Real Life Secondlife meetup

This was one of the first time that I’ve been with so many Singaporean Secondlife residents in the flesh. It was interesting to see all those avatars and personalities coming to life.

I received an email from Eng Kiat from Ideafactory about a week ago, inviting me to participate in a real life meeet. Initially I was sceptical about the entire agenda, but I was keen to meet up and see other Secondlifers in real person.

One of the first few persons whom I met was Preetam and Jacky. Both of whom I’ve met previously in Ngee An Polytechnic during an interview, courtesy of Jason, a NUS student whom was doing a thesis.

I also met Alvin, the leader of Secondlife Singapore group. Coincidentally he’s a Jurong person too! We could even meet up in a blink of an eye to eat at the famous Nasi Lemak stall nearby.

Later on, the rest of the attendees came in one by one.

Nicholas explained that the reason for the meet was that Cory Ondrejka, the Chief Technology Officer for Linden Labs will be coming over to Singapore in March. He was interested in setting up an office here in Singapore because of the locale and the diversity of people here – thus the sourcing of talents for developers. Chosen ones will spend about 6 months in San Francisco to learn the ropes.

We spent the evening discussing about the ideas for the next gathering. Preetam suggested a barcamp where we could lead an open discussion, while Ivan suggested having a Singapore Island in Secondlife. Andy cautioned however that should an island be made, it should not just be a 3D interpretation of an environment, but as an outlet for creative flow.

Ideas flowed. Admittedly, I was a little uncomfortable about the angle the discussion was going. Ideas like pushing Secondlife to schools, getting certification, and the entire focus on commercialism just wasn’t appetizing to me. To me, the social and human element is the most important part in a community. However, it was understandable that to actually start gaining interest, there must be some sort of push factor.

I’m interested in the barcamp. It would be good to hear what people thought about Secondlife. I think Maybe I could even host one 🙂

Coincidentally, SMU is organizing an event – I saw that there is a talk on Virtual Worlds and the Metaverse. Sounds promising.

More on the event narrated by Vanessa and Ivan