In this article Wagner James Au writes about some of the pressures and expectations that everyone is expected to be American in Second Life. I personally have not found it to be a barrier, though I have been happy to express the fact I am a brit. Indeed there are many groups such as Brits in SL who are clearly not just US based. Our eightbar group in SL by its very nature crosses many cultures as the interest in Second Life spans further than us in Hursley and across IBM.
I have also found that in general people are quite chilled out and polite about things. SL is more of a leveller in terms of culture. Though given it is a ‘english’ focussed language based medium I am sure its NLS support will grow. Who knows we may even be able to learn a bit more about one another’s cultures through this medium more than any other?
hey guys – xmlhttprequest for second life. you probably already know about this
http://www.hackdiary.com/archives/000085.html
Yes, thanks, we have been wiating for it. It still has some limitations, but is a very nice extra.
I have altered my RSS weather feeder to be triggered by in world httprequest but still use XMLRPC to pump it to the multiple weather objects I have aroudn the world.
I have got some httprequest response going too, it is limited to 2k response, but the xmlrpc is only 255 bytes so its much better.
Also, obviously, the httprequest/response does not mean you have to expose the uuid of the object to get the external stuff to talk to things.
I have llhttprequest to PHP to RSS news feed and back again. A lot quicker that teh XMPRPC which had a 10-15 second lag.
The calls are throttled per server or parcel to stop swamping the while ting, but it is still very useful.
If only my external PHP provider had database support (it does but it will cost me even more money)
The example you have shown has got lots of people excited, but it does rely on owning the land/server that the media screen is on.
All my examples are generic devices that can get information (text) from the outside world and do something with it.
Bring on the gecko browser in textures
If anything, we’re under pressure to become more like British socialists, not under pressure to “become American”. An “Asian Values” encouraging conformity to the collective also have a good run in SL, and many of the most vigorous proponents aren’t even Asian.
The technological elite on the forums loathe land barons, hate tacky American things like Tringo games and yardsales, hate what they view as suburban ticky-tacky developments, despise those who are aggressive salesmen or politically outspoken individuals from any other form of politics other than socialism (even liberalism), and detest commerce in general (unless it’s something ratified as cool, like Victorian steampunk). There is indeed a culture clash in SL, but it’s not at all what you imagine, it’s in the other direction.
I guess it depends which elite think they are the most elite 🙂
I did have an unusual culture clash with some US SLers who thought my england flag, the st george cross was a medical red cross flag.
Once we get translation sorted out and its truly multilingual I am sure all forms of other elite groups will rise up.
We often have the battle of full inclusiveness versus the identity of a group as something special. SL and alike all offer ways to be both elitist and inclusive.
I like you point the culture clash may be the other direction 🙂
A very good post.