Monday, 8 December 2008

Wk10_Looking for online communities-Virtual World (Catch up post)

Write a post to your blog with ideas on what sort of communities exist on Second Life and how you might operate as a facilitator for a community communicating on it.

It’s a shame that I cannot log onto and experience second life due to my poor Internet connection. I googled, read articles on Second Life and watched machinema from YouTube. All these efforts provided me a rough idea of what is Second Life.

What is second life

Second Life (abbreviated as SL) is a 3D virtual world developed by Linden Lab which launched on June 23, 2003 and accessible via the Internet. From then on, it has grown explosively and today is inhabited by millions of residents from around the world.

Users, also are called Residents can to interact with each other through avatars. Each resident can explore, meet other residents, socialize, participate in individual and group activities, and create and trade virtual property and services with one another. Second Life is designed for users over eighteen, while Teen Second Life is used by residents aged between thirteen and eighteen.

Machinema from the link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b72CvvMuD6Q at YouTube gives introduction to Second Life. Residents can meet their friends in real world in Second Life. They can have discussion, meeting and transactions via their avatars. Residents in Second Life form different communities through their interests.

Education in Second Life

Second Life is gradually accepted and is used as a platform for education by colleges, universities, libraries and government entities. There are over one hundred regions used for educational purposes covering different topics and subjects. It is an excellent platform to deliver high quality service to world wide audience at low cost.

Dodson believes that
“Second Life constitutes a good example of ‘edutainment’ - the idea that students are more likely to learn if they are first amused.”
Suppose we can join or form a community in SL and using it as a platform to discuss or share the learning information in SL. I suppose we can help a meeting or discussion in SL so every residents of the course can interact with fellow residents. I hope I can explore Second Life soon. I am really interested and keen on it. Probably after my Internet connection is fixed, I would like to spend more time on it. I am sure it will be helpful for facilitating online communities in SL in the future for me :-)

Reference


Dodson, S. (n.d.). Is there a second life for teaching? Retrieved 12 08, 2008, from Guardian.co.uk: http://www.guardian.co.uk/digitalstudent/second-life

4 comments:

Leigh Blackall said...

Hi Joy, I hope you can find your way in there soon too. There is a large NZ research project running at the moment, looking at education using SL. Perhaps you'll gain something by following the research blog

Joy said...

Thanks Leigh. Definately I will go and try it. It's frustrating that I still cannot be connected. Maybe the whole system needs to be re-installed :-(

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