Burn 2, formerly Burning Life, is now gearing-up for action, having just had its Community Day on August 5th.
Scheduled for the week of October 1st through 9th, this year’s event is themed as “Rites of Passage”, defined as “There are moments of crisis and frisson in our lives which inform us that we’ve somehow crossed an inner threshold and are changed. Thus moving from one state of being into an unknown other obliges us to face our innermost insecurities, and it requires faith, a willingness to leap off the ladder of ordered existence. Our theme this year invites participants to join with others in creating rites of passage.”
Burn 2 – originally Burning Life – commenced in 2003 as an in-world extension / interpretation of the annual Burning Man event, dedicated to “community, art, self-expression, and self-reliance”, and held each year in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada.
Until 2010, the event was sponsored by Linden Lab, which also spawned a series of “afterburn” events that would be held throughout the year, including the 2004 Winter Expo and the 2010 Spring Fling.
This year, Burn 2 will, as a non-Linden sponsored event, be centred on two sims, Burning Man – Deep Hole and Burning Man – Silver Seed (SLurls), and the organisers are currently calling for help in a number of areas:
For volunteers to help with the running of the event
This coming weekend will see SLCC 2011 takes place in Oakland, California. The event starts on Friday morning, and continues through to Sunday evening, and will feature in-world events as well and the actual conference event itself.
Keynote speakers for the event are:
Rik Panganiban – “We Built This City: Creating a Better World” 08:00 Saturday 13th
Rod Humble – “The Future of Second Life” 13:00 Saturday 13th
Sunday Linden Keynote panel: John Laurence (SL: Durian Linden), Senior Director, Consumer Product; Jeff Vogt (SL: Vogt Linden), Senior Director, Business Product; Sarah Kuehnle (SL: Esbee Linden), Senior Producer at Linden Lab responsible for Viewer optimisation; and Michael Gesner (SL: Gez Linden), Executive Producer, Consumer Product responsible for in-world experiences; moderator: Peter Gray (SL: Peter Linden), PR Manager at Linden Lab.
Keynote events will be interspersed with other events and breakouts, including features on Mesh and a look at the fascinating From Kansas to Cairo Project which is also the subject of an entry in this month’s Month of Machinima. There will also be screenings of the films, Deep Down‑A Story From the Heart of Coal Country and My Avatar & Me. As I reported recently, an in-world experience associated with Deep Down is currently nominated for an Emmy award. The full conference schedule details all that is on offer – all times SLT / PST, obviously.
For those unable to attend, events will be streamed (via ustream) both in-world (Slurl) and to the SLCC website, as Dirk McKeenan reports:
Coming via Pete Linden is news of an competition being run on behalf of Duran Duran to further celebrate their presence in Second Life.
Entitled “Your avatar at the DDU” (Duran Duran Universe), the competition will see the winner’s own photo signed by the group.
The competition was announced via a notecard which reads:
“Your avatar in the DDU” contest!
Get creative and take a nice, cool, crazy or whatever mood you are in snapshot of your avatar in your favourite location in the DDU. The winner will get his/her avatar photo signed by the band.
Simply add your entry (one per person only) from August 8th 2011 until August 22nd 2011 to our flickr group: http://www.flickr.com/groups/youravatarintheddu/ . People can vote your picture as their favourite until September 5th 2011. The 10 pictures with the highest count of favourite votes will be forwarded to the band to choose the winner. So head out right away and keep your cameras klicking. Good luck!
Nick, Simon, John, Roger
The DDU is location on the Khanada region (Surl). So, if you’re a Duran Duran fan – teleport in and try your luck!
This weekend, from Friday 29th through 31st July, the Duché de Coeur’s Academies Royal de Musique and Peinture will be holding their second annual music and arts festival in Second Life.
The festival will feature more than 20 artists during the course of the weekend, performing in a number of venues that showcase the Duchy’s beautiful sims. Artists attending the event include:
Champagne Rain
Waltkeys Faith
Miles Eleventhauer
SaraMarie Philly
Yuki Hutchinson
Tip Corbett
Miriam Forsythe
Trowser Boa
As well as music, the festival will feature dance and act as a preview of the Academies’ upcoming season of events (commencing September 17th), including the grand opening of the Duche de Coeur’s own art gallery, featuring the works of some of SL’s most talented artists.
Travel between the venues can be facilitated via the Surls above, or if you prefer to travel in keeping with the theme of the Duchy, using the available horse-drawn carriages, which also include options for touring select resident homes during the festival and traveling to merchant locations offering freebies.
About Duché de Coeur
Duché de Coeur is a fictitious area of France that comprises the real life regions of Provence, Languedoc, Aquitaine, and Poitou, Normandie, Touraine, and Franche-Comté. It is an accurate depiction of a world of friendship and romance as it might have been around the Age of Enlightenment of some 225 years ago, in an idealistic world where all classes live together in harmony. Further information on Duché de Coeur can be obtained from Bedrich Panacek or SkyeRyder Varriale.
Virtual Ability, the first winner of the Linden Prize in 2009, will be holding the International Disability Rights Affirmation Conference in Second Life this weekend (July 23-24th). The aim of the international conference is to “begin to explore legal protections around the world for persons with disabilities.”
Panels will discuss local legislation that supports the rights of persons with disabilities, with panelists attending from Australia, Belgium, Costa Rica, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, the US and the UK, and include:
Scott Gill, Executive Director of Access 2 independence, a Center for Independent Living in Iowa, US, who will be discussing the independence movement
Simon Walsh, from the UK; who will be comparing the US ADA legislation with the UK’s DDA
Sister Abeyante a Salvatorian Sister, who will be discussing advocacy for disability (civil and human) rights
Roberta Walker Kilkenny, a college instructor; who will be making a presentation on significance of the UN Convention.
Other organisations attending the event include: the National Service Inclusion Project and the Job Accommodation Network.
Commenting on the conference, Alice Krueger, president of Virtual Ability, Inc., stated: “It is a great pleasure to host so many wonderful speakers. Our audience will gain information about the extent of the issues facing people with disabilities, and the potentials for solutions to barriers.”
This weekend will see the “main event” for this year’s Relay For Life activities in Second Life, around which events have been running since March 12th.
Relay For Life is the signature event of the American Cancer Society, and has been active and growing in Second Life for 7 years. The very first Relay For Life in Second Life (RFL SL), held in 2005 raised almost $5,000 USD for the American Cancer Society, and was attended by a few hundred avatars. In 2010, over $220,000 was raised across the Grid. Events held this year have so far raised of $300,000, bring the total raised over the last 7 years to over $1 million even before the official weekend of festivities kicks-off – a staggering and impressive figure. The event this year is themed on “Seasons of Hope”.
This weekend will see the opening of the official Relay For Life sims, which are packed with information and will play host to a world of events and activities designed to be fun, and to give us all a further opportunity to support the work of the American Cancer Society.
The Events and Activities
RFL SL Welcome Centre
The weekend kicks-off at 10:00 SLT on Saturday 16th July with an opening ceremony, which will be followed at 11:00 by the Celebrate survivors / care-givers honour walk along the RFL SL track – and everyone is invited the line the track and celebrate with these remarkable people.
At 21:00 SLT will be the Luminara Ceremony – a solumn reflection with readings and inspirational music; sims are darkened for in remembrance of those and their loved ones who have lost their battles to cancer or are still battling it. Again, all are invited to participate and asked to walk the RFL SL track in silence.
Sunday the 17th will see the Fight Back event starting at 06:00 SLT. Pick up your specially made RFL HOPE Cape and Fight Back Flags – available at the Relay Stations, and join in and make a fight back pledge to save a life this year; your own, a friends, a family member, or someone you don’t even know yet.
Finally, at 10:00 SLT will see the closing ceremony and tribute to all this year’s RFL SL has achieved.
The welcome centre comprises a circular area and flags from the nations of the world, together with a range of information boards that provide more background on RFL, the weekend and the track itself. It operated on a one-way basis, with the direction you should take to work your way around the boards clearly marked. Make sure you pick up the goodies on offer – the RFL guide, pedometer, etc.
Welcome centre information boards
The track itself (reached via a teleport point at the welcome centre), runs through some 34 sims (not including all of the events sims mentioned above), divided into the four seasons: spring, summer, autumn (/fall) and winter. It is here that people can cheer on the participants in the Celebrate walk, and join in the Luminara Ceremony and Fight Back walk. As well as the major events, there will also be themed walks around the track, offering people the opportunity to join in activities in fancy dress, etc.
There are a few simple rules associated with the track: it is a one-way circuit, and slower walkers should keep to the right, please move off the route if you stop to chat or go afk, don’t bring pets that can wander randomly, etc. A full set of the rules is available at the welcome centre.
Looking down the track
The route is lined with donation boxes (this is about raising money, remember!), as features displays and builds put together by the teams participating in this year’s event, which you can explore as you go. With so many sims, region crossings might be an issue, especially if things get busy (to say nothing of the risk of individual sims being down unexpectedly. This has been catered for as far as possible by sim boundaries being clearly marked on the track itself, each of which has a traffic light indicator for the sim ahead: red indicates the sim ahead if either full (avatar-wise) or offline; amber indicates it is subject to heavy use and extreme lag; green indicates all should be OK. However, even if the light for the sim ahead is green, if you can see a lot of folk on one of the walks, you should still approach each boundary with caution to minimise rubber-banding.
The RFL Youthful sim, just off the main track, will be featuring events for younger members of Second Life, including:
Saturday 16th:
10.00-12.00 SLT: Opening and kick-off party
12.00-13.00 SLT: Morgan Canare
13:00-14:00 SLT: Tallyesin Resident
15:00-17:00 SLT: Doctor Who themed party
17:00-18:00 SLT: JennaSue Crosby
20:00-21:00 SLT: LoneWolf55 Genesis
21:00-22:00 SLT: Halloween Costume Hour
23:00-01:00 SLT: Winter Formal Dance
Sunday 17th:
08:00-09:00 SLT: Brett Hansome
10:00-11:00 SLT: Closing Ceremonies
Note that further youth events may also take place.
A famous NYC landmark on the NYHealthscape-sponsored sim
All-in-all, RFL SL offers a magnificent range of displays, activities and events, all in the name of a very worthy and international cause: the fight against cancer. With so much to see and do, I very much hope that all of us can find time to walk the track, enjoy what is on offer and give whatever we can – and don’t forget to visit the event website.
Burn 2, formerly Burning Life, is now gearing-up for action, having just had its Community Day on August 5th.
Coming via Pete Linden is news of an competition being run on behalf of Duran Duran to further celebrate their presence in Second Life.
This weekend will see the “main event” for this year’s Relay For Life activities in Second Life, around which events have been running since March 12th.
