So you might want to check my SecondLife temp:real journal if you want to know what's going on right now.

I will break it down here for those of you who do not know SL. SL is a 3D, video game engine based, world. In SL you can create worlds, communities, businesses,etc. You develop a real online presescence and can have property, group, vote, design your character, etc.

Recently, I started teaching an online course at UB with Jesse Fabian, using SL, as a place to 3D model and script for class.

Mostly, SL is like livivng in an art community, where everything is built by the inhabitants. Second Life has has nothing to start out with. New land is like an empty landscape.

In the world there are no hitpoint, etc as such that you would typically find in a video game. That is except in the land named Jessie.

Jessie is the only seriously militarized zone in SL. It confuses me why people who like military fantasy games would choose the SL engine. It seems like engines such as unreal, or quake, etc would provide much better military strategy type fun.

Taking inspiration from Anna Schleuner's Velvet Strike project, I began purchasing land in Jessie, erecting monuments to anti-militarism and then abandoning them. Well, at first I tried to inhabit them but was slaughtered. Eventually I began to build a giant fortress toward my protest effort and in order to protect me while building my monuments.

This made the "army" de Secondlife really angry. Eventually, they sent a spy who I trusted. He threatend me and wanted money for protection. All of this angered me in return. Ironically, my emotional response was to crush them but then, even if they lost they would be winning idealogically, by dragging me into their military fantasy.

So I decided to just leave the giant anti-war monument and add images of children of wounded children from real world war. I am so sad that Parts of SL have come to this. I have to say that I am actually starting to prefer there.com and think that when the class is over, I will abandon SL in favor of the isolated protection that there.com capitalist fantasy bubble provides. Its kind of like Disney World vs real life.

I know that I could just avoid the land of Jessie. But knowing its always there, really bothers me. Why did the makers of SL sell out to military fantasy? It is really an interesting question. Was it to make money off the military gaming community? If so that is really pathetic and makes me wish I had never invested money in their dream, in the first place.

The military simulation community has access to so many online games where shooting, fear, and terror tactics rule. Why add it to Second Life? One of the few interactive, online worlds where people have the ability to do other things besides fight.

I understand adding paintball, like in there.com or sports -even sword fighting. But machine guns, al queda style training camps and camo gear is unecessary. Plus the constant threats and emails I am getting for having had a peace sign.

Something idiotic made me trust a spy who I later witness double agenting on me. He ended up stealing my money and causing estrip some serious grief to the point where the person playing him decided to just stop.

The spy tried to sell me the same camophlage helicopter he sold to the army. I told him I thought it was ugly and he seemed angry. I am just honest. If you are playing never trust Nicko Snow or Craig Thompson.

In the end I would like to see an end to militarisation in Secondlife. I think I am going to start a petition. In reality, I think I will just end up leaving, which is sad - I thought it had so much potential and tried to sell the idea to so many other visual artists and academics.

Maybe, I should just try and start my own simulation for non-violent artists.

This is a great picture of Michael and I. We both look really happy, especially Michael. Apparently, it was a happy birthday for everyone.

The birthday party went really well. A lot of people came by and people managed to mingle and all get along.

On another note, Sara's friend Bob gave us this picture when we were in San Diego.



He told me that he wanted it to go around the world. So I am trying to fulfill his wish and bought zigzagman.com

There is a large size version of the picture for printing there. I will add other sizes soon.

This is the coolest extinct thing ever. It is called a teleharmonium.

In 1897, Thaddeus Cahill, lawyer, engineer, entrepreneur, received a patent titled 'Art of and Apparatus for Generating and Distributing Music Electronically'. His plan was to broadcast music via telephone lines to restaurants, hotels, and private homes. The sounds were to be heard through loudspeakers that he had designed to be attached to telephone receivers.

Cahill attracted investors, formed a company, built the Telharmonium, and, in 1906, moved it to Telharmonic Hall at 39th Street and Broadway, New York City. Technical problems caused the business to collapse in 1908. Revived briefly, the project terminated in 1914.



Check it more info:

Well,
I was first introduced to Simon Harak through Holly from (e:strip). She had him come to UB to speak last year at the onset of the war. It was starnge that he was a Jesuit Priest talking about peace at UB and staying at Canisius. I asked him why he did not talk at Canisius - in fact a Jesuit School. And he said not everyone was as concerned about these issues as him.

That really made me question a lot about the Jesuit institution at large. It had a huge influence on me not applying for the long-term job there.

The reason I am writing about this is I was searching for some more information about him and I found a his essay entitled, "The Siege of Iraq"

Note: It was written in 2000 and its only gotten worse since then.

If you want more information of the seige of Iraq please check out the voice in the wilderness website here