Germany

This was interesting, I can speak a little German so I wanted to make one of my locations somewhere in Germany in hopes to strike up a conversation with another avatar here in German. I arrived here and flew around. I found someone walking and approached them. I spoke to them in German and they just said "Hi" in English and walked off. Hahaha, guess most Germans don't find it exciting to visit obscure German places when they already see them as often as they wish in real life.

Eiffel Tower

It seems Senait and I chose one of the same locations as each other, I find that interesting. Of all the places to choose, we both choose this as one of our locations. As for my experience, once again, do not like the way the screen loads up or the camera angles, but it was pretty neat seeing the Eiffel Tower.

Group Meeting

This was a great challenge, it seems within 2nd Life, on my computer at least, that the surroundings take a lot of time to load up and develop. It mostly looks like colorless pixels most of the time while attempting to fly or walk around an area you have chosen to be in. For me and Senait, it took nearly 15 minutes to find each other when we were practically right next to each other in the location we chose to meet in (Saudi Arabia). It was not an enjoyable experience for me, more frustrating than anything else. I wish the product was more developed to make it easier for people to meet each other or at least more user friendly because I am sure there has to be a way much easier than what Senait and I went through to meet for this project.

Group meeting

Our group picture was taken in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on a boat called Atlas.

The virtual society and the real world society have some similarities but they are totally different. In the real world people have to work hard to achieve their goals while in the virtual society could do anything easily almost without any effort and limitation. In the real world people have no ability to fly but avatars could fly and humans have to travel thousands of miles sometimes for days to go to places but the virtual society could teleport to any part of the world with a click of a mouse which does not even take a second.

Our meeting in Second Life was quite a challenge. Moving from one place to another was very difficult, however once we reach to the place we wanted, it was interesting to talk while being in the same place as a character. Meeting in the virtual world is different than meeting in Blackboard Vista, in blackboard we could only read the words we type and wait to the next message to arrive while in Second Life we could actually do things together while chatting.

Using virtual world could enhance the learning and teaching experience in a very good way. By using the Second Life to support the traditional teaching process, teachers could more easily explain the subject by actually practicing what the book is saying and students could benefit from being an active participants and practice what they learn without risking their real life resources. Also by using the Second Life as a learning tool students could share their experience with other students all over the world and that would develop their understanding of other societies and different cultures all over the world.

second life

Venice - Itally
Traveling thousand of miles to Venice took me only couple of seconds. I was able to see different part of the place. However, as a first time user I straggled a lot while moving from one place to another.

Sydney - Australia

I went to Sydney as I always want to see the opera house. When I was trying to take a picture one avatar was unhappy because he or she though I was trying to take a picture of the car the avatar was driving and I had to move to diffrent spot.

Marquises Island

When I tried to go to South Africa, I found Marquises Island which I have never heard before. A very beautiful place and a couple of other avatars were on a boat. This time I was able to fly without banging myself with a building or falling into the water.

Kuwait

When I went to Kuwait, I did not have any difficulties. I noticed that whenever I move away from some place the place start to despair slowly. I wanted to capture the monuments on the snapshot so I was flying the whole time.

Eiffel Tower - Paris

Visiting the Eiffel tower was my best Second Life experience. Every other Avatar was approaching me without knowing who I am. There are some friendly people out there. This time I walked around the tower for some time but I was unable to capture the picture of the tower from the ground so I had to fly.