Vector Inspector School Assembly Program

Machinima and real-time animation is an art form and more, it is a great storytelling genre. The ability to screen capture what is in a virtual 360 degree environment makes a lot possible for us as film and video makers. Using the Second Life engine as our animation platform means we utilize every nuance we can to craft our films. Public Safety and Health concerns are also our concerns, as parents and citizens.

We have just finished working on a project which is our first Public Service Announcement (PSA) for the San Gabriel Valley Mosquito Vector Control District. This video will be shown in school auditoriums to help kids learn what they need to do to keep their home areas safe from the invasive Asian Tiger Mosquito. These school children will also be given sample kits to collect samples of water from around their home areas, which will help determine the extent of the mosquitoes' breeding.

This mosquito has been seen in Southern California since last September and while not indigenous to the area, if allowed to establish, they could potentially spread disease and be a game changer for lifestyle there. They transmit a number of dangerous human diseases as well as dog heartworm. This is a community issue that requires community level support and participation.



PookyMedia was given the task of creating a film to be shown in schools and using real-time animation, or machinima, we were able to give life to the characters, personalities and really show what kids will be required to do to help and participate in this important scientific study. It will also illustrate how to keep their home areas safe as well. We added music that would inspire and with the great unlimited creativity of Second Life and its creators, along with our PookyMedia team, have created a video that will hopefully teach and help eradicate this real and present threat to the great state of California.

I have relatives and friends who live in Southern California so this was brought especially home to me. I am very very proud that our work will be a help to public health and safety for this nation. We share it with you and if you are in the Southern California area, now you know what to do - get rid of the standing water anywhere around your home!

If the Technology didn’t exist, the moment would have created it. OnTheAir.com is on that wavelength. This is viewer call in with web cam application programming that gives us the chance to host shows with audience participation. In some ways it is like call in radio except radio doesn't need Hair, Lighting and Makeup. Being an avatar working in a virtual world, with camera ready features doesn't need that either. Log In Viewer Entertainment is something that resonates pretty deep with me, Second Life has given me a tremendous opportunity which might just be ready to port, so I'm going to try it out. I am still doing the shows inworld, Real Life is just another platform.

For those of you who know me, developing real time live action log in game shows is, the future of entertainment, as immersive game show, means you become part of the program. Here a community can also develop around the game and the brands which will eventually sponsor them. I am so convinced of this I am leaving my avatar on the grid and bringing my somewhat realer, definitely more imperfect self in front of the webcam for Yay Me or Nay Me, which originated as a segment from one of the shows I have running out of Second Life called The 1st Question on the Virtual TV network treet.tv.

Having people compete for sponsored prizes has been part of entertainment beginning with Radio, which early TV picked up. One of the longest running titles on TV is the Price is Right, which has been going since 1956. People love to be involved in games and love to cheer on and sympathize with winners or losers.

What we have seen grow over the past 6 years is proof that viewers love being doers. Sit back and relax has firmly become lean forward and engage whether in game or Social Media. Facebook, Pinterest, twitter, instagram. Got an image? A thought? Something to share on every and any level? Well there are a multitude of places where you can show and tell everyone just that. Crowd content, we are ready to take that next step and play within the program, even authoring our own shows. This offers sponsors unique opportunity which transcends liking or following or repinning. YouTube is proving this all the time. Playing within a sponsored challenge has to be more exciting. I am ready to go live to see if this is true.

There is a lot of talk about what will TV be in the future? How will people shop through their TV's, or talk about what they are watching? What is Social TV? What is content everywhere, even on your Google glasses? I got tired of watching a long time ago. We are now at a new place to activate our own programming, and invite others to be part of it. And you can choose to actually “take the stage.” This is a perfect set up for contestants, fast easy and fun. Immediately gratifying and exciting. There can be no doubt that people love to play games – Us humans spend 3 Billion hours a week playing video and computer games, according to PEW. However these recent Nielsen numbers on TV viewing habits over the past decade were surprising. That is, how sitcoms have disappeared from the radar, is it possible that people would rather generate their own laugh-track (Or other appropriate sounds one makes when playing a video game) than listen to one? My guess is this significant casual entertainment segment has migrated elsewhere to being part of the action, not passively entertained.





RealityTV is very significantly represented, which says that a whole lot of folks want to see people who aren’t the most beautiful and stunning doing things that involves real life challenges, like losing weight, instead of watching Friends.

With the growth of Connected TV I think the future lies not in what you are watching. It's going to be what you are doing. And allowing people to take part in the programming is going to be what's next.

Being part of this future through the avatar based game shows I have successfully developed towards “Merv Griffen of The Internet” now demands I step up to the tech that has just presented itself, or lose sight of the title. I just had to take this call.

When you can watch yourself because you have just logged into a show and get swept up in live play, we are entering a new place for entertainment. This is a beginning, the curve just might have caught up with me. Hope to see you there.

Tune in and Play - Yay Me or Nay Me - Log In Viewer Entertainment does indeed spell LIVE - OntheAir.com/channel/125 Tuesday 5PM PDT / 8PM EST

The Second Life Enquirer interviewed me recently! As an admirer of the publication, for their insight and forthright reporting on things we need to know, I was really proud to be in this -
Please have a read and feel free to comment -
This is a stunning platform and moment in time for those of us who are digital to our virtual bones!

http://www.slenquirer.com/2012/03/spotlight-on-pooky-amsterdam-ceo-of.html

The $10 million Qualcomm XPrize  is for a“Star Trek like” medical tricorder. Would this have occurred without Star Trek?  Though I am not sure to the answer, I do know that science fiction is where new invention inspires reality.  Science fiction has storytelling at its core, we have utilized these stories and the gadgets within for templates of the future.

Writers of Science Fiction have been able to tap some stream of consciousness to come, in the incredibly rich veins of creation they mine and bring forth. Amongst those in the public are the scientists, who have an interest in these inventions, and I am sure young Star Trek fans were greatly influenced by what they saw each week. Clearly there is a crossover effect for science, fiction and fact. “Snow Crash” has been cited as an inspiration for Second Life itself.

Pointedly story telling is more than entertainment, it is the free imagining which leads to actualization which will carry an audience along with you. We are still Human version 1.0 and a story that has resonance is not just one with a lot of flashy effects.

Traditional media tells us the story in movie or TV format where we watch passively, video games today allow us to play within the games' story. (Star Wars The Old Republic game released on Dec 22nd last year, had over 60 million in-game hours  played within its first week— roughly equivalent to watching all six Star Wars movies over 4 million times. ) The narrative structure is however tightly drawn, and players are forced to work within the game designers story, which granted, works for many.

Surely these players utilize the available assets and create their own interpretations of the future they are playing a part in.  The Imperial Agent in SWTOR will have to acquire new skills and equipment to help them combat the ever-growing threat to the Empire, and they have to think fast and employ weapons as fast as they can.  This is no leisurely adventure: action and reflexes are the demands of this kind of game. The player is involved with the technology in new and yes highly immersive ways, but there is no originality here and no “what if.  There are no shoulders of giants upon which to stand within a game like this.  Your success depends on how fast and accurately you can work those buttons.

The question becomes: Do you play someone else's story? Or do you originate your own? When the story teller becomes the story participant, the narrative is taken to another level through that immersion. The authenticity of the story is irrefutable when you are living it, not waiting for the next game prompt.

In World of Warcraft though you pick your lineage, you are somewhat freer within it.  And another MMO of note HabboHotel with over 225 million registered users, allows neither scripting nor asset creation, but you are welcome to freely form your activities with what is available. What you don't have is the greater collective of millions of people who can build what they want.

For this you really do have to go to Second Life.  This is where new fiction will meet the virtual road and the first person story becomes the multi person story and eventually, the event. Science fiction  role play is significant in Second Life, with spaceships,  starbases, and a plethora of accessories available. As you can customize your look, author your role play and your storyline, the eventual enterprise which grows out of this stands an excellent chance of becoming where new invention takes place. Within virtual worlds, new ideas also infuse our minds with imaginary and fantastic invention.  And these ideas are taken further, and form the seeds of reality not only as it will come to be but as it is now!

While I am one person and can think of a lot, I am only one person, with you there is twice as much, and with a legion of people enterprising and playing,we can think of that much more. Our intelligence has demands placed upon it by others who expect a retort or answer as we play in real time with them.   This is beyond suspending our belief – we are willingly immersing ourselves in a new story which we grow and evolve daily.  This is is so different from traditional sit back and relax media.  This is tips of your fingers, edge of your seat engagement.  For those of us involved, other kinds of games pale. And here is why Second Life isn't really a game. Its a life-story told against the backdrop of a million different user creations. Just like when you walk down the street- it is the creation of many different hands, not just one Lead Art Director.

This living story we are telling one another is vital to the  history of ourselves.  Being active participants in something we can experience beyond the “mere mortalness' of our daily and present lives. Powerful stuff, and I do look to this plane to create the new invention and discovery, because it is what we are doing with a marketplace of amazing inventions and items that I would bet will be seen in the physical world over the next 20 years or sooner.

And I also imagine a kind of  Gedankenkuche (thought kitchen) of the future as well. Not only is this a place for people to create their stories, but also where actual scientists are talking. This is the platform for development of the future, while we can now utilize full media within this environment – where we can invite scientists to sit across from a virtual table, actual location unimportant and even use Wolframs Alpha on a prim to cross fertilize ideas. That is really the science fiction of the future, where scientists can discuss ideas in real time with no limits and then, even see their visions actualized in 3D.

What kind of stories will these be? Ones I suspect which lead one day to documentaries.

Where this is the home of the future for thought leaders who can utilize not only real time interaction, video, film and more for problem solving, but the great resource which is one another.  .

Next up – Virtual Game Shows – or how I learned to stop worrying and love the buzzer