Cartoon of the Day

Brother and Sister Team Up in Second Life to Support Relay for Life

By Nazz Lane
 

While working on a story, I’d been introduced to Renfew Sperber who along with her brother msw Tomorrow own the Callidora SIM in Second Life. As we chatted about the upcoming event, she told me of her brother’s struggle with cancer and of their efforts on behalf of the “Relay for Life” activities in Second Life and of their ongoing fundraising activities for the American Cancer Society. I found their story compelling and had hoped to meet with both for a conversation. We exchanged e-mails and in-world IM’s to set up a date and time for the three of us to meet. It was unfortunate that msw was unable to join us as his real life job interceded, but he agreed that Ren could speak for him since she was integral to the efforts at Callidora.

Nazz: What was it that brought you into Second Life?

Renfew: Initially I came in to research the viability of the second life platform for my real life work. I was challenged by our engineers to come up with a way to provide more worldwide communication and peer-to-peer collaboration opportunities to them. We are dispersed ... seven countries. So this was a big challenge. I bought a copy of Wired to read on the plane trip back from France and stumbled on an article about IBM and what they were doing in second life at that time (2007). Light bulbs started going off in my head and after a couple of months I built up the courage to come in to research a bit more.

Nazz: Does your company still use second life?

Renfew: My company never bought into the idea … a little too new and untested, although they did seriously consider my proposal. It is really following this initial testing of the waters that the story of our lives, mine and my brother’s … and our evolution in second life begins.

Nazz: When you started, had msw already been diagnosed with cancer?

Renfew: Yes, he had been diagnosed with colon cancer in January 2007. In fact, he spent his birthday that year in the hospital room after having had this diagnosis and three feet of his colon removed. He was in chemo at the time that I found out about second life and came in. I needed a partner in crime, and could not think of a person more likely to support this and see the potential of the technology and least likely to laugh me out of the room. I told him about it and the next day he had an avatar and was here. He has been amazing and inspiring.

Nazz: Is that when you both became involved with Relay for Life?

Renfew: Yes, we had purchased the islands and developed them to create a test site for the work project. During that same time msw joined the survivors group in second life. It was amazing for him. He had not responded well to his chemo and was very sick. In real life there was not a local survivors group within easy commute distance, so the second life survivors group became a lifeline for him. In the group he met many people and through them he became involved in Relay for Life. Also I need to mention Dolcebella Zabaleta. Dolce is msw's real life wife. She also came in and comes to most of the concerts. So this is real family thing. She has been incredibly supportive of him, me, and this entire journey. Ishtar Roux has been our team captain for the past two relays. After the work project fell through we seriously had to reconsider what we wanted to do with the island(s) and our second life journey. We decided to use the islands for hosting benefit concerts to raise money for RFL. This started in early 2008. After the relay ended, we decided that we wanted to continue to raise money year-round for the American Cancer Society. msw contacted them and made arrangements for special kiosks to be made to allow us to make direct donations year-round. We launched these benefits October 2008 to supplement the RFL season.

Nazz: How many islands do you own?

Renfew: We have just the two, Callidora and Kleio.

Nazz: Callidora is for events?

Renfew: Callidora Beach is the home to our benefit concerts. We have had the great gift to be able to work with some amazing talent and this just would not have happened without them. From October 2008 to July 2009 we raised just a little under $6,200 USD for the ACS.

Nazz: With the end of RLF, will you be doing same this year?

Renfew: We plan to kick off in October again. Finalizing the schedule now, but typically we've run the events the third Saturday of every month. We will continue through July 2010 and the take August and September off as we did this year. Our goal is to break $8,000 USD this year.

Nazz: How is msw doing, he’s still in remission I hope?

Renfew: msw is doing great. He is still in remission and we are incredibly thankful and humbled by this. I wish he was here to tell you about his experiences as a survivor in second life. A number of months ago the survivor group pulled together a number of survivors and had them share their stories with the rest of the survivor groups. msw participated and told his story, along with a number of others. I was totally blown away … sitting on this side of the screen, just listening and watching the chat, truly left me without breath. The power of the ways that second life can provide community and support to individuals that are in such situations was very clear and incredibly moving.

Nazz: It sounds like an incredible journey for you both.

Renfew: He is my only brother and we are very close. I was there with him and his family after the surgery ... to be able to have him here is an amazing gift. We live in different parts of the US and second life was a way to keep very close during this time in his life. We joked that we talked more in a single week after second life than we had in a month before that. Put on the headsets and there you go! It has been so very wonderful, being able to share all of this with him. And look at what he created … this beautiful … beautiful place. An architect in real life, this was a way for him to really exercise his imagination and became a healing place for him. I wish I could find the words, you know, to really articulate all of this … there is a great deal of emotion involved.

Nazz: Any closing thoughts or comments you'd like to share with my readers?

Renfew: I think that the one thing that comes to mind is that the journey in second life is not always the one you think it will be. Serendipity steps in and the process you, the vision you have, the work you do evolves. msw and I talk about this a great deal. We found things here, and in ourselves through being here, that we could not have possibility imagined. Being open to possibility and embracing it is a big part of the second life experience.

Nazz Lane

* * * * *

Dana Vanmoer mentioned this article to me in a conversation online yesterday, from when this article was reprinted on Friday September 7 2017. The Second Life Newspaper would fold less than a year later, and Nazz Lane would leave virtual journalism to concentrate on writing fiction. But the Relay for Life in Second Life would go on, to continue to strive for the day a cure is found for all cancers. - Bixyl Shuftan

“We Gotta Say Goodbye, For the Summer” - Bahama Beach Club Closes

 
By Bixyl Shuftan


At 6 PM Saturday August 22nd, the Bahama Beach Club at the Goldrush sim held it’s final event. Club owner Rory Langdon was the DJ that night, playing classic rock for a “Back to the ‘60s” beack party, with some guests and staff in their swimming trunks and bikinis. Instead of in the club, the party was held on the beach sands.

Rory Langdon, or Joe Ward in real life, has been playing music for over 30 years, with experience as both a DJ and club manager. Experience he brought with him to Second Life, both DJing and club managing here. In March 2009, he decided to start up a club of his own, buying up some land that already had a nightclub there, “Club 9:30.” As it turned out, there really was a Club 9:30 in real life. So he kept the building for a while, setting up a small beach club next to it, poles holding up a thatched roof, with a danceball overhead with a particle streamer sending down a light show at times, with a picture of a blue parrot behind the DJ stand, which became known as “Flip the bird.”

With his partner Marai McMahon helping to manage things, Rory had planned to run both clubs with events in both every week. But problems in real life cut down on his time in the metaverse, and the prim content limit limited what he could do with both clubs. So they decided to take down the nightclub building, building a a bigger beach club. They also put a little more detail in the beach. adding rocks, a waterfall, palm trees and hammocks, a secret cuddle spot, and more. Some people dropped over between parties just to see the beach scenery and relax. The new bigger club was renamed the Bahama Beach Club, though sometimes simply called the “BBC” as a pun on the famous media company.

Besides himself, Rory had other music-makers performing. Bosco sang at the club for a time. Later on came DJ’s SonicBlu and Boo Gearhead. And throughout the club’s history, there was ScratchMusikatt the “Chaos DJ,” playing for the late at night while he also performed in real life.

The club and it’s grounds took up a quarter sim, but prim limits limited what Rory, Marai, and the staff could do. There was talk about buying up a half sim, or maybe a full sim in the future for things like a staff residence home. Then his old friend and former neighbor Foxyfurman Kumaki who runs the Foxworth sim offered a deal. Rory and Marai now have a section of the sim there for a club, which will be opened sometime in the near future. This time, it will be a nightclub to go along with Foxy’s casino next to the place. The land on Goldrush will be sold.

So, the Bahama Beach Club comes to a close, at least for now. It’s likely it will come back in some form, but the place at Goldrush will be missed.

As the final party came to a close, virtual champagne was passed around, and toasts were made.

“To this place being good to us, memories made here.”

“To memories old and new, to friends who shall never be forgotten.”


*  *  *  *  *

Addition (2015): In the Summer of 2008, I came across and made friends with the people of Woodlin, eventually joining the community in October. But over a period of weeks from January to March 2009, the place fell apart due to drama, the majority of us heading over to Foxworth, owned by Foxyfurman Kunami. But while Woodlin had it's own clubs, Foxworth didn't have one. It's entertainment was an open-air gaming hall with machines of Foxy's construction. Enter Rory Langdon, whom was one of Woodlin's DJs, and was the manager of it's short-lived "Margaritavile." Wanting to stay in the club business, he got some land in a sim separate from Foxworth that already had one, and went to work with help from Foxworth's residents. More of the club's history could be seen in this article of the place, that was published in August 23 2009, the day after its closing party.

  Rory never did open his nightclub. Events in real life intervened, and he was forced to take a hiatus from Second Life. While he was able to make occasional reappearances, he never could stick around for very long. Some months later in March 2010, Foxworth itself had to close down. Marai and a few others were able to relocate to a place they called Glen Meadows, but there was no room for me. But there was another group of friends I had with their own estate: The Sunweavers. ScratchMusikatt did end up meeting a special friend at the BBC, and their friendship continues to this day, as does his DJing.

Bixyl Shuftan

 

Space Frontier Saturn V Moon Rocket Ride

By Bixyl Shuftan

It was about forty years ago last week that Apollo 11 went to the moon, mankind landing on an alien surface for the first time in history. Many of us in Second Life know of space areas, such as the International Space Museum, but can one find a place where the moon landing is re-enacted?

The answer: Yes, but it’s not quite finished.

In the Space Frontier Workspace (formerly known as the Space Frontier Sandbox) near the Sci-Lands, there is a Saturn V rocket on a launch tower. Built to scale (two avatars at it’s base in the picture can just barely be seen), the rocket stands high in the air, connected to the red launch tower. The rocket is very realistically detailed, and includes a “sound HUD” for audio from the Apollo 11 mission (does not always work) which one gets by clicking an old-fashioned computer on the launchpad’s corner. This grand build was made by Wicked Quasimodo.

One enters the rocket by clicking on the command module, almost at the top of the Saturn V. The huge vehicle launches at 32 minutes past the hour, every hour, with the tower’s gantry retracting just a few minutes before. If you’re outside, it’s a spectacular sight as the great behemoth launches into the air. If you’re inside the rocket, you’re in for quite a ride.

I had the fortune of speaking to one of the people responsible for the sim, Rocket Sellers. “I was just mitigating some space debris here,” he told me, “impromptu erotic photo studio in the sky. ... I’m the owner of record here, and there’s a crew with cleaning powers. I try to clean politely so they do not reincarnate as pesky griefers.”

Asking about the Moon rocket, “It’s still a work in progress. This is Version Two. Wicked Quasimodo had an earlier build, but Havoc 4 broke it. This one is lower prim, and the lunar module is sculpty. It really should be on NASA property, but there’s no NASA region that will adopt it. He first tried on the NASA CoLab Testbed, but the sim was just too lagy, and there was just too much junk in the sky. So he began working on it here, with the idea it would find a home at NASA for the Apollo 11 Anniversary. Instead, NASA put some posters around with landmarks to here.”

“The first iteration did the whole flight profile, including splashdown back on Earth. ... The last time I took the trip (on this rocket), we only got to lunar orbit. ... I don’t know if it lands yet or not.” Rocket Sellers then mentioned a famous name dropping in, “Last week, we had an avatar named ‘Buzz Aldrin’ visiting here. I asked him if he had taken the Saturn V Apollo 11 ride to the Moon yet. He answered, ‘Yes, 40 years ago.’ ... I don’t believe it’s really Buzz, although I can’t figure out how he got the name. ... I guess Linden Labs is not assiduous about protecting famous names.”

Rocket Sellers invited me to go along for a ride on the Saturn V, and so we and one other person got aboard the command module. And at 32 past the hour, the rocket roared and thundered up into the air. The ride is best seen with Environment set to Midnight, and being a Second Life spaceship, the stages shake a little as it travels upward. Eventually, the first stage falls away, and then the second. Soon, the ship comes to orbit a megaprim Earth, “It’s very beautiful from up here” “Approaching New Guinea.”

There is a black square under the Moon rocket at this stage. Rocket Sellers explained, “That’s the work platform, and also when you transfer to the Lunar Module, it keeps you from falling through space.” The Command Module does have windows that you can see your avatar from the outside. But looking inside through either mouselook or panning, the inside is quite detailed with numerous instruments and panels.

Eventually, the faring on the last rocket stage separated, and the Lunar Module, folded up, appeared. The Command/Service Module then rotated, and connected to it. Passengers could then right-click to board it. The connected ships then went into Lunar orbit. Unfortunately, the ride did not progress any further. It had yet to be finished.

Despite this and the tiny flaws, this reporter, can only consider it a great and memorable build, especially if one is a space fan, or otherwise nostalgic for these glory days of the manned space program.

The Space Frontier Saturn V Moon Rocket is at Space Frontier (154, 126, 137).

“It’s good when a rocket or space person finds the place.”

Bixyl Shuftan

RFL Walk: The Really Wild West Exhibit

By Bixyl Shuftan

With so many exhibits on the Relay for Life walk, there just isn’t the time and space to write in detail on each of them. But I did get a sneak peak at one, the “Really Wild West” by the Passionate Redheads.

The exhibit was set in the Old West themed area of the Relay for Life Walk in the southwest corner of the RFL Endure sim (the other west sim was RFL Courage just to the east), the road just on the edge of the RFL Advocacy sim to the south. The place looked like it was set in some mountainous desert, with Native American music in the background. Just behind and to the right of the sign over the entrance was the main building, a two-story adobe structure that served partially as a store, offering a number of items for sale for charity. But the place also had some messages of inspiration. Nearby next to the road were some whimsical “Armadillo Crossing” signs, with armadillo nearby.

Paths and bridges helped one up the mountains. One could walk around to the various sights, but there were also teleports to the more notable ones. There was a mine in which one could hop on a cart and ride down the tracks. There was a river rafting ride, in which one could make their way down the twisting mountain waters. There was an Indian Circle, in which one could sit on a blanket, get a drum and a stick, and beat in rhythm.

The completion of the exhibit was announced in a few group chats a couple nights before the Relay for Life Walk officially started. People headed over, gathering at the adobe building, and having a party around the hot tub. When this reporter checked a few days after the Linden lease ended on Tuesday, it was still up.

Most of the work on the exhibit was done by Lomgren Smalls. Of the theme of the exhibit, “We found out we were on the ‘western’ themed sim already,” he explained, “I thought blending in with what was already there was a good idea.” Others had told me Lomgren had spent so much time on the place, he got only a few nights sleep in the days just before it was finished, “If you count actual hours ... I put in around a day, to a day and a half of work. Others did more as well, with the river, the detailing, the plants, etc. If you count real-life time... it was done in... 4-5 days.” Of the various attractions, “We all contributed toward the ideas. Daaneth loved the mine idea. We were all just spouting out ideas quickly.” Lomgren had no idea how many stepped off the track to look around, but he had a good idea what they felt, “Everyone's loved it.” Although pleased to hear it was still up, he felt it wouldn’t me much longer before it would vanish into the blue, “Anything after (Tuesday) is a bonus.” Despite the temporary results, Lomgren was still happy to have built the place, “That Relay is awesome, and more people should try to get involved. And that building it was fun, if exhausting.”

For his work, the Passionate Readheads awarded him, along with Dusk Griswold, the first Annual Fimi Awards, named after the late Artistic Fimicloud.

On July 21, Daaneth Kivioq announced the Passionate Redheads had raised 2,425,968 L, or over $9,300.

Bixyl Shuftan

Addition: This would be the first Relay track camp of the Passionate Redheads team I would see. It was part of a great introduction for me to the Redheads. The team would do other exhibits in the future, but this was among the most detailed and interactive by it. Despite all of Lomgen's work, and that of those helping him such as Alleara Snoodle, he never did win an official Relay award for the build. Sadly, the team would fold in 2013, but many of the members would come together again under a new team: the Sunbeamers.

Cartoon of the Day

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By Bixyl Shuftan
Click to enlarge

 

The Rabbicorn

  
I was in the audience at an event when a friend told me about something in the IBM 3 sim that she told me was must-see, “I don’t usually recommend places, but this ... “ So I decided to check it out.

I teleported over, and found myself in a room that looked like it was surrounded by television static, with a couple pages explaining how to get about. But with no portal to the exhibit, the only way to go was down a road, my vision around me obscured by the visual equivalent of white noise. Eventually, it cleared on the road itself, and I soon noticed a room through the static that was brighter than the rest and had some color. I could also make out some people inside. So I went inside.

And there was Bryn Oh, the artist behind the exhibit in her gray, ghostlike avatar. She was looking at some notes on the floor with someone. The room itself had a dark steampunkish feel to it with a phonograph in one corner and some sparking equipment around. Two others came into the room to congratulate Bryn on her exhibit. After that, Byrn turned to me, and after greetings she explained the area, “This is a story that is told in stages, through poems. It is about the character behind me.” She turned to a bronze mechanical form behind her on a table lit by a spotlight, part rabbit part unicorn, “The Rabbicorn.”

Bryn went on, “This is the first part (of the story) here. In the hand of the creator is a poem.” She told me I could zoom in on the poems, or “you can click on it to see it on screen. It’s easier that way. When you have looked at the scene, there is a teleport to the next one.” The teleports looked like black magnifying glasses with white sparkles around them. “Oh, one more thing, there is a machinima ... on top of a tower, there will be a TV there. Click on it. That tells more of the story.”

And so clicking on the first teleport took me to the first part of the story, the place showing a tinkerer having just built the Rabbicorn, and having to make a decision about the creation. Further teleports lead one further into the story, each place a work of art, and soft music in the background adding to the beautifully surreal atmosphere. At one point, the teleports lead to a climb up a debris-filled tower. Although one could just fly up with a flight feather, it’s better to try to walk and jump your way up as much as you can. It is around here one finds a link to the machinima Bryn mentioned. Watching it isn't necessary for the story, but does help add to it. It is not much longer when one gets to the end and the fate of the Rabbicorn.

Taking a look at Bryn’s blog, the exhibit opened on Friday July 10. She also stated that it was originally planned that no more than 6 avatars would be allowed in the sim at one time, feeling lag would ruin the experience. It was not an easy decision, as she worried some might get the impression that the small numbers meant their fellow residents had little interest in the finer arts in Second Life, “So if I can't limit the sim to 6 or so, and you find yourself in a laggy mass of people then please come at another time when it is empty. It really is meant to be seen this way. It has a mood brought on by the story, ambient sounds and being alone brings out the quiet mood of the story.”

An exhibit that is well worth the time to go see.

“The Rabbicorn” is at IBM 3 (56, 50, 23). To read more about this exhibit and other projects by Bryn Oh, click here for her blog.

Bixyl Shuftan