SL and non SL people and the land of nothing (Rambling)

I see it as another dimension of being.

To me it is just as "real" as our physical world, yet it is not physical, but digital. As others have pointed out, speaking on the phone or in chat programs or even by email is also no less "real" than face to face physical communication, it is simply a different mode of communicating. SL takes that and adds the critical element of a visual reproduction of 3d space -- a critical thing because our minds have evolved to think in 3d, we relate very naturally to a 3d presentation, and it makes it feel that much more "real" to us, even if it is a digitized presentation of reality.

I go back to the Metaverse Manifesto on this: we have been augmented by the digital age, such that we can live both in our physical and digital realities at the same time. Far from being silly, it is a tremendous opportunity for everyone who can grasp it -- not, in my view, by suspending disbelief, but by grasping the true extension of the human experience that the digital reality makes possible.

My partner probably said it the best: we're on the edge of the wedge. In a few years time, as digital worlds proliferate well beyond SL, personal 3d avatars will be as commonplace as email or Facebook. We're simply the pioneers, the first ones stepping into the digital reality and reaping its rewards.

In addition to all of the above - we are pioneering and making history.

SecondLife: The final frontier
These are the voyages of the Secondlife, Enterprise
Its 5 year mission
To explore strange new worlds
To seek out new life and new civilizations
To boldly go where no man/woman has gone before

Even if we are marginalized misfits

Yup!
Who ever heard of yellow-pack conformists ever pioneering and making history??

I found one simple way of explaining SL to my mom.. and what sucks is that it was CSI.

Before that stupid Down the rabbit hole episode, my mom gave me grief about my self-supporting hobby. After it: She now just gives me grief about being at the computer all the time. It's an improvement, believe me, since I can now say that I'm working in SL and she'll shut up.

Somebody has yet to prove to me that RL is actually "Real".

Two professions routinely address the question "what is real"; Philosophers and Physicists. From a philosophical point of view, Plato's allegory of the cave is instructive with respect to SL. Take a look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegory_of_the_cave and notice just how well Plato addressed this issue.

From a physicists perspective, it's interesting to note that meatspace (RL) is constructed of atoms, which in turn are made up of protons, neutrons, and electrons. SL on the other hand, is constructed entirely of electrons. It's interesting to note that electrons are no less "real" than the other two particles, although they are considerably less massive.

It appears to me that either group would find it difficult to prove with any certainty whether SL is "real" or not. Oddly enough, the same can be said of RL!

Perhaps a more interesting question is this: What do SL and RL have in common? I've noticed that it's mainly objects that don't penetrate the "membrane" between the two well.
On the other hand, personalities, intelligence, ideas, knowledge, money and emotions pass in and out readily. Yes, objects are very important, but they aren't everything.

SL to me feels like 2 things. When i`m wandering round exploring shops or clubs it sort of feels like a 3D version of the web. but instead of just seeing content displayed in a 2D way, instead you can wander around each web site (Sim) and interact with the content via your Avatar. You can also see who else is viewing the same site as you and interact directly with them if you so wish, something that you can`t see or do when looking at web sites on the web.


The other way i view it is as a 3D Chatroom, for example if I go to a club I can meet people and talk with them or just sit and listen to whats going on, in just the same way as a Mirc based chat room, except in SL your given more visual clues as to how the person wants to be seen, rather than in Mirc you only have names to based each persons persona on.

I`ve never felt that SL is a game, I play MMO games and they feel like proper games with other people playing them, they have rules and objectives, however SL lacks any of that, when you enter SL your free to just do as you want so SL does not really in anyway feel like a game to me, its more of a social network, the possibilities for what you can do are really only limited by the people you meet and to a degree the limits of the SL environment, however I can see virtual worlds like SL in a number of years becoming much bigger as technology improves and the possibility to do even more within them, even expanding out into RL, for example imagine being able to wander through a virtual city, go into a shop browse the goods as if you were there in person and then actually purchase the items and have them delivered to you r/l, or imagine a virtual world which offered you the chance to visit places thousands of miles away without actually having to leave your room. Not everyone would maybe want to do that, however for others the virtual world could become more real in some ways than the real world.

The weirdest thing in life:

At a job interview. They ask "What are your 'other' interests?" So Second Life comes up.

It hard to talk about it without sounding like: A) A Born Again Christian or B) A Total Nutcase.

Heh! LL should pay me for Promotional Fees the way I talk about it. LOL! I feel like the Tom Cruise/Scientologist of SL.

I love my Second Life. I will do anything for my Second Life (almost).

I somehow "see" something to it, that WoW doesnt have.

I dont make "million$$" in SL, but enough to show 'its there'.

The worst part of explaining SL is that whole "Deer in the Headlights" look you get.

I think it's like a box prim with streaming video replacing a texture on one side.....

Yes - and I'm disposessed (as in redundant) now too.

Is SL real? Goodness it is as real as anything else is! When you have had enough of Plato, take a look at the teachings of Buddha - all is empty of inherant existance.

The danger, though, is that people take SL in different ways. I also do not view SL as a game, as I note above. However, I do know that there are a goodly number of participants who do, in fact, view it as a game, and "play" it as such for pure entertainment -- that is, the rest of us are there to entertain them when they want to be entertained. Now that's all well and good, as I think everyone has the right to enjoy her SL as she wishes, it's her time after all, but the issue arises when one of the game/entertainment types interacts with one of the non-game types and the interaction goes beyond the trivial. I've seen quite a few people get severely burned in SL because they were interacting with someone who really saw SL mostly as an interactive TV show or interactive novel, where the other "characters" (read: people) are there for entertainment. It's a danger inherent in the place at the moment because of the very different ways that people are engaged with (or disengaged with) SL -- all of them are fine, but some of them don't mesh well with each other.

This is so like me, except that I do leave SL running while I sleep. When I'm ready to retire for the evening, my av will find a cozy resting place on a lounger, the day bed, or on the rug in front of the fire (strangly enough, rarely the bed).

When I lost my first home on SL, I was emotionally distraught, cried all night. I was only renting the land, but I had so much work and time into making it just the way I wanted it.

I have a black cat in both RL and SL and my SL one sometimes seems to be as much as an attention hog as my RL one, plus I have bunnies and hedgehogs and a bat that I don't have in RL. I include nature sounds in my yard to add to the "realism". I have a huge yard full of plants and flowers which I would never take the time to tend to in RL.

I get to socialize with people from all over the world... which I've done for years in my gaming days, but now there is a visual representation of the people that I meet. I do use voice with my Master and occasionally with a few close friends, but not always.

I've developed a love for goth/industrial music which is something that I'd never been exposed to living in small US towns my whole life. You couldn't find it on a local radio station here if you tried.

I can look and dress in ways that I never could in RL, for whatever reasons (expense, not being 20 something and having a perfect 10 body, availibility, social prejudices, modesty).

I can go to the video store and get a movie to watch with my Master who lives on the other side of the world.

I don't make enough money inworld to cash out, but most of the time I make enough to cover my SL expenses or close to it.

As far as RL acquaintances, they are used to me by now, even if they don't understand it. I'll sometimes start talking about something at work and I get comments like "now are we talking about RL or your fantasy life?" I don't care what anyone thinks, I do what I enjoy and haven't watched a TV for years.

I would only disagree with you in that as someone who is pretty much and "Entertainment" user of SL, I don't see everyone as here to entertain me, but as as people looking for entertainment as well. I see SL as sort of a theme park. It real while I am there, but at the end of the day I leave the park. The people I meet in SL are either fellow park patrons, or are the people who keep the park going, but they are people and are treated the same as any others. But I do agree that sometimes the philosophies do clash, but they do in RL as well.

Oh I wasn't thinking of you when I wrote that. I know that not everyone who is in SL as entertainment treats others poorly as well, that's for certain. It's just that *some* people who take SL as entertainment treat others that way, and in any case it can be a clash -- I do agree that this also carries over to RL at times, too.

Oh ,I didn't think you were, no worries there. I just wanted to mention it because just as there are those "Casuals" who trivialize it to the detriment of others, there are the "Lifers" who also feel that we don't have as legitimate reason to be here as they do.

Remember that Second Life was originally designed as a game. I mean, take a look: http://gamegal.com/secondlif/index.htm . That fairly clearly shows that the original intent of SL was that people would be doing creative things as a "levelling" activity in the same way as they would on an MMORPG, and the original designs show that too - L$ were very much like "points" originally; they couldn't be exchanged for money and there was a high score table built into the client (in fact I actually saw that when I first joined. It was View -> Leaderboards.. from the menus. #1 was always Anshe, I think #4 was usually Simone..)

The whole idea that the typical user of SL wouldn't have any creative or income engagement at all, but would just be using it as a talker, didn't exist back then (even if you just build a clubhouse to talk to friends in, you would be earning L$ through the dwell and ratings systems). That's sort of been retrofitted, as has the platform model, so it's not too surprising it's still kind of in a state of flux (the serious parts of the transition happened no more than two years ago)

There's only one thing worse than talking about the grid to someone clueless.


Scenario 1:

"Here, have a beer - hey, what's your favourite NFL team"

"Erm... I kinda don't have one, I'm online a lot."

"Oooh, oh, okay, yeah I heard about all that. I was thinking of checking it out."

"It's alright - it's a little different than watching all those big guys sweating on the television, but interesting in its own way."

"So it's one of those dungeon games, heroes and dragons and stuff?"

Well it's called Second Life. You can ah... play house, and make yourself a little dollie character and ride on toy trains with furry friends."

"Hah! That's... kinda twisted, mate..." (long pause) - "I've heard of it I think - is it full of freaks and stuff?"

"Ah, there's a few deviants, sure."

*further embarrassed silence*



Scenario 2:

"...yes, I do have a Second Life account, I'm there"

"I have three, and a house and I'm doing a clothing business and my friend is there too, I'm AOL1234 Magic and my friend is WarN00b Hax and we hang out..." *slyly* "I'm kinda into bondage and stuff in there too, wanna be my slave?" *laughs* "What's your SL name?"

"Ah hey, do you play Eve Online also? I heard it was good."

"No. I played Warcraft for a while though but it got boring. What is your SL Name, I'll IM you!"

"I never tried Warcraft. I'm just too busy I guess."

"What is your SL name! Come on! I won't make fun of you!"

"Ah, erm, *cough*desmonshan*cough*"

"Desmon... wait, did you say you are Desmond Shang?"

"..."

"Get out. No way. You're Desmond?"

"... ... ..."

"OMG I can totally see it! You are so the same! Keeewl! Hey, give me some land will ya? A sim?"

*further embarrassed silence*



No escape either way...

Reminds me of "Amadeus" ... I like teh music Mozart - there's just too many notes ...

What Ghosty said.

I'm 40-sumthin *cough* and you're quite right about people not "getting" SL, you either do or you don't. My 69 y/o mom gets it - my best friend doesn't. *shrugs* I've given up trying to explain SL and I guess I'm guilty of being a bit "in the closet" about it but frankly it's just easier than trying to explain it.

The thing I like the most - as Ghosty said above - is the ability to get to know other people without all the things that tend to divide us in RL getting in the way. Very cool.

Hi all.
I'm, ummm... middle years, too. And NOBODY I know 'gets' it, apart from a couple of people I know vaguely in RL who I don't want to see in SL so I fudge and change the subject when they ask for my online name. I have a rather large doll's house in RL (a gift) but no space to have it where I can work on it - so SL is a bit like that for me. Also, meeting people is nice. Like someone else said: a chatroom where you can 'see' who you're talking to.
Anyway, going through a lean patch at the moment in RL so I cleared my land (mainland)and put it up for sale - so upsetting! Then I looked into renting and discovered I'd be paying about the same but with restrictions on what I could do. So I hotfooted back to my place and cancelled the sale before anyone bought it. Phew! In that 48 hours, I came to the conclusion that if I didn't have my 'place', I wouldn't like SL as much - nowhere to go when you don't feel like going anywhere, if you see what I mean. Also, what would I do with all the furniture, plants, poseballs and so on...?

Hi Zerock -

Me and my RL husband also enjoy SL together. We have found it to be extremely therapeutic for relief of our RL stresses. We are 40-50ish and work fulltime have 3 kids and live in a rural redneck town. We cannot realistically go out socializing, dancing, exploring, boating or building at all because of all of our personal obligations and responsibilities.

SL has given us an opportunity to do all of that and more. We get to look and behave as silly and extreme as we would never be able to otherwise. I meet and converse with people from all over the world. And for me, the feeling of being "plugged in" to a world far larger than this little podunk town we live in (RL) is priceless.

No one we know gets it. Not even our teenage daughter. They don't understand why we spend so much time on the computer playing "games". But for us it has added a completely new dimension to our lives.

Like you & your wife - he is more of the builder/creator/gadget collector - I am more of the shopper/dancer/explorer. But for the first time in several years we are able to sit and spend some time together - in the same room - as well as the same "world". I don't think many couples can say that for their relationships.

Not to mention the added - uh should I say - "spark" that our online dating has reignited between us.

Look us up sometime in world - maybe we can double date!

To me this sums it up, ENJOYMENT OUT OF THE GAME. Does it really matter how old you are? If you enjoy it, do it! Who the hell cares what the neighbors say or friends think. You don't have to justify to anyone what you spend SL or RL as long as you are satisfied.

LOL...I am a forty something and I have been in SL almost 3 years. I get a lot of enjoyment out of SL, but it took me awhile to find myself and what to do with my new life....now I sometime wish for the good old days of not having anything to do or knowing anyone.

Television? Movies? What is that?