SL Convention in Tampa - Update

This past week my activities included attending the Second Life Convention in Tampa, FL, along with participating in a Sloan workshop entitled “Introduction to Second Life.” The best thing about the SL convention is I didn’t have to explain what “second life” is to anyone. It was difficult to get use to introducing myself by my avatar’s name, Susie, Felisimo, which was on my nametag. Some eye openers:

• A lot of corporate trainers attended who are involved in SL. IBM has 48 islands.
• I networked with one individual about internship opportunities. I have some work to do here.
• Some colleges and libraries are doing some awesome education in SL.
• It’s very profound and on the cutting edge.
• Not your typical business education type conference.
• I saw one walking around with a furry tail who was probably replicating his “furry” avatar.
• So many new businesses have begun as a result of SL such as Avatrian, a Second Life development shop and metaverse consulting firm.
• Saw some of my Ohio friends and attended some of their presentations.
• Attendees represented all generations. This surprised me as I didn’t think I would see many Baby Boomers, but there were a lot of us. Probably a fair split on gender.
• Enjoyed hearing Philip Rosedale (Philip Linden), the founder of Linden Labs. He gave a keynote presentation.
• Enjoyed Intellagirl’s keynote on The Promise based on Clay Shirkey’s Here Comes Everybody. Intellagirl presented at the Stark State workshop I attended this past January. I plan to read this book.
• Attended two presentations about two new virtual colleges offering training and education: Rockcliffe University and Insight Virtual College.
• I didn’t meet anyone in the field of office administration. I’m sure I was the “loner.” Many were in the arts and sciences area, health area, and some in computer science. I did connect with an individual from Florida teaching in the computer information area.
• An SL Certification program is in the development stages.
• At Teachers College of Columbia University, they provide cubical spaces for students on their island and use the following: in-world discussions, group and individual visits, guided tours, group work, and assigned individual and group work. They ask their students to take a snapshot of their Avatar and RL person, scale them, make a frame, apply to a texture, mount it on the wall—Class of 09! I like this idea.
• The importance of ethical digital citizenship was addressed in many sessions along with Terms of Service, and Code of Conduct. It was recommended that College’s should revise their Student Code of Conduct to include Second Life.
  

Then I spent time participating in the in Sloan Workshop. I completed a lot of the forums prior to leaving for the SL convention. I was able to attend the final in-world session on Thursday, but I really didn’t find it that valuable. I think it’s because I did this in the four-week class I took. This course really was for “noobs.” I’m a little beyond that. I do like the information the facilitators provided regarding scavenger hunts along with how they ran the course. We used Moodle, which I’d never used before. I don’t think it’s as user-friendly as Blackboard.

This week, I’m back to attending some workshops in SL and typing my convention notes along with researching websites and other information I received at the convention.