Who wants a second life?

Isn't one life more than a handful? I'm trying to figure out the Second Life phenomenon. I read a while back that it was the most played video game ever. Of course, call it a video game and immediately announce that you are not one of the residents of Second Life. And, a video game it is not. It's more like a cyber lounge. Visit an alternate universe, change your image, take a class, go to a nightclub, meet another player to share some (ahem) indiscretion.

I have to ask, why walk around on a computer when I can walk in real life along the coast and actually get exercise? Why watch a woman play the guitar in a virtual club with virtual people when I can just go to a club? Are the people playing too unsightly to go outside? They live somewhere with no live music available? Are they paranoid schizophrenics who have a hard time dealing with strangers? Or are the streets where they live too dangerous for walking? Is it possible that there are over seven million people in this predicament? If not, it means that someone I know must be playing Second Life.

With 7,573,799 residents and growing at 36% per month (although only 1,739,352 have logged in during the past 60 days) the popularity of Second Life is difficult to ignore. Do you know that the average user spends FORTY HOURS PER MONTH on Second Life?! Holy crap, that's like a whole work week. Is it just like the rest of the Internet, people connecting via blogs and online dating? Or is it something more, the only way we'll connect in the future? I'd love to meet someone who can tell me what's cool about it.

At the risk of sounding like someone's grandmother, are people living a second life instead of a RL? (In SL, an RL means real life.) I used to work with a guy who was very sweet but seemed a little lonely. He had a four year old daughter and lit up whenever I asked about her. One day I said something about Second Life and he said he wife "was on there all the time." They have a four year old, he's working and she's living life online? It's a good thing it isn't that expensive or people would be losing their RL homes to buy land in SL.

This is what I have been able to ascertain so far:

1) The worlds are created by users so it either looks like our world or looks like someone's sci-fi version. In other words, most of it is hideously ugly. I expected it to be much weirder and "out there". This is just like the real world except badly drawn.


2) The activities, while fantastic (like flying) are only happening on a computer screen. What happened to the REAL futuristic technology of simulated reality? Let's just plug into The Matrix already! Honestly, I think I'd rather go to Disneyland.

3) Video games are created by artists and writers - they have details, a history, they have an objective, they make sense. This just seems haphazard to me. Here's a question. Does a man living in SL as a woman have the same experience as a man cross-dressing in RL? Otherwise, what's the point right?

4) It has rapidly been taken over by what else, sex. I guess most people want their second life to have more/weirder sex. Except again, let me remind you that there's no actual sex. At best you're watching your badly animated avatar humping another one. (Realistic body parts cost extra) Yuck!

5) Every business on the planet has jumped on board and as usual has no idea why. They don't even know what it is they just hear the numbers of how many people (i.e. consumers) are online and want a piece of the action.

Wired published a traveler's guide because, of course, they have an office there.

They list three minor "hazards and annoyances":
1) It's confusing and can be difficult to master even the simplest of actions.
2) Crowded places slow your frame rate to a slow crawl, apparently just a fact of life in SL.
3) It's ugly and overwhelming (already noted).

Gee, maybe I was being too harsh before. It sounds fun. I wonder if people are spending 40 hours a month on it because that's how long it takes to learn things and refresh the screen. Ha ha ha. Here's something potentially interesting. Virtual Hallucinations was created by UC Davis medical staff to simulate the audiovisual hallucinations associated with schizophrenia. Wander through and voices tell you to kill yourself. If you look in the mirror, a death mask stares back. (Educational!) This is at least on the right track, experiencing how other people see the world, but not nearly as impressive as the virtual reality chambers being used to treat soldiers suffering from PSTD.

Browsing photos on Flickr of residents' Second Lives, I get a sense of the appeal. It's a creative outlet for the average person. Without any special technical abilities, anyone can create a character, a world, or a product and see it move and interact with other people's creations. I can dig that. I still don't think it's for me but if anyone has done it and liked it, I want to hear about it!