Joe Essid directs the Writing Center at the University of Richmond, where he teaches courses in writing and literature. He is a Richmond native who attended the University of Virginia and earned a Master's and PhD at Indiana University. His research interests include technology in the classroom and Southern literary humor. His academic writing has appeared in Computers and Humanities, The Writing Lab Newsletter, and anthologies about technology and writing. He is a contributor to Style Weekly and has appeared in Eighty One and RVA. Ignatius Onomatopoeia is the "avatar" who represents Joe in the game-world Second Life. Ignatius will be wandering the virtual terrain of Second Life while his creator writes here about what may be either "the next big thing" for the Internet or the latest darling of the cyber-hip... the reader can decide.
E-mail contact: jessid@mac.com | Web address: writing2.richmond.edu/jessid

Location: SurfWatch Web Site

Since there is obviously a virtual racing scene, why not one for virtual surfing?

I’d like to thank Barchan Paderborn for telling me about SurfWatch, dedicated to reporting where, how, and when to catch waves in the metaverse.  I’d seen a story about his blog in Wagner James Au’s New World Notes, and then Barchan dropped me an e-mail.

As Second Life develops better “physics” and coders have their way with its open-source scripting language, we’ll see virtual sports that compete with a decent video game for playability.  It’s natural that leagues, teams, and competitions will emerge. Jezz and I have both seen that at the Motorsports and Autosports regions, where races are common.  Barchan’s latest entry (as of my writing this) covers “The 2008 Second Life Surfing Association (SLSA) Season One Champion Awards Party.“

I’ll avoid any poorly delivered surfing terms here!  I’m not a surfer, but it’s exciting to see this type of community blossom online.  Barchan welcomes guest-writers, but he notes that “interested contributors contact me first before writing. . . .other than style guidelines, all the stories are written as if they are real life versus commenting on SL from [real life].“

Real-life surfing publications are taking an interest in Barchan’s work, he reports. Now I’m tempted to grab a board and try my luck. It would make for an amusing guest-column for SurfWatch. Some of my students have gone virtual surfing and loved the experience.

DMZ oh, the avatar of a former student, provided the image of him on the beach and about to catch some waves.

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