This is what I have so far....Tell me what you think.

I-Chromosome

A couple decide to have children. Since this couple is older in years, they are a lot of experience and knowledge behind them. They also acquired and gained knowledge from their parents and people of previous generations.
Since information and databases are continually growing, it is taking us longer to learn it, apply it, and improve onto it.
The couple then decides to visit a gene therapist that is able to provide the couple with options as to what they want in a child. The therapist asks the couple, “What are some elements of your child do you want emphasized?” The couple responds with saying they want the child to be healthy, attractive, and knowledgeable about their family history as well as having the knowledge base of a top level medical scientist. They have chosen to use the I-chromosome, which would be the 24th chromosome. The gene therapist then virtually configures the child together so the parents can get a preview of the child when they are a child, teenager, and adult. If there is something they do not like, they can change it and finally print the final version. The genes are then transferred into either partner through a simple oral capsule and then nine months later, a child of their dreams!
As the child grows, the I-chromosome would instill them with required knowledge and therefore the child does not need to spend the time and money to learn and interpret the data. The child can pick up where the data left off and truly advance it to its potential.

Side Panel Notes:
-There are normally only 23 pairs of chromosomes in the human genome. The I-chromosome would be everything we are today plus some advantages
-I-chromosome is a virtual based system that enables children to have ‘built-in’ knowledge and become a true expert in life.


Nava-Info

John is a busy man who is always on the go. Since he has a number of jobs to complete throughout the day, there are a number of things that are placed on a mental “to-do” list. John said in the afternoon that, “I wonder what the advantages of a mortgage is over renting a place?” Often these mental thoughts are forgotten over time and John ends up stressed because he was unable to remember to do something.
John goes to bed at 1:00 am, exhausted, with all these to-do lists on the mind, he then falls into a deep sleep. Instead of losing these reminders, the Nava-Info system scans John’s thought processes throughout the day and records them. The Nava-Info then floats thorough the acquired information and sorts it for the individual. It also finds those ‘to-do’ lists and starts working on those items for John. The Nava-Info system researches the advantages of both renting and owning a place and it also gives an educated opinion on the subject.
Once all the “to-do’s” are researched and given opinions, the information is then telepathically sent back into John when he is still sleeping. John wakes up at 6:00 am and already knows the answers to his questions from the day before.
By getting these “to-do’s” finished when he is sleeping, it allows him to give more time and attention to things that are important to him; both in work and outside of work.

Side Panel Notes:
-Nava-Info is a system that would read and organize particular brain waves that contain research-based insight. The Nava-Info would allow the user to go to sleep, learn will sleeping, and wake up both physically and mentally refreshed.

Jeff Drost

The "run for office" scenario sounds great guys... make sure you expand and refine that one. Try to be clear about what the "big idea" is in all your scenarios. Maybe an introduction paragraph may work to describe what you want your scenario to illustrate. It will also help your team to more easily contribute.

Nice start.

Story Outline

Sunday Morning Cartoons

I’m watching TV one afternoon when I see an advertisement for a cartoon that reminded me of the series I used to watch. I take the remote (possibility) and browser through a cataloged (possibility) of cartoons that were popular in my youth.

I locate the Sunday morning entertainment and turn on an episode. It’s called Roony the little red fox... (Describe personal entertainment) The storyline follows the exploits of 5 animals that are lost in the forest trying to find there way home. My favorite character is a red fox.

Now that I am older I realize why my favorite character appealed to me. It was the reincarnation of my grandfather. The Dual incarnation (describe) derived from the information generated by his avatar.


Virtual Religion

The world is so full of temptations today. It has allowed for the corruption of our culture. Technology has only made sex, violence and disrespectful values more pervasive. However that same technology is such an economic force that no individual would be able to excel in the world without it. Fortunately the abilities of duality can be harness to enhance the religious principles which represent my basic values.
The ability to customize the whatever (second life phone) interface is one example. The tradition of arranged marriage was on the decline in my culture until whatever spawned a new resurgence. It has even made this process more affective. My wife and I have only been married for 1 real year now even though we have been together for several virtual years. The device selected the traits genes and even the heritage of my bride in order to generate our heritage. When we bare children new avatars will be created for them as well.
However even in the virtual world we are sometimes treated as outcast. The (whatever) allows people to share and unacceptable amount of information and experiences that my religion deplores as blasfomy. Because of that we accept only Natural Ordain methods of Duality (a new code of virtual ethics that have become the platform for new religion)
Memorial standing

The Virtual Raft

I live in a small village in the province of whatever country. There is a doubt resources are scarce and corruption if everywhere. A better future lies 1000 miles off the local coastline. The path is a treacherous one and I don’t have the means to guarantee a safe journey. A (virtualraft) will be constructed with the help of my village. Resources will be pooled collectively so the few of us provide for the rest.
In order to make the raft villagers must collect as much raw material as necessary. That means scavenging the landscape. Heaps of nearly and completely incomprehensible data are collected and then speed out on the Virtual Rug ( possibility ). It takes years of practice but the elders of out tribe have the ability to weave the data strands into intricate patterns. These culturally reflective patterns are the new platforms on which they communicate. They are a delicate mix of culture and technology through which they communicate


My run for office

It’s been a long day of campaigning. I’ve just been in 50 different countries meeting with competing interest groups national causes and issues. This type of information would be impossible to absorb and redristubute to all the different groups that makeup the new world (new world is the virtual world devoid of all borders)
Duality is an active part of my everyday campaigning activities. It’s not my words that need translation it’s also their meaning. My demeanor, tone and messages are altered to fit into the culturally diverse landscape. The greater economic performance of countries across the world have meant less sovereignty. The actions of one country affects so many others that citizens of one are just as concerned about whose getting elected in there neighboring entity than their own.
I might be running for a physical seat in the Californian legislatue but I’m running for a virtual seat in the Iranian province of whatever. In Californian today its labour laws while in iran personql translator

Ghost

My imaginary friend gies everywhere I go. He’s a represnation of myself and he is in everything I own. When I wake up in the morning he brushes my teeth he cookes my breakfast and records everyaspect of my life so that if I go to the drugstore it is my shopping list it can tell me what to buy. It knows what I need in my life at all times I can send it on errands or simply tell is to go away. It comes with me it can be inmbedded in my skin or clothers. I can live the live of another personas avatar, they can live mine.

Me and my avatar woke up and walked into the bathroom. I brushed my teeth while he reminded me to go to the grocery store to pick out some ingredients for dinner with my girl. We sat down for breakfast and discussed the plummeting stocks that I had recently bought. I agreed to sell but held off anyways. I’m sure I’ll be reminede about it tomorrow. I got in my care and went for a business meeting with my boss. It was a beautiful day so we took a walk in the park that’s across from the office. We discussed plans to build a new apartment building downtown while our avatars discussed the finances that would entail. After work I went the the grovery store where I purchased ingredaiants.
I always know when my avatr is near or another one. I can see them. I caught my girlfriend cheating this one time when I was having luch with my friends from accounting .She was flirting theyt a

Signal: Stock Market and Second Life

The signal is concerning the stock market and the impact that commodities have on our lives. A commodity is generally known as wares offered for exchange. Commodity markets are where raw or primary products are exchanged. These commodities are then sold and exchanged over regulated exchanges, such as the New York Stock Exchange.
Some points of the signal include thinking of how communities, free time, human life, and even air as commodities.
Communities can be thought of as commodities in that they can be invested in and improved over time. Currently, we only put value on resources in which we can receive immediate value. In the future, we need to invest in communities and the value that they have in our lives. This relates strongly to Second Life since it is a community. It is all about connecting people from different parts of the world into a common medium in which ideas and concepts can be exchanged.
The concept of human life as a commodity is an interesting concept. “A good example is the IPCC calculations cited by the Global Commons Institute as placing a value on a human life in the developed world "15x higher" than in the developing world, based solely on the ability to pay to prevent climate change.” This means that it is not necessarily the person’s life that is important, but rather their ability to use their wealth and status in life to make a difference in the world. In relation to Second Life, this is and is not the case. Everyone enters Second Life at the same status with the same wealth. However, people can often bring their wealth in the real world into Second Life and thus set themselves apart once again. One thing that Second Life enables a person without real life wealth is that they can generate wealth on Second Life by providing a service or product. They can sell commodities no matter their local market conditions, status, or wealth. It gives everyone a fresh start—removing the unjust fact that people are born into wealthier situations than others.
Free time can also be commodified. “Indian economist Amartya Sen, applying this thinking to human freedom itself, argued in his 1999 book "Development as Freedom" that human free time was the only real service, and that sustainable development was best defined as freeing human time.” We are getting so busy in our lives that we often do not have free time. We need to book our free time and thus treat our free time as work. In order to go on Second Life, most of us use our free time to explore it. What if we were paid to spend time in Second Life; paid to relax with others and build community?
The final part of the signal addresses the issue of air as a commodity. The “Global Resource Bank, a proposal to manage global resources "outside national jurisdiction" for global benefit. This would include air, water and genetic resources.” This would mean that we cannot take anything for granted and that everyone owns the air. No one person/country has the right to control it. Second Life is very similar in that no one should own or control it. It should be free and available to everyone. It is a resource that everyone can use in whatever way to establish themselves within this community.


Human Behavior:

There were a number of basic, human needs that are addressed within this signal. The nine basic human psychological needs are security, adventure, freedom, exchange, power, expansion, acceptance, community, and expression.
This signal addresses the exchange and community. As stated above, exchange functions in every part of our lives. We use commodities of all sorts to fulfill daily activities such as free time and other basic living.
The idea of community is huge in this signal. Communities are something that needs to be worked on and developed over time. Communities are constantly changing and thus can provide unique opportunities to exchange ideas between citizens/residents within the community. By stating the community as a commodity, one can show the importance in our daily lives.
The idea of a human life as a commodity is somewhat discerning. We often like to think of life as something sacred that has no monetary value. If we think of life as a commodity, one could assume that if the price is right, then a human life is no longer sacred. One could also interpret it as that since we put such importance on commodities, that labeling life as a commodity shows our appreciation for it.


Technology:

The technology in the stock market involve computers, individuals trading stocks, telephones, and now, online trading. This involves computers, servers, and also the Internet. This technology is very similar to what is required for Second Life to operate and function. Most of the trades were done through voice commands and talking to other people. Since online trading is taking over, the transactions are completed over the computer and through text. This allows the stock trader to be more efficient and handle more transactions throughout the day.


Signal Amplification:

The idea of virtual commodities is a strong idea to consider. The idea of marrying or exchanging real commodities with virtual commodities can raise some questions. How could Second Life facilitate commodity exchanges within its community as well within our real life environment? By looking that the human behaviour, we can see that there is major importance placed on life, community, free time, and even air. We realize that these things in life that have not previously been thought of as a commodity. If we think of commodity as a simple exchange, then you can see the value of it in our society; both on real life and in Second Life. As a commodity, ideas can be traded amongst residents and create a stronger community because of it. We need to share these ideas using technologies that make the user more involved; making the exchange face-to-face.

Point of Departure:

Stock Options
-This point of departure talks about the need of exchanging ideas, time, community, and even air as commodities by instantaneous sharing the idea using face-to-face technology. Allowing the commodity to be shown visually, and if needed, to be touched, allows the commodity to be exchanged between residents.

Let me know what you think! Thanks guys!

Jeff Drost

Emerging Signals

Second Life Radio

Second Life Radio is a signal for a number of reasons.
One thing that SL Radio is going to allow Residents to post any music that they want played throughout SL. Right now, the radio will only be played within certain areas of SL such as the InfoHubs and other public places.
This gives musicians all over the world the opportunity to share their music with anyone instantaneously. This can allow new musicians to get their music exposed without any substantial cost or commitment to a record company. This could lead to the creation of free voice in the truest sense. It will allow people to share their music without any barriers such as financial.
The technology that is there for this signal is through servers and other digital mainframes that enable files and music to be shared over the Internet. How the user interacts with the system is that they first need to create a digital recording of the music, upload it to SL using a computer and the Internet. This is where the change in the signal will occur.
New technology will able users to perform live to the second life audience without needed to interact with the computer. There is also music that is solely created using computers. This technology can be expanded to allow the creator to be more interactive with the music he/she is creating by actually flowing and moving with the music. This could lead to people making music merely by their movements.
People often have moods that they go through and they use music to express those moods. This would usually involve the musicians to compose music and lyrics to express his/her feelings and state-of-mind. Some people may find this medium of expression limiting and usually requires skills such as writing and being able to play an instrument. What if the user can just express himself/herself merely through their movements and thus creating “music”? This “music” could then be showing throughout SL and then other residents could interpret or relate to that mood. This mood can be shown through ones avator and could be shown to SL that way as well.
Music is not the only thing that is and could be broadcasted throughout SL using the Linden Radio. Opinions, thoughts, lecturers, and forms of announcements could all be addressed. This could allow residents to stay informed as to the activities that are happening within their communities. The sharing of this knowledge allows stronger communities to be built within SL.
Opinions are a strong thing. They can be shared or disagreed with. This is where debates often come into play. So many people within this world have an opinion on some topic but do not have a medium that enables them to freely express themselves. If they have a medium, they may not have the exposure to be heard be anyone to make his/her opinion heard. The great thing about this is that in SL, people are equal in a sense. Most avators do not demonstrate their master’s place in the world and that makes people in SL more equal. People that are normally shy within the real world can be very open within SL. This could build their confidence, which will transfer into their real life and thus create a more confident, opinionated individual in real life.

Points of Departure:
Free Opinion Sharing
-Sharing information opinions to the world in the truest sense—free of cost, geographic location, occupation, education, etc.


Educational Lectures:

The future of learning is upon us. Right now there are lectures and forums happening within SL that enable the teacher to be in one part of the world and remotely teach his/her class that is also remote of each other. This could mean that you could meet with anyone, at anytime, without any expense. One does not have to be geographically in the area in order to teach.
Teaching is getting a face-lift. We first need to look at what teaching is. Teaching is the behaviour of sharing ideas from one, educated “expert” in a particular field to an individual, or group of people, that are unfamiliar in that topic area.
The current technologies will have a lecturer that is human, and alive, and interactive with the students. The instructor and student need to be within the same geographical area. We use our voices and ears to communicate to each other. We use paper and blackboards to visualize certain concepts. We even use data communication tools such as computers and slideshows to present video and other multimedia.
This could all change in SL. The instructor could be alive or dead. The instructor could be someone influential human being in the past and his/her avator lives on to voice their findings long after their human counterpart has past. The one problem is it may only be a one sided lecture because there may not be any interaction with the avator. But future thinking can tell us that it just may be possible. This is great because a student can find information out first hand from the source instead of only finding second hand summaries of the topic discussion.
The freedom to share ideas in SL is fascinating. The problem could be that since anyone can present ideas, this could flood SL with both good and average ideas. Usually only important people that were experts in the topic area were able to talk on the subject. One could find out the power of the speaker by looking at who he is talking to and what his/her creditals are. In SL, this area is not present, which can be good and bad for the SL community. It can allow unknown people to voice their opinion but it can rob the people with the real knowledge to teach properly.
One aspect of free teaching is that there is a potential for abuse. The abuse can be taking advantage of other lecturers or could be spreading false information on a particular topic of study. One would then argue that who is to control the flow of information and who would determine what is right or wrong to be said? If there is going to be a system of control over the education that is being presented, and then you rob the residents of Second Life of their freedom of speech.

Points of Departure:
Eternal Teacher
-A teacher can always be a teacher even after death. He/she would have an avator that could carry on their opinions and teachings for years to come. Online Exchange:

There is a signal that was brought up in our discussions in class. Alexander Manu mentioned that played a Tiger Woods golf game on a game system. After playing the Tiger Woods character repeatedly, Alexander was able to create an excellent character in which he saved to the memory card. He was curious one day as to how much someone is willing to pay for that memory card. He posted it on eBay and found out that it was actually quite a hot commodity. Why was this object worth so much? What can we learn from this signal?
This has brought to mind the whole idea of exchange and how that plays a big part in Second Life. Online file sharing is a big part of the Internet as well as creating communities online. The whole concept behind communities is the idea of sharing and exchanging. Exchanging ideas, thoughts, opinions, knowledge, resources, are all things that can increase communication and closeness within a community.
The next idea is the whole concept of selling a digital character. This shows that people are willing to pay for certain skills that can only be mastered by playing or training for hours in a digital realm.
The behaviour of this signal is the idea of exchange and how it can enhance a community. There are limitations provided by the technology today.
The technology today is somewhat limiting. In many cases, information is sent via computers and the Internet. The Internet and email has some limitations to the size of files and information that can be conveniently shared with others. Other limitations are that we still save things on memory cards. To share large amounts of digital information, we need to physically send it using a memory storage device. The technology also requires some knowledge of computing and how that works. Often they have to be fairly affluent in working with computers and other digital media.
The emerging signal could be looking at new ways in exchanging information without relying so strongly on affluent digital skills. One should be able to exchange information, ideas, videos, pictures, and other information freely without technology determining what could/should be sent.

Points of Departure:
Show and Tell
-This is the whole concept of exchanging information and knowledge amongst a unified community.

Research Articles Below:


Want to be on Radio Linden? I'm happy you clicked!
=======================================

Radio Linden is a forthcoming station from a team at Linden Lab. We'll be streamed inworld on--fittingly enough, Linden land--and in addition to our own official announcements, news, and info about Second Life, we're looking for a wealth of Resident music and to do interviews with Residents to be broadcast through the digital airwaves.


Recently, we put out a call for Resident music. We've had a first round of submissions, and nearing the end of Feb. 2006, we're looking for more! This post, which includes the guidelines, also has more info about Radio Linden:


With Resident Interviews, we want to get your views on the world! They'll likely be conducted through Skype (www.skype.com). Questions may include but certainly are not limited to:

+ What do you like most about Second Life?
+ How did you find out about Second Life?
+ What do you look forward to in the future in Second Life?
+ What does Second Life add to your first life?

and whatever else spontaneously happens during the casual conversation. Speak to a live Linden and express yourself! It's fun, it's free, and it's a first in SL! (But we don't do psychic readings... yet.)


So, if you'd like to arrange an interview or send us your tunes, please email:
radio@lindenlab.com

You can also contact us at that address if you have any questions, queries (which are like questions, but different), inquiries, comments, and ideas... thanx for reading.

Over and out! =^_^=

http://forums.secondlife.com/showthread.php?t=86489


Let me know what you guys think! Thanks!

Jeff Drost

I just down loaded a documentary called The History of Hardcore. Its traces back to the begining of hard core film. anyways if anyone interested in seeing that doc I could burn you a copy.

These are some great signals

"Interactions with other people via avatars have an emotionally arresting quality that text-based interactions lack. (These applications) make the idea that there is a real cyberspace quite tangible."

The transfer of social life to cyberspace is one among several trends affecting the nature of governance globally today

Some examples include online marriages, the exchange of virtual world money and high-priced characters sold on eBay.

Linden Lab has to govern while trying not to govern. It is in a precarious position

In 2003, avalon. became world's first design/brand agency to establish a working presence within a virtual world

Lead Sponsor

Linden Lab is the producer of Second Life, an online world with agrowing population of subscribers (or “residents”); currently, the community has well over 42,000 residents from 91 countries. By providing residents with robust building and scripting tools, Linden Lab enables them to create a vast array of in-world objects, installations and programs. A short list of examples include homes, vehicles, sculptures, stores, Artificial Intelligence programs, nightclubs, landscapes, clothing, mini-games, and collective Burning Man-style art installations. Since its early stages, Linden Lab has allowed its residents to retain full IP rights over their own creations, thereby insuring that their contributions to the community remain truly their own.

Since Second Life’s commercial launch in the summer of 2003, residents have found ways to channel their in-world creativity into real world benefits such as conducting online college classes on a variety of subjects and creating projects with psychologically therapeutic applications. In Second Life’s fully-integrated economy, residents have turned the selling of their goods and services into a partial or full real-world income, and sponsored fundraising events that have donated thousands of US$ to real world non-profit organizations and causes.

Linden Lab is committed to fostering an egalitarian community whose membership fees are relatively nominal. In all this, it takes as its guiding principle the vision of the online world as a participatory democracy—one that transcends national borders, class, and ethnicity—where full citizenship is open to everyone with the capacityto imagine.


Gold Sponsors

ANSHECHUNG.COM is Second Life's largest in world business. What was originally intended as a research experiment to explore the feasibility of value creation inside a virtual space has become a symbol of entrepreneurship and economic success in online worlds. Within 16 months an initial investment of 9,95 US$ for a basic Second Life account has grown into a widely diversified real estate and service business turning over more than 500000 L$ in goods and services per day.

Beside the ANSHECHUNG.COM name, that stands for general land sales and financial services, several other brands have been established. Centre Ville and Plush are Second Life's largest telehub mall chains, together featuring more than 700 retailers in over 30 locations. The Dreamland brand with its more than 50 regions stands for the cutting edge of zoned community development. SLExchange.com, in which ANSHECHUNG.COM holds a 30% stake, is the most popular Web-based trading platform for Second Life content and land.

By optimizing the distribution process for land, content and services as well as by increasing liquidity in the real estate and financial markets, ANSHECHUNG.COM has contributed to the overall growth and success of the Second Life economy. New and innovative products, such as the A'ksha desert, themed simulators and localized communities have resulted in additional choices and diversity for residents. ANSHECHUNG.COM is also a major sponsor of various community projects and has received mention in various media such as East Bay Express, LA Times and the NY Times.



In 2003, avalon. became world's first design/brand agency to establish a working presence within a virtual world. During that time they have been active contributors to the community, consistently utilizing Second Life as an innovative channel for commercial projects and product development.

To date, project highlights include the design and implementation of a full range of own brand products and services as well as the development and creation of the in world region, avalon. They have also worked with one of the UK's top fashion labels, Mrs Jones, reproducing her Spring/Summer collection and simultaneously launching it within a virtual world. They continue to break new ground, experimenting with brands and ideas.

This coming year, will see the avalon.virtual world film festival, a world music festival and the launch of two new brands within Second Life. To discuss ways to realize your virtual world vision and step across the digital divide please contact justin@riversrunred.com

The organization behind avalon. is Rivers Run Red a UK and USA based design agency who specialize in developing brands and delivering creative content for the entertainment and technology sector. Their clients include: Carat International, Disney, Vodafone, Paramount, Renault, Adidas. Recent film projects have included: The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, The Chronicles of Narnia.


Bronze Sponsors

The Electric Sheep Company is unlocking the potential of virtual worlds as a medium for business and community.

Three-dimensional online worlds—with Linden Lab's Second Life at the forefront—are moving away from entertainment-only content and towards becoming a serious, flexible platform for business, creativity and community akin to the World Wide Web. The Electric Sheep Company seeks innovative solutions that combine technology and community to help continue this trend. The challenges are similar to those faced in building the Web’s infrastructure—how to find useful content, how to create secure business transactions—as well as many new and unique problems. We offer products and services that address these problems and put the community’s needs first.

We have begun to work on the problem of how to apply modern search technologies towards finding Second Life content, both in-world and on the World Wide Web. We are interested in other projects relating to our stated goals, and welcome proposals for collaboration. For further information, contact Hank Hoodoo in Second Life or email Jonah Gold.



SLBoutique.com is Second Life's premier web shop, featuring over 10,000 items, including clothing and other creations from over 300 of SL's wonderful creators.

SLBoutique is proud to be a part of Second Life's strong community, and offers free tutorials, free items, and much more to help new players gets started. SLBoutique has also participated in many charitable campaigns, including the Second Life: Relay For Life with the American Cancer Society, and recent efforts to raise money for The Red Cross to aid with relief for victims of Hurricane Katrina. SLBoutique is providing free web-hosting for the Second Life Convention.

Come visit us on the web today, to sell your work, buy from the easiest-to-use web site for Second Life items, or just check out some of our interviews with creators or freebies! You can find us at SLBoutique.com.



BelaSon Consulting LLC, an essential part of your business development and marketing needs. Focused on helping clients trail blaze into new market sectors providing the essentials to small companies to help them prosper.



e Mantria Group, LP is a specialized real estate investment and development company, focusing on the emerging market real estate sector. Innovation and leadership in this niche market is what gives The Mantria Group its competitive advantage.



Ronin is the premier brand by Hiro Pendragon for action gaming in Second Life. Ronin products are a combination of innovative scripting and items with a fine attention to detail. Sales from Ronin drives Hiro Pendragon’s other projects—tools to improve all of Second Life.

When vending machines sold for 1 to 5 US$ each during the summer of 2004, Hiro’s free vendor kit provided a free alternative to resident businesses, that offered great features with reliability and ease of use. His other premier tool, PosAbility, allows much greater flexibility and efficiency for how avatars can be animated, breaking bounds in the large furniture industry of SL.

Hiro’s upcoming project, Scoogle (working title), is a search engine like no other in existance, designed for flexibility of searching for all kinds of items and locations, while providing efficient means to keep metadata accurate, up-to-date, and useful for a 3-D virtual world.


Organizational Sponsors

The Acceleration Studies Foundation (ASF) is a nonprofit community with a network of thousands of executives, technologists, systems theorists, futurists, and change leaders exploring the accelerating development of science and technology and examining its impact. Through its outreach and advocacy, the ASF seeks to fulfill its mission to help individuals, business, and society examine the opportunities and the potential risks of the accelerating rate of technological and social change.

The ASF supports Future Salons across the U.S. (www.accelerating.org/futuresalons.html) and Europe, produces the Accelerating Change Conferences (http://www.accelerating.org/ac2005/), and educates and advocates through media, publications, white papers, analysis, and consulting. The ASF network is a global community that carefully investigates the accelerating pace of change and the future of technology. Informed individuals create an informed community, thus the ASF’s mission to “improve the way we look at the future.”


The Institute for Information Law and Policy is New York Law School’s home for the study of law, technology and civil liberties.

Participants in the Institute aim not only to understand the interplay of law and technology but to influence its development. The Institute develops and applies theories of information and communication to analyze law and policy. It also seeks to design new technologies and systems that will best serve democratic values in the digital age.

The Institute is, above all, a “do tank,” where lawyers innovate, harnessing the new tools of information and communications to the goals of social justice. This mission is premised on the notion that both software code and legal code shape human relations. Like law, technology, too, determines how we communicate and share information, which, in turn, defines our culture. Therefore the research and pedagogy of the Institute train students in the text-based tools of the law and the graphical tools of media and technology

The Institute is a center for civic innovation as well as policy analysis and legal theory development. Our curriculum includes several “design” courses that teach new lawyers to create video, audio and software innovations in addition to wielding the tools of legal reasoning and rhetoric to solve problems. The Institute’s constant contact with “hands on” projects assures that the theoretical work of the faculty remains relevant to real world challenges.

Students affiliated with the Institute (Harlan Scholars and Institute Student Fellows) pursue a specialized and rigorous course of study, which thoroughly grounds them in intellectual property, information and technology law. Working closely with Institute faculty, Harlan Scholars also pursue advanced research and design projects aimed at bringing about real-world change through legal scholarship and/or media and software innovation.

Students run the Institute’s interdisciplinary conferences and events, where new ideas are generated that translate into real-world innovation. The Institute takes full advantage of its New York location to convene people across disciplines and institutions in pursuit of its goals and to expose students to the best of the legal, technology and design communities.

The Institute consciously aims to create a “hot spot” for innovation—taking an approach unlike that of any other law school. The Institute prepares students for new opportunities in industry, media, technology, government, civic and policy organizations and the legal profession.

Style hive
What is the Stylehive?
The Stylehive is new kind of website - a collaborative shopping community. It is a place where contributors can work together to share and discover the hottest stores, designers, trends, and must have products.
The Stylehive is a collection of all the best products, brands, designers and stores discovered and tagged by the Hive community.
The Stylehive is the unique product and vision of entrepreneur and CEO Michael Carrier. Michael has enlisted a talented team of technology and online shopping experts who are passionate about making it easier to find the most interesting products, brands, and designers on the web, while providing a simple way to save and share these finds with others.
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This it interesting
It was a simple proposal: people would loan Linden Dollars to him, he'd keep a running tally of who gave what, and use that to pay off his college tuition. And when things were turned around for him, he'd pay people back in the order they paid him. It's an experiment in the trust and generosity of a social network that only really exists in a virtual world. ("I could in fact take all this money and throw it into the stock market or something, cackling insanely as I sip tequila in Bermuda," he acknowledged in the Forum post announcing his scheme. "It IS an unsecured loan, after all".) But Digeridoo has been a Resident since 2003 (ancient, by the world's standards), and a well-established SL architect. Perhaps because of that-- or just the general fungibility of virtual currency for random acts of whimsy-- within two days, he's collected over $700 in loans.

Once he's stabilized, he plans to start paying off the community of loaners with Linden Dollars. Much of those funds will come from his in-world businesses-- prefab homes, land development, and the odd custom buildings, assignments he does for the L$ equivalent of US$20-30, usually. (He may even auction off some of his old buildings, like the famed Digeridoo Tower, which now exists only in his inventory.) As it happens, he's also applied his SL building skills in college, as a Urban and Regional Planning major-- such as an assignment to build a scale model of Rome's Piazza Novona.
SLODCASTING
All the drama, patter, and giggles of SL, now portable for your morning commute: Johnny Ming's Secondcast, podcasting hour-long shows on a myriad of Second Life subjects. The first episode is a Skype-powered rountable between Ming, the SL Herald's Walker Spaight, famed architect Lordfly Digeridoo, fashion empress Aimee Weber, and Snapzilla founder Cristiano Midnight, winging it on assorted topics, from the new Resident Moderators program in the official Forums to the OpenGL controversy to the perils and pleasures of being famous in Second Life. (Aimee memorably compares it to being an Employee of the Month at a Walmart outlet.) Spinning off his recent SLOG post, Lordfly offers some fiscal prognostication, predicting that the Linden Dollar will eventually inflate to its "true" value of US$1/L$361. All interesting stuff, though maybe the most interesting thing for me is hearing the real life voices of Residents I've only communicated with up to now via text. The effect may even be more jarring than the experience of meeting them in-person-- since, after all, avatar identity is so wrapped up in what you say, and how.
New Econmomic Model
Chris Anderson, editor-in-chief of Wired Magazine. I wrote The Long Tail, which first appeared in Wired in October 2004 and will become a book, published by Hyperion, in early 2006.
The theory of the Long Tail is that our culture and economy is increasingly shifting away from a focus on a relatively small number of "hits" (mainstream products and markets) at the head of the demand curve and toward a huge number of niches in the tail. As the costs of production and distribution fall, especially online, there is now less need to lump products and consumers into one-size-fits-all containers. In an era without the constraints of physical shelf space and other bottlenecks of distribution, narrowly-target goods and services can be as economically attractive as mainstream fare.
One example of this is the theory's prediction that demand for products not available in traditional bricks and mortar stores is potentially as big as for those that are. But the same is true for video not available on broadcast TV on any given day, and songs not played on radio. In other words, the potential aggregate size of the many small markets in goods that don't individually sell well enough for traditional retail and broadcast distribution may rival that of the existing large market in goods that do cross that economic bar.
The term refers specifically to the yellow part of the sales chart at upper left, which shows a standard demand curve that could apply to any industry, from entertainment to hard goods. The vertical axis is sales; the horizontal is products. The red part of the curve is the hits, which have dominated our markets and culture for most of the last century. The yellow part is the non-hits, or niches, which is where the new growth is coming from now and in the future.
Traditional retail economics dictate that stores only stock the likely hits, because shelf space is expensive. But online retailers (from Amazon to iTunes) can stock virtually everything, and the number of available niche products outnumber the hits by several orders of magnitude. Those millions of niches are the Long Tail, which had been largely neglected until recently in favor of the Short Head of hits.
When consumers are offered infinite choice, the true shape of demand is revealed. And it turns out to be less hit-centric than we thought. People gravitate towards niches because they satisfy narrow interests better, and in one aspect of our life or another we all have some narrow interest (whether we think of it that way or not).
Our research project has attempted to quantify the Long Tail in three ways, comparing data from online and offline retailers in music, movies, and books.
1) What's the size of the Long Tail (defined as inventory typically not available offline)? 2) How does the availability of so many niche products change the shape of demand? Does it shift it away from hits? 3) What tools and techniques drive that shift, and which are most effective?
The Long Tail article (and the forthcoming book) is about the big-picture consequence of this: how our economy and culture is shifting from mass markets to million of niches. It chronicles the effect of the technologies that have made it easier for consumers to find and buy niche products, thanks to the "infinite shelf-space effect"--the new distribution mechanisms, from digital downloading to peer-to-peer markets, that break through the bottlenecks of broadcast and traditional bricks and mortar retail.
http://www.thelongtail.com/about.html
Got a philandering spouse? Property needs securing? Marked for vendetta? Online gumshoes for hire in Second Life-- rates from L$100/hour, plus expenses.

I was checking the other blogs out and I found some interesting links. Here is that link concerning the idea of having multiple avators per person: http://www.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2006/02/secondlife_reac.html

Jeff Drost