3pointD.com

Live theatre has been a bit of a dead issue in the virtual world of Second Life until now. Occasional projects come and go, but nothing of any scale seems to get off the ground — perhaps because of the difficulty of operating avatars and “listening” to a performance in chat. Reuben Steiger’s virtual world services company Millions of Us is determined to see it done, however, and is holding an evening of live theatre tonight in the Millions of Us sim. Rather than produce its own plays, though, Millions has issued a challenge to SL residents — complete with cash prizes — to create plays they can perform live at the New Globe Theatre this evening.

The performances will begin at 6pm SL time, though there’s apparently been only one full scale entrant so far. “From the Shadows” was written by SL resident Enjah Mysterio, and features a cast including Eilen McTeague, Lucipher Baphomet, Selador Cellardoor and Ida Keen. The performance will be directed by Osprey Thereian, who also designed the sets. [UPDATE: Reuben has posted a video of a portion of the production on YouTube, complete with voice added in. Check it out.] (more…)

Aaron Delwiche of San Antonio’s Trinity University and the Terra Nova blog posts the news that the next State of Play conference will be held January 7-9 in Singapore. “We are convening thought leaders from Asia, Europe, Africa and the Americas to engage in a lively discussion about the unique regulatory and cross-cultural challenges posed by the growth of transnational virtual worlds.” It’s an interesting choice of location for what’s probably the most forward-thinking conference on virtual worlds. Asia has more virtual world “residents” than any other region of the world, and has seen a number of legal decision handed down that treat virtual worlds more like real places — with real property laws — than any in the West. Singapore will be tough to get to for many Western-Hemisphere VW pundits, but it also opens the dialogue to people we haven’t heard that much from on te other side of the world. (more…)