you can multitask
They also have music - streaming music with a DJ - can't tell if it's recorded or live. Bu it's definitely not my kind of music.
and then i decide to look at popular places - went to IceDragon's Playpen
they have these dance pads - they animate your character for ya and you dance, and dance, and dance
and get paid - $3L per 10 minutes.
I can't figure out what the deal is - it's not like a party, people aren't talking.
Then i remembered sites with big "dwell" get money - so they have these dance pads to help you earn a little and they earn more
Odd - there's a character there dancing who's been there more than an hour dancing - he's made about $20L. I'm going to dance my 10 minutes to get $3L just to see what it's like
You can go off and leave your character tho and they keep dancing so you can multitask
They also have music - streaming music with a DJ - can't tell if it's recorded or live. Bu it's definitely not my kind of music.
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