Back to "First Life"

My adventure in Second Life (and this blog) has come to a close. Rather than continuing here on to a whole new set of topics, I am retiring this blog devoted to my experiences in Second Life.

You can find my new blog Plead Ignorance at: http://www.pleadignorance.blogspot.com

If you are interested in reading about my fascinating journey into Second Life, I would suggest you begin reading this blog starting with entry #1 and follow the evolution of my Second Life experience as it unfolded for me. It truly is a strange and interesting place. - Robert

24. Epilog

My foray into Second Life is over. My own anecdotal research showed that the average avatar life span was roughly 145 days. By about 120 days, I felt I had experienced everything Second Life had to offer. I had thought I could get twelve postings out of my Second Life experience. With a bit of persistence I doubled that; but, without repeating the same stories with slight variations, there really isn’t all that much happening in Second Life. Much of the ballyhoo is just that, hype… and marketing.

I have read some of the other blogs about Second Life. Many of them, frankly, are quite boring; reviewing the latest dance club (they are all about the same) or promoting someone’s gallery. Most seem as though written by adolescents with fairly shallow and superficial real world experience – “shopping” being prevalent in most of them... Not much there to hold the interest of an adult mind.

Yes, there is a lot of creativity in Second Life. I think it would be useful for me were I an architectural student; it is a great place to build and test prototype building designs and landscapes. But Second Life is predominantly kinky sex, shameless marketing and endless shopping. It is no wonder that many people tire of it after a few months.

The few that stick it out seem to be heavily into role-playing scenarios. To the extent that Second Life is an extended game, I can see why people would be compelled to continue to log in for the gaming aspect. But there are other online experiences that are more elaborate and compelling than Second Life.

Most surprising (and troubling) to me of all is the extent to which Second Life is a place for people to engage in emotional relationships outside of their primary Real Life relationships. I encountered many partnered people who were essentially having online affairs in Second Life. I asked many of these people if they had shared their feelings with their partner with whom they were having an emotional estrangement. In a majority of the cases the answer was “No”. They would rather act out their fantasies and desires in Second Life than confront the difficult issues between them selves and their real life partners.

Sure, some people have met in real life and even gotten married through the contacts they made in Second Life. But to do that, these people had to ultimately lay eyes on one another, see their real life physical bodies, touch and hold each other. How can someone truly be a friend, or even a lover, if you don’t even know their real name?

Is Second Life worth trying? That is a judgment one needs to make for themselves. Indulging in fantasy can be an enlightening personal experience; an opportunity to test ideas and experiences and see how they feel. The danger is in losing one’s identity regarding the boundaries between fantasy and reality. After all, ultimately, Second Life is only a game.

See more postcards from Second Life (the ones that never made it into the blog) here. - R

23. Obituary

Obituary – Harrison Renard - Harrison was born on October 29, 2007. He never made any money, he left no heirs, no estate; he never even had a place to call home. He was just a wanderer in this world - here to learn, and perhaps occasionally, to teach.

He believed the world of Second Life was supposed to be a place of fun and fantasy, for experimentation and discovery. He found Second Life a beautiful place, but ultimately Harrison found it to be a lonely place. His “friends” will not miss him - there will be no empty places in their Second lives left by his absence. He will be forgotten within a matter of days.

Harrison discovered that this fantasy world often mirrored the real world more closely than he had expected. In both worlds people live out their dreams, their fantasies, share their joys and suffer pain, loss and heartache. Perhaps their avatars allow them to become an extension of themselves; enabling them to discover things within themselves that are too difficult, costly or painful to experience in real life.

Harrison initially entered the world of Second Life as would a child, not knowing at first what to expect. He was amazed by what he found; people doing wonderful things, people doing awful things. People of great virtue and deep depravity; silly and thoughtless people, and yet others of discerning wisdom and deep intellect.

His Second Life experience was both profound and insignificant. Harrison played around the border regions of his own true character, those indistinct lines between integrity and deceit, virtue and infidelity. And ultimately, he experienced the inextricable connection between love and loss - All here residing inside the circuitry of the servers at Linden Labs. Perhaps the Universe that we regard as our “reality” is just as tenuous a thing, a mere collection of impulses inside some gigantic cosmic computer. But this is for other minds to debate.

Harrison found that Second Life, in many ways, is ultimately real life. The experience one has in either world comes from what one makes of the opportunities that are revealed to them. As Louis Pasteur said: “Chance favors the prepared mind”.

There is indeed intelligent life in Second Life.

22. A friend in need…

Go through your phone book, call people and ask them to drive you to the airport. The ones who will drive you are your true friends. The rest aren't bad people; they're just acquaintances. ~ Jay Leno

The subject of friends on Second Life needs to be revisited again as, I believe, there are some significant differences between the realities of friends one makes on Second Life (or online in general) and REAL friends. I honestly fear many in Second Life have become too deeply immersed in the fantasy world to be able to clearly and objectively distinguish between the two.

There are, of course, anecdotal accounts of people meeting on Second Life which have resulted in real life marriages. Ok, not that surprising, actually – my daughter and her husband met online in a chat room; one grandson later, I can attest that all worked out pretty well. There is no doubt that people can meet, get to know one another and even begin to form emotional bonds via an online venue; it happens all the time.

But this phenomenon is nothing especially unique to Second Life; people have been meeting in online chat rooms for the past two decades. Second Life simply has combined chat with the newer technology of online gaming networks (like World of Warcraft orHalf-Life, for example). The graphical component simply adds a simulated physical presence (avatar) with which to interact. Great - so now you can have “cartoon sex” with someone you’ve just meet instead of hacking them to pieces with your Scimitar.

But what of your friends; just how true a friend are they? Sure, conversation often becomes intimate, even deeply revealing at times. We are, after all, social creatures; ultimately I believe we all have the potential to care deeply about other people. But does this alone define genuine friendship?

As teens, we begin to distance ourselves from our parents and begin to form relationships outside the family. As anyone who has raised teens knows, the pivotal period arrives when adolescents believe that their parents no longer “understand” them – they turn to their friends for emotional support. They may even perceive unconditional acceptance from their best friends. The fact is, this is only an illusion. These budding friendships are superficial and tenuous; buoyant only when things are going well. Ask these friends to support you financially, defend you in times of conflict, or when your values or needs contradict with theirs… the support of these caliber of friends often evaporates in a heartbeat.

I have some tough question for the residents of Second Life: Look critically at your list of “friends”. How many of them would lend you money if you needed it? (Real money, not $Lindens) Or like Jay Leno’s joke, which ones could you IM to ask them to drive you to the airport? I’ll make it simpler still – How many of them do you even know their real names?

These aren’t friends of yours on Second Life; they are contacts, acquaintances at best. They may make you feel good when you talk with them, but there really is no true substance between you. Talk is cheap, talk is easy. Friends are people for whom you have given up something for their benefit; you have sacrificed something of yourself for them. It may be time or money; it may be they were there with you at a time of crisis or perhaps they were the instrument of something good they helped you achieve. You have touched them, seen their faces, you know them by their voice, they even enter your dreams… and perhaps they have even driven you to the airport!

Try this right now – who, in your list of avatar "friends", can you, right this minute, go out and have a drink with? If the answer is none, then it might be time to park your avatar, shut down your computer and re-enter the world of living, breathing people.

“The quality of one’s life is directly related to the quality of one’s relationships” ~ Nancy N. (Real-life wife and best friend.)

21. Reality Check

Warning: The following post contains Real World content.

A few years back, the combination of mid-life crisis and a near fatal heart infection motivated me to do some serious self reflection. The result was that I took up Skydiving.

This was something I had always wanted to do but always been way too afraid to try. So it lingered in back of my brain until the jarring events of my almost-demise kicked it to the forefront of my consciousness. So there I was, paying good money to have an experienced Jumpmaster strap me to tandem harness and launch us out into space of an altitude of 10,000 feet.

I don’t remember much of my first jump beyond than the sheer TERROR. I can even less recall why I went back the next week to sign up for skydiving lessons. I had somehow come to the conclusion that simply riding as a “passenger” with an experienced skydiver simply did not satisfy the nagging deep within me to accomplish something significant.

What this has to do with my Second Life experience will be obvious shortly. Suffice it to say that I began learning how to accomplish this sport in earnest, I guess, to prove something to myself…. perseverance in the face of fear and all that… yeah, whatever.

Still a student, one afternoon I was teamed up with a new instructor at the Drop Zone (DZ); he was not my usual Jumpmaster. We discussed the plan for the day’s lesson; controlled flight. We would “step out” (skydivers don’t “jump”), meet up with the Jumpmaster in mid flight and I would execute a series of controlled turns. It seemed simple enough; we loaded into the aircraft and climbed up to jump altitude.

Our exit was perfect; I arched and soon was in stable freefall. You can't talk over the sound of the wind as you fall at over 120 miles-per-hour; hand signals are used to communicate. I made my first turn to the right… Ok. I made another turn, this time, to the left… Ok.

... Then the instructor did something I wasn't prepared for. He gestured with his index finger pointing upward, making a circular motion with his hand. Ok, I thought, he wants me to make another slow controlled turn.

Now the amount of time a skydiver has between exiting the aircraft and pulling your chute at 3,000 feet, is only a matter of seconds. At “terminal velocity” the ground comes up at you damn fast. So as I completed my turn and again faced my Jumpmaster... he was now waving his hands WILDLY in my face! I had no clue what this meant, but my "mental" clock was hinting that my time in the air might be just about up.

I turned and tracked away from him (sort of putting your arms back and your legs out like a jet plane). It was then I did something that skydivers seldom EVER do… I looked at the ground. To this day I still tell people that I believed I could clearly make out individual blades of grass.

Then I made my first mistake - I pulled my main chute instead of my reserve. The reserve is packed to deploy fully in under two seconds. Had my main chute malfunctioned, well, there certainly would be no blogging happening today. But, it opened with a rustle and loud “fump”. I cleared the roof of the hangar by a couple of feet, flared and lightly touched down on the warm summer grass. It had only taken roughly five seconds between the time my chute opened and I my feet touched ground. I had stopped my freefall with less than 1,200 feet to spare.

The DZ owner came over and debriefed us separately. I was commended for having my “head on”. But the Jumpmaster was reprimanded - The instructor is NEVER supposed to follow his student to his death.

I left the DZ that warm summer day with a greater appreciation of life, and a newly-acquired recognition that nobody really knows what is best for you better than YOU. I'm now fully convinced that most people don’t know what the hell they are talking about.

I never saw that Jumpmaster at that Drop Zone again.

... One day, someone told me that you could go skydiving on Second Life. I smiled to myself… You know what you can you learn about yourself from skydiving on Second Life? - Not a goddam thing!!!

I'm the one wearing the orange helmet.

20. Psychoanalysis and Second Life.

"A man should not strive to eliminate his complexes but to get into accord with them: they are legitimately what directs his conduct in the world." ~ Sigmund Freud

Glance at the profile of almost any Second Life resident and a wealth of information about that person will be revealed. Notice that I used the word “person”… not avatar.

The denizens of Second Life would have you believe that they wish to maintain their anonymity behind a cleverly-crafted avatar; but that is not entirely true. In reality, their egos often betray them. Their avatar, they believe, is merely a costume designed to hide their true identity. But their choice of costume itself reveals much about the person beneath. The fantasy one chooses is, in itself, a window into the psyche.

Most who complete the “real life” section of their profile will often profess to wishing to keep their Second Lives and Real lives from intersecting. They are fooling no one; least of all themselves. The avatar is a puppet – It can do nothing without its puppeteer. Every step, every action, every word is drawn from the mind of its creator.

Whether they realize it or not, the actions of their avatar belie the character of the person controlling it. Gallant or deceitful, profound or superficial, the avatar behaves only in a manner reflected by its puppeteer. Their real life desires, dreams, weaknesses and fears are lived out through their fantasies within Second Life. One is not really that anonymous after all.

The truth is that people struggle with trying to find their identity among the real world sea of competing personalities. People naturally desire to proclaim their unique selves to the world. If you don’t believe it; explain the huge growth of social networking sites like FaceBook and MySpace. These places cater to the needs of the “Me”… my worth as a person as measured by the number of “friends” I have, whether my tastes in music conforms to what others feel is most popular, how many “hits” my web page gets. People desire to be liked and accepted; they clamor for attention or recognition wherever they can find it.

I recall a comedian one time talking about this very thing… first, he said, there was “People” magazine, then came “Us”… what’s next, he quipped… “Me” magazine?

The fact is that your choices as an avatar are inextricably tied to your sense of self. You want to play as someone else, flamboyant and extraverted… perhaps opposite of the real life timid person hiding in their bedroom on a computer? You may, instead, be telling the world that you are insecure, uncomfortable being around other more dominant personalities. Or does your avatar more closely resemble the real you, saying rather that you are comfortable and confident as the person you are?

Interestingly, among those in Second Life who initially state they wish to keep their Second lives and real lives separate, I have found a vast number of them are very willing to talk about them selves when given the chance. Being on Second Life may even afford one a more secure environment to encourage the shy to interact with others, perhaps even more so than in the real world. After all, unlike the real world, everyone in Second Life is here by choice.

One afternoon I was hiking the trails in a beautiful location called Secret Reflections. A light rain was falling as I walked through a field of beautiful purple flowers. As I approached a clearing where some other people were standing, an avatar appeared. He was cloaked in black and wearing a death head mask. Drawing a gun, he began shooting at people; loud banging disrupted the sounds rushing water and birds singing. The only impression this person had the limited intellect to convey about himself was that he was an “Asshole”. Unfortunately, the Real world already has plenty of those.




Photo (right): “Griefers” (online vandals) hack and damage a beautiful Asian village for the same reason most vandals do… to get attention the only way their insecure little minds know how.

19. Dear Abby

Sometimes getting along in Second Life can have it's pitfalls. Relationships, money, friends, STDs - So who can you turn to for sound advice...?

Dear Abby, that's who!

DEAR ABBY: I met this really great girl recently. We talked for over twenty minutes then had the most fantastic sex I’ve ever had in my life. Now, I don’t see her on my “friends” list any more and she won’t return my IM’s. What can I do? – Blueknight.

DEAR BLUEKNIGHT: Your first mistake was taking too long to get to know this girl. Twenty minutes – Hell, who’s got that kind of time!?! Most women on Second Life prefer to dive directly into the sex animation. Next time, don’t wait to get to know her; if you two aren’t boogieing on a pose ball within five minutes, forget about it. More likely, your failure to launch usually indicates that it’s probably a guy, and not a real girl, behind that cute little avatar you fell for. But don’t fret; if it’s been more than 48-hours since you saw her last, she most likely has totally forgotten you by now.


DEAR ABBY: I seem to have trouble making friends. When I walk up to people they usually just “poof” before I can say anything to them. And if I can get someone to talk with me, they often tell me they don’t speak English. I’m lonely and want to make some friends. – Darksider.

DEAR DARKSIDER: Have you considered changing your avatar appearance from a Darconian Space Lizzard to something more resembling a human being?


DEAR ABBY: I’ve got, like, tons of friends. But recently my Mom, like, kicked me out because I was spending all my time online. She wants me to get a job but that is totally bogus because my Dad said he was going to keep paying support while I go to community college. But I haven’t enrolled yet. So I, like, need a place to crash until my Dad comes through. What should I do? – BoFlake.

DEAR BOFLAKE: Ah, you have made the same mistake that a great many young people have today; confusing “friends” on Second Life with REAL friends. You see, your Second Life friends are nothing more than simple contacts; it's not like they have any sincere emotional investment in getting to know the real you. After all, do you even really know who they are? Now if you had any REAL friends, you could ask to borrow money from them or live with them until you get established on your own. Second Life friends will just delete you off their friends list if you go all gnarly on them. I’ll bet your parents wish they could just delete you right now.


DEAR ABBY: I met a guy and I really really like him a lot. The problem is that I love to dance and he doesn’t. He says it’s totally boring and that it's way more fun to dance in real life. I love to dance, Abby. I can spend hours and hours with my avatar dancing, I can even earn $L 15 while I dance. What can I do get him to dance with me? – Babette.

DEAR BABETTE: That’s because he’s right, dancing in Second Life IS boring. Most people are defragging their hard drive while their avatars are dancing. Have you thought about interacting with him on some other level, like taking him shopping for a new skin or having sex with him? Most guys have very simple needs from their online women. Try finding out what HE likes to do. Learn to role-play or how to fire a variety of weapons. If not, have you ever thought about if you might be attracted to women? It’s just a thought.

18. Love Story

You can't buy love, but you can pay heavily for it. ~Henny Youngman

Antoinette met Mark at a dance [not their real names]. He was charming and she was beautiful. They danced and talked late into the evening – the night was magical, they discovered so much they had in common. They began dating, and as most new couples are, they were inseparable. When not together, the mere anticipation of being together again sustained them until they could be.

The two soon located a house to rent and moved in together. They decorated and made plans… they were infinitely happy their first year together. It was the romance from which fairy-tales are made.

Then one afternoon Antoinette came home to find Mark in bed with another woman. Her world deteriorated in front of her. She was too taken aback to respond, her mind almost incapable of processing the depth of Mark's betrayal. She had to leave... to think - what should she to do; what had happened? She returned to their home hoping to find Mark there; she needed to talk with him, to understand. Instead she found their home emptied of all Mark’s things. He was gone - completely. He left nothing behind... not even a note.

Antoinette tried to contact Mark but he would not return her notes. She was left with her overwhelming grief and unanswered questions. She never found out why he had left; had she failed to make him happy? What possibly could lead Mark into the arms of another woman… why had she not seen it coming? Her pain was laced with bitterness and self-doubt. For a brief moment, she considered taking a drastic course – to never log into Second Life again.

But life goes on… even in Second Life. Antoinette is now wiser and more cautious, and Antoinette has discovered something new about herself, her bi-sexuality.

The Second Life experience has the potential to return the investment one puts into it. This can be the case for the financial aspects, certainly. But it can also be true of emotional investment. I appears that many women are drawn to Second Life to supplant crucial emotional needs possibly missing in their real lives. It may be to fantasize about having a more beautiful body or flirting with experiences out of reach to them in real life. But for many, they are here to fill a void in their hearts - a void that can only be found in being wanted and loved.

Monica is typical of many other women here. Her behavior in Second Life is flirtatious and promiscuous, a persona than she could never indulge in outside of fantasy. She can often be found at clubs where she likes to dance and meet new people - and where she knows men will come looking for a woman. Her wardrobe of virtual clothing is replete with fashions looking as though they were ripped from Victoria’s Secret. In real life, Monica’s husband travels during the week, often gone two weeks at a time. Stuck at home alone with a 3-year old son, she logs onto Second Life while her child naps or is in day care. Monica works nights, but day or night have no relevance in Second Life, and there are always times when men can be found who are interested in meeting her.

I asked Monica what I have asked many of the sexually active avatars here; does she feel that she is “cheating” on her husband. “No” she replies, “…as long as it stays on Second Life, then it is just fantasy; no one is hurt”. “But does your husband know?” I ask. She quickly responds, “Yes, but he thinks Second Life is stupid... and he thinks I am stupid [for being here].” But Monica is bright, smart enough to have found a way to draw warmth and solace from a box of wires and plastic. Leaving her child and going to a real world bar… now THAT would be stupid. At home playing online, should her child call out to her, she is instantly by his side.

It is difficult to conclude if Second Life is a force for good or ill where human emotions become drawn into the virtual world. Who is qualified to judge? Over centuries, kings and queens were often compelled to marry someone who they did not love. Often betrothed for purposes of creating allegiances, securing kingdoms or avoiding wars, they have carried on secret love affairs. Penned on paper and sealed with wax, handed through trusted servants or friends, often taking months to reach the eyes of their lovers, men and women have lived and loved one another solely within their hearts and minds. The technology may have improved, moving these communications today at 186,000 miles per second, but desires of the heart have remained unchanged through thousands of years of human history.

Antoinette now speaks freely of her break-up from Mark. Since him, there have been others who have come and gone from her life. Wiser, but not jaded, Antoinette relies on her experience and faith in her own character to sustain her. And she has found strength and comradeship in her new “bi” friends.

Monica can still be found at the club where she loves to dance, meet and talk with new people. If you are a nice looking guy and good with the sweet-talk, she just might invite you home.

17. How (Not) to Succeed in Business

There’s a sucker born every minute. – allegedly attributed to P.T. Barnum

In the business world, the “appearance” of being successful is more important than actually BEING successful. Image is everything. That is one of the reasons why realtors often lease an expensive car to drive their clients around; to give the appearance of success and affluence… with the hope that it will come to you. Well, that is the theory anyway.

Corporate America is still licking its wounds from the bill of goods it was sold about the new emerging Internet a decade ago. They were told Brick and Mortar stores would be relics; realtors would be out of work as customers picked their new dream homes themselves from web sites. Digital snake-oil hucksters hit the market and the NASDAQ swooped higher, and then sunk lower than it had in it's history. It never did fully recover.

But the folks in the business world apparently are slow learners. There is money to be made in Second Life, they were told, and if you don’t sign on now, your competitors will leave you in their dust. So companies like Coke, Cisco and Nissan, for fear of missing the next technical money wave, clamored to carve out a presence in Second Life. They found it… but unfortunately nobody found them!

In 1849 the Gold Rush hit California. Hopeful idiots from all around the globe came to the Sierra Nevada mountains to get rich digging and panning for gold. None ever did. But there were millionaires made by the Gold Rush - four of the wealthiest men in California, Crocker, Hopkins, Huntington and Stanford made their gold by “mining the miners”. They ran the stores that sold mining equipment to the gullible souls scratching in the dirt and earned one of the biggest transfers of wealth in history. Even today, the promise of making big money in real estate is eclipsed by the people who sell services to realtors. Realtors come and go like the wind, but the guys who sell them refrigerator magnets and personalized pens continue to thrive.

The business world entered into the Second Life phenomenon with some rather mistaken assumptions – primarily that what works in the real world would work in the virtual world:

Marketing problem #1: What are you going to sell to avatars in Second Life? First, don’t open a restaurant. What do people want in Second Life? Skins (bodies), clothes and sexual organs. Unfortunately, there are already like two ka-jillion shopping malls in Second Life, not counting the places that give this crap away for free. I’ve picked up a complete wardrobe for my avatar for nada, plus a mini-sub, various assault rifles, and a bi-plane.

Marketing problem #2: Location, location, location. There is no hot location in Second Life. The most popular places are Welfare Island, and Naughty Neva’s Orgy Club. No Rodeo Drive, no West 57th street, no Soho district. In fact, you can be cruising around out in bloody NOWHERE and find a shopping mall! Ok, in the real world there ARE a lot of Starbucks out there, but not one on every corner of every block in every city. Second Life is saturated with stores trying to sell the same limited line of crap.

Marketing problem #3: Attracting eyeballs. If Coke wanted to hit up 50,000 people in one location with product information, they might try advertising at a sporting event, like a stadium. But if you get more than two dozen people at one location in Second Life, the computing demand begins to lag the system down. In fact, other Second Life residents start to harass you if you are wearing “bling” - jewelry or costumes that emit sparkle or rays…all which place a greater demand on the system resources and slow the activity to a crawl. How much marketing bang for your buck can you get with a mere 23 people scoping your ads?

The reality is that there truly aren’t that many people on Second Life at any given time. I did a quick poll of randomly selected people I encountered here. The average length of time people had been in world here was 145 days, less than 5 months. Wired Magazine did an article on Second Life titled: “How Madison Avenue Is Wasting Millions on a Deserted Second Life”. In the article, it notes that out of the millions of “registered” users, only about one million have logged on in the last 30 days. The article goes on to say: “the big draws for those who do return are free money and kinky sex.” People aren’t here to test drive a virtual version of the latest hybrid vehicle. And the last thing they want to do is bounce out of Second Life to check your web ad.

I found a guy who was running a blog on how to make money in Second Life; his blog hasn’t been updated for six months. That alone should tell you something. Yes, some people have made real money in Second Life; mining the big companies that thought they were missing out on the technology of the century. That money has been made coding empty buildings for companies nobody will ever see. Hopefully Madison Avenue has wised up by now.

The bottom line is, if you run across someone who claims they have made a lot of money in Second Life, ask them if they own their car or if they just lease it.

16. Where is everybody?

So after spending ten glorious days on the (real) Mayan Riviera, I find myself again wandering around in Second Life. And actually, it’s getting pretty boring!

I have been looking for people with whom I can interact with here. So I search the “map” for lots of little Green Dots indicating some semblance of human activity. I wandered into the Tiki club, which I quickly discover, has found a way to artificially populate it with Green Dots to give the APPEARANCE that there are lots of people there. Not! To the owner of this club I would ask: “…and the point of doing this is what exactly???” But the club owner isn’t there, so I move on.

More Green Dots on the map; I teleport there. It’s one of thousands of shopping malls; people shopping for crap to wrap their avatars in. I don’t have any money; and even if I did, I don’t want or need the clothes or skins they are hawking. An amazing number of female avatars put “shopping” as one of their favorite activities to do on Second Life. That pretty much is in line with Real Life “Moron America”! Again, I find this tremendously boring so I continue on.

More Green Dots. This time it is a club where a bunch of people dancing. Actually they aren’t dancing, their avatars are. I click on the dance activator and my avatar animates into dance. Everyone is doing exactly the same dance moves. I thought the fun in dance was moving your body to the rhythm of the music. However, my body (as is everyone else’s) is hunched over a computer keyboard. I tap my feet to the beat of the music. Bored again, It takes me a few minutes to find the appropriate key strokes to stop my avatar from dancing then move over to where some women are Pole Dancing.

I sit on a stool in front of a stage where three female avatars are dancing. Again, their gymnastics on the pole are scripted animations. One of the pole dancers sends me an Instant Message (IM). Ok, finally - some level of human interaction at last. The chat is flirtatious and laced with suggestive innuendo. I notice the “tip jar”. She notes that I haven’t yet clicked on her tip jar and inserted some $Lindens. The chat begins to lag a bit. She asks if I would like to see her remove her top. Uh, this is so I can see some cartoon breasts, right? I come out and tell the lady directly that I have no money for tips; actually I have no money, period. The conversation slows to a crawl. The other pole dancer IMs me; I cut to the chase - I have no tip money. (Well why should I waste her valuable time?)

I head for the door. I don’t know why I just don’t teleport my avatar out of there; somehow having it walk toward the exit I think sends some type of non-verbal message. I step outside the club, its night. I think about two nights earlier when I, for real, stepped out into the night in Cancun. The wind was warm and humid. There were the sounds of traffic and music in the distance; and the smell of good food from the restaurant across the street. Here, on the street outside the club in Second Life there is only the sound of wind. I use my mouse pointer to adjust the “ambient” sound of the wind down to zero.

I conclude that Second Life can be a lonely place if you are not sufficiently superficial to be happy with six-word sentence conversations with people and shopping. Clearly the women avatars on Second Life are primarily interested in the feedback loop of “money = shopping”. Money is obtained by enticing it from horny men. They then shop to get more sexy outfits to entice yet more men for yet more money. I surmise that probably a lot of Guys have figured out that the best way to earn some money is to create a female avatar to achieve that very goal. I wonder if the pole dancers I had just chatted with were really guys?

Are there indeed women on Second Life who want something more from the experience than shopping and pimping for money? Are there women who prefer to think and express themselves rather than being “collared” by some Master/Mistress who controls who they are allowed to talk with? I’m looking to find some “real” people here, and I am having a very difficult time finding them. And I am tremendously bored.

15. All Inclusive

I overheard a strange conversation (actually, I didn't "hear" anything as it was typed chat) between some people yacking in Second Life. Someone mentioned that they thought that Second Life was "... just like REAL life!". yeah, sure it is - if your real life lacks the senses of touch, taste and smell!

This week we ditch the dismal Pacific Northwest rain to spend or the next ten days on the beautiful Mexican Riviera in the REAL Cancun. You know, I think that people actually begin to lose their grip on reality after being on Second Life for too long.

Although I wish (oh GOD how I wish) we could be teleported there, we will spend ten glorious days in the warm Caribbean drinking "Jose' Squirt-o's" (Squirt and Tequila) on the beach, snorkeling in Xel-Ha and going to my favorite restaurant, which has eight different kinds of Mole' for my enchiladas.

I expect to not even SEE a computer the entire duration of the trip. I won't be checking my e-mail, I won't be sorting my "inventory", and hopefully nobody in Second Life will notice, let alone care, that I am even gone...

... Because I will really be right HERE, on the tip of the actual Yucatan peninsula. I am going to enjoy the sights, sounds, smells; the warm wet Caribbean on my naked skin, taste of a cold cerveza as it washes down a plate of pollo con mole' in an open air restaurant while, back in Frozen North, the nephew will be baby-sitting the Koi pond to keep it from freezing over.

For anyone who seems a little confused about how much they think Second Life is so much like "real" life... try "teleporting" yourself a frozen Margarita! -- Hasta la vista until the 17th.

14. Meet Joe Black

I have been viewing a lot of films recently that evoke some type of metaphor regarding my Second Life experience. In the 1998 film “Meet Joe Black” (remade from the 1934 classic “Death Takes a Holiday”), Death, in the likeness of actor Brad Pitt, takes a break from his normal duties to assume human form and walk as a mortal upon the earth. The transcendent being assumes the identify of Joe Black, a young, good looking, normal guy in an experiment to understand the experience of being human.

Initially this adventure is merely a lark for Joe, a chance to savor heretofore unknown human experiences such as touch and the joy of the taste of peanut butter. But he also soon discovers pain, laughter, deceit and ultimately, love.

Joe’s earthly experience becomes cathartic, a revelation to this supreme entity. His naive curiosity draws him to experiment with mortality. At first, oblivious to what he might find, he pursues relationships with dispassion. He has no sense of danger, no fear, why should he? He is omnipotent. Rather, he begins life like any child discovering the world for the first time. And, like a child, he is oblivious also to the fact that his presence affects other people.

But the strongest of all experiences, for which he initially is unprepared to confront, is the emotion of love. Initially he discovers the pleasures in physical attraction, but then emotional bonds develop. Eventually Joe learns that love is more than something pleasing for himself; he learns that true love must transcend the “self”. Joe eventually recognizes that love and loss are inexorably intertwined. He ultimately comes to understand that he must die for love to prevail. Mr. Death himself comes to know that he too must make the ultimate sacrifice.

If one looks deeply, one will find that the extent to which individuals can experience emotional bonds within Second Life is palpable. Indeed, casual encounters in the spirit of unabashed fun are ubiquitous here. But occasionally two people meet who reach deeply through, and directly to the person behind the avatar, touching an all too human heart within. It can be both exhilarating and, ultimately, heart-breaking, with reverberations lasting long after the computer is shut down for the night.

There are times when my partner and I, lying in each other’s arms late at night, recognize that there will come a day when only one of us will remain here in the real world. We know it to be true, that time will inevitably come. But we rejoice in the moment that, at least for now, we are together. Avatars remain ageless but true love requires us to see through our aging mortal bodies into the soul of our partner. To love that person inside that body until the time comes for the Game to end.

Author's note: I had intended this entry to be the final one in this series about Second Life. However some of my readers have contacted me suggesting other possibilities here yet to explore. With such encouragement, how can I refuse.

13. Logan's Run

Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been. ~Mark Twain,

Something in my distant past has been nagging me since I began my Second Life adventure. It didn’t quite come to the forefront until I stumbled upon an old movie I saw back in the 60’s, Logan’s Run.

BAM! There it is - Logan's Run is Second Life before the Internet. The plot goes something like this: A protected and self-contained world insulated from the “real” outside; No sun, no wind, no rain, perfectly comfortable atmosphere. All your needs are provided for. Everyone is young and attractive; in fact NOBODY is over the age of thirty.

Want to have sex? Put yourself out on the “circuit” where you can be seen. If you see someone you are attracted to, simply teleport them to your location. After all, sex exists just for pleasure; uncommitted and free. Don’t like your face, your body shape, your height? Have it changed, a simple procedure. Life in the domed city is idyllic, no problems, no pressures, just the pursuit of pleasure. But there is one drawback… population control. You see, when you reach the old age of thirty, you must die.

The population created for the 1976 film even looks remarkably like Second Life avatars, dressed in thier flimsy and revealing cloting. The parallels between Logan's Run and Second Life are almost creepy. Rarely does one find avatars showing any signs of age or imperfection. In fact, many Second Life residents spend an inordinate amount of time finding the perfect “skin” for their avatar. Shopping, as I will discuss later, consumes a great deal of a resident’s time in Second Life. In many ways, why not; what else is there to do?

Of course the theme that Logan7 (played by the very young and attractive Michael York) must ultimately face is that he turns age thirty and, surprise, he doesn’t want to die. He escapes the city and discovers that there is a “real” world out there. That people had parents, had goals and dreams and accomplishments. But most importantly, that he could grow old together with the woman he loved.

When glancing at the profiles of other Second Life residents, I have noted that that a fair majority are no older than a few months. “Birth” dates dating back to 2006 are rare. This causes me to wonder if interest the Second Life experience runs out for many people beyond a few months?

The truth is that life isn’t really very interesting if everything is perfect every day. Humans need challenges, trial and error, setbacks and successes. People need a reason to get up in the morning and face their day. A poem written by a good friend of mine addresses the pursuit of perfection like this:

I dreamt I died and went to Heaven, And it was perfect.
No pain, no strain, no hunger.
Worship the Lord forever in Absolute perfect comfort.

I stood it for one day, and then I wondered,
How could I stand this for a Billion, Billion years?

Everything was perfect, no room for improvement.
You could not know the Joy of helping others,
Nor could you make anything better than it was yesterday.

What a glory,
To worship Him forever,
In a World of absolute perfection.

~ Jerry Andrus, 2007

Second Life provides everything… and in doing so, provides precious little of the valuable elements that human beings need to live a meaningful life and thrive in the real world.

12. The search for Enlightenment.

Before I was enlightened, I chopped wood and carried water. After I became enlightened I chopped wood and carried water. - Zen teaching

My original “mission” was to search for “intelligent life” in Second Life. So I inquired of one of my friends if she could put me in touch with a Guru; someone who possibly had thought through the values and virtues of this simulated world and could put it in perspective for me. The “Go To” guy, I was told, was Artamus.

Everyone one is extremely easy to find in Second Life, a quick search function and the UI quickly yields their profile. So I dropped Artamus a note. Within a day I heard back from him. A very congenial guy, Artamus suggested that I search for topics of interest to me. However I had already done that. So he provided some teleport coordinates to locations within the world that he found particularly interesting and suggested I might want to visit them also. I don’t need to pack in Second Life, everything in my inventory follows me, and teleporting is absolutely the BEST way to get around in Second Life.

I first visited Dralm Lhakhang, a Tibetan style village clinging to the side of a snow capped mountain. I wandered through the beautiful temple which overlooked the city of red tile-roofed houses and stores below. I could spin the prayer wheels; little strings of colored flags were draped between the roofs of the houses. I could practically feel the cold wind waft down from the Himalayan peaks. But there were no people here; the Dalai Lama does not reside in Second Life. Aside from interesting architecture, there was no one here to enlighten me.

I next traveled to Secret Reflections. Another lovely place; a mountainous rain forest. It could have been Peru or in Washington’s Olympic mountains. Paths wound between the ferns and orchids, small foot bridges crossed streams near high waterfalls. A steady rain fell. Here there were more people; couples mostly, secreted on blankets or in ornate tree houses. This seemed more like a romantic place for couples. At the top of the climb, peacocks strutted through the grounds. But it again seemed that, without a lover or friend with whom to share the experience, it was yet another beautiful, but lonely, place.

So I returned “home”, which by now had become an Asian village. This place was now my place of refuge in Second Life. Although generally uninhabited, occasionally someone will come by on who I can practice my remedial Japanese.

One afternoon while resting here, a man paddled by in a canoe. He saw me and pulled onto the shore. He was a Samurai… from Michigan. I was relieved that he didn’t speak much better Japanese than I did. I have seen him there several times now, often inside a Buddhist shrine close to the square I call home. He was inside meditating, or at least, his avatar was.

Now the concept of logging into a virtual world to find solace and inner peace seemed a bit obtuse to me. I could imagine this guy at home in front of his computer, multitasking, making phone calls, sorting the bills, all while his avatar was sitting cross-legged in front of Buddha, likely in sleep mode.

But perhaps it is not that far far-fetched to think that someone would desire to place them self, or for their mind anyway, in a place they cannot easily achieve in their real life. Perhaps again the lure of fantasy is to dream the dream of transcendence that the real world tries so hard to deny us.

So “Gambattte kudasai” *, my Samurai friend from Michigan.

*(Keep your chin up! Said to encourage someone)

11. The Meaning of [Second] Life

When patterns are broken, new worlds emerge. Tuli Kupferberg

“I’m doing my Master’s thesis on Second Life”, said Mr. S, a student from Germany attending university in London. “I want to know what draws people here to Second Life, but more over, why they stay.” I was attending a group discussion I had seen advertised about finding meaning in Second Life. As this was also why I was here, I decided to attend the discussion.

The group was small, eventually only four people attended. We started out using the public voice capability, but a woman arrived who could not use voice so, out of courtesy, the discussion was shifted to using typed text chat. This, unfortunately, significantly throttled-down the course of the discussion. However, the discussion continued for over an hour, mostly regarding relationships people have had in Second Life that had resulted in painful situations in their real lives.

The lone woman attending the discussion, CY, revealed that she had experienced a very traumatic relationship with another Second Life resident. She called it “Second Life crush”. It had caused her to almost abandon her Second Life entirely.

As the meeting was breaking up, I privately messaged Cy and asked her if she would like to continue the discussion between the two of us privately. I told her that I had also had a very profound relationship experience and wanted to get her thoughts on the matter. She agreed.

She teleported me to her home, a beautiful Roman columned pavilion high on a cliff overlooking the ocean. We sat cross-legged an puffed on a Hookah as we talked. I had just begun to relate to her my experience when she interrupted me. “Before you go much further, I must tell you… I am a Guy!” This immediately explained why Cy had not used voice at the group discussion earlier. My initial reaction was to immediately leave.

But Cy had apparently felt confident with me, enough so that she revealed the very private fact that she was indeed a “He”. His honesty and trust deserved my admiration and so I stayed and we talked.

Cy had been a male avatar initially on Second Life. He had convinced his real world wife to try it also. At first Cy’s wife had a great time exploring. But soon she began a relationship with a married European man. As the relationship between them grew, it was suggested that the four of them find a way to get together in real life. Although Cy was not interested, the European man’s relationship with Cy’s wife began to take on increasing intensity.

All too quickly plans were beginning to be put into motion; airline tickets were to be purchased and the European and his wife were going to fly to the US to meet Cy and his wife. Cy balked, things were clearly getting out of control and Cy needed to put the brakes to these plans which, by now, had become frightening.

The situation reached crisis when Cy learned that the European was secretly pressuring Cy’s wife, prompting her to question her love and commitment to Cy; attempting to further drive an emotional wedge between him and his wife.

It ended abruptly; Cy’s wife left Second Life, ending her experience there with no desire to ever visit the virtual world again. Cy was also badly shaken, though he feels he is much wiser for the experience and he remains on Second Life. However, now his presence in Second Life is in the body of a woman. Why he chose to change geneder I will talk about more in and upcoming posting.

For now, Cy feels much safer; his life is more tolerable in Second Life, perhaps even more so as a female. He realizes how dangerously close his Second Life came to permanently ruining his real one. He is more cautious now about enteringing into relationships with others here. Yet I find that willingness to draw the curtain open, revealing the person behind the avatar to others, is often stronger than many here might freely admit. Fantasy, after all, is merely an illusion... reality is what it is.

Postcards from a far away land.

A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving. ~Lao Tzu

Second Life can be an incredibly beautiful place. Breathtaking landscapes set against a stunning sunset. Often the building craftsmen have paid creative and intricate attention to architectural detail. Humorous at times, but also quite thought provoking, it is a place where one can travel to lands both real and imagined. Below are just a few of the places I have happened upon during my travels.

10. The Dark side

"There are thorns everywhere, but along the path of vice, roses bloom above them." - Marquis DeSade

"Everyone is a potential naked slave to you once you become a trainer." - Anne Rice

Fantasy and imagination are wonderful things. But occasionally indulging them can sometimes reveal things about human nature which press uncomfortably against our personal boundaries or our sense of propriety.

Our resident agent, Harrison, transported himself to “Bound and Determined”, a popular BDSM location. One can find large numbers of such places here in Second Life. Bound and Determined is fairly tame as this genre of sex activity goes. Some groups cater to more sinister role play scenarios of kidnap (capture), torture and rape.

But here in Bound and Determined, residents troll for others to act out bondage play, someone to be Dom or Sub, seeking to restrain or be restrained for pleasure.

Once again I was successful in engaging the people behind the avatars to talk about their fantasies. Most of them reveal that they cannot (or will not) do BDSM in their real lives; Either there is no practical opportunity or, more likely, they simply are too timid to venture there. A significant portion of the Dom/Sub relationships and play are female on female. Some make clear statements in their profiles to discourage men initiating contact with them.

Here the fantasy is to possess (or be possessed by) another person. I have difficulty wrapping my mind around the concept, especially when I read a resident’s profile saying: “I belong to {name} and wear his collar with pride”. The idea of being someone’s property to whom you have surrendered your free will is disquieting to me, even in a fantasy.

A vast inventory of BDSM tools, whips, collars, chains, restraints, handcuffs, dungeons, cages… are available, many fully animated to simulate realistic physical and sexual torture. Frequently Linden Dollars are exchanged to facilitate the desired fantasy. There are virtually no restrictions on the depths of fantasy that can be played out here.

One fantasy activity did catch the attention of the real world requiring Linden Labs to actively intervene. “Age Play” as it is called; creating avatars looking like children on whom virtual pedophiles could fantasize abusing. The outcry was swift and the company quickly moved to restrict the practice. Some fantasies are too horrible to condone even in an artificial world.

BDSM, of course, has been played out in real life fantasy scenarios for centuries. The participants are organized, have rules, and protocols for acting and suspending their acting when the game strays from the plan. Second Life is just the latest and newest venue for a legitimate form of sexual fantasy. And you can't beat that!

9. "The time has come," the Walrus said,"To talk of many things:

… Of shoes and ships and sealing-wax; of cabbages and kings. And why the sea is boiling hot, and whether pigs have wings." – Lewis Carroll

It isn’t all pillow talk and MUD (multi-user-dungeon) role play in Second Life. Some people are here for the opportunity to engage with others in a myriad of topics of interest to real world human beings. There are discussion groups occurring everywhere within Second Life. The best part: No registration fees, no parking problems, no hotel costs. Most of the locations are held at beautiful scenic locations. One I attended recently was outdoors on the patio of a quaint little Bavarian beer garden on a cliff overlooking a river. It even began to rain about an hour into the discussion. Nice.

On this particular day I counted 210 special events scheduled over the coming few days; parties, yard sales, concerts just to name a few. Of these, 52 were specific group discussions on a variety of topics from holiday decorating tips to politics and everything in between.

Here is a sampling of some of the discussion topics happening this day:

• Mystic Bards writers' group meeting Thursday the 13th, Presented by Mystic Academy and Baji Bourjade. Bring your ideas or your writings if you want to read to us!!! - Meet on the red sofas.
  

• A meeting to discuss the merits and benefits of the FairTax plan, a revolutionary tax reform plan which promises to revitalize our economy and curb the power exerted through selective taxes and tax cuts, by changing the fundamental way in which tax is collected by moving from dozens of individual taxes to a single national retail sales tax.
  

• TOPIC: The Scientific versus the Spiritual - Are science and spirituality mutually exclusive? - How can the peacefully co-exist? - How can they support one another? - Where does knowledge end and faith begin? - Let's tackle the grey area between science and spirituality. -- Strong opinions and beliefs encouraged.

• Discussion of Asperger's Syndrome and other conditions on the autistic spectrum.

• Love asking questions and a good conversation? Come to Socrates Cafe to meet others to discuss questions on a variety of topics! There are no questions or topics set in advance - each session's topic is selected by the participants.

• The EvenTide Group is holding a meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous. All are welcome to this open discussion meeting.

Yes, even AA meetings are held on Second Life. I can add nothing to this narrative that underscores the potential for facilitating communication between individuals; the topics speak for themselves. If anything, the ability to attend and contribute anonymously and yet cross regional, national and cultural barriers is quite remarkable.

Notably, one group I have yet to find scheduled to meet on SL is "Weight Watchers". Obviously body image is not an issue of interest for avatars.

Interesting, I see a discussion coming up soon is about Psychic Healing. Hmmm, I think I might see what happens when the resident Skeptic shows up for that one!

8. Watson, can you hear me?

The human voice is the organ of the soul. -- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

No feature on Second Life is more underutilized than the capability of real-time voice communication. People here are absolutely addicted to typing; they absolutely refuse to allow anyone to hear their real voice. And I believe know why… Voice single-handedly has the greatest power to completely dispel fantasy.

For one thing, if you are a guy masquerading as a female avatar, using voice will blow your cover in a heart beat. Your voice is the only real life asset you cannot “cloak”. An avatar’s only ability to stealth their voice is through communicating via written chat. To me, it is terribly aggravating. And extremely inefficient, and who wants to be inefficient when passions begin to steam up the monitor.

Case in point: The following cyber-sex session conducted using text chat:
Him: He runs his fingers through her golden hair and gazes longingly into her eyes.
Her: Ooooo
Him: Their lips touch... his body pushes against hers; her hands tug and loosen his belt.
Her: Mmmmmmm, “Kiss me, Harrison”. xoxo
Him: “U R so beautiful, Babe”, he says as he unbuttons her top, rips it from her body throwing it into the corner of the room.
Her: :0)

Passions begin to rise, but unfortunately, accuracy decreases as typing speed increases. Libido gets sidelined as having both hands occupied with writing precludes any practical form of real life physical self engagement.

Becoming suspicious about the paucity of the use of voice, I began routinely asking people why they seldom use it. I got a plethora of excuses: My microphone doesn’t work, voice crashes my computer, my kids are in the next room sleeping, I live at home, my husband might hear me. They all promise to use it next time, but they seldom, if ever, do. Instead, more excuses.

To me, voice has the potential to be the pre-eminent killer app feature in Second Life… for cyber-sex alone, if no other reason. To be able to hear the lilt; the inflection, the breathing of the person behind the avatar. That is, if it is not ruined by the sound of the TV blaring in the background.

Eventually it becomes tedious to essentially transcribe lines from a romance novel at each intimate encounter. I have begun to refuse to talk with people not using voice. I am getting discriminating in my old age (two months now). If, for whatever reason, you aren’t willing to use voice, then “C-Ya… adios”.

Beyond cyber sex, many serious online discussions occur in Second Life: business meetings, political discussions, technical support, even AA meetings. I attended one such discussion, where unfortunately, they chose not make use of voice capability.

Discussing anything through typed chat with more than four people is impossible. Clearly one can speak five-times faster than one can type. By the time I responded to what someone had said, the topic had quickly shifted, my comment rendered useless under the rapidly shifting context of the discussion. It is difficult to impossible to compose a thoughtful relevant commentary between multiple people through written chat. Use voice or don’t bother. Besides, I think I am coming down with Carpel Tunnel Syndrome.

7.2. Looking for love in all the wrong places, Pt.2

v. cheat (chēt) cheat•ed, cheat•ing, cheats
1. To act dishonestly; practice fraud.
2. To violate rules deliberately, as in a game: was accused of cheating at cards.
3. Informal To be sexually unfaithful: cheat on a spouse.
4. Baseball To position oneself closer to a certain area than is normal or expected: The shortstop cheated toward second base.

Devon and Angel (not their real avatar names) are two such people where their fanciful lives together on Second Life struggle to fill an emotional connection missing from their reality. “We are living together here in Second Life”, they told me. This statement pushed my sense of credibility… how could they possibly LIVE together in a fantasy world?

Speaking with Devon privately one time, he told me of his sexless marriage to a deeply religious and emotionally distant wife. I asked him if he had talked with his wife about it. No, it was easier to just find someone to love him on Second Life; besides his wife wouldn’t understand.

Angel was less inclined to talk about her real life husband, other than to say he was very conservative. She was on the computer often when he was away from the house; she would sometimes quickly log off, disappearing if he came home unexpectedly; even if she was in the middle of cyber sex.

Although most people want their real lives to be private while on Second Life, many were quick to talk about why they were here. The women in particular were very candid about wanting to have passion in their lives without the strings of commitment. They liked to dress up sexy, flirt and be complimented on their attractiveness. Many are too busy in their real lives to pursue such hedonistic pleasures for themselves.

As it turned out, Devon and Angel actually live within easy driving distance of one another. I asked Devon if he had ever thought about arranging a real life meeting with Angel. “No… it would only complicate things”, he said. Were their passions to ignite in the real world, there would be drastic ramifications involving children, families, friends, work; a myriad of factors that intertwine in our real lives. The complications of bringing their Second Life relationship into the real world would devastate two households; potentially disastrous if their respective spouses ever uncovered their fantasy life affair.

There is also the unspoken fear that the reality of arranging to meet outside the fantasy would dispel the fantasy itself, destroying it. Like living in an Enchanted Cottage, they are beautiful and chic; no one is overweight, balding, or unattractive in Second Life. Reality exacts a heavy toll on perfection. It is easier and more desirable to maintain the fantasy.

But here on Second Life, they can live together, have sex with each other and with other couples. There is no virtual garbage to take out, no virtual dishes to wash, they have no children, no peers to judge them, no nosy relatives to condemn them or spouses to exact revenge or uproot their real lives. It is both beautiful, and at the same time, very sad. Somewhere, two people sit in a chair in front of a monitor and type out their love for one another while watching two little cartoon people lie together in each others arms. It is not for us to judge if they are being unfaithful or if they are cheaters.

An interesting article about this topic appeared in MSNBC: Is a virtual affair real-world infidelity? You can read the article here.

7.1. Looking for love in all the wrong places.

Blogger's note: This topic became a hotly-discussed and extremely volatile issue between the author and some residents of Second Life, ultimately resulting in friendships being severed. Due to the sensitive nature of this topic, no pictures will be posted associated with these next two entries.

in•fi•del•i•ty (ĭn'fĭ-děl'ĭ-tē)
1. Unfaithfulness to a sexual partner, especially a spouse.
2. An act of sexual unfaithfulness.
3. Lack of fidelity or loyalty.
4. Lack of religious belief.

“My husband is in the next room”, typed the cute little avatar sitting next to me in the spa. “I have to be quiet or he might hear me.” She was darling (or course, all of them are) and she had randomly wandered into my home island, as so many of them tend to do. Her spelling belied that English was not her native language. Soon she revealed that she was Norwegian, 24 years old, married with two children. She was on Second Life because she was lonely and no longer in love with her husband.

I am certain, were I to poll the residents of this strange world, that maybe a third of them would admit to being here because something is missing from their real lives. An acquaintance of mine currently is producing documentary about “cyber affairs” on the Internet; specifically about the prevalence of women emotionally cheating on their husbands and boyfriends online. The ease of world wide connectivity in the last decade has opened a brave new world to lonely women. I have no delusions that men have likely been doing the same… they merely started earlier.

In the famous scene in the film, “The King and I”, Yule Brenner sings of a humorous analogy about the socially-acceptable differences between male, versus female, behavior. “…To fly from blossom to blossom, the Honeybee must be free. But blossom must not EVER fly, from Bee to Bee to Bee!” There have existed few cultures on this planet where female philandering is accepted to the same extent that male philandering is condoned. Women who overtly attempt to pursue sexual freedom have not always been held in high esteem throughout history, and even into our times. It is a double-standard, to be sure, and it is clearly not fair.

But here on Second Life, women pursue their sexual fantasies as vigorously as men have always done. There is safety in anonymity, women are freed from being concerned about their body image. Here, all avatars are shapely, beautiful and sexy. The brain is the sexual organ most used in this place. Second Life provides a canvas where elaborate fantasies are painted from imagination and tinted with desire.

But fantasy must never be allowed to intrude on real life. A significant number of female profiles declare their intention to keep their Second Lives and Real Lives separate and private. Yet I have discovered several incidences where the lines between fantasy and reality have become blurred. I will examine these borderlands more deeply in Part 2.

6. Apocalypse Now

I am generally not a big Science Fiction fan, but one specific sci-fi genre particularly sparks my imagination; the apocalyptic end-of-the-world epics such as “The World of Flesh and the Devil”, “Omega Man”, and my very favorite, “The Quiet Earth”. In all these films, all of human kind (except for two or three lucky individuals) has been wiped from the earth. Usually it’s due to a nuclear holocaust, but any human arrogance caused science/technology blunder will usually do the job.

I love these types of films. And I can act them out in Second Life. I am amazed at the millions of virtual acres that are completely uninhabited by any people whatsoever. Houses, stores, castles, sky scrapers all totally devoid of any human life. I can stroll down empty streets, wander into people’s abandoned houses and peer through their stuff. I can fly their abandoned helicopters or steal a boat and explore their private islands.

Naturally the thought nags me, why is all this stuff here and not being used? I walk through beautifully crafted homes containing detailed possessions, all left seemingly untouched and unguarded. Who do they belong to? Why aren’t they here to enjoy them?

I am totally puzzled by this phenomenon. Supposedly virtual real estate is at a premium in Second Life, it costs real dollars to obtain it and the supply is finite. Yet here are vast expanses of habitable land… and no one there.

So I don my camouflage fatigues and grab my combat shotgun and wander through the empty streets of metropolis wasteland. What was that!!! Did something move behind that tree? Did I hear footsteps or is it my imagination? I cock my shotgun then peer around the corner of the abandoned store, staring down the empty street. “Hellooooo, Is anyone there?” I hear only the wind and … silence.

5.1. Update regarding Friends.

A while after writing the previous entry, I happened to again encounter the woman who I believed had forgotten our conversation and basis for extending friendship initially. “You don’t remember, me, do you?” I asked her pointedly.

To my surprise she did indeed remember me. She recounted back to me many of the personal things I had revealed to her about me. Of course, she could have also simply been reading from reminder notes jotted down in my profile. But even if she was, she at least made the effort to remember something unique about me.

Perhaps the measure of friendship lies not so much in who your friends are as much as what kind of a friend you are to THEM. And that is not very different from how we maintain friendships in the real world.

5. Friends and Lovers

What is a friend? A single soul dwelling in two bodies. -- Aristotle

What sets Second Life apart from many other online collaborative or gaming environments is the capability to establish interesting levels of relationships with other people. From a practical sense, having someone become your “friend” allows you to locate each other within the huge population of residents. You receive notification when your friends log into, or out of, the world. These pop-up notices potentially can be a bit annoying if you have a lot of friends.

I often have quickly made new friends after some brief random encounter. A conversation may have ensued which made that particular person interesting, helpful or for whatever reason, simply a desire to get together with them again. Similar to real life, you meet someone you hit it off with and hopefully arrange to share time with them again.

But a funny thing seems to happen with friendships made in Second Life. Often, after only 24 to 48 hours, the virtual kinship with this individual seems to have evaporated completely. You may pause briefly before removing them from your “friends list”, but if you never seem to get together again… well, [delete] and they’re gone!

I have had several such puzzling encounters. For example, I once met a highly intelligent woman who had an advance degree from a major university. She was running her own business, both in Second Life and real life. Our initial meeting was remarkable and I was suitably impressed, and believing her to be interested, I revealed to her some personal information about me (something rarely done in Second Life, apparently).

I ran into her again a day or two later. “Did you look at my web sites?” I enquired. “Hell, no”, she responded abruptly. I was rather puzzled; she had seemed interested in seeing my personal and business web sites during our initial conversation. Now it seemed as though we had never met.

I was confused, had I mischaracterized our first meeting? Had she been friendly for some other ulterior motive? Was I merely a “mark”, she being peeved that she hadn’t successfully closed me on some sale? I soon found that many subsequent “friendships” I made would not last the test of time… meaning a few days!

One avatar I chanced upon even disclosed in her profile that she deletes most of her “friends” once a week and to not be offended if you wind up discarded from her list. Seemingly, friendship held little value to this individual and, apparently, many others like her.

I wondered if this cavalier attitude toward friendship could be attributed to the “real” person behind the avatar or the “fantasy persona” of the avatar character itself. Can a fantasy character even be expected to form a bond with another to the same extent one human could with another? Perhaps this is a stretch; an unreal expectation.

I routinely started each visit to Second Life by logging into my “home” island; mostly because my “friends” (or at least familiar avatars) could be expected to be there. Some of them weren’t actually “friends”, they would greet me when I arrived. We’d chat a bit: “How’s it going?”, “Fine, yeah, me too”; or sometimes offering helpful tip or an encouraging comment. Superficial to be sure, perhaps the same conversations one would have with friends at real life work.

But I had to ask myself, if my computer ceased to function and I could no longer access my Second Life friends, would they notice I was gone; would they miss me?

My real life friendships, of course, have deeper dimensions than are possible in Second Life; more than the measure of the feelings that can be conveyed solely in conversation. My real friends are here for me, we have built things together, we have shared laughter over a meal. We support each other emotionally when we have suffered great personal loss. We know our friends strengths and their weaknesses, the sound of their voices; what makes them happy and sad. We can see them, touch them. They are tangible with every human sense. They are genuine to us, something I believe a mere avatar can ever truly be.

4. [Ctrl]+[Alt]+[Delete]

If computers get too powerful, we can organize them into committees. That'll do them in. ~Author Unknown

My first PC had 64k of memory, two 5’ floppy drives and the cursor came in one color – green. I have installed, used and upgraded a LOT of software over the years; a good portion of it is Crap. To the software industry, “bigger” seems to equate to “better”. Probably 85% of our software’s capability goes unused.

But I really need to give credit for the folks at Linden Labs; the UI for Second Life is a nicely designed piece of software. This is probably due to the fact that they are a small company and not answerable to a large hierarchy of marketing and engineering departments bent on pushing useless features users neither need nor want.

The quality starts when you first bring up the UI. Before you even log in, links to the latest system status and other information is a single click away. The Preferences are organized well; the left-hand tab topics easily guide you to the needed setting. Compare this to MS Word where one needs to bring up their “Help” monstrosity in which, I might add, I have almost NEVER found the help topics I am searching for.

One unique little UI feature I particularly like is the “pie menu”, a little circular menu system that branches from pie-shaped choices. And it is transparent, so you can see the screen under the menu; a brilliant application of context-sensitive help.

Once logged into the program, one can bring up the “Lag Meter”, a feature giving you status of your client software, network connection and server health with green, yellow or red lights. The Lag Meter will even offer recommendations regarding where you can make adjustments to the client settings to optimize performance and reduce latency. Again, an ingenious programming strategy. I would love to see such a feature as this on FireFox or IE.

The search features are extremely powerful. And the inventory of one’s possessions, landmarks, and actions is well organized and easy to use. Even newly acquired items are placed in a special tab to keep them separated until you choose to integrate them into the main inventory. If you log out, they will be sorted into the inventory automatically when you log back in.

Clearly the folks at Linden Labs want their customers to be able to easily spend their time navigating the wonderful world they have created and not waste it trying to navigate the client software instead. The IT industry could learn something from the folks at Linden.

3. Hi ya, sailor... new in town?

"Actually, if my business was legitimate, I would deduct a substantial percentage for depreciation of my body." -- Xaviera Hollander

It’s been true of the human condition since the dawn of civilization; Sex has forever been a commodity for exchange in all societies, and it is flourishing within Second Life. A significant number of female avatars earn their livings pole-dancing for tips or providing “escort” services, or both. Virtual prostitution is perfectly legal in fantasy world.

The shear number of female avatars advertising for escort sexual services is staggering. Many avatars make it abundantly clear that they don’t give away their services; “No Freebies” say a lot of profiles. The field is so vast that many escorts have even diversified into providing specific types of sexual acts, BDSM, specifying “Sub” or “Dom” only, for example. Many women even cater to only female clients.

Yet how lucrative this profession is in Second Life is not clear. After all, every female avatar looks like a “babe” and every guy looks like a “hunk”. Clearly the real world barriers to most guys getting laid (ugly, stupid, or ugly and stupid) don’t exist in this faux world of physical perfection. Something else is at play here. But what?

Dancing at strip clubs is another way for women to earn cash, mostly from tips. Why the person behind the avatar isn’t bored totally out of their mind while their online alter-ego spins herself around a brass pole for hours on end is a complete puzzle to me. Personally I think it would be far more interesting to blast away some serious alien butt on Half-Life.

The answer probably lies somewhere in some odd psychological payoff. Perpaps in the very human need to be desired, to be wanted. I’ve seen this when I have been in real world strip clubs, in the faces of the women who dance for lonely, horny men. These women like what they do… a LOT. They like having men want them, to desire them. Getting men to part with their hard-earned cash is a testament to their desirability. The tip jar is their score card, their “attract-o-meter”. In Second Life men will pay for the privilege of being with them; a fantasy that appears to touch some secret core of feminine vanity

Here a woman can be the sexy whore that she could never be, legally or socially, in her real life. As disturbing as it may sound, but some women even enjoy acting out capture and rape fantasies on Second Life.

How many of the people behind these female avatars are really women? Some estimates are that 20% are men. Still, that leaves four-fifths woman leading very socially taboo vicarious sexual lives.

Is this a good thing or a bad thing? I don’t know… but it is just fantasy, and Its generally accepted that we leave people’s fantasies alone.

2. Money for nothing; chicks for free.

Of his existence in Second Life, Dwight Shrute (TV’s The Office Noob) said that everything was the same as in his real life… except that he could fly. Lack of creative imagination withstanding, most people are here in Second Life to experience adventures far out of their reach in the real world. This is a fantasy place where your imagination has no limits. You can be anyone you want to be, do anything you want to do. You don’t even need to be human; you can be a “furry” (animal avatar) or even an alien if you wish.

But do not expect to leave all of your everyday world behind when venturing within Second Life. This virtual society is driven by the same two overriding forces that also shape everyday life in the real world – Money and Sex.

Second Life’s economic system is truly one of the key elements setting it apart from other online sim experiences. Although one theoretically can get around without money, it is in fact, very difficult to do. The currency of the realm is “Lindens” ($L) which one can earn through plying various trades or professions. Being good at coding scripting language, a form of programming, is but one useful skill for acquiring cash. But having talent at writing, drawing, designing, building all are useful trades in SL. Architects take notice, you can create buildings here that you likely will never see built in your entire real world career.

As in the real world, property ownership is the cornerstone of wealth. Owning land allows you the opportunity to generate income, either through rent or using your location as a place of business. Residential property ownership affords an owner a certain amount of power control over their Second life experience, particularly the ability to ensure privacy. There are even virtual realtors to help you market or locate that perfect home.

Of course, this is a fantasy world and many people are not greatly motivated to come home from their real life jobs to work here for their $Lindens. However, there are creative ways in which, in exchange for some due consideration, others will pay you for information. Completing surveys can earn you some quick cash, if you don’t mind signing up to likely be spammed. Or you can go “camping”.

This is the oddest concept to me on SL, getting paid to sit around. There are Camping opportunities practically everywhere; benches mostly, where your avatar can sit and do absolutely nothing and earn $L3.00 for 20 minutes. I must confess, the point completely alludes… let me see, I log onto a virtual fantasy world then sit my ass on a bench doing nothing for hours on end in order to earn cash. The benefit of trading my boring real life for a boring online life has yet to be explained to me coherently!

But there is one sure-fire way one’s avatar can earn a decent income; Prostitution. I’ll explain more about the world’s oldest profession in this brave new virtual world in my next entry.

1. Looking for Intelligent life in Second Life.

From a recent episode of the TV comedy show, The Office:

Jim: Playing that game again?

Dwight: Second Life is not a game. It is a multi-user virtual user environment. It doesn’t have points or scores. It doesn’t have winners or losers.

Jim: Oh, it has losers…

Americans abhor that which is not "cool", and so we smirk with our buddy Jim, smug in our self assurance that we are nothing like The Office Noob, Dwight. Yup, what a Loser. And all those other geeks, misfits and horny teenagers playing pretend on Second Life, well they all need to go “get a life”, right?

And yet, I was curious; is Second Life truly populated by a cadre of under socialized Star Wars re-enactors and lonely outcasts hiding behind computer monitors? Is this a refuge for nerds who would be knights and wall flowers dreaming of being princesses?

To find out the truth about Second Life I would have to infiltrate this strange realm. I would need to go into deep cover, like a CIA a Field Operative in a foreign land. This would be an intelligence-gathering mission, live among the residents of Second Life (SL), gain their confidences, walk among them and pick their minds for strategic information. My mission: To see if there really is intelligent life in Second Life.

Second Life is an online “game”, although it is not a game in the empirical sense. It is true what Dwight says: there is no winner at the end of the game… for one thing, there is no “end”. No scores are tabulated (unless you count the acquired financial wealth of some of the inhabitants). It is, for all intents and purposes, a parallel simulated world environment that exists wholly within the servers of California’s Linden Labs.

The first thing that sprang to mind was the (then) futuristic Disney movie, Tron. Here in 1982 computers were emerging technology and largely misunderstood by the general public. Here a Hacker digitizes himself to enter into a computer gone mad and bent on destroying all mankind. Pretty much the theme of every Sci-Fi film ever made. The Hacker becomes a program living among, and interacting with, other programs inside the computer, finding good programs and bad programs and turning the course of the evil computer ultimately to good. If nothing else, the motorcycle chase scene alone is worth renting the movie.

In 1982 computer games were in their infancy, they made use of clunky graphics and cumbersome keyboard commands. Many of the best were only lines of text. Games actually drove Moore’s Law, the doubling of computing processing power every two years. Graphic card manufacturers were on a parallel treadmill, increasing rendering and 3-D capability to keep pace with processing. Indeed, taking over the job of displaying the image on the screen from the central processor. Some graphic cards today are actually “water cooled”.

At the same time the computer gaming technology was evolving, the emergence and expansion of broadband Internet was reaching into most middle class homes. It was in this primordial digital soup that SL crawled onto the dry land of the computer desktop. That was in 2003.

Second Life now claims to have hundreds of thousands of residents, a vibrant economy (where some people actually make real money), and is capturing the attention of several large corporations as yet another emerging media market. Aside from the expected horny teenager group, Second Life is populated by scientists, philosophers, programmers, teachers, business people, hucksters and hackers. People with advanced degrees abound, and citizens from Europe, Asia and many parts of the real world globe.

Over the next few weeks I will be blogging my journals, postcards if you will, from this mystical land; sharing what I have discovered about life within Second Life.

One disclaimer: No names or identities of ANY residents of Second Life will be disclosed anywhere in this blog, real or fantasy. - Harrison Renard, 007