Blog #6

Second Life lends itself to “machinima” very well. Since Second Life’s selling point is the ease at which it allows users to model, script, and control the environment, the process should be rather straight forward to most users.

I watched the “CSI NY Second Life”. Although I am not a fan of CSI, and am rather new to Second Life, I was able to understand relatively well what was going on. I assumed that the creators of CSI are doing some sort on interactive tie-in with the television show. This is very exciting, since it is an attempt to bridge the gap between entertainment such as television, and the on-line world.

Although the video is also most likely hosted on youtube, it is more meaningful than someone’s random musings or video journal in that it is in reference to an event in which people can interact with, and not just observe.

Blog #5

I am sure I have stated before, I have used Second Life on a few occasions before it was expected to do so in class. The concept is a very interesting one, however unoriginal it is. There have been a plethora of onlines games that revolve around a virtual world before SL came into existence. There have been just as many, if not more internet sites that were user driven. However, the idea where the virtual world is successfully driven almost entirely from user generated pieces on the scale of SL is something that has never happened before.

Before the beginning of the quarter, I was rather unimpressed with what I saw and red about second life. This is possibly do to my lack of time spent exploring it. After completing the class, I am still hesitant to proclaim it the groundbreaking communication and virtualization that it is so often hailed as.

The software resources that are used are a bit old and outdated. The modeling process is slow and cumbersome, which is reflected in the quality of work created in world. The world itself is almost always in the early stated of building. This leads the world to be a horrible mismatch of unfinished objects.

Understandably so, there is argument against overhauling Second Life engine and creating a “Second Life II, better game engine” would mean that a lot of people with less capable computing power would be unable to take part in the new more computer intensive world.

However, for a communications class, Second Life serves it purpose and is an adequate introduction into online user generated virtural worlds though nothing else, its shear size and accessibility.

Blog #4

I used to be a volunteer for the Lab-Rat program in the Natural History Museum when I was younger.  I became relatively familiar with the Museum Center though this experience.  Even though I feel very knowledgeable about the museum, I was shocked to see how much it has changed since I was last there.

 

I was surprised to find that a lot of the older exhibits that I used to give tours over where not there anymore.  The old exhibits like Dino Dentistry were replaced, or improved by new ones.  The Paleo-Lab has overgone the most impressive change that I had notice taken place.  The improvements to its size and quality were very impressive, especially considering the Museum’s tight budget.

 

The community partners seemed to be very knowledgeable in regards to the area of focus in the museum center.  However, they seem to lack the technical knowledge that is going to be key in implementing this project.

Blog #3

Since we only had a limited time in the lab, we the majority of students (self included) built a hollow shell, and put a texture over it.  This was done by hollowing out a half sphere prim.  The texture was given to us from the Museum Center.  Oddly enough, this made the shell very convincing with little time and effort.

The majority of students built the same thing, with varying results.  Most of the communication was done through “real life”, seeing as it is still more efficient to yell something across the room than it is to type it out and communicate it using the chat function.

Again, getting the bloghud to work correctly was the most difficult part.  I was unable to get it to crosspost, so I was forced to download the picture from bloghud.com, and repost it on the wordpress directly.  I checked and rechecked, and everything dealing with the bloghud was correct.  I am not sure what the issue is.

Blog #2

I have done a small about of 3D modeling and graphic design while I was in high school. From the courses I have taken, I have a general understanding of the modeling process. This being said, there is still something to learn with each individual modeling software environment.
Before the tutorial, I was not very confident in my ability to model objects in second life. After going through the tutorial, I was able to add a few tools to my building arsenal. This is very important, since I feel more capable of modeling something in Second Life. I was able to build more than just the basic shapes, and gained a greater understanding and appreciation of the building process in second life. Although I found the interface a lot more bulky and sluggish than what I am used to, I was able to model what I wanted to fairly quickly.
What I found most difficult was my inability to get the bloghud working. I had to rely on my knowledge of image hosting and the use of tags to get my picture to display properly.  I had to take py picture from the bloghud site, download it, and then post it here.

Blog #1

I am not much of a gamer. I haven’t bought a new game in almost 3 years. However, I am very capable when it comes to navigating and utilizing the internet. I have seen the proliferation of it since my early childhood

The assignment’s purpose was to show how technology effects our lives. Specifically, our focus seems to be on the internet. As an engineer, I am very skeptical of the internet’s continued growth. Its usage is not infinitely exponential. Hardware limitations and the population decline of the 2050s will are signs that the internet’s size is slowly coming to its maximum value. The physical limitations of computer hardware, not the bandwidth, is the limiting factor of what the internet can be used for. Other industries and technologies all have their respective epochs and limits. The internet is no different.

The first assignment was a reminder that there is an increasing growth rate in the size and difference of usage of the internet. What it does not readily show is the physical limitations of the internet. The important thing to realize is that transistor will be as small as physically possible in about 10 years. This means that most likely within the next 20 years, we will see all of what the internet has to offer, not how expansive it can be.

Keeping this is mind, it if fairly reasonable to say that the internet will stop evolving the way it has been in the next 10 years. There should not be too much more that can be done, and it changed our lives more in the last 10 years than it will in the next 20.