SL Con 08 question

Maybe its much to early to start thinking about this but....
is there any news as to where and when the 08 Con will be?

Tampa, Florida. Why would be a good question to ask.

http://slcc2007.wordpress.com/2007/09/28/slcc-2008-location-and-surveys/

ooo. I forgot there was a SLCon.
Was last years any good?

um.... because its only a 2-hour drive to disney world? I dont know.

Good excuse for a trip to Florida? It's raining and cold here. I vote in favor of a trip somewhere sunny and warm. SLCon? I don't even know what that is.

its the second life annual convention.
I heard about it a while ago but wasn't that bothered because it is over in america, but if it gives me an excuse to take a trip over there and see some family while there, I may just jump at the opportunity. I just dunno what it is like as i have never been to a convention before.

the SL Convention...2007 it was held in Chicago.

Why? The Florida tourist industry is working hard to leverage business/pleasure combination trips. I'm sure that's part of why Tampa ended up on the list. I know that the Tampa convention center has struggled in years past and may have been offering some very attractive deals to potential conventions.


From the convention center in Tampa to Disney World is closer to an hour. Two hours with traffic. I'm sure Mickey Mouse will be thrilled to see all the avatars who show up in September.

I'm glad this thread came up... I am quite tickled that I'll probably be able to attend the convention with it being relatively close by. Looks like I need to arrange for some vacation time...

its probley in tampa becasue its on the coast, all sl cons should be on the coastal states if you ask me, becasue that way its easier for international travel.

let me know when they hold it in Seattle...ill be there

I've been to a coin convention, a baseball card convention, a used book convention, and an auto convention. All involved selling used stuff. I have no idea what a SL convention would be like.

Oh, and if you do go just be aware that the Weekly Standard will likely send someone there to make fun of you, like they did for the most recent SL convention.

I'll be busy making fun of me, too, so it's OK, really.

What I found odd was the mention of how everyone seemed to be in their 40s or 50s, and rather good looking (might have been 30s or 40s). Interesting.

Well if they're going to call rather good looking, they can make fun of me all day.

I'd be curious to read the article, actually, if anyone knows it's still around.

Is there anyone else like me who has no desire to attend a SL convention? I don't want my RL and SL meshing that much.

i do, it would just be fun to put faces to the people i see here everyday in the forums, as well as a few i run into in world. i'd prolly slip and call them by thier SLnames though

This is no lie. I frequently catch myself referring to my partner by his SL name in conversation. I get blank stares in return. Is that a sign of sickness, or what?

lol well i lucked out there, my sl/rl partner used his real first name!

Sorry, I mis-remembered the article.

"When I first arrived at registration for the convention in Chicago, there were about 70 young, hip, multiethnic twenty-somethings, all smartly dressed, standing in line."

. . . .
"For a moment I was shocked at how much SLers looked like their avatars. It turned out I was in the wrong place--this was the registration for a local graduate school's open house. The SL crowd was somewhat different. There were a handful of Asians and perhaps a dozen African Americans; the rest of the 900 or so convention goers were white. There were nearly as many women as men, and the average age appeared to be early- to mid-40s. There looked to be more people in their 50s than in their 20s. And without delving too much into matters of body mass index, there was very little physiological correlation with the average avatar. On the whole, the gathering looked not unlike a Howard Dean rally, circa 2003."

This link may or may not work:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/content/public/articles/000/000/014/145mliuh.asp?pg=1

Oh, and a response letter to that article:
"GET A (REAL) LIFE!

I FOLLOWED JONATHAN V. LAST's article exploring the virtual world of Second Life ("Get a (Second) Life!" October 1) right up until he wrote: "You can see why reporters and corporate honchos and foundation presidents get excited." I'm afraid I still don't get the point of it. I can understand reading news on the web. I can understand porn on the web. I can understand Amazon.com. I can understand eBay. I cannot understand people pretending to live on the web. These people need to get a real life. I'm 62 years old and not retired. In the last nine months, I swam three miles non-stop, got a new dog, and took up playing the sax. I have neither the need nor the time for a "Second Life."
Norman, Okla."

And just because:
Newt's Second Life:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/content/public/articles/000/000/014/182satlx.asp

This was in the front section, unlinkable .. I think:
"Get a (Second) Life, cont.

Because real life is not interesting enough, Second Life continues to entertain, providing diversion in the form of a lawsuit filed on October 24 in New York by several residents of the virtual online world against another resident, on the charge of intellectual property theft. (For a refresher on the virtual world, see Jonathan V. Last's "Get a (Second) Life!" in our October 1 issue.)

The facts of the case, Eros et al v. Thomas Simon a/k/a Rase Kenzo (Kenzo is Simon's avatar in the virtual online world known as Second Life) boil down to this: The plaintiffs are all vendors of virtual gewgaws inside Second Life. They sell pretend shoes, pretend clothes, and other such. Lead plaintiff Eros is a company that creates pretend sex toys. The plaintiffs charge that Simon (and ten Second Life John Does) exploited a glitch in the Second Life software to copy their wares and resell them at Second Life "yard sales" in an attempt to "unjustly profit from the fame of and goodwill associated with the Plaintiffs' Marks."

This is not the first Second Life lawsuit to hit American courts--that distinction went to a Pennsylvania man who sued parent company Linden Lab in 2006 for suspending his Second Life account and depriving him of his virtual assets. But Eros et al is the first suit brought in federal court. The plaintiffs are asking for damages equal to three times the profits they lost as a result of Simon's alleged piracy.

Simon claims that the case rests on evidence acquired when the plaintiffs entered his pretend Second Life house and took pictures of the copied merchandise, and that if he's going to be held to RL (that's real life) rules, then so should be the plaintiffs.

So many wonderful possibilities! Will the court order the defendant to make his restitution in the pretend Second Life currency, the Linden? Will anyone show up at the
trial dressed like a giant lizard (the lead plaintiff's avatar is "Stroker Serpentine"? And if Second Life were to establish its own court system, would anyone be able to tell it apart from the Ninth Circuit?"

IRS eyeing your profit:
http://www.weeklystandard.com/content/public/articles/000/000/013/115eckhl.asp

I was at SLCC in 2006. I doubt anyone recognized me, though.

One of my closer SL friends has indeed called me by my SL name IRL. I also got a RL greeting card from my SL mom, with character names on it. Makes for an interesting pair of lives

Mari

/me nods in agreement.

Your partner didn't recognize his own SL name? I am confused.

I had a great time at the SLCC in Chicago. I went by my avatar name, as I think did most. Saying "I'm Sylvia" in meatspace was cool. For me the SL community is a bunch of friendly creative types who are generous to share their computer graphic skills, the very skills I have been working hard to sharpen. The con extended that into meatspace and was a perfect fit for me. The business and education tracks were mostly inspiring and useful. I got re-enthused for what I am wanting to accomplish in SL. And I fell in love with Chicago.

hehe i like that you call it meatspace sylvia lol.
i am really tempted to go. I could turn it into a well needed proper holiday. My biggest problem would be that I would be in a new country, on my own and I don't drive lol. I may have to leave it until next year. My relatives live hours away from Florida lol. oh well lol. i'll see what happens.

I went to SLC in Chicago, because I live here and because a SL friend was going. We met and had a blast. I found the sessions exciting: successful business owners discussing marketing strategies and tactics; legal issues for residents, present and anticipated; a panel on SL sex and relationships; the why and how of SL event management.

For me the biggest revelation was seeing the intellectual firepower involved in and behind SL. Consultants, lawyers, businesspeople. Anshe Chung's ceo (and hubby) was particularly impressive, I thought, as he talked about their long-haul strategy, which included moving their head office from Germany to China, where they employ 30 full-time workers who, he noted, come to work in an office. (Telecommuting, even even for virtual worlds, doesn't work all that well, they have found, he said.)

Among my favorite moments: the teenager who sat down near me during a tech session, of which I was understanding about 30%. After about 5 minutes the kid gets on his cell phone and says, "Dude, get in here. You need to hear this." Also, a Domme, her smiling handsome quiet boy sitting obediently beside her, saying she sometimes plays in Gor and sometimes takes a male alt to gay Gorean sims. Says she, "You can tell it's me, because all my male alts are extremely hot and always at least two years old." One more. The three grandmotherly, suburbanish-looking ladies sitting together and taking notes who, it pleased me to imagine, are partners in a BDSM toy store.

Just fyi, it is possible to maintain anonymity at the SL convention. You register in world, paying with Lindens or paypal. Your name badge is in your avatar's name. At no time are you ever required to divulge your identity if you don't want to.

As to Tampa, well, I suppose I'll go anyhow.