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The Amputee Virtual Support System in Second Life

Prisqua — Sat, 22 May 2010 07:45:55 +0000

The Telemedicine and Advanced Technology Research Center has an interesting new rehabilitation project in Second Life’s virtual world called “AVESS” (Amputee Virtual Environment Support Space). Soldiers abroad who find themselves an amputee typically spend weeks or months in rehab afterwards, away from their friends and family back home. Then when they do return home, they find themselves isolated from their support system of therapists, psychologists, and friends. The in-world AVESS attempts to allow these soldiers to interact with their family Virtually, and then attend presentations and group activities inworld once they return home.

When wounded warriors return home, they face long term care and recovery, often isolated from their family.

TATRC is now developing the Amputee Virtual Environment Support Space on the Second Life Enterprise platform as a virtual clinic where amputees, their families and healthcare providers connect to supplement care and improve the quality of life of patients.

Currently available inworld as a test proof-of-concept, DOD requirements will put the official version in the SL Enterprise space (behind DOD firewalls and security controls). Overall, it looks amazing and powerful, if it catches on.

[Source]

And life goes on to Agina Island

Prisqua — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 13:41:35 +0000

Like in real life, people come and go on Second Life.
The club was keeping both Saki and I very busy. Saki and I were hosting parties everyday at the club with different djs and that did not leave us time to do much of anything else. But it was also also a good opportunity to meet new people and for new friendships like Ninoo and his girlfriend Meea. Ninoo was a dj and started dj’ing at the club on New Years day. Life on Second Life is pretty much the same as in real life… lots of disappointments, bitching, cheating, people breaking up and moving on to something -or someone else…

Depending on how you play the game and some people do not like to call Second Life a game, but this is a world that can be emotionally draining. Some people sees SL as just a bunch of pixels and could not care less about anyone or anything, others have a real second life on there which can affect their real life.
JAG sees SL as just a game and a bunch of pixels. I am attached to my avatar and the other avatars sharing my Second Life.
JAG is in the USA and I am in Australia. Though we talk on the phone everyday nearly 24/7, it was quite interesting to be together on Second Life.
But our biggest disagreement happened on Second Life and he decided to move out the house leaving me hurt. We could not resolve the issue and I decided that I did not want him in my Second Life at all so banned him from the club and the house to which most people could not understand and hated me for it too.
Real life is real life and Second Life is Second Life so try to keep the two separated sometimes is complicated. And people were judging my and could not understand why i would do that but they had no idea what was really going on between JAG and I.
Anyway, Saki and I were offered a better deal for land and decided to settle for a new home behind the club. So I put my land on Costa Rica for sale L$27,000.
On Costa Rica, tiers are due and payable on the first. If you are late, you get charged a late payment fee of L$1000!!! And it is all automatic, you cant avoid it! Tiers are also non-refundable and i had just paid my tier. I put a higher price because first I wanted to get my money back – bought the land for L24,000 and a bit of the tier I already paid. There is no freebie on Costa Rica. and i thought putting it higher was better just in case I had to negotiate the price. Within 48hrs it was sold and without having to negotiate anything.
The weird part was JAG and I finally talked on Second Life on that now empty lot just a few hours before it was sold. My first land, my first home, my first friends…

My first house

Prisqua — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 14:12:20 +0000

I joined Second Life® sometime in 2006. At the time I was heavily involved with Internet Marketing. An ebook came out about Second Life® explaining why it was good to join on a marketing point of view. I knew about Second Life but never really checked it out but decided to buy the ebook, read it and joined. At the same time I was also an avid player of the Sims 2. So the first thing that got me was the graphic, the way avatars moved on Second life, the way they acted… when you direct them to do something their arm stands in the air… I think I was way comparing it to the Sims 2 I suppose. I looked around for a few days, and even though I had read the ebook, I could not really understand what Second Life® was about and never returned.

Never returned until mid-2008. Someone on Plurk had a “land” for sale and was asking if anyone from Plurk was on Second Life®. So decided to go and meet that guy in-world. He explained about the “land” and what he was doing on SL™ but that was not enough to make me stick around.

Another few months passed and another friend of mine tried to get me back into SL™. I have to admit going there with somebody you know, makes it way easier. Then I met other real life people who were heavily involved on SL™ and had been there since the beginning so this time around I got intrigued.

The first thing was to make my avatar not act like a mad woman! So Prisqua Newall was re-born looking good as an avatar lol
Then I decided to set up a home and went shopping around.

You can be on Second Life® for free as joining is free and you don’t have to have a home and you don’t have to spend a cent. But I liked the idea of having a home and decorating it.

So you can go out and buy a parcel of land. The parcel may have a price tag if you chose a very popular region and some you may buy for L$1. Then you have to pay a tier every month or call it rent but you have to pay a monthly fee every month, that cannot be avoided. Price are calculated based on the sq.m or prims allocated to the parcels. Hard to explain the prims, but this is the most important part for some: the number of prims which basically define how many objects you can place on your parcel.

I spent about a week looking around and finally decided to settle on Costa Rica and build my first home.