Avatars and Second Life

Created my Meez virtual avatar. As I mentioned in a previous post, I am very familiar with virtual worlds, as I am a regular player of mmorpg.

Second Life is intriguing because of its "open sandbox" structure. By this I mean the players themselves are active participants in the creation and content of the world. In most mmorpg you are a passive participant, experiencing content created by someone else.

As is true in most things, you get out of it what you put into it. These virtual worlds can be very real but in a distorted kind of way. You are meeting and getting to know real individuals but not necessarily the "real" person. Individuals can create a whole new persona and identity in a virtual world.

There are many positive sides to this. I am aware of a number of individuals who have virtual lives who in their real life are handicapped in one way or another. Virtual worlds allow them to interact with other people in a way that their handicap is not a factor. It "levels the playing field" of the social interaction. The same can be said for age, race, gender, sexual preference, etc.

However, this begs the question: If you are not really getting to know the real person, is this a healthy interaction? Is it a sad substitute? In my opinion it all depends upon how much of your real self you let into the virtual world.

I play mmorpg for an escape. They are like going to an amusement park and meeting people who like to ride the same rides as me. I don't play them for the social interaction but that interaction inhances my experience in the virtual content.

Second Life seems to me to be an attempt to blur the difference between Real Life and Virtual Life. To somehow merge the two. Using the Virtual to address issues of the Real.

This might work for some people but for me that ruins the experience in both worlds.


PS. I should point out that even the mmorpg that I play have issues with Real Life creeping in.
Take a look at this article that talks about real world economics in a virtual world.