opropi: May 2007

Thursday, May 31, 2007

Renault Offers Free Car to SL Residents

World Stock Exchange Relocates Headquarters

SL Newspaper in Dutch RL Magazine VIVA

A memorial for fallen heroes ...

Interview with srv4u Conacher, a blues musician in SL

Amsterdam for sale .. again !!

Biggest record player in SL !!

WORLD STOCK EXCHANGE HOSTS UNIQUE NEW OFFERING

JEWS ALL AROUND THE WORLD and in Second Life have a new 'home' with the opening last Sunday of the Ir Shalom "City of Peace" sim by Carter Giacobini and his very talented team of co-creators, CryptoMorph Lake and Lyric Wilberg.In his opening ceremony speech, Carter told the crowd that when he started building the Jewish Historical Museum and Synagogue (JHM&S), he had planned on opening in September, or even later, but the desire of the Jewish community to set down roots had been so strong, the whole project had been completed just three months after the JHM&S had opened."I think that's a testament to the desire of the Jewish community to set up roots wherever we are," he stated. "Throughout our history, we have adapted and succeeded in every environment that diaspora has led us to. And, even though exile didn't bring us to SL, we still bring with us the desire and ability of adaptation, unity and community.""We bring with us the need for family ties, to be with fellow Jews in an environment that we have made our own.""My hope is that this place will serve as the foundation of the Jewish community on SL. To be the main place where Jews can come to take classes in our community centre; have parties at the country club; develop their businesses in our shops and Jewish Business Development Group; learn about our history in the museums, and to be able to be with each other in a safe environment.""This is your city. This is your new home."Carter went on to explain that the main focus of the site was locating the Temple Beit Shalom in the centre of the city, so that all things would be an outgrowth from that. Project contributor, CryptoMorph Lake, began construction on the temple, the day the island was born."The temple was the first thing to begin here - as it should be anywhere in any Jewish community," continued Carter, who paid tribute to the "wisdom and knowledge" of his co-creator Crypto and acknowledged the "amazing gifts of time and decorating sense" of Lyric Wilberg and the exhibition construction of Tomaso Rall.Crypto wished "a big mazal tov and shehachianu" to the island, thanking everyone who had helped out in creating the final creation the crowd now beheld.He referred to Ir Shalom as "a very unique place, one that is fully dedicated to serving the group with content you can't get anywhere else. A place of community and learning."When Tomaso called out, "Here's to life!", the rousing response of "L'chaim" rang out throughout the crowd.One of the highlights of the day was the announcement of the winning Torah design for the temple. Photo above: Judges were unable to choose one winner from the entries above, so selected three Torahs for the synagogue. The winning entries were made by Mushund Mills, Janae McLeod and Nightspy Rebus & Rafi Tulip.Among the many interesting sites to visit at Ir Shalom, is the Holocaust Memorial Museum which, to be expected, is a solemn testament to the darkest days of Jewish history in modern times. One of the saddest information plaques reads:"On the walls, you can see scratch marks made by people trying to escape. To the left is where the crematory was placed. After the prisoners were murdered, they would be vaulted into the crematorium by use of a crude catapult to be disposed of."No matter what you think of, or how you feel toward, Jews - this type of scar is bound to set you apart from others. An injury of this magnitude lasts forever.Next door, at the Historical Centre, famous Jews featured include Modigliani, Leonard Bernstein, Marcel Proust, Mayer Amschel Rothschild, Albert Einstein, Ann Landers, Golda Meir and Goldie Hawn.The most poignant display is of Nazi Holocaust survivor, Liviu Librescu, who was also an aeronautics engineer and teacher. Liviu was recently murdered at the Virginia Tech massacre. More than any other display there, I was moved to bend my head for a moment's silence in honour of this simple man. Librescu used his body to barricade a classroom door to protect several students, but was gunned down.The information sheet on Liviu urges, "Let those he saved now make the most of it."(Photo above: Liviu Librescu (centre) is flanked by Ann Landers (on left) and Modigliani (at right).Shops and businesses at Ir Shalom include the very wittily named "Mitzvah Bar Gift Shop" - specialising in alcohol and hats! (If you can help the also very wittily-named bar owner Jieux Shepherd, refine his chair scripts, he'd be ever so grateful!)There is also a Rabbi's Attic shop; a Sisterhood of Ir Shalom drop-in centre and Bubbe's Bakery and Jewish Deli, offering chocolate chip cookies, donuts, and Bubbe's chicken soup, reportedly "good for what ails you".One of the many people who made it to the opening (international time differences made it difficult for European and Israeli Jews to participate in the event), was Orthodox Jewess, Tam Hyun who said she had been keeping an eye on construction work for the past couple of weeks."It's tremendous - more than I ever thought was possible," she enthused. "It makes me feel welcome and not so much a stranger to SL. The island brings a bit of real life home to me."RebMoshe Zapedzki took me on a tour of the shul, which is Yiddish for synagogue and showed me the ahron, where the torah, the set of guidelines on behaviour to God and man, is stored on a raised platform.He paid tribute to what has been achieved, saying, "Communities are built by a small handful of people like Carter and Lyric and Beth."Another guest, Kafka Schnabel who has been tracking Jewish developments in SL since the beginning, said, "I think this is a big step for the Jewish community of SL. We are creating a Jewish shetelt. I hope that this will lead to interesting new developments in SL Judaism, and hopefully also interfaith." People celebrating the opening of Ir Shalom included Chana Beck, who describes herself as "Jew Crew", Yoni Schwartzman, Nemi McCoy, TamaraEden Zinnemann, Blayke Allen, Ghahir2 Binder, Cajh Writer, GruvenRueven Greenberg, Yoni Schwartzman, Gavriel Beerbaum, Charles Houston and Kirk Claymore.Comments about the site ranged from Chana Black's, "This will be a wonderful community, I just know it" to Gavriel Beerbaum who said, "Wait until I spread the word about this at the Beit Israel Group in Portugal."Another memorable event of the evening was a 'Magical Mystery Tour' in a bus, driven rather chaotically but with great panache, humour and enthusiasm, by sim owner, Carter Giacobini.I would like to say that I took this tour, but for most of it, I was either running behind the bus, or flying above it trying to get on! At one stage, I did manage to board the double decker, but I got thrown around so much I fell out the back, with a great appreciation of how a cocktail feels in the shaker! When the journey (ordeal!) was over at last, there was the odd mention of "hire a limo next time!" "with a driver!" At the end of the festivities, while we danced to the grooviest music I've heard yet on SL and I listened to the happy banter of Jews 'at home', I almost felt Jewish myself.Photo above: CryptoMorph Lake, Carter Giacobini and Ever Student (front row) with one of the guests beside Tomaso Rall and Tam Hyun (middle) and RebMoshe Zapedzki, Gavriel Beerbaum and Nemi McCoy (rear)(Photo above: TamaraEden Zinnemann (centre) and her friends who engaged me in a stimulating discussion of Judaism the day before the opening) More on this and other Jewish-related issues in later editions.http://slurl.com/secondlife/IR%20SHALOM/250/137/23

Second Fortune : a SL version of Wheel of Fortune

Dont forget about our latest Photocontest in EVENTS !!!

New featured designer

Real Linden Dollar Bill

Only in SL-Newspaper

The Virtual Arms of the Law

About a month ago, I did an article on the influence of real world politics in Secondlife (http://15timez.blogspot.com/2007/04/vive-la-politque.html). This got me thinking, as many things do. If you take a look at the virtual world we all spend a good deal of our time living in, where is the the government making sure that everything is run smoothly, and seeing that our online community runs smoothly justly and fairly. When laws are broken, and the peace is disturbed, who does the regular citizen of Secondlife contact, to assist them and make sure their online experience is enjoyable and safe. Well, the answer is obvious... The Lindens, the representative of Linden Labs. However, again treating this virtual world as real, this means we have unelected officials, answerable to no-one, personally enforcing what laws they decide upon, if you can find one. The nearest similar setup to the law infrastructure in SL, would be the comic book world of Megacity 1, as seen in the Judge Dredd books, a dystopian land set in the future, where a group of state appointed officials roam the city, acting as judge, jury and executioner. If we aren't careful, the lack of democratic government in Secondlife is going to have a certain US President pushing to drive tanks into the virtual world, to overthrow our tyrannical rulers.But on a more serious note, it seems that I am not alone in my concern about the lack of a proper legal and political system in Secondlife, and I met up with two such people, Ashcroft Burnham and Mondrian Lykin, two of the main protagonists behind a project tentatively titled "The Justice List", aimed at setting up a more structured and democratic for of governance for the citizens of Secondlife.

Voodoo: So could you give a brief description on what the "Justice List" is, for our readers?Ashcroft Burnham: In very simple terms, it's a legal system for SecondLife, but one that has real powers of enforcement, and one that doesn't need any help from Linden Lab to make work. There are lots of disputes and potential disputes in SecondLife that could do with formal resolution: disputes about broken agreements, land use, alleged griefing, extortion, etc.. Until now, there's been no way of resolving those in a formal way, and that can create problems. The justice list (and I emphasise that that's just a provisional title: we've yet to finalise a proper name for it) hopes to solve all of that. The enforcement is taken care of by a system of automated distributed banishment. It's a bit like BanLink, but based on a court system, rather than a network of individual decisions. People put an object on their land. It ejects anybody who's on the list (hence Justice *list*). Putting people on the list is the ultimate form of punishment.Voodoo: So, the current system, as enforced by the Lindens, was not adequate?Ashcroft Burnham: Well, Linden Lab don't *have* any sort of system for resolving sophisticated disputes. They deal with (or, at least, try to deal with) incidents of serious disruption, and violation of the terms of service and community standards, but that simply doesn't cover a great range of the possible disputes that need to be dealt with. Breaking a business agreement, for example, or installing so many camping chairs on a piece of land that nobody else in the sim can get to use their land isn't covered by the terms of service or community standards at all. Sophisticated business can't easily emerge in SecondLife without a sophisticated in-world legal system.Mondrian Lykin: They do have some kind of abuse reporting system, but that just deals with the ToS (Term of Service) issues.Voodoo: So, how do you decide who should legitimately be on the list, and who has been unfairly nominated for inclusion?Ashcroft Burnham: We establish an entire legal system :-)Voodoo: with courts, judges, juries?Ashcroft Burnham: Yes :-)Mondrian Lykin: and a Parliament, and an executiveAshcroft Burnham: There are a surprisingly large number of real-life lawyers interested in being involved in the project.Voodoo: A cynical person would suggest they are looking at more of a way of getting money... even virtual moneyAshcroft Burnham: Well, actually, the opportunities for earning money are not very great in this system. There isn't a guarantee that we'll be able to make enough to cover our costs. We eventually hope to have salaried judges, for example, but I don't foresee them getting more than a few thousand Linden every month. Most people who are interested in being involved are interested in being involved because it's an inherently interesting thing to do.Voodoo: Indeed. Now, you mentioned a Parliament? Setting up a government of SL too?Ashcroft Burnham: Well, after a fashion, yes :-) After all, somebody has to decide, ultimately, what the laws are that the courts enforce. There needs to be democratic legitimacy.Voodoo: Democratic? So we would all get a say in their appointment?Mondrian Lykin: The Parliament will be formed by members elected by those who adhere to the system. Each of them will have one vote, and the Parliament will pass the laws that will be applied in the territories where the system is applied.Ashcroft Burnham: The subscribers, those who put the objects on their land that eject the people put on the list by the courts, they'd be the people who'd get to vote. Subscribing would be free. So, those who help the system to function get a say in how it works.Mondrian Lykin: I think it is important to say that banishment will not be the only verdict issued by the courts; they will have other instruments, like fines, injunctions and such.Ashcroft Burnham: Banishment will be used, however, against people who do very serious wrong, or breach the lesser court orders (i.e. fail to pay fines, etc.)Voodoo: It all sounds like a pretty huge project... have you come up against any obstacles so far?Ashcroft Burnham: Well, we're fairly early on. It's hard to tell whether, for example, we'll be able to raise enough finance to acquire the land needed for the court and parliament buildings, and to pay for the server. But, so far, things seem to be going fairly well. Recruitment has gone quite well. We now have a strong management team putting together all the logistics, and the constitutional team is about to start meeting and working out the details of the constitution, too.Mondrian Lykin: Resources seem to be the biggest issue, and of course, the recruitment. We have to follow at lest 3 main aspects: management, technical and constitutional. We formed 3 teams that are going to work on each, respectively, and we are about to start recruiting.Ashcroft Burnham: If any of your readers would like to join us, they should IM me or Mondrain in-world.Voodoo: What would you say to those who might say that this would be a pointless endeavour, since LL can overrule and disband this if the felt they wanted too?Ashcroft Burnham: Why would they want to do that? We're not doing anything against the Terms of Service or Community Standards. LL have, in theory, the power to disband any in-world group or project, but that doesn't make every group or project worthless.Mondrian Lykin: This system is user-generated, as far as it is good for the users that subscribe to it, there should be no reason for them to intervene in any such, if any at all, wayAshcroft Burnham: They haven't intervened in BanLink, after all.Mondrian Lykin: There exist already some communities who have their own laws, I am thinking to the RPG communities, or the Gorean communities, and such othersAshcroft Burnham: But none of them yet have a sophisticated legal system capable of handling serious business and related disputes, and they tend to be narrow in scope. They have designed (of course, in other ways) their own system, and they obey to itVoodoo: So, as long as your laws don't contradict the ultimate “constitution” of SL, the LL ToS, everything should be ok?Ashcroft Burnham: Well, indeed. And there'd be no reason for us to do that :-)Mondrian Lykin: I think nobody would be happy to hear that LL intervenes in something that doesn't break the ToS. Business people on SL would be quite upset to hear thatAshcroft Burnham: I think that this is a very exciting project, and could bring great benefit to SecondLife as a whole. The encouragement of sophisticated commerce through a refined and professional legal system could have a marked impact on the SecondLife economy.Imagine how much better that things like financial services would work if there was a sophisticated legal system to go with them.Voodoo: Well, thank you for your time, and I'd like to personally wish you the best of luck with this.Mondrian Lykin: thank youAshcroft Burnham: Thank you very much :-)

Spring into Life Fashion Show

In Memoriam: Stick Bellman

King Kong lives !!!

What is it?

Van Gogh goes 3d

Playboy coming to SL !!!

Now Available on SL-Newspaper :

Wonderfull Artist : SanityInn Wind

Adrenaline rushes ...

Madame Mathy's 'Cabinete de Clairvoyancy'

by Miralee Munro

THE IDEA OF HAVING YOUR FORTUNE READ is an intriguing one, but far more so when there is every chance you will learn about your Second Life, as well as your RL. Avatar readings are a relatively new concept, but the opportunity is now being offered by French clairvoyant, Madame Candice Mathy of Normandie, France. Regular readers will know that SL Newspaper columnist, Natalie Niven is one of Madame Mathy's delighted clientele. (Apparently Natalie was given some very promising news in the romance department).Madame Mathy says she "fell head over heels in love" with SL when she arrived here in March 2007 and loves creating her own avatar, something she is very skilled at through her abilities as a stylist. Through a interpreter, Madame Mathy (who does not speak English), says she also enjoys helping people by doing the clairvoyant readings.I asked whose future is being revealed, the avatar's of the RL being? She replied that there was not much difference between the two, as it is the personality of a person which is being read and both the RL personality and the SL personality combine."Our personalities are the same," she explained. "It is more a feeling of things, and this, everyone will interpret differently. I speak rather, about what touches a person. It has to bring something of reality."Most importantly, Madame Mathy believes that SL offers people a good opportunity for their spirit to grow.I asked if the process of allowing your 'inner self' to be expressed so freely in SL made it more difficult for her to read people's 'other' life, since for most people the two are so completely different.But she reassured me that the two combined to make the complete personality, and that it had no impact on her ability to read for the person.Still, there was still some resistance from some people to the idea of clairvoyant readings. "It is never easy to open to somebody," she pointed out. "Whether it is the reality of SL or RL. People can be somewhat uneasy, but I find they speak openly with me.""Clairvoyance is a metiér I adore," she enthused. "I became aware of my abilities when I was an adolescent, but did not use my abilities then."With eight years experience in clairvoyance, Madame Mathy uses gypsy 'belote' cards in her readings, charging 100L per question.She says she has been able to help people in many ways - from predicting a proposal of marriage, advising of gifts to come, warning of a fraud to such simple events as "a surprise feté or de soirée romantique".If you plan to visit Madame Mathy in her 'Cabinete de Clairvoyancy', try and arrange an interpreter if you do not speak French.by Miralee Munro

Thursday, May 31, 2007

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Monday, May 28, 2007

Sunday, May 27, 2007

Saturday, May 26, 2007

Friday, May 25, 2007

Thursday, May 24, 2007

Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Monday, May 21, 2007

Sunday, May 20, 2007

Saturday, May 19, 2007

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

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