Here’s another for the series:
(Click for full size)
Category Archives: Second Life
No Copy, No Mod
My good friend, Stuart Storey of Psychonic Pictures, recorded this video during a performance at the open mic event at Los Arboles in Second Life. It shows some nice detail of the Windlight option currently being explored by many SL users.
Stuart is also the host and producer of many podcasts, including the PodMafia Podcast, The Ten Cast, Building with Wharf, and others. He recently launched the Second Life Podcast Network.
The Pursuit of Happiness – Virtually
I found this article by following a Google ad while reading my Gmail. Interesting article about where we are headed with virtual networking. The writer does a nice job of showing how virtual reality has been developed through the last few decades. The article also points to what we might expect in the next few years.
Here’s a clip:
Dan McCall Performs “See Red”
Here is a video of my good friend, Dan McCall, performing his song “See Red.” This song can be found on his current album “Wait for Me.” Please pick up a copy at his site or through
, Rhapsody (US only) or Amazon
Dan can be found performing his acoustic performances regularly in the Second Life environment. He uses the moniker “Dan Octavia” when there.
Rich Desoto in Second Life on Fox45
Fox45 and ABC22 (same ownership) in Dayton ran this story both Monday night and again this morning. This morning my wife and I traveled to their station to sit in for a live interview in the studio.
Good experience for talking about live music in Second Life, as well as to talk about some of the positive aspects of SL. There seem to be so many negative stories out there.
I was pleased that they gave us so much air time — over six minutes total with the preproduced package and the studio visit.
Recorded Performance from UStream.tv
If you have an hour you don’t know what to do with, you can watch this performance from UStream.tv. I recorded this while performing a show for Second Life at the Rocky Shores sim. This was my first attempt at recording video and broadcasting video live while also streaming my audio live into Second Life.
All in all, the performance went well. I was pleased that the technology held up and that people were able to give it a try with me. I was glad to see some of the people there using the links and trying the experience.
Nice Post at the Flektor Blog
The video of my song “It’s All Good” that I created at Flektor received attention on the Flektor blog.
After the video was up a few days, Ron posted the widget on the Flektor blog with a really great write up! He wasn’t aware that musicians were streaming their live shows in to Second Life — so now he is very interested.
It is great that the video got attention; It is absolutely better that live music in Second Life has reached yet another potential fan. Another good example of connectivity through social media.
For those that don’t know, live music has a very active community in the Second Life environs. There are now hundreds of musicians using this as a vehicle to share their music, refine their skills, get immediate audience feedback, and to try new songs before taking them out to venues or for studio production.
Many people can attend these shows from the comfort of their home, as well. It has been a great opportunity for those that enjoy live music to do so while tending to their kids at home, recovering from health related issues, dealing with physical limitations, working on other projects or networking with others, etc.
Second Edition Covers Desoto
I was impressed to read a very lengthy, well-articulated, and well-researched post by Stone Semyorka of Second Edition. He wrote extensively about my music (including the tune “Avatar Girl“, my involvement in Second Life, and my hometown, Centerville, Ohio. It is refreshing to know that someone has taken a few minutes to gather data, facts, and accurate information before posting an article such as this.
It shouldn’t surprise me, though, that Stone paid so much attention to detail. In his first Second Edition blog post he noted, “Even though I am in-world, I will hold firmly to an outsider’s skepticism and the professional’s belief that the ordinary residents of Second Life need complete information. If there’s an interesting story in-world, I will find it and tell you about it.”
Be sure to stop by his site, read the article that he wrote about my activities, and also to comment! Stone is apparently keyed into the benefits of being “a connector” and readily solicits feedback and social exchange to his writing.
Technorati Tags: Stone Semyorka, Avatar Girl, Rich Desoto, Second Life, Centerville
I Made Newsweek (Video)
A month or so ago I performed a Second Life show at the Wheelies club owned by Simon Stevens (Simon Walsh in Second Life). This was a “grand re-opening” event, as Simon and his crew had recently rebuilt and re-opened the sim to the public.
I had a great time at this performance and was pleased to provide the service for their event. Many thanks to Cher Harrington for asking me to play my music there.
As it turns out, Newsweek had a representative attending the event, as well. Jessica Bennett (JB Vella in Second Life) reported on the event and video was created. Two of my songs “Avatar Girl” and “I Used to Sleep” were included in the video, as well as images of my avatar, Rich Desoto, performing.
Akela Talamasca from Second Life Insider also commented on this news coverage, as well. It is refreshing to see some Second Life coverage that shows a positive view of the environment and the social networking community.
If you are reading this in a reader, there is video above this line.
Technorati Tags: Newsweek, Jessica Bennett, Second Life, Wheelies, Simon Walsh, Second Life Insider, Akela Talamasca, Avatar Girl, Rich Desoto
Ridin’ the Whirlwind!
So much can happen so quickly. I’ve been enjoying some interesting connectivity sites these past few days, in addition to handling several tasks, performing Second Life shows, and helping with production of the Nowhereville Concert Series podcast.
I was alerted earlier this week to a service called “Jott” that enables one to call in their “to do” list or other reminders via a phone number. This audio message is then transcribed, saved to the site, and also emailed to the user. The Jott user can view the transcribed message, listen to the audio, and even send it along to others in their group or contact list if desired. The service even enables a person to Jott messages directly to other Jott users. I’m contemplating how to use this to connect with others effectively. I’m obviously looking for something more productive than sending along the “what I’m doing now” messages — which can be done in Twitter or Jaiku, et al.
However! I did find that there is a free service at egorcast.com that enables a person to connect their Jott account to their Twitter or Jaiku account — thus feeding their verbal Jott message via phone back to either of these two services. This can be an effective way to use Jott to keep your mini-blog flying at warp speed. Well, sort of. The user needs to accept the downtime needed (and possible inaccuracies) for the service to transcribe the audio to text before it will deliver. This generally takes about five to 10 minutes. I believe that it also has the capability of delivering to a WordPress blog. Now, if that would work imagine how quickly one could blog entries by just speaking into their phone? I’m skeptical of the accuracy of the transcription — and believe that more time would be spent reformatting and correcting the errors!
The UK based band redzone performed a show in Second Life today for their contribution to the Nowhereville Concert Series. This show was very well attended both in the SL environment, as well as on the provided audio stream. I recorded the audio, did some light mastering and have sent it along to my co-producers, Corey and Jen, for the podcast version of the show. This show is a combined effort of Audio Gumshoe (my podcast) and Bucket.
And if this were not enough, I was excited to learn that my good friend from Taiwan, Mark Forman, released an episode of Second Life Notes today! What made this a special release is that it was his interview with J.C. Hutchins, author of the podcast novel, 7th Son. In the show, Mark shared some comments from various Second Life participants that also enjoy the writing and audio book content of J.C. Included were comments from Chris Moody, CC Chapman, and yours truly. We commented on our thoughts about 7th Son and why we are fans of the writing.
This episode was also exciting because Mark introduced the world to a song I had written called “Another Man.” (He also titled this episode with the same name as the song.) This song was directly inspired by the podiobook, so it was included in the interview with J.C. Hutchins. J.C. is a very gracious person and wrote to let me know how much he appreciated the song. I plan to upload it to the Podsafe Music Network very soon — and it may also be available as a free download at J.C.’s website.
Finally! Mark invited me to participate in the community group at Disembodied Voices New Media Conspiracy. I have to admit — I’m quite humbled to be invited into this group of visionaries and new media pundits. The connections continue to amaze me. I fully intend to become a more regular blog contributor and new media producer, while looking at all of the options available to help us become better connected in this world that appears to be getting smaller.
Tags: Nowhereville Concert, Second Life, Jott, Twitter, Jaiku, egorcast, redzone, Audio Gumshoe, Bucket, podcast, Mark Forman, bbluesman, J.C. Hutchins, 7th Son, Chris Moody, CC Chapman, Another Man, podiobook, Podsafe Music Network, Disembodied Voices
