boston to build avatar of itself in second life

From the Boston Globe:

"Close your eyes and imagine this dream of the future: a place where you can stand in line to pay parking tickets, visit an auditorium where the mayor is giving a speech, or drop in on a meeting where planning officials are wrestling with development plans.

You might be forgiven if you think that doesn't sound like a very exciting dream. Or if you think the place already exists, in a concrete building at Government Center.

But Boston officials aren't talking about the real City Hall. They want to build a new, virtual one in the animated online world of Second Life, where users create digital images of themselves and live alternate lives, working virtual jobs, attending virtual nightclubs, and chatting with other virtual people..."

Virtual version of foot bridge that connects Cambridge to Allston

the tragedy of suburbia

Archinect Discussion
It is good to see Kunstler's fervent advocacy for the American city and a recognition that our built environment is broken. However, one has to question Kunstler's conservative acceptance of new urbanism and its results (Seaside FL) and complete loathing of modernism. Going back to pre-industrial city is no longer a possibility and to move forward we have to learn from all hte architectural knowledge, not just the one we like.

Sadly, the virtual world in perpetuating the suburban myth copying it uncritically.

war as network

One of the paradoxes of the beginning of this century is how a group of people living in some of the most remote places on earth seem to be having the upper hand in adjusting their operations to the technology of the day. This otherwise fascistic conservative enemy, is somehow apt at using the newest in technologies and ways of working in their fight, by:

1- Using the internet as much a possible to communicate, train, and propaganda (now, even Second Life)
2- Working as a loose network of independent cells, making them hard to track

The same as any military advance it will take some time to adjust, a task that seems like it would be hard for a body of government that is known for its centralized systems and top-down management. However, the best and brightest in uniform are theorizing and developing ways to move forward. If you are interested, check out this very detailed report on complexity theory as it applies to the war with AlQaeda by Lieutenant Colonel Michael F. Beech, United States Army Report (PDF). The Department of Defense is also looking into ways of weaponizing the web.

I hope that as we wake up from the ongoing nightmare that is Iraq, we come up with the ways of thinking we need to develop to ultimately beat this enemy that shows the will to adapt quickly. From Roman military settlements, to moats, to the suburbs, war technologies and systems always end up influencing the way we experience our built environment, as we develop the new systems we need to beat AlQaeda I wonder how they will influence our design practices.

Articles used throughout this blog entry:
CS Monitor | Internet jihad: tackling terror on the Web
Economist | A world wide web of terror
BBC | U.S. plans to 'fight the web' revealed
Washington Post | The web as weapon

Air War College

marketers: second life is dead, viva la twitter!

As reported a few days ago, Second Life is seeing its market squeezed by competition and a general sense that besides being 'cool' not much is really happening in there. Now two of the U.S.'s top papers are getting into the SL bashing. The LA Times reports on the mass exodus of advertisers and companies. The NYT follows the LA Times article, repeating some of its premises, and praising the qualities of twitter.

towards a teledildonic architecture

++WARNING++ some of the links on this post are not suitable for work

While the ivory tower figures out how to bring the virtual and physical together, the sex industry moans in indifference. They have been exploring in that field (successfully I would presume) for some time now using teledildonics. The way it works is that at either end people hold his and hers sex toys (in whatever preference and in every possible combinations), a software panel then allows for a partner to remotely control said sex toy.

GirlsRainbow diagram of a recordable teledildonic experience:

Sinulate control panel:Thinking that we will increasingly get information (including that which can produce orgasms) fed directly to us via the web, it seems like architecture will be deployed as a human-proportioned pleasure machine, bringing you the views, smells, sounds, and whatevers of your choosing. The city of pods is making a come back!

networking energy

We are running out of oil and soon its extraction costs will go through the roof due to the volatility of the few places in the world were can still get it from. It is time to start thinking about alternatives. But what will this alternative look like?

Will it follow today's main way of centralized production of energy like this video shows:


Or will it follow a decentralized format closer to this video:


The answer could be a defining moment for the city (and more specifically the neighborhood), what it looks like, and how it functions. The first proposal seems grossly of scale, were it to malfunction maintenance would not be very easy, and because of its grandeur it could be a possible target for attacks. The second proposal seems to suggest that we need to move away from the grand infrastructural projects that defined the beginning of modernity and move towards smaller scales of interconnected networks, which would be more appropriate for our new culture of decentralized informational exchange.

At the end of the day, it may be that it is not a choice between one and the other, but a combination that allows for the interconnectivity of individuals to form a network that is then enhanced by a smaller central system (to make sure that power is never out).

all ghost no shell

It should surprise no one that spiritual and religious groups are beginning to use Second Life as a place of worship. Coming together around a set of beliefs is as old as, well... Adam, or Wountie the hopi warrior, or Lucy the fossil.

People are beginning to create Synagogues and Churches, preachers are beginning to lash out against e-sin and e-xcesses and their consequences. These groups are beginning to tackle ethical issues from virtual affairs to what your avatar wears.

Now back to the title, is a virtual life the closest we can come to having a literal "spiritual" experience? What I mean is that in the virtual world you are transported into another being a ghost with no physical form. That is probably too much of a stretch (although isn't spirituality all about stretching?), still I wonder how our spiritual life will change as it becomes further digitized. Also, I think I find the prospect of designing a place for spiritual epiphany exciting.


image from The Decatur Daily