Second Life Extra Credit Questions

In case my Cc didn't work.

Did you use Second Life before the class?

No, I had only heard about it on the news and in passing.

Did you socialize with other residents in Second Life?

Not really, I talked with other students in the class mostly.

Did you notice any difference socializing with other residents who you did not know verses your classmates?

The few I did talk to did not seem very friendly nor very helpful whereas all my classmates I talked to were always willing to answer questions for me.

**added by Roger** Do you have any suggestions on what the Library could do with it’s Second Life island?

Continuing to add books and films is a really good idea, also if they had events in Second Life that were advertised at the University as Utah campus as well as online would be a neat way to get people together.

Getting Started in Second Life

Marriott Library
Thurs, April 24th 1-3pm
More Info

This was by far the worst of the three extra credit assignments, I was under the impression we were going to a lecture in Second Life and for a tour of the virtual Mariott Library. Only twenty minutes of the two hour ordeal was for the lecture... the rest of the time was spent getting people up and going in Second Life by creating characters, doing tutorials and finding their way to the library's island.

It was a huge waste of time for those of us who had taken Game Development, we had already had months of experience with the basics of Second Life and we had created games in Second Life, we in fact took tours of the games we had created. Alex and I were significantly younger than anyone else taking the class, most the people in it had never used Second Life and were on average about 45ish and female. The woman in front of me and the woman beside me were so excited that they could talk while they were both at work, I don't think either of them knew instant messengers exist.

The class was really geared towards an older crowd as well as a less experienced crowd, but that didn't stop them all from being impressed by my Kool-Aid man outfit.

This class could have been made much better if it would have been geared towards anyone wanting to know more about Second Life rather than just beginners. Also if they had shown people other things in Second Life such as buying outfits, cars and other stuff, they were all given money but not really told where to go to buy things.

For a first time user and this being the first of a class like this, it would have been very interesting and entertaining but I would not suggest assigning something like this again for students who have used Second Life already so more people who have never used it would've had an opportunity to use the class.

Machinimafest '08

WPRA Auditorium (OSH Building)
April 23rd 3:30pm

Machinimafest was a display of students work that combined both film and computer animations, it really was different than anything I'd seen before. Some were defiantly more entertaining than others but most of them were really well made. Some had some serious audio problems but maybe that was due to last minute editing or something.

The Passion of McCain was about John McCain and Hilary Clinton's love affair as they tried to hide it, the best part was the voices were not mimicked, the people who made the film used real clips of their voices and cut them into pieces. It made the film even funnier knowing that every word was something they had actually said at one point just not with the words in this order.

Higher Than Noon was a spoof on typical westerns, it was really funny and often the whole auditorium seemed to be laughing.

My personal favorite was Villains Anonymous, it was essentially an alcoholics anonymous meeting but for villains with problems. It was a really funny mix of characters from Darth Vader to the monster from Doom. Some of the films defiantly seemed to drag on for me but even though this was one of the longest I was a little sad when it was over.

Personally the films like The Nameless Traveler and other more serious films did not hold my interest as well as the spoofs or funny ones did.

It was really impressive knowing that they made all of these using the Half Life 2 engine, I honestly had no idea things like that were possible.

Fiction Finished

I searched and searched for friends for Sarah on blogger but it didn't work out so well, I thought afterwards that doing a myspace page and blogging on that may have been a better idea.
Sarah

Fine Arts Technology Gallery Opening Extra Credit

New Media Wing
Monday, April 21 5-8 pm

This was a really interesting and exciting extra credit assignment, the gallery opening featured University of Utah's students capstone projects. One of the projects was a game called Curupira, the whole basis of it was to send a message about saving the rain forests. The game was played like a typical side scrolling platformer with you playing a character given a bow and arrows to defend your rain forests with.

I really liked this game, it looked really good with bright colors and fluid animations it also played well, I told Travis that if it was a Nintendo DS game I would have bought it. The game was entertaining but it also very clearly gave its message about the rain forests including some information about rain forests at the end. I was also really impressed when he said the game had been made in about a month, it really did look like it would've taken longer than that(although I suppose if they worked long hours every day for a month it would make sense).

Another students project was based on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Test that works kind of like a personality test. Her project consisted of pictures that had different options for the user to click(it was done on a computer) and based on the pictures they chose it would basically give the user a summary of their personality traits. Travis had taken the Myers-Briggs test a few weeks before this gallery and got the same results on both tests. My results pegged me as The Inspirer which after seeing the traits and reading more online is very accurate for my personality. I was really impressed with her ability to create something like this that requires someone to use their subconscious attraction to images to help understand their personality.

There were also three other projects to see but they didn't captured my attention like these two did. I was so intrigued by the Myers-Briggs Test that I've spent plenty of time online reading more about it.

fake sarah blog

I'm going to make the majority of the posts on saturday night to try and make the blog more believable.
sarah

Step three

Sarah- A high school student, giddy about finally getting to go to prom with her crush. Her motivation is to tell Adam how she feels, and her goal being to become Adams girlfriend. Her conflict is that she and Adam have been friends for so long she's worried he will not see her as a girlfriend. Her epiphany is that Adam is not really the person she thought he was, and that he is not nearly as sensitive as she thought he was.

Sarah is a highly motivated student, who plans on going to college and making something of herself. As graduation nears she worries that she will never be able to tell Adam how she has been feeling, so she asks him to go to prom with her in hopes that she will be able to open up to him. Sarah has been so infatuated with him that she has over looked many of his short comings, but comes to realize this when he stands her up on prom night to go with another girl at their high school instead.

Paragraph

A high school student plans her prom night for weeks, she has made appointments to get her hair done, to get her make up done and has picked out the perfect dress. Her date is her long time friend and crush, Adam who has no idea about her feelings. She plans to tell him about how she feels when the go to dinner. He told her he would pick her put at six, but he doesn't show up at six... or at seven... she is left waiting for him for hours. All the time she waits for him she is on her computer blogging the evening. In the end he never shows up and eventually she gets a hold of him and he went to the dance without her with another girl.

One sentance summary

A high school student is left waiting for her date on prom night, but he never shows up.

Ideas for my online fiction

I was thinking of making a myspace page, or make a video and put it on youtube pretending to have been dumped on prom night by my dream date or make a fake blog.

Online Fiction

New Zealand Tours

Using a tennis ball to unlock a car

Result of online fiction

Link to my wikipedia article

Blessed Sacrament School

New Wiki Article

I'm going to create a Wikipedia article about the elementary school I went to, Blessed Sacrament.

Minor edit complete

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Women%27s_lacrosse&oldid=197832225

Guidelines for editing Wikipedia

1. Don't include information not important to the article.
2. Check spelling before saving.
3. Write in the correct tense.
4. Write in the same style as the article is already written.
5. Do not post your opinion, post facts.
6. Do not include slang words.
7. Post under the appropriate areas in the article (further reading under further reading not in the middle of another area)
8. Read the entire article before editing to avoid saying something that has been covered already.
9. Do not use vulgar language unless necessary to the article.
10. Do not post pictures that are not helpful to the article.

Minor Edit Article

For my minor edit I'm going to edit the Women's Lacrosse page on Wikipedia. The page doesn't include information such as when the whistle is blown in a women's game every player must stop moving and can't move again until the whistle is blown to start play again. Players are allowed to move their arms and sticks but are not allowed to continue running or walking on the field.

Fishing sources

Traditional: Harrison, Frank. Getting Started in Fishing. New York: 2006.
Online: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fishing
Non-traditional: http://youtube.com/watch?v=lDQ1GAZZk6E

Snapshot essay Tattoos

I've had this conversation with my boyfriend Alex numerous times now about why people feel the need to justify their tattoo/ tattoos. I sometimes wonder if people are just trying to convince themselves more than anyone for their reasoning behind why they chose to get a pink butterfly or tribal design on the small of their back.

Walking into Target the other day we saw a young woman entering the store wearing short Ugg boots and sweatpants rolled up to about the knee revealing a tattoo on her calf.
Alex- "That's the ugliest outfit I have ever seen."
Me- "I'm sure she's just wearing it to show off her new tattoo... ugh I hate that."
Alex- "Oh my, you're right. Ugh."

Fast forward to today.

Alex and I are in Red Mango, some new frozen yogurt place that looks like it's trying to be ultra cool. A girl who looks about eighteen walks in with pink streaks in her hair and a shirt that's too short and pants that are super low. To no surprise she has some swirly lettered tattoo between the pants and shirt. Once again some girl trying to show off her tattoo.
Alex- "I should just start cutting holes in my shirts to show off my tattoo...."
I just wanted to hand her my sweatshirt and tell her it's not 90 degrees out yet, it's still 35 put some real clothes on.
I would bet money on that if either of these girls were asked about their tattoos they would have a very touching and sincere story about a loved one.

I have no problem with people being proud of their tattoos but I also think people end up looking like idiots most of the time when they go out of their way to show it off.

Personally I really like tattoos, so much so that I chose to get a Day of the Dead skeleton permanently etched into my back, but when someone asks me why I got it I feel the response "I wanted to" is plenty. Why should I have to have some long meaningful story behind it, is it maybe because tattoos are permanent? Maybe because people feel foolish?

I was reading an article in Shape magazine about two women, one who regretted getting her tattoo and one who loved hers. To no surprise the woman who regretted hers had a horrible looking design on her lower back while woman number two had two flowers on her leg, each representing one of her two daughters. Here's what I have to say about that article, who wouldn't hate having a poorly done tattoo in the most cliche place for young women to get tattoos? I think most people would regret that, unless of course they got it after their ex-boyfriends best friend died to show how close they were.... PLEASE GIVE ME A BREAK!

For lady number two, her tattoo was very well done with a lot of color and detail, it wasn't my favorite tattoo I've ever seen but it was pretty. And what woman doesn't like knowing she has something beautiful on. But does she need a reason to get a tattoo? Why should she? But I suppose this confusion just leads to annoyance for me.

Hopefully soon I will just stop noticing how much these things bug me or people will start realizing that tattoos don't have to be constantly shown off and that you don't HAVE to give some story as to why you got it.

Half a coach seat (revised)

My mom is a flight attendant for Delta Airlines so I have been fortunate enough to travel more than the average person. One of my favorite places to visit is Hawaii so my mom will fly lay overs to Hawaii every couple of months and let me tag along to take advantage of the free hotel room. This particular story is about my flight home on one of those trips when I was about fifteen.
I got to my aisle seat and sat quietly waiting for the rest of the passengers to board, I was really hoping that no one would be sitting in the rest of the row so that I could stretch out and sleep. Unfortunately this was not the case, a very large woman stood beside me looking at her boarding pass and the row number, and informed me that she was in the seat next to mine. I moved so that she could get into her seat and get situated, as I sat back down she wiggled uncomfortably because the arm rest was going into her side. I should mention that as a non revenue passenger at this time I was required to wear dress clothes every time I flew and I was supposed to basically sit down and shut up and it was an unspoken rule that I could not ask for any special treatment or complain about my seat.
This woman probably weighed in at around 300 pounds give or take some so she asked me if I minded if she lifted the arm rest up. I was absolutely terrified, I didn't know if I was allowed to say no but I really didn't want to have to share my already small coach seat with another person. Without even waiting for my response she started to lift the arm rest, but at the same time my mom, the flight attendant for this flight walked by and abruptly pushed the arm rest back down and said "This needs to stay down the entire flight. Thanks" and smiled politely at the woman. The lady looked disheartened but I was so relieved. This all happened in a matter of minutes but had my mom not walked by right then I may have enjoyed seven hours of half a coach seat.

Half a coach seat

My mom is a flight attendant for Delta Airlines so I have been fortunate enough to travel more than the average person. One of my favorite places to visit is Hawaii so my mom will fly lay overs to Hawaii every couple of months and let me tag along to take advantage of the free hotel room. This particular story is about my flight home one on one of those trips when I was about fifteen.
I got to my aisle seat and sat quietly waiting for the rest of the passengers to board, I was really hoping that no one would be sitting in the rest of the row so that I could stretch out and sleep. Unfortunately this was not the case, a very large woman stood beside me looking at her boarding pass and the row number, and informed me that she was in the seat next to mine. I moved so that she could get into her seat and get situated, as I sat back down she wiggled uncomfortably because the arm rest was going into her side. I should mention that as a non revenue passenger at this time I was required to wear dress clothes every time I flew and I was supposed to basically sit down and shut up and it was an unspoken rule that I could not ask for any special treatment or complain about my seat.
This woman probably weighed in at around 300 pounds give or take some so she asked me if I minded if she lifted the arm rest up. I was absolutely terrified, I didn't know if I was allowed to say no but I really didn't want to have to share my already small coach seat with another person. Without even waiting for my response she started to lift the arm rest, but at the same time my mom, the flight attendant for this flight walked by and abruptly pushed the arm rest back down and said "This needs to stay down the entire flight. Thanks" and smiled politely at the woman. The lady looked disheartened but I was so relieved. This all happened in a matter of minutes but had my mom not walked by right then I may have enjoyed seven hours of half a coach seat.

About me

My name is Jenni and I'm a sociology student at the University of Utah. I really don't care for school but I am in no hurry to finish, I think I'm a bit afraid of working full time. I have never had a blog before so I'm not too sure what I'm supposed to write about. In my spare time I like playing video games and watching movies.

What is a blog?

Blog is a shortened version of web log, they basically have become public diaries for people to express their opinions about things or just rant about nothing. Blogs have become a major issue in our society, I heard about some woman who complained about her bosses in a blog and she untimely lost her job because of what she had written in this blog.
I have never really been into reading peoples blogs, but this one was pretty interesting http://tackychristmasyards.com/ I liked how there are violations for specific things, but the "What the heck?!" violation was probably my favorite because I thought no one outside of Utah said "heck."
My favorite Web 2.0 app.... I still am trying to understand this idea of Web 2.0 but Wikipedia told me that it is a Web 2.0 application and if so then it's my favorite because I use it daily.