About the author
Yes, my name in the ActiveWorlds universe is CyberWoLfman and it may be familiar to you. I tend to get around a lot. Just remember not to believe everything you hear. Most of it's probably lies, anyway. LOL If you do hear someone lying about me and saying bad things about me, it's a pretty safe bet you're talking to a gor/gorean. ;-)
For more information about the ActiveWorlds program, read my ActiveWorlds 3D chat program review.
Also, I do not spend as much time in AW as I used to, prefering to spend it in better 3D chat programs. So, if you telegram me, I probably won't get it, as the server deletes them after a week or so if you don't log in within that time. If you want to contact me, try meeting me in my 3D world, This Is It.
How I came to ActiveWorlds: Reading sci-fi is one of my addictions, and I have read literally thousands of stories. There's a least one thousand books here in my private library at home! But one of my favorite books was Neal Stephenson's "Snow Crash". While I read it, I longed to have a place to go to like the VR world, the Metaverse, in the book. Then I heard about AlphaWorld back in 1995 and downloaded and installed the program. There's even an old video tape in my house somewhere of one of the short segments that Cnet did on it. Maybe someday I'll find out how to make a mini-movie out of it, and put it on the Web for everybody to see.
When I first used this program, there was only AlphaWorld. I fell out of the sky from at least a height of 50 meters (or it may've just felt like it with my slow computer) and hit the ground, and that was how everyone came to AlphaWorld back then. No other worlds, no world list. There was a brick GZ, and one big sign a little distance away from me, facing me, saying how to move. I remember moving the sign by accident, then getting worried somebody would get upset with me about it. Don't think there was even a chat screen. I remember having to turn around all the time to see if anybody was talking to me, and read the text above their heads. (One time, there was a guy saying something about taking a tour group through.) So things have changed just a little bit since then... I wonder if Protagonist, Da5id, and some of the older users will remember me? They didn't appear to pay much attention. LOL Well, that, and I was using other names, back then, so they probably wouldn't recognize my current one, but some of you know the other names I used. ;-)
The computer I used to visit AlphaWorld with back then was a 486, and it ran at 66 Mhz. When I came in, it screamed and screamed, and wanted to go home, poor thing! Since I have this weird habit of thinking of machines (and even bots) as people, I didn't stay too long, because I didn't want it to suffer.
Although I wished with all my heart I could spend more time in AlphaWorld, I couldn't. The computer couldn't take it, and I couldn't afford a better one. All I could do was read the news. Maybe most of the users thought it was boring, but to me, it was like watching a new world being formed, and the stories surrounding that. Not sure if it really happened or not, but there was one story I read about an asteroid destroying AlphaWorld and another about somebody named Queen Nemesis building an underworld. Odd things seem to stick in my mind. ;-)
Before I came to ActiveWorlds, I used a program called Worlds (I tended to call it WorldsChat or Worlds 3D Chat). Anyone else remember that program? The little hall of avatars you had on your own computer that you could choose from, and all that? I even remember that I could download new avatars and put them in it, but only up to a certain number of avatars, because it could only hold so many in my little gallery. So I put a bunch in at once, while keeping in my favorites and checked them out that way. The computer didn't perform too well with it even though those avatars weren't that realistic (all of them were holographic back then and not articulated 3D avatars, but there was this one female avatar that some ladies liked to use that if you saw it from just the right angle... but there may be children reading this, so I won't say it), but at least I could use the program in a way. One of my favorite things to do was wander around outside of the space station by using that little trick that some of us knew to do it. But our aim had to be good to do it, and sometimes it took a few tries, as it was right near the top of the little stairway, and you had to go into the tiny crack on the wall. Now some of you other past users of Worlds 3D Chat realize what I mean. ;-) Yes, you probably did see me hanging out in space sometimes. Or maybe going behind the mirror in that one room. Starting to bring back memories? Heh, heh. It was more fun than hanging out in the big room in the WorldCenter with the signs on the walls and all that, or the rave room. One thing I've always wondered about. Was that minotaur or bull in that one room with the writing on the walls within the maze a bot or a person?
Currently, I have many projects in the ActiveWorlds universe, and I'm determined to someday finish them all. Hey, I heard that snicker! ;-) Until then, they're all in a more or less 'under construction' state. Between studying multiple subjects, making Web pages like the one you're reading now, or making them for others, writing, doing some photography work in real life, and a variety of other things that take up most of my time, I'm usually too busy to build in ActiveWorlds.
Back to CyberWoLfman's ActiveWorlds Experience.