Comments on: The Transitioning of Second Life: by Katy Duke

By: Katy Duke

Katy Duke — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 21:25:12 +0000

WOW! That was truly an exciting event and incredibly powerful technology – Zev & I met virtually and were able to put our questions to forestry experts in Poznan, fresh from the conference talks in Poland. At OneClimate Island they are holding more ‘live’ sessions every day next week, but if you can’t make it you can watch at 5.30pm GMT here – http://oneclimate.net/poznan
You can also see a great blog from Amanda Chiu here – http://www.worldwatch.org/node/5946

By: Katy Duke

Katy Duke — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 15:29:32 +0000

Oh, and if you want to go to Etopia Island you can get there here;
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Etopia%20Island/193/54/22

By: Katy Duke

Katy Duke — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 15:25:09 +0000

At 5.30 pm today (Saturday) in Second Life the ‘One Climate’ group I’m a member of will be on the air in the main arena on OneClimate Island. The message they sent follows;
Danny Nelson reports of what’s been happening today in these crucial UN negotiations and introduces two guests – giving you the chance to put your comments and ask any questions on tackling climate change. We look forward to seeing you – and please pass the invitation on. You can join us right here: http://slurl.com/secondlife/OneClimate/19/238/22

By: Zev Paiss

Zev Paiss — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 16:32:43 +0000

Great conversations folks! I wanted to add in that the power consumption used to run the Linden Lab server for Etopia Island, has been “offset” by purchasing Carbon Offset credits. We are part of a group called “Green Island Project” where we pay $50 USD per year to offset the power used by the central server through the purchase of renewable energy. It is not perfect, but it is showing our understanding that even the power used in this application needs to be generated in a sustainable manner.

By: Katy Duke

Katy Duke — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 09:03:37 +0000

The ‘roughtype’ forum where the power discussion happened initially seemed to get the calculation of power consumption wrong, and later concluded; ‘The roughly 1,000,000 avatars active now in Second Life – thank god – never are using peak power all at the same time. They all SHARE the energy consumption of the whole Linden Lab data center and a part of their PCs power consumption over the year. And on average they use less than 75kWh per year.’

It’s still a lot but I hope that even when/if our solar/wind/water/CHP-generated electricity is rationed, companies like IBM will switch off their aircon (but not in the server room!) and continue to be able to meet & educate virtually rather than travel, even if we have to give it up as a social networking tool.

I’ve found a couple of local companies providing solar servers but the pv arrays are in California!

By: Greenpa

Greenpa — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 17:33:15 +0000

bare nekkid ascii! I love it! But I think you’re missing a basic point- a little mystery is often sexier; shouldn’t those nekkid ascii be wearing thongs?

Sure, the amount of data is not going to change quick- but; frequently first versions of software are very clunky and slow compared to something refined by a really sharp programmer. Could easily be a way to cut processing considerably just from that standpoint. Maybe? I’m not really familiar, and it’s out of my area. But my brother was part of the team that developed digital cable- and that was “impossible” when they started-

By: George Peattie

George Peattie — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 16:33:01 +0000

I have a suggestion lets strip out all the graphics, take th environment back to bare nekkid ascii. We could have clients capable of threading conversations, call it noosnet or something. If you really need interactive we could keep the real time and go for some kind of chat relayed around the internet
Seriously though, the amount of data needed to represent 3D spaces, especially big well rendered 3D spaces is never going to be a light load on servers or PCs. Keeping us on the treadmill of ever increasing hardware requirements is always going to come at a cost in energy use, not to mention the investment in infrastructure needed to keep the network going if everyone started hanging out in Second life.

By: Greenpa

Greenpa — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 15:51:53 +0000

Wow, that’s a scary amount of energy consumption. I have to agree that it’s a very “sexy” place and process, though. Maybe this is an opportunity to work from within, and find ways for it to suck less?

It’s not going to disappear anyway. Any good Transition hackers looking for something to do on winter evenings?

By: Michael Ryan

Michael Ryan — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 15:20:17 +0000

Our company, Magrathean Technologies @ http://www.magrathean.ca has built in Second Life for several years. Our education division has developed a “distance education” simulator named Sprott Shaw, one of our clients. Their sim was the first one developed in Second Life to accomplish their distance education objective. All of the respective technologies were constructed before “voice” was enabled. This sim was designed to include all forms of communications and was given recognition by the BC Ministry of Education. Second Life is a wonderful system which can facilitate distance education and hopefully, always will be.

By: Steve Atkins

Steve Atkins — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 11:37:44 +0000

Thanks for the info George – thats it, I’m about to delete the Second Life application from my computer and stick to playing scrabble (which i prefer) : )

In terms of education, the internet is an incredibly powerful tool – but the massive power consumption (as you’ve pointed out) is bad, really bad.

A way forwards could be:

1. All websites hosted on 100% renewable energy sources
2. ISP’s (Internet Service Providers) run on 100% renewable energy sources
3. All computers (home & office) run on 100% renewable energy sources

…I think each and every Transition website should be promoting this.

By: George Peattie

George Peattie — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 10:39:03 +0000

It’s not just the local PCs that use a lot of power the servers running the virtual world also pull in a lot of power.

Basically it looks like the virtual you consumes as much power as a Brazilian. A quick google on Second Life and Brazil should dig up the details.

By: Steve Atkins

Steve Atkins — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 08:04:29 +0000

I had a go at Second Life recently, it was a pretty surreal virtual experience, great to see peoples imagination run riot, loved the flying and met friendly strangers.

I’ve not flown to Etopia Island – will check it out some time – sounds great & I’m sure worth promoting Etopia to games people.

One thing that concerned me… running the ‘Second Life’ program was very energy intensive on my computer, generated alot of heat & the cooling fan was running continuously, (on a macbook pro).

By: Zev Paiss

Zev Paiss — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 22:11:33 +0000

Katy – I appreciate your comments on my virtual eco-village. It is interesting that when the Island was created in April of 2007 I knew nothing about the Transition Town movement but as an environmental planner in real life, I believe that providing visions of how we can live in a more sustainable way can be very powerful! Onward…

By: Josef Davies-Coates

Josef Davies-Coates — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 18:00:03 +0000

A comment I posted is in the spam queue because it had a couple of links in it.