I spent the evening with Jesse in Second Life working on scripting. I need to get some nice scripts completed for my independent study with Josephine. Right now I am working on a virtual pulsing dicoball that when clciked on, offers to sell the user a disco braclet. Then if the user is wearing the bracelet, when you click on the ball it makes you dance.

Who know how it will go, but I think it could be the start of a sucessful disco business. I will post some pictures later tonight.

As a youth (I am now 27), I used to be a world traveler. During my 17-23 year old years, I went to school in

Rockhill, South Carolina(1 Year) Winthrop, the school, is really beautiful, unlike Canisius which has beautiful pictures in the catalog and is really 3/4 of the year under snow, Winthrop is always nice. I chose this chair from the main building's porch because as a crazy 18 year old, me and my friend Amy ran naked across campus and took pictures sitting on these chairs. Those pictures have been censored, but the chair gives you a feel for the craziness of that day.


Flagstaff, Arizona(1.5 Years)
One of the most visually pleasing cities in the world. there is so much natural beauty abound, that is is almost inspirational.


Jena Germany (1 year)
Not so beautiful, bu thte Christmas market is pretty with all the lights. It's nice than buffalo at Any time.


Flensburg, Germany (1 Year)
Definately a cute city on the ocean. I loved living there.

Missing Image ;(

During that time I traveled to so many cities, some of which I will list here in no particular order. These are only the cities/towns I stayed in, not just drove through, and can remember quickly. There are links for the cities where I attended school:

Toronto, Vancouver, Niagara Falls, Montreal, Quebec City, Moyi, Hope, Nelson, Edminton, Greensboro, Winston-Salem, Richmond, Washington DC, Pittsburg, Philadelphia, Chicago, Detroit, Albany, Syracuse, Rochester, Ithaca, Myrtle Beach, Rock Hill Columbia, Charlotte, Charleston, Savanah, Atlanta, Athens(GA), Tampa, Phoenix, Tuscon, Prescott, Flagstaff , Sante Fe, Denver, El Paso, Juarez, Huimas, Las Vegas, Reno, Portland, Seatle, New York City, Sacramento, Yuma, Redding, Eureka, , San Francisco, San Diego, Sioux Falls (Canistota), Barstow, Jena , Dresden, Flensburg , Husum , Strasbourg, Leipzig, Neu Muenster, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Eckenfoerde, Kassle, Konstanz, Freiburg, Berlin, Koeln, Dusseldorf, Lubeck, Kiel, Dortmond, Munich, Stuttgart, Lugano, Luino, Basil, Geneva, Copenhagen, Paris, Nice, Genoa, Rome, Milan, Robagano, Treviso, Venice, Florence, Barcelona, Madrid, Amsterdam, Gibralter, Fez, Marakesh, Valencia, and London.

Growing up in Kenmore, I had the idea that by travelling around the world, I could be exposed to other ideas that I thought I was missing in Kenmore and needed to properly develop into an adult. I think I was right. Especially during the German Years. I was hungry for other experiences. Or trying to subconsciously escape living near the former Linde plant [inlink]userName=paul,blogID=397[/inlink]
(hahaha.)

Anyways, then I started getting hooked on computer communication and my world shrunk. I remember my first experience with the internet was in South carolina. I just kind of figured that the internet and Netscape were the same thing. I rememeber using pine for my email, and being really excited when I figured out how to look stuff up for the exchange program in Germany. I found that the school I was going to had a site. That didn't mean they had good internet access. When I got there, I found one computer lab that had very sparse hours. Crazy now, thats probably why I got so much done during those years. By the time I got back to New York and then moved to Arizona I was ready to get my very own computer, so in 2000 I took out my first loan and bought my iBook. Let it RIP, matthew watered it with the plants in 2003, and its days came to a close.

The iBook was my very first personal Computer after the Commodore 64 I had as a child and the very first computer I owned with a modem. I still traveled but brought the computer with me. Then as time went on I began to purchase
more and more communication devices and my world traveling came to a halt in 2002. Now I have 3 computers and a cell phone that can go on the web and I almost never leave my neighborhood. It seems that as my computer communication methods expanded, my world traveler days came to a close. I am really kind of sad about this.

I can still talk to people from everywhere and get ideas from them at least, I guess that was my the most important part of travelling to me. It was also about getting to know who I was without the restaint of my friends and family who knew who I was.

My biggest worry is that it all goes the other way. People from really isolated places aroun the world can tap into American superPopCulture and download it into their worlds, as well. This sucks for everyone in a way, soon there will be no reason for anyone to travel.

My greatest problem is that in all of the cities I saw, especially the American ones, it was kind of the same. Especially out west, while each city had its own little flare, most of them had a corner that included a target, office depot, home depot/lowes, dollar store plaza. Each one also had a super walmart, even the Canadian ones. No kidding, I even saw a Walmart in former communist Jena, Thuringen, a small city in the old East Germany. What the hell is going on with that? So now I have decided that I can just live here in Buffalo and visit electronically.

The only cities that were truly mind boggling were Fez and Marakesh. They seemed like they left development about the time Mohammed walked the Earth.

I hope to organize this journal entry and its meaning later, but I figured if I did not write it I would never get that far and its been bothering me.

--update
I realize that other things have changed iin my life that brought me to this static place. I am just saying the computer helped a lot.

In response to Julie,
We are having a big camping party at Aleghany on the 20th. So if you can have it another day it would be great. On the other hand feel free to come on the camping trip. We have a bunch of cabins at Aleghany and there will be skiing involved!

Everyone is chippin in $25 each for the cabbins. Email me if you have questions.

I had another thought about competition today. Anything that involves numbers and counting can be converted into competitive action. So for example, croche can be a competitive art in that one artist can outstich another in terms of number of rows.

What does it take to make a truly non-competitive activity? Can there be non-competitive activities that rae still considerted fun? Any ideas?

If you don't understand this it doesn't make a difference. If you do , it might be important. Someone sent me this information, and hoenstly I can't say I know its true but its something to think about.

Major Overnet warning!!!!

Some apparently leaked information has come to our attention and if it’s true, using Overnet could put you in jail!

Allegedly the maker of edonkey who goes by the name Swampy was busted by the Fed’s a couple of months ago. As a part of a plea bargain to keep himself out of jail he agreed to let them have full access rights to his web site. Swampy did NOT create Overnet the Fed’s did however by appending Swampy’s name to it and distributing it via his web site meant it would be trusted through out the community. They used Microsoft’s .net software on purpose because it easily and secretly allows them to track users based on IP and Mac addresses via a special proxy server, It logs what their sharing and what their downloading each time they connect to Overnet. This information is also passed on to otherlaw enforcement agencies world wide.Overnet is NOT server less as it claims; the GUI just hides them along with many hidden features like the proxy server connection. They only want you to see what they want you to see.

Bottom line is if you already use or have used Overnet they already know who you are where you are and what you have done. Could be only a matter of time before they come a knocking!

P.S. Also the forum moderators at the edonkey web site have been replaced by Fed posers so be careful what you post their.

More observations and questions - This is written in reference to the gadzukes journal entry from the Tempreal site on Thursday, January 29th 2004, 13:25 PM.

I also believe in the healing power of video games. Well, not specifically video games, but the healing power of play. However, I always question to myself why so much of game play is based around perceived violence and why acting out symbolic violence is specifically relieving for many people? I am not refering to Second Life, or even our class experience specifically.

It is definately possible to have games and play of another type. For example scrabble, or Dance Dance Revolution, a great game I had about raising a hamster, animal crossing, tetris, etc. All of those games provide their players with a sense of satisfaction and masterly when played. So I do not know if the violence itself is the key to the healing power of play or if it is a sense of purpose and mastery. I realize that most Americans are not into those type of games. Do you think it has something to do with our personal up-bringings or with our societies focus on militarism?

In the Interactive Environments course I took last semester at the University of Buffalo , we studied the video game culture in Japan and found that they have large tradition of games that involve skill outside of shooting. For example cooking games, organizing games, logic games, dancing games, etc and that their fighting games are often based more on fantasy than reality (magic powers vs. machine guns).

I noticed at the while at the local videogame store the other day that many America games are really based on reality. Lets use "Socom" or "Counter Strike" as an example. If video games are an escape for many people why do Americans often want games that base their play on reality?

I just remembered I had a lot of money still left in my there.com avatar's account and felt like shopping. Ironically, in real life I shaved my head because I can't justify paying to get my hair cut while in there I decided to go with a Lavendar hair-style that cost me about $3 US.



There is something really wrong with that. If you do visit there.com soon. My avatars name is also Apfeljung as in Second Life. And I look like the images above.

Well I have been working on this mask for a bit. The manager of the intended project expected something more simplistic with less detail. So now I have nothing to do with this. So I thought I would put a picture of here for you'll to look at and me to remember the hard work.



My Second Life is a little less stressful. The Linden's have given our students a land grant and I have moved away from Jessie, to the militant zone.

I am really glad to have moved. It was starting to make me insane. I moved to a new peninsula in the middle of the simulation and built a new two story house. All of the students have accounts now, so I think it start getting more interesting. Jesse and I made the first test, requiring students to transport to a particular location, build a model and texture it.

We are also having them conduct an interview with an avatar that has a career that they would like to pursue. This week we will also be leaving for There.com . I am curious to see how it goes.

Does anyone have anything they want to post to the front page? Just email me. The space is up for grabs right now.

In response to the journal entry below - One of my students tells me: "Besides the fact that it’s just not good form to say bad things about others."

That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. If we were all just silent dissenters nothing would ever change. Should we not question what we consider wrong because it would be "bad form" and others may not like us. That is probably the most free speach repressive statement possible. Self-repression, to be implimented in the name of "good form!"