Sound Installation: Virtual Worlds final

SL community

During the final stages of my sound installation project, I started hitting some major bumps as far as scripting goes. I decided to post on one of the SL boards, and immediately got 5 different responses telling me how to alter the code to make things work. Then there was a long argument over whether they should just give me the script, or teach me how to do it myself. Soon after I logged in and found a script from a woman who owns her own shop in SL. I started talking with her and she not only helped me out with the original script, but showed me how to work out all the bugs and make my coding clean and efficient. I learned more from conversations with her than from any wiki or video I found online!

Playing the Building

http://www.davidbyrne.com/art/art_projects/playing_the_building/

I've been thinking about my final project for the term, which will be some sort of sound installation. I know that I want something that is interactive and that can't be created IRL. In order to focus my ideas, I've been looking at some real life sound installations. Today I came across this project by David Byrne, who used the infrastructure of a building and converted it into a gigantic instrument. He attaches things to the walls, pipes, and beams to make them create sound. I find this fascinating because it's not only an extremely interesting project conceptually, but aesthetically as well.

Zombie Attack

http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Cayuga/197/240/502

Avatar

My avatar is the product of a lot of experimenting. It took me forever to figure out how to actually mess around with outfits, but once I did there was a lot of mixing and matching going on. The skin is from one of the premade outfits (I think maybe the cyborg one?) and I just experimented with it enough to learn where all of the options were. I think I bought the hair somewhere - don't remember exactly. It's not my favorite, but I'm working on it. I can't exactly figure out how to adjust it the way I want. As far as the dress, I found it at this random dollar store (it's a real thing). So, I guess this says that I'm cheap even in a virtual reality? Besides that, I have no real reason why I created this particular avatar.

Question for 1/18 discussion

Do you think that the earlier text-based incarnation of the virtual world is the ideal form, since they are, as Au put it "fantastic realities evoked purely through imaginative worlds"?

Why I'm here

I think it's pretty amazing that technology has allowed us, in a sense, to completely change who are. It matters very little how you look, what your family is like, where you live, or what kind of education you have. I am taking this course because I've always wanted to look into how virtual worlds change social interactions, not only online but IRL as well. It's creating a whole new structure that requires us to do some adjusting.

I'm looking forward to exploring the psychology behind virtual realities and how they affect human behavior.