Pre- and Post- conference

Mini-conferences held: 1 (good); New outfits bought in heady rush after conference: 2 (so far, good); SL gurus not met due to infelicities of mobile phone network: 1 (bad)

Have not done any blogging since was v. busy organising mini-conference on 26th June. Will blog about that next, however will first do a quick round up of other things. Am pictured above relaxing at home after successful completion of conference. During last week had kept SL excursions to essential prep for mini-conference, wearing same outfit for a whole week.

Thus in celebration when conference over had a look at the fashion blog feeds and then zoomed over to snap up this fetching top from Zaara and then the skirt from Liquid Velvet Studios to go with it.

In RL in Sydney almost met Anya I's RL equivalent, unfortunately due to mobile phone outages we missed each other. Almost as bad as SL.

Interest, Talk, Recognition

People expressing interest in SL conference: 5 (good); Talks given about SL at RL conference: 1 (OK); No. of people spontaneously addressing me as Sheila Yoshikawa at RL conference: 1 (good)

Interest in conference increasing including one person who wants to do SL poster - hurrah! Suppose should put in link to info about conference so here it is: http://networked-inquiry.pbwiki.com/About-LTEA2008-in-Second-Life

At RL conf was encouraged when identified as Sheila Yoshikawa by another delegate, that not being name on RL conference badge, naturally. Also gave talk about using SL for my class and for IL generally, was bit discouraged when no questions afterwards, evidently had not presented SL as stimulating wow-factor environment - or perhaps too much so? Or perhaps simply was talking too fast.

Interesting but obvious point: when access SL from other side of world, SL is (of course) exactly the same. So not evident from above pic that was in Australia when took it.

Travel

Conferences announced: 1 (good); Interest so far: 0 (bad); SL gurus contacted who expressed desire to meet in RL: 1 (good)

In RL am now on other side of world, vis Australia, which takes rather longer to get to in RL than in SL i.e. approx 24 hours longer. However is worth it terms of hello sky, hello beach, hello sun, hello Aussie wine effect. Excuse for Australian jaunt are numerous conferences and while over here will also be attempting to lead conference track in SL on 26th June, when in RL will be based in Sydney.

This will be no prob at all if interest is at current level i.e. none. However, there is a week to go and have only just announced it, plus realise that email for registration got mangled in copying and pasting so no wonder if mailbox not overflowing. As part of attempt to gain Peace of Mind while in Sydney contacted well known SL guru, but seems that state of SL awareness amongst computing services at her uni is almost as bad as at mine. Hey ho. Hotel is supposed to have internet access plus have just splashed out on new shiny laptop with Nvidia 8600 graphic card

Shop, Make, Swing

Meadows created in shop: 1 (v. good); T-shirts created: 3 (good-ish); University campi visited: at least 1 (good)

Have zillion and one things to do before embarking on RL trip to Australia so of course have spent night:
1) Creating t-shirts for mini conference (will blog more on this in due course)
2) Editing chatlog, revising notecard, doing blog entries etc etc (see last post)
3) Blogging summer outfit in ihearts blog;
4) Selecting new outfit to wear tomorrow;
5) Buying assorted cute furniture items at BP Voyager store (one is in background of first pic. ie dressing table with animation)
6) Installing new photo display in shop (see first pic)
7) Uploading pics of SL to Flickr
8) Doing this blog entry

Of course sounds quite useful when put like that. Or at least sounds productive, if only in virtual way.

On Monday attended "Lessons in SL" meeting which is usually in Black Library, but this time was field trip to Ohio University campus with ample opportunities to get stranded on roof, stuck in staircase etc etc. Pic on right shows us at the start of the tour.

Facebook and information literacy

RL sessions on Facebook delivered: 1 (good); SL sessions on Facebook delivered: 1 (good); Time spent in SL: 2 hours (approx) (good); Time spent on Facebook: 15 mins (OK, but it's so TWO-DIMENSIONAL)

Maggie and I did a RL session on What does your facebook say about you? on Tuesday in RL in Sheffield, and in the evening I led a SL discussion about Facebook and Information Literacy.
SL session was only announced the night before due to lack of organisational skills, so not surprisingly were not v. many people i.e. 3 plus me. However it was quality not quantity and think there was an interesting discussion, though more about Facebook than info lit.

The RL PowerPoint is on Slideshare, and includes slides which record points raised by participants in the RL session (about 24 people, a mixture of lecturers and other staff at the university, plus one student): http://www.slideshare.net/sheilawebber/what-does-your-facebook-say-about-you The chatlog of the SL session is at http://sleeds.org/chatlog/?c=300

Information Literacy expanded

Discussions held: 1 (good); Transcripts edited and mounted online: 1 (good); Notecards updated and transformed into pdfs: 1 (good); Poster revised and mounted in the CILR: 1 (frankly this is all rather exhausting)

The transcript of the discussion on Expanding/Enhancing Information Literacy Using In-World Tools, held on Infolit iSchool in SL, is now available at http://sleeds.org/chatlog/?c=295
The discussion took place on 29 May 2008. It was led by Robin Mochi, a US librarian (pictured below, though I don't think Robin is REALLY that enormous).

Robin introduced the SLOOg and the Salamander HUDs, explained their uses and responded to questions. Robin provided a notecard with some core definitions, links and explanations, which can be downloaded from http://dis.shef.ac.uk/sheila/mochi-29-may.pdf People had the opportunity to get copies of the HUDs themselves and the vendors for these are now the Centre for Information Literacy Research building on Infolit iSchool (http://slurl.com/secondlife/Infolit%20iSchool/101/211/22/ )

We were looking at the setup in Sakura House (where the discussion was held) a couple of hours beforehand, when we were joined by someone who turned out to be a student at Edith Cowan University, in Western Australia. Very cool, and rather late where he was. He was having to write about SL and libraries and said he was glad to find people to talk to. He is in the middle in the final picture.

Colleague, disco, usual stuff

Graduation parties attended: 1 (good); Black library discussions: 1 (good); New SL colleague buying land: 1 (v. good); neighbours selling land: 1 (bad)

Briefly attended dance party for US library graduates at Rich Idiot. Took place in middle of night here and had actually aimed to go home before it started, but when inevitably was still faffing around in SL when witching hour approached, thought might as well drop in.

As usual was all grey and laggy for some time, but was able to make out name tag and distinctive form of North amongst the dancers. Had chat, and am now privileged to be included as an Educator's Coop hanger on, which means I can attend their meetings etc. (though again these happen at late hours, but there you go).

Have been talking recently to colleague Jackie in our RL Education Department, who was just entering SL. Was excited to find that not just brief, glancing interest as she has now invested in her own little parcel and already acquired clothes, hair etc bit like her RL self, or at least more like her RL self than me. She has installed tree and campfire and I think was searching for arabian tent. Wondered about dropping her landmarks for places with arabian tents, but do not wish to seem pushy.

Then was on to Black Library discussion, late, but did not prevent me from chuntering on. Fear that tend to return to same topics in conversation, but then am not only one.

Was sad to get email from neighbour to say that was selling up some of her land, to go down a tier. Said land was pleasant consisting mostly of grass and trees. She asked if I wanted any of it, but am currently at max for my tier so was able to resist. Hope that new buyers enter into current spirit of the sim i.e. Japanese/ elvish houses and plenty of green.

Sadness

No. of sad databases: 1 (bad); No. of sad SL users as result : approx 56,000 (v.bad)

Lotte Linden just posted message to SL official blog saying "Our central database is sad, which leads to disruptions in several inworld services, such as teleports, search and profiles not working, and transactions failing.Please do not attempt any transactions with non-copy items at this time."

Could it be that databases can acquire Seasonal Affective Disorder? If possible, still seems unlikely explanation since must be quite sunny on West Coast of USA at present where computer is. Has database suffered bereavement? Perhaps mourning loss of motherboard or fan? Or is it technical term that someone with sense of humour has contorted into acronym "sad"?

At any rate is good insofar as deters self from wandering into SL instead of doing various work things which are outstanding. Here is picture of me dancing in SL which was supposed to be cheerful, but looking again I'm not so sure.