There has already been some debate about the Virtual Worlds Panel we are running at this year’s conference. And even though we have to admit that ‘Second Life Virgin’ probably best describes our very own experience with virtual worlds, we are – as always – open to new ideas.
FOTE09 in Second Life
We teamed up with Virtually-Linked, a Second Life solutions provider and consultant who have worked with Daily Mail and General Trust, The Telegraph and London Metropolitan University. They will help us stream the event live into the virtual world, where you can immerse yourself inside a virtual replica of the Royal Geographic Society theatre and follow all the presentations.
This is a great chance for everyone who couldn’t make it, be it because of ticket availability, work commitments or geographical location. But following the conference in SL – I’m keeping up with the acronyms – doesn’t keep you from actively joining the debate. You will be able to submit questions to the speakers after each block of presentations as well as taking part in on our virtual worlds and cloud computing panel discussions.
But let’s get to the nitty gritty how-to part of following FOTE09 in Second Life. Thanks to Deborah at Virtually-Linked for helping me out with this. You will need to sign up to Second Life – that can be done directly through the Virtually-Linked web site. (Please do this before the event, as you will need to download the software that enables you to use Second Life).
- Go to the Virtually-Linked website
- When you register through Virtually-Linked, you will automatically create a default avatar. Important: make a note of the SL first and last name you’ve chosen
- Download the Second Life Browser
- You will need to login before 9.00am on Friday October 2nd, however it will be useful to have a trial run beforehand.
- You will arrive in “Hyde Park” from where you can teleport to the virtual FOTE09 theatre
- Use your mouse to click on the doors – this will take you inside the theatre
- When inside the theatre, use the direction keys on your keyboard to move around
- Please select a seat by clicking on it with your left mouse button
- To see the live streamed video, click on the arrow next to the video icon on the bottom menu to the right hand side of the screen
- If you have difficulty, please contact Debs at Virtually Linked
I had a trial with this last night and it’s all pretty straight forward. My only problem was not writing down my usernames (you need to enter a SL first and last name) and password, as I was expecting an email with my login credentials.
Apart from that it all worked very well and it will be interesting to see if FOTE09 will be as successful in the virtual world as it has been in the real one.
