SXSW Site

Hi all, Jess here.

I must admit I never heard of the South By South West conference before this class. After touring the website, the event seems fascinating. At first I thought it delt only with on-line media but there are conferences on film and music as well. The site seems overwhelming to me. It is content heavy and I don’t know where to turn. I suppose it reflects the conference itself in that it’s a big bang in a short amount of time.

My first pick for interesting people who have spoken before at SXSW is: Fayandria Foley-McDunnough. She chairs a fund raising event called Second Life’s Relay For Life for the virtual reality website Second Life and spoke at SXSW in 2008. The money raised for the relay is used for cancer survivors and there is a Cancer Survivors Group in Second Life. I think it’s fascinating how this group on a site like Second Life bucks the perception that only people who spend all their time in front of a computer pretending to be their avatar instead of truly interacting with people face-to-face use this site. Instead, enterprising people like Ms. McDunnough are using the site to raise awareness and provide a space for cancer survivors to meet and interact.

The next person on my list is also related to Second Life. His name is Douglas Gayeton and he created an entire documentary in Second Life. Gayeton’s avatar, Molotov Alva, guides you through the documentary that aired on Cinemax. It’s so interesting how we can create an entirely different self that improves on are conception or desire of who we want to be. What’s next? Cosmetic surgery and avatars are manipulated versions of who we are so what then becomes “real”?