Not really. But my Second Life name is AmandaD Foodiboo. I figured if I was going to download Second Life (which I was avoiding) I might as well pick a ridiculous last name. I downloaded SL tonight and did some skeptical exploring. I explored my classmate’s island and the ASTD island. Both were informative but I was still wondering how the heck SL could be used for learning.
I went to the SL website and here I found something that totally blew my mind. I was reading the Offical Second Life Blog and a post about the White House’s Deputy CTO, Beth Noveck, and the mixed-reality event she did yesterday. It sounds totally crazy, but in a sort of good crazy way. Here’s an excerpt from the blog:
“Beth presented in a physical conference room in New York with roughly 50 people in the audience. Meanwhile, over 100 people congregated at the MacArthur Island conference amphitheater in Second Life—waving hands and sending hellos via text—as everyone found a seat and settled in for the discussion. After Beth was introduced, she began her 30 minute discussion on ways that we can use emerging technologies and social media to help our government institutions make better decisions and solve problems more effectively.”
Can you imagine what that must have been like? Gosh, what will they think of next? I can’t wait to see the video and to see how it all played out. I’m also interested in the topic of the event, her new book, “WIKI GOVERNMENT: How Technology Can Make Government Better, Democracy Stronger, and Citizens More Powerful.” So, I think SL is cool, a little too advanced for me, but cool.