This is day two of the Virtualis convention center grand opening in Second Life, and it's going a little more smoothly for me than yesterday. First and most importantly, I've been able to actually hang out for entire sessions, instead of bopping in and out and all about like I was yesterday. I missed James Hogg's session this morning on emergent technologies, which from what I hear was really good. But I did get to sit in on CMP Boot Camp by Bonnie Wallsh and Marianne McNulty, which was really informative--I somehow get the impression that they've done this topic before! There was someone there who had been doing events in Second Life for a long time (relatively speaking) who had never heard of the Certified Meeting Professional designation, and he sounded interested in it. Actually, this guy says he's been earning a living putting on events in Second Life for a couple of years now, so if you're looking for a job, you may want to expand your horizons outside of the usual desired city and state.
Here's a shot of Joan Eisenstodt's session yesterday in the Eisenstodt Learning Center, which is so cool.
Anyway, then Joe Pine did a keynote on the experiential economy that came off, I thought, much better than the session he did with his fellow Authenticity and The Experience Economy author Jim Gilmore at PCMA in January. It didn't cover a lot of new ground for me, but it was really fun to see him talk about virtual experiences from inside a virtual experience. I wish he'd done something a little more experiential than the usual PowerPoint presentation, just to prove the point, but the content was terrific.
Taking a break now before heading back to the Virtualis main ballroom for John Foster's international contract negotiation session in a few minutes. It's still a little frustrating for me because my Mac seems to have some sort of firewall built in that won't allow me to use the Second Life voice chat. So I'm using my PC laptop, which allows the voice chat, but is brought to its knees (ankles? toes?) by the Second Life program; everything (especially my avatar) moves jerkily and in slo-mo, and things take a long time to reach full resolution. But it's still really cool.
One thing I'm enjoying is being able to comment via text chat as the session goes on. I don't know if that's distracting to the speaker or what, but the running commentary added another dimension to it for me. Especially the funny bits.
OK, back to the ballroom...