The JJIE Virtual World Journalism Project: Experimenting with Virtual Worlds as an Emerging Journalism Platform
Year: 2016

4 Literature Review 5 Study .10 Project Overview .10 Why Virtual Worlds for Juvenile Justice Stories? .11 Methodology .14 o Tools The Virtual World Platform: OpenSimulator .15 Our Project's Place in the Metaverse .15 Student Interns In the Virtual World .16 Communication Platform: Google Docs .16 o Participants Objectives .17 o Procedures .19 o Data Collection .20 Results .21 Project Internal Surveys .21 o Student Interns..21 o Mentoring Team .26 Mixed Methodology: Ethnographic Study .32 Campus Presentation Student Audience .33 Communications Class Student Audience .34 Analysis .36 Discussion .39 THE JJIE VIRTUAL WORLD JOURNALISM PROJECT 3 Conclusion .40 References .42 THE JJIE VIRTUAL WORLD JOURNALISM PROJECT 4 Abstract Although immersive journalism in the virtual world was pioneered by journalist and documentary filmmaker Nonny de la Pena years ago, traditional journalists are just now discovering its potential as an alternative platform to report the news. This study explores the singularities of immersive journalism in virtual worlds using the "Marginalized Youth Voices Amplified on Virtual Worlds" project, which a journalism professor at Kennesaw State University received a grant to develop. The grant came from an Online News AssociationAlthough immersive journalism in the virtual world was pioneered by journalist and documentary filmmaker Nonny de la Pena years ago, traditional journalists are just now discovering its potential as an alternative platform to report the news. This study explores the singularities of immersive journalism in virtual worlds using the "Marginalized Youth Voices Amplified on Virtual Worlds" project, which a journalism professor at Kennesaw State University received a grant to develop. The grant came from an Online News Association Challenge Fund for Innovation in Journalism Education, and has been used to produce 3Dscenario machinima (action videos inside virtual worlds) to tell real life journalism stories of the youth in the juvenile justice system. The project deploys the principles of traditional journalism in the virtual world to re create the experiences of youth in the juvenile justice system. As the project's student researcher, I plan to discover what journalism professors, students and professionals can learn from this nine month experience of using virtual world platforms to tell real world journalism stories. Using a combination of ethnographic and survey research, this study will undertake a structural analysis of not only the production practices of immersive virtual journalism such as the reporting and recording of stories in virtual world scenarios via OpenSimulator, an open source platform, multi user 3D server application but also of the impact of this emerging, evolving form of journalism on audiences, especially media averse youth audiences. At the conclusion of this experiment, the answers to the following questions will be more clear: How successful can an interdisciplinary group of undergraduate students be in telling youth justice stories in virtual worlds? Does the immersive, personalized nature of virtual world journalism resonate more with youthful audiences than traditional journalism does? Do college students believe that it provides a richer, more empathetic experience in news THE JJIE VIRTUAL WORLD JOURNALISM PROJECT 5 consumption? What can traditional journalism learn from immersive virtual world journalism?  The presentation of news has drastically changed over the years. As McNair (2009) pointed out, news has gone from "analogue to digital; passive consumption of content to userproducer interaction; stationary to mobile" (p. 2) Due to the new, innovative technology of the ever evolving Internet, journalism has been forced to keep up with a wide range of techniques for gathering and distributing news. Such innovations have ultimately re defined journalism, causing news reporters to find and create inventive ways to capture the attention of their digitally inclined audience. As a result of the ever developing technology that has constantly challenged traditional journalistic practices, virtual reality has emerged as one of those innovative storytelling platforms. Digital media in the form of online journalism has promised "new dimensions to news coverage" like "immediacy and abundancy" (Miller Reynolds, 2014, p. 154) but virtual reality gives a whole new meaning to its third dimension: interactivity. According to Burdea Coiffet (2003) virtual reality functions as "a simulation in which computer graphics are used to create a realistic looking world" (p. 2) Rather than being "static," the world "responds to the user's input" (Burdea Coiffet, 2003, p. 2) While interactivity in digital media initially enabled viewers "to express their thoughts about a story or provide news tips" via online media (Miller Reynolds, 2014, p. 156) virtual reality permits "real time interactivity," which means that "the computer is able to detect a user's input and modify the virtual world instantaneously" (Burdea Coiffet, 2003, p. 2) In other words, the user makes the decisions of what he or she can see on the screen, providing an entirely new connection between audience and news story. THE JJIE VIRTUAL WORLD JOURNALISM PROJECT 6 Although virtual reality was invented over 50 years ago, beginning in 1962 with Sensorama Simulator, Morton Heilig's first virtual reality video arcade, and the first commercial virtual reality technology, the DataGlove was created by VPL INC. in 1992, the idea of immersive journalism has only just begun to emerge. In fact, virtual reality applications were created in various areas like art, medicine, entertainment and the military before they were even considered as a journalism platform (Burdea Coiffet, 2003) When virtual reality journalism first appeared in 2003, it was mostly practiced in Second Life, "a computer generated alternative reality"  In Second Life, users from all over the world construct avatars to navigate through virtual environments and participate in social, business, and educational activities similar to those in "real life." Just as news exists in the real world, news exists in Second Life, where residents and reporters actively produce news stories. Three virtual reality newspapers in particular, beginning with the Alphaville Herald in 2003, and including the Metaverse Messenger and the Second Life Newspaper have aimed to provide residents in and out of the virtual environment with ways of understanding life in the virtual world. Along with these virtual world newspapers, TV shows emerged in Second Life, starting in 2006 with Metanomics, a web based mixed reality show with virtual interviews. Hosted by Robert Bloomfield, this five year running virtual talk show enabled any individual avatar in the audience to participate by asking questions in real time (Cruz Fernandes, 2011) Metanomics became so successful that many described it as "the seminal form of what journalism will look like in the 21st century" (Cruz Fernandes, 2011, p. 6) Following the success of Metanomics, another virtual reality news show, MBC Weekly News appeared online with the Metaverse Broadcasting Company's Metaverse TV Network show lineup. THE JJIE VIRTUAL WORLD JOURNALISM PROJECT 7 As a result of the success of these virtual reality shows and the growing popularity of Second Life in general, major news sources such as CNN and Reuters began to engage in virtual reality with the creation of Second Life bureaus. Through its user generated iReport model, CNN allowed virtual citizens in Second Life to participate in the creation of the news (Cruz Fernandes, 2011) while Reuters established full time in world avatar reporters in Second Life. Major moves from these companies prompted various other magazines, newspapers, and TV stations to establish a presence in Second Life. Suddenly, virtual worlds were intersecting with various "real life" brands, causing Second Life to come to the forefront of conversation in "reallife" media (Totilo, 2007) These growing developments of virtual reality eventually led to the most s