SLCC conference (1)

Conferences with "audio streaming" attended: 1 (good); Audio streamed; practically none (bad); Games of primtionary played: 4 (good, mostly because didn't win)

Before the social visit mentioned in last post attended first full say of SL conference - education track of big SL convention being held in RL. Conference in Chicago (USA) apparently in hotel which not really geared to the needs of hundreds of bandwidth-hungry delegates, and net result was that audio streaming to SL mostly did not work on Saturday.

In fact got muddled about time so missed first inworld session, but arrived for session on disability and SL which think was put together to compensate for lack of audio streaming. In fact this turned out to be best thing of 2 days I think, probably because all inworld. Had not thought much about problems of students with special needs, but certainly need to. Up til now SL has been good for those with hearing impairments, but as voice comes in gets more problematic again. In RL group work & discussion is more of problem that "lectures", would imagine is same in SL.

Not sure about dyslexia - can see arguments both ways - will perhaps consult student who has nearly finished PhD on dyslexia and acquiring information. Here we have notetakers (usually students) for people when is identified that they have special need and can't see why you couldn't have same in SL. Full transcript of this session is up at http://sleeds.org/chatlog/?c=76

After this audio streaming resumed but only in strange muffled way, and could not understand what people saying, not even when was James Dearnley who is Brit (from Loughborough Uni) moderating session on Scilands.

Therefore was proposed that we avatars have game of primtionary. When first announced paniced, esp. as to begin with was talk of TEAMS and it brings back schooldays and no-one wanting self in their netball team, and rightly so as was rubbish at netball. And rounders. And hockey. Compounded this panic by, meaning to IM Ishbel saying something like "arghh now they are selecting teams", instead speaking out loud to conference room.

Turns out primtionary based on pictionary. Someone IMs a word to builder and then builder has to build something out of Prims to represent word, and first person guessing words is next builder. Catch was pretty easy to spot, and as am not v. good sport nor v. good builder knew better than to guess.

However not as daunting as thought, esp with easier words, one pictured is MOUTH. Last one was INTEGER though - well, I mean.

Parallel organising of RL/SL conferences seems horrendously complex and fraught. Think will continue with SL only events for now, gradually increasing their scope.