Betterverse: Nonprofits in the Virtual World

Virtual Festival Promotes PTSD Awareness from November 4-13

Just a quick reminder that the "Be Fearless 2011" festival is running from November 4-13 in Second Life.  Sponsored by the group Fearless Nation, "Be Fearless" seeks to support those who suffer from post-traumatic stress syndrome. The goal of the event is to "raise awareness and promote education about PTSD and to help banish stigma and misinformation about the condition."

It is taking place on the Oak Beach sim at this teleport link. Some featured events:

• A Sims-Wide Art Exhibit: Some of the Virtual World’s finest artists, notably Eliza Wierwight of Patron Gallery and Emporium, will be exhibiting, bringing to our sims breathtaking art installations to walk through and experience.

• World Class DJs: Spinning original mixes live from every corner of the globe each day of the event! with SL's top Hosts getting the crowd dancing and cheering. Genres such as Trance, House, HardHouse, Techno, TripHop, and everything in-between will be represented with original mixing from the most dynamic DJs inworld.
  

• International Musicians-Singers-Songwriters: Concerts by some of today’s most gifted musician, performing originals and their own take on covers, representing a wide range of genres from folk, blues, rock, country, funk, rap, hiphop, soul and more. 
  

• The Fearless Sims-Wide Hunt: Starting at our virtual PTSD Library and Gallery, hunt enthusiasts will search for hunt items filled with free gifts and clues to the location of the next treasure. Taking hunters across our beautiful sims to each area of our PTSD retreat (normally closed to the public) to see our educational hubs and healing environments.

See the official website for more information.

Imagine Peace in the Virtual and Real Worlds from November 11-13

 

The "Imagine Peace Festival", a festival to celebrate the work of small organizations promoting peace around the world, will be taking place in Second Life and the real world from November 11-13.  There will be talks, concerts, shows and exhibitions. Among the notable events are concerts by Avantegarde Frequency, Cylidrian Rutabaga, Mankind Tracer, and Ga Go Gigamon! a 7 Member Japanese band; tours of the virtual museum of Afghanistan; and various virtual art exhibits.

Proceeds from the events will go to support three organizations:

• The Revolutionary Association of the Women of Aghanistan
• Rural Economic and Agricultural Development Agency of Cambodia
• and the One Laptop Per Child Project 

Head to the official website for updated schedule information.

Fashion Institute Awards Virtual Land to Nine Science Groups.... wait, what?

The Abyss ocean science museum in Second Life

The Fashion Research Institute announced on November 1 that they have awarded "regions" of virtual land in the virtual world to nine nonprofit, research and educational institutions.  The land will be hosted on the Science Sim virtual world, built on the OpenSimulator platform, an open-source version of Second Life.

The nine awardees are:

• The Abyss Observatory
• The Cyprus University of Technology
• The EdLab Group Foundation
• The Honor Engine
• The Oregon L5 Society
• Meta-Institute for Computational Astrophysics
• Preferred Family Healthcare
• Science Circle
• BIO-SE project (Biological Interactive Objects for Science Education)

Looks like quite a variety of science-focused institutions represented, including scientist networks, health care services, and a virtual ocean science museum.  

The "virtual land grant" is comprised of four regions, which can support 100,000 primitive units, a substantial amount of space for these groups to prototype new projects, hold meetings, and allow their staff and members to build.  The grant will last for nine months from September 2011 to June 2012.

Sounds like a great opportunity for the institutions receiving the "land grants."

But it's unclear why the Fashion Research Institute is involved, since their aim from their website is to develop "innovative design & merchandising solutions for the apparel industry."  Perhaps they are taking a very wide-reaching approach to their research on the applications of virtual worlds for different sectors?  Or perhaps there is some other science and technology connection that is not so apparent?  We'll approach them for comment later.

See the full announcement and more info about each of these organizations on the official release.

Seeking Psychological Counseling and Therapeutic Services in Virtual Worlds

Last friday at the Nonprofit Commons, RJ Muni, licensed psychotherapist, spoke with the community about psychological counseling services he and his volunteers provide for Second Life residents at NewWays Counseling / Sunshine Garden.  We discussed other groups and individuals who were providing counseling and therapeutic services in-world, and I realized that it might be helpful to have a listing of those resources for others.

So I created a page on the Nonprofit Commons wiki here .If you know of therapists, mental health centers and others providing psychological counseling in virtual worlds, please provide that information to nonprofitcommons@ techsoup.org so those can be represented.  And if there are already listings of these services somewhere online, we'd appreciate the link.

I think that psychological counseling using virtual worlds is one of the strongest use cases in showing the real value of virtual worlds in people's real lives.