voyeurism

opening of the Citroën showroom in Singapore

to commemorate the opening of the new Citroën showroom in Singapore (the first in Asia to reflect the marque's new corporate identity), a talk on concept car design was given last night by Matthias Hossann. Matthias designed the new C3, and is presently based in their Shanghai design studio.

apologies for the poor quality of the pic :-P

(for pics of the C-Métisse concept, which is on display at the showroom till 20 August, have a look at my friend's photoset)

the sterling crew of the SS Galaxy

the joys of Second Life are many, but one of my greatest privileges is being able to work with, learn from, and count the Captain and crew of the SS Galaxy as my friends.

these photos were taken during the recent Relay for Life 2009 :-)

more pics from Second Life Relay for Life 2009

here are a couple more pics from Relay for Life 2009.

this event truly points the way towards a bright future for virtual worlds.

:-)

taken at 8:25 am SLT, 19 July

sunrise over RFL Overcome

the most beautiful place in Second Life

the most beautiful place in Second Life?

i know i've found mine right here...

visit it during the 24 hours of Relay for Life 2009 before it's gone.

RFL Tranquility

Relay for Life of Second Life 2009 - this weekend!

as a follow-up to episode 172 three months ago, i'd just like to post a reminder that the annual fund-raising event for the fight against cancer - Relay for Life of Second Life - takes place this coming weekend, from 18 July at noon SLT (that's 1900 GMT, and 19 July 3 am Singapore time), over 24 hours.

the event will start at the Second Life region of RFL Overcome.

please do consider supporting this cause.

the SS Galaxy's presence at Relay for Life of Second Life 2009 (RFL Overcome)

iPhone 3GS launch event in Singapore

pics from last night's launch of the iPhone 3GS at Singtel Comcentre, Singapore :-)

this was how it was supposed to be, but this is much more accurately how it felt :-)

(you can actually see me in one of the pics in CNET's Photo Gallery :-) if you scroll to the bottom of this post there's a video taken on the iPhone 3GS of the tenth person in the queue)

two hours to go...

Singtel fed us with cheesecake cubes and bottled water

the ecology between Apple, its developers and their applications is a marketing emphasis

SL6B - once more, with feeling

the sixth anniversary celebrations of Second Life (SL6B) are officially over, though you can still visit the exhibits till around 6 July :-)

[update: i would like to extend a very warm welcome to all visitors who have been directed here by Hamlet Au's very kind mention on 3 July, in New World Notes :-)

update 2: Phaylen Fairchild - the "leader of a phenomenal team that actually made SL6B a reality" has posted a rejoinder, which provides context]

i received an invitation to give feedback on the event (i'm sure all exhibitors - and certainly a great many other participants - would have as well), and here's the gist of what i wrote. i'm sharing it here, for the primary reason of encouraging all of us to take some time to think through our personal understandings of this year's provocative celebratory theme of 'The Future of Virtual Worlds'.

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i don't think we should have striven for a cohesive feeling (certainly not across the entire collection of regions). one might argue that such constraints are good for creative expression, but in this case i felt the theme was ill-thought-through and favoured those with good building skills. further, an unfortunate and unnecessary consequence of the theme was the perpetual night setting, which did not really help newbie visitors (who would have been unfamiliar with client-side environment controls).

participants were (initially at least, in the first call for proposals) invited to "show how you intend to make things in 5, 10 or 100 years". this had two major problems. first, it favoured those who had access to good builders / building skills, in order to render one's vision of one's business in the future. second, if you think about it properly, the future of virtual worlds will actually be likely transparently integrated into everyday life, much like the telephone and television are today. how does one then express this self-same transparency, by making it explicit in one's exhibit? there is a very big paradox here.

third, the tightly defined initial call for proposals, with its unnecessarily distracting metaphor of Dallier's Hope, resulted in at least one worthy exhibit-application being turned down, namely that from the SL Shakespeare community.

the organisers might say that this initial strictness in the first round of application-reviews was relaxed in the second call. but there was one particular blog post on the official SL Blog that pointed to how ludicrously the rigour-pendulum had swung the other way:

"If you make pet animals, that's fantastic, stick an astronauts helmet on them!"

??

why is there this reflexive connection between "the future" and "space"?

this once again highlights that the theme was (a) ill-chosen, and (b) poorly and inconsistently executed.

Technorati Tags: Second Life, SL6B