SLExperience management: The Renaissance Hunt

--rambling, amateur & preliminary observations--

--actually, while I began with wanting to connect my experiences through TRH1 to ideas for libraries in SL... I realise I don't have enough knowledge at all, so if you've been tempted to visit expecting to learn something useful I apologise, though you might skip the following blather if you're willing to answer some questions--

Today visited the penultimate merchant in The Renaissance Hunt. As some were not ready when I began, I cannot claim to be "finished", but I have at least sorted through *all* of the gifts collected so far (and good heavens that is an undertaking for over 135 gifts!).

Early on we were asked through the in-world group to vote via notecard on a FAVE FIVE of locations (no mention of this in the blog that I can see) when we finish.  Yay: an additional validation for my new (since The Sinister Steampunk Hunt) practice of keeping a Hunt Journal. I figured a Hunt Journal would help me recall what I liked (or not) in case I'm ever asked for recommendations; it could support recall to help others on the hunt; it would help me keep track of where I'm at as a Hunt can be very long; but most importantly I'm under the impression that jotting notes helps me think straight - and wherever I go and whatever I do in Second Life I wonder "what if SL-libraries did things this way"?

Do any Hunts offer prizes for the first to finish? I can't imagine so, because a race would compete with the value for merchants of having hunters take time to browse the stores. Even so, I did want to FINISH the Hunt (I didn't finish SSH) (greed:pretties:free) and so I felt a self-imposed time pressure because time spent on hunt was time away from my projects; and guilt-time at the downloads it consumes.

On the other hand: this Hunt experience provoked thoughts about quality experience management that could give points of comparison to my analyses of SL Libraries, and yet I'm not sure I captured those thoughts adequately. Notecard journalling saves switching in and out of Evernote - however it lacks images because my frugality will not let me upload my snips* as images to inventory. So, I'm going back to the start to see whether, with greed out of the way, I can concentrate on a reasonable analysis.



With snips I tend to focus on things that could be better - but as I can't snip past instants, nor my passing psychological dispositions, nor the things I did not realise I was seeing, identifying the things that made the experience so positive will be harder. Particularly when returning just distracts me with beauty I didn't see first time around (the landscaping, Mike, is ... is ... "perfick" (thank you Pop Larkin)), and the postponed acorn-greed.

Actually I guess the acorn-hunt will be an aspect to consider, but I believe I will try not to take photos of the merchants at the Faire because, although Perryn's careful selection of them (as webspelunker Ghostraven mentioned) is an important contributor to the Hunt experience (and care in setting selection criteria is an important librarian consideration), it will just be too diverting.

OMG it is dawn already, the rest will have to wait

... 

This is one of those posts I will probably edit over time.

*snip refers to my use of Windows Snipping Tool rather than the SL snapshot because even though I can send a snapshot direct from Second Life to Flickr, with Snipping Tool I can be more selective in what I capture, and because I am not an artist I don't need dramatic Meghogging resolution.

However, for the sake of comparison, the first picture above was Snipped, and this one Snapped:

Aiming to interview JJ Drinkwater: 1st day of research

So, yesterday I dreamed of eventually (after background research) interviewing JJ Drinkwater (who I've repeatedly over time noticed doing terrific things in librarianship in Second Life). Today serendipity set me out on the journey:

Once-upon-a-time, I had subscribed to the AlexLib Subscribe-O-Matic Gizmo. It sends notifications (which SL can send to email) of events such as today's:

Join us Wednesday at 4pm SLT for "Voices from the Civil War" and a discussion of Walt Whitman's poem "The Wound Dresser"

What a good time to progress this research ... let's see ... if I log in there will be a notecard and/or a landmark and I can begin my inspections ...

Indeed, while I began jotting notes in a draft blog post, it seems I wanted an image for everything, even wished I had videographic skills.

OOPS
During my first round of camming I was Distracted by the profile of Eleanor Anderton (picked up from her creation of a sign [a help sign - one worth discussing, I'll link it in later] on the skyboat display of resources [that to me seem should be IN the library?]) which I followed to her blog where she wrote about BareRose's Antonia

Bare@Rose Search Database via kwout

Back from that distraction, I began capturing photos of the meeting room's exterior signs and interior exhibit, uploading to Flickr, linking images, discussing notecard contents. A slideshow only shows the photos, it doesn't capture my annotations, so if you're curious, you can see my notes over at Flickr beginning with Once-upon-a-time, if I continue this method of note-taking it will all be in a collection I'll call Caledon Librarianship.



OOPS again

Currently interrupted because: while photographing the Discussion Display Wall (Whitman discussions) to identify the variety of content I realised that the train passes by the door and the photo would be improved by having the train in it!

But when is the train?

See Steampunk Wiki for Caledon National Rail and I notice that this (wonderful) wiki could do with some data linking; but back to the train time ... this meeting room is close to Victoria Station (which is just North/left from this door)... four different routes (are they the same train?), 3 stop at Victoria ... Northbound might be best angle on the engine, so before 04, 15, 26, 56 of the hour, while southbound is 20, 44, 52, 55 of the hour.  Of course I missed two trains while I was trying to work that out, and I've noticed that there have been some dramatic lighting changes so I've been wondering how that will affect the shot.

Eating cold tea I missed two more passes, but now two scheduled trains haven't passed at all.  So even in the virtual world, when one is waiting for a train--it will be late?

Back on track, I have dozens more photos, and still need to upload describe and link them. I'm going to have to become a little more efficient, take fewer photos, or forget about using Flickr for note-taking. It seems my inner researcher and inner tourist compete for function time.

What have I achieved so far?

1. I've admired the meeting room - not sure if it is considered one of the branches of the Caledon Libraries; discovered through in-world exploration that just across the park from the meeting room are at least two library facilities and behind/above the meeting room is a special collection. I could probably investigate such details faster by perusing wikis/websites. While googling a suitable link to acknowledge Eleanor above I discovered the Caledon Library Volunteer HQ which (at least historically, it was last updated in 2009) in addition to the site for visitors: The Library Militant will probably answer all the little questions I have.
2. I've seen:
   • evidence of a current discussion series; and past discussions (social activities are a fundamental attribute of virtual world experience I think, although I also believe we seek meaningful social activity); 
   • begun identifying qualitative distinctions between objects for display, information storage and access, and preferences; 
   • continued reflecting on the importance of consistency with a well-defined environmental theme (ie: I believe that my enjoyment of Caledon Library for its thematic consistency as well as its quality library functions would be typical for anyone in-world).  I think that although we like a pretty library in the real world, its prettiness is way less important than its services. But then longevity of the Second Life library might also rest in how well services meet users' needs/desires -- unless the Second Life library is content to exist as an art exhibit.
3. Not found a relevant group - one day in.
4. Oh yes, documenting instances of advertisement - that was about discovering the nature and extent of Caledon's liaison. 
5. Looking forward to exploring the Caledon catalogue/database, but want to see what is what in-world first.
6. I believe that my download limits, and/or needing to avoid excess distractions, and/or the fact that even if I could concentrate in-world the Flickr note-taking method is so time-consuming -- could sooner rather than later send me to read Drinkwater's pages.
7. I think my original questions are so far still good, but it is only one day in. I am noticing the uber-importance of a team of volunteers, remembering the joys and challenges of managing volunteers, and wondering how Drinkwater's experiences of volunteer management would compare.
8. So much for being the final step - testing out that phone for the sake of an imaginary newbie audience to my photoset - I leaped into making a tentative first contact.

Contact point: Drinkwater's private line | Flickr - Photo Sharing! via kwout

Community Virtual Library in Second Life

Facing off the library pigeon by moonflowerdragon, on Flickr


Since my last assignment for the year was submitted, I've had more time for Second Life. Over the years I've regularly checked LIS literature and the biblioblogosphere to keep up with LIS and educational activity in Second Life, and observed broader opinions expressed through twitter. While I have not tallied or coded the variety of articles (and only recently began collecting some with Zotero), my general impression was that many, while positively justifying their experiments, appeared to conclude that technical barriers and initial learning curve limited its overall usefulness for ongoing purposes. However some reports within the last couple of years claimed to be continuing and abundant higher education sims still exist so I intend to discover, if possible, what kinds of programs continue.

Naturally I checked out the changes at Community Virtual Library. It was looking strong and healthy, but I was curious how librarians were thinking about the future of CVL and coincidentally a meeting was planned to discuss where CVL would go from here. Abbey Zenith's prelude to the meeting, published in the aforelinked Rez Libris, included comments that have me curious:

"Perhaps we have not yet realized the potential we envisioned" I can't remember how the original vision was framed.

Abbey reports that reference, exhibits, collections, programs all continue to be successful as services to Second Life residents - so I was curious about statistics, how it is determined who is using CVL and what counts as successful. Abbey's concern was for a loss of "momentum we had in providing professional development opportunities to librarians, library staff, and students". What does Second Life, let alone CVL, offer librarians, library staff and students? Has it changed since Kathryn Greenhill's (2007) 10 reasons? Have librarians moved to other virtual worlds or is the role of information professionals in virtual worlds not so much of the 'librari'ness? Are libraries in virtual worlds role play sims? If so, I don't mind the RP.

Unfortunately the meeting was on at 4am Eastern Daylight Time, and it was one of my late nights so when my alarm rang I was asleep again a few minutes later. Thankfully the meeting was logged so I could catch up the next day.

It appears that aside from the normal imperative to look forward and continuously evaluate, part of the reason to ponder the future is that in 15 (or now 14.5) months the tier fee payments will see a dramatic increase because the initial non-profit arrangement no longer exists. Ah, fundraising discussions :-) that brings back memories from my days in the Australian Breastfeeding Association. So I need to keep my eyes and ears open for: grants, donations, visitor-attraction (no-one mentioned Hunts - they don't *all* focus on shops - I've been on two that didn't - and I'm not a shopper) and the visitor attraction thread raised some interesting ideas - sounds like fun ahead.

It is really hard to glean the key points of meetings from a conversation log - I wonder whether anyone has used an interactive web screen at such a meeting to track brainstorming and keep agenda/minutes?