ExigencyDon’t get me wrong: I think SecondLife is a forward-thinking, innovative online writing laboratory. But that doesn’t mean it couldn’t be improved, and it starts, at least to me, with SL's infrastructure and ethos.
At MSU, our online writing center is open to anyone: distance learners, residential students, people who can’t get appointments otherwise, etc. But, I think its core audience -- at least theoretically, at one time -- was distance learners, people studying from afar, often times non-traditional students. Folks working on their Masters of Social Work while working full-time, for example. The picture above is the outside of our Writing Center which is managed by folks outside of Michigan State University. Our center is located on an Island.
SecondLife, as I’ve mentioned has a lot of affordances: see-ability, hear-ability, movability, malleability, etc. But, SecondLife isn’t first and foremost an educational software. Rather, it was an online community/game interface molded to meet the needs of educational situations. Of course, this doesn’t inherently rule it out. But I do think the sort of after-the-fact way that the education-SecondLife marriage came to be does yield some shortcomings. It’s for this reason, I’d like to theorize a SecondLife alternative for synchonrous, identity rich, multi-modal consultation-style learning.
Monies and castes
Second Life’s a weird animal. It’s got its own economy (the currency is called Lindens and actually corresponds to real money). It’s got its own political structure. There are people who build and lease spaces and who set rules and parameters, effectively creating a caste. If you’re like MSU, you’re subject to this caste system and are forced to lease your space under someone else’s rules. Even individual avatars have to wade through Linden’s economy: though some things are free, many items used to personalize your appearance cost money, meaning that identity-creation ain’t free (go to marketplace.secondlife.com at your discretion as there are some strange accoutrement on SL).
Also, as I previously mentioned, in order to even gain access to the MSU Writing Center on SL, you’ve got to be approved (tagged) by one of our landlords, a sort of SecondLife knighting. Though this is a simple and fairly innocuous process, it’s still time consuming. Taken as a whole, these elements might deter a writer from seeking consultation with us, which, I’d guess is especially true for people unfamiliar with gaming culture and SecondLife-esque programs (possibly a large segment of our target demographic).
My proposal
I think there’d be some utility in creating a web-based, non-downloadable space where writers can go, easily access and manipulate an avatar, and talk about their writing. In this way, the application would maintain the perks of SecondLife (quasi-embodiment in the form of an avatar, synchronous communication, multi-modality {text, sound motion, etc.}. By removing some of the gatekeeping mechanisms (getting tagged, paying for stuff, etc.), this application might be more approachable for leery writers. Since writing is such a deeply personal process and seeking help can be a tough decision, we shouldn’t make it any more difficult than it has to be. The screen-capture above shows the red-tape associated with SL. Because we're not in control of our space, we're told where we can and cannot go.
Not to get greedy, but it’d also be useful to have a Convore-esque chat feature that allows chats to persist and writers to continually access topics of conversation. Likewise, a voice recorder might be nice so audio conversations could persist for later access (or a voice-to-text recognition software that allows for a “log” of what transpired in a given session). I think such additions could be beneficial for both writer and teacher. The writer obviously benefits from a record of questions and answers, but the teacher can benefit from the ability to reflect and retrace. As of now, conversations in SecondLife are fairly ephemeral, sticking around only for a few minutes.
I am sure this is a coding and programming nightmare and it’s awfully idealist, but I think building off the strong foundation SecondLife has laid would be useful in opening up the Writing Center to people from afar.
I’ll keep thinking about this and edit/elaborate as the week progresses and this concept marinates a little.
Interesting post, your comment on dealing with the issues created by the "after-the-fact way that the education-SecondLife marriage came to be" seems to tie directly into the Bill's post about "the technical code."
ReplyDeleteYou also mention that the inconveniences of the current SecondLife writing center might be deterring a large portion of your target demographic from actually taking advantage of this resource. From your description, it sounds like this could be a distinct possibility. It might be interesting to explore this theory by conducting some sort of survey to determine how these non-traditional students perceive the current program and whether it's inconveniences outweigh the potential benefits.
Nice observation Cait! With software, the technical code and the actual code that constitutes the technical artifact can meaningfully coincide.
ReplyDeleteDave Sheridan - once the Director of the very WC where you work, Mike - and I along with some others here at WIDE have been working on a project that includes some features like this. I really like the concept you sketch, though, Mike, of a "synchonrous, identity rich, multi-modal consultation-style learning" It retains key features of the WC model while recruiting the affordances of a persistent online world like SL.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading your proposed improvements on some of SL affordances, and how this can facilitate learning esp. for distance learners.A social work student was sharing with me how the movability affordance you mention becomes a limitation when you cannot have your avatar sit down when you want it to(I have experienced this frustration myself).The teleporting affordance isn't fun either. Your post also made me make connection with Alan Costall's article when he talks about access to affordances. He talks about how objects(including technologies like SL)are "maintained" and "policed" by others and thus limiting access by certain people. He also notes that the access issue is related to ownership issues, yet people tend to ignore discussing this aspect when they talk about affordances. (*We should talk about the politics of SL someday).Like you say, SL is great resource not only to distance learners but also for clients and consultants with introvert personalities who would rather IM about assignments/papers than have a f2f dialogue.
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