When I first joined BlogHer I thought “Wouldn’t it be wonderful to go to a Blogher conference!” Chicago is a long way from Australia for a 3 day conference. So imagine my delight when I discovered I could attend this in Second Life(SL).

This meant becoming a member of Second Life. It also meant becoming part of a virtual world. This is not just sign in and log on and all will be okay.

First I had to choose a first name that matched one of the surnames on offer. I tried many names before I came up with Abundita Jewell. I then had to get dressed and I had some funny experiences, Donna a true SL fanatic who teaches in SL, gave me some clothes and by the time I registered for the opening cocktail party on Thursday night I looked presentable.

I didn’t have the wardrobe of Queen Tureaud, who during the week had been inducting us newbie Bloghers into SL. Practicing walking was one of the tasks: yes you have to learn to walk, run, turn and sit. I can now walk, run, fly and sit and I even went dancing – that was fun. As you can see from the snapshots, I am the one with the bright red pony tail which someone gave me. I have yet to learn to face the front. I want to see what I really look like from the front. I know I have long eyelashes – got a glimpse of those. I was having a challenge with my skin at one point – I was all purple until I was given skin. It is truly another world.

So what does this have to do with blogging and business, you might ask?

Firstly, I think the most amazing this, that without even leaving the comfort of my home. I was able to participate in a conference thousand of miles away. I sat in a chair, listened, was able to ask questions of the panel meet fellow Bloghers. I found this was so exciting.

This is the cutting edge of what may be the future of cyberspace. I even got up on my one sleep-in morning, Sunday, to log into the session on Second Life Real Business Brilliant or Bust.

You can listen to these sessions at http://slcn.tv

This is a snapshot of the opening session. It does look like a real life session, you can go to Blogher to see what the whole program was for both RL (Real Life), and Sl (Second Life).

Combining blogging and Second Life: This was one of the sessions that I was most interested in. That meant I needed to stay up until the small hours of Saturday am – I stayed up for a while, but as in RL, in SL there are technical glitches and I couldn’t hear anything, so I went to bed and I listened to that session later. I discovered the next day I hadn’t learnt to drive all the SL controls 🙁

Now to blogging and SL, as outlined in the BlogHer SL program:

More and more bloggers are entering this virtual world to connect with community, chronicle their second life, and gain more readers. Residents are leaping out of their comments and into avatars to have full blown discussions on their blog topics in real time. How does blogging and second life interact and what’s next? Discussion moderated by BlogHer in Second Life hostess Erin Kotecki Vest (aka Queen Tureaud) who has used Second Life as an extension of Queen of Spain Blog, with panelists Vint Falken – who blogs about Second Life, Second Life podcaster and blogger TheDiva Rockin and Koz Farina, the creator of the second life blogHUD, which allows you to blog FROM Second Life.

I had had RL contact with Vint as she had left a message on my blog. Vint lives in Sl and her blog is predominantly about SL. The Diva Rockin has a personality blog plus The Fashion Police where she and her reporters scour SL for stories. She sees RL and SL as a parallel. Koz Farina of podcast.com produces tools that we bloggers can use in SL. They are called Bloghuds and for the mobileheads he is now doing mobods. Beyond me. It is great, I imagine those of you with 10 year olds plus or minus 🙂 will learn very quickly.

I like the idea that I can have a blog in SL that I can relate to my RL blog.

You can have a feed in SL, that as in RL will take you to a RL feed..

Second Life Real Business Brilliant or Bust

This was a great session about how business is using SL. I felt this was relevant to bloggers. The session was full of information and the link to listen is at the end of this post. I took pages of notes which i will write up as an article. This was the outline:

Bloggers and major corporations are making waves in Second Life. Some are even making real money from virtual transactions – can you do it too? How creative do you have to be and how do you get in on this new industry? Are major companies just wasting their time or is there real business being done? Moderated by branding expert Nina Burokas our panel is filled with SL business mavens including Jeanette Gibson, Cisco System’s lead in new media communications and Linda Zimmer from MarCom:Interactive, Jody Devere aka Patty Streeter of AskPatty.com, and blogger and SL small business owner Daisy Beauchamp!

Highlights I saw were:

• SL has great potential for business. Cisco has embraced this in a very innovative way.
• SL was described as being like blogs on steroids – interesting for us bloggers?
• It’s a go, even though what you might read in the press says otherwise.It is like the early days of the Internet. It is like the wild west: a new Frontier.
• Potential to combine RL and Sl as Askpatty.com does. Head to her site to view you tube videos of Blogher. I like what she had to say about her potential customers: Power Internet Women Users, also women who are passionate about cars. You can visit her site in SL, build and race a car of your dreams.
• Potential for Family gatherings-This I believe is HUGE.
• The potential for people to tap their creativitiy.
• It’s all about collaboration.

The hows and whys of each person and how they came to SL was very varied.

So where do I stand after this brief intro to SL. Would I participate?

Yes. I would like to have a bloghud and maybe even have some art on Askpatty.com office walls.

If you like new frontiers, explore for yourself.

Abundita heading to the nightclub

If you want to know more check out these links.

Candidates SL Good Bad and Indifferent

Second Life Real Business Brilliant or Bust

SL Covering Virtual World

Blogging and Second Life