Image: The Port inauguration, Humlegården, Stockholm, 2005
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The Port is a community driven island inside the online 3D world Second Life. The island is open and accessible to Second Life’s 175 000 (Aug 2005) inhabitants and potentially to all Internet users.
One could argue that 3D modelled social platforms, such as Second Life, establish a new type of spatiality – a meeting place within digital networks. Therefore, geographically speaking, The Port exists in a network of many locations, but is also a location in and of itself.
The Port was initiated by Goldin+Senneby in 2004 and has developed in collaboration with architect Tor Lindstrand. Today, The Port community consists of an international network of over 50 members. We have established The Port as an open WIKI-like structure where anyone can freely initiate projects.
Using The Port as a point of departure we are pursuing our own series of investigations. We have been looking at how value is created and communicated in an immaterial sphere, how one can locate complex collaborative production and build relations of trust in a virtual environment, and how community building can establish a sense of autonomy without imposing an internal culture of control.