Project 3 Credit Crisis Part 1

Summary
In this project Tsoi Chan(TL Dumpling) and myself(Phoenix Grayman) decided to create a finite state machine that represents how the Credit Crisis came to be. The credit crisis is very complex so we got the majority of our information from here. Mr. Jarvis has very good visual on describing the different steps of the crisis. Our project takes these steps and puts them into a finite state machine modeled in Second Life.
Motivation and Interaction
Denotation
The denotation of this data is represented in a number of ways. First we have the main billboard. The main billboard explains each state and also numbers the states so that the user know which state they are in. Each state is like a piece of the puzzle and explains the reasoning of the puzzle piece and how it relates to the whole. So as the state machines moves forward the big pictures get easier and easier to understand. To facilitate the billboards purpose of conveying this denotation, we use highlighting to bring notice to the parts of the economy that are being affected in the billboard's current state. This helps the user better understand the connections between all the states. The states of our model are as follows

1. Looking for a Good Investment: Investor look for a profitable investments
2. Federal Reserve: Investor go to Federal Reserve but the investments there aren't very profitable
3. How Banks Make Money: How banks make money and set up for why investors went to the bankers
4. Bankers Go Crazy with Leverage: How investors and bankers are connected
5. Why This Works: Explanation of why CDO aren't really a bad idea
6. They Get Greedy: How they made it a bad idea because of greediness
7. What Went Wrong:Explanation of why the change was a bad idea
8. Downward Spiral: The effects of the bad idea
9. Credit Crisis: The overall final effect the one we see in the news
   

Connotation
The connotation of the data is represented in the themes of the models our group created. The first theme we used is that we modeled our objects with symbols that represent the models real world equivalent. For example, for investors we modeled big buildings which tap into our archetype of the lifestyle of investors. Another theme we use to represent the connotation of the data, is by capturing the theme that Jonathan Jarvis used in his visuals. His theme helps convey the story better because the color scheme reminds the user of money and thats what the credit crisis is all about.
Video