September 30, 2010

• I’ve been living another life

  For the past year, I’ve been living another life. A virtual one. I don’t even remember how I heard about Second Life. Only that I was curious enough to sign up to see what the hype was all about. And like most people, I’ve got hooked in because it’s a fascinating world that represents a different reality than what I know. It’s not better. It’s not worse. It’s just different. It’s like playing with a digital Barbie that you can dress up, along side thousands of other digital Barbies from around the world. But the one thing I love about it isn’t the escape it provides from the daily grind, (though I must say, once in a while I zone out when I’m in design mode or at a music event). It’s like a dreamland that only exists when I log in, one that I share only with all my virtual friends. And unlike Facebook games where people are just playing against a program, in SL, you’re not really “playing” anything. You’re just being a different version of yourself, with different versions of other people, and doing things that you would also do in real life, only, with other people in a virtual environment. Weird huh? Allow me to explain.

  In the past year, I’ve:

  …read my own poetry at poetry workshops…

  

  …designed graphics for clients…

  

  …met and hung out with virtual friends from around the world…

  

  …attended live music events…

  

  …participated in community activities…

  

  …hosted parties…

  

  …opened up a business…

  

  …organized fund-raisers for charity…

  

  …created photography exhibitions…

  

  …created machinima…

  

  It’s amazing, really. Most of these activities take place when I’m not working in real life, or when I have some down time in the evening. I mention this because my virtual friends threw me a virtual surprise party because it was my virtual birthday, (or “rezday” as they call it in-world).

  

  Imagine if we all knew about SL when we met. Rather than chat rooms, we’d all be sitting around in at the virtual coffeehouse, sipping digital java while we idle our workday away! How crazy would that be?

  

   

  • 6:32 pm
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