August 2007 on -empyre- *The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: Being in Second Life *

Join us at -empyre- < http://www.subtle.net/empyre> in August 2007
for:

*The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: Being in Second Life *

when hostess Melinda Rackham is joined by special guests: Annabeth
Robinson, Patrick Lichty, Stephan Doesinger, Dr Ricardo Peach Christy
Dena, Kathy Cleland, Adam Nash and Dr Fabio Zambetta


Neal Stephenson's Metaverse reigns supreme. One of it's current
incarnations- the multi-user virtual universe Second Life claims a
population of 8 million avatars. SL is embraced by many as an
innovative and safe fantasy scape - enabling play, creativity,
education, companionship, love and lust. It is reviled by some as a
cesspit of antisocial isolationist addictive behavior; and SL is
dismissed by others as simply an over-inflated hype driven commercial
venture expounding the values of property acquisition and commodity
exchange. Whatever your perspective, SL is serious business with an
exchange rate which fluctuates against the $US and an estimated
Second Life avatar electricity consumption equivalent to the average
citizen of Brazil. In this seemingly infinitely expandable universe
aesthetic endeavors, creative constructions and artistic performances
are enacted daily.



—> Annabeth Robinson (UK) is a Second Life Artist focusing on
interactive and sound driven projects, Metaverse consultant and Sim
builder, Lecturer - Design for Digital Media at Leeds College of Art
and Design. aka AngryBeth Shortbread http://www.annamorphic.co.uk/

—> Patrick Lichty (US) is a technologically-based conceptual
artist, writer,independent curator, co-founder of the Second Life
based performance art group, Second Front, animator for the The Yes
Men, and Executive Editor of Intelligent Agent Magazine. http://
www.voyd.com/voyd/

—> Stephan Doesinger (Austria) is a conceptual artist and
architect. His second book "Learning from Sim City," will be
published in September. He initiated Bastard Spaces the 1st Annual
Architecture and Design Competition in SL to be announced at Ars
Elctronica. aka Doesi Beck http://www.doesinger.com/ http://www.sl-
award.com

—> Dr Ricardo Peach (AU) is the Program Manager for the Inter-Arts
Office at the Australia Council for the Arts, which is funding a SL
residency. Born in Volksrust, Mpumalanga in 1968, he and his family
migrated to Perth, Australia in 1980. aka Ricardo Paravane http://
www.ozco.gov.au/grants/grants_new_media_arts/second_life_artist_resid
ency/

—> Christy Dena (AU) is researching changes to art and
entertainment in the age of cross-media production for her PhD at the
University of Sydney. Dena works as an industry strategist, mentor,
educator and journalist. aka Lythe Witte http://www.christydena.com/
http://www.lythewitte.net/

—> Dr Fabio Zambetta (AU) lectures at School of Computer Science
and Information Technology at RMIT University Melbourne and
researcher in the area of 3D embodied conversational agents, 3D
virtual environments, and interactive storytelling. aka Fabio
Forcella http://goanna.cs.rmit.edu.au/~fabio/projects/

—> Kathy Cleland (AU) is a writer, curator and lecturer in the
Digital Cultures Program at The University of Sydney and is currently
completing her PhD investigating avatars, digital portraiture and
representations of the self in virtual environments. aka Bella
Bouchard http://www.arts.usyd.edu.au/departs/digitalcultures/?
page=staff&id=katclela

—> Adam Nash (AU) is a media artist, composer, programmer,
performer and writer who works in networked real-time 3D spaces,
exploring them as live audiovisual performance spaces. His work has
been presented at SIGGRAPH, ISEA, and the Venice Biennale. aka Adam
Ramona http://yamanakanash.net/

—> Dr Melinda Rackham (AU) is the Executive Director of ANAT -
Australia's peak body for artists working with emerging technologies.
Her Ph.D. explored the nature and construction of avatars and multi-
user Virtual Reality Spaces. aka Marina Regina http://www.subtle.net

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