This was a collaborative project to explore virtual news venues as a viable space for the evolution of journalism. As part of this project, Dancing Ink Productions created a newsroom in the virtual world of Second Life for the Kamal Adham Center for Journalism Training and Research at the American University in Cairo.  The project was directed by veteran American journalist Lawrence Pintak now Dean of the Murrow College at Washington State University who covered the Middle East for 30 years. It was funded by a grant from USAID.  The first tenants of the virtual newsroom were a group of eight Egyptian bloggers. Dancing Ink Productions reported on their efforts covering the 2008 US Presidential Campaign at Dispatches from the Imagination Age.

The virtual newsroom hosted a series of events, including a press conference with former US-Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy James K. Glassman; and a conference about coverage of the Swine Flu crisis with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  Documentary reports on those events are below. Broadcast quality machinima for all the events is produced in collaboration with Ill Clan Animation Studios.

Virtual Journalism: The CDC Discusses Swine Flu is a documentary about a May 16, 2009 event in the AUC Virtual Newsroom.

Documentary Premiere: The machinima documentary, “Virtual Journalism: Inside the American University in Cairo Virtual Newsroom,” exploring journalistic and cross-cultural impact and potential of the virtual newsroom project premiered on April 6, 2009 at the Washington State University’s Edward R. Murrow College of Communication conference on Virtual Journalism. That video, which was produced in collaboration with Ill Clan Animation Studios can be viewed below:

Inaugural Broadcast: On January 12, 2009 at 11 am EST, the Inaugural Broadcast of the American University in Cairo’s Virtual Newsroom (designed and produced by Dancing Ink Productions for The American University in Cairo with funding from USAID) took place in the virtual world of Second Life and was broadcast to a live global Internet audience produced in collaboration with Ill Clan Animation Studios. The live audience communicated in real-time chat with event participants and moderators in Second Life. The event was produced and hosted by Rita J. King, the CEO and Creative Director of Dancing Ink Productions, and Joshua S. Fouts, the Chief Global Strategist of Dancing Ink Productions and broadcast to the Internet by SLCN (videos below). The broadcast-quality machinima documentary produced by Dancing Ink Productions co-directed with Ill Clan Animation Studios features a moderated discussion about the transfer of power between US president administrations between Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs James K. Glassman (also a well-known journalist) and eight Egyptian political bloggers who covered the US election. The documentary depicts the event itself, as well as the reaction of Glassman, the bloggers and project director Lawrence Pintak, a veteran war correspondent and author who runs the American University in Cairo’s Kamal Adham Center for Journalism Training and Research. Read the press release from the American University of Cairo summarizing the event here.

Second Life avatar of then-US Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs James Glassman in the virtual newsroom of the American University in Cairo in Second Life.

Below are videos from the January 12 event:

Short Clip from the AUC Glassman Event

Full-length video of the 45 minute live event.

November 2008: Construction of the AUC Virtual Newsroom begins

Tweeting from a Prim using the new Second Life Viewer 2.0. Image credit: Ian Hughes (SL's ePredator Potato)

By Rita J. King

Today’s launch of the new Second Life Viewer 2.0 put the mainstream tech world on notice. Robert Scoble was wisely chosen as the one to interview Linden Lab CEO Mark Kingdon about the implications. The implications are vast–so much so that it’s almost impossible to tell where this will take those of us who have been in business in Second Life for years, as well as countless new users this will attract (Linden Lab is looking to increase active users by 40 percent to a million in 2010).

This isn’t just a new viewer, in the sense that it yields a new view and organizational framework on a pre-existing platform, but rather a massive extension of exciting new capabilities within the platform itself.

Second Life has never been more poised for mainstream success. This milestone has been a long time coming, but I’ve always believed that the day would arrive. I don’t view the new viewer as a Second Life for Second Life, because from my perspective, the space has been vibrant from the start and has only become more remarkable and impressive over time. But this is a new dimension.

The new viewer feels akin to seeing that first glimpse of the earth from the moon. Not necessarily the way an astronaut feels it, from space, but from the perspective of a human being who nevertheless shares in the mixed media gathered over time and gains immeasurably from the new visions it creates when shared and experienced. The ability to embed mixed media within the basic fundamental building blocks of user-created content, known as prims, is revolutionary. Among other benefits, that’s the new viewer’s major headline.

Story is the beam that unifies people during a particular time and place and gives our collective symbols meaning. The new viewer is a door that opens into a deeper form of storytelling, one that contains the possibility of successful collaboration in the face of looming global transformation. Story is at the core of every strong brand, movement and life.

Immersion within such environments will create unprecedented opportunities for the development of business and education as training and simulation expand significantly into the medium–for real world benefit.

Thank you, Linden lab, for developing this amazing new capacity to collaborate, create, document and innovate in an entirely new dimension!

Cone of Obliscance via MJT.

By Joshua S. Fouts.

Irving Wladawsky-Berger has a thought-provoking blog post nominally titled, “Gender-based Differences in Behavior,” but its really a think piece on the economic collapse, autism, empathy and systems.

One of the many themes we’ve been exploring in our work at DIP is the intersection at which the transformation of a new global culture and economy and cultural systems meet. We’ve found virtual worlds to be a powerful venue for studying this intersection: By removing the physicality of human interaction, but still preserving the physical appearance of interaction, we are able to have experiences that are meaningful but not encumbered by the physical limitations. Limitations could be physical violence at one extreme but include a wide range of lesser discomforts, such as intimidation and fear of sharing intimate or controversial thoughts.

Irving’s essay touches on an issue that is near to our work: The neuroscience of gender and how it affects our relationship with systems. Irving highlights the work of Simon Baron-Cohen (the cousin of another well-known Baron-Cohen):

Perhaps the best work I have come across in understanding gender-based behavioral differences is being done by Simon Baron-Cohen, Professor of Developmental Psychopathology and Director of the Autism Research Center at the University of Cambridge. As part of his research into the causes and treatment of autism, Professor Baron-Cohen has been investigating why autism spectrum disorders occur far more frequently in males than females. Since my own son suffers from autism, this large gender difference is something I have personally observed through the years.

To help him gain insights into the mystery of autism, Baron-Cohen has been asking whether there are essential differences between the male and female brain. His research has led him to the theory that “the female brain is predominantly hard-wired for empathy, and that the male brain is predominantly hard-wired for understanding and building systems. I call it the empathising-systemising (E-S) theory.”

From early on virtual worlds like Second Life have been used as both a form of therapy and a safe area for interaction for people with autism. In some ways the linear nature of the systems that virtual worlds provide — that is, devoid of the physical — makes it more manageable for the autistic mind. Autism as an enigmatic manifestation of the human condition sheds insight into who we are and how we work. Our work exploring cultural pressure points through virtual worlds have given us greater insight into how it is that people can meet each other where we are. Irving’s essay moves us one step closer toward framing and addressing these questions. Take a look.

"What is real life" Image credit: Rita J. King

One year ago after a powerful few days in Doha, followed by some mind-expanding discourse with Metaverse Evangelists Ian Hughes and Rob Smart, DIP sat down and wrote Our Vision for Sustainable Culture in the Imagination Age. The motivation was simple: Virtual Worlds were changing the face of the art and culture around the world. We were viscerally moved at the authentic movements toward self-expression and identity that we found, especially in the virtual world of Second Life. We were delighted to have the opportunity to pursue a project that illuminated this. The moment of transformation was and still is in its infancy, but it was maturing in a way that we saw vividly across a tapestry of continents and culture. We set a course to chronicle it.

The New York Times Magazine has an excellent article this weekend that paints the picture of the evolving landscape of art and culture cast through the prism of virtual worlds. In “Portrait of an artist as an Avatar,” Sara Corbett tells the story of Second Life’s Filthy Fluno, the physical world artist Jeff Lipsky. The story is a delightful, organic tale that is best read from start to finish. I particularly enjoyed this line:

Is it possible that by simulating an edgy, superconfident art star that you, too, could become one?Is it possible that a guy like Filthy Fluno, by leaning forward into the virtual world, is slowly tugging Jeffrey Lipsky — who says the value of his artwork has more than quadrupled since Filthy entered his life — closer to the same set of dreams?

The article references the Second Life Community Convention. DIP sponsored a panel there that featured two of our collaborators, Ill Clan Animation and Starr Sonic of SLCN.tv, Second Life’s web streaming network. We were thrilled to see the Second Life community and one of its most interesting members getting a level of attention it deserves.

Digital Diplomacy, January 2009

Findings from Understanding Islam through Virtual Worlds Project
“Elevating humanity’s most distinguishing feature: the imagination.”

February 2, 2009 — After a year of research across the Internet and four continents, Dancing Ink Productions’ Rita J. King and Joshua S. Fouts, senior fellows at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs, have released the findings from the Understanding Islam through Virtual Worlds project. The project was funded by a grant from the Richard Lounsbery Foundation.

The findings include a trilogy of actionable reports including policy recommendations on the potential use of virtual worlds for public diplomacy to be submitted to the Obama Administration; a mini broadcast quality documentary produced in collaboration with Ill Clan Animation Studios; and a graphic book chronicling the journey. By releasing three versions of the report Fouts and King hope to make accessible what is still a very new medium. Digital versions of the findings can be found here.

“With this report, Josh and Rita have illuminated a new path–a definite intelligible plan–for practical public diplomacy in an area of supreme urgency. Furthermore, they have done so by elevating humanity’s most distinguishing feature: the imagination,” said Joel Rosenthal, President of the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs.

The idea for Understanding Islam through Virtual Worlds project was hatched with a very specific idea in mind: How could people learn about other cultures in an authentic, experiential space — specifically, how could they learn about cultures that self-identified as Muslim? King and Fouts chose Second Life for many reasons, among them that it is the best international platform — more than 70% of its users are from outside the United States. Their goal was to to see what they could learn about Islam — not by inviting particular people with particular perspectives into Second Life, but rather to follow the trail of what was already happening culturally in the space that might yield new insight about Islam.

“Belief systems overlap now in ways that would have been unthinkable millennia ago when many of the conflicting ideas still governing human behavior today were created, but immersive virtual environments offer the perfect medium for assessment of concepts of self and community,” Rita J. King told the audience at the Carnegie Council. “It is not just a good medium, passable amid a sea of other equally effective options. It is the perfect medium, at least as an initial training ground to teach the digital culture how to engage in difficult and sensitive conversations involving real-world challenges in the complete absence of any possibility of physical violence or even any trace of intimidation. Additionally, virtual environments offer a deeper level of candor, which is necessary for true understanding.”

“Earlier this week, President Barack Obama launched the first public diplomacy campaign of his presidency by granting his first international interview to a non-US satellite television news station, Al Arabiya,” said Joshua S. Fouts in his January 29, 2009 remarks at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs. “In doing this he effectively went over the leaders of the Middle East and spoke to the people. ‘All too often,’ President Obama said, ‘the United States starts by dictating … so let’s listen.’”

This project at its foundation is about storytelling which is about understanding something new about the human condition. Public Diplomacy, Cultural Diplomacy or Strategic Communication as it is also known, are efforts by governments, NGOs, and civil societies to tell their story to foreign publics. Too often public diplomacy is criticized for being too preachy and not listening. With this project, Fouts and King listened to, and documented the narratives of, people from all over the physical world who either practice Islam, or want to further understand those who do.

Digital copies of all of the Understanding Islam through Virtual Worlds reports can be downloaded here.

For more information, see DIP’s Dispatches from the Imagination Age and the Dancing Ink Productions homepage.