Second LIfe Diary #8

I'm trying to stop shopping quite so much for my apartment in SL, or for clothes — which is way more fun in SL than it is in real life, let me tell you — and actually explore more. So I decided to visit the Titanic which, in SL, is not resting on the bottom of the ocean but is comfortably docked and ready for tourists.


This is me (tiny me, way at the front) doing my best "I'm king of the world!" It kinda lacks something when the boat isn't actually moving.


And here I am, floating in the ship's pool. I probably should have brought my bathing suit.

Heh heh, you said "sticky"

I don't know why, probably because I'm testing the upper limits of stressed-outedness lately, but I thought this was funny.


I mean... really. Did they not know what the substance was? If you got close enough to know it was sticky, couldn't you identify it? And how wise it is to stick your finger in something — to determine its stickiness — if you don't know what it is? Ah, local reporting at its finest.

Slumdog, you got lucky

On first read, the blast-from-the-past news this week that the Oscars would, for the first time since 1944, feature 10 Best Picture nominees instead of the five we've become used to was disconcerting and a little dismaying. Will it mean an even more crowded holiday/award season release schedule? twice as much "for your consideration" advertising? a *shudder* six-hour awards telecast?

But consider what might have happened last year, when the feel-good fairy tale Slumdog Millionaire was a shoo-in months ahead of the awards, and you'll see why this is actually a great idea. Might there have been a different outcome if the field of nominees had been twice as wide?

As a brief aside, first, let's take a moment and reflect again on the fact that of last year's fiee Best Pic nominees, only two of them were in the top twenty best-reviewed of the year: Milk (#13) and Slumdog Millionaire (#6). Yup. The other three nominees weren't even in the top twenty. Contrast Slumdog's 86 score on Metacritic to The Reader's dismal 58. This disconnect between mass critical opinion and the voting tastes of the Academy will probably never be resolved, so anyway...

Here are the five nominees from last year:

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Frost Nixon
Milk
The Reader
Slumdog Millionaire

And, as we know, Slumdog Millionaire looked like the best choice to Academy voters.

Now consider, the following list:

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Frost Nixon
Iron Man
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
Rachel Getting Married
The Reader
Revolutionary Road
Wall-E

This is what I think the BP nominees might have looked like with a field of ten. In this company, Slumdog doesn't look quite so much like a slam-dunk, does it?

Using the "voters vote with their hearts" theory (which is shaky at best, but we'll go with it), voters could have taken their Slumdog vote and cast it instead for Iron Man or Wall-E. What's that? Iron Man is too lightweight for the Academy? I'm sorry, did you see Slumdog?

That doesn't necessarily mean Iron Man or Wall-E would have won. But if they leeched enough votes away, Milk, The Dark Knight or even Benjamin Button could have benefitted and snuck into the lead. On the other hand, with Wall-E actually in the running, instead of relegated to its token Best Animated Feature category, it could have built enough momentum (it certainly had the goodwill and the rave reviews) to win on its own.

So that's what's ultimately so great about this new plan, and why it's the smartest thing the Academy has done since... well... in a long time. For a couple of months it will give a smaller film like Rachel Getting Married or Revolutionary Road, or a genre pic like The Dark Knight a chance to bask in the spotlight as a Best Picture nominee. But more than that, by taking the same voting pool and spreading it twice as thin, it makes it that much more likely a real — and, perhaps, more deserving — underdog will win.

A beary slow news day

This is news? really?


The really "bwah!" moment is at :38 — see if it doesn't force a guffaw out of you. I still can't decide whether or not they meant this seriously, but I seriously hope... not.

And should we be surprised it's a Fox news channel?

Hey, Emmy voters

You know, Mr. and Ms. Emmy Voter, every year you get lazy and vote for the same people as last year, and pretty much every year you get the nominations spectacularly wrong. And every year people try to help you out by pointing to worthy nominees, and every year you ignore us.

Doesn't stop me from trying again this year. Now that you have your ballots in-hand, just write down the following and be done with it. Because we can always hope that, for once, you won't just nominate Jeremy Piven and Tony Shalhoub and Two and a Half Men again. And again. And again.



Remember that this is your last year to do right by Battlestar Galactica. Get it wrong and we may never speak again.

If you're interested in actually doing your homework, here is the complete list of submissions.

You're welcome.

Second Life Diary #7

Shawn, one of my Second Life buds, accompanied me over the weekend on a quick jaunt to Disneyworld.

Well, okay, not Disneyworld, per se. It's called Mouse World in Second Life and, though you wouldn't know it from the high level of detail, it's not officially endorsed by Disney (who is missing a great cross-promotional opportunity). The Mouse World sim creators have done an amazing job replicating some of Disneyworld's highlights.

We first rode Thunder Mountain Railroad which, while a bit jerky in spots, was still a fine simulation. Then, after chatting a bit with a Snow White whose first language was evidently not English, we tried to ride Space Mountain. Shawn never could get the ride to function for him. I was able to get on the ride, but it kept malfunctioning and I finally gave up and got off. It may not have been deliberate in this case, but actually that's pretty much what Space Mountain is like in real life as well. So, once again, good job of verisimilitude.

The capper, though, was the Haunted Mansion. Complete with a suspiciously accurate narration and musical score (suspiciously accurate = a recording of the real ride), this simulation hit every single feature of the real Haunted Mansion. It's possibly the most impressive thing I've see in SL so far, and that — coming from someone who has conversed with dragons and been menaced by vampires — is pretty high praise.


Having a sit-down in front of Cinderella's Castle. Prince Charming was a no-show. (Click to enlarge.)

Tony's closing number

NPH = Nearly Perfect Host.


And here is the story behind it.