Home again and thrilled to be here! Had a great week; my small project went over big and I am now on fire to turn it into reality.
I did a presentation of a presentation, and just that really got people fired up. I was surprised because I didn't think it was much, but the concepts are powerful. The project was a discussion and outline about a series of continuing ed seminar/workshops I'd like to offer on Virtual Reality and all it's related social interaction. Gaming is my particular focus, but I'm open to doing talks (and research) on a much wider array of topics about online and electronic communication and culture. For this project I just did a fancy PowerPoint overview of what I envision as the first seminar; an experiential introduction to VR worlds. I used a bunch of screen shots of various games like World of Warcraft, Sims 2 and Grand Theft Auto IV to illustrated what VR is, and the multiple layers that make it so appealing (and sometimes addictive) for millions of people. My teacher and two of the students were all very "low tech" and not at all familiar with VR or gaming. None of them could conceive of why anyone would be drawn to VR and why they might prefer it over the real world. I was surprised that just a discussion with screen shots was enough to make them understand. In my real presentation I'll have lots of live demonstrations and interactive activities to give people hands-on experiences, plus lots of physical (as in paper) stuff to work with. If just a PowerPoint ABOUT the program is inspiring I can hardly wait to do the real thing!
Then, since I have opted not to work on Practicum stuff outside of practicum, and because I have all afternoon on Fridays and all day Sunday to work on homework, I had a leisurely lunch with friends on Thursday, tutored a classmate on some testing stuff and watched TV rather than studying or working after class. Same general pattern today; class, lunch, a little time hanging out, and some dissertation and testing work before driving home AT 3PM! W00T!
Looking forward to a little gaming and then a movie with AR tonight. Seems I'm taking an impromptu minivacation and it feels GOOD! :p
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Mamabeek
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4 comments:
Congrats. It always feels amazing when other people get excited about your work.
Sounds like you have put together some really cool ideas. Would you discuss that website second life in your seminar? I know that's become a huge hit, although do people consider it gaming?
You're leisurely end of the week mini vacation sounds fantastic as well. I am not there yet but I am hoping to be able to accomplish something similar very soon. I am in desperate need of a break.
Oh yes, Second Life is a Sims game and incredibly popular. It's hard to give a single name to electronic activities anymore, since they're all blending together so much. I find the entire culture shift fascinating and I wonder where it will go and what will come next!
Back to work this morning. Sigh. It's pretty sad when a 'vacation' entails one afternoon and evening, isn't it?
I was thinking of Second Life, too, when I read your post, but I realize it's not quite like the gaming examples you mentioned. It's amazing how many people are into it! I would check it out but, every time I think about it, their system is down or, if I can download it, it runs my laptop temperature up higher than I'd like. So...I've never properly looked into it but would like to one day.
Have a wonderful weekend :)
Donna
I haven't heard of this Second Life game. I'll have to look that up. I play Sims on the computer and PS2 from time to time but find that time goes by obscenely quickly when I play that game and then I start to feel like a Sim character who goes through the motion of life to replenish a particular need.
A couple of years ago, I started taking a course where the project was to look at how the avatar people create for themselves compares to their reported identity and whether inconsistencies between the two are predicted by certain personality characteristics. It wasn't really my type of project, so I ended up dropping the course (plus the prof was crazy).
The stuff you're doing sounds interesting. Congratulations on the successful presentation.
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