Among the many kool features of our Los Arboles sim, are the sky clubs.  Conceived of and created by our own Van Hoffnung, these themed destination spots were designed to bring people, through their avatars, together to enjoy great music and hang out with existing and soon-to-be friends and virtual world business associates.

THE BAGDAD CAFÉ

The centerpiece of Van’s Route 66 destination spots is The Bagdad Café.  This is Van’s way of paying homage to the real world historic rustic diner located in the peaceful California Mojave Desert on a remote part of historic Route 66 between Las Vegas and Los Angeles.  (Did you see the movie or one of the stage productions by the same name featuring such notables as Whoopee Goldberg, Jack Palance, and Jean Stapleton?)

This week’s grand opening was enjoyed by a standing-room-only crowd.  The featured performer was the talented Joaquin Gustav, the avatar representing an accomplished real life musician, composer, and music teacher from Buenos Aires.  Joaquin has become one of the most popular performers in Second Life® by masterfully playing popular and original tunes on his acoustical guitar LIVE from Argentina.  People from around the globe (including Argentina, Canada, England, Italy, Mexico, Spain, and the United States, to name a few) came to the Bagdad Café to listen to Joaquin’s heart-melting guitar stylings via a live media stream that carried Joaquin’s notes directly into SL.  Kool huh?  By the way, Joaquin will appear at the Bagdad Café Thursdays from 3:00PM – 4:00PM PST (aka SLT).

LA NIGHTS

The second of Van’s nightclubs on Route 66 is the beautiful LA Nights.  A fantasy club right out of Van’s imagination, this neon-clad disco floats among the stars in the clear Los Arboles night sky, and will play host to the best disk jockeys SL® has to offer.

Appearing at the grand opening of LA Nights, and returning Wednesdays from 2:00 PM – 4:00 PM PST, was avatar DJ Riff Gaffer, an extraordinary entertainer with a smooooooth radio-announcer voice.  Riff played our favorite tunes, took requests, and provide interesting commentary about the music he played from a variety of musical styles and eras.  But there’s more to this story than meets the eye … 

Riff was introduced to Van by Avatar Lia Linette (whose real person lives in Kentucky, USA).  Lia works for Van as his lead club hostess and was out scouting for talent around the virtual world when she found Riff.  Turns out, in real life, Riff’s real person lives only a few miles away from Van’s real person in England.  I bet if Riff would have just turned the volume on his sound system way up, Van wouldn’t have needed to log in to SL® to hear him!  Small worlds (virtual and real), don’t you think? 

I’ll share more about lessons we’ve learned about hosting events and using media in SL® in future blog postings.  I might even share my sneaky plans for incorporating Van’s clubs into an immersive training design I have up my sleeve. (Shhh! I haven’t told Van about these ideas yet, so keep this to yourslf.)  For now, I’ll just enjoy the moment and look forward to more great experiences hosted by our sim and produced by our very own Van Hoffnung of Hoffnung Productions.

Who are your favorite virtual world performers?  What are examples of event planning and hosting ‘best practices’ that make your virtual experiences out-of-this world?

While an experimental approach is great for developing virtual world building skills, such a method would not be feasible at Los Arboles  for two key reasons:

1. Trial and error is inefficient and time consuming.  I want to have Training Town up and running in less than 3 months so I can include a 3D immersive learning experience for participants of the next Train-the-Trainer workshop I’ll be facilitating for ASTD-LA in February 2010.  Building a whole sim AND establishing a new team AND creating asynchronous virtual world learning experiences to supplement an existing synchronous real world workshop AND attending to personal and professional real world demands AND learning all those things we don’t yet know we don’t know was either going to be an ambitious undertaking or a totally unrealistic folly.  If we to pull all this off between November 2009 and February 2010, we would have no time to waste with unnecessary errors and steep learning curves.
    
2. I don’t want to HAVE TO kill my sim-mates.  Without a clear and shared understanding about how Los Arboles was to be developed, the three of us would be setting ourselves up for unnecessary frustration and conflict.  After all, there is already enough intangible-ness to deal with in virtual worlds without adding undefined and unarticulated intentions to the mix.

So, after agreeing in concept about how to share this sim and support our respective goals, Van and Trill and I engaged in some intensive brainstorming  and ultimately agreed on some general concepts to guide the build of our new sim.  For example:

The General Look and Feel of our Sim will feature a small town nestled among mountains and hills in the center which descends into lush tropical beaches at the shorelines.  Waterways meandering throughout will create ambiance and some will allow access for the ‘Grumpass,’ a multi-sim touring boat.

The Theme for our Sim (at ground level) will be Tudor-ish – a commercial town with quaint old-world charm.  The town will feature a collection of shoppe-style buildings with displays to help instructional designers and training facilitators aspiring to use 3D and virtual world platforms for educational purposes.  The Tudor theme will also include a Train Station as a point of entry for newbies to Second Life®.  (Get it?  Tudor sounds like ‘tutor’ and a Training Station is a place for learning to happen.)  

Location, Location, Location:

• We will use the ground level of our sim for:
  • Tudor-style builds
  • Teleport hubs and ‘launching pads’ to skyboxes
  • Recreation/entertainment spots for public access
  • Primary indoor and outdoor retail displays
     
• We will use skyboxes in designated air space above our sim for:
  • Learning, entertainment, and retail settings that are not consistent with the Tudor theme or which don’t fit on the limited land space
  • Private behind-the-scenes work benches and laboratories we will use to design, build, and test elements for our sim
  • By-invitation-only learning events, conferences/meetings, social events, or private gatherings that are not open for general admission.

With these guiding principles in mind, we marked preliminary property lines in the sand and subdivided the entire sim into 3D parcels (measured in longitude, latitude, and altitude).

• We cordoned off all spaces we knew would need special sound/media configurations.
• We measured out parcels to support the primary purposes each of us have for the sim (i.e., training, entertainment, or sales) and made sure we allocated enough ’real’ estate to realize those goals.
• For each parcel, we assigned a ‘director’ – either me or Van or Trill – the one with the strongest interest in the parcel’s purpose) to be responsible for overseeing the development and maintenance of that virtual space.  I’m in charge of training parcels.  Van is responsible for all parcels with an entertainment or recreation focus.  Trill will oversee all indoor and outdoor retail sales areas.

Because each of us brings unique strengths and work styles to the project, our approach to sim development has been a collaborative one.  Van constructs all the Tudor-style structures that will be used to support my training agenda and Trill’s retail operations.  Trill terraforms the island and landscapes all ground areas on the sim.  And, when I’m not busy prototyping/scripting learning objects in my ‘sky lab’ or hunting for training props to support my immersive designs, I generally find time to annoy Van and Trill with my unrelenting suggestions and/or incessant requests for technical guidance.

Ultimately, each  of us, sometimes individually and sometimes collaboratively, is rezzing virtual builds and objects in our assigned parcels.  The opportunity to work collaboratively enables us to leverage our respective strengths.  The chance to work independently gives us the privacy and space to express individual work style preferences:  

• Van tends to work methodically.  He is likely to think about a project for a long time and then, when he finally starts construction, he forges ahead and maintains a laser focus until the project is complete.  He has also learned to ‘lock’ me out of his builds until he is ready to turn over the ‘keys’ because he knows I am likely to ‘help’ before he can tolerate my ‘indispensable contributions’ to the beauty and quality of his creations.
• I am a multi-tasker.  I have no shortage of discrete and not-so-discrete projects going on at any time.  To my frustration, I am much less experienced in the virtual world than either Van or Trill.  Consequently, I tend to bounce from one task to another as time, interest, and just-in-time skills allow — much like a butterfly flitting from flower to flower to flower.
• Trill seems to approach her work more organically.  She holds many creative ideas in her head all at the same time and will launch mini-subprojects at random (or so it seems).  Once Trill starts a project, she tends to stay with it from start to finish, like Van.  In my humble opinion, the key difference between Trill and Van is that when Van is finished, he moves on to other things without often looking back.  When Trill’s creations seem complete, they rarely are.  Trill is very detail oriented and is likely to let things settle in for a while and then come back to them to make final adjustments and refinements.

Right, wrong or indifferent, except when I get into trouble for touching a work in progress before I have been given permission, the development of the sim is moving along well.

How do you approach the design and build-out of your virtual space?  Please share your best practices and discoveries with us.

Avatar Van Hoffnung is an accomplished builder in virtual worlds.  Developed in real life through hands-on experience and the school of hard knocks, his mechanical and spatial aptitudes are matched by a serious commitment to make virtual world experiences as ’real’ and believeable as possible.  An accomplished top notch builder in virtual worlds, Van is the chief architect and general contractor for all building projects for our Los Arboles SIM. 

Avatar Trill Lomu happens to be a very accomplished and talented artist in real life.  She expresses her creativity in many ways in virtual worlds where she designs everything from clothing to furniture to beautiful land and sea scapes.  I once believed that only G-d could create a tree; but then Van introduced me to Trill, and I discovered that she too can craft trees and flowers and mountains and rocks and caves and probably a whole lot more.  Trill is the chief landscape architect and designer for our Los Arboles SIM.

Some of the skills that enable us to collaborate effectively is our shared ability to perform well as a team.  Whether in the real world or a virtual world, we know we must:

• Achieve role and goal clarity
• Make timely and effective decisions
• Work through challenges and different points of view
• Build relationships on a foundation of trust, openness, and mutual support
• Follow through on their commitments
• Demonstrate technical competence

In addition to these competencies, the rest of the ‘what’ that makes our collaboration successful is that Van and Trill and I each have different yet complementary plans for sharing our SIM. 

• Deb Quintessa (that’s me) wants to use our SIM as the virtual world headquarters for immersive 3D distance learning events designed /hosted by Working Relationships and also as a resource hub for fellow educators and mental health professionals.  I am the beneficiary of the builds and landscapes that result from the Van’s and Trill’s creative expression.
• Van Hoffnung intends to use our SIM to produce/host live music events featuring talented performers from around the world.  He also wants to use our SIM as an outlet for self-expression and creativity.  Trill and I are two of Van’s most enthusiastic and adoring fans and friends who are happy to come up requests so he can craft phenominal builds for us, and may even leave him with enough time to use his creativity to serve his own purposes as well.
• Trill Lomu plans to use our SIM to create and showcase the original designs she has come up with and as the primary location from which to make her creations available for purchase.  She also wants to use our SIM as her design studio.  Van and I plan to host events that will attract scores of avatars to our SIM who, as they engage in our events, will interact with Trill’s handiwork and be able to indulge their temptation to buy her products inthe shopping center Van designed for her or select items of interest from where they displayed throughout our SIM.

Each of us has demonstrated a willingness and ablility to listen carefully to each other and respond honestly.  We seek out ways to help each other achieve our respective goals through brainstorming or by rolling up our virtual sleeves.  We don’t compete with each other …  we advocate for each other instead.  And, as we support each other, we seem to end up benefiting ourselves in the process.

What qualities do you look for when you set out to collaborate in virtual worlds?  Who do you consider to be the best in class builders, scripters, and learning designers for virtual world platforms?

I was  hooked from our first meeting when he met with me and Trill and Van at Van’s Bagdad Cafe on Route 66 (at our Upper Dryston 1/4 SIM) to explore our interest to occupy/rent his Los Arboles SIM.  We knew, from that moment, he would leave an enduring mark on our virtual world experience.

His name is Crap Mariner.  Apparently, when his real person turned that windup key on his back  for the first time, he cut his hand, and shouted “CRAAAAAAAP!”   And that is how this unique avatar claims to have gotten his name. 

Don’t tell anybody, but fortunately for us, he has an aversion to making a profit (a trait I personally admire in a landlord), allows his residents the latitude to be creative, is accessible, responsive, and often the first one to showcase a new development in the neighborhood.  OK, he can be a bit of a pain in the *(#)@% when he sets out to be, but that is one of his most endearing qualities.  We love you Crap!!!

Our lot (Los Arboles) is located next to Woodbridge and Orcahorse, two lush green peaceful sims located above us to the North.  Along our West coast are Edloe, Nowhereville, and  BlaksleeWorld – three sims that constitute a potpourri of parcels and islands sporting a clock tree, a dog-bone-shaped building, a blue space-needle-futuristicy structure, a rustic fishing lodge with a yak on top (don’t ask!), and an oversized gumball machine.  (The Elvis sign and revolving toilet that were spinning over two other structures seem to be gone now.) 

Along our Eastern and Southern shores are wide open  undeveloped pristine waters with clear and unobstructed horizons as far as the eye can see.

Before we started to build, we came up with an overall vision for our little corner of the virtual world.

STEP ONE:  We engaged in some ‘urban planning’ and figured out how we might use the land and shape it to accomplish our aesthetic preferences and functional objectives.  Chief among these were to: 

1. Provide space for Working Relationships Training Town and its iconic training station - resource hubs for educators and onboarding facilities for new avatars.
2. Create a footprint for a shopping mall to feature the original creations of our resident landscape architect/artist, Avatar Trill Lomu.
3. Mark off media zones to support educational and entertainment venues located in strategically placed skyboxes.  Chief among these would be Avatar Van Hoffnung’s Bagdad Cafe on Route 66  and my Working Relationships Training Town Cinema in the Stars , both of which would need to reside over protected media ‘hot’ zones.
4. Provide a waterway with room for an multi-sim transportation system — a little boat called ‘the Grumpas’ which was generously provided and maintained by the owner/manager of the five adjacent regions in our neighborhood.
5. Create an environment that would blend seamlessly with Woodbridge (to the North) and support the quiet and quaint settings we were trying to create.

STEP TWO:  Trill (our resident landscape/softscape designer) sunk all the land in our SIM to around 10 meters below sea level to begin with a clean and blank slate.

STEP THREE:  Trill TERRAFORMED the area to create islands and other land masses for our builds.  To do this, she was in consultation with me and our master builder/hardscape designer Avatar Van Hoffnung to make sure she considered our ideas and vision for the SIM. 

The waters under the heaven were 
gathered together unto one place,
and the dry land appeared,
and it was good!!

Is there anything else you would have done at this stage of SIM development?  Don’t hold back.  Please share your experiences and lessons learned.

I’ve sent my Avatar, Deb Quintessa, to hundreds of learning events in SecondLife®.  Most of them are delivered through voice chat and are supplemented with the voiced and IM-ed comments from learners, spectators, and other participants.  Examples:

• Weekly professional meetings featuring guest presenters held in SecondLife® and sponsored by the Gronstedt group (Train for Success)
• Spanish language classes (held in SecondLife® at Instituto Español

Unfortunately, and my Avatar won’t let me forget them, I have inadvertently sent her to roundtable discussions and classes offered by well-respected educational institutions (we don’t respect ‘em any more!!!) where the entire event (usually lasting 60 minutes or more) was conducted in text chat.  Examples:

• A building class for beginners at one location
• A scripting class for beginners at a virtual world university
• A roundtable discussion of virtual world educators (yes professors and trainers who should know better)

Texting was by design.  It was not the emergency back-up plan implemented because voice didn’t work that day.

We were shocked, appalled, and taken aback!!!  When my Avatar talked with me about these all-texted events (including the ones she sneaked out of early) neither she nor I could figure it out.  In real life, it would never occur to me to stand in front of a group of people and ‘text’ my presentation to the audience.  Why would such an approach be considered appropriate in a virtual world? 

Imagine this …  you attend an event along with a room full of other interested people.  The speaker takes his/her place at the podium and commences to ’text’ his/her comments to your cell phone so you can read what he/she has to say!!!  Better still, the presenter turns his/her teleprompter backwards so you and the rest of the audience can just read the script yourself.  How about this … you tune in to the evening news on TV, turn off the sound,  and read the whole newscast in the rolling subtitles.

For heaven’s sake.  This is nuts!!!  If we are going to have to read the event, deliver it ASYNCHRONOUSLY.  Send the content in a notecard, a pdf file, post it in a blog, or publish it in a book.  We don’t all read at the same pace.  And even if we did, if we have to read your script for ourselves, what do we  need you for?  The least you could do is  read your script to us.  While this too would be a punishing experience, at least it gives you something to do, and frees the rest of us to look at each other or your PowerPoint slides — don’t get me started, the use of PowerPoint deserves a blog entry all its own!!!

Don’t get me wrong.  I think it is terrific when broadcasters offer simulcast subtitles to increase accessibility to programming for people who are either not able to hear or who do not speak the language of the speaker.  But neither was the case for the examples of the synchronous events described above.

If you are reading this blog and can make even a marginally convincing case for using text chat in lieu of voice for SYNCHRONOUS programming in virtual worlds (or for that matter, any place in the solar system), please share your point of view.  Clearly, the benefit eludes me.

Looks like one of us needs an image consultant; and, since I got here first, I think it should be her!!!  I wonder where Avatars go to shop.  I have no money.  I don’t even know how to earn it.  Guess I’ll need to ask my real person (RP) Debbie for an allowance.

Maybe we’re triplets … or sextuplets.  Everywhere I look I see Avatars that look just like me.  THIS HAS GOT TO STOP.

Before someone can adequately interact with avatars and objects that are part of VW learning experiences, participants and their avatars must master basic virtual life skills.  This is true for learners and learning facilitators alike.

Now, if you were to suggest that interacting with learning and communications technologies is (or at least should be) a standard consideration for designers of distance learning, you would be absolutely correct.  Preparing participants to operate the learning or communication vehicles used to support learning should be part of the design.  In most cases, this preparation can require little more than a brief overview that touches on selected keyboard/phone functions and perhaps some tips about learning etiquette.

When designing learning for VWs, in addition to the above considerations, it is also necessary to consider the VW life skills required by learners and facilitators.   Achieving an adequate level of mastery to get to and participate in VW learning events  often requires hours of preparation and practice supplemented by a network of wikis and interactive support.

As I design my first virtual world learning event, I’ve been thinking about the following questions:

1. To participate in facilitated or self-directed in-world learning, what VW life skills must avatars already possess?
2. How/when/where will new and not-so-new avatars develop these competencies?
3. Where will an avatar find help if he/she gets stuck or lost?

Virtual world life skills typically include:

• Moving:  Can the avatar get from place to place and extricate him/herself from unpleasant or difficult situations?  [Skills required: Walking, flying, teleporting, using maps and finding destinations by using search functions, sitting, and using pose balls]
  

• Perceiving:  Can the avatar take in information?  [Skills required: Seeing (using a camera), hearing (using media), and interacting with objects]
  

• Communicating:  Can the avatar express him/herself?  [Skills required: IM-ing (public/private), sending note cards, voice chatting (public/private), conference calling, using gestures/animations]
  

• Acquiring and Accessing Stuff:  Can the avatar obtain in-world learning materials?  [Skills required: Buying/taking, inventory management, and moving/rezzing objects]
  

• Building Relationships:  Can the avatar make friends?  [Skills required: Joining groups, accessing Avatar profiles, offering/accepting friendship, and getting help]
  

• Creating Scenes and Stuff:  Can the avatar manipulate objects?  [Skills required: Building and scripting]
  

• Establishing a Virtual Presence:  Can the avatar create a personal or professional image that aligns with their intended use in VWs?  [Skills required: Choosing, acquiring, and wearing clothes/accessories]

For a glimpse into ways one avatar developed these competencies, be sure to read the posts by our own Avatar Deb Quintessa, as she takes a walk down memory lane and tells of her early days in the VW known as SecondLife®.

So … did I miss any key virtual life skills?  What personal experiences can you describe that would enable us to learn more about ways to help avatars get up to speed and master the virtual life skills needed for self-directed or facilitated learning events in VWs?

The audience is listening!!!

Just in case you’re wondering, I was not under the influence and I’m not an alcoholic.  I drink socially and can stop whenever I want to.  (Bet you’ve heard that before!!!)  Truly, I’m just a klutz who hasn’t mastered the fine art of walking in SL yet.  But, before you go and get judgmental on me, answer one question first:  In RL how many times did you fall down when you were learning to walk?  And don’t tell me, after all these years, you don’t still occasionally trip and land flat on your face.  They don’t require employers to carry workers’ compensation insurance for nothing!!!

Flying in SL is much faster and safer for me.  I’m good at taking off and navigating in the wide blue yonder.  In SL you don’t need a pilot’s license, certainly don’t need to stand in line at security checkpoints, don’t need to check baggage, and really need not bother to board a plane, helicopter, flying carpet, or space ship.  There aren’t even any schedules to deal with.  It is wonderful NOT having to check in two or three hours before you want to fly. OK,  I still have to brush up on my landings.  I rarely hit my intended target.  Its a good thing Avatars don’t get bruised or break bones when they hit the ground.  (If I fall out of the sky, and there is nobody there to see me, did I really crash?)

I suppose its a good thing I haven’t started operating motor vehicles yet.  A word to the wise:  if I were you and saw me trying to get around in SL, I would avoid me at all costs!!

Firewalls notwithstanding, to get off the ground SL demands ample internet bandwidth, good CPU processing strength, enough memory (not you … the computer!!!), sufficient display resolution, and the graphic muscle to run a 3D application.  Fortunately, the software is free so you’ll be able to focus your invetment in hardware!!! Oh yes, you’ll need a mouse, a keyboard, speakers and, if you really want some interactive fun, a headset (with a microphone). Bottom line: if your computer doesn’t have the guts for this technology, you might wanna just take up knitting!!!

My desktop does just fine.  Until the recent release of the SL software, even my laptop could do a fair job.  But that was then.  Now, my laptop functions more like a doorstop.  So … here’s what I would recommend you do if you want to get started:

Download the free SL software from www.secondlife.com.  If it allows you to log in, great.  If it doesn’t, you may need to give your computer an infusion of hardware. 

You’ll find the tech specs for PC, MAC, and LINUX under the help tab on the SL website (above) where there will be a pop-up with detailed system requirements.  If you’re like me, that should confuse you enough to make you want to throw up your hands and give up before you start. BUT DON’T.  Here’s the deal:  if you ain’t got what it takes to EMPOWER yourself to  log on, you probably ain’t got what it takes’ to design a learning simulation in SL either!!! 

MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU!!!