MUVE Location - Koru
Why Koru?
I chose Koru as my second virtual environment because it was my first location I had ever visited inside Second Life. Koru has many interesting characteristics about it, one moment its a classroom the next its a sort of community hangout, then next its a building zone. Koru is always changing.
What is Koru?
Koru is a sim owned by NMIT Nelson and shared throughout the New Zealand Polytechnic Community. It is the home of all MUV601 students where residents can explore and learn about virtual worlds. Koru is generally a place for students of different expertise to congregate. MUV students, midwifery students and AUT students all share the same land and the land has been sculpted to visually indicate each section of Koru.
Koru aims to inform its residents about what you can achieve with Multi User Virtual Environments, teaching us the extent to which virtual worlds can be utilized.
Koru is constantly changing because of its educational purpose. Koru's virtual presence makes learning fun and interesting.
The Koru Community
Koru is run by Aaron and Clare who's online aliases are Isa and Arwenna Stardust, respectively.
The main group Koru associates itself with is the MUV601 group which all NMIT MUV students are registered to when they enroll in the class. This makes it easier to keep track of who is who and also makes communicating easier when taking virtual road trips.
MUV students have been given unique permissions to build on Koru and have also been given unique work spaces to build as they please.
Generally for MUV students Koru is used as a classroom where Isa will direct the class and teach us about Second Life, building and more.
Description of Koru from a technical standpoint
Koru is a beautiful sim that is nicely laid out and built. The feel of a tropic island is acheived with large palm trees and seaside beach. Buildings such as the AUT building and the midwifery building are well designed and constructed, clean textures also help make the buildings pop.
Koru is a canvas for builders to flex their creative muscles and it shows, students and lecturers have made amazing things on Koru but one of the most technical and eye catching of them all is the Hyperdome.
The Hyperdome is a large building Northeast the center of Koru. Its a large detailed dome like structure made primarily by Isa for the purpose of Foundation Studies which prepare students before learning about a variety of subjects.
The Hyperdome is masterfully crafted from top to bottom. The outer area is decorated with gardens and seating, aswell as a flight of stairs that round the building. Textures are utilized specifically to draw your attention with contrasting colours and paua like patterns.
The Hyperdome can change form at the click of a button, saving precious space. As seen above the Hyperdome caters to lots of situations. Its primary goal is to teach social skills in an interview situation, preparing for an interview, starting with what to wear to how to act.
Specifically the Hyperdome has the abilty to change and swap in and out 5 different rooms within the dome using scripts and prims. (We haven't reached the point in time where we have learnt to script in Second Life yet so I'm gonna assume its pretty technical!)
The stairs cases that surround the Hyperdome not only add to its aesthetics, but also its functionality. The first flight of stairs have billboards that appear when you touch them, teaching you everything you need to know about interviews. The outer stairs cases to each side of the Hyperdome create and teleport you to different interview rooms for different situations. This is done the same way the Hyperdome changes rooms, space is saved by making rooms appear when they are needed and dissappear when they are not and users are seated and teleported to the interview room in the sky.
Observations of the build Koru overall is a lovely place to visit and explore, its rich sense of community and love for learning are great for new comers and veterans alike.
Its shared land is decorated with a large amount of content which acts as as a central hub for residents to hangout "meet others and talk about their work, their study, their teaching, their ideas, their dreams, their lives..."
I'm enjoiying my stay at Koru for the time being, its been great learning about what Second Life and the world of MUVE's have to offer.