This is the twenty-fourth in a series of mini-interviews with the residents of Second Life. For the most part, I'll try to leave the responses unedited, except where editing will grant greater clarity.

Shaunny, along with AllieKat Stovall, is one of the wolves of the Shelter, now the Shelter in Exile (long story). She doesn't look particularly fuzzy here, but believe you me, she can bring the heat when provoked!

Your SL name: Shaunny Stovall

How did you first come to SL?: I first came to SL from watching my sister AllieKat play and was hooked :)

How did you choose your name?: Well, Shaunny is my real life nickname so, it stuck!

What's your favorite thing about SL?: Getting to know people from around the world and meeting new friends daily.

What do you like least about SL?: Honestly, the freaking updates and bad lag.

Favorite hangout/store?: Has to be the Shelter, baby! And the Gin Rummy!

Name one new feature you'd like to see added to SL: Well, let's see ... the freaking database needs to be bigger!

Shout outs: HEY ALL YOU OUT THERE, STOP BY THE GIN RUMMY AND SEE ERBO & THE GANG!

This is the twenty-third in a series of mini-interviews with the residents of Second Life. For the most part, I'll try to leave the responses unedited, except where editing will grant greater clarity.

Shockwave Plasma, or Shocky, as I like to call her, is someone with whom I don't get to speak more often, and that's a shame. I've always found her to be intelligent, witty, insightful, and whimsical, frequently all within the space of 3 minutes. I don't know how she was able to slip the Resident Snapshot noose for so long, but I finally nabbed her!

How did you first come to SL?: I was looking for some sort of on-line social, or gaming group, and tried to find one that was more than just blasting people and space ships. The ones I found were rather bland, or rather stifled, until I came across Second Life. It reminded me of Snow Crash, I must have read that in 2000.

How did you choose your name?: I was trying to decide between Plasma and Pixel, and as Plasma is the fourth state of matter, and as we are neither gas, liquid, or solid,
then a Plasma I must be. One of the first Cyberpunk novels was "The Shockwave Rider" by John Brunner, so that was suitable for for my first name in my first
cyber world. Now I find a Shockwave Plasma is also a spectroscope.

What's your favorite thing about SL?: The people and the imagination they display. Touring the Sandboxes can be more like walking in an interactive art gallery, than walking through a building yard. Meeting people from all over the world is my cure for insomnia. Sometimes I would be awake until 2am, but logging in to SL seems to get rid of the thoughts that kept me awake.

What do you like least about SL?: Being in the UK, and most of the parties, weddings, shows are mainly for a USA audience, where most of my friends reside. (That's life). No boolean searches in FIND/Search. Griefers. LL not banning Mime avatars.

Favorite hangout/store?: Shelter/ Shelter in Exile. I don't have a favorite shop, but I like to crash test Cubey Terra's planes.

Name one new feature you'd like to see added to SL: To have the servers spaced around the globe.

Shout outs: Hi Tateru, Mera, Sumar, Pip, Ordinal, Dani, Erbo, Aldo, Misty, and Oni (where ever you are!)

I'm not a big fan of schools, but the first lecture I received at school, aged 12 and knowing not one person in the whole 1800 pupils, stuck in my terrified mind. The headmaster told us all that we had the choice in life of being drivers, or being passengers in the train of life. I've always been headed for the front of the train, not due to any particular ambition or application controlled by me, but by an eldest child's natural leaning towards taking responsibility ... something I really don't feel I can take the credit for.

I was reminded of that lecture when I saw Erbo Evan's blog, called Evans Avenue Exit, in which he talks about SL culture. His motto at the top of the page reads: "On the road of Second Life there are passengers and there are drivers. Erbo Evans has a Chrysler that's as big as a whale and it is about to set sail...Welcome to your Second Life." This is all a bit blog-cannibalistic as he in turn refers to Tateru's article on New World Notes. Over there she writes, and Erbo quotes:

"You and me, we had a culture. Maybe it was a good one, maybe it wasn't. But it's gone now, for better or worse. By sheer numbers, these new women and men are Second Life. They outnumber us, and they will be the ones to make or break the world. They don't know who Aimee Weber is, or Anshe Chung, or Starax Statosky or Prokofy Neva or Torley Linden. They'll likely never even hear the word "FIC" during the rest of their second lives. The tax protests will probably not even register as a curiosity."

This is the twenty-first in a series of mini-interviews with the residents of Second Life. For the most part, I'll try to leave the responses unedited, except where editing will grant greater clarity.

Erbo's been a friend for quite a while now, but we always seem to miss each other in-world due to scheduling conflicts. So much so that he looks different every time I see him, and most recently, he's got a new baby! Her name is Alia, after Paul's sister in the Dune novels. Erbo's quick to point out, however, that she's no abomination! Congratulations, Erb and Dani!

Your Name: Erbo Evans

How did you first come to SL?: I had read about it in various places -- magazine articles, blogs, and so forth -- but it wasn't until I was able to build a new workstation that I finally had hardware powerful enough to run SL. In the end, curiosity got the better of me.

How did you choose your name?: "Erbo" is derived from my real name, and has been my preferred handle or account name ever since I was in college. I picked "Evans" because of its Colorado connections, such as to Mount Evans (one of Colorado's "fourteener" mountain peaks, the closest one of those to Denver, and site of the highest paved road in the United States).

What's your favorite thing about SL?: When I came in, I was intrigued, as a programmer, by the building and scripting aspects, but, as a longtime virtual community person, I was intrigued by the community aspects as well. In the long run, it's the latter of those that has proven to be most rewarding.

What do you like least about SL?: The fact that most of the good stuff seems to happen while I'm stuck at work and can't get in-world. :-(

Favorite hangout/store?: Well, our clubs, of course, but beyond that, The Shelter and Soulmates.

Name one new feature you'd like to see added to SL: Better management of instant messages, such as the ability to block them (and route them to E-mail) without killing inventory transfers and in-world chat, the way Busy mode does. I've had some back-and-forth with Torley and others on her blog about this. The proposed "Jabberization" of SL may help (and, as a former employee of Jabber Inc., I'd love to see it happen!).

Shout outs: To Blessed Danielle, of course, and Val, and all our Spira Enterprises managing partners and employees, and all the Shelter regulars, whom I don't get to see often enough anymore.