I’ve just been watching a conversation at the Alliance Virtual Library in Second Life. The gatekeeper, Franja Russell, has been advising a total newbie, Kingjames Hermit on land rentals inworld.

I met somebody, newer than I, named Niky Dirval too. He logged in from Spain, and spoke enough English (or “Inglish,” as he called it) to carry on a converstation with me. I ran into Niky in the Palmetto Library, in Cybrary City (as I was casting about for reference librarians). Actually, Niky ran into me. Or, really, he walked right up to me. It was as if he had materialized on the spot; not only because he was suddenly upon me, but also because he kept insisting he had never been here or anywhere else on these premises before. As it happens he was wearing something very close to the same skin wore when I created my SL account.

It was a little surreal. Did he birth himself right on this spot? Here he was, the very newest version of me – fazed and unable really to communicate fluently because of the language barrier – and he kept asking me to tell him what to do. Me. I was almost as lost. I talked with him a spell and then gave him a landmark to the Help People Tutorial site. I could not think how else to help, but I had at least been around long enough to go that far. The subject line for this blog bears Niky’s final salutation to me before he teleported away. I had wished him good luck and buenas suerte. I think “lo Mismo te Digo” means something like “the same for you.” Very Cool. And he may already be passing me by. Sunrise, sunset.

I visited an in-world archives, the Aero-Astro Nasa Colab archives, also in Cybrary City. At this self-built place I met the owner, Archivist Llewellyn, who graduated from Kent State with her LIS degree in 2005. She showed me her films and the books for which she has either added pages or embedded a link. I could tell she was really proud of her place. I followed here around from one exhibit to the next. She stood over my left shoulder sort of watching me watch a video, and occasionally asking questions like “pretty neat, huh?” Archivist posed for me in front of one of her displays (though first she wanted to change her clothes.) She is resplendent:

When I had walked in, she was just then changing her clothes to jeans and a t-shirt. When I asked if I could take a photo, she requested that I come back in five minutes. She wanted to get dressed up again – into her flowing gowns. I posed her several times. The picture given above is not one of the poses. It is candid. It looks good, but it stands in here, because I did not save the posed pitctures carefully enough. No real matter, though. The best pictures are saved to my inventory, and I shared them with Archivist. She was pretty excited about getting her SLUR in this post, so if you are reading this please visit her.

Archivist told me just before I left that she is expanding her archives, and including a section on African-American influence within NASA. I told her that was great and requested that she keep up the good work … and noted that she was probably telling me this because I appeared there as a black man – or really, I guess, I was a black man. I mean … fascinating. The Second Life interface allows us to evoke almost anything we want or do not even want. Again, very cool. [She also taught me how to link to the SLURL]

The Nasa CoLab Archives seems to be unique in Cybrary City in that the owner likes to be there and continue to work on her library. Having been there (Cybrary City) several times, I have had a devil of a time finding actual reference workers. At The Mark and Emily Turner Memorial Library, I managed to IM the owner, reference librarian Sonja Morgwain. As I stood in her library on my own (She was at Info Island International at that point) she explained that most of the Cybrary City organizations are self-serve. The whole SIM tends to be crowded only during events and book discussions. She invited me to join the book discussion group in the Readers Garden next to the Turner Library (I accepted). The Turner Library itself is rather sparse. The theme seems to be Maine-based authors (the RL Turner Library is in Presque Isle, Maine).

The teleport landing at Info Island International is really the best place, as far as I am concerned, to meet and chat with librarians or other reference type personnel. I’ve dropped in several times to shoot the breeze with (and sort of interrogate) Soup Johnson, Katfancy Kiergarten, Gareth Otsuka, Siren Tunwarm, BuddhistLibrarian Ballyhoo (goes by Bud) and Alacrity Lorefield. Dropping by this hub may be the best thing a newbie and LIS student can do to get going in SL. I now have several dozen links to SL libraries (most of them in Cybrary City, and most usually empty), new group memberships, tips on skin-buying, a circle of people who already recognize and seem to “get” me (clique-y, kind of), and some understanding about the way things work. As a matter of fact I met Sonja Morgwain here; she friended me, and then I teleported to her library and chatted with her as I looked around. I noticed with Archivist at the Nasa CoLab, and with pretty much everybody I met at Info Island, that people are not at all shy about posing for photographs. My favorite so far has been Siren, shown here as she appeared the other night (I had not yet learned how to get most of myself out of the frame):

The next night I sat where Siren is sitting here and chatted with Soup, Bud and Alacrity. Eventually I stood up and posed them on the wall: