Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Hilarity Ensued (More Peening)

So Whiskey Monday, who is a marvelous writer (check out her blog and her Twitter feed), put a bug in my ear and a bee in my bonnet when she told me about a contest in Harlow Heslop's blog post, "The Golden Peen...Contest?".

I read Harlow's post and it immediately captured my attention as it did several others who found the idea irresistible.  Take the shining, polished golden peen and make creative and/or funny pictures with it and submit them to Harlow for judging.  Golden!  (Submissions are due Friday, May 25, 2012.)

Harlow says the idea came to her when Strawberry Singh (another blogger) gave her a golden peen as a gift.

Sales of the golden peen exploded and the creator, Chefkoch was, naturally, curious.  So he posted about it and guessed that the sales were generated by a blog post made by SpaceCase Munster on her (super fun) blog, "Virtual Vagabond."

SpaceCase let him know that not only were the sales largely generated by interest in Harlow's blog post, but that people were enthusiastically posting their peen pics on the Second Life Feeds and Flickr and other places.  Chefkoch went hunting for peen pics and found a veritable treasure trove.  He was delighted!  So he put together a mash up of the current entries as of today.  His post is a great way to see all the pics in one spot.  Check it out and see if you don't catch Peen Fever.  Join the fun!  If you do, link us!

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Fine print:  Pardon all puns, intended or otherwise.

Links:
http://whiskeyshots.wordpress.com/
http://www.harlowheslop.com/archives/2761
http://strawberrysingh.com/
http://www.virtualvagabond.com/
http://www.virtualvagabond.com/free-metropolis-rosie-robot-avatars/
http://sambadibanana.tumblr.com/post/23566337561/since-3-days-i-am-experiencing-an-unusually-large
http://sambadibanana.tumblr.com/post/23643618433/mystery-of-mesh-penis-gold-sales-rate-increase
https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Mesh-Penis-Gold-High-Glow-FULL-PERM/2659774?lang=en-US
http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/other-web-sites/68797-crimes-against-convention-lee-here.html#post1561533
http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/members/leehere-albums-harlow+heslop%27s+golden+peen+contest.html
https://my.secondlife.com/

Sunday, May 20, 2012

"How do I find mental health resources?"

I get asked this question or variations of it a lot.  I'm going to put some ABC-123 basics for finding mental health resources here.  The question usually comes up in virtual worlds or virtual world forums and this is my virtual world blog, so you'll notice a focus on virtual worlds.  You can peruse the following post or just skip to the links at the bottom.  As you wish.  And, speaking of wishes, the best of mine to you.

Second Life - Inworld

Find a nice spot in Second Life where you can relax.  I like beaches.

relax

Set your avatar to "afk" so you can limit messages and focus on your search.

afk

Open your "Search" box.  Keep in mind different viewers keep that function in different places.  This is mine:

opensearch

Note and use the pulldown menu of types of searches.  I believe that if you are seeking mental health support, your best chances of finding what you want come with searching "Places" and "Groups."

searchoptions

You should use a variety of search terms from the general to the specific.  I'm going to start with the obvious, "mental health."  I'll search "Places" and then "Groups."

mentalhealthplaces

mentalhealthgroups

I received 9 returns for "Places" and 44 returns for "Groups."  That's a good start.

This is a screenshot of me searching "Places" for "Depression."  I received 35 results and if you look at the descriptions, you can see they are clearly about supporting people suffering from depression.

searchtermsdepression

This is a screenshot of me searching with the term "Transgender" in "Groups."  I received 280 returns.  Now some of those are going to be fun and frisky sex groups, but some, like the first one listed, will be support groups.



Pick a place that appeals to you and Teleport to it.

Pickone


Pickone

Keep going until you find one you like.  You're the consumer, the shopper.  So shop.




Google

You can also go online and just Google things like:

mental health in Second life
mental health in virtual worlds
support for depression in Second Life
transgender support in Second life
depression support forums

And so forth.

Googleformentalhealth



*** This blog post is under construction.  ***

Links:

http://gotvirtual.net/community/threads/real-life-help-resources.895/#axzz1vRrqk9Hn
http://community.secondlife.com/t5/General-Discussion-Forum/Mental-Health-Resource-Center-in-SL/td-p/1539603
http://modemworld.wordpress.com/2012/04/24/virtual-ability-mental-health-symposium/
http://www.metaversehealth.com/2012/04/mental-health-symposium-second-life/
http://healthinfoisland.blogspot.com/
https://www.ismho.org/home.asp
http://virtualhelpblog.com/2011/11/03/improve-your-mental-health-through-virtual-worlds/
http://www.kouroshdini.com/2008/04/02/mental-health-resources-in-second-life/
http://psishrinkers.blogspot.com/2011/06/psi-shrinkers.html

Sunday, May 13, 2012

Daniel Voyager's "SL Newbies" Blog Post

Colleen Criss just alerted me to the fact that Daniel Voyager has posted some detailed, specific and helpful 2012 information for SL Newbies.  Worth checking out if you are new or helping the new-to-Second Life.  That first link in particular, "SL Newbies" is like a one-stop shop of resource links for newbies.  Good stuff, Maynard.

Links:
http://danielvoyager.wordpress.com/sl-newbies/
http://danielvoyager.wordpress.com/2012/02/22/top-10-new-resident-places-in-second-life-2012/
http://danielvoyager.wordpress.com/
http://www.youtube.com/user/Secondlife#g/u