Get a Life...A Second Life?

Real, unreal, surreal, hyperreal.Think your life is
boring? You can live elsewhere, virtually. You can do all sorts of things through an alternate identity, an avatar, in another virtual life.You don't have to be here when you can be there.Virtually there. Or maybe really there.

Harvard courses for real college credit, see-through clothing,
concerts, parties with sushi and sex? Yep.It is all there. Life as
we know it is no longer associated with the here-and-now, the touchable
and the tangible.

But not to worry: teenagers have community standards for their
virtual lives in Second Life.Will our children live lives more real elsewhere than here? Will it matter?

More than 900,000 users have signed on to Second Life, an online virtual place built and owned by its residents and now in its third year (privately owned by San Francisco-based Linden Labs).It blends fiction and reality in an online parallel universe.It is more than just a SimCity type of real-life simulating space.
Corporations such as Sun Microsystems and Reuters are establishing a
presence there. Philip Rosedale, CEO of Second Life, said more than 100 residents are living there full-time.

According to an article in Christian Science Monitor, Harvard has a class there this fall with a virtual replica of Harvard Law School's Austin Hall and 90 students are getting real life college credit for taking the course.
Education is growing to be a significant part of how Second Life is
used, says John Lester, community education manager at Linden Labs.
Virtual classes (not necessarily those of Second Life) offering A.P.
credit are being questioned by the College Board who wonder about
students going into second-year college science courses without ever
using a Bunsen burner, according to a NYTimes article.Virtual learning can help architects by using simulation and online learning is a burgeoning industry. But it is way beyond learning and is becoming an alternative way of living...

But it is more than the learning that caught my interest.Where
does the real end and the virtual begin? The real world becomes unreal
and the unreal becomes real and it is hyperreal. In the first merger of real and unreal, Wired magazine wrote
about Michael Buckbee, a real-life resident, has founded a real-life
business, Fabjectory, to sell real objects custom-created by avatars in
Second Life.

Teen Second Life opened in '05 and residents (who appear as avatars
of their own design) can grow into the Main Grid. There is a
zero-tolerance for mature content for teens (nudity is not allowed so
teens can't remove their underwear but can use transparent clothing so
avatars can appear nude). There are Teen Community Standards which include respect and staying anonymous.

A big draw, according to an AP article, is the prospect of witnessing or engaging in virtual sex...computer
graphics allow a plethora of fantasy realities, although Rosedale
didn't intend the virtual environment to be a brothel.

Sun Microsystems is launching a presence, the Sun Pavilion, calling this a "key example of the Participation Age and the next evolution of the network as the computer," writes a Forbes article. Wonder what it looks like? Popular Science has some virtual photos of the Second Life September 14 concert featuring Jonathan Coulton hosted by Creative Commons. A show
was held October 19 of the best screenshot Creative Commons photos and
machinima from the concert. Wagner James Au has a foot in both
worlds. As an embedded journalist in Second Life, he has a write-up on his real-life blog about the event.

Party this weekend? Au has information about a party in Second Life this weekend which is sponsored by Wired and Millions of Us (the latter is a company to help businesses harness and understand the power of virtual worlds).You can come, too, and have sushi and drinks -- if you are "there".

Boris, commenting on Joi Ito's blog
about the concert, wrote:"People are so attached to their physical
bodies! Granted the interface between our counsciousness (sic) and this
plane of
experience is tightest (currently) in this biological form but really,
suspend that for a moment and hey it's all just data!"

Boundaries? Limits? Barriers? Here and there soon may be everywhere. This I know: the buzz is building to the point that the scramble is on to BE THERE.

Unreal real might become more real than real. Really.

Content by MotherPie

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