Timeless Prototype, a long time and very influential member of Second Life and I met in Real Life today and had, as you would expect, a very interesting discussion around Second Life and around metaverse concepts.
We were both already aware of one anothers standing in the community and various contributions. Timeless is the creator both of the London Eye I blogged about recently and the famous Multi Gadget.

I will not expose any Real Life details as that’s for Timeless to choose to do.
However, we certainly are on the same wavelength, and are both totally committed to the future that we can see, feel and already experience with these metaverse concepts.
As with the ‘business’ exchanges with various key influencers in Second Life we all seem to be very experienced people, who have mentally qualified this direction as extremely significant.
Significant enough to invest our own time and money, and convince people around us to join the cause. Those of you who look up our Second Life eightbar group will notice the membership topping the hundred mark. All individuals around the world, who all have the same employer.
I came back home from our meeting, even more inspired to find that my wife was sitting reading the Saturday Times and a 2 page spread on Second Life. Also mentioned on game tommorrow my Andy Piper
Anyway, thankyou Timeless, and I hope we get to work together somewhere and ride this incredible wave.

I have recently been trying to consider, in order to explain, why there is such an effective and instant bond created when people collaborate in Second Life. Giff Constable from electric sheep
explains a particular interaction within a team and also adds “The one thing you hear over and over about Second Life is how it triggers some sort of psychological reaction in the brain that makes you feel like you are WITH somebody else, even though in reality they are thousands of miles away in front of a computer screen.”
I have a few theories. One is that currently the people who are using SL are the people who know how to communicate in this sort of way, the sense of ownership and investment being a self fulfilling virtuous circle. Which could equate to believing our own hype.
The other is that we have evolved to become more literate in electronic communication, and up to now we have been restricted by the interface. Having the experience that we all tend to have had up to now SL is such a breathe of fresh air that it opens up some things that have been squashed for so long by emails and documents. Like suddenly moving from B&W silent movies to colour surround sound and a plot we can influence.
A few of us have said also how it is changing how we look at real life, I certainly look at the architecture buildings in a new way. An adrenalin charged game entertains, enthrawls and then you need a rest. Metaverse interaction in Second Life is a continuing flow of ideas, chance meetings, humour filled interludes, discovery of other things as well as a design and tech geek environment. I can be talking cross corporation collaboration one minute and writing some code the next. This makes it more fulfilling, without a context break of changing systems, travelling to meetings, dealing with bureacracy etc.
This is not to say it is better than real life but it does allow for a more flowing approach to operating in multiple threads and modes. When you know the other people in the environment are there for the same sort of reasons you are then immediately more on one another wavelengths.

“Hugo Dalgleish” a fellow eightbar member in SL pinged to to say I should come and see his Amazon interface in Second Life. Spookily there were also some posts on New World Notes, and on the Amazon Web services blog about similar ideas.
we could be on the edge of a very exciting development.
Updated: with this bigger article on Hugo and his SL partners work at

I came back from holiday in France the other day so had missed some of the initial coverage of this build such as over at 3dpoint.com. It did not take me long to hit Second Life and see how things were progressing. Hursley Island has grown, lots of builds and lots of people. I did, as per usual though, start to explore the wider world though.
The most impressive, awe inspiring and also touching, is the very large build by many of Second Life’s leading lights for the American cancer society Second Life relay for Life 2006.
I did the entire walk, though only once so far. I bumped into many of the famous Second Lifers, Spin Martin whom I always bump into!, Cubey Terra and Timeless Prototype to name but a few.
Timeless had an excellant build for the UK/London, having been on the real London eye a few weeks ago this made it even more personal for me. Personal experience being the cornerstone of social computing.

Cubey Terra was helping people base jump from the eiffel tower

The whole build has lots of interesting architectural points, experiences and generally has a more Epcot than Epcot feel to it.
My photo blog for the walk can be found here with the slurls to the individual element, but get a pedometer and talk the walk, donate as you see fit.

UPDATE : As Eric Rice has reported the relay raised $31,520.76 USD