OLJ Activity - Second Life

I participated in a tutorial of Second Life, organised by the lecturer and attended by a handful of students, a couple of weeks ago. I didn't experience much success on the day and decided today was the day I had enough courage to reenter the virtual world of Second Life.

I am definitely a novice user of modern gaming. I was a player of SIMS in its early years, but have no experience of interacting with others in an online environment. That is, until the tutorial on Second Life.

During that experience I became very anxious when I was unable to find the initial environment to meet the group. It took about 20 minutes and many Facebook posts to try and find the group. I discovered my error. The link popped up but I did not recognise the online name and became anxious I was in the wrong environment. I was destracted with the destination guide picks popping up on the left of the screen and assuming I was going to be transported directly to an environment.

Once I found the group, I was able to make limited movements and fumbled my way around the environment. I was able to follow others and be transported to other locations. I thought I took pictures during this experience. However, I am unable to find them.

I have had limited success in altering my avatar. I have been able to change some clothing items, but not all. I had difficulty in finding options and navigating my way through this process. I had concerns for a while when I was able to remove her shirt and had difficulty in dressing her in another. But perseverance ensured she was appropriately dressed in the end.

Altered clothing

I managed to save a few photos to my computer and some to my profile feed. Although, there were some photos that went to the profile feed when I was trying to save them to the computer. I am not particularly sure what I was doing. Likewise, I had limited success with posting photos. I was able to post photos directly from Second Life to Facebook with the intention of them posting to the closed group INF506 but posted them to my profile instead. I was able to import photos saved to the computer in this blog post, but not from Second Life.

CSU-SIS Meeting Hall

Today I was able to walk, run, sit and stand. I was able to find another location, the bar, and keep objects in my inventory such as drinks, cocktails and tea.

I was able to sit in the Meeting Hall. It was here I reflected on the learning potential of online environments such as Second Life. Avatars would be able to attend lectures and meet up with groups. Some environments would be beneficial for distance education students to experience a practical classroom, such as a Laboratory. Having studied anatomy I can see real potential for learning opportunities in an anatomy lab.

Sitting in the Meeting Hall