About my Second Life research:

All Second Life residents are invited to participate in a research study on the topic of performative readings of Second Life. The purpose of this study is to investigate the activities that residents perform which allow them to appropriate and change the game space for their own uses and introduce their own readings of Second Life as a text. This is an interview-based study that focuses on the investigation of the range of performative acts of the residents that change the game space of Second Life for personal uses. If you have engaged in role playing games, or consider yourself to be a hacker or griefer or experienced these performative acts, you are encouraged to participate in this study. All personal information about the avatars who partake in this study will be kept confidential and all avatar names will be changed. If you would like to contribute to this study please IM Defne Demar in-world, IM me at AIM, PaleFireR, or e-mail me.

This is an independent study conducted as a part of a dissertation project at Indiana University.

About my Lonelygirl15 research:

You are invited to participate in a research study which investigates how digital environment elicits different reading habits than that of print texts. The digital markup of the electronic text allows the reader to move beyond the mere reading of the text; (s)he can perform readings that can manipulate and substantially change the nature of the text. To investigate the wide array of possibilities of this kind of reading, I would like to conduct an interview-based study of Lonelygirl15, a video diary that is (and is still being) posted on YouTube. Lonelygirl15 is an interesting example of performative narratives in that not only it spawns additional storylines created by its audience and not explored by the original series, but also requires its audience to solve puzzles, uncover mysteries to help progress the plot. In other words, the actions of the audience influence of the direction of the plot. The puzzles and mysteries are implemented both in real world and on online platforms to create an experience that blurs the boundaries between reality and fiction by extending the fictional story onto the real world. For instance, the audience members or the players can interact and meet the characters of the story on various platforms in real time and hunt for clues embedded in real-world locations. Also information about the story and the game can be passed onto the players through various platforms such as e-mails, snail mails, faxes, phone calls, instant messages, and other means. Referred to as Alternate Reality Games (ARG) these games blur the boundaries between fiction and real life.

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