Boom Pearls –

JP: I agree with you, it is very hard to read the invitation and get a taste for it and then create an account and get an avatar, and then download the program, install it and then ..

Yes we should do much to enter, so it is probably most your friends and people who are present in Second Life that will see it. But we can say that the website is working very well, to give the impression of what it is. I would like to see Tommy Støckel’s project, and tried to create an account but I couldn’t do it. The material was presented on the website, and gave me the urge to see more. So it acts as a port into the place. The problem is that there are still those technical hurdles.

It works okay once you have entered? But when you get in it’s difficult to get others to do the same because it actually requires a lot to do so. When they have set up the account, and is about to log in, it’s not certain that their computer works, if it does they must learn to navigate in a 3d space. And to get from one place to another.

Yes. One of my friends who had made an avatar couldn’t navigate in there. And then there are some who have started the creation process, but has not completed it.

I wonder whether it would work if we had accounts ready to use.

Yes that was what I thought, maybe you should try it with the next project. So you could jump on an identity. Compared to the exhibition, and if you want people to see it, then it will be easier if anyone can jump on. It is not the same as making a video of it and take it out, it is not the same experience you get. We have the experience of movement as we do here and that is the fun of it. Otherwise we could just do it on a blog or anywhere online. But the representation makes it interesting, that it’s not one-one, so there are some shifts, especially when you are present with a deputy at the same time. With a site and a video, it’s something you’re looking at, which is separate from you. Where in Second Life we are present in the same room, in the same representation or simulation of a room. So it’s mainly reports on the technical hurdles I have received as response, and only the one friend from the opening who knew Second Life in advance and therefore would like to come.

He thought it was quite funny. So did I, too. Because it was an imitation of a real preview, where one stands or drink beer, and not knows what to say and then do you say little. It’s the same predicament. Only sitting in separate rooms. You sat in Berlin, I sat on Amager and Niels på Nørrebro, he was just away from the computer shortly to shop. You walked in and out, and I was out and do some coffee, and then went in again. It was quite fun, splitted personality. I had the same feeling as when I’m at a preview. A little shy, slightly embarrassed. So I drink myself full of Free Beer! Fun though the beer didn’t have any effect, it’s just that it is there, it is a domestic thing. It belongs to the context. This is something we have taught us that it belongs to an opening, although we are only three people. And Antonia and Tommy logged in as they were about to get up in San Fransisco.
You can not see if there was anyone else in the area, will it be registered?

We could have done, but I was a little afraid of violating people’s privacy by recording them at a specific place without them knowing it. I don’t know if it is wrong.

It is a bit like talking on the phone, but it is a little more as a meeting, because you have a substitute. I hadn’t thought about it before. I have never played computer games and I’m not interested virtual reality. It means nothing to me. But it’s been a fun experience to see that it almost becomes a physical experience.

An understanding of physics, or a physical experience?

There is a very close parallel between a meeting there and in reality, to move around in there and move around here. But then there is no flavor in there. It is a very long time ago we agreed that I should do this project and I did not know how to address it. But then I worked on this poem. I was not really aware that I would focus on those senses that are not represented, it has more been something i felt. But sometimes you can also get something through a sensation. Because I didn’t know Second Life and the world at large, it has been an experimental project of a size that made it easier to detect how it works and what does not. I would not have dared to rush into making a huge project. I am not visual.

You are not used to deal with visual art or online art, so it would be a big leap to work with huge things?

But for me, as a poet, it has been a leap, it is very visual and has a different shape than when it’s only about working with words. Second Life has been a fun experiment. A place where you can try some things with low costs. If we really had to do a book down here on the beach, twenty meters high, it would have been difficult to do. Here you get an idea and you’re able to realize it relatively cost-free. In this way, there are no limitations.
I think it is interesting that this is a no-mans-land where nothing is given in advance, you can create what you want. And it has elements of something very recognizable. If you would you could make a copy of this location. It invites to add something. I am not used to work with visual form that way. But because you have the ability to combine audio, visual and text, it was easier to experiment than to do it in reality. When I did the staircase installation, I worked with a visual artist and constantly had to think of whether we illustrated each other’s things. It was very heavy and one to one. That’s how was back then, which it was not supposed to. But here where I’ve made it all, it’s my own fault. It was okay to do something I don’t do usually in 3d.
But how come you invited Seimi Nørregård and I?

It was because I wanted to work with someone who worked with different media and was interested in the transitions between different media. Both you and Seimi does that. There are a few persons who wouldn’t participate because they are not interested in Second Life and the visual, they don’t feel it relates to them. The extra place to experiment, perhaps relates more to those who are interested in transitions. They may have had other reasons, I can only guess.

I can recognize some of it. I have an instinctive scepticism towards gaming and Second Life, I can not really manage it. I wonder what this is now, is it something for geeks? Sorry! It is also one of the responses I have received, “what is that?” “Second Life, it thought it was dead.”

Yes. Because they have read it in some website, or heard a media declare it.

It is a kind of subculture. We also talked about this at the opening. Again, there were many parallels to Real Life. That it is a small audience, and here it is a place which has a limited audience. In principle, it is accessible to all. There are some users, who represents a very small percentage of the world’s population. I read somewhere that within the last month there were about 1.5 million who had logged on.

It has shifted between 40 and 80,000 active users who were logged on at the same. They were not at all at the same place.

No it is not jam packed.

This fits well with the title, Dessert Room.

How do you think curating is different from Real Life?

I almost get more power. But then again I also have less power. I work on the transition between Second Life and Real Life. It can mean I have more to say. There are not that many of the invited artists who can go in and do more than I can. Others need help and then I provide a contact to someone who can help or I do something myself. There has been some interesting situations because I am more or less central. It also gives me the opportunity to work closer to the process.

Yes, we have worked very closely together, in some manner, because of the technical limitations I had in the construction of the project, I  guess it is like that in some of the other projects because it is people who do not normally use Second Life.

It is an interesting problem if I am too close to the process. But I don’t think it’s that bad, because it is only some parts I get involved. This will also be an artistic project for me. Curated organization, to mark places suitable for art, investigate them as more or less interesting for the arts. Perhaps, I don’t value it so much, maybe I am also slightly critical of Second Life in some situations. It is not just me who is. I think probably it is a pretty good tool, because you can meet. While there are these difficulties we have talked about. First create an avatar and then there is a forgotten account. Then you enter and it is difficult to navigate. Then there are more people who forget their password. And again. It is quite funny things. That is just how it is. It is marking how problematic it is to get these things to work. It was the same with other software some years ago.

As a general thing. Today I created an account at TDC to buy music. I buy a number. Then it’s a format not supported by my system because I use Macintosh and I can not use the file, unless I choose a Windows operating system or get a plugin which can read the wmv format. That is all the time. This means that the benefit is difficult for me to use. It was the same when I wanted to have Internet banking. It took so long, because I always received password for Windows software, until they finally gave me an extra piece of hardware to make it more secure. Now it is a huge relief. It is a year since I got it. Before that I had to use machines in the street.

It is interesting that home banking is the reason why Danes are using computers and the Internet. My mother had it in’92 or’93, and after some years it made my father use the internet.

Yes it’s a great relief, but it has been an effort to make it work.