Artificial Boy

Life 2.0 Cover

The real world of Second Life What are we to make of an adult man who leads an online life in which his avatar is an 11-year-old girl? Inhabitants of Second Life, the online virtual world where this man/girl hangs out, are not troubled by such questions. The ability to explore alternative identities is what attracts many people there in the first place. For the rest of us, we can find some answers in Life 2.0, a carefully-produced documentary about the real physical lives of Second Lifers.

As for why an adult man would want a school-aged girl for an alter-ego – I’m still not sure. But the man that actually created one? Well, he suddenly doesn’t seem quite so odd.

Kids5B exhibit Kid Bloggers of SL – by Koffeekid Smalls, Alton Icarus (55, 141, 23). Koffekid made a tribute to the Kid-friendly bloggers of SL.

As always, you can check out Adz Childs’ Shared Items which often has links to articles that are interesting to our community. However, today inspired by the Kid Bloggers of SL exhibit I have decided to share a new Google Reader feed entitled “Kid’s Blogs“.

The feeds comprising it are hand-selected by me, but the individual posts are not. Here you will see all of the kid blogs I visit daily. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do. Maybe you will add some of them to you own news aggregators. Of course, Artificial Boy RSS feed is in there too. Which is kinda spooky.

Kids5B exhibit Our Stories – Why We Became Child Avatars by Taiven Janick and Sage Kostenbaum and contributors, Alton Icarus (72, 98, 24). My story is there, as is David’s, and Sokmunky’s, and many others. There were some kids there who I hadn’t met yet, but I read them all anyway. The stories are sometimes both amusing, describing the well of creative energy tapped simply by changing shape, and sad, bringing up real life child abuse. Many are emotionally powerful. One story was so awesome, and accurate, and touching, and said it all so perfectly, I IMed the author and made a new friend. I don’t want to say who it is without permission. Visit the exhibit to read for yourself.

David and I went on the Childhood Dreams Dome, Loki’s official submission to Second Life 5th Birthday/Anniversary (SL5B) on behalf of the Second Life group, Second Life Children. Read the rest…

Kids5B exhibit Aspen Nights, Alton Icarus (54, 43, 24) Today at Kids5B I went to DJ Austin’s Rock Show at the reduced-size (kiddie) version of Aspen Nights, where we celebrated Tomas Gandini’s rezday! Read the rest…

Kids5B exhibit Starry Nap by David Thurman, Alton Icarus (49, 68, 24)
If you wear yourself out coloring, painting, and making stuff out of clay, right next to the craft center is my brother David’s Starry Nap Room, inspired by Le Petit Prince. Just walk through the wall behind the Craft Center to see the exhibit, and you can take a cuddly nap on a big yellow star. David says that Sok plans to do a story reading in here. Read the rest…

Kids5B exhibit Art Center by Adz Childs, Alton Icarus (49, 90,23)
This is an art center designed after art classrooms found in elementary school, or activity centers found at summer camp. I created this exhibit because one of my favorite things to do is color and create things used for coloring. My new brother David must like it too, because one of his first creations is an easel which he calls ‘caballete dibujo’. I put it out on display too. Read the rest…

Kids5B exhibit The RanDom Family Gallery by Adz Childs and David Thurman
Remedy II (199, 148, 24), Kids5B, JUNE 23 – JULY 7, 2008.
Photos of Random Family, selected items from their home. Read the rest…

Update:
I contributed to SL4B. I made some decorations for the bridges and roads in all of the regions, and helped a tiny bit with Camp Duck Itch. I wasn’t planning on contributing much this year but I planned to see if the SLC build needed any help as the deadline grew closer (thats what i do). But, there’s no point in staying in the builders group now.
[18:13] Second Life: You have left the group ‘SL Birthday Exhibitors’.

Updated with more links:

Ruslan Laryukov – Second-Class Citizens

I find it regrettable that LL has decided to snub three of its more significant and loyal constituencies by excluding them from SL5B: kid avis, gor and bdsm. -Ruslan

JIRA – MISC-1231 -Missing Cultures & Communities from SL5B

The following communities are said to be missing from what was described as: ‘Celebrating the cultural diversity of Second Life’: ‘Who do you hang around with in Second Life? What are your communities’ traditions and signature characteristics? Are you proud of your sexy blue fur? Your excruciatingly detailed tea ceremony? Your murky environments? Your sculptures? The help you’ve given to others?’ -Vint Falken

Rai Fargis – The “SL5B” PR Desaster

Dusan Writer – Lock Up Your Kids, Tie Up Your Kajira, It’s Time to Celebrate

So, sure, you can come aboard, and you can lock up your private island and keep the weirdos out – OR, you can come aboard and realize that this is the flowering of something different. If you want safe and sanitized go to There.com or sponsor some furniture in the Sims – but you’d better realize that this IS the Wild West, and it’s that way for a reason – because THIS is the frontier, this is where the great ideas are arising, this is where the creative classes, the prosumers and the hackers, the griefers and the savants are mashing up the future, and if you want some sort of hint of how the future’s going to unfold you’d better at least suck it up and have a look around. -Dusan Writer

Ordinal Malaprop – A Restriction of the Youth

The recent clarification that Child-Like Avatars will be permitted attend, but not exhibit, makes the situation even more ridiculous. Clearly the Prurient will take this as confirmation that the Laboratory is quite happy to promote all of the things in their imaginings, and it will simultaneously serve to confirm to the Childrenish concerned that they are not considered worthwhile, and in the category of the Second Class in Second Life. -Ordinal Malaprop

firstlifeisfullofcrap – The Fake Children

And every culture is being given the opportunity to showcase what they’ve done, what they will do, and what their vision is for tomorrow. Without limitation. Without sanitization. Without scrubbing. Without censorship. Except one. And I don’t think that’s right -Crap Mariner

danielregenbogen – Update on SL5B

SLC – Still More (A clarification)

Robin Linden has indicated that child avatars are allowed and welcome as attendees – this is simply affecting whether child avatars can be contributors.

SLC – More on SL5B

…This decision was made thanks to people like United States Representative Mark Kirk who are on a misguided quest to keep real life kids off an adult only service by penalizing a company already making steps to keep real life kids off the system… -Marianne McCann

Massively – Calling all cultures? Not any more

…Linden Lab (according to staff) is apparently afraid of the whole of Second Life being shut down at a legal level if it should show any implicit support of — well, an activity that mental health professionals tell us we should be trying to find ways to do more of…Childlike play, and reliving our respective youths in positive and nourishing ways… -Tateru Nino

danielregenbogen – LL discriminates against the kids!

…This mail was forwarded to and answered by Robin Linden, who wrote me that kid avatars would be welcome as guests but not allowed to contribute to the showcase – because that wouldn’t be in the best interest of the event and Linden Lab. What a poor and cowardly decision! I don’t expect much more, but I answered her with this mail:… -Daniel Regenbogen

Jacek – [Rant] Intolerance

…Rampant violence? That’s fine. Hopscotch? My god, we have to put a stop to that!…-Jacek

According to a post in SLForums, child-shaped avatars are not the only self-identified community excluded from the event. [This has since been denied by Everett Linden in a comment on the Massively article]