Your intrepid reporter.

Salutations, to whoever is coming across this page; my name is Miller Copeland, and I run the website you're now at. Since this publication is a brand-new one, I thought I'd start by taking a moment and explaining who I am, and what IN THE GRID (ITG) magazine is going to be about.

I'm someone who's been professionally involved with the RL underground arts for more than a decade; I've written, I've published, I've toured, I've run live events, and a lot more. So when I first became a resident of Second Life in spring 2006, it was to the underground locations and groups that I of course first gravitated. I started writing about my adventures initially through a special category at my RL journal; I quickly had fellow residents, though, suggesting that I expand it into a full stand-alone blog and monthly magazine, which I've finally decided to do.

ITG covers what I think is the true underground culture of SL, things that a lot of other publications simply don't cover themselves, or don't do a very good job of; the latest artists, the latest arts organizations, the latest cutting-edge programming experiments, the latest fetish sex clubs. They are things that I and future contributors are simply going to in the grid for fun anyway; things that maybe others are interested in too, but for one reason or another aren't discussed much in public.

Once a month, then, I'll take the ten or so most intriguing blog entries that were posted, expand them in scope and size, add lots of photos, and publish it as a free PDF magazine here at the site; unlike this blog, the magazine will have much longer interviews and thoughts concerning just the subjects and people who were most fascinating that month. And we accept advertising, too; in fact, a placement of a monthly PDF ad gets you a free month of advertising here at the website, too.

Also your intrepid reporter.

For those who don't know, by the way, I'm known as an omnisexual in the grid; I exist there both as a man and a woman, and randomly shape-shift between the two as an evening continues. I just like to let people know, so that there's no confusion when I show up as a gender they weren't expecting. I'm a bit more of a smartass than my RL counterpart; also never afraid of a little trouble, and willing to check out just about anything you have an invitation for. I'm relying on you cool people to tell us what cool things to write about; send all suggestions, no matter how strange, to inthegrid [at] gmail.com.

So that's it for now, and you can expect about one to three good entries a day, starting tomorrow (Monday, September 11th). Hope you'll have a chance to come back often.