Friday, May 30, 2008

Reality keeps ruining my life^

It's usually very easy for me to get addicted to things. Be it chocolate, Facebook or a silly computer game. I usually don't come across as the person who would be glued to the laptop hours at end playing computer games. Well, you can imagine me as the person glued to Facebook or MSN, but computer games would probably never cross your mind.
Anyhow, I've been playing this game for the past year. I started it when I was writing my dissertation, mainly because life was a bore. A year on and I'm still hooked. I think Second Life™ does that to many people.
I always found a reason to log on, curiosity, fashion, OooOo Virtual friends, or just plain old exploring ! It's a really cool game, if like me you have no life !
Recently, London School of Journalism announced that it would be opening it's doors in the Metaverse. LSJ would be offering lectures on various topics, and it's courses are NUJ (National Union of Jounalists) certified! And I went on to have a look.
The place was dead. Unless it's a club or a sex dungeon (gasps!!), most places in SL™ tend to be empty, it's only full till the eyeballs in case of an event.
So I left and came back to the sim a couple of days later, to find some dude who explained to me about LSJ. I can't say the conversation was interesting, but I asked him when the next lecture was *yes! I am a nerd!* and he said that the lectures are held with gaps of 21 days in between and the last one was the weekend gone by. Disappointed I agreed to keep track of the events. A month and still waiting ! Several writer and poetry ones have occurred, but none relating to journalism so far. BooHoo !

Click to see the larger version of me in the virtual LSJ campus


I do think it's a great idea for LSJ to open it's doors in SL™, I wish they had this during my university days, hell I wish my university did it. By the way, the university I attended was the top journalism university when I started, by the time I left it went down in the charts. What a bummer !
SL™ also has other businesses online, Seat just sent me a notecard about it's new sim, I haven't checked it out and I doubt I will! But the Doctor Who write, Terrance Dicks, was online recently for a little talk his book and Giorgio Armani had an interview in SL™ last year. So it's all very cool. Not just for little nerds like me :)
I just thought I should write something positive about the virtual world, since most national media seems to diss it, hey ! it's not all about sex and hawala *money laundering for the blissfully ignorant*.

^Quote by Calvin from Calvin&Hobbes

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