Woodbury: University or Conspiracy?
by Pixeleen Mistral on 08/07/07 at 5:25 pm
by Janelle Kyomoon, former Woodbury University visitor
the lost SL campus of Woodbury University
Woodbury University, a liberal arts college located in Burbank, California, has been the heated subject of controversy since the conception of its virtual campus in March of 2007. The finger has been pointed at Woodbury for being a conspiracy and cover-up for recent griefer activity. What was the initial plan for Woodbury University in Second Life? Was it just a haven for griefers, or did legitimate educational activities ever occur?
In the spring of 2007, Woodbury’s school Media, Culture, and Design offered an experimental communications course under the title CO-3714 Virtual Worlds. This course was designed to study the culture of the internet, and interact with it via the metaverse that we all know as Second Life.
The first Woodbury campus was designed in a terracotta, Moroccan theme and housed a large auditorium, a student store, and a media culture building. The auditorium was used for several scholastic events, including a biography presentation of visionary Leo Bronstein. Students from Woodbury met at the campus twice a week to creatively collaborate on designs, and experience virtual interaction.
In order to keep the highly-stylized designs of the campus uncluttered, a student sandbox was created below the campus. The students began using this free area as more of a “cultural” sandbox rather than a technical one. Students posted different humorous images from the internet and used it as their place to hang out in the metaverse. Many of these images originated from the website 4chan.org which almost instantly attracted the attention of other 4chan fans. I am not one that openly agrees with some of the things done by the 4channers or /b/tards as they are called but they usually kept to themselves in the sandbox and in one instance where one of the few did come over to grief me and they were quickly ejected and banned from the area.
Woodbury’s open door policy had pluses and minues – like SL itself
Due to Woodbury’s open-door policy in the cultural sandbox, many users took advantage of this in a positive manner, and others abused it. The day that the Patriotic Nigra were tipped off to the existence of what they dubbed “The Shrine” is the day trouble began for the school. The sim was crashed repeatedly, which immediately drew the attention of the Lindens and anti-griefing groups such as the JLU. The first campus was deleted by the Lindens under the assumption that it was a stronghold for the PN, rather than a legitimate university.
the Justice League’s Woodbury files
The school was able to phone Linden Labs and explain the situation, but the damage to the sim was permanent. The new “downtown Los Angeles” themed campus was quickly reconstructed with the assistance of many sympathetic users from the university and 4chan. In order to prevent further griefing attacks, the “Woodbury University” group was formed with exclusive build and scripts rights being given to it.
Es wäre doch schön…
Student activities and learning did take place at Woodbury University. One only has to look so far to see so. Lynn Insoo, a metaversal visionary and immersive 3D specialist, was able to display his amazing 360 degree photos and video at the Lucid Exhibition within the Woodbury sim. His work drew high-profile users to WU, including no less than 5 Lindens. He was also included in the German publication Hello Second Life, praising his accomplishments at Woodbury. Lynn even named off many Lindens that visited the Woodbury campus to see exhibit as witnessed in chat logs I have of him speaking with Tizzers Foxchase:
Lynn Insoo: I actually remember bringing Jack to see the exhibit at Woodbury.
Tizzers Foxchase: Was it true you brought Philip Rosedale to the exhibition?
Lynn Insoo: There were several Lindens brought there. Jack, Glenn, Matthew, Which and Qarl Linden.
Lynn Insoo: All found the research interesting and were glad to see such work being done on campus.
Lynn Insoo: I never showed Philip Rosedale my work personally.
Woodbury also housed a movie studio on the campus for the students interested in film creation. The studio focused on the art of Machinima, bringing real world filming techniques into a virtual space. Several sets were constructed including a Back to the Future themed set, a green-screen sound stage, and a Soviet nuclear submarine from Hunt for Red October.
Woodbury University was an open canvas that allowed students from other schools to come and try their hand in this virtual world, I being one of them. Since my earlier years I have been fascinated by fashion and the work that goes into, specifically costumes or cosplay. Having made many of my own costumes and outfits in my First Life, I saw Second Life and Woodbury as an outlet to express ideas in fashion and costuming. Woodbury University allowed me a space to work with prims and other options to fully express myself creatively in the virtual world so that I may carry it back into my first life. My use of the prims were purely basic and simple use to obtain a style of look and clothing and still is. I started off reading blogs and looking in the beginners area of Second Life. Woodbury gave me a place to freely express my ideas without putting down a ton of money to have a place to store some of the prim objects I was using.
Woodbury was not a haven for griefers. It was not a conspiracy. Woodbury University broke the mold of traditional educational methods in Second Life. An environment such as Second Life has become an immense opportunity for small schools such as WU, allow them to compete with larger players (such as Harvard). Woodbury has continually managed to remain the #1 most visited real life educational spot in Second Life with a daily traffic average of 10,000.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 9th, 2007
>I refer you to:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/2231101.stm
Um, China blocking Google isn’t like some European countries blocking a racist and obscene site *shrugs*. Go and read at least Wikipedia, lametard.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 9th, 2007
Allana, coming from YOU as the source, this parsing has absolutely no credibility. And your parsing is completely lame, just like all the other apologists for Woodbury. It’s not a question of taking one’s head out of SL; it’s a question of taking one’s head out of one’s ass.
Where’s the course list?
Where’s the course web page?
Where’s the entire “School of Digital Arts” web page?
Where’s the reading list?
Where’s the actual student projects?
The professor himself is either a fraud, or is prototyping something not yet finished that is totally not ready for prime time and which he himself is guilty of misrepsrenting here with his idiot propaganda implying his island’s closure had to do with racism against Hispanic students (!).
Why can’t common-sense questions be asked about this?
I don’t notice even the Leninists and Dan “Zhelenyakov” Hunter even coming to the rescue of these griefing apologists.
Try to accept that it’s a scam, and one that has everything to do with sinister Internet subcultures, as much as you’d like to pretend they don’t exist.
Reality
Jul 9th, 2007
“Try to accept that it’s a scam”
Provide real, hard line evidence dearie.
Jim Schack
Jul 9th, 2007
“Try to accept that it’s a scam”
Provide real, hard line evidence dearie.
good luck getting that outta her. Still waiting for proof for my involvement on crashing her sim.
Allana Dion
Jul 9th, 2007
I’m clearly not an “apologist” for Woodbury. Hell, I had the PN and /b/tard morons on my own site sniping at me for daring to have an opinion on this.
Since you’re so blocked when it comes to comprehending anything I say simply because I’m the one saying it, I’ll make my opinion a little more clear for you.
Linden Lab was right to close the Woodbury sim and in fact, should have done it sooner.
The professor is an employee of Woodbury University, the real University, that’s easy to verify.
But the professor did not do his job as he should have, that’s easy to see. (which explains your inability to find a course list, a reading list, etc.)
The students grew increasingly out of control and increasingly involved with lower elements of the internet, with Tizzers leading the charge.
None of the above indicates a conspiracy, nor fraud. It points only to incompetence on the part of Clift and immaturity and incompetence on the part of those he put in charge.
I hope that Tizzers has been disciplined by the University, perhaps she’ll learn something from the experience. I hope that the professor gets some flak from his superiors as well, perhaps next time he’ll do his job better.
It is calling it a “conspiracy” or a “scam” that I don’t understand. A conspiracy to do what? A scam to gain what?
Which is the more rational possibility, that an associate professor of communications is more likely to be lazy and unprofessional, or more likely to be some kind of con artist?
B.S. Pointer
Jul 9th, 2007
>>@anon/kalel
I doubt anyone cares if you “sanction” it or not, except for a 1 or 2 people complaining.
Im assuming you “sanction” it because that wiki page shows the pro JLU side of the story of when you attacked the WU sim.
Whatever Hazim. Kinda funny how that whole article was re-written and edited by a /b/tard and the end result is what you see now up there in the article. It seems pretty damn unbiased as possible with more of a /b/tard side showing through in showing how much accidental damage some of the League did by shooting off the hip. It seems to show what went on with Woodbury quite nicely in a nutshell for someone who wants to get up to speed on things quickly. It also shows how the PN pretty much barged in, covertly or not, and used Woodbury dragging the non griefing /b/tards and eventually the whole sim down by their barging in. Learn to read Hazim, nice try.
Allana Dion
Jul 9th, 2007
>”The professor himself is either a fraud, or is prototyping something not yet finished that is totally not ready for prime time and which he himself is guilty of misrepsrenting here with his idiot propaganda implying his island’s closure had to do with racism against Hispanic students (!).”
I agree with you that clearly this associate professor crossed a lot of lines and playing the race card sealed my opinion about him definantly. As a hispanic myself, that comment actually pissed me off. But it still only shows incompetence and idiocy, not out and out evil.
But yes, it’s easy enough to verify the man does work (for the time being at least) for Woodbury University.
There is no course information for this particular class that I was able to find either. But you can search the site for yourself if you like .. http://www.woodbury.edu/index.aspx
Jessica Holyoke
Jul 9th, 2007
One point of reason. In the article “griefer U”, the initial investigation by Prok was due to a police blotter report;
Date: Thursday, April 12, 2007
Violation: Community Standards: Harassment, Soliciting Abuse
Region: Woodbury University
Description: Organizing abusive attacks on regions.
Action taken: Suspended 3 days (copied from original article.)
The JLU brainiac wiki entry above seems to describe the incident that lead to the police blotter entry. (Early April could mean April 12th, the fact that a number of accounts that were present at the time of intervention by the JLU were banned which would correspond with the police blotter entry.) The entry shown above was last modified April 23rd. Perhaps the JLU could enlighten people with their research into the activities of the Woodbury group since that time. Because based on that April entry, the Woodbury Sim was not guilty of anything but allowing PN’s to use their land.
Jessica Holyoke
Jul 10th, 2007
Here’s what I mean by evidence.
At http://www.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2007/07/woodbury-univ-1.html#comment-75282002, Tizzers Foxchase stated that she received the screenshot from the Brainiac wiki from Carigorp Matzerath.
I talked to Carigorp Matzerath and he said that he did not give permission to access his account, nor did he give out the screenshot to Tizzers. This means that Tizzer’s comment is a lie.
In talking further with Carigorp, he revealed that the heist of information was done by the PN months ago, but that the copies still existed and were passed around. So if the actual exploit was done by the PN and the copies were freely floating around, then why lie about something that was easily verifiable? Its been established that the PN hung out at Woodbury. It’s likely that if the PN invaded the brainiac wiki, they would have taken a copy of the woodbury entry because it mentioned the PN’s. So it was likely they would have shared that information. So why lie about it? That’s proof of eddie haskelling. That’s being evasive. That’s the sign of a guilty mind.
John Endwahl
Jul 10th, 2007
People:
Here’s the deal.
Woodbury bought a sim to use for ed purposes, to be the basis for a class, and to show off to their board/donors.
Then it fell by the wayside. There was no accountability, Tizzers got the griefing bug and has now been trying to justify it as research.
It’s not so much a conspiracy as it is arrogant and aimless people letting things get out of hand.
Tizzers Foxchase
Jul 10th, 2007
I think out of everybody here, John Endwahl got it right. (Except for the part where I “got the griefing bug.”)
Back in March, Clift gave me control of the sim as an estate manager. While playing around with terraforming, Darthblueafro and I thought it would be fun to dig an underground hangout. It didn’t really become “The Shrine” until Darth brought Ron Graves (who then called in everybody else including the PN). I was fascinated with the fact that we had 10-15 people hanging out at the once quiet Woodbury sim.
Honestly I did not even know what a doomsday gun was until I experienced it first hand (Some PN shooting it off at WU). WU was never meant to be a place for griefers. There is no conspiracy Prokofy. Things got out of hand and I am somewhat to blame for not stopping it earlier.
Also, just to clear things up… I still have my “job” (it’s actually a work-study) at Woodbury.
[23:24] Me: We need to settle this once and for all like decent people. This whole thing is getting out of hand and it’s causing nothing both unnecessary drama for both sides. I am not the super villain you think I am. I don’t sit here plotting and planning ways to cause you pain. In fact I spend most of my SL time shooting the breeze with Intlibber at the AVIX. If you don’t believe me I will allow you to see me on the map at all times. I don’t have anything to hide. So will you lay off with the conspiracy stuff?
[23:24] Prokofy Neva: blow me
[23:24] Prokofy Neva: MUTE
Prokofy you are an unreasonable, mentally-ill, psychotic person who needs professional help.
Why Bother
Jul 10th, 2007
>”In talking further with Carigorp, he revealed that the heist of information was done by the PN months ago, but that the copies still existed and were passed around. So if the actual exploit was done by the PN and the copies were freely floating around, then why lie about something that was easily verifiable? Its been established that the PN hung out at Woodbury. It’s likely that if the PN invaded the brainiac wiki, they would have taken a copy of the woodbury entry because it mentioned the PN’s. So it was likely they would have shared that information. So why lie about it? That’s proof of eddie haskelling. That’s being evasive. That’s the sign of a guilty mind.”
Oh boy. That doesn’t look good on Tizzers part. I mean why lie about it, why not just come out and say that it’s easily obtainable since it’s floating around out there. She’s been given the benefit of the doubt many many times but I have a feeling her lies are starting to catch up to her.
>>”I agree with you that clearly this associate professor crossed a lot of lines and playing the race card sealed my opinion about him definantly. As a hispanic myself, that comment actually pissed me off. But it still only shows incompetence and idiocy, not out and out evil.”
I agree with this wholeheartedly, being Hispanic myself, and not living very far from the RL Woodbury. I find these remarks made by Clift insulting. Considering that alot public schools, community colleges, and Universities are 50-70% Hispanic/and/or any other race or “minority.” Going to these schools in Southern California I can tell you that racism plays into things very little considering that most of the staff is of a “minority.” Southern California is a pretty big melting pot…these remarks trying to justify what occurred with the Woodbury sim were way out of line..and I’ve still yet to see Clift issue an apology.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 10th, 2007
>Then it fell by the wayside. There was no accountability, Tizzers got the griefing bug and has now been trying to justify it as research.
>It’s not so much a conspiracy as it is arrogant and aimless people letting things get out of hand.
>Posted by: John Endwahl | July 10, 2007 at 02:18 AM
And you are…?
And Tizzers is…who? Fired? Not fired?
And why is there no course record? What you fail to see is that it is indeed a conspiracy.
It’s everywhere, in your gas stations, and your Wal-Marts ROFL.
(P.S. re: Website you have — I remember a letter exactly like that in 1972, with the same prototype machine called then “telecopier,” only in another company — Xerox — in another country and city, and with more emphasis on carrier beads and magnetic fusion and the role they would play in imaging.)
Anonymous
Jul 10th, 2007
Prok. Seriously.
A conspiracy? That’s giving the PN, the /B/tards from the various chans, the SA goons and Tizzers waaay too much credit.
If you look around on the 4 chan and 7 chan sites, as well as SomethingAwful.com, you will see that all of them, consist of nothing more then some kids making fun of everything they can find to make fun of on the internet. Furries, foreigners, racists (Hal Turner is a good example), eachother (fail 7chan is made of fail! NO U!), anime fans who like Japan too much (weeaboo’s anyone?), youtube movies, tubgirl, and everything else they can get a response out of. That’s basically all they do, exchange anime, manga, porn and childporn pics and poke fun at people.
If you look around on poolsclosed.com, you can easily find some RL pics of various PN members, and you will see that it’s just a group of teenagers. The recent ‘raid’ on Anthrocon shows what they can really do. 3 PN showing up at a furry con, with ‘pool’s closed’ signs…
White kids with afros hoding anti furry signs, cowering in the rain holding umbrellas that a friendly furry (yes, a FURRY) gave them.
Now, if you want to suspect those kids of conspiring against you, Prokofy, GET REAL.
They couldn’t even conspire against a wet paper bag.
Secondly, all these forementioned sites and chans and whatnot were around AGES before anyone has EVER heard of SL, let alone of you Prok.
And thirdly, yes, someone CAN easily claim they often visit 4chan for the manga images. I do. As well as 7chan. It’s a fantastic place to find your anime and manga fix.
Yes, there’s a lot of shit flying around there, raids planned, hatespeech and racism going on. A LOT. So fucking what. Great proof that they conspire against you.
Actually, the only thing all these places share, is that they dislike anything out of the usual. And gee, that includes people who rant on all sorts of things on their blog and the SLHerald, and ESPECIALLY if they so nicely respond to being poked with a stick.
Try ignoring them COMPLETELY for a while, you’ll see that they will eventually get bored and just go back to griefing furries.
Take it from a furry who’s had quite some experience being griefed by these guys. They might be a nuisance, but seriously, they’re NOTHING more then that.
In short, they’re not smart enough to conspire against you, and you’re crazy, or just have a too huge ego if you think that all of them founded the chans and SA *just* for you.
And yes, they ARE poking you JUST BECAUSE you make such a nice target by shouting bloody murder at each time. My advice? Don’t respond, don’t talk to them, don’t IM them, don’t post abnout it on your blog. Just ignore, and ban.
They’ll be back with an alt, but eventually will stop if you ignore them completely. Cause that’s all they want: attention.
Sadly their parents won’t give that to them to get them out of our hairs.
Thinks With Portals
Jul 10th, 2007
first id like to say thank you to Janelle Kyomoon for her written word said about WU. the open door policy really does bring in all sorts of people. this brings light to something that was shown dark from people who make there first judgments on something they read from here instead of going there them selfs and experiencing it.
Thinks With Portals
Jul 10th, 2007
now this may be taken off of the herald. it might not. this may even get my account banned. but this is something i read that shows the colors of second life in its full assortment of colors.
For years, Second life and Linden labs like to paint themselfs with the brush of creative and expressive freedom.
When in reality, the world of second life is far from Free. Really, all we’re garunteed by the Community standards are a few simple basic “rights” to protection from being harassed or “assaulted” with virtual popguns.
After further examination though, what rights do we have towards freedom of expression, freedom of assembly? Could peaceful protest fall in as a breech of “Disturbing the Peace” in the ’Big six’?
Disturbing the Peace
Every Resident has a right to live their Second Life. Disrupting scheduled events, repeated transmission of undesired advertising content, the use of repetitive sounds, following or self-spawning items, or other objects that intentionally slow server performance or inhibit another Resident’s ability to enjoy Second Life are examples of Disturbing the Peace.
We really have none.
Every day I hear the excuse “Well, they own the sim, they can do what they want!” thrown around. If that’s true, then we’re simply living in a totalatarian virtual state.
Where freedom only goes so far as the social norm and if something is found “broadly offensive” by more than a few people, it can likely be construed as harassment, disturbing the peace, or some form of griefing.
There’s no standard sim owners have to follow as far as granting rights to individuals. The only people with any kind of “Rights” are the sim owners themselfs, they’re merely sharing those rights as privledges to the individuals for staying on their land if they agree with them. Noone has to put up with individuals assembling on their sims for peaceful protest or otherwise, not even the lindens. Even if the individuals in the sim are supporting the majority of the sim through donations, they can be removed if whoever has the power or ownership rights disagrees with them in any sort of way.
You’re only “free” in second life if you and your opinions fit the social norm and don’t break any taboos. We’ve gone from trying to protect individuals from harassment into an era of imprisoning our own kind in a jail made of political correctness and trying to avoid offending anyone. Nevermind that we don’t actually put any limits on what’s acceptably “offensive.”, just whatever the current “moral majority” feels like is offensive. We’ve taken the power out of the hands and voices of individuals who actually play this game day-to-day and put them into the hands of those who can manipulate the “Moral majority”.
shockwave yareach
Jul 10th, 2007
Dear anonymous furry:
They are a mere annoyance, yes. Right up to the moment that they deploy their doomsday weapon and other simcrashing tools. And if build is turned off, as it is in most of Furnation, they’ll crash the sim other ways. This is not silly fun like the Gremlins particle gag (which is funny and temporary) – this is out and out war on the grid and everyone on it.
Trolls that do no actual harm are tolerable, if annoying. But those that repeatedly crash the network to get their LULz have no place in the metaverse and should be removed from it. The efforts a handful of people have to go through just to watch the FPS without being soundgreifed or buried in penises is considerable. (And just what is the fascination the b tards and their ilk have with doggy cocks in the first place? Are they closet bestialists or something?)
asdhvgf
Jul 10th, 2007
“We’ve taken the power out of the hands and voices of individuals who actually play this game day-to-day and put them into the hands of those who can manipulate the “Moral majority”.”
Sounds a lot like RL. Scary.
Covert
Jul 10th, 2007
edward.clift@woodbury.edu
This is Mr. Clift’s email address, his professional one. I will not give out his personal email address. Anyone who feels they should, please email Mr. Clift and POLITELY ask him to apologize for playing the race card when RL racism has no play in Second Life. He needs to apologize for his remarks.
Thank you.
Janelle Kyomoon
Jul 11th, 2007
>>[23:24] Me: We need to settle this once and for all like decent people. This whole thing is getting out of hand and it’s causing nothing both unnecessary drama for both sides. I am not the super villain you think I am. I don’t sit here plotting and planning ways to cause you pain. In fact I spend most of my SL time shooting the breeze with Intlibber at the AVIX. If you don’t believe me I will allow you to see me on the map at all times. I don’t have anything to hide. So will you lay off with the conspiracy stuff?
[23:24] Prokofy Neva: blow me
[23:24] Prokofy Neva: MUTE
This shows just exactly how childish Prokofy can be… honestly should a 50 year old who has a job in the UN and is noted for translating russian text be talking like this. You would think with that job and those translations under her belt she would at least at like a mature human being.
I agree that there were greifers that got out of hand in Woodbury but there is NO CONSPIRACY behind it. And honestly who would want to believe a 50 year old woman that uses the phrase “blow me” when someone honestly goes to here trying to bury that hatchet and make things work… do you really want to believe her conspiracy theories. Sorry I couldn’t post to this earlier. I am enjoying the rest of my vacation visiting beautiful shrines and gardens in Tokyo, Japan. Hope all of you have a wonderful week including Prokofy
wood
Jul 11th, 2007
This article is funny, the Woodbury University in RL said they knew nothing about a Second Life or Virtual Woodbury and so that being said the Woodbury in SL is nothing but a fake PN stonghold.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 11th, 2007
>You’re only “free” in second life if you and your opinions fit the social norm and don’t break any taboos. We’ve gone from trying to protect individuals from harassment into an era of imprisoning our own kind in a jail made of political correctness and trying to avoid offending anyone. Nevermind that we don’t actually put any limits on what’s acceptably “offensive.”, just whatever the current “moral majority” feels like is offensive. We’ve taken the power out of the hands and voices of individuals who actually play this game day-to-day and put them into the hands of those who can manipulate the “Moral majority”.
Thinks With Portals thinks up his ass.
I’m um baffled why I need to make available servers I pay LL rent for to you for your infantile ventings and “expressions”.
Buy or rent your own goddamn server and see if you can get away with the kinds of things you think are “art”. So far, it hasn’t always impressed the Lindens that crashing servers, testing weapons, rezzing racist crap all qualifies as “art”.
I’ve yet to find any moral majority — or frankly, even minority! — in Second Life.
What I have found is a determined minority of nihilist totalitarian assholes masquerading their licentiousness with infantile screams about their “rights” and “freedom”.
Prokofy Neva
Jul 11th, 2007
>I agree that there were greifers that got out of hand in Woodbury but there is NO CONSPIRACY behind it. And honestly who would want to believe a 50 year old woman that uses the phrase “blow me” when someone honestly goes to here trying to bury that hatchet and make things work… do you really want to believe her conspiracy theories. Sorry I couldn’t post to this earlier. I am enjoying the rest of my vacation visiting beautiful shrines and gardens in Tokyo, Japan. Hope all of you have a wonderful week including Prokofy
Blow me.
That’s about the only appropriate thing I can think to say to someone who is a serial griefer and liar.
Anonymous
Jul 11th, 2007
And here again we see Prokofy yelling her childish high school mentality again. Spouting names and obscenities instead of facts.
Alyx Stoklitsky
Jul 11th, 2007
Prok, I find you conduct and words towards Janelle to be utterly repulsive. Janelle is not even a /b/tard, but rather just someone who found herself a home in the Woodbury sim.
Also, lets have a fucking rest with the 20th century Russian politics, shall we? I’m sick of hearing your stream of cold-war buzz-words. Sounds to me like you’ve been brainwashed by your government.
GODLESS COMMUNISM!1!1!11
jaster
Jul 15th, 2007
Real nice! Many thanks, Cheers!