On the Road to a PhD

The House of Flames got is start in the wake of my entry into the Educational Leadership and Innovation PhD program at the University of Colorado Denver. Becoming the avatar Flameheart Sol was concurrent with becoming indoctrinated into the world of writing and research. Both identities were challenging and five years later, my dissertation was as much an auto-ethnographic view of my experiences as Flameheart as they were about identity interplay in virtual spaces.

A funny thing happened on the way to my dissertation defense – I became Flameheart Sol, founder of House of Flames Media. It began innocently enough; I began a virtual music venue in Second Life, and with some real world business talent and a lot of virtual help, the House of Flames became a prominent virtual venue. As I studied identity development and constructivist learning as a student, I also studied streaming audio and video as a virtual business owner. The more versed I became in my area of study, the more adept I became in streaming media.

Within a few years I finished my coursework as a student, and I began streaming media outside of virtual worlds. By the time I was ready to propose my research study about virtually performing musicians in Second Life, I was also outfitted with a Sprinter van and the ability to stream as a mobile unit. It wasn’t as if I was living an alternate life as an avatar-gone-human; both these identities were significant and real, becoming the multi-lifing that Turkle (2011) writes about.

With my dissertation defense imminent, I am looking at two equally earned paths; that of an academic who attempts to inspire and transform the students I am able to cross paths with, and that of a music-technology lover who wants to broadcast the performances of those who might never cross paths with a global audience. Can these paths peacefully co-exist?

Looking for my place in the world, using social media, virtual worlds, and whatever will come after them to change human behavior. If you have a place for someone who will always “think different,” please leave a comment.

Turkle, S. (2011). Alone together: Why we expect more from technology and less from each other. New York, NY: Basic Books.

Giving Back to the Music Community

The data has been collected and analyzed, the first draft of the dissertation has been turned in, and it is time to reflect on what has been five years of work. This was a study about identity interplay in virtually performing musicians but in the end, my own identity was as affected as much as the subjects.

Performing live music as an avatar was part of Second Life. It just didn’t happen in other virtual spaces. Second Life gave three dimensions to performance and in those early days people were just happy to have a place to play. Maybe back then we were all naive about the possibilities of live music there but at least we were a community.

Then something happened. Venues got bigger and crossed sims (my own venue, the House of Flames among them), performers began to charge venue owners to perform. They brought managers and assistants. Venues had to add hosts to try and cajole visitors out of Lindens to help pay the performers and the tier, while performers walked away with performance fees and tips. After a while it stopped being fun and it was easier to just pay the tier and not hold shows, than to deal with inflated fees and demands of performers who had just gotten “above their raising.”

During this study I was able to work with several musicians, many of who had been in Second Life since those early days. There was something different about them. They didn’t beg for tips; their fans knew how to do that on their own. They shared stories and conversation – they had friends who were fans and these relationships were built up over years of memories. The fans were as immersed in their roles as fans as the performer was immersed in their role as a performer.

In many cases these performers had matured enough to start giving back. They hosted open mic sessions; they played for free or had special concerts that they did for charity. They promoted the work of other musicians and went to their shows. They were mature members of a music community. That is the example they have set and it has been humbling to work with them.

It was time for me to step up as well. Second Life enabled me to have a dream, and to make that dream real. The House of Flames Performing Arts Complex is honored to be the new home of Living Room #13 and Juel Resistance. Her Naked Acoustic shows will be held there beginning April 6, 2011.

House of Flames – Real Music in a Virtual World

Virtually Performing Musicians From A Physical Perspective

It has been my extreme honor to work and interview seven virtually performing musicians for my dissertation, Life as Art: The Interplay of Identities Among Virtually Performing Musicians in Second Life. Phase One of my data collection included interviews of the avatar musicians in Second Life. Phase Two, now underway, includes meeting the musicians physically to interview them and observe a performance that is streamed into Second Life. These musicians have altered their schedules, gotten their families involved, and were as accommodating as I could ever have hoped for. I was the intruder and they were all incredibly gracious.

While the data needs to be input and analyzed, I was able to spend two extra nights on the road (waiting for a horrific snowstorm to pass) working with video from the first two subjects. From a videographer’s perspective they aren’t perfect (tweaks will be made before the final compilation) but they accurately present the artists, their music, and what drives them to perform virtually. Have a look:

Juel Resistance

Arimo Teixeira

Virtual Entrepreneurship, Streaming, and the Future

The Virtual Entrepreneurship course that was taught a the House of Flames was a great success. It is a first for the University of Colorado Denver School of Business, and may even usher in a series of classes I am to design and teach using Second Life. The results of the class have been accepted for presentation and publication at an international conference – you can view the video portion here:

Spending so much time at the House of Flames over the summer was a lot of fun. We had a launch event where we brought back the HOF Master of Ceremonies, Cybster DJ. It was like old times again. I really miss the excitement of having regular shows and being “on the map” where live music in Second Life is concerned. It was great exposure but it was never a moneymaker. Teaching classes on the island can help support the monthly costs of ownership and also help keep the House of Flames in the news.

In the physical world, the House of Flames has been without it’s beloved Sprinter van for two months because of vandalism done when we were last in Austin (I thought that town lived for music-related stuff). We should be back on the road next week, and are looking for community events to stream. If you are in the Rocky Mountain region of the United States and have an event you would like to broadcast, please contact the house of flames at info@houseofflamesmedia.com.

The Bard Center for Entrepreneurship Partners with the House of Flames

The Bard Center for Entrepreneurship, in partnership with the House of Flames, will hold a student project launch celebration on July 17, 2010 at 6PM Pacific time on the House of Flames Island in Second Life. Music by House of Flames Master of Ceremonies Cybster DJ and dancing will frame the evening, with student teams displaying and demonstrating their class projects, some of which will be available for sale.

The projects are the capstone for the Virtual Entrepreneurship class taught by Deborah Wise (Debe Wise in Second Life), Doctoral student in virtual world identity and adjunct professor for the Bard Center for Entrepreneurship, which is part of the University of Colorado Denver School of Business. Her own entrepreneural efforts in Second Life birthed the House of Flames, a premier live music and events venue. Professor Wise has successfully transferred her virtual business model into the physical world House of Flames, a live event streaming company based in Denver.

The class is offered as a 3 credit graduate course, guiding the students through market and financial analyses, business plans, product design and packaging, and finally the sale of their project. The class enables students to implement skills they have learned in other business courses in a way that can only be accomplished by becoming a virtual business owners. Assisting Professor Wise is Barbara Collazo (Second Life name), who has recently completed her Certificate in Virtual Worlds from the University of Washington.

Everyone is invited to help celebrate the students’ achievements and vote for the most viable Second Life product based on a number of criteria (available at the event).

For more information about the event or the class, please contact Debe Wise in second Life, at (720) 394-4043, or at dr.deb@me.com.

Will Wireless G4 Capability Impact Satellite Broadcasting?

In recent months the House of Flames has considered the purchase of a satellite dish for broadcasting live music events and festivals. Popular belief was that most indoor venues don’t have the Internet capabilities necessary to broadcast lie and a dish would make broadcasting these types of events more reliable. The cost of satellite dishes capable of broadcasting up to 2M of uplink bandwidth can be expensive and have entirely different specifications than a dish that would be able to broadcast to television. Capabilities to do the latter increase costs exponentially and it would appear one need to decide which camp to join before making a purchase.

During this “information gathering” I realized that most of the gigs the House of Flames broadcast had Internet access. Venues are not making wireless Internet access available for their customers and finding a wired Internet connection in a venue is actually more likely than finding a soundboard to connect to. In my travels, most bands are still bringing their own mics and PA systems, while Internet is available for the administrative needs of the venue. Of course, this isn’t always the case but it has presented enough of a pattern for me to wonder if a satellite dish is necessary for indoor shows.

Outdoor shows present an entirely different challenge. Outdoor festivals are becoming more common when weather permits and broadcasting everything from music to sporting events is a niche where purchasing a dish makes sense, particularly if a broadcast organization such as the House of Flames can line up enough events to make satellite transmission profitable. The need for reliability and the ability to offer a professional broadcast system often makes the difference between being awarded a contract and not.

Recently however, I have seen 4G devices such as the Sierra Wireless Overdrive offered by Sprint which claim to be upload speeds that can be ten times faster than a wireless 3G connection (up to 5M of upload speed). Having tried a 3G wireless card just to view what I was broadcasting on a separate computer, there would be no way I would trust an uplink to a 3G wireless connection. I even looked into aggregator products like those offered by Mushroom Networks, which bond the upload capabilities of several wireless cards into an aggregated stream for mobile broadcasts. These aggregator products require the broadcaster to have several wireless cards from different carriers (all at a monthly fee) and each of these cards needs to be broadcasting at it’s peak capacity to aggregate the uplink bandwidth necessary to broadcast reliably. In my own experience, I have rarely found a wireless card that actually performed up to the claims of the service provider. If that is the case, then what makes 4G worth a try?

Using Sprint as an example, they are committed to having a nationwide 4G network in place across the US by the end of 2010. Currently there are 27 markets that offer 4G coverage and if a device and service plan is purchased, the device will switch back and forth between 3G and 4G, depending on where the user is. If the House of Flames is in a 4G coverage area and can reliably broadcast 2M with the device, then that may eliminate the need for a dish. The operative word here is “reliability.”

Another drawback to wireless cards is the data transfer limit before additional charges are incurred. Downloading a compressed movie is one thing – uploading a live stream of a show can use 5G an hour – typically the limit for most wireless cards. Surprisingly, the Spring 4G network will also offer unlimited data transfer…UNLIMITED????? If that is the case, then there is no worrying about overages and their costs.

There is a place for satellite broadcasting and I’m not sure that 4G will eliminate the need for a dish. If 4G proves to be reliable and can upload at even half of what the advertized speeds are, then it might replace a large percentage of where a dish might be needed for Internet broadcasting (it can’t come close to television broadcasting or disaster data recovery). I welcome additional viewpoints as I am an information seeker at this point and before I spend thousands of USD on a dish, I would love to hear from people who might be using 4G for this purpose. Please contact me through this blog, or at info@houseofflamesmedia.com.

Before the Music Dies

A friend recently sent me the following link:

www.hulu.com/watch/62945/before-the-music-dies

It is about the commercialization of the music industry into a money machine as opposed to a vehicle that encourages artistic expression. It is about who has more sex appeal and who can look good on camera, not who can actually sing or play music. I’m thankful to be among that growing population that is tired of a record industry or a mega-radio conglomerate determining what my tastes are. In looking at my own iPod, I have everything from Thelonious Monk, Taj Mahal and Little Feat, to ZZ Top, Pink, and U2. How can a record company determine my tastes?

That is where live streaming and the power of the Internet come into play. As a streaming media company, the House of Flames can broadcast anyone – they don’t have to be famous, have a record deal, or look like a cover model. They just have to be able to play and share their soul with their audience. There is an emerging “Band of Music Brothers” who are devoted to returning music performance to the people who can and will support it financially.

The House of Flames is looking to partner with web-based music media companies that want to broadcast the people who make music…anywhere. Contact dr.deb@me.com or visit our website, http://houseofflamesmedia.com

Debe Wise will be teaching a graduate level class in Virtual Entrepreneurship at the Bard Center for Entrepreneurship at the University of Colorado Denver beginning in June. It is a 3 credit, summer online course in how to create a business in Second Life with the possibility of migration to real life (which is how the House of Flames began). Anyone can register for the class; watch the video at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCBTXAbGsUA

Renewing the Fire

The House of Flames is in the media business. If you have read this blog for any length of time, you know we take the live transmission of media very seriously. To that end, we have spent the last couple of months getting better at what we do and planning for what lies ahead. And there could be some big things…big.

One of the first things we did this year was to form an alliance with Todocast.tv. After looking for a long time at the Content Delivery Network options that were out there, Todocast had the best blend of customization, Pay per view ability, chat features, and delivery options of anyone we had considered. They are also satellite friendly, which makes them a good choice for the direction we are headed, which is satellite transmission. Check out our channel page at http://todocast.tv/houseofflames.

Once we had the delivery network in place, we began to look at satellite options. From broadcast bandwidth to transmitter wattage, we have been all over the map in taking the House of Flames to the next step of differentiation. Web-based transmissions happen at entirely different bandwidths than television transmission, with the latter requiring tens of thousands of dollars. For the short-term, the House of Flames is going to move to broadcast the highest quality most redundant Internet based streaming that can be had. We feel there is a lot of growth to be had in Internet-based streaming, especially to mobile devices. We will concentrate in that area and grow as our opportunities arise. We have covered out television-broadcast bases, however. There are some great people in Austin who we have come to know and have decided to align ourselves with. The folks at ATX/HD (http://www.atxhd.com/) have the television satellite uplink capabilities we need more demanding broadband jobs, and our partnership with them enables us to video/broadcast any type of event. Our reach is all over North America but we will travel wherever we have an opportunity we can’t pass up.

Our most recent accomplishment is to revamp our website and make it social-media friendly. The new http://houseofflamesmedia.com website is up and running and will act as a repository for our work. Check back and see it often and also click on the links at the bottom of the page to follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Youtube.

We are committed to becoming a premier live streaming events company. Keep watching!

To Infinity…And Beyond

Now that you know why I do what I do, my goal is to devote myself to consistently doing it better. There are issues like adding more cameras to a shoot, upload bandwidth, and the persistent problem of how to broadcast in a location where Internet access may not be available. Perhaps the more pressing problem in streaming is how to monetize the effort in order to be able to call this a vocation as opposed to a hobby.

I belong to a LinedIn group called “Streaming Media Professionals” and asked just this question about a Pay-Per-View (PPV) solution that can be used with my Flash streaming host. I received a number of answers, from a code-database snippet from the UK I could purchase to provide token authentication, to a complete solution that even includes a satellite dish (todocast.tv). One thing that emerged in the discussions (which garnered 17 comments) was the heated volley over the issue of Digital Rights Management. There was an Austin company called BUYDRM(.com) that promoted the need for digital rights management and the solution they provide. This in essence makes sense if I am going to be streaming a major artist but is it necessary for a medium sized company that is taping/streaming lesser-known artists? Also, how is this policed if someone DOES copy my work? Wouldn’t a desktop recording program copy anything that is played, regardless of whether it is purchased or not?

It reminds me of a concert events “company” I came across in Second Life. Unlike the House of Flames and many other quality music venues in virtual worlds, this organization used live concert audio from major real-life events and then had avatars that were created to look like the headlining artists “perform” for the crowd. The event I was able to attend was a Stevie Nicks live concert that was actually recorded at a venue near my home! I was uncomfortable with this business model on many levels. It abuses copyright laws, it makes live performance a mockery, and it is promoting a model that most people who are honestly working in music would find offensive.

When I was able to speak to the person who “ran” the show (for a fee), he said that he has had very little trouble because most artists don’t have representation in virtual worlds, less people who are watching copyrights. He did say that he had gotten a “cease and desist” note from the representative for one artist, which only caused him not to parody that artist any longer. This takes digital rights management to an extreme but it illuminates the multiple opportunities for rights violations where digital /interactive environments are concerned.

Why I Do What I Do – Part 3

The House of Flames was established in Second Life (and ultimately a legal entity in real life) to highlight virtually performing musicians and stream their talents to anyone who came to our shows or had the ability to join us via a web browser. As time went on however, it was apparent that we were only serving a segment of the population that had access to the technology that made this possible. As someone who is in education and champions the underdog, the issue of making this same opportunity available for everyone began to be part of my thoughts when I woke up and when I went to bed. When people met me, within a few minutes I was talking about the House of Flames and what I hoped to do. In short, the House of Flames and where it goes in real life has become my passion.

In 2009, the House of Flames purchased its first mobile unit van with the intention of outfitting a live Internet studio in the back. This will allow us to travel to remote gigs and broadcast the event, whether it is corporate, music, or even sporting events. Hopefully that will pay the bills and allow the House of Flames to pursue the passion that has now been cultivated over the last three years: to use the technology that is available to find those whose music should be heard but isn’t. We aren’t a record label (I guess anything is possible) but there are people who are paying their dues in clubs who are really talented and because they don’t have access to the same level of technology as those in virtual worlds, they are never reaching the audiences that would love to hear them. The House of Flames hopes to bridge that gap.

Of course we need money, of course we need time, of course we need to find those people who truly need to be heard. Maybe it was the sudden death of my former husband Monte that made me realize we only have so long to leave the earth better then we found it, and if this is truly my passion I need to pursue this. What the House of Flames needs is for people to get the word of our mission out, for us to be invited to hear people who need to be broadcast, and for those with the financial ability to make this grow to find us. I have seen some pretty wild shows on cable TV…I think this one has merit. It will be accomplished one way or another because I have to…it is my passion.