Expanding into the Virtual World.

Yesterday I ventured WAY outside my comfort zone, as far as  my online presence goes. First, and not really that big of a leap, I got an invitation to Google Wave. It seems like a pretty neat tool, like Google Docs and Gmail and GChat all rolled into one (as well as a bunch of stuff I probably haven't figured out yet.) It seems like it won't be completely useful until it is fully released, since currently I am limited as to who I collaborate with.

The second (haha, pun intended) new experience for me is that I joined Second Life. Here is Wikipedia's description of it, but for anyone who's not familiar, it's basically life, online. Christopher had mentioned it during the last intensive, and I was curious enough to check it out. And there went 2 hours of my real, flesh-and-blood life that I will never get back.

I'm still reeling over the experience, and I'm not sure how to sort it all out and describe it. The majority of my time was spent configuring my avatar and trying to figure out how to remove the stupid polka dot dress my virtual self was automatically dressed in. I spent maybe a half hour exploring other places (aside from Help Island, where I should have stayed.) Then I had a group meeting and had to take a break. (Phew.)

I can only imagine our social media class meeting in Second Life, and I'm already laughing out loud. That would be a hilarious class. It would be really fun if we could make it happen, but there is such a time commitment and required tech know-how to get set up that I can only see maybe a fifth of our class participating.

I have a few thoughts about Second Life that are floating around...
- Why so many people dressed like fairy tale creatures?
- Do people use SL to facilitate meeting in real life?
- What is the etiquette if I don't want to talk to that Michael Jackson (Thrilled years) avatar guy?

And tying into my Ethical Consumerism blog, I can't believe that SL has its own currency (L$, the Linden dollar) and that REAL money is being exchanged in a virtual world! Virtual people, being controlled by real people, are paying virtual money, purchased with real money, to buy virtual goods. I guess technically this exchange of money is for a service (allowing virtual people to live more extravagantly without actually accumulating waste) which is better than buying yet another pair of shoes.

Anyway, not giving up on Second Life yet, but I'm finding that I'd rather coordinate my outfit than get out there and talk to people. Isn't that the point? If I want to be a socially inept loner I can just keep doing that in my real life.