second life

I think there is something rather exciting about the fact that people are nowadays able to create an avatar for themselves and live a life of pure imagination. Personally, it is not something that I am interested in doing but looking at the number of people who part take in similar games I can see why it is important that we all pay attention to them. Perhaps the most interesting question is examining “ how, and if, our experience of virtual spaces allows us to rethink the experience of the mind and body relationship.” (Ensslin, A & Muse, E 2011)

Brian Massumi makes a very reasonable point that the imagination and virtual world make a great match! Looking at the length that people go with their creations, I really hope that it is just their imagination :)

Lets consider Second Life and its unlimited opportunities. For instance, there is probably no other platform where people can experience the life in Medieval Times with a group of people who are truly interested in the same subject. There is no harm in dressing the part, role playing and conversing with similar minded people, is there? But how do we feel when they start to get intimate or even have sex (which is very common!)

Axel Bruns points out:

'Collaborative spaces removes 'the real-world limitations placed on social and/ or collaborative behaviour by factors such as language, geography, background, financial status, etc.' by providing the tools for widespread ,equitable collaboration across large communities of users. It also compensates for human inadequacies in processing, maintaining or developing social and/ or collaborative mechanisms.' (Bruns 2006)

Maybe it is just too weird or we do not get it how people can spend so much time role playing a life that does not exist but I don't think it really matters. What second life does is that it adds another dimension of experience to people's lives. It really harms no one and it won't be long lasting. It'll take its place in history and will give birth to some other genius idea!

On the other hand, I find it really hard to forget the Korean couple who had spend so much time on second life raising a child that they had neglected their real life child! This we can not fully blame on the game, although it does raise concerns.

Still, Second Life was innovative and it probably deserved all the attention it received. Let's see what is next?

References

Bruns, A 2006, ' Blogs, Wikipedia, Second Life, and Beyond', Peter Lang Publishing, New York

Ensslin, A & Muse, E 2011,'Creating second lives: community, identity and spatiality as constructions of virtual”, Routledge