Now already a while ago, Robyn gave me the Beautiful Blogger award. Quite an honour, as she strives to design her own websites at Simply Creative, so she supposedly knows what to call beautiful! Accompanying the award were a set of "rules", among which some questions that I will gladly answer:
Why did you start a blog and why do you continue it?
I already wrote extensively about my reasons to start this blog in my post NBI: In the head of a newbie, but I'll tell a bit about why I'm still here. The most obvious reason would of course be: for you, kind reader! Indeed I think I don't think I would still write this blog if no one ever would read it. That's simply not motivating. I must admit that it's pretty cool to see that my amount of visitors per day has more than doubled since May, month of the NBI and about when I started this blog. However, I don't expect this blog to become very famous ever, for various reasons. I either don't play enough, or play too many games - big blogs cover very many games and gaming culture in general, or are restricted to one game and try to be "The Source" in that area. Writing such a blog would feel too much like work to me. Which brings us to the actual reason I blog, which is twofold: I have the need to write things down & I have an urge to create nice pictures and show them off somewhere. I guess it's the synergy between that need and reactions on this blog that keep me going (really, I wouldn't enjoy it without your comments!). That I sharpen my English skills as a non-native speaker is a nice side effect.
What does your average day look like?
I get up, get some vanilla yoghurt and tea and play a game or read my favorite blogs while I eat it. If I'm a good girl, I then open my agenda and make a plan of what to do. I'll do some chores, play some nyckelharpa, then grab the newspaper and jump on my bicycle to head off to university for a lecture of to the library to study. When I get back, I'll run for half an hour if I'm being a good girl with enough energy left. Then my beloved Tiger will come home, we cook and play some online games together. Crazy fact: I raid almost every day. During downtime (= if we need to wait on other people) I tab out to react on comments on my blog. I usually write my posts during the day, when I have inspiration. I often write on paper during a lunch break of if I'm traveling by bus or train.
What is your best and your worst collaboration with other bloggers?
I have been so lucky as to only have met and collaborated with nice bloggers. My little blog even has been spared from trolls (no, this is NOT an invitation!). My best collaboration, if you want to call it so, must be the one with Vaneeesa Blaylock and the other amazing authors of iRez. Starting as a Second Life blog, iRez developed into a blog about virtual life as a whole, and Vaneeesa invited bloggers from other disciplines over to broaden the community. And you can already guess, one of them was me! While I was invited over to just write a guest post, I suddenly had the positive surprise of finding myself listed as one of the blog's principal authors. Sneaky Vaneeesa did it again! iRez is the place for me to step out of character, take a step further away from gaming and get into discussion with the other authors. I simply love this virtual tearoom full of mysteries. I still haven't found out why the blog is called iRez and why you write Vaneeesa with three e's (psst, don't tell her that I'm such a noob!), but make sure to check out this blog!
What does this blog mean to you?
For me this blog is a place to tell about my experiences in the games I play. It's somewhere in between a public diary and a way of getting my opinion out there. Moreover, it's my own place where I can say whatever I like, which is a great freedom. Blogging - as in both in writing as with getting involved with the blogger community - is an awesome hobby. Just great fun.
The nomination
Yes, because receiving this award means you're allowed to give it away to other people, too! Originally, it said you have to give it away to five others. Now here's a problem: I don't really like chain mail constructions, and this smells like one. It's quite frankly the reason that I've been putting this off for so long. But now I've made a decision: I'm going to be a naughty girl and break with the rules. Not because I can't think of five beautiful bloggers (on the contrary, I can make up loads more), but because I think it's more meaningful to give it away with a bit more attention. So instead, I'll just nominate one blog and that is:
I admit that the first time I heard about her blog, I was like "what is this?!". Supergirl's humour, happy mood and positive posts are quite contagious, though, and I'm always curious to see what she's come up with. I guess she's like a little sun in the blogger world. Enough reason to get awarded as a Beautiful Blogger!
Have fun with your new title, Supergirl!
The six bullet points of this blog award: 1. Who gave you the award? 2. Why did you start a blog and why do you continue it? 3. What does your average day look like? 4. What is your best and your worst collaboration with other bloggers? 5. What does this blog mean to you? 6. Who would you like to nominate yourself?
Gefeliciteerd! :D Well-deserved. I don't blame you about the chain-mail bit, and I know you're shy about praise and compliments, so it's great to see you sharing this with us at last.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations! It is a well deserved prize and I also agree with your reasons for your chosen nomination. Yours and Danania's blog are certainly among my favorite blogs. :)
ReplyDeleteAwwws, that's really nice of you to say. I read your blog with much joy, as well. :D
DeleteYou're very welcome for the award! Also just a small spelling error, my name has a y instead of an i. :)
ReplyDelete-Robyn
Waah, why did I do that wrong, I knew that! Guess I shouldn't post articles past 12 pm. :D
DeleteNice read, thanks for posting :)
ReplyDeleteI grinned when I read the BBA is like a exponential chain mail thing and that you broke the chain, or at least didn't follow the rules to a T. Ravanel makes her own rules. High five!
Yay Ravanel! You are so deserving.
ReplyDeleteAnd holy moly, what a pass-forward honor! :)
I will strive to make you proud.
Aww, CONGRATULATIONS!!! Who deserves "Beautiful Blogger" better than you! You do such a glorious and gorgeous job over here!!
ReplyDeleteAnd, Aww, thanks for your kind words about iRez. WE are so lucky and happy to have YOU be a part of our little community.
As for your questions about iRez / Meee...
In Second Life the, sort of, most basic thing you can do is "Rez a Cube"... absolutely everything you see in that world started with someone rezzing a cube... so, like many before, we took Descartes philosophical consideration of doubt... and turned it into our own statement of identity.
As you know, a lot of people powerfully love these worlds, the people, and the experiences they have there. But many others think, well, that we're crazy or losers or both. So "I Rez, Therefore I Am" is a sort of statement of Avatar Identity. That I am here. That I exist. And that that simple fact should impart some aspect of legitimacy, some degree of rights to this avatar identity.
I've always loved in many different ways, Richard Stallman's statement of revolt when passwords first came to the MIT computer lab so many years ago. He hated them. He said that passwords were a sort of enslavement because they meant that the person who sat at the computer yesterday had the ability to control what the person sitting there today could do with it. And he thought that the person sitting there here and now should have the power of self determination. (paraphrased a little, but mostly his point, I think)
So for me, "I Rez Therefore I Am" is a sort of statement of avatar rights. Maybe a little bit like "We're Here, We're Queer, Get used to it," that I'm an avatar, get out of the way and let me live my life already.
As for "Vaneeesa," hahaha, well, no offense to all the Vanessa's out there, but that is a sort of predictable way of spelling it. Plus you'll never get your name as your username that way. Plus I spend my days thinking up ways to piss Mark Zuckerberg and Vic Gundotra off, and few things piss them off more than repeating vowels in the names of their putatively "Real" users. (hahaha, it's true, I actually said the "R" word! OMG! /me cackles...
Anyway, keep up the amazing, amazing work Ravanel!
xox0xOxoX0Xo
Oh nooooo, you found me! ;)
DeleteBut, seriously, thanks for the explanation (although now the next question is "what the heck is a SL cube?"), and that's great stuff from Stallman. A pretty utopian view too, I would add, one that wouldn't work in practical terms (e.g. don't viruses proof the foulness of some minds?). But I digress.
I'm happy I now know all your secrets (mwouhaha) and I had to chuckle at the Vaneeesa-reasoning. To many more beautiful iRez days!
grats on receiving the reward :)
ReplyDelete