interview | Willow Caldera

Posted on October 19, 2009 by Ana Lutetia | No Comments

Second Life name – Willow Caldera
Rez Date – 7/9/2004

Red Velvet, originally uploaded by Willow C.

Icicle 2, originally uploaded by Willow C.

1 – How did you discover Second Life and what made you create an account?
My ex-boyfriend insisted I join after stumbling across the website and thinking it might be more interesting of an evening than the telly. I was skeptical, but in the interests of harmony I let him convince me – mind you, he’d left within a fortnight, and I’m still here!

2 – How did you come up with your Second Life name?
Willow has always been my online choice of name – but, yes, it did originally come from Buffy. I picked my second name, I’m ashamed to say, because it’s the name of a town in Morrowind, (still) my favourite game.

3 – Lots of people only stay inSL for a week or a month after creating an account. What made you stay and what motivates you to log back in?
The people, mostly, but though I do of course mean my friends and the people I’ve met along the way who’ve inspired and entertained me, not to mention worked with me, I also mean that in a slightly different way. I find Second Life a fascinating study in human nature: it’s the birth of a new country, the evolution of a new society, and it’s interesting to watch how it’s turned from the sex and gambling playground to a capitalist nursery. I can’t help but want to stick around for the ride.

4 – What have you been doing in SL? Tell us your story: what have you been up to or what have you created.
I dabbled as a blogger in the early days, with Style Disorder, and was then a writer and section editor for SLNN before its sad demise. I’ve since been working with Sound’r making Machinima – we’re a full-service Machinima studio – and I’ve just joined New World Notes as the live music reporter.

5 – Have you found, developed or improved any skills because of SL?
People will tell you I’m the oldest noob they know – which is true, I’m still startlingly inept and can’t build to save my life. Willful ignorance, I call it. So I’ve always relied on skills I already had, unless you count my dabblings in Photoshop. The writing tied in nicely with my real life career by helping me fit my journalistic hat for size, while Machinima gives me the chance to pick up video editing skills I learned early in my working life and take them much further – it’s also fantastic exercise for the imagination!

6 – Could you share a funny or awkward story that happened to you inSL?
Shelly Toonie and I were dressed up in period finery, bonnets and all, to shoot a scene from the Jane Austen novel ‘Emma’. We were filming in a peaceful, scenic garden where you could almost hear the birds chirping in the trees – it was a perfect setting. That is, until a Glamazon in spandex decided to sit on Shelly’s lap and, thinking we’d set her up as a joke, she said, “How YOU doin?”. We went for a second take, but this time it was interrupted by a naked avatar fleeing across the camera, and then an amorous couple hidden in the bushes got over-excited and… well… the camera got wet.

7 – What would you change or improve in Second Life?
I would introduce tiny little imps to fetch things from my inventory for me, or walk-in wardrobes. I’ve lost so many outfits in the disaster that is my filing system that I would be horribly unhappy about it, if only I could remember what they were or even that I’d lost them.

8 – Can you share your current and/or future projects for SL?
Currently my focus is on Sound’r and part of what we’re concentrating on is developing a sci-fi series of short videos. It’s called Crucible and is based on a standalone piece we made a while ago – people kept asking us what happened to the characters, so we decided to tell the full story.

9 – Have you ever had any issues whatsoever within Second Life? If so, how did you reported and was the feedback positive?
I think everyone has their own personal Second Life bugs; mine are to be notoriously prone to crashing and an intermittent problem with my Search window that stalls my game for minutes at a time. But as far as griefers, thieves and other nuisances go, I’ve not been on their radar for a long time – the last time I asked for help was probably 2 or 3 years ago and the Lindens were always friendly and helpful.

10 – Is Second Life merely an online game or do you consider it more of a metaverse or a virtual world?
Most definitely a virtual world – there are no NPCs and monsters in Second Life, only us, our interactions and the contributions we each make.

11 – Imagine a new resident asks for your help. What would do? What would you tell him/her?
That would depend what they wanted to make of their experience! I would help them create their avatar, take them exploring to see some of the grid’s beauty spots and show them some of the projects and opportunities residents have created for themselves. Hopefully that would give them a taste of what’s possible so they could decide for themselves which parts interest them.

12 – How would you describe yourself in one word?
Meerkat.

Sometimes, originally uploaded by Willow C.

Your urls

Blog: blog.soundr.net – www.willowc.blogspot.com

Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/willowc/

SLurls: www.soundr.net
http://www.youtube.com/user/SoundrProductions

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