I thought it was an excellent piece. They had a short interview with Markos, and another with Gov Richardson. There are a couple of nice clips from the presidential forum. And there are some nice interviews with attendees. The coverage was very positively framed, and showed that PBS views Kos and the NetRoots community as a powerful and informed influence on political policy in the US.

I am delighted with my experience attending the Yearly Kos Convention in Second Life. I’m not saying that there weren’t problems, but they didn’t overshadow the fantastic experience of attending this event virtually. This was by far the best event that I have had the pleasure of attending in Second Life. There were as many as 30 avatars in a single section of the Stadium at times and there was no lag at all. The attendees were attentive and did not distract from the sessions by chatting about inane topics. IMs and chat discussions were intelligent and stimulating for the most part, and it really added to the impression of attending the event live, in real time. They also had microphones at the SL venues that you could touch and submit questions to the moderators at the Chicago site. Even more impressive was the fact that they actually used many questions that were submitted through the SL interface. Totally awesome. I did not regret paying for this level of access to the convention for one second.

The Presidential Forum and Breakouts with the Candidates

Hillary’s breakout session was held prior to the forum with all of the candidates. Her breakout was streamed to the YKOS Arena in SL, and although the video was not as crisp as the Stadium venue, it was quite acceptable. Hillary was well accepted by the crowd, and she seemed relaxed and genuine. Here are a couple of snapshots from that session.

The presidential forum was held at the Netroots Stadium, and the audio and video quality was excellent throughout this session. The candidates present were Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Dennis Kucinich, John Edwards, Bill Richardson, Sen Dodd and Mike Gravel. The session consisted of two moderators asking questions that were submitted via the internet prior to the session, and taking questions from the audience. The moderators did an admirable job of making sure each candidate got adequate time to answer the questions, that candidates did not monopolize the floor, and that each candidate got questions that were specifically directed at him/her. The quality of the questions was remarkable, and it was obvious that the candidates realized that they were speaking to an extremely well informed audience. I will leave political analysis of the content of the forum to others who are more experienced at that occupation, but I did take some pretty good pictures of most of the candidates. Here are some of the better ones.

The last major event of the convention is tonight’s closing keynote speech by Markos Moulitsas, the founder of the Daily Kos at 7:30 Central Time. You can view that event on ustream.tv on my blog embeded on the August 2 post, or you can go to ustream.tv.

What a great convention, and a wonderful interactive Second Life experience!

The first session I attended was the Future Leaders forum which was in the Netroots Stadium in Second Life. The session itself was unexpectedly engaging and exciting. It featured progressive candidates who ran in 2006, and will run again in 2008. I was impressed by each and every one of these people. They were practical, as well as passionate. They are running for office because they want to make a difference, and they have strong feelings about where our country should be headed. It is also worth mentioning that the audio and video quality in the Netroots Stadium is excellent, which really adds to the experience. I almost felt like I was in the auditorium in Chicago.

I attended another panel in the Digby’s Corner venue (not sure what panel it was…) while I was waiting for the lunchtime keynote session. The audio and video quality there was not as good as in the stadium (one of the YK folks explained to me why – mostly has to do with $$s), but it was quite acceptable. I had some good conversation with other attendees at this session. I really enjoyed it.

I am back at the stadium now listening to the lunchtime keynote with Andy Stern, President of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), CLC. I don’t always agree with Andy’s point of view, but he has some excellent insights into the state of employees in America today.

Below is a snapshot from the Netroots Stadium today.

Well, today is the day. The Yearly Kos Convention kicks off today in real life, Chicago, and also in Second Life, Progressive Island. The convention center in SL looks great, and you can still register to attend in SL. You can view the Yearly Kos Second Life schedule by clicking on the link, or you can see it in SL outside the convention center. There is also a streaming video of the convention from Chicago on ustream.tv. I think they will be streaming this video to some of the venues in SL. I have also embeded the ustream feed below.

Check out this post on DailyKos for details on registering and attending DailyKos in Second Life. Here is a short excerpt from that diary.

There are three venues on Progressive Island where the sessions will be taking place: Netroots Stadium, YKOS Arena, and Digby’s Corner. Go check it out, and find out when and where you should be for your must-see sessions!

And don’t anyone forget that you can still register even after the conference has started! We definitely don’t mind if people show up late, as long as they show up.

Barack will be participating in the events on Saturday both in Chicago, and I believe there will be real-time interaction with the SL audience for the Presidential sessions.

More to follow on this topic….

Update:
Ron (Drip Wise) and I (Goldberry Graysmark) attended the keynote speech in Second Life tonight and really enjoyed it. The video and sound quality were excellent, and so was Gov Dean’s keynote speech. Check out the pictures.

Ron and I Sitting in Netroots Stadium

Checking Out the Video Stream

Gov Dean Giving His Keynote Speech