New things

Greetings everybody, and sorry about the silence: I've been slowed down by a particularly unpleasant cold/chest bug (but improving rapidly).

First: I've revamped the beach discussion area (see photo). Feel free to click on things, as I had my builder's hat on. There is also (gasp!) a platform on the sea with a dance ball and campfire area. If you're interested in the furniture and stuff, IM me, mention the blog and it's yours for free (or nearly, for the things I spent untold hours on...!).

How to get there? Well, if you haven't got a bookmark, then check out the new teleport sign near the main TP point (near the main amphitheatre). That lets you tp to the various areas - and when I get round to it, also back to the main square again ;) I'm making you work, but I'm like that...!

Next to the beach area I'm in the process of finishing off the 'reading garden' suggested by Jesa, which will be a public area to show off a page of your work, an extract, a book cover, whatever you like. How to use it will be covered in my next post. Check it out - it's also a peaceful place to answer IMs, or simply relax.

Second, I'm adding resources to this blog as I find them: so far I have Jesa's blog, Jeddin's website, but any others are welcome. We also need more BLOGGERS as I would imagine you could rapidly get bored a constant diet of my rambling. Volunteers please?And one final note: I would love to see Book Island be more... alive, not to put too fine a point on it. And I intend to start trying harder to get people there: discussing, dancing, taking booths, etc. I have lots of ideas but there's so much I'd like to do that I'd need a month off RL to get it all in motion. With your help, however, it would be both more fun and faster.

So please, let me have your ideas, observations, complaints, etc. I'll get back to you.

Best wishes to all,

Ari

GiveTalk - presentations in SL made easy!

Jeddin Laval, who many of you may know from his talks on Electronic Literary Macramé, is willing to share his great "SL presentation" invention "GiveTalk" with us all. Now, I'm not a geek (stop laughing in the cheap seats) but it's great. If you've ever seen Jeddin in action, you'll know that his presentations combine text in your chat screen, all ready to copy/ paste if you want, plus the possibility of spontaneous text / dialogue and voice for those who use it.

I'm hoping (no, determined) that he will present it to us all, including offering us all a copy of his GiveTalk gizmo / program / script / object (no, I'm really not a geek). For now, here's the notecard that will go with it, which even I understand - well, I think so.

If you'd like a personal preview, IM Jeddin Laval!


GiveTalk: Presenting a Simple Talk in Second Life
by Jeddin Laval

It's actually fairly easy. You don't have to face a bunch of impatient guests while you fumble to correct all your chat typing mistakes and try to find the right words all at once. The GiveTalk screen and script take care of all the delivery details. All you do is write, and then deliver your words with a touch.

No fat-fingering your chat text in as you go – the script in GiveTalk speaks it all for you. If someone asks a question in chat, you can reply right in the middle of your talk yourself, manually. You won't lose your place. If you want to do voice, just do it. You don't have to, but the option is there for you just in case.

Suppose you've already written your talk. Here's how to set up what you've written:

1. Create the text of your presentation in a text file, keeping each line about six or seven words long. That way your text will show up as single lines in the chat window. If you want the text to stop coming out at specific places, insert empty lines there.

2. Get into Second Life and copy/paste your text into a notecard. Give the notecard a nice short name.

3. Get yourself a copy of the GiveTalk screen. It's just a simple panel you'll be touching when you want it to speak your text in the chat window.

4. Add your notecard to GiveTalk's inventory.

5. Now when you want to start your talk, touch the GiveTalk panel, and the first block of your text will appear. Each touch presents the next block.

6. When you're done, the text will stop coming. That's all you need to know.

This is the simple version, for anyone who would like to start the easy way. All you do is prepare the text and insert it in the GiveTalk panel. Just with a series of touches, you deliver your talk without effort.
But what if text isn't enough? Would you like to show slides? Offer handouts? GiveTalk can do that for you too. If you're interested in doing any of these things, I'll point you to another writeup that tells you how. It turns out to be nearly as easy as what I've just outlined.

Sunday's event

(Thanks to Mungojerry for the details)

Wild Shore Press is happy to announce that playwright and author Dr. Don Elwell will do an author talk on his plays and on his new novel "The Ganymeade Protocol" This sunday, October 26, at SL 1PM at the main amphitheatre on Book Island.

Elwell's play cycle "The Coyote Trilogy" ("Coyote," "Cyberpunk Opera," and "Dub for Babylon) began in the coffeehousees of Los Angeles, particularly the legendary Iguana Cafe, in 1985-86. Over the next ten years, Elwell and composer James Henriques created three interlinked plays that predicted with bizarre accuracy the virtual revolution and it's impact on society. The play of the trilogy, Cyberpunk opera, in particular captured the virtual life many of us are living in SL today.

If you'd like a free copy of Cyberpunk opera, drop an email to:
sl@wildshorepress.com
and an autoresponder will bounce you back an email with the full text of the script.

A rather nice review of the 2006 Baltimore production may be found at:
http://www.citypaper.com/arts/story.asp?id=12205

Dr. Elwell's new book "The Ganymeade Protocol" is a novel of piracy and anarchism in the near future. A full description may be found at www.wildshorepress.com or stop by the Wild Shore Press store in SL at :
Publishing Island 10, 31, 35

We hope to see you at the reading!

Office hours

Apologies for the lack of notice I gave for the office hours but I do plan to do this more often. Thanks to Jeddin, Jesa, Madddy and H2 for coming and coming up with a LOT of ideas.

These are a few things we discussed:

- we need more events (including ongoing discussions, how-tos, etc.)
- we need people to feel involved with BI (see 'more events' above, but also ways to get people there, chatting, networking...). This means getting BI better known by any means possible.
- we need some themes, focal points, such as 'books in the future' (I'm working on some ideas for that)
- we could provide a sort of 'reading garden' where islanders can post extracts from their books, etc. On a sandbox basis so it can be cleaned up occasionally...! Possibly a sky platform with a link?
- BI needs to be more 'fun' (this could be a hard one....). Possibly a makeover of some areas? A few 'fun' courses? Competitions? A dance area?
- The time zones are often tricky to handle, as I'm in Europe. Possibility of roping other people in to host things or greet people for events I can't attend - beware of me in pestering mode. I'm happy to do the announcing, notices, etc. but it would be good to have some regulars 'there' for events when it's the middle of the night for me.
- Drive more people to the blog (I'll put a sign up in the square) to read about events, etc. and for that matter, more bloggers. I'm also intending to put up lots of resources on the blog's sidebars as time goes on. Watch out for new stuff, starting with today. PLEASE contact me if you'd like to write for the blog?

Jeddin is going to offer us all some software that will make presentations in SL easier. Voice seems to be something that people have mixed feelings about - we'll talk more about that later. Thanks!

Jesa is willing to give some courses on editing and writing and we'll work that out and announce them. Thanks!

I think that's about it - if I've forgotten anything, please remind me.

Electronic Literary Macramé event Sunday and tonight.

The third in the ELM series by Jeddin Laval, this time about how to read an ELM. This one is going on as the same talk done in two time slots, one past (this past Sunday) and one coming tonight (Tuesday, October 21, 4:00 PM SLT), for the convenience of different groups of readers.

Here's the Second Life link for the talk tonight: How to Read an ELM

I'm using my own ELM, DESCENDING ROAD, as the example for the discussion. For anyone who wants to see the content ahead of time, or who can't make tonight's talk, a complete transcript of the Sunday talk session is available at the author's Website .

For those in Second Life interested in tracking developments in the new ELM technology, you can join the group "ELM: Electronic Literary Macrame" to keep up to date on news and events, and exchange data with others sharing the focus.

For those in Facebook having the same interests, the group "ELM Books" carries similar news and links.

Look for more news again soon! I'll have an interesting announcement shortly of special interest to those who would like to see how virtual reality can help authors visualize, portray, and stimulate interest in their settings and literary textures in general.

You can stop by my Second Life booth for lots more information.

Office hours / gossip session

Sorry it's been a while, and also sorry for the short notice, but...

*** OFFICE HOURS ON THE BEACH AT BOOK ISLAND ***
Tomorrow, Wednesday, at 12.30 pm SL time

Please bring your ideas, complaints, comments and enthusiasm.

VOICE - what do you think?

I'm going to try to do a poll inworld too, but any means to an end...!

What do you prefer:
- Events using voice
- Events using chat / text
- A mix, so that 'non-voicers' get the gist