Friday, September 28, 2007

Civilisation

I mustn't go on about Second Life, but feel I owe this post to the person I met the other evening - actually it was midnight - on the Learn4Life island. Previously I've wandered alone through the location's meeting rooms and cafe, but on this occasion this male figure was standing, clutching a torch, on the beach. I think it was a beach. Anyway, with a bit of help and some of the civilised discourse I would expect from a Scottish educator, I was able to teleport to Paris, circa 1900, and join him in a goblet of Absinth in a bar. Later, after he'd left and I was considering whether to log off and go to bed or to have a look for the Eiffel Tower, I was approached by a second man - well, it was a male avatar - and invited to sit and chat. More absinth. By this time in real life I'd be on the floor, but no, there I was perched decorously on a bar stool and conversing in three languages. (All in text - I haven't progressed to sound yet) We were joined by a third man who told me about the free parachute jumps from the Eiffel Tower. It was all very civilised and written in proper English rather than text-speak, so I felt quite at home - see last post for the contrast.

But I have a question for any Mac-using Second Lifers: I have problems already with sitting on seats - the ctrl/click produces the suitable gesture on the part of my avatar, but as often as not that's as far as it goes. And when I found the lift to the Eiffel Tower no amount of clicking on it would have any effect - though I know I was in the right place because I saw two Spanish-speaking chaps do the same and vanish skywards. Help needed, please - I'll get bored if I can't influence my environment.

To say nothing of the effects of too much absinth.

5 comments:

  1. spotted this on edublogs - glad to help.

    With Torch of Learning ;-)

    Kind Regards

    Joe Wilson SQA

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  2. Anonymous7:15 PM

    I'm just jealous because when I've tried Second Life on my Glow laptop, it just crashes :-( So these environments are still a mystery to me.I look forward to reading about your experiences - a sort of vicarious Second Life - if you can have that :-)

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  3. Dorothy, I'll begin to doubt my own sanity if I do it too much!

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  4. I think you need to maybe move between the ctrl and Apple keys as you click on things. I'm still learning, too. Not easy, but worth it if you can base jump without getting hurt.

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  5. Yay! It works! Thanks, Ewan - now you can turn your attention to watching for the water going the wrong way down the plughole...

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