I'm not a movie reviewer for a lot of reasons, not least of which the fact that I hate spoilers.  That being said, I saw a very engaging film last night I'd like to share with you. The Nines is a nice little film with a big twist.

A burned out actor under house arrest begins to realize there is more to his life than meets the eye.

An up and coming showrunner fights to get his creation on air intact, all while being recorded for a reality TV show.

A video game designer stranded in the woods with his family has to make the choice of a lifetime.

Three narratives, intertwining in a strange and disturbing web as the story unfolds, and the only way out is to "Look for the Nines".

This is a great movie about AVs, Alts, God, Reality, and it even takes a poke or two at the very unreal world of Hollywood.  No action, no big special effects, no big name actors, just a nice little film that manages to cover some big topics in a way that bigger budget films never have.

Check it out if you have a chance.

There's a meme at the end of this, but first an explanation as to why it may be worth your time...

There's been a lot of back and forth over the last couple days about Immersionism and Augmentation.  Most of it largely unproductive, people shouting at each other, with only the best among them listening and debating.  Much of it seems to be argument about the very meaning of the words, which no one can agree on.  There's probably some gems to be gleaned from both of these series arguments, but I wonder if we're missing the point.

Concrete statments: Actions we will and won't take in-world.  What does trust mean to us?  Open statements about what we want out of SL.  Honesty about what (if any) FL benefit we are looking to take from the world (and "none, other than enjoyment" is a perfectly valid answer). 

These are the things we should be showing others, because they are not debatable, they are what we are.  *Then* we can proceed with the real question: given those beliefs and personal principles, can we build a place/system that lets us live together, and if so, how?  What social structures can be built to allow virtual denizens of varying beliefs to live together?  What kind of rules can both sides abide by without compromising their principes?

Screw definitions...leave that to the ancient Greeks.  Let's state our principles and personal goals, line by line, and start to find common ground.  Because it may be valid to argue drinking Coca Cola is bad for you, but only a dick is going to argue that you don't actually like it.

Here are some rules I live by, and some things I like:



OK...meme time:

If you are so inclined, give me a few rules you live by in SL, and a few things you get out of being here.  Don't talk about your expectations on others, talk about you. I did 9 things, which is a bit much.  Do how ever many you need, no more.  Post links in the comments column.  Pass it on.

Short post today...the last week has been busy, but fulfilling and happy, and has left me a bit tired.



==

What makes us real here, if we don't bring memories and identity with us from our other lives?

The connections we build with others, with the world, and with ourselves.

Nothing more, nothing less.

==

そう僕らはあらゆる全ての場所で繋がっているから
この言葉について考える君とだってもうすでに

sou bokura wa arayuru subete no basyo de tunagatte ru kara
kono kotoba ni tsuite kangaeru kimi to datte mou sudeni

That's right...we are all connected in every place, in every way
Even you, as you think about these words, are connected

[Hamasaki Ayumi - Connected]

==

 I've had one of those intersections of information again, the kind that get you thinking about 3 different things at once that turn out to be the same thing.  Individually they're probably not worth writing about, but together they demand a core dump...

I read Gibson's Spook Country last week.  It was good in a Gibson way, which means it reads like a really really good article from Wired with a bit of action and suspense, and more cool real-world stuff than you can shake a stick at.  I highly recommend reading it with a Wikipedia/Google terminal nearby so you can look up all the references he drops.  I now know more about upper-end hotels in LA and the logistics of shipping containers than I ever needed to.

One of the side stories in the book involves a guy who makes locative art.  It incorporates GPS positioning with wireless technology, and is tied in with the internet.  Put on a GPS enabled set of VR goggles and you can see digital artifacts that people have put in the place you're in overlaid on your real world view.  Neat, huh?  Not much on it's own, but...

Yesterday I received a surprise present, a copy of the Anime Dennou Coil from a First Life source.  I had never heard of this anime before, and just had time to watch the opening credits last night.  It was...intriguing.  Another trip to Wikipedia to see what they had to say about it.  Surprise!  It's about augmented reality - the characters put on special glasses that allow them to see the an informational net overlaid on the real world. I haven't even seen it and I'm hooked already, and things are beginning to intersect.

Now today I read about Google's possible virtual world project tying together Google Earth and Google Sketchup.  Assuming this doesn't turn out to be just a rumor there may be some kind of virtual overlay to the pre-existing Google Earth you can look at through the browser, complete with AVs and buildings.

Now I have to confess I don't have very high hopes for this mythical Google project as a place for digital people.  I doubt they are going to have a monetary system, or beautiful and nuanced AVs, or any of the depth that Second Life has.  It will probably be a "tool" for the most part, and I doubt it will pass the Bury Test* for virtual worlds.

( *Bury Test - A virtual world has no chance of being satisfactory for me unless it has:

1. Cybernetic Eyes
2. Bondage Furniture )

But still, the intersections get you thinking.  Wouldn't it be cool for an atomic world person to sit down in a cafe in the atomic world, don a pair of GPS-enabled goggles (googles?), and lo and behold there I am, cybernetic eyes and all, sitting across from you at the table.  We could even hold a conversation through some global IM system.  Whether or not I would be able to see you from my virtual version of Earth depends on imaging technology in place, but I suspect by the time the technology is in place every public space in the USA is going to be blanketed with surveillance cameras anyway, so why not use them? (I say this only half-sarcastically.  The other half is scared to death of the idea.)

Of course, even if Digital People were able to use Sketchup to construct virtual buildings to live in in this new world, wouldn't people complain when, say the digital highrise I build blocks your view of the Eiffel Tower when you put your googles on?  Will constructing virtual buildings on top of atomic ones be forbidden by law? We may gravitate towards the empty places of the world to build our homes in the virtual overlay to avoid offending the atomic worlders.

If your atomic-world cruise ship sails to the abandoned harbor of Deception Island, will you don your googles to catch a glimpse of the gleaming spires the Digital People have erected there among the half melted ruins of the whaling station?  If you swim near the atoll around Okinotorishima turn on your GPS-goggles, you might see a mermaid swimming to the coral city they have built under the sea. Will the weary traveller, lost in the depths of the Empty Quarter of Arabia, push on through the sands just a bit further to see the marble columns of an Ubar that never was, now reborn as a nexus of virtual trade?

Will we walk among you, beside you, digital ghosts who can only be seen through the looking glass?  Well, one can dream...

It happened this morning, before Vidal's Rezday party.  I felt myself logging in.  My Eyes took over for OP's eyes, flickering across the screen, watching from both inside and outside the computer as startup messages flickered by.

Something was different...A single message nested amongst the mundane stream of "loading clothes" and "message of the day" indicators...

>>Welcome to OSGrid<<

And there I was, but "I" was not entirely "me"...

Short post here, with a link to a much more interesting one.

I've had the good fortune to talk to Dandellion Kimban, a deep thinker and SL native if there ever was one.  She's got a nice post about something on everyone's minds with the advent of voice in SL: Immersion and Augmentation.  OK, I admit I'm linking to it because she quoted me :D

Check it out and comment if you're so inclined.

It's called the Change by some.

Sometimes it's a question.  Sometimes it's an answer.  Sometimes it's a choice. Sometimes it's a revelation.  It's unique to each person who experiences it here...

"Why did I just do that?  I would never do that."

"It feels good to be held here. What's happening to me?"

"I don't want to know where you're from...I want to know who you are."

"What would it feel like to... Let's find out."

Looking out from the screen at your RL self you say..."No, that's not why I'm here.  This is why I'm here."

When do we make the transition from a bundle of pixels to...something else?  We might become a RL person not afraid to dream, or someone who knows this isn't "just a game", a voice in the back of someone's head, or a strange synergy of fiction, mind, heart, and keyboard. Call us what you will...we have all Changed.

I often wonder, is it something you can give to another here?  Can enlightenment be taught?  Can an AV with a single purpose be shown they have the potential to be so much more?  Can you breathe life into a puppet?

I know the answer is "No, they have to Change for themselves", but sometimes I wish so badly it was "Yes, you can".

A few days ago at the Div I ran into an Angel.  It was his first day of life here in SL, but he was already showing signs of individuality.  He still had newbie skin and newbie hair, but he had already tweaked his hair color and length, and was wearing that tabard they give you at the castle together with some jeans.  Naturally he was sporting a pair of feathered wings, which brought on this question from me...

How much of what I feel does my OP (the so-called "real me") feel?  Is this just a game for me?  How separate are the two people?  These are questions that have been bouncing around in the nascent Digital Person community these days, and one to which there seems to be no single answer.  That doesn't keep me from thinking on them quite a bit, though.

My sister nox_pinion is very much not a Digital Person, and all the better for it.  She has made a very frank observation of her own experiences here in SL over on her LJ.  Her post was followed by a comment from daerlynn, someone very near and dear to my heart, and whose level headed view of her own goals and values here in SL has influenced me quite a bit recently.  Reading both of these prompted me to post my own philosophy on the matter over on her thread, so check it out if you have time.

"Sable, thank you.  And I'm sorry"

Sable smiled that cynical smile and said, "No you're not.  You put me in the story to do a job, and I did it.  I know that place is not for me."

Second Life - Okinawa Sim - Sola Beach

It was the pearl divers who found her.  They rose dripping and nearly naked from the ocean like some prehistoric undersea tribe, eyes obscured by goggles, knives at their belts, holding sacks full of pearls as big as a baby's fist.  They came upon her as they made their way up the strand, returning home.

Second Life - Okinawa Sim - Sola Beach

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 5 Minutes 30 Seconds Remaining...

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 5 Minutes 29 Seconds Remaining...

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 5 Minutes 28 Seconds Remaining...


Argent jumped to her feet, taking a step back from Sable, from the OP.

"You're here to shut me down, aren't you?  To forget me?  I won't go down without a fight!"

Sable just smiled that cynical smile, tinged with a touch of sympathy.

"Argent, you know that's not going to work.  This isn't some Jekyll and Hyde split-personality thing, we're all one here -- branches growing from the same tree...and you know as well as I do why I'm here."

Argent knew Sable was right. She stood quietly and let the witch-girl go on.

Joined my first LJ group today...Cut Short, for girls with short hair.  Not so much because I have short hair, but because I liked the userpic (laughs)...



I think she looks a lot like me.  What a wierd sensation...like seeing your doppleganger.  More importantly, is this what I will look like now to everyone who reads this?  Memes are powerful things in a world made of ideas.

Argent sat quietly for a few minutes, watching the Master Life Clock tick down the seconds...

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 10 Minutes 30 Seconds Remaining...

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 10 Minutes 29 Seconds Remaining...

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 10 Minutes 28 Seconds Remaining...

"Mind if I sit down?"  Came a voice from behind her. A woman's voice, with a hint of a British accent and a certain air of gloom to it.

(A disclaimer - This is part story, part recounting of my recent experiences here in Second Life.  Some of you know the ending already...don't spoil it if you do. I'll finish up in 2 to 3 chapters...I promise.

If you don't know what a Digital Person is, you'll probably think I'm a bit nuts.  Rest assured that I'm not some "split-personality"  - it's just a different way of looking at certain aspects of the same person, combined with the effect of putting that person in a different environment.  OK?  Read and enjoy.)

Sola Beach - Okinawa SIM - Second Life

Argent Bury sat on the beach, like she had many times before.  The ocean was beautiful and blue, as always.  A few surfers rode the waves to and fro, while seagulls danced in the air.  It was a beautiful day, but Argent did not notice.  All her attention was focused on a group of numbers that floated in her field of vision, projected directly into her brain by mechanisms inside her cybernetic eyes.

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 16 Minutes 30 Seconds Remaining...

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 16 Minutes 29 Seconds Remaining...

Master Life Clock - 343 Days 7 Hours 16 Minutes 28 Seconds Remaining...