Transcript of Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable: July 6, 2010
Topic: interview with Jonathon Richter (SL: Wainbrave Bernal)
Iggy's Notes: Photos would have gone missing this week if not for Hobbs' excellent work! Join our VWER group at Flickr and add your own pictures!
AJ Brooks: Hi everyone, and welcome to the Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable meeting.
AJ Brooks: Our meetings are made possible by the Office of Information Technology at Montclair State University. We meet here each week at 2:30pm SLT for an hour.
AJ Brooks: Our meeting today is an interview with Jonathon Richter (SL: Wainbrave Bernal)
AJ Brooks: We will be using Voice Chat for this meeting. If you are having problems hearing, please IM Margaret Michalski (up front here) and she will help you.
Maggie Marat: Hi Wainbrave!
Wainbrave Bernal: Hey Maggie!
AJ Brooks: There are also signs on the walls of the amphitheater. The most important thing is to keep your microphone muted.
Margaret Michalski: Hi Wainbrave
AJ Brooks: The Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable is a forum to educate and inform the community about issues that are important and relevant to education.
AJ Brooks: The views and opinions of any of our special guests or visitors do not necessarily represent those who volunteer or organize these meetings,
Wainbrave Bernal: Hi Margaret! :)
AJ Brooks: or of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, Office of Information Technology , or Montclair State University.
AJ Brooks: This is a public meeting, so we do keep and publish a transcript of what is said in local chat. For a copy of transcripts, please visit http://www.vwer.org
AJ Brooks: If you've not seen the transcripts, you should check them out - they are a great information asset.
AJ Brooks: The Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable meeting happens each week and we continue to develop a community of educators from around the world with a variety of thoughts, needs, and ideas.
AJ Brooks: Please join the Virtual Worlds Education Roundtable group here in SL. You can also find us on Facebook and Flickr by our full name and Twitter as VWER.
AJ Brooks: Finally, if you have Mystitool on, or other similar tool, please put it to sleep or detach it for now. :-) It tends to lag things.
AJ Brooks: Just one more reminder, You are welcome to use the local chat as a back channel, but if you have a question for our guest, we will be using Google Moderator.
AJ Brooks: Google Moderator is a web based tool where you can go to add a question OR vote on questions that have already been asked.
Sam55 Chester: Hi GRaham
AJ Brooks: The most popular questions will appear on the top of the list, and those are the questions I'll ask our guests in voice chat.
AJ Brooks: Please note, Jonathon and I will NOT be monitoring local chat, so if you'd like a question asked, please post it to Google Moderator (and also vote on the other questions that are there)
AJ Brooks: There are URL givers on either side of the amphitheater floor and also behind me above the Montclair State sign.
AJ Brooks: Click on it and you will get a pop up asking you to open a web page, which will open inside the SL browser (you can also click to open it in a regular web browser)
AJ Brooks: Through this site http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=3838&t=3838.44 you will ask and vote for questions. You do need a Google account to sign in.
AJ Brooks: As a hint, it is better to have "local chat" open for these meetings, it will help you follow along better.
AJ Brooks: As most of you know, my name is AJ Kelton and I am the Director, Emerging Instructional Technology for the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Montclair State University in New Jersey
AJ Brooks: I'm thrilled to have Jon as my guest today.
AJ Brooks: Hey Jon, hows it going?
Olivia Hotshot: Thursday - new meeting DAY - starts the Thursday after SLCC.
Olivia Hotshot: Thursday August 19 is first Thursday we will meet.
Maggie Marat: wOOOT!
Wainbrave Bernal: yeeeeeahawww!
Maggie Marat: *nods
hobbs Constantine: AJ says: Please let him know if you will be attending SLCC either in person or in world
Olivia Hotshot claps just cause she's excited
hobbs Constantine: AJ says; that VWER will be a Community Sponsor of SLCC
Margaret Michalski: If you don't hear AJ please IM me.
Maggie Marat: we po
Kali Pizzaro: do it for the love
Kali Pizzaro: ;-)
hobbs Constantine: AJ says: if you are interested in participating in sponsorship ($) please let him know
Profdan Netizen: What do we get for higher amounts?
Wainbrave Bernal applauds
Olivia Hotshot: http://www.slconvention.org/sponsors/sponsorship-sign-up/
Wainbrave Bernal: hear, hear - SLCC is on the rise again!
Olivia Hotshot: welcome
AJ Brooks: sorry.afk@gmail.com
hobbs Constantine: AJ says: he only has 1 week to pull together sponsorship info, email AJ privately or IM him here in SL
Olivia Hotshot: http://www.slconvention.org/sponsors/call-for-sponsors/
hobbs Constantine: AJ says: I've known you for a long time. Tell us who you are and how you got started in SL and what brought you up to CLIVE?
Olivia Hotshot: haha
Kali Pizzaro: WB: I am Jonathan Richter i am a research associate for the centre for advanced technology in education at the university of Oregon
Maggie Marat: Mari got so many of us rollin, eh?
Kali Pizzaro: WB: I started in vw in WoW, and then moved into Sl in 2006
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we had a number of projects and we got a grant for the salamander project
AJ Brooks: Post questions, or vote for questions that are already posted, by going here: http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=3838&t=3838.44
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we this was to try to improve the search for educators
Kali Pizzaro: and students
Kali Pizzaro: we got $10,000 dollars
Maggie Marat: Eloise!!!
Olivia Hotshot: =)
Maggie Marat: Eloise has done much to support Ramapo Islands on TeenGrid
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we also partnered with a Spanish company
Kali Pizzaro: WB: also hooked dup with Merlot
Olivia Hotshot: Yay1
Kali Pizzaro: WB: this is the largest learning objects repository
Kali Pizzaro: WB: sun microsystems was in partnership with merlot this got us in volved in what was project wonderland
Kali Pizzaro: WB: these however, were cut
Kali Pizzaro: WB: but i am still involved with wonderland even though it requires work
Kali Pizzaro: WB: the salamander project allowed us to tag
Kali Pizzaro: WB: heads up display =(HUD)
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: Please explain what a HUD is-- Heads Up Display
Kali Pizzaro: WB: this is like what you would see in a airplane simulator so a box is diplayed on top of the sl display
Kali Pizzaro: youcan script this to have other functions
Kali Pizzaro: and move it around the screen
Kali Pizzaro: WB: this allowed us to create a hud which was interactive to have buttons which allow you to search for stuff easier
Olivia Hotshot: http://www.merlot.org/merlot/index.htm
Kali Pizzaro: WB: so merlot is a great resource as a repository of specialist learning objects in community of practice
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we got good support from Claudia Linden
Sam55 Chester: She use to have meetings on Thursday afternoon
Kali Pizzaro: WB: this led to us having to work on how to get material into the merlot as they were not keen on open up there space to
AJ Brooks: http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=3838&t=3838.44
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we therefore created a salamander Wiki
Kali Pizzaro: salamander
AJ Brooks: Post questions, or vote for questions that are already posted, by going here: http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=3838&t=3838.44
Kali Pizzaro: WB: these were populated by team
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we had minimal success with this but were able to show it could be done
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we also got a lot of attention
Kali Pizzaro: WB: as a mashup this caused some problems with vetting etc
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we had difficulty in defining a learning object from Sl
Kali Pizzaro: WB: it was a complex process
Kali Pizzaro: WB: Wb: we also had a number of HR issues
Kali Pizzaro: WB: which was eating into and going beyond the initial $10,000
Kali Pizzaro: WB: a company from India came onboard and CLIVE was born
Olivia Hotshot: heh
Kali Pizzaro: WB: the centre for learning in virtual environments
hobbs Constantine: lol
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks if we can break CLIVE down into a couple of things. First tell us conceptually about CLIVE, then tell us about the future of CLIVE (where it is going), and then what makes this effort different than any of the previous efforts (aka from salamander)
Kali Pizzaro: WB: ok, so CLIVE is much more complex than the Salamander project
Kali Pizzaro: it has expanded beyond the VW community
Kali Pizzaro: Merlot has project all around the word about 60 million
AJ Brooks: Post questions, or vote for questions that are already posted, by going here: http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=3838&t=3838.44
Kali Pizzaro: WB: last fall we created a taskforce which created a taxonomy to tackle this
Olivia Hotshot: welcome
Kali Pizzaro: WB: the taskforce has done a great job Ann thanks Olivia
Maggie Marat: gaming environments WooT!
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we have a number of different tools in this project
hobbs Constantine: AJ reviews the questions again
Kali Pizzaro: WB: where we are going is the creation of a Community of Practice (CoP) of educators
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we are launching virtual Safari in a few weeks
Olivia Hotshot: -about to hold our first test Safari-
hobbs Constantine: my keyboard Abo, I feel a virtual thought approaching on Safari
Maggie Marat: <----waves hand to volunteer!
Jimmie Veeper: How do I sigh up?
Kali Pizzaro: WB: this will e a collection of educators who will work together to create a collection of images, etc of areas in Sl this will then go to the merlot database
Teri Boxen: sounds great
Maggie Marat: <-------- scans inventory for safari clothing
Kali Pizzaro: WB: these will them be put into themes which will be announced to the general public to allow folks to explore these different areas
Kali Pizzaro: easily
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we hope this will increase and make easier the exploration of learning ares in Sl
Teri Boxen: i can help during the summer
AJ Brooks: Post questions, or vote for questions that are already posted, by going here: http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=3838&t=3838.44
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we subscribe to the opensource ideal
Kali Pizzaro: so if you want to collaborate please contact us
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: what about challenges? Will they be the same as salamader? What will be different/the same?
Kali Pizzaro: WB: the same 3 challenges are there
Kali Pizzaro: technical
Kali Pizzaro: bandwidth etc
Kali Pizzaro: coordinating the safaris will be a challenge
Kali Pizzaro: for example if you take quest environment
Kali Pizzaro: you may need a number of virtual environments due to the amount of areas for learning
Olivia Hotshot: < If you want to volunteer with Safaris - you can IM me at the end of the meeting -
Kali Pizzaro: we will not be able to capture it all but this will point folks in the right direction
Maggie Marat: Quest Atlantis: http://atlantis.crlt.indiana.edu/
Maggie Marat: possibilities :-)
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: You can see this project from a high altitude Jon. It has far-reaching positive possibilities.
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: If you could summary, how would this impact the folks here or folks reading this transcript-- how would this impact the average person? What good is this to them?
Kali Pizzaro: WB: thanks for your praise
hobbs Constantine: yay ARVEL!
Kali Pizzaro: WB: some folks may not know about the group si am involved in
AJ Brooks: there are now questions to be voted on - so go vote on your favorites or add your own.
AJ Brooks: Post questions, or vote for questions that are already posted, by going here: http://www.google.com/moderator/#15/e=3838&t=3838.44
Kali Pizzaro: in Sl
Kali Pizzaro: WB: this project is difficult to show folks the value but this will be helped by the safaris
Maggie Marat: show me the learning --sums it up
Kali Pizzaro: WB: as people see the value it will spread throughout the COP
Maggie Marat: gloriously chaotic
Maggie Marat: the Safari's
Wainbrave Bernal: jonathonrichter@gmail.com
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks via Google /Maggie: How does one join the task force?
Kali Pizzaro: Wb: the taskforce will be disbanding soon and the there will then be a editorial board in merlot
Kali Pizzaro: WB: they will then work on CLIVE island and make changes to the taxonomy. please email if you are interested. You need to be a member of Merlot so please join for free or do it through your institution
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: Grinn: "Does MERLOT have a presence in Second Life?
Sam55 Chester: Definitely
Kali Pizzaro: WB: CLIVE is merlot in sl
Olivia Hotshot: heh
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: Ann: When will CLIVE island reopen for exploration?
Kali Pizzaro: WB: WB: well it is closed for development at the moment
Olivia Hotshot gulps
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we expect to be open in the next week or so
Kali Pizzaro: it is a work in progress
Kali Pizzaro: work
Kali Pizzaro: although we wanted it phased it will be slightly more disjointed
Kali Pizzaro: than this
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: Heather: How would newbies use the CLIVE database?
Jimmie Veeper: Willy Nilly
Profdan Netizen: Maybe you can take Larry's job, AJ!
AJ Brooks: he's looking for a replacement. hmmmm
Kali Pizzaro: WB: the clive database can be used by using the normal search terms you would use for your specialist area
Kali Pizzaro: in any search engine
Kali Pizzaro: this will bring you to a number of areas which can be explored if you wish
Kali Pizzaro: in different platforms
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: Are you still accepting focus group members for the Virtual Safari effort? I would be interested in participating
Wainbrave Bernal: hooray
hobbs Constantine: (that ? was from Achrysalis)
Olivia Hotshot: - if people want to be part of the safari teams they can IM me -
Kali Pizzaro: WB: okay well there will be a overview of the virtual safaris and area to sign up
Kali Pizzaro: there will be different levels, guide, etc
Ignatius Onomatopoeia waves at Boo Boo
Kali Pizzaro: then a post safari area to bring it all together then an area to present
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks when the safaris were going to run
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks if Jon and one Safari team can return here to VWER as our guests
Kali Pizzaro: WB: Wonderful i am sure we would love to this and would be eager to partner with VWER
Kali Pizzaro: WB: it might be better to wait until we do a few first
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we will give a better rounded presentation
hobbs Constantine: AJ speaks like an educator and recognizes that even challenged Safaris are learning experiences
Kali Pizzaro: 5 minutes
Kali Pizzaro: 33 on the sim
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: Over the years, I've come to consider you a futurist. Considering VW, there has been a lot going on (SL and others)
hobbs Constantine: AJ asks: i.e. staff cuts from LL, CEO replacements.....what are your thoughts about all of this?
Kali Pizzaro: WB: we are in interesting times. We face many challenges
Maggie Marat: <-----was never disillusioned
Kali Pizzaro: However, virtual spaces seem to be changing, one hand there is stress and friction but on the other hand if we keep on it we can
Kali Pizzaro: WB: or may see an increase in the numbers of new folks seeing hte value in VWs
Maggie Marat: MAny thanks Jon!
hobbs Constantine: AJ laughs "May you live in interesting times" is a curse.
Margaret Michalski: Thank you
Olivia Hotshot: Thank you Jonathon!
Olivia Hotshot claps enthusiastically
Jimmie Veeper: Thanks
hobbs Constantine: AJ thanks Jon for sharing and spending time taking about his project
Meredith Winslet: Thanks Jonathan!
Grinn Pidgeon: thx
Kali Pizzaro: cheers Jon
Zotarah Shepherd: Thanks Jonathan
Graham Mills: Agreed - great work
Ignatius Onomatopoeia applauds
Jozen Ocello: thanks Jonathan
Zotarah Shepherd: Thanks AJ
hobbs Constantine: AJ thanks Jon on behalf of the educational community and reminds Jon that he is an inspiration for all of us.
Birdie Newcomb: ty
Teri Boxen: ty
hobbs Constantine: AJ : reminds us that we will be here, same bat time, same bat channel.
Achrysalis Metaluna: Great talk, thanks!
hobbs Constantine: next week
Ashy Viper: thanks guys ...that was great
Eliasdehart Sixpence: thanks
Margaret Michalski: thanks AJ
Sam55 Chester: Thanks
Kali Pizzaro: if it is freezing
hobbs Constantine: AJ: Stay cool, stay dry, thanks for coming!