Spotlight MacArthur Foundation

1: Rik Panganiban from New York, NY, USA at 12:53 pm on Thursday, June 14, 2007

It is great seeing MacArthur express such interest in the potential of virtual worlds to better support collaboration and relationships across borders, cultures and sectors.  Given the vital civil society that has quickly sprung up in Second Life—from the great work of Global Kids, Tech Soup, the American Cancer Society, and less formal philanthropic and political efforts all over the grid—the time is ripe for the larger philanthropic community to explore their role in these new public spaces.

I welcome this discussion and plan on attending.

2: Edward Castronova from Indiana University at 3:38 pm on Thursday, June 14, 2007

I think there’s an exciting opportunity here. If the overarching goal of philanthropy is social change, what better way to induce it than by helping society reimagine itself? A virtual world is an Other place. It contains real people who interact in ways that are dramatically affected by the design of the environment. Philanthropy can imagine a better world, then build it, then get people to experience it, live, first-hand.

The most powerful social change comes when entire communities of ordinary people realize, as one, that they can indeed live differently. Getting whole communities of people to make such a realization at the same time is extraordinarily hard. It frustrates change even when the need for change is completely obvious to everyone; no one believes that the others are ready for change, so no one changes, and therefore the pessimists are right. Philanthropy uses every tool at its command to make the case both persuasive and public - demonstrations, missions, pilot projects, campaigns. Yet none of this overcomes the social dynamic of “I’ll change when everyone else does.”

A virtual world enables whole communities to leap immediately into the envisioned future. Those communities gain cohesion that persists out into the real world. The pessimists are defeated by the abundance of public action in support of change and by the existence of a self-aware community that supports moving forward.

Philanthropy can build a virtual city on the hill, showing us what we are missing, and we can achieve.

3: kanter at 6:40 pm on Thursday, June 14, 2007

This is very exciting news!  I’m sure the nonprofit community in Second Life will be most interested in joining the dialog and learning!

I’m also very curious to see what your avatar will look like!

4: Susan Tenby from TechSoup Community manager and organizer of Nonpro at 4:10 pm on Tuesday, June 19, 2007

I am very excited to attend this event.  We will be bringing in representative avatars from the nonprofits in attendance at our weekly Friday morning SL meeting (these occur every Friday at 8:30am PST)to join us at this event. 

I am eager to hear Mac Arthur’s take on SL and its role in the future of the Web.  We devotees see it as the next social networking tool that can provide access and creativity with communities that was previously prohibitively expensive or impossible. I would love to see what your vision is for this exciting collaboration platform.

5: couty sabah from Israeli govt at 1:16 pm on Friday, June 22, 2007

I would like to share our experience with establishing VCoPs (Virtual communities of Pracrice) for social workers in my country. Many of those are designed for caseworkers dealing with children at risk

6: Rik Panganiban from New York, NY, USA at 5:43 pm on Friday, June 22, 2007

Wonderful, interesting event today. Thanks so much for putting it on, and addressing my question (the first one.)

I posted some notes, pics, and links to a short video of the event here: http://www.rikomatic.com/blog/2007/06/lowering-barrie.html

I look very much forward to continuing the conversation.

7: MIRABAI BUSH from Center for Contemplative Mind in Society at 12:07 pm on Monday, June 25, 2007

I’m sorry I missed it—I am v interested in the possibilities of education through Second Life.At the Center for Contemplative Mind, we have thinking for some time about introducing meditation and other contemplative practices on Second Life. In first life, we have been exploring contemplative practices to sustain and inspire young social justice activists, and we have been supporting university professors through fellowships in contemplative curriculum development. I’d love to see how effective this could be in a virtual world—many of the best-known meditation teachers in the country have expressed interest.

8: affordable web hosting from affordable web hosting at 4:06 am on Monday, February 18, 2008

I am eager to hear Mac Arthur’s take on SL and its role in the future of the Web.  We devotees see it as the next social networking tool that can provide access and creativity with communities that was previously prohibitively expensive or impossible. I would love to see what your vision is for this exciting collaboration platform.