Second Life Reforestation Project a Finalist for $5M American Express Prize

Second Chance Trees, a cooperative effort in Second Life from Plant-It 2020 and Converseon, announced today that it is a finalist for the American Express Members Project. The Members Project allows American Express members to select and vote for one project to create a positive impact worldwide. Out of 50 finalists, Second Chance Trees is the only one based in Second Life. Second Life residents can go to Second Chance Trees Island and plant a virtual tree for 300 Linden dollars (about $1.50). Second Chance Trees will then plant a tree in a real-life endangered area. If enough people vote for the project here by July 17, Second Chance Tress will receive up to $5 million in funding from American Express to plant over 1 million trees. You can watch a video introduction here.

From the website:

Plant-It 2020 will plant 1 million virtual trees in SecondLife – the largest 3D social networking website – leading to 1 million actual trees being planted. We already have a virtual forest in SecondLife where people go through the process of purchasing and planting virtual trees – each of which leads to actual trees being planted to reduce global warming. Details on this reforestation project are available at secondchancetrees.org. The Plant-It 2020 website is at plantit2020.org.

At the virtual forest in SecondLife, there will be 1) a carbon calculator, 2) integration, if desired, of the American Express participation through signage and other activities, 3) podcasts on environmentalism/tree reforestation, etc., 4) machinima videos on YouTube, 5) video integration (touch to watch forestry video), 6) an initiative blog, 7) music "fund/visibility raising concerts," 8) mashups with Google Earth and other widgets/gadgets, 9) partnerships and co-promotions with Environmental Council and other activities, and 10) broader participation efforts within and outside of SecondLife. With all of these activities, corporations, organizations and individuals can still come to SecondLife and plant virtual trees, leading to real trees being planted. We already have this project occurring on a smaller scale in SecondLife so we would simply need to purchase more 'virtual land' and then design the new forest along with the various promotional & educational aspects.

Joey Seiler
www.VirtualWorldsNews.com
joey (at) showinitiative.com
(512) 535-8650
skype: joey.seiler.vwnews

Comments

[Eena Oyen]

Congratulation to this project!

In connection to this, I'd like to introduce the initiative "REALEAF - Make your avatar carbon neutral", which was founded by FORCE SUNRISE.
Second Life Island owners, companies with representative offices as well as private users have the opportunity to neutralize the carbon emissions caused by surfing in SL.

For each contribution made on the Sim "Metaverum B", a virtual leaf labeled with your avatars or company's name will grow. For each leaf on the virtual REALEAF-tree, a real tree will be planted.

You can also check, who has taken part yet, by checking the REALEAF website, where every supporter is listed automatically: http://www.forcesunrise.com/en/realeaf/
or visit the project directly:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Metaversum%20B/82/83/22?img=http://www.forcesunrise.com/images/realeaf_slurl.png

Support projects like these, to add value to virtual worlds by enriching the real world!