Where in the world, we asked ourselves, could we hold the awards ceremony for the Blogpower Awards 2007?
Our nominees are from all over the world. There is simply no convenient place for them all to meet. So I suggested to James Higham, founder of both the awards and of Blogpower itself, that we hold the ceremony in another world entirely; in Second Life.
For those of you who don't know it, Second Life or "SL" is a virtual world hosted on the servers of Linden Labs in California. Linden Labs provide the landscape. All the buildings and objects to be found there were built by SL "residents." Anyone can get an account, download the free software and wander about for free.You only have to pay if you want to own "land". For this purpose that's entirely unnecessary as you will be my guests. I invite you to join me for the ceremony in my "sky box", 500 metres above my SL "home", "Last Ditch House".
The award ceremony will be on Sunday 1st July and will begin at 0900 New York time (1400 in Britain, 1500 Central Europe Time, 1700 in Moscow and 2200 in Australia). Please put it in your diary and come along. The drinks are free and you will be most welcome. Please tell all your friends.
If you don't have a Second Life account, please download the software, register and set one up entirely free of charge. You must select a surname from SL's standard list, but you can choose a meaningful first name. My SL name is "LastDitch Writer" and that's my "avatar" you can see in the pictures (click to enlarge). If you can also choose a first name that corresponds to yours, or to that of your blog, it would make things easier in a crowded room at the ceremony.
Between now and the ceremony there is plenty of time for you to set up your account, change the appearance of your avatar to suit your taste and work out how to get around. Don't worry though. On the day, you won't need to navigate to find us. There will be links like this one here and other Blogpower blogs which will launch the software and connect you directly to the venue. You will materialise on the welcome mat you can see in the picture, so step quickly away before the next guest arrives!
Send me a message in SL when you have set up your account. You are more than welcome to visit the venue in the meantime and take a look around. The right hand teleport on the balcony leads to my home on the ground. The left one takes you to my office in another sky box nearby. Make yourself at home, but watch out for the security robots!
The drinks robot will provide whatever you like so ask away. It's free but also virtual and (sadly) tasteless. I look forward to meeting you - at least virtually - at the awards.
The title date doesn't match the event date in the body text.
ReplyDeleteSounds great. unfortunately can't be there until about an hour later and my comp is crap anyway.
ReplyDeletebrilliant idea, see you there
ReplyDeleteI'll have a go and try and get there! If nothing else comes up- got a lot of family stuff happening at the moment- I'll be there and would love to meet people.
ReplyDeletevirtually at least :)
ReplyDeleteholy jesus!
ReplyDeleteyou're making me feel old, technophobic and inadequate, james.
i have three weeks to figure this out.
here goes...
too busy enjoying my first life to be arsed with a second life :-)
ReplyDeletesorry, i'm with Sally here.
ReplyDeleteCan't do it ! Sorry mate!
It would be very nice if we could support Tom's initiative and I think Blogpowerers really should en masse.
ReplyDeleteOf course no time is convenient but sometimes we really should do something.
So come on, people, you all supported the Awards - now it's our ceremony.
As for non-BPers, I'll personally invite as many as possible.
A great idea, thanks for the invitation. I'll see you there if I'm not en route to the Russian Federation.
ReplyDelete