Santa gets cheap
Some students may be able to afford their own holiday gifts this year as Wal Mart will be offering a $199 Linux desktop (no monitor) with an 80GB hard drive. Of course, to me this seems like a typical Wal Mart product… buy it cheap, throw it away in a year (wasteful, right?). But even still, you have to admit it’s a solution that wasn’t there last year. I’m not sure if it will be capable of running Second Life, but with all the tools you need for classes being free or online (Open Office, Google Docs)… this computer rivals the cost of some textbooks.
Speaking of textbooks, I’ve been waiting since the 1980’s for my hand held digital book. Finally, it seems like Amazon has one that will be affordable ($50) and (most importantly) real! The Kindle was supposedly going to hit the shelves last week but has been delayed until the end of the year. Why am I looking forward to an digital bookreader? All selfish reasons, of course. Bedtime reading is tough with a laptop… which is also too heavy to hold like a book. Comics. I want to read/make/distribute comics digitally. Wikis. My students have made a 2D Foundations wiki textbook… now I want that textbook to be downloadable onto a bookreader.
The problems so far I’m foreseeing with the Kindle: 256mb? I have a 2gb micro sd card the size of my fingernail. I think Sony can do better than 256mb. Just words? I need pictures too. PDFs as well. And why can’t it play music while we’re at it. Also, is it durable? Can I drop it on the floor after I fall asleep reading? Apparently I will be able to buy and download books straight to the Kindle… Can I rent books? Free? Like I do from the library? They can tell me Harry Potter drinks Coca Cola if they let me download the books for free.
In fact, if somebody combined the above two products… I’d pay $100 for one. A flat, hand held bookreader, web browser, IM chat tool, that could download and play music, video, and pictures but NOT be bogged down by all the other apps my laptop has to run. That’s what I want Santa to bring me. Can the elves make that?
Santa gets cheap
Some students may be able to afford their own holiday gifts this year as Wal Mart will be offering a $199 Linux desktop (no monitor) with an 80GB hard drive. Of course, to me this seems like a typical Wal Mart product… buy it cheap, throw it away in a year (wasteful, right?). But even still, you have to admit it’s a solution that wasn’t there last year. I’m not sure if it will be capable of running Second Life, but with all the tools you need for classes being free or online (Open Office, Google Docs)… this computer rivals the cost of some textbooks.
Speaking of textbooks, I’ve been waiting since the 1980’s for my hand held digital book. Finally, it seems like Amazon has one that will be affordable ($50) and (most importantly) real! The Kindle was supposedly going to hit the shelves last week but has been delayed until the end of the year. Why am I looking forward to an digital bookreader? All selfish reasons, of course. Bedtime reading is tough with a laptop… which is also too heavy to hold like a book. Comics. I want to read/make/distribute comics digitally. Wikis. My students have made a 2D Foundations wiki textbook… now I want that textbook to be downloadable onto a bookreader.
The problems so far I’m foreseeing with the Kindle: 256mb? I have a 2gb micro sd card the size of my fingernail. I think Sony can do better than 256mb. Just words? I need pictures too. PDFs as well. And why can’t it play music while we’re at it. Also, is it durable? Can I drop it on the floor after I fall asleep reading? Apparently I will be able to buy and download books straight to the Kindle… Can I rent books? Free? Like I do from the library? They can tell me Harry Potter drinks Coca Cola if they let me download the books for free.
In fact, if somebody combined the above two products… I’d pay $100 for one. A flat, hand held bookreader, web browser, IM chat tool, that could download and play music, video, and pictures but NOT be bogged down by all the other apps my laptop has to run. That’s what I want Santa to bring me. Can the elves make that?
CNN in SL
CNN has opened its latest “office” in Second Life. In an experimental move, the news company is not only moving into the realm of virtual reality, but it’s enabling Second Life users to create the content. This actually looks like a very interesting implementation of a virtual location, with tools that Second Life users can use to transmit copy and gather photos. There will be kiosks set up throughout the virtual world in order to provide news to users.
CNN in SL
CNN has opened its latest “office” in Second Life. In an experimental move, the news company is not only moving into the realm of virtual reality, but it’s enabling Second Life users to create the content. This actually looks like a very interesting implementation of a virtual location, with tools that Second Life users can use to transmit copy and gather photos. There will be kiosks set up throughout the virtual world in order to provide news to users.
CNN in SL
CNN has opened its latest “office” in Second Life. In an experimental move, the news company is not only moving into the realm of virtual reality, but it’s enabling Second Life users to create the content. This actually looks like a very interesting implementation of a virtual location, with tools that Second Life users can use to transmit copy and gather photos. There will be kiosks set up throughout the virtual world in order to provide news to users.
Synthetic worlds – real community, real money
Synthetic worlds – real community, real money
Exodus to the Virtual World: How Online Fun Is Changing Reality will be published shortly by Palgrave Macmillan.
“The membrane is allowing not only economic factors to seep through, but social and cultural ones as well. People all over the world are connecting in new ways through the technology moving from a calculation model to one of communication. Our children will grow up knowing people in Africa, Asia and Europe and see it as the norm. They will lose sight of geographical distance and explore cultures and people my grandfather had no chance of meeting. The new world offers limitless expanses of both digital and analog connection and understanding, and brings the world closer together. New social connections can overcome geography, culture, and sometimes even language. Most companies find a team of 25 unruly on a project, but in WoW guilds take part in raids every night creating a sense of group connection and goal achievement. The identities that form in these communities allow people to explore and play with their own identities. The world might not recognize your leadership skills, but you can learn and mature them in a virtual world and then apply them to the real world. All this can create a close, strong bond of friendship and community.”
I think it’s about time that the media began to also cite the usefulness of virtual worlds, besides the usual hype and sensationalism (thanks Mark!).
