SLCC 2009 - Saturday

Another amazing day. Met more old friends and met lots of new friends.

My body decided that it would not stand for a shortage of sleep three days in a row, so I slept til after 9pm and I missed all of the morning sessions, including a talk by Philip Rosedale, so I guess I lost my chance to shake his hand.


More old friends

The first session I attended was Patio Plasma's session "Building Interactive Science Exhibits" in the education track. I arrived early and the next person to arrive in the room was a lady in pink with whom I had a brief exchange about power outlets in the room. When Patio arrived, I went over to introduce myself and revealed my main alt's name, whom he knew. And as we were chatting, he mentioned he was going to take out his partner later in the evening and therefore was going to miss the Musicians Ball. His partner Emileigh Starbrook is a long-time friend. And I realized he was referring to the lady in pink in the back. Oh, my god. I had to rush over and give her a big hug. And we caught up on news a bit until Patio had to start.

Patio is giving a tour of the real-life Exploratorium tomorrow (Sunday) at 3pm and I'm going to try to make it.

Afterwards, I went back to the business track and caught a panel of content developers talking about best practices, followed by impromptu talks by a few inworld entrepreneurs who talked about their businesses. I guess the "Standards" session was cancelled. In between the talks, I chatted with my tablemate Karina Linden, who is a developer based in Seattle and a fairly new resident. (I've met a few Lindens this weekend.)


More acquaintances and more new friends at dinner

The final session I attended in the evening was a workshop that Bettina Tizzy led. I saw Chenin Anabuki whom I know by reputation but never had much chance to chat with, so went over to join his table. Then we were joined by more people, including a man who went to the wrong hotel (he meant to go to another Westin hotel for another conference and decided to stay and participate). Then the nearby table joined us and we became an even bigger group. Our group's task was to come up with a few points regarding object permissions in SL.

During the presentations, Bettina talked about Siefert Surface and she motioned towards my neighbor. Siefert had referred me to planet textures that I needed a couple of years ago to make a Christmas ornament for the International Spaceflight Museum. Of course, he doesn't remember the incident.

Afterwards, I got a chance to introduce myself to Chenin and we talked about Avatrian and how he got started. Then two ladies who were sitting next to me at the table invited us to join them for dinner and we were supposed to meet up in the lobby at 6:30. I was at the lobby early and found others in our table and I assumed that it was the same group.

So we hopped on a couple of cabs (the two ladies and Chenin were nowhere to be found, unfortunately). I was in the cab with Bettina (I finally got to meet her), Mark Slate, and Cinco (I didn't get a chance to catch his last name). Mark sat to my left and we had a great conversation about the old SL (he joined in 2003). To my right was Pascale Illyer and we chatted about content I make. Across from Mark sat Kazuhiro Aridian who makes avatars. Next to her sat Siefert and Tezcatlipoca Bisiani, who did the presentation for our group.

It turned out that the outing was planned by Bettina and Hamlet Au. It was a Mexican restaurant and -- *sigh* -- I forget the name already, which is unfortunate because their carnitas were good.


The Musician's Ball

Mark had to get home, so he said goodnight as we left the restaurant, but not before he said the hotel was only a mile away. Some of us decided to walk instead of taking a cab. Silly me, I was walking with a group of young people. Thankfully, they didn't walk too fast. Siefert said goodnight several blocks from the hotel and walked in the opposite direction. Pascale, Kaz, Tez, and Cinco (I think that was Cinco) lingered near the entrance of the grand ballroom before deciding to join Hamlet's table near the back. But I said hi to Capos and TG (who was wearing a blue bandana and flower stamps on his cheeks and hands for the 60s theme). Dallas walked by sporting a long tee that had a drawing of leopard bikinis, a throwback to her leopard thong shtik in late 2006.

I met more people in the course of the evening -- Mia Kitchensink, Nassus Dumart, Lyndon Heart (whom I had seen both inworld and in Seattle when Capos and TG visited, but never formally met). Meanwhile, I got to chat with the group I was with. Tez and Kaz logged in and showed us their avatars.

I decided to stay until Capos's and TG's performances and Capos's first song was dedicated to me (woohoo!). It's the same song he usually dedicates to my alt everytime I come to his shows. I even went up front with EvaMoon and other ladies to stand in front of Capos and wave our arms in rhythm. Later, I got a real-life kazoo to blow when TG sang his "Analog Guy" song.

After TG's show, I said my goodbyes and headed home.


A critical decision

This weekend has been an incredible experience. It's more than just the sessions, although I learned quite a bit in them. It's really about the people -- the new friendships forged and, especially, the old friendships cemented, simply by seeing the real faces of the people behind the avatars. And there is something extraordinarily heartwarming about seeing a face light up after finding out who you are, followed by arms spreading wide for a hug. It is those moments that I will always remember about this SLCC, my first and most certainly not my last.

But during the day, I have made a decision, one that would significantly change my SL. My main alt will no longer be anonymous. I won't advertise my RL identity with her as I do with Treasure, but I won't take extra measures to hide it either.