4 changes I’d make to Second Life October 14, 2007
Posted by mwj as environment, games, media, second life, technology, virtual worlds, web2.0, web3.0, world of warcraft. 5 comments.I’ve been out of the blogosphere for far too long, so I’m just going to jump into it and not make any apologies. I’ve been spending more and more of my time on Second Life lately, at the University Project that Sun has set up for the Masters of Digital Media.
Second Life is a great big open playground, where you can build a lot of different things and add scripts that make them do a lot of different things. Anything that citizens make in Second Life belongs to them, and they can resell their items at any price using Linden dollars which can be exchanged for real money. But you know all that already.
What I’m interested is where Second Life falls short in its claim to be heralding in a new paradigm for cyberspace. In particular, there are at least four areas that need significant work before virtual worlds like Second Life can be part of Web 3.0.
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Mastering digital media March 16, 2007
Posted by mwj as education, games, journalism, media, second life, technology, web2.0, world of warcraft. 2 comments.My Dad told me that a recent article I wrote for the TWU school paper, Mars’ Hill, went a long way in explaining why I’m pursuing the career path that I am. For those who want to know, I’ve republished the article below.
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The kingdom of Norrath has a GDP roughly equivalent to Namibia. In 2002 the average citizen made about $3.42 an hour. This is an impressive figure, considering Norrath has been in a constant state of civil war since its genesis in 1999. What makes this figure even more impressive is the fact that Norrath is a virtual kingdom, inhabited by players of the online game EverQuest.
These days, inhabitants of online worlds can earn much more. Second Life, which is more of a virtual world than a game, encourages players to buy and sell virtual goods for real money. Some citizens rake in over $50 000 a year. Of course, some are logging 70+ hours a week, as in the case of Veronica Browne of Simone! Design, a virtual fashion company. Despite the long hours, she makes over $17 an hour, well above the retail average. Even the more fantastical games like World of Warcraft, with over seven million players, have well-established economies where it is possible to make a significant income over and above the monthly cost of play.
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Nick Gisburne and YouTube: a new context for an old debate February 14, 2007
Posted by mwj as journalism, media, philosophy, politics, technology, web2.0, youtube. 3 comments.
This is a YouTube piece that excerpted from the article below. Unfortunately, I had to record it with a stone age camera, but I got the audio with my iBook speakers, so its fine. (Link)
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The debate over religion and free speech has erupted on YouTube. Nick Gisburne, an atheist on YouTube, recently published a video entitled “Islamic Teachings: Cruelty From The Qur’an.” This video was taken down by YouTube staff, at first citing its “inappropriate nature,” and both of Gisburne’s YouTube accounts were subsequently made unavailable to the public and permanently disabled. Until other users started to publish Nick’s work on their own account, it was impossible to find any of Nick’s videos, either his attacks on Christianity and Islam, or his videos speaking in defence of himself.
I have a huge interest in this debate, and believe it is an opportunity to examine the implications of “new media” for the old discussion over the tension between religious freedom and the freedom of speech. It also shows us a darker side of Web 2.0: in a world where “social networking” is the new mechanism for determining what content we do and do not see, there is the major danger of the whole enterprise devolving into “gang warfare,” as one YouTube member has so aptly put it.
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GooTube’s got company December 22, 2006
Posted by mwj as art, business, media, politics, technology. 2 comments.
Something new in the blagosphere? Lulu.tv and Lulu.com are offering free, on-demand video and book publishing, and the author keeps 80% of the profits. For any print publishing, this is based off of the number of sales (which, I assume, are made one at a time - how much quality they sacrifice for cheap one-off printing costs I don’t know). For the videos, they promise 80% of the ad revenue generated by video views goes to the person who uploaded it. I don’t know what sort of algorithm they’ve got rigged up for that one, but with a little bit cleaner and tighter presentation on their .tv site, I think they could give the new big kid on the block a run for their video advertising dollars.
Bring it home, boys, bring it home October 25, 2006
Posted by mwj as art, design, journalism, media, news, twu, writing. 1 comment so far. 
GooTube October 16, 2006
Posted by mwj as business, media, technology. add a comment.Google bought YouTube for $1.65 billion. That’s one thousand, six-hundred and fifty million dollars.
Chad and Steve