Second Life

Why a post on Second Life?  Because you just can't get away from Second Life these days -- putting aside the exact terms of Cory and Dmitri's bet, Second Life is certainly vying with WoW as the apple of the media's eye, the virtual world publicity monger du jour.  For instance, in the past month of so I've personally encountered:

• An eight-page Wired "Let's Go" travel guide to Second Life, complete with a fold-out map.  (Can't beat a fold-out map!)
• A nice big article in The Economist about Second Life with quotes from Ted, "father of virtual reality" Jason Lanier, Cory, and Henry Jenkins.
• Henry Jenkins writing an essay-length blog post about brands in Second Life, and declaring that "Second Life has been one of the hot new stories in participatory culture in recent months."
• Yochai Benkler's Wealth of Networks, the Web 2.0 book du jour, which mentions Second Life on pages 74-75, 136 according to the index. (But I think I saw it alluded to several more times than that as a paradigmatic "peer production" environment.)
• A Wall Street Journal write-up on Virtual Fashion -- a.k.a. the fashion designers of Second Life.
• A Harvard Law School extension course in Second Life.
• Even the good folks at Cultural Studies are featuring articles about Second Life.

Who knows what others have stumbled across, but you get the point. 

So here we are, supposed to be on top of these things just as much as the above-mentioned luminaries (well, I guess Ted is one of the above mentioned luminaries), but the last time we really focused on Second Life in our discussions here was when Ted was wondering if we should really care about Second Life's security breach.  He opined there that SL is "Web 2.0 more than anything else" and the rest of the discussion took place in the comments.  Before that, I had offered up the fact in August that I didn't actually see Suzanne Vega perform in Second Life but that even if I had I didn't imagine it would have been quite as interesting as people were saying it was.  (I'm sure you all appreciated that deep insight.)

So, to the point: there's apparently all this enthusiasm about Second Life today, as opposed to other VWs, in the mass media and among the digerati.  We've got what seems to be a slight lack of enthusiasm about Second Life (at least lately) here on Terra Nova.  We've been talking about WoW, Eve, Meridian 59, Virtual Laguna Beach, community managers, etc., but not talking much about Second Life.

So what's our problem catching the Second Life wave?  Is this something like MUD-Dev syndrome ('We've already covered that back in 2003!")?  Are we still afraid of promoting Cory's pet project?  Is it time to set up a Terra Nova island?

Update:  In the first comment, Samantha says the call question should be: Besides being covered by other organizations, why should we be talking about Second Life?  How does discussing Second Life inform or develop our collective view of virtual worlds?

Update 2 (Oct 5):  This is incredible:  Endie at Zombie Pirate Ninja Monkey runs the numbers, actually bringing some empirical data about our posting practices to bear on this debate.  ("So what I did was rip every TN article since the beginning of June, using a piece of code that I wrote to extract oil-sector data from the EIA site.") Read the whole post, but here's the breakdown of the last 100 posts: World of Warcraft 29% / Second Life 20% / Eve-Online 6%.  Thanks, Endie, that's awesome!

Comments

[Samantha LeCraft]

Many of the 90 comments on the We Need Community Managers thread made over this past week ended up centered on Second Life.

One of the things I personally enjoy about TerraNova is its collaborative nature, and the emergent effects we see when twenty odd VW luminaries gather in one place and post that which interests them. I don't take it as any sort of slight against Second Life (or any indication that the TN authors are out of touch with the VW mainstream) that there hasn't been a topic started with a focus on Second Life in three whole weeks. (FWIW, we've gone far longer without touching on other topics -- when was the last time we checked in on A Tale in the Desert, for instance?)

So let me turn the question around: besides being covered by other organizations, why should we be talking about Second Life? How does discussing Second Life inform or develop our collective view of virtual worlds?

[greglas]

Good points and good question, Samantha -- I can go with that. :-)

[csven]

Because it's unique?

[Matt Mihaly]

Every virtual world is unique in some ways and derivative in others, csven.

(I commented on this article on my blog, and I apologize but am reposting it here, but the post was initially intended as a comment here.)

There's an article over on Terranova this morning talking about whether Second Life should be discussed more on Terranova or not. The article's author, Greg Lastowka, points out numerous bits of pseudo-mainstream press coverage like the Economist and Wired, wondering whether the media coverage alone warrants more discussion of Second Life. Leaving aside the fact that Linden Labs is presumably paying their PR firm - Flashpoint - to help generate, and to place, these stories in the media, my answer is no. Media coverage doesn't mean something is actually worth talking about. Just turn on American TV news to see what I mean.

Personally, I think Second Life gets media attention because mash-ups are accessible: Harvard course in a game! Fashion in a virtual world! These are easy-to-grasp stories for the media to pitch and actually have a kernel of potential interest to your non-virtual-world-using public, for whom a story on the motivations behind WoW moving from 40 to 25 man raids would be pretty inaccessible.

Purely anecdotally, the only time we've gotten nationwide TV coverage was when we put Gleam (addictive drug) into Achaea, allowing reporters to title stories, "DRUGS IN A GAME!" Gleam is not a very interesting part of our games, as far as I'm concerned, but that parallel to something that everyone understands in the physical world made it a powerful media hook.

I guess I don't see a reason to focus on something just because the media is focusing on it. World of Warcraft, or Runescape, or Habbo Hotel, or Cyworld, etc all have far bigger impacts on the world both in terms of the consumer and in terms of influencing the creators of new virtual worlds. They are what matter in the virtual world space in terms of impact. Second Life remains a relatively small virtual world that has little impact on the virtual world space as a whole, I think.

That's not to say SL isn't doing some interesting things, but almost every story in the media about SL runs the same way, "Brick&Mortar institution jumps on the PR bandwagon and sticks something in Second Life." What we don't seem to get a chance to see is how impactful that actually is beyond generating an initial press release for Linden and the Brick&Mortar institution. Susanne Vega's much-touted in-world performance, for instance, was reportedly seen by only a few dozen people. Wells Fargo decided to move its experiment to ActiveWorlds, etc. All we tend to hear is an initial flash of hype, and then little else.

So in summary, I believe that (and I mean no disrespect to Linden), is that Second Life generates media attention not because it's having much of an impact, but because its genre-less world makes it easy to generate endless PR opportunities touting "Thing from physical world in Second Life." Better yet, those PR opportunities seem to require no follow-up. The investment needed to generate it is so small, relatively speaking, that it doesn't matter if it actually has an impact. The press release is the main intended impact, or so it typically seems to me.

--matt

[Luis Villa]

I'm very much an outsider to Terra Nova and virtual worlds research in general, but I'll say that Harvard is interested because of the mostly unique combination that people can (1) join for free (2) create things freely (3) intertwingle real and virtual world easily. We couldn't trivially do the real world->in world video/audio streaming we do anywhere else that I know of, and that was pretty crucial to us. I'd think that combination of issues, and understanding why they are or are not compelling, is a pretty interesting one for Terra Nova. [For example, Matt seems to assume that #3 is not interesting, when it clearly is interesting to a lot of people- I'd love to see Terra Nova discuss that.]

[Luis Villa]

[I forgot to mention that I used to work at the Berkman Center; that's why I mention Harvard in particular.]

[Mike Sellers]

Second Life has captured the imagination of many people such as those Greg lists above -- almost all of whom are speaking to or writing for audiences generally unfamiliar with virtual worlds and who are unlikely to be captivated by the prospect of playing an undead warlock or cow-man shaman.

So why doesn't it get more respect around here? First, I think it does get a fair amount of respect and discussion (some have said that SL and WoW are almost all we talk about, and as Samantha notes often SL is the topic within the topic). To have built what they have represents a tremendous and noteworthy effort, no doubt about it. SL breaks the mold of otherwise game-like virtual worlds.

That said, nagging issues remain that dampen the enthusiasm of many who follow virtual worlds closely:

- SL's PR pumps up its popularity (much as anyone wants to, whether you're pitching a restaurant, movie, or MMOG), but as we've discussed several times, they seem to play fast and loose with their reported numbers -- or at least, their numbers are apples to other virtual worlds' oranges. This doesn't bother some people; for others it leaves a whiff of skepticism, or even cynicism (with a touch of sour grapes, maybe) about SL's ostensible popularity.

- Other than porn and slavery fantasies, there's not much to do there for most people. I know, I know, the aficionados will take umbrage at that and point at the small Harvard or musical gatherings or the like. But from the POV of the average, typical, new user, what I hear from 'civilians' trying it out is just that: they went in, couldn't find many people, and couldn't find anything to do next (and/or, "and then I teleported into this really strange place..."). Even if there are 100K active users (by some definition) in SL, that means that about 0.1% of them are able to participate in the special events, and 99.9% are left with whatever else they can find.

- It remains unproven technically and as a business. This may be hard to imagine given its apparent success thus far, but there are still, from an outsider's POV, important scaling and security issues that SL hasn't fully addressed; and they are AFAIK still not close to profitable. They have the benefit of a very long runway and lots of venture capital, but it remains to be seen whether an all-user-created-content world can fly on its own.

- Finally, SL attracts 'true believers,' just not gamer true believers. Those who promote and defend SL do so with terrific zeal, but they are often those not overly familiar with other online worlds. There's a lot to be said for attracting a non-game audience (any way we broaden the potential user base is a good idea from my POV), but nevertheless this means that MMOG fanatics and SL residents will often speak past each other, neither seeing their own religious zeal (it's a common sort of rift: vi and emacs, Mac and PC, Ginger and Mary Anne). This zeal feeds the PR engine of course, pumping up the true believers while obscuring important issues and attracting those who have only read about this 'online world' thing in an article someplace. The problem is the other issues that remain unresolved while some are left to wonder why SL doesn't get more respect. Ultimately, despite all Linden Labs' accomplishments, it seems sometimes that SL could be a victim of its own PR -- that it could be in danger of becoming that worst sort of celebrity, one 'famous for being well-known.'

[epredator potato]

My job has changed massively in the past few month due to Second Life being what it is. I am now a metaverse evangalist and go around showing people how they can be much more effective in interacting with one another.
Second Life has the unique quality of not being a game. Thats great for people in business. It also allows us to do the techie thing and access things outside of its world.
So we have collaboration in a richer environment, content creation and content from outside and on top of all that we have commerce.
This is where the web is going. Second Life is a very very good example that lets us actually do all the things we would normally just talk about.

[Luis Villa]

Mike: all very fair points, particularly the 'nothing to do there' one. I think that is a very real problem for SL, and is why I haven't entered SL since I left Berkman.

[Tangentially, and probably not Terra Nova appropriate, if they fix the scaling issues, SL has the possibility to be the underlying virtual worlds OS. You could build WoW on top of what SL wants to be; you can't build SL on top of WoW or anything WoW (at least publicly) is aspiring to be. From my seat as someone interested in the business of online worlds, this is quite interesting. But again, probably not really a Terra Nova-ish issue.]

[Though I suppose if someone became the Windows of virtual worlds- and SL and maybe Google seem to be the only people who even realize this is a possibility- the issues of monopoly and governance would be quite of interest to Terra Novans.]

Luis>"Tangentially, and probably not Terra Nova appropriate, if they fix the scaling issues, SL has the possibility to be the underlying virtual worlds OS. You could build WoW on top of what SL wants to be; you can't build SL on top of WoW or anything WoW (at least publicly) is aspiring to be."

Presumably, that is the lofty goal of the team over at Multiverse. http://www.multiverse.net/

"The Multiverse Client works in a similar fashion. It's not browser-based at all, but like a browser, it's a single application that's installed on a consumer's computer. And it can connect to any virtual world that's built on the Multiverse platform. Whatever makes that virtual world different from any other is streamed dynamically to the Multiverse Client. With the Multiverse Client, the player is always only one click away from any world built on the Multiverse platform. And each game can look and play radically differently from any other game on the platform."

[Anonymo]

> You could build WoW on top of what SL wants to be;

I'm going to have to call b*llsh*t on that. That's the Kool-Aid talking.

I've heard no evidence that Linden plans on building the incredibly more complex stuff into SL that would enable them to do anything like a real MMORPG. SL is a great creation all on its own, but let's not fall into the zealots' trap of believing that it can be all things to all people.

[Luis Villa]

I'm most certainly not a zealot; as I pointed out I haven't used it in months. But they are creating a world that is virtually completely scriptable- it is hard for me to imagine what can't be done in it. The biggest real question is whether or not they can scale that up. I have serious doubts. But the pieces are all already there to do fairly complex game interactions for anyone who wants to.

[By the way, you'd be more credible in your name calling if you gave examples of what couldn't be done.]

[chasyork]

But CAN WoW be built atop second life? It's a nice thing to say, and we've all seen some rather creative things in SL, but I'm not convinced.

- There are some basic environment characteristics that SL doesn't allow you to alter. Some of them are... well, rather unrefined. It takes a forgiving eye to accept that, on some occasions, my avatar decides to extend his right foot at a 90 degree angle from his body... or a right arm in awkward bonebreaking poses. Moving fixes that, but it still requires a degree of tolerance that you wouldn't find in the WoW crowd.

- BANDWIDTH: I have a rather fast DSL connection. My time in SL is usually entering an area... waiting... seeing big blocky things appear... waiting some more... getting detail... waiting some more... finally I get a breathtaking view.

Then I move and repeat.

Commercial MMO's cache huge volumes of art assets locally to aviod these disjointed experiences. I assume that SL acts like a browser cache after downloading on demand, but ALOT of work needs done to make this operate to a level needed for an MMO.

SCALING:
We've all mentioned it- but there are many different aspects here:

-Geographically: In games, distribute too many people across too much real estate, and it seems rather single-player. As content material is added, will the population be too diluted.

-Operationally: The number of people in a visible area increases bandwidth demands exponentially.

It may seem like the first issue would resolve the second, if it were not for clustering. What will happen with the first slashdotting of a Second Life business?

PURPOSE
Ok, it's cool that you can see a SL phone booth, access it, and Skype a real world number. How is this functionally better than me going straight to the application. Yes, you could model a virtual barnes and noble store to browse through- is that more or less functional than BN.com's current interface.

----
The metaverse client is a bit different. It is a common engine, but assets are managed much like a commercial MMO- downloaded packs prior to the experience, combined with realtime updates. The client is designed to offer NOTHING by itself, but can accept any environment- as opposed to building an environment on top of the SL environment.

[Michael Chui]

I'd say there's nothing wrong with talking about Second Life. Thus, if there's something to talk about, we can talk about it. No reason to go looking for news.

[Wagner Au]

I suspect the main culprit is the growing sense that Second Life is no longer an online world, but a 3D Web. That it's no longer an enclosed world with its own discrete rules that can be analyzed as a microcosm, but instead, primarily an interface for real world commerce and marketing. In NPR's "On the Media" segment on SL, Ed said something about how he's become less interested in Second Life's internal economy as it's become more connected to the real world economy. This impression is strongly put forward by most mainstream coverage of SL, which emphasizes the money making opportunities almost exclusively-- especially those brought in by the entrance of real world companies-- usually to the exclusion of everything else.

To the extent that this is a factor, I have to say, it's a false impression. It's true there's a storm of interest from outside companies who want to put Duran Duran, Toyota, etc. into the SL, and that's cool, but on the ground, experientially, Second Life is still most of the time a microcosm and an enclosed, immersive world where all kinds of socioeconomic issues emerge that are worthy of Terra Nova's attention. The challenge of course is reporting on them, and I've recently become concerned that my own blog has gotten skewed more and more toward "real world comes to SL" stories, away from talking about the emergent social behavior that's most fascinating to me about Second Life.

[Luis Villa]

What part of 'you could build WoW on top of what SL wants to be' was not clear? Of course you can't build it on top of what SL is now. Duh. Please stop wasting our time arguing with a strawman claim that I didn't make.

What could be an interesting discussion, I think, is what happens if SL (or someone like SL- perhaps the metaverse.net folks, or Google) does becomes a defacto standard and/or dominant host for a variety of virtual world/game spaces. I think that has interesting legal, social, and economic implications for virtual spaces, which surely is completely on-topic for That was the question that was asked and that I was trying to answer.

[Matt Mihaly]

Luis:

Is that an interesting question? For something to be a defacto platform standard, doesn't it have to be basically faceless middleware? Doesn't it then become like discussing the Unreal engine, for instance - interesting mainly only on a technical level? I mean, when discussing Virtual Laguna Beach, what's more interesting to a social science Terranova crowd? There's technology or what was done with it?

Not sure on the answer myself, as I'm unsure if there is something fundamentally different about a platform for virtual worlds that makes it more interesting than talking about linux (the platform that many MMOs run on now, for example).

--matt

[Luis Villa]

On topic for Terra Nova, I meant.

[Luis Villa]

Hrm. Possibly right, Matt; not sure. Certainly a better discussion to have, either way :)

I do tend to personally find monopolists/quasi-monopolists interesting from a business/economics point of view, but as I originally said, I'm not sure that is interesting for most of Terra Nova.

Perhaps of more relevance is that not all platforms are faceless; Microsoft has a much more aggressive and dominant relationship to many people who use their platform than Unreal does. As Lessig says, code is law- if Second Life (or Google) becomes the defacto platform everything runs on, and (for example) makes anonymity hard, or makes anonymity very easy, just as an example, there are definitely implications there. But that may be way too far abstract for TN. Dunno- just a reader, not a writer/regular poster here :)

Wagner: I do think that if you want to exclude all the real-world/second-world overlap, there isn't a heck of a lot that is particularly unique/interesting about SL. But I'm willing to be convinced on that point :)

[Matt Mihaly]

Luis:

I think there is a lot of fairly interesting things about SL beyond the real-world cross-overs. As an example, I think the way SL empowers the furry community is pretty darn cool, and it's WAY more impactful than something like Suzanne Vega "singing" in SL, but given the prevalence of sexual themes in furry-dom, it may not be something Linden wants to talk about.

--matt

[Luis Villa]

I guess maybe that particular empowerment seems obvious and non-interesting to me- give people a communications forum, and they communicate about non-mainstream sex acts over it. That is a story as old as time :) [You can also replace 'non-mainstream sex' with 'non-mainstream anything', probably, or maybe I've just been smoking too much from the Long Tail pipe of late.] But I guess if there are new wrinkles to it in SL, that would certainly be of interest.

[Matt Mihaly]

Luis:

Well, granted, it depends on what you define as interesting. But one can pitch the real-world crossover elements in exactly the sameway. It seems obvious to me that people will integrate elements of reality with each other (virtual worlds being part of a larger reality). That is a story as old as time as well.

--matt

[Mike Sellers]

Epredator potato: My job has changed massively in the past few month due to Second Life being what it is. I am now a metaverse evangalist and go around showing people how they can be much more effective in interacting with one another.

In usability, community, and similar fields, it's often difficult to come up with specific points of increased utility and ROI. Given that and your comment above, I'm very interested in hearing specifics of how Second Life (or any other VW) enables people to be "much more effective in interacting with one another." More effective measured how? And do you mean as compared to face-to-face? Phone? Text forum or textual virtual world? What are the specific benefits you, as an evangelist, see?

I am, I admit, a skeptic about the "metaverse" or the "3D web" especially any time it's imagined to be contained within a single overarching platform or technology. SL is not TCP/IP or HTTP, much less the Windows for the online world. Nor has LL begun to address the enormous issues surrounding a truly shared metaverse running on distributed, separately controlled, possibly separately hacked, machines (against which the self-replicating object issues currently plaguing SL are a walk in the park). Maybe they will resolve these difficult issues soon, but they haven't done so yet. As such talk of the singular 3D metaverse seems to me to be a misapprehension along the lines of imagining that after completing a terrerstrial railroad that we'd be building a railway to the moon (as I said in another item here). The same goes for imagining a game like WoW being built on top of SL -- the two are fundamentally different deep in their architecture, and "scripting everywhere" doesn't make it possible to make any game you like.

[Mike Rozak]

Random comments:

Media - WoW and SL are both virtual worlds. WoW is a game. ALL games are designed for children. Children don't read the Economist, Wired, etc. Therefore, pound-for-pound, WoW is less interesting than SL. (WoW is still weighty, so it gets covered in the Economist, etc. anyway, but SL disproportionately more so.)

WoW and SL being the only virtual worlds talked about in TerraNova - Besides the fact that WoW dominates the market, 80%-90% of virtual worlds are basically the same as WoW. The next largest "genres" would probably be represented SL and Eve Online. (Note: genre != setting. Eve = world-like, WoW = Diku game-like, SL = builder/socializer)

[Thomas Malaby]

I'm with Samantha on this; our discussions are probably a better index of our interests than TN OP titles would suggest.

I find Second Life fascinating (if theoretically more than practically atm; but, then, I'm just a gamer :-) ), and have begun to publish work that draws upon my research at Linden (see here). But my interests are a bit orthogonal to the general tenor of the media coverage of SL (no doubt to a certain degree shaped by Linden Lab's marketing team -- I certainly don't hold that against them).

For me, what gets lost amid this interest in breaking down the "RL-VW barrier" through SL examples is not only what is emergent and unique to SL's community, as Hamlet noted, but more broadly the specificity of SL as an artifact created by LL, incorporating within it a distinctive set of assumptions about human beings (that are linkable to game development, software development, certain political ideas, management ideas, etc). These do not determine SL by any means, but they interact with those emergent phenomena in interesting ways. Code is law in an important way in SL, but while we may be ready to explore the ramifications of that here (and I see the writing I've been doing this year as part of an effort to do some conceptual brush-clearing to make room for that conversation), we shouldn't be surprised if quasi-mainstream media has a ways to go before it's ready for that.

[Jerry Paffendorf]

Greg > We've got what seems to be a slight lack of enthusiasm about Second Life (at least lately) here on Terra Nova.

Glad you brought this up. IMO it's kinda true, it's kinda long-running, and it's kinda weird lol. But I'm a user-created, media-rich, web-connected virtual world guy first and foremost, so I notice biases in the other direction as much as I enjoy biases pointed in my own. I'm interested, as a vision, in the 3D web that we can use as an extension of everything great about the 2D web, and SL feeds that beast. Terra Nova raised me (I'm crazy enough to have read every post and almost every comment since it started :), and I know my straight-up MMOs and history (thanks largely to everyone here), but I'm more of a 3pointD-style guy because of the lack of enthusiasm you mention. That energy is elsewhere. I think this issue of SL within the Terra Nova community is maybe another more beardy level of the video game/virtual world culture clash that Raph's been writing about. Does that sound right?

SL, as an archetype (along with Multiverse, Google Earth, Microsoft XNA, anything coming up that you and an open developer community can build things for without getting permission from the boss or being Richie Rich, and that accordingly offer straight-up consumers wonderful things they'd never get otherwise), represents a coming shift in virtual worlds. Johnny Haxx0r, Joe L337-3D-Sk1llz-but-Stupid-EA-Won't-Use-My-Coolest-Ideas-:(, Tim Web 2.0, and Mr. Big Media/Computer Company are all scoping their new creative, product, and job opportunities at once, which is incredibly exciting! Call it the early metaverse, Web 3D, 3pointD, user-created VW platforms, "Web 2.0 + video games", or however you want to try and say it in one bite. In all this SL is important because it's like a seed, and it, and even more importantly the wider read-write web-connected VW idea, is growing. You don't just turn that on with a PR machine (as Matt brought up), and you certainly can't turn it off once it's started. Our ideas are being led there. As I've said with a wink about SL, the future is here, it's just a little laggy and hard to search at present ;).

Humor me, but to quickly and clumsily step on top of all this and why it's important, a very ragged recent history of a popular web that feels like it was here forever but wasn't:
2004 was the year of the blog
2005 was the year of the mash-up
2006 belongs to MySpace and YouTube
I think one of the next few years could bring something like 'the year of the avatar', and if so it's going to come from customizable, web-connected virtual spaces where people can do really cool bloggy, start-uppy, mash-uppy, myspacey (add me! lol), youtubey, at times *hypey*, reallifey and secondlifey things.

Just my two-cents as a forward-looking Terra Nova liker, who's done his homework, shows up early for class and teaches in the evenings, is very much on the active front lines, staggering both the web and MMO worlds, and stuffed full to bursting with the dog food.

Mike Sellers > - SL's PR pumps up its popularity (much as anyone wants to, whether you're pitching a restaurant, movie, or MMOG), but as we've discussed several times, they seem to play fast and loose with their reported numbers -- or at least, their numbers are apples to other virtual worlds' oranges.

Mike, check this out. They just added more, including logins broken down by time period. Good on you, SL, wherever your road finally leads.

[Prokofy Neva]

My, my aren't you all terribly sophisticated and jaded, and aren't we the yahoos and "true believer" Kool-Aid drinkers!

I really think that yes, Terra Nova should get an island. Or, if that's too expensive, just get a 4096 on the mainland off the auction -- or I would be happy to rent you one : )

Like Jerry Paffendorf said gosh, a year ago, "Everybody's getting an island in Second Life"...and where are YOU???

I dare you to convene regularly in world. I dare you!

Of course SL is still a microcosm with its own wierd synthetic economy. That's why I am repeatedly perplexed as to why Edward Castranova keeps bypassing it and ignoring it and refusing to study it. It's some wierd little thing going on, I don't know the background to it, but I guess it is some kind of pissing match with Cory Ondrejka or something? How else to understand it?

The kinds of things that the Terra Nova eggheads should be studying up close and personal, instead of pontificating about here in a superior vacuum, or in ever diminishing puddles of former glorious games, would include:

o is the virtual world creating a new cultural explosion -- machinima, 3-d art, etc. that will be defining the new for this decade?

o alternative lifestyles like Gor and BDSM -- are they proliferating, will they influence real life, are they becoming more sinister -- and creating more backlash?

o griefing behaviour -- how does it start, how does it escalate, why does it happen, can it be controlled

o how to groups get formed, how do they stay together, what makes them fall apart?

o can you have democracy with a game company in charge?

o is the meat-world concept of law rooted in private property a hopeless fantasy to try to replicate in a virtual world where property can be rendered meaningless but where value may reside in content or events rather than land?

o can you create and sustain e-governance projects within the synthetic world and overlap them to real life?

o are all these awareness-raising things for cancer, poverty, Katrina etc terrible illusions, faking people out into thinking they're doing something, or sustainable for real-life action?

These topics are all about virtuality and synthetic worlds, and are frankly more interesting and more useful than topics like "Gender Swapping in MMORPGS: When Ken Becomes Barbie" or figuring out whether the linguistic patterns of NPCs in MMORPGs are like those of Aland islanders...or whatever you're writing your dissertations on atm.

In other words, I think all these professors who have been dining out for years as game-god hangers-on (and funded by game companies!) have to wake up and see the handwriting on the wall that Raph has been talking about -- the games are dinosaurs, they're dying. The new things are going to be synthetic worlds. You could all revamp and recast yourselves as experts on these new thingies but you can't tarry to long leveling up in WOW -- you need to figure out the SL tier system, get your golf game on with the right FIC and Lindens, and start your Second Lives.

[Prokofy Neva]

Hey, SNOOPYB, you know full well that I call dibs on using that term "year of the avatar" FIRST

Acknowledge, please.

http://secondthoughts.typepad.com/second_thoughts/2005/12/2006_the_year_o.html

[Mike Sellers]

Jerry, thanks for pointing me to SL's posted login numbers (NB: you have to sign up for a free account to log in and see these). I assume they're counting unique logins, not all logins, though the site doesn't say. Nor does it differentiate between the apples of free accounts and the oranges of paid accounts. Nevertheless, the numbers are interesting and show SL's long tail with a lower frequency of login than online game worlds.

Residents Logged-In During Last 7 Days 112,918
Residents Logged-In During Last 14 Days 150,554
Residents Logged-In During Last 30 Days 235,311
Residents Logged-In During Last 60 Days 351,206

There are also economic numbers posted there, but as one blog poster points out there, they may not be communicating quite what LL intended about ecommerce in SL:

Simplest terms: Out of 100 residents during a 30-period, only 4 will turn a profit. Out of those 4 there will be 2 earning less than US10, 1 who will earn between US$10 and US$50, and 1 that will earn more than US$50.

The official blog posts notes that these numbers undercount somewhat the economic activity, and of course there's no way to interpret these to get to average revenue per user per month for LL (the ever-elusive holy grail that no one is going to publish ;-) ). Still, interesting info.

[Jerry Paffendorf/SNOOPYbrown Zamboni]

> Hey, SNOOPYB, you know full well that I call dibs on using that term "year of the avatar" FIRST

Not quite, dear leader. Please see top-left corner of slide number four in this blog post dated November 14, 2005, compared to your n00bish reference on December 11, 2005: Prokofy PWND!! lol

Please footnote all future references to 'year of the avatar' or any derivative wordings relating the same basic concept with http://slfuturesalon.blogs.com/second_life_future_salon/2005/09/brave_new_virtu.html

Sincerely,

The Management

;)

[Prokofy Neva]

SNOOPYB, that is the LAMEST fake PWNED I have *ever* seen. ROLLS EYES!

Contrast and compare your reference, regardless of date, my BLOG -- with its high visibility! -- and also I'd invite you to type the phrase "year of the avatar" into Google, and see what comes up FIRST (my blog, not slide no. 4 (!) of your Powerpoint (!).

Your slide no. 4 (erm...that's like...something visible????) says "year of the avatar 200?"

It has a *question mark* duh. That's not predicting any year of the avatar. That's just putting a 200?

!!!111

Whereas in the year 2005 (!) I had the foresight and imagination to predict 2006 as THE year of the avatar. OK, there's still 3 months or so to go, it's not too late. Heck, it IS the year of the avatar ALREADY.

So, no, I'm first, and again, I direct everyone to source MY first usage of a PRECISE year for the "year of the avatar", not this lame thing in tiny print on slide no. 4 of a powerpoint buried on a blog by Jerry-the-question-mark Paffendorf.

http://secondthoughts.typepad.com/second_thoughts/2005/12/2006_the_year_o.html

After all, a written sentence on a blog counts as an actual written source that can be referenced; the title in tiny print you need a magnifying glass for on a Powerpoint slide (no. 4!) doesn't count!

Sheesh.

Prokofy Neva
CEO
Ravenglass Rentals
Sutherland Dam
Second Life
The Metaverse

[Matt Mihaly]

Prokofy Neva wrote:

Like Jerry Paffendorf said gosh, a year ago, "Everybody's getting an island in Second Life"...and where are YOU???

I dare you to convene regularly in world. I dare you!

Right, because convening inside a laggy 3d environment is conducive to what exactly? Having virtual sex, perhaps, but certainly not to getting something done more efficiently.

Incidentally, everybody is certainly not in Second Life. They're in Runescape and World of Warcraft.

the games are dinosaurs, they're dying.

Either Raph is wrong or, more likely, you're misinterpreting what he said, because it's pretty darn hard to take current trends and say "They're dying." In fact, they're thriving, and that doesn't look likely to change. Whether they will continue to absolutely dwarf the Second Lifes and There.coms of the world is another question, but one general type of virtual world being bigger or smaller doesn't have much impact on the health or longevity of the other, as they serve different needs.

Game worlds aren't going to die off any more than YouTube is going to kill Hollywood.

--matt

[Michael Chui]

That's not predicting any year of the avatar.

You really don't read what people say, do you?

Though I love how you denounce Google as an authority one month and hold it up as an example and a proof the next...

I dare you to convene regularly in world. I dare you!

To echo Matt, why? It's much less stupid to irregularly convene asynchronously on this forum. For the same reason, I wouldn't regularly convene in WoW or EQ or whatever. Richard and Aaron can do as many classes as they want in-world, but those are devoted sessions.

Maybe you should start First Lifers Anonymous. "Hi, in my past life, I was a homeless person in Canada, but now I build dream homes in SL."

Oh, and everybody's on MySpace. Where are YOU?

Granted, by responding, I've naturally set myself up for massive overgeneralizing, but I can probably live with that.

Terranova eggheads

Question. Why do you beg for attention from people you regularly insult?

Michael Chui
Standard sized Real Person, with one Yahoo! Avatar.

P.S. Greg: Henry Jenkins almost never talks about Second Life on his blog, though in his responses to Bogost, he admits he should have put it into his book. Considering he's on two of the bullet points, I think it's okay that Terra Nova isn't giving daily updates on the State of Second Life. But if something important happens, of course we want to flame each other over, er-- discuss it genially in the comments.

[Kami Harbinger]

Matt Mihaly spake:

Right, because convening inside a laggy 3d environment is conducive to what exactly? Having virtual sex, perhaps, but certainly not to getting something done more efficiently.

If your hardware doesn't suck, and you give a region and people time to stream in, the environment's not particularly laggy. Maybe you should buy a better computer and network connection, and stop running between sims when you're supposed to be having a meeting.

Yes, some people have sex in SL. It's the first system ever that's better than mere chat for cybersex. That's not a horrible thing that makes it unstudyable. That should be the giant neon sign that tells you that this is fundamentally different and interesting. Ultimately, sex is one of the primary human motivations, and one of the primary drivers of interesting new technology. Being a sexless drone is not something to aspire to.

What SL does that nothing else even comes close to, is that it allows you to perceive other peoples' body language, both conscious and unconscious. A psychological study recently found that people in SL maintain the same kinds of physical distance and positioning they do in RL, even when there's no in-world reason to do so. Anyone who spends any time in-world and fiddles with their gestures soon realizes just how effective this system is.

IBM, especially the Hursley lab, has been doing meetings in SL, because it's far more psychologically effective than mere text chat, and far more convenient than gathering people for a physical meeting.

The thing some people are missing is the Snow Crash effect: "condensing fact from the vapour of nuance". Some people are autistic, and for them a text MUD or heavily abstracted and rigidly-delineated MMOG will suit them better, allow them to totally avoid anything resembling human contact.

For the other 99.99% of humanity, SL's likely to be a far more comfortable environment for interacting with others on the Net. The general complaints real people have with SL right now are that the interface is a little cumbersome, and their hardware isn't sufficient to see what's out there. Once they have decent computers and a volunteer helps them through the interface, they stay pretty much forever.

As for the topic: if TerraNova doesn't study the most advanced virtual world available, it's made itself irrelevant. Keep studying 26-year-old MUD designs (with or without 3D GUIs on top of them), and you won't learn anything new. The academics who studied and worked on hypertext systems before the WWW also decried the Web: it didn't have 2-way links, it had an ungainly protocol, it didn't have conversational state... They all became irrelevant and lost their jobs, because they refused to study this thing that did what they wanted but not the way they wanted. You're the same way, and you're going down the same route to irrelevance.

[Matt Mihaly]

Kami wrote:

If your hardware doesn't suck, and you give a region and people time to stream in, the environment's not particularly laggy. Maybe you should buy a better computer and network connection, and stop running between sims when you're supposed to be having a meeting.

Yes, blame me for the experience. For the record, my computer is reasonably powerful and my connection is speedy. ;)

Yes, some people have sex in SL. It's the first system ever that's better than mere chat for cybersex.

Haven't used a lot of virtual worlds then, I assume?

That should be the giant neon sign that tells you that this is fundamentally different and interesting.

That it has the potential for better sexual interaction than some virtual worlds, and more restricted potential than others, does not make it fundamentally different. It just makes it different, like every world out there (all of which are different in some way or another from each other).

IBM, especially the Hursley lab, has been doing meetings in SL, because it's far more psychologically effective than mere text chat, and far more convenient than gathering people for a physical meeting.

Let's be clear here: You mean that an extremely small subset of people at IBM use it for meetings. That's not to diminish its usefulness to those people, but saying that a few people at IBM use it for meetings is not really saying anything in particular.

For the other 99.99% of humanity, SL's likely to be a far more comfortable environment for interacting with others on the Net.

99.99% huh? I'll be pedantic and point out that WoW alone has .1% of the world's population using it already, putting lie to that claim. ;)

The general complaints real people have with SL right now are that the interface is a little cumbersome, and their hardware isn't sufficient to see what's out there. Once they have decent computers and a volunteer helps them through the interface, they stay pretty much forever.

I would guess that most people would have no complaints with SL because one generally doesn't try a product/service until it might fulfill a need. I know what the value proposition of World of Warcraft is for a wide audience: entertainment. I can't see a value proposition for Second Life in terms of a wider audience, but then, maybe I'm just blind. The fact that it doesn't have one after years of operation says it's probably not going to though. If it was 10% as useful/good as the SL boosters claim, a good portion the internet would be using it already due to viral spread (like MySpace or really, any free-to-use site/service that provides value to a wide range of people).

--matt

[Thomas Malaby]

@Kami: Um, I must have missed something. Terra Novans don't study SL?

[Thomas Malaby]

[shrugs]
[dumps twenty-four months of fieldnotes, interviews, and writing out the window]

(Apologies for the split post.)

[Prokofy Neva]

Aren't Runescape and MySpace games for kids? I guess I'm just not into them. And while many of you are "into" World of Warcraft I mean, seriously, what are the really meaty intellectual, cutting-edge issues coming out of WoW? The lives of Chinese gold-farmers? The fate of a would-be gay guild? There's all that and more in SL.

Eggheads isn't a term of insult, it's a normal, jocular term.

Thomas Malaby, with all due respect, shrug if you must, but I don't see Terra Nova qua Terra Nova studying and really grappling with SL and recreating the Blog-in-the-Round that is possible in SL. We've all just said that -- you never discuss SL here. And that's because as a collective, you don't go there and engage with it. It's too "laggy," you say. Or there's something you just don't like. The bling? Well, you can turn off shiny.

As for your own research, well, we've never seen it posted much here? Or? Am I misinformed? You've never held an inworld meeting..or have you? Or maybe it was in private? Or maybe unlike Tom Bukowski who actually seeks input and holds regular public meetings, you're pursuing your research more quietly? I just don't know. You're not seen there; your work isn't visible. But...it's a big world. Maybe I missed the group notice.

I'd pretty much have to endorse what Kami said.

What's to study in WoW? You get together and chat and bond, go kill monsters, chat some more about what it was like to bang on those monsters. THIS is study???

[Mike Sellers]

Back to something Samantha said earlier:

So let me turn the question around: besides being covered by other organizations, why should we be talking about Second Life? How does discussing Second Life inform or develop our collective view of virtual worlds?

There have been several inflated claims made above (and elsewhere) about the uses people are finding for SL. I'm skeptical to say the least. Is there anyone who can cut through the religious fervor and substantiate them?

How, specifically, can "people ... be much more effective in interacting with one another" in Second Life as opposed to other virtual worlds, as claimed by "epredator potato" earlier?

Is SL really a platform for ecommerce? Their own numbers seem to indicate that fewer than 2% make more than $10 per month. Is this accurate? Are the claims overblown or is there something more hidden here?

Is SL a significant economy in its own right, or a backwater when compared to other virtual worlds? What pecentage of SL users create content there? What percentage of that is used? What evidence is there of significant economic exchange?

Is SL a viable business? That is, can it support the claims of being the new OS for the metaverse as a profitable business? This is neither a cynical or irrelevant question: if SL cannot become profitable, the many hopes pinned to it for an enduring virtual world (much less a metaverse) go up in smoke.

How has LL addressed the serious security issues surrounding an all-user-created-content world to provide a stable experience? If a world can easily be brought down by replicating party hats and the like, can it create a stable long-term presence and community?

Is SL really accessible to a broad audience? As Second Lifer Kami Harbinger (who posted above) said on her blog, "You can't even be in SL unless you have a pretty awesome computer, a high-speed Internet connection, are neophilic enough to try something like this out, and are smart enough to understand what's happening and find something interesting to do there.

That's a pretty narrow set. Pare it down even more by those who are interested in creating content, don't mind having little to do there, and/or aren't bothered by hypersexualized content, and it seems to be a pretty small set. Is this the basis for the metaverse?

Does SL allow people to "perceive other peoples' body language, both conscious and unconscious"? That's a big and important claim -- what's the evidence for this? I'm extremely interested in the perceptions of body language (notions of 'personal space' are only the grossest form, and are found in almost any graphical world), and don't readily see how SL lends itself to this.

To what degree are people (e.g., "IBM, especially the Hursley lab" as claimed by Kami) actually using SL for real-world meetings? Is this experimental or just a matter of course? What are the perceived benefits by the participants? Is there any sort of data on these benefits? Or is this all just a novelty?

Many claims like these are being slung around here and elsewhere -- see the original set of mainstream publications in the original post above -- for the benefits of Second Life. Are they real or are they illusory? Is this all hype perpetuated by the true believers, or is there something more there? Is there anything really worth discussing when you peel back the obfuscating rhetoric? Is this the gateway to the metaverse, or just the offspring of Activeworlds, a solution still, ten years on, looking for a problem?

Making more claims or just making the same ones louder doesn't help the case for seriously looking at SL. Beginning to answer some of these questions might.

Touch not the kool-aid.

[Thomas Malaby]

I do discuss SL here, Prokofy, often in the course of comments but also in OP's. I haven't done in-world meetings--I'd be happy to if people are interested (and I've never complained of SL's lag, at least that I can recall). If you haven't found my stuff, Prokofy, it isn't for my lack of crowing about it here from time to time, lol. Here's a run-down of recent activities, since you asked ;-). (Although this kind of self-serving presentation makes me a little uncomfortable, so I want company! Other academics here should also link their recent SL-related work; that would be a helpful thing for many here, I think.)

In general, I guess I devote a fair amount of energy to reaching/connecting with audiences not already involved with/aware of VWs, so that may account for my seeming less visible to you. Tom and I are doing a panel at the national anthropology meetings, trying to get anthropologists to be a little less techno-phobic and embrace research on virtual worlds, whether on the resident-side (what Tom is doing) or the creation-side (like my Linden stuff). It looks like there are prospects for a special journal issue out of that. This week's Infinite Mind (their regular broadcast) includes an interview they did with me about Second Life, if anyone's interested (I talk a bit about the relationship of SL to games, which is connected to a substantial piece of the book about LL/SL that I'm writing). The conference I co-organized with Sandra Braman at UWM, now appearing in First Monday as a special issue co-edited by us, was very much the result, on my end, of trying to get VW scholars talking beyond their own circle (and includes my most "empirical" writing on LL/SL so far -- that link should go live in the next week or so). Other writing pertaining directly to SL was the Games & Culture piece that appeared this March. I guess I just find myself more interested in devoting energy to the out-group than the in-group (as it were) at the moment, TN aside. That could change of course.

Beyond me, Ren and others also post/talk about SL frequently here, which is why I agreed with Samantha's assessment that began the comments. The strength of TN, as I see it, is the interest in broader questions that transcend particular VWs, which is why the comments range pretty freely across examples.

[lewy]

There are a couple of unique aspects to Second Life that differentiate it from other MMOG's. One question is, can you make money at it? A friend of mine recently discovered SL and is in the process of building a casino. His step-father directed a couple of the Mondo movies back in the 1960's and is looking into building "Mondo Hollywood" on an island as a way to promote his movies.

I'm thinking of recreating a mah jong parlor I liked to play at when I lived in Japan, down to the complimentary tea and food menu. If you can't travel in real life, is a simulation in SL something worth trying? If anyone's interested I'll post the location once it's up.

[Michael Chui]

For the record, Bonnie Ruberg is a TN author. For those who don't remember her, this is her introduction, and her inauguratory post, BDSM in a World without Pain.

Aren't Runescape and MySpace games for kids?

No. And what do you have against kids? How does being "for kids" invalidate something as a worthwhile subject of study?

What's to study in WoW?

Anyone who reads Terra Nova on a regular basis should be able to answer that question. Here, I'll even link you. Click me! How many pseudo-military organizations exist in SL? Compare with the number of guilds in WoW. Explain why, and correlate this disparity to the development of the warrior class in post-agrarian societies, as well as historical trends of militaries and martial art schools in developed countries, against the comparatively superficial designer profession, in particular that of the architect. Yes, I just made that up on the spot, but whoever is welcome to tackle it with whatever variant they like. =)

Anything can be studied. Anything can be examined. Welcome to reality. Take a course on research methods.

Try not to do things like invading a country to liberate them through the imposition of democracy. It has bad precedent.

Terra Nova is not about Second Life. It shouldn't be. Talk less; listen more.

[Richard Bartle]

Prokofy Neva>We've all just said that -- you never discuss SL here.

In part, the reason may be that some of the TN authors are high-ups in SL and they try to avoid writing about it because of a seeming conflict of interest. Futhermore, if they do want to say something in particular about SL, then they run the risk that their words are taken apart thread by thread and analysed by the SL community for signs of partisanship.

When any of the rest of us write anything about SL, it's in the knowledge that there are others here more expert on the subject than we are, so we're unlikely to say anything controversial.

I do recall from TN's early days, though, that there was a concern that we might be getting too many authors from SL and exhibiting a SL bias. How times change, eh?

Richard

[Ace Albion]

I made this point in another comment somewhere in one of the other TN talks about what talks should be talked about- I see quite a few articles that have used SL as the location *for* study, not so much with SL as the location *of* study. Bonnie's articles are a good example- there's nothing particular to SL or the specific possibilities of its direction and/or potential in the ones I recall, just that it's the most convenient 3d avatar based virtual space where people roleplay sex.

Using SL is quite a lot like trying to access the web in '93 over some throttled university connection on a grimy old sun terminal running mosaic. It's slow *now*, it's laggy *now*, scripting can't recreate the level of depth of "gameplay" of WoW *now*. What about in five or ten years time? I doubt it would be a huge stretch to provide pre-generated "game" content as a download/disc for a specific use of SL as a background platform for World of Whatever, rather than relying on the grid as it is now, for example. If not SL, then something else down that branch of the family tree, for sure. I don't see much potential in WoW etc, except for more WoW etc. I see a potential in SL for something else- even if SL itself doesn't survive.

Anyway, I don't read TN to read about SL- I don't expect to see much of interest about SL here, and it doesn't cause me sleepless nights to think there's an academic blogsite that isn't talking about my favourite internet pastime. There are other places to read interesting discussions about SL and its potentials, one of the best ones being SL itself if you find a good spot.

[Prokofy Neva]

>When any of the rest of us write anything about SL, it's in the knowledge that there are others here more expert on the subject than we are, so we're unlikely to say anything controversial

I think that's all the more reason to become more knowledgeable just by dipping your toe in more than once a year : )

You yourself are fortunate to have even your own RL name in SL! Think of the fun you could have!

And I don't think anyone should fear these higher-ups and game-gods here -- they shouldn't put a chill on discussion.

>Some of the TN authors are high-ups in SL and they try to avoid writing about it because of a seeming conflict of interest

Basically, I don't think this situation is a very good thing for free and unfettered scholarly inquiry.

I see the executives/designers of other games like There and others feeling far more free to come here and discuss even their own worlds/jobs.

I think this should be examined.

[Prokofy Neva]

Thomas, it wasn't me who started the discussion about "why don't we talk more about SL here". It was Greg L.

And it's a good question to ask. SL is talked about enough; sure, you've all posted when it crops up. But a statistical analysis would probably find more posts about WoW and other MMORPGs, It's a blog with a MMORPG rather than a virtual world tilt -- perhaps that's ok, but it is limited then -- and possibly growing rapidly outdated as a field or sub-field.

Re: >In general, I guess I devote a fair amount of energy to reaching/connecting with audiences not already involved with/aware of VWs, so that may account for my seeming less visible to you. Tom and I are doing a panel at the national anthropology meetings, trying to get anthropologists to be a little less techno-phobic and embrace research on virtual worlds, whether on the resident-side (what Tom is doing) or the creation-side (like my Linden stuff). It looks like there are prospects for a special journal issue out of that. This week's Infinite Mind (their regular broadcast) includes an interview they did with me about Second Life, if anyone's interested (I talk a bit about the relationship of SL to games, which is connected to a substantial piece of the book about LL/SL that I'm writing). The conference I co-organized with Sandra Braman at UWM, now appearing in First Monday as a special issue co-edited by us, was very much the result, on my end, of trying to get VW scholars talking beyond their own circle (and includes my most "empirical" writing on LL/SL so far -- that link should go live in the next week or so). Other writing pertaining directly to SL was the Games & Culture piece that appeared this March. I guess I just find myself more interested in devoting energy to the out-group than the in-group (as it were) at the moment, TN aside. That could change of course.

These are great to know, and you shouldn't feel shy about posting such things -- gosh, everybody else on here seems to!

And I could add that they are all recent and fresh things. I don't know if you've ever been on Infinite Mind before this on SL; I think not.

Yes, I think you should hold a Terra Nova meeting inworld. It's not laggy, that's a red herring.

[Prokofy Neva]

>Making more claims or just making the same ones louder doesn't help the case for seriously looking at SL. Beginning to answer some of these questions might.

Touch not the kool-aid.

Mike, all the questions you raise in your post, and the subjects of study like body-language in virtuality and the efficacy of virtual-world meetings as a replacement for real-world travel and conferences face-toface, are all topics for study -- they should be studied inworld.

I think there's enough articles out there, beyond the obvious planted and hype-type articles, that you can see that it is worthy of study. So it just seems easy enough to come in and study it.

One way of doing that would be to have open meetings in SL on a schedule, open to the residents. Or if that seems to scary, create a group with invited members and have meetings set to that group entry.

[greglas]

Prokofy> Thomas, it wasn't me who started the discussion about "why don't we talk more about SL here". It was Greg L.

Yep, and I was actually hoping that it would go where it has gone, with some folks (e.g. Matt & Mike) explaining why a lack of focus on SL is warranted while others (e.g. Prokofy, Jerry, Luis) are taking us to task for not being more interested. Given SL's current publicity level, I thought that needed to be discussed here. And of course, Thomas is right, some of us are very interested and very involved (e.g. Cory & Thomas & Betsy), which gives credence to what Richard says, that those of us (e.g. me) who aren't "experts" on Second Life are more inclined to reticence.

Because of my lack of expertise, I'm not really inclined to "shepherd" this thread along in any particular direction, but I want to say that this discussion has been really helpful to me in understanding what people see as important or unimportant about Second Life as opposed to other virtual worlds. Also, I guess it goes to show (once again) that the heart of this blog is in the comments.

[Jerry Paffendorf]

> Yes, I think you should hold a Terra Nova meeting inworld.

The Kuurian Expedition group built around Ted's Synthetic Worlds Initiative already meets inworld regularly. Here's the blog with events. Coincidentally I just this morning received the invite and will be speaking on the Metaverse Roadmap next Tuesday. w00t on that.

It's funny, I've been doing the future salon meetings in SL for like a year and a 1/2 now, and our first presenter waaay back in April of 2005 was Jim Purbrick AKA Babbage Linden who had just hopped from Terra Nova because of his new job at Linden Lab :). Big wheel a keep on turnin'. Ye olde historic archive.

Mike, I'll try and do a little write-up of my experience using SL as a meeting and presentation space. I done seen it all from the good to the bad.

[Thomas Malaby]

Ahem. There would be a different interest for Betsy, as it were. ;-)