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 As we finish this month's issue, I find myself looking back at all we've accomplished this past year. I think about our original intentions, what we were up to and what led us to go so far. It's hard to put a project like this together, and I've been lucky to have such great supporters around me, and we've made an incredible group that put all these stories together.
The work is huge, and we've been learning a lot, while at the same time, we've tried to answer people's expectations. We never were naïve enough to think that with our limited circulation and our nonexistent budget we could achieve a broader audience in Second Life and especially outside Second Life.
One of our goals was to drive attention to librarians outside Second Life for what their peers were doing here and motivate them to create an account and be one more of us.
There will always be skeptics and people who will not understand why people put such an effort in building library services in virtual worlds, but the fact is the process is already ongoing, and the proof is that AVL is here for almost three years, and hopefully they will stay much longer.
The very nature of Second Life can be ephemeral. People come and go, and much of the work is volunteer based. The next step will be naturally to start paying people for the effort, time and commitment they are doing here, but we cannot put aside that much of what has been done throughout Second Life was possible much because people were free to do what they really believed in.
That was the case of RezLibris. I had this idea to bring the librarian community together, and some people followed. I was blessed to have such great partners in crime.
Now, I face this difficult task of writing my last editorial. I feel humbled by the kindness, warmth and intelligence of this community of people. But it's time to continue with other projects in my life.
To follow my real life pursuits, I have to go back to my studies, and this will give me no time to dedicate myself to RezLibris, so it's only fair to let others continue this job, and I'm sure they will succeed.
Like Leeorie Alter once said, I think this is a part of the "growing pains." When you have a child, you watch them grow. It's hard to see them leave you when they begin to mature, but it's a fact of life. So I have to let RezLibris follow its way and grow without me. As for me, I will be watchful and certainly be an avid reader.
There are many thanks I would like to address, and I don't want to bother our readers with a long list of names, but there are a few people I would like to thank personally for believing in this project from day one. To start, I would like to thank our founding members, Dulcie Mills, Eirene Janus and Leeorie Alter and, of course, all the wonderfull staff and writers that work with us in present and have worked with us in the past. I would also like to mention Lorelei Junot and Abbey Zenith's names, for being so supportive and for believing in this venture.
This is not a goodbye; it's a farewell. And there's no words to say how I will miss this. Thanks for everything!
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