Future Now
The IFTF Blog
Virtual ecology
"Second Life resident "Laujosargas Svarog" has created an self-contained functioning ecosystem within the virtual world. The system includes computer coded clouds, birds, trees, and flowers that all interact. This "Island of Svarga" is a stunning experience at the intersection of intentional biology and pervasive gaming.
From the New World Notes blog:
The result of a year's work, Laukosargas Svarog's island of Svarga (direct portal here) is a fully-functioning ecosystem, adding life or something like it to the verdant-looking but arid pallette Linden Lab offers with its world. It begins with her artificial clouds, which are pushed along by (Second Life's) internal wind system.
"If I was to turn off the clouds the whole system would die in about six hours," she tells me. "Turn off the bees and [the plants stop] growing, because nothing gets pollinated. And it's the transfer of pollen that signals the plants to drop seeds. The seeds blow in the wind, and if they land on good ground according to different rules for each species, they grow when they receive rain water from the clouds. It's all interdependent."
