A lot of times after my first day in SL the programme just kept freezing and not letting me do a lot of stuff. I don’t know if that was because of my internet connection or my computer or on the programme itself but I kept having difficulties moving around, teleporting and connecting.
Which I have to admit did nothing to encourage me. I invisioned it a lot easier and different. It was like you are reading a book and you love it and then and go and see the film and be disappointed. I don’t know how else to describe it.
To be honest if this wouldn’t have been my project for university I would have given up ages ago and just left it. But as this was and still is my project I was reluctant to go through with it and get myself intergrated into my Second Life. I guess life is full of illusions and disappointments so why should this be any different.
When I finally managed to get it all going again, after deleting and downloading the programme again I figured I would start again at Help Island and ask the people there where I could go and what to do.
My advantage is that apart from English I am fluent in German, and as there are a lot of German’s there I figured that would be of some help, and I was right.
I gave myself as German and in no time was in a conversation with another German girl who also hadn’t been on SL that long. I asked her about different Islands and if she knew where I could go and explore. I didn’t mention that I was doing research because I think that would spoil my overall experience, and she mentioned apfellland to me. So I typed it in and teleported myself to that island. There were a few islands with the same name like the Ghetto, or City and so on.
I went to the main island and was surprised. I actually met some people! Didn’t think that would happen J
There were only a few and there were all just sitting or standing around not moving, which I thought was a little bit odd.
I just went up to one of the guys and asked him a few questions, I told him that I was new to SL and if there is anything he could help me with.
He was really nice and gave me some tips, mainly about the island I was on. I asked him why everyone was just standing around and not doing anything, and he told me that this was one of those camping sites where you can click on a sign and if you kept in range of a few meters you could earn Linden Dollars by just being there. I wouldn’t have to do anything just stand there and look pretty.
Well I thought that wasn’t too difficult I could do that J, so I clicked on the sign and just stood there with the other ones. Most of them singed to *away* meaning the real people weren’t with their avatars and just left them there to earn some money.
(Im not going to mention any names on this blog for now as I don’t know how they would react)
But this guy was really nice and he did add me as my friend. Well now I had a friend in SL, which I was happy about, which I guess sounds a bit sad but it did make me feel a bit better and more involved than before; a sense of belonging.
He showed me how I can now see when he is online and how to make money. It wasn’t much only a couple of Linden Dollars per 12 min, but hey who can complain by earing money doing nothing but just standing around.
He also taught me how to sit down, which I didn’t know before and how to read his profile. I found out that he was born into SL sometime in April 2007, which I though was funny.
Being born into a new world, that put a whole different perspective on the whole thing. You don’t create, you are born, well I guess its like the real world.
Sadly he had to go back to his real job in the real world and I was again left on my own.
So I decided to let my avatar stay on this spot a little while to get some money, while I was doing something else.
After a few hours I got bored and logged off, but more ready and encouraged than I was before, and ready to give it a go again the next day and explore more.